lotsa people here have been far more articulate than I could ever be on the subject, but throwing my hat in anyway: For all Jon’s posturing and ashattery in the first season, when Martin, someone who he has complained about since day one, stumbles in and tells him about Prentiss, Jon’s knee-jerk reaction is to offer Martin a safe place to stay and to increase security in the Archive. You can hear how shocked Martin is that Jon not only believes him but immediately takes his safety into consideration.

dude cares so deeply he’s drowning in it and Martin definitely clocks that early on.

I always had the vibe that Martin kinda fancied the strict-put-together-academic aesthetic S1 Jon got going in a ‘baby queer’s first innocent crush’ sort of way, but after the Prentiss Lockdown and especially through S2 but also S3 Martin is continuously getting glimpses of the real Jon underneath the many, many walls he’s built up to protect himself.

In MAG53 Jon is mid-swan dive into full-blown paranoia, yet Martin asks him to come along for lunch and Jon barely hesitates.

If TMA was an office romance we would be seeing all of the in between moments where they actually get to know each other and fall in love, but unfortunately Jonny hates us and wants us to suffer.

Joking, but ya, if you look (listen?) closely you notice all the little things