Cthulhu Land of the Long White Cloud AU Read online

  “Told you you’re not to come here, Mister Shandon,” Will says, advancing, the rifle held low but oh so very there. “This place is tapu. People come here, bad things happen. Drop your knife.”

  Augustus regards the approaching men. Sees how their eyes are downcast, looking only at the ground, at the bases of the trees, not up at the marvels that surround them.

  “How can you deny what you have here?” he sputters, the knife still poised upon his skin, ready to make the final incision. “These are not simply childish etchings, they are more than mere art. They speak to a higher existence, to that which called out across the trackless ocean to your forebears. Showed them this place. Don’t you see?”

  “Put the knife down, Mister Shandon.”

  He stares at them, aghast. How can they be so blind? Can’t they hear the siren song? Can they not taste on the wind how the ocean calls?

  He makes the cut. The pain is distant, but final. The knife drops into the leaf mould, blood spattering where it falls, a pattern like the spiral of nebulae against the black. He looks at his palm. The eyes stare up at him, deep and dark and hollow and weeping with the joy of blood, and they blink their approval. The ocean roars.

  Augustus holds up his bloodied hand so they can witness the truth for themselves. “See!” he cries, eyes shining with triumphant glee. “This is what was needed!” He backs away from the men with the guns, towards the tussocks and grasses and the border between land and sea.

  Will brings the rifle up to his shoulder, sighting down the barrel. “Stop walking, Mister Shandon. You’ve done a very foolish thing.”

  But fear is a foreign concept now. How can he be afraid when the immensity of all creation surges beneath his feet? He is but a mote of dust, yet he shines bright in the light of a star he cannot see. Not yet. That star, that light, resides beneath the waves, has lain here sleeping for so very long; and in its sleeping, it has dreamed, and its dreams have crawled up through the waves and made their homes in the nightmares of men, who have marked the trees with their terror, their warnings.

  Only because they do not understand, he thinks.

  Augustus Shandon does not fear. He has given the dream life, his own life. He drips it in a steady, coagulating ooze onto the grasses at his feet, trails it in the sand, like breadcrumbs leading from a dark forest back to a safe place. He tops the dune.

  The ocean was always a constant breathing thunder in his ears, but now it has changed. Now it is a hiss, like the sound behind silence on the radio waves. Will and his companions hesitate, their mouths open. Augustus turns.

  The tide has drawn back. The seafloor lies glistening, exposed like flesh beneath skin peeled back by the scalpel, and along the line of the bay, the ocean stands in a rising wall. It arches over the island, an open eyelid, and in the swirling murk of the sea as it stands and gathers and grows shimmer the lights of ancient stars.

  Augustus stumbles through the sandy grasses towards the sea, a door opening to greet him. The men with their rifles forgotten let him go. The silence is now so huge it swallows Augustus, soaking up all thought. His boots sink in the wet slurry of sand, thick with seaweed and gasping fish.

  Of course, when you are so ancient and wise and you flee across the void to find a place to hide, where better than deep beneath the waves? And when you can perceive that in the fullness of time, these fledgling mammals who hoot and shriek and hit each other with rocks will grow to dominate the lands, to wither each other with their wars and avarice, eventually to burn up in the heat of their own flame, would you not bide your time until the dawn of their collapse nears, even if those days may be drawn out by a measure of eons? What matter, if you can sleep? But in sleeping, yet you dream, and still you desire the adoration of the lowly, still you desire the satiation of warm sacrifice: perhaps an animal, or a person, or an entire race. And so your needs infect those with a mind clear enough to hear you above the noise of the world, to hear the silence that hisses between the stars, that silence you found in the deep places between the continents, wrapped in its skin of sea. A place into which those sacrifices might be cast to soothe your sleeping hunger, and never be seen again.

  “I heard you, and I have come,” Augustus cries, halfway across the bay now, the wall of water towering ever higher. “What do you desire of me?”

  He raises his hands in supplication. This will be his moment. For this, he has lived. In the wake of all the madness humanity has wrought, he will usher in something new, something beautiful, to sweep away the desperation and ennui into which the world has fallen.

  He doesn’t hear the gunshot, only feels the shattering of bones, the spray of blood hot on his cheek as a bullet passes through his upraised hand, destroying the glyph he has so carefully nurtured, carved, and brought to life in the pulsing of his own heartbeat. He wants to scream, but there is nothing in his throat but the great silence that has drawn him in.

  Yet the circle has been closed.

  The thing that lurks, slumbering, the thing that has opened one bleary eye and tasted the salt of sacrifice, knows that it is loved.

  The eyelid raised over Augustus Shandon blinks, the presence behind it barely twitching in its millennia-long sleep, and the ocean collapses back into the bay. Augustus hears no more but the roar of the winds that howl through the empty spaces between the stars as the waters fall down upon him, and draw him hungrily into that deep, eternal throat.

  THE CAVERNS OF THE

  UNNAMED ONE

  Jane Percival

  Prologue

  I’m floating up through the clouds, as if I’m a plume of thistle­down. Caressed by pleasant warmth. I barely recognise that sweet feeling, so long has it been. My eyes are tightly closed and yet beyond the lids there is bright light. Dazzling. I try to raise an arm to shield them, but the limb is weak and falls back against my chest.

