Shadows in the Deep Part 2

[Valadius† 0]

Shadows in the Deep

 

Part 2:

 

The Account of Student

 

Thomas J. Smith

 

When I heard of Professor Johnson's suicide, I was astonished. I wish I could have attended his funeral, though I didn't have any money to rent a tuxedo or fuel to get there, nor did I really think it proper for me to go there, barely having any relationship other than that of student and teacher. However, I did send my best wishes to his family. He was my favorite history teacher back when he taught in Central Wyoming Community College in Riverton, Wyoming. He was a teacher in that college for thirteen years and I had him for one year before he decided to retire and work for the Star Valley Historical Society. He did much better than the teacher that's there now, but I know you guys aren't here to be told anything about that.

 

You're here to talk about It, aren't you?

 

Well, I wish I had never seen It. It is evil. There's no other word for It. Evil.

 

My search began about a year ago after Professor Johnson's suicide. For some reason, his memory jogged back to me and it led to my call to the Wyoming Psychiatric Hospital here in Cheyenne. The lady who answered the phone wouldn't let me have any information until I told a bit of a lie that I was Professor Johnson's nephew on his sister's side. Luckily, she bought it and asked me for my address to send all the information they could.

 

It took only a couple of days for the package to arrive in my mail. I took it into my bedroom of my small apartment in Riverton so that I could go through the materials. A lot of it didn't make much sense to me. Especially when it spoke of when he was found down the hill and by the road south of Bedford Bench. It said that one of his arms had been severed, and traces of very corrosive slime was eating at his shoulder. I also read that he was in a pure state of shock, barely breathing. They said that the only way possible for Professor Johnson to make it that far from the house he had looked into was because he was working on pure adrenaline.

 

I was amazed by that. What terrible thing had happened to him to do such terrible things to him? And what fear would have driven him nearly a mile south, even with an amputated arm?

 

And then I came upon his interview. I could hardly believe that such a sane man as he could come up with such delusions as he did. Maybe he was sane, for after what I've seen now, who would want to live knowing all this?

 

Finding myself obsessing over his interview, I put it away in one of the drawers of my dresser to ease my mind a little. I found myself thinking of just why was I so interested in someone that truly I really didn't know as a person. He was a teacher. He wasn't family. Still, I wanted to see. Wanted to see what happened to the poor man. Maybe it was the sense of mystery; I hardly know.

 

I slept well the night after reading all within the package. Morning came, I went to work, then came home. The usual day.

 

After microwaving a dinner for myself, I sat down to have some time to watch some shows on TV. It was about halfway through the second show on my usual watch when there was a knock on my door. Immediately, I assumed it to be another pair of religious people, wanting to give me a pamphlet to come and join their church. I always get them when my favorite TV shows are on. It's like they plan it that way.

 

Agitatedly, I got up and opened the door. Nobody was there. But I did see a blue sedan drive off in a real big hurry from the sidewalk near my first-floor apartment door. Then I looked down at my feet. There was a piece of yellow notebook paper; a note made out of magazine and newspaper clippings.

 

It said this:

 

Mister Thomas,

 

What is dead should stay that way. What is unsolvable should remain so. Don't delve too deeply into what you don't understand. Professor Johnson found what should never been discovered. If you gaze, too, into the abyss, you'll find what Johnson found: the fact that the abyss gazes back.

 

A friend

 

Confused and a little distraught by this, I threw it in the garbage. It was after that that my curiosity was peaked again and I looked over Professor Johnson's interview for the second time. The "idols" that he mentioned that so prominently held his interest started to hold mine. By no means were these statuettes familiar to me. So foreign. Almost alien, I guess would be the best word to use.

 

I pulled out my laptop and started searching for anything about this "Great Cthulhu" and the "Bloody Tongue".

 

In my search, only a few things came up. The first was a cult discovered in Africa, where they worshipped a strange entity called the Bloody Tongue. Nothing much else was known about this weird cult.

