@bad-place-to-become-lost replied: The Archivist/Jon Sims in I Am in Eskew…
Jon Sims would be on thin fucking ice in Eskew.
The main reasons he has done so well in TMA are that a) He has unimaginably powerful dark forces plotting his survival, b) Martin, c) He makes strong and capable allies by sacrificing himself to protect people, and d) Martin again. Now, the dark forces are working almost unanimously AGAINST him, being self-sacrificing is more likely to just get himself and others hurt, and, importantly, no Martin.
On one hand, it’s very possible that he’d just go native and never look back. He might even enjoy it. He would definitely fall in love with the city itself, as terrible as it is; the mysteries it holds, the secrets, the history. He’d probably take a job at an archive not unlike the Institute. An archive which, also not unlike the Institute, has something monstrous living inside it. The Something has rules, and it can be bargained with, like many things in Eskew. Jon learns this quickly, and… ‘befriends’ is a strong word, but he learns how to keep it happy and fed, and he learns that it will keep him safe in return. If Jon let himself go into the dark embrace of Eskew, he’d do very well for himself indeed.
On the other hand, whenever Jon’s psyche gets good and shattered, he has a remarkable tendency to swipe the jagged pieces at anything that gets close to him until he gets a chance to recover. Which, in Eskew, he does not. If season 2 of TMA is any indication, Jon would go utterly feral the first time the city tried anything funny at him. He would simply not stop until Eskew was ragged with bite marks and blood from his tearing, rabid fingernails. Jonathan Sims would live in the sewers and kill and eat every monster Eskew sent to drag him back out. Jonathan Sims would climb the church tower, set the building on fire, and stand in the flaming ruins to make sure it burned down. Jonathan Sims, the Archivist, would be the scourge of Eskew in ever-increasingly grandiose and self-destructive ways, until the city has to choose between letting him go and waiting for him to destroy them both. Assuming also that every fiber of Jon’s considerable willpower, intellect, and determination are focused on getting back to Martin, he might just make it out.
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