The Madness of Cthulhu Volume 2

by Joshi, S. T

  Went down a shaft—is “down” right word? There isn’t really a “down” here. Went along shaft that led us along a continuous passage. Possible maintenance catwalk? Different chambers are separated by RFID-sealed doors. Tenebrae’s computer system is friendly enough to be able to adapt to our signals and recognize what we’re trying to do. I’ve already written a program for our pads that can open/close any door in the Object, but couldn’t make any headway in deciphering the larger network behind the door protocols.

  Passage led to chamber of unknown dimensions, too dark and big to see the walls with our flashlights. First part of chamber is filled with tall hexagonal columns of same unknown black material as rest of Tenebrae. These columns all thrust up and down like cylinders in an engine, each with their own separate rhythm. There is a tangible electric charge in the air. Also very loud roaring noise, possibly from mechanism behind columns. Registers at about 109 dB, mostly on bass frequencies. We all found the sound disconcerting on some physical level. Made me feel a little nauseous.

  Walkway continues past column array and extends far enough into blackness that the mechanism noise is no longer audible after a bit of a walk. Walkway comes to an abrupt stop. Only total darkness. Can’t imagine the function of it, possibly uncompleted or intended to connect with a transport device that we haven’t discovered. We stood there in the darkness and shined our flashlights, ran sonar scans, nothing out there as far as we could see. Takeda said he could hear/feel something subsonic, but my instruments didn’t pick it up and the rest of the group couldn’t hear it either.

  TAKEDA’S JOURNAL—

  MISSION TIME 06152

  Something about that noise, dancing on the edge of hearing. It made my skin crawl and made me sweat. As if it skipped my ears, my body, and went straight to my unconscious, whispering to my brain stem without letting me in on the secret. It was coming from somewhere in the darkness, and I was very aware that we were standing on a thin strip of solidity in the midst of absolute nothingness. For a moment I imagined that the room was as big as the universe, a whole universe of nothingness, nothing out there except that sound.

  Everybody else says they heard nothing, but I know what I felt.

  BIOBOT REPORT AGGREGATION—

  MISSION TIME 07300

  127 walked along a passage approximately five kilometers in length. The walls are perfectly square and the passage turns at perfect right angles at random intervals, sometimes going up or down. Passage is a dead end with no exits. Map attached.

  303 discovered a large ovoid chamber approximately 1 kilometer long. In the center of the chamber is a deep ovoid reservoir filled with pure water. Ripples on the water’s surface indicate that something is moving underneath, but 303 is not equipped for water exploration so no further data could be compiled.

  082 has become stuck in a passageway. The passageway decreased in size as it moved forward, eventually becoming too small to allow further travel. When it turned around, it discovered that the passageway it had traveled along was now decreasing in size in the same fashion until travel in that direction became similarly impassable. It turned around and headed back only to discover the same effect. Et cetera. Escape seems impossible and it is estimated that it will take it three days to starve to death.

  486 through 534 have left the effective range of their transmitters and all communications have ceased. It is assumed that they continue to explore as per their commands.

  PERIMETER SECURITY CAMERA VIDEO FEED—

  MISSION TIME 09527

  (Brownbeck is kneeling in front of a wall. Just above her head there is a grate open in the wall. A bright orange glow issues from between the slats. This is the only light in the corridor. Brownbeck has her head and arms up against the wall, leaning on it.)

  BROWNBECK: Tell me. Tell me.

  (She looks up at the grate.)

  BROWNBECK: I have to know. You promised.

  (She pounds her fists against the wall. It makes no sound.)

  BROWNBECK: Goddamn it!

  (She slowly comes to her feet, her knees shaking beneath her, her hands pressed against the wall for support. She peers into the grate, her fingers going inside.)

  BROWNBECK: Please … where are you? Please …

  (The light goes out. Brownbeck pulls her fingers out and the grate snaps shut, soundlessly. Brownbeck collapses to her knees again, weeping.)

  MOSHIVE’S LOG—

  MISSION TIME 11145

  Vanhoven and Kellerman went missing. It’s been nearly 20 hours since we last had contact with them. Nobody saw them leave the camp or knows why they would have left. Perimeter video has nothing and their beacons either aren’t working or are out of range. They didn’t take any supplies with them.

