#it would require the lightless flame cult to be a thing

[personnotfound]

does anyone else think it would be really cool to somehow someway get an Agnes statement in Protocol?

Her role in Archives was that of a messiah impacting the world and people around her in wildly different ways whom we were never supposed to hear from directly. And we didn't.

It's been said before by Jonny himself among others that that effect wasn't conveyed the greatest. That in the end it just kind of felt like her perspective was missing, rather than deliberately excluded.

That being the case, I think It would be neat to get something from her here in Protocol. I still think it's important to pay respect to the original vision, and I don't think a retcon would be a good idea, so an alternate universe version of her giving a statement of one kind or another I think would be really satisfying and interesting without screwing with established canon.

Idk. Some thoughts. I'm not caught up on Protocol rn because the manner in which I'm listening to it is perfectly hinged and normal.

[phantomrose96]

The Lonely trying to enact its ritual only as a means of stopping The Extinction from enacting theirs is very funny to me because that's probably the only way you could even convince The Lonely to do their ritual.

The Fear rituals are all about unleashing their specific brand of chaos and torment on everyone else. But what the hell does The Lonely care about everyone else? The Lonely wants nothing to do with the 5 other people in line at the grocery store, let alone the world. Do you know how many more people they'd have to get involved with if they apocalypsed the entire world? The effort? The nuisance? Who would bother?

I like to imagine Peter Lukas has a little sheet of paper in his desk with a list of "pros" and "cons" for enacting the Lonely Ritual with the "cons" list just a mile long detailing every single distinct human interaction that would be required to end the world, and the "pros" list like "--will stop receiving phone calls about car extended warranty" "--cashier will stop asking if I want to donate $3 to Paws for Life charity" "--will not have to talk to Jonah Magnus anymore"

Like the only thing more annoying then enacting The Lonely ritual would be enduring the consequences of living in someone else's fear hell so the pro-vs-con balance finally tipped with the (apparent) advent of The Extinction and Peter got grumbling out of his chair to go answer Jonah's phone call.

Even funnier to me that Jonah had to hand Peter an Avatar of The Lonely because recruitment for The Lonely is probably hard as hell. Lightless Flame got to build a whole cult following for themselves but I bet the second Peter converts an Avatar to The Lonely they go "neat" and vanish off the grid to haul off to a cabin on 400 acres of uninhabited land in Montana with a "no soliciting" sign tacked on the front door.

Like Peter's just standing there watching his 14th Avatar convert hitch up a bindle and hop on the nearest passing boxcar to buttfuck-nowhere and Jonah comes along shoving Martin at him like "here, this one literally cannot leave. do whatever you want with it" and Peter was like "!"

[mindthelspace]

Sad TMA thought for the day

So... Agnes being prone to ‘violent rages’. 

Let’s think about what kind of people the Cult of the Lightless Flame attracts. The kind of people who would have been responsible for helping raise Agnes. The first things that come to mind are ‘lacking in empathy or compassion’ and ‘takes pleasure in hurting others’. There also seems to be a trend towards arrogance, poor social intelligence, and religious fundamentalism. 

Additionally, we know none of them wanted to be stuck looking after a child. They wanted a Messiah to end the world for them. The childrearing required to get one was just a necessary annoyance. 

So... how often, during Agnes’ childhood, would she have been, for instance’

- Palmed off on some grudging newcomer because the leaders couldn’t be bothered to sit with her.  - Been mistreated by one of these newcomers, because they registered children mainly as “people smaller and weaker than me”.  - Been used as hazing for newcomers. (”If he can survive a few hours with her, he’s in! Haha!) - Had her emotional needs ignored because nobody around her saw other peoples’ feelings as mattering, ever.  - Been snapped at, mocked, or derided for behaving like a kid around somebody who didn’t want to be looking after a kid.  - Hurt someone or damaging something accidentally, and been alternately and almost randomly yelled at, laughed at, or congratulated. Almost never asked about it though, or asked if she was OK.  - Had to learn to deal with inconsistent treatment by the adults around her. People A and B worship her and give her anything she wishes because of that. People C, D, E and F tightly control her. Person G treats her sort of normally. People H and I are horrible shitheads. Person J just acts like she’s not there. Sometimes people change categories, either permanently or by the day. Often completely new people are brought in and she has to get used to their brand of inappropriate childcare too.   - ... You get the idea. 

