On the horizon, strange shapes marched out to sea. Or were they coming this way? Once they had been cranes but I couldn't begin to guess what they were now.
The trees we passed had been transformed, too. They seemed soft, as if it would be impossible to climb them. Their leaves – if that's what they were – moved unnaturally to the urging of a breeze that could not exist.
I decided I needed some air. Maybe that would clear my head; I was clearly hallucinating. As the doors slid open to allow me into the vestibule that connected my carriage to the next, I saw a middle-aged woman with greying hair crawling on the floor. She was being thrown about by the motion of the train and was saying over and over “Oh Lord, help me. Oh Lord, help me.” I leant down to help her up but she jerked away and rolled herself into a ball against the wall, her fingers curling over the lip of the inset litter bin. She kept her face turned away and continued her unending prayer. I got the brief impression that there was something missing from her face.
Slightly offended that my offer of help had been spurned, I decided to leave her to the train guard and went to a door to let the window down. The breeze whipped into my face and within a few minutes I was able to convince myself that I felt better.
Turning to return to my seat, I noticed a man lurching towards me down the aisle. He was blocking my way so I stood and waited for him to pass. As he approached I noticed that his eyes seemed oddly glazed. His step was more uncertain than could be explained merely by the motion of the train. Eventually he made it as far as the door, which opened automatically to allow him through.
“There's plague on board ... it's plag—” He held out a bottle of water and a partly unwrapped sandwich to me. I stepped back, watching in disbelief as both items were swallowed in seconds by a white fungal growth. The items dried and disintegrated before my eyes.
I forced myself to look away as something told me his hands and then the rest of him would soon suffer the same fate. Covering my mouth and nose for fear of breathing in anything, I began to run up the carriage. Behind me came a noise like a vacuum cleaner pipe becoming clogged.
I plunged through the door into the next carriage, the familiar hiss and clunk of the door calming my nerves only slightly.
Those announcements were always urging passengers to 'contact a member of the train crew' if we saw a suspicious package. This was a damned sight worse than a suspicious package, so that's what I was going to do. The buffet car was my best bet, I thought. But it was at least three carriages away.
As the train lurched around a bend, almost threatening to tip over it seemed to me, a bird, or something very like it, smashed into the window. It seemed to crawl along the glass for a few moments, a huge thing with black feathers and large claws and teeth. I turned my head away quickly but curiosity forced me to look back. It had teeth, I was sure of it. They could clearly be seen within its misshapen beak, attempting to gnaw at the glass. The animal clung on desperately before it was torn away by the wind as the train picked up speed. A woman sitting nearby had also seen the monstrosity and turned to look at me with terrified eyes. “What was it?” she asked in a very small voice, shrunken by fear. I shook my head and continued towards the buffet car, not wanting to think about what I'd seen.
I paused at the carriage end. Only one more to go now. As I prepared to sway and lurch along the aisle once more a woman came staggering towards me. I reversed out through the doors, which opened reluctantly behind me so that she almost ended up careering onto me. She uttered just one sound, regular and low, over and over again. “Eeeeee. Eeeeee. Eeeeee.”
I peered into her eyes. At first I thought she wore trick contact lenses, but then I realised that it couldn't be the case. Her irises and pupils had been replaced by tiny clock dials, the minute and hour hands showing just one minute to midnight while the second hand raced towards the vertical.
Her face flushed a dozen vivid colours as her mind melted inside its bone prison. “Gypped!” she gasped, then slowly disappeared, as if eaten alive by her surroundings. Disbelievingly, I stepped forward and waved my hands through the space where she'd been like an idiot child. There was nothing.
I struggled to remain calm, noticing that my mouth was incredibly dry, my heart almost rearing up in my chest. I had to get to the train guard. They had to stop this, even if it meant halting between stations and getting all the passengers to safety. I had no idea what was threatening us but something was terribly wrong.
