Fortunately, the best thing about a nightmare reality is that nightmare rules apply. I concentrate, my dream armor disappears, I sprout wings, and I take to the air.
Hell yeah, I do.
I sweep down over spires, twist between towers, work my way deeper and deeper into the heart of the complex. A vast central tower looms before me. I aim for a window near its peak, tuck in my wings, clutch Kayla tight to my chest—
—and tentacles explode out of one wall and smash me into the tower.
And, yes, that would probably be the worst thing about a nightmare reality: nightmare rules apply.
I fall, scrabbling against the tower’s sheer surface. I try to clear my mind, to focus. My fingers elongate, develop suckers. I latch on. One arm spirals away, elastic and strong, wrapping around Kayla.
I climb the wall. It ripples beneath me.
I jump as the first spike erupts from the wall’s surface. I fall, but re-summon my wings. I seize Kayla. I climb. The spikes eject from the wall at speed. Jagged rain.
My body is steel before they strike me. I shelter Kayla and they clatter away.
And screw wings. I’m from the twenty-first century, dammit.
A moment is all it takes to get a jet engine strapped to my back. Going up.
The tentacles lash out as I jet upwards, but I angle away, roasting them with afterburners. They blacken, curling and falling away. Take that, you bastards.
A window looms. I blast towards it, faster, faster. And I’m outstripping the citadel’s imagination. I’m outstripping its speed to respond. I’m bloody winning.
Except the window’s frame twists even as I slam towards the glass, the edges stretching, stretching, until it resembles something worryingly close to a smile.
Glass shatters. A wall looms. I collide. Blackness descends.
Later
How long was I out? How long do I have left? Is it too late for reality? I look for my watch, but everything is black.
“Kayla?” I say. No reply.
“Always late,” a voice says.
I recognize that voice.
“I’m very disappointed, Arthur.”
It’s my mother’s voice.
A spotlight flicks on, a white circle of light on the floor before me. I hear footsteps. My mother comes into the circle. She’s bleeding. A great gash across her neck. She collapses, reaches for me.
“Jesus!” I dash forward, grab her hand. She’s trying to say something I can’t hear. I read her lips. “Arthur…” There’s something she’s desperate to convey, but she can’t …
And then it hits me. Nightmare rules apply.
And this is a cheap bloody ploy.
Lights. I summon them. Banish the darkness. My mother’s body wilts in their brightness. Becomes mannequin parts falling apart beneath cheap clothes. An illusion dismissed.
The brightness illuminates a throne room, rich wall hangings, a velvet carpet, a magnificent golden chair. No Kayla. I can’t see her. But there, standing before the chair, waiting for me—my target, my goal. Nyarlathotep is home.
And seeing him there, all traces of confidence drain away. No, they are violently expunged from my body. Seeing him there, finally, I am truly afraid.
The Nyarlathotep Event :: Case File #10 :: Rematch
Fear. It’s easy enough to be ruled by it. There are a lot of things to be afraid of these days. Terrorists. Bioweapons. New Lady Gaga songs.
My personal issue with fear is a little more immediate, though. It is seven foot tall, wears red robes, and goes by the name of Nyarlathotep.
And I’m in his citadel, in his dimension, and in this moment, I realize I probably should have brought my gun. My super-powered co-worker, Kayla, is a government-paid swordswoman, but she appears to have disappeared into madness.
Crap.
Up until now it hasn’t been too much of a problem. Until now, I’ve been able to take advantage of this being a reality other than ours, and just summoned things by concentrating hard. Apparently now I’m in Nyarlathotep’s actual house, that’s not an option. Not that I don’t try it. I imagine swords, guns, knives, bombs, even Donkey Kong on the off chance I can catch him off guard.
No go.
Nyarlathotep steps towards me. He’s got no gun either, but that’s not really an issue for him.
Visions overwhelm me. Rush up at me from the floor, swallow me.
—drowning here, swallowed by surfaces suddenly turned liquid. I can feel them pressing in. Insects scuttering forward, enveloping me. In my mouth, my ears, my eyes. Peeling back my flesh. And beneath I am something other than expected. There is no flesh here, no blood and bone. Hollow glass veins. Crystalline tendons. A hammer descending, to shatter me, obliterate me. Fear building, building. My heart beating faster in my chest until I fear even that. Until it is enough to shatter my fragile body. Overwhelming me. Drowning me—
It could go on and on. Forever. There is so much to fear. To run from. Through the vision I can see Nyarlathotep, hand outstretched, pacing slowly towards me. And I know then that all thoughts of killing him are madness. Because fear can never be killed. It will live forever, beat in my heart forever.
But there, then, I know too, that all of that doesn’t mean fear can’t be overcome too.
I squeeze shut my eyes as the visions press in, but I push back. I gather my breath. I open my eyes.
Nyarlathotep is a step away. His fingers an inch from my throat. I have one hope. One trick this place has taught me. I brace myself. And I laugh.
In his face, I laugh. As loud and hearty as I can make. Trying to avoid the hysteria overcoming me. I laugh, and I laugh, and I laugh.
His hand strikes me and shatters like glass. Nyarlathotep stares at it, disbelieving. He comes on, his arm grinding against me, splintering, fracturing, spilling to the floor in glistening red shards. And then his whole being smashes against me. And he is only so much dust at my feet.
And then his whole citadel trembles. Cracks run through it. The whole of this reality shatters and shakes. And then I am falling, tumbling through a tear in the world, into blackness.
Christ Church College, Oxford
I land with a crack on my back in the center of Christ Church quad.
I lie there panting. I look about me. And I realize, this is it. This is Oxford as I remember it. Regular, normal, boring Oxford. Normal, boring students staring at me, wondering where I’m from. The madness from Nyarlathotep’s reality has been banished.
Kayla, my co-worker, lost to madness in that other reality, sits up next to me, paws at her eyes.
“Worst feckin’ dream I’ve ever…” She shakes her head.
In my ear, static as my earbud reconnects with the MI37 home office. I hear Tabitha’s voice. “Five, four, three… oh wait. You’re back.” She pauses. “Cut that bloody close. Idiots.”
Yeah. Everything back to normal.
And I smile. Because, really, there’s no place like home.
•
The Black Brat of Dunwich
Stanley C. Sargent
“In effect we have unsettled and reversed the given configuration, suggesting an alternative—culture/nature.”
—Donald R. Burleson
At the bartender’s suggestion, Jeffrey and James made their way to the rear of the dimly lit Arkham bar. They saw only one person in the smokey shadows of the back room, a thin ancient man seated alone amidst the shadows and smoke; they casually approached his table.
“Pardon me, mister,” Jeffrey proffered, “my friend and I are collecting data for a book we’re writing about the so-called ‘Dunwich horror.’ The bartender said you’d actually met Wilbur Whateley and might be willing to speak with us.”
The dark, seated figure offered no immediate response. After a few moments, the two intruders looked at each other, then shrugged and turned to walk away. Their retreat was halted by a gritty voice inviting them to sit. The pair eagerly retraced their steps.