The Burrowers Beneath

by Brian Lumley

  “Talking of elementals”—Crow entered the conversation—“you say that many of the earth-types rot in water. Now, you say it as if you’d actually seen such a … a dissolution—but how can you be sure?”

  “Dissolution, you say. Hmmm,” Peaslee mused. “No, more an incredibly rapid catabolism, I would say. And yes, I have seen such a thing. Three years ago we hatched an egg at Miskatonic.”

  “What?” Crow cried. “Wasn’t that a very dangerous thing to do?”

  “Not at all,” Peaslee answered, unflustered. “And it was quite necessary. We had to study the things, Crow—as much as Earthly knowledge would allow. We still are studying them. It’s all very well to theorize and conjecture, but practice is the only sure way. So we hatched an egg. We’ve done it often since then, I assure you! But this first one: we had it in a large boxlike room, a pentagonal room with an imprisoning device set in the center of each of the five walls. Oh, the thing was well and truly prisoned, both physically and mentally; it could neither move from its room nor communicate with others of its kind! We fed it mainly on soil and basaltic gravel. Oh, yes, we tried it on the flesh of dead animals, too, which produced a hideous bloodlust in it—and so it was obviously safer to feed the thing on minerals. At only six months old the creature was as fat as two men around and nine feet long; like a great gray ugly squid. It wasn’t full-grown by any means, but nevertheless we were satisfied that it was at least big enough to accommodate our experiments. We had a good idea that water might do the trick. Even old Wendy-Smith—” he paused momentarily to peer with horror-shrouded eyes, nonetheless wonderingly, even calculatingly, at the now faint stains on the floorboards—“knew that much, and so we left the water-test until the last. Acids didn’t seem to worry it in the slightest, or any but the most extreme degrees of heat—and we used a laser! Nor, as we’d expected, did pressure, shock, or blast affect it; even powerful explosives set off in contact with the thing didn’t bother it unnecessarily, other than forcing it to fill in the gaps blown in its protoplasm! Water, though, did the trick beautifully. But before that there was one other thing we tried, and it worked so well that we had to stop the treatment or simply kill the thing off out of hand.”

  “Oh?” Crow questioned. “Might I hazard a guess before you tell us?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Radiation,” my friend said with certainty. “The thing did not like radiation.”

  Peaslee seemed surprised. “Quite correct. But how did you know?”

  “There are two clues,” Crow answered. “One, the eggs of these creatures are shielded against radiation; and two, there was that which Sir Amery—or rather his brain in that monstrous body—told us before he … it … died.”

  “Eh?” I cast my mind swiftly back.

  “Yes,” said Crow. “He said that we might ‘try Ludwig Prinn on Azathoth.’ And of course Azathoth is the ‘Nuclear Chaos’ of the Cthulhu Cycle.”

  “Good,” said Peaslee, obviously appreciative of my friend’s grasp of the matter, “and do you know the passage in De Vermis Mysteriis to which Wendy-Smith referred?”

  “No, but I’m aware that there’s a so-called ‘invocation’ in the book for raising Azathoth temporarily.”

  “There is indeed—” Peaslee nodded his head grimly—“one which bears out your theory—and that of the Wilmarth Foundation, incidentally—that the ‘magic’ of the Elder Gods was in fact super-science. It is a spell invoking the use of an unspecified metal, one which, to use Prinn’s own words, ‘may be found only by the most powerful use of extreme and dangerous thaumaturgies.’ He even gave the required amount of this metal, but in cryptic terms. We sorted out his symbols, though, using the university computer, and discovered his principal measurements. The rest was easy. Prinn had in fact specified a critical mass of highly fissionable material!”

  “An atomic explosion!” Crow gasped.

  “Of course,” Peaslee agreed.

  “But there are many such ‘invocations’ in the great Black Books—the Necronomicon and others of its kind,” Crow protested.

  “Yes, and some of them are vocal neutralizers of the mind-prisons of the Elder Gods. In most cases, thank God, their pronunciation is a veritable impossibility. Yes, we can count ourselves as damned lucky that the ancients, particularly Alhazred, didn’t have a system of getting the pronunciation of many of these things down on paper—or papyrus, or stone, or whatever. Also, it’s fortunate that man’s vocal cords are not naturally given to the use of such alien syllables!”

