#the sins of the father is an episode that lives in my mind rent free. how dare they just drop that into the story and do nothing w it again

[dreamspring]

the idea of a bbc merlin reboot or sequel is somewhat heinous and also unappealing to me BUT i would kill for a prequel series. i need to see the nimueh/ygraine/uther love triangle. give me young gaius turning into a terrified supporter of uther’s regime. give me young balinor! give me a world still full of magic i want to see how it worked!! give me these characters before the great purge it would be fascinating to see how it all descended into madness and tragedy (especially since we know how it ends)

[eighthdoctor]

The Priest and the Prison, or: TMA isn’t done with MAG019/020 yet

So I’ve been on a relisten kick. I just did 19/20 today (the cannibal priest one) and noted, at first absently, that unlike most of the episodes, it’s not clear which entity is involved. Unlike MAG005 ‘Thrown Away’, however, 19 and 20 are overflowing with references to entities--just more than one of them. Also unlike ‘Thrown Away’, afaik Rusty Quill hasn’t addressed this one in FAQs--which almost certainly means that it’s relevant and not an easy answer of “yeah I hadn’t worked it all out yet”.

But in case that’s not convincing enough, here’s some things which stuck out to me and which point towards a potential outcome:

Entity involvement: As mentioned above, there are many, many entities involved here.

The Spiral: Bethany doesn’t realize what’s going on around her and behaves oddly in ways similar to MAG126 ‘Sculptor’s Tools’. The swirling text on Father Burroughs’s Bible seems connected to the general reality distortion effect.

The Web: Mostly implicitly through the mention of the house on Hilltop Road, which was used by the Web as a halfway home and source of food.

The Desolation: When performing the exorcism and while Ivo Lensik is pulling down the tree that’s connected to Agnes Montague, Father Burroughs experiences sensations connected to burning, including rapid heat and apparently smoke inhalation.

The Beholding: Father Singh lists all of Father Burroughs’s sins in what is evidently an act of Knowing. When Burroughs approaches what seems to be the Oratory, ‘The church’s large round window shifted as I watched, as though it were a tremendous eye that were turning to focus upon me.’ Which is about as Beholding as it gets, imho.

The Stranger: The person Father Burroughs confesses to looks like Father Singh, but doesn’t sound like him and Father Singh is demonstrably somewhere else at the time. Whether this is a NotThem or some other manifestation of the Stranger is up for debate. Breekon and Hope delivered the yellow stole to the Oratory.

The Lonely: Oxford is abandoned when Father Burroughs leaves confession, and when he tries to approach people they vanish. The roads also turn weirdly and the town he is familiar with is alien, much like MAG150 ‘Cul-de-Sac’.

The Corruption: Burroughs’s stole is a “sickly” yellow, the service attendees are ‘fevered, jaundiced yellow’.

The Flesh: Cannibalism. :D Also perversion of religion, per MAG130 ‘Meat’.

Houses: Two houses are present in this episode. One is the house on Hilltop Road, which has strong connections with the Web and also the Desolation. The other is 89 Bullingdon Road.

Bethany’s room is on the 1st floor (2nd for Americans) at the back

On the wall, under the wallpaper, is the word “mentis”, which is Latin for ‘mind’ and most common in English in the phrase non compos mentis, a legal term for someone of unsound mind

But Bethany was living in halls that year, and no one was renting 89 Bullingdon Road, according to the letting agent.

Furthermore Father Burroughs was found in “one of the back rooms” in that same house, sitting in front of the two dead students.

Assorted points of interest:

“It wants your faith.” Plenty of entities are involved in feeding on things from people, but two in particular are associated with faith: The Web (free will & predestination), and the End (...yup). But ultimately here I’m open to persuasion.

Bethany smashes a mirror. Mirrors are associated with the Spiral (MAG47), the Beholding (MAG60), and potentially either the Stranger or the Extinction (MAG147).

‘A man appeared at the door. He was tall and pale, and dressed as an altar server.’ I can list a bunch of people who it’s not (Gerry comes to mind--no bad dye job or tats) but also a bunch of people who it could plausibly be. Idk.

‘It was bright, so bright. Candles covered every surface, each glowing so powerfully that I could barely look directly at them.‘ Other than not the Dark, all I can think is this has something to do with the Destruction (fire) or the Beholding (illuminating everything?) or an anti-Dark ritual??

