“Some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new Dark Age.”
This quote from H.P Lovecraft has struck a particular chord with me as of late. I wish I could flee from this ‘light’. I guess I should start from the beginning. People in my town keep saying there is a cloud over us, a coming storm.
I work as a cable operator in my town so I get front row seats to all the juicy backwoods politics. Most nights I tune out and read my book but a few nights ago something caught my ear. One of the selectmen said “There’s a coming storm, and the townspeople won’t be ready.” He said these words exactly. Even my coworker who was seated next to me looked confused. The board brushed it off and the meeting went on as normal, a whole lot of nothing happened and when it came time to leave, I said goodnight to everyone and begun the short drive to my house.
The whole time I felt uneasy. There was a chill in the air walking to my car that was uncharacteristic of mid summer. Something felt horribly wrong. Slowly over the past few weeks board members have been stepping down at an alarming pace. At first I was worried about my job security. No board means no meeting to record and broadcast.
We got down to just 3 members, barely enough, before having a new election. At the following candidates night one of them kept saying those ominous phrases referencing “a cloud over our town, and the coming storm”.
It was around this meeting I started noticing weird details that weren’t quite adding up. The candidate in question, the one being ominous, was awfully sick just the night before at another meeting. Tonight he showed up in a suit and tie looking healthier than ever. Another person of interest in the town, the person in charge of the infrastructure and roads of the town, also was acting strange. Normally he has a loud bombastic attitude but he was quiet tonight, complacent.
On my way home I payed a little bit more attention. The suspicious candidate pulled out of the parking lot before I could and started headed into town. He happened to be going the same way I was going and about halfway to my house, this person pulled into our town’s church parking lot. It was 11 at night so this was already strange. What made it worse was that throughout my 20 years living in this town, I have never seen anyone go in or out of that building. Nor have I ever seen the lights on inside. No one else that I know of has either.
I’m a curious person and especially as of late I have tried to stave off my quest for knowledge because it has only been a bane to me but I just couldn’t help myself. I pulled into the old police station right across from the church and turned off the lights in my car and waited. About 5 minutes later a distinct red pickup truck pulled into the church lot, it was the road agent. They turned their vehicles off at the same time and got out. They walked up to the side entrance of the church and fiddled with something I couldn’t quite see before disappearing inside.
Now I’ve watched enough horror movies to know I shouldn’t go in under any circumstances so I turned my car on and drove the rest of the way home. My mind was racing but somehow not with fear. I was ecstatic that something exciting was happening here for once so immediately when I got home I called my 2 friends who lived in town still until they woke up and explained the situation. Over the following nights we devised a plan to sneak into that church and see what was going on. It wasn’t a great plan, no big heist or anything, we were just going to take a crowbar to the side door assuming it was locked.
A few nights later at around midnight we parked across the street and made our way to the church and walked up to the side door. Carl, my friend with the crowbar, walked up to the door and saw it was cracked open ever so slightly. Now I was second in our little line and I’m a rather paranoid person so I always carry at least a pocket knife but tonight, I brought my hunting knife that was affixed to my belt. I undid the latch that was locking it in its sheath as Carl opened the door. Our 3rd friend Joe was on lookout for most of the night.
As the door opened we saw a church interior. As our eyes adjusted we saw pews facing an altar kind of thing. We looked around and decided it was safe to turn on our flashlights. As the rays of light illuminated the wall above the altar there were eyes drawn in red all over the wall. Scrawled out around the eyes were the words “The Watcher Welcomes You” and “it’s watching” all in what appeared to be blood. Carl walked up to my altar while I looked around the rest of the church.
There was a few back rooms that had a small kitchen and almost a living room. The walls here were covered in eyes as well. They looked almost like Eyes of Horus, and some other words were thrown into the mix, “Khonsu”. I drew my knife to open a few cabinets and one of them, as I opened it something flew out at breakneck speed. I helplessly slashed at the air in front of me and when I calmed down I saw a falcon had landed on a chair in the other room. I slowly walked over to it and saw it was beckoning me to a few papers on a desk.
Scanning over it I saw some words about the ‘rebirth of humanity’. Right as I was about to pocket the papers I heard a commotion from the main room. Joe was now yelling for me to come and help, so I ran into the other room. What I saw there I can’t quite explain. I saw what I think was Joe, but his arm was split into hundreds of tendrils most of which were attached to Carl who looked dead. At least I hope he was.
Joe had some formless appearance almost. Something about his character was just, unclear. Almost like looking into a pond and seeing your reflection as a pebble is thrown in and it ripples around your face. That’s the best way I can describe it. I tried to run and pull Carl away but one of the tendrils caught my arm. It turned to the color of my skin and began to meld with it. I hacked off the tendril and the rest of what was attached to me wriggled and writhed wildly like a snakes body without it’s head until eventually it rotted away and turned to dust.
I ran outside into the night and sat in the car, unsure if what to do next. I saw a small red gasoline tank next to the old police station. Acting out of mostly fear mixed with a bit of arrogance I grabbed the tank and began pouring it on the front steps of the church. I took a lighter from my pocket, lit it, and dropped it on the steps.
Immediately it erupted into flames and the old wood of the church caught quickly after. Soon the whole building was consumed in fire and I stood back and watched it burn. I stood there across the street all night watching until the church was nothing but smoldering ash. No one came to stop the fire either. Not until the sun rose the next morning.