[Intro Theme]
ANNOUNCER
Rusty Quill Presents: The Magnus Protocol.
Episode Fifty-Three – Previous Administration.
[Music]
[Phone recording begins]
[Celia exhales]
ALICE
So… Are you going to knock, or are we just admiring the woodgrain of the door?
CELIA
I just –
ALICE
Because don’t get me wrong, it’s got a real mid-century modern vibe that I kinda dig. I wanna say teak? Is that teak?
CELIA
Look, Alice, are we sure we’re not just wasting our time here? We already got completely blanked by Mrs Hussain and honestly, I don’t expect this to go any better.
ALICE
I’ll admit I foolishly underestimated you and Sam’s ability to alienate every person you meet, but this is still our best bet. Unless you’re finally ready to come with me to the Hilltop Center–?
CELIA
Enough, Alice.
ALICE
We haven’t been back once yet and –
CELIA
Enough. We’ve been over this. It’s too dangerous.
ALICE
It’s not like I’m going to run up and shove my head in there! I’ll keep a nice, NHS-endorsed, socially-distanced two metres. Hell, maybe I’ll treat myself and stay five metres away!
CELIA
I’m serious, Alice.
ALICE
So am I. It’s been almost a month now since Sam vanished and we’re still faffing around when we could be in that basement right now investigating an actual lead.
CELIA
You don’t understand –
ALICE
How can I when you refuse to even consider it?!
CELIA
(quiet) I can’t go back there.
[Beat.]
ALICE
(softer) Look, I get it. I do. But we’re going to have to face it sooner or later. What happened wasn’t your fault, but the longer you make us wait for –
CELIA
(changing the subject) Okay. I get it. Now did you want me to knock, or are you–?
[The door unlocks and swings open]
GERTRUDE
That won’t be necessary.
CELIA
Oh! Uh, hello again, Gee…
GERTRUDE
Gertrude. Hello again, Celia from the O.I.A.R. And…?
ALICE
Alice.
GERTRUDE
Alice. I see.
CELIA
We’re sorry to bother you again.
GERTRUDE
Yet here you are. Why don’t you come in?
[Phone recording begins]
[Bustling noises from a distance]
GERTRUDE
(calling) Sorry for the mess. Gerry has been experimenting again. Pointillism this time. Tea?
CELIA
Uh, no, thank you.
GERTRUDE
You’re sure? I was putting on a pot anyway.
CELIA
No, really, I –
ALICE
I’ll have one, thanks.
GERTRUDE
(calling) Wonderful, let me just find – ah, there it is.
ALICE
You have a lovely flat.
GERTRUDE
(calling) Thank you, dear. It’s not perfect but it’s nice and quiet, just the way we like it. We’ll be sad to see it go.
ALICE
Oh, are you selling or –
[Gertrude emerges.]
ALICE
Bloody hell!
[ALICE and CELIA instinctively move to stand]
GERTRUDE
(coldly) Sit down. Both of you. Slowly.
[They both sit.]
ALICE
So uh… What’s going on?
CELIA
Okay, let’s… Let’s all just calm down –
GERTRUDE
I am perfectly calm. Frustrated, certainly, but I have had plenty of time to prepare for this day.
CELIA
What do you want?
GERTRUDE
Right now I want you to avoid doing anything that forces me to shoot you.
ALICE
With that thing? It looks like an antique.
GERTRUDE
It is. My father’s Enfield No. 2, from his officer days. It’s almost a hundred years old, but I can assure you it has been very well cared for and is quite functional.
ALICE
Cool. Celia, why does this old lady want to shoot us?
CELIA
I don’t know!
GERTRUDE
I shouldn’t have let you leave last time, but Gerry was adamant. I knew you’d be back for him, but I am ready to stop you.
ALICE
Gerry, he’s your grandson, right? Celia, why does she think we want to steal her grandson?
CELIA
I don’t know! Gertrude, what is going on here?
GERTRUDE
Phones, watches, any other electronics on the table. Now.
[Celia and Alice do so, including the phone we are listening through]
ALICE
Listen, you don’t want to hurt us –
GERTRUDE
Of course not, but I’ll get over it. Now turn around, hands on your head.
CELIA
People will notice we’re missing.
ALICE
Eventually…
CELIA
(with the tiniest nervous laughter) Alice!
