Then, as he made his way to the Middle East, in mid-January of 2014 came the revelation of a supernova in the Big Dipper, the Great Bear asterism, the one so important to the Cult. This was SN 2014J, an exceedingly close supernova that was so bright it could be seen by amateur astronomers all over the northern hemisphere. Another signal that Cthulhu, great Cthulhu, was awakening.
This recalled the oceanic turbulence of 2001 and the discovery of an ancient city below the waves of the Gulf of Khambat, south of Mumbai on the western coast of India: a city older than Sumer, older than Mohenjo-Daro.
The Earth and the seas began giving up their secrets and the Cult of Cthulhu was becoming more excited by the hour. He could feel them, feel their agitation and their communications like tiny needles pricking the flesh all around his skull. The Ukraine was in flames, instigated by a neo-Nazi militia, and its president escaped to Moscow ... a cult in Nigeria slaughtered all the students in a school by locking its doors and burning the building down ... a few days ago they seized nearly three hundred schoolgirls and are holding them in captivity, swearing allegiance to Al Qaeda ... This much blood, this much violence will provide the energy necessary to raise dead but dreaming Cthulhu from his sarcophagus beneath the Earth, from his coffin in Aghartta.
From his Tomb beneath his very feet in the beyul of Khembalung.
Like a terrorist or spy, dragged unconscious and drugged, tossed onto a helicopter or a plane going to an undisclosed location, Cthulhu—the High Priest of the Ancient Ones: dreaded alien entities who were even now crowding around the soon-to-be-opened Gate—disappeared into a black site. Extraordinary rendition. A place far from the haunts of men, far from the civilized world that lived and dreamed a fantasy of right and wrong, of good and evil. And there he should stay.
Even as the cries of the Cult and the booming voice of Cthulhu, Kutulu, the Man of the Underworld, were making themselves known in his head, echoing from one side to the other of his cranium, cerebellum, cerebrum, commanding him to open the Book and say the words, Miller resisted. Resisted mightily. For the terma must be destroyed, and the terton along with it.
It was almost time.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Death and Resurrection
For, as we must not forget, initiatory death is always followed by a resurrection...
—Mircea Eliade, Rites and Symbols of Initiation
Adnan's back was against the wall, both literally and figuratively. He heard voices outside in the Nepalese night, muttering voices, the occasional cough, and curses spit in five languages. It was completely dark, but Adnan did not dare turn on his flashlight because it would give away his position.
What are they waiting for? he wondered.
He had managed to sneak over to the two dead bodies in his doorway and remove their weapons and what he could find of their extra ammunition. That was a plus. What was bothering him a little was the fact that he could not identify who the bodies were: not their unit, their ethnicity, nothing. They didn't carry any ID that he could find. They looked vaguely Asian but that was all. They could have been from anywhere.
He had two AK-47s with extra magazines. As long as they didn't lob any grenades or blow the rock standing in front of the entrance he could hold out for quite some time. But he hadn't heard back from Angell or the JSOC team. There was a very good chance that they were all dead and he was the only one left. That thought gave him no comfort at all for it meant that he would die, and die alone, in that antechamber to Hell.
He was not aware that the timing of this night was of the essence. He didn't know that the forces outside the cave were planning a major offensive that would get them inside the cave and down the tunnels to the Tomb of the High Priest in time for the Opening of the Stellar Gate.
He was not aware that he had, at most, fifteen more minutes before the antechamber to Hell became Hell's studio apartment.
Angell had lost consciousness.
He had turned to leave the “Cave of Treasures” and the crazy old shaman when something hit him in the head. He blacked out for what must have been only a few minutes for the light from the lantern and everything else in the cavern looked unchanged.
“What the fuck?”
“Sorry, professor. But I couldn't have you going off like a mad man.” He was holding what looked like an antique knife with a very heavy handle. That was evidently the weapon he used to knock Angell down.
“Me? Me, the mad man? Are you ... you're insane!” Angell struggled to get up from the floor but he suddenly felt nauseous from the blow and stayed on his hands and knees while trying to collect himself.
“You are not in any position to save anyone right now. You will do more harm than good. Give me five minutes to explain, and then I will help you out of here so you can save your friends.”
“I don't think they have five minutes,” Angell said in an anguished voice.
“Oh, they do. You see, the forces arranging themselves outside the cave can't do anything until they hear from me.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“I am the one they are all looking for, out there,” he said, pointing in the general direction of the cave entrance. “I am one of the Keepers of the Book.”
“Jesus. I'm surrounded by megalomaniacs with god complexes ...”
“Yes, probably. But in my case, I am just a kind of Listener. It's a hereditary title, passed down in initiation from generation to generation. My title is ambiguous, actually. The word means both ‘Listener’ and ‘He who is heard.’ Even in Hebrew. Depends on the circumstances.”
“Like asura and deva,” Angell replied, his pain subsiding and his strength gradually returning. He looked around for a weapon to dispatch this crazy old man once and for all.
“Exactly. You're getting the hang of this, I see.”
“So? Now what?”
“So now, let us raise famous men.”
“You mean, ‘praise.’ Let us praise famous men.”