Plus there were all the normal child things she was denied by virtue of what she was being made into. No cuddles, no interaction with other kids, probably not much affectionate or playful attention at all (nobody joins the Cult of the Lightless Flame to play hide and seek with a five year old, after all). At some point they’d have had to start denying her normal food and drink, as being able to subsist on a Fear-only diet was important apparently. 

Plus plus she was basically forced to shoulder the hopes and dreams of a bunch of adults from birth. “We made you to change the world in the way that we want! This is the entire reason we let you exist! We need you to do this, our happiness depends on it!” 

... TLDR what I’m getting at is that there were almost definitely a lot of times where small!Agnes's violent rages were actually reactions to being raised in stressful, miserable conditions by by a group of sadistic negligent pricks. But the Cult couldn’t see that- its’ members aren’t the kind of people who think the wellbeing of a child is important- so they shrugged and concluded that she was just being ‘a brat’ for no reason. It didn’t occur to them to work out the difference between a desolation induced fit of rage, a normal tantrum, and a reaction to being hurt- and even it had, they probably wouldn’t have seen the point. 

(This also means that there’s a good chance that when Agnes became consistently quiet, considerate and engaged in her studies, it was because she’d finally internalised that her own feelings didn’t matter, and that she should just focus on what her caregivers wanted from her. Only say things they want to hear, only do things they want her to do etc.)

[oldmilfenjoyer]

should you message them on seeking entityarrangements dot com based on what theyd pay/gift you with: tma edition

elias bouchard: sure he has dirt on everyone but you know he won’t share it. he’s also managing a questionable organization literally what are the institute’s credentials? actually is he still employed he’s in jail? -10/10

peter lukas: he may have money but it’s his family’s money and papa nate won’t approve of his endeavors in interacting with people. there’s also a very real risk either you or him will be murdered. while there are benefits to him getting murdered over the course of your arrangement, this post isn’t about gold digging. 0/10 (however if you go for a marriage route, there won’t be any pre-nup negotiations. 5/10 since you may be the one getting murdered.)

simon fairchild: not only is he genuinely rich but he’s also fun! you’ll get free sky diving lessons and the eccentrism-inducing knowledge that nothing in life matters. wahoo. 10/10

gertrude robinson: does the institute pay her or is that a statement = food and institute basement = rent thing? 2/10

michael shelley: there’s no way in hell his account has even been background checked. don’t do it. 0/10

helen richardson: she’d treat you so right however never trust a realtor if given the chance they’d throw you to the depths of hgtv and with the spiral that threat may be literal. do you want to get caught in a never ending episode of house hunters? 6/10

nikola orsinov: creepy mannequins are a very niche industry so you could have a lucrative side hustle on ebay or with your local creepy mannequin trade (?). alternatively, blackmail your local target/jc penney/marshalls/kohls/etc by setting up nikola’s gifts in their stores. they’d probably pay you a lot of money to take them back down and never come back. worst come to worst she may steal your skin but you’ll get a lot of free skincare products out of it! 8/10

jane prentiss: three words: California red worms. i know this is a post about sugaring, but you could both make bank AND live the cutesy farmer wife life we all dream of. 10/10 

jared hopworth: this man. this man has so many arms one. two he’d pay you in bones which are very versatile. open a halloween prop story. scam a medical school. sell them on ebay. i don’t care. message him. 100/10

tom han: successful business owner and excellent cook! may be into vore. 7/10

mike crew: he’d be very sweet but simon’s right there. you could make annual fairchild get together’s really awkward if you played your cards right though. 5/10

manuela dominguez: speaking of scamming people, there’s a pretty high chance manuela would pay you in weird science shit like the dark sun. you could definitely scam nasa, the pentagon, etc etc i know nothing about space but your wallet sure will! 10/10

maxwell rayner: he may be an international cult leader (and based off my research on dating lucrative megachurch priests, cult memberships require dues) but darkness does not pay the bills. in fact it probably fucks over your electric. 1/10

jude perry: so does anyone in the lightless flame have money? like they’re molten wax they don’t need food/shelter/utilities. you could scrape parts off of her and start a candle business but she might kill you? ?/10

agnes montague: jude would kill you candle business or not. -100/10

julia montauk: now this is a gal that knows how to scam credit card companies. an arrangement with her would turn into one of those sugar mentorships seeking arrangements is always advertising but we all know don’t actually exist. 10/10

jurgen leitner: not an avatar but Scam Him. Do It For All Of Us. 100000/10

[madmaudlingoes]

MAG (Potentially) Web-Related Events Timeline

(expanded from a previous post. ??? indicate extreme uncertainty about timing.)