Pressing on, I entered the final carriage. I could see the counter of the buffet car through the door at the far end. I had just passed the second row of seats when the air was torn open by the sound of every phone in the carriage ringing at once. All around me people fumbled in clothing and bags, trying to find the devices and shut them off. Some had them already in their hands but seemed unable to do anything but stare at them as in a trance.
Covering my ears with both hands, I pressed on down the carriage as quickly as I could. In front of me, a man stood up, rummaging in his coat. Quickly I pushed against the top of his seat and balanced on the arm rest of the one on the other side of the aisle. I had to get out of there.
The few seconds that I'd been forced to uncover my ears had allowed the sound to slice into my head. A dull ache had begun in the very centre of my head as if my blood was being pushed into places it wasn't supposed to go. It seemed to grow worse with every second as I struggled forward. Now it was as if a hundred tiny claws were scrabbling in my skull in a frenzied bid to break open the bone and get out, while the air pressed in on my eardrums as if I'd suddenly plunged into deep water.
The phones continued to ring as people struggled with buttons and swiftly removed batteries to try and silence them. Nothing seemed to work. Children had begun to wail. A woman was screaming. Another had begun forcing a knitting needle into her own ear.
I passed the four strange men I had seen on the platform. Out of the whole carriage, they seemed the only ones unaffected by the terrible assault on the nerves. In fact, they seemed delighted by the sonic chaos around them, seated around a table and exchanging grins.
What had begun as a cacophony of various ringtones and snatches of music had now changed into one sound, high and insistent. The phones had all begun to sing, if that was the word. The almost absurd diversity had blended into one keening crescendo, an otherworldly fluting that worked its way brutally into the brain of everyone who heard it.
By now I was nearly at the end of the carriage. I was sweating and in pain, almost blind with something bordering on fear. Finally, I was near enough. Pushing a woman and child out of the way, I lunged at the door and, not waiting for the automatic mechanism to open it, clawed at one edge. I forced my muscles to obey me and pull the sliding door aside, almost falling into the vestibule beyond. Crawling across the space dividing the two carriages, I reached up to the handle of the toilet door. I yanked down on it and leaned against it at the same time.
As I tumbled inside, I yelled out in relief. Then I stopped in mild panic. I'd given voice to a word I'd never heard before. It was a strange word but one I somehow knew meant a form of redemption or safety, maybe a rescue of sorts.
I clambered to my feet and forced the toilet door closed behind me. Now, at last, I could no longer hear the music. I ran cold water over my hands and splashed it on my face, trying to forget the altogether alien word that my tongue had uttered.
Drying my face in a handful of a paper towels, I stood with my back to the wall and tried to remember who I was. As my eyes re-focused, words began to write themselves across the opposite wall; a sort of sordid Biblical imitation. The characters were bizarre and unfamiliar, totally unintelligible. I had a sense that they were incredibly old, though they appeared far too complex and sophisticated for any ancient race that I was aware of. A form of long lost Arabic, perhaps? The words “I was, I am, I will be” insinuated themselves into my thoughts.
I had no idea what the phrase meant. Yet another puzzle to contend with. I sighed heavily an
d pulled open the toilet door. As I stepped towards the link between carriages the train leapt sideways, sending me sprawling into the buffet car. I had got here at last, though I hadn’t intended to arrive face down.
Clambering to my feet, I was astonished, though not surprised, to come face-to-face with the dark-skinned man I had seen earlier on the platform. Somehow it seemed right that he was here. I didn't know who or what he was but this was obviously his base, from where he had transformed an ordinary train into a hurtling nightmare; his own kingdom of pain.
Taking my courage in my hands, I pulled myself up to my full height and, aiming at a commanding tone, I addressed him. “What do you know about what's going on on this train? One man said something about a plague ...”
At first I thought the dark man was going to deny any knowledge of the strange events. But instead he said softly: “The only plague here is that of knowledge. But that is easily dealt with.”
