by Declan Finn
My partner arched a brow. “And what is your final … solution?”
If Whateley picked up on the comment, he didn’t note it. “Stop all vaccinations and increase the level of undocumented aliens into the country.”
I blinked and exchanged a glance with my partner. Alex shrugged.
“That seems very … specific, Professor.”
Whateley shrugged. “Oh, they have to be undocumented, Detective Nolan. The undocumented are poor. They’ve dealt with most of the exotic viruses out in the world without the aid of modern medicine. They are stronger. Tougher. More resilient by the experience. White people? Pfft. White people are too soft in comparison.”
Wait, what did he call me?
Alex nodded slowly, the sort of thing he would do when talking with a homeless EDP— emotionally disturbed person. “So what did Matchett want you to do with the money, exactly?”
Whateley smiled slyly, as though he were doing the easiest thing in the world, and we were far too stupid to do the same thing. “From Old Miss, I lobby politicians. With a few phone calls, I’m involved in distribution. The strategic placement of the undocumented in areas where they can leave the most impact.”
Pearson arched a brow and said, dryly, “You mean infect the most people?”
Whateley spread his arms and grinned. “Exactly!”
At that point, I realized that he called me by my name and rank, even though I hadn’t given him either. I summoned my armor with my will and forced it to slowly unfold down my arms and legs, staying inside my clothing, but giving me protection.
“Evolution in action!” Whateley continued excitedly, ignoring all of our reactions. “We cut out the soft from humanity, and promote the stronger. The superior! After all, the people we want in our society are going to be good communists who can work together. They will be sane, rational people who know that God is dead—or Islam! Which knows that God is merely a good tool in the hands of the state.” He looked at me, and he winked. “The better to tax the infidel into next week.”
My armor flared to life and armored me up all the way. With a push of my legs, I leaped into Professor Whateley shoulder first and drove him back into his porch. We crashed into the house, smashing into a table in the front foyer. I slammed Whateley into the wall so hard he left a hole in it.
Normally, I wouldn’t use the armor against a civilian, but it was clear that this wasn’t a civilian. If he had been, I would have broken ribs, bruised his spine, and otherwise nearly killed Professor Noah Whateley.
Whateley grabbed me by both shoulders and threw me away, still in my armor. I came to my feet as Whateley rose, unconcerned and smiling.
“What gave me away?” he asked.
He shot in and backhanded me in the helmet. The clay buckled and dented, and the impact sent me into the wall, leaving a bigger hole next to the one he had left.
“Your name?” Whateley mused. He nodded to himself. “That was it, wasn’t it? I should have opened with it.” He punched into my gut, doubling me over. He didn’t leave lasting damage, but too many hits like that, and I didn’t expect my armor to hold.
Whateley threw his hands up in an overly dramatic shrug, then led it into another backhand. “I should have opened with it. That I recognized the smug, sanctimonious cop from New York City. ‘Of course, detective, you made national news when you took down that serial killer and quelled a riot.’ Or maybe the WHC. Or the mayor.” He kicked me deeper into the wall, driving me in like a nail. “Pity you’re too stupid to live, Saint.”
The door closed behind Whateley. It slammed in the faces of Pearson and Alex without any human hands going near it. It locked itself.
Whateley slid his hands back into the pockets of his jacket.
I was still lodged in the wall but on my feet. I reached around with my left hand, searching for something to grasp. A bit of electrical cable would do. Some piping would have been even better.
I spared Whateley a glance. “Have we met?”
Whateley grinned. “Oh, the whole hosts of Hell know who you are, Detective.”
The display in my armor showed me an aura around Whateley. It shimmered in black and red. The walls no longer looked solid in my vision but more like Jello, as though the house was made of ectoplasm.
Hmm. With my left side, pinned into the wall, I punched up through the guts of the house.
The house roared in agony.
Whateley looked around, concerned at the noises the house made.
I ripped my fist out through the wall and swung for Whateley’s face. His head barely flinched with the punch, and I had been able to punch through concrete with this armor.
My second punch was an uppercut to Whateley’s belly. The impact lifted him off the floor.
Whateley backhanded me and sent me flying for the side wall of the porch and a new gaping hole in it. This new hole was a gaping bottomless chasm—
And this hole in the wall had teeth, with a six-foot gaping maw.
Why does the bloody wall have teeth?
I slapped the floor to stop my momentum. The wall warped and twisted and snapped at me with razor-sharp fangs. I pushed away, to my feet and twisted around so my back-fist smashed into Whateley’s face. I sent him sprawling.
I threw myself into and through the front door.
The whole house growled behind me. The growl was like a bear the size of a bus.
“Run!”
15 The Doom That Came to Dunwich U
I took six bounding steps down the path, then stopped dead, surprised by the sight of the campus through the display of my armor.
It was a sight of the Dunwich University campus without the glamour used to conceal the truth.
