Prompt Post: The Magnus Archives #1

[gertrude_robinson]

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PROMPT: Michael/Peter, Memory, Manipulation

[(Anonymous)]

Michael remembers Peter Lukas. It remembers that Peter Lukas took Michael Shelley on his way, that he was the pilot of the vessel that led him to his doom. It remembers the Peter Lukas that did not look at Michael, barely saw him, and the Michael that - desperate, at times, to talk to someone that SAW him, and not someone who looked through him, increasingly saw him as a sacrifice already made - walked after him, sometimes, and hovered desperately in his presence.

Peter Lukas rather liked Michael Shelley - a very lonely boy.

The Spiral is not lonely. It cannot be, should not be - it should not be human enough to be lonely. Perhaps that is why Peter smiles when it sees it, reaches out and touches its face with a cold, solid hand.

Is that why it aches when Peter Lukas then walks away?

Fill: Michael/Peter, Memory, Manipulation

[(Anonymous)]

I have had this prompt in my WIP folder since February, and finally, I have it written. This is also posted on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25552387

---

Doubt breeds well in loneliness. You invent figments to bring yourself comfort, and when those are stolen away, you’re left alone with a mind you can no longer trust. In short, Michael is rather fond of the Forsaken— as much as it can be fond of anything.

Now, of course, it knows the truth of the sea captain who had sailed the Archivist and her sacrifice to an island that has never existed. It knows that he fed on poor Michael Shelley, so desperate for approval that he would soak up any company that didn’t immediately dismiss him.

Perhaps it would make sense for Michael to hold a grudge, but it doesn’t. They all have their natures, and Peter Lukas was simply following his — to offer just enough friendship that, when it was revoked, it left Michael Shelley bereft. Loneliness made the task that Gertrude set seem all the more approachable, Michael recalls.

It clicks its tongue, though no one is around to observe the act, and steps outside of itself.

The door has been standing in a corridor of the Magnus Institute for several hours now. It isn’t a comfortable sensation, and requires significantly more effort than Michael would prefer, but sometimes it falls into the old habits of observation. Stepping down the corridor, it listens for the voice that lured him here to begin with.

By the sounds of it, Peter Lukas is arguing with the head of the Institute. He sounds very young in comparison to the Watcher’s devotee, all brashness and open irritation. If Michael had the time, it would be fascinating to dissect the weaknesses present in that exchange — all the little vulnerabilities in the relationship between the Eye and the Lonely.

A shame, really, that Michael is so terribly impatient.

When Peter Lukas steps into the corridor at last, his eyes move over Michael as though it isn’t even there. He only turns to look when Michael reaches out and wraps its fingers around his arm, fingers tearing through the thick fabric of his coat.

“Captain Lukas.” The words fall from its mouth almost involuntarily.

It cannot feel loneliness, but sometimes it thinks it remembers how it must have felt — all choked up and helpless. Michael can’t say it enjoys the idea at all.
Peter Lukas grins. It is, on the face of it, a pleasant expression; it even reaches his eyes.

“Can I help you?”

“… No, I don’t think so.”

Michael uncurls one finger at a time from his arm. Peter Lukas’ brow furrows in mild displeasure as he examines the wreck that Michael has made of his coat, but he doesn’t comment. His footsteps are dull as he steps down the corridor, and out of sight— into a citrus-yellow door.

Hm. Michael hadn’t anticipated that.

With more hesitance than it would prefer, it steps into itself, and finds its corridors filled with fog. Obfuscation, and not in a way Michael enjoys. As it walks onwards, it has to steady itself on the walls, gouging thin lines of paint and paper into spiralling curls that fall to the floor.

Several times, it has to acknowledge its own reflection, how blandly human it looks. Michael Shelley’s smiling face stares back at him, and Michael knows how intimately it has been disconnected from others of its ilk. No hand of the Spiral would dare to blanket themselves in identity, no matter how unwillingly. But Michael could not concede to death, and so it is alone.

