Work Text:
[Melanie revives the GhostHuntUK channel just for this video. She rolls into frame in front of a black board. She is in a nice blazer and a “GAYMER” t-shirt, sunglasses on, holding a mug that says World’s Worst Boss with a large, crossed out eye under it.]
The Magnus Archives. Aside from being, somehow, my worst place of employment in a string of jobs that included an Office Max, this YouTube channel that went defunct after I had a very public breakdown and almost everyone I knew ghosted me (pun intended), a brief period of self-employment in which I was assaulted by multiple ghosts, and an Einstein Brothers Bagels, it’s a “highly respected” place of “research” and “higher learning” that’s been “haunting London” since 1818. On the surface, they collect stories of experiences with the supernatural, research on the paranormal, and any object that just seems to behave a little outside of nature’s laws. Under the surface, they’re a big warren of spooky, constantly shifting tunnels where my coworkers found at least one dead body.
Oh, also under the surface they collect people’s experiences of horror and feed them to an extraplanar entity known as the Beholding or the Eye, giving those people horrible nightmares in which they relive the worst moments of their life while watched by whoever is holding the role of the Archivist until either they or the Archivist dies! Unless you work there, in which case you’re exempt from the spooky nightmare clause but your boss can read your deepest traumas and force you to relive them at any given time, and also you can’t be fired or quit or even murder your boss to release yourself from your forced servitude because again, he will force you to relive your father’s death in excruciating detail! So the only way out is to blind yourself and hope your significant other is cool about it and not a sadistic book collector who then murders you in your sleep with a garden hoe!
[slow exhale] But that’s none of my business.
Before I left, my job was to record, research, and file statements that had been given to the Magnus Institute. And I know true crime and supernatural experiences are all the rage right now— I should know, I made my living off it for like three years— but before you get all excited, remember that “forever reliving the worst moments of my life in my dreams” bit. And remember, you still have a chance to have a supernatural experience of your very own! The Entities are out there, and they’re hungry!
Maybe you’re thinking, Melanie, I’m sure it can’t be that bad! I’m a logical human being, I’m rational about my fears and would make all the right calls in a scenario like that, no matter how terrifying! Hell, maybe I’m even a doomsday prepper and I’m prepared for literally anything the extraplanar phobia embodiments could throw at me! Come at me, bitch!
Well, good for you. But I’ve read a lot of these statements, and you’d be surprised at just how badly some people take finding out that they’ve been personally or impersonally victimized by an incomprehensible force of terror. Today, I’ll be laying out a simple guide on how not to react to finding yourself in the crosshairs of an unknowable eldritch monster.
[TITLE CARD: Melanie dancing while behind her words appear reading “MK Unravels What To Do When The Universe Has It Out For You”]
To help demonstrate to you, dear viewers, I have carefully curated a list of statements to illustrate the consequences of each action you should or should not take. Unfortunately, because the world is inherently unjust and essentially functions as a hellscape where morality does not matter except in the small comfort we can provide each other in our time on this planet, the consequences do not always match the action. This makes ranking them from least to most effective, as I’d originally planned, a bit difficult. Fear not, however! I have a few criteria laid out to make this as objective a guide as possible, so that when your time is up and your dark crawling twisting hunting roiling god comes for you, you can say, “Well, at least I did everything I could— and looked pretty sick doing it! Some future underpaid archival assistant is gonna have a great time reading this one.”
So without further ado:
One! How sensible was the action taken in response to the situation at hand? When faced with a creepy floating figure in a dark alley asking for a cigarette, did you step into the alley to give it to them? After having sex with a woman who then exploded into worms, did you get tested for STIs? When confronted with a man with a name that sounded kind of like Alucard from Castlevania, did you decide he was a vampire and murder him?
Two! How effective was the action, ultimately? As I already said, we’re kind of outmatched here. You could be the coolest, smartest, most level-headed person in the world, but when Simon Fairchild decides it’s your time to take a long, long fall from the top of a high building, it’s your time. Even so, I feel like if you survive not only long enough to give a statement to the Institute but also until we finally find your file and do follow-up research, you deserve some points. Even if you end up dying shortly thereafter.
