The Magnus Archives - MAG 159 - The Last

Episode Date: October 24, 2019

Case #0182509-BStatement of Peter Lukas regarding his life, family and interactions with The Lonely. Statement extracted 25th September 2018.Thanks to this week's Patrons: Sarah Schrader, Jeremy Wallace, Ellie M, Laurent, manywisps, Micah Epstein, Ezzoh, Anke Gladnick, Rhadja, ECD, Kelly O, Q, ivelostmyspectacles, Luna Zephyr, Pagan angel, Stormy Weather, 3 Eyed Mavens, Nadia Tudhope, E K, Vance BarnhillIf you would like to join them, be sure to visit www.patreon.com/rustyquillEdited this week by Annie Fitch, Brock Winstead & Alexander J Newall.Written by Jonathan Sims and directed by Alexander J Newall.Performances:- "The Archivist" - Jonathan Sims- "Peter Lukas" - Alasdair Stuart- "Martin Blackwood" - Alexander J NewallSound effects this week by "Ambience, Seaside Waves, Close, A.wav" by InspectorJ (www.jshaw.co.uk), kangaroovindaloo, elementals, Adam_N and previously credited artists via freesound.org.Check out our merchandise at https://www.redbubble.com/people/rustyquill/collections/708982-the-magnus-archives-s1You can subscribe to this podcast using your podcast software of choice, or by visiting www.rustyquill.com/subscribePlease rate and review on your software of choice, it really helps us to spread the podcast to new listeners, so share the fear.Content notes:- Isolation- Murder / Death / Loss- Family estrangement / NeglectJoin our community:WEBSITE: rustyquill.comFACEBOOK: facebook.com/therustyquillTWITTER: @therustyquillREDDIT: reddit.com/r/RustyQuillEMAIL: [e-mail] Magnus Archives is a podcast distributed by Rusty Quill Ltd. and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Sharealike 4.0 International Licence Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the first radio ad you can smell. The new Cinnabon pull-apart only at Wendy's. It's ooey, gooey, and just five bucks for the small coffee all day long. Taxes extra at participating Wendy's until May 5th. Terms and conditions apply. Hi everyone, Alex here. I'd just like to take a moment to thank some of our patrons. Sarah Schrader, Jeremy Wallace, Ellie M, Laurent, Many Wisps, Micah Epstein, a moment to thank some of our Patrons. Thank you all, we really appreciate your support. If you'd like to join them, go to www.patreon.com forward slash rustyquill and take a look at our rewards. Rusty Quill Presents The Magnus Archives Episode 159

The Last Martin! Martin! He doesn't want to see you. Where are you? I'm not here, Archivist. No one is. It's only you. Fine.

Then maybe no one can answer some questions. You've still got time, archivist. Turn around and leave. You've played your part. Now go. What's wrong, Lucas? Afraid of talking face to face? Of course. Or haven't you been paying attention? Martin! It's odd, really. You each think you're so focused on the other, but how much do you really know each other? How much time have you

spent together when not working or bickering or fleeing from that latest thing that wants to kill you? So, what are you seeking? The image you've each created of the other? The people you think

you love don't exist. Not really. And that's a very lonely place to be. Shut up! Martin! He doesn't want to see you. Then let me hear that from him. Just go.

Make me. Unless you can't. The lonely and the eye aren't too far apart, are they? Not really. What good's being alone if you don't know how alone you truly are? Which means... Well, I think you're worried. You know I'll find him eventually, and you know I can find you.

Hmm. thought so. Martin. John? I'm here. I came for you. Why? I thought you might be lost. Are you real? Yes.

Yes, I am. Come on. We've got to get out of here. No. No, I don't think so. Why? This is where I should be. It feels right.

Martin, don't say that. Nothing hurts here. It's just quiet. Even the fear is gentle here. This isn't right. This isn't you. It is, though. I really loved you, you know. He's done something.

Peter's done something to mess with your... Damn it! Martin! Martin! I tried to tell you. He's gone. He made his choice. And it wasn't you. It was for me, though. I'm the reason he... I did this to him as much as you.