It cackles at that. For all that Michael cannot feel loneliness, it is doing an admirable job of parodying it.

“Is this supposed to intimidate me?” Michael calls, voice fading into the mist.

The flickering lights that line the corridor cast an amber hue through the Lonely’s attempts at concealment. If it weren’t for Michael’s hand resting on the wall, it might think it were standing on an empty street at midnight, its only company the sodium vapour lights above.

An impatient breeze rushes down the corridor. Michael’s smile broadens beyond the confines of a human face, and it continues walking. Its innards may be choked with fog, but they are still a part of Michael, not owned by any interloper. Peter Lukas has walked for miles since he entered, but here he stands, leaning against one wall. Nonsense can be so convenient sometimes.

“I believe most people would call this rude, Mr. Lukas.”

Peter Lukas turns, his smile identical to the one he’d worn in the Institute, his eyes a haunting ocean-gray. If he is shaken by his time in the corridors, he doesn’t show it.

“Please, call me Peter,” he replies, soullessly amiable. “Michael Shelley, wasn’t it?”

The corridors shudder around them, the fog curling into biting teeth. Michael hums, the same tone of that whistle in Peter’s pocket. Michael Shelley had heard it only once, shivering on a cold lifeboat on the way to Zemlya Sannikova, and it haunted his dreams for the rest of the voyage.

“No,” Michael replies, matter of fact. “You sailed Michael Shelley to his doom.”

Peter’s eyebrows raise, but his smile never falters. “So I did. Are you holding a grudge?”

Michael hadn’t thought so, but it feels a strange, flickering ache, twisting at the core of its being. It must be anger, though it bears no resemblance to the things that claw through these corridors when its thoughts turn to Gertrude Robinson. It cannot be anything other than anger.

“Perhaps,” it decides. “I could kill you very easily.”

Peter Lukas, for all his power, is still human. His patron may insulate him for a time, but the more cognitive powers always have a weakness — to serve them, one needs mind enough to fear madness. Eventually, even the apathy of Forsaken would fall to weeping and exhaustion. It may even be a dent to the Watcher, should he remain trapped.

Yet, despite every reason Michael has to kill him, Peter Lukas isn’t afraid. The taste of fear is absent from the air, and its sense of Peter in its corridors is a simple white-noise numbness.

“Were you curious,” it asks, “about what happened to Michael?”

Peter’s smile softens, as though Michael has said something very foolish.

“No. Why would I have been?”

Of course. Michael Shelley was a brief blip of satiation, his presence representing nothing more than a victory against a rival entity. He didn’t matter. Not a single person missed him.

Peter had offered Michael Shelley his coat, Michael recalls. He had been cold, hugging himself to ward off the chill as he watched over Gertrude Robinson, and Peter had placed a pale hand on his shoulder and offered his coat. The heavy fabric had held no warmth, no comfort — just a reminder of the ice that was hardening in Gertrude’s eyes as they travelled further north.

Michael’s sigh resonates in the walls, a mournful whalesong sound.

“Leave,” it says, reaching out as though to caress Peter’s cheek. “Before I change my mind.”

Peter laughs quietly. On any other man, his expression might seem curious; on him, it’s the detached fascination of a predator surrounded by easy meals. He weighs his options, considers his chances, and raises his hand to meet Michael’s.

Michael’s fingers aren’t sharp — Peter expects them to be, after all, and its nature is to abhor expectation. No, its hand is soft and longing, so very nearly human.

“Leave, Peter Lukas,” it says again, voice fracturing like stained glass.

With a cheery hum, Peter lets his hand drop to his side. He watches, for just a moment, as Michael tangles its hands together, fingers spiralling around each other in a way that does nothing to erase the sting of human contact. Then Peter turns on his heel, walking into the mist without fear.

He’ll find a door, Michael thinks, the thought hazy and distant. Where it will let him out, Michael doesn’t know — and doesn’t care.

The fog clears, reluctant wisps clinging to the corners of mirrors.

Michael is alone.