Behind the man, sitting on the buffet side-counter, I saw the object he had held in his hand when I'd first seen him. Even this close, it was difficult to make out exactly what it was. It looked like something vaguely animal but there was an element of chaos about it, as if all its parts were in a constant state of change. As I looked at it I realised that it was changing, slowly and hypnotically, as new forms sprang forth from it just as others sank away into the main body.
I looked back at the man, puzzled, pointing at the object. For a few moments he said nothing, but when he spoke once more his words sounded like some bizarre religious pamphlet.
“You are a pilgrim. You seek forgiveness, confirmation, redemption. It is all available to you.” As he spoke, I noticed the depths of his dark eyes seemed as if they were moving, as if they were not eyes at all but merely portals into an unknown place where all hope had been extinguished, all memories devoured.
I looked around me. The familiar colours and shapes had all begun to change. Tones of an undiscovered spectrum crept into the usual subdued reds and blues of the train's mundane livery, transforming it into a living masterpiece.
“Does it please you to see the world in its true form at last?”
“But ...” I began. I stopped, looking around me with revulsion, then glared at the dark stranger. “This can't be how the world really is,” I said, defiantly.
He nodded, lowering his eyes. “Oh yes. Oh yes. This is your world ...” he said softly.
Behind the dark stranger stood a line of people at the buffet counter. Their skin seemed waxen, their eyes as dead as cold ash. Two of them turned their shrunken mouths to me and, with huge effort, tried to move their leaden lips and granite tongues.
The dark-skinned man saw my eyes darting from one to the other. “Do not be concerned about them. They will be joining us soon,” he said. I didn't know what he meant but the statement made me fear for my own safety. Did I now look like them? I searched around for a window or some other reflective surface.
Stepping over to the nearest window, I saw that the surface had become dull and had a texture almost like that of fur. It was completely opaque. Instead I ran my hands over my face; I could detect no changes but how could I be sure? My senses were betraying me, seemingly changing their function as I struggled to maintain my balance within the speeding prison.
I clenched my fist, digging my nails into my palms. I spoke slowly, deliberately. “What is happening here?”
“You should prepare to meet your maker.” The words fell from his dark lips as if made of stone.
This time the answer was obvious to me, despite the throbbing in my head; I wasn't buying into any religious crap. “I don't believe in God!”
“Neither does your maker. At least not in that God!” He was worryingly close to me now. “I can assure you that the old gods are dead – the older gods have returned!”
I thumped my hand against the wall in anger, expecting it to hurt. Instead the soft wall absorbed my brutality with a dull thud that seemed to last most of the day. “Who the hell are you?!” I demanded.
“My name is Nyarlathotep.”
“Nye who?” The first part of his name definitely sounded Welsh but the last part was a bit of a puzzle. He didn't answer but simply stood staring at me with a slight grin on his face, as if staring down at an interesting insect, knowing its doom was not far off.
“Nye who?” Again he simply stood there, as if deliberately testing my patience; provoking me passively from behind his frozen face.
“I said 'Nye who'?” I was almost yelling now. This time he smiled, showing shockingly white teeth that contrasted starkly with his ebony skin. He shook his head from side to side, openly mocking me.
I could no longer contain my anger and lunged at the man. But the distance between us opened up until it was vast, uncrossable. I felt dizzy, as if I was looking down from a great height and my body was rebelling against it. My anger was useless, I realised. I tried to think clearly and struck on the idea of performing an everyday task, to try and pull myself back from the brink. My hands felt too heavy to be of any use so I decided to ask a question. A normal, everyday question.
“How long before we reach ...?” I had meant to say Swansea but my mouth formed a series of sounds and syllables that seemed to get tangled within each other. I uttered a a word that seemed impossible, that my mind could not grasp and that my memory rejected.
The dark man smiled. “Soon,” he whispered in a booming voice.