GETRUDE
We’ll be long gone by then. Just as long as we’re finished before… ah. Too late.
[The energy of the room subtly shifts. ALICE starts to laugh.]
CELIA
What’s funny?
ALICE
Sorry I just… this is so daft! After everything that’s gone on, this is what does us in?
CELIA
(laughing) Stop! This is serious!
ALICE
(laughing) I just honestly didn’t see it coming, getting shot by an antique-wielding grandmother…
[CELIA and ALICE start genuinely laughing.]
GERTRUDE
Oh for goodness sake.
[Footsteps approaching]
GERRY
(calling from the hall) Gee Gee! I’m back!
[GERTRUDE sighs whilst Alice and Celia keep laughing.]
GERRY
I got the milk and loo roll but you didn’t say what type of biscuits, so –
[He sees the tableau]
[They all turn and look at him as Alice and Celia try to get themselves under control]
CELIA
(still laughing) Hi Gerry!
GERRY
(brightly) Celia! Hi! Gee Gee, what’s all this?
GERTRUDE
I have it under control, Gerry. If you could just be a good lad and give me a few minutes, maybe take a walk around the park.
GERRY
That does sound fun, but I do need to know why you’ve got the gun out and are pointing it at Celia and…?
ALICE
Alice, lovely to meet you!
GERRY
And you! I love your hair.
ALICE
Thanks!
GERTRUDE
They came back, which means the government knows about you, which means we have to leave.
GERRY
And you want to shoot them?
GERTRUDE
(sighing) Well, not anymore, obviously.
[She lowers the gun.]
GERRY
Great!
CELIA
So, what… we’re good?
GERRY
For now, at least. Tea?
CELIA
Yes please, Gerry!
GERTRUDE
(resigned) And Alice already asked for a cup.
GERRY
Righto!
[GERRY heads into the kitchen to make tea. Everyone else sits. It’s somehow not as awkward as it should be.]
ALICE
So like, just to be clear, you were going to shoot us, right?
GERTRUDE
That was the general idea, yes.
CELIA
But now…?
[GERTRUDE sighs and puts the revolver on the table]
GERTRUDE
With Gerry here, I just don’t have it in me.
ALICE
Sorry, am I missing something?
GERRY
(calling) My fault, sorry! I know it can be a bit strange in extreme situations like this but it’s not something I can turn off, I’m afraid.
ALICE
(realizing) He’s an External… But like, a good one, who makes people… happy?
GERTRUDE
(muttering) Whether they want to be or not…
CELIA
Whoa…
ALICE
You didn’t say anything about this happening last time, Celia?
CELIA
Sam and I were getting along, so, I guess I just didn’t notice?
GERRY
(reentering) Most people don’t, which is handy, I suppose. People don’t often question an unexpected good mood.
CELIA
Until it happens at gunpoint.
GERRY
Oh! Speaking of, Gee Gee, I’m going to need you to move that off the table so I can serve.
GERTRUDE
(sighing) Oh very well.
[GERTRUDE moves the revolver while GERRY serves the tea.]
GERRY
Honestly though, I don’t think you’re going to need it. These are good people, nice people. I’m sure of it.
GERTRUDE
Everyone seems nice to you, Gerry.
GERRY
Because they are!
GERTRUDE
No, because they can’t not be around you.
GERRY
Oh, I don’t know. I seem to recall you getting pretty snippy if I don’t do the dishes.
GERTRUDE
(wearily) I’ve had practice.
GERRY
Well either way, they don’t look like they came here looking for trouble. They’re not armed, they didn’t bring any police, and they’re not exactly intimidating. No offense.
ALICE
None taken.
CELIA
I mean, it’s not like we came here prepped for an External.
GERRY
External?
GERTRUDE
I presume that’s the O.I.A.R. word for catalysed subjects.
GERRY
Oh, I see. So you really didn’t know?
CELIA
Nope! We wanted to ask you about something else entirely. Complete misunderstanding.
GERRY
Now that is funny!
ALICE
So, what’s your story? Can’t really go back to the sweet old lady routine now.
GERRY
(to “Gee Gee”) You may as well tell them. They’ve been asking about the Institute and if you’re set on us leaving anyway, it can’t hurt to let them know.
