#ostc

Martin barely notices it at first. An innocuous file, sticking out of his case, scuffed with the permanent marker he took to it in an attempt to hide its second-hand nature. Could have been in there for weeks, really. He sighs, wondering if Hana is playing another prank on him. He pulls it out and- god, are those spiderwebs? Maybe not Hana, then. He flips it open, noting the high quality paper. 

Statement of Hazel Rutter regarding a fire in her childhood home.

How did he end up with a statement from the archives tucked away in his things? No way it was Gertrude. He couldn’t even remember the last time he saw the Head Archivist, and had only heard rumors of assistants in that basement. Maybe someone from the library borrowed it, and it somehow ended up in his bag? Well, no way he’s headed back to the institute at this hour. It’ll have to wait until morning.

He’s just about to close the folder when he spots something curious. The first page seems… short. Are the rest of the pages research notes? Can’t hurt to read it, right?

Hello, John.

Apologies for the deception, but I wanted to make sure you started reading, so I thought it best not to announce myself.

I’m assuming you’re alone; you always did prefer to read your statements in private. I wouldn’t try too hard to stop reading; there’s every likelihood you’ll just hurt yourself. So just listen.

Now, shall we turn the page and try again?

This doesn’t seem to be the statement. Is someone using the archives to pass notes? Why would they do that? The spark of curiosity grows into a raging fire. Martin doesn’t consider himself much of a gossip, but this is just too weird to pass up. He does work for a paranormal research institute, right? It’s only healthy. 

…

IS SOMONE WRITING FUCKING FANFICTION ABOUT HIS WORKPLACE?! Gertrude Robinson, Jonah Magnus (probably), and him. Martin. Also some guy named Jon? And what’s all this about dread powers and marking? And Jane Prentiss? Peter Lukas?

This was honestly just too weird. He was absolutely going to HR with this, what the actual fuck. It’s certainly… inspired. Evil gods (?) and the end of the world? He would be a bit flattered that someone liked him enough to include him in their institute fanfic, but sliding it into his bag was crossing a line. 

And who were the other people included in it? Sasha… could that be Sasha James? From research? Whenever she dropped off a late book, she always included a biscuit or two. She was nice. Helen sounded like she wasn’t working for the Institute, maybe. Melanie, Detective Tonner… and Jon. The man meant to ‘keep an eye on him’. The next Archivist? Gertrude wasn’t that old yet.And the statement was from 1992, so there’s honestly no way-

No, Martin, stop thinking about it. It’s someone’s weird fanfic that they decided to give you. Wait, was it Hana? This seems too extreme for her but…

Tomorrow. It’s a problem for tomorrow’s Martin. For now, he’s going to get Mum to bed and then spend the rest of the night relaxing. Maybe watch some shitty telly. 

The next morning, he trudges up the stairs to the dusty office. After a brief description, he’s shuffled off to a small room where a sour faced woman introduces herself as Diane. She clacks away at an ancient computer, barely acknowledging him. Martin settles uncomfortably into the rickety old chair, and begins to describe the strange situation he’s found himself in. Diane types away without responding. He wraps up the strange tale and sits in silence as she slowly finishes typing away.

“And you have the text with you?” Diane looked over her glasses at him, a bored expression on her face.

“Y-yeah, uh, here!” Martin dids into his bag, pulling out the folder containing the offending document. He passes it over to her, hands shaking. Why was he so nervous? She flips it open, and then glares back at him.

“Where is it?” she drawls.

“What? It’s right there, in the folder!” Martin stands and looks over her desk. Sure enough, the folder is empty. “It, it was…”

Diane flips the folder closed and shoves it back at him. “We are busy. Please come back when you have actual evidence.”

Martin’s too stunned to apologize as he shuffles out of the office. Did it somehow slip out of the folder? It had to, there’s no way it just disappeared like that. Unless there’s some kind of malevolent force that decided to mess with him for fun. But if it was targeting him, why so much focus on Jon?

He shakes his head and takes a deep breath. Nothing he can do about it now. Time to go to work. He walks down to the library, and groans. Someone is pacing back and forth in front of the empty desk, looking irate. He almost considers turning back and facing Diane’s wrath. Instead, he heads towards the desk.

“Beth’s not at the desk?” Martin calls out to the man. He stops in his tracks, and whips around, glaring. 

“Obviously not. And I don’t expect anyone soon, as it’s been five minutes.” He glares at Martin.

“I’m so sorry to hear that. I had an issue to take care of, and I thought she could handle it.” Martin placates him, slipping behind the desk. He feels bad about shoving the blame off on her, but he really doesn’t have the energy to deal with this. “What can I help you with?”

The man looks a bit surprised, but quickly settles back into his surly state. “I requested a book nearly two weeks ago, but still haven’t received it. It’s Paranormal Specters of Eastern Europe, Volume 3. Allen Jackson.”

Martin searches their catalogue as fast as he can, scanning entries. The man taps his fingers on the desk, glaring. What a winning personality.

“Ah, looks like we just got it in last night! I would have sent you an email today, but it looks like I don’t need to anymore. Give me a second to pop back and grab it for you.” 

“Finally.” the man grumbles. Martin almost runs to the back, ready to get this man out of the library. It takes a minute to dig through the shelf, as it had been scanned in but not sorted yet.

