#mag 20

[cult-of-the-eye]

MAGNUS ARCHIVES THEMED PICK UP LIN ES

Are you a real estate agent? Cause I would love you to come in my corridors

Are you a priest cursed by a fear god? Cause I'll make you say unholy things

Are you a friend of Michael crew? Cause I can make you dizzy and sweep you off your feet

Call me Agnes Montague cause I have a burning passion for you

Call me Jon the way I head your archive

Etc etc (feel free to add ur own)

[ethereal-w0lf]

Besides the fake statements what TMA statement has the least reliable narrator?

Honestly I don’t trust the priest from mag19 and 20, (my favorite statement)

[forest-dwelling-abomination]

Y’all remember that one time a priest fucked up an exorcism so bad he had no choice but to eat people?

[magnuspanoptes]

mag 20, desecrated host is the first time the dread powers are established as something like godlike figures in their world. the entity reveal hasn't happened yet, but the horror is spoken of as a literal demonic possession (because that is the framework of the world father burroughs is familiar with) which overpowers his own faith.

"it wants your faith" both in the sense that father burroughs is going to be marked by an entity and that he's about to have his christian faith tested and broken by what he will experience, and i really liked how they achieved that with cannibalism. the eucharist is the body and blood of christ (he's catholic, he believes in transubstantiation) - so, obvious cannibalism symbolism here which is going to be exploited with the reveal of the communion wafer having been human flesh the entire time. but not the body of christ, no, just two mutilated corpses. because your god is not here, your god is not real. and it further ties back into the podcast's broader themes of consumption, that there is no communion to be found in this world, theirs is a strictly hierarchical universe where you eat and are eaten.

[heyitskoye]

Magtober day 10 - fav statement - MAG19 and MAG20 or case #0113005, statement of Father Edwin Burroughs, regarding his claimed demonic possession

I love me some cannibalistic priest!

[beheldandcompelled]

Relistened to MAG 20 and didn't know if this point about who went through the statement before Jon was ever addressed.

My first thought is Elias went through the file to see how he could've made his Archive and what to avoid.

Or Gertrude but Elias' long con didn't start until after her death so I really do wonder if he read these accounts to determine how to start with Jon.

[grape-eating-vampire]

i've lost my marbles

[thatpodcastkid]

Magnus Archives Relisten 20, MAG 20 Desecrated Host

Father Pruitt from Midnight Mass but if he was still an old man. You agree, reblog.

My MAG 20 analysis, spoilers ahead!

Facts: Continuation of the statement of Father Edwin Burroughs regarding his claimed demonic possession. Statement given May 30, 2011.

Statement Notes: A hallucination sequence is one of the best modes of horror. The inability to distinguish between the real and unreal aspects of the vision combined with the symbolic imagery and attempts to determine the cause of the hallucination itself often means the audience experiences the same level of fear and confusion the character does. However, I very rarely see them done well in non-visual mediums. The best example I can think of is the dream of Percival Glyde in The Woman In White. But this episode is really effective in that. You don't understand anything that is happening, you're just stuck on the ride with no hope of getting off, and Father Burroughs is in the seat next to you. If you know of any other really good dream or hallucination sequences in horror narratives, tell me about it in the notes.

I also noted how whatever was possessing Burroughs really reveled in his guilt. I discussed this in the Part I analysis, but the conflation of guilt and fear as two sides of the same coin is an incredible choice, especially in a religious story. You are guilty because you are afraid of your own actions, you are afraid because you did something you should be guilty for. You are afraid of being found guilty, you are afraid of punishment, you are afraid you will never stop feeling guilty.

Entity Alignment: This is another mixed bag episode. This definitely seems like a lot of effort to make Burroughs afraid and/or just to kill two people. I briefly wondered if Burroughs could be involved in some kind of ritual, but the overall events of the episode don't feel directed or focused enough. If there was goal aside from torturing Burroughs and his victims, I couldn't determine it.

The line from Genesis "Behold, thou hast driven me out" obviously invokes some Eye imagery. I did note how much of religion, particularly Catholicism, centers around viewing and reveling in the majesty and horror of God/a god. Religion's ability to unwittingly turn people into voyeurs of their messiah connotes it with the Eye. Furthermore, the previously mentioned focus on guilt and the horror's apparent delight in Burroughs suffering associates with the Eye as well.

