Chapter Text
XII
Jon doesn't want to talk about Tim, it turns out. Gerry doesn't press the subject, but he realizes as they go back to the flat that Jon's burrowing closer to him than usual. It may be a bit selfish to enjoy holding Jon close when he's only looking for comfort, but he can't bring himself to feel guilty at the spark of pride in his chest that comes from knowing Jon feels safe when pressed against his side.
"The offer still stands," Gerry says quietly as he sits on the sofa. "I could feed you, anytime you need it."
"That's not-" Jon drops on the seat next to him with a huff. "I don't want to use you. You- it's already bad enough that- that you can't leave this place if you want to."
"You know? I don't think I would." Gerry shrugs. "Not anymore."
The silence that falls over them after his words is heavy and tense, like a net about to break under the tension of their unsaid words.
"Was Tim right?" Jon asks after a moment. His voice has the bitter taste of nerves when it pours into him, and Gerry has a sinking feeling that he knows where this is heading, but that's miles away from knowing how he feels about it. He supposes he did want to have this conversation, but the timing is not... ideal. "Was that flir- is that what you were doing?"
Honesty has never failed him when it comes to Jon, Gerry decides, taking a deep breath to still whatever is stirring in his stomach. "I was. Thank you for noticing," he says. Then, after Jon's face goes carefully blank, "we should talk about it, shouldn't we?"
Jon grimaces. "I would rather we didn't."
"Huh. Okay, we don't have to. Can I- is there a reason why?" Gerry asks, ignoring the pang of pain at the refusal. It's not like he didn't know what he was getting into with this man that has been treated so unfairly by this world that he's wary to feel anything that is not fear and pain.
"Because-" Jon starts, stops, then starts again after a deep breath and a slow exhalation. "Because it took me three and a half years to figure out how I felt about Martin, and this- Gerry, how do we know this is not the Beholding making you think you feel-"
"Oh no," Gerry cuts in as irritation sparks in his stomach. "No. Jon, I'm a grown man. And a fairly smart one, if I do say so myself. Believe me when I say I know when the Beholding wants me to feel a certain way, and this is not one of those things."
Jon sputters a little, and Gerry shifts away on the sofa when he starts looking a little like a cornered animal. "But that- it makes no sense, why-"
"For God's sake- Jon, the stubbornness is part of the charm, but you make this very difficult." Gerry runs a hand down his face. Of course, of course this is Jon's thing, his need to believe everyone deserves better, except himself. "Listen. I'm not going to give you an itemized list, so go ahead and compel me if you don't believe me. I'm- I have feelings. For you."
And they say romance is dead.
Jon's mouth is hanging open, his breathing is shallow, and Gerry worries for a moment that he's going to have an actual panic attack over this. That would make this one of his most awkward love declarations, for sure.
"Gerry I- this is-"
"Look, it's alright." Gerry lifts a hand to stop him "I know how you feel about Martin, Jon. This is not- I'm not demanding anything from you."
"I know you're not," Jon mutters, his gaze dropping. "I know you wouldn't."
"Except... I guess I am demanding that you take my feelings seriously, because they're real." Gerry hunches over a little to look at Jon in the eye. "It doesn't matter what you do with them. Just- I don't regret this. I don't regret you."
"Yet," Jon says so lightly it might as well have been Gerry's imagination, if not for the fact that he knows perfectly well it's something Jon would think. "I need a moment."
Gerry nods slowly. "All the time you need."
He's expecting Jon to retreat into his bedroom, so he's understandably surprised when the man just... stays there, looking ahead at the blank screen of the TV as the seconds stretch on and on. Fine, this is... not awkward or uncomfortable at all. It occurs to Gerry at around the four minute mark that maybe he should leave instead, this is Jon's space after all. He wants to ask, but he did just say 'all the time you need', like an idiot and-
Slowly, clumsily, Jon's burn-smooth fingers tangle with Gerry's on the cushions. Oh.
"I- you said you know how I feel about Martin." Jon doesn't turn to face him, but Gerry figures it's alright.
"I do. If you ask me, it's a bit rude that no one's thought to ask me how I feel about Martin," Gerry says casually. Jon's face whips around like he's been slapped, and Gerry struggles to keep his face straight at Jon's puzzled frown.