GERTRUDE
It very much can, but I’m not sure I have it in me to fight you on it. Could you at least wait in another room, though? I’d rather not have to explain it with a smile.
GERRY
All right. But I’m taking this with me.
[He picks up the revolver.]
GERRY
Don’t want you tempted while I’m gone, do we?
GERTRUDE
(muttered) God forbid.
[GERRY exits and his effect on them lessens slightly]
GERTRUDE
(relieved) So… You want to know about the Magnus Institute?
ALICE
Yeah. I guess we do.
GERTRUDE
Where to start?
I first became aware of the organisation in the early ’70s. At the time I was struggling to make sense of an experience I had had some years before. The details are, quite frankly, none of your business, but it had several important effects on me: one, it left me certain that monsters were very real in a supernatural sense, not merely a metaphorical one; two, it rendered me utterly alone in the world, without any remaining family, loved ones or meaningful connections; and three, it led to me taking my first two human lives.
You can perhaps imagine the effect such a radical change has on a person. Or perhaps you can’t. Either way, the few years immediately afterwards were spent searching for the meaning of what happened, or at least an explanation. It should not be difficult to imagine how such a search might lead me to the doorstep of The Magnus Institute.
When I first came to them they were rude, dismissive and extremely skeptical. They did not bother to hide the fact that they viewed me as someone who, if not an outright fantasist, had stumbled across something she could not hope to understand.
The first time I visited, they accused me of wasting their time and had me escorted from the premises. It was this, more than anything else, that convinced me the Institute knew what they were talking about. Unlike the many other groups I had found that promised insight into the darker corners of the world, they were not recruiting or selling or reassuring. I was certain they knew what was going on and decided I would stop at nothing to join them and learn the truth for myself.
It was the third time that I broke into the Institute that I finally met Dr Welling. By this point I had found more than enough evidence of the strange and unnatural in that building, and there was no longer any pretense between us. Instead, I could see in his eyes something I had witnessed only once before: someone deciding whether or not to kill me. However, unlike the thing I had met at the bottom of my garden, Welling was too weak to make the decision.
He had me recite my story yet again, and paid particular attention to the point at which I had to murder my father and my sister. Then he was silent for some time.
“Do you think you could kill again?” he asked at last.
I said yes. It was strange; the question evoked no feeling in me at all. No fear, no eagerness, no revulsion or discomfort. The violence meant nothing to me at all and I realised in that moment that perhaps the thing in my garden won after all.
Dr Welling nodded and gestured for me to follow him. He led me from his small office, through austere wood-panelled corridors, and finally down some ancient stairs to a cold stone basement and there, surrounded by three worried-looking academics, I found my first project with them.
It was quite an easy one to start with. While it was still recognisably human, it was clearly in a great deal of pain flailing and spasming on the cold flagstones. A thin trickle of molten gold streamed from its mouth, ears and nose. There was even some below its fingernails and under its closed eyelids and the skin around these areas was cracked and blistered from the extreme heat. I would learn later that this was the first in their new series of experiments, and they hadn’t been prepared for such a… grotesque result. The only thing they had available for me to use was a heavy iron spanner left behind by a workman who had been fixing the building’s piping.
It was enough.
After the business was finished, there was no question about my membership of the Institute, or what my role within it was going to be. I still don’t know if I ever fully believed in the Institute’s goals, but I’ve considered the question for twenty-five years.
You’re perhaps too young to understand how difficult it can be to remember how you truly felt about something so long ago. It becomes coloured, distorted… Everything you said, you did, you felt, it all bleeds into each other and gets muddled by the things that follows.
It certainly waxed and waned over the decades I worked for them. I did respect their mission, though I was perhaps more grounded, less utopian, than my colleagues; it was hard not to be when I was the one disposing of their many, many failures.
The messianic rhetoric always irritated me, but the fundamental idea – investigating a force that transformed people for fear and evil, then finding a way to invert it, to transform someone for hope and light – that made sense to me.
Perhaps I was naïve… No, I was definitely naïve, but I needed there to be at least a chance that something good could come from all that awfulness.
I don’t know how many people I killed for the Magnus Institute over those three decades. More than twenty, certainly. They normally made one attempt each year, although there were exceptions for special circumstances.
Not all their failures were killed, of course. One escaped, a few were locked away, experimented on. They kept the Blood-Brewer for almost five years before having me dispose of him, and I think the Archivist was still down there when I burned the place down.