‘At that moment, the bell rang to mark the start of the mass. It was a single, jarring tone that cut through the air and made me almost double over in pain, so badly did it pierce into my pounding skull.’ I have no idea. The only place I can find bells mentioned is MAG152 ‘A Gravedigger’s Envy’, but that doesn’t quite make sense here. Although it would add in the Buried, who thus far has been missing.

Mark 9:14-19 is the start of a longer story (9:14-29) in which Jesus heals a boy possessed by ‘an impure spirit’. I’m not sure if this is the Web (possessing people is very much in its remit) or the Corruption (impurity).

Other involvement:

Somehow Burroughs gets to 89 Bullingdon Road, somehow the two students are captured, tied up, and killed, someone provides and then removes the scalpel and other tools.

The altar server is most likely this person--if we just knew who it was.

The entire setup feels very much like a ritual, but not for any particular entity, or at least not one of the 14? 8 are explicitly involved (Spiral, Web, Desolation, Beholding, Stranger, Lonely, Corruption, Flesh) and 3 are potentially (End, Extinction, Buried). The only 3 missing are Dark, Hunt, and Vast--and the Dark may be explicitly repelled? At any rate, the whole “take over a person, then ritually mutilate and consume them” seems ritual-y to me.

Gertrude read this statement and deliberately misfiled the second half with the ritual in--”As it turns out the second part of this statement was simply misfiled in the next folder”.

Given that Gertrude has already appeared twice in s5, and that we are now in a world in which multiple entities overlap and collide (see MAG164 and the watchful maypole), and that the timeline for this makes no goddamn sense even by TMA standards, and that Jonny was explicitly asked about the timeline and didn’t answer it (link), and that the house on Hilltop Road is a centre for the Web and a hole to another universe...

We’re going to get an answer on what was up with Father Burroughs and 89 Bullington Road.

If pinned down on it, my current bet is that the Web was experimenting with alternative rituals. Whenever these events happen (2006-2011 is fair game) it’s still contemporaneous with Gertrude investigating and interfering in rituals--although since this one seems to have gone as planned, I suspect she only recognized it as such in 2015, when she escalated to “deliberate non-involvement”. Perhaps this was the proof she needed that leaving the Dark alone would not destroy the world.

[newidaho]

7.  The New Idaho Museum of Oddities

Don’t have the time/patience/desire to read with your eyes? Don’t have eyes? Well, have your friend read you this:  You can check out the audiobook for free on Apple, Google, Stitcher, or Spotify.  Subscribe for new episodes every Wednesday!

20 December 2054

Johnna Johnson had only been at work for 5 hours, but time was moving quickly.  After all, she was getting paid to do essentially what she did at home.  That was the beauty of the New Idaho Museum of Oddities—they gave you a comfy seat, some snacks, and they didn’t ask that you do anything but show off your Oddity.

Like many in NIMO, Johnna’s ‘Oddity’ was her weight.  Truthfully, Johnna considered this rather offensive, but the ease of the job made it worth the degrading job description most days.  And at 375 pounds, Johnna was well qualified to ride in the trailer.

Most days, it wasn’t so bad.  Johnna sat down in her seat, watched a Virtual Movie through her Lenses, read a Virtual Book, or browsed the internet.  An entire Virtual World lay just behind her Lenses.  It wasn’t a problem to spend six hours without moving around.  Who liked to move, anyway?

Johnna had always been quite heavy.  She was born in 2024 to John Johnson, a single father in Southern Idaho.  Having grown up on a farm, Johnna had had every opportunity to eat healthy growing up.  John, however, had never enforced this habit, and by the time Johnna learned the health benefits to eating her father’s crops, she was already well addicted to the junk food that was always kept around the house.

Johnna’s father had scrapped together enough money to move to New Idaho in 2030, already sensing that it might be the next big thing, and he brought the 6-year-old Johnna with him into the mountain ring.  He only had enough money to buy a small plot of land in Southern New Idaho.  Though farming was a much more lucrative profession in New Idaho than it was in the rest of the state, the size of John’s land was good for hardly more than subsistence farming with a very small profit on the side.  

