Chapter Text
It was an ordinary day when Martin found out that his boss—the boss whom he was admittedly crushing on quite heavily—was homophobic.
Really, he had thought everything was going to be rather boring. He didn't wake up late, he didn't wake up early. His shower was short and lukewarm. His breakfast tea was okay—not bad, not good, just okay. The tube had just the average amount of people, and Rosie gave him a politer nod when he entered, just like she did everyday.
Then he ran into Jon. Quite literally.
"—oh my god, I'm so sorry, are you—Jon?"
Sprawled on the floor, Jon sighed, "Yes, I am, in fact Jon."
It took Martin a second to understand that that was an attempt at a joke—and he couldn't help the extremely loud laughter that escaped him. Jon winced, though, and Martin realised that sounded like a pity laugh—even though it had been completely genuine. The joke might not have been funny enough to deserve it, but Jon joking was a novelty in on itself.
Something else that was a novelty was Jon not shouting at him for making mistakes. Martin might have thought that meant he was in a better mood than usual, but—well, Jon just seemed very, very tired.
"Are you okay, Jon?"
Martin realised the absurdity of asking that, considering they were still sprawled on the floor in the doorway to the archives, but now that the question was out there, he genuinely wanted to know.
Jon, seemingly content on the floor, waved his hand, "Yes Martin, I'm fi—"
He froze.
The silence that followed was the awkward-est silence Martin had ever had the honour of being part of. After a few seconds, he resisted the urge to check his watch—well, his phone—and followed Jon's line of sight.
It seemed like he was staring at Martin's T-shirt.
Martin's T-shirt was nothing special. It was old and tatty and he had got it at the only Mechs concert he had ever attended—along with about seven other pieces of merch. Only three of those were T-shirts though, and he didn't quite make it a habit to wear them to work.
Okay, that was a lie. Martin pretty much exclusively wore soft T-shirts to work, and the Mechs were his favourite band. He still thought it was better than Tim exclusively wearing Hawaiian Shirts to work and Sasha exclusively wearing neon socks and shoes. At least his clothes had practical purpose beside pissing off authority.
God, he hoped Jon didn't dresscode him.
The good minute it had taken his spiel, Jon had continued staring at his shirt. Martin tugged the hem, self-conscious. He hoped the rather large tear wasn't visible.
"Um, is-is there something on my shirt?"
That seemed to do the trick. Jon's gaze snapped up, his expression twisting into something Martin couldn't quite figure out.
Before he could say anything—or try to guess what Jon was thinking—Jon said—blurted out, really, "That band is horrible."
Martin blinked. His emotions speedran through relief, then confusion, and finally settling on offence.
"Excuse me?"
Jon looked like he would pay the ground to swallow him.
"I—I mean," he stammered. Martin just stared at him and he looked more mortified by the moment.
Jon seemed to visibly shake himself, schooling his experience into what Martin thought was supposed to be professionalism.
"Right," Jon said, "start with the Flynn file. You're late already."
And before Martin could tell him he was decidedly not late, he was already walking away.
That, Martin decided, was weirder than if Jon had dress-coded him.
"No, Georgie, you don't understand," Jon hissed into the phone. "This is a complete disaster."
On the other end, Georgie was sti too busy laughing to respond.
"Georgie," Jon groaned.
"You," she gasped through the laughter, "You told him your own band is horrible. Oh my god."
She dissolved into wheezing laughter once again.
"I cannot have him find out about Jonny D'ville, Georgie." Jon was hissing again.
"I'd say," Georgie managed through the wheezing, "I'd say it's much too late for that."
Try as he might, Martin couldn't quite get the interaction with Jon out of his mind.
It wasn't even that he was offended—which, don't get him wrong, he was. He loved the Mechs with all his heart, and was harbouring somewhat of a crush on Jonny D'ville since, well, since forever, but especially since he had punched someone from the audience for intentionally misgendering Toy Soldier.
(At least no one could accuse him of having a type, what with how different Jon and Jonny were.)
It was just that it had been so bizzare.
"Hey Tim?" Martin ventured.
"Marto Kart." Tim acknowledged without looking up from his computer.
"Do you," Martin paused. Tim finally looked up, curious. Martin tried again, "Do you know if Jon has something against Concept Albums or something?"
