I spent most of the rest of the evening poring over The Unimaginable Horror text in my room to see if it contained some hidden insights or secrets regarding the titular Great Old One.
It also allowed me to avoid having to explain to Jessica and Mercury that “I may be an aeon-old alien who might destroy the Earth.” I’d managed to convince them both I wasn’t a monster needing to be killed and wasn’t anxious to reopen the debate.
The rest of the group hunkered down in their hotel rooms, fortifying them against possible attack, Bobbie was the only one who chose to interact with the town. The rest of the team spent their time playing cards and discussing what they were going to do when they laid their hands on Whateley.
It was almost midnight when I finished taking my notes on the book’s contents and Mercury came up for bed. My lover smelled of cigar smoke and more than a few beers. Her pockets were also noticeably lighter. While Mercury brushed her teeth with the bowl and pitcher provided for us, she didn’t change for bed. My lover had learned from our night in the tunnel to keep her clothes on during sleep and have a pair of loaded shotguns underneath the bed. Mercury was being paranoid, but justifiably so given that we knew someone was trying to kill us. People powerful enough to send an army of the dead after us.
Mercury cast a glance at me when she slid into the bed, moving her hand to the lantern I had by the bedside. “Do you mind if I turn this out?”
I closed the copy of The Unimaginable Horror in front of me. “No, I’m done. My studies have proven both insightful and useless.”
“How’s that?” Mercury said, turning the lamp until we were plunged into darkness except for the moonlight through the window.
“The Unimaginable Horror was written by a United States Army captain who fought in World War One. During his time in France, he encountered horrific living dead created by a scientist operating on the wounded,” I said, thinking about how all of this seemed familiar. “After being dishonorably discharged following a period of amnesia and violence, he spent the rest of his life trying to accumulate information on the supernatural. This book is the collection of his findings centered on the creature he believed to be at the root of all evil.”
I could still remember one particularly harrowing description:
The Swami Chandraputra, who I had at first taken for a charlatan due to his ridiculous pseudonym, led me on a dream-quest of breathtaking as well as terrifying unreality. We took ourselves to the darkest of dimensions existing in the shadow of the Earth where not even the psychic will of the Great Old Ones could penetrate.
There, I bore witness to the Tower of Zhaal, a massive construction which rose an infinite number of miles into the airless void through every facet of the Multiverse. Forged of alien bones and crystalline growths, the Yithians had carved it from the body of something that might have been a Great Old One itself had not it failed the final stages of Nyarlathotep’s Trials.
The blessings of Yog-Sothoth, Nyarlathotep, Azathoth, Shub-Niggurath, Great Ka’thu’lu, Yastur and Asumai the Yithian Knowledge Bearers, and others stretched this alien citadel to everywhere but nowhere. The freakish technology of the Yithians was advanced beyond measure, yet trying to keep the Unimaginable Horror bound here seemed like locking up a tiger in a flimsy cage of bamboo.
Bound to fail.
We dared not come too close to the alien citadel, but as far away as we were, I could make out a vision that would haunt me until my dying days and lives beyond. At first, it was beautiful, like an endless sea of fireflies moving through the dark to become one with the Tower.
Then a slow creeping sensation of horrified realization slithered up my spine and chilled me to the core. The wisps of light were the psychic residue of the human consciousness, given life and immortality in the Dreamlands. I saw them absorbed into the Tower, twisted and mutilated as their Second Death screams were a nightmare beyond measure.
Unable to contain my revulsion, I cried out, “My God, it’s powered by us!”
The very thought of it all made me sick.
“So, what was useful and what was useless?” Mercury asked, unaware of what strange aeons and apocalypses I was contemplating.
“The book contains many insights into the nature of the Unimaginable Horror and its servitor races. Like Hastur, it is responsible for many forms and varieties of living dead. The Unimaginable Horror is also linked to gaseous clouds and corrupting energy beings which sound familiar but I can’t place.” I bit my lip. “There’s also quite a few spells and rituals which Captain Boo, the author, describes as being effective.”
“Captain Boo?”
“No wonder he was kicked out of the military,” I said, not wanting to reveal we shared the same name. “The book explains also the Tower of Zhaal can be summoned from places where the barrier between dimensions is weak and has no physical location. He listed a few possible places, but frankly, those are useless to us since the Rising shattered the dimensional barriers in thousands of places.”
“I love it when you talk smart,” Mercury said, taking the book from me. “Maybe I can figure out a way to combine sorcery with scientific instruments to measure where the biggest dimensional crack is.”
I looked at her, uncomfortable with such casual use of the unnatural. “That might work, even if I don’t recommend you doing so.”
“I’ve accepted you as a supernatural creature. You can accept me as a witch,” Mercury said, joking.
It was a joke in poor taste since my deal with the Yithians would rid me of my inhuman side forever.