"I thought..." Jon lets the thought trail off into a questioning silence, and Gerry shrugs again.
"Martin is... he loves you." That much is true, however you look at it. "That's enough for me to give him a chance. And you know? He's not half bad, when he's not being overly dramatic about me being at his flat uninvited."
Jon doesn't even seem to register the joke. His face is a study in changes so minimal Gerry probably wouldn't notice if he wasn't looking for them; as it is, he can see the confusion in Jon's eyes, read the slightest hint of fear in the way his lips purse tightly against each other.
"I'm saying you don't have to choose, Jon." Gerry says as calmly as he can. He's quite lucky he doesn't have a heart anymore, he decides. "I'm here, if you want me. Any way you want me."
Jon's face is looking steadily more and more flushed, but he doesn't seem to be panicking anymore, which is... good. "Is- I don't know if- is that really fair to you?"
"What? Sharing you?" Gerry asks, and Jon coughs nervously. "Talk to me?"
"I'm just- I don't often-" Jon runs his good hand through his hair with a sheepish, awkwardly pleased chuckle, and Gerry has the thought that if he wasn't completely gone for Jon already, this would be enough to do him in. "I don't think I've ever had anyone talk of it like-"
"Like you're something good that I would want to keep for myself?" Gerry's lips twitch into a smile when Jon's face flushes even more, and it's both endearing and sad, how even the delight at the confession is guarded and the slightest bit disbelieving. "Because you are. But who knows? You love Martin; we'll work something out, because Mister Sims, I am in love with you."
It's a thrill to say it, to see Jon's eyes widen the slightest bit, his lips twitching almost nervously into his usual lopsided smile. Gerry feels his stomach flip at the sight, and has the fleeting thought that he'd gladly spend the rest of his life saying those words again, if it elicits that reaction. Who knows? Perhaps the two of them will be enough to convince him they mean it, once they get Martin back.
"We should-" Jon clears his throat. "Should we be focusing on this? With everything else that's happening?" he asks, but he doesn't take his hand back and as far as Gerry's concerned, that's an invitation to continue the talk.
"I don't know. I think we should." Gerry runs his thumb over Jon's knuckles. He's learned a few things in his years of fighting entities, about the things that make you keep going when there is no light around you. "It's the small things, the... the normal things-"
"They give you a purpose," Jon breathes out slowly. He turns to look at Gerry then, his face veiled in a soft awe that almost looks like hope.
"They really do." Gerry whispers back. It's foreign, to be seen as a motive instead of a tool. Exciting. "I-"
"Can I kiss you?" Jon blurts out, and Gerry half chokes, half snorts on whatever he was going to say next. Jon's face is equal parts embarrassment and determination. "It's okay if-"
"No, I-" try as he may, Gerry can't hold back a delighted laugh. "I would like that very much, Jon."
Slowly, Jon's hands come to cup his face like they did some days ago at his office, when Gertrude mentioned- Gerry pushes the thought away, focusing instead on Jon's nervous face as he rises up in his knees, and he lets his eyes fall closed when Jon tilts his head to the side.
Jon's lips are warm and tentative in their advance, and if his voice was intoxicating, his touch is simply addictive. Gerry finds himself trailing after him when Jon pulls back, and his stomach does a flip at the pleased chuckle that comes from deep in Jon's throat as he concedes into a second kiss.
Gerry's tongue pokes out almost on reflex to wet at the chapped lips pressed against him, and Jon's mouth parts like the light caress had been a command, catching Gerry's lower lip between his.
When they part again, Jon's teeth catch and pull softly at the ring on Gerry's lip, and Gerry's eyes fly open as Jon retreats. They sit there in tense silence, until Gerry's eyebrows raise and he tilts his head, giving him an amused, questioning smile as he jangles the piercing with his tongue.
Jon's blush is almost luminous, and Gerry cackles as he goes to pull this ridiculous, perfect man into a hug, and perhaps -if he's lucky- a couple more kisses.
"...Huh." Melanie rips a few more strands of grass. "So he's back?"