  I’ve halted all investigation while we organize search parties for them. Reinyer’s leading a squad on horseformback. Everybody else is doing an on-foot sweep of the passages we’ve mapped. I’ll be behind at the camp keeping a close eye on everybody’s video feeds. Getting my crew back safe is my number one priority right now.

  SECURITY CHIEF ARNO REINYER’S SUIT-MOUNTED CAMERA VIDEO FEED—MISSION TIME 14309

  (Reinyer, Ngede, and Takeda are riding horseforms two abreast through a corridor lined with undulating archways.)

  NGEDE: I’ve got a theory about this place.

  REINYER: Go on.

  NGEDE: So the physics here are basically impossible. I mean completely outside the scope of what should be possible within the rules of physics we know. Meaning that the builders were maybe from somewhere outside the rules.

  REINYER: What do you mean?

  NGEDE: I mean like outside this universe. Not from a parallel universe or anything like that, just—outside.

  TAKEDA: That would actually explain a lot. This place makes no sense in any kind of cultural framework.

  NGEDE: There might even be some kind of extradimensional superstructure behind all this. We can only see this place in three dimensions—well, four if you count time—so there’s probably a whole level around everything here that we can’t even see.

  REINYER: If we’re from different sets of physics, doesn’t that mean we shouldn’t be able to exist in each others’ universes? Like trying to go out in a vacuum naked?

  NGEDE: It’s like a spacesuit then. A shell.

  TAKEDA: An entry point.

  REINYER: Then we’re walking into someplace we really shouldn’t be.

  (Takeda’s horseform rears up and emits a high-pitched whine. Takeda tumbles off as the horseform staggers around, its optical sensors wildly panning around, focusing and unfocusing.)

  REINYER: Takeda! You okay?

  (Reinyer jumps off his horseform to pick Takeda up off the ground.)

  TAKEDA: What the hell is wrong with it?

  (Reinyer’s horseform is also starting to malfunction. It jerks spastically, opening and closing its feedhole. Ngede’s horseform has seized up and is whimpering and refusing to move. She dismounts.)

  REINYER: Everybody get clear! Something’s wrong!

  (Reinyer grabs Takeda’s hand and pulls him up. Ngede starts to back away, watching her mount cautiously. Now all the horseforms are making the same high-pitched whine and staggering around.)

  NGEDE: Some kind of signal interference?

  (Reinyer looks over at Takeda. He is looking around nervously, searching the rafters for something.)

  REINYER: Takeda, what is it?

  TAKEDA: Nothing … I’m fine.

  (The horseforms’ skin is starting to quiver and bulge. The electronics packages inside are being forced up against their skin, forming rectangular lumps. Takeda’s horseform sprints in staggering bursts toward the wall and repeatedly bashes its head against it. Reinyer’s horseform’s legs quiver and collapse beneath it and it seizes and spasms on the ground. Ngede’s chirps shrilly and runs off down the hall into the darkness.)

  REINYER: Let’s all get out of here before that starts happening to us.

  (Horseform shrieks from o
ff-camera.)

  NGEDE: But they could still be alive out there! We could keep going a while on foot …

  MOSHIVE (on radio): No. Turn back. We can’t risk losing more.

  (Takeda’s horseform bashes its head hard against the wall and it pops open leaking gray slime. It slouches down lifelessly.)

  CATHEDRAL CAMP VIDEO FEED—

  MISSION TIME 14512

  (Moshive and the other remaining crew are gathered at the camp armed with electroguns, stuffing supplies into backpacks. Reinyer and the search party have returned.)

  MARSHALL: I’m so glad you guys made it back without the horseforms. There’s something going very wrong with the biobots. All the scoutforms have gone crazy, one of them got Rodriguez and … he didn’t make it.

  REINYER: I’m sorry to hear that. He was a good man.

  MOSHIVE: I can’t raise Tomasi either. We have four down now. We’re going to get out before we lose another. Grab what you don’t want to leave behind, we head out on foot for the Searcher in ten minutes.

  REINYER: We need weapons. What’ve we got here?

  MOSHIVE: There’s a stash of electroguns.

  REINYER: Not my favorite, but they’ll do.

  TAKEDA: Ngede, I’m scared.

  (Ngede puts her hand on his shoulder.)

  NGEDE: Come on. We’ve both lived through worse missions. Remember Cerulean? That was a mess.

  TAKEDA: Yeah, but this time … I’ve heard it. I know what Tenebrae is capable of.