1950s-1960s: Raymond Fielding runs a halfway house for troubled kids in Oxford, out of his home at 105 Hilltop Road. He owns a table with a hypnotic pattern on it (”Burned Out,” “Recluse”). The Cult of the Lightless Flame send Agnes Montague to him, and the Web (maybe) binds her to Ray/the house (”Chosen,” “Infectious Doubts.”)

c. 1970s: Neil Lagorio and “Gabe” split up; Neil no longer works in stop-motion after this. (”The Puppeteer”) (Same Gabriel who became the Worker-in-Clay?)

1974: The Fielding House burns down. Fielding’s body is recovered, mimus one hand, which Agnes has kept. Gertrude Robinson finds a box of Agnes’s hair in the ashes. This seems to be point at which the House becomes a “wound in reality.” (”Burned Out,” “Chosen,” “Infectious Doubt.”)

c. 1975? Gertrude performs a ritual that binds her to Agnes, preventing Agnes from performing the Desolation’s ascension ritual. She says the Web tricked her into it. (”Infectious Doubt.”)

c. 1990s???: Annebelle Cane, if she can be believed, encountered a drug addict, covered in spiders, weaving at a wooden loom hidden in an abandoned chip shop. The experience engenders in her a phobia of spiders. (”Weaver”)

c. 1995/1996: Jonathan Sims reads “A Guest for Mr. Spider” and is almost taken by the Web.

c. early 2001: Adelard Dekker binds the Not-Them to the Fielding’s hypnotic table from Hilltop Road. (”The Distant Cousin.”)

November 25, 2006: Ivo Lensik uproots the tree at 105 Hilltop Road, and uncovers the spider apple at its roots (”Burned Out”). In Sheffield, Agnes Montague commits ritual suicide, which involves a box of spiders and the severed hand of Ray Fielding (”Burned Out,” “Burning Desire”).

Late fall 2010: Annabelle Cane participates in an ESP study at Surrey University in Guildford. She becomes a Web avatar and disappears; over the next few years other study participants also vanish. (”Thought for the Day”)

c. 2011??: Neil Lagorio, succumbing to an unknown form of paralysis, becomes unable to leave his home in Connecticuit. (”Creature Feature”). A former colleague, Alison Killala, moves in with him to care for him. Neil remarks with sadness that he’ll never get to work on his final project, “The Dancer” (”The Puppeteer”). (Both Nikola Orsinov and the Mechanical Turk were referred to as “the Dancer” in the context of the Unknowing.)

c. early 2012??: Annabelle Cane visits Neil Lagorio. Alison Killala spends five months watching Neil’s “original cuts,” and emerges to find Neil dead. Annabelle orders her to turn over Neil’s “original cuts” to the Magnus Institute. (”The Puppeteer”)

c. February 2012: Dexter Banks and around one hundred cast members vanish from the set of his film “Widow’s Weave,” on the same day the news of Neil Lagorio’s death broke in the press. Every year since, in February, one corpse washed up on a nearby beach. (”Creature Feature”)

March 14, 2012: Alexia Crawley gives her statement regarding Dexter Bank’s last film. (”Creature Feature”)

December 1, 2012: Alison Killala delivers Neil’s films to the Magnus Institute, on Annabelle’s orders; they’re placed in Artefact Storage. (”The Puppeteer”)

February 23, 2014: Jane Prentiss comes to the Magnus Institute and gives a statement about the “wasp’s nest” in the attic of her building in Archway. She mentions the spiders there as well. Shortly thereafter, she becomes a Corruption avatar and disappears (”Hive”). Arthur Nolan, formerly of the Lightless Flame, self-immolates in order to destroy the remaining nest. (”Pest Control.”)

