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It's polite to knock.
Martin has no idea what, exactly, they're hoping to find at the Oddities and Antiques Show, but whatever it is, it had better be good. John's dwindling supply of Statements has been a building source of unease for him even before it ever came up in conversation. The box he so blessedly received ages ago is kept in John's office, not something he ever really roots through, but he has kept a sort of automatic mental tally of the number of times he's been aware of John rationing from it. They both knew it would run out eventually, with no guarantee of a replacement. It's not like this is a nice three year subscription Darrow will just replenish for them. In his darkest moments, he's found ways to blame himself for it. The gift had appeared in his flat at the time; a gift he wanted, needed, to help John. He'd let himself believe, wishfully or no, that it was his own desire to keep John safe and well that prompted its arrival. Has he become too complacent? If he just needed it more, would another come?
It's ridiculous to think that way, and he knows it. He hasn't let John in on those thoughts, chasing them away as best he can. This is a problem they will both find a way to resolve, somehow or other. And in the meantime, they can still hope some solution presents itself.
John's split off from him now, now that he seems a little less likely to just go after the first Statement he can feel. Martin wishes he'd stuck close, would have liked to keep John's hand in his, for his own comfort if nothing else. He trusts John to maintain his own discipline. But searching alone through all the wares, more efficient though it might be, is not very relaxing or very fun. And he really doesn't know what he's looking for.
He's gravitated toward the books; there are a lot of them, and there's a non-zero chance of finding some sort of personal account among the published works. And it might be nice to pick up something for himself, if he finds something. If he can allow himself to even think of recreation at a time like this.
It's very sudden and very subtle when it happens. He's brushing his fingers over the disorganized heap on this particular table, feeling the spines, both because he likes the tactile experience of it and because he's hoping to feel out anything unusual or unique. Not expecting 'unusual or unique' to find him first.
It starts with an itch, though he doesn't even notice that at first. No, first he notices the book itself. Thin, simple cardboard, bright, stark white. A children's book, here among all the dusty old novels and dry non-fiction.
He fishes it out and his heart drops into his stomach. Lunch was a while ago but he feels for a perilous moment like he's about to throw up. Staring back at him is a friendly smile drawn onto a bulbous black body. Eight legs extending at sharp, nauseating angles. He knows the title before he even flips to the front cover to see it, drawn as if with a knife: A Guest for Mr Spider.
Open it, he thinks immediately. He ought to be sure. There's every possibility this is a real and ordinary picture book in some universe, or just one of Darrow's many copycats. Just the inside cover. Just to check for the label. To be absolutely certain it's a Leitner before he panics.
It's only then he notices the itch, as of something crawling across the back of his hand. His free hand twitches out to scratch or to shoo away whatever's on him, but there is nothing there. He stays like that, frozen, one hand clasped around the other clutching the book. Mr Spider smiles at him, broad and inviting. Open up, he seems to say. A quick peek won't hurt you. You know the danger. And you know better than anyone: spiders aren't really so scary, are they?
He almost throws the book back down on the table, but he can't quite — doesn't want to. Shouldn't. No one else should find this.
Well, of course no one should. This is for him.
It's for him.
Jesus, that was the very day he learned, wasn't it? It hits him like a sudden breath of cold air on the back of his neck. The box of tapes, Darrow's first and only gift to him. John hugging him like it was normal and not an act of desperation. Shared breakfast. Shared stories. The first real story he heard about John's childhood.
Is this Darrow's idea of a fucking joke?
"How much?" he blurts out at the woman behind the table. She glances at the book in his hand, barely seeming to notice it, and tells him Two dollars as if she just decided on the spot. He pays her. He steps away, hurried and unsteady, knocking into a few people and drawing a few annoyed looks as he tries to make himself small within the crowd.
Of all the days to not have his bag on him. Too hot for a coat or even a jumper. Nowhere to hide the bloody thing. But he has to — he has to keep it hidden. John can't see it. John must not be allowed to see it. This is his problem. His.
He crams it under his arm, hugging himself like he's fevered, and scans the warehouse for any sign of John. Easy enough to spot, tall as he is, isolated among the crowd. As if his hunger is a visible thing, or an odor: no one wants to be near him. Thoughts flicker through Martin's head like flashes of lightning against a dark sky: leave. Leave without him. He doesn't have to know. He doesn't have to see. He won't miss you. No one ever misses you.
"Christ," he hisses under his breath. The itch is worse now, crawling up both his arms, seeming to wind paths around him. There is something else too, a faint tickling sensation round the back of his neck and fluttering against his cheek, like he's just walked through cobwebs. He rubs at his face hard enough to redden it but there is nothing there. Imagining it. Can't trust himself right now. He has to get out of here — no, they both have to get out of here.
"John," he whispers, much too far away to be heard, but it doesn't matter. It requires astounding effort to force himself to walk, and he keeps himself moving by muttering John's name under his breath, scarcely aware he's doing it, as if the moment he lets his destination slip he'll lose focus. Can't let John see it but can't leave alone, either. They'll get to the Archive. He'll be able to think more clearly, get this scratchy thing out of his head. If he can just—
"John," he finally says, breathless with relief that he made it. He grabs loosely at John's arm, his palm sweaty, barely making contact before instantly returning it to wrap round himself again. "John, I found — We have to leave. We have to leave now."
It's ridiculous to think that way, and he knows it. He hasn't let John in on those thoughts, chasing them away as best he can. This is a problem they will both find a way to resolve, somehow or other. And in the meantime, they can still hope some solution presents itself.
John's split off from him now, now that he seems a little less likely to just go after the first Statement he can feel. Martin wishes he'd stuck close, would have liked to keep John's hand in his, for his own comfort if nothing else. He trusts John to maintain his own discipline. But searching alone through all the wares, more efficient though it might be, is not very relaxing or very fun. And he really doesn't know what he's looking for.
He's gravitated toward the books; there are a lot of them, and there's a non-zero chance of finding some sort of personal account among the published works. And it might be nice to pick up something for himself, if he finds something. If he can allow himself to even think of recreation at a time like this.
It's very sudden and very subtle when it happens. He's brushing his fingers over the disorganized heap on this particular table, feeling the spines, both because he likes the tactile experience of it and because he's hoping to feel out anything unusual or unique. Not expecting 'unusual or unique' to find him first.
