Future Lovecraft

by Anthony Boulanger

  And inside? That darkness was warm and wet, vaguely like a mouth, she thought, though it contained no teeth. She drew her finger out and, though it felt wet, she could see that it was not. All the ocean in this little ornament, she thought, and closed her eyes. This was not her sunlit grain.

  The darkness belonged to Bolanle, as surely as the shadow man did. This thought came to Abeni upon waking. The day had not yet begun on the station; its crew slept on, tied to the rhythms of the ancient world that had envisioned this place. Did that world exist, still? Abeni often wondered, for to her, Earth was but a dream, a place for other generations. Her place was here, Aphelion in deep space, and she roamed its corridors barefooted, heading toward Bolanle.

  In Bolanle’s room, Abeni pulled her to the decking and showed her the pendant, cradled in both hands, opened, the darkness yawning. Bolanle stared. “This is for you,” Abeni said, and pressed Bolanle’s hand to the dark.

  Bolanle vanished. It was not a sudden thing; Abeni wished it had been. The woman disappeared bit by bit through the small opening of the pendant, as though she were a piece of paper, folded in on itself over and over. Bolanle shrieked once, as the shadow man ripped himself free from her then pushed her—pushed her as he might a boulder from a great height, hands and feet of abyss pressed against her backside—pushed her until only a toe remained poking out, and then that, too, was swallowed by the darkness. Abeni stared, expecting to see something—there was only that small, yawning circle of dark—then lifted her gaze to the shadow man, now crouched across from her.

  “Feeding me will not stop it,” the shadow man said. His voice was a terrible thing, the sliding of oil down Abeni’s throat, and she felt she would be sick. “If you plant all the nutmegs...there will still be the water. Even they cannot drink it all.”

  Abeni wondered if she could drink it all and the shadow man laughed. His laughter was like a flood—she wished for that field of grain, so the water might be stemmed, but it rushed onward, over her, into her. She was drowning now, in a water thick like oil, which filled her nose and mouth and ears, until she was mute and could only watch herself float away. In this floating, there was no peace, no peace until Aphelion, herself, bent under the pressure and exploded.

  Abeni’s hand snatched out to grab the shadow man. His borealis eyes went wide and she laughed, bubbles streaming through his oily flood. She latched onto his impossibly long arms and held to him, and then—

  He vanished as Bolanle had. Folded up on himself, until he could be folded no more, and poof! Abeni fell to the decking, the pendant rattling beside her. She half-expected Bolanle to be vomited out, but no, the pendant had closed and there was no Bolanle. Abeni grabbed the pendant and opened it, but even the small darkness has closed upon itself, no more than a pinprick within the metal. Abeni stroked a finger over it—oily wet—but it did not expand.

  She closed the pendant and stood on shaking legs, moving out of Bolanle’s quarters, toward the docking ring. Most of the station was still not awake, but merchants would arrive soon, early ships on clocks different from station time. Even now she could feel the slight vibration in the station as a ship docked. By the time she reached the docking ring, they were unloading and Abeni watched from a shadow. As the goods came onto Aphelion, the iyaloja wondered what else she might have let slip through. All these years, how many pendants? How many shadow men folded inside merchants? She saw nothing out of place, yet—until there, there! Her eyes went wide as a trio of shadows slid out of a shipping container over the wall, creeping upward on obscure feet.

  If you plant all the nutmegs....

  His words came back to her; Abeni shook them off. Of course, she could not plant all the nutmegs, for she lacked the soil—Or did she? Abeni’s mind turned to the place where she had awakened and that awful, fetid smell. Compost, she thought. Station waste. But he had said no—that even planting them would be of no use. She could not see what was coming, only knew there was something—something in these shadows that crept from the containers of distant worlds. What was Aphelion becoming gateway to? What?

  As Mother of the Market, it was her job to stop it. Abeni knew this the way she knew her own heartbeat, the way she knew she craved the light of a distant sun. Sunlight on grain, she longed for it—but no, not yet.

  Yes now, sweet Mother.

