I refused to yield to their demand. But they threatened that if I didn’t release the girl, they would certainly catch her.
As this was by no means an empty threat, not only was she now living in my bungalow, I took her with me wherever I went. The accusations never stopped. On the contrary, they got worse! Whenever anyone died, she was the cause. As each day went, the pressure of her potential exorcists increased. I would have yielded to their demand, were it not for the timely intervention of Professor Dimbo Theresa.
Professor Dimbo offered to carry out a test on the girl. She saw the case in another light. For her, it was a step towards finding a cure to the disease, if one could actually find out what made the girl different from the rest of her village. And, although she was fiercely warned that this was a case beyond science, Professor Dimbo was not one who would easily go back on her decision.
Within a week after this test, Mrs. Chioma, herself, died. With their worst instigator gone, the mob faded and the pressures on me subsided. Professor Dimbo later revealed her findings. It was as startling as it was ordinary: The little girl had sickle cell anaemia. Anybody blessed with this ailment has a greater resistance to the ADAIDS—similar to the immunity they had to malaria.
In the subsequent days, I went on more searches. None yielded results. After a month, I became tired and abandoned the project.
The survivors in Uwani dwindled.
They all died.
I became worried for the girl, because she was still so sickly, and hoped I would die first, but it was not to be. She died yesterday.
I have burned my dead. My suitcase is in the car; my supplies are packed.
I am heading to no destination in particular.
One day, I will find another living human.
But for now, I am the last man standing.
EXHIBIT AT THE NATIONAL ANTHROPOLOGY MUSEUM IN TOMBOUCTOU
By Andrew Dombalagian
This is the first professionally published poem for Andrew Dombalagian, a long-time amateur writer. His other poetry, inspired by Lovecraftian illustrations, anime characters and everyday observations, has previously appeared in collegiate publications.
This artifact, showing evidence of prolonged exposure to the conditions of space, was recovered by Professor Amadou Sangare in a folk market outside the New Lagos Desolation Zone, although its true origins remain unknown. The inscription is etched in a dead language, not native to Africa, believed to have once been a trade language prevalent on Terra. Translation has revealed the meaning of the prayer poem, though elements such as rhyme and metre have been lost in transition.
The plaque bears a prayer offered by early starfarers to the Elder Gods, pleading for protection and safe passage between planets and star systems. The crude mysticism and superstition once applied to space travel parallels the rudimentary nature of technology and knowledge of that bygone epoch. Note the childish optimism expressed in the verses, reflecting a primitive belief that the long-dead Elder Gods yet possessed any influence amongst the stars. This artifact represents both an infantile step in starfaring history and a remnant from the Dark Ages, when mortals yet doubted, and even challenged, the supremacy of the Great Old Ones.
The flapping of heavy, grey wings against the membranous thickness of the void
Echoes in the thundering roar of our thermonuclear heart, pounding against its carbon bonds.
Humble are we who sail the satin tapestry of night, ever on the verge
Of the Pit, where sleeping lies the Blind Idiot of all Oblivion.
May the sheen of Bast’s smile, though never so warm as upon her brood,
Find our voyage safe from the burning cold wrath of the aether.
Before Hypnos closes all eyes forevermore, for another day,
May we yet gaze with awe and horror unfettered.
Protect your servants from the ebon, bilious hearts that throb against the crystalline
Chains that bind them to the orbs and spheres that pulsate brightly in the
Eternally Yawning Gulfs. Their noxious, chromatic radiations pollute the
Eons with the foul beneficence of their Great Old Masters.
The narrow, blanched roads between worlds that our vessel travels overhang with
The looming, glassy canopy of galaxies and nebulae fertile with Three-Lobed Eyes.
They watch with a patience as icy as the void that cradles their bower.
Though our voices are mere flecks of cosmic dust adrift between eons,
Please heed this plea from your vassals, O Elder Lords.
May the dying light of the cosmos find our hull shining with the might and majesty
Of the vast shell that ferries Lord Nodens across his abyssal kingdom.
From the hearth fires of one sacred star to the next, may we lowly souls find safe passage,
And in our journeys, may we find comforting respite
Against the Old Ones who dream in their deathless slumber.
THE DOOR FROM EARTH
By Jesse Bullington
Jesse Bullington is the author of the novels The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart and The Enterprise of Death. His short fiction has appeared, or is forthcoming, in various magazines, including Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Chiaroscuro, Jabberwocky, and Brain Harvest, as well as in anthologies such as Running with the Pack, The Best of All Flesh, The New Hero II, Robots vs. Zombies: This Means War, Historical Lovecraft, and Candle in the Attic Window. He currently resides in Colorado and can be found online at www.jessebullington.com.
I
WHEN PIPALUK, THE chief engineer of Hiurapaluk’s Peril Containment Plant, together with 12 of her most well-armed and efficient underlings, came at flickering, artificial dusk to seek the infamous Professori, Laila, in her amphibechanical facility on the lower-most substreet of the city’s underlevel, they were surprised, as well as disappointed, to find her absent.
Their surprise was due to the fact that Professori Laila had made much to-do about her expedition not taking place for another fortnight; all of Pipaluk’s plots against the Professori had hinged on there being sufficient time to gain the rest of the Quorum’s approval before confronting the rabble-rousing academic. They were disappointed because their formidable warrant, with symbolic fiery font glowing on an antique digital tablet, was now useless; and there seemed to be no earthly prospect of wiping the smug expression from Laila’s hairy face, to say nothing of confiscating her domestic warrens for the use of the Engineers Guild.
Ingeniøri Pipaluk was especially disappointed, for Laila was her chief rival in the Quorum’s science bloc, and was acquiring altogether too much fame and prestige among the Voormis of Mhu Thulan, that ultimate peninsula of the Grænland subcontinent. Pipaluk had been glad to receive certain evidence corroborating her suspicions that Laila’s expedition through the Eibon Gate could be catastrophic, and not just in terms of heightening the Professori’s already-dangerous popularity.
This evidence suggested that Laila was not, in fact, a devotee of the state-god, Tsathoggua, whose worship was incalculably older than the Voormi race. No, it seemed that the Professori instead paid tribute to Tsathoggua’s paternal uncle, Hziulquoigmnzhah, with whom the true god of the Voormis had suffered a falling-out sometime in the previous millennium or three. This schism, which had something to do with the fall of Humanity, or perhaps the rise of the Voormis of Grænland and sundry other peoples in sundry different places, had resulted in the sealing of the Eibon Gate.