Three! How cool did you look doing it? If you’ve gotta die, would you rather do it shuddering and crying, or while dropping a sick one-liner and giving some avatar a really bad day? You may notice that I’m weighting this a little unfairly and that’s because even if you die horribly before a murderous ex-magician turned mannequin, if you do it with so much flair and panache that we hear about it anyways, you’re a legend in my eyes. Or— you know what I mean. This one’s for you, Tim.
Okay! With that out of the way, let’s get down to the ranking itself.
Number twenty: Tova McHugh. When this self-described philanthropist experienced a string of near-death experiences, she discovered that she could prolong her own life— by taking the lives of others. The more well-loved they were, the longer they lasted her before her next incident. Now, arguably, this person has been avoiding the End’s grasp for years, which should get her some cred for effectiveness. I’d even be willing to give her points for sensibility, since I can’t say it was exactly her fault that she unknowingly killed the man performing her surgery in order to bring herself back from flatlining the first time. However, once she found out that she was, in fact, trading other people’s entire lifetimes for a few more months of her own apparently superior existence, she continued to do it. And that’s so deeply uncool I have to subtract like, negative two million points per person. If you’re gonna kill someone in this nightmare world, at least do it to their face, and for fun not profit.
Number nineteen: Mike Crew. After getting struck by lightning and stalked by a Spiral monster, this guy dumped an obscene and, frankly, unreasonable amount of money into collecting cursed books on purpose so he could try them out and see if he liked them. That’s almost as bad as Leitner collecting them for fun, and remember, nobody likes Leitner. This bastard read The Boneturner’s Tale and thought, nah, and just sent it back to the library, and now we have Jared Hopworth! Thanks, asshole! Anyways, when he found the book he wanted, he went and jumped off a tower with it like a coward instead of confronting his problems head-on. He doesn’t even harass people properly, he just gives them bad vertigo. Coward. I can do that myself if I go long enough without eating. In any case, Daisy shot him, so that’s one more moment for the Mike Crew cringe compilation. Also, imagine being named Michael.
Number eighteen: Oliver Banks. Look, we all had our breakdowns in university. No one’s holding that against him. At least he had it mostly in private and not in front of several cameras so it could then be posted to YouTube, destroying his professional reputation along with his mental health, but whatever, not like I’m bitter. And when he discovered his tragically specific fortune-telling powers, hey, we don’t blame a man for developing a little insomnia. You could even forgive him for most paths he might choose after that, since he was sleep-deprived and constantly being reminded of the inevitability of the deaths of everyone around him. Sure, it’s a lot for one guy. However. His plan for dealing with these nightmares, instead of maybe investing in some melatonin, was to commit identity fraud, hitch a ride to the middle of the goddamn ocean, and take a nap. And when he realized he couldn’t even escape the world’s most boringly distressing hentai there, he drove his whole boatload of scientists into the path of a falling satellite, came back to life, and swam to Australia, I guess? What the hell, dude. I thought End avatars were supposed to be chill.
Number seventeen: Lisa Carmel. She might be self-aware about it, but letting your true crime book club turn into an Island of Dr Moreau deal is still bad. Very bad. Cringe serial killing with my fail club. I used to be Slaughter-aligned and I still say, don’t hunt your friends for sport.
Number sixteen: Hector Laredo. This guy was such a bad drug mule that the P.I. tracking him spent more time dragging his useless ass than doing his job. His wife thought he was playing around behind her back but the only person he was playing was himself. And then he got his bones turned by my second least favorite avatar. Nice going, dumbass.
Number fifteen: Timothy Hodge. As previously mentioned, if you have a horrific sexual encounter with someone who is becoming a worm hive, burning down your flat is a great start. A second step, however, would be going to get yourself checked out. That’s a particularly nasty way to get an STI (sexually transmitted infestation). Maybe if you’d gone to your local clinic, you could’ve saved yourself the trouble of becoming a hive yourself and getting killed via CO2 canister-wielding archival assistant. Just saying. Wrap it up.
Number fourteen: Benjamin Hatendi. The blanket never did anything.
Number thirteen: Naomi Herne. As anyone who’s ever taken driver’s ed will tell you, don’t drive when drunk, high, exhausted, under the influence, wasted, tipsy, or violently grief-stricken. You might drive off the road and get trapped in an endless empty foggy cemetery. Though I guess her options were leaving or the Lukases and their weird family funeral thing, so I can’t really blame her for skedaddling.