"Seems like it. Just thought you should know, maybe tell Basira." Gerry shrugs beside her. It's nice to just lay down on the grass at the park and relax, now that their mysterious fires turned out to be a -somewhat- false alarm. "Jon compelled him, so I believe him when he says he's not here to hurt anyone, but I'm still going to keep an eye on him."
Melanie turns to look at him, and sure enough he's got an award-winning frown on his face. "Why? It's not like he can lie to Jon."
"Don't like him."
It takes a second, before the dots connect in Melanie's mind, and she sprinkles her handful of grass over him. "Was he mean to your boyfriend?" she asks with a teasing smile.
Gerry turns to her, unimpressed, and blows a strand of grass off his nose. "Actually, yes. But it's alright, we kissed a lot afterwards, and it was fine."
Melanie groans. "Say one more thing about that, and I'm going to go back to my stabbing days."
Gerry laughs, and Melanie feels her lips twitch into a smile. It's a nice day to not be afraid.
Jon's office is large enough, but it still feels uncomfortably cramped when Basira pulls Daisy and Melanie in, and Jon has the gall of looking questioningly up at them.
"I- what's this about?" Jon frowns, climbing to his feet.
"Sit. Down." Basira orders. Jon arches an eyebrow, but he complies with the order.
"Daisy?" he asks, and Basira feels her blood boil when Daisy just shrugs by her side.
"We found something, Jon." Daisy says almost softly. Basira punctuates it by slamming the tape recorder on the desk, and Jon flinches back.
"Ah," he says almost sadly, looking at the tape like a note left behind by someone long gone. "We'd been wondering where that would end up. Should've known."
"So you know what it is." Melanie comes closer to the desk with cautious steps, and Basira doesn't warn her to stand down because she can't for the life of her decide on what outcome she wants for this, not when something inside her pushes back against the indignation, against the knowledge that this is wrong, like a snake whispering that she too could reach for the offered fruit.
"That would be Jessica Tyrell's tape. Or rather... her statement," Jon mutters quietly. "About her meeting with the Archivist."
"Nice to know you at least remember her name." Basira crosses her arms, as the name flares up like a searchlight in her mind.
"I remember all of them." Jon sighs.
"What?" Basira slams her hands on the desk, and shakes off the hand Daisy lays on her shoulder.
Flanking Jon's side, Melanie rolls her eyes. "You're really not helping your case."
"I suppose I'm not," Jon says, nodding. "I'm not going to deny I hurt these people."
"So what? Are we supposed to just think it's alright because you're sorry?" Basira feels Daisy's hand come to rest at her shoulder again, firmer this time. "Just forget about it?"
"That is not what I'm saying." Jon gives her an impatient eyeroll, and Basira wants to strangle him. She's been working herself to the bone to keep everyone alive and human, and this idiot-
"How many?"
It takes him a moment, before he dares bringing up his eyes to meet hers. "Seven, counting Miss Tyrell."
"Jon..." Daisy whispers by Basira's side, sad and hurt, and Jon averts his eyes, before he starts again.
The first one, he says, was an accident. He was out for a smoke a few days before he had his revelation about Melanie, when he realized he'd forgotten his lighter. That rings a bell in Basira's mind; she knows he always carries the shiny silver zippo with the spiderweb design. He walked into a shop to purchase another, he says, and Basira forgets about it. That's what you do when you lose your lighter, it makes perfect sense. The man, he says, wasn't even scheduled to work that day; his coworker woke up with terrible cramps, and he offered to cover their shift. Jon asked him where the lighters were, and then he asked about the warehouse.
The second was a woman he found when he went to take a walk by the riverside, because he wasn't healing well after Melanie stabbed him.
"I thought you hated walking by the river, because of the smell." Daisy mutters, and another bell rings in Basira's mind.
"This is not my fault. Don't put the blame on me," Melanie says firmly, and the bell -if there ever was one- falls silent again as Jon nods in agreement.
The next three he sought on purpose, but they came to him almost like it was them who were hunting him instead. A woman whose phone slipped from her hands and split to pieces on the ground, when she desperately needed to make a call. A man whose son, who was supposed to meet him there, was delayed due to heavy traffic caused by an accident. The last of them, ironically enough, needed a lighter. If there are any alarms in Basira's mind, she doesn't hear them, because Jon says without the strength he got from these three, he would never have found Daisy in the coffin.