I staggered back out into the carriage vestibule and leant my forehead against the cool of the glass. I panted like a thirsty dog on a baking hot day.
The train roared through a small station at enormous speed. Several filth-caked things could be glimpsed reeling and flopping on the platform in the semi-darkness.
As the train rounded a bend, the silver sliver of the River Tawe visible below us, it barely slowed at all, the metal wheels screeching in protest. As the distance was eaten up, I caught a glimpse of the station ahead through the window. It had changed. I knew it would have. It had grown enormously and towered ahead of us, like something made from splinters of diseased glass or broken pieces of bad, old dreams.
I braced myself against the door, closing my eyes against the vertiginous speed. My insides felt as though they were being torn out. Screams reached me from elsewhere in the train.
The train finally halted with a sound like a hundred huge hammers pounding on a steel skull.
I felt the stranger's hand on my elbow. It was ice cold. “Come,” he said. I opened my eyes and looked at him. The door at our side folded or melted – or something between the two – but suddenly it was no longer there. I stepped onto the platform, glad to be still for just a moment. A long, precious moment when I thought, stupidly, that everything might be all right.
A sound like a hundred corrugated metals huts being torn apart by a huge machine came from behind me. The appalling sound drew my attention and I glanced over my shoulder. The train was crumbling in upon itself like a dried-up old leaf.
I turned to the strange, dark man, who was now a yard or two ahead of me. “What about the other passengers?”
“Surely it's traditional to bring offerings on a pilgrimage?” he said, coldly.
I knew then that I wouldn't be returning from this place, this city that was no longer a city but merely wore the face of one. I prayed to God – whichever god was listening in this unearthly place – that my daughter would be safe.
I couldn't pretend to be sad to leave behind a world so rotten that it had allowed me to do the things I had. But I did grieve for little Rose, growing up without her father. Then again, maybe she'd be better off out of my poisonous clutches; maybe she'd grow up clean.
Several dark shapes lay, groping eyelessly along the platform across from where I stood. The dark stranger turned to me and, in a voice that turned the air chill, said “Fellow pilgrims.”
The sky above the station had turned bright copper, the unclean light seeping down the station walls and bleeding onto the platforms. It
was just inches from my feet now. But they felt like lead, unable to move even an inch.
When the light reached me, a shock ran through my body, stealing my breath away and making me sweat as if I was fevered. My innards clenched. It passed in a few seconds; I became aware of the taste of vomit in my mouth and a warm dribble of semen trickling down my leg.
Behind me I could hear his voice; it came from the bottom of a million-mile deep well. “This is an old land – I was here before, long ago. But this time I will create it anew. It begins now ...”
A keening sound like the wind forcing itself into the narrow spaces between buildings filled the station. My feet were forced forward, moving me to the end of the platform alongside all the misshapen creatures. God only knew what our future held ... or if we had any sort of future at all.
Slowly, heavily my feet inched forward. Though my face remained impassive, deep within me the remains of my soul screamed as the station exit opened like a huge maw, ready to swallow me.
SONG OF SUMMONING
Brian Willis
PREFATORY NOTE – When Professor Colin Vernon was compiling his authoritative critical biography of the (hitherto largely forgotten) English composer Edward Raphael Holt (1764-1805), it was, as he noted, a source of considerable frustration for him that, in a career otherwise meticulously recorded by way of diaries and letters, one period in Holt’s life remained a mystery; the period covering Holt’s residence in Wales between September 1801 and his ‘breakdown’ (to use the modern parlance) and subsequent return to London in early 1802.
Since the publication of Professor Vernon’s book (‘Edward Raphael Holt; The Genius Muted’ , Oxford University Press, 2007), there has been a resurgence of interest in this lost, forlorn figure of the English Romantic movement. A season of his music was programmed last year at the Barbican; a documentary on his life was broadcast on BBC4; and there is talk that Sir Simon Rattle is to record at least one of his symphonies.
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