by James Palmer
“Previous life?” Burton murmured.
“This apparition you see from the corner of your eye is you from a previous life,” said Lady Helena. “It has attached itself to you due to your affinity for one another. It is you, and at the same time, not you.”
“How do I get rid of it?”
“You must face it head on,” said Lady Helena. “It needs to know, in no uncertain terms, that it is no more, and that yours is the only soul bound to this world.”
Challenger snorted laughter. Abberline groaned.
“Gentlemen, please,” said Burton, shifting in his seat.
“Lady Helena, how can I possibly face it, when I can’t even see it? It exists always in the corner of my vision.”
“You can face it directly on the astral plane,” said Lady Helena. “But the astral plane is in great turmoil this night. The conflagration that plagues the city exists both in this world and the next.”
“How do I get there?” asked Burton.
“The way is dangerous for those who have never traveled as the spirits do.”
“How do I get there?” Burton said again, more forcefully this time.
The medium acquiesced. “Very well. I can see you are determined. Perhaps you are strong-willed enough to survive the journey. Come.”
The old woman gestured to a low couch. “Lie down.”
Burton rose from his seat and laid himself upon the couch.
“Captain,” said Challenger. “We’re losing valuable time.”
“I have to see this through, Professor. I believe it is connected to the chaos outside, to Bulwer-Lytton’s cult, to everything.”
Lady Helena gasped. “Baron Lytton is behind this?”
Burton nodded. “Yes. He made contact with abysmal entities that live at the bottom of the sea.”
Lady Helena shook her head. “I have heard him speak. He is very knowledgeable in the area of Theosophy, and the Dweller on the Threshold is his coinage. But he seeks only knowledge obtained from the spirit world and ignores the wisdom and patience that comes from the material realm.”
“Help us stop him,” said Burton. “Help me confront my double and put an end to this madness.”
The medium nodded. “Very well. But I must warn you, the astral plane is no place for a novice.”
“Understood,” said Burton. “Now what do I do?”
“Close your eyes,” said Lady Helena, and he did so.
“Clear your mind. Concentrate on your body, how it feels. Flex your muscles, loosen them. Start with your toes and move up your body. Make sure every muscle is completely relaxed.
Burton did as instructed. This is similar to many meditation techniques, he thought.
“Breathe deeply,” Lady Helena intoned.
Burton felt something hard rest on his forehead.
“This is a quartz crystal,” said Lady Helena. “It will help control your vibrations and protect you while on the astral plane. Continue to breathe. Focus on your breathing.”
Burton continued to follow her instructions, slipping into a familiar hypnotic state. Everything and everyone around him felt very far away and inconsequential.
“Now concentrate on moving your toes, your fingers, your arms. But not your physical body, your mental one. Your spiritual one.”
Burton felt his fingers flex independently of his actual fingers. A warm vibration spread out through his body, starting from the quartz crystal resting on his forehead and radiating downward. It was quite pleasant.
Burton began to feel light, like a balloon. He bobbed up and out, twisting around to see his body lying on the couch, Lady Helena, Challenger and Abberline kneeling beside him.
His astral form grinned, and he turned and rose up through the ceiling and straight into a dark abyss.
The Dweller on the Threshold
Captain Richard Francis Burton stared into the abyss, and the abyss also stared into him. The blackness was vast, without light or heat. The nothingness went on forever.
He felt the presence of someone behind him. Burton turned, afraid the apparition would depart like all the other times. But this time, instead of fleeing to the periphery of his vision, it held still.
Burton regarded the figure carefully, his heart pounding, his throat tightening. It was him. The Other Burton. The feeling was like that of looking in a mirror, save for the permanent scowl on Other Burton’s face.
“You killed me,” said Other Burton, and Burton didn’t recognize his own voice, realizing that we all must sound different to ourselves. He was hearing himself for the first time as others heard him, and it was disconcerting.
“I did not mean to,” said Burton. “I am sorry, for you have lost so much. We both have.”
