ONE

The Dreams in the White House

HE STANDS ON THE balcony, his senses in complete disarray. He’s not sure where he is, or how he got here. Looking down, he sees he’s far above a white city of colossal towers and low, terraced monuments. The stone beneath his feet is cool but pulsating, like some massive, encrusted entity’s breathing. He’s barefoot, clad in the striped pajamas he wore to bed. He bends down to touch the surface; a prodding finger pulls up a small, pebble-sized piece of greenish, porous rock.

As he rises, a locked-away part of his mind shouts that he must still be asleep, in his bedroom beside his wife, this is a dream . . . but he can see and feel and smell with such clarity. The night breeze carries a hint of chill too extreme for this place and time, a chill that whispers at the lethal non-space that sprawls between stars. With the freezing air comes a smell he can’t compare to anything else, unless it’s the nauseating stench of burning fuel in sea water that he experienced twenty years ago, during the war.

He hears something, like a flute played by a lipless piper. There’s movement below, in the streets of the vast city. He can’t make out much—he’s too far above. But then all sensations coalesce into a single, imminent emotion.

The emotion is terror. Something is coming.

I

Special Agent Frank Elwood Jr. pulled his hat down lower over his eyes as he tried to melt back into the shadows of the old building. He didn’t like lurking in this part of Arkham, especially not at midnight on a misty October evening. The rest of New England might have been reveling in the glorious fall colors of changing leaves and innocent Halloween decorations, but this town hadn’t known innocence in centuries. The walkie-talkie in one hand gave Elwood not quite as much comfort as the sawed-off shotgun he carried under his long coat . . . which is to say not much comfort at all.

The metal box squawked, startling Elwood. He raised it to his mouth, punched the talk button, said, “Alpha-One. Go.”

“Alpha-Two. Nothing here.” That was O’Hara, stationed a few blocks away. “You got anything?”

“Not yet. Alpha-Three?”

Jefferson’s voice crackled through the tinny speaker. “Alpha-Three. No Olde Fellowes action in the meadow.”

“Alpha-One, over and out.”

He dropped the walkie-talkie back into a pocket and eyed the vacant lot across the street. He knew this had once been the location of a house that was notorious even by Arkham standards: The “Witch House,” home of Keziah Mason, a 17th-century crone who was said to have fled Salem and taken up residence here, still practicing black arts and accompanied by a rodent familiar called “Brown Jenkin.” Elwood’s own father, Frank Sr., had even lived in the house briefly when still a college student, until a friend of his named Walter Gilman had died there under mysterious circumstances. All of those still renting rooms in the large, three-story abode had removed themselves at that point and the house had been demolished not long thereafter.

Elwood had always known that his family’s association with Arkham—where his father had continued as a professor of mathematics at Miskatonic University until he’d died of a massive stroke two years ago—was why he’d been recruited by Hoover himself for the FBI’s Human Protection League, but that didn’t make him feel any better about being positioned here now.

Even though the Witch House had been torn down more than thirty years ago (the demolition had revealed a wealth of hidden horrors, including human bones, occult books, and unidentifiable antique relics), its presence still infected the area. The barren plot of land had been claimed by the government when the last owner had simply stopped paying taxes on it, but it had never been re-built on. It had once been surrounded by a tall wooden fence, but even that structure had long ago succumbed to a rot that seemed to seep up from the poisoned soil. Tall, bent weeds, all of a uniform gray-brown color, sprouted from the ground, which was spongy underfoot. Haze often seemed to overhang the area, even when the rest of Arkham was clear; although animals avoided cutting across the lot, late-night drunks staggering past sobered up quickly when they heard something big moving among the weeds, or claimed to glimpse glowing eyes that didn’t follow the proportions of any creature they could name.

The HPL had kept tabs on this place for decades, just as they had many other eldritch areas in old Arkham and elsewhere across America. These were all prime sites for Olde Fellowes activity. One of the League’s informants in the town often mentioned strange sightings in the area, but the stories were usually too vague to merit following up. Not this last one, though: Eddie Polonsky, a red-nosed senior citizen who supplemented his monthly Social Security with HPL snitch money that bought him better (or at least more) whiskey, had told them that something big was brewing.

“A lotta folk hereabouts are reportin’ some damned odd dreams lately,” he’d said to Elwood, over drinks in a dockside tavern as Eddie glanced side-to-side anxiously. “Mitch Atcheson, he swore he walked into the old Witch House one night, that it was still standin’. In the dream, he climbed them stairs, went all the way up to the top floor where that one feller had died, found a pile of bones there—and they was human bones. When he waked in the mornin’, he found somethin’ in his own hand, and saw he was clutchin’ a finger-bone. Shook him up so much he walked over to the place as soon as he got dressed, but ’course he found nothin’ but weeds and that cursed soft earth.”

Elwood had waved over another drink for Polonsky before asking, “That’s weird, sure, Eddie, but you called me and said you had something worth a c-note, and that ain’t it.”

“No, that ain’t it.” Eddie waited until the fresh drinks appeared, took a healthy slug of alcohol, wiped his mouth with his flannel shirt sleeve, and said, “I seen somethin’ there myself last night.”

“What? What did you see?”

Eddie’s rheumy eyes had creased, his voice grown even huskier. “I was goin’ by the place myself last night just about 1:00 A.M.—I don’t like to go that way late, y’know, but I’d had a bit too much and got turned around. Wound up there, tried to go by it fast, but . . . damned if I didn’t see . . .”

He broke off, looking away. Elwood leaned forward and nudged his arm, trying to bring him back. “What, Eddie? Tell me.”

“It weren’t on the ground, no, but floating overhead, above that blasted place . . . big, like a train car, but round, or rather, like it was made up of lots of round things. It had these arms—no, not arms, more like them things on a squid . . .”

A chill passed through Elwood. “Tentacles?”

“Right! Like tentacles. And eyes—too goddamned many eyes. I clamped a hand over my mouth to keep a scream in, just turned and ran, expectin’ to feel it behind me any second, feel one’a them tentacle-things wrap ’round my throat. . . . But I made it home, I did. Haven’t slept since.”

Elwood believed it. He’d never encountered a shoggoth himself, but he’d studied case files and talked to other agents who had. Even in incorporeal dream form, these soldiers of the Armies of the Night were terrifying.

He pulled out his wallet, slid a hundred to Eddie, and on second thought added a twenty. The old man grabbed the bills, crumpled them and stuffed them into a pocket, tossed back the last of his drink, and got to his feet. “Thanks, Mr. Elwood.”

Eddie started to stagger off, but Elwood stood up and caught his arm. “Eddie,” he said, speaking softly, “take my advice and use that money to leave Arkham. At least for a while.”

Eddie yanked his arm free, nodded, and fled.

Elwood had taken the information back to the League’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., and now here he was, thirty hours later, standing outside the lot that had once held Arkham’s Witch House. His frequent partner, O’Hara, was stationed with their car two blocks away, while Special Agent Jefferson stood guard at a fetid, swamp-like meadow just below Hangman’s Brook, following his own lead.

Jefferson was one of the youngest members of the Human Protection League, a 23-year-old kid who’d graduated at the top of his class last year with a psychology degree from St. Francis in Brooklyn; he was smart as a whip and cool under pressure, but it had still taken Attorney General Robert Kennedy’s order last year to hire more minority agents to get the young black man into the HPL.

Herbert Jefferson had only been with the Lovecraft Squad for a few months, but had already developed a network of his own informants, some of whom had come to distrust the FBI’s Caucasian agents. Jefferson’s Arkham informant, a Cuban drug addict named César Garcia, had told him a startlingly similar story about encountering a many-armed monster floating above the meadow.

Wishing he’d brought a thermos of hot coffee with him, Elwood was shrugging his shoulders against the New England October chill when he noticed something curious: the low mist hanging above the vacant lot across the street had grown. It gathered height as he watched, and grew dense, almost glowing beneath the vague illumination of the street-lamps. It thickened, broadened . . . and then just as quickly evaporated into tatters.

The lot was no longer vacant.

Elwood’s pulse quickened as he blinked in shock. A house stood there now: three stories, of antiquated design and rattletrap upkeep. Shingles were missing from the roof, paint peeled from the sides, the posts holding up the front entryway were splintering, and a gabled garret jutted from one side like an angry pustule.

He knew this house; he knew it from photos he’d seen in case files, and from descriptions his father had provided. It was the Witch House of Keziah Mason, who’d been found guilty of practicing black magic three centuries before, but had vanished from her jail cell after inscribing arcane symbols on the walls. This was the Witch House that had been torn down thirty-two years ago, now standing solid, if not exactly sturdy, before him.

Elwood stood for a few seconds, ears straining, stomach clenched, waiting. When nothing more happened, he pulled the walkie-talkie out. “This is Alpha-One, I’ve got a sighting. So far the situation is quiet . . .”

O’Hara called back, “Roger, Alpha-One. On my way.”

Elwood pocketed the handset, lifted the shotgun, and started across the street cautiously.

He reached the property line, where the moldering remains of the wooden fence jutted up like broken teeth. The house was completely dark and silent, no light or sound, not so much as a creaking shutter. Elwood thought the front door was wide open, although it showed up only as a blacker black within the front entry.

