THE APPROACHING DARKNESS by PENNYSPY RATED FRT

Winner of the 2009 TIWF Halloween Challenge.

Rated FRT for language.

Scott was bound, tightly. His arms were folded around his chest within a thick white jacket, his legs restricted by narrow chains. He squirmed, gasping, raising his head and drawing in a painful, cramped breath. Trying to get to his feet, he braced his back against the walls, only to feel softness against his shoulders. The walls are padded…

He glanced wildly around. The room felt tiny as he twisted, seeing no door, and only the smallest of windows out of reach above him. It was closed, a small dark square against the creamy white material.

“Hello?” Scott shouted. His mouth felt unbearably dry. It stung as he bellowed again, “Let me out! Let me out of here!” He struggled harder. “Someone let me out!”

It seemed to take hours of shouting before he heard a key turn in the hidden door. Two burly guards entered, their grim faces suggesting that Scott would hold no surprises for them. They stood either side while he asked frantically, “What’s going on? Why am I in here…?”

“Edmund.” A middle-aged man in a white coat entered after the guards. “How are we today?”

“Edmund?” Scott frowned, “Who the hell is..?”

“Really, Edmund, you should know that this isn’t going to get you anywhere. We’re here to help you, but if you insist on this charade, we aren’t going to be able to make a difference.”

“My name is NOT Edmund,” Scott said, slowly and surely. He glanced nervously around at the walls again, pulling a little against the straightjacket’s sleeves. “Just tell me, Doc. Where am I?”

“So you want to start like this? All right, Edmund. You’re in Arkham Asylum,” the doctor said patiently.

“Arkham?” Scott didn’t like the name, couldn’t remember why, “Where the fuck is that?”

“Arkham Sanitarium in Massachusetts, Edmund. The pride of New England. You might have gathered, this is the asylum, and your loving family admitted you here.”

“What?” Scott’s heart chilled completely. “The…they put me in here?”

“Yes, but don’t worry – they have only your best interests at heart, I’m sure.” The man came closer, although warily – the two orderlies hovered closer at Scott’s sides, as if fully expecting him to try something. “I am Doctor Galpin. I’m taking a special notice of your case…”

“My case? Why am I in here?” Scott demanded.

“Don’t you remember?” the doctor said.

Scott searched his memory. The past swam up in a black wave of nothing, he was instantly lost in its darkness and felt massively sick. He shook his head. “I…I don’t remember anything…how long…since I got here…?”

“You have been here for two months,” Galpin said, “but this is the first time I have been able to speak to you.”

“Two months?” Scott frowned, shaking his head violently. The movement made the orderlies loom closer, so he controlled his panic with an effort. “What was I…what was I doing for two months?”

The doctor smiled almost reassuringly. “You were distressed, I’m afraid. I theorised that you were suffering a great trauma…which your family were at a loss to explain. You don’t remember beyond that?”

Scott shivered again, afraid, suddenly, of that deep darkness in the back of his mind, “No. I don’t remember. I don’t know…”

“Best not to rush it, then. How do you feel, Edmund? I’m most curious…”

“My name isn’t Edmund, Doc,” Scott said. “Why do you keep calling me that?”

Galpin looked at him with barely concealed amusement and no little curiosity. “All right. Who do you think you are at this time?”

Scott took a breath, and said his name, “…and Jeff Tracy is my father, and, you have to tell him to visit me. Once he sees me, he’ll know I’m not mad. I’m all right now, doctor. Can’t you tell? You have to let me go.”

The doctor nodded, “This is very interesting. What else can you tell me about Scott?”

Scott didn’t understand the question. “Tell you about me?”

“Yes,” Galpin had taken out a small recording device, “What can you tell me?”

Total paranoia gripped Scott. For all he knew, he’d just given away major International Rescue information. He snapped, “I want to see my family before I tell you another goddamn thing!”

“I understand,” Galpin said smoothly. “This is difficult. But don’t worry, we’ll help you. Now, try to relax. I’ll send a nurse in to feed and water you, and we can take this up at a more civilised hour.” He smiled widely at Scott again, “Good night. I know we’re going to have a very interesting time working together.”

“Call my family!” Scott demanded, “Tell them where I am! Tell them I’m better now!”

“In the morning, we will discuss this, Mr Curwen.” Doctor Galpin glanced over his shoulder as he left. “It’s good to see you awake again, but keep your strength up. You will need it.”

Scott tried to scramble after the doctor but the two orderlies picked him up without a problem and something stung in Scott’s neck. All the fight went out of him. Scott slid to the ground, dazed.

“What happened?” he murmured. “Why am I here…?” His eyes throbbed. The men above resembled shapeless ogres, suddenly they were twenty metres tall and their forms wavered unsteadily. The motion triggered an unaccountable sense of terror in Scott. He let out a wild yell, wriggling back on newly unreliable limbs.

“Isn’t he any better?” Scott must have blacked out again – he opened his wet eyes to the sight of a young nurse looking suspiciously at him. She held a plastic knife and fork and a flask with a straw attached. She must have been the one who had spoken. Her voice was unsympathetic.

“I’m…I’m sorry.” Scott managed to breathe normally. He noticed that Galpin had gone. “I’m…I’m all right.”

“Glad to hear it.” She didn’t look glad. “You must be hungry,” she said.

“Very,” Scott said – and paused. It was only now dawning on him how odd he sounded; a stranger to his own ears. His sore throat, maybe. Then he got a whiff of cooked food beneath the dish at her side, and his stomach began growling hard. He said, “You… don’t happen to have a steak under there, do you?”

She treated him to a small smile. Her looks were unusually plain – or maybe it was the bald lighting in this stark room – and her smile was pale and in contrast to her dark eyes. She said, “No, just hospital chow – sorry, Edmund.”

She didn’t sound sorry.

He frowned. “My name isn’t Edmund.”

