( oh, sure, he could have just asked. you know, like a normal person. but if he had ever been that much of a normal person, he sure as hell isn’t one anymore—similarly, jonathan sims has never been known for his charisma either. when gallivanting around the globe, making his fumbling efforts to gather information and disrupt the other Powers’ rituals, there’d been enough instances in which the average person’s charity with him and his probing questions had run out (or not existed to begin with), and he’d had to… exert pressure. as time had gone on, his willingness to even give them a chance had dwindled, and at this point it barely even passes through his mind. he may have been in this strange plane of existence for a week or two, but he had spent God-knows-how-long roving through a hellscape of his own making as its own post-apocalyptic Antichrist (self-proclaimed, sarcastic). there, when he had wanted information, he took it. if something or someone presented themself as an obstacle, he removed it. after the grim severity with which he handled former enemies (and even former allies), cutting through the bullshit and compelling a simple answer doesn’t feel like too much of an overstep.
to say his perspective on the subject is warped would be a bit of an understatement.
the Archivist’s compulsion can be as understated as it is underhanded, tricking the mind into the same complacency it would answer any simple, non-privileged question with. this is the approach john had taken, phrasing the question as casual, even as he layered it with power. he is not surprised it works (as, to his eyes, jason seems to him like any archetype of the “punk kid”), though he seems more surprised by the answer itself. weapons dealer? he adjusts his mental measure of the young man. there’s enough confidence in his words to relay experience; he clearly knows what he’s talking about. though, really, john just finds himself relieved at how mundane the matter was. he’s already thinking of how to disengage and leave him to it—
that’s when his answer cuts off, and john can sense where this is going to go in the half-second afterward. he goes still, rigid; he’s cutting through the mental calculations to judge whether or not he might be able to back off faster than the young man could come after him, but qualities like “speed” and “strength” had never been his forte. he’s scarcely backed up half a step before jason is on his feet and closing the distance fast, and his second step back does little more than throw him off-balance when he’s grabbed by the collar and physically dragged over toward the roof’s edge.
that’s when he starts to get afraid. but it’s a very strange kind of fear, mostly because he never seems to lose the sense of lofty, unattached certainty he had had when compelling jason a moment ago. the dichotomy is bizarre. his breathing comes quick and shallow as he senses the yawning abyss of nothing open up behind his back; suddenly he is sat before michael crew again, trapped in a mental plummet at terminal velocity, and the inscribed fears of no fewer than three or four victims of the Vast resonate with that sensation in atonal symphony. without thinking, his hand flies to lock around the offending wrist in a dead man’s grip. he can fear the threatened fall (and he does; it’s evident enough in the anxiousness of his breathing and the occasional, sudden shudder of adrenaline), but he can also feel a calm resolve that it’s doubtful it would even kill him. that’s what does battle in his expression and in the dark intensity of his gaze, playing at such odds with the instinctual response of trauma.
his first response is a single, mirthless laugh. ) Well, I can’t say I’m known for my good ideas.
( he keeps a knife on him in his coat. he doesn’t want to use it. he’s not even really sure if he can—he’d used it to kill the man most deserving of it (and then martin had used it on the second most deserving), so using it against anyone else felt… wrong. even worse than reacting with violence seemed in this situation.
so just trying to pull something even more painful out of him was also out of the question. violence against the sanctity of the mind was just as terrible as violence against the body. sometimes more so.
he’s never been a particularly adept liar either, so… what, his last resort is probably just the honesty he had avoided using at the jump? oh, irony. )
Because I wasn’t about to ignore someone staking out the rooftop of the place I’m staying without knowing why he’s there.
( a little entitled. and also not very enlightening, given that much is obvious (except for perhaps the fact that john had already known he was up here?). after a moment of deliberation, he continues, and when he does, his tone of voice has softened. he’s filed away the more imperious edge to reveal something more heartfelt beneath. ) Someone is staying with me that I need to make sure remains safe. I—I had to. ( a beat, and, after searching jason’s face with dark, bottomless eyes, he continues on intuition rather than the certainty of Knowing: ) Surely you could understand something like that.
