Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-11345660-20151228010023

Hi there! I'm a bit new here, but I have always dug what you guys are doing and I think it's about time to join in the fun. This is a fun little tribute to Weird Fiction Master H. P. Lovecraft I wipped up on my family vacation to Westport, where I took advantage of its setting to craft a small love-letter to the Cthulhu Mythos. I would like any feedback you have to give!

''"I have frequently wondered if the majority of mankind ever pause to reflect on the occasionally titanic significance of dreams, and of the obscure world which they belong"--H.P.Lovecraft ''

            The interesting thing about hoarders is their lack of understanding when someone asks them to throw a few items away. Miriam Finchely, a distant relative of my mother's, was one such individual. Her property was of her own late mother's design, a derelict attempt at a home inhabited by Miriam and her two excessively fluffy dogs. The tables were filled with old possessions of her mother, particularly ones having to do with the sea. The property laid between an old themed town modeled after a carnival convenience stand and the beaches of the Puget Sound.

            It was small, spread out place. The roads were well kept, as was the grass, but the same effort seemed to escape the buildings themselves. Sprayed by the ocean mists and hard sand, they had adapted a certain kind of oceanic rot. Still, one could hardly call the place unpleasant. The weather was in good favor when I arrived with my parents and two of my three siblings at the town of Westport, a dwelling for hoarders like Miriam, my mother, and nameless entities who had taken an interest in the brine-spattered townsfolk.

            Let's describe Miriam. She bore a striking resemblance to my grandmother, with her vaguely ginger hair that was curled to a rather out-of-style arrangement and the deep lines on her face. The resemblance would've almost been uncanny had Miriam not bore a ghoulish grin that stretched ear to ear. Despite her senile looks, she was an energetic personality. She treated my family to an excellent lunch at the last grease spoon in town, formerly known as the Sand Castle. As to her purpose in my journey, I had not known at the time of meeting her that she would be the reason these events happened at all.

            My mother was a genealogist in hobby and she had a tendency to drag everyone along in her endeavors. After uncovering many things about our family, she met Miriam. My mother received an invitation from her to stay overnight in her home and share what knowledge she had about our ancestry. I, along with everyone else in my family, were only interested out of politeness. But I had a curiosity when it came to bits and bobbles. Miriam had plenty strewn about her excuse for a home. Once tired of sifting through things one would find in a gift shop, I visited her balcony. It overlooked a very unimpressive view of dead trees and brambles. On the support beams there hung wind-chimes made from old shells. A few chairs for relaxing were placed in the corner, gathering dust.

            At first glance it was unremarkable, until I noticed a small carving of some sort in the corner. Throwing off the eager affections of Miriam's dogs, I took a closer look. It was a rough cut from a deep red mineral protruding from a craggy rock like a geode. It represented something unfamiliar to me; a sculpture of some sort of embryonic squid was what it looked like. There was something I didn't like about it, though I can't say exactly what. It was disturbing, inspiring strange thoughts inside the most unlikely recesses of the mind. Some fearful; some--I admit--sexual. I cannot explain it further.

            I inquired to Miriam as to its origin and how it came to be in her possession. When she came to see it, the look on her face confused me. It was almost as if she had not known it was hers at all. She answered my questions half-heartedly. No, she didn't remember where she acquired it. No, she didn't know what it represented. She was sure, however, that the sculpture was ruby. I was skeptical, but her serious gaze silenced my doubt.

