Chapter Text
15 minutes before Jon’s due to have his very first performance review with Tim, he’s crawling through WikiHow in a desperate attempt to figure out ‘how to give advice to someone older than you without sounding condescending?’ All it’s giving him, incidentally, are articles such as ‘ How to Deal with A Condescending Boss. ’ That’s concerning. He hopes Tim doesn’t share his sources.
He wouldn’t, though. Probably. Jon is a very good researcher.
Tim is too, of course. Jon’s always prided himself on his near obsessive work ethic when it came to cases–one that Tim just didn’t seem to share. Tim does normal people things, like make friends.
Once he’d expressed this to Sasha. Not that his research was objectively superior to Tim’s (Lord, she’d rat him out five seconds flat), but that “ha-ha, gotta love that #relatable moment when you focus on something so intently for six hours that you forgo all your bodily functions!” She didn’t exactly look at him blankly , but she very kindly and very gently asked him if he’d ever discussed ADHD with a doctor.
Jon had given her an out-of-character thumbs up.
Jon has no idea what ADHD is. Absolutely Delightful Human Dear? Whatever. It’s probably one of those ‘memes’ Tim was always roping everyone else into. Likely some ridiculous Twitter trend that involved hashtagging nonsensical acronyms. The other day during their lunch break, Martin announced that he was the “DUFF of the Archival Assistants” (whatever that was), and Tim and Sasha started refuting the declaration immediately.
Jon liked to watch Martin being berated as much as the next person, but he’d just retreated back into his lair the minute this debate started. See, he had very important work to catch up on. Like his personal research into red salamanders (Jon had been taking meticulous notes on the Plethodontidae family for the better part of a month now.) It was not something an ‘ADHD’ would do. Probably.
He’d been so lost in thought about salamanders that Jon notices it’s already 15:20. Shit. He hasn’t even memorized this article yet.
Tim shows up at 15:22, hand-wavingly punctual, with a bright, “How’ve you been, Boss?”
Jon puts on his glasses to disguise his unpreparedness, as if Clark Kent was also a sexy-in-a-librarian-rat kind of way. (And owned a glasses chain.) “You saw me this morning, Tim.”
Tim pulls out a chair and snorts. “Yeah, uh, that was a whole three hours ago! How could I possibly know what goes on in the secret life of Jonathan Sims?” He furrows his brow while plopping down (with the back of the chair facing Jon. Tim straddles the seat–naturally). “By the way…why did we see you running to the break room this morning?”
“Poor circulation. Now, if you’d like to get this over with?” Jon stares him down.
Tim just smiles back, amicable as ever. “Aye-aye Cap’n.”
Jon’s just about to pull up the color-coded spreadsheet he’d created so that these reviews went off without a hitch (he hadn’t started Martin’s yet, but he could probably draw it out on the extra piece of tea-stained, crumpled-up loose leaf lying under his desk) when Jon hears an unmistakable bzzt.
Tim raises his phone and immediately goes ashen. Suddenly, Tim stands up so fast that he knocks his chair down. He starts making a mad break for the door, eyes still glued to his home screen. In the process, he trips over the legs of his fallen chair. It doesn’t even slow him down–already halfway on the ground, Tim’s suddenly on all fours and bounding towards his escape like a rabid dog or wolf or something. He doesn’t even open the door with his hands , instead opting to headbutt the frosted glass with an entirely animalistic grunt.
As Tim tears out of his office, Jon doesn’t even get up from his desk. He just watches the whole scene unfold, his jaw hanging open.
The sound of laughter and screaming (???) startles Jon out of his paralysis. When he pokes his head out of his doorway, he sees that Tim is literally galloping towards the Archive bathrooms.
“Good Lord, Tim! What is the meaning of–”
Tim’s already turning the corner. “Sorry, Boss! There’s a SNORLAX! In the ARCHIVES!”
Okay. (A Snorlax?) That was…well.
Jon takes a deep breath and tries to regain his composure. Tim was guilty by reason of insanity, but…Jon stomps over to his assistant’s accomplices. Martin and Sasha are still sitting at their desks. Martin’s head is bowed–Jon can’t see his expression. Sasha looks him in the eye, face as placid as ever, but her lips are slightly pursed and her eyes are…watering?
This disrespect had gone on for far too long. “Why is there a ‘Snorlax’ in the Archives?!?!” He demands.
That’s what does it. Martin’s head falls into his keyboard, his shoulders vibrating with growing laughter. Sasha tries her best to hold it in, and fails: she lets out a loud wheeze and joins Martin in their mockery of Jon’s honor.
At that exact moment, the sound of a stampede comes from the ceiling.
There's a pause, and then the floodgates open.
Everyone, everyone, is running unencumbered into the archives. They hold their phones in front of them like beacons, a crazed, manic look in their eyes.
Jon's a little disturbed. This must be what it's like to watch himself in his element. He watches Rosie and David and Sonja and Arden and John A. John X. and John D. and John H. and Michael L. and Michael S. and Michael C. and Michael P. and a bunch of other people he doesn't know. Interrupting his workday! God forbid. They start wandering in between shelves, tripping over loose statements on the ground, and--my God, did Emma just get a staple in her foot?
Sigh...Maybe Jon's flights of fancy and general behaviors do have an affect on those who surround him. Maybe they can be as disruptive as...this.
A disembodied voice comes from the bathrooms. “Guys, guys! I caught it!!!”