Chapter Text
Gossamer white cleared from Jon’s vision, revealing the dark sky above. His body felt wrong and a stinging pain pulsed from his rear side, from his tailbone up to his head. Through the daze, Jon lifted his head up to look around and it became immediately clear what happened; he had passed out and fallen backward on the pavement.
He scooted up to a sitting position and touched a hand to the back of his head. It didn’t feel like he had a cut back there, but when he looked at his hand, through the dim glow provided by the streetlights, there was a small amount of blood. Nothing to be concerned about, just enough to cover a fingertip.
His hand was wrong, though.
He couldn’t tell how, or why but it was wrong.
Jon shook his head, trying to clear out the dizziness but only making it worse. He felt like he was forgetting something. His head was buzzing in pain, and the sounds around him felt faint and distant. Everything felt distant. The pain from his headache pounded in a strange pattern, like someone knocking at a door. In the fuzz of his mind Jon could see the “door” before him, bending in like a cartoon with every jolt of pain slamming into him.
Jon blinked the image that felt too-real away, but as it disappeared he realized there really was a door before him.
No, not a door. The door.
The one that Evan Pritchett knocked on. Mr Spider’s door.
The air was sucked out of him. He was just laying there. He was unconscious there. Just before the door.
He was alive. Jon almost had to reassure himself. He wasn’t eaten. He was here. He was fine.
His breath was rushing. There wasn’t enough oxygen. But he was alive. He was breathing. Even if he couldn’t keep the air in.
Jon turned and reached out, “Mar-” the word died on his tongue. What was he doing? Who was he reaching for? There was nothing there. A strange pang of absence pulsed in his chest. He was alone. But wasn’t he always? He didn’t exactly have any friends, so he wasn’t sure why it felt so strong at that moment. He needed to focus, not whine.
The moment his breath slowed enough and the buzzing disorientation in his head lessened, he scrambled to his feet. He about made a run for it, when something caught his eye. There was a white book laying on the stoop of the door, with a black spider illustration. A chill went down Jon’s spine.
It made him want to run faster, but a small part of his mind spoke up. You caused Pritchett to die. If you leave the book there, you’re going to kill someone else too.
The rush of guilt that flooded him was the push he needed to snatch the book before he sprinted off down the street.
He didn’t know how long he ran for, but when he felt he was far enough away he stopped under a street light and looked down at the book in his hand. He could still feel that strange violent energy leaking from it that made him hate it in the first place, but it had changed in some way Jon could not describe. He kept a tight grip on it, making sure it wouldn’t open. There was a horrible temptation to do it anyway. A strange curiosity made him wonder if the last page would be different now. Would he see the aftermath? Would Mr Spider be full?
He shook it off. He was not going to get caught by it again. He grabbed the book with his other hand and tried to rip it, destroy it, something, but it was hard — especially since he did not want to open it. Never before did he despise his weak nerd arms as much as he did now.
As he shifted his grip, trying to see if he could rip off even a small section of the book, he noticed something blemishing the white cover.
A bloody fingerprint.
It gave Jon a start before he remembered it was his blood, his fingerprint. Not… Pritchett’s, or anyone else's. This was a normal, natural mark.
Why then, did the fingerprint look so strange?
Jon had read a book on forensic analysis before, even did a small experiment like the book said, but this was not the same fingerprint he remembered. Not the same as any fingerprint he’d seen before in his life.
Instead of a normal loop or whorl, Jon’s fingerprint looked uncannily akin to a spiderweb.
In a panic, he looked closely at his finger. The bloodstained finger looked just the same as the print. Examining the others, he realized they all bore those same spiderweb-like divots.
Jon would have screamed if he were not deathly sure it would draw attention to him.
Later — Jon could not tell for the life of him how long it took — he finally found his way back home, book still firmly clutched in his hand. He let out a gasp of relief when he closed the door firmly behind him and collapsed with his back against it. New tears flowed down his already stinging eyes. He knew the danger was still in his hands, but even so, there was a safety in being home.
He curled around the book and sobbed. An overwhelming sense of pain and fear, joined with a strange sense of loss. He had left something behind, near that door he knew would haunt his nightmares, but what exactly it was he could not say.
Dissolving into a puddle of tears, curled up, Jon let out a screech when something poked him.
