A/N: Here's that teaser for the new crossover I'm working on. I might change it up in the actual story, but hopefully you guys get the gist of it here.
Jonathan Sims started up the recorder with a familiar heavy click. "Remember, Stiles, Statement numbers organized by the last three digits of the year, the two digits of the month, then the two digits of the day."
"Got it," the teen answered in his American accent. To be honest, Jon wasn't sure he'd ever get quite used to hearing the dialect so casually. "Year, month, day. Check. Just curious though, don't you normally do these statements when you're alone? Or like, with the person?"
A tired sigh. "Yes, but I need you to finish filing these statements for me, and I'd rather have it done sooner than later. Plus, you still need to know how to take and record these statements. So, if you don't mind..."
"Oh, right! Sorry, you won't even know I'm here!" The teen gave Jon a thumbs up before burying his nose in the files he was practically laying in next to the wide-open cabinet.
The Archivist let out a huff before turning to the recorder and statement in front of him. "Statement of Lydia Halligan regarding her insomnia. Original statement given 8th June, 2015. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, London.
"Statement begins.
"I don't know when I last slept. It's not that I can't remember, it's just that I can't really tell. When I manage to steal an hour or so, if that's even happened, my dreams seem so vivid and my waking so disjointed, that they blur together. Like all I have are scenes and images, devoid of context, and no true way to tell what is real and what is not...
"... There is a billboard outside my flat. It overlooks a small roundabout and used to have adverts for whatever the latest TV drama was. The metal that holds it up is old and rusted, and sometimes I think I can hear it groaning ever so quietly as I walk past. Now it has an advert for coffee. I assume that is what it's advertising. It's a woman, bright and cheerful, with a sky-blue blouse and shining white smile. She holds a cup of coffee, the steam rising and curling in front of her eyes. There is no brand name or information, just the words, 'Sleep is overrated' in a tall, thin font. I don't know how long it has been there. Her eyes seem to look in through my window...
"There is a man in my living room. He is tall, with sandy blond hair that twists into unruly curls. I must have invited him in. He sits in my armchair, drumming his fingers together. They make an odd, clacking sound when they touch. I know him, though I have no idea where we might have met. His smile is friendly but I don't like it. I apologise, tell him I've forgotten his name and he waves it away, saying that names are overrated, then asks how my day has been. I tell him I don't know which day he means, and he laughs and laughs and laughs until my nose begins to bleed. I see the blood dripping onto the patterns I have been drawing. How long have I been drawing? It isn't my pen..."
Jon is snapped out of his trance-like reading by a strangled choking noise coming from his assistant. The teen quickly turns it into a cough and spins some lie about swallowing his spit the wrong way, but Jon doesn't believe it for a second. Wearily, he turns back to the recorder.
"Statement resumes.
"The billboard is damp. A sudden rainstorm has soaked it through and the paper peels away at the corner. The sky-blue blouse is now mottled and mouldy; the smile has warped into a sneer. The coffee is still steaming, the swirls of the steam unaffected by the rain, though the brightness in her eyes has turned into a vicious glare. I can see the rust in the metal supports more clearly now, and they seem to bend ever so slightly when they groan. The text now reads: 'Sleep is for the weak'...
"... The man is back. This time I am on a bench in the park. The clouds roll and curl gently in the pale sky of dawn. He is twisting long blades of grass into strange spirals, but his fingers keep cutting through them instead. Is this when we met? He looks at me, his face impassive... if I even see a face. He tells me that I look terrible. I try to focus, but his body shifts and undulates like so much else when I try to focus. I tell him I haven't slept, and he nods and tells me that's ok. He is lying, and it makes me very afraid...
"... I am running through the city. The alleyways are narrow and winding and do not turn all the directions that they should. The smell chokes me and my body is heavy as stone. I lean against a wall and, for a second, I am unsure if I will ever be able to stand myself up again. I stagger through another street then I stop. I lie down on the tarmac and it is warm and soft under me. I feel sleep begin to overtake me, but I am wrong. It is dawn, and all that comes over me is faint and sickly sunlight. I can hear his laugh again, and my mouth tastes like burnt coffee.
"I do not know why I am here. I know this place and what you want, but I have no proof to give you. I have nothing that cannot be waved away as a bad dream. By you, at least. I cannot wave, for my arms are too heavy and my hands are busy drawing those strange, familiar curves. What do you want? To find a child's tooth and hold it up triumphant, a talisman to conjure those things that you should fear. To photograph and analyse a billboard that has never once advertised coffee. To talk to a person who is not a person and whose strange laugh you should be fleeing? I am here, and I give you my words. They are all I have, and all you want, and perhaps when I am free of them then I will be allowed to sleep.
"I am standing before the billboard. It is night, though a nasty ray of daylight makes it glow a dying pink. The roundabout is empty and will never see a car again. It just goes around and around and around with no way on and no end to be had. The woman is baring her teeth in a triumphant snarl, her blouse now stained with the same rust that laces through the bars that support her. Her eyes slough off her face, revealing the twisted shapes of whatever the poster is that sits behind her. The steam that rises from the coffee is the same. Always the same, always undisturbed, curling in on itself. The words that stand stark above it: "Sleep no more". I walk toward the billboard, and my sobs are drowned out by the screaming of rusted struts as they bend. The scream of the metal, buckling under the fatigue, the scream of the woman as she bears down upon me. It collapses on top of me, and I collapse with it."