( the pressure of Knowing is far lesser here, in this place, around these people. the Eye had only amassed the knowledge it had over his world because it had existed just outside it for as long as there were animals conscious enough to feel fear. these new universes, though, and these new people… it knew remarkably little, and so did john. they both hungered to change that. just give them time. )
no subject
( oh, sure, he could have just asked. you know, like a normal person. but if he had ever been that much of a normal person, he sure as hell isn’t one anymore—similarly, jonathan sims has never been known for his charisma either. when gallivanting around the globe, making his fumbling efforts to gather information and disrupt the other Powers’ rituals, there’d been enough instances in which the average person’s charity with him and his probing questions had run out (or not existed to begin with), and he’d had to… exert pressure. as time had gone on, his willingness to even give them a chance had dwindled, and at this point it barely even passes through his mind. he may have been in this strange plane of existence for a week or two, but he had spent God-knows-how-long roving through a hellscape of his own making as its own post-apocalyptic Antichrist (self-proclaimed, sarcastic). there, when he had wanted information, he took it. if something or someone presented themself as an obstacle, he removed it. after the grim severity with which he handled former enemies (and even former allies), cutting through the bullshit and compelling a simple answer doesn’t feel like too much of an overstep.
to say his perspective on the subject is warped would be a bit of an understatement.
the Archivist’s compulsion can be as understated as it is underhanded, tricking the mind into the same complacency it would answer any simple, non-privileged question with. this is the approach john had taken, phrasing the question as casual, even as he layered it with power. he is not surprised it works (as, to his eyes, jason seems to him like any archetype of the “punk kid”), though he seems more surprised by the answer itself. weapons dealer? he adjusts his mental measure of the young man. there’s enough confidence in his words to relay experience; he clearly knows what he’s talking about. though, really, john just finds himself relieved at how mundane the matter was. he’s already thinking of how to disengage and leave him to it—
that’s when his answer cuts off, and john can sense where this is going to go in the half-second afterward. he goes still, rigid; he’s cutting through the mental calculations to judge whether or not he might be able to back off faster than the young man could come after him, but qualities like “speed” and “strength” had never been his forte. he’s scarcely backed up half a step before jason is on his feet and closing the distance fast, and his second step back does little more than throw him off-balance when he’s grabbed by the collar and physically dragged over toward the roof’s edge.
that’s when he starts to get afraid. but it’s a very strange kind of fear, mostly because he never seems to lose the sense of lofty, unattached certainty he had had when compelling jason a moment ago. the dichotomy is bizarre. his breathing comes quick and shallow as he senses the yawning abyss of nothing open up behind his back; suddenly he is sat before michael crew again, trapped in a mental plummet at terminal velocity, and the inscribed fears of no fewer than three or four victims of the Vast resonate with that sensation in atonal symphony. without thinking, his hand flies to lock around the offending wrist in a dead man’s grip. he can fear the threatened fall (and he does; it’s evident enough in the anxiousness of his breathing and the occasional, sudden shudder of adrenaline), but he can also feel a calm resolve that it’s doubtful it would even kill him. that’s what does battle in his expression and in the dark intensity of his gaze, playing at such odds with the instinctual response of trauma.
his first response is a single, mirthless laugh. ) Well, I can’t say I’m known for my good ideas.
( he keeps a knife on him in his coat. he doesn’t want to use it. he’s not even really sure if he can—he’d used it to kill the man most deserving of it (and then martin had used it on the second most deserving), so using it against anyone else felt… wrong. even worse than reacting with violence seemed in this situation.
so just trying to pull something even more painful out of him was also out of the question. violence against the sanctity of the mind was just as terrible as violence against the body. sometimes more so.
he’s never been a particularly adept liar either, so… what, his last resort is probably just the honesty he had avoided using at the jump? oh, irony. )
Because I wasn’t about to ignore someone staking out the rooftop of the place I’m staying without knowing why he’s there.
( a little entitled. and also not very enlightening, given that much is obvious (except for perhaps the fact that john had already known he was up here?). after a moment of deliberation, he continues, and when he does, his tone of voice has softened. he’s filed away the more imperious edge to reveal something more heartfelt beneath. ) Someone is staying with me that I need to make sure remains safe. I—I had to. ( a beat, and, after searching jason’s face with dark, bottomless eyes, he continues on intuition rather than the certainty of Knowing: ) Surely you could understand something like that.
( the pressure of Knowing is far lesser here, in this place, around these people. the Eye had only amassed the knowledge it had over his world because it had existed just outside it for as long as there were animals conscious enough to feel fear. these new universes, though, and these new people… it knew remarkably little, and so did john. they both hungered to change that. just give them time. )