 

The other was that of a book. That book was written by one HP Lovecraft. It was called Call of Cthulhu. Somebody had copied it down the entire tale and posted it on the internet in a paranormal society site. It was such a weird tale, yet so vivid. As if it had truly happened. At the bottom of it all was a short paragraph written by someone posted anonymously. It was a comment that sent chills through my spine. It read something like this:

 

HP Lovecraft's tale of Call of Cthulhu has often been questioned to be true due to strong coincidences and a cult in Louisiana who truly with them a most blasphemous idol of the description given when the story reaches Part 2: The Tale of Inspector Legrasse. Lovecraft has given his most mysterious and terrible abomination: Cthulhu.

 

And below the anonymous statement, there was links to other things, all of them things linked with every weird tale Lovecraft had ever done. Ships' whole crews disappearing, expeditions where all within were missing or massacred, minds of what were once great men eaten away by means of which nobody could explain, a military takeover of a New England fishing town due to evil activity, and a whole town who fears a hill and an abandoned bell tower. How could this be? It had to just be coincidence, but everything added up. But they shouldn't add up. They were just stories written by a great author, not some strange memoirs of true events!

 

But if they are true, I thought, then please, God, don't let it be known, for who knows what would happen? Such terrible things!

 

My mind was busy whirling through it when there was a harsh scratching at my door that made me jump. I shut my laptop and pulled the blinds from my bedroom window away for me to see. That was when I realized how dark it was. The moon didn't give off much light that night. All I saw was an outline on the porch. It certainly looked human.

 

I got up out of the bed where I was searching on the web and paused. Why would a man scratch at a door instead of knocking or ringing the doorbell? That was when I grabbed for the knife I kept by my bed in case of break-ins. My hand wrapped around the doorknob, turning quickly and pulling it back, my other hand raising to give a slash to the intruder if they meant harm to me.

 

It was then that I recognized the figure. It was one of my friends, Jimmy Hirchfield. His face was pale, his usually brilliant eyes now glazed. The scratching was apparently his fist lightly scraping the door, as if too weak to give a true knock to my door.

 

He swayed on his feet before falling forward. I dropped my knife aside and grabbed him quickly, saving him from a harsh fall, when I noticed the piece of paper pinned on his back. It looked like the crude outline of an octopus head, with tentacles dangling. The paper was soaked in red and when I touched the paper I knew it was blood. Underneath the paper, there was a clean exit wound, flesh having burst forth from Jimmy's back!

 

As I held him, I got my cell phone from my pocket and called for an ambulance and the police. But before they answered the call, I saw something move from the corner of my eye. Jerking my head in that direction, I found nothing in the pitch blackness. Then there was a whoosh from above and wind blew past my face, but only for a split second, as if possibly an owl flew past me.

 

Shivering, I pulled my friend indoors as I repeated at the police that my friend was hurt. In a few short minutes, the ambulance arrived and took Jimmy away while I got questioned by the police on how I came across my wounded friend.

 

It wasn't until the next day when I received news that Jimmy died that night due to shock and severe internal bleeding. But the doctor told me something else. He said that when he was cleaning the wound, he came across a sharp spike poking just barely out of the exit wound. He said also that he had a hard time pulling it free from Jimmy's body, and it wasn't until he succeeded several minutes later when he finally found out why. There were terrible, wicked barbs upon the spike, making it cling to Jimmy's insides and caused such horrible internal bleeding.

 

I felt largely responsible, but I truly didn't understand why. Almost as if I was looking where I shouldn't, and thus causing the death of poor Jimmy Hirchfield. Now I find myself envying him. At least he doesn't have to live with what he saw before he died.

 

His funeral was going to be held a month later, scheduled to be buried in the Casper Cemetery, close to where he was born and raised in the small city of Casper, only two hours away from where I lived in Riverton.

 

I decided on a whim to drive down to Casper at around evening about a week after the incident to relax, call up a hotel and reserve a room for the night, and perhaps catch a movie or two in one of Casper's three or four theaters. Having put fuel in my car and called up the hotel, I started on my way to Casper at around seven-o'-clock in the evening.