Your inhuman side is your consciousness, John. Your body just reflects it. The voices in my head were taunting me now.
Taking a deep breath, I said to Mercury, “I trust you.”
“Thank you, John,” Mercury said, lying down on her pillow. “I trust you, too.”
I opened my mouth to confess everything. To tell her that I loved her, that I wanted her to know I would be by her side. That I didn’t want anyone else. When I started to speak, I was interrupted by the sound of heavy snoring.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” I muttered, rolling my eyes. I shook my head and lay down beside Mercury, trying to go to sleep despite all the terrible things in my head. For once, Nyarlathotep did not stalk my dreams and I had a peaceful slumber. I dreamt of better, more peaceful, days. Which should have been my first clue that something was wrong.
Richard Jameson and I were sitting together in the middle of his garage, standing in front of a map with a folded-out piece of cardboard in front of him. There were dice in front of us as well as numerous hand-carved miniatures of humans, monsters, and other near-human races. Half-repaired machines, pieces of salvage, and framed movie posters from the Pre-Rising world decorated his messy home as pigs snarled in the pen outside.
I was wearing a pair of shades and not looking directly at Richard because, simply put, he was hideous. A furry dog-like face with an extended snout, greenish skin, and shark-like teeth were just some of the horrible features that made his appearance loathsome. Richard tried to disguise his appearance or mitigate it by wearing an outlandish shirt displaying some long-dead musical group called the Grateful Dead. They must have been truly ghastly if they had that name.
“I don’t see the appeal of this board game,” I said, trying to let Richard down easily.
“You’re an investigator trying to determine the secret horror that rests in the heart of Salem House,” Richard said.
I sighed. “I encounter enough horrors in my daily life. I don’t need a game where I pretend to confront more.”
Richard shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. You read the book so you’re doomed anyway.”
“I’m not supposed to read the book?” I asked.
Richard shook his head. “You’re never supposed to read books in this game.”
I sighed. “Listen, Richard—”
“Shh,” Richard said, lifting a bunch of dice and throwing them. There were a lot of sixes. “A gigantic tentacle reaches through the door, grabs you, and drags you off to the Court of the Toad Monster King.”
“The what now?”
“I’d say you should roll your own dice, but you’d go insane and die before you can respond.” Richard then took a drink from the glass bottle containing his homebrewed sugary black beverage. Strangely, not an alcoholic one but something that had once been a popular soft drink.
“This is a stupid game,” I muttered. “There’s no way to win.”
“This game,” Richard said, raising a single six-sided dice, “isn’t about winning. Instead, like life, it’s about how you lose.”
“I don’t like to lose.”
Richard shook his head. “Then you’ve got a serious problem since you can’t beat the Great Old Ones. You can only impede them.”
I frowned, disliking the way this conversation was going. “Let’s talk about something else.”
“So how are things in Kingsport?” Richard asked, which was confusing because he died before I ever set foot in that city.
I shook my head. “Terrible. Since the destruction of the Marsh Family and the partial takeover of the city by the Remnant, it’s been nothing but a rush of settlers trying to make as much money from the new trading opportunities as possible.”
“Money is good,” Richard said. “For humans, at least.”
“Maybe,” I said, sighing. “I’ve got plenty of work as a caravaneer. I’ve also supplemented my income with bounties.”
The actual Wild West had never been big on the “dead or alive” method of law enforcement, but the Post-Rising era didn’t have the luxury of a central government. Families of victims and towns putting prices on the head of murderers was about as good as it got in the wasteland.
“You should see if they need you as a sheriff,” Richard said. “You’d do a decent job, I think.”
I snorted. “God no.”
“Why is that?”
“They’d probably give it to me,” I said, taking a drink of my sarsaparilla. “New Arkham got a big wake-up call last year. One that’s gotten settlers moving from the city out into the wasteland. Lots of conflict with the Dunwych and other tribals, but that’s to be expected. Mercury has plenty of business as a doctor, caravaneer or not. Really, we could live on her salary alone.”
“And why don’t you?”
I shrugged. “I don’t like people getting too close. People respect your privacy on the trail. I also have to kill fewer people in shoot-outs.”
“Ah,” Richard said. “High noon duels a thing in Kingsport?”
“I don’t think anyone really fought duels like that in the Old West,” I said. “I think they just tried to shoot at each other. It’s the same in the New East.”
Richard smiled a toothy grin. “I always wanted to be a cowboy. I ended up a dogboy.”
“And that’s no bull,” I said, smiling. I missed Richard. “Jackie misses you.”
“I doubt that,” Richard said. “I’d be a reminder of what she’s becoming.”
“That wasn’t so frightening with you around.”
Richard was silent. “So how is the whole business with the Unimaginable Horror thingy?”
I blinked, aware I was dreaming, but suddenly more … awake. “Richard? Is that you? Is your ghost visiting me?”