He was debating his options—enter the house or stay outside to observe?—when a noise drew his gaze upward, a noise that combined an atonal reed instrument with bubbling tar. Something was taking shape against the hazy, starless night sky, something big, made of room-sized globules that meshed and shifted and roiled, while long, wavering arms and dozens of eyes swam in the restless surface.

Elwood felt the bottom drop out of his gut. He had to will his knees to hold him up. He knew what he was looking at, even though he’d only read about them, or heard the secondhand accounts from witnesses (the few that had survived, that is), some of whom were so frightened years after the encounter that they’d turned pale just from the retelling.

Shoggoth. The word alone felt alien, ominous, fecund with dread. Shoggoths ranked just below the elder entities themselves in the Great Old Ones, the worst of their monstrous legionnaires.

And this one was moving toward Elwood.

He knew the shotgun would do little to damage it, but he also knew it would catch him if he tried to run. If he were going to die here, on this ugly, abandoned corner of Arkham, then he would at least try to inflict some harm on his killer. He raised the shotgun, pumped it, waited as the nightmarish thing drew closer . . .

It stopped. And then it retreated.

Elwood stood like a statue, still gripping the shotgun, his finger sweaty around the trigger. As the shoggoth drifted up and away from him, he lowered the gun and waited, watching.

Something came into view now near the shoggoth, looming above the Witch House—a spire, extending far overhead, made of some pearlescent substance Elwood couldn’t name. It must have been hundreds of feet high; it was featureless except at the top, where a walkway or platform encircled it.

A man stood on the platform. Although it was too far up for Elwood to see him clearly, the shoggoth was plainly heading for him. Elwood felt dread for the lone figure.

“Is that somebody standing up there?”

Elwood started, almost lifting the shotgun, but relaxed when he saw it was O’Hara; he hadn’t heard his partner join him. “I think so . . .”

Both men went silent as they watched the alien monstrosity float upward until it seemed level with the man, who stood his ground. The man and the shoggoth regarded each other; Elwood wondered if they were somehow communicating.

O’Hara asked, “Why isn’t it attacking him?”

“I don’t know. It almost seems like it’s . . . respecting him.”

Before the scene could advance any further, it faded away, like the memory of a dream in morning light. The Witch House followed. Within seconds, Elwood and O’Hara stood in an empty plot of land, surrounded by nothing but trash, weeds, and rot.

“What in God’s name was all that?” O’Hara whispered.

Elwood turned to go. “I don’t know, but whatever it was, it’s over now. I could use some food and a warm bed.”

By the time they reached the car, Elwood knew what he had to do come morning. He didn’t like dealing with Hoover—he found the Big Boss repulsive, truthfully—but Director Nathan Brady and the FBI’s head honcho needed to hear about what they’d discovered tonight:

There was a new player in the game.

II

Bobby leaned back in his desk chair. After a moment of consideration, he unbuttoned and rolled up his sleeves. He wasn’t especially hot, but he knew it would irk J. Edgar Hoover. And he did enjoy irking Hoover.

It was probably the only thing about dealing with the FBI director that he did enjoy. As the attorney general, Robert Kennedy was J. Edgar Hoover’s superior, but Hoover treated him like an unruly student in a Catholic high school. Bobby’s brother John had given up dealing with Hoover altogether; he only “spoke” to the director via an appointed liaison. During his first year in the White House, President Kennedy had invited Hoover in for a few talks, but had finally grown weary of Hoover’s superiority and condescension. They both knew that the only reason Kennedy had kept the aging bureaucrat on as the director of the FBI was that Hoover had files (including surveillance tape) on John’s long-ago affair with Inga Arvad, a one-time acquaintance of Hitler who was still suspected of having been a Nazi spy back when the Third Reich had been dabbling in occult objects and research.

Bobby was in his office now, awaiting Hoover’s arrival, because of the talk he’d had with his brother this morning. His brother rarely asked him to chat outside—it always meant something especially serious. Jack had waited until they were strolling through the Rose Garden before he’d said, “Sorry, but I don’t trust Hoover anymore—I wouldn’t put it past the son-of-a-bitch to have bugged the Oval Office.”

“I don’t know, Jack,” Bobby answered. “I mean, sure, the Justice Department, we all know he’s got his fingers in that pie, but . . . the president’s office?”

“You’re probably right. Bet you’ll be glad when that new FBI building is finished and you get the Justice building to yourself.”

Bobby smirked. “Won’t stop Hoover from bugging anyone.” They walked in silence for a minute; then Bobby asked, “Jack, what’s this about? Is Hoover giving you some trouble?”

“No, not exactly. It’s . . . well, those dreams I told you about, you know—when I first came to the White House two years ago . . . ?”

Bobby nodded. “The ones where you’re high in the air, and you see a big shining city . . . ?”

“Right. Well, they’ve gotten . . . stranger. And last night I had one where I was standing on this balcony made of some kind of greenish rock, and in the dream I leaned down and poked at it, and a little piece came away. Then, when I woke up this morning . . . I had this.” Jack pulled his right hand from his pocket and extended it, palm up, to Bobby. Bobby looked down and saw a quarter-sized piece of rock the hue and translucency of green sea foam. He touched it with a fingertip, expecting it to be warm from Jack’s hand, but it was smooth and cool, almost cold. “What the hell is it?”

“I don’t know. But, Bobby, there was something else, some kind of big . . . creature that floated up right next to me. It was like nothing I’ve ever seen, or imagined—it had dozens of eyes, and tentacles like it should be underwater, and at first I thought it wanted to kill me, but then it changed, and somehow I knew it had judged me and accepted me. And that was when I woke up, or . . . I don’t know, this may sound crazy, but maybe I didn’t wake up so much as came back.”

Bobby stopped and eyed his brother, weighing the possibilities. He knew that Jack was taking a lot of medication for his back pain—was this some kind of overdose hallucination? A stress reaction? But his brother had started having these dreams as soon as they’d arrived in Washington, so that was nothing new. And there was the green stone—what was it, and where had Jack gotten it from? “Well, I can see why you might not have wanted Hoover to hear this . . .”

Jack stopped strolling and turned to his brother, his expression serious. “But I think Hoover has something to do with this.”

“Sorry, I’m not following you . . .”

“We need to know more about what he’s been doing with that clandestine organization he’s got buried down there under the Washington Monument. He’s never been straight with us about that.”

Bobby shrugged. “There may not be much to be straight about. It all sounds pretty crackpot. I mean, we’ve got the Russians trying to out-muscle us, organized crime breathing down our necks, a civil rights movement that’s shaking everything up . . . do Hoover’s little fantasies about monsters or little green men really matter next to all that?”

“What if . . .” Jack trailed off, waited, finally went on. “What if he’s actually onto something, though?”

“Oh, come on . . .”

“Look, I know how crazy this all sounds, but just do me this favor: find out everything you can about what’s going on with the Human Protection League, will you?”

Bobby clapped a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Okay. I’ll dig a little deeper.”

That meeting had been this morning. Now Bobby awaited Hoover’s arrival, planning what he’d say. In a sunny corner of the office, his big dog, Brumus, snorted in his sleep, as if he too were having troubling dreams.

Bobby’s secretary announced the FBI director’s arrival, and a few seconds later Hoover, as impeccably dressed as ever, entered. As he and Bobby shook hands, Bobby saw Hoover’s eyes crease in disapproval at his rolled-up sleeves, and he suppressed a smile.

“Thank you for coming on such short notice,” Bobby began.

“Of course.”

Bobby decided to cut to the chase. He thrust the stone Jack had given him across the desk, setting it before Hoover. “Ever seen anything like that?”

For a second, he thought he saw Hoover’s eyes widen, but the director’s flicker of astonishment was quickly clamped down by his steely composure. He picked the stone up, held it to the sunlight, tossed it once in his palm before replacing it on the desk. “Jade, maybe? Where did you get it?”

“From a friend who says he found it in a dream.”

“That doesn’t make much sense, does it?”

Bobby shook his head. “No, director, it doesn’t, but there it is. I just wondered if it might have something to do with your Human Protection League. Or what is it the press sometimes calls it now—the Lovecraft Squad?”

Hoover peered at Bobby, a withering stare that Bobby knew had been used in many interrogations over the decades. “Who did you get this from?”

“It came from someone I believe. He told me about things he saw in this dream—big things that float, have a lot of eyes and arms. Sound familiar?”

Hoover snorted. “Sounds insane.”

Bobby reached across the desk and retrieved the stone; he was satisfied to see a split-second of disappointment cross Hoover’s face. “So do you want to tell me more about your secret bureau’s work?”

“Like what?”

“Anything. Tell me about cases they’re working on right now.”

Hoover started to rise. “I’ll have my secretary send you over some recent case files—”

“Sit down, Hoover.” The forcefulness of Bobby’s tone shocked the director enough to cause him to hesitate, although he didn’t sit. “I want to hear it from you.”

Hoover considered for a moment before responding, “You know, Mr. Attorney General, I’ve got a file on you too. It’s quite thick, in fact.”

“None of us in the Kennedy family have ever claimed to be saints.”

