The Magnus Protocol 30 - Dead End Job

Coach, the energy out there felt different.

What changed for the team today?

It was the new game day scratchers from the California Lottery.

Play is everything.

Those games sent the team's energy through the roof.

Are you saying it was the off-field play that made the difference on the field?

Hey, a little play makes your day, and today it made the game.

That's all for now.

Coach, one more question: play the new Los Angeles Chargers, San Francisco 49ers, and Los Angeles Rams Scratchers from the California Lottery.

A little play can make your day.

Please play responsibly, must be 18 years or older to purchase play or claim.

Rusty Quill presents

The Magnus Protocol.

Episode thirty Dead End Job

You can't ignore her forever.

I just don't know what to say to her.

I was kind of hoping she wouldn't check her voicemail for another few hours.

Really think she's that upset?

Five calls in seven minutes and a bunch of messages.

What does she say?

Don't know.

Can't quite bring myself to check just yet.

Her listenes well, but she doesn't really understand.

I don't know.

Maybe she's right.

What?

When I started at the OIR, she told me not to let it get to me.

Now look at me.

You were attacked?

Yeah, by something I released.

Because I let stuff get to me.

Because I got curious.

My head is killing me.

I'm not surprised.

When I saw you lying out there, I thought.

Well,

yeah.

Headache makes sense.

You need water?

No.

Tough guy.

You're lucky we didn't need to run to catch the last Oxford train.

Unlucky.

Second thoughts?

I don't know.

It's just starting to feel kind of far away now.

I was so certain we had to get to the hilltop center Aesap, but no.

Well,

I don't think there's another train back till tomorrow morning, morning, so we may as well do a bit of snooping.

I know.

Just wish I could focus properly.

Rain's easing off at least.

That's good.

Thanks, Celia.

For what?

For coming with me.

You didn't have to.

Sounded like you'd have gone anyway.

At least this way I can make sure it all goes to plan.

There's a plan.

Besides, you're not the only one who's curious.

Well,

I still appreciate it.

Anyway, what if you were right?

When you said we had to go now, or something terrible would happen.

You just had a weird monster in your brain.

Maybe it was the truth.

Christ, I hope not.

I do not feel up to an apocalyptic conflict right now.

Hopefully, the painkiller should be kicking in soon.

Rest up.

We're safe here.

Come on, Sam.

You goddamn.

Pick up, pick up, pick up.

It's following you, you stupid.

Excuse me, miss.

I'm going to have to ask you to rain it in.

Sorry.

I don't want to have to ask you to leave.

Okay, alright, I get it.

Wait, where's the ticket office?

Closed for tonight.

Machine's over there.

Are there any more trains going to Oxford tonight?

Check the board.

I know I can check the bloody board.

I just thought you might be, I don't know, useful.

You have a good night, miss.

Right.

Oh.

X, Oxford, Ron.

Adult.

No real card.

God, I don't know.

Any time they return,

how much?

Christ, no.

Seriously,

Alice.

Yeah, Colin, I'm here.

Are you in the office at the moment?

Uh, no.

Why?

For God's sake.

I need your help.

Um,

I'm in trouble.

Like, right now,

I'm not really.

I'm kind of in the middle of something.

I'm messed up, Alice.

Freddy's

messed up.

I'll come round first thing tomorrow, okay?

And then we can.

You can tell me what you think is going on with Freddy then, yeah?

Colin,

yeah,

sure.

Sorry to bother you.

Goodbye, Alice.

Colin?

Listen, I'll be there as soon as

crap.

Breena, I've just had a call from Trevor Herbert, MP.

Oh,

did he

enjoy his visit?

He certainly found it illuminating.

I'm glad.

If my job was all that was at stake here, I'd probably praise your initiative.

I have no idea where you've been digging these files up from, but you've certainly used them effectively and bluntly.

I have no idea.

There is much more at play here than you know.

And you are not prepared for the scale of responsibility about to crash down on your shoulders.

I'm sorry.

No, you aren't.

But I think you will be.

Is that a threat?

Goodbye, Gwen.

What

that's it?

That's it.

Give the others my regards and best of luck.

You're all going to need it.

You're sure

there's not much round here?

We're fine, really.

Fair enough.

Cheers.

So, I'm guessing that's it then.

You alright?

Just checking for tape tape recorders.

Look, even if it was on the train, which we can't be sure of, there's no way it could have beaten us here.

I mean, how many eyes did you say it had?

Plenty.

Then, yeah.

I doubt it's getting a lift.

So we're okay for now, at least.

Come on.