  “But wait,” Crow cried in apparent exasperation. “Here we have decided that Azathoth is nothing more than a nuclear explosion, a destructive device against the CCD. But surely he was the original leader of the Great Old Ones, including Cthulhu, in their rebellion against the Elder Gods? I don’t follow.”

  “Don’t take the old writings too much at their face value, Titus,” the professor told him. “For instance: think of Azathoth as he/it is described—‘an amorphous blight of nethermost confusion which blasphemes and bubbles at the center of all infinity’; that is, central in time and space. Now, given that time and space support each other’s existence, they therefore commenced initially simultaneously; and because Azathoth is coexistent with all time and conterminous in all space he was there at the beginning! This is in effect how he became the first rebel—he altered the perfect negative-structure of a timeless spacelessness into the chaotic continuum which we have today. Consider his nature, Titus: a ‘nuclear chaos.’ Why, he was—he is—nothing less than the Big Bang itself, and to hell with your Steady-State theorists!”

  “The Big Bang,” Crow repeated, patently in awe of the vision Peaslee had conjured.

  “Of course.” The professor nodded. “Azathoth, who ‘created this Earth,’ and who, it is foretold in books predating mere man, ‘shall destroy it when the seals are broken.’ Oh, yes, Titus—and this isn’t the only mythos that has us going in flames next time!” He paused to let this last sink in, then continued:

  “But if you insist on looking at the Cthulhu Cycle literally, without admitting this sort of cryptic reference, them consider this: following the failure of their rebellion, the Great Old Ones were served punishments. Azathoth was blinded and bereft of mind and will. Now, a madman is unpredictable, Titus. He rarely recognizes either friend or foe. And a blind madman has even less recognition. How unpredictable, then, a blind, mad chaos of nuclear reactions?”

  While Peaslee had been talking, it had grown plain to me that something else was bothering Crow. He let the professor finish, then said:

  “But listen here, Wingate. I accept all you say, gladly; I thank our lucky stars that you’re here to help us out of a hole—but surely all we’ve done up to now is alert the CCD of your presence! All this talking, particularly what’s been said about water and atomics as weapons—surely we’ve been giving the whole show away?”

  “Not at all.” The erudite Peaslee smiled. “True, in the beginning, when the Foundation first got started, we did give lots of information away in this manner—”

  “What manner?” I cut in, having been lost by the conversation. “Do you mean that the Cthonians can listen in on our discussions?”

  “Of course, Henri,” Crow answered. “I thought that was understood. They’re good at ‘receiving’ as well as ‘sending,’ you know!”

  “Then why didn’t they know where we were without first having to find you in that dream last night? Why didn’t they pick your plans to come down here to Henley right out of your mind?”

  Crow sighed patiently and said: “Don’t forget that we have had the use of certain protections, Henri—the Tikkoun Elixir, the Vach-Viraj Incantation. Nevertheless,” he continued, frowning, “that’s just exactly what I was getting at!”

  He turned to Peaslee. “Well, how about it, Wingate? Here in the houseboat, while admittedly I’ve been using the Vach-Viraj Incantation pretty regularly, well, we’ve lately run out of the Tikkoun Elixir. So what’s to have stopped the Ctho
nians from listening in on up?”

  “These devices you mention are poor protections, my friend,” the professor answered. “Perhaps they helped a little, but obviously the burrowers were still getting through to you—both of you—at least partially. It’s my guess that they’ve known where you were all along. They are not getting through now, however, as witness your alert minds and, despite lack of sleep, your newfound feelings of psychic and physical freedom. Now listen:

  “As I was saying, when first the Foundation got under way, we did give away lots of information in this manner, and with the passage of time the would-be hunters almost became the hunted!

  “In 1958 no less than seven recruits of the Wilmarth Foundation met untimely, unnatural deaths, and the remaining members immediately sought protection. Of course, it had long been known that the star-stones of ancient Mnar formed the perfect barrier—certainly against their minions, to a lesser degree against the CCD themselves—but these stones were so few and far between, and usually only accidentally acquired. A definite source of supply became imperative.

