Work Text:
Jon hadn’t had time to really consider his actions before he’d gone straight into the Buried. He was more of an “ask completely unrelated questions, shoot, and then ask the relevant questions later” kind of guy. He’d wanted to get straight to saving Daisy, which meant he had to wait on exploring the existential horror of being able to just look at his own rib.
But oh, he certainly was exploring that feeling now.
It was very clean, he could appreciate. There had been no, uh, bodily fluids or detritus on it. Jared was very good at what he did, you had to hand it to him, even if what he did was reach into the bodies of others to steal their organs and reabsorb them into himself. If you’re going to have a skill you might as well hone it, Jon supposes.
The rib is smooth. Pale. Got a nice curvature to it, interesting to look at.
Describing it physically doesn’t really convey the way it feels to be looking at it, your own perfectly removed and intact bone, like a sneak peek at what it’ll be like when you’ve donated your body to science and your real human remains are in some high school anatomy class for the kids to be freaked out by, until the shock wears off and they think it’s funny to put you in a Hawaiian shirt and sunglasses.
Jon’s not a fan.
He is staring at the rib, considering writing into his will that he is cremated and scattered at sea after his death, just to ensure that no one ever sees him once he can’t see them, when there is a knock on the door. The handle immediately starts turning.
Jon’s eyes snap up as Tim walks in.
“Hey, boss, I was wondering-”
Jon’s eyes snap instinctually, nervously, back to the rib, and then up at Tim again.
Tim has seen the rib.
Jon scrambles forward in his seat, grabs the rib and stuffs it unceremoniously into one of his drawers. He’s pretty sure it’s the one with the spare paper, but he doesn’t look as he slams it shut much too loudly and shifts forward in his chair, elbows on his desk and fingers steepled beneath his chin as though he had been sitting like that the whole time.
He adjusts a paper. Looks up at Tim, whose mouth is still hanging slightly open, but the ends are curving upward and oh no, that won’t do.
“You wanted something, Tim?” Jon radiates innocence. He has never done anything overly strange in his life, Tim, so don’t even suggest it and don’t start making a big deal out of things.
Tim (and Jon knew, of course he knew, that this wouldn’t work just let him wish) is not so easily deterred, and that upturning of his mouth is turning very much into what could be called a smile. “Just wondering what you’re up to.”
“That’s no reason to interrupt me, Tim, for all you know I could have been reading a statement,” Jon says.
“But obviously you’re not, so let’s chat,” Tim replies, and he walks in and sits across from Jon as though he owns the place.
“I’d rather like to get back to my work, thank you-”
“Is that what you’d call that? Staring at your liberated rib with dead eyes? I know the work we do here is creepy, but I mean that’s taking it to the level of ghoulish.” Tim wiggles his fingers on that last bit, and oh he’s getting a kick out of this, the prick.
“I was… studying it. It’s the best example we have of how Jared Hopworth’s ability works. By all rights, it’s an artifact,” Jon counters and tries very hard to not let on that he had come up with that idea on the spot.
“Well, then, I may as well take that off your hands. Bring it down to artifact storage for you.” And really, does he have to say it so smugly?
“No, that’s- that’s quite alright Tim, thank you for the offer, but I’d like to examine it a bit longer myself.”
Jon and Tim stare at each other across the desk, Tim suppressing smug glee and Jon suppressing indignant rage, and neither doing it particularly well.
“Was there something else you wanted?” Jon asks (challenges) after a moment.
“Yeah, actually,” Tim answers airily, as if he’s pondering the question, and Jon knows that whatever teasing thing he is about to say is something that has been on his mind for a good while. “I was just wondering if the rumors were true.”
“And what rumors would those be?” Jon asks dryly, playing Tim’s game in hopes that he’ll leave him be.
“You were a bit alternative in college, right? You were in a band and all that?” Jon nods shortly and vows that he will never make a friend or tell anyone anything ever again.
Tim grins, a sadistic gleam in his eye and here it comes, the punchline at Jon’s expense:
“So I’m sure you know about the whole Marilyn Manson thing.”
Daisy and Bassira do not find out until later why they see Jon chasing Tim, Tim cackling and crying out “No shame Jon, I’d do it too if I were you!” and “I just figured you would have tried it by now, curiosity is your whole thing!” as Jon threatens “firing” and “murdering” and “sending the next artifact we get over to your house and letting you find out what it does.”
Jon vows to start locking his office door after that.