“Only one of us can prevail,” said Other Burton. “We cannot both exist. One of us is the lie; the other is the truth.”
“Agreed,” Burton said to his double, nodding. “But how do we decide which one?”
The Other Burton was silent for a long moment before raising a hand that now held a sword. He gave a cry of rage before lunging toward Burton, who moved out of his way just in time to miss the blade’s stinging arc as Other Burton attempted to embed the weapon in his right shoulder.
“Bismillah!” said Burton. “Wait. I am unarmed.”
“Only if you want to be,” said Other Burton as he lunged once more. This one Burton parried, surprised to find an identical sword in his hand.
“So that’s how it works on the astral plane,” said Burton as he counterattacked.
They danced back and forth for a couple of minutes, swords clashing, but neither Burton got the upper hand. Each version anticipated what the other was going to do.
“This isn’t going to work,” said Burton panting. He pulled back, tossing his blade aside. They had the same training and were equally matched.
The Other Burton regarded him. “We must duel to the death.”
“Why?”
“It is the only way to resolve the rupture in Time. The rupture that allowed their incursion into this world.” He gestured, and Burton felt a cold presence surrounding them, watching them. He looked, but just as with the Other Burton, he could only discern them indirectly, over his shoulder, behind him.
He felt naked and afraid, as if he were a microbe being examined under a microscope by intellects vast and cruel and unsympathetic.
“They were going to come anyway,” said Burton. “They were here before.”
Other Burton shook his head. “They came because of you. Isabel went missing because of you.”
“No,” said Burton. “What I did had nothing to do with her. I—”
He stopped. Could the Other Burton be right? It was something they had changed that caused Time to run along this deadly new course, a course in which Isabel had been in Hyde Park that day and had been snatched from his life. A course in which no mediums went mad. A course in which Edward Bulwer-Lytton started a Dagon cult and was now at war with London.
“I am sorry,” said Burton. “We have both lost so much. Isabel—”
“My Isabel!” Other Burton shouted. “Yours yet lives, in some other version of Time. In killing you, I will take your place, the time streams will merge, and I will have her back. And the world, my world, will no longer be filled with monsters.”
Burton could see the madness in his bloodshot eyes. How many sleepless nights had he endured? How many evenings did he spend stalking Hyde Park in search of his Isabel? The toll it must have taken on him. This poor man wasn’t the doppelganger. Burton was.
“Bismillah!” Burton swore.
He looked in the direction the stygian entities’ presence was strongest.
“Bismillah!” he swore again, raising his fists. Somewhere in the distance thunder echoed.
“You may be right about me,” said Burton. “But you cannot possibly know how the time streams, as you call them, will merge. Time may indeed be a river, but plotting its course is not like locating the source of the Nile. There wi
ll be ripples, eddies. Something else will change. Something you didn’t intend.”
Other Burton held his sword down at his side, pondering his words. “My fight is not with you. It is these otherworldly entities that caused this. They are the reason we traveled through time. They are the reason history is bifurcated.”
Burton regarded his double. “You said there was a rupture that allowed their return to this world. What did you mean?”
“Can’t you feel it?” said Other Burton. “It’s all around us now, growing in strength. The mediums felt it first, because they are sensitive to ethereal vibrations. Bismillah! I sound like one of them. There was a time I thought them mad. Now, I doubt my own sanity.”
“I know what you mean,” said Burton. “So this tear in Time is what has given rise to all this madness? Bulwer-Lytton’s cult, this sudden interest in the occult?”
“Yes, I think so,” said Other Burton. “It makes as much sense as anything else. I just want my time stream back, before we made a mess of it.”
Burton nodded.
“It was the artifact that did it, you know,” said Other Burton. “The object Miss Marsh showed us was the same one that was part of R’lyeh’s control mechanism. We smashed it.”
“Of course,” said Burton. “Smashing it in the past meant we could not have possibly seen it in the present. How could I have been such a fool?”