It starts with an itch, though he doesn't even notice that at first. No, first he notices the book itself. Thin, simple cardboard, bright, stark white. A children's book, here among all the dusty old novels and dry non-fiction.
He fishes it out and his heart drops into his stomach. Lunch was a while ago but he feels for a perilous moment like he's about to throw up. Staring back at him is a friendly smile drawn onto a bulbous black body. Eight legs extending at sharp, nauseating angles. He knows the title before he even flips to the front cover to see it, drawn as if with a knife: A Guest for Mr Spider.
Open it, he thinks immediately. He ought to be sure. There's every possibility this is a real and ordinary picture book in some universe, or just one of Darrow's many copycats. Just the inside cover. Just to check for the label. To be absolutely certain it's a Leitner before he panics.
It's only then he notices the itch, as of something crawling across the back of his hand. His free hand twitches out to scratch or to shoo away whatever's on him, but there is nothing there. He stays like that, frozen, one hand clasped around the other clutching the book. Mr Spider smiles at him, broad and inviting. Open up, he seems to say. A quick peek won't hurt you. You know the danger. And you know better than anyone: spiders aren't really so scary, are they?
He almost throws the book back down on the table, but he can't quite — doesn't want to. Shouldn't. No one else should find this.
Well, of course no one should. This is for him.
It's for him.
Jesus, that was the very day he learned, wasn't it? It hits him like a sudden breath of cold air on the back of his neck. The box of tapes, Darrow's first and only gift to him. John hugging him like it was normal and not an act of desperation. Shared breakfast. Shared stories. The first real story he heard about John's childhood.
Is this Darrow's idea of a fucking joke?
"How much?" he blurts out at the woman behind the table. She glances at the book in his hand, barely seeming to notice it, and tells him Two dollars as if she just decided on the spot. He pays her. He steps away, hurried and unsteady, knocking into a few people and drawing a few annoyed looks as he tries to make himself small within the crowd.
Of all the days to not have his bag on him. Too hot for a coat or even a jumper. Nowhere to hide the bloody thing. But he has to — he has to keep it hidden. John can't see it. John must not be allowed to see it. This is his problem. His.
He crams it under his arm, hugging himself like he's fevered, and scans the warehouse for any sign of John. Easy enough to spot, tall as he is, isolated among the crowd. As if his hunger is a visible thing, or an odor: no one wants to be near him. Thoughts flicker through Martin's head like flashes of lightning against a dark sky: leave. Leave without him. He doesn't have to know. He doesn't have to see. He won't miss you. No one ever misses you.
"Christ," he hisses under his breath. The itch is worse now, crawling up both his arms, seeming to wind paths around him. There is something else too, a faint tickling sensation round the back of his neck and fluttering against his cheek, like he's just walked through cobwebs. He rubs at his face hard enough to redden it but there is nothing there. Imagining it. Can't trust himself right now. He has to get out of here — no, they both have to get out of here.
"John," he whispers, much too far away to be heard, but it doesn't matter. It requires astounding effort to force himself to walk, and he keeps himself moving by muttering John's name under his breath, scarcely aware he's doing it, as if the moment he lets his destination slip he'll lose focus. Can't let John see it but can't leave alone, either. They'll get to the Archive. He'll be able to think more clearly, get this scratchy thing out of his head. If he can just—
"John," he finally says, breathless with relief that he made it. He grabs loosely at John's arm, his palm sweaty, barely making contact before instantly returning it to wrap round himself again. "John, I found — We have to leave. We have to leave now."
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The worst case scenario, in John's mind, would be something along the lines of him isolating one of the less fortunate attendees and extracting a Statement directly. It doesn't even occur to him that the actual worst case scenario might look like this: Martin hurrying up to him, his face drawn and one cheek a little too red, and a beat of blessed, terrible incomprehension before John sees the corner of a slim, cardboard children's book tucked beneath Martin's arm.
Even just the corner is unmistakable. The stark white background, the scrawled tangle of cobwebs. He remembers those details with a clarity that feels a little perverse when set against the details he's forgotten, like the name of the boy who was pulled inside instead of him. If he wrested the book away from Martin, he knows exactly what he'd see: the bulbous monochrome illustration on the back cover, and the title all but carved into the front: A Guest for Mr. Spider.
And he wants to wrest it away from Martin. His fingers twitch with the impulse. There are several potential reasons why, not all of them bad, some of them even noble, but he doesn't know which reason is at the forefront: if he wants to protect or prevent or possess. Or perhaps there is no reason he can claim for himself, no thread he can follow with a human impulse tugging at the other end. Perhaps it's the same compulsion that gripped him when he was eight, a compulsion he might call mindless if he didn't know better.
He looks at how tightly Martin is gripping the book, and wonders if he feels it, too.
The urge to grab the book increases threefold at the thought that he might, but no, no, he's done the right thing (a small part of him wants to devolve into hysteria at the idea of any aspect of this being right), he knows how serious this is, and he's come to John instead of opening the bloody thing. They can handle this together. But they do need to leave; they need to— they need to get to—
"— The Archive," he gasps out, reaching forward, the movement of his arm catching a bit before he manages to curl his hand around Martin's arm, near the book but not touching it. "We'll take it to the Archive."
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"Y-yeah," he gasps, barely suppressing the urge to retch with the effort of tamping down these obsessive, skittering thoughts. "Yeah, let's—"
Speaking is too difficult. He moves, dragging himself past John without enough force to detach himself, teetering on a knife's edge between too slow and too fast. If he runs, John will chase him. It should be a comforting thought but it isn't. Keeping pace, keeping close, is tortuously difficult. He has a frighteningly clear image of himself then, walking not on the edge of a knife, but on a strand of spider-silk, knowing a single misstep will plunge him into darkness, and John along with him, with that hand still closed around him. He should break away. He should run. It takes every ounce of willpower to fight that impulse, which only grows stronger, gnawing with every step. It is exhausting. He wonders how he will possibly make it.
They make it out of that place, away from the excess warmth and noise, into open humid air, but it doesn't feel like progress. Out here, all that space is dizzying, presenting too many open avenues down which he might flee. He has to say something. He has to speak.
"I'm—" he grits out, his jaw working against paralyzing resistance, and shakes his head, trying to shake himself loose. "It's trying to... I, I can feel it." He grips the book tighter, his body fighting against even so faint a cry for help.
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So stop playing the game, a part of him whispers. Just take the damn thing. It was yours first. The package doesn't belong to the delivery boy.