            Miriam could not tell me more, either because she didn't know anything or she didn't want to tell me. I didn't want to be a nuisance by pestering her with questions, so I went with my father, brother, and sister to the beach. Here, I could enjoy the sea methodically gnawing at the coast without Miriam's trinkets. The sand was warm and smooth beneath my toes and the sun cast light down directly above us. It looked like a popular destination, as large groups of tourists flew kites and swam.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            It was very windy, and the breeze provided cool contrast with the high temperature. While my siblings played in the sand, I grew drowsy in the lazy weather. Under the pretense of gathering sea shells to display on my windowsill at home, I took refuge in the shade created by a large trunk of driftwood hidden by the dunes near the parking lot. I laid myself on the sand and rested my head against the wood. After getting comfortable, I closed my eyes to nap for a few minutes.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            I had full intention of waking up, but I must have been sleepier than I thought, because I found myself I did not recognize. I am not an experienced dreamer by any means. Those I do have are spontaneous and random. But when I came to the hollowed out Cavern of Flame after descending seventy steps, I knew I had stumbled across something only a select few ever got to experience.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            In my hands, I carried with me the ruby sculpture of an unknown god I had taken from the waking world with my curious subconscious into deeper slumber. I soon realized that I had brought it there to find out where it came from. When I entered the Cavern of Fire, I was greeted by two old men who introduced themselves as Nasht and Kaman-Thah who revered a number of eldritch beings called the Great Ones who ruled from the unknown places of Earth's dream-space. The priests did not fail in their hushed worship of the greater still Other Gods, who held sway over all from outside the realms of matter at the center of black infinity.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            I nervously listened to their stories, scarcely imagining what such being could look like, and the priests Nasht and Kaman-Thah noted it was better not to and asked to see the item I carried. When I showed it, they gave me a queer look. I knew they had the answers I came for. They told me it was definitely from the dream dimension that I was very close to entering, but didn't say exactly where inside it was made.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            It was foolish of me to hold fast to my curiosity, but my interest was piqued when my ears first hear the concept of this dreamworld. The two priests seemed to be averse to me going any further and told me that an inexperienced dreamer walking down the seven hundred steps to the Gate of Deep Slumber and entering would be almost as disastrous as attempting to climb the tall mountains whose peaks the Great Ones house. Undeterred, I questioned them if it was impossible for a newcomer to survive this wondrous place. They dodged my question by stating that fortune does not favor the foolish. I ask if it had been done before and they became silent.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            Unsure of what this response meant, I--damningly so--deemed their answers unhelpful, and so I bid them farewell and descended the seven hundred steps before me. Each one took me farther and farther from the waking world and whatever my fate would be when I crossed into the unknown, I would do my best to pursue the mystery of the sculpture. Before I reached the gate, I heard feeble voices calling after me and I saw the old priests hobbling down the stairs, begging me to hear their warnings. They offered me an exchange of sorts. If they told me the origins of the ruby sculpture, I must promise to never enter the Gate of Deep Slumber and stay in my own ever-shifting dreams of fancy.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            The offer was tempting. This was, after all, the reason I had come. But my blasted curiosity, as potent as the most powerful poison, withheld me from immediately agreeing to these terms. First, they must answer the question of whether this fantastic world would be impossible to traverse at my current level of experience. Reluctantly, they answered no, and began to tell me the tales in which they thought other feats could not be achieved.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            A man had traveled beyond Time and Space to reclaim what he believed the Great Ones owed him. King Kuranes, who rules over the city of Celephaїs, dreamt it into existence when he was nothing but an ordinary junkie. These dreamers had defied the gods, even the Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep, to achieve their ultimate goals. What made me so different? The priests said those men were master dreamers. They had will, mileage. The priests were convinced that if entered, I was destined to fail. Some things were not meant to be uncovered by mortals.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            But I had heard too much of this place to not see it for myself. I explained to the two elderly priests that I could not be swayed. They lamented for me, telling me I had been warned, and once again advised me to step forward no more. I should have listened. Had I known the terrible beginnings of the ruby sculpture, I would have gladly cast it into the abyss where it belonged and fled into the waking world. But I entered and braved its dangers, its wonders, and slowly learned what it meant to dream.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            It was all a mistake. For it was only too late I discovered where the ruby sculpture had come from and I was already being hurtled past the stars towards the center of a place too dark to describe. The only thing I can say is...the courts of chaos unknowable is not of any known universe.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            Nyarlathotep, the mocker, was the one who revealed the sculpture's origins. It was of ruby mined from the dead city of Sarkomand by the beastly slaves of the moon-creatures. The raw material was flung outside Earth's dream-space after being delivered to the Great Ones' fortress of Kadath. There, the Great Ones sent it forth to the almighty Others to create a bust of their patron's likeness, and who should that ruby contact than that blind, idiot god that gibbers and gnaws at the outside of matter like a wave crashing over the banks? It is the very same that its servant, the Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep, had sent me flying to impossible speeds when it grew bored of my presence.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            And as I stared into its maw as I soared closer and closer, the only thing I thought clearly about before my mind slipped was the regret of not having heeded the two priests Nasht and Kaman-Thah. I closed my eyes to shield my sight from it, but it was still there in my head. There was no getting rid it. My last glimpse of life before I was devoured by the daemon-sultan Azathoth, who name no lips speak aloud, were the many ruby sculptures crafted by the embryonic beings who played their sonorous  flutes and drums while hurtling them back to Earth and the Deep Slumber to be claimed by those as foolish as I.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            The Others must have had a sense of humor, because I woke up on the beaches of Westport a mere few minutes after I had closed my eyes. My siblings were still playing in the sand. After we left to return to the home of Miriam's other, I noticed her ruby sculpture had gone.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            She had no memory of ever having it. All that was left was a strange expression on her face and her late mother's possessions lying across the dingy house. I often wonder how much Miriam has seen of the Deep Slumber and the wonderful terrors it held. I didn't want to pester her with strange questions about the outside, but her face betrayed her feigned ignorance of the subject. And now I understood why she hoarded so much, why her and my mother wanted so desperately to have us all cling to the past, and why I was sent back.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            The dreaded daemon-sultan Azathoth, whose name no lips speak aloud, chose to remind Miriam what awaited her in the darkness with its hideous carved visage. Maybe my mother as well. They must have realized the only way to stay sane was to hang onto every memory--meaningful or useless--for fear of being snatched away by the coming of those slimy blasphemies at the end of time. Maybe that's the cruel lesson the Others wanted to teach me, for what could I learn had I been devoured? Even now, a collection of sea shells are starting to fill my mantle as a desperate attempt to keep the nightmares away. But as the daemon-sultan likes to remind us, its waiting out there. Waiting to hoard us all from whatever light we've been briefly given. There's no escaping the maw that makes life meaningless.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "TimesNewRoman","serif"">            And I've had nightmares every night since. <ac_metadata title="Into the Infinite Maw--First Draft Review Requested"> </ac_metadata>