“Hmm. And speaking of people who aren’t likely to be canonized—our surveillance of Martin Luther King finally yielded something.”

Bobby wanted to squirm. He wasn’t fond of Hoover’s obsession with the charismatic civil rights leader, but Hoover had painted a convincing portrait of King as an ambitious rabble-rouser who surrounded himself with communists. “What did we get? Is he in a red sea?”

“No, but this could be potentially more useful—we believe King may be having illicit sexual encounters with women who are not his wife.”

“How is that more useful?”

“Think about it: King’s a preacher. Can you imagine what it would do to his reputation if word got out that he was breaking one of the Ten Commandments?”

Bobby tasted something sour; for a second he wanted to spit, but instead he swallowed it down. “Director, with all due respect—if you’ve got no proof that King’s a communist, then maybe we need to just walk away from him.”

“Mr. Kennedy, your brother was quite clear on believing that the president should be leading the way on civil rights, not some Southern preacher. If you don’t want to make that happen, then I will.”

With that, Hoover turned to go. On his way out, he paused near Brumus, eyeing the huge sleeping Newfie critically. “I hope whatever I smell over here isn’t something your dog did to that rug, because that would be destruction of public property.”

Hoover walked out. Bobby let him go, but made a mental note to leave Brumus at home from now on.

III

Elwood was in his favorite booth at Tony’s, savoring the first bite of his Friday night pepperoni pizza as he eyed the cheerful Halloween decorations. Crêpe paper pumpkins and black cats arced between lighting fixtures overhead, while the walls sported cardboard cutouts of cartoonish witches and bats.

Elwood had a fleeting sniff of pleasant nostalgia (wearing a homemade skeleton costume out to beg treats from the neighbors) that was swiftly replaced by melancholy—in the HPL, Halloween was anything but playful. This year in particular, the League’s agents—including Elwood—had a sinister sense of something gearing up, something they couldn’t quite name but could feel in every atom. The festival seemed to be celebrated not just by both modern and ancient revelers, but by human and non-human as well, across the Dreamscape. Today was October 25, leaving Elwood with a sense of dread about what the next six days would bring.

A drunken woman and her male companion staggered past his table, hitting it hard enough with one hip to make him grab his bottle of Pabst before it toppled. The woman apologized and laughed as the man caught her from behind, hugging her. The man was dressed as a pirate, the woman as a nurse; the pirate made some joke about his timbers being shivered before they both stumbled away again. Elwood watched them go with a mix of irritation and envy.

At thirty-five, he was sitting in a pizzeria alone on a Friday night. No wife awaited him at home; he wasn’t on his way to meet up with a girlfriend. His living room floor wouldn’t be cluttered with toys, his sleep interrupted with cries or someone calling his name. He’d had girlfriends, sure; one—Elaine—had even lasted for a year, before she’d started to complain that his work meant more to him than she did. O’Hara would sometimes show up (late) at work with circles under his eyes because he’d been up with a baby the night before, or juggling finances to pay for a new swing set, but Elwood still wondered if he did enough good in the world as a member of the Lovecraft Squad to equal how much of his own life he’d given up.

That was when a man slid into the booth across from him. The man had on a cap pulled low over his eyes and sunglasses, even though it was after 8:00 P.M. Elwood stared for a second, the slice still held in midair, until the man asked, “Special Agent Frank Elwood?”

There was no mistaking the voice—Elwood had heard that distinctive Massachusetts accent and that youthful timbre on the radio and television plenty of times. He lowered the pizza, trying to peer past the dark glasses. “Well, technically, it’s Special Agent Frank Elwood Junior . . .”

Robert Kennedy removed the glasses and grinned. “My mistake. Of course.” He extended a hand. “Robert Kennedy.”

Elwood accepted the hand, too stunned to do otherwise. “Sure, uh . . . Mr. Attorney General. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Bobby leaned in, closer. “How are things these days in the Lovecraft Squad?”

“Don’t you know? I mean, I’d expect you to be better briefed on all the different cases than I am. I only know my own files.”

“To tell you the truth, Agent Elwood, Hoover doesn’t let me in on much about the HPL.”

Elwood leaned back against the high wooden booth behind him, glad for the protection the solid dividers offered against any prying eyes or ears. With Hoover in charge, you could never be too sure.

Bobby continued, “In point of fact, Hoover doesn’t tell me anything about the HPL. I’m not even sure what it is you fellas really do.”

Elwood pushed the pizza to the side, his hunger forgotten. “How can I help you, Mr. Kennedy?”

“I’ve read your personnel profile. I think you’re a good, solid agent, a man who believes in what he’s doing. Am I right?”

Elwood guffawed. “Well, I’m sure not in it for the money or the comfort.”

Bobby smiled, pushed the cap up slightly but didn’t remove it. “I know about you and your father, I know that you don’t always trust Hoover any more than I do, and I know that you’d like to do the right thing. Frank, I need someone to tell me what’s really going on down there, in those subterranean corridors.”

“You want me to spy on the HPL?”

Bobby shook his head, waving a hand. “No, nothing like spying. I just want to know what you’re working on. You can’t spy on yourself, can you?”

“So you really don’t know about the Human Protection League, about what we’re fighting?”

“I’m guessing it’s not communism or organized crime. That really is about as much as I know.”

Elwood took a deep breath, mulled it over, and then said, “Are you familiar with a writer named H. P. Lovecraft?”

Bobby shook his head. “Can’t say that I am. Sounds like somebody who writes ladies’ romance novels.”

Elwood snorted. “Far from it. In some literary circles, he’s regarded as a moderately interesting writer of horror fiction. But in the Human Protection League, we know that he really wrote about facts.”

“What kind of facts?”

“That before mankind appeared, the Earth belonged to a race of Elder Gods. Something happened when we came on the scene and they were pushed back to the dimensions they originally came from, but they’re always looking for ways to invade our world because they want it back. One of the main ones is called Cthulhu, and it’s said that he’s asleep somewhere in a city beneath the sea.”

Bobby stared in disbelief for a second before blurting out: “This is real?”

Elwood grinned, unbuttoned a cuff, rolled up his sleeve to reveal a series of two-inch-wide bruises, each roughly circular and maybe an inch from the next, running the length of his arm. “I got these from something that came up out of a sewer two weeks ago in a place called Dunwich; it’s probably lucky that I didn’t see the rest of whatever was attached to that appendage. We call the enemy the Armies of the Night. There are humans working with them—trying to open the gates for them to return—the most dangerous being a hermetic society called the Olde Fellowes. They’re well organized and equipped, although they don’t always need guns. They’ve even got their own versions of tanks, things called shoggoths that are the size of railroad cars. I encountered one of those for the first time last night.”

Bobby held Elwood’s arm and turned it to the light, examining it carefully before falling back against the booth as he exhaled sharply. “I’ll be damned,” he muttered.

Rolling his sleeve back down, Elwood said, “There are worse things too. And some of these things, have . . . well, sir, not to put too fine a point on it, but over the centuries they’ve inter-bred with human beings. We’ve tracked and raided whole communities of them—there’s one on the East Coast called Innsmouth—”

“Innsmouth,” Bobby interrupted. “I’ve seen that name. Didn’t we conduct a gambling raid there just a few years back?”

“Well, that was the cover. There was no gambling in Innsmouth. It was an extermination mission. And not the first one.”

Reaching into a pocket, Bobby removed a small item wrapped in a handkerchief. He opened it to reveal the green stone he’d taken from Jack. “Ever seen anything like this?”

Elwood took the stone, held it up before his eyes and nodded. “Sure, we see this all the time—they make statues and icons from it that they use in rituals. Our scientists say it’s a type of rock that doesn’t naturally occur on Earth.”

“Would Hoover know about this?”

“I can’t see how he wouldn’t, Director Brady usually keeps him briefed.”

As he re-pocketed the stone, Bobby said, “That’s what I needed to know. Thank you, Agent Elwood, you’ve been very helpful.” Bobby pulled out his wallet, extracted some bills, and placed them on the table. “Let me pay for your pizza.”

There were five one-hundred-dollar bills on the scratched surface.

Elwood considered for a beat before sliding the c-notes back to the attorney general. “That’s very kind of you, sir, but I do make enough to afford a pizza.”

Bobby re-pocketed the money. “I knew I’d chosen the right man.” He slid out of the booth, stood, held out a card that was blank except for a phone number. “Thank you, Agent Elwood. You can contact me any time at that number—it’s completely secure.”

For an instant, Elwood had an urge to deny the card, to just get up and walk out. If he took it, was he being disloyal to Brady? To Hoover? But somehow his gut instinct was to trust Kennedy more than either of them, so he accepted the card and shook the attorney general’s hand. “I will, sir.”

Bobby glanced at the restaurant’s holiday decorations, and, with a knowing half-smile, said to Elwood, “Oh, and happy Halloween.”

After Kennedy left, Elwood returned to the pizza. It was cold by now, but he ate it anyway. After all, he thought, never know which pizza might be your last. Trick or treat.

IV

It was the morning of Wednesday, October 30, when Elwood found the memo on his desk from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. His throat went dry when he read it.