“How could we have been such fools,” Other Burton corrected. “It was the unresolved paradox that created the rupture. It is the rupture that gives power to Bulwer-Lytton’s infernal weaponry.”
“If we close the rupture,” said Burton, “we will stop Bulwer-Lytton. We’ll stop them all.”
“But what about Isabel?” said Other Burton.
“It might bring her back,” Burton offered.
“Perhaps.”
Burton watched in horror as the blackness around them resolved itself into chaotic indigo mists through which strange, not even remotely humanoid shapes toiled.
“They are here now,” said Other Burton. “On the astral plane. They intend to finish us. Punishment for not doing their bidding.”
“How do you know this?”
“They shout at my mind through the crimson mists,” said Other Burton. “Our previous contact with the shoggoth in R’lyeh primed our minds for them, and them for us. Can’t you feel them?”
Burton didn’t know what he felt. An eerie feeling of something wet pawing on the back of his neck.
“What do we do?” he said. “Can we die here?”
Other Burton shrugged. “I suppose I don’t truly exist, and you are merely the spirit form of your body back on Lady Helena’s couch. What have we got to lose?”
Burton took up his sword from where he had tossed it and grinned a savage grin that made him worthy of his nickname, Ruffian Dick.
“To heal the rupture, one of us must cease to exist.”
“You mean die,” Burton corrected.
Other Burton raked a hand through his beard. “I’m already dead. I am nothing but unused potential. I mean cease to exist.”
Other Burton spun around, confronting a large thing covered in lamprey mouths and indigo tentacles. He sliced at it with his sword, sinking the blade deep into one of its mouths.
“Go.” said Other Burton. “Now!”
Burton moved to help his doppelganger, but he felt a tug from behind. He looked over his shoulder and saw the thin white thread of energy that trailed off his back and into darkness. It was pulled taught, vibrating softly.
Other Burton lost his sword down the blasphemous maw of an amorphous spheroid entity. Burton tossed him his as he felt himself being lifted off the ground and pulled gently backward, away from Other Burton and the abhorrent entities that surrounded him.
Down and down he went, through colorless night. He had the impression that his eyes were shut, so he opened them.
Abberline and Professor Challenger were hovering over him, worried looks on their faces.
“Well?” Challenger barked. “What did you see?”
“Are you all right, Captain Burton?” said Abberline, helping the explorer to a sitting position.
“Yes, yes. I’m fine. “Stop fussing over me.”
“Did you find the Dweller on the Threshold?” asked Lady Helena, leaning in close. “Did you face him?”
“I did,” said Burton. He slid his legs over the edge of the couch and planted his booted feet firmly on the parquet floor. It felt firm and solid and real. “And it wasn’t some bloody astral spirit. It was me. The other me, from the time stream we changed. The one who’s Isabel disappeared in Hyde Park.”
“What the deuce?” said Challenger.
“It’s true. He told me how we altered the time streams. The artifact in the machine on R’lyeh. It was the same one Miss Marsh and Nemo found in the South Pacific. By destroying it in the past, I made sure that they never found it here in the present.”
“Bugger me,” said Abberline. “I need a drink.”
“Aren’t you on duty?” inquired Challenger.
“Yes, but what of it?”
“Help yourself,” said Lady Helena, gesturing to a sideboard in the corner.
They watched as the Chief Inspector got up and poured himself a brandy.
“You may all partake if you wish,” said Lady Helena to Burton. “You have been on quite a journey.”
“So what happened up there with the other Burton?” asked Challenger.
“It’s hard to explain,” said Burton, taking a proffered glass of brandy from Abberline and downing it in one gulp. “Our change created a rupture, a wound in Time itself. This rupture somehow empowered these entities to try and return, and powered the Deep Ones’ weaponry. The Other Burton sacrificed himself to the entities on the astral plane so that there would be only one Burton, me. Thus repairing the damage.”
