by Paul Crilley
“Nah. I just went insane. Much easier.”
“You say you’re here to stop people from interfering with Cthulhu?”
“Yup.”
I stare at him expectantly.
“Oh . . . yeah! I . . . suppose we should go see what’s going on with that. See if whoever it is has breached my defenses. The name’s Dvalin, by the way.”
“Harry Priest.”
“Weird name.”
We make our way back along the streets, finally finding the others lounging up against the wall.
“Thought you were dead,” says Graves. “Who’s your friend?”
“This is Dvalin. He’s a . . . guardian of some kind. He’s supposed to make sure nobody messes with Cthulhu.”
“Not very good at your job, are you?” asks Graves.
“Hey, bite me, beardy. I haven’t seen another living person in hundreds of thousands of years. Forgive me for not sitting outside that great glass erection for my entire life just on the off chance that I get a visitor.”
“You say forgive me, but I sense you’re not being genuine,” says Graves pleasantly.
“Are you really one of the Guardians?” asks Winston, his voice an awed whisper.
Dvalin draws himself up proudly. “I am. I was here from the beginning, when the great Cthulhu was brought here by the Elder Gods. That day will long be remembered as one of great import. The skies were dark and bloody. The moon full and gibbous. The Elder Gods were like giants striding against the cosmos, ancient, wise beings who had captured their offspring and—”
“Moving on,” says Graves, pushing himself off from the wall and heading along the street again.
The others all follow, leaving a sputtering Dvalin standing in the street behind us.
Dvalin, despite muttering and complaining all the time about us intruding in his city, leads us through the dark streets, taking us in the direction of Cthulhu’s tower.
I’m not sure how long we walk. The city plays tricks on the mind. One minute we’re walking along a thoroughfare, the next we’re climbing a set of stairs. But as I look up I see the ground is above us instead of the stars and the night sky is off to my left. I see a group of people on the opposite side of the street and with a sickening lurch of vertigo I realize they’re mirror images of us.
“Best not to look around,” says Dvalin. “Focus on your feet.”
“What’s going on?” asks Graves.
“It’s something to do with Cthulhu. As we get closer everything sort of twists around. Up is down. Left is right. Just follow me, and you’ll be fine.”
After a few more minutes of nausea-inducing travel we arrive at the huge plaza surrounding Cthulhu’s prison. The tower itself is black obsidian, a massive pillar of volcanic glass hundreds of feet in circumference. There are etchings and inscriptions in the glass, so that as the moon moves or my gaze shifts, I catch glimpses of alien writing that twists and turns in my mind.
But it’s the scene playing out in the plaza itself that really draws my attention, a scene of utter chaos. The area is dominated by a Rip, blue light spilling out into the city. And coming through that Rip are hundreds of creatures.
I stare at them, my heart sinking. The outer perimeter of the square consists of thousands of insects, like the ones that made up the wall when I was drawn into all of this. The ground is crawling and writhing with giant maggots and worms, most the size of my arm. There are other insects too: centipedes, millipedes, and spiders. It’s like a sea of terror, undulating around the plaza. Every now and then the insects rise up, coming together to form into the shape of a human, striding back toward the tower where they join up with the other creatures. The monkeys move through the insects, occasionally picking a writhing maggot up and shoving it into their mouths.
“Nightgaunts,” whispers Graves, pointing.
I follow his finger and see lurching creatures with gray, oily skin standing around the door into the tower. They have horns and tattered wings that flap and twitch as they move.
There are also more of those Shamblers, too many to count. Black-armored hides strike blue highlights, their white tick-heads jerking left and right, sniffing blindly at the air.
There are shoggoths too, those weird, undulating bags of diseased slime. Every now and then arms and legs protrude from the sacks and the creatures take on the human form to move around.
“So,” says Anderson. “I hate to be the one to bring this up, but I’m assuming Nyarlathotep is already up at the top of that tower, yeah?”
“Most likely,” says Graves.
“And we’re getting up there how?”
We all turn to Dvalin.
“We’re not,” he says simply. “Not unless you want to kill yourselves. There’s only one way in.” He gestures at the door, guarded by Shamblers and insect creatures. “And we’re not getting past them.”
“So what do we do?” asks Winston.
“We come up with another plan. Come on.”
He leads us back through the city until we’re far enough away that we won’t be overheard. We turn a corner . . .
. . . and find ourselves facing down ten gun barrels.
“Graves?” says the Inspectre, lowering his gun. “Why the hell am I not surprised?”
Graves throws an accusing look at me. “Seriously?”
“What? I didn’t even know! I just thought we could do with some extra manpower.”
“What’s next?” asks Anderson. “The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man?”
“What the hell is going on here?” growls the Inspectre.
“I can’t be bothered to explain it to him. Anderson?”
Anderson strolls across to the Inspectre, and Graves turns on Dvalin. “Well?” he demands. “This is your city. You’re the warden. Don’t you have any weapons?”
“I have lots of weapons. But they’re last resort only. It takes a lot out of me to control them.”
“Boo-hoo. Stop being precious and get them armed up. We need to spray that tower with napalm or something.”