Date: October 30, 1963

To: All agents, Human Protection League

From: John Edgar Hoover, FBI Director

Subject: SECURITY BREACHES

Please be reminded that all activities of the Human Protection League are considered strictly confidential. Only persons in the immediate employ of the HPL are exempt from this prohibition. Persons in the Federal Bureau of Investigation outside of the HPL, the Department of Justice, or any other arm of the United States government may not be apprised of any activities of the HPL unless prior authorization is received from Director Brady or myself. Any agent of the HPL who is discovered to be conveying any knowledge of the League’s activities to any person or agency outside of the League will be subject to the maximum penalties under the law, including but not limited to arrest and trial for treason.

The sweat on Elwood’s skin was abruptly chilled as his body temperature dropped. Did Hoover know something about his meeting with Kennedy? Was it possible that all HPL agents were followed without their knowing? Or was Tony’s bugged? Was everywhere in Washington under surveillance?

Elwood’s desk phone rang. He picked it up and heard a familiar voice on the other end—Hoover’s secretary. The FBI director wanted to see him in his office, as soon as possible.

He hung up, rose from behind his desk, and swallowed back his unease. The two things—the memo and the phone call—could be completely unrelated. And it wasn’t as if he’d promised Kennedy anything. Still, he was glad that he’d gone home after that meeting, memorized the number on the card, and burned it in his kitchen sink.

Elwood arrived a half hour later at Hoover’s office. He was admitted promptly. The director was cordial and polite, offering him a seat. Hoover’s smooth façade gave nothing away.

After Elwood was seated, Hoover picked up a few typed sheets of onion skin paper. “Agent Elwood, I’d like to ask you a few questions about this report you filed with Director Brady last week . . .”

Elwood tried to keep his face impassive as relief flooded his system. “Certainly, sir.”

“You say you saw the Witch House, and a large tower . . .”

“Yes, sir. Quite clearly.”

Hoover scanned the report again before speaking. “Was there anything at all insubstantial about either? Or did they seem completely real?”

“Quite real, sir. I was struck especially by how a sort of low-lying fog seemed to surround the structures, rather than being visible through them.”

The director nodded before asking, “So would you say that it was as if some other reality had intruded, or that you were glimpsing it through a hole in our reality?”

“Yes, that sounds like a fair description.”

“And this man you mention . . .”

“The man on top of the tower?” Elwood asked. “I’m afraid he was too far off for me to see clearly.”

“I understand that, Agent Elwood. But I want to know your opinion of what you thought he was doing. You describe a very curious and somewhat unprecedented encounter between this man and a shoggoth. Did they seem to be . . . colluding?”

Something roiled in Elwood’s gut. This was all wrong. “No, sir, I wouldn’t say that—”

Hoover cut him off. “How can you be sure, agent? You said it was a considerable distance from you.”

“It was, but I . . .” Elwood trailed off, realizing he could not in fact be sure about what he’d seen. “I suppose it’s possible, sir.”

“Agent Elwood, you’re a valuable agent with a fine future in the HPL, so I want to level with you: you’re not the first to glimpse this man apparently conversing with the Armies of the Night. Like you, no one has yet been close enough to identify the man, but I believe he should be considered an extreme risk and we need to assign a top priority to identifying him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“How’s that new agent doing—Jefferson?”

There was something in Hoover’s voice and abrupt change of subject that Elwood didn’t like—almost a verbal sneer as he said the agent’s name. Elwood suspected that Hoover had a distinct preference for Caucasian agents—he stopped just short of mentally labeling the director as a racist—and he thought he could hear just a hint of that now.

“Herbert Jefferson is in all ways an exemplary agent. He’s smart, hard-working, cautious . . . I recommend him very highly.”

“You say he’s cautious . . . in what ways?”

Did Hoover suspect Jefferson of being a security breach? Was that what this morning’s note had really been about? “I’d trust him with my life, sir. He values security protocol and practices it with great care.”

“Good.” Hoover leaned back, peering at Elwood. “Director Brady and I have got a new assignment we want you to take charge on: We’ve had reports of recent Esoteric Order of Dagon activity in the warehouse district of Arkham. We’ve tracked a number of former Innsmouth residents to that area—they fled there after our most recent raid on Innsmouth three years ago. We think they like that area because it’s old and decayed, so it reminds them of their hometown. We want you to put a team together, provision all the arms and equipment you’ll need, and head out there right away to see if they’re up to something. If they are, you have full discretionary powers to terminate all such activities. Am I clear, Agent Elwood?”

“Crystal, sir.”

“Remember that tomorrow is the 31st, and it’s more than a day for children to dress up and demand candy—to the Old Ones’ sympathizers all over the world it’s a major night for rituals, so that’s what you’ll be mostly looking for. Oh, and you might consult Agent Carter’s Dream Division before you set up your team—they’ve been giving us some interesting feedback lately from the Dreamscape. Let’s just say it corroborates everything in your report.”

Elwood stifled a wince at the mention of Randolph Carter. He didn’t like the dreamer one bit, even while he acknowledged Carter’s importance to their work. He’d only had one previous meeting with Carter, which had taken place in the HPL’s research laboratory, darkened almost to the point of invisibility; he’d only just been able to make out Carter’s long gloved hands and misshapen body. But the voice—high like a child’s, but with the scarred gruffness of a very old man—had left him instinctively wanting to flee the room. He didn’t care how much Carter had endured or what he contributed to the League—he just wanted to avoid him at all costs.

“Dream Division. Got it.”

The FBI director pinned Elwood with an intense stare that briefly gave him the sensation of being an insect stuck to the display board of a master entomologist. After a second, Hoover said, “Elwood, I’ll level with you: something big is going down. We’re not sure exactly what it is, but Carter believes the Armies of the Night have almost succeeded in opening a permanent gateway between our dimension and the Dreamscape. If that happens . . . mankind is over. And right now, the Human Protection League may be the only thing that’s keeping it from happening.”

Elwood swallowed before responding. “We’ll stop them, sir.”

“Good man. Dismissed.”

Elwood was almost out of the office when Hoover called after him. “Oh, Agent Elwood . . .”

Elwood turned back. “Sir?”

“Did you get my memo this morning?”

A jolt of nervous adrenaline shot through Elwood. “I did, sir.”

“I’ve heard rumors of certain—let’s say highly placed—members of the Justice Department snooping around lately, and I’d just as soon they not get their noses into the business of the HPL. I’ve got my hands full with this situation happening on the 31st, organized crime, and this Southern preacher, King.”

“Completely understood, sir.”

“Thank you, Agent Elwood.”

Hoover turned back to another report on his desk, indicating the meeting was at an end.

Elwood managed to keep his knees solid until he returned to his office beneath the Washington Monument.

V

He hovers above the great city, not sure how he’s arrived there or what force keeps him aloft. He is propelled forward by some sort of gust or current; he sees he still wears the same pajamas he dressed in for bed, that his feet are bare, but he feels neither cold nor heat. He realizes he’s not alone—before and beside him are conglomerations of shifting geometric shapes, shimmering from dark magenta to iridescent blue, and he’s not sure if they’re living things or mechanical devices or something unnamed that exists beyond either organic or inorganic. He senses that they are traveling with him, perhaps even leading him.

They descend now, moving down past the tallest spires (is that the same one he stood on a few nights ago?) toward a section of ornately carved structures that suggest museums, or governing seats . . . no, temples, he realizes. As they get closer, he sees the buildings are covered in friezes depicting scenes he can’t entirely comprehend. He can make out an image here and there—a giant figure lowering a single, screaming man into a gaping maw, a fish-frog thing lifting a blade over a human sacrifice—but most of it bewilders him. He recognizes the greenish, faintly glowing stone that holds the dreadful scenes, though.

He feels terror well up as he sees they are approaching the entrance to the largest of the temples. For a second, he struggles against the force that pulls him forward, but he is nearly overwhelmed by an immediate sensation of agonizing control, and so he cedes himself to it. As he and his—Guards? Porters? Fellow ghosts?—pass beneath the massive frieze (which he sees is three times taller than he is and extends indefinitely to the right and left), for an instant he glimpses crumbling stone walls filmed in slime and dampness, but then he’s swallowed by the vast dark within the great temple.

Eyes (does he truly still possess eyes?) adjust, and he sees the temple actually pulses with its own illumination, but he cannot guess the source. The floor is occupied with scurrying acolytes. Some are vaguely human, although beneath their cowls the heads are misshapen, elongated, ridged. Others are bloated nightmares, with no hint of humanity about them; he finds it difficult, in fact, to even look at some of the things rushing about the temple.

The preparation centers on a raised platform near the front of the structure—an altar. Some of the acolytes use small shrieking creatures to paint the altar in blood. Others kneel on the floor, inscribing complicated diagrams that mean nothing to him. What he does comprehend, however, is that the way is being laid for some sort of significant ritual.

Reality is shifting around him, but it’s not part of his dream—he knows, instinctively, that forces are gathering for the coming ceremony, forces that are powerful enough to rip the very fabric of the cosmos apart. He doubts that many humans would survive that event; the fact that he might be one of them gives him no comfort.

But how can he alone stop the end of the world?

It was after 2:00 A.M., the 30th having clicked over to become the 31st, before Elwood and his men found the Order’s ritual.

