by Aratare, X.
“You really think I’m going to die in this battle?” Johnson asked. His hands lingered on Gabriel’s waist. His touch was appalling. He had caressed Gabriel’s grandmother with those hands just the night before. Gabriel wanted to shake them off. He wanted to scream. But he reminded himself that Johnson was sick.
“Yes, I really do. And Jax and Marko, too, as I keep saying,” Gabriel said.
Four more minutes and they would be there.
No, Gabriel, you cannot be his! You cannot!
I’m yours, Casillus. Nothing can change that. But his life—
Is his to throw away! He will try to keep you in a cage! If the madness does not kill him, he will never let you go! But I will not either! I will kill him myself to save you! Casillus yelled.
Johnson gently touched Gabriel’s hair. “We’re going to spend a lot of time together after this, Gabriel. I’ll take care of you.”
“What?” No, you’ll be dead, Johnson, and I’ll be in the sea. “You’re letting me and my friends go if I call Cthu—it for you!”
“No, Gabriel. I can let your friends go, but you and Casillus … you have to stay with us,” Johnson said.
Gabriel jerked away from him then. He nearly toppled over but he caught his balance. “You’re changing the deal, Johnson!”
Three minutes away.
His heart thudded sickly in his chest. His mind offered images of himself and Casillus in tanks of water while scientists observed them, took samples from them, tortured them. Casillus had been right all along. Johnson couldn’t be reasoned with.
“We can’t have you going back to the Mers and telling them what we know,” Johnson said. His gray eyes were flat and expressionless.
“The Mer communicate telepathically, Johnson. So bullshit that you’re worried about us talking to them!” Gabriel yelled.
Aemrys knows his plans! Casillus cried. He has told our people. They will not let Johnson keep us!
No, they won’t, Gabriel realized with a chill.
“It’ll be war,” Gabriel said out loud. “You want a war with the Mers.”
“Without Cthulhu to protect them, I think the fight will be fairly on humanity’s side,” Johnson said mildly.
“And everyone who didn’t believe you when you told them that there was a threat in the ocean suddenly will, won’t they? They’ll have to admit that they were wrong about you. You’ll have their respect back and more. But that’ll only be because you will have created the threat, right, Johnson?” Gabriel snapped.
The former military man said nothing.
Johnson couldn’t be saved, or if he could, it would be at the expense of a war between Mer and humankind. The price was too high to save him. The stark fact sat there and Gabriel let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding. Johnson had to die so that many more would live. The decision was made.
Two minutes away.
I knew you would change your mind, my Caller, Cthulhu rumbled.
“You may have told the Mers much already, but you do not know everything.” Johnson grasped the final stone and carried it over to the empty corner. “We’re there, aren’t we, Gabriel? Where your parents’ boat went down? That’s where Cthulhu is, isn’t it? That’s what the scanners are telling us, anyways.”
They were there. He could feel Cthulhu below them. Waiting. Watching. Amused.
Gabriel began, “If you already knew where it was—”
“Cthulhu wouldn’t have stayed without you being on board, and you still need to Call it up, don’t you? Or will it come on its own?” Johnson asked.
I only come for you—my Gabriel—my Caller—for you—to kill the forlorn soldier, Cthulhu rumbled.
Yes, I know. I understand, Gabriel said.
“One minute to go,” Gabriel confirmed. “And Cthulhu comes only for me.”
It felt strange to say Cthulhu’s name finally, but also right. He had no fear now. No doubt. He would endure what was to come and have no regrets.
Gabriel, Casillus called to him softly. He hadn’t heard Cthulhu’s voice, but he felt what Gabriel did and knew that Gabriel had come to a decision.
Casillus, I need to close down our bond now, Gabriel said. I need to protect you.
I understand, Casillus said, and Gabriel did feel understanding over the bond, but he also felt Casillus’ anguish at not being with him, at having put Gabriel in an impossible position. You have decided?
Yes.
You will Call Cthulhu and Johnson will die.
Yes, Gabriel’s voice was softer.
It is the right thing. I … it is the right thing, Casillus said.
I know, Gabriel said. There is no other way. And it’s my decision, Casillus. Mine alone. Not yours. Not the Mers. Mine. I’m good with that.