  NGEDE: Heard what?

  TAKEDA: Like you said. Incompatible physics. The entry point.

  MOSHIVE’S JOURNAL—

  MISSION TIME 159??

  We’ve officially lost contact with the Searcher. It should have been back along this passage, but the further we went along it the further away the Searcher’s signal got. Now we’re I don’t know how deep in this thing. If we had any maps they’d probably be worthless. Also, all the video on our devices stopped working. No cameras, no pads, we’re wandering around blind here.

  We stick together, we watch each other, we sleep in shifts. Still don’t know why Vanhoven and Kellerman left the camp like that, so I can’t take the chance that somebody else is going to go crazy and wander off.

  I think the other biobots are out there somewhere. I hear scuttling from the walls around us sometimes. Hope Reinyer’s as good a shot as he says.

  It’s funny but right now I can’t stop thinking about how much I want some goddamn coffee.

  TOMASI’S JOURNAL—

  MISSION TIME

  The passages are changing, they have to be. I don’t see it but they have to be. I keep following the glowgel trail I left behind me trying to find the way out, but it doesn’t lead out anymore, it just leads deeper in.

  I think I saw myself. Like a ghost, all blurry and it walked right through me. Going the other direction following the glowgel.

  Another me. Three so far. Still following that glowgel. It’s me from the past I think. If I follow back where he went maybe I can get out of here.

  * * *

  I keep seeing them more and more. None of us can see each other. Just had a worse thought, what if it’s me from the future?

  Time collapsing in on itself. The glowgel is all me, ghost trail of me, looking for the exit. Exit’s gone. Time’s gone. All of us searching forever.

  AUDIO LOG—

  MISSION TIME ???######

  (Sounds of low bass thrum vibrating on regular cycles.)

  NGEDE: I think we’re getting further in. There weren’t rooms like this on the outer level.

  MOSHIVE: No, we came from this direction. I remember passing by this sound on the way in.

  MARSHALL: Still no trace of the home beacon.

  (Bass sound rises to overwhelm audio and then drops out.)

  BROWNBECK (screaming)

  REINYER: Somebody help me hold her!

  (Sound of struggle, grunts, cries of pain.)

  BROWNBECK: It’s (unintelligible)! It’s going to tell me! Let me go! I have to know! (Unintelligible.)

  MOSHIVE: Tell you what?

  MARSHALL: Jesus, just let her go! We’re going to—

  (Bass noise overwhelms audio.)

  BROWNBECK: It knows! It knows! (Muffled cries.)

  REINYER: That’s better. You hear that? The scuttling …

  NGEDE: I hear it.

  MOSHIVE: Load charges. Get those floodlights on.

  TAKEDA: Got it.

  NGEDE: Yes—

  (Bass noise overwhelms audio.)

  NGEDE: —EMF interference. Let’s get out of here. There’s a door ahead.

  REINYER: I’m not going to be able to drag her over that bridge.

  BROWNBECK: Back! We’re going the wrong way! It will tell me!

  MOSHIVE: Leave her.

  REINYER (yelps): She bit me!

  TAKEDA: Wait, wait, above us—

  (Bass noise overwhelms audio.)

  (Sound of screaming, heavy panting, rips, tears and thumps. Discharge of electroguns.)

  MOSHIVE: Here! Come here!

  NGEDE: —can’t make it!

  REINYER: God damn ugly smelly sons of bitches!

  (Discharge of electroguns. Screaming. Clattering.)

  TAKEDA: There’s another way here!

  REINYER: Go! I’ll—

  (Bass noise overwhelms audio.)

  MOSHIVE’S LOG—MISSION TIME

  ######################

  I keep telling myself there was nothing I could have done. Too many bots, not enough guns. I vomited all over my suit and I stink to high heaven with bot guts. I hope it’s all bot guts.

  Somehow I made it back aboard Searcher. I’m the only one. But I can fly her myself if I have to. There’s nothing to be done. I can’t wait for Ngede and Takeda. I have to get out.

  AUD#IO LOG--

  MISSI*ON TIME ???

  TAKEDA: I can’t see anything.

  NGEDE: Me neither. We must’ve been going closer to the center. Physics breaking down.

  TAKEDA: So where do we go from here?

  NGEDE: This is it. There’s nothing.

  TAKEDA: I can hear it. It’s getting louder. It’s this way …

  NGEDE: Take my hand, Takeda. Stay close.