“Ok,” she shrugged, and lifted the lid. Dinner was apparently mashed potatoes, large lumps of greenish vegetables and tasteless pale meat that could, perhaps, be chicken. Scott grimaced at the bland texture and at the indignity of being fed, but the food seemed to help a little. He chewed thoughtfully, taking in his surroundings again. The nurse didn’t seem the talkative type, she let him consider – and think as hard as he dared about – his current situation.

He was in a mental institution in Arkham, Massachusetts.

He had no idea in the world how he’d arrived here.

He’d lost two months, somehow.

And for some reason they all called him Edmund.

Scott gulped down the last of his mashed potatoes and let her give him a few more sips of the water she’d brought. Frankly, he could’ve used something far stronger.

“Aren’t you going to untie me?” he asked her.

She shook her head and stepped away. “Doctor Galpin has recommended you stay like this overnight, just as a precaution.”

“A precaution?”

“After what you did…last time,” she said, her face carefully neutral. Scott finally recognised the look - pure fear masking as indifference.

“What did I do?” he demanded. “Please…”

She shook her head. “Goodnight.” She picked up the tray.

“Wait, please, tell me, what did I do?” He felt the orderlies crowd right up to him as he struggled onto his knees, raising his voice, “Tell me what the hell is going on! What did I do?”

The orderlies roughly pushed him back again. Scott struggled briefly and then stopped, breathing hard. His body felt thin. Weak. Had two months changed him that much?

The lights went out and the door banged shut. He heard it lock – and then he was alone again in the pale padded room.

He felt like he had lain fully conscious all night, twisting uncomfortably in the jacket’s sheath. Scott blinked as a hard strand of sunlight pierced the air above him. His eyes stung, and he squinted a few times to clear the gunge that had gathered while he’d briefly slept, stubbornly sticking them shut.

Like a bug, like a maggot, he squirmed his way toward the door and leaned close to its edges. He listened for noises, and they came, slowly. He heard yelling and the echo of a long corridor. Slippered footsteps came quickly toward his door and were just as quickly gone. The clatter of breakfast trays. For a single moment, the harsh breath of somebody just above him, then they were gone, too.

He held out the hope that they would bring him breakfast next, and leaned against the side of the door. Peering back into his cell, Scott noticed a small, unblinking fisheye camera positioned on the high ceiling. It reflected the sunlight on one side, and as he stared it seemed to blink back.

Impatience rode through him again. He breathed deeper and shouted, “Doctor Galpin! Doctor Galpin, I need to speak to you! Galpin!”

He yelled until he was hoarse.

Doctor Galpin didn’t come in, but a nurse finally did about ten minutes later. A different one from last night, this one was curvier and a couple unruly inches of wavy black hair peeked from beneath her smart nurse’s cap. Another pair of orderlies entered as she pushed in another tray of food and some water.

Scott submitted to the two orderlies, who clearly trusted him as far as the last ones had. He had to know why.

“Can I see my file?” he asked her.

“I’m just here to feed you,” the nurse said.

“What’s your name?” Scott inquired.

That brought him a vaguely revolted look, but she said, “Katy.”

“Ok, Katy, will you tell me why I’m here?”

She narrowed expressive eyes at him, “You don’t know? I’ve heard that before…”

“I’m not crazy.” Scott felt it was worth adding.

“Oh, I know that,” she said – and Scott winced inside at the repulsion in her voice. Perhaps he should be checking his breakfast for ground glass.

“When is Doctor Galpin coming?” Scott asked next, swallowing the tough lumps of bacon and just about getting the slimy eggs down his throat.

“He’ll be here in an hour or so,” Katy said.

“What’s he doing?” Scott just kept trying.

“His rounds,” she said. “He’s a busy guy. Might be more than an hour. No promises.”

“Do I have to stay like this until then?” he shrugged inside the jacket.

“Yes,” she said.

“Oh.” Scott dreaded what was coming next, but it was getting that he had to ask. “So…how does a guy take a leak around here?”

It involved a lot of looking the other way and they didn’t even take him beyond the padded room as he’d been hoping. Once the undignified moment was over, they ensured he was back in the straightjacket and went to the door. Scott demanded again, “I have to talk to Galpin! I’m not who you think!”

The nurse and the two orderlies left. Scott scrambled back to the small hatchway, gathering his strength for another bout of yelling. He heard the key turn to lock him in, but then he made out two voices outside. One of them he recognised in a heartbeat.

The voice was angry – he heard it shouting – and Scott yelled through the door, “Virgil! Virgil, I’m in here! Get me out! Virgil!”

The door swung open. The orderlies tried to push past – they lifted Scott up firmly and pulled him away from the doorway. “Virg!” He yelled, “Tell them who the hell I am!”

Finally. Finally it was over. Hope surged up.

The two big orderlies gripped Scott firmly, yanking him up and twisting him round so he faced the wall. Scott struggled – their hard hands dug against his shoulders. “No!”

“Let him go,” Virgil’s voice rang out. “Dammit, put him down!”

“Virg?” Scott tried to turn his head.

“Scott?” Virgil’s voice was right behind him; he felt a concerned hand touch the back of his head.

“I advised you to keep your distance, Mr Tracy. What on earth are you doing…?” Galpin had come in – Scott smelt the doctor’s aftershave stinking up the room.

“Tell them to put him down,” Virgil growled.

“He’s dangerous,” Galpin said. “You might not think it to look at him…”

“Let me see him,” Virgil ordered.

Galpin must have given the nod, because the two orderlies turned Scott, still squeezed between the two men, who kept his knees buckled and a firm grip on either shoulder. The cell seemed full of looming bodies. He pushed the panic down, his eyes intent on his brother.

“Scott,” Virgil said as he stooped down towards him, “is that…is that actually you?”

“Virg?” Despite his position, Scott did his best to seem laid back and sane. He almost managed it, saying, “Virg, tell these assholes to let me go, willya? This has been one huge fucking mistake. These people are nuts, they think I’m…”

“Scott?” Virgil was staring hard at him, and Scott frowned now.

“What’s the matter?”

“Is it…I don’t believe it, but…is that you?” Virgil said.