I didn’t set the blaze personally, of course, but we all knew the O.I.A.R. was paying attention and I had little doubt what the outcome of my anonymous tip would be. I was surprised by how sloppy their hirelings were, though. It was messy work. Overdone with no eye for detail.
As for why I did it? You already met him. Gerry was nine when he underwent the first of the transmutation rituals. I was… out of favour at the time, and so my colleagues did not consult with me about the use of children. I didn’t even realise they had done so until Gerry had already been changed into the being of raw positivity that I now protect.
I have never had children. I never wished to have children. I don’t like children. But even I have my limits, and finding out that in their desperation for results, they had started to use them as subjects… I suppose it was all somewhat academic to them. When it all inevitably went wrong, they weren’t the ones that would need to… dispose of the results.
Like me, Gerry had no family to speak of and he was already so… changed that he would need to be cared for by someone who understood. What else could I do?
I took him away, along with a few items from the vault that I could sell to some collectors for living costs.
I remember, I was smiling when I stole him from the Institute; I was smiling when I called the OIAR; and I was smiling when my colleagues were murdered and the building in which I had done such terrible things was burned to the ground.
I don’t know how much of that was due to his presence. I suspect the point is moot. It was an odd experience regardless.
CELIA
So you just left it all behind?
GERTRUDE
We tried to. We moved down to London, tried to move on, but that sort of thing never truly leaves you. I ended up keeping something of a watch over the ruins. I would discourage adventure-seekers and explorers however I could, doing my best to hide its existence from them online or rendering it uninteresting. And I would clean up when occasionally one of them would go in anyway and find some dangerous trinket that ultimately killed them.
ALICE
I didn’t hear a peep from you when me and Sam went snooping.
GERTRUDE
You went there? I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. I don’t watch as closely as I once did and truthfully there’s not much I could have done, even if I had caught you. My knees have been going for years now, and the journey up to Manchester isn’t as easy as it was.
ALICE
Well then, I’ve got some bad news for you, because the Archivist has escaped.
GERTRUDE
What? No, it must have died in the fire. And even if it didn’t, it’s been twenty-five years; it would have starved down there.
ALICE
I mean, it’s definitely been snackish. It’s been feeding on people left, right and center since it got out. Then it grabbed my friend and pulled him into a portal to hell.
GERTRUDE
I beg your pardon?
CELIA
(intervening) It’s a hole in reality that leads… somewhere else. That’s what we’re trying to investigate. That’s why we’re here.
GERTRUDE
I see. Well I’m sorry about your friend but I don’t believe I know anything about such a “portal to hell.”
CELIA
It was in a property the Institute owned at the Hilltop Centre in Oxford. Do you know it?
GERTRUDE
Perhaps… I often dealt with the paperwork for property purchases. Some of the researchers believed that locations could be catalyzed the same way as beings or objects and they were trying to find a suitable location.
ALICE
And did any of them mention a horrifying tear in the fabric of the universe?
GERTRUDE
I believe one of them may have referred to a “rift” at some point, but I just assumed they were talking about a problem with the building’s structure, like subsidence. I certainly don’t remember anything else.
ALICE
Seriously? Nothing?
GERTRUDE
By that point I was sufficiently ostracized that they told me very little about Phase 2 of the “Great Work.” I suppose in some ways it’s a blessing. If I’d known about this then I’d have had to watch over it too.
CELIA
And now?
GERTRUDE
Now I’m too old and too tired to do anything except try to protect Gerry from his own naïveté.
GERRY
(distant) I heard that!
GERTRUDE
Speaking of which, since I have answered all your questions I would appreciate you doing me the courtesy of answering one of my own.
ALICE
Go for it.
GERTRUDE
When should we expect a visit from your hired killers?
CELIA
What? I mean… Never?
GERTRUDE
I find that hard to believe.
ALICE
Look, I don’t know what the O.I.A.R. was like in your day, but now? It’s… crap. There’s three of us in a basement cataloguing junk that’s fuck-all use to anybody. The only way anything burns down is if I drop a joint on some paperwork while I’m napping.
GERTRUDE
(unconvinced) And yet you found us.
CELIA
By accident. Sam and I were looking into the Institute for personal reasons, not for the OIAR.