  Where am I? Vomit pushes its way up my throat. I can feel it dribble between my lips and… Am I lying in water? I consider opening my eyes. Dare I? The brilliance stabs my brain. I bring my arms up to my face and peer at them. It’s difficult to focus.

  There are ugly marks at the wrist, some healed, some still raw. They sting. I glimpse my legs. They’re bare from the thighs down, white and latticed with cuts.

  I close my eyes again and try to think. My memory lacks detail. In fact, I have no memory. I am…I can feel… But…

  My body rocks gently. Waves splash over me, pushing me around.

  I manage to drag myself a little out of the water. Despite the warmth, I’m shivering uncontrollably. Then I begin to retch. I spit out some briny water and something feels different. I try to move my tongue, to press it against my teeth to check… I have no tongue!

  Sounds bombard me. I want to block out the noises; they’re deafening. The crashing of waves, the shells and stones scraping together. I sense dark shapes up above in the brightness, mocking me with their fearful sounds of cackling and shrieking, and that piercing cry that builds to a scream. It emanates from my own throat.

  Unidentified Man Found on Rangitoto

  Auckland City Police are seeking the public’s help to identify an elderly Caucasian man who was found in a distressed state, at the water’s edge on the south-western side of Rangitoto island yesterday evening. He was discovered by a visiting group of tourists, who had spotted a body floating in the shallows.

  The man is described as being emaciated and of indeterminate age, with long white hair and an unkempt beard. He has pale, fair, skin and grey eyes. The man, who was in a fragile state, was treated for hypothermia by the crew of the Westpac Rescue Helicopter, and then flown to North Shore Hospital’s Intensive Care Unit. He is now in the critical care ward. He has been unable to provide an explanation of where he came from, nor were there any identifiable items on his person.

  Frank’s Story

  My name is Francis Woodburn. My father died in the Great War
when I was four. Mother was thirty when they got together—that was old for those times—and she never remarried. She had a sister who remained single, too. I guess there weren’t so many men around after The War. My mother didn’t really like to talk much about my father. When I was older she moved south, so I didn’t see much of her up until she died. We wrote to each other—that’s about all.

  As an only child, I spent a lot of time by myself. When I grew older, I never really had a mind to marry anyone. Never felt the need.

  Perhaps it’s because Mother would never talk about it, but I’ve always had a ‘thing’ about the war, and about my father, too.

  In 1955 I was living in the city, running a second-hand book­shop just off Mt Eden Road. I’d occasionally purchase house-lots of books; deceased estates, that kind of thing, in the hope that something valuable might turn up.

  This story begins on a Tuesday morning. I’d just set up a display of gardening books in the front window when the phone rang. It was a gentleman I knew, who told me that his next-door neighbour had been found dead and that the family were at the house, sorting through her possessions.

  “She was a nice old biddy, used to be married to some military chap, based over at North Head, I reckon there’d be some books in that house that might interest you.”

  So, I shut up shop for the morning, drove down to Onehunga and parked outside the address. It was an old wooden villa, quite fancy. I knocked on the door and made myself known to the sons. When they realised that I bought house-loads of books they perked up considerably. I had cash in my pocket (always pays to be prepared), a few quid changed hands and they led me to their father’s study. The room was a mess with books all over the place. My heart sank. It was obvious someone had been through the shelves before me. My face must’ve displayed my disappointment as one of the sons chipped in,

  “Yeah, sorry. Our sister’s been here ahead of you, that’s why I didn’t think it’d hurt to take you up on your offer.”

  He looked like he had more to say, so I waited.

  “People from the old man’s work turned up, too. They carted away quite a bit of his personal material. Military stuff, and some ‘souvenirs’ they called them.”

  That’d teach me to think I’d won something over on the chap. I kept my face neutral.

  “I see. You’ve had a generous deal from me, then.”

  I was glad that they left me to it and started packing the remaining books into the empty beer crates I’d brought for the purpose. They were mostly of little value, although I knew that I’d be able to on-sell some of the reference books.

  I lifted a couple of encyclopaedias and saw that I’d exposed a thin volume, lying flat on the shelf beneath, well-hidden. I picked it up and carefully untied the ribbon that bound it. I walked to the window and peered closely at the inscription on the inside cover, ‘Journal of Doctor Edgar McLeod, 1896’. Interesting.

  I re-tied the bow and carefully placed it between the two encyclopaedias, then packed them in with the other books. When I arrived back at the shop, I spent the rest of the day unpacking my purchases and seeing to the needs of the few customers who came in. The journal was waiting for me on a table in the back room, and I was looking forward to examining it more closely.

  Dr McLeod’s Diary

  When I finally had the chance, I held the volume before me and surveyed the covers. They were of dark green leather, stained with watermarks and beginning to scuff at the edges. Inside, the pages were closely written in a fine, slanting script. Many of the pages had dated headings, in the manner of a diary. In some places, the ink had quite faded. This would make them difficult to decipher. Additionally, within the pages, a number of folded hand-written diagrams and maps had been inserted, and these in particular were well-thumbed and worse for wear. About two-thirds through, the writing abruptly ceased. In fact, it appeared that McLeod had stopped writing mid-sentence. The remainder of the pages were blank.

