If someone were to rip open Jon's chest and peer through all the blood and tissue and brick walls guarding up his heart, they would see the way he let his sentiments consume him to the fullest extent; all the while pretending to have neatly buried them in some metaphorical depth of his being. To anyone else, it was painfully obvious he was the type of person who believed that if he ignored his problems long enough, they would disappear. They don't, and he learned that lesson the hard way.

He ignored the initial intrigue, when he first joined the Magnus Institute to work as a researcher and Tim Stoker's friendly charm caught his attention. He ignored how quickly they became friends. He ignored the way the grey that he carried in his presence from birth seemed to get a little lighter whenever Tim was around. Not colourful, not yet, but just a bit brighter.

He ignored the tinge of hurt he was guilty of feeling when he was transferred to the archives as the head archivist and picked up on the hint of history Tim and Sasha had. He was their boss, he told himself, what they did outside of the institute was none of his business.

He ignored the way his eyes would drift to the glass separating his office from the archival assistant's workspace, the way he wished he could join in when waves of laughter would spill though the break-room door and he would know to whom he owed the courtesy of making Sasha and Martin laugh. What good would that do?— he would say to himself while he made himself a who-knows-what-number-th cup of coffee to survive the over-hours.

He felt himself growing greyer since having the title 'Head Archivist', even though he carried it with esteem. Sure the work of organising generations worth of archival mess was taxing but noticing the hint of contempt in Tim's eyes ever since was even more so. Jon knew that Sasha deserved the position more than he did. He would've agreed but the decision wasn't taken by him, and yet he bore brunt of Tim's frustration for it.

Maybe that was when it got hard to ignore. Sometimes, in the late hours, when he sat laying his head back on his chair staring up at the ceiling after recording a statement which always left his heart beating faster (for what reason, he couldn't come close to guessing), he wished it wasn't him there. He wished he could be out there in the archival assistant's space and Sasha in his chair. It was pathetic and he hated himself for it but he could live with it. He had for so many years.

As if to challenge him, all the messy emotions he suppressed and let fester inside him lay down their roots in retaliation. It hurt, coughing up tiny yellow buds that caught against and scratched his throat on their way out. It was especially hard at night when they would choke him in his sleep until he woke up gasping and panting, clutching onto dear life.

What hurt more was hiding his condition, knowing that there was no cure to this, knowing why this was happening. There was no point in telling anyone, let alone the subject of his sad little infatuation. Tim didn't return said infatuation and outing himself would do nothing but earn him pity. He would rather get the pesky petals out in a tissue, throw them in a bin and carry on reading statements with a bleeding throat.

It got worse after the Jane Prentiss incident, however impossible that may have seemed. Individual petals turned into clusters and eventually fully formed flowers. That was when the fear for his life truly gripped him. He put on his investigative cap and nose-dived into the tunnels any chance he got, at least that kept him occupied and distracted from the bitterness Tim shot at him with his scar-riddled face. That always made his chest ache but maybe that was just the cage tightening around his lungs with time. At least it was a bit easier to breathe in the tunnels.

He thought he hit rock bottom when he was hunched over his desk one late evening, his weak, malnourished body shaking with violent coughs, trying its absolute best to expel the foreign contents from the depths of his respiratory system; and like the cherry on top, the familiar sound of snickering that made his head spin emerged from some non-existent door and swirled mockingly in his ears.

"What a sorry sight, Archivist."

Michael's voice pricked like needles all over him. He peered through burning, blurry eyes at the blood-soaked petals in his hand. 'Sorry'. Somehow the feeling wasn't mutual.

"You could use a hand with that." They were closer now, or perhaps farther, it was hard to tell. "I'd be happy to help."

Their voice blended into tinnitus and he could feel them reach towards his chest where the source of his ache was. He pushed himself back, letting the chair fall loudly. The sound helped ground him through their sickening laughter.

"Unwise as always." They grinned as he attempted to make up for the loss of breath to the best of his stunted abilities.

The words 'I'm alright' died on his tongue because it was glaringly obvious he wasn't and Michael was not a fool. Despite how much he hated how cryptic and confusing they were, it was somewhat a relief that someone knew what went on with him. Or something at least. Martin did seem worried but he knew better than to pry after being shut down. Basira did too but she wasn't a staple in the archives to do anything. Tim was too angry to notice.

Jon couldn't recall when he picked up smoking again. Maybe when he found that lighter with the web design. Not that it mattered. A couple of cigarettes now and then did nowhere near the damage that his body was doing to itself. The realisation that he had already started to accept his condition grew on him quite slowly. There was always so much else going on after all. It only fully solidified in his mind when he found himself on the terrace the night before their 'operation' at the House of Wax museum.