Late 2014: Carlos Vittery freaks out about the spiders in his garden and moves to a new flat, in Archway. He notes that the building is infested with small, silver worms, suggesting Jane Prentiss is already using the building’s basement as a hiding spot. (”Arachnophobia”)

c. 1 February 2015: A woman in Guildford (probably Annabelle Cane) hires Greg Cox to develop a forum called “Chelicerae” for her, where people can submit stories about weird things that have happened to them to “the Story-Spinner”. One of Probably-Annabelle’s requirements is that Greg inserts certain names or phrases into the code, though not in ways that would normally have any effect on the site. One of the names is Carlos Vittery’s. (”Web Development”) (It’s noted that when Annabelle emails Greg, she uses very large fonts.)

March 15, 2015: Gertrude Robinson disappears, leaving a tremendous amount of blood behind in the Archives. She is later found shot to death in the tunnels beneath the Archives. (”Human Remains”)

April 9, 2015: Vittery gives his statement about a “ghost spider” to the Institute, and “shortly thereafter” is found dead, wrapped in spiderwebs. (”Arachnophobia”)

August 1, 2015: Angie Santos gives her statement after she and Greg are attacked near his flat by some kind of spider-thing. She states Greg has been working on the Chelicerae for about six months. (”Web Development”)

Autumn 2015: Jonathan Sims is appointed the new Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute (”Web Development” implies this happened after Angie Santos’ statement.)

c. Late 2015: Jared Hopworth begins receiving letters, typed in very large fonts, directing him towards potential victims and allies. He initially ignores them, but eventually comes to trust the letter-writer. (”Flesh”)

February 26, 2016: Martin goes to Carlos Vittery’s former building in Archway to follow up on his statement. He notices spiders in the basement, decides to explore, and discovers Prentiss hiding there. She follows him home and besieges his flat for approximately two weeks. (”Colony”)

Late March - July 12, 2016: Prentiss occupies the tunnels beneath the Magnus Institute and begins breeding worms. Various people mention seeing the worms outside the building. (”Schwarzwald,” “A Distortion,” “First Hunt,” “Anatomy Class”)

Mid-to-Late July 2016 (between 12th and 29th): Jon spots worms inside the Archives seemingly for the first time. Breekon and Hope deliver a package directly to the archives addressed to Jon (”Old Passages”) containing a Zippo lighter with a spiderweb design on it (”Taken Ill”) as well as Fielding’s Web table. Jon is adamant that he doesn’t smoke, though Elias mentions in “Infestation” that he (Jon) used to.

Late July 2016: Greg Cox goes missing. (”Web Development”)

July 29th, 2016: Jon attempts to kill a spider in his office and accidentally knocks a hole in the drywall, revealing an entrance to the tunnels under the Institute. Prentiss attacks, possibly earlier than she had planned for, and is killed when Elias activates the archives’ fire suppression system. During the attack, a mass of worms create some kind of gateway or portal in a wall in the tunnels, warping the stone. (”Lost and Found”/”Infestation”/”Human Remains.”)

August 2016: Jon sneaks into the tunnels to explore and notes there are a LOT of dead worms down there (”Too Deep”).

Late September 2016: Jon notes that an awful lot of spiders have moved into the tunnels under the Institute and appear to have eaten all the dead worms. (”Literary Heights”)

February 16, 2017: Jon destroys the Web table binding the Not-Them (”The Distant Cousin”) and then takes a badly-timed cigarette break while Elias commits brutal pipe murder (”The Librarian”). (In “Hide and Seek,” Tim makes a jibe about Jon sneaking cigarettes in “Hide and Seek,” implying he’s been doing so for a while before this.)

April 28, 2017: Daisy takes Jon out to the New Forest with the intent of killing him. She comments on his spiderweb lighter when she searches him. (”The Coming Storm”)

June 30, 2017: Gerard Keay comments on Jon’s lighter, asking if he’s a “spider freak.” (”Family Business”) (According to “First Aid,” Gerry at one point had a similar zippo with an Eye design on it ...)

August 6-7, 2017: The Unknowing. Jon remarks that “there’s no such thing as just cobwebs” while they explore the House of Wax, right before they stumble upon a stray tape recorder. (”The Masquerade”)

c. mid-December 2017: Jared Hopworth is directed by his letter-writer to attack the Archives, and given a photograph of Jon with instructions to kill him. He is stopped by Melanie and Helen. (”Flesh”)

February 15, 2018: “The spiders” send Oliver Banks to talk Jon out of his coma (”Far Away”) 

c. February 24, 2018: Jon remarks that he’s seeing cobwebs everywhere he goes, and takes this to mean the Institute is being watched. (”Civilian Casualties”)

c. March 17, 2018: Jon finds the tape about the Last Feast, covered in cobwebs, in his desk, deducing that it was delivered by spiders. (”Meat”).

