0:00

Hi everyone, it's Lori, voice

0:02

of Celia in The Magnus

0:04

Protocol. Today, I'm very pleased

0:07

to announce that the Crowdfund

0:09

campaign for The Magnus Protocol

0:11

Mysteries board game has officially

0:14

launched. Designed by

0:16

the team behind The Resistance

0:18

and KOO, The Magnus Protocol

0:20

Mysteries puts you in the

0:22

role of an OIAR employee,

0:24

piecing together clues and information

0:27

about supernatural cases. Perfect

0:29

for fans of escape rooms, puzzles

0:31

and mystery games. Each

0:33

game box is filled with all

0:35

the evidence you need to uncover

0:37

the truth, including documents, photographs, news

0:40

reports and even audio recordings featuring

0:42

some familiar voices from The Magnus

0:44

Protocol. For more

0:46

information and to

0:48

donate, just go

0:50

to www.brustyquill.com/protocol game.

0:53

Thanks for your support. If

0:57

recent temperatures are any indication, it looks like

0:59

we're in for another cold winter. Make sure

1:01

your residential or commercial heating system will keep

1:03

you warm all season long by calling the

1:05

5-star heating experts at Crop Met Cap. A

1:07

Crop Met Cap 5-star technician has the training

1:10

and tools to properly fix and maintain your

1:12

system and can catch potential problems before you're

1:14

left out in the cold. Call

1:16

1-800-GO-CROP or visit cropmetcap.com.

1:18

And remember, Crop Met

1:20

Cap is the one with

1:22

5 stars. Crop Met Cap,

1:25

home of the 5-star technician. This

1:28

podcast is brought to you by Aura. 2024

1:31

has seen a surge in high-profile

1:33

data breaches, raising serious concerns about

1:35

the security of personal information. This

1:37

past summer, national public data reported

1:39

a breach potentially affecting every American.

1:41

That's why we're thrilled to partner

1:43

with Aura. Aura is a complete

1:45

online safety toolkit, which includes a

1:47

variety of other features to keep

1:50

you safe online, including a VPN

1:52

for secure browsing, data broker

1:54

opt-out to stop companies from selling your

1:56

personal information, a password manager to help

1:58

you create and store storage. Mark

4:05

and his daughter, Andy, played the telescope

4:07

game together on their back balcony, peering

4:10

up through the ancient telescope Mark had bought

4:12

secondhand at a pawn shop down the street.

4:16

It perched, overhanging their fifth floor

4:18

apartment railing, a broad, squat tube

4:20

with huge bronze knobs. At

4:23

first, Andy's small hands could barely fit around

4:25

the knobs, then she would make a sweeping

4:28

motion with her arms to ask Mark to

4:30

coax the image into focus. The

4:33

telescope game was simple. Andy

4:35

would point the telescope at the latest celestial

4:37

body she was enamored with, then,

4:39

after peering through the filmy lens long

4:41

enough to get it focused, she would

4:44

declare that they had locked on, Captain!

4:47

Mark would make a hum, as

4:50

they were teleported together to the planet's surface.

4:52

Then, Andy would describe exactly what

4:55

they were seeing and feeling on the planet.