Burroughs isolation heightening his fear does tie in elements of the Lonely, while the smiling imagery is reminiscent of the Stranger. Of course, the hallucinations and loss of control of one's mind associates Burroughs with the Spiral, and the cannibalism associates him with the Flesh. But if I had to pick a true second to the Eye as the main entity associated with this episode, I would have to go with the Web. Burroughs is incapable of making any choices. The demon controls his actions, eliminating his independence and manipulating him. Even if it is not really a possession but some other manipulation of his psyche, it prevents Burroughs from acting independently.

Character Notes: Breekon & Hope mention! In spite of my earlier doubts, their involvement does signal some kind of ritual. Usually, they're only involved in deliveries associated with high level entity action, such as the coffin or Jon's lighter. I don't recall this stole being mentioned in any other episode, but if Breekon & Hope delivered it, it must be relevant somehow.

Another reason this episode might be affiliated with a ritual is that Gertrude was apparently the last person to read it. In her final days, she was primarily focused on stopping rituals, which indicated this case was particularly important.

When will my Martin return home from the war.

[gristlebloom-orchid]

Random headcanons about somewhat unimportant characters (TMA)

Graham Folger... oh, that guy would never swear. I am sure of this. And I feel like Sebastian Adekoya wouldn't much either... or he would with Jared, perhaps. Also hear me out I made Not!Jared/End!Seb and Boneturner!Graham/Oliver-but-nothing-bad-happened-to-him would anyone read anything about it? Also Not!Jared is a gingerhead, do whatever you want with this information.

Ross Davenport (MAG90) may or may not hate having over people at gym just blasting music on a speaker - like just buy headphones and stop bothering me with whatever you listen to (not sure what he would listen to but I just like giving every character I like liking about the same things as me which isn't too bad given how large my taste can get. I feel like he would listen to Tub Ring.)

Hezekiah Wakely would love weighted blanket+noise canceling headphones combinaison, I would lowkey resurect him just to give him that.

Tyler, the guy from MAG177 in the processing line, I give him a 70% chance of also being terrified by the Eye but not as much as being just processed throught the lines, cut up only for them to use nothing, then restart.

Toby Carlisle, really, that guy just needs help please give him therapy instead of insulting him in your statement Christof you asshole (I feel way too much sympathy for this guy even if he stared ominously at his neighbor while smoking on the balcony and hammered meat everywhere)

Bonus thought: The man who speaks in bells (MAG20-unnamed but mentionned) is pretty hecking cool I love this guy

[insertfandomrefhere]

dyou ever think about the fact that father edwin burroughs cannibalized those oxford students during or shortly after jon's time at oxford?? because i do

[theriverpointace]

H E L P

just listened to MAGs 19 and 20 and they are causing some remarkable difficulties for my timeline!!

here’s what it boils down to, afaik:

idk if anybody has any answers to this that don’t include spoilers? (the wiki is my best friend and worst enemy rn.) atm i’m tempted to chalk it up to burroughs not being in total control of his senses—could that include his memory?? idk!! idk and i hate it

[microclown]

I’m relistening to the Hilltop Rd episodes before I move on to 195 because I need a refresher, and I have to say I’m not liking the implications of these parallels…

The “anger” From MAG 8

and MAG 162

The feeling of there being no other choice…

In MAG 8

MAG 20

And MAG 194

…👀

[voidthescribe]

MAG #20: Desecrated Host II

Re-listening to the horrible tragedy of Father Burrows is just desperately trying to figure out which Entity was messing with him and then going to look at theories on tumblr and realizing that I couldn’t figure out which one it was because it was, like, half of them.

[late-to-the-magnus-archives]

"T" is For Tomb - a Magnus Archives one-shot

Jon. Jon is somewhere.

(Or Jon is nowhere, and he is imagining, he has gone mad, he’s landed where the Fears wanted to go and the Web decided and Jon is eaten, Jon is dust, Jon is—)

Jon is somewhere. Martin will find him (or what was the point of any of this), even if it takes a thousand years.

Final warning: post MAG-200. Dark. Bittersweet kinda ending, heavy on the "bitter."

AO3

--------------

“What do you want me to do with this?”