Yes. Suppose you did. Where are your friends, archivist? Tim and Sasha are dead. Yes. Daisy and Basira are probably dead. Because of you. Georgie and Melanie have left me. And? Martin's gone. You're alone, Archivist. The last one standing. I did warn you. I did want you to leave, but... Perhaps it would be better if you stayed a while.

After all, you can't hurt anyone in here. Yes. Yes. Or perhaps you could answer some questions. What? I wouldn't try to leave if I were you. I can see you now. I can find you wherever you go.

Fine. It was just a thought. So leave. Not before I get some answers. That's not going to happen. Tell me your story, Peter Lucas. No. Tell me. Fine. Fine. Where do you want to begin? The start? A lonely youth? My gradual path

to becoming an only child? That's the thing, you see, about a family faith. You've got to double down on the believers. My mother had five children over her life before my father finally drifted away. She was a Lucas to the core, though not born into the family, while my father, for all he believed himself keen on a life without obligation, gradually withered away to nothing as she cultivated the space between them. The house was sprawling, our bedrooms were kept as far apart as possible, and changed often, as we were cared for by a rotating cast of nannies and tutors. You know, she's still alive.

But I still can't picture my mother's face with any clarity, and I consider that a blessing. I'm not even burdened by hatred for her. She is simply someone who exists far away from me. It was the sort of childhood that would not be allowed if we didn't have money, but we're an old family with, shall we say, a remarkably direct line of inheritance. The sort of family where no social worker would even be allowed on the property. But for all that, aside from a few oddities of faith, I don't know how different my upbringing was from other scions of aristocracy.

From what I understand, severing the connection to your humanity is a cornerstone of an upper-class education, though I was spared the targeted traumas of boarding school, as my mother clearly believed the danger of friendship was too acute. I suppose to call myself an only child is technically untrue. Two of my sisters still live, though they disavowed the family and moved far, far away. Still, to be cut off from one's family

is its own very special sort of loneliness, isn't it? So we all serve in our own ways. The other two, my brother Aaron and sister Judith, well, they weren't considerate enough to quietly grow to adulthood and disappear. They simply didn't have the temperament to thrive in the Lucas household,

always trying to instigate games, make friends, connect with people. games, make friends, connect with people. As far as I'm aware, they were sent away to live their lives with very distant relatives, never to return. I'm sure it's possible my mother resolved the matter in a less pleasant manner, but in my limited interaction with her, she never struck me as a cruel woman, and I would imagine for children that age, the fear and isolation of being uprooted and sent away is just as strong as that of meeting a more grisly fate. I, of course, was the favoured son, being quiet and reserved and, at all points, deeply engaged with my own loneliness.

and, at all points, deeply engaged with my own loneliness. I had no time for books or television or any of the escapes and artificial friendships of fiction. No, I was myself, and that was enough. I would spend my days exploring the wide grounds and forests of our estate, finding the hidden corners I thought that none would have found before me, though now I wonder how many generations of Lucases had exactly those thoughts in exactly those spots. As soon as I was old enough, I would run away for days at a time. I would take what money I needed from my mother's purse and hitchhike to any city I could reach. Looking back, I realize how odd it was that her

purse was always so full of cash, and I believe it may have been the closest thing I ever received to her blessing. By the time I arrived at whatever destination I had arbitrarily picked, it would usually be night. I would walk around the darkened streets, drinking in the sodium orange, looking at the lit windows of the tower blocks that surrounded me, each one a small cozy den of warmth and humanity, and reveling in my distance from them. Sometimes I would pass another late-night traveler on the street, and I would hate them. They shattered the distance, my cocoon of quiet stillness, and I wished with all my heart that they would simply disappear.