While the path was unchanged, everything else was turned into a warped nightmare. Each building had teeth in the mouth of each doorway. The windows flickered like dozens of eyes. The students that carried their books as anyone would—some in their hands, some wore backpacks…
All of them were in various states of decay.
The ones carrying books and talking to each other only had the beginnings of decay in the side of the faces and arms, black veins running down nearly to their hands. The ones with book bags had the corrosion running up and down their bodies, with dead, vacant expressions.
The ones on smartphones, though, were dead inside and out. Empty eyes, flesh missing out of their cheeks so I could see their teeth, or flesh hanging off their fingers or around their eyes.
Others were different. They seemed to be alive and lively, with scales covering parts of their flesh. Like scales that hadn’t been fully shed from a fish, or maybe the slow formation of a cocoon, ready to change the students into something … Other.
The security guards were the most familiar things—they were Serpent men constructs.
The lawn rippled as though it was alive.
I flung my arms up to stop Pearson and Packard from running past me into a dead student.
“Necromancy,” I said aloud.
“Damn it,” Pearson spat. “Old Missy! I missed the connection. Bloody Lovecraft!”
I watched as the students poured out of the buildings. A handful of security guards closed in on us. They didn’t have to rush. The paths were narrow, and the big, burly men sauntered casually towards us. But behind them, the crowds of students filled in the space. The Serpent men security guards were only there to slow us down while the students formed a barricade.
Pearson moved back to back with me, and Alex fell into the formation. His gun was in his left hand, one of his metal saint cards was in the other.
Alex kept an eye on the incoming. “What do you mean, Lovecraft?”
“We’re in Essex County. It’s where his city of Arkham and Miskatonic University were located.”
Alex growled. “He made up Arkham and Miskatonic U! THEY WERE FICTION!”
“No, he changed the names to protect the guilty. Why do you think they call it Old Missy?”
I had a sudden thought bac
k to the end of my mission in Germany. The terrorists had summoned and bound the demon Asmodeus. I didn’t want to hear anything he had to say. Even if it was the truth, it would probably only be a detriment for me to know. As I walked away from him, he screamed that what was coming was something that H.P. Lovecraft would have approved of.
I guess he was right.
“Why are they only blocking the paths?” Alex asked as the students and Serpent men security guards closed in on us.
“The lawn is … rippling. I think it’s also alive.”
“The lawn is lava. Got it.”
Whateley slammed into me from behind. I stumbled forward three steps, then spun and bent in half, hurling him to the path. I stomped for his head. Whateley rolled out of the way and onto his feet. He leaped for me, and I burst forward, blocking his right roundhouse and drove into his gut with a left. Both strikes felt like hitting stone.
I swung my right fist up into his face and brought my left down into a liver shot. He might have been unhurt by the blows, but his body mechanics knocked his head back, then doubled him over.
This meant I could easily grab him by the skull. I planted my right foot just past his left side, then twisted my body around, hurling Whateley into the great lawn. He bounced and rolled with each impact as he came to a stop in the middle of the yard.
The lawn instantly rippled to life around him. The surface was more like water in the middle of the tide coming in.
Whateley stood in the middle of the lawn, raised his hands to the sky, and laughed.
The Serpent guards and the students stopped a few yards away. There was nowhere for us to go, so why bother? The only path not blocked led us back to the horror house behind.
Whateley called out to us, “Did you think that you could defeat me by feeding me to the campus? The campus is our focus. It is a source of power! I control it! We are unstoppable.”
Whateley reached down like he was gathering sand in his hand, even though it was still at waist height. Ephemeral eldritch energies pulled up from the lawn, turning into a ball of gold and purple plasma that swirled and danced like a beach ball of lightning in his hands.
“Brace!” I called.
Whateley threw the ball. Lightning shot out from it on all sides as it rushed towards us. Another blue flame ignited at the core as it shot down.
It came down with the speed of lightning.
But the Soul Ring reacted at the speed of thought.
A shield of pure white light appeared in front of me. The purple plasma struck it and exploded. The bright blue fireball was immense and consumed all it touched. It blew out parts of the path and dug a hole in the dirt several yards deep and wide. Lightning crackled from it, striking the nearest conducting surface—the Serpent guards. Blue lightning shot out to the sky, turning the clouds black for a moment before it shot back down and struck the great lawn. The buildings howled. The trees screamed. The lawn writhed in agony and rippled as far away from the damage as it could.
When the violet flames cleared away, it left scorched earth like glass. The campus had been so badly wounded, the abomination within had been cauterized, and the sickness purged.
I and my partners, however, were left totally unscathed. The shield conjured by the Soul Ring had been perfect, and had reflected everything sent at us.
Whateley glowered at me. “Okay,” he said flatly. “No more Mister Nice Demon.”
He pointed at me. His finger lit up from the inside. The same eldritch energies as before gathered at his back, a capacitor with a full charge.
I raised my fist with the Soul Ring pointed at him. It glowed white, ready to do battle with damnation.
I smiled behind my helmet. “Bring it, bitch.”