“No, I’m just a dream,” Richard said, knocking over my figure on the board game. “Of course, who’s to say—”
“Don’t,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve had enough from Nyarlathotep trying to convince me reality and imagination are one and the same.”
Richard chuckled. “I guess he would know.”
I stared at the fallen figure before me. “I’ve made a deal to try to get my humanity back, but I don’t trust the people who made the promise.”
“You can always do what old Ephraim Waite did and steal the body of a human.”
“What?”
“Deep One hybrid who screwed up the life of one of my relatives. He switched his mind with his daughter then her husband, keeping him as a concubine in his daughter’s body. It’s the kind of thing that happens all the time with wizards.”
“That’s … horrifying,” I said, staring at him.
“Yeah, Freud has got nothing on Old Ephraim,” Richard said. “It worked, though. He got to be human again. Too bad he was never human in where it really mattered.”
I stared at him. “This is where you tell me it’s OK to become a monster as it’s still me.”
“Oh hell no!” Richard said. “The mind is affected by alcohol, drugs, and lack of sleep. How do you think it’s affected by changing your fucking species? I crave the flesh of the dead and think arcane weird thoughts brought about by the ghouls’ racial memory. I may pretend otherwise, but I’m less human than if I really was a dog.”
I stared at him. “Thank you for that bit of honesty.”
“I am, however, sick of watching you piss and moan over being a monster, though. Either shit or get off the pot. Accept you want to dwell in wonder and glory forever as one of Azathoth’s court or die as a human being. You can’t do both.”
“I don’t want to die.”
“Then a monster you shall be.”
I closed my eyes. “So be it.”
Richard smirked. “That’s the spirit.”
I took a deep breath. “I don’t think Marcus Whately is actually trying to destroy the world either.”
“No, he’s trying to prevent it from being destroyed,” Richard said.
“Huh?” I asked, staring. “Are you supposed to represent what my unconscious has decided?”
“Sure, if that’s what you want. He figured out long ago, though, that the Faceless Ones are trying to raise the Unimaginable Horror from its prison in the Tower of Zhaal. Now he’s working to stop them.”
“Why are the people at Miskatonic University trying to stop him?”
“Marcus’s plan depends on freeing the Unimaginable Horror to stop it from getting free.” Richard shrugged.
“Then they’re right. He’s a madman.”
“It will get free in a few centuries anyway,” Richard said. “Nothing is eternal compared to the Great Old Ones, and they can’t shore up its prison without Zhaal. Anyway, the people at the University are prepared for the Horror being freed in a few centuries.”
“How’s that?”
“They believe once the Horror is freed, it will wash the world clean of all life. The gigantic mother of all living colors will suck the Deep Ones, ghouls, and humans dry before leaving a water-covered world that will evolve in fascinating new ways. The survivors at Miskatonic will project their minds into the future to join the Yithians in possessing new species.”
“Those murderous bastards,” I growled.
“Only Armitage and the Great One,” Richard said. “Even then, they’re more afraid of Marcus Whateley summoning his father to deal with the situation than of the Unimaginable Horror destroying the world. Marcus is the child of Yog-Sothoth and the brother of Katryn of the Dunwych.”
Katryn. Now there was a name I hadn’t heard in a while. “So, can the Horror be put back in its prison if freed?”
“If anyone can do it, Marcus can,” Richard said. “He’s not trying to build a new world, just trying to preserve this old one. Marcus has faith humanity can build a life on this awful wasted rock.”
“Can we?”
Richard said. “No, humanity is going to be dead in a few generations.”
I thought about Gabriel, Anita, and Jackie. “Goddammit. It’s not fair.”
“Humanity can change, John,” Richard said. “It might become something new that can survive, or it might just fade away and be nothing more than a memory. That doesn’t mean the experience wasn’t worth it.”
“It’s how you lose,” I muttered.
Richard nodded.
I stared at the monster figurines and picked up one that looked like a Kastro’vaal. “I had a dream that my father, me in a past-life maybe, was the sole survivor of a dead race. Nyarlathotep said he might be the key to destroying humanity but saving his own race.”
Richard picked up the piece. “Reincarnation isn’t the only thing that happens to the soul—”
“Souls exist?” I asked.
“After a fashion.” Richard shrugged. “Yog-Sothoth exists in all times and spaces. He keeps a record of everyone and everything. He is a part of us and separate. We also all have dream-selves. So maybe you are an alien reborn.”
“Maybe I am,” I said. “Will I destroy humanity?”
“If Nyarlathotep wanted humanity gone, it would be,” Richard said. “You may not have a choice if humanity or the Kastro’vaal live or die, but you have a choice as to how you react.”
“Unless my brain changes with my body.”
“Then it’s not you anymore and not your problem.”
That’s when I woke up to the sounds of explosions.