John's lips twist into a grimace as they step out into the blazing summer sun, everything too hot, too bright. Overexposed. For Christ's sake, he's not snatching the fucking book — the brief mental image of how absurd that would look, two grown men tussling over a goddamn children's board book in broad daylight, is mortifying enough that he can feel some of the cobwebs clear from his mind, no match for English propriety. But it isn't just his mind currently under siege, and blinks rapidly as Martin spits out a few terse words to that effect.
"I— c-can you—" John starts, before giving his own head a brief, frustrated shake. He cannot simply put this question and expect an honest answer. There's a static hiss from one pocket as he Asks, "Can you resist it?"
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He's not sure of that, is the thing. It would be so easy. He can't stop thinking about how easy it would be. He's not sure John could catch him. John might have greater initial speed, but he is no athlete, and his history of smoking has left its marks. Even not very athletic himself, Martin has more stamina. And he's stronger.
These thoughts are insane. He bites his own lip to try and distract himself. He doesn't even hear the start of John's question; wouldn't hear it at all if it didn't suddenly break, crystalline and sharp, through the webs in his head.
He's been Compelled. He wouldn't know it normally, but it scrapes against the work that's already being done on him with familiar violence: he's felt this before, in those dreams where the Archivist has infiltrated and overpowered the Lonely's lingering grasp. He answers, because he must, but there is resistance coming from somewhere else, not him but the thing that winds around him, clutching tight. It hurts.
"Not much longer," he gasps, information that he couldn't even have guessed at now calling itself up from some unknown place and spewing forth against his will. Christ, is this what it feels like? "I'm all right for now but it's wearing me down. It's going to win."
The answer, succinct as it is, pours out without leaving him space to breathe, and the moment it's out he lurches slightly, sucking in air as though suddenly coming up from drowning. His own words tangle in his throat. He doesn't know what to say. He knows, somewhere in a space that's still him, that John had to do this, that it was prudent, necessary, in the interest of protecting him from the force that is already grappling hard to swallow him whole. There is a part of him that wants to offer immediate reassurance. It's okay. I know. I understand.
He can't. The Web won't let him — or maybe it is easier to assume that he is being prevented supernaturally, and not that even with all that rational justification, he is still hurt.
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Would it need to?
John's gaze remains fixed on Martin's face, his focus unwavering. A distant part of him notes the distress in the furrows on Martin's brow, and the pain in his eyes, and is sorry for it. But it is too small a sorrow to indulge while the book is still in Martin's arms, weaving its threads around him, threatening to overcome him entirely. And the part of John that loves him was never the part of John that was strong enough to save him.
"Then give me the book," he says, his gentle, almost reasonable tone belied by the proprietary hiss of the tape recorder in his pocket. He lifts his free hand in open expectation.
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He feels a tightening around him, can almost see the silvery threads glinting in the sun, has just enough time to wonder if he's imagining it before he also sees, as if in slow motion, John's other hand rising, fingers unfurling (so absurdly spider-like), palm raised in expectation.
He sees this at the same moment the words hit him, the gentleness in that voice neither familiar nor comforting as it pins him to the moment, forces his gaze up as surely as if that hand were lifting his chin. He opens his mouth but there is no reply to make. He has not been asked to speak.
The Web drags at him as he unfolds his arms, the book pushed or pulled toward John by invisible force that, for the moment, drives his movements. The Web resists, and then... and then it doesn't. Martin cannot look, his flickering stare stuck to John's, but he can feel it: the itch going away, the pull leaving him, the sensation of being slowly cocooned dissipating as suddenly as it had come upon him, and he has a clear image in his mind of those strands of silk unraveling from him and crawling, instead, up John's arm from his outstretched hand. For a moment he cannot shake the terrible conviction that he is being abandoned, and it all makes such absurd and perfect sense. Is it not always this way? Passed idly between hands, from the Eye to the Corruption to the Buried to the Web, always and forever back into the bitter, steadfast embrace of the Lonely?
It never wanted him. He was simply a vehicle. The way it gets to John.
He tries to tell himself, at a great distance, that that doesn't make sense; that if it had only wanted John, it would have placed itself in John's path, that it could so easily have arranged to be found by John and John alone. But he cannot be sure. He cannot be sure how much power the Web commands here, across worlds. If it simply grasps at the one holding it, undiscerning, or if this was simply the path it found necessary to take. Across him, through him, using him and then leaving him behind.
And it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because it's in John's hands now, whatever its intentions, however its methods. Martin finally tears his gaze away, looking instead to that horrible little book now pinched between John's fingers, and again he thinks he sees the sunlight glinting off something, now weaving its way around John's wrist.
He doesn't think he wants it anymore. That urgency has passed like a sickness, and he can only stand there, dazed and blinking in the light. The danger has left him, just like that; left him and shifted fully onto John, and he just let it happen. He opens his mouth and finds his throat too dry. He swallows and tries again and can only manage a hoarse whisper: "John—"
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And that can be easily arranged. He doesn't like doing this, but Martin has already confessed his own susceptibility to the Web's machinations, and his safety is paramount. The continued Compulsions roll off of John's tongue. "Sit on that bench," he orders, not unkindly, with a nod towards a nearby bus stop, "and don't get up until you've counted to..." he pauses for a moment, calculating a length of time that is adequate without being cruel, "... three hundred."
Five minutes. Enough time for John to act. Enough time for the Web's lingering influence over Martin to fade. Martin will likely still come running after him, of course — John's under no illusions there — but as long as he gets to their flat first, he can simply do up the latches to keep everyone else safely away.
Yes. It's not a full plan, but it's a good start. By the time he gets back to the flat, he'll know what to do next. John lets go of Martin's arm, turns away, and heads down the thoroughfare at a brisk lope.
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So he does as he's told, smooth and unhurried, no unevenness to his steps, nothing to indicate he is being forced, that this is anything other than his own will; he settles into a sit and stares straight ahead as he begins to count, steady and nearly silent under his breath.
John leaves him. He can see it out of the corner of his eye. John leaves him there, not quite running, but still hurried. Martin struggles to watch him even as he counts, until the fuzzy shape of him is lost within the city. Martin realizes, at some distance, that there are tears running down his cheeks, apparently the only impulse that couldn't be overwritten. He wants to scream; his breath doesn't even hitch. He tries to force himself to get up, to break free of the prison of his own body, to run like hell and catch him and stop him. Nothing, not a spasm, not a twitch of his fingers.
