MAG 175: Epoch

An inventory of what comes after. Audio recorded by the Archivist, in situ.
==Statement==
The statement is written by Leah in the form of a series of notes, observing the new world.
The first note relates to a lamp. It is old, partially melted and so covered in stains its original colour cannot be determined. It is too badly damaged to work, bulb cracked, wires cut, and there is no power in this new world anyway. 
Despite this, it does turn on, and the light it casts draws the colour from everything around it, leaving nothing but grey.
The second note relates to seagulls. They can no longer fly, too tangled in plastic wrapping to move their wings, their feathers are black from oil, and their throats are filled with concrete so they make no noise. They cannot see, and hunt by hearing, stalking their prey with serrated beaks and many jointed legs. Their babies are born already covered in oil and plastic. Their name is technically inaccurate- there is no longer a sea.
Leah hides behind a vending machine, waiting for the thing hunting her to pass.
The third note relates to an old book. It was a history book, although what of is unclear from the damaged title. It has been dipped in some kind of fat, and the pages have clogged together from water damage. If you press on it, water will pour from it, and it will scream.
Leah remembers having read the book once, back when its history seemed important and she was trying to warn people of what was to come. But it meant nothing, in the end.
The fourth note is a scathing critique of an umbrella. What is an umbrella doing here? It has not rained in fifty years, and the only clouds are poisonous clouds of sulfur. The only water is in the wet rot of the towering piles of garbage that fill the sea bed. Its fabric is too damaged to even protect from the constant, baking sun. Leah wishes she had enough water in her body to spit on it
Leah does not know why she is writing this, but what else can she do?
The fifth note relates to a native of the wasteland. This is its world and its home, it does not care what a human was. It hides beneath the rubble, so all that is seen are its dark empty eyes, and its oddly familiar smile, and its long, unfurling, grasping tongue. It mutters to itself, in a voice that sounds like old toothpaste commercials and army recruitment messages.
Different ones have been seen, but Leah does not know if that means there are multiple, or if there is just one, who is getting bigger.
Leah muses that even had she seen what was to come, no-one would have believed her.
The final item is a bone. A rib-cage and a skull, yellowing in the sun. It seems oddly familiar, somehow.
Leah wonders who it belonged to, and if she might have been able to save them with an earlier warning, as she tears off another of her ribs to write with.
==Post-Statement==
After walking for "a literally uncountable amount of time", Martin decides he is going to have a rest. He sits on the ruins of a couch and John declines to join him. They discuss matters.
Martin asks John if this means The Extinction was indeed real. John confirms that yes, in the sense that it was a thing that was feared, although it is unclear whether it was truly at the level it could join the other fourteen. Whether that is even a valid question is also unclear. Even with the Knowing, things get muddy, and attempts to analyse the Entities or put them into categories or talk of emergences and new powers are just human attempts to categorize their fears, to make them more understandable. No-one truly understands the Entities.
The Eye is, after all, a being based on the observers fear. It cannot give a truly objective answer.
Martin then asks if the world would have ended anyway, if the Entities had not manifested. John replies that it could have. Things were bad, and a lot of things would have been destroyed. Humanity would likely have survived, but it would be "the end of a lot of things". Is that the end of the world? Everything ends. Even the nightmare world will end someday.
Martin asks John if there is any truth to human religions. The Eye cannot see the answer to that, only our fear of the answer. John does not know, but he notes that no-one's faith saved them from the Entities.
Deciding there's been enough existentialism, Martin gets ready to leave. John cautions him and reveals that Daisy and Basira are in the next domain they are heading to. To John's surprise, Martin is happy about this, and is excited to see their friends again, even under the circumstances.
As they head off, John is less sure.
==Continuity==
*Related Entity: The Extinction
Category:The Magnus Archives Episodes