He looked up to see his Gran, looking down at him with worried eyes.
“What happened?” she asked, in a tone that told him it wasn’t the first time she’d asked.
Jon tried to tell her, he really did, but all that came out was a babbling mess of words. No matter how much he tried she just didn’t seem to understand. The book was evil, and they needed to destroy it and Pritchett was dead, the Spider got him and it's all Jon’s fault and he’s so sorry and-
Gran hushed Jon, putting a hand on his shoulder. She had none of the proper urgency on her face.
“Hush, hush. Take a breath Jon,” she said.
Jon tried but his throat felt so sore and the tears kept flowing. Gran frowned and put a hand on his shoulder. Jon flinched at the touch, but calmed and took a couple deep breaths.
“Prit- Evan Pritchett,” Jon rasped out.
“Did he hurt you?” she asked, concerned.
Jon shook his head. “He’s hurt- dead. I saw him. He went- went into the door and he died,” he got out before breaking into sobs again.
Gran’s face shuttered. She nodded slightly and marched over to the phone in the kitchen.
As she was talking, Jon stood up and began walking. Gran didn’t notice, but Jon had a mission. He went over to where they kept the duct tape — a little down the hall in the cupboard next to the bathroom — and began wrapping the book in it. It wouldn’t be enough but it was better than nothing. He would need to get Gran to help him burn it.
Jon heard in the distance as Gran said some last words and hung up the phone. She must’ve noticed he was gone from his spot as she called to him.
“Jon?” She poked her head around the corner and saw him. “Oh, yes. You should probably clean yourself up. Police will be here shortly.”
Jon looked at himself and nodded at her misinterpretation of why he was over here. He set down the book on the cupboard and moved into the washroom. He didn’t need to look at himself in the mirror to know how disheveled he was, and so immediately turned on the faucet and splashed his face. He grabbed a tissue and blew his nose, but he knew it wouldn’t stop the snot and faint tears still falling down his face.
Jon got lost in his thoughts, thinking about what he’d say to the police and still trying to sort it all out himself. The buzzing in his head had quieted but not gone away, and the pain still pulsed.
A knock echoing from elsewhere in the house jolted Jon. He only began breathing once he heard Gran talking to the police and bringing them inside.
Talking with the police did not go well. They asked him to start his story, but quickly got impatient when Jon started telling them about the book. The meaner cop — an older man with stubble on his face — cut him off and asked him where he had seen Mr. Pritchett. It threw Jon off and filled him with frustration. He was going to get there, he knew what he was going to say and this was important. But when he looked up at the man Jon let out a huff and cut off his story.
Jon told them he was in the park when he first saw Pritchett. That he knocked the book out of Jon’s hands. That he picked up the book and started walking off, as if in a trance. The mean cop looked like he was going to cut Jon off again, but the nicer cop — a woman with kind eyes but a condescending expression — shot him a look. Jon felt a bit encouraged and continued to tell his tale, but when he got to how Mr.Spider ate Pritchett, both his Gran and the mean cop scoffed.
“So your kid got himself worked up over a book,” he said to Gran.
“I’m so sorry, Jonathan’s always had an imagination but I didn’t think-” Gran started.
Jon felt a dread welling up in his chest as they spoke. They didn’t believe him. They weren’t going to do anything. Pritchett was never going to be found, dead or otherwise, and Mr Spider would still be around. Jon didn’t notice as his breath began to pick up the pace.
He was shocked from his spiralling when the nice cop spoke up.
“You shouldn’t dismiss him outright,” she chided both of them.
Jon’s breath caught in his throat. Maybe he would find help.
She leaned towards them and spoke in a quieter tone Jon was pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to hear. “Children often lack the understanding of what they’re seeing in regards to traumatic events. They then tend to misinterpret what they see, and put it into simpler terms. Mr. Pritchett might really have been taken or killed in front of Jonathan. We need to be supportive and try to get what we can from him.”
Jon’s heart plummeted. It was better, he supposed, to be believed at least a little, rather than being dismissed as a dumb kid freaking himself out. But he saw what happened. It wasn’t his imagination. Jon would have died too if Pritchett didn’t take his place. Frustration welled up in him, tears forming anew.