 

The drive, as I have known for years, was a rather lonely one. Sagebrush, empty land, telephone poles, and pronghorn antelope seem to be the only sights you will ever see throughout the whole trip. At least until you get to the small town of Shoshoni about twenty miles on the highway, and even then there's not much to see. Honestly, the place looks like it was established in the forties but never modernized. Old buildings and old houses. Had it not been for the 635 people who live there, you would think it was a real ghost town. It's a rather dismal place, really. I had read once that the census of the year 2000 said that there was 246 households and 171 families residing there, even in its near ancient surroundings.

 

After passing that near-empty town, it's basically the same sagebrush and antelope story once again. I was closing in to Hell's Half-Acre about an hour into the trip, the night coming as it usually does.

 

Just as I saw the old Hell's Half-Acre sign, I heard a strange noise softly in my ear. Thinking it might be engine trouble, I pulled over by the gate of the Hell's Half-Acre Café, which is now closed, and turned off my radio. It was after I listened to the sound for a while that I realized that the noise was not from my car, but from outside. It was a heavy sound. Like that of a bird's wings when it flies, but magnified to such magnitude of that that brings ideas of creatures long gone from our world.

 

And it was getting closer.

 

Whoomph! Whoomph! Whoomph! Whoomph!

 

And the sound seemed to go faster and faster until the car shook slightly with the force of whatever it was.

 

It was then that I did what even a foolish man would have not done. I stepped out of my car, still hearing that loud whooshing noise that I had heard only a second before. Ducking my head where I was behind the car, I watched the night sky through the opposite window, looking out towards the Hell's Half-Acre Café.

 

Whatever was making the noise had went behind the closed-down café, past the building and into the barren lands beyond. Take careful, quiet steps, I snuck upon the café and its boarded-up doors and windows. I peered from behind the café, out toward the rocky miniature world on the other side.

 

The landscapes is so alien there. No wonder when it was discovered it was dubbed Hell's Half-Acre. Pillars and walls of light yellow and white stone of rough texture and sharp angles that would certainly be difficult to climb if unprepared.

 

It was down in those miniature canyons and pillars that I saw men; men standing around one monolith of rock, barely illuminated in the dim moonlight. One, who I assumed was a sort of leader, stood tall, his arms raised towards the pillar's peak, chanting something. I really can't remember, nor do I want to remember, because as he chanted and the some odd fifteen other people bowing and seeming to call out to it in ecstatic unison, the monolith seemed to vibrate and from within came a dark green glow, and even my meager human nose began to be filled with a nauseous stench, maddening my nostrils.

 

Then came the sinister whooshing sound and It came into the soft glow of the monolith. It's hard for me to describe It as the light was so soft. All I could see, barely, was the outline of whatever this damnable thing was. Its body was long, coiling like a serpent, though I could see distinct arms and legs. Or were they arms and legs? I wasn't sure then nor am I sure now, for I remember seeing no real feet or hands or claws. And It had wings; wings that were covered in spines like the fins of a lionfish. Its head, though…I wish that I never saw its head, for my fear of spiders made its appearance shock me beyond recognition, for that's what it looked like. The head was the only part of It fully illuminated, so I saw in damnable detail the many eyes upon its face and longs, dripping fangs from its serpentine mouth, as if it were a drooling dog. And I saw the end of its tail, where I could see that long spike-like stinger, like that of a scorpion. And It made clicking sounds with it spines on its wings and its fangs and scales.

 

I hid once again behind the café, closing my eyes as I felt the urge to run back to my car, but I found that if I did, that shadowy abomination would surely see me, and I was certain that it would kill me.

 

All I could do was listen to the blasphemous chanting from below, hoping and praying for morning, though knowing it was still many hours away. Whimpering like a lost child, I tried to cover my ears from the chanting and the sinister clicks of the abomination, but it was as if my hands weren't enough. I could still hear it! It was as if that small moment of hearing it seared it permanently into my mind.