  The whisper startled her and the shadow man curled his hand around her throat. Abeni no longer felt inside the station; the docking ring and its cargo bays seemed far distant, only a smudge of light on the distant horizon. The shadow man pulled her backward, through stars and planets, through nebulae and across black holes. Flashpoint, she thought, and squeezed her eyes shut, but even then she could see the places he showed her and all their terrible creatures. The darkness writhed, reaching for her with questing limbs that were sun-warm and slick. Abeni could not breathe for the horror that spread before her, this rotting land with its dying gods. These creatures reached for her, for Aphelion, to live yet again though so many had forgotten.

  The sunlight here was sickly, throwing into shadow more than it illuminated, but she could see winged horrors moving within that light. Abeni tried to make sense of what she saw, but could not; she found that when she stopped trying, she could see more, more that made her want to shriek, but she had no breath, for the shadow man kept firm hold of her. She supposed, in a far distant corner of her mind, that he hoped to intrigue her. These goods, if they could be called such, were like none Aphelion had seen; wouldn’t the universe marvel that Abeni had found such wonders? Wouldn’t they herald Aphelion Station as the new dawn, the beginning of an entirely new life?

  Abeni wrenched herself free. She stumbled to the decking, hands smacking the metal before her shoulder could. She sucked in a breath and startled when she felt a hand touch her shoulder. She rolled toward the wall, expecting the shadow man, but it was a different man who stood there, the merchant Esmail, whom she slowly recognized. Abeni took his hand and pulled herself up.

  “Little Mother, are you well?”

  Her eyes moved past him, to the shadows that coated the walls of Aphelion Station. “I am not,” she said, seeing no reason to deny it. She was not well and neither was her station, but she wondered how both might be so, again.

  “You speak in riddles, Abeni,” Esmail said, after she told him of Bolanle, of the nutmegs, of the writhing darkness. She could not make better sense of all that she had seen, did not know how to stop what she felt coming. “You speak of things that are not so. These shadows do not move and nutmegs are but nutmegs.”

  The worst thing of it, Abeni decided, was not Esmail disbelieving her. It was that she longed for the things the shadow man had shown her. She wanted these creatures to come through Aphelion Station and make their mark upon it. How wonderful a discovery these great and terrible things. This corner of the universe had never seen their like. The curious child within Abeni responded to that, wanted to see these creatures in the light of the sun, wanted—

  No. What she wanted did not matter. She could not allow it. Would not. “Esmail, I need your help,” she said. “I need the containers of your ship and the compost of this station.”

  The shadow man said it would not matter, but Abeni moved forward, anyhow, claiming one cargo bay for her experiment. Sunlit grain, she wanted a forest of sunlit grain. She would have to make do with nutmegs and so, did, planting all that she had in the malodorous compost the engineers gave her with mocking smiles. They thought she had finally lost her mind, for nutmegs were not grown this way. The horticulturists told her the same, insisting she come to their deck to see how they did their work—one must splice, one must graft!—but no. Abeni paid to house her experiment within one of the cargo holds and waited, ignoring everyone who told her she was wrong.

  As the hold began to warm over the coming days, Abeni wondered if perhaps she was wrong after all, but something within her said to keep on. Never had she heard such an insistent voice and so, she tended the nutmegs as she might children, o
ften forgetting her normal duties as she walked among the growing trees. This could not be so, the arborists said, walking down the neatly planted rows; how could these poor nutmegs be growing as they were? Abeni did not know, but watched as they soared upward and reached for the ceiling with its artificial sunlight streaming downward.

  Harvest, and Abeni welcomed those who would see what she had grown. Esmail came to help her gather the nutmegs and it was he who opened the first of the pods to reveal the spice inside. Thus, it was Esmail who suffered the first horror as the creature unwound itself from the nutmeg and crawled out of the pod, latching onto the nearest arm. It was, after all, hungry, Abeni supposed.

  The creature was a thing she had seen in the writhing darkness, a dozen lashing limbs and one hungering mouth. As it suckled at Esmail’s arm, he staggered backward. Below his moan, the cracking of other pods was heard within the cargo hold. Beneath Abeni’s feet, the decking rumbled. She moved to the doors, knowing then that Aphelion was lost. All that it had been, gone. Her mistake. Her vain hope. She pushed the arborists into the main docking ring, sealing the cargo hold with herself and Esmail inside. All around them, pods broke open, creatures writhing to escape their confines.