I will never allow you to be harmed like this again. I swear it, Casillus said.
I—I love you, Casillus, Gabriel sent.
And I you, my Gabriel.
Gabriel winnowed down the bond, sending one last flow of love over it to the Mer. Then he said to Johnson, “We’re here.”
The boat’s motor revved down and then cut off. The sea was completely flat now. Like glass. It reflected the sky above them. Stars upon stars upon stars, and the moon was a bone white disc. It was a fitting battlezone.
“Will you Call Cthulhu now, Gabriel?” Johnson asked. He was standing over near the empty corner, stone hefted up on one of his massive shoulders.
“Yes, I’ve done all I can to save you,” Gabriel said while meeting Johnson’s gaze for the last time. He would think of this moment as the one when he said goodbye to the man. He looked over at Jax and Marko, too. They would die. His actions would cause that.
Gabriel then looked over the side of the boat. He could see the phosphorescent discs on Cthulhu’s tentacles moving beneath the water as the tentacles stirred through the water. They were no more than twenty feet below the boat’s keel. Gabriel reached out mentally to the monstrous being just like he did for Casillus. Cthulhu reached back.
For a moment, the world was blotted out and Gabriel thought he might have swooned. He was enveloped in a darkness so deep that it seemed like the very idea of light was not possible. And there was a bone-deep coldness, a bottom of the ocean cold that seeped into Gabriel’s body and chilled him to the core. He sensed that some memory of this coldness would always be with him. He would never feel completely warm again. The price a Caller paid. Suddenly Gabriel was aware of the world again, both above and below the water.
I Call you, Cthulhu. I Call you to strike down the Mers’ enemies.
I come, my Caller, I come … I come … I come …
The water frothed and bubbled as the monstrous creature rose up from the depths. The boat rocked wildly, nearly sending Gabriel onto his ass, but he grabbed ahold of the railing and held on. There were shouts from Marko and Jax, but not Johnson. The former military man seemed as unconcerned by the rocking as he would have been by waves in a bathtub. He kept his feet planted firmly and continued to balance the stone on his shoulder. Waiting and watching for his enemy to surface.
Gabriel’s eyes left him and fixed on the spot where he knew the top of Cthulhu’s bulbous head would break the surface. He would see it with his own eyes now. The water roiled as if it were boiling from heat, but there was nothing warm about Cthulhu. Gabriel wouldn’t have been surprised to see the water turn to ice.
And then Cthulhu burst through the water’s surface. It rose up and up and up and up until it blotted out the sky and was the only thing to be seen. A mountain growing out of the sea. A mountain of madness. Gabriel felt a thin trill of a scream whistle in the back of his throat as he looked at it.
Its skin was the color of an oil slick dotted with green-gold phosphorescent discs. Its countless eyes were the size of tires and glittered under the bone-white moon. Its tentacles spread out across the water like a writhing army of snakes large enough to crush a town with one swipe. A piping sound filled the air. Cthulhu was magnificent and terrible
and connected to Gabriel at the most intimate level.
He heard Marko and Jax scream then. Both soldiers were gripping their heads and screaming as if they were hearing an unbearable sound. Blood leaked from their ears, noses, eyes, and mouths. It would be over soon. Their brains would liquify and they would fall to the ground. Dead. All over soon. This was not a battle. Not even a slaughter. Cthulhu was a force of nature that could not be stopped. Knowing that the land tribe had faced this horror for their crimes, too, enabled Gabriel to forgive them. For this was the ultimate punishment. Nothing could be more horrible than this.
Gabriel’s head turned towards Johnson expecting to see the same terrible bleeding and dying. There was blood leaking from Johnson’s right eye, but he wasn’t screaming. He was smiling. He stared at Cthulhu with satisfaction. And then Johnson set the final stone down into the corner of the cabin.
Silence.