  “In ’59 Miskatonic’s kilns actually commenced manufacturing the stones—or rather, soapstone-porcelain duplicates—a process perfected by our young Professor Sandys, and by 1960 all members of the Foundation were equipped with them. The very first man-made stones were useless, by the way, but it was soon discovered that by incorporating fragments of a few damaged original stars in the composition of the manufactured ones, that as many as a hundred new star-stones—each as effective as the originals—could be made from one of the old!”

  Peaslee paused here to dig into his great briefcase. “Here, by the way, are the reasons you no longer have anything to fear from the Cthonians, neither physically or mentally … so long as you’re careful, that is! Always remember—they never stop trying! You must carry these things wherever you go from now on, but even so you must try not to venture anywhere below the surrounding ground-level. I mean that you’re to keep out of valleys, gullies, quarries, mines, subways, and so on. As I’ve said, you needn’t fear a direct attack, but they can still get at you indirectly. A sudden earthquake, a fall of rock—I’m sure you follow my meaning.”

  He produced two small packages which he carefully unwrapped, passing the contents of one to Crow and the other to me. “I have many more of them. These two, however, are yours personally from now on. They should keep you out of trouble.”

  I examined the thing in my hand. It was of course a star-stone, featureless, gray-green; the thing might easily have been a small, fossil starfish. Crow, too, gave his stone a thoughtful examination, then said: “So these are the star-stones of ancient Mnar.”

  “Yes,” Peaslee agreed. “Except you couldn’t call these stones exactly ancient. They are samples from Miskatonic’s kilns—but for all that, they’re just as powerful as the real things.”

  Crow carefully placed his stone in the inside pocket of his jacket, hanging by his bunk, then turned to thank Peaslee for what could only be called a priceless gift. He followed this up with: “You were talking about the Wilmarth Foundation and its work. I was very interested.”

  “Of course,” the professor agreed. “Yes, we’d better get through as much as we can of basic explanations and details tonight”—he glanced at his watch—“or rather, this morning! We’ll have to be on our way later today. Now where was I? Ah, yes!”

  “Well, 1959 was a momentous year for the Foundation, for as well as our discovery of a means of manufacturing these protective devices, we also sent out our first real expeditions since the thirties. The new expeditions were, though, less well advertised—almost secretive, in fact, and necessarily so—and fronted with fictitious objectives. We were particularly interested in Africa, where it was known that at least one Cthonian species—namely the kith and kin of Shudde-M’ell—were free and roaming loose. There, on the borders of that region explored by the ill-fated Wendy-Smith Expedition, our horror hunters discovered two tribes whose members wore about their necks exhumed star-stones, protections against ‘evil spirits.’ Their witch doctors, the only members of the tribes allowed into the taboo territories, had been digging up the stones immemorially, and the Mganga with the greatest number of stars to his credit was reckoned a very powerful witch doctor indeed! Witch doctors, it may be added, did not have a great life expectancy in that area. Inevitably they would dig where they ought not!

  “Incidentally, this ritual collecting of the star-stones explains Shudde-M’ell’s original escape from those prisoning environs, and how his brethren were liberated to pursue their aeon-old policy of regeneration, infiltration, and their efforts to free even worse horrors throughout the world. The throne-nest had remained in G’harne for some time after the general exodus, it seemed, but it was members of that nest that followed Wendy-Smith back to England. Now, of course, as you are only too well aware, England has its own loathsome complement of the Cthonians.

  “Wendy-Smith was a bit confused as to their propagative rate, though. He speaks of ‘hordes,’ then of ‘extremely slow procreative processes.’ In fact, the creatures are slow in reproducing—but not all that slow! We can reckon on a cycle of thirty years, with a female laying two to four eggs at a time. The trouble is that once they’ve reached this thirty-year stage of maturity they can lay every ten years. By the time a female has reached her century she may very well have littered thirty-two pups! Fortunately, so far as we’ve been able to ascertain, only one in every eight of these monstrous ‘children’ is female. I rather fancy that one of the G’harne eggs which Wendy-Smith unknowingly took was just such a female!” The professor let this ominous thought sink in, then added: “Overall, I should think we can take it that some hundreds of the beings are now alive and spreading.”