  And then, the shadow man came and laughed in Abeni’s ear as he wrapped his arms around her. Abeni leaned back in his embrace, wanting to let these creatures out, wanting to show them to the world, and yet -

  “Told you, there will still be the water,” the shadow man whispered.

  She thought, Oh, but I miss the sunlight. “Let the water come.”

  The shadow man flooded the compartment with his warm, oil-slick water. Abeni felt herself float upward, amid the creatures who swam and seemed to grow within the disagreeable water. They moved effortlessly, bobbing and darting, swarming over what remained of Esmail, drifting closer to Abeni and the shadow man. She pressed closer to him, into his darkness and beyond.

  “Sweet Mother,” he whispered—and then his eyes flew wide.

  Abeni had reached beyond him, to the control panel, where slick fingers skimmed to vent the compartment. Water and creatures alike were blown outward, into the abyss beyond Aphelion Station, into the darkness between the stars. Abeni felt the shadow man release her, felt his scream as his children died, amid boiling water which then exploded in a shower of ice. Did it snow between the stars? That day, it did.

  And Abeni...Abeni reached until she could reach no more, and dreamed she felt sunlight trailing over her cheeks, her throat, and into the hollow of her fish-marked palm.

  for J., as always

  DARK OF THE MOON

  By James S. Dorr

  James Dorr has published two collections with Dark Regions Press, Strange Mistresses: Tales of Wonder and Romance and Darker Loves: Tales of Mystery and Regret, and has a book of poetry about vampirism, Vamps (A Retrospective), that came out this August from Sam’s Dot Publishing. Other work has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, New Mystery, Science Fiction Review, Fantastic, Dark Wisdom, Gothic.Net, Chi-Zine, Enigmatic Tales (UK), Faeries (France), and numerous anthologies. Dorr is an active member of SFWA and HWA, an Anthony and Darrell finalist, a Pushcart Prize nominee, and a multi-time listee in The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Up-to-date information on Dorr is at: http://jamesdorrwriter.wordpress.com.

  “HOUSTON,” THE VOICE crackled, “we’ve completed our separation. We’re starting our descent to Tsiolkovsky now.” Tasha monitored the transmission, only half-glancing at the flickering control panel screen as she fired her own rockets. She didn’t need to follow it word for word, anymore than she needed to check the adjacent monitor’s feed from Earth, with its pre-dawn view of the Moon’s hair-thin crescent—the dark of the Moon—just above the horizon to know, more than anyone else, what was happening. The voice was that of Gyorgi, her husband.

  “Commander Sarimov, we read you in Houston. All systems A-OK?”

  “Gyorgi Sarimov here. Yes, Houston. Tsiolkovsky’s below us, brighter than Tycho on your Earthside. Its central mountain—you’ll see for yourselves once Natasha has brought her C.M. to a higher orbit. Meanwhile, to north, we can see the Sun glinting off the peaks of the Soviet Mountains while, southeast of us, Jules Verne Crater, the Sea of Dreams....”

  Tasha heard NASA’s reply, mostly lost in static, perhaps a result of her shifting orbits, or, more likely, because the Command Module that she now piloted alone was itself passing behind the Moon. It would store the pictures that Gyorgi sent to it, waiting until it passed once more into sight of the Earth, where she could transmit them to the International Space Station and, thence, to Houston. But, for now, she could still hear Gyorgi’s voice.

  She shut her eyes. Listened.

  ...Fancies such as these were not the sole possessors of my brain. Horrors of a nature most stern and most appalling would too frequently obtrude themselves upon my mind, and shake the innermost depths of my soul....

  Why had she thought that?

  She thought, instead, of when she had first met Gyorgi, at what they then called the Baykonur Cosmodrome, over tea at the enlisted men’s mess. She was, technically, a civilian and he still in training, so that the officer’s sector was barred to them. Back when the U.S.S.R. still existed.

  Such horrors as she herself had experienced that dark night, when she’d felt a loneliness such as she felt now—separated from her then-future husband, with nothing that she could do. The night of the accident.