  I turned to the beginning of the document, and began to read…

  “My name is Edgar James McLeod and I am putting pen to paper to record the sequence of strange and disturbing events that I have witnessed this year past.

  “The league of which I am a member is comprised of one dozen upstanding citizens of the City of Auckland’s community. Our purpose has been to seek and uncover knowledge not previously revealed to the common man. Through the guidance of our leader, we have made unimaginable progress. In fact, we have made the acquaintance of an ancient being, an Old Unnamed One.

  “Beneath the military bunkers of North Head, there runs a vast system of tunnels, many of which have been requisitioned by the army. But there are other corridors, which wend their way far deeper, and beyond these there lies a series of ancient caverns. It is within these chambers that the Unnamed One resides.”

  McLeod’s opening paragraphs drew me in immediately, how could they not?

  Over the next several evenings, once I’d closed up shop for the day, I pored through his notes. The more I read, the more I became intrigued by his account.

  McLeod wrote that the members of his secret society had indiv­idually been acquainted with each other in London, and had been recruited into the group upon arrival in Auckland. Their mentor and leader went by the unremarkable name of, ‘the Major’, suggesting a military background, and indeed, McLeod was careful to only refer to his fellow members by either their surname alone (i.e., Smith or Johnston), or by occupation, (e.g., ‘the Politician’, or ‘the Italian’).

  His description of the Major, however, covered a complete paragraph. “He is lanky with an awkward gait, almost dragging one leg behind him. It has been said that he sustained an injury in The Crimean War and has a weeping ulcer, but I doubt this is true. However, there is a smell about him that no amount of Cologne can disguise. Men avoid his proximity and yet are also drawn to him. He has a way about him, and yet I do not care to catch his eye.”

  In the mid-1880s, North Head was under the control of the New Zealand Army, and the ‘Major’ was indeed associated with the military. This association allowed him to organise clandestine work below ground in conjunction with the bunkers and tunnels being built in anticipation of an expected Russian invasion. Convicts were used to extend the army’s tunnels, and it seemed that at least two prison guards were paid by the society to steer work into other more secretive areas. McLeod didn’t explain how the Major acquired his information, but from the outset, all his energies were focused on the construction of the concealed set of corridors.

  As McLeod’s account progressed, his tone changed from excite­ment, to reservation, to a strange uncertainty. He began to get lost in convoluted thought; his choice of words became cryptic (almost code-like) and his descriptions more obscure. The final entry was completely unsatisfactory, merely stating, “Tomorrow morning we shall know one way or the other. I am hoping that the Major will err on the side of common sense.”

  I was left feeling frustratingly short-changed.

  North Head

  When I was at college we all had to serve a stint as cadets. For a few weeks each year, we were billeted at North Head and underwent infantry training. I didn’t mind—it was a diversion from regular schoolwork, and, as I said, the military side of things interested me. By day we were under tight control (the usual drills and gun practices) but at night no-one seemed to care what we got up to, as long as we didn’t do anything that drew attention to ourselves. We just had to keep quiet and avoid trouble.

  Some of us used to creep out of the dormitory after lights out, to explore the tunnels. We’d apply boot polish to our faces, don woollen hats and kit ourselves out with torches. Once away from the main tunnels, which were usually lit, one of the first things you’d notice was the complete and utter darkness—it wasn’t the kind of place you’d wish to explore without a torch, that’s for sure. The place was like a rabbit warren with winding tunnels leading deeper
and deeper under the hill, and vertical vents that drew the eye upwards. The vents had metal rungs leading up into the darkness and if you shone your torch up, the beam just disappeared. Some of the tunnels were wide enough to drive a convoy of vehicles along, while others could merely be glimpsed through barred windows. There were dead ends with doors made of riveted steel, sporting huge padlocks. The place had an eerie feel to it, too. It was almost as if someone was watching us, just out of sight, but I’d always put that down to it being night-time and the excitement of being out of bounds.

  McLeod’s notes described something quite different. For one thing, he wrote about the original tunnel works, the sections built in the mid to late 1880s, when everything was newly constructed. Then he was writing about a complete network of secret tunnels that led deeper, straight down into the depths below North Head, straight to a series of vast subterranean caverns.

  Although his writing was difficult to make sense of in places, I read on, and as I did so, I tried to match his descriptions to my own sketchy memories of the place. The key was in the location of one particular ‘legitimate’ tunnel that was also the entry point to the series of secret tunnels. According to his account, this tunnel lay directly behind a building he referred to as ‘the laboratory’. The more I read, the more certain I was that this was the dwelling now known as the ‘shepherd’s cottage’ situated on the southwestern face. If I was correct, then this entrance was the key to gaining access to the hidden sections.

  For some days I’d had it in the back of my mind that I’d have to go and find these caverns of McLeod’s, just to satisfy my own curiosity if nothing else. Though, if I’m to be honest, for the first time in my life I experienced a thrill of excitement.