Jess Tyrell he found in a coffeeshop that he heard Martin mention years ago. She saw an ad for it on Facebook before going to bed, and decided on a whim to treat herself to lunch there the next day, even if it was out of the way for her. Basira stops to think it over for a moment, but she decides in the end that it makes sense Jon would seek solace in a place that reminds him of Martin.
The last one was a man asking for change at a corner, when Jon went out to purchase coffee because they were running out at his flat. He usually sat at a different corner, but that particular morning someone called the police about a pickpocket in the area, and he decided to move for the day, just to avoid talking to them. Jon had dropped a ten pound note in his cup, and handed him a store-bought sandwich before he asked about the scars on his face.
All through Jon's tale, Basira feels something prickling at her nape. It itches and tickles as it crawls just along the edge of her consciousness, where she can't swat at it, and she can't put her finger on just what it is, because she keeps getting distracted by the thought that Jon has been feeding on innocents right under her nose.
"I- turns out I won't have to do it anymore," Jon says, and Basira realizes he hasn't stopped talking.
Melanie arches an eyebrow. "Do you think that's why the Eye brought him? So you could feed from him?"
"As an emergency resource only, if I had to guess." Jon sighs. "The Eye would much rather I keep hunting."
"Well, you won't. It can't keep changing you if you don't let it." Basira says dryly. Jon's eyes, when they land on hers, are a bright, uncanny green. "Don't say-"
"I think you Know better now, Basira." It's not the words themselves, but the sadness in Jon's voice, what makes her recoil from the desk.
"Basir-"
Daisy's question goes unanswered, as Basira rushes out the door while her heart tries to beat a hole through her chest.
The door to Martin's office is not uncannily cold when Gerry pushes it open. That's a good sign, at least.
"Hey. I talked to-" Gerry's eyes catch a flare of movement and light, and he crouches to the ground almost on instinct.
"Tim!" Martin's horrified voice comes from somewhere to his right, along with his heavy steps and a sound like cloth slapping against wood.
Gerry looks up to find Martin patting off a smouldering patch on the wall, and he grunts. Of fucking course.
"What are you doing here?" Gerry asks as he rises to his feet again. Tim's hand is still stretched towards him, his eyes burning like an unattended fire.
"You're a bit confused." Tim climbs from his chair, and the temperature in the office rises even more. "What are you-"
"Could you two stop that?" Martin snaps. "Tim, sit down."
Gerry watches in amazement, as the man obeys with nothing more than a sullen, wary look.
"Why is he here?" the man asks, frowning.
"Because I asked him to be here." Martin rolls his eyes, and Gerry Knows with sudden, delighted certainty that Tim has no idea, that Martin hasn't told him about the Extinction or why he's isolating himself. "Gerry, what happened?"
"I talked to him," Gerry says, making sure to be as vague as possible. "We figured something out."
Martin nods. "About..."
"About a couple things." Gerry feels his lips curl into a smirk, as Tim is practically boiling on his chair. "I'll tell you more next time. But that's settled."
"That's... that's really good." Martin gives a relieved sigh, and he seems to regain a bit more color, before fixing him with a warm, relieved smile. "Thank you, Gerry."
"Anytime," Gerry smiles back. It has the added benefit of riding the room's temperature a few more degrees. "I'll see you later for the tapes. Alone, hopefully."
"Fuck off." Tim snarls, but Gerry's already closing the door behind him.
His smile fades almost immediately, and he leans back against the door. Watching out for Martin's humanity is already hard enough without the beacon of destruction and rage that is Timothy Stoker. What is he even doing at the Institute, wasn't he so desperate to leave and be free? It's-
"You must be Gerard Keay." It's not until the man speaks that Gerry even notices he's there, and that says more about who he is than the name the Eye whispers into his mind as he looks up into the face of the tall, grey-haired stranger. Fuck.
"Peter Lukas, I suppose." Gerry squares up, arching an eyebrow and reaching behind himself as discreetly as he can, until he can turn the doorknob and crack the door open. For all his girth and bulk, Lukas looks almost ethereal, like a faraway form you can barely make out through the fog before dawn, like the silhouettes sailors made into sea monsters and legend.
