Future at the bottom of the cup

Written for @tmafantasyweek

Day 4 - Leaves

Martin never uses tea bags to make tea. He always uses leaves. The reason behind it is not only the quality of the drink…

…

Martin believed in supernatural, occult, uncanny (he could maybe even say magical) and overall logically in explainable forces long before joining the Magnus institute. Why? Because he himself could be considered proof that there are things that neither science nor common sense can explain.

Well, alright not exactly he as a person but one neat little power he discovered a long time ago and which he still cannot properly explain. There is not much to explain really…

He simply sees things. In a way that no one else does. Things that are about to happen.

…on the bottom of a tea cup. Yes, no matter how often his visions prove themselves to be real he still doubts his own sanity. It could be just one big coincidence. Maybe he just has a wild fantasy. Wild enough to see fragments of tea leaves to create pictures of animals or everyday objects… and then his mind only finds a way to make sense and connect it with something that happens. It could really be it! Maybe he has no gift of prophecies!

Like right now when he looks at the empty mug to which he made tea for Sasha earlier that day all he can see at its bottom is… spiral. Yes the tea leaves formed a perfect spiral which does not make any sense. What the heck could that mean? Who knows, Martin does nto. Just as he suspected, yes, he definitely cannot see a future and…

“What are you looking at?”

Martin almost drops the mug into the sink as Tim appears out of nowhere next to him.

“I was just washing dishes!” Martin almost tries to hide a mug with the spiral before he remembers that he does not have to. Tim could be staring - well, right now he literally is staring - right at it yet he does not comment on the weird shape of tea leaves. Of course he does not because he does not see anything unusual there. Only Martin somehow can make sense of it. As if it were forgotten letters no one but him knew.

 “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. You just stared at it as if you were trying to read a future from it or something…” Tim laughs and Martin tries to smile as well because what else can he do. Just tell him the truth? Yeah right… He would think he is either only joking or is straight out crazy.

Martin first noticed this strange power of his when he was eight and cleaning the cup to which he previously made tea for his mother. Looking at the bottom of it the fragments of tea leaves seemed to create a weirdly vivid picture. It looked like a foot in a weird position… with bandages maybe? He thought nothing of it but that evening his mother slipped in their shower and sprained her ankle.

Since then he could not stop noticing the shapes the tea leaves were creating and how often they seem to be related to things that happened in the following few days. The events seen in tea leaves differed from big to small ones from good to bad ones. He saw a cat there and indeed the next day he met one very friendly kitty. He saw there broken umbrella and a few days later strong wind really destroyed his only protection from heavy rain.

There was a bit of self-fluffiness in those prophecies sometimes. Idea of applying for a position in Magnus institute came to him only after he saw the building in impossible details at the bottom of his cup. And so he is here. Maybe he should join the artefacts in the storage as one of the mysterious objects there instead of spying on the future of his colleagues in the archives…

“Will you also wash mine when you are at it? Feel free to look at my future as well!”

“Sure thing!” Martin answers on the ‘washing the mug for him’ thing. He already knows he will catch a peak of Tim’s future whether he wants to or not. The leaves in Tim’s cup look to Martin as… police station? That would be concerning if Tim was not regularly getting there information from his… sources. Well at least someone still has a nice and readable future. He looks again at Sasha’s mug and frowns.

When he was at the washing dishes he could pick the last mug to wash. Which brings him to the main reason while he is doubting the fact whether Martin ever really had any abilities as a seer or not.

He knocks on the door leading to the office of the Head archivist of the Magnus Institute and after hearing an annoyed sound of approval he enters.

“What do you want Martin?” Jon is sitting behind his table which looks even messier than usual with a tired look on his face. As per usual Martin completely forgets the line he has been preparing before entering Jon’s office. Stupid brain. Stupid crush on his boss.

“I… sorry just… Have you finished your tea?”

Jon looks at his cup as if he only just noticed it. Then he checks its content. Only after that he looks back at Martin. “Yes. Yes I did,” Jon lifts it but Martin is already in front of his desk taking it out of his hand. “Is that all?”

“Yes… well… will you want more tea?”

“I don’t care. I really need to record this so unless you need anything else…” Jon sighs and Martin almost asks him if he should not for once consider going home sooner. He looks like he needs some proper rest. But…

“Sorry. I’ll go now…”

Martin smiles awkwardly at Jon who is already looking back at his statements and tape recorder anyway.

“Where was I? Oh yes, statement case-…”

Clutching Jon’s cup in his hands Martin leaves his office anxious to look at the fragments of leaves at the bottom. Afraid he knows what he will see there.

And indeed.

Exactly the same as every single time at the bottom of every single cup of tea Jon drinks. There it is staring right at him.

The eye.

It does not make any sense! No matter how boring one lives life there is always something different to see. Martin should know, his life is very uneventful yet every time he sees something different yet for some reason in Jon’s case from the moment Martin looks at his cup of finished tea for the first time there is always that eye.

At first Martin was worried Jon would hurt himself in one eye somehow… Got an infection maybe? But Jon’s eyes seem to be completely fine. It simply does not make any sense.

It worries Martin. But… What can he do? Come to him and be like: ‘Hey Jon do you have any significant relationship to eyes? Like does omniscient eyeball float in your kitchen at home or something like that? Why am I asking? Oh, you know I just can see the future in tea leaves and for some reason yours always look like an eye.’ Yeah, he of course cannot do that.

Martin finally starts washing the mugs. He will wait and see. One could say he will keep an eye on Jon’s future hidden at the bottom of his cup… He chuckles. It retrospective it will probably be very stupid joke.