The Archivist drew a breath, and could hear his new assistant letting one go.
"Statement ends," he finished.
There was a tense silence in the office as Jon worked out what he wanted to say to summarize this particular statement. A silence broken, eventually, by the voice of the young American. "Did you know that I have insomnia?" Jon gave him an incredulous look, and the teen started babbling.
"Well, I mean, it's definitely nowhere near that level, but a while back it definitely was. I mean, I couldn't tell what was and wasn't real, and I would doze off in class and stuff but everyone told me I was awake and listening just fine, and it got to the point so bad that my friend's mom, who's a nurse by the way, had to give me some intense sedatives. It was really friggin' scary, and I still get terrified when it feels like I can't tell what is and isn't real. And I used to sleepwalk and have these night terrors -- it was really weird that one time I sleepwalked all the way from my house into the woods around the town. The woods were around the town, that is, I didn't walk through the woods and then around town, no. Just real deep into the middle of the woods. Apparently I called my friend while I was still sleeping and told him I was in an industrial basement with a bear trap on my leg, but yeah. His mom found me eventually, and his dad, I guess? I mean, the guy's not much of a father figure if I do says so myself --"
"God, do you ever shut up?" Came the voice of Tim, another archival assistant, from somewhere in the archives.
"No! Why?" Stiles yelled back with a shit-eating grin. He looked to the Head Archivist. "Uh, yeah, sorry. Umm, continue, I guess?"
Jon shook his head and sighed for the millionth time. "This kid," he muttered under his breath. "Erm... right. Statement. This is a difficult one. I am forced to agree with Ms. Halligan regarding how verifiable what she says is. There's no way to confirm it isn't a series of bad dreams. It sounds like a series of bad dreams. A cry for help from a woman with a very severe problem. There are no details to follow up, save for Ms. Halligan herself, who passed away from a heart attack less than a month after giving this statement. She was 29."
A soft whistle came from Stiles, which was quickly cut off due to a withering glare from Jon, who snapped, "Do you have headphones or something? Stiles nodded, looking a little guilty, and reached into his pocket. Jon turned back to the tape. Good. Stiles wouldn't be listening to this. "This time last year I would have dismissed her as a kook, wasting our time. But a year changes a lot, and I now recognise the description of a tall man with curly blond hair and an unnerving laugh all too well. Michael, did you drive her to this? Another victim of your warped games? Or were you simply drawn like a vulture? Or maybe a shark sensing blood. What do you want from your victims?
"I'm rather glad I don't drink coffee," Jon admitted. "Statement ends." With that, he stopped the recorder and leaned back in his chair. He glanced at Stiles, who was paused mid-motion with the tangled earbuds in his hands. The teen sported a look of wide-eyed recognition and confusion, looking like he was thinking hard. "Stiles?"
"Hmm?"
"I understand that these statements are interesting," Jon started. Shit. Did he hear the tangent about Michael? Jon couldn't let a kid get roped into this. He continued, feigning tired annoyance, "But you've got to try to stay on-subject. Frankly, I don't really care about the woods around your town or phone calls you make while asleep. Just focus on the statement, alright?" He received a vigorous nod.
"Got it, boss."
Jon returned the nod with less enthusiasm, and went about organizing the statement back into the folder it came from, when he stopped. It didn't make sense. It couldn't. But the reaction, the brainstorming... maybe Jon wouldn't end up the cause of his newest assistant's involvement after all...
"Stiles?" Jon spoke slowly and deliberately. He turned in his chair, and stood slowly, facing the teenager, who looked to him with expectancy. "When did you meet Michael?"
He had to admit, Stiles was a good liar. "What d'you mean?" he asked with a frown.
"Oh, don't even bother trying to lie to me," Jon snapped. "The blond man from the statement! With the curly hair and the unsettling laugh! You know him!"
Stiles stood abruptly, eyes wide. "That Michael? That's the guy she was talking about? What, do you know him or something?"
Jon couldn't stop the mad laugh that escaped him. "Of course I know him!" He stated angrily, "He's been popping up in statements left and right! He not-so-subtly kidnapped a woman who came in to give a statement about him!"
The excitement left Stiles's eyes. "I'm not sure we're talking about the same Michael... the guy I met helped me out, he seemed like a pretty okay guy."
"But you--"
"Yeah, he had blond curly hair and a weird laugh that was kinda--"
Jon interrupted eagerly. "Kind of distorted?"
Stiles was looking increasingly uncomfortable. "Well, yeah, but still! I haven't known him a super long time, but I can tell, he definitely doesn't seem the kidnapper type."
The Head Archivist stared at him in shock. He sputtered, "You--! You don't even seem to -- to care that he's a -- he's a thing! That it's a non-human thing!"
The teen laughed and spoke so casually it rolled off his tongue like a reflex, "Yeah, well you start to tune that out when none of your friends are human anymo..." He realized what he'd said when he caught Jon's expression of fury and shock. "Oh fuck," he mumbled, not looking away from his boss.
"You WHAT?"
"Nothing," he squeaked. "Here's your files bye," Stiles shoved the manila folders at Jon before speed-walking out of the office. He didn't notice that Jon had started the recorder back up in time to catch their whole conversation. Nor did he see Jon leaning into it with lips moving fast as his eyes darted at the new assistant speeding through the archive.
A/N: So yeah, there it is! It's pretty long, so sorry about that. But let me know if you guys want more of that, and I'll work on putting it up as its own story!