  “This is fascinating,” Crow murmured. “How do you track them down, Peaslee—what system do you employ to detect the beasts?”

  “Initially, as your English professor suggested, we tried specialized seismological equipment, but the system wasn’t accurate enough. For example: how might one tell a ‘natural’ from an ‘unnatural’ tremor? Of course, we also have a worldwide news service, and our headquarters at Miskatonic is ever on the lookout for inexplicable disappearances or anything else suggesting the involvement of the CCD. For the last few years, though, we’ve been using people gifted as you yourself, Crow, are gifted.”

  “Eh?” My friend was taken aback. “Gifted like me? I fail to see what you’re getting at, Peaslee.”

  “Why, your dreams, my friend! Even though you were not then ‘on the books,’ as it were, of the CCD, still you picked up impressions from their monstrous minds. To a degree—certainly on the Cthonian thought-levels—you’re telepathic, Crow! And, as I’ve said, you’re not alone in your ability.”

  “Of course,” I cried, snapping my fingers. “But that explains why I came back from France, Titus! I could sense that something was wrong; I knew that somehow I was being called back to England. Furthermore, it explains my moods of depression in the weeks prior to your inviting me in on this thing—I was picking up the echoes of your own gloom!”

  Peaslee was immediately interested, and made me relate to him all of my doom-fraught sensations throughout the period leading up to my return from Paris, “as though drawn back,” to London.

  When I was done, he said, “Then it seems we must acknowledge you, too, de Marigny, as being something of a telepath. You may not be able to project your thoughts and emotions, as Crow here obviously can, but you can certainly receive such sendings! Good—it seems that the Foundation has recruited two more extremely valuable members.”

  “Do you mean to say,” Crow pressed, “that you’re using telepaths to track these creatures down?”

  “Yes, we are. It is easily the most successful phase of all our operations,” the professor answered.

  “And yet—” Crow seemed puzzled—“you haven’t discovered the whereabouts of R’lyeh, Cthulhu’s seat at the bottom of the sea?”

  “What? Y
ou surprise me!” Peaslee seemed shocked. “Do you really think we’d risk men by asking them to contact Cthulhu?” He frowned. “And yet, in fact … there was one of our telepaths who took it upon himself to do just that. He was a ‘dreamer,’ just like you, and he was on a nonaddictive drug we’ve developed to induce sleep. But on one occasion, well, he didn’t follow orders. Left a note explaining what he was trying to do. All very laudable—and very stupid! He’s in a Boston asylum now; hopeless case.”

  “Good God … of course!” Crow gasped as the implications hit him. “He would be!”

  “Yes,” Peaslee grimly agreed. “Anyhow, this method of ours of using telepaths didn’t evolve properly until two years ago, but now we’ve developed it fully. I flew over here yesterday in the company of one of our telepaths, and later today he’ll be off to look up a British colleague … a pilot, ostensibly in ‘Ordnance Survey.’ They’ll hire a small airplane, and tomorrow or the day after they’ll start quartering England, Scotland, and Wales.”

  “Quartering?” I asked.

  “It’s our term for dividing into a series of squares an area to be ‘prospected,’” Peaslee explained. “David Winters—that’s the telepath’s name—can detect a CCD up to a distance of twenty-five miles; he can pinpoint them from five miles away! In a matter of a week or two we’ll know the location of every nest and each individual horror in all three countries—if all goes according to plan.”

  “And Ireland?” I asked.

  “We have no reason to believe that the Emerald Isle has yet been invaded,” the professor answered. “Ireland will, though, be checked over at a later date.”

  “But they can move!” Crow protested. “By the time your telepath has done with his job, his early, er—sightings?—could be a hundred miles away from where he first plotted them!”

  “That’s true,” Peaslee agreed, unperturbed, “but we’re after numbers, mainly, and large concentrations. We have to know the best spots to start drilling, you see?”