The Web has left him behind and there is nothing now but the cold certainty of what will happen if he is too late, if he doesn't stop it. It's what would have happened to him if John hadn't intervened. John saved him; he understands that. But who is going to save John?
Because John will open the book. He will read it. He will get to the end and he will knock. Its little door will open and the Web will swallow him, the way it tried to all those years ago.
Or maybe it won't. Maybe it doesn't have that power here, dampened and dulled as all the other entities seem to be. But there is no reassurance to be found in that fragile hope. The Lonely has made several strong attempts to take him over the years, some frighteningly close, and the Eye's hold on John is as strong as ever. There is no reason to hope it will be all right. Not now, with John going to such miserable lengths to keep him safe and apart.
Martin keeps counting. He tries to speed up his pace, but he can't even do that. He tries to push himself up, to struggle in place, to give any outward sign that he's in distress apart from the too-subtle tears drying on his face, but it's all useless. He is, for now, a puppet. He has to recite his given lines and only then will he be allowed control over himself again. He just has to pray he's fast enough. That John didn't buy himself enough time. That he can even guess where John is headed.
"Two-hundred-fifty," he whispers, his heart beating so fast that the pounding blood is all he can hear. Soon. Just a little longer and he can get up. He goes over the paths from here to The Archive and to their flat, trying to determine the quickest routes and which destination is more likely, if John would continue to his own domain as intended, or if John would try to throw him off the scent — or even if the Web itself would choose to direct him elsewhere. That's assuming John doesn't wind up in an alley along the way. Martin tries not to imagine what might lie ahead for him: the book on the ground, John nowhere in sight. He tries not to imagine what he might do then.
"Three-hundred," he whispers, and it's like something just snaps: he's upright faster than he expected, the abrupt change in blood pressure temporarily blacking out his vision. He staggers, catching himself on the bench; he allows himself only a second before he propels himself forward, sprinting down the street as hard as he can. Bramford, he thinks. It has to be the Bramford. It has to, because he has only one chance. He runs, ignoring the sharp pain in his lungs and his legs, unprepared for such a sudden burst of athleticism. He runs, desperate and unstoppable, because there is no alternative.
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Of course, he isn't so foolish as to presume that this isn't what it plainly appears to be. John's feet continue to carry him along as he shifts his grip on the book, clasping it between his hands, holding it firmly shut as he looks down at the cover. Every detail aligns with his memories. His eyes trace over the clumsy, violent angles of the U in "Guest" — it could almost be mistaken for a V. No one could have faked such a thing. No one would have got that U just right. No one could have recreated the precise depth of each letter, which John confirms with the pad of his thumb. He barely notes the glints of silver and grey tracing over his own knuckles, winding around his wrists. That isn't important. Only the book is important.
He should make sure, though, shouldn't he? It is only right that he should Know, and that he should Know by Looking. That is his purview, after all.
But he isn't fool. He's careful. He makes sure, despite his quick steps, that he only cracks open the front cover, his thumb insinuating itself atop the first page and holding them all firm against the back cover. No funny business. He just needs to see if the plaque is there.
And there it is. Christ. He stares down at Leitner's seal, as if this old-world intrusion is the most startling of all. He wonders how Leitner did it: how he found this book in the first place, how he had the temerity to put his own mark upon it, how it fell through his hands. He wonders if this was the only ostensible children's book that spent time on Leitner's shelves. He has so many questions.
He turns the page.
There is the illustration of the barely-furnished room with its two doors and the flowers on the table. And there is Mr. Spider, standing still and expectant. John's stomach lurches, and he realizes, with a hot rush of embarrassment, that some small, childish part of him had hoped the room would be empty. That he would see only the table and the flowers, and the two closed doors, and the bland patterned wallpaper and the featureless picture in its neat square frame, and that nobody would be home. Stupid.
His fingers twitch. A thin strand of webbing catches the sunlight. He turns another page.
And then another.
He reads, feverish and furious, tears pricking at his eyes at every familiar picture, every simple line of text. He keeps expecting it to be different, or worse, or more — he keeps wanting the book to show him something he hasn't already seen before, to stop wasting his bloody time, to stop making him feel foolish and miserably small for reading it in the first place.
He's too old for a book like this. He was always too old for a book like this. He was always so fucking stupid.
He is distantly aware that he's made it back to his flat. It's not the change in lighting or temperature that strikes him as strongly as the base relief of being out of public view, where no one can see him like this, red-faced and weeping over his own foolishness, gripping a stupid book for stupid children between his hands.
Mr. Spider wants more.
Of course he does. He always did. And why shouldn't he get the fly that was foolish enough to wander into his web twice?
It's what he deserves.
It's polite to knock.
John stares at the cutaway door, barely aware of his own labored breathing or his pulse pounding in his ears, and lifts a curled fist.
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His last fear, before the all-consuming dread of either having come to the wrong place or of simply having come too late, is that John will have latched the door. He is so certain of this that he doesn't even try his key, and those few seconds gained might be what makes all the difference, because the door isn't even locked. He knows they locked it when they left. John is here. He's here and he didn't even stop to lock the door behind him.
Having expected to have to force it, Martin ends up hurling himself into their flat with such force that he nearly falls to the floor. He catches himself on the wall of their mercifully narrow entryway and uses that momentum to shove himself forward, his eyes raking around the flat for any sign of either John or the book. A little bit of movement catches his attention, but only for a split second. It's just their cat, his spine arched and his tail puffed up, startled and unhappy with all this irregular commotion. Martin bears him no mind. If he's out here, then it will have been to get clear of John.
Martin all but careens into the wall as he makes the sharp turn toward their bedroom. The door is ajar, and he can just make out — he's there, just the sharp point of his elbow as he turns a page, and—
"John, no!" he cries as he practically explodes into the room, veering around their bed. John's eyes are on the book, and the book is braced against the door of their closet, and John's hand is raised, and his fingers are curled into a fist to knock against the little cardboard door on the page. Martin has never seen it before, only heard it described, and even this slight glimpse is enough to stir something in his gut, enough to see the faint return of that itch. A childlike desire to wrest the book back and open it himself.
He wrenches his gaze away, back to John. "Stop!" he roars, seizing John's hand and pulling with all his might to drag him back from the closet, away from the book. He can feel the breathy strands of spiderweb beneath his palm, running up John's wrist and arm, and he barely represses a shudder as he struggles to break John loose.