Scott felt sick and confused. He nodded frantically, “Of course it’s me – don’t be ridiculous – someone’s fucked up – tell them to let me out!” At Virgil’s frown he said, “Virgil, help me out here. What did I do? Why the fuck did you all put me in here?”

“We didn’t put you in here,” Virgil said. His voice was wary. “Your…the Curwens did…”

“Who?”

“Your sisters,” Doctor Galpin said. “They put you in our care.”

“I don’t have any sisters,” Scott said. He looked pleadingly at Virgil. “Virg? Get me out of here…”

“I…” Virgil sighed. “I don’t know.” He glared at Galpin. “Let me talk to him alone.”

“Mr Tracy, I only let you in here at all because Lady Creighton-Ward…”

“Let me talk to him alone.” Virgil repeated.

“I don’t think…”

“I’m not leaving,” Virgil said. He looked back at Scott, “Not until I’m sure of what he knows. Just give me ten minutes with him.”

“I cannot allow that…”

“Ten minutes.” Virgil snapped. “You’ve hogtied him so well I’m surprised he can breathe. I’ll be fine.”

“I am not happy about…”

“I don’t care,” Virgil said firmly. “But I do want to know why he thinks he’s my brother. If you want answers too, let me talk to him. Alone.” He drew a deep breath. “I guess the Tracy Foundation might remember Arkham Asylum in its seasonal tax write-offs. If you move aside.”

Galpin’s nose looked severely out of joint, but the lure of a donation won through. He took a long look at Scott, and then at Virgil.

“Five minutes,” he said at last, “And we will be just outside. Good enough?”

“Good enough,” Virgil nodded.

The orderlies let him go. Scott breathed out in relief, still feeling their hard fingers digging into his shrunken shoulders. Once they were gone, he said, “Virgil, what the hell do they think I…?”

“Look at this,” Virgil said, and pulled out a compact from inside his dark leather jacket.

“That yours?” Scott attempted a joke.

The corner of Virgil’s mouth twitched. “Nope. It belongs to a friend.”

“Penny?” Scott asked.

“Could be.” Virgil opened up the mirror. “Now I want you to take a good long look at this.”

Scott blinked. He looked into the small reflection, and for a long minute he didn’t say a word.

The man staring back had blue eyes, but there any familiarity ended. The stranger had a thin, rakish face, topped with dirty blonde hair that had probably once contained a parting. He looked anywhere between twenty-five and forty, haggard and pale. The man stared directly back at Scott, his watery eyes bulging in apparent disbelief.

Scott knew how he felt.

He couldn’t breathe. The horrible reality of it was choking him. He felt dizzy, the air escaping from his lungs in rapid jerks. “No…no…” Everything was falling in on him, the heavy padded walls crushing his flimsy new bones, blond hair and waxy pale skin. Suffocating his heaving chest. “No…”

He wouldn’t stop falling. Weird curved shapes lurched before his eyes, he heard mad piping music and the thunder of distant drums drawing him into their dark reaches…

“Easy.” Scott felt Virgil’s hands supporting his shoulders. The world stopped turning and he stared up, terrified, into Virgil’s face.

Up. His whole life, he had been taller than Virgil. And now…

“What…?” Scott forced the word from his throat, choking, “Who is that? Who?”

“Apparently, you’re Edmund Curwen,” Virgil said quietly.

“No,” Scott shook his head, “No, I’m not. I’m…” He clenched his body inside the jacket, flesh sticky with sweat. “I’m Scott. Virgil, believe me. I don’t know what’s made it look like I’m…” he shut his eyes. “Let me see it again.”

Virgil kept one hand on Scott’s left shoulder and held the small mirror to Scott’s eye level again. Scott repeated his stare of disbelief. He breathed directly onto the mirror, watched the stranger’s breath fog it up and then the blond man reappear.

“It’s impossible,” Scott felt the voice-that-wasn’t-his whimper. He cleared his throat. “It’s fucking impossible,” he repeated, with feeling.

Virgil looked at him. “I know,” he said softly.

“But I’m…I’m Scott, I…”

“Prove it,” Virgil said, “Please.”

Scott stared at him for a long moment. Then he said, “All right. Virg, you asked for it. That night…we went to the mainland and tried out a new club that Gordon recommended. We met those triplets…”

He went into detail – and he was surprised by how much actually came back, pin sharp, so much that Virgil stopped him rapidly.

“Ok,” he said, “Point taken. How about the farm?”

“I used to read you stories in the chicken coop,” Scott said with a wry grin, “And Grandma could never figure out where we were.”

“Ok,” Virgil said again.

Scott said, “Good enough?”

“I think so,” Virgil said. Then he leaned in. “What's the only time you have too much fuel?”

“When you're on fire," Scott replied. “I get it, Virg. Dad’s rules of the air. We drove the others crazy with this…” They were some of the first lessons they’d ever learned, even if Scott couldn’t recall mentioning the lines out loud since long before International Rescue began.

“Say the next one,” Virgil said.

“Flying isn’t dangerous…” Scott said.

“Crashing is dangerous.” Virgil nodded. “All right, last one. Take offs are optional…”

“Landings are mandatory,” Scott finished. “Virgil…c’mon. We did this to death when we were kids.”

Virgil’s shoulders sagged and he put his hands back on Scott’s shoulders, “Scott, this is fucking impossible.” He hugged him.

Scott finally felt warmth spread through him again, reassured by Virgil’s acceptance. He said, “Virgil, please tell me what you think hap…”

“That’s long enough,” Doctor Galpin came in and Scott tensed against his brother../

“I’ll figure something out,” Virgil said quietly into his ear. “Trust me.” He took the mirror away again, and looked him straight in the eye. “Try to remember.”

He released Scott and turned to the doctor. “I’ll need longer to question him. He knows things about my family. I can’t explain how but I have to know.”

“I’m intrigued,” the doctor said, “How can he know so much about your brother?”

“I have no idea,” Virgil said, “I’d like to question him again.”

“Do you know where your brother actually is, Mr Tracy?” Doctor Galpin said.