“It doesn’t work like that,” snaps Dvalin. “I need to prepare. We’re talking a major mental workout.”
“I don’t give a crap!” shouts Graves. “Do what you need to do and do it now! I for one do not want to vanish in a puff of existential smoke. Do you understand me?”
I walk away, leaving them to argue. Maybe it would have been better if I hadn’t called any of them into the Dreamlands with me. Not that I was able to control it, but still. None of them are really helping much.
I spot a set of stairs leading up the side of a building. I start climbing, hoping for a place to just sit in silence. I get past the second story before suddenly realizing I’m walking upside down. The ground is above me again, the sky below. I freeze, wondering which way to go. My instinct is to crouch down and just grab hold of something, but I resist it and keep walking.
Before I make it to the top, I walk sideways, backward and diagonally, and then upside down once again before finally reaching the roof.
I lean over the low wall and stare out over the city. I can still hear the sounds of arguing from below. The Inspectre doesn’t sound like he’s taking it well. Something about memos and needing to shoot Graves. I know how he feels.
A flare of light catches my eye. I squint into the distance, staring beyond the city walls. At first I think it’s just lightning, but then the light flares to life again, and with a sinking feeling I realize it’s yet another Rip.
And as I watch, a second army of creatures marches through.
They lope on two, four, sometimes six legs. Some fly through the air, skimming out of the Rip and then soaring over the ocean, flapping massive, leathery wings. There are shantak, the creatures that captured me in the ruined city. Others look like floating octopi, while still others look like huge dragons, covered in black-and-red scales.
In the ten seconds I stand there watching, hundreds of creatures have poured through the Rip to gather on the shores outside the ci
ty walls.
I sprint back down the stairs, keeping my eyes focused on my feet so I don’t get disoriented. I find the others in the empty square. Graves is sitting on a broken column while Anderson talks to the Inspectre.
“I really can’t shoot him?” says the Inspectre plaintively.
“I’m afraid not. At least, not for whatever it is ICD accused him of.”
“Army!” I shout. “There’s an army coming! Outside the city!” I look around for Dvalin, but the small man has vanished. “Where’s Dvalin?”
“He stormed off in a sulk,” says Graves. “What are you saying about an army?”
I lead the way back up to the rooftop just as the first of the shantak soars over the walls. I stare at it in fear. I never really got a good look at them when I was clutched in one’s claws, but they are massive and black-skinned, creatures from primitive nightmares. Its snout is a black beak dripping bile, and it screeches as its huge wings bring it soaring over the city. It’s followed by others of its kind. I count at least fifty of them before giving up.
“Shantak,” says Graves. “Nasty things.”
The first shantak pulls up and hovers in the air. The others crest the wall in blurs of motion, screaming their hatred as they soar off into the city.
The first shantak flaps its wings slower and slower, sinking to the ground in a cloud of dust. Its beak opens and closes, snapping together with loud clack-clack noises I can hear even from this distance.
“I’m not sure standing in the open like this is the wisest thing to do,” says Winston nervously.
Before we can do anything I hear an odd noise, a muted thumping, thudding sound that echoes throughout the streets.
“What’s that?” whispers Smith.
I kneel down and touch the roof. Vibrations run up through my hands.
Then a furious screech echoes behind us. We run to the opposite side of the building and stare out over the city.
A battle is taking place about a mile from where we stand. The shantak fly through the air, screeching, wheeling and banking to avoid the arrows and spears flying toward them from the ground.
“Who’s doing that?” mutters Smith.
Then we see them: the statues. The ones we saw scattered everywhere. They’ve come to life, all of them gathering together to defend the prison city. All the statues are armed, firing bolts from massive crossbows and hurling spears into the sky.
How the hell did they come to life? Is it an automatic defense system?
“Check it out,” says Anderson, pointing.
It’s Dvalin. He’s standing on a rooftop a short distance from the battle. His hands are raised above his head, and he jerks around as if he’s having a fit. Wind whirls around him, making it look as if he is surrounded by a mini tornado. The wind flies briefly in our direction, and I hear him screaming, shouting commands in a language I don’t understand. I lean forward. Blood pours from his ears and nose. He calls out again, screaming obscenities into the sky.
He is controlling the statues.
“Huh,” says Graves. “He wasn’t lying after all. How about that? If we survive I’ll have to apologize.”
I shift my attention back to the battle. Four bolts slam into one of the flying creatures, bringing it skidding down into the streets with a wet thud. Another takes a bolt through the wing, and it twirls unevenly into the side of a building. It falls to the ground, and one of the statues steps forward and slices its head from its body.
The once-silent city echoes with noise: shrieks of pain. The twang and thunk of crossbows releasing. The wet sounds of shearing flesh. Dvalin’s shouted commands.
Some of the shantak swoop low and knock the statues down, but it seems that nothing can stop them. They simply keep getting up until a leg shatters or a head is ripped from a body. And even then they drag themselves across the ground to finish off any creatures that come within reach.
“Shouldn’t we help?” I say.
“No need. Those statues have it taken care of.”