What unit did you say it was?

17,

according to Helen's records.

But it doesn't say if there was a shop there or anything.

So, how do we know which unit is which?

Most don't even have signs left.

This way,

you sure

call it a hunch.

Sam.

Oh,

sorry.

This place is just making me a bit nervous, you know?

I don't think it's actually, like, properly abandoned.

Some of the shops look in decent neck.

Maps does still list a bunch of businesses here, but no websites or opening times or anything.

I can see why.

Like, that can't be a real dentist, right?

We want your teeth.

Yeah,

that's not normal.

I think it's normal for here.

Maybe we should come back in the daytime.

What happened to stopping that archivist?

Yeah, well...

Uh

I think it's coming from that old appliance store.

Then it's not unit 17.

Ignore it.

But it looks like it's open.

Yes, it is.

And it's probably coming from inside a washing machine, or a fridge, or something else with a suspicious door.

And we both know what happens if we open it.

Yeah.

I really wish my job wasn't just to learn about all the horrible things that can happen to you in a place like this.

Try to think of it as preparation.

Now, I'm guessing that it's just around this.

Oh, Christ.

What was that for?

Sorry, it was a reflex.

That's one hell of a reflex.

Here, let me help.

What the hell are you two doing sneaking around here this time of night?

We could ask you the same question.

I'll work here.

Sorry, you work here?

Yeah, I clean up, make sure everything stays locked up.

Like the one with all the banging.

Ah, crap.

Which one was it?

Uh, Grey's appliances.

Right, I better go lock it back up before it's well.

Look, you two need to leave.

It's no safe here.

The lights are mostly gone, and the structure is weak, so.

It's alright, you can just say it's haunted.

Okay?

Yeah.

This place is haunted, like ridiculously haunted, and dangerous with it.

I don't know if you'd want to be ghost hunters or something, but trust me, this place isn't here for you.

You should go.

Celia?

We have business in one of the units.

Fine.

Just leave me out of it.

If you like.

I do.

Which unit?

17.

The old outreach center?

Yeah, I think so.

For the Magnus Institute.

If you say so, no one's been in there in decades.

Come on.

I keep the front lock tight, but I can let you in the service entrance.

Just like that.

You learn to go with the flow here and stay out of the way of whatever goes on.

I just keep it clean and lock up when I can.

If you're stupid enough to go poking around, that's on you.

I said my piece.

Well, that's not exactly reassuring.

No, I don't imagine it is.

Where to?

Hey, are there any other taxis working tonight?

Probably, but I'm the only one here, so you take it or leave it.

Sorry, no, yeah, it it's just I'm looking for someone.

Right.

Uh, this guy, Sam.

Have you seen him tonight?

I can't tell you that.

Client confidentiality, you know how it is.

50 quid?

Yeah, I took him and a lady friend over to that creepy old shopping centre up Cowley Way.

Weird, but I don't judge.

How fast can you get me there?

This time of night?

Ten minutes, easy.

Wicked, you're on.

Look, it's none of my business, but I'm not getting involved in any like crime of passion stuff, all right?

I don't want to be a witness to anything.

No, no, it's nothing like that, I promise.

Now, can we go?

Sure.

After I'll get the 50.

Fair.

Shut up!

Just one boring night.

Is that so much to ask?

Can't believe I'm still here after all these years.

Looking after this place is as much about what you don't see as what you do.

The first time I came here...

The first time I came here, I knew something wasn't right.

I used to clean hospitals and I know what dried blood looks like.

And hear it.

It was everywhere.

I didn't believe it, of course.

Didn't let myself recognize it, but I still saw it right from the start.

In the corners, in the cracks.

Was it from the victims of this awful place?

Was it mixed into the concrete when it was first raised?

Or do the buildings just bleed?

Is this place of wounds that never fully heals?

I don't know, but on hot summer nights I can smell it.

So I take the job.

You wouldn't ask me if you could see my payslips of these last 30 years.

Life was bad when I met the owner.

He smiled so wide, like he was so unbelievably pleased to be offering me such an opportunity.

I asked about the blood.

I couldn't help myself.

He just smiled and added another 10 grand to the salary.

I didn't ask any other questions.

I never even learnt his name.

From that moment on, it was just the three of us.

Me, the blood-stained silent concrete of the hilltop centre, and the duck.

In all my time I've never come during the day.

It would break some strange unspoken rule.

I don't know if anyone has ever come here shopping.

I don't know what shops are still open.

I don't know if it closed down years ago and I'm just another ghost loitering amongst the great grey corpse.