They’d been working their way along River Street in Arkham since they’d arrived in the town at just after 3:00 that afternoon. The day was overcast, and the mist from the Miskatonic River that ran along the other side of River Street seeped through coats, penetrating through skin right down to the bone. Elwood had managed to pull together a team of four, including O’Hara, who had promised to take his two young children trick-or-treating. His partner wasn’t happy at instead having to spend Halloween in Arkham, but he agreed that the fate of human existence outweighed two costumed tots and their treats. They were joined by Kretzmer, a solid blond man who’d been with the HPL for twelve years, and Jefferson. Kretzmer and Jefferson each carried duffel bags loaded with guns and a few hand grenades.

The team had started in the French Hill area. The warehouses were old, made of groaning timber and crumbling brick; they stank of mildew, stagnant water, and organic rot. Most were empty. They’d briefly considered illegally breaking into the buildings to search them, but peering through greasy, sooty windows showed no lights on inside, no circles of chanting cultists. Two warehouses had been legitimately occupied by workers, loading crates of fish and blocks of ice into the backs of delivery trucks. Elwood examined the faces of the workers, but saw none of the aquatic taint of Innsmouth in their features. The workers in one warehouse grew nervous when Elwood and his men entered, but their anxiety centered on some large wooden crates behind them stamped in Spanish; Elwood guessed the crates contained illegal Cuban cigars. Normally he would have taken great pleasure in busting a smuggling operation, but not tonight.

Just after 10:00 P.M. they’d stepped into a dockside tavern called The Witch’s Brew, anxious to ward off the late autumn chill with food and drink. They’d just ordered burgers and beers when a man entered the tavern, glanced around warily, and then approached their table. He was a small man with a long nose and teeth that jutted in every direction, giving him the appearance of a particularly mangy wharf rat. “You the fellows what been roustin’ the docks today?”

Elwood glanced at his men before turning to the new arrival. “I wouldn’t say we’ve been ‘rousting.’ More like just . . . interested.”

The man’s eyes shot right, then left, then skittered over Elwood. “I might be able to help you with that interest, but you gotta make it worth my while.”

Elwood smiled and leaned back in his chair. “What we’re really hoping to find is the best Halloween party in Arkham. Something with real power. Something that can only happen tonight.”

The rat-man nodded frantically. “Yep, I pegged you fellas right.” His eyes fell on Jefferson and lingered too long there. Jefferson held his gaze, not blinking, until the ugly little man looked away. “The Lovecraft Squad, aren’tcha?”

“Maybe,” Elwood said, with a nonchalant half-smile. “Can you get us into that party?” Elwood reached into a pocket, withdrew his wallet, and slid a hundred-dollar bill toward the man.

The man eyed it critically. “Sure, but the way I see it, there’s four of you.”

Sighing, Elwood withdrew three more bills and added them to the first. The informant snatched up the money, then shot a glance at Jefferson. “And one of you’s gonna be harder to handle.”

Jefferson remained impassive. Elwood made a show of standing to return his wallet to a pocket before stepping close to the informant and speaking in low, urgent tones. “I’m the one who is about to be harder to handle. Are you going to take us to this party now, or do I need to take that money back?”

The informant held up his hands. “Okay, sheesh. Let’s go.”

Kretzmer and Jefferson rose, but O’Hara shouted in indignation, “Oh, fer Chrissakes, Frank, don’t we even get to eat our burgers? I’m starvin’.”

Elwood clapped a hand on O’Hara’s shoulder. “Sorry, Gerry. There’ll be burgers and Halloween candy when we’re done.”

O’Hara frowned, but followed them outside.

The fog had built up, so the four HPL agents had to hustle to keep track of their informant. The streets were empty aside from them, sounds and lights muffled by the thick, yellow vapor. Elwood called to their informant, “What’s your name?”

“What difference does that make?”

“I thought it might be useful if I require your services again in the future.”

The rat-man looked back, briefly baring his oversized teeth. “No chance of that—I’m leaving Arkham as soon as I show you what you’re looking for.”

“How do we know we can trust you?”

“Because I want you cats to stop what’s going on. This is bad, as in—very bad. Since these creeps from Innsmouth arrived, there’s been a lot of weird shit in the air, but news goin’ around is that this thing they’re working on tonight is the weirdest and the worst. I want you boys to stop it, but I also don’t want to be here if you can’t.”

O’Hara muttered under his breath, “Great.”

After a block, they crossed the street; below the sidewalk, the Miskatonic River gurgled as it pushed up against the ancient algae-lined stone walls. “Why are we crossing the street? There are no warehouses over here,” Elwood asked.

The rat-man led them down a short flight of stairs to a precarious, tilting wooden dock. “We’re not going to a warehouse.” He avoided stepping onto the dock, though, and jumped to a small dirt bank below it. He looked up and said, “If you boys have got any kind of lights, now’s the time to fire ’em up.”

Kretzmer and Jefferson set down the duffel bags, unzipped them, and removed four strong flashlights, which they distributed and turned on. The four jumped down beside the rat-man, who indicated a man-sized circular opening in the stone wall. “In there.”

Elwood knew none of the four were happy about venturing into the dank, tight sewer tunnel, where an ambush would be all too easy. “How far is it?”

The rat-man shrugged. “Not far—in fact you should hear ’em before you see ’em. Good luck, boys—you’ll need it.” With that he deftly leapt back up onto the stairs and had disappeared into the swirling fog before they could haul him back.

Elwood and O’Hara shone their lights into the tunnel, seeing only several inches of brackish water with more slowly dripping from overhead. Turning back to his men, Elwood said, “What do you say—keep on this path, or go back up and continue searching the warehouses?”

Kretzmer spoke first. “I say we follow this lead. We know these cultists like being underground.”

O’Hara added, “And I believed our rat-faced little friend was really scared, so I vote this way too.”

Elwood looked to Jefferson. “How about you, Herbert?”

“If this doesn’t pay off, there’s still time to check the warehouses, right?” Before Elwood could stop him, Jefferson plunged into the tunnel. The other three followed.

They’d gone a few hundred yards, avoiding squeaking rats and tumbled-in side tunnels, when Kretzmer stopped them. “Hold on a second—listen.”

They did . . . and heard a faint rhythmic sound. “Is that drumming?” O’Hara asked.

Jefferson hurried on again. “This way.”

Within a minute of pressing forward, the sound had become unmistakable: Drums, whistling atonal flutes, chanting voices. Elwood reached forward and grabbed the rookie’s shoulder, holding him from going on. “Wait up,” he whispered, and then turned to address O’Hara and Kretzmer as well. “I think we’re close. We need to proceed from here with extreme caution. Jefferson, let me take lead.”

Jefferson nodded, albeit reluctantly. Elwood held a finger to his lips, indicating quiet, then led the way forward. They came to a place where multiple tunnels intersected; after pausing to listen, Elwood chose one to their right. It was more narrow than the line they’d been in, causing them to stoop and crab-walk as they made their way along. The sounds grew louder, echoing off the sides of the slime-coated walls. Finally light entered the tunnel from ahead, and Elwood paused his team long enough to be sure they all turned off their flashlights.

They inched forward again, following the tunnel as it curved to the right—and then Elwood held out an arm, stopping them. The tunnel mouth was no more than ten feet ahead. It opened onto a large underground space that seemed to have been a natural cavern; the walls, which were lost overhead in darkness, were rough, untouched limestone, as was the floor. The light was provided by flaming torches, most held by robed figures.

Elwood flattened himself out as much as possible and crawled forward through the foul-smelling sludge in the tunnel. His view broadened as he neared the oval tunnel mouth; at last he was able to see fully what was happening.

There were perhaps thirty of the robed figures present, arranged in a semicircle around a large stone altar. The platform was carved with strange hieroglyphics, some of which Elwood recognized; the sculpted scenes, however, were immediately obvious, showing human victims being consumed, torn apart, or violated by monstrous organisms that didn’t belong in this world. Looking up, Elwood saw more of the scenes roughly sculpted into the cavern walls.

The crowd of acolytes was swaying slightly to the drum-driven consonance, and Elwood glimpsed something happening at the altar stone: a priest was poised above it, holding a knife in one hand and a leather-bound volume in the other. The priest had protuberant eyes and huge, moist-looking lips, marking him immediately as an Innsmouth emigrant. Elwood couldn’t make out the particulars of the book from this distance, but he guessed it might be a copy of the Mad Arabs’s Necronomicon, the chief grimoire of the Armies of the Night.

There was a child on the altar. Human, unconscious, bare feet, its small body dressed in ceremonial robes, hands and head painted in blood with more of the magic symbols.

The ritual was plainly reaching a climax. An unseen presence filled the space, and beyond. It couldn’t yet be seen, but Elwood knew all those present felt it—it scratched at their consciousness like a nocturnal predator seeking a way into its prey’s burrow. Elwood had faced cultists, creatures that were mostly vapor, men descended from fish, gigantic shoggoths . . . but what waited for this sacrifice was older, bigger, and far greater than any of those.

Elwood had only seconds. He turned to his crew, ready to issue orders—but when he saw them, he froze. Their faces, anxious yet dedicated . . . they would likely all die here tonight.

Die . . . or worse.