After another couple of minutes of furious fighting, the last of the flying creatures are shot from the sky. The statues collect together into formation and move along the streets, stepping on the corpses, squashing them into a wet mulch as if they’re crushing grapes for a demonic wine tasting.
We watch as they march past below us before we climb down from the roof and follow after them. They carry on through the streets and take the stairs leading up to the top of the city wall. We continue to follow, hesitantly, trying to keep quiet. The statues don’t even give us a second glance. Their attention is fixed on the beaches outside the city.
The Rip has closed up now, but every available inch of shore is covered with creatures. They spread away to either side, thousands upon thousands of them.
“What now?” whispers Winston.
“Relax,” says Smith nervously. “Look at the size of this wall. There’s no way they can breach it.”
“All defenses can fall,” exclaims Graves cheerfully. “Just a matter of finding the weak spot.”
“Even so, we should find a defensive location,” says the Inspectre.
“You do that. Maybe somewhere out on the beach.”
The Inspectre opens his mouth to argue, but at that moment every single creature suddenly looks up into the night sky.
We follow their gaze. Winston whimpers in fear.
The stars are moving. Slowly at first, but picking up speed, turning in a slow pinwheel across the sky, as if a camera had been left on all night and then speeded up to see the movement of the earth. I fight off a sudden lurch of vertigo.
“He’s done it,” says Smith in horror. “Nyarlathotep. He’s activated the spear. He’s using it to unlock Cthulhu’s prison.”
“We’re doomed!” wails Winston. “Doomed! What are we going to do? My God, what—”
Anderson slaps him across the face. He looks at her in shock, and Graves bursts out laughing.
“Blaze of glory time, kids,” he says.
Wonderful.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I stare up at the spinning stars, and for some reason it takes me back to twenty years ago, lying on the grass verge of Megan’s parents’ house until four in the morning, just looking up at the night sky and talking about everything and nothing. It was winter, but I wasn’t cold. My heart was pumping so hard it kept me warm.
She was the one. I remember thinking that. Megan was the one I was going to spend the rest of my life with. She was kind, funny, had a dark sense of humor, and she seemed to get me. She was perfect.
So what happened? How does something like that, so pure a feeling, just . . . disappear? What happened to that innocence we had? That optimism?
My heart clenches at the thought of all that vanishing. At the thought that it wasn’t even real. Maybe that’s why it disappears. Because it wasn’t real? Because it was all a dream?
But that’s not how it works, is it? If it happened, even in my mind, it’s real. If we experience it, it’s real. And it’s all there for a reason, to bring us to exactly where we are today. I’ve lost so much, but if I hadn’t, I might never have been in the position to join up with Graves. If Megan and I hadn’t split, we might never have had this chance to stop something terrible from happening. Megan always said I had to go with the flow. To just stop fighting everything. That there was a reason things happened. Maybe she was right after all.
I look at the others. We’re back on the roof now. Graves is sitting with his head tilted back, staring up at the stars and smiling ruefully, his gun across his lap. Winston and Smith both look terrified, and Anderson stands next to them, staring out over the city, holding her shotgun with a determined look on her face. The Inspectre and his men have fanned out around the roof, each covering a different approach.
“Sir,” says one of them urgently.
I look across and see that the small army that had been loitering outside Cthulhu’s tower is moving, heading toward the walls where the glass guardians
are standing watch.
Which means the entrance to the tower is now unguarded.
Fuck it. I suppose if this is going to be done, then I have to do it.
None of the others are watching, so I slip back down the stairs and run through the streets, pausing at every crossroads to make sure there are no surprises waiting around the corner.
The empty plaza isn’t quite deserted. There are still two Shamblers standing on either side of the doorway. I walk out of my cover, raise the gun, and shoot them both. They wither and crumble before my eyes, bones dropping into a dusty pile that I kick aside as I enter the tower.
Darkness and freezing cold envelopes me. There’s a thick mist hanging in the air. I can barely see my hand in front of my face.
I make my way forward until my foot hits a stair, and then I start to climb, making sure my feet don’t slip on the wet glass. A few minutes later I’m on the outside balcony that rings the vast space where Cthulhu is being held prisoner.
I glance out over the city and see that battle has begun. The creatures from the tower are battling with the guardians on the wall. And it looks like some of them have opened the gate, because the creatures from outside are spilling into the city, joining the battle with shrieks and triumphant cries.
The stars are spinning faster now, a pinwheel of white lines moving in a blur. I peer through the closest arch into the huge room. Except it’s not really a room. It’s a vast floor of black glass, designs etched in silver into the obsidian. It has no roof, the space open to the whirling stars.
The crystal structure is there, just like in my dreams. A multifaceted prison divided into segments that shift into different geometric shapes when I look at it. In each facet I can see an image of Cthulhu. Crouched over, eyes closed, bat wings curled protectively around his body, octopus head pointed at the ground.
He’s so big I can’t take it all in. A creature larger than the Eiffel Tower, trapped inside a geometric crystal sitting on top of a huge glass tower. It’s something out of a nightmare.
Nyarlathotep stands before Cthulhu. The spear has been thrust into a hole in the obsidian floor. The spearhead spins round and round, searching for the combination that will unlock Cthulhu.