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"No!" he grits out, his tongue curling around the word as if it's a foreign object he's expelling from his mouth, his gaze still fixed on the little paper door.
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"John—!" He grimaces as he struggles to pull John bodily away from the book, but even succeeding at that will not stop the threat. John will keep trying to knock on that little door. As long as the book is within his reach and sightline, and as long as John is not himself, the danger persists.
Martin cannot bring himself to touch the book directly. He fears the part of him that wants to. Instead he takes the only avenue that seems open to him: he thrusts himself entirely between John and the book, covering it with his body, his back now pressed against it as he grapples with his partner with both hands.
Even now he can feel it, the unbearable itch spreading across his shoulders, the outline of the open book seeming to dig into him as if intending to leave a mark. He can feel, horrifyingly, a tiny localized point of juddering movement, as of something behind that little paper door, clawing and scrabbling to get out. He can sense it for what it is: a furious, snarling threat to devour them both.
He tries to push those awful sensations from his mind, to focus only on John, on trying to fight him, trying to keep him still. He catches John's raised arm in one hand, and he can feel the webs spun around him; with his other hand he grips tighter than he normally would around the back of John's neck, trying to keep him in place, to force their eyes to meet. "John," he says, sharp and almost stern, betrayed by his own terror, by the tears he cannot hold back. He has no idea how to get through to him, and he latches, desperate, onto a trick John once used on him. He has no power to compel or give the words any extra authority beyond his own need, but maybe need is enough. He prays it will be enough, as whatever sits behind that little door scratches incessantly at his back. "John, look at me. Look at me."
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Why is this so hard? Why would anyone want to stop this?
It is not the sound of his own name that slips between the strands of web tugging him insistently onward, but the imperative to look. Look at me, someone says, recasting the impediment as a someone. John blinks, his stomach swooping as his focus shifts, as he remembers how to look at and not through. He registers the pressure around his neck, and his body jerks in objection, his grip loosening as he wavers between warring instincts to push forward and pull away.
What is he doing?
He lifts his gaze, and meets a pair of eyes he knows better than his own.
It's Martin, Martin who has put his body between John and the book, Martin who is pinned against Mr. Spider's door. John stares, poleaxed by the revelation, his lips silently shaping the first syllable of Martin's name.
What is he doing?
The Web still twists around him, refusing to relinquish its hold without a fight. But John doesn't need the Mother of Puppets to convince him that he doesn't want Martin — Martin! — anywhere near that bloody door. His grip on Martin's shoulder tightens, and he pulls, staggering backwards, trying to draw him away.
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It's difficult to parse the shift that comes over John, nothing so pedestrian as blinking or turning his gaze, and yet Martin can see it, some minute flicker in his eyes as they come into partial focus. John sees him, but he isn't quite there, his hand still clenched around Martin's shirt, his lips moving wordlessly.
That half-measure of clarity comes with a new complication as John changes tacks, trying instead to pull Martin away, to throw himself to the very fate Martin is trying to avert. The unexpected change in tension and direction throws Martin off balance, and he tips forward, losing his tenuous hold on the book. It does not fall as fast as it should; rather than simply slide down to the floor, it seems to slither out from under him, landing just beside them with an impossibly weighty thump. Landing open. And out of the corner of his eye Martin could swear he sees movement: a sickening array of needle-like points pouring out from that little paper door, so thin they could almost be invisible but Martin sees them, long and black and sharp, jabbing up into the empty air with tangible frustration.
Martin doesn't think. There isn't time. He uses John's momentum against him, surging forward to knock him off balance, throwing both arms around him to hold him fast. With an intense burst of effort and a deep groan that tears at his throat, Martin twists just enough to give the book a good hard kick, and it slams shut with a furious snap.
The danger is not gone. John is still tethered to it. Martin can feel the threads wrapped around John's arms, can feel them ghosting across his own hands as they tug inexorably toward the book. He keeps his grip tight and plants his weight, dragging until he brings John down with him. With one hand and all the strength he can muster, Martin holds him down; with the other he starts frantically scraping at those horrid silky strands, trying to wipe them away. It is not so tidy and simple as when John clears the Lonely's fog from him. The Web sticks; it tries, spiteful, to clutch onto Martin's fingers even as he pulls it from John. But its grasp is waning. It cannot recover its advantage. Martin persists, all fury and desperation, until he swipes the last visible shreds of it from John's arms; then, acting on an impulse he can only trust for an instant, he seizes the book and hurls it across the room with an angry shout. It smacks into the opposite wall and lands hard, impossibly heavy, but inert.
"John," he whispers, breathless. He's kept his awareness of John relegated to the back of his mind; only now does he really look, equal parts frightened and hopeful over what he might see, keeping his grip tight.
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Mr. Spider must be furious. The delay is inexcusable. They will be punished — the certainty prickling over his skin like tarsal claws beyond counting — and they will deserve it.
And then Martin's foot collides with the book, the cover slamming shut, and the room turns sideways. John lands hard on the carpet, the breath driven from his lungs as Martin pins him down. Too-close-I-cannot-breathe. His body thrashes in objection, the mindless animal terror of being restrained looming large even as the Web's traces are brutally scraped away. The desire for the book is wrested from him as surely as the book itself, but he cannot feel relief as it strikes the opposite wall and succumbs to gravity, defeated, because every muscle aches and his lungs cannot draw in enough air and the carpet's low pile abrades his palms as he scrabbles uselessly against Martin's hold. Too-close-too-close-too-close-too-close.
"Let me go," he gasps. He doesn't know what he sounds like, can't hear himself over the blood pounding in his ears. "Let me go!"
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But he can't imagine John would fight him like this of his own accord.
"John," he answers, speaking rapidly over him, as if he can just talk him down from this. "John, stop. I've got you. It's me. It's me." There is a tremor in his voice that now has less to do with the fear of what they've barely (and only ostensibly) escaped, and far more with the uniquely unbearable sensation of John fighting him. He's never had cause to hold John down like this before, and it is decidedly unpleasant, feeling him thrash, hearing that frantic rasp in his voice.
The fear of what might happen grapples uncomfortably with a consuming desire to give John what he asks. He compromises, awkwardly, by loosening his grip but trying to draw John messily into what might be more of an embrace. This will all be all right if they can just — if they can just take a moment to breathe, surely. "I'm here," he promises, wishing he didn't sound so damn plaintive about it.