The piping and screams were suddenly cut off. Gabriel thought for a moment he had lost his hearing, but then he heard Marko and Jax moaning. But that moaning lessened soon. The goons’ hands left their heads. Blood droplets spattered the boat’s bottom as the goons blinked. They were coming back to reason. Gabriel realized that he could also hear the swish of Cthulhu’s tentacles in the water, too. But he couldn’t hear Cthulhu. Not the piping and not the monstrous being’s voice in his mind. He couldn’t hear Casillus either. Even with their bond winnowed down to its smallest, there had still been some sense of the Mer’s presence. But not now. There was an emptiness in Gabriel’s soul. He was cut off from Cthulhu and the Mers. He was truly alone.
“And now to free you, Gabriel,” Johnson said as he picked up one of the parchments and indicated for Jax and Marko to do the same.
The three of them began the incantation and it was Gabriel’s turn to scream.
9
LANDFALL
Gabriel fell to his knees and screamed as the chanting swelled in volume. His blood felt like it was burning inside his veins. The pain was so great it almost felt pure in some terrible way. His fingernails clawed at his arms and shoulders as if he could dig his own blood out to stop the agony it was causing him. In contrast, he didn’t feel the red welts that he scratched into his skin. He curled into a ball then, unable to remain upright.
CASILLUS! CTHULHU! He reached for them vainly over bonds that did not seem to exist. He was in a glass box, stopped on all sides from reaching out and from them reaching back.
Through the pain that cramped his body, keeping him in a curled ball on the bottom of the boat, he desperately strained his head around to look up at Cthulhu. Why wasn’t it attacking? Why weren’t Johnson and his men dead? Why wouldn’t the chanting stop? But in a second the answer to all those questions became painfully clear. The water was roiling around Cthulhu. Huge waves were rising up as the monstrous creature surged up and down, yet the boat was not moving. The sea around it was still. Calm. For fifteen feet in any direction from the boat, the seas were like glass. Outside of this oasis of calm, Cthulhu’s tentacles thrashed wildly in the air and water. The ocean outside this circle of calm looked like a sea of snakes.
Dozens of tentacles rose up and snapped towards Johnson and his goons, but they didn’t get closer than the line that cut the smooth seas from the roiling waters. It was as if there was an invisible wall. Every time that the tentacles hit this wall there was a burst of electric blue sparks. Cthulhu roared and it had Gabriel curling into a tighter ball and rocking from a new agony. It’s roar was like an avalanche of sound, like mountains grinding themselves to dust. He wondered why he could hear the roar, but not the trilling. Perhaps the trilling was just in his mind.
Then the sky above them suddenly flashed pure white, night turning to day. Brighter than the day. It was like the flash of atomic fire. At that moment, Gabriel remembered saying to Corey and Casillus that of all humankind’s weapons only nuclear weapons had a chance of destroying Cthulhu and here was that atomic blast.
The blackness that followed was complete or maybe Gabriel had gone blind for a moment. He didn’t know. He blinked his eyes again and again until finally the night sky returned. Gabriel realized that he was now lying on his back, looking up at the vastness. But something was very different than it had been before. There was a rent in the sky, a rift, a wound, and through this opening, Gabriel could see alien stars. They glittered redly and the darkness around them was somehow darker and seemed physically heavy. He feared that darkness might pour through the tear and splash down onto Earth, painting the world black.
The Outer Dark, something told him. They’re going to send Cthulhu back there. They’re really going to do it.
Gabriel turned his head to look at Johnson. The ex-military man’s head was thrown back. Gabriel could see his profile and it was glowing in the moonlight. It reminded him of an ancient Roman general’s bust. Jax and Marko did not look as triumphant. Sweat coated their pasty faces. Their hands shook like they were doddering old men and not the strong fit mercenaries they were. Jax’s hair was now gray and Gabriel did not think it was just from the moonlight. His gaze then slid past them to Cthulhu itself. Gabriel saw himself reflected in those dozens of eyes, which were as large as car wheels. Though he could not feel its thoughts or emotions, he knew that there was pain and rage pulsing inside of it.
If Johnson wins then he’ll take this fight to the Mers. He’ll imprison my friends. He’ll experiment on Casillus and me. Many, many people are going to die for no reason. I can’t let this happen!
