Chapter Text
Every culture of note has its dragons. From the fire-breathing behemoths of Western legends to the wise and benevolent serpents of the East, dragons captivate our imaginations and haunt our collective dreams. But why is it that civilizations separated by oceans and millennia share such similar stories of these fantastical creatures? Is it merely a coincidence, a shared quirk of human imagination? Or perhaps, just perhaps, there is a layer of truth to these ancient tales—a hidden reality that has been lost to time…
—
The Eye stared down, vast and unblinking, a cosmic iris absorbing all it surveyed. Jon, standing alone in an expanse that seemed to stretch infinitely, gazed up at it with rapturous horror. The emotion was a contradictory blend—nourishing in its revelation, yet tormenting in its intensity. The Eye was endless, eternal, always Watching. There was no escape from its gaze. It was omnipresent, the source of all Sight, offering no answers, only observation.
Jonathan Sims, unable to bear the weight of such scrutiny, fell to his knees. A guttural howl erupted from him, a sound of primal agony and ecstasy. Beneath his skin, he felt things skittering, as if his very flesh had become a battleground for unseen horrors. His spine ached with a deep, resonant pain, as if it were being pulled and twisted by unseen forces. His head throbbed, a relentless pounding that drowned out coherent thought, leaving only static and the oppressive, suffocating sensation of being Seen.
His scream choked off into silence as his vocal cords failed him. Instead, there was only the buzzing of static and the overwhelming flood of Sight, a sensory overload that seemed to tear at the very fabric of his being. He collapsed fully now, his body convulsing, feeling his neck and back stretch unnaturally. Every nerve ending screamed with a pain that was almost holy in its intensity. Something was terribly, terribly wrong.
Desperation clawed at him, and he reached upward, his fingers elongating grotesquely, nails curving into talons as he tried to clutch the ever-Watching Eye from the sky. He wanted to tear it away, to rip it from the heavens and end the ceaseless flood of knowledge that was pouring into him, drowning him.
The torrent of information was unending, a door flung wide open, letting the flood spill in and consume him. It reached his neck, his mouth opening to scream only to release bubbles, his voice swallowed by the deluge. He felt himself sinking, the ground giving way to an abyssal depth, the light of the Eye dimming as he was plunged into the cold, dark depths.
He sank further, the pressure building, compressing him from all sides. The light faded, the omniscient glow of the Eye receding into darkness. He was drowning, not in water, but in knowledge, in Sight, in the unbearable weight of the universe's gaze. His body went limp, the last of his breath escaping as bubbles that drifted upward, toward a surface he could no longer see. The darkness closed in, final and absolute.
(Art by dcartcorner on tumblr)
—
Jonathan Sims woke up in a cold sweat. The nightmares were nothing unfamiliar, not untrodden ground. He was used to witnessing the horrors of his victims, but this was different, this was new. This was his own nightmare, and instead of being relieved, he could only feel a pressing sense of doom.
He scrubbed at his eyes, wet and crusty, again, not unfamiliar. However, the ache in his back was a relatively new friend. He just needed to get down to the kitchen or at least the living room. He couldn’t be in bed all day, not again, he just couldn’t. Wasn’t a 6 month coma long enough? Thank you very much, he’d done enough sleeping for a while.
As he attempted to move, though… sharp pinpricks of pain danced through his ribs and the middle of his back. He bit back a scream as tears formed in his eyes.
A new day had just begun and it was already ruined.
Once again, Jon had ended up staying in Georgie’s apartment. At least, this time it wasn’t his choice, not completely: apparently a months-long coma is completely able to destroy one’s muscular mass and bone structure, because as he woke up, Jon was completely unable to stand on his own.
And as a cherry on top, if everything else wasn’t enough, Jon’s landlord had evicted him from his flat.
Basira hadn’t cared, and Martin wasn’t around. Thankfully, Georgie offered to take care of him once it was clear he needed help, making two things clear from the get go. First, Jon needed to take care of his physical health and stay motivated for physical therapy. She had no intention to be his nurse. Second, he was on thin ice: just the fact he managed to survive without a heartbeat for months was a medical miracle, but any more signs of unnatural creepiness and he was out the door. It was a similar conversation that they had had many years before, back in Oxford, albeit under different circumstances. She was firm then, and perhaps even firmer now. Multiple trips to A&E after a 6 month monstrous coma were very different from a social anxiety disorder, after all…
Jon agreed to the conditions and so ended up dealing with a lot of pain in his back and getting used to walking again after 6 months, but at least he wasn’t alone.
—
Georgie cared about Jon, she did. She also cared about her own wellbeing and, well, her apartment had already been broken into once by creatures who wouldn’t think twice about killing her, so she felt completely justified in her wariness.
Still, despite her threats, she wasn’t ready to throw Jon—a Jon who’d gotten painfully thin and dealing with chronic pain—out of the door.