The laser shot out and struck my shield. I was content to let him waste his ammunition. I figured out why we had come. If the university was a focus, a source of power, then it was something built up over years. There was nothing in my arsenal that could contend with that power out in the field, especially if I didn’t know where or when it would turn up. But here, at the source of that power, I had a chance.
I thought at the Ring my intentions. And it wasn’t just for salvation from the dead. The serpents and the students both closed in.
O God, you are my God—it is you I seek!
The shield became like an umbrella over us, coming up and dropping to the path in a curtain of light.
For you my body yearns; for you my soul thirsts, in a land parched, lifeless, and without water.
The shield expanded from us in an ever-spreading ball of light, pushing back on the death beam from Whateley. It pushed out from the path and struck the lawn.
I look to you in the sanctuary to see your power and glory.
The lawn rippled and thrashed against the shield, but it gave way and calmed. It became smooth and quiet. It flattened out like a rug being smoothed out against heavy furniture.
For your love is better than life; my lips shall ever praise you!
The Serpent guards held their weapons at the ready, bracing against the might of God’s light. They leaned into the wave of the shield’s energy, and the white light consumed them, only leaving ashes behind.
I will bless you as long as I live; I will lift up my hands, calling on your name.
The curtain of light washed over the student body. Many of them looked frozen as the light poured over them. But when the light moved past, students staggered through and wondered what was going on, unaware of what happened.
My soul shall be sated as with choice food, with joyous lips my mouth shall praise you!
The students who looked dead and rotted under my display were hit with the light and seized up, then they dropped like a switch that had been hit. They had been dead already. The light merely purged the dark forces that had been animating them.
I think of you upon my bed, I remember you through the watches of the night You indeed are my savior, and in the shadow of your wings I shout for joy.
The ones dead inside, but not decaying, fell to their knees and wept.
My soul clings fast to you; your right hand upholds me.
I turned my attention, and the attention of the ring, to the rest of the campus.
But those who seek my life will come to ruin; they shall go down to the depths of the netherworld!
The light of the ring smacked the house behind us. It roared and bellowed like it was being vivisected. The house itself leaned into the light to fight, and it fell back, stiffening as the eldritch horrors were purged from it.
Those who would hand over my life to the sword shall become the prey of jackals!
The lawn rippled under Whateley, dragging him back, away from the curtain. He gathered up the energies left around him and made a motion to push off the ground.
It sent him flying away.
But the king shall rejoice in God; all who swear by the Lord shall exult, but the mouths of liars will be shut!
The curtain of light blew through the rest of the campus, flushing out the rest of the satanic energy. The buildings became normal. The lawn settled and became as Earth. The students, however, freaked out, especially at the dead friends and fellow students fallen at their feet.
Then, the curtain of light disbanded, falling away. As soon as the light from the Soul Ring cut out, so did everything from it. I armored down before anyone really paid attention to me. It was bad enough that the students had gone through trauma from Hell.
But Whateley had gotten away.
I narrowed my eyes and looked off into the distance with my display. Whateley was already out of range.
“What the heck was that?” Alex snapped. He turned away from the once-hostile mob and back to me. “Was that you, Tommy?”
I shrugged and raised my fist with the ring. “It was this.”
Pearson frowned, bending his beard. His brow furrowed harder than I had ever seen him. “Interesting. I’m almost surprised that Whateley, whatever he is, didn’t allow you to escape and co
ntinue the pursuit off-campus. If the campus was a source of power, the first instinct wasn’t for him to drive you off of it.” Pearson waved at everything that had been cleansed of the dark powers. “Why even risk this? Why announce the power here? Why make it a target in this way?”
I was about to answer that evil tended to overreach so hard they dislocated something, but that struck me as wrong. Something big was coming. It had to be. It was the only way any of the forces of darkness would consider risking themselves. They had been concerned about the monks Minniva had contacted, so they had to be stopped before the monks turned it into a race against time. They bought themselves at least a day and a half – Pearson took time to cross the Atlantic, and it took us time to track down Minniva.
But something big was coming, and the campus was not a part of it.
But if the campus isn’t part of it, I thought, then what was it for…? Excess resources. Backup.
“A trap,” I said aloud.
Alex and Pearson looked at me. Alex cocked his head. “You mean it was meant to lure us in and kill us?” He scoffed. “Obviously, that worked so well.”
I shook my head. “Last night, we took out whatever horror they sent after us. But we needed the ring.” I pointed my fist at the stretch of lawn where the flames had turned it to glass. I said a quick Hail Mary to activate the ring and heal the land.
The ring flickered and fixed a square foot patch.
I raised my fist to Pearson’s eye level. “They wanted me to burn through the power of the Soul Ring. They had to know I had something like it—if the forces of Hell talk to each other, the Succubus from Germany would have told her bosses. They would have told Whateley and everyone else involved. They wanted me to burn through the power in the ring. And now we’re down a weapon.”