As a farmer in New Idaho, John was exempt from all taxes, and was therefore able to live comfortably.  Johnna, however, was still heavily bothered by her family’s lack of upward mobility and became obsessed with the rich Lucid Labs children at Sky High.  In her attempts to jumpstart her own social mobility, Johnna went seeking attention wherever she could get it.  

During this quest for recognition, Johnna wound up pregnant at 17 by a man who subsequently wanted nothing to do with her.  She was too proud to take child support (a move she later sorely regretted).  The last she had heard, the father had gone to University out of state, and had never returned to New Idaho.  This was probably for the best—she couldn’t imagine him coming into the MoF to see her now.

Johnna kept her pregnancy a secret from her father as long as she could, but after 8 months, and with no way to hide the inevitable physical manifestation of her mistake, she came clean to her father, who immediately expelled her from his house.  He hardly had enough money to take care of Johnna, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to pay for her sin.

Johnna found opportunity to visit her father a couple more times before his death in 2043.  Charlie, her child, was 2.  He would never know his father or his grandfather.  Charlie and his mother were all the family either of them had in the world.  

In search of a new family, Johnna stumbled upon FuTech Christian Church.  It was a beautiful opportunity—not only did their message provide her with hope going forward, but she never had to meet any of the congregation in person.  She could appear or disappear as she wished while she took in the messages.  She knew that many of those she saw in service were connected to the local network, but many also came from out of town, interested to see what a FuTech Service from New Idaho looked like.  This provided Johnna with a diverse community who only wished to build her up as she went through her always-difficult time raising Charlie.  They even offered him free enrollment on need-based scholarship to the FuTech Virtual Home School.

Thus, through her drive, her faith, and her gig with NIMO, Johnna had carved out a decent survival for her and her son.

The time was nearing 1400h, and there had been a good bit of traffic.  The New Idaho Mall was still rather busy with last-minute shoppers.  You could tell some of the visitors felt a little bad for staring at fat people, but it had been surprisingly normalized to a large extent in the New Idaho society.

Not everyone, however, was so tactful.  Johnna could sense bad energy as soon as the goateed man in the yellow polo stepped into the trailer.

‘Goddamn, Shelly, truck G is a heavy one indeed!’

‘Ricky, stop.’

‘I’m just saying, I’m just saying.  Look,’ he lowered his voice to a whisper that Johnna could still hear, ‘those two are even eating Oreos—it’s almost like you can see them growing as we speak.’

‘Ricky.’

‘No, really, I wonder if they get a raise in pay if they have a raise in weight.  Don’t you think that would just make sense?’

Johnna got up from her horizontal position and looked at the visitors.  A mistake— when you look into the eyes of a visitor, like staring down a vicious dog, you open yourself up to attack.

‘Hey there!’ Ricky said to Johnna.  ‘How’s the day going?’

Johnna nodded.

‘Do they not let you speak?  You’re human just like me—I can see that even if other people think there are four little men inside you pulling the levers.’

Johnna remained silent.

‘Come on, have a little fun!  Are you having a good day?  Getting paid a good bit?’

Johnna could tell she wasn’t getting out of this without a response.  ‘Yes, it’s been a pretty good day.’

‘There we go.  I knew you could talk.  So hey, then, let me ask you this—you happy doing what you’re doing?  You feel good about this stuff?’

‘Ricky, come on.’  Shelly hit her husband on the thigh.

‘It’s an innocent question,’ Ricky said.  ‘I really want to know.  Is this a good gig?  You like doing this stuff?’

‘Ricky, obviously she doesn’t.  And I’m sure she doesn’t like you talking to her this way, do you?’  Shelly asked Johnna.

‘It’s not obvious, Shelly.  If she didn’t like it, she wouldn’t be doing it.’  Ricky turned back to Johnna.  ‘So do you like it?  Wait, I have a question—were you always this fat, or did you put on the pounds to get the gig?  Can’t be that bad, huh, just sitting here doing nothing but talking to losers like me all day.’  Ricky laughed.  ‘No answer?  Come on!  Do you like it or not?  I won’t judge.  Oh, and follow-up to my last question—cuz Shelly’s gonna hate it, but I really want to know—how did you get that fat?’

‘Rick—We’re leaving.’