“Frank?” That was O’Hara, whose kids were at home, safe for now, in bed. In the years to come, they might hate the name Frank Elwood for what would happen here tonight.

Elwood gestured at Kretzmer’s duffel bag. “Slide that over here.” He briefly considered a grenade, but feared it would bring the whole place down on top of them . . . and if that victim on the altar died by his hands, would it help the monstrous thing that was trying to come through? Instead, he pulled out a Browning automatic rifle. With its twenty-round magazine, he thought he might be able to take out most of the acolytes before they rushed him. If they were confused, he might have time to pop in a fresh magazine . . . or they might reach him as he struggled with it.

The priest raised his blade.

There was no time left to think. Elwood slammed the magazine home, unfolded the bipod below the barrel, and took aim.

He was squeezing the trigger when everything changed. A cry went up from the acolytes, some of whom started forward. The priest fell back, dropping the knife. The pressure of the waiting deity changed, from anxious anticipation to confusion.

All because of the man who now stood beside the altar.

Because he was surrounded by a pulsing shimmer, Elwood flinched away at first, unable to clearly see. Then his eyes adjusted, he looked again . . .

His heart skipped a beat when he saw the broad, handsome face, the thick brown hair, concerned gaze . . .

“Frank?” That was O’Hara again, whispering behind him. “What’s happening?”

Elwood lifted himself away from the gun. “A man just appeared, but—it’s not possible . . .”

“What’s not possible?”

“The man . . . it’s Kennedy.”

Kretzmer overheard and asked, “The A.G.?”

“No—the president. John F. Kennedy.”

The other men pressed up close behind Elwood to see, and he moved aside to let them. He wanted confirmation that he hadn’t gone mad.

“Holy Christ,” whispered O’Hara.

“The president,” he heard Jefferson blurt out, too loudly. Elwood held up a warning hand as he scanned the members of the Esoteric Order of Dagon for any sign of alarm, but they were focused on the lone figure standing before them.

Elwood saw now that the president was incongruously dressed in pajamas, but he stood confidently before the assemblage. The very air in the cavern changed; the nearly palpable charge of dread was calmed, gentled to nothing. The acolytes stood in perplexity, the priest backed away. Kennedy strode through their midst to the altar, picked up the sleeping (or drugged) child, turned, and walked away. He stopped one last time, gave the cultists a stern but benevolent look.

Elwood waited, his finger ready on the Browning’s trigger in case the president was rushed . . . but no attack came. After a few seconds, Kennedy, holding the small child, walked off into the gloom of the cavern’s far end and was lost to view.

The cultists pushed back their cowls, dazed. The less human ones—those with protuberant eyes and fishlike mouths—slumped to the ground as if their puppet strings had been severed. The knife fell from the limp fingers of the priest, hitting the stone with a dull clang.

Elwood turned to his men and motioned them back down the tunnel. “Let’s get out of here.”

It was the rookie who asked, “You mean we’re not going to—?”

O’Hara cut him off. “Get your ass in gear, kid.”

They were silent until they reached the sewer exit and once again stood on the bank of the Miskatonic, where the fog had lifted, revealing galaxies of stars and a welcome half-moon. “What the hell just happened, Frank?” asked O’Hara.

Looking at his friend, Elwood shook his head. “I don’t know, but . . . somehow Kennedy stopped them.”

Kretzmer said, “How could the president be here? How is that even possible?”

“I’ve got no idea. But—he was.”

As they made their way back through the silent streets of Arkham to their car, only Jefferson, the new agent, spoke. “Are all the missions like this?”

VI

Bobby sat on one of the couches in the Oval Office, listening as his brother spoke while pacing the room. Apparently Jack didn’t care if Hoover heard this conversation.

“I can’t explain it, but I was there, Bobby. Completely there, in the midst of this . . . this ritual. Something big—something just impossibly huge, like—like a god—was waiting. I knew it wanted to come into our world, and it would have, if they’d finished what they were doing, but . . . well, I think it stopped because of me. I don’t know how I did it, but they didn’t touch me.”

Bobby weighed his words carefully before speaking. “It was Halloween last night, Jack, it’s easy to get worked up on that night and have some pretty intense dreams—”

His brother cut him off, turning to glare. “This was not a dream. This happened.”

Bobby held out a placating hand. “Okay, okay . . .”

Sitting beside his brother, Jack leaned forward. “Let’s say this was not a dream, okay? We know it’s been happening since we came to Washington.”

“I’ve been reading through some of the files of the Human Protection League, and it turns out that a lot of Washington was built along occult lines . . .”

“You’re kidding me.”

“I’m not.” Bobby gave his brother a half-smile and continued. “Freemasons had a big hand in the city’s layout, and incorporated all kinds of symbols in the design, including a lot pertaining to the zodiac.”

Jack eyed his brother before laughing. “You’re one of the most rational people I know. Do you believe it?”

“Well, the Lovecraft Squad certainly does. They take all of this stuff very seriously, even brought in special experts who consulted on the best location to put their offices. So it’s possible, I suppose, that this is something you’ve always had, but it took this place to . . . well, activate it.”

Jack nodded, and then stopped abruptly. “Wait, the little boy . . .”

“Boy?”

“You can verify this whole thing, Bobby. The boy I took out of there, the one they were going to sacrifice—I dropped him off outside a police station here in Washington, the one on Indiana next to the Criminal Justice building. At least I think I did. Check with them and ask if they found a child on their doorstep in the middle of the night.”

Bobby pulled a pad and pen out of his pocket, jotted the note. “Will do.” Bobby put the pad away, started to say something, rose, paced, and finally turned to his brother. “Jack . . . these things the Lovecraft Squad fights—monsters, even gods from other dimensions—the only thing that’s ever stopped these things in the past has been an extraordinary amount of fire-power, and even that’s usually just a temporary deterrent. If you can stop them somehow without guns or explosives . . .”

“. . . Then we can do to them what we did to Khrushchev in Cuba last year.” Jack grinned.

Bobby somehow couldn’t work up the same enthusiasm.

Hoover pumped Elwood’s hand. “Good work on putting down that ritual last night, Elwood. I knew I could count on you.” Hoover released the hand, settled into his desk chair, and waved the agent into the seat opposite.

“Thank you, sir,” Elwood said, as he lowered himself onto the cool leather, “but we didn’t actually do anything.”

Hoover frowned. “Then who did?”

“This man stopped the ritual—the man I told you about before, who I saw on the tower. He was there again.”

“Did you see him properly this time?”

“Clearly, sir.” Elwood took a deep breath and said, “It was John F. Kennedy.”

Hoover stared for a second in silent disbelief. “John F. Kennedy . . . as in, President Kennedy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And how do you explain that?”

Elwood shrugged. “I can’t. But I saw him clearly, and it was President Kennedy.”

Hoover steepled his fingers and peered over them at Elwood. “Tell me exactly what he did.”

“We came upon this Esoteric Order of Dagon ritual in a cavern beneath Arkham. There were maybe thirty participants, including a priest. As we arrived, the priest was about to sacrifice a child—six or seven, I couldn’t be sure of the gender. Suddenly Kennedy came walking forward out of the darkness, and everything just kind of froze. He picked the child up, turned around, and walked back into the darkness.”

“And you have no idea where he went with the child?”

Elwood reluctantly shook his head. “No, sir. I couldn’t see him on the far side of the cavern.”

“So you also don’t know why he stopped the ritual.”

Blinking in surprise, Elwood said, “To save the child.”

“Or to deliver it personally to whatever was waiting for the sacrifice.”

“What?” Elwood wanted to tug at his collar, get some air, cool off, stop the world from spinning. “No, sir, I’m sure that wasn’t—”

Hoover cut him off. “Why are you sure? You can’t tell me what happened to that child.”

“But . . . I . . .” Elwood broke off as he realized Hoover was right about that much, at least—he didn’t know where Kennedy had gone, or what had happened to the child. Was there a chance Hoover was right? But no, he’d felt a distinct change in the atmosphere after Kennedy had left . . . but would Hoover believe that? Would he want to believe that? He needed more proof. Maybe someone else who had seen Kennedy, although O’Hara, Jefferson, and Kretzmer had seen no more than he had.

Randolph Carter. As loathe as he was to think it, he had to talk to the leader of the Dream Division. If Carter still had a foot in the Dreamscape, he might have seen something too.

“Thank you, Agent Elwood.” Hoover was standing up, extending a hand, indicating the interview was over. “I’ll look forward to reading your full report later this afternoon.”

“You’ll have it, sir.” Elwood shook the FBI director’s hand.

He felt Hoover’s eyes searing his back as he left the office.

VII

Carter inhabited a small room that adjoined the HPL’s main lab; not only did he require almost constant medical attention, he was also monitored by the League’s scientists to make sure he never returned from the Dreamscape in the company of anything else.

Audiences with Carter had to be requested personally with Director Brady a day in advance, and were often rejected; Carter’s mood had as much to do with it as his health. Elwood was almost hoping his latest request for a meeting wouldn’t be accepted, but it was. He proceeded to Carter’s room at the arranged time, where the dreamer’s ever-faithful assistant, Dorothy Williams, led Elwood in.