I know that it gets other visitors though.

I know because I clean up bits of them sometimes.

A patch of torn out hair, a half-melted tooth, a rotted fingernail torn from the root, and never enough to matter to anyone else.

I try not to see these days.

I ward people away at night, warn them that they shouldn't be here.

Usually they listen, but not always.

I remember the first time someone wouldn't turn away.

It was the winter of 97.

A man staggered up to me, stinking a cheap booze and piss.

He wanted to buy a lighter.

I told him to leave.

I told him that all the shops here were shut.

He called me a liar.

Then I noticed a light illuminating me from behind.

One of the shop fronts, a news agent I'd never paid much attention to, was open and apparently always had been.

What's more, there was a haggard yet eager old woman I'd never seen before stood behind the counter.

I tried to warn the man, but he just shoved me out the way and walked inside.

I went to clean the far side of the center and ignored the smell of burnt hair and charred meat.

It wasn't all death though.

Sometimes people arrived.

Not often, but every now and then you'd find some thin emaciated soul wandering around, lost and confused.

Ambulance would come take him away.

Maybe they're fine, but I doubt it.

I only called the police once.

Only once.

It was the whimpering.

There's always noises when you're cleaning, but you lock them up or curse them out and they shut up.

But this time, it didn't.

It just kept on going and going from one of the clothing stores near the East Exit.

Patience, I think it was called.

And this time I broke one of the unspoken rules.

I had a look.

At first, there was nothing, just darkness and clothing and motionless mannequins.

But the whimpering still filled the shop.

I checked the mannequins and it was on the third one that I realised what was happening.

Why the outfit was so mismatched.

Why the clothes had been pinned in place.

Why it was bleeding.

Why it was whimpering.

Of course, by the time the police finally bothered to turn up, there was nothing to show them.

A woman had been taken when I went out to greet them, leaving only one more bloodstain.

I got a caution for wasting police time.

Serves me right.

The next day I got a call from the owner.

He seconded and last time I ever heard his voice.

He asked me if I was still happy working at the Hilltop Centre.

He asked me if there was anything I wanted to know.

He asked me where my daughter liked to shop.

I was never curious again.

Even when I found the owner dead in his office, with every blood vessel stripped from his body and strung around the room in a grim cat's cradle.

I just closed the door and kept cleaning, and the payslips kept coming.

I tried to take time off.

Holidays are important.

If you're here too long, too regular, you start to feel like you're part of the place.

Like it's getting inside you, making you a fixture.

That's when I take the caravan and get some space, remind myself of the world.

Because at the end of the day, it's just a job.

But I still dream of the hilltop.

In my dream, it waits for me.

Silent, grey, and eager for my company.

Its concrete bones are streaked through with blood like rippled ice cream, and I reach out for it.

It's soft and cold and yielding.

And then the gritty mixture snakes up my arm and begins to harden.

It pulls me onward, scraping off skin and tearing muscle until I finally fall.

It is rough

and cold and silent inside.

The world is locked away

and when I open my mouth to scream,

the cold grey pours down my throat and it fills my stomach with stone

It fills my lungs with gravel

and my blood.

We

are

it is me

and I'm it

and we

are

we

are

gone,

so use your phone.

Oh,

yeah,

Alice?

17 missed calls.

Yeah.

You gonna call her back, or she can wait.

Besides, I want to look around.

There's not much to see.

Yeah,

they must have completely cleared it out.

If they were ever here in the first place,

maybe we should.

There it is.

You've got something.

Stairs to the basement.

Great spot.

Well.

After you.

And they say chivalry is dead.

Look, last time I went to a basement, I accidentally released a monster, so

come on.

Do you hear that?

I hear it.

Do you see that?

Yeah,

I see it.

What is it?

Look how it splits the light

like a prism

It's so

beautiful

Celia

Do you know what this is

almost

Wait

what does that mean?

It's complicated then simplify it Sam listen for God's sake Celia Enough, okay?

I'm sorry, but enough.

I know you want want your privacy, but we are way too deep for that now.

My head's killing me.

I'm staring at God knows what, and there's some creature on its way to record us to death or whatever, so enough!

No more mysteries, no more cryptic clues and weird half-truths.

Just for once, I want to know what the hell is actually going on.

It's a wound in the world.

A tear between here

and

where I came from.

And it wants me back.

What are you saying?

It's unbalanced.

What?

Institute, alchemy, all of it.

It's all about balance.

Duapruma.

Four elements, seven planets.

It's all the same.

You've got to keep things balanced.