Jon tried to convince them of the truth, but now they were merely placating him. He wasn’t some dumb scaredy-cat, he knew what he was talking about! It took a while for him to give up, but eventually he just told them what they wanted to hear. He didn’t know where the door was; he didn’t remember the street. He knew it was a while away from the park, but couldn’t provide them much more. The mean cop was clearly frustrated, and the nice cop was still looking at him in that way that irked him, but eventually they said they had enough and would continue their investigation elsewhere.
Jon thought about showing them the book, asking they take it and deal with it, but he realized that if they didn’t believe him then they would read it, and they would die and it would be his fault. While thinking about this, he suddenly realized he did not have the book on him. He must’ve put it down. He would need to find it before it could get its hooks on Gran.
When the police eventually left, Gran chided him again for bringing up stories while something serious happened, but Jon was done with it. Still, she made Jon a snack and tried to comfort him, which felt nice.
After a little bit, Jon mentioned the cut on the back of his head, and Gran got some rubbing alcohol to clean it, bringing him into the more brightly lit kitchen. It stung but it felt so little in the wake of the pain he had felt earlier, he barely noticed. When Gran finished she turned him around.
“That should be all. Don’t get yourself hurt again,” she chided.
Jon nodded and looked up towards her.
“I’m glad you’re okay. You worried me half to death when you came in like that,” she continued, the softness somewhat surprising Jon.
“I love you, Gran,” he spluttered out.
She pressed a kiss to the crown of his head. She drew back and ran her thumb under his cheek, wiping away a tear.
Her eyebrows furrowed suddenly.
“What on earth happened to your eye?” she cried out, looming close and looking at Jon’s left eye.
His eye? “I… dunno,” Jon muttered finally.
Gran frowned, “If this is some new trend among you kids-” she cut herself off and sighed. “Not the time. Go to bed Jon. It’s been a long night.”
Jon nodded, and walked off confused. As he was going to the bathroom, he spotted the book, laying on the cupboard, still wrapped in duct tape. He snatched it and hid it in his room before going to brush his teeth.
When he got to the bathroom, he looked into the mirror to see what Gran was talking about. At first he didn’t see anything wrong, his eyes looked the same as they always did.
His head buzzed a little louder than usual. He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose to try and get it to go away. He took a breath and looked again to try and spot what she meant.
Suddenly, it hit him. He was looking for something small, but the answer was obvious when he took a step back.
Instead of brown, his left eye was green.
~~~
Jon’s dreams were twisted and strange that night. He was for some reason much taller and in a body that still felt wrong in some intangible sense.
There were flashes of places and times with little connection between them. A place with boxes and boxes of papers that made him feel like he was being watched from some dark corner. He noticed someone was sitting at one of the desks. A blonde woman who was pale and looked at him with exhausted and guilty eyes; no, it was a darker skinned woman who was buried deep in work, sitting across from another woman with dyed hair and anger in her eyes who was demanding they do… something; it was a woman without a trace of fear in her eyes, but with a disappointed frown on her lips; it was a trio, one man in a hawaiian shirt with a too-bright smile, a woman whose details all seemed to slip from notice, and a man in a thick wool sweater who made Jon feel warm inside.
Another flash and Jon was sitting at the desk of a man in a suit with a piercing stare, who was pushing papers towards Jon that he couldn’t make out the words of. Then of the same man with that too-smug expression erased as he was getting stabbed in the chest, Jon’s own hands doing the action. Of Jon reading something and hearing that man’s voice coming out of his own mouth.
Jon saw people reliving their worst nightmares, looking at him with hatred and Jon knew that he was guilty, and deserved their glares.
He saw the ghost of a man with dyed black hair and eyeball tattoos looking at him with a strange camaraderie.
The most striking flash of a dream was of him walking through what he knew to be hell, into the webs of a spider. The fact that the spider was a woman made no difference. He saw what she was, truly. He remembered saw himself yelling at her. Saying he would make his own path. He saw her eerie smile as she almost begged him to try.
Jon awoke to a pounding headache. There was something on the tips of his fingers — knowledge he needed to remember — but it slipped out of his grasp, too large to have any hope of finding purchase. It felt as if he were trying to drink the ocean and drowned for his ambition.
It was a foolish effort. One that served to cause little but pain.
But even from the ocean one could swallow some small mouthfuls of water.