"Temporary Head of the Institute, yes." Lukas gives him a jovial smile. If he noticed the opening door, he makes no mention of it. Gerry hopes the fact that Lukas is practically looking through him means he's not paying attention to what he does. "It has come to my attention that you've been... intervening, in my assistant's training."
Well, there go his hopes of helping Martin unnoticed.
"I think Martin is plenty qualified already," Gerry says with a smirk. "No need to train him anymore," he adds loudly to cover the muffled scurrying inside the office.
"The Watcher gave you a second chance as a chewtoy for the Archivist, and I, unlike Elias, am under no obligation to tolerate your meddling." Lukas' smile remains, though it doesn't reach his eyes. "If you keep messing with my affairs-"
Gerry can't help it. He snorts. "What? You'll throw me into the Lonely?"
Lukas' eyes narrow in anger. "Well, aren't you cheeky."
"I am, thank you for noticing." Gerry snorts. "Believe me, Lukas, even if I had the slightest trace of respect left for you after working under Gertrude for years, your threats wouldn't work on me."
"If you think-"
"Actually, I Know. Try it if you want to waste your time, but you can't touch me." Gerry interrupts, his face growing serious. "I know exactly where my anchor is."
"I guess we'll see, won't we?" Lukas gives him a look of distaste. Gerry really hopes he managed to buy enough time for Martin to push his friend through a window or something, because he really would be risking a holiday in the Lonely, if Lukas gets any more riled up.
"I guess we will." Gerry pats the man on the shoulder as he passes, delighting in the way he almost seems to recoil from his touch. "Get fucked."
"So you finally talked?" Daisy asks. They're sitting against the corner of his office again, their backs to the wall and down on the floor to make the room look bigger than it is.
Jon leans his head on her shoulder, and she leans her head on his. "We did. Mostly about my feeding, but... other things too."
"That's good. He cares about you."
"Is Basira- how is she?" Jon asks. It had been a stupid thing to say, and now she hasn't talked to him in two days.
"She's- it's difficult, Jon," Daisy says with a sigh. "She doesn't want to admit she's- Basira's constant. She doesn't change and-"
"Well that's just boring, isn't it?" Helen says by Jon's other side. He feels Daisy flinch, but he Saw the moment the door appeared on the floor beside them, and so he's not surprised when it opens, and Helen leans her crossed arms over the edge, the tips of her fingers reaching far past the edges of the door. "To always be the same? Predictable."
"Some people like stability, Helen." Jon rolls his eyes, leaning over to take a peak at Helen's corridors. From this angle it's like looking into a well-furnished pitfall, and he sees Helen's body hanging into it, much longer than it ought to be. He also sees a shadow, bending a corner at a full run many, many miles inside Helen. "Did you eat someone?"
"Not someone." Helen smiles to the tips of her ears. "Not all of us can have a sweetheart that doubles as a snack cabinet, Jon."
He has the fleeting thought that he likes that she uses his name, when she called him Archivist before.
"Why did- hm." He stops himself before completing the question. It's about choice, he remembers. Or it should be. "I'd like to know why you gave them the tape."
Above him, Daisy nods approvingly. Jon snorts. Three monsters learning how to be civil to each other.
"Backup plan." Helen's shoulders shrug way over her head. "In case he wasn't enough to stop you."
"Very determined to save my humanity, I see."
"It seemed like the kind of thing you'd care about."
Jon sighs. "It is. You probably could've dropped it to Melanie instead, however. Basira has a lot on her plate, like Daisy said, with her changes. Not to mention she's still trying to find leads on the ritual for the Dark and-" Jon stops, when Daisy's breathing stops.
"She's what?" she asks, and only then does Jon catch on to the fading static, and the soft pressure of the Eye in his mind. Daisy straightens, and he closes his eyes to take a breath and let some more Knowledge come. Helen is looking curiously up at him, when he parts his eyelids again.
"At Ny-Alesünd. The cult of Mr. Pitch has their Dark Sun there, and- and she knew this," Jon lets out an irate laugh. "Of course she did."