“Yeah,” Virgil looked at Galpin and then back at Scott, “Yeah, now I do.”

“Are you saying he’s in here, Mr Tracy?” Galpin asked.

Virgil laughed dryly and shook his head. “No. No he isn’t. In fact, I only saw him ten hours ago.”

Scott’s heart chilled. That wasn’t possible. “Virgil!”

“I hate to say I told you so,” Galpin said smoothly, and they walked out.

“I still need to talk to him again. In private,” Virgil was saying, and the door swung shut.

Scott leant against the door while it was locked. He listened to Virgil and Doctor Galpin, and their bodyguards, walking casually away.

Scott hunched over, still remembering the stranger’s face in the mirror. It must have been a trick, some fakery…a computer screen, even. He wished he could touch the face and feel the difference for himself, stretch and get the range of his body which felt small and cramped and weak beneath the straightjacket. He went over it again and again, coming up empty of an answer each time. How was this possible?

He clung to the hope that Virgil had recognised him, but he was still wondering for sure when the door finally opened again. It was hours later. The room had gone dark. Scott lifted his head and blinked to see his visitor. A big orderly stood there, but his crumpled face was suddenly familiar to Scott.

He grinned, the sudden unfamiliar action made his jaw click. “Parker?”

“Yes, er, Scott.” Parker gave a nod of assertion; he was wearing a probably stolen hospital uniform.

A blonde female nurse came in beside Parker. She looked him over suspiciously. “Scott, is that actually you?”

“Penelope! Yes,” he pulled himself up on his knees. His body was aching from the restraints, “Yes! It’s…it’s good to see you both. Unless I’m dreaming.”

“I can assure you that you aren’t, Scott,” she said, “Now come on. I would dearly like to go into more detail but I’m afraid that we haven’t much time.” She sprayed something over the little camera in the corner of the room.

“What’s the plan?” he asked, shuffling awkwardly on his knees towards them.

“It’s simpler just to show you,” she smiled. She bent swiftly and unlocked the manacles around his ankles. “I’m afraid you’ll have to stay in the jacket for now. We must keep up appearances. Keep your head low and stay quiet, Scott. We shall endeavour to get you out of here.”

Scott stayed between them both, hunching over as they instructed. He couldn’t resist glancing around – rapidly concluding that mental hospitals made his skin crawl even worse than regular ones. Walls reflected a sickly green paint in an unpleasant institutional glare. The air was clinical but somehow menacing. He kept shuffling, stumbling on unused legs, longing to break free.

“We’re taking you through the tunnels,” Penelope said softly over his shoulder, “There’s a way out to the car park where we can get you away from here unseen. Leave it to us.”

“Galpin’s going to be pissed…” Scott breathed.

“He will be when he wakes up,” Penelope murmured. “We have around ten minutes before then, or if somebody finds him…”

“Which they won’t,” Parker added.

“Then we can let you out of that dreadful jacket,” Penelope continued. “Once we’re in the tunnels.”

Scott nodded, now increasing his shuffle as the memory of walking flowed back into his extremities. He was in a strange body, but he’d barely been able to see or even feel it. It was definitely weaker than his own, and he shivered inside its skin. He suddenly realised it also carried a limp which sent a painful twinge ran up his right leg every time he put his weight on that side.

“Almost at the entrance,” Penelope whispered. “Play along.”

They reached the enforced gate, and Penelope said, “We’re transferring Mr Curwen to the examination rooms in the east wing.” She held up a pass card. The guard on the other side cast a glance over it.

“Whose orders?” the guard inquired.

“Galpin’s,” Penelope confirmed, “And he really doesn’t want to be kept waiting.”

The guard grinned and the key twisted in the lock. Scott breathed again as they went through it, out into daylight. There were large windows this side of the gate. Protective slats let in jagged shard of sun, which gave the greenish corridor a steadily pulsing hue. Scott glimpsed a garden on the outside.

“How big is this place, anyway?” he murmured.

“Very,” Penelope said. “Arkham is the largest mental institution this side of Bereznik. The facilities here are a little better…”

“You’ve been doing your research,” Scott said.

“Yes – and that’s why we’re going into the tunnels – they make it much faster to get around. Just get to the end of this corridor; we’re nearly at the entrance.” Penelope kept walking ahead of him, Scott limped awkwardly behind her.

His body felt tight and close now, and his bound arms were no help in balancing on his new legs. He followed the top of her head, neatly topped by a small nurse’s hat, until they reached the T-junction at the end.

“This is the backbone of the hospital,” she said, “The stairs to the tunnel are only two hundred yards away.” She upped the pace, and Scott and Parker kept close to her.

Once they were at the door marked ‘Lower Access Stairs,’ Penelope rapidly used her keys and the door swung open. Within it was a set of concrete stairs, wrapped in a wire mesh. A damp, stale smell rushed from the dark air. Penelope hurried inside, followed by Scott, and Parker shut and locked the door behind them.

They followed the staircase down two levels, and Scott was very glad for the mesh, which held off some of the terror of descending so fast without arms to steady himself. Parker seemed attentive to his problems.

“Can’t you let me out of this thing yet?” Scott panted.

“It’ll be safer once we’re all the way down, although this entrance is little-used,” Penelope admitted. “We might not be alone in the tunnels, but I believe that this section is not often visited except for certain…inmate mortalities.”

“What?”

“This leads to a grave yard, Mr Scott,” said Parker. His voice was cheerful as he added, “Only ten minutes away.”

“Perfect,” Scott grunted.

They reached the bottom of the stairs. Scott turned his back to Parker, “We’re down, guys, now get me out of this!” He met Penny’s barely raised eyebrow. “Please?”

“Of course.” Penelope nodded to Parker, who set to work with the keys. There were several on the chain, Scott stood uncomfortably whilst the talented chauffeur tested them.

“Can’t you just pick the lock, Parker?”

“I…” Parker was perhaps about to launch into some sort of speech about why, when Penelope lifted her head and Scott felt a shiver go down his now scrawny, pale neck.