March 20, 2018: Jon  meets with Jared Hopworth and learns the context of the attack from December (”Flesh”).

March 24-27, 2018: Jon goes into the coffin to rescue Daisy. At some point, Martin sneaks down into the Archives and sets up several dozen tape recorders to play statements, which are enough of an anchor for Jon to escape (”Entombed”). Martin tells Peter in “Time of Revelations” that he doesn’t know where he got the idea from.

c. April, 2018: Daisy asks Jon point-blank where he got the spider lighter from, and he doesn’t answer the question. There is Some Static this time. (”The Puppeteer.”)

c. early July 2018: Jon is “drawn” to rearrange a filing cabinet and discovers Marcus Mackenzie’s statement, leading him to suspect that he’s being compelled to feed by the Web. Shortly thereafter, Basira finds the tape Martin made in “Scrutiny” and confronts Jon about his feeding. (”Threshold”).

July 20, 2018: The gang go to 105 Hill Top Road, finding a written statement from Annabelle Cane along with Jon’s first tape as Head Archivist. Annebelle tells Jon to stay away from Hill Top Road in the future, and the line gets Spooky Static. (”Weaver”)

[backofthebookshelf]

105 Hill Top Road: What the Fuck

(Relevant episodes: 008, 019, 043, 055, 056, 059, 067, 078, 089, 114, 130, 134, 139)

I mean, I think it's pretty obvious at this point that Anya Villette came from another reality, right? The timeline's different but the Powers are the same. At least one of them, with that spidery tree. She goes into the house in one reality and wakes up in another one, where all her friends tell her, "oh yeah, when shit like that happens to you, you go to the Magnus Institute," and she says, "the what now?" And there's this building in Chelsea that wasn't there before and they take her statement and then she...what? Does she disappear? Do the spiders get her? Or does she just not have a legal identity in this reality so that's why they can't find her?

(Did Gertrude actually read this statement? She's probably busy as hell in 2009, she's been working on rituals, Mary Keay has just turned herself into a book, Leitner's running around in the tunnels. And she was skeptical of Dekker's theories; would she be as skeptical of something like this? Presumably she read Vanderstock's statement, she would have wanted to know, and he mentioned the "scar in reality" but would she have believed it? Would she have considered it worth following up on, even without the spiders doubtless doing all they can to keep people from paying attention?)

Vanderstock mentions "other Powers" at work at Hill Top Road, but the only one I can identify besides the Web and the Desolation is the Spiral, and that only vaguely: Ivo Lensik and Father Burroughs were both Spiral-adjacent. And I wonder about that table, too; everything about it seems Spiral-like, except for the fact that it is used to trap a Stranger creature. Granted I can make a case for hypnosis being related to spiders, but still.

Still no idea what actually happened there, of course. Agnes would have been fully grown (26, per her death certificate) by around 1980, assuming she ages normally, which is kind of a big assumption. (139 makes it sound like it took her twenty years to be eleven years old, but that might be me misinterpreting.) Vanderstock makes a reference to Gertrude doing something that delayed their ritual preparations just after Jude Perry joined; not sure whether that's when she first met them in '89 or when she "completed her transformation" in '91, but let's average the difference and call it sometime around 1990. But the house at Hill Top Road burned in 1974, so whatever was happening there happened well before they'd given up on their ritual.

(Besides, it really sounded like the Last Feast was the first ritual Gertrude had successfully and intentionally disrupted. So either she did this accidentally or it was something else. But why assume it was her, otherwise? In 2008 Mary makes a snide comment about Gertrude not getting out and doing much herself, which is hilarious because she disrupted at least two rituals in 2008, but it does indicate that she's at least not seen as someone who gets involved. But that's almost twenty years later; maybe she used to get out more? Maybe the Eye had a particular interest in something? We've got a few statements from the 90s but mostly 1996 and later; we've got exactly one statement from the 80s and it's Tucked In. Anyway. This is (probably) a distraction.) (Interestingly Jon only comments on Agnes's death, not on whatever happened in the early 90s, which makes me wonder if it wasn't Gertrude at all but the spiders themselves. But Vanderstock is so sure it was her.)