And one day, one of them did. I still remember him well. He was tall and broad, wearing a green raincoat he'd clearly bought before middle age began to set in. There was a thin drizzle that night. One of those rains you can't see, but leaves everything glistening and damp. And he was struggling with an umbrella. I tried to pass him quickly, but his eyes met mine, and he... smiled. And asked if I could help him. I can't describe the feeling that passed

through me. I can only say that I told him to go away. And he did. Or perhaps I did. In retrospect, it's hard to be sure which of us fell out of the populated world, but either way, the sense of blissful relief, edged with a strange creeping fear, was something I never experienced before. It was intoxicating. When I returned, I was met by my mother and a small group of stern-faced relatives that I had never seen before except at funerals. They took

me below the house and showed me the truth of our family. It was difficult to accept at first, not because I didn't want it to be true, but because it seemed unbelievable that any god could be so perfectly in tune with my heart. I left the house again shortly after and took to the sea. I never saw my mother again, except, of course, at funerals. Except, of course, at funerals. Some of my most peaceful memories were on the tundra. I had gathered a small group of trusted souls who I knew were loyal and dedicated to my money.

They had no qualms or morals about what we did on that boat, and, at my request, each signed the ship under a false name, so I would never have to know who they were. Those lonely nights of sacrifice and waiting, hearing the dreadful sound of my ancestor's whistle drift over the dark and brooding waters, knowing another soul was leaving this world. God, I wish I was there now, locked in my cabin, staring over the quiet emptiness of the open ocean. But it's moored now, and I came on

land at Elias's request. My crew is out there waiting for a call I think I am now unlikely ever to give them. I will call him Elias, for that's how I've known him for most of our acquaintance, though I originally met him when he was still James Wright, head of the Magnus Institute. I considered him a dull little man at first, so keen to watch other people's misery, to lose himself in second-hand pain and drama, exactly the sort of thing I'd always been so keen to avoid. Gertrude was the one that scared me. She seemed to have no interest in meeting me whatsoever, something I appreciated, but there was something in her eyes when she looked at me, as though she was making a calculation, and I was an

unwanted integer she was deciding whether to remove. It wasn't until much later that I realised exactly how true that was. Still, it seems I was never oppressing enough concern for her to sail out after me, or even wait until I made port and waylay me. I suppose even she couldn't have predicted

how it would all turn out. Thinking about it now, perhaps one of the reasons I lasted as long as I did was that I was, at the end of the day, predictable a known quantity I had my little patch sending my poor lost sailors to their forsaken end

but I rarely stepped outside of it when I think of all those I met who travelled in this secret world we found ourselves in Gertrude, Simon, Mikhail, even Rainer. There are plenty whose lives might well have been easier with my death, but it was rare that I strayed outside my habits. Maybe that's why, when I crossed paths with Adelard Decker, we ended up talking and he told me his theory of the extinction,

something that stayed with me even after he died pursuing it. The thing is, the loneliness I crave that fills my heart with that reassuring unease relies on distance from other people. But a world without people at all,

or at least anything I would recognise as people it is meaningless without the lighted window in the distance how am I to see myself apart from it no, such a world would be terribly dull and scares me in a very different way a fear I am happy to offer up of course but one that I would prefer not come to

pass. My instinct was much like the others. I thought that if I could complete my ritual first, then the potential birth of the dreadful change would be meaningless. I started it, shortly before Simon convinced me to join him in his little space experiment. It was interesting, of course, but in the end a tremendous waste of money just to scare a single astronaut. But I had it in my mind that it might distract from my true attempt. I had commissioned the services of architects, designers and sociologists, all under a variety of pretenses, and had secured a plot of land

near Oldgate East. I was going to build a tower block of my very own. Oh, it was a marvel of design, deceptively spacious apartments, yet no room quite big enough for a double bed or decent sized sofa. Cooking facilities that seemed adequate until you tried to do more than microwave. An office space in every flat, but without a door, so you could never truly escape your work. None of them had more than a single bedroom, though each had a main bathroom and an en suite, which is a small touch I was very proud of. The lower floor levels were left deliberately empty, so anyone living there could only see the people below from a distance, the lights of the city that they were removed from.