“What…?” he said. Then he saw the look on her face – Penelope’s baby-blue eyes big with fear, her face completely white. She was looking up.

“Run,” she gasped, and took off down the corridor.

Parker propelled Scott forwards, starting his legs at speed. Scott stumbled, top-heavy in the straightjacket, and as he did so, he glanced up and saw a great shadow at the top of the stairs they’d just descended. The lights were going out, and there was a hint, just briefly, of a shape in the approaching darkness.

Scott forced his stumble into a run. His weaker legs were already protesting the effort, he was quickly in an agony he had rarely felt. Parker started out behind him, but then the older man passed him and Scott ran on in the darkening tunnel, struggling to keep up. His breathing grew ragged, painful, his vision blurring until he was sure the thing was on him, at his heels, its sticky touch just millimetres from his fragile body.

He ran until a small hand grabbed his shoulder and two more hands gripped his waist and pulled him into a doorway. Penelope and Parker slammed the door behind them just at the moment Scott saw the tunnel outside go dark through the glass square. Then the other two yanked him forwards, and without a single word pushed him up another narrow staircase, again wrapped in wire mesh. Scott dug deep – willing himself to reach the top, even though thin lungs were begging him to stop.

The lights went out below them.

Penelope reached the top first and he heard her battling with the keys, fighting to open the reinforced door. Scott was only aware of the dark behind him – he hurled himself at the door as it clicked, half-believing his own terror had forced it open. The lights went out at the top of the stairs at the moment all three elbowed their way into the blinding daylight.

Scott sprawled into the sparse, muddy grass, frantically pushing with his legs to get away from the tunnel entrance, his lungs bursting with the effort. The shape was moving inside the doorway, a shifting thing that flung an arc of fluid darkness towards them.

Penelope fired a tiny gun at the shape and Scott heard the thing squeal and shift again. Penelope cried, “Quickly! The gate!”

The muddy field was slightly sloped. Scott forced himself up it, clambering over the low white gravestones. As they reached the top he realised there were trees – this was the edge of a wood. They broke through the wooden gate in a flurry of hands and kicks, although Scott was never sure if Parker undid the padlock or if they’d just kicked the thing down. Then he followed Penelope again, eager to be away from the thing he’d almost seen.

He almost ran into her when she finally stopped, gasping. He sank to his knees against the nearest tree, sucking oxygen into long-deprived lungs.

“Untie him, Parker,” Penelope requested. Her blonde hair had come down, tangled and in disarray after their flight. Scott had a sudden inkling that she’d secreted the gun beneath her nurse’s hat.

Parker set to work on his chains again, and Scott’s arms unlocked with a creak.

“What…was…it?” he asked, turning so that Parker could finish untying him. The Chauffer’s hands were shaking. Scott could sympathise.

“I, I’m not sure, exactly,” Penelope said. Despite their exertion, her face was still pale, her eyes sunken in their sockets. “We cannot linger here, Scott. We must get to the car. Parker…”

“H’already working on it, Milady,” Parker said. He fiddled with his own watch transmitter, “The car is due west, about ‘alf a mile away.”

“Jolly good.” She smiled wearily at Scott. “I promise you, I shall try to explain some of this. I hope we have at least that much time.”

Scott was still stretching his arms, realising they were wiry, and not completely useless as he’d feared. He still gulped air, his heart thudding after his panicked sprint. “What happened to me, Penny?”

She said. “I’ll tell you what I know. I don’t think you are going to like it.”

Scott followed Penelope and Parker out of the forest. He wouldn’t let himself remember what he’d seen in the tunnels. His mind was more crowded with other, more pressing questions.

Maybe now – now he was with International Rescue’s most trusted agents – he stood a chance of figuring out a few of the answers.

Still, he shuddered at every unknown creak in the woods behind him as they made their way to the vehicle and the faint promise of safety.

The rental car was a practical black 4x4 with tinted windows. They must have put his escape – and their arrival - together in a hurry, to have left FAB1 behind. Scott clambered inside, his leg still twinging as he lifted it to get in. He sank onto the vast back seat with a groan, looking up at the roof, hearing rain start to patter above.

“Where’s Virgil, now?” he asked.

“He’s waiting for us,” Penelope said – she sat beside him and Parker, of course, took the wheel. The doors locked around him with a reassuring thunk.

They drove across the gravelly mud. Already rain had started to fill up the windshield, and Parker flicked on the wipers. Scott stared at the ripples they caused, his mind flying with possibilities. Under it all was a deep weariness in the aftermath of the unnatural events he’d just survived.

He turned his head to Penny. “Ok, Penny. Talk to me.”

“About?” She was stalling.

“About everything.” He waved a hand out – saw its white skin and bitten nails. A long scar ran up the back of his left wrist and ended at his elbow. “Everything you know.”

“When does your memory stop?” she inquired.

“I remember…” Scott leaned forwards, thinking hard, hearing the windshield wipers make their oddly soothing sweep against the thickening rain. He found a way around that unnameable part of his memory, reached the safe cliffs where he knew he had been in the real world. “I remember flying in Thunderbird One to…Europe. Somewhere in Hungary.”

“Yes, there was a rescue there. You were knocked unconscious for some weeks. I still can’t believe this is you, Scott. But you are, aren’t you. If I can tell, it’s no surprise that Virgil knew the instant he saw you.”

“Wouldn’t be so sure, Penny. Looked to me like he took some convincing,” Scott said, “And he still might not believe it. He also told Galpin that he’d seen me yesterday.”

“After a fashion, yes, he did,” Penelope said. “That’s the mystery we are trying to solve. What else do you recall?”

“I landed in Hungary, I…I was looking up at myself…and then I woke up in a straightjacket with nurses acting like I’m Jack the Ripper,” Scott said.

“And nothing else?”

Scott swallowed dryly, the dark seemed very close. “No, nothing at all.” he said.