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"Stop, stop!" he cries, halfway to sobbing. It is, perversely, the Eye's lucidity that saves him: his frantic desperation to know why this is happening prompting an immediate answer that he will eventually come to appreciate as obvious. "It's not the book," he blurts with sudden clarity but no less desperation, forcing the words out between frantic pulls for air. "It's the c-coffin, N-Nikola, please—!"
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"Oh—!" he yelps as though he's been stung, his hands snapping open and his arms pulling up. He recoils, all but throwing himself back, staring in wide-eyed, open-mouthed horror as cold comprehension starts to seep in, drowning out the heat of adrenaline with sickening finality.
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Okay... he's okay. There is no smell of earth or lanolin, no restrictions to his movements that aren't courtesy of his own weakness and exhaustion. He squeezes his eyes shut and forces his breathing to slow, an imperfect in for two and out for two because his rabbiting heart is certain that if he takes longer than two seconds to inhale, he will die (the part of him that knows this to be nonsense is still too distant to argue the point). He flexes his ankles and his fingers, the only two muscle groups that are still inclined to cooperate, and nothing impedes him. His heart rate gradually slows. The panic subsides.
And reason, horribly, begins to reassert itself. Christ. Christ. The Web had nearly ensnared them both; he almost allowed it to finish the work it started over twenty years ago; he'd forced Martin to— and then he'd—
For a moment, he's so certain he's about to be sick that he throws out a hand to blindly grab the nearby rubbish bin, a small receptacle that usually holds nothing more exciting than crumpled tissues and the occasional crisps packet. But no, no, he's made enough of a fucking spectacle of himself. He pushes the urge back down, breathing through it, keeping his eyes shut because he can't bear to see whatever expression is on poor Martin's face. Then he releases his grip on the bin and slowly covers his face with his hands.
"Sorry," he finally manages in a cracked whisper.
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Silence rings in Martin's ears. The book is still a heavy blot in the corner of his eye, but he doesn't look at it, can scarcely even think about it. It's the too-near echo of John's cries that have his attention now, the too-close memory of panicked tension in his limbs as he'd fought to get free, not of the book but of him, frantic, gasping, pleading. Martin hadn't listened; hadn't trusted him. He hadn't understood.
Nikola — there's a name he hasn't heard in a long time, an event he hasn't had any reason to recall. An old, long-gone incident he'd just assumed John was happy to put behind him, as if one can just forget that sort of thing. As if he doesn't still wake up sweating from the memory of what Jacob Riggs did to him.
The coffin, though. That bloody coffin. John had climbed in to save Daisy, both of them trapped and choking in the crushing weight of the Buried. Martin had helped them escape it; Martin had his own little trip through, brief, impersonal, and more than enough to add it to his roster of nightmares. That, he thinks, he should've anticipated.
A sudden lurch of movement and noise snaps his attention back to the present, to John reaching for the bin as if he might be sick. He seems to pull himself together in the next moment, which is just as well, because Martin doesn't think he'd be able to stomach just sitting here and watching, and still isn't sure he can move.
Finally, John speaks, muffled through his hands, and Martin feels something give, a little tremor moving through him.
"N—" he starts, flinching toward him involuntarily. He gives a distant little shake of his head, though it doesn't matter; John still isn't looking. "No, I... I'm sorry."
I should've— dies on his tongue. He couldn't have known, not really, and the idea of forcing John to reassure him in this moment does not appeal. What's done is done and he simply must bear it.
"Are you okay?" he says after a moment. "Is there anything—"
He can feel the bloody book across the room, between them and the door, as if it's trying to trap them in here. A thought he tries not to indulge too clearly. In a moment. They can deal with that in a moment. He swallows thickly and rephrases his question: "What do you need?"
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And perhaps there still isn't. Martin would probably be insistent upon that point. But that hardly makes him feel less wretched over how bloody eager some mindless animal part of him was to recast Martin as a threat. The panic was so swift and all-encompassing that he almost wants to imagine it was another of the Web's machinations, but he knows better. He didn't spend what little strength remained to him dragging himself towards the spot where the book now lies. He'd been too busy dragging himself away from his partner.
A partner he is still too ashamed to want to face, though the alternative gnaws at him the longer he sits here, shivering in his own flop sweat, letting Martin and his gentle, salient questions go unanswered. John grimaces into his own hands, then lets them slide down, wiping the expression away as they go.
Martin hasn't moved. The book hasn't moved either. A distant part of him wonders if this is some faint glimmer of a silver lining: that his own meltdown was sufficiently dramatic to break the book's hold on them both, at least to a point. It still itches at the edge of his awareness, refusing to be forgotten or ignored, and John is under no illusions; he can't imagine allowing Martin to fuss over him when the book is still there, still... uncontained. But he doesn't want it, and for the moment, it seems Martin does not want it, either.
It's an opportunity that he can't allow to be wasted on his own feelings. "We have to..." he gestures wearily towards the book. He's not sure what, exactly, ought to be done. Jurgen Leitner had managed some kind of coexistence without falling prey to it. But Christ, they can't just pop it on a shelf. Maybe putting it in a box, having it out of sight, would be an improvement.
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He still doesn't like it. The book is an intrusion in every sense, an unwelcome visitation from the past, a finely sharpened spear point puncturing their lives here. It wormed its vile way into the peace they've established, the life they've built, into each of their minds and now their bedroom, leaving such wreckage in its wake. It feels, suddenly, like an insult he can't bear. He realizes at some distance he is angry.
He pulls his gaze from John, not quite willing to let it shift to the book, and so it lands neatly between the two: on the lighter, that same old lighter John still carries with him, apparently having slipped from his pocket, now lying idle on the floor.
He doesn't think. He moves first, reaching out to grab the thing. "All right," he says, curt and clipped as he rises sharply to his feet. "Let's have it done, then." He strides across the room and snatches the book up off the floor, stubbornly ignoring the jolt in his gut as he does so, as he feels it scratching at him with opportunistic malevolence. Without waiting for a response and without turning back, he leaves the room, marching with vicious determination to the bathroom. Set fire to the damn thing and watch it wither away in the tub. It has to happen, now, before anyone changes their mind.
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"M-Martin," John sits up sharply, eyes widening as Martin turns to grab the book. He lurches to his feet, one hand braced against the closet door, head spinning. "Martin, wait!" He can't afford to linger until his head clears; he staggers after Martin, arms outstretched to catch himself against frame and plaster as he lurches through the door and down the hall.