“No. I mean ‘raise.’ As from the dead. That is what this is all about, isn't it? Raising the dead but dreaming Cthulhu from his ancient slumber beneath the Earth (a phrase with more than one meaning, by the way). Raising the dead, reanimating the dead. The ancient Egyptians were famous for it, weren't they? They believed their Pharaoh would ascend to the Pole Star by means of the Big Dipper. What they called the Thigh of Set. Your Carl Tanzler tried to do the same.”
“Who the hell was that?”
“They must have told you. German agent? Sent by Himmler to contact your great-grand-uncle George Angell? He was also the man in Florida who tried to bring his lady love back from the dead, and consulted with Lovecraft on the case. Well, that's what they said, anyway. In reality he built a modern sarcophagus and mummified her so she could fly to the heavens, just like a Pharaoh. Did you know he made love to her corpse? For years? Imagine the Tantric implications. I mean, talk about a great rite.”
“What the living fuck are you talking about?”
“Forgive me. I so rarely have an audience. This is all about raising the dead. Your Book, Necronomicon: Dead Names. The Bardo Thodol, called the Tibetan Book of the Dead. The Book of Coming Forth by Day, which most know as the Egyptian Book of the Dead. Death, Professor Gregory Angell ... yes, I know who you are ... Death is all the rage around here.”
And soon to be the rage outside if I don't get to Adnan in time, thought Angell.
“The sooner you understand this, the sooner you can help your friends out there. If you don't understand it, you're all doomed and your whole planet with you. Pay attention, and stop looking for a weapon. I'm not an idiot.
“Raising the dead is not a technology restricted to humans and animals. It can also be used to raise ... things ... that are not human and not of this Earth. Easier, actually. What Tanzler was doing in Key West ... what Lovecraft wrote about in his stories ... what the Nazis tried to do during the war (remember Operation Barbarossa? Why do you think they called it that?) ... and what the Cult intends to
do here, are all part of the same process. Once the method is perfected it can be applied to anything. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, then he rose himself after he had practiced on Lazarus. This is why he was buried twice: first in Jerusalem and then in Srinagar. This is all about raising the dead, Doctor Angell. But not only dead people. Not those poor souls you watched being butchered in Mosul. Or at Kutha. What they intend is to raise the First Priest, the High Priest of the Old Ones, and with him to instigate the rebirth of the planet ...”
“And the destruction of humanity.”
“Certainly. Isn't it about time? The planet is exhausted. People are tired. All we know how to do is slaughter each other and we have gotten progressively better and better at it. First it was hundreds, then thousands, then millions at a time. Now it's tens and hundreds of millions. We can't begin to speak of saving a million people from anything. But we can kill them in huge, unthinkable numbers! We've run our race, and now it's over. All those people you weep over will be reborn, Doctor Angell, but in new bodies, bodies better suited to interstellar travel. They will be reborn as what you call aliens, yes. So what? They were aliens to begin with. Our origins are in the stars. It's time for all of us to go home. And the Book you seek will help open the Gate to allow those forces—our ancestors—to come back and reclaim what was rightfully theirs. And you, Doctor Gregory Angell, by your very flesh and blood, by your genetic code, you are the missing piece of the puzzle! That is why you are here. That is why that wizened old sorcerer back in Washington recruited you and sent you here. The Place, the Time, the Book, and the Priest.”
“Morphic resonance,” Angell whispered to himself.
“What?”
“Morphic resonance. That's why I'm here. When one member of a species learns something new, the other members of the same species learn it at the same time, across space and across time. It's a theory that was proposed by Rupert Sheldrake decades ago.”
“Your point?”
“You and your followers are in some kind of telepathic contact with this Kusu-lu, Kutulu, or Cthulhu, right? Psychics are also in contact, if we believe Lovecraft. Artists, musicians, sensitives. That was the whole point of the Lovecraft story. If true, it proves the existence of the morphic field. It means that Sheldrake is right, and that once they have raised their High Priest the same effect will take place across the universe. The dead will rise. Everywhere. They will have learned how. Not just your Old Ones, but beings of which you have no knowledge or understanding, beings that share the same morphic field.
“That's why I'm here. I'm the descendant of the man who discovered the Cthulhu Cult. The man they say was murdered by a German agent. The man who knew Lovecraft personally. The man who gave him the idea for the stories about Cthulhu. The man who knew about the existence of the Necronomicon. I'm the key to accessing Lovecraft's morphic field. He had no children! He has no descendants. I'm all there is!”
The shaman sat back on his heels, squatting unceremoniously in the Cave of Treasures, apparently speechless.
“Since Cthulhu is in contact with human beings he shares the same morphic field as the rest of us. He is similar enough ... what did you say? Genetic material from the stars? ... that what happens to him happens to all of us. This planet could well become the battleground for forces unimaginable, for monstrous beings that cannot die, or stay dead. Dead but dreaming, isn't that what the Book says? And when that Dreamer wakes up ... when he becomes a Dreamer of the Day ... so will all the others,” he ended in a whisper, as if talking to himself.
“They have the Book,” said the shaman, whispering like Angell.
“Who does?”
