It is the end of the world. In a way, it has always been the end of the world. When time and space saw that things were about to get apocalyptic, they looked at each other for a long moment, shrugged, and packed their bags for a vacation they didn't plan to come back from. For some people, it has been the end of the world for a few months. For some, 2 years. And for a privileged few, always. Whatever the case, it's a very good excuse for getting drunk.
Somewhere, a tape recorder whirrs to life, and one woman gives it a dirty look.
"You can destroy them," says former podcast host, cat-owner, and cult leader Georgie Barker. Currently, her occupation is: Alcohol.
"Will it help?" Basira asks in a voice so thick with irritation that it's a wonder she doesn't choke on it. Georgie considers, waves a hand vaguely in the air, and drinks.
"It won't stop it, but, I don't know, it's cathartic?" Basira nods, stands, walks over to the tape recorder, and picks it up. She turns it over in her hands, and it hums cheerfully as it feeds on the misery of the room. She taps her nails against the side. With sudden violence, she throws it at the ground, and it shatters, plastic and tape running away from the impact point in confusion. Basira steps on the corpse of it to see if that might make her feel like she's accomplished something.
Somewhere, a tape recorder whirrs to life. This time, it's nestled itself on the back of the ratty couch that used to hold The Archivist as he silently tried to find the bottom of his bottle. In the minutes since, his boyfriend, miraculously not filled with spiders, has joined him. The couch now holds Martin Blackwood and Jonathan Sims, and when the tape recorder joins them, Martin raises a hand to push it off. Then sighs, shakes his head, and drops it to pet Jon's hair.
Jon, throughly intoxicated, makes a whirring noise that is suspiciously similar to the tape.
A note about finding drinks during the Apocalypse: It's harder than you'd think. Not because it isn't there, but because most of it isn't alcohol proper and it's rather unpleasant to open up a bottle only to be greeted by a wisp of fog symbolizing someone's inability to be emotionally vulnerable. When it is to be found, (on a far back shelf of an empty grocery store where the announcement sound rings every seven minutes on the dot but is never followed by any announcements) the wine will be sour and the whiskey will be more poison than drink, but they'll do the job just as well.
"It doesn't actually make you feel better," says Melanie King, who is on the same side of sober as Basira but for different reasons. She is having a hard time staying there. "It connects your anger with aggression. Next time, you'll just want to destroy something again." These are not her words, but they were good advice when she heard them.
"You didn't stop me," Basira points out. Melanie grimaces. It doesn't seem like good advice anymore.
"I'll wait until we know you have a next time to be worried about," Melanie says.
"Which we will," Martin says, "so, no more smashing things." Melanie snorts but doesn't argue. She thinks that if she were drunk, she would have. That's part of the reason she hasn't picked up a glass.
"Do you think everyone will remember? When it all shuts off," Georgie asks, contemplative, "or will things go back to normal and we'll be the only ones? We will remember, right?" Without meaning to, all eyes turn to Jon, seeking answers. He doesn't respond to the sudden attention, not until Martin pokes him in the cheek.
"I'm not sure what you asked, but whatever it is... I don't know. Not here, anyway," Jon says. He starts rubbing his hands together and sits up before he gets a crick in his neck from using Martin's leg as a pillow. Sober Jon might have been embarrassed, but then again, sober Jon had been through more than one literal hell, so perhaps not. Georgie lets out a sigh of relief.
"That's probably a good thing." She leans back against Melanie's chair. "You don't want any?"
"You've asked me that already, hon. Twice." Georgie blinks and gives her a weak smile.
"We know it's working, then." It's a smile Melanie does her very best to return, with little success. A few domains over and uncountable miles away, the face she makes is adopted by an Avatar of the Spiral and used to send a woman into a fit of hysteria. Melanie will never know about this. She'll still feel a lingering sense of guilt for it, but it's a book that will fit right in on her extensive shelf of self-condemnation.
"Do you want to remember this? It hasn't exactly been..." Basira trails off. For a moment, she almost- This assignment's turning out to be a real hoot, Daisy would say, with sarcasm as sharp as fangs. "Fun." Basira finishes.
"Someone should. Might as well be us," Georgie says. Basira nods. In a selfish part of her heart, she would like to forget the monster Daisy became. In another part, one that's only gotten louder the longer she's had to walk the domains, she knows it wouldn't erase the monster she always was. (Basira is still only human, and sometimes the selfish part wins. Some days, she needs to remember Daisy's smile like she needs air.)
"I won't," Jon puts in. He's had enough time to figure out exactly what it is they're talking about now. "If I live." He adds, because he is impossible.
"Jon..." Martin warns. Jon lets his head drop to his boyfriend's shoulder, rubbing a hand along the scratchy couch cushions. Staying (mostly) upright is harder than he remembers, even sitting down.
"You don't get to die on us now, bastard." There's frustration in her voice, yes, but no real anger. "We dragged you this far. You're coming with us over the finish line." Against Martin's shoulder, Jon mouth turns up at the corners. It's not a smile, but it is happy. He thinks that getting drunk was a fantastic idea. It's giving him other fantastic ideas, too, like-
"Jon, where-" He stumbles to his feet, using Martin to lever himself despite an affronted squawk. He bats his boyfriend's worried hands away. He's fine; He remembers how to walk. Mostly. The only table they have is a small, dinky coffee table that is holding the remainder of the night's alcohol. Jon deems it sufficient for his purposes. Purposes being climbing atop it. It wobbles dangerously.
"I need to tell everyone-" He begins and wobbles again. Martin sucks in a sharp breath.