“And what of Isabel?” Challenger asked softly.
Burton stared at the floor. “Gone. With the rest of that now nonexistent time stream. Oh, how I wish Herbert were here. He could make sense of this, if anyone could.”
“Where the devil is he, anyway?” asked Abberline. “A Time Traveler should have returned to the precise moment he left, should he not?”
“Perhaps he is smarter than all of us,” said Challenger. “If you had a bloody Time Machine, would you come back to this insanity?”
While Abberline mused on this, Burton got up and refilled his glass. “It’s quiet outside,” he said after taking a sip.
Lady Helena returned to her table, her eyes closed. “Yes. The ethereal vibrations have calmed. The astral plane is no longer a place of strife and turmoil.”
“That’s wonderful news for those on the astral plane,” said Challenger. “But what does that mean for us here in jolly old England?”
“It means the tide has turned,” said Burton. “The rupture in the time stream was what was powering Bulwer-Lytton’s esoteric weapons. Now, if he wants to burn this city to the ground, he had best do it the good old-fashioned way.”
“By Jove!” said Abberline. “We’ve got him now. We’ll send his army of fish demons back where they came from.”
“Let’s finish this, then,” said Challenger, his eyes seeking Burton’s. “What say you?”
Burton downed his brandy. “I say we’ve come this far. Let’s see it through to the end.”
It Was a Dark and Stormy Night
The East End was in Chaos.
People ran screaming, running from things that were not people.The smell of fish was overpowering, and twice Burton reeled in horror as one of the Deep Ones emerged briefly from the fog, brandishing some sort of lethal-looking trident made from that strange gold they had in great supply.
The weapons Abberline procured from the police storage facility evened the odds somewhat, and there were no more blasts of ethereal lightning from the esoteric weapons Bulwer-Lytton’s cult had received from the Deep Ones as advanced payment for their souls.
Chal
lenger, handy at the trigger, blasted into the crowd that came at them through the fog with much relish. Burton was more deliberate with his shots, wary of hitting anyone human. Bulwer-Lytton’s cultists had scarcely had time to begin mating rituals with the Deep Ones. For that, Burton counted his lucky stars.
By the time they entered the Cauldron the army had arrived, pushing people back and cordoning off the most dangerous areas, containing the cultists to the East End.
“We’ve got to push them back all the way to the docks,” said Challenger.
Burton nodded. “I think the army has the same idea.”
They moved along through the fog. It was rough going, but they were pushing the enemy back deeper and deeper into the East End.
They fought for over an hour, adrenaline the only thing keeping Burton going. At last they neared the London Docklands. Inhuman screams filled Burton’s ears, and he cringed at the sound. People were running everywhere, defenders and assailants alike. Bullets zipped all around their heads, and Burton and his companions took refuge behind an overturned cart, where Abberline assisted with reloading while Challenger hefted twin pistols, firing blind into the darkness. Hunched beside him, Burton caught a flash of yellow in the fog-shrouded, moonlit gloom. It darted into a wooden structure straddling the wharf.
“Cover me,” Burton shouted.
“What?” said Challenger.
Burton jabbed him in the ribs, pointing in the direction the yellow robed figure had gone. “Bulwer-Lytton.”
Challenger nodded and set about covering Burton’s path with copious amounts of lead.
Burton hunched down and ran after the figure, opening the door and following him inside.
The place was dark, safe for shafts of moonlight stabbing through slits in the rough-hewn planks that made up the structure. He heard water lapping at wooden pilings not far beneath him. Around him were dim outlines of barrels, boxes, and old fishnets strung about like immense spiderwebs. Burton caught an eerie glow coming from a stack of large crates and followed it.
Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton stood glaring at Burton, his dirty yellow robes flowing about him. He held a peculiar object in his hand, brandishing it like a pistol. It was a strange copper color, with a clamshell-shaped node that glowed with an eerie green light. That light made Burton’s guts go to water and his stomach seize.