“Alright, got that for you! All I need now is your card.” Martin says as he emerges from the back. The man slams his card on the desk and looks off. Martin gently picks up the card, scans it in, and then scans the book.

“And that’ll be due back in 30 days!” He slides the card and book across the desk back to him. “Oh, it looks like you have a book due tomorrow. Would you like to renew-” He looks up from the screen to see the man already walking away.

“What a prick.” he whispers to himself. He’s about to exit the account when he spots the name. 

Jonathan Sims.

A shiver runs down his spine as he glances to the empty doorway. Just a coincidence. Nothing more. He takes another deep breath and sets his bag on the desk, which immediately falls and spills its contents everywhere.It’s official. This day was awful. Just for a laugh, he opens up the file that started it all. Of course, that horrible fanfic is there in full.

    “No no no, come back here, please little pup!” Martin yelled, running after the rambunctious dog. He hadn’t meant to let it in, but the little bugger had managed to shoot through that tiny crack. He had to catch it, though. If Jonathan Sims was like he remembered, he could NOT piss him off on the first day.

    He turned the corner to see it staring into an open doorway. He rushed forward, barely managing to wrap an arm around the squirming dog.

    “Caught you, little bugger. Now to get you back outside where you belong.” Martin huffed out, gently scratching its ears to calm it down.

    “What is that doing here?” A surly voice sounds above him. Martin whips his head up to see Jonathan Sims, glaring down. Shit. There goes the whole ‘not pissing off his new boss’ plan.

“Oh uh J- Mr. Sims! I was-well, you see-”

“Jon. Just Jon.” A grimace passes over his face.

“Right. So, I was coming in from the exterior door, and this pup was outside. And-and before I could get myself through, he just, uh, bolted inside.” Martin explains. He shifts the squirming dog in his hands for a better hold. 

    “And what are you doing in the archives?”

    “Oh! I’m Martin Blackwood! I used to work in the library, but now I’m an archival assistant.” It was a little disappointing that Jon didn’t recognize him, but he was just a librarian. 

    “No you’re not. I requested Tim, and I requested Sasha, and you are neither.” Jon glare hardens, somehow.

    “I-yes? Did Mr. Bouchard not tell you?” Martin resists withering under his gaze. Jon sighs in irritation.

“Apparently there are a few things he conveniently left out.” He pinches the bridge of his nose. 

“Well, uh, how about I get this dog out of here, and then get you my qualifications. So you, uh, know who you’re working with!” Martin needed to get away from Jon before he gave even more reason for the Archivist to be mad.

“Yes, get that thing out of here before it causes a bigger mess.” Jon waves his hand dismissively, re-entering the room. He shuts the door firmly.

“Jesus Christ.” Martin sighs in relief. Not the best  first impression, but it didn’t seem as disastrous as it could have been? Jon was really annoyed, but it seemed to be ‘new job stress’ and not ‘Martin is unbearably annoying’.

An hour later, he’s rummaging through storage with Tim, looking for tape recorders. It’s ridiculous in here. Boxes almost reach the ceiling in precarious stacks. Various bottles of cleaning supplies scattered across the floor, some empty with dried patches around them. Ancient leaks, dried up from years spent untouched. And, of course, a near-infinite collection of spiderwebs strung up everywhere. Jon had taken one look at the room and immediately retreated, citing something about ‘having to look over Martin’s paperwork’.  Martin didn’t blame him, though. If he had a chance to get out of this dusty room, he’d take it in a heartbeat.

“So, I heard you almost sicced a dog on Jon today.” Tim brings up.

“Oh god, I thought I was gonna have a heart attack!” Martin replies. He sets down the box to look at Tim. “I just wanted to pet the cute dog outside the door and suddenly I’m getting stared down by my boss! I hope I didn’t mess everything up…”

Tim laughs. “Oh, Jon’s always been a little surly. You just need some time with him to break open his shell!”

“Does his shell open up to another, spikier shell?” Martin sets the current box on the ground with a huff.

Tim laughs again, only to sneeze at the dust swirling in the air. “It takes a while for him to thaw out, but don’t let that cold exterior fool you. He’s a real bleeding heart.”

“Really? Because it seems that he’ll be shutting us all out with that office door…” Martin trailed off.

I’m assuming you’re alone; you always did prefer to read your statements in private.

“Hey, good job man!” Tim’s voice calls him back to the present.

“What?” Martin jumps.

“You found it! Now I can hand that over to Jon and we can get out of this dusty room!”

Martin looks down to see the box he used to be holding, and had apparently opened. Inside sits a dusty black recorder. He hands it over to Tim.

“Don’t worry, when I hand it off, I’ll make sure he knows you were the one who found it.” Tim winks. He goes to leave, but pauses. “You wouldn’t mind putting everything back while I deliver this, yeah? Good on you!” and he darts out the door.

“Tim! Get back here and help me clean this up!” Martin calls back, but his only response is the closet door slamming shut. He runs a hand through his hair. He hadn’t thought about the statement that had slipped into his bag for a while. Sure, it was kinda weird that Jon had taken over the archives after Gertrude’s disappearance. He had paid attention to the gossip swirling the past month, but he didn’t expect to be at the center. It seems like the picture of nepotism, a bunch of researchers with no experience getting promoted to the archives. If you believe the note… No. Martin shook his head. His workplace was weird, but it’s not like Elias was feeding employees to some kind of dark force.