4:58

On Venus, the roiling clouds hung

5:00

overhead as acid rain pelted their

5:03

suits. On Mars, their

5:05

step was light and the thin

5:07

atmosphere barely carried the sound of

5:09

their voices. And on

5:11

Jupiter, they flew through the clouds

5:13

of the endless storm, tossed and

5:16

tumbled by the centennial winds. Andy

5:19

and Mark would act out collecting

5:21

samples, exploring craters on moons, and,

5:24

if they were pushing the telescope to its

5:26

limits, initiating first contact

5:29

with aliens on faraway

5:31

stars. Andy

5:33

became obsessed with astronomy at a young

5:36

age. After her class had a

5:38

module about the solar system, she came

5:40

home starry-eyed, declaring that she wanted

5:42

to be an astronaut. She

5:44

had passed through other obsessions at this

5:47

point, dinosaurs when she wanted to be

5:49

a paleontologist, horses when she wanted to

5:51

be an equestrian, Mark still

5:53

wasn't sure where she had learned the

5:55

word equestrian, but her obsession with

5:57

astronomy was different. Peetering

6:00

out after a few weeks of scattered

6:02

interest her passion only grew as time

6:04

passed Mark bought Andy

6:07

books about the solar system then each

6:09

of the planets and eventually textbooks about

6:11

the structure of the universe Months

6:14

after her class moved on from the stars

6:16

and he could only imagine one present for her

6:18

birthday That was

6:21

when Mark bought her the telescope Andy's

6:24

Fascination with the stars deepened into a

6:26

love for learning driven by her desire

6:29

to see the cosmos for herself When

6:32

she was just nine she could quote

6:34

facts about Einstein's general relativity theory and

6:36

the speed of light Her

6:38

obsession gave her a zest for her homework that

6:41

mark had never had as a child She

6:44

told him that she would have to get very good

6:46

grades to become an astronaut Mark Worried

6:49

for Andy At

6:51

first his worries were expressed

6:53

through a concern that her obsession could

6:56

alienate his daughter from her classmates who

6:58

were beginning to develop the social dynamics

7:00

that would exclude someone so obsessed with

7:02

a specific topic and This

7:04

happened as Andy turned 11 Mark

7:07

would sometimes try to suggest indulging

7:10

more age-appropriate interest improve her situation

7:13

But Andy brushed off these suggestions

7:15

yelling no telescope game In

7:19

response to the dolls and sports equipment mark

7:22

pro offered Eventually

7:24

mark thought that his suggestions sank in

7:26

on some level To

7:28

prepare herself for the physical demands of astronaut

7:30

training And he took up soccer

7:33

and started making connections through her team which

7:35

allayed marks fears about her social development as

7:38

Andy grew older her discussions of space

7:40

grew less abstract and more realistic about

7:43

the path that she would take Being

7:46

an astronaut was a rare and difficult thing

7:48

But she thought starting at an early age gave her

7:50

a leg up in achieving that lofty goal This

7:54

change only pushed marks mind to further

7:56

reaching concerns. He worried about

7:58

the discrimination. She would fail as a woman in

8:00

a science field. He worried that

8:03

she would get discouraged as her dream seemed

8:05

further away, as high school and then college

8:07

and then training would bring their own particular

8:09

challenges that could beat her down. He

8:11

believed in and supported her, he thought, but

8:14

he still worried that the system would find her

8:16

lacking in some way, that she would

8:18

be locked out of her dreams. Then

8:20

where would she be? The

8:23

Telescope game invited Mark into other,

8:25

more visceral fears that formed Stu

8:27

with the abstract ones.

8:30

Although the lens of Andi's excitement obscured

8:32

it, the landscapes and situations

8:35

she described during the Telescope game

8:37

were always rich with dangers. To

8:40

be an astronaut was to enter the most inhospitable

8:42

place that a human could go, with

8:45

only a flimsy suit between themselves and

8:47

certain death. The wondrous

8:49

vistas she described in the game were filled

8:51

with dangers that he could not imagine that

8:53

his daughter, who he had held, so

8:56

fragile in his hands when she was born,

8:59

could survive. These

9:02

worries preyed upon Mark's mind after the

9:04

Telescope was packed away in its old

9:06

leather case and he lay in bed

9:08

with moonlights streaming in under his curtains.

9:11

Sometimes, he wished that they lived

9:13

somewhere less rural so that stargazing

9:15

wasn't quite so easy and maybe

9:17

Andi's interest would turn somewhere safer.

9:20

But the ideation was strangled by the

9:22

wave of guilt he felt as he

9:24

realised the implications of that longing. He

9:27

wanted his daughter to feel confident and supported

9:29

in whatever she decided to do with her

9:32

life. It was wrong

9:34

for him to want to dissuade her from being

9:36

an astronaut because it scared her dear old dad.

9:39

In fifth grade, Mark took Andi to

9:41

Arizona to tour the desert where NASA

9:44

simulated moon walks. Beyond

9:46

the plaque that commemorated the first

9:48

moon landing stretched endless miles of

9:50

black volcanic rock. As

9:52

Mark and Andi hiked together, he involuntarily

9:54

had a vision of all the air

9:56

being sucked away from the surface and

9:59

their bodies slowly falling to the ground

10:01

in one sixth gravity. He

10:04

unconsciously held his breath as Yuri played the

10:06

vision in his head until he was broken

10:08

out of his trance by Andy tripping on

10:10

the craggy rocks as she bounded up ahead.

10:12

Where they stood had been trod by countless

10:15

astronauts, some of who had died trying

10:17

to get to the moon. Others

10:19

had gone all the way there, left footprints

10:21

in the lunar dust and returned safely

10:23

to the soil. Mark

10:25

tried to focus on these survivors as he

10:28

sucked in the dry desert air. Now

10:31

12 years old, Andy's hands were large

10:33

enough to grasp and turn the knobs of the

10:35

telescope on her own, but she

10:37

still expressed childish joy in playing the

10:40

telescope game. Mark's

10:42

worries had fermented into a stew

10:44

of tepid disapproval and guilty support.

10:48

That summer she wanted to spend seven weeks

10:50

away at a junior astronaut camp. Her

10:53

latest planetary obsession was Neptune and

10:55

its moon, Titania. Mark

10:58

arrived home late one cold February evening.