I can't find anything in other statements that tells us much of anything aside from one thing: the Institute got a new Head in 1973, a year before the house burned. It might be nothing, but if the Web and the Eye are as closely aligned as we keep speculating they are, it might be something. (This was Elias's predecessor, James Wright, about whom we know nothing at all.) There is a really annoying lack of statements from the 80s and early 90s; we have virtually no idea what was going on in the supernatural ecosystem at that time. Would those be the statements on tape that were found with Gertrude's body, perhaps? What did happen to all of those? Two or three boxes of tapes is a lot of statements.

But back to the point, what was happening at Hill Top Road? It was owned by the Fieldings from the 1800s, which makes me think it's been a Web stronghold that long. (I'd love to know if Walter Fielding knew Smirke or Magnus or anyone else in their circle.) By the sixties Raymond Fielding was using it to harvest...victims? Hosts? What did happen to the kids Ronald Sinclair saw in the basement, who had been turned into spider egg sacs? Were they just there to feed the baby spiders, or were they turning into spider-Jaegers like the one Trevor Herbert met in 2009? (Daisy told Basira her first sectioned case was something to do with spider husks but we never got any other details. That would've been the latter half of 2002. We got no other details but I'd be interested to know where it was. HEY JON TALK TO YOUR COWORKERS.)

So okay, 105 Hill Top Road is a spider factory, cool. Then Agnes shows up. Two-three months later she saves a guy from getting et by Raymond Fielding for no apparent reason, that's nice of her. (Agnes likes cute boys confirmed.) And it seems like she stops him from taking in more kids, because they say the number of kids at the house dwindles until it's just Agnes left, and then Raymond disappears. It's "years" that Agnes lives in the house alone and mostly never leaves, though pets go missing from the neighborhood, before, in 1974, a five-year-old goes missing. A week later the house burns down and in it they find only Raymond Fielding's skeleton, sans right hand. So that sounds like Fielding was feeding on the kids, and catching smaller prey after he didn't have them any more, and when he worked back up to kids again Agnes caught him and stopped him. But it had to be more than that, because this is the fight Vanderstock describes as creating "a scar in reality," and which tied Agnes to the location. The fact that she kept Fielding's hand worried Arthur Nolan, which yeah, that would worry me too, but I'm not an avatar of destruction created by an evil cult, so I have to assume it was for some reason other than "eew."

(I also have to wonder exactly what their ritual required, other than Agnes herself, because there's a long time between 1974 and 1990. But.)

Then, in 2006, the house is being rebuilt and Ivo Lensik is working on it evenings and weekends, and who shows up at the door but Raymond Fielding, in an old-fashioned coat and looking "like something out of an old Polaroid," showing off the deed to the house and poking around. This show doesn't really go in for ghosts, and besides he was an avatar or something, so I'm gonna go with "alternate universe Ray Fielding," I guess. Who then...gets burned to a crisp after being inside the (new) house for two minutes? There's a smell of burning and a scorch mark on the floor. This freaks out Lensik so bad he falls and hits his head and also worries that he's getting schizophrenia (which his father apparently had, except schizophrenia doesn't work like that, that was definitely Michael) and he goes to the hospital, where a local nurse apparently likes suggesting exorcisms to people.

(There's no indication that anyone from the Lightless Flame noticed AU!Ray, so I'm assuming for now he was destroyed/banished/yeeted back to his own reality by whatever latent Desolation power is attached to the place.)

So one night the exorcist shows up and while he's waiting outside Ivo Lensik just. Snaps. He cannot handle that tree. That tree is looking at him and he doesn't like it. He takes a crowbar to it and it bleeds; he chains it to his truck and pulls it down. At this point Agnes, who's out with Jack Barnabas being blessedly normal for a change, spasms like something hurt her and makes a panicked phone call, and then Arthur and Diego and everybody show up at her flat with an unlit lantern, a bag of candles, and a jar of tiny spiders, and then she asks them to kill her. Vanderstock puts it down to Jack Barnabas, but in Barnabas's own statement it's very clear that the tree comes down, she calls in a panic, they meet her at her flat, and then she kisses him and he's in the hospital for three days. (I'm not saying her attachment to him didn't ruin the ritual, that's probably why she made whatever decision she did, but the tree was an inciting incident.)