  And then she chuckled. Gyorgi had found the words now to speak to her, perhaps just in a whisper over the uplink. For her ears only. And Gyorgi remembered. He quoted to her, not the words that she had thought during the accident nor words of his own, but those of an American author, Edgar Allan Poe, from a story she’d shown him in Florida after he’d started his training with NASA.

  The story had had to do with a balloonist who’d gone to the Moon.

  ***

  When she began the transmission again, she already knew of the Lunar Module’s safe landing, of Gyorgi’s careful step out onto Tsiolkovsky’s smooth floor. She had seen, as if through his eyes, the other two follow: one man American, one a Frenchman. There would have been another American, too, in orbit in the C.M., had he not taken ill just before their launch window. She had been a last-minute substitute for him. In her mind’s eye, she saw herself still on Earth, standing outside in the dim, winter air to watch the nearly invisible Moon rise, where she would be, had it not been for Gyorgi’s powers of persuasion. And she thought that, in the imagination of another Frenchman, not far from where she and her husband had lifted off scarcely four days before, other lunar cosmonauts had launched themselves in a shell from a huge gun.

  So many authors, and not just Americans and Frenchmen, had been enamoured of the Moon for centuries. Even the namesake of her husband’s landing site, their own Tsiolkovsky, had written among his scholarly papers a novel, Outside the Earth. Others, too—Oberth, Goddard, the Englishman H.G. Wells—wrote fact and fiction about lunar travel or travel to planets beyond the Moon. Or, in the case of Wells and another American, Lovecraft, of alien beings beyond the Moon, who, turning the premise on its head, came to Earth to do evil.

  Horrors most stern and most appalling....

  Tasha shuddered. As if Mankind couldn’t do evil enough itself.

  She thought of Russia. Its people. Its sorrows. Its myths, also, though they, like the Western science-fictional myths filled with their own wonder, had helped bring her and her husband together.

  And now he had landed, part of the first expedition to the Moon’s far side. The side that was dark when you could look up and see the Moon—always faced out to space. And light when you couldn’t, so that now, when the Moon was hidden from Earth, Gyorgi had light by which to explore.

  “...We’re setting the cameras now on the crater floor.” This she brought up on the C.M. monitor to watch for herself, to compare the camera eye “reality” with such deeper truths as her mind’s eye might show her, again almost as if she might
see through his eyes. So well did she knew her husband, by now, and his way with descriptions.

  And she saw a graveyard....

  ***

  Her mind snapped back to the Baykonur Cosmodrome. To a metal table and glasses of hot tea. “You,” Gyorgi had said, “you know the myths, too, then?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “The Sun and the Moon. The stars their children. You, Cosmonaut-in-Training Sarimov, brought up in Krasnoyarsk”—they’d known each other that well by then—“are the image of Dazhbog, of the Sun.”

  He chuckled. She gazed at his sun-bright hair—her own was pale-brown, at best its dim shadow—as he smiled and answered, “Then you, Mechanical Engineer Tasha, must be that strangely named beauty ‘Myesyats’. Named as a man, yet entirely a woman, the Goddess-Moon.” He chuckled again. “You know, they were married.”

  She blushed. By then, they had slept together, but still...talk of marriage? She frowned as she answered, “True. They were married. But then he abandoned her.”

  Gyorgi laughed. “Yes. But the following springtime.... “

  And then, a week later, he did leave her, though not by his own choice. The KGB was still to be feared then and when, one evening, he didn’t show up with the others at the mess, she imagined the worst. She knew what he had been trying to do for her, to get her into the cosmonaut program. Fearing, to be sure, that as an engineer, she might at any time be re-assigned to some other location, something she didn’t wish to happen, either. But she knew, too, that, while Gyorgi had a way with his superiors, a way of usually wheedling successfully what he asked for, one could not push the system too far before it would push back.

  And that was when she’d found out how much she really loved him.

  ***

  “Houston, do you read? The cameras are working, but possibly, we’ve made a miscalculation. We’ve set down on the southern side of Tsiolkovsky’s central peak, since that’s where the ground seemed the smoothest, but as a result, our landing site is in shadow. Perhaps in a few days, when the sun has shifted somewhat....”