He climbs to his feet, vaguely registering the sound of Helen's door closing and Daisy standing up to match him.
"Jon-" she calls, but he's already crossing the office and out the door.
Helen's door has reappeared by the side of Basira's cot, but she doesn't seem to have noticed, lost in her book as she is.
"I thought we were done with secrets." Jon comes to a halt a few feet before the cot, and Daisy advances some more, standing almost between them.
Basira turns the last page of her book, and turns up to look at them. "That's a conversation starter."
Daisy sighs, and Jon rolls his eyes. "Ny-Alesünd, Basira. The ritual. When were you going to tell us?" he asks. Something in his chest begins to loosen up, and he wonders if it's just the promise of more knowledge helping to calm his irritation.
Basira's face clears of confusion then, though it does close off a little more. "I was gathering intel," she says, and Jon has to restrain himself from asking if it was tasty, because he doesn't want a broken nose, not even for a few minutes. "How do you know about it?" Jon arches an eyebrow. "Ah."
"Elias told you?" Jon asks. The Eye didn't volunteer that, and without the freedom to feed -a freedom he doesn't want, he reminds himself- Jon didn't think it wise to force it.
"He mentioned it." Basirs gives a sharp, annoyed shrug. "I had to make sure he was-"
"Are we having another intervention?" a third voice asks.
"Welcome back, Melanie," Helen pokes out of her door to greet the newcomers, and Jon turns. The feeling of calm that blanketed over his annoyance makes a lot more sense now, even if Gerry -and Melanie by extension- is caked head to toe in dirt. "Found another one of your books?"
"Had to unbury it before we could burn it." Melanie shrugs. "What's this about?" she sounds calm, if slightly puzzled, and Jon feels a pang of relief run through him.
Violence still lurks under Melanie's skin like a bull confined to a pen, but she's controlled it, redirected it, and none of it is aimed at the people in this room, not even him.
Gerry comes to stand behind him, and his hand lands on Jon's shoulder as easily as breathing. "What's going on?"
Jon gives Basira a pointed look. "What's going on, Basira?"
"You know what, Jon?" Basira climbs to her feet and goes to take a step forward, when Daisy lays a hand on her arm to still her. "You're acting very self righteous about sincerity in your little 'team', for someone who felt like he had the right to hide that you were feeding on innocent people for months."
"It's not-" Jon sputters, only to be interrupted.
"Yeah, okay, but why didn't you tell me about whatever this is about?" Melanie asks, frowning. "Was that another one of your 'I'm the only one qualified enough' bullcrap, or are you only telling Daisy things now?"
Daisy's hand tenses, when Basira flinches at the accusation. "Who was she supposed to tell? She-"
"Daisy-" Jon goes to take a step forward, but Gerry's grip on his shoulder tightens and pulls at him, and he too can See the blood rising inside the woman. "Daisy. The quiet."
Daisy turns to him with a snarl, but her gaze does begin to soften, and the growl that was mixing with his own static starts fading back into her throat-
"Aw, it was just about to get interesting." Helen's breathy, echoing laughter washes over them all, and the Distortion doesn't even have the decency to flinch when they turn to glare at her.
"Helen-" Melanie starts, but Gerry lays his free hand on top of her head, and she huffs, crossing her arms.
"You're all really bad at this," Gerry observes.
"Oh, sure. Am I supposed to believe you and Gertrude had a healthy communication, and you ended in a book on accident?" Basira snaps. Gerry's hand flinches on his shoulder and Jon bristles, suddenly furious.
She can lob any and all accusations at Jon, he's earned her mistrust; but Gerry's just trying to help, and he won't allow-
"Jon." Daisy says simply. "The quiet."
It's only then that Jon realizes the static around them is almost deafening, and Gerry's grip has become bruising. Jon's body's pulled taut like a violin string, and his head aches like it will split, as he tries to focus on Daisy's words. Right. The- fighting won't fix anything, especially when Jon has the sneaking suspicion that he has the upper hand in here.
"Right." Jon says.
"Right." Gerry repeats, squeezing his shoulder once before softening his grip. "Yes, Gertrude lied to me. Look at how she ended. Look at how I ended. This is exactly what Elias wants, for you to be at each other's throat so he can go ahead with whatever it is he's planning."
