MAG 111: Family Business

Image by @artopodians on Twitter

Audio
Transcript
Warnings

Statement of Gerard Keay regarding the death of his mother, Mary Keay.

## Pre-Statement

Jonathan Sims is given the Catalogue of the Trapped Dead by Julia Montauk and Trevor Herbert in which he is instructed to read the last page. The pair leaves the room and John starts to read the last entry, an account of the death of Gerard Keay.

Once finished Gerard appears, summoned by John. At first, Gerard is uninterested in talking to John. He has been used repeatedly by Julia and Trevor as a 'bloody monster manual.' John introduces himself and Gerard asks when Gertrude died. He is pleased that her ending was not peaceful as she supposedly would not have wanted to go quietly. John then asks Gerard to help him stop The Unknowing but Gerard initially refuses. He has become increasingly frustrated and depressed with his new existence as a book, as undeath is existentially painful, and has no interest in helping John.

John asks him what it is he wants. Gerard bargains with John, saying that if he takes his page from the book and destroys it, thus permanently ending his 'life,' then he will give John everything he knows about what Gertrude had been planning and about The Unknowing. John agrees and tears out the page.

Gerard begins to recount everything he knows about The Unknowing. Apparently, whilst the ritual could be delayed, there was no way to completely stop it as everything could be replaced. But he and Gertrude believed that, once the ritual started, it might be vulnerable — it could be disrupted and thus stopped. Whilst Gerard does not know what it could be vulnerable to, he is able to tell John about a storage unit where Gertrude has hidden something that she thought could do it.

The pair discusses Gertrude and the abilities both she and John display from being Archivists, though Gerard notes Gertrude seemed reluctant to use hers. She would also occasionally read statements aloud when she was "getting shaky", though she did not record them.

The conversation moves onto Gerard's mother, Mary Keay, and Gerard talks about how she was driven, wanting to start a mystic dynasty, a family to worship the occult. He mentions how the Lukas Family is an example of one such dynasty, a family which worships The Lonely, but not the Fairchilds who just share a pseudonym but are not blood related.

As the conversation focuses more on Gerard and his relationship with his mother, John asks if he would be willing to give a statement.

## Statement

Mary Keay believed she had been cheated out of some grand mystical legacy from her Von Closen relatives, and she aspired to use the power of the Entities without being consumed by any of them. She greatly admired Jurgen Leitner, and put a lot of effort into tracking down books from his collection.

Gerard's father had worked in the Archives of the Magnus Institute, quitting shortly after Gerard was born. However, Mary killed him in his sleep soon after and presumably bookbound him, although when Gerard eventually checked the book his page was not in it. All through his childhood, Gerard was tutored in occult secrets that even adults would have struggled with, and they travelled extensively, meeting "things" that terrified Gerard but greeted Mary with affection.

As a youth, Gerard tried to run away, but he found mundane life terribly ignorant. Instead he resigned himself to being part of his mother's obsession. However, as he got older, he came to realize how misguided her attempts to control the Entities were, and their relationship deteriorated badly. He could not, however, bring himself to cut her off entirely.

Gerard came up to the bookshop one day to find Mary had partially skinned herself as part of a ritual to take full control of the Catalogue of the Trapped Dead. She begged him to finish it, as she was about to faint from blood loss, but Gerard panicked and ran out of the shop. Due to the blood on his clothes and the extent of Mary's wounds, Gerard was charged with Mary's murder. However, even the incomplete ritual allowed Mary to manifest herself physically again, and she somehow tampered with the evidence before Gerard could be brought to trial, and there was not enough evidence for a second trial as several eyewitnesses had withdrawn their testimony.

For the next five years, Gerard was haunted by his mother, whom he describes as "damaged" by the botched ritual, powerful but erratic. She sometimes faded out of existence, during which time he occupied himself destroying Leitners and trying to evade her power. Eventually, Gertrude Robinson offered to destroy the book and thus set Gerard free. He did not realize that she had learned how to make pages out of people before she did so.

## Statement Ends

Gerard explains that Gertrude was trying to stop not just the Unknowing, but all the various rituals that would allow one of the Entities to manifest in the world. He and John discuss the Entities, including Robert Smirke's list of fourteen, and why anyone would help such beings transform the world. Gerard mentions tracking Jurgen Leitner and meeting "a pathetic old man" who could not possibly have been him, and John does not correct him.

In the end, Gerard asks John to call him "Gerry." John then dismisses him. He thanks Trevor and Julia for their help, telling them his next step is returning to London, and they thank him in return for "bringing them Max Mustermann's head," which they will have fun with.

## Continuity

* **Related Entity:** The Eye and The End
	+ The Keays are affiliated with The Eye
	+ The Catalogue of the Trapped Dead is an artefact of The End that first appeared in MAG 70.