"Jon, get off the table before you hurt yourself." Basira says, but pointedly, neither she nor anyone else makes him do so. It's not like he can be hurt.
Although, it would just be their luck if The Archivist died during a drunken ramble by falling off a coffee table.
On second thought, Basira tenses and prepares to grabs Jon if he should fall.
"To. Tell everyone. That-" Jon continues, trying to keep his footing. He looks a bit like someone surfing, if the surfboard has been chewed at the edges by sharks and the person is more of a snorkeler by trade. "That I wouldn't be here without you. Not here, the end of the world, that's- That's always been my fault. But here. Under the institute. In Jurgen's rat tunnels. With you." He flaps his hands. Should you have asked him in the moment, Jon would have told you it was possibly the best speech he'd ever given in his life. If you'd have asked Georgie, she would have told you that he used to do this back at Uni, too. "And I love you. I love all of you. You're here, and... Thank you." He finishes, eloquent as ever. He looks down at the floor, which seems millions of miles away. This is not because space no longer works at the end of the world, nor is it because the Vast is planning an imminent assassination of Jonathan Sims. It's because he's a lot more drunk than he realized and whatever coordination he had to get up on this table has fled in a panic. "Uh."
"Alright, alright. Let's get you down." Georgie chuckles. Jon doesn't so much take her hand and let her guide him off as he does flop down into her arms. It's easier than it was at Uni. Jon hasn't gotten any bigger, but Georgie's gotten stronger. "Better?"
"Yes. Thank you." He steadies himself, puts his hands on her shoulders. "Georgie?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm going to save our son." Melanie coughs. Loudly. Georgie makes a confused face, and then her light chuckle becomes a full laugh. "He's a good cat. The best cat."
"Worry about yourself, Jon. Not The Admiral." She pats his cheek. "Although, yes, we're going to save him." Jon nods.
"Georgie?"
"Yeah?"
"He didn't want to hurt anyone. He didn't mean to." Her smile wavers at the edges. "And he's sorry. The Admiral. He's sorry for getting so many people-" Georgie hugs him.
"I know." Jon hugs her back, and it's only partially because he's not sure how much his legs work anymore. After a minute, Martin comes over to retrieve him, and Jon goes without a fuss. Georgie kisses him on the forehead. "Good night, Jon." He mumbles something that's probably an answer.
"Night, all." Martin says for him. Basira waves. Melanie turns her head in their direction, lips pulled into a thin line.
It's not difficult to guide Jon back to their cot. Martin's glad he's never been one to start losing motor control when he's drunk. Jon seems to have enough of that for both of them. He goes where Martin leads him though, and he stares. Martin's more than used to that by now. Jon doesn't blink unless he's making a conscious effort to. It's nice, in a way, because Jon already knows his face, every freckle and stress line and the way he scrunches up his nose when he's frustrated, and he still wants to keep looking at it. It's not new knowledge to feed the Eye. It's looking for Jon's sake alone, and that makes it... okay. Good. Cute. When they get to the bed and he lets go of Jon, his boyfriend follows the natural course of gravity and hits it with a thump.
"Make room." Martin whines at him, and Jon mimics the sound, smushed against the bed. Martin shoves him, a little ungraciously, but Jon just rolls with it. Nearly off the bed, but Martin catches him with a sigh. Martin counts the seconds down as he settles next to Jon. Four. Three. Two. And- There is suddenly an Jon-shaped octopus clinging to him with every available limb. Exactly as Martin planned. The perfect crime. Jon squirms until he's comfortable.
It's really hard to tell if he's asleep, Martin realizes five minutes later, because he's still staring at him.
"I wanted to cook for you," Jon murmurs. Not asleep, then.
"Didn't you? Before all of this. I specifically remember-" Martin says.
"No. No. Not that. We were going to have an adversary-"
"Anniversary?"
"Shut up, Martin," Jon hides his face, and Martin grins. "I wanted to make you dinner. With candles. And romance."
"That's really sweet of you." It would require more coordination than Jon has and more energy than Martin can spare to properly kiss like this. Instead, Martin lifts his hand, kisses his index and middle finger, and then presses them against Jon's cheek. "Also, I'm really glad you had a plan. I think I was panicking a little. I had no idea if you'd even want to celebrate it, or how, or what to do... How did we spend our anniversary?"
"Time doesn't work here."
"Humor me."
"Hm." It's hard to see his face in the dark, but Jon looks up and frowns, trying to remember. "I think... That place where all the doors were mouths. One of them tried to eat you." Martin makes a face.
"Ugh."
"Yes. Not particularly romantic."
"Guess we'll just have to have a do-over, when this is done," Martin says. Jon doesn't answer.
"Our world is ending," he says, finally, very quiet.
"The world's always ending."
"Our world." Jon finds Martin's hand by running his fingers down his arm. "Everything else is ending, but we were beginning." Jon's voice is a tremulous thing, hiding in the dark. "I wanted to cook for you," he repeats, "and repaint the bedroom. You never liked the color. You deserved to go home somewhere and know that it was where love lived." Martin breathes in, one long breath, and he holds it until the lump in his throat retreats. Jon is tracing nonsense patterns over his palm, and his voice is getting softer.
"We still could, you know."
"I'd like that." Jon finds an extra centimeter of space between them and snuggles closer. "I love you, Martin."
"I love you, too, Jon." He waits until Jon falls asleep. Makes sure this time, both that he is and that he'll stay asleep. Martin can't move without disturbing him, but he's always been a quiet crier. If anyone notices his eyes are still red tomorrow, he'll have the alcohol to blame, and the end of the world.