Number twelve: Lionel Elliot. I understand that if you are a university biology professor, you’re expecting the worst part of your tutorials to be a bunch of lacklustre students who don’t want the be there, maybe a troublemaker or two. But I’d say that even if they end up being a little creepy, if they’re attentive and dedicated, why not give it your all? Sure, feel a little faint when they start rearranging their bones, whatever. But all students deserve a good education, Dr Elliot. No child left behind.
Number eleven: Sebastian Skinner. You have to respect a man who survives not one but two avatars who are actively trying to mess with him through the sheer power of obliviousness. Nikola Orsinov’s minion had to call him out twice to get him to notice her creepy skin factory. He just did his job and left. Prince of staying in his lane. It’s also extremely funny that the Stranger apparently went out of their way to find a plumber with a thematically appropriate last name to harass just to make Gertrude paranoid. I don’t know what Jude Perry was up to, but apparently entertaining her is a decent way to keep her from doing more than messing your arm up. I guess Jon did kind of know what he was doing, or at least what to expect when he tracked her down. Not that that’s an excuse. In any case, it’s too bad Mr Skinner doesn’t seem to have made it, because I think he deserved a nice leave after that mess. Clearly an exemplary tradesman.
Number ten: Dylan Anderson. Okay, admittedly on the surface this guy seems pretty cool with his New Zealand pig farm and his circus-hosting side gig, but also the vibe on this one is extremely off. I mean, not only does the pig eat at least one pig and one clown, it’s inducing nightmares? And his response to finding a human femur in its pen is to just lie down in the middle and pray? It may have worked, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. And the Gertrude Robinson Special of encasing the monster pig in a block of concrete seems an awful lot like hoping the Thing stays frozen in Antarctica, if you ask me. If that pig cracks loose and comes after me , it’s knife first and cement later.
Number nine: Craig Goodall. A testament to the buddy system. I’m just saying, maybe if more people warned a friend before dipping off to investigate the creepy abandoned takeaway, fewer people would get chopped up by Flesh avatars. I’m just saying, Laredo .
Number eight: Alexander Scaplehorn. Points off for working for the IRS. Points returned for seeing a freaky floating figure in the basement of a freaky taxidermy shop, saying “Not money laundering not my problem,” rugby tackling the taxidermied owner, and dipping right out of there.
Number seven: Lesere Saraki. I already have so much respect for A&E nurses, and A&E nurses who handle a situation like two severely burned men (one covered in eye tattoos and the other chanting freaky stuff) making everyone leave and then turning her hospital into an oven before one of them kills the other and turns him into ash, like Lesere Saraki did has my devotion for life. She tried to keep doing her rounds, then tried to get out when it was clear the situation was devolving, then went to deal with it directly when that didn’t work. And she’s clearly the most sensible person out there. In her own words, “I screamed. Why not? I’d already established no one was around to hear me.” Yeah, why not scream when a spooky, goth, heavily injured, previously unconscious man pops up and grabs your arm? Perfectly reasonable way to deal with the stress. And then, when she has to make the choice of letting him stab the other man with a scalpel or trying to stop him from doing that, she makes the very reasonable choice of just getting out of the way and letting those more invested than her battle it out. She just… cleans up the mess, has a cry, and goes home. Still works on the ward to this day and refused to give us a follow-up when we came calling. God, I think I’m in love with this woman.
Number six: Robin Lennox. The icon walked straight out of the Spiral because he was going to be late for Sunday dinner. Also, half his statement was about his dog, which Basira hated but I found very engaging. Also, generally annoyed the hell out of Basira. I wish I got to take his statement instead of Spiders Georg’s.
Number five: Jordan Kennedy. First of all, this guy is cool cause he’s like Section 31 but an exterminator, not a cop, so basically he actually provides a necessary service to society. Not only did he have to deal with regular gross bug stuff but he got stuck with the ant-carpet house and The Bee Movie : the musical, so we should really all be thanking him for his service. He even went above and beyond the call of duty. When the King of Nastiness John Amherst tried to choke him out for spraying his little ant farm, our man Jordan just straight-up set him on fire. And he did the same thing to Worm Queen Jane Prentiss, which is still pretty sick even if he wasn’t technically the one who killed her. Actually, I think we’ll let him take the credit for that too, because fuck Elias. All I’m saying is, I’d let Mr Kennedy take care of my bed bugs.