Tim blinked.
"That's a weirdly specific question," he said, "and also one of the only things I somehow happened to know about Jon. He absolutely loves them. It's one of the only times I've seen him break from," he made air-quotes here, " 'professionalism'. His eyes light up and everything."
"Huh," Martin said. That was very, very weird.
"Why do you ask?" Tim inquired.
"No, it's just," Martin hesitated, wondering if he should tell Tim. Well, he thought, why not. Two heads and all that. "We bumped into each other this morning," Tim snorted, and Martin decided to ignore him, "and out of nowhere—no, seriously, I didn't even ask him—he looked at my T-shirt and went, that band is horrible."
Tim snorted again, this time at his impression of Jon, but his eyebrows were raised.
"That's the space pirate band you love, isn't it? You sure he didn't say something like, I cannot be bothered with frivolous things like music in a professional setting or something?"
"See," Martin said, "that won't be as confusing. That's in-character."
"Huh," Tim said.
It was later that day when Jon came out of his office to hand them statements that the real bombshell dropped.
Sasha's input, Tim had suggested, would be very helpful, considering she had known Jon the longest and was somewhat friends with him given them co-heading of the archives, but she had not yet come back from the week-long, well-deserved vacation she was taking.
(They all knew Sasha was more qualified than Jon for the job and she should have been the only head archivist, but the only time Tim brought it up, she had grinned and said, "Are you kidding me? I get the same pay with half the work," and the tension had receeded from Jon's shoulders.)
So they made do on their own, coming up with theories and then ultimately talking about the statements and their general creepiness until Jon came out of the office to dump even more work on them.
"We need another assistant," Tim groaned as Jon handed them both three more statements for follow-up on top of the ones they already had, "there's only so much about gay porn I can research before I want to gouge my eyes out."
"Ah," Jon muttered, "don't remind me of that statement."
And something about the way he said it—he could see Tim tense as he felt a bit cold.
"Why," Tim said with what Martin could see was forced nonchalance, "is there something wrong with gay porn?"
But well. Jon had always been bad at reading social cues.
His nose wrinkled in what Martin was sure was disgust as he said, "I'm just not into that."
Then, not letting Tim or Martin react, he waved his hand, "Enough about my personal life. Get back to work."
He disappeared into his and Sasha's office.
Martin still felt a bit cold as Tim turned to him with a grim expression, "Doesn't your space pirate band tend to have queer story lines?"
Yes. Yes it did.
"Oh," Martin said, "He's homophobic."
This time, Jon honestly did not know what he had done wrong.
Usually, when he pissed people off, he had some inkling of what had happened or where he had pushed them too much. He still usually tended to stand firm with his opinions, but at least he knew.
But this time, he had no idea way Tim was suddenly being frigid or why Martin wouldn't meet his eyes.
"And you didn't accidentally imply that all their opinions are wrong and they should chuck themselves into a volcano?"
"No, Georgie," he groaned, "that was one time. None of my co-workers are flat-earthers." He paused, "Actually, Tim gives me a slight flat-earther vibe, but we haven't discussed it yet."
"So you don't remember being rude to them that day at all?"
"Well," he said, "I did tell Martin the Mechs were horrible that morning, but he seemed to be fine after, if a but confused." Georgie snorted, but Jon ignnored her as he tried to think what had changed after, "It was only when—oh."
"What?" Georgie said, "Did you suddenly remember that you actually did tell one of them to jump into a volcano?"
"No, I—" Jon swallowed. He hadn't thought…
Georgie seemed to sense the change in his demeanor. She stopped petting The Admiral and said, "Jon?"
"Well," Jon said, clearing his throat, "I had given them statements to work on that evening, and one of the statements was annoyingly sexual and made me a bit uncomfortable. Tim mentioned it, and I said I was, uh. I was not into that. That's the last amiable conversation I remember with them."
Georgie's mouth tightened as Jon felt slightly nauseous.
Someone knocked on the door. Georgie deposited The Admiral in Jon's lap as she went to open the door. He heard Georgie greet Melanie, and then, as they made their way to the Living Room, Melanie anounce, "I got tiramisu from the shop with the steps."
Georgie sighed, "We might need more alcohol. Apparently, Jon's co-workers are aphobic."