 

Slowly, with my hands still clasped to my ears, I brought my head around to peer around the corner. The man who was leading the ceremony was still speaking in the horrible tongue. Behind him, one of the men bowing to monolith-perched abomination stood and began to walk towards the monolith, his arms raised and his eyes wide like that of a drug-crazed maniac. He walked right underneath the beast, looking up at it, spreading his arms wide as it lowered its wings, bringing its spines down to caress him, touching him all over. It was almost like those spines were to It as antennae are to insects, because its mouth seemed to show an expression of pleasure as its spines touched and rubbed the man. Then it brought its head close to the man, its fangs dripping as it opened its jaws wider and wider until it was able to engulf the man's head.

 

I could not turn away from the gruesome sight as the beast proceeded to swallow its sacrifice whole, the chanting getting so loud that I could hear every syllable of that blasphemous language past my cupped hands. Soon, there was nothing left of the man except a bulge that slowly slid down the abomination's body to stop in the middle and squirm, no doubt being slowly digested.

 

It was then that I could not hold it in anymore. I threw up right where I was thanks to the terrible sight of so hideous a thing. I still can't get that image out of my mind of that squirming bulge within It.

 

But it was then that I realized that my squeamishness sacrificed me my chance to remain safe and hidden. I saw It turn its head quickly towards me and its many eyes began to glow in a sick green and red manner, the colors interchanging from one to another. Then It clicked its fangs together, directly towards me. Then the man who was leading the terrible ceremony also glanced in my direction. It was then that I shook visibly and ran.

 

My mind was blank except for one thing: get to the car! My legs pumped and burned as I ran, as if to never stop, even after I heard the great whoomph-whoomph of It. I tripped and landed hard on my knees, just when I felt the heavy wing beats of the creature just above my head, and that I knew me if I hadn't tripped. Just the presence I felt from the flyby, I had an odd feeling that it had full intentions of killing me.

 

But I couldn't focus on that. I needed to get to my car. Getting to my feet, I ran to my car, grabbing the passenger door's handle.

 

It was locked! The automatic lock system locked all the doors when I began my drive, and now the only door that's unlocked was that of the driver! And the wing beats of the abomination were growing louder as it apparently was making a return flight back to me!

 

I got onto the hood of my car, scrambling over it, landing on my side on the ground at the other side, and I grabbed the door handle just as I heard that sinister clicking from that thing in the air. I knew It was near.

 

Pulling the door open, the world seemed to slow down. I jumped into the car, slamming the door shut, when that spike-like stinger of a tail burst through it, the spike flying forth from its tailtip on impact and lodged itself in the dashboard, narrowly missing my face, then another spike extended from its then-empty tailtip and it curled its tail, lodging it into the ceiling of the car interior. I watched in horror as the car was lifted off the ground and pulled high into the air.

 

Then I felt a jerk as It flung its tail and It released the vehicle into the air. I huddled to the floorboard as best I could, waiting for the impact.

 

Next thing I knew, I was awake, in terrible pain, and in a hospital bed. From what I heard the doctor said, a man hunting pronghorns in the area at the time came upon my car in the middle of a prairie some ten or fifteen miles away from Casper. I suffered a major concussion, a broken arm, buckled wrist, several broken ribs, and a torn femur.

 

Of course, they blamed everything on me being high on some drug or drunk for ending up that way. But after testing me, I was found clean. And then they blamed my concussion for all the things I told them I saw. But I know what I saw. Though I wish I had never been there. I can't have any of those images out of my mind. All the medication they have in the world could not get rid of that clicking noise either.

 

I hear it every night.

 

As if It were still after me.

 

INTERVIEWER'S NOTE: Mister Thomas J. Smith was found dead in the Wyoming Psychiatric Hospital two days after his interview. Cause of death was ruled a suicide by a sharp implement stabbed through the neck. A barbed spike was apparently stabbed into Mister Smith's throat while he was laying in bed with his window open for fresh air. But no fingerprints, not even Mister Smith's, were found on the spike-like implement. His funeral will be held in three days.