And if something is missing, if someone is misplaced,

the equation doesn't balance.

And that's when things get bad.

Bad how?

It keeps pulling me back.

Closer and closer.

It won't let me stay.

But you don't want to go back.

I don't remember much of how I got here, but I know there's nothing to go back to.

Here, I have a life.

I have Jack.

He needs me.

I have to balance it for him.

What are we doing here, Celia?

All this digging?

The OIAR?

The Magnus Institute?

You just wanted to get me here.

To make me trust you, so that what?

You could just use me to pay off some kind of cosmic debt?

It was your idea to come here tonight.

Was it?

I'm sorry, Sam.

So it was all a lie?

Not all of it.

I really did like you.

So what's the problem?

We're here.

Alice won't make it in time, and I know you're carrying that knife.

What happens now?

You push me?

Stab me?

Oh, do I need to jump in myself?

Come on.

What's stopping you?

What's stopping you, Celia?

I...

I don't...

When I first awoke, I knew nothing.

Nothing but the dream of things that sliced my who from me with claws like scalpos.

Oh god.

They would blunt me and

toy with what it meant to be me, peeling away my layers, first my name, then my memory, and then a whimper.

and then the fearless one reached in and grasped me, tore me out, leaving my story to fall away like autumn leaves.

I said, Leave her alone.

This is it.

Cool.

And like I told the others, there's nothing here, so if you want me to hang around, Sam

Celia

Celia,

Sam

Sam.

Oh god.

Oh god, no, please.

Sam is

Rough

and cold

and silent

and

no.

We are

the hill talk.

We are

the hill talk.

Not again.

Sam,

Celia.

you dark horse.

This is the OIAR.

Uh, Bouchard speaking.

Oh, hello, Gwen.

Just do I was after.

Oh, that's uh.

That is to say,

what can I do for you, Minister?

I'm guessing since it's you're picking up, you've spoken with Lena then.

Oh, yes, she, uh.

she left.

Didn't make too much of a scene, I hope.

Difficult business, after all.

Oh, no, not at all.

Great.

In that case, congratulations in order.

I'm sure you'll do a fine job.

I'm sorry?

I'll get someone to put the paperwork across your desk first thing tomorrow and make it official.

But let's not stand on ceremony.

As far as I'm concerned, you're the ringmaster now.

Gwen,

are you still there?

Yes, yes, still here.

So,

what do you want?

What should I do?

Oh, don't worry about me.

I'll stay out your way.

I've never been one to micromanage.

You have my full support.

Right.

Anyway, I won't keep you.

Congratulations again, and uh, best of luck.

Sam

Celia

Alice

Alice

down here

Celia

Where's Sam?

We've got to get out of here.

That archivist thing, it followed you.

It might be.

What?

What is that?

What happened?

Where's Sam?

It attacked us.

He tried to stop it, to protect me, even though

they're gone, Alice.

They're gone.

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.

Newell and directed by Alexander J.

Newell.

This episode was written by Jonathan Sims and edited with additional materials by Alexander J.

Newell,

with vocal edits by Lorianne Davis and Nico Vitesi, soundscaping by Tessa Vroom and mastering by Catherine Rinella with music by Sam Jones.

It featured Billy Hindel as Alice Dyer, Shahan Hamza as Samama Khalid, Anusha Battersby as Gwen Bouchard, Lori Ann Davis as Celia Ripley, Ryan Hope Ver Anderson as Colin Becker, Sarah Lambie as Lena Kelly, with additional voices from Beth Ayer.

The Magnus Protocol is produced by April Sumner, with executive producers Alexander J.

Newell, Danny McDonough, Lynn C., and Samantha F.

G.

Hamilton, and associate producers Jordan L.

Hawke, Taylor Michaels, Nicole Pillman, Cetius DeRaven, and Megan Nice.

To subscribe, view associated materials, or join our Patreon, visit RustyQuill.com.

Rate and review us online, tweet us at the RustyQuill, visit us on Facebook, or email us via mail at rustyquill.com.

Thanks for listening.

Coach, the energy out there felt different.

What changed for the team today?

It was the new game day, Scratchers, from the California Lottery.

Play is everything.

Those games sent the team's energy through the roof.

Are you saying it was the off-field play that made the difference on the field?

Hey, a little play makes your day, and today it made the game.

That's all for now.

Coach, one more question.

Play the new Los Angeles Chargers, San Francisco 49ers, and Los Angeles Rams Scratchers from the California Lottery.

A little play can make your day.

Please play responsibly, must be 18 years or older to purchase, play, or claim.