Carter was seated today—during their only prior encounter, he’d been bedridden—and was probably as close to cheerful as he ever got. His boy’s body had wizened with age, and he still wore the hefty canvas mittens and bronze metal eye-patch that hid the parts of himself that were no longer human. He eyed Elwood with genuine interest as he entered, before saying: “Thank you, Dorothy. That will be all.”

The middle-aged woman quietly closed the door behind her as she left the office, but not before giving Elwood a mistrustful stare.

“Ah, Special Agent Elwood, nice to see you again.”

“Call me Frank.”

“Thank you, Frank. Please don’t concern yourself about Dorothy. She’s fiercely protective of me and my work.” Carter leaned slightly forward in his chair, although the movement seemed to cause him some discomfort. “Am I correct in assuming that you’re here to talk about the president’s role in the Dreamscape?”

For an instant, Elwood could only gape. When he found his voice again, he asked, “You’ve seen him too, I take it?”

“Oh yes. Our Jack is nearly as gifted at night-traveling as I am.”

Now it was Elwood’s turn to lean forward. “Okay, that’s part of what I don’t understand: if he’s in the Dreamscape, why do I keep seeing him? I mean, I don’t see you.”

“I travel much farther than Jack. There are worlds beyond worlds, dimensions you cannot begin to imagine. With all of that available to you, why remain tethered to this realm?”

“Because,” Elwood said, measuring his words, “you care about what happens here.”

Carter nodded his scarred head. “He does. I don’t.”

“Then why are you here?”

Carter’s features suddenly darkened, and for a second so did the entire room. Elwood, who had experienced far more dangerous and mysterious events, shivered as the temperature dropped and something like a cloud of dread filled the chamber.

It vanished as quickly as it had materialized, leaving Elwood stunned and Carter completely unmoved, as if he’d not even noticed. “I am here, Agent Elwood, because I am afraid. In the Dreamscape, things are . . . stirring. When I am within that sphere, it is increasingly difficult for me to move safely. And when I return, my pursuers frequently try to follow me back.”

“Was that one just now, trying to break through?”

Carter smiled, bitterly, before saying, “They can sense when I am agitated.”

Elwood was abruptly anxious to leave the room, so he moved onto his real reason for coming. “Mr. Carter, what’s happening when Kennedy confronts the Armies of the Night? Why do they seem to back off?”

“Surely you’ve experienced the president’s immense charisma, have you not?” Elwood nodded, and Carter continued. “That’s how his psychic gifts manifest in our world. But with the Great Old Ones, Kennedy seems to have an unprecedented ability to control them. Or not control, but . . . pacify.”

“Is that possible?” Elwood had experienced the dark gods personally, had felt terror so extreme he could only wait, gripped in its frozen fist, immobilized, until it passed. The idea that something so powerful could be rendered placid was almost unimaginable.

“You’ve seen it, haven’t you?”

“Yes, but . . . Hoover thinks Kennedy is colluding with the enemy.”

Carter snorted. “The great tragedy of Hoover is that he sees enemies in the wrong places. And unfortunately, Director Brady reports directly to him.”

“Does Brady concur with Hoover’s viewpoint?”

Carter thought carefully for a moment, as a strange clacking noise came from beneath those concealing mittens. “Let’s just say . . . Director Brady has his own secrets.”

At that moment, Dorothy Williams entered the room and pointedly held the door open behind her. The audience was obviously over. Elwood stood to go, thanking Carter. He started to hold out a hand, then remembered the mittens and instead thrust his hands into his pants’ pockets. He was halfway out the door, already relieved, when Carter called after him in that strange piping voice, “I’m sorry I can’t help, Agent Elwood.”

“You already did, Mr. Carter.”

VIII

Date: November 10, 1963

To: All agents, Human Protection League

From: John Edgar Hoover, FBI Director

Subject: HUMAN INTERACTION WITH THE ENEMY

I have recently received a number of reports of sightings of an individual who is VERY highly placed in the United States government in the company of key players in the Armies of the Night. If you should encounter this individual in any surveillance of enemy forces, DO NOT ENGAGE. Until we can correctly ascertain the full scope of this individual’s involvement, he must be considered extremely dangerous. Please mark any reports of such encounters as HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL and for my eyes only.

As an additional note, be aware that November 11 should be considered a significant date for Old Ones activities. When the Gregorian calendar took over from the Julian calendar, Halloween (or Samhain) shifted eleven days, and some cultists still celebrate the day according to the old Julian calendar. I urge you to exercise extreme caution and be on your most vigilant on this day.

Elwood slid the memo across the battered wooden pizzeria tabletop to Bobby Kennedy, glancing around nervously. He’d carried the memo out of HPL headquarters at great personal risk, the same risk he’d taken calling the attorney general’s private number to arrange this meeting.

Bobby read the memo and looked up at Elwood. “Thank you for alerting me to this, Frank. I know Hoover would throw a fit if he knew I’d seen it.”

“He would, sir.”

Waving the mimeographed memo, Bobby said, “Let me ask you something, since you seem to have Hoover’s ear on this stuff: do you have any thoughts about how he plans to deal with this?”

“That’s why I wanted to see you right away. The director is completely convinced that your brother is seeking an alliance with the Great Old Ones in order to entrench his own power. I think it’s possible that . . .” Elwood broke off, unable to complete the sentence. What he was about to suggest was treasonous, terrible, unthinkable, yet he believed Hoover was quite capable of it. He gulped and continued. “. . . he intends to harm to the president of the United States.”

Looking away, Bobby said, “How would he do that?”

“I can’t say for sure. But he’d set it up so that blame would never return to him. He bears no love for the CIA, so he might try to find a CIA agent or informant he could use as his patsy. Somebody like that could be placed at a location where the president will be, but the real killer would be hidden somewhere else.”

Bobby chewed a lip, thinking. “We’d be looking at a public place, then, probably something out in the open.”

“I’d guess so, sir.”

“Do you think Director Brady is involved in any of this?” Bobby asked bluntly.

Elwood thought for a moment. “I’m not positive, but I don’t think so.”

Bobby began folding the memo. “You don’t mind if I keep this, Agent Elwood?”

“It’s all yours.”

Shoving the folded note into a pocket, Bobby rose and offered a hand to Elwood. “Thank you again, Agent Elwood. The nation is grateful, and so am I.”

Elwood accepted the hand. “Thank you, sir. Just promise me you’ll keep the president safe—he may well be the most important man in human history.”

The note Bobby slid across the president’s desk had four words on it: Don’t go to Texas.

Jack looked at the note, raised his eyes to his brother’s serious expression, and said into the phone, “I’m sorry, but I need to call you back.” He hung up and said, softly, “What’s this about?”

Bobby tilted his head toward the Rose Garden. Jack took the hint, rising from behind the desk to follow his sibling outside. When they were away from the White House, Bobby said, “There’s a lot of stuff happening down there in the Lovecraft Squad. A lot of stuff that has to do with you. The agents there think you’re some kind of superman.” Bobby finished with a nervous laugh.

“I don’t know about a superman, but . . .” Jack stopped walking and turned to Bobby, excited. “You know, those HPL boys have been fighting this war for a long time now, just barely holding even . . . but I think I can end the war. I can’t explain how I know that or even how I can do it, but . . . all I know is that in the dreams, I can stop the fighting, and I think maybe that’s enough.”

“So do a lot of the agents.”

Jack thought for a few seconds before asking, “So what does this have to do with the trip down to Texas to raise more funds?”

Bobby knew what he was about to suggest was crazy at least, seditious at best. He squared his shoulders, took a deep breath, and said, “Because some of those agents think Hoover’s got it in for you.”

“Hoover? But I’m winning his war for him!”

“Unfortunately, he doesn’t see it that way. Don’t forget, this is the same man who’s seen communists lurking in every corner for the last twenty years. He thinks you’re working with the enemy. I’m hearing that he might be waiting for an opportunity out in the open, so he can have something set up that won’t connect back to him . . .”

Bobby trailed off, unable to go on. His brother eyed him closely for a few seconds and then said, “Bobby, are you actually trying to suggest that the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation might engineer the assassination of a president of the United States?”

“I don’t know. It sounds crazy, but—”

His brother cut him off, with a vehemence that surprised Bobby. “It doesn’t just sound crazy, Bobby—it sounds impossible! Am I supposed to never leave Washington—hell, never even leave the Oval Office—again because you think Hoover might try something?” Jack caught himself then and lowered his voice. “Look, I appreciate your concern, but I just can’t cancel this trip. Lyndon’s counting on me, and you know we could use Texas for next year’s re-election bid . . .”

Bobby nodded. “I know. Just promise me one thing: I don’t care what Hoover’s got on either one of us, we need to retire that son-of-a-bitch after you get re-elected. He’s older than the Moon and he really doesn’t like us.”

Jack laughed and clapped his brother on the shoulder. “That’s a promise.”

IX

He feels something different in the Dreamscape tonight. Something powerful, something that rumbles through dimensions like a mallet on steel. He doesn’t understand why this day—November 11—should somehow be special, but it is.

In the city of spires, the mad hordes shimmy and gyrate in the streets. In the heavens, orbs and spheres twirl, as if outlining figures he can’t read. Through it all, that sense of some impending arrival reverberates.