Footsteps, distant voices; the crunching of rubble, both falling and loose.

“Leave it. We’re done with tapes.”

Closer steps, grinding grandeur into dust. “Want me to smash it?”

Guilt tinges this voice now, guilt its owner wants to deny. “I think… we can probably just turn it off.”

“Okay.” That voice moves away.

The guilty one (only the smallest bit, only a little aware of what she’s done) approaches, and for reasons unknown, speaks. “If anyone’s listening…” The tape whirs, voices mumble, someone shouts to someone else. “Goodbye,” says she. “I’m sorry, and…” The guilt. It is there, but too late. This cannot be undone. “Good luck.”

#

Martin wakes screaming, and he wakes alone.

He wakes, bereft in terrible discovery of self-without-him in a place of ruination.

Jon! Jon! Jonathan Sims! Please, for the love of God, answer me!

Shouting into a sea of screams, loved ones crying for loved ones, an empty spot beside him where Jon should be. Jon’s blood coating his hand, the knife, his clothes. Jon’s life coagulating, going dark, gathering rubble and dust, less like blood by the hour and more like tar.

Jon! Please!

Martin hears him. He’s sure he does: Martin. Find me, Martin. I’m waiting for you.

But where? Where? How? Jon sounds as calm and inviting as he’d ever done in the weeks before Elias (no, Jonah) sent that letter and ruined it all.

But it's not coming from anywhere. There’s no direction. It’s outside Martin’s head (he’s reasonably sure), but he can’t find it.

Can’t find Jon.

At the end of the day, the first day, the last day, the first-next-day of hell, Martin faces the truth that Jon might be gone.

He refuses to swallow it down.

#

No one sees Martin Blackwood. Not as he is. Not as he was.

Basira does, sometimes. She’s vague about it, knows his name, does not seem to remember what he’s done or whose he is. The rest of the time, she looks through him. Like when he asks about Jon.

Perhaps that’s fortunate. He runs into her a lot, and is sure she would stop him.

His key works in his apartment door (and he feels guilt for leaving the site of destruction, guilt for abandoning the place where hides Jon’s voice, guilt for going to his nice, soft bed when others huddle on rocks that used to be flats and weep for those they miss).

He should be with them. Searching. Helping.

No one searches for him. No one helps him.

He can’t.

#

He goes back the next day. Wanders, calls. Sometimes Jon calls back– just his voice, that gorgeous baritone that first hooked Martin’s thoughts then affection then desire, once Martin had learned to speak Jon and understand how quirky his new boss was, to translate from brusque and maybe mean to he’s fucking scared and lonely so it all made sense.

He hears the voice, but it is further away, and that makes him panic.

He searches, overturning brick, plunging into risky crevasses and disintegrating doorways.

No one sees Martin Blackwood. He walks past police and emergency services, past fucking Basira (who is smug, who is in charge, who seems to think she earned something for putting down a monster, but Martin knows the only thing that earns is pain).

Jon’s voice is further. 

By mid-afternoon, Martin can no longer make out words.

By dusk, it’s gone. Gone. He never found a direction. 

Martin screams.

#

By dark, he doesn't even remember going home, but finds himself there, a path walked in emptied endlessness over many years, and the silence is Buried, constricting his lungs, and the silence is Vast, endless insignificance, and he cannot breathe  at all.

He bathes, and he prays to no one, and he lies in his bed. And he’s hot, and he sweats, and his heart burns within him, and his throat twists to something it ought not be, and his skin crawls with bugs he can neither find or kill.

Jon. Jon is somewhere.

(Or Jon is nowhere, and he is imagining, he has gone mad, he’s landed where the Fears wanted to go and the Web decided and Jon is eaten, Jon is dust, Jon is—)

Jon is somewhere. Martin will find him (or what was the point of any of this), even if it takes a thousand years.

#

Somewhere around day three, he realizes he has not eaten.

He doesn’t feel hungry. Should he? He didn’t feel hungry in the apocalypse, either (and memories of bringing tea, never drunk, break him down, crush him onto the sidewalk like preserved peaches), but after his weeping, Jon is still gone.

Martin will not stop calling.

Jon!

Nothing. 

Jon!

No voice. No—

Wait.

Jon?