“I wish I could enlighten you, Scott. All I really know is that you were in Hungary to rescue some cave divers who’d become trapped. Gordon retrieved you and Edmund, after you were knocked unconscious in another rockfall. You had been rescuing the last few survivors. When you…your body woke, a month after those events, it behaved….differently.”

“How?”

“Virgil told me – he said that all your memories had faded with the injury. You had a nasty head wound, and your family felt that it adequately accounted for some bizarre changes in your personality. You asked incessant questions about International Rescue. You were anxious to relearn your duties. They tried to teach you again, to jog your memory.”

“But I don’t remember doing anything like that; I only remember…” Scott shook his head. He couldn’t touch the truth, however much he thought he wanted to. It remained safely buried. His new body shuddered all around him.

“Scott?” Penelope sounded concerned.

“What happened after that?” Scott asked.

“After two weeks of trying to explain your unusual behaviour, I believe that Virgil was the first to grow truly suspicious. He began to ask me to help him – away from your father’s notice. He said that you had become…dangerous, in a way he couldn’t quite express....”

Scott clenched a narrow fist, watched the new arm’s scar flex and twist. “What else?”

“With Virgil’s approval, I intercepted emails to the Tracy network. We received one 48 hours ago from the good Doctor Galpin, requesting help from your father. It appears he was trying to disprove the notion that a certain dangerous patient of his was receiving telepathic information from one of Jeff’s sons. He was eager for any information that your esteemed family could give him. Virgil insisted on visiting at once, and Parker and I joined him.”

Penelope paused, “I think Virgil grew most suspicious when we discovered that the person’s name was Edmund Curwen, and the name of the family which you went to rescue over five months ago, in Hungary.”

“What did I…did Edmund do?” Scott asked. “Why was I put there? In that…place…?”

Penelope tightened her lips. “Are you sure you want to know?”

“Tell me everything,” Scott said firmly. “Penny, I have to know!”

Penelope nodded. She said, “They found you in a car, sitting beside a dead man…he had been brutally attacked. So had his family. The evidence was rather incriminating, but I believe that you were in a catatonic state and the court recommended holding you in a secure unit. Doctor Galpin was assigned to see if you would become fit for trial.”

Scott squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, taking this in. The black space in his head mocked him – daring him to look directly at it. He caught barely a glimpse, and gulped back a wave of pure nausea. “A family? Jesus, Penny…why the fuck did you let me out of there?”

She patted the top of his hand. “Scott, I don’t believe any of this is as it appears, and neither did your brother. Virgil was simply going to watch you for a few days, to see if you could continue to prove who you were. Then he was going to take steps to remove you, I promise, despite these rather inconvenient circumstances.”

Scott almost grinned at that. Only Lady Penelope could call his being trapped in the wrong body an ‘inconvenient circumstance.’ “But why would I, or even Edmund, do that?” Scott asked, rubbing his forehead with his hands. His skin was clammy, his hair full of grease and sweat. “And why did you decide to bust me out so soon?”

“Virgil says that he received a message in the hotel about four hours ago, urging him to get you away from Arkham, or…” Penelope’s face tightened at what she also clearly remembered too well. “Scott…I think there’s a great evil at work here and you are right at the centre of it.”

Scott drew a deep breath and leaned back into the seat, “Great evil. Right. This is insane, you know. I have to be going insane. But…” He looked at the damning reflection in the dark window. Edmund Curwen’s bug-eyed expression stared back, accusing him. “Dammit, now I’m not so sure…”

“We are trying to understand this ourselves,” Penelope said. “I have made several enquiries that may prove useful. Now, we’re almost there,” Penelope said. Scott sat up straighter. “Virgil can tell you more, I’m certain.”

“I hope so. Where’s my…my body, now?” he asked.

“As far as I am aware, he is on the Island.”

“Whothehellis he?” Scott asked.

“Who or what he is, I fear I am…not sure, yet.” Penelope said, dryly. “But your obvious presence among us is rather strong proof that whoever is controlling your body now, they are certainly not who you were.”

Scott rubbed his face with his hands again. He was still looking for a logical way out of this, and that part of his mind hardened against the growing panic and disbelief. He swore he would make sense of it. Somehow.

It was still raining hard when they reached the New England guest house. Despite its chipped white paint it bore the watery onslaught with a kind of ancient dignity. Rain bounced off the shutters as Scott got out of the car wrapped in an inadequate travel blanket, shivering in the hospital t-shirt and the thin asylum-issued pyjama bottoms. His bare feet scraped on the gravel drive. He could barely feel them.

“Hello?” Penelope rang the doorbell. She looked anxiously at Scott. “We must get you warmed up. We can’t fight whatever this is if you’re afflicted with pneumonia…”

“No,” Scott agreed, his teeth chattering. The blanket was already soaked. He just wanted to see Virgil and grab a hot shower. His new body cringed under every drop of freezing rain that trickled down its skin and he had no energy left to resist the chill. He was already exhausted.

“Nobody’s answering,” Penelope frowned. She opened up her compact. “Virgil? We’re here. Can you let us in? It appears your landlady has gone to the shops…one hopes.”

She frowned a little more, and then glanced at Scott. “How odd. Nobody’s coming to the door, and Virgil now doesn’t reply.”

“Shit.” Scott shuddered, mostly with cold. “Why do you think that is?”

“I don’t know.” Penelope drew herself up, the rain had plastered her hair to her sculpted features, and she seemed almost skull like for a moment. Scott squeezed his eyes shut again, willing the trick of the eye to pass.

“We need to get inside,” Penelope murmured. “Parker, if you would…?”

“H’of course, Milady.” Parker did something deft with the lock and a piece of wire he drew from the sleeve of his large dark overcoat. Scott shivered again, hating this weakness. The big door with its fearsome lion doorknocker opened with a click.

“You’re a handy guy, Parker,” Scott grunted, hurrying in out of the deluge after Penelope. “Hope you’re around if I ever lock myself o, out…out of my s, ship.”

He heard Parker give a little chuckle behind him. Scott grinned. He needed a whisky, right NOW.