This night may determine the future of more worlds than just his own.

The November 11 stakeouts were a bust.

Regardless of the date, nothing happened anywhere. The League had agents stationed in Arkham, Innsmouth, Red Hook, Dunwich, and Providence. Elwood, following a hunch, had stayed in Washington, D.C., positioning himself at L Street NW and 16th Street NW, a location that some believed was at the center of a pentagram that formed the city’s dark heart. Elwood walked, sat in his car, checked in with his team, but no one had anything to report, not even so much as an errant drunk. At just after 1:00 A.M., Elwood had called it off and sent his men home. A few minutes later, he was in his own car, driving toward the White House as he headed for his apartment.

The city was quiet, and seemed somehow darker than usual. It was early on a Tuesday morning, long before the morning crush of commuters.

Elwood had almost passed the White House when he glimpsed motion—from overhead. He risked a look up, craning his neck to peer through the windshield.

Lightning crackled, the jagged forks illuminating a titanic shape in the fuliginous sky.

Slamming on the brakes, Elwood brought the car to a squealing halt and leapt out from behind the wheel, looking up. A form was taking shape over Washington, limned by lighting and defined by the blackness of the sky between the stars—a gigantic form with a face surrounded by tentacles, nascent wings on the bent back, talon claws on fingers and toes. The Washington Monument barely came to its knees as the thing squatted slightly.

Elwood had never seen the dread Cthulhu in person, but he knew this was what he gazed upon now, a Great Old One taking shape in the night sky above America’s capital. He stared, and as he stared—and as the shape gained more corporeality—he felt parts of his mind tugging at their moorings, like a ship that begs to be lost at sea. They’d been stupid to think they could fight this thing, this impossible eldritch thing that would destroy them, scatter like ants that which it did not consume, ending everything, everything, everything, everything . . .

Elwood tore his gaze away from the thing towering above him, shutting his eyes tightly. The after-image beat on his retinas with those giant clawed fists; he felt himself staggering, then doubled over, vomiting into the city street as he fell to his knees. The world spun, and Frank Elwood Jr. spun with it, scrabbling at any hold, for anything that would save him . . .

Kennedy. The president. He had to warn him.

Duty brought sanity, and Elwood rose to his knees, still shaky but keeping his eyes down, away from the roiling sky. The car . . . he had to return to the car . . .

He stumbled down the street, trying to focus on his feet, on the asphalt, on anything but the vast horror blotting out the sky, and so he didn’t immediately notice the man moving toward him. He stopped when he saw him: a robed figure, holding something in his arms. No, not robed like the cultists, but in shimmering white . . .

It was John F. Kennedy. And he was walking toward Elwood.

Elwood stared, at first wondering if his sanity had fled, but then he realized he felt calm, restored. Kennedy smiled as he neared; he wore a white bathrobe over pajamas, his feet bare. When he stopped walking, just a few feet away, the robe floated and waved as if stirred by an invisible breeze, but the night air was still.

“Hello,” Kennedy said, carefully cradling something Elwood couldn’t see yet, “do I know you?”

“Yes . . . ,” Elwood started to say, but his voice was hoarse. He swallowed, and tried again. “Yes, sir. Agent Frank Elwood Jr. of the Human Protection League.” Elwood glanced up into the sky above and now saw nothing but stars, stars in the correct patterns and places.

“I’m very glad to find you here, Agent Elwood. Perhaps you can help me with something.” Kennedy held out his burden, and Elwood realized it was an infant, so small, no more than a few weeks old. “I took this little one from a ritual tonight, and I’d appreciate it if you can deliver it to the proper authorities.”

Elwood stepped forward and took the child. It slept peacefully, a tiny human with skin the rich color of black coffee and a full head of curling ebony hair. Elwood was struck with wonder at its serenity, its very humanness. “You can count on me, Mr. President.”

“Good man.” Kennedy nodded at him and then turned to go.

“Mr. President,” Elwood called after him.

Kennedy turned back. “Yes, Agent Elwood?”

“How did you do it, sir? How did you turn that—that thing back?”

Kennedy looked at Elwood for several seconds, considering his answer. “I’m not entirely sure myself. Good night, Agent Elwood.”

“Good night, sir.”

Kennedy strode away until he was lost in darkness. Elwood was startled when his young charge stretched, yawned, gurgled, opened its eyes. It looked up at him, and Elwood saw curiosity and trust there. He was startled by a surge that rose up from deep within him, a rush of care and affection.

“Let’s see if we can find your folks,” he said to the small, wondrous face that somehow reignited hope in him.

Twelve days later that hope died as Elwood stared numbly at the front-page of The Washington Post: PRESIDENT KENNEDY SHOT DEAD; LYNDON B. JOHNSON IS SWORN IN announced the headline.

Camelot had fallen.

X

Date: November 23, 1963

To: All agents

From: John Edgar Hoover, FBI Director

Subject: SHOOTING IN TEXAS

I called the Attorney General at his home this morning and told him I thought we had the man who killed the President down in Dallas at the present time. I stated the man’s name is Lee Harvey Oswald, that he was working in the building from which the shots were fired that hit the President and the Governor; that apparently he left the building and a block or two away ran into two police officers and, thinking they were going to arrest him, shot at them and killed one of them with a side arm; that the rifle had been left in the building.

I told the Attorney General that we have had a case on Oswald as he has been involved in the Fair Play for Cuba Committee. I stated the Dallas police have him down at headquarters and I have our Agents there.

The Attorney General asked if Oswald is a Communist. I said that he is not a Communist but has Communist leanings. I related that Oswald went to Russia and stayed three years; came back to the United States in June 1962, and went to Cuba on several occasions but would not tell us what he went to Cuba for. I stated he is a very mean-minded individual; that it is entirely possible he may have some Communist sympathies but, so far as we know, is not a member of the Communist Party.

I told the Attorney General that, since the Secret Service is tied up, I thought we should move into the case.

On Monday morning, November 25, Elwood took a seat in Hoover’s office. The director barely looked up from a stack of paperwork on his desk. “What can I do for you, Agent Elwood? I’m extremely busy at the moment.”

Elwood put a new sheet atop Hoover’s stack. “Sorry to add to your workload, sir, but as you can see, I’m tendering my resignation from the Human Protection League.”

Frowning, Hoover scanned the typed letter before looking up at Elwood. “I’m very sorry to hear this. May I inquire as to the reason?”

“I no longer believe the HPL can stand against the forces of the Armies of the Night.”

Leaning back in his chair, Hoover asked, “Did you believe that at some point?”

“Yes, sir . . . up until last Friday afternoon.”

“Agent Elwood,” Hoover said, apparently weighing his words carefully, “what if I told you that I had irrefutable proof that our late president had been collaborating with the enemy?”

Elwood’s heart skipped a beat. “What kind of proof, sir?”

With just the barest hint of a smile, Hoover answered, “I’d only be able to share that with you if you agreed to stay on.”

Elwood thought it through: he knew virtually every single agent in the Lovecraft Squad, and he knew they all shared his opinion of Kennedy. Even Randolph Carter had viewed the president’s night work in a favorable light. However, the agents had whispered about how Hoover was secretly pleased with the transition—Johnson, the new president, held Hoover in much higher regard than Kennedy ever had. Whether Hoover was lying about his proof, or—much more likely—had simply chosen to apply his own interpretation to the facts, everything seemed to have worked out just how he wanted it to.

“Share them with Agent Jefferson, sir. He’s a good man and deserves promotion.”

“Not as good as you, though.”

Elwood remembered that Bobby Kennedy had been the one who had gotten Jefferson hired, not the FBI’s director. Without another word, Elwood rose to go.

Hoover let him make it all the way to the office door before he said, “Mr. Elwood . . .”

Elwood felt the use of “Mr.” as the pointed barb that Hoover had certainly intended, but he nonetheless stopped and turned back, waiting.

The Director continued, “You are aware, of course, that you possess extraordinary knowledge that is strictly confidential. Agents rarely resign from the Human Protection League, so we haven’t had to institute certain processes regarding classified information, but be aware that we will be reviewing this situation very carefully.”

There it was. Elwood knew then that he would be watched for the rest of his life—if he was allowed to live, that is. A man who may have been involved with the assassination of a president of the United States would surely have no qualms about eliminating a minor agent. And if he wasn’t eliminated, he would exist knowing that his every move was under surveillance, his phone tapped, his loved ones followed, his life constantly monitored.

It was worth it. He had plans: the FBI had had no success locating the parents of the infant Kennedy had handed him, and he planned to apply to adopt the child. Once that was approved (and he had friends who could assure that it would be), he would take his new son—whom he would name John—and move to the other side of the country, away from Washington and villages of inbred fish people and eldritch evil. He’d find a new home, where he could work in private security and support the two of them, and he would never say a single word about what he’d seen in the Lovecraft Squad, not even to John.

He would tell John that he’d adopted him because he wanted love and family in his life, and it would be the truth. And if the League was no longer successful in holding back the things that wanted to break through into this world, the things that could be held back by one man who was gone now, then he would be there to protect John to his dying breath.

He made no reply to Hoover as he left the office for good.