It occurs to him to interrogate his own alarm, to ask himself why the thought of Martin lighting the book on fire terrifies him, to make sure the answer isn't merely 'because the book wants to survive and has convinced me to agree with it'. But he doesn't know what the bloody book wants. And, more to the point, he has no idea what burning it will accomplish, and he's pretty sure Martin doesn't, either.
So he makes himself stop in the bathroom doorway, his breath coming fast, one hand clinging to the jamb and the other lifted in warning, but not reaching, not yet. "Martin," he says again, low and urgent, "I-I-I don't think that's wise."
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And there's John in the threshold, holding back as though he doesn't dare enter.
"Why?" Martin snaps, looking back angrily, his eyes not quite meeting John's. "What else should we do with it? Put it on a shelf? Keep it in the Archive? Toss it out for someone else to find? It almost killed you, John. Twice. It almost—" His throat thickens around the words took you from me, and he turns back. Beneath his anger is a thread of fear that the book will try to stop him somehow, that he can't trust John's protests, that he can't even trust himself. The only way past that is action.
"Fuck this," he says, and he swipes hard at the wheel. Never did have the knack: there's a spark against the grindstone, but the flame doesn't ignite, and he tries again impatiently.
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For a fraction of a moment, he allows himself to remember Joshua Gillespie — long enough to imagine the satisfaction of shutting the damn book in the freezer — but then the scrape of the lighter draws him back into the moment.
There is no flame: Martin's lack of experience, or a more elemental refusal to succumb to something as pedestrian as a simple flame, one that doesn't even have the Desolation's wrath behind it? His palms sting: the Web's proprietary tug, or the inevitable side effect of scrabbling at the carpet?
"Martin." John tries to reach for Martin's arm, to land there gently, and he is distantly surprised when he succeeds. Dread still roils in his gut, but it doesn't resolve itself into a mindless demand to stop this at any cost — not yet. He pulls in a ragged breath and pulls his gaze away from the book, trying to meet Martin's eyes, instead. Trying to put words to his misgivings without voicing the Mother of Puppets protestations for her.
"If you burn a door," he finally says, "what happens to the doorway? Does it collapse? Does it stand open?" Christ, he's tired. He entertains the idea that perhaps he's too tired to do anything stupid. "Do you know?"
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And the questions are frustratingly pertinent. Martin doesn't know the answers, and the uncertainty is frightening. His eyes dart down to the book, glancing nervously as if a direct gaze might capture too much of his attention. It's landed on its front, and the awful illustration seems to be staring balefully up at him.
"I-" His breath shudders and he closes his eyes. "I don't know."
His thumb hurts from his ineffectual attempts to work the lighter. He loosens his grip slowly, then lowers his arm, his shoulders slumping in sudden exhaustion.
"Then what do we do?" he asks, faintly plaintive.
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He bends to open the cabinet beneath the sink, where they keep a few crumpled plastic bags to line the room's little rubbish bin. He shakes one open and then holds it out. "Pop it in here to start with," he says. "And then..." he sucks on his teeth for a beat, then ventures, "do we have duct tape?"
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It's enough that he smiles, barely, an uneasy little twitch of his lips. "Yeah," he agrees. "Yeah, okay. There should be duct tape in the hall closet, same shelf as the lightbulbs and all."
He's stalling. John has the bag open for him. All he has to do is pick the book up. Just once more, quick and perfunctory, just like he did to get it here in the first place. And then he's done. And then, ideally, neither of them will ever make direct contact with it ever again.
Granted, this feels like a temporary measure. He doesn't like the notion of leaving it in their freezer; he thinks if the Web really wanted to, it could compel them to retrieve the damn thing, no matter how much trouble it was.
But it'll do for now. It'll have to.
"Sorry." He shakes his head as if rousing himself, and absently sets the lighter on the edge of the sink. "Okay."
He bends down and pinches the book gingerly by one corner. He's not sure if the itch in his palms is down to his own nervous sweat, a psychosomatic response, or something else. He's not interested in decoding it. He turns around and drops the book sharply into the open bag, releasing his held breath in an audible gust. "Okay," he says again, staring at the bag as if the book might somehow jump back out.
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The plastic bag isn't quite opaque enough to be of too much use in that regard. Martin drops in the book, and it lists immediately towards John, the the back cover's illustration bleeding through the milky plastic like a figure emerging suddenly out of a fog. John winces, but dutifully twists the bag shut. Flimsy as one layer of plastic may be, it's still better than feeling the cover against his fingertips.
"Tape," he says, absently slipping his lighter back into his pocket before bending to retrieve another bag. Another layer of plastic couldn't hurt. "Let's mummify the damn thing."
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When he finally finds the roll at the back of a mess of underused supplies in their closet, he's near to furious, and he'd only just managed to stop himself asking John why he can't simply Know where the tape is, as if they haven't both been through enough already. He pulls off a massive length, grimacing at the sharp sound of tearing adhesive, and helps John get started wrapping it round the thing before he goes to fetch the kitchen scissors. There's a moment where he's not sure they'll even need the scissors. Neither of them seem to want to stop taping, as if they'll only feel secure when they've used the entire roll on it.
They don't get that far, but the package is still far heftier than such a thin book would suggest by the them they're done. Martin opens the freezer, shoves aside half-empty ice trays and some ready meals they probably ought to dispense with, and John tosses the thing in, and Martin shuts the door with a heavy thunk.
They both stand in the kitchen for a few moment. Martin's hands are still shaking. He sets the scissors on the counter and takes a few breaths.
"Okay," he says, and he draws a little sobbing breath, his voice breaking a bit: "Okay." His fingers twitch. He wants to reach out, to pull John close, but he's not sure he would be welcome. Not sure what either of them even needs. He tries to imagine offering tea, and the idea of something so normal would make him laugh if he didn't feel so completely hollowed out.
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It isn't until the work is already in progress that John appreciates the ghastly aesthetic of it all: four limbs working in concert to swaddle the book in a steady rope of dull grey tape as efficiently as a spider might entomb a fly. Not to render it inaccessible, not really, but simply to put it away for later. A meal deferred, not a meal denied.