“Everyone please be quiet,” Penelope said softly, “We must see if Virgil’s all right. Given what we have so far encountered, we must proceed with some caution.”

Still shaking with cold, Scott said, “W, where’s the room?”

“It’s the first door on the landing. Wait here, if you don’t mind,” Penelope said, and seemed to glide soundlessly up the staircase before Scott could say another word.

A grandfather clock ticked in the memory-lined hall. The wallpaper’s pattern was hard to see between hundreds of photographs and prints. A large oil painting of an elderly New England gentleman glared at Scott and Parker from far the end of the hallway, which the dim daylight couldn’t quite reach. Scott shuffled on a ragged carpet the colour of clotted blood, listening hard for movement upstairs. He exchanged a glance with Parker. Parker had a hand on the rail, ready to launch up to his mistress’s rescue in a moment.

The clock ticked for a long second, then it seemed to pause and Scott heard a single thump followed by a gasp.

Parker instantly bolted upstairs and despite his weary body Scott did the same, awkwardly mounting the stairs, gasping as he made it.

Parker flung open the nearest door; Scott reached it a moment later. “Penny, are you okay?” he called.

Penelope looked briefly confused by the sight of them both staring at her from the door. She said, “Um, yes. Sorry for any alarm. I knocked one of Virgil’s sketchbooks over. I assume that he left it perched on the side when he went out.”

“How do you know he went out?” Scott asked.

“Because he isn’t here,” Penelope said.

“Well where did he go?” Scott heard a panicked edge in his voice, irrational and annoying.

“I am trying to find out.” She did that strange little frown again. “He would have called.”

“Unless someone stopped him,” Scott said. “Where else would he be?”

“Excellent question, Scott.” Penelope raised an eyebrow. “I’m trying to discover that myself. I’ll attempt to call him again. Parker, please could you prepare some hot, sweet tea for all of us.” She lifted the compact, fiddling with its transmitter. Parker got to work with the room’s tea making facilities.

“Keep trying.” Scott limped into the room, dripping onto the sparse blue carpet. It was a basic guest bedroom. The sheets on the double bed were rumpled, and it appeared to at least have an en suite bathroom tucked away in the far corner. Whilst Penelope worked on the compact radio, he yanked some jeans, a belt and a sweater out of Virgil’s suitcase. He opened the en suite door. “I’ll be in here.”

Penelope nodded and Parker sat down on a chair facing the door – he’d pulled out a gun and sat there, on guard. The kettle burpled on a little table nearby, the sound of boiling water resembled the battering rain outside.

Scott grimaced and shivered again.

The bathroom consisted of a small shower and a toilet, with a narrow sink in the corner. The floor was carpeted and there was yellowing wallpaper around the bath. Virgil’s razor and wash bag was just on the side. The lighting was poor, but Scott was strangely glad for the enclosed space and the tiny window. It meant nothing could get in – this very thought sent a violent cold spasm down his spine. Angrily, Scott stripped off his soaking wet clothes – trembling in the chill he dried himself with the nearest towel, and caught another glimpse of himself in the mirror.

It still startled him. The stranger glared back beneath bushy white-blond eyebrows. Scott leaned forwards, looking hard. As he’d thought, the pale-skinned body had a wiry build; the arms were clearly used to some exercise but had never been built up by weights. The man flexed his skinny torso in the mirror, turning around to examine himself all over. A long scar ran from the back of one ankle to his thigh. That accounted for the limp. Then he saw it – a faint tattoo on his left shoulder. A five-pointed star, elaborate yet tiny, with writing he couldn’t read underneath it. Puzzling over this, Scott only returned his gaze to his new face once he was convinced there were no further physical defects he needed to be aware of.

Edmund Curwen, if that’s who he was, had a boyish look to his complexion betrayed only by old, haunted eyes. Scott guessed he was in his late twenties, and maybe even looked it on a good day. He also carried a few days’ growth of facial hair, which Scott set about removing with Virgil’s razor. He warmed his skin under the hot water faucet, hearing Parker and Penelope talking quietly out in the bedroom.

Then Scott dressed quickly, doing up the belt on Virgil’s jeans to the tightest it would go and pulling on a sweater that fitted more like a long tunic. Yep, Virgil was a big guy all right. Scott could use him here about now

“Any news from him?” Scott asked as he re-entered the room. He picked up a cup of the tea Parker had set up, gulping the hot, sweet liquid in grateful slurps. He also helped himself to two – or four –of the cookies that had been thoughtfully spread out beside it. The immediate sugar rush felt obscenely good.

Penelope was still working on the compact. “Yes, but not directly, which is most curious.”

“What?” Scott wasn’t following her.

“Virgil isn’t answering his mobile – every time I call, I’m transferred to his voicemail. And all I get on his wristcom is static. Yet I just received a message from him on my mobile.”

Scott knew he should be paying closer attention to what she had said, but his relief at hearing that Virgil had left word overrode his normal caution. “A message? What did he say? Where is he?”

“He’s headed for Miskatonic University,” Penelope said. “He said he received an important lead, and he’s gone to meet the person there. He wants us to rendezvous with him in the records room at the Orne library.”

“He took off on his own?” Scott frowned. “Why didn’t he wait for us?”

Penelope shook her head. “Obviously he’s as impulsive as the rest of his family when it comes to uncovering the truth.”

She had him there. Scott had to give her a smile – one that faded quickly at what she said next. “That aside, there is a more pressing question, Scott. Why can’t I reach anyone on Tracy Island?”

Scott turned the sketchbook over in his hands. “What do you mean? You can’t reach anybody?”

“Exactly,” Penelope said. “And I think…”

“Fuck.” Scott had absently opened the sketchbook, and what he saw startled him so much he dropped it, spine first, on to the bed. It fell open at the centre, a hideous thing crawling from its pages, impossible charcoal body lifelike and terrible. Scott recognised it and that blank space in his mind quaked dangerously. He backed away as Penelope and Parker leaned over it. Her face had gone white again, whilst Parker’s had creased into an evermore strained glare.