That morning, she had woken up early and was hoping to talk with Jon about trying to take a short walk outside for once, when she heard the muffled scream of pain. Maybe she was unable to fear the worst, but this worried her: he visibly hurt and ached every day but tried to pretend everything was ok, to the point of driving her nuts. To hear him scream, and call for help, meant that the pain really got to the point where he couldn’t pretend anymore.
She hurried to the bedroom Jon was occupying, holding the muscle stimulator the physiotherapist had given to them. Nothing worked quite like it, since pain relievers didn’t seem to do enough anymore. To be honest nothing did.
“Here” She handed the device over to him gently and helped him attach the electrodes to his back.
She saw it in his eyes: Jon could’ve cried with relief right there, if he hadn’t been so stubbornly proud.
“Mx Barker what could I have done without you?” He smiled instead, sighing shakily.
She didn’t reply, instead she helped him undress and stick the device to the middle of his back. Allowing some time for the electric pulses to do their work, she allowed him to settle down before talking. “Another bad one?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.” He sighed. “You’d think that spending 6 months lying on a bed wouldn’t give you such back problems.” He groaned dramatically.
Georgie rolls her eyes. “I'm no doctor, but, well, that sounds more reasonable than not having a heartbeat for 6 months.“ Jon couldn’t help but laugh at that remark.
She grimaced, not having meant to be funny.
“Too soon?” He offered a small smile.
Georgie considered her next words carefully. “Jon I care about you, I don’t want anything to happen to you. But, I just want you to take care of yourself more. This can’t be a hard thing to ask for from you.”
He frowned, seeming to take in her words. How could it be that after his miraculous recovery, he was only getting worse? Georgie really hoped it was a matter of willpower.
She didn’t want to think about the alternative options.
—
Later that day, after a painful but invigorating walk to the park, Jon elected to run the water in the bathroom for a nice, hot, and most importantly long bath, good to work out the ever growing aches and pains he had long since accepted to face daily. He eased himself in and settled into the liquid embrace of relief. Georgie had even let him use some of her candles to make the room smell warm and inviting.
He let himself soak for a while, staring at the ceiling and letting his thoughts wander. That dream… It had been a while since he had dreams of his own, and even that one felt so vivid, so real. Maybe the Eye was trying to tell him something?
The water was lukewarm when he finally got himself out and dried himself off, the heat had worked wonders for his aches and he sighed with contentment. He picked up the comb and started to detangle his wavy curls. He could almost believe that life was going to be alright, after all, that he was healing, as much as he could. As he dressed himself up, though, he noticed something weird. He stopped for a moment to take a good look at himself in the mirror, at the now familiar but not less awful canvas of scars across his body, but something felt wrong. Were those… bumps? Cysts maybe? He ran his hand over them, on his arms and legs and chest. They were solid but had a… squish to them. He shivered with involuntary revulsion. He went through his limited closet and found a sweater with long sleeves, that would do the trick for a while.
At least he had a scheduled doctor’s appointment the next day, to check up on his recovery. Better sort this out sooner than later..
—
Disappointingly, but expectedly, the doctor was not very helpful and slightly dismissive of Jon’s case. He understood, of course, but it didn’t stop him from getting more than a little annoyed.
“Must be psoriasis,” they said nonchalantly when Jon mentioned the bumps. “I will send some medicated creams to your pharmacist, follow up in about two weeks so we can re-evaluate.” They didn’t even look Jon in the eye.
“Thanks.” Jon mumbled. He would try the creams, but to be honest with himself, he didn’t think he would have the time to follow up. He was already planning to go back to work, and the archives were probably a mess after his long absence.,
“Keep an eye on the bumps,” the doctor continued, “they could be lipomas. Harmless really, but take notes if anything changes and bring it up at your next appointment.”
Jon wanted to scoff, this was ridiculous. He rolled his eyes, about to reply with a scathing remark when he remembered Georgie’s words as she dropped him by the doctor’s office. Be nice to people. Jon sighed, forcing himself to give the doctor an insincere but polite smile.
“Thank you doctor.” He droned, trying not to be too irritable.
—
“So, how’d it go?” Georgie looked him over when he got back home. Taking the tube on his own had been a small victory, but he felt exhausted. Thankfully, The Admiral jumped off her lap to greet him, an ever present small joy in his life.
He sighed, realizing she was still waiting for an answer. “Waste of time honestly. Just to keep an eye on it and follow up and take some stupid cream.” He sat down heavily next to her.
“Are you going to try it?”
“Sure. But I don't think it will work.”
“How so?”
“Just a feeling.”
—
That night, before bed, Jon inspected the bumps again, and resigned to try the meds.
The cream was cold and made his skin crawl, too close to the lotion and treatment Nikola had inflicted on him to be comfortable. And just to add insult to injury, it soon made the itching worse and not to mention his skin oily. Just his luck, he shuddered under the duvet, trying not to think of plastic hands and thick ropes.