“The other Keepers. They have the Book, and they will open the Gate on time.”
“When? What time?”
“When the Great Bear hangs from its tail in the sky. When the stars are right. It could be at any time now.”
“I need to get to where they are. Now!”
“That's the Tomb of the High Priest. Kutulu. I can take you there. It's not far. Another mile or so in the tunnels. But you won't like it.”
“Let's go!”
“I warned you.”
They made to leave the cavern.
“Why won't I like it?”
“Because giving up disbelief is much harder than giving up belief.”
At the moment they exited the cavern, the stuttering of automatic weapons reverberated off the walls. Angell's heart sank, and he turned on the shaman with murder in his eyes.
The battle for the cave had just begun.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Walpurgisnacht
SN 1006, the largest supernova in human history, exploded on April 30, 1006 CE in the constellation of Therion. Mount Merapi on the island of Java exploded on the same day, burying Borobudur beneath volcanic ash.
April 30, 1492: the day Christopher Columbus received his commission to set sail for the Indies.
April 30, 1776: the eve of the day the Illuminaten Orden was founded.
April 30, 1789: the day George Washington took the Oath of Office as first President of the United States. The Washington Monument is exactly 555 feet high; the number of the word Necronomicon in Greek numerology.
April 30, 1919: the day seven Thulists—members of the Thule Gesellschaft, the secret society that practiced occult rituals in the Four Seasons Hotel in Munich, alongside the nascent German Workers Party—were murdered by Communists. It was the instigation for the Freikorps Revolt against the Communists that introduced Adolf Hitler to the Thule Society and the German Workers Party, which became the Nazi Party.
April 30, 1945: the day Adolf Hitler is said to have committed suicide in the Berlin bunker.
April 30, 1966: the day the Church of Satan was founded in San Francisco by Anton Szandor LaVey.
April 30, 1975: the day Saigon fell.
April 30, 1978: the day the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan was proclaimed, with disastrous consequences.
May 1, 2003: Operation Iraqi Freedom officially ends. Iraq war begins.
May 2, 2011: Osama bin Laden executed in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Chapter Thirty-Four
The Beast in the Cave
Life and death have been lacking in my life.
—Jorge Luis Borges, Discussion
Adnan had rapid-fired one of the AK-47s as three men tried to force their way into the entrance around the rock. He dropped all of them but regretted the expenditure of ammunition. He did not dare approach the bodies for more since it seemed they were now tired of waiting and would pour more troops into the opening in a desperation move.
They had fired on their way in but their shots went all over the place. They were not wearing night-vision goggles and, like him, were afraid to use their flashlights in case they telegraphed their intentions.
But now all bets were off. He knew they were fixing lights to their automatic weapons and would simply start barreling in the entrance regardless of the risk to themselves. He slid across the floor to the other side of the cave, figuring they had a fix on his earlier position. His eyes had gotten accustomed to the dark and could make out silhouettes positioned around both sides of the rock. He wouldn't waste ammunition on warning shots but would wait until he had a good target.
Just please, God. No grenades.
He heard a sound behind him. He swung in its direction, holding the AK out in front of him, when he heard Angell's voice.
“Adnan. You all right?”
“Yeah. I'm right here.”
“Are you hit?”
“Not yet. What kept you?”
“Never turn your back on a shaman.”
“What's that supposed to mean? Never mind. Where are the others?”
“I haven't heard or seen anything from those guys. I have no idea where they are.”
“Is that someone with you?”
“Yeah. The old guy from before. The Tibetan.”
“I thought he disappeared when the flash-bang went off.”
“What about these guys? As soon as we leave they'll come flowing into the tunnels.”
“I'll take care of that,” said the shaman, pushing past them and walking straight to the cave entrance.
“What the fuck! Get him back here! They'll kill him for sure!”
“He says they'll listen to him.”
“Really? Seriously?”
“He's like their leader, or something. Look, while he's doing that let's get the hell out of here and down the tunnels.”
The shaman walked up to the rock and said something in Tibetan. There was sudden silence from the other side. Then he said something in a different language. It might have been Zhang-Zhung. There came a low growl from the assembled forces outside. The growl rose in volume to become a chant. It was one Angell had heard too many times already.
Ku Tu Lu! Ku Tu Lu!
The shaman came back to Angell and Adnan.
“That will hold them for awhile. They know I am a Keeper, and they will await my orders. Let's go. We're running out of time.”
He led the way through the tunnel aperture and began moving quickly in the darkness like a blind man. Angell and Adnan could do nothing else but follow suit.
“Where are we going?” whispered Adnan.
“To the Tomb of the High Priest,” answered Angell. “It's where everybody who's anybody is gonna be tonight. My mission is to grab the Book and then get out of here. Problem is, I don't know where JSOC is. They were our ride.”
“Let's cross that bridge when we come to it.”
They descend deeper and deeper, the air getting thin, the darkness absolute. The walls of the tunnels are covered in dampness and ichor, a thick slime that they cannot see but which they can feel and it disgusts them. Adnan has given one of the AK-47s to Angell with a brief instruction as to how to use it. The shaman is armed with his ornate knife.
The Lovecraft Code Page 40