The windows were thick, and every wall had soundproofing inside it. The corridors were full of false doors, so even though each floor was designed to minimise the probability of residents encountering each other, it would seem as though they were crowded in by doors that would not open if knocked on. I made the elevators very small. Then I offered the rooms at a ridiculously low price for their central London location, and then screened the applicants mercilessly. I prioritised those who had newly moved to the city, graduates who needed cheap accommodation

and were moving into intensive, high-stress jobs that would give them little time for socialising. Recent divorcees were also very suitable, especially those whose friends had sided with their partner. I crammed them in, pushing them to stew in a cocktail of distant lights, empty corridors, and lukewarm take-out for one. The plan was to wait until those inside reached a critical mass of loneliness and despair,

then, all at once, lock them in remotely, cut off their internet and phone lines, and leave them to die alone in their single-occupancy professional tombs as the Forsaken emerged from their terror. I called it The Silence, though to be honest it was mainly because I thought they had to have names. Can't say if the title was desperately inspired. Then, of course, Gertrude Robinson happened. Do you know how she did it? What a devastating weapon she used to derail my plan.

The newspaper. She tipped off someone in The Guardian. I still remember seeing the headline there in black and white, the loneliest building in Britain. Trouble is, everyone I picked was white, middle class, so people actually cared, falling over themselves to declare it emblematic of the problems of the modern world. The thing pieces started to pour in.

The applications started to drop off and I was up to my neck in community outreach programs. No way to salvage it. Years of my life and a sizable fortune down the drain. She didn't even have the decency to kill me. It really knocked me back. Took me years to find myself again. I returned to the tundra, tried to forget.

But the trouble was I'd tasted the game now. I'm still hungry for more. I suppose that's why I was so keen when Elias contacted me. We kept in touch, of course. My family helped fund the Institute, and he'd always been good about tipping me off to potential victims. Going through something horrific can leave you feeling very isolated indeed, especially if you know no one else will believe you.

And of course, he knew I find it hard to resist a wager. If I could convince one of his staff to willingly pledge themselves to the lonely, it was all mine. He even let me pick the victim. He was so sure the prize of the institute, the panopticon, and a willing vessel to use it would be just too much for me to resist. And he was right. Just didn't go quite as I'd hoped. You know, this is one of the first bets I ever made with him that I've actually lost. But I guess that's how hustlers work, isn't it?

They lose and lose until you're willing to put it all on the line, and then the trap shuts. So I suppose that's probably why I reacted so rashly, trying to rip his victory away, keep you here. But it looks like I might have underestimated my opponent once again. And what was his prize? What did he get if you lost? Oh, he got you. I'm done. Tell me. I'm not saying another word. Tell me or I will rip it out of you. No! Answer my question! No! Leave me alone! Tell me! No!

Leave! Alone! Tell me! Stubborn fool. Martin. He's gone, Martin. He's gone. His only wish was to die alone. Tough. Now listen to me, Martin. Listen. His only wish was to die alone. Tough.

Now, listen to me, Martin. Listen. Hello, John. Listen, I know you think you want to be here. I know you think it's safer and... Well, maybe it is. But we need you. I need you.

No, you don't. Not really. Everyone's alone, but we all survive. I don't just want to survive. I'm sorry. Man, look at me. Look at me and tell me what you see. I see.

I see you. I see John. I see you. Oh, Martin. I was on my own. I was all on my own. Not anymore. Come on. Let's go home.

How? Don't worry. I's go home. How? Don't worry. I know the way. The Magnus Archives is a podcast distributed by Rusty Quill and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Sharealike 4.0 international license. Today's episode was written by Jonathan Sims and directed by Alexander J. Newell. To subscribe, view associated material, or join our Patreon, visit RustyQuill.com. Rate and review us online, tweet us at TheRustyQuill, visit us on Facebook or email us at MailAtRustyQuill.com. Join our communities on the forum via the website or on Reddit at r slash The Magnus Archives. Thanks for listening. It's Kareem, the voice of Simon Fairchart from the Magnus Archives, letting you know about our sponsor, Audible. For fans of heart-racing, bone-chilling and mind-bending stories, Audible has everything you need.

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