GERTRUDE
And your superiors?
ALICE
(laughing) Yeah, I wouldn’t worry about that. They know less than we do.
GERTRUDE
…
Fine. You may go. But don’t expect to find us here again. Regardless of how “crap” the O.I.A.R. may have become. We’ve clearly stayed here longer than was sensible.
CELIA
Fine by us.
ALICE
(standing) Thanks for the tea.
GERTRUDE
Good luck finding your friend. And make sure you thank Gerry on the way out. He gets upset when people leave without saying goodbye, and he did save your lives after all.
[Landline recording begins]
[GWEN sits at her computer, typing slowly]
[She sighs, stretches, then returns to typing]
[The door to the office opens]
GWEN
(not looking up) You’re late. Again.
NIGEL
Sorry I, uh, I did try to call but…
[GWEN sees NIGEL DICKERSON standing there sheepishly]
GWEN
Mr. Dickerson? What are –
NIGEL
Nigel, please.
GWEN
How did you get in here… Nigel?
NIGEL
The front door wasn’t locked and reception was – That is to say, there wasn’t anybody there. I thought I might have to find a security guard, but…
[Beat]
GWEN
Was there something you needed?
NIGEL
Oh, er, yes. I’ve been trying to get through to Lena, but I haven’t had much luck.
GWEN
That would probably be because Lena no longer works for this department.
NIGEL
What!? Oh. Oh dear.
GWEN
I am currently the head of the O.I.A.R.
NIGEL
You? Really?! But I thought – You only just –
Right. OK… OK. Right. Well, then, um, I suppose I need to talk to you, then.
GWEN
I suppose you do.
NIGEL
I was hoping… That is to say, wondering, whether you had any work. For, uh…
(whispering) For Mr B. It’s been a little while and I was worried that we might have missed something or…
GWEN
You haven’t.
NIGEL
Oh. So…
GWEN
This department is currently undertaking a review of its relationships with all External partners. Until that review is completed, no new… assignments are being given out.
NIGEL
(getting nervous) None at all? A-are you serious?
GWEN
I am.
NIGEL
Well, how long is this ‘review’ going to take?
GWEN
…the timeline has not yet been finalized.
NIGEL
(scared) No… No, you don’t understand. It’s not – If I can’t get him any more – Please, you’re making a mistake, a huge mistake!
GWEN
No. No more free lunches, the buffet is closed. If, if, I decide we will continue working with externals like… your client, it will be on our terms.
NIGEL
And what are your terms?
GWEN
For now? Don’t call us, we’ll call you.
NIGEL
Don’t be a fool, he knows who you are! He’ll find you, he’ll –
GWEN
He’ll do as instructed, otherwise he’ll lose access to our systems forever and all the… opportunities that we have been providing him.
NIGEL
(desperate) I’m begging you, you can’t send me back without something –
GWEN
Goodnight Nigel. Feel free to leave the way you came.
[Beat]
[Footsteps as Nigel finally turns to exit]
NIGEL
(opening the office door) You don’t want to play this game with him…
GWEN
I’m not here to play games, Mr Dickerson, I’m here to work. And it’s about time everyone else did the same.
[NIGEL exits despairing, closing the door behind him.]
[Music]
ANNOUNCER
The Magnus Protocol is a podcast distributed by Rusty Quill and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Sharealike 4.0 International License. The series is created by Jonathan Sims and Alexander J Newall, and directed by Alexander J Newall.
This episode was written by Jonathan Sims and edited with additional materials by Alexander J Newall, with vocal edits by Nico Vettese, soundscaping by Meg McKellar, and mastering by Catherine Rinella with music by Sam Jones.
It featured Billie Hindle as Alice Dyer, Anusia Battersby as Gwendolyn Bouchard, Lowri Ann Davies as Celia Ripley. The Magnus Protocol is produced by April Sumner, with executive producers Alexander J Newall, Dani McDonough, Linn Ci, and Samantha F.G. Hamilton, and Associate Producers Jordan L. Hawk, Taylor Michaels, Nicole Perlman, Cetius d’Raven, and Megan Nice.
To subscribe, view associated materials, or join our Patreon, visit rustyquill.com. Rate and review us online, tweet us @therustyquill, visit us on facebook or email us at mail@rustyquill.com.
Thanks for listening.