He shoves the thought aside. This is the first step, not the last one. They'll secure it more effectively. They just need some goddamn breathing room, that's all. And as the layers of tape accumulate, obstructing both the sight of the book and even the shape of it thanks to the bunched plastic bag and the occasional twisted bit of tape, the itching beneath his skin begins to fade a little. He's still breathing in quick, shallow, hiccups, still desperate for this to be over, but the threat feels a little more distant, the monster somewhere around the corner instead of breathing down his neck.
Martin makes room in the freezer, John lobs the parcel inside, and the freezer door slams shut. John stares at it, distantly aware of his thundering heart and the persistent tremor in his limbs. Is that it? Can they presume to rest? If he hears the damn thing knock, he thinks, a little hysterically, he's going to piss himself.
Instead, after two beats of breathless silence, the refrigerator's condenser fan cycles on. John startles as if it was a gunshot. "Fucking Christ!" he gasps, staggering back a pace and then sitting down heavily on the kitchen floor and burying his head in his hands. "Jesus," he adds in a fractured whisper before bursting into exhausted tears.
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"John," he says, the syllable coming out pathetic and desolate. "C-can I," he interrupts himself with a frantic pull of breath, barely holding off the threat of a sob, "can I hold you?"
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God, he's so tired. As the supernatural threat recedes, a litany of animal complaints crowd in to take its place: he's exhausted and thirsty and he needs a shower and a change of clothes and to sleep for an uninterrupted week and Martin probably needs all of those things, too, but he's not the one falling to pieces on the bloody floor about it. "I'm s-sorry," John manages to gasp out between sobs against Martin's neck, arms clinging tight around him.
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"It's okay," he says quietly, which sounds laughably inadequate, and the fact that it's true — that they are literally as okay as they can be right now — might almost make it worse. But he tries to believe it, rubbing John's back slowly. "We're okay. We made it through." His hand reaches up to the back of John's neck, the base of his skull, applying gentle pressure before he flexes his fingers up, scrubbing through John's hair. "I've got you."
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"'s all my fault," John insists, leaning harder into Martin's embrace even though he ought to be pulling away. "I was so, s-so fucking stupid, I don't know what I—" he cuts himself off to pull in a ragged breath.
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"What it did to you, what it convinced you to do and what it tried to do, is not your fault," he says, his voice trembling a little, distantly furious at the mere implication. "Now let's get you up. It's time for a lie down." No arguments. He starts to shift around, trying to coax John up, to get them both on their feet.
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The floor that his backside and knees are both suggesting was a stupid place to collapse to begin with. "Okay," he says, damp and abashed. He draws back a little, avoiding Martin's gaze and grabbing the counter with one hand to pull himself upright. Whether he wants to prioritize a lie-down over the rest of his dully clamoring needs feels like a moot point once he's on his feet; he doesn't have the energy for anything else. Nor, for that matter, does he like the idea of either of them being left unsupervised in the flat while the other has a shower. And while the thought of bathing together isn't as conceptually mortifying as it might have been early in their relationship, it's a level of novel intimacy he's far too embarrassed to suggest at the moment. Lie-down it is.
They make their way into the bedroom, where John's gaze immediately alights on the bin he'd dragged out of place. A small detail, perhaps, but indicative enough to make the place feel like a bloody crime scene. He shuffles over to put it back, a small, tight frown on his face, before allowing himself to sit down on the mattress.
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Returning to the bedroom feels heavier than it ought to. It feels a bit like their private space has been violated by it all. Martin tries to turn that aside as well, but he can tell John feels it too, his focus locked on the displaced bin. Martin watches helplessly as he goes to fix it, then finally sits, looking rather numb.
He lets out a slow breath, then eases out of his jeans, leaving them in an unceremonious heap on the floor before joining John on the bed, sitting close without touching.
"Hey," he says softly, reaching out. "Come here."
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The soft coaxing feels like an olive branch — one that shouldn't be warranted for a whole host of reasons. None of this is Martin's fault. At this point, he suspects the most immediate problem is just that he's so miserable and exhausted that any kind of graceful recovery feels impossible: there's nothing he can do that won't land wrong, or make him feel like a bigger prick than he does already. His eyes burn with the threat of fresh tears — frustration, this time — as he pulls his legs up onto the bed and lies back, his blurring gaze fixed on the ceiling and his lips pressed together tightly.
Christ, he wishes he could just disappear.
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So he just sits there for a moment. Then he gets up again. "You stay put," he murmurs, walking around to John's side of the bed and bending over to remove his socks. John doesn't object, and Martin throws his socks in the hamper and then starts unbuttoning John's shirt, helping him out of it as gently as possible. Maybe this feels infantilizing. He can't bring himself to care.
Once this is done, and John's a little more acceptably dressed for a dire, exhausted nap, Martin climbs back into bed and lays himself close along John's body, curling an arm around him and tentatively nuzzling his forehead against John's cheek. "It's okay," he says softly, not sure what else he has to offer. "We'll be okay."
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It's all he can do to just silently cooperate as Martin helps him out of his shirt, too pathetic to enjoy the attention but unwilling to throw Martin's kindness back in his face. A growing portion of his meager reserves are going towards not simply bursting into tears again, but when Martin curls up along side him and nestles close, it dislodges a shuddering gasp out of him. Before he quite realizes what he's doing, he lifts a hand to clutch at Martin's arm, as if terrified he might (sensibly) pull away.
"Sorry," he says, his voice a pitiful croak he hardly recognizes as his own, tears flowing once more. "I just..." he abandons that line almost immediately; he can't account for himself. He's just so fucking tired.
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Sorry for finding the damn thing; sorry it all happened. It doesn't matter. All that matters is holding John close to him, keeping him safe and comfortable until he can just rest. Martin adjusts his position a little, arranging it so he can better stroke John's hair, which he intends to keep doing as long as he remains conscious. "Just rest now," he murmurs. "It's okay."
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And despite everything, the gentle passage of Martin's hand through his hair is having its usual effect. Opening his eyes would take titanic effort.
But there's still enough lingering paranoia shivering through his system for him to tighten his grip on Martin's sleeve, the fabric bunching between his fingers. "Don't leave," he pleads, urgent despite his exhaustion.
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"Not going anywhere," he murmurs, and presses a kiss to John's forehead. "I'm here with you."
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He takes one slow breath, and then another, his body finally relaxing in spite of himself. But even as his arm loses its tension, his fingers remain curled around that patch of fabric as if both their lives depend on it. "Okay," he says again, more sigh than word.