"Don't think too much about it." Melanie mutters, and Jon feels a sudden wave of warmth for her, when she gives Gerry a worried frown.
"I'm not. Just... you don't have to like each other, or trust each other." Gerry trudges on. "But you have to work together, and you have to stop keeping secrets from each other. It's the only way."
It's... quiet, after his words.
Of course this would come from the man that gave so much for the cause that he ended up a shadow of himself
Eventually, Melanie scoffs, looking up at Gerry. "Some secrets, please?"
Gerry snorts. "Okay. Some secrets, if you're weak." He takes Melanie's punch to the ribs without flinching. "What is this about?"
"A ritual, apparently," Daisy mutters, giving Basira another, subtler worried look.
Gerry nods. "And where is it happening?"
"Ny-Alesünd," Basira and Jon say at the same time, and the static comes back for the briefest of moments.
"...Well count me out of that particular road trip, I have things to do here." Melanie cracks her neck, shaking Gerry's hand off her head. "But I'll, you know, keep the fort safe. Keep an eye on Martin. Which reminds me, shouldn't someone tell Martin?"
Gerry lets out something between a groan and a sigh. "I'll do that. You need someone with good reflexes, with his new guard dog."
Jon closes his eyes, tapping lightly at the pool of Knowledge behind the cracked door in his mind, until he finds the particular thoughts he's looking for. "Tim is actually going to go get them some food in about ten minutes, so if you'd like to wait, you're welcome at my office."
"I'd like that." He can hear Gerry's smile in his voice, but even that doesn't prepare him for the sight of it aimed down at him when he opens his eyes again, and warmth coils at the bottom of his stomach like a pleased cat under the sun.
"I'm out." Melanie groans somewhere behind Gerry, and gives his side another punch before stomping away.
Jon darts a look at Basira and Daisy, who seem to be having a whispered conversation of their own, before he reaches to grab Gerry's hand and pull at him. He comes along easily enough, and Jon leads them back to his office where something primal and monstrous whispers 'safe' at the back of his mind.
"You can take a seat, if you want." Jon gestures to the chair before his desk.
"I don't think I do, actually." Gerry leans a forearm on the wall above Jon's head, and bends to rest his forehead against Jon's.
"Are you coming with us? Up north," Jon asks, trying to ignore how everything in him is yearning for Gerry's mouth like a sinner longs for absolution.
This is still new and unknown, but Jon's learned pretty fast that Gerry enjoys teasing him, leaning in just enough that they could kiss if Jon pulled him down. Jon for his part, enjoys not giving into that. It works about fifty percent of the time, but they always do end up kissing.
"I told you." Gerry whispers against him, close enough that Jon feels the silvery ring graze against his lower lip. "You're not going into any more entities without me. Should've thought about your vacation plans before adopting a revenant."
Jon snorts, and leans up to plant a kiss on the corner of Gerry's lips. That's one lost battle, but he doesn't feel too bad. "I knew feeding you that one time was a bad idea."
Gerry kisses him back slowly, like he doesn't want to be done anytime soon, and Jon hooks an arm over the back of his neck to bring them closer together. Stopping a second apocalypse doesn't sound too bad or scary right now, not with Gerry in his arms and the promise of Martin in his mind.
"It's been ten minutes," Jon whispers, parting from the kiss slow and unwillingly, like waking up early in the morning. "Tim's gone now."
"Hm... I should go talk to Martin."
"You should." Jon exhales slowly, as Gerry pulls back from him. He's smiling, and Jon feels like he will burst, because this man that's suffered so much is happy to be here with him and he feels like he doesn't deserve how relieved that makes him.
"I'll go tell your crush you all decided to play nice, then." A spark of something mischievous gleams in Gerry's eyes, almost as thrilling as the kiss itself, and Jon prepares a long-suffering sigh- "Should I give him one of these from you? Just in case he misses you." -which promptly catches in his throat and comes out in a flustered cough.
"Get out of here!" Jon pushes at his shoulder, and Gerry cackles in delight as he closes the office door behind him, leaving Jon alone, red-faced and juggling an armload of embarrassing and confusing thoughts.