Gabriel didn’t have a plan beyond getting to his feet again. He flopped back over onto his stomach and pulled his arms underneath his chest so that he could push himself up into a kneeling position. From there, he would grab the boat’s railing and haul himself up. But then Johnson, Jax and Marko’s voices rose again. The incantation was building to a crescendo. Cthulhu roared once more. Gabriel shook with the sound. His limbs thudded against the bottom of the boat.
Why doesn’t Cthulhu swim away? Swim away! Swim away! Swim away!
And then Cthulhu did begin to move. But not towards the sea, but towards land. It didn’t move like a mountain lumbering any longer. Now it was steaming towards the shore. It flowed around the boat, giving it a wide berth, as it headed for the beach. Cthulhu had clearly determined that if it was going down, it was taking the Eastern Seaboard with it. Gabriel’s choked “no” was completely lost against the boat’s fiberglass bottom. Johnson turned with a snarl that mixed with the chant as his eyes followed the monstrous creature.
“Get the engines started!” Johnson suddenly cried. “We have to go after it!”
Jax tried to move towards the steering column, but he fell to his knees. Marko went to help him up but then he fell down, too. They looked to have aged fifty years in the past fifteen minutes. Neither man could get up again. Only Johnson appeared unaffected by his exposure to Cthulhu. At least physically. There was complete madness in his eyes. Johnson jumped over the goons and the roar of the boat’s powerful engine suddenly came to life. Johnson slammed the boat into drive and it jumped forward like an eager dog on a leash. He piloted the boat in a wide circle to turn it around. He then pushed the throttle up to maximum power and they raced after Cthulhu.
Cthulhu’s back was more horrible than its front. It had ragged wings, which were spread wide like sails. They reminded Gabriel of a bat’s wings but moth-eaten. The rear of the squid-like head was bulbous and protruded like an obscene balloon. Its back was a mountain of oily blackness. But its hideousness did not slow it down. It moved as fast as a freight train towards shore.
At first, it seemed that Johnson would not be able to draw even with Cthulhu let alone get around it to the front and stop it from making landfall. But somehow the boat gave an extra lurch of speed and they gained upon the monstrous creature.
Johnson crouched low over the controls. Sea spray glistened in his short hair. Gabriel felt the spray all over his body and it soothed him. Without the chanting, he was able to get up onto his hands and knees
. The boat jumped beneath him and he had to hold onto a nearby low seat to keep from falling flat on his face again.
They circled around Cthulhu and Johnson once more stopped the boat. Now they were between the monstrous creature and land. But Gabriel knew that Cthulhu could just move further down the beach. It could outlast the fuel in Johnson’s boat. Johnson’s plan simply couldn’t work. Because in the end, his chant relied on Cthulhu staying still and there was nothing keeping it in place. Yet Cthulhu did stop as if the boat between it and the wide swath of sand was really an obstacle. Gabriel again saw himself reflected in Cthulhu’s alien eyes.
Why are you stopping? There was no answering rumble yet Gabriel suddenly knew. It was his choice whether Cthulhu went on to make landfall or not. But how is it my choice? I can’t stop Johnson! What options do I have?
Cthulhu wasn’t even moving its tentacles so that the water was still as glass again. Gabriel got to his shaky legs. He still felt drained, drained of energy by the stones surrounding him. They cut him off from the Mers and Cthulhu itself. His belief that he had ever truly been alone was completely blown out of the water. Like Casillus had said he had just kept himself to himself because he feared the emptiness and rejection, but the Mers had always been with him
Suddenly, Johnson spun away from the controls and grabbed the parchments he had been reading from off of from the ground. He turned towards Cthulhu. His craggy face looked haggard.
“Jax! Marko! Get up! We must continue the chant!” Johnson screamed.
But the two goons were not getting up. They were unconscious in the bottom of the boat. Johnson let out a roar of frustration. Gabriel gasped when Johnson began to kick the goons’ prone bodies. Again and again and again, the thwack of Johnson’s boot into flesh rose up. Gabriel stumbled over to Johnson on legs as weak and uncertain as a newborn fawn’s.
“Stop! STOP!” he cried as he thrust Johnson back from the prone, unconscious men.
Johnson whirled towards him. There was nothing of sanity in his eyes for a moment. But then he realized it was Gabriel and shook himself like a massive bull.