Number four: Julia Montauk. Sure, you could say I just put Julia up this high because she makes me both scared and horny, and you wouldn’t be wrong . However, after this chick’s childhood was ruined by not only our second favorite cult but her own dad’s murder addiction, she tried to live a normal life and actually managed it for a while! She went to therapy! She worked night shifts! She ignored the true crime fanatics, as we all should! Go to therapy and maybe you, too, can survive your trauma and live the best life possible in this godforsaken world. Or move to America with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and get really into murder yourself. Six of one, half a dozen of the other.
Number three: Gerard Keay. Our lad Gerry is mostly up here because apparently he had a real piece of work for a mum, but he still turned out a charming young goth who spent all his time being cryptic, popping up in random locales, protecting people from the entities, and being cryptic to protect people from the entities in random locales. And I have to say, I may be a lesbian, but I’m a sucker for a man in eye tattoos, a bad dye job, and a black leather duster. Points added for being so good at staying in his lane that cancer got him before the Beholding could. More points added for beating the shit out of Jurgen Leitner. Points deducted for touching a Lightless Flame cult guy with his bare hands, apparently. Man, you and Jon need to stop touching Desolation groupies. You know they’re just sentient hot wax, right?
Number two: Helen Richardson. I’ll be the first to admit that initially, Helen wasn’t all that impressive. Sure, she survived her first run-in with the Distortion, but apparently Michael was fond of playing with its food, so it’s not surprising it let her out at first. And unfortunately, she made the mistake of coming to the Magnus Archives. Oh, and also of letting it reclaim her. For most people, that probably would have been the end of things. You wander around in an endless Holiday Inn crossed with a hall of mirrors until you starve or the Distortion catches you. But not Helen! This goddess found her way to the very center of the Spiral while Michael was out being a delightful nuisance to our least favorite Archivist, and she locked it out! Getting locked out is never fun, but imagine being locked out of your spooky corridor hellscape… and also you are your spooky corridor hellscape. Real brain… twister, one might say. So yeah, Helen Richardson dealt Michael the Uno Reverse of the damn century. And now she is the Distortion, and also my best friend.
Number one. I’m sure you’re thinking, Melanie, of course this must be Joshua Gillespie! Famed for keeping his cool (literally) and staying in his lane while in the possession of the only known stable physical portal directly into one of the entities! But that is because you are all FOOLS and COWARDS. Number one: Georgie fucking Barker. Not only did this absolute legend stay sane in the face of the secret of eternity and survive the world’s most useless and terrible campus protest, she came out of it with sick ass nondestructive powers! And not only that, she built a podcasting empire off the experience! Georgie Barker is literally fearless, and as a person who feels fear all of the time I deeply respect that. Georgina Barker looked into the End, the spectre of our inevitable demise, and said “Yeah, someday, but not today. Bitch.” Number one smartest, coolest, funniest, raddest, best kisser, most no-nonsense, sickest queen in this hellscape we live in and my girlfriend: Georgie Barker.
[GEORGIE from behind camera: aw, babe.]
But I mean, yeah, also Joshua Gillespie. That guy may not have been that snazzy about it, but he’s just off the charts on sensibility and effectiveness. And he did start in Amsterdam, I guess, so the guy does know how to party. And now he’s probably rolling in cash because he literally got paid for this shit, so. King. I’d gladly let the two of you rule the wasteland as publicly appointed monarchs.
[GEORGIE: Not sure how I feel about that bit.]
Now that our ranking is done, you might say, “Melanie, I learned nothing from this guide! I am no more prepared for the apocalypse than I was before!” To which I say, what, do you want me to do everything for you? Read between the lines. Nothing works, everything works. I did the research, and I’m presenting it to you. You do the analysis. I worked at the Magnus Institute for months , you can read this 20-item list and figure out the patterns. I’m done now. I did my time. Come on, Georgie, let’s go.
[camera tips like whoever was holding it has let go. Melanie dumps whatever’s in her mug on the floor, strips off her mic, and leaves the frame. General chatter of her and Georgie discussing their dinner plans, then a door creaking and Helen’s voice joins in. Door creaks again. The video cuts out.]