There is… something. A touch, a breeze, a memory of breeze, an instinct that says Jon is not too far. Jon is alive. Jon is there. Jon is—

Jon is.

Martin runs. Runs, tripping over rubble and dandruffed concrete, at last fleeing the wrecked, wry circle of the Panopticon’s fall. He ignores Basira’s shout (of course, now she sees him), following not a sound not a sight not a knowledge but an instinct, something born of faith and will and maybe madness, something he will follow even if it is right off a damn cliff.

#

It is not dissimilar to the Apocalypse, in many ways. He runs until he can’t, then walks until something kills him (and nothing does), north, following that wrong and reminiscent beckoning, through roads clogged with abandoned cars and cracked glass and memories of terror.

And he has not eaten, and it does not matter. 

Jon.

#

The sun rises and sets and rises again, and Martin wipes his face to find he sweats but does not thirst, and wonders if he will die on this trip.

It does not matter. Maybe this is the last walk. Maybe today was the last of his final days alive, and if so, he does not care. He’s done.

He had to stab his beloved. He had to do the worst thing. What more can the world ask of him?

Jon.

He feels Jon. Senses.

He walks.

#

Sun rise.

Sun set.

Sun rise, sun set, sun rise, sun set, shoes worn, hole in sole in soul in mausoleum of thought and mind and pattern, and all he can do is walk. Nothing besides remains.

Sun rise. Sun set. And on the seventh day, like creation, not terribly far from Aberfeldy, he knows that he will rest.

#

He descends into the grassy valley, past the place where good cows once stood, but the cabin is not there. Something else is. He stares, stunned in ticklish grass that lightly scratches his dried, dirty hands, and stares some more.

It is a tomb.

Above ground (necropolis like New Orleans). Burnt and blasted, abandoned and rust-stained, and its dark, decorative door hangs wide open.

(He has neither drunk nor eaten since waking, and sure he must be hallucinating now at the very least.)

And Martin opens his mouth, and for the first time since waking, truly speaks. “Jon?”

Martin

on the breeze on his cheek on his lips skipping the bother of ears—

Martin come to me

Martin comes.

It’s over. The end. Whatever comes next in this helpless world is not his to do.

“I paid for my peace,” he says like dry bones, squeaking together under sun and gnawed by something dark. “I paid for my peace! ”

(And thinks, as his dirty, frayed trainer-toe just dips into the impenetrable shadow, that this is what They were waiting for, that They are bound to Jon and he to Them, and it should not have been possible to disappear into the Lonely since Martin woke up, but it was, it is, because something went wrong, and oh, it will go so much more wrong, but Jon waited because Martin wasn’t here, and once Martin is here, it will continue to wrongness, and Martin does not care, and Martin paid for his peace, and Jon did too, and maybe Jon’s peace is no longer what it was when he was human unstabbed alive appeasable —)

Martin, whispers the tomb-wet breeze.

“Jon,” he creaks in tomb-dry tone.

Martin

Martin steps into the dark, sees nothing, feels

Finds

“Jon,” he says, falling into familiar arms, into that known funny scent of ink and electronics and spiders, does not care that he is seen and stripped and flensed in this dark of all-sight, does not care about pain or grief or anything but this, does not care that (Jon died this is not Jon this is something else) whatever remains is enough of Jon to want him back, and what more matters now?

Martin paid for his peace.

Jon doubly so.

“I’m home,” Martin whispers, crumbles, disintegrates, rests, and as he is held, the door, in need of oil, screeches closed as the world finds screaming again.

-----------

Notes:

So, uh. This is my 200th fanfic. I did not exactly plan for it to be sad? Here we are, anyway! I'll create some proper fluff to make up for it. Scout's Honor.

[generalb]

MAG 20 “Desecrated Host II” review: nevermind! It was a straight go to episode 2 type deal. I gotta admit I’m kinda disappointed, I thought we wouldn’t be seeing the second episode for a season or 2. I liked the illusion scene at the end, it was very spooky and easy to picture it.

They mentioned a name at the end as well that Sims says is familiar; a company, called Breekon & Hope Deliveries(had to look it up for spelling, but looked no further). Have we already heard of them before this episode? I’m genuinely asking. Pls comment on this post because I’m afraid of spoilers if I look it up.

Statement Ends.