Or, The Task of Carter Randolph
Or, Cthulhu Cthild Cthare
© 2001 by Tom Smith
Many and uncanny are the things I have seen in this world. In the
foreboding tundra far beyond my lands, where the sky comes to awful life
with the shimmering of ions charged by far-off stars, I have watched an old
woman, shriveled with terrible wisdom, strike the bare trunk of a tree with
an axe until something like unto blood flowed from it, and then boil that
viscous ooze into a sinister delicacy for the tables of kings. I have
traveled many miles west to the Hills of Blackness, and looked upon the
towering, alabaster faces of the ancients who ruled this land, their stoic
and silent visages hewn unnaturally from the living rock. I have seen
patchwork kingdoms ruled by vermin, and living heads in boxes inciting
brother against brother. But naught of this has prepared me for the wonders
and trials of my new existence, to which I took vows of dedication,
devotion, and adoration, but which has resulted in geases, both passive and
active, I did not anticipate. Before all others, one particular obligation
tasks my very soul.
You must understand, first and foremost, that this was a duty for
which I felt neither desire nor qualification. But it was pressed upon me,
by that matron of the house wherein I resided, with a stern reminder that,
on a basic level, I was at least partly responsible for the situation. I
could not argue with this fact; it had necessarily been ascertained, with my
very blood and genetic matter, by a local laboratory often beset by
protesters of the most vehement sort. What was I to do?
I edged open the door of the darkened chamber with trepidation. The
stench of human effluvia was overpowering. The light from the portal fell
upon a raised cage of ancient wood, not quite square, and decorated with
icons of some lost tribe that worshipped beasts. The sigils celebrated the
gluttony of the bear, the wild and uncontrollable fury of the tiger, the
fatalism and endurance of the donkey, the inscrutable yet impractical wisdom
of the owl, the smug quickness of the rabbit. The metallic rim of the
construct glinted as if angered that illumination had touched it.
Suddenly a cry erupted from the miniature prison, and I perceived a
thrashing and a shuddering within. Swallowing terror as best I could, I
peered over the rim of the cage.
There it lay! Approximately two feet long from end to end it was, with
a disproportionately large skull and flaccid, powerless limbs. Its pallid
flesh was utterly without hair. Its eyes were huge and unfocused, and it
appeared plump, as if recently fed to satiation. God in Heaven! Could I
truly have caused this creature to emerge from nothingness into full being?
No matter. My task lay before me. As I had been instructed, I laid a
square of clean cotton cloth, nearly as long as the creature itself, just so
upon the nearby table. The cloth I anointed with a whitish powder, intended
to subdue the reek of the creature and soothe its raw and uncalloused flesh.
Easy enough so far; but the true challenge lay in the next step. I took a
breath, made my peace with the uncaring universe, reached into the very cage
itself, and lifted the nearly inert creature in my sweating, unsteady hands.
It immediately began to writhe, as if sensing my doubt, and abruptly it
emitted a wail I shall take to my grave.
Ah, God, it mewled so! The walls rang with its incessant shrieks, both
piteously high and yet somehow guttural, and my ear drums nearly burst, and
my nerve nearly failed me; but it was clutching at me now, trying to find
purchase in my flesh with its newly-forming talons, and I had no choice but
to persevere. Fortunately, I had been given some rudimentary instructions on
how to deal with the creature's outbursts. Several strokes of my hand along
its spine, as if I were hypnotizing a crocodile in the manner of the Buhaia
tribe in the jungles of Ahndjur, and numerous repetitions of the words of
power I had been taught, "toora loora loora, toora loora lay", and the
creature grew somewhat calmer, though still its eyes were puffed with what
alien emotion I could not guess.
But now my nostrils were assailed anew by the reek of the thing. I had
remembered too late the cotton cloth it yet wore, once immaculate and
wholesome but now tainted and befouled beyond retribution, the cloth I was
to replace!
For a moment I lost all hope, but then I espied a receptacle nearby,
strongly constructed and cunningly sealed, which could be for no other
substance than this blighted fabric. I lay the creature on the table next
to - not on - the prepared linen, and carefully opened the clasp which
fastened the old cloth in place. I was not prepared for the corrupt vapours
which wafted o'er me as I unfolded it, but the end was in sight. I grasped
the creature by its legs, lifting just enough to draw the grim fabric from
beneath it. Into the appointed scuttle I dismissed that besmirched linen at
once, taking care not to touch (and thus taint) anything else with its
foulness.
At length I was able to crudely wrap the freshly prepared cloth around
its nether regions. This I affixed in place with the clasp, which I now
noticed was a cunningly constructed locking needle of the purest steel. It
did not seem to have any discernible ill effect upon the creature, but I
felt safer for having the cold iron between it and me.
Gingerly, so as not to rouse its keening once more, I returned the
creature to its holding pen. It did not seem to mind its imprisonment,
however, but gurgled happily, and then arranged itself for sleep with a
countenance so trusting that my heart suddenly went out to it, and my hand
started forward of its own accord to stroke the creature's brow.
At that very moment, I remembered myself, and what I had done, and I
stared at my traitorous hand for a long moment before fleeing the chamber
altogether, dreading the inevitable time that, once more, the task should
fall upon my troubled soul.
http://www.tomsmithonline.com/comedy/thing_in_the_crib.htm