(At the same time the tree is coming down, too, Father Burroughs is inside the house feeling like he's burning alive, and the Spiral is speaking through him insisting that he's already been claimed and the Desolation just doesn't care. It doesn't stop until the tree comes down outside. There's also no indication that any Desolation avatars noticed this.)

Under the tree is a six-inch-square box covered in twisting lines and there's a whole OTHER thing, because that box belongs in the center of the table that trapped the not!Them, and how did it get from here to there? How did it escape the fire that burned down the original house? (Graham had it in 2005. Dekker had it in 2001. No clue where it went between 2005 and when it shows up at the Institute in 2015.) And what was the purpose of it when Fielding used it, had the kids sit around it every Sunday dinner? Did he bury the box, with an apple inside, to protect himself from Agnes? Is that why pulling down the tree hurt her? (In Anya Villette's statement the tree is heavily spider-identified, to the point where she refers to it interchangeably as "branches" and "arms," of which it has eight, but in Ivo Lensik's statement he notices that it was heavily burned at the base. Was it attacked by the Desolation? In which case why did pulling it down hurt Agnes? Was she, in fact, tied to the tree itself? In which case, given the importance of the tree in the alternate reality, is there an alternate Agnes out there? Maybe one where she got to go on dates with cute boys instead of having to either die or burn down the world?)

AND. As more than one of us have pointed out by now, in 114, Jon says:

I’ve half a mind to just go down and have a look at it myself, but… I don’t know. Ever since it first came up I’ve felt like it would be… just a very bad idea.

And then Tim walks in and he and we forget all about it, but doesn't that sound like spidery manipulation to you? It does to me. So whatever Agnes and the Desolation did at Hill Top Road, it had a lasting effect (both in terms of leaving some remnant of the Desolation there and in the side effect of the...apparent dimensional portal?...) but the spiders do still seem to hold a lot of sway there as well.

What this has to do with anything I wish I knew, but I will say that 114 was the first thing I thought of after Garland Hillier's "la porte est la porte," which also sounds a lot like "all the doors are open now" from The Bifrost Incident (which is probably an entirely different continuity and has nothing to do with this other than ~themes~ but you know), but now that we've been talking a lot about the Powers as places I'm not so sure that means anything other than poor Hillier managed to walk into the domain of the Extinction and found his way out again for a while. But if the Powers are places, does that imply that Anya Villette came from one of them, or that there are other mostly-normal universes that haven't been taken over by the Powers? And if they exist...well. What does that imply about saving our universe from them, or losing it to them? (By "our" I mean "Jon and Martin's universe," obviously, "our" universe is another one entirely. I hope.)

tl;dr (TOO LATE): I have absolutely no idea what was or is happening at Hill Top Road but I’m pretty sure the spiders don’t want anyone poking around and also someone should go poke around there immediately, unless that's what Martin is doing right now, Martin stop, go back and get your boyfriend, he's freaking out

[somanyfuckedupiftruebooks]

*twirling my hair around my finger ditzily* haha yeah there's sooo much to unpack bestie you have no idea

Love that this basically comes from not having the Entities fully nailed down yet and is later explained away by other members of the cult being like 'yeah asag doesnt mean anything actually, that guy was just a fucking idiot'.

Extremely great that Martin claimed to be able to speak latin, a skill that would be in no way necessary for his job, to a bunch of academics whose research into the esoteric presumably often requires some basic latin translation. And it seems like he got away with it right up until Jon decided to start nitpicking every little thing he says or does. Also! Evidence for Martin having Polish heritage, which is a fanon I'm extremely fond of.

Also interesting that Jon, a supernatural researcher, can't find any solid references to the Lightless Flame, a real supernatural cult active for at least a few decades (maybe longer? can't remember). Why is the supernatural so goddamn good at staying hidden? Or, alternatively, why is everyone in the Institute (except for the Archival staff) so useless at discovering evidence of the Entities?

RIP king, keep thotting it up in the book dimension.

No further occurrences, but she still feels watched. Is the Eye waiting for something to happen, or will it just slowly continue feeding on her fear for the rest of her life?

