#really intense

ELIAS FUCKING BOUCHARD

The more horrifying stuff Elias does, the more attractive my mental picture of him gets.  I went from “ah, a bureaucrat” to “ah, a snack in a suit” remarkably fast when he started going full Omniscient Heartless Horror on his employees.  I have literally nothing to say in my own defense.  This is particularly upsetting to me because, having had incredibly over-involved bosses with control of the CCTV cameras, I profoundly sympathize with Melanie’s desire to rip his fucking throat out.

Oh, also, I know everyone is into Elias as In Charge Of Everything, but this popped fully formed into my head last night and I don’t know where I’d put it or what I’d do with it or what fic it’s destined to be attached to, but I DO know I’m very serious about it.

Jon is--he is so angry, and it’s his own anger and it’s the Archivist’s anger and it’s the anger of a thing that is created to Know and is being denied Knowledge, and so he storms forward and snarls, “What is your goal here, Elias?”  

The compulsion is usually no more than a prickle, painless, almost unnoticeable, but now it rips its way out of his throat like Jon is speaking lightning.  He is sick of this, Jon will not be lied to, the Archivist will not be put off--

Elias closes his eyes as the compulsion hits him, a smile shaping his lips as he lets out a short breath, almost startled, and Jon Knows that he loves this.  Jon Knows, all-consuming and too immediate to look away, that Elias loves their awful god true and pure, loves Jon with the adoration of a priest about to slit his own throat on an altar, and when Jon is like this, tearing the truth out of Elias’ blood and bones, Elias loves the feeling of being flayed open by the true pupil of the Eye.  

“The goal,” Elias hums, opening his eyes.  Jon stares back, meets Elias’ eyes fearlessly, and Knows that Elias is looking nowhere else.  Elias is staring into Jon’s eyes, into the eternal black of the pupil, and feeling like he could kneel under the Archivist’s merciless gaze forever.  Elias is the priest of a mad god and Jon is altar and congregation and messiah all rolled into one, and Elias wants to hit his knees and live here.

Jon Knows it.

“The goal is simple, Jon,” Elias says, still smiling that smile, half his usual collected calm, half something not unlike bliss.  “You gain power.  You serve the Eye.  And I serve you.”  A pause, and Elias lets out a breath, almost a sigh, as if he’s testing Jon’s compulsion, seeing if he’s quite free yet.  Then: “Forever,” he adds, and the compulsion snaps.

MARTIN FUCKING BLACKWOOD

Martin burning the statements was a fucking power move of a distraction and honestly I adore him.  Like, I would like to be on record that I think Martin is one of the bravest motherfuckers in this entire show, to bait Elias like that even though he knows what Elias is going to do to him.  That shit fractured Melanie on a pretty extreme level and Martin volunteered.  I’d better not hear any of you chucklefucks talking shit about my boy, he might be scared a lot (Martin’s part of Testament was fucking...good...I understand that this is a horror podcast and that therefore everyone is going to be miserable a lot, but please let Martin and Jon know a little fucking support from each other) but he has nerves of steel and I’m proud of him.

TIM AND BASIRA AND DAISY

I lumped them all together because I have similar shades of feeling about the tragedy of it all.  Tim who’s been living a long, slow self-destruct ever since s1, and whose last words to Jon are “I don’t forgive you--but thank you,” and if you don’t think I believe that the Eye shows that to Jon when it’s looking to keep him in line, you don’t know me very well, my friend.  Basira, who wanted out of this, who wanted to be free of this, who so very nearly fought her way out of the Unknowing with pure grit and willpower, and who is going to be trapped and marked by this nightmare she wanted out of forever, until the day that willpower finally meets something it can’t fight.  And Daisy, my vicious love, hunter and killer and wild thing so barely tamed to Elias’ orders, even with Basira like a choke collar around her neck, who is trapped at the bottom of that fucking coffin.  I’ve never heard of something so utterly antithetical to a person’s soul.

MELANIE FUCKING KING

I know Melanie eventually ends up...shall we say, aligned with the Slaughter, which I assume is a natural consequence of being shot by a ghost.  I understand that this is, objectively, a bad thing, but honestly the Slaughter is fucking fascinating to me and I would love to see her have some long term effects there.  The Slaughter soldiers who broke the previous Unknowing are so well described, in all the chaos and the not-knowing and the unfamiliar, the line He was a soldier and he was nothing but a soldier; his blades were blades and forged for killing and his mouth was a mouth and made to order death hits like...comfort?  It’s VERY good, there’s something in my queue about my obscure headcanons re: Melanie and the Slaughter.  I love Melanie at her most furious, snarling into a tape recorder about how the only thing to do with a person like Elias is kill him with her bare hands.  In fact I love a lot of things about Melanie, including that she was apparently ready to throw the fuck down with anyone, anywhere, even before she got hooked into an IV drip of pure rampant violence, but that’s just the thing that’s at the top of my list right now.

THE FUCKING EYE