  MO)s(VE’S L_G—

  MIScION T%IME????

  Been flying up and down this shaft for miles. I can’t find anything. No tunnels. No exit. It should be here but it’s not. No signals. Nothing. Back and forth for hours and hours at top speed and there’s nothing here and I’m just wasting fuel.

  I’ve got some coffee brewing and I’ve got the last five chapters of my book to finish. After that I’ve got one charge left in my gun. I’m going to die, I know. But I want to relax a little first.

  AU*O L__________

  MISS##?????????

  NGEDE: Takeda?

  TAKEDA: Yes?

  NGEDE: I can’t feel anything.

  TAKEDA: Where are you?

  NGEDE: I’m here. But I can’t feel you. Takeda, I think I can hear it now.

  TAKEDA: Where are you?

  NGEDE: I’m—I can’t—I can’t feel myself.

  TAKEDA: Keep it together, Ngede. Try and stay together. Remember … remember that double date we went on back at Orion Station?

  NGEDE: You got the blonde and I got the brunette. Nice cozy little cantina there, had good margaritas.

  TAKEDA: It wasn’t margaritas, it was manhattans.

  NGEDE: Manhattans … yeah. That brunette could knock them back like water. What was her name … ?

  TAKEDA: Mari.

  NGEDE: God, she was hot. And then you had the bright idea of sneaking out of the station in a little four-seater shuttle so we could watch the magnetic storms over the planet.

  TAKEDA: We had to pretend to be sober to get past security, and I was so afraid I’d start laughing and blow our cover. It was hard to calculate the trajectories while tipsy, but we did it.

  NGEDE: It was so beautiful, big arc
s of blue and green dancing over those swirling polar clouds. I took Mari’s hand and we watched together.

  TAKEDA: And then the sun set and it was dark, and we could see the purple aurora reflected in the ocean.

  NGEDE: Takeda … I …

  TAKEDA: Ngede?

  (Silence)

  ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

  I can’t feel myself, I can’t see myself, I’m not even sure if I still exist, if I’m even typing this or if I’m just going through the reflexes but there’s nobody there. I don’t know if the world outside still exists. I don’t know how long I’ve been like this. It could be five minutes or a million years. This place is so old. No, old isn’t the word for it. I can hear it more clearly. This place has no age. No time. It exists both inside and outside. And the more I go inside the closer I get to the outside.

  I can’t feel anything but I know I’m moving. Circling the center. I can’t walk away but I can’t get in either. Something is stopping me. But it seems to be getting weaker and weaker. Or maybe I’m changing. It says we/they can’t. The last remains. Not dead but unable to live. I know why I cannot feel myself. Why there is no light. No sound. They cannot live in it. Too vast to move through time.

  I can hear it in my soul, so big and lonely. So close. They need me to do what they can’t. It happened and they cannot happen, they are beyond happening. They are eternally beyond. Our world grew around them but they cannot live in it. I do not know if I am we or me. All the lines are becoming unclear. Perhaps it is already done. Perhaps this is all that’s left. I will keep writing as long as I can but I don’t know if anyone will read it. If there’s even anything outside to read it.

  I must do what we/they can’t. They can’t happen. I can cause to happen. They need me to do it. I am still me enough not to do it. I’ll try to stay together as long as I can. I don’t know how long that is. Instants are forevers here. Forevers are instants. I’ll keep writing. I’ll hold onto myself as long as I can. After that …

  I don’t know.

  NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

  THE EDITOR

  S. T. JOSHI IS THE AUTHOR OF SUCH CRITICAL STUDIES AS THE WEIRD Tale (University of Texas Press, 1990), The Modern Weird Tale (McFarland, 2001), and Unutterable Horror: A History of Supernatural Fiction (PS Publishing, 2012). He has prepared, corrected and annotated editions of H. P. Lovecraft’s collected fiction, poetry, revisions, and essays; with David E. Schultz, he is editing Lovecraft’s collected letters. His biography, H. P. Lovecraft: A Life (Necronomicon Press, 1996), won the Bram Stoker Award and the British Fantasy Award; it was published in an expanded and updated edition as I Am Providence: The Life and Times of H. P. Lovecraft (Hippocampus Press, 2010). He is the editor of the Black Wings series of Lovecraftian anthologies (published by PS Publishing and Titan Books).