“How did Virgil draw this?” Scott whispered. “It’s the thing in the…the hospital.”

“Yes,” Penelope’s voice sounded husky, he saw panic dancing in her pale blue eyes as she reached out and turned the page. Another strange creature – this time an oddly elongated beast with backwards legs and a wolfish, gaping mouth – watched from the paper.

Scott lunged forwards and shut the book.

Penelope said, “Perhaps…he had more than just a message. We must check these pictures, Scott. They may prove a useful guide...”

“Right,” Scott rubbed his face again, feeling the unfamiliar smooth skin under a strange palm. “Virgil’s gone insane. That’s what’s happened.” He sighed. “You’re sure you can’t raise the Island?”

“Very sure,” Penelope said stiffly.

“Then we need to go meet Virgil.” He felt fortified by sugar and caffeine and warm clothes. “But I need a weapon, Penny. Tell me you have another goddamn gun in here…”

“I believe I can provide you with something.” Penelope reached into her suitcase. “What’s your preference, Scott? Regular?” she pulled out one of IR’s standard personal weapons and then another, a Desert Eagle with a few adjustments. “Or extra large?”

Scott whistled. “You sure came prepared.” He gestured for the second gun.

Penelope zipped up the suitcase briskly and handed him the Desert Eagle. “I hope so, Scott. By the looks of things I believe I rather underestimated. I have a feeling that these may prove inadequate for repelling the creature we encountered in the asylum.”

Scott turned the heavy weapon over in his new, smaller hands, his alien eyes drawn to the light bouncing from its curves. “It’s a start,” he answered soberly.

They started to pack up, within a few minutes they were almost ready to leave. Scott pored over Virgil’s sketchbook while he waited, forcing himself to look at the images, when Penelope lifted her head and looked sharply at the door. “Did you hear that?” she said.

Scott tilted his head to hear, Parker stood up straighter, fastening the case without looking. After a moment or two Scott whispered, “What did you…?”

“There.” Penelope moved toward the door, drawing her snub nosed gun from her jacket. Scott listened and suddenly he could hear it too. It was a faint footstep, somebody creeping along the hallway outside. A faint, reedy chuckle turned his blood into cold rain.

No one spoke now. All three moved toward the closed door and Penelope pressed her ear against it, listening. The shuffle came again and they tensed, Parker exchanged a look with Penelope, she nodded and he began to open the door, beckoning Scott behind him. Scott heard his heart thudding, his hands suddenly clammy on the cold metal, he held the weapon in his right hand, wondering suddenly if his aim was up to actually hitting whatever waited outside.

The shuffling went by and they held their breath as one, listening to it move, then when they heard it pass their door Parker threw it open and burst into the hallway with a shout. Scott pushed through next and Penelope let out a high pitched cry of “Parker, Scott, no!” and they all froze again. Scott peered around Parker and cut the silence with a small, ashamed laugh.

“Is anything the matter?” a little old lady stood in the hallway, half silhouetted in the dingy hall light. She seemed easily in her eighties, her hair was white and very thin, and she wore a baggy red-patterned night gown and pink slippers. She peered at the three of them from watery grey eyes, and Scott wasn’t exactly sure what they’d all been expecting. The horrors in Virgil’s sketchbook had filled his head for a moment there.

“No, ma’am, nothing’s the…” Scott began.

“I’m so sorry,” Penelope started to say, “I don’t know what you must think…”

“Milady…!” Parker gulped, pointing with the gun.

It dawned on Scott that the old lady’s nightgown wasn’t naturally red at all, and a lot of it had probably come from the dripping thing she had tucked girlishly behind her left arm. A trail of dark blood led down the hallway.

“Whatever’s the matter with you all?” the old lady said, looking indignant, “I must be going.” She lifted her hand and a head swung out from behind her back. A young man’s head swung towards them, his mouth lolled and his sightless muddy brown eyes implored them from beyond the grave.

“Holy shit,” Scott muttered, “Holy shit…”

“Who was that?” Penelope whispered.

“That’s Randolph, one of my students, the lodgers. He left his school books open and I read, there were so many books, one spoke to me. Bright terrible sights I saw…I have things to do, I must be getting on…” The old lady’s wrinkled face shifted in the dark, more shadows fell around her shaking shoulders. “The Mad God is coming and he will be…so, so cross if I don’t get this to him…” She peered at them all, suspicion crinkled her face further into the shadows. “You won’t stop me?”

Scott couldn’t take his eyes from the dripping head and said in a strangled voice, “Of…of course we won’t…we’re leaving right now, aren’t we…” It’s not Virgil. Thank Christ it’s not Virgil.

“Yes,” Penelope whispered in an equally dry, terrified voice, “Oh, we’re going. We’re ever so busy as well…”

The old woman fixed them all with a long look and then her face opened in a beatific smile. “Oh, that’s good, that’s good. I’ll be downstairs if you all need anything at all.” She turned away and the severed head swung around with her. Scott swallowed back nausea, unable to peel his eyes away from it.

He heard Penelope speak, “Parker?”

“Milady?”

“Get the bags.”

The chauffeur moved back into the bedroom, casting a wary look back where the old woman had descended.

“Penny,” Scott said, “We should, we have to do something about her.”

“What would you suggest, Scott? Contacting the police? Maybe when we’re a long, long way from here but right now there simply isn’t time. I didn’t know how to tell you before, but the world has been seeing more incidents like this every day, signs of a…I hardly know how to begin…”

“What things?”

“Before we lost contact with Tracy Island, there were more rescues in the last two months than you had all seen in three years. Earthquakes and volcanoes, particularly. There was no way to keep things going.”

“And they let Virgil come out here and find me? Did they just give up or something?”

“I don’t know,” Penelope said stiffly, “I’m afraid only Virgil can tell you that. At least we know he wasn’t here when she began her ‘work’. Thank you, Parker.”

Parker emerged with two large suitcases and a frown. “’as that mad old bat come back yet?” he asked.

“We leave quickly and quietly. If she does cause a fuss, we’ll