11:01

Over dinner, Andy told Mark that she someday

11:03

wanted to be a part of a manned

11:05

mission to Titania. Mark

11:07

tentatively questioned if they would have the

11:10

technology in her lifetime, a

11:12

common argument he employed. He

11:14

did not express his horror that Andy would want

11:16

to go to an icy rock almost two billion

11:19

miles away from the earth. Andy

11:22

responded, with familiar frustration, that it was

11:24

possible and the technological gap between Mars

11:26

and other planets would be easier to

11:28

cross than the current gap between the

11:30

moon and Mars that manned missions currently

11:32

faced. Mark decided not to

11:34

press the issue into a fight tonight. He

11:37

smiled awkwardly and said that maybe she

11:40

would be the first person to walk

11:42

on Titania's surface. Then,

11:44

Andy went on to tell him how

11:46

the thin carbon dioxide atmosphere of Titania

11:48

wouldn't even carry sound and

11:50

that there was liquid water deep under

11:53

the moon's crust and that maybe there

11:55

were tiny microbes living up on Titania

11:57

right now whose ancestors she could study

11:59

in her space. spaceship laboratory. She

12:02

wished she could be there right now, to see

12:04

it all. As

12:07

Mark was washing the dishes after dinner, he

12:09

secretly hoped the talk of Neptune was over

12:11

for tonight. He didn't know if

12:13

he was up to wrestling with the contradictions in

12:15

his fears after a long day of work. When

12:18

Andy came in and set the old leather case

12:20

that held the telescope on the kitchen table, he

12:24

struggled to suppress a groan.

12:26

He briefly wished he could be somewhere

12:28

else. "'Come on, Dad,'

12:31

she said. "'Just a few minutes. Neptune

12:33

is visible early tonight.'" Mark

12:36

begrudgingly unpacked the telescope as Andy went back to

12:38

her room to collect her notes on Neptune. His

12:41

mind briefly wandered to a job in the city

12:44

he had seen online a few days ago as

12:46

he gingerly unwrapped the tube. Guilt

12:49

shot through his gut like an electric shock. He

12:52

took the telescope outside. As

12:55

he was tired, Mark hoped he could sit

12:57

back while Andy did the heavy lifting of

12:59

aiming and adjusting the telescope and acting out

13:01

the telescope game. He

13:03

set up the worn bronze tripod and screwed

13:05

in the knobs that attached the huge telescope

13:07

to it. The telescope

13:09

hung heavy just over the lip of the

13:11

railing. Mark peered down through

13:14

the lens to make sure it didn't need cleaning and

13:16

saw through it a stretch of road a

13:18

few blocks from his apartment. Then

13:22

with a hum in his ear, he

13:24

was suddenly standing in that stretch of road.

13:28

He jumped onto the sidewalk and shook

13:30

his head, disoriented. He

13:32

looked back at his apartment. He didn't

13:34

know how it was true, but the telescope had

13:36

teleported him like they had pretended it could do

13:38

all those years. A

13:40

yawning pit of dread opened in his

13:43

stomach and his legs involuntarily began a

13:45

desperate sprint back towards his apartment building.

13:48

He was yelling for Andy, but he didn't know if

13:50

she could hear. As he

13:52

approached, his eyes flew up to their balcony

13:55

and he saw that the telescope still lay limp,

13:58

pointed to the ground. Andy

14:01

was nowhere in sight. He

14:03

burst into the lobby, and the desk attendant

14:06

watched as he first dashed to the elevators,

14:08

then backtracked to the stairs. He

14:11

took them three at a time, his

14:13

heart beating erratically. He didn't know

14:15

if he had ever moved so fast in his entire life.

14:19

He got to his apartment door but realised he didn't

14:21

have the key. He started

14:23

pounding at the door, yelling for Andy to

14:25

stop, to not go to the telescope, to

14:27

not look to the sky. There

14:30

was no response. He

14:32

busted down the door with a kick, desperation

14:35

driving him with a whip and tore

14:37

through the living room, eyes

14:39

scanning for Andy until he got a view of

14:41

the balcony. The

14:44

ancient telescope sat

14:46

upright, not leaned on

14:48

the railing, but

14:50

pointing to the starry void

14:53

above. The

15:10

Magnus Protocol is a podcast distributed

15:13

by Rusty Quill and licensed under

15:15

a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial Sharealike

15:17

4.0 international licence.

15:20

To subscribe, view associated materials or

15:22

join our Patreon, visit rustyquill.com. Create

15:25

and review us online, tweet us at

15:28

therustyquill, visit us on Facebook or email

15:30

us via mail at rustyquill.com. Thanks

15:33

for listening. start

16:01

smarter and using AI

16:03

tools is smart but integrating trusted

16:05

mission AI into your technology is

16:07

smarter. We're not just

16:09

making technology solutions in national security

16:12

and health, we're making smart smarter.

16:14

Lidos. Hi

16:16

everyone, it's Billy, the voice of

16:19

Alice in the Magnus Protocol here.

16:21

Today I'm here to advertise The

16:24

Other Stories, one of a range

16:26

of new podcasts recently launched on

16:28

the RQ network from the brilliant

16:31

creative team at the story studio

16:33

Hawk and Cleaver. The Other Stories

16:35

is an award-winning weekly audio fiction

16:38

podcast featuring incredible stories across multiple

16:40

genres including horror, thrillers and sci-fi.

16:42

With over 600

16:45

episodes and a range of miniseries

16:47

or individual stories they have stories

16:49

for everyone. Search for The Other

16:52

Stories wherever you listen to your

16:54

podcasts or go to theotherstories.net or

16:57

rusticwill.com for more information. Have

16:59

fun and see you later!