First of all, cute that Jon mentions he counted the people himself (like a big boy!) But mostly I am interested in the timeline here. What do we think was happening at the exact second the camera feed cuts to the image of the eye? I would like to suggest that it was the moment that Gerry used his Beholding powers to Know the passcode to the supply room.

@a-mag-a-day

Mag 12

As someone who worked multiple Christmases at multiple hospitals, I can confirm this. It's the worst day of the year.

This is the first episode I've hit during 'a mag a day' that I didn't immediately recognise from the title alone.

It wasn't until I got to this part that I recognised the statement and realised that my boy was about to arrive! <3

Here he is!! Reeah's specialist and most beloved boy!! For his second appearance he has shaved his face and dyed his hair well (for once) and bought himself a fancy new coat that immediately gets destroyed.

He's also acquired a series of bizarre and discomforting burns across almost his entire body! Cool that we get a callback to Gerry's first appearance in MAG4. He's 'had worse' indeed.

First mention of the tattoos!

What I like about these is that anyone with a tattoo will know that the less fatty tissue there is between your skin and the bone underneath, the more painful it is to get a tattoo there. Also the more your skin 'moves' the faster your tattoo will fade and the more difficult it will be to make sure it heals cleanly. So by tattooing every single joint, Gerry went about marking himself up for the Eye in one of the most painful and awkward (and expensive and time-consuming) ways he possibly could. But none of that matters because it's sexy and it slaps. The only thing more important than serving your patron is serving looks!

That's why it's great that the Eye stepped in and made sure the Desolation didn't mess up Gerry's signature look. It would have been a tragedy to mess up such intricate and detailed inkwork!

Motherfucker leaves the house each morning with nothing but firestarters and accessories (both customised to suit his aesthetic, of course). He also carries a passport as his primary ID, which tells me that he probably doesn't have his driver's license. He's the world's most perfect man.

This is interesting. I assume this is the point where everyone else got up and walked out of the building? Although I can't figure why the Desolation would prompt people to leave the site of an oncoming fire, so maybe Beholding had something to do with it? Idk, I don't think it makes sense either way.

Anyway, the point I was about to make is that it's extremely interesting that our statement-giver is just able to shrug off whatever power is compelling people out of the building. She does it so casually! What does she mean by it not being the first time she's felt a reaction lile this? Has she encountered Desolation, or another Entity, before?

Quick aside, this is how you know that an evacuation didn't take place. Hospitals have procedures in place to evacuate non-ambulatory patients in case of an emergency, and would never simply leave everyone in their beds like this.

Hells yes! If it sucks, hit da bricks!

Even more hells yes! Talk shit, get smothered. While I'm glad she didn't get her hand burned off, I am sad we didn't get to see Nurse Badass single handedly (heh) shut down an invocation of the Lightless Flame by aggressively shushing a man.

Oh he's... strong you say? 😳 That's interesting to me for purely academic and completely non-horny reasons (lying).

[mxalexwhat]

Like, there's so many components that would fit TMA!!! There's a number of playbooks that would fit so deliciously.

The Chosen playbook has a move called Dutiful where you have to act in accordance with your Chosen fate. Jon Sims, anyone?

There's the Divine's playbook that has the move Boss from Beyond where your supernatural superior requires you to do a task and what you roll determines the level of difficulty. Perfect for any Avatar.

The Expert had a move called I've Read About This Sort Of Thing and comes with a lore or mystical library. Archival staaaaff.

The Flake is a conspiracy theory. LOTS of Web possibilities to play with.

The Initiate is kinda like a member of a sect or cult. More archival staff possibilities or even the Cult of the Lightless Flame or Dark Church of the Divine Host

And of course, the Monstrous has major avatar themes. You have curses to pick: dark master, feed, pure drive, etc. You also have a special motivation too where if there's ever a moment presented in game to give in to your dark side you must roll to see if you resist!

Or just the Mundane you're an average Joe who's gotten involved somehow. As you level up, you have the option to take a move from another playbook which has Georgie and Melanie and Basira vibes getting touched by different fears.

If one of you sonsabitches starts a TMA Monster of the Week game and you don't invite me, I stg I will be so sad.

I'm trying to write a campaign for this Monster of the Week dnd game and I am kinda tempted to just set this in the TMA universe and have the party fight oc fear avatars each mystery