‘Come on, wait, give her a minute to answer.  You gonna answer?’

Ricky was looking at Johnna with a smile on his face.  It almost seemed like the man meant well—like he was genuinely curious and truly didn’t care about how rude he was being.

‘It’s not a bad way to make a living,’ Johnna said.

‘Not bad, huh?  Well, I’m glad you like it!’

‘Okay, Ricky?’  said Shelly.  ‘Now can we go?’

‘Wait wait, though—she didn’t answer my last question—how the hell did you get that fat?’

Johnna didn’t want to answer this man’s question—it was downright mean, though the innocent look on his face somehow communicated otherwise.  The question was, at the very least, objectively rude.  But for some reason she felt she owed him an answer.

‘Honestly, just what you would guess,’ Johnna said.  ‘My diet and a sedentary lifestyle.’  He had made her admit it to both him and herself.  She pushed down the emotions bringing tears to her eyes—she had affected an attitude to herself and others of pride in her body, and she did not care to admit that it could have been different.  She preferred to believe she had little to no agency.

‘Aw, damn, I guess I could have guessed that one,’ Ricky said.  ‘Oh, well.  I guess the rest of my questions will wait for another day.  Truck G!  Another one to check off my list, huh, honey?’

‘Alright, Ricky, let’s go.’

The blue-and-yellow-clad couple headed out of the trailer, leaving Johnna to herself for the rest of her shift.  Only an hour.  A six-hour shift altogether.  Based on the traffic today, her pay could very well come out to $75.  That’s 1/4 of rent in the Jungle.  Not so bad for a day’s work.  Three more days like this, and rent was covered, then just some extra money for—for—

Dammit.  That man, Ricky, had opened a wound.  She was now feeling guilty for thinking about the type of food she knew she would spend the extra money on.  But her weight—it wasn’t all just food, was it?  It was her genes, it was the fact that she couldn’t afford a gym, it was the fact that she hardly had any money, and the money she did get went to the survival of herself and Charlie.  And adding on to everything, she just didn’t have the time.

Yeah, screw him.  Johnna stuck out the rest of her shift, received her tips for the day, and walked down 11th street to Slick Business, the coffee shop across from the Government Building on the New Idaho Mall.  She went to the desk and ordered a Large White Chocolate Mocha with whipped cream.  The coffee shop was still busy at this time of day, but she found a spot to sit on the second level.

As she sat down with her coffee, Johnna flipped through different news articles on her Lenses, but her mind kept coming back to that man in the Museum today.  He had asked her if she liked working there, and if she had tried to get fat so she could have that job.  He had a point—if she lost weight, she would no longer be an Oddity.  The Government was basically paying her to stay unhealthy.  And if she was unhealthy, she wouldn’t have the energy to get another job.  When she looked at it that way, it seemed the Government was basically keeping her captive.

Johnna did a quick search for “New Idaho Government” and looked through the most recent news articles—nothing she wanted.  She tried “New Idaho Government Terrible”.  Now she was getting somewhere—certainly someone had thought like her.

One of the first hits caught her eye:  a website for a group called “NIANS”—New Idahoans Against New Slavery”.  She opened the page.  On the left side of her lenses, hovering over the table in front of her, was an image of a black stone fist raised into the air.  On the right side was a sort of manifesto.  She skimmed through it.

NIANS, apparently, was taking a stand against what they believed to be a new form of slavery or indentured servitude—the low-income government work programs, also known as Guaranteed Basic Income.  They argued that most of these jobs were demeaning (something clicked for Johnna when she read that one) or traumatic.  After that was a long paragraph explaining the negative effects of Mineshaft on the population, specifically the youth.

At the very bottom of the page, Johnna saw a call to action:  “NIANS hopes to eradicate poverty through common sense solutions.  We plan to force the New Idaho Government to raise our minimum wage to the federal level, something that should have been done a long time ago.  Additionally, we plan to ask for an increase in wages for those serving in such traumatic and degrading programs as MineShaft and the Museum of Oddities.”

Johnna’s eyes lit up.  she hadn’t known what she was looking for, but this was it—a way out for her and her son—a chance to never work again—NIANS.  As she drained the last of her Mocha, Johnna waved her hand over the link:  “How Can I Volunteer?”