The sky was a drab, dark grey, the cool air a contrast to his feverish, warm breath. He leaned his weight against the railing and lit a cigarette. The hot smoke invaded him, giving a slight burn to his throat. It wasn't surprising how quiet it was despite Tim being right there beside him, smoking his own with his eyes set somewhere far. There wasn't much left to be said after having recorded a 'final statement'.

Final. The mere thought of the word tasted more bitter than the bile he had gotten used to over the recent months. And yet, the lack of light in his coworker's eyes suggested there was little chance of it being anything else. Jon glanced back at the streets below, a puff of smoke leaving his chapped lips.

"I thought you didn't smoke." It was as if the words were snatched right out of Jon's mouth when he was thinking of ways to break the silence and Tim beat him to it.

A sad excuse of a smile pulled at one corner of his mouth. "Funny I could say the same to you."

Tim gave a dry shrug, glancing down at the cigarette he was holding over the railing, and said nothing; but the message was understood. Smoking was the last thing that could hurt him. Yet that did nothing to ease the feeling of Jon's heart sinking deeper into the dark, murky pit of his chest cavity. A physical pain shot through his chest following that and air turned solid, forming a lump in his throat. He simply took another puff, pretending that helped.

As awkward as this exchange would have looked to an outsider, it truly wasn't. In fact, it felt more comfortable than anything, just like the old days before both of them had descended to the hellscape known as the archives; back when Tim still considered Jon a friend. And maybe, after all that happened, all the distrust and contempt, they were friends once again; just for a bit.

"Weird, isn't it? How the world just goes on, completely oblivious."

Pulled out of his thoughts, he turned to his side to find his friend watching the people on the road below. He followed his line of sight down, taking a moment to process he was referring to their plan for the next day.

"Yeah, it… feels unreal." It was remarkable how quickly he slipped into the everyday-Jon image instead of adding something meaningful.

Tim gave a huff of sardonic amusement. "Feels real all right." He inhaled a puff of nicotine; the light crackle of the fiery tip was easily discernible in the quiet, a speck or two of paper ash fleeting somewhere far on the breeze.

"More than anything that happened for... I don't know how long." His voice was almost ghostly but sure. So sure, it was frightening. And his unhealthily glorious face turned to the left, surrounded by wisps of grey, eyes part-lidded and sullen, trained on the archivist in a way that could easily make him lose his footing.

Jon went mute, unable to think, talk, breathe, or do anything. He stared back like an earthworm witnessing a supernova in the sky. And in that instant, he felt the long unsaid truth crawl its way up to his mouth and sit on the tip of his tongue, ready to slip out. He might even have said it when he remembered he needed to feed his decaying lungs some air once in a while and something assaulted his trachea from the inside.

He lurched forward, a hand clamped tightly over his mouth, tears hanging at the corners of his eyes. The sound was nasty; it disrupted the haven-like peace and filled it with pitiful hacks and gasps. He turned away from Tim, pawing at his pocket for a tissue. He hoped— no, he prayed the pure, white lily that left his mouth, the blood of the words they killed on their way to lay in triumph on the soaking tissue, went unnoticed. He crumpled it up and, disgusting as it was, stuffed the flower in his pocket in a quick frenzy to avoid any questions. When he calmed himself after swallowing the remnants on his tongue and turned, a very concerned face greeted him.

"You alright?" Somehow his voice was sharper now, though it didn't matter.

"Yes," Jon cleared his throat, "I'm okay, just… just a little–"

"You've been doing that a lot, coughing and throwing up and everything," Tim cut him off. "You sure it's not…serious?"

The Archivist sighed and the smell of cigarettes mixed with a faint floral scent filled his nose. He wondered if that was the case for Tim too. He hoped not. "Well, I'm not sure but compared to everything else, it's not a huge deal."

That made sense; he could see the thought ringing in Tim's head when his gaze turned contemplative as he inhaled deeply, his chest rising in a soft motion. They had gone through far worse, all of them, especially Jon. Sure to those who knew, this was another tragedy he had to suffer but ignorance made it look like nothing at all. And to Jon, that was for the best.

Accepting the blooming life inside him was his only option as well as his pick. The roots and stems and buds and petals and pollen were another organ, a part of him, just like his unrequited feelings. They couldn't just be weeded out of him if he wanted, and at this point, he didn't want to. It hurt and it took him further and further from being human, but despite it all, he was fine, at peace with it even. He was content with the longing stare he'd set on the shattered researcher hell bent on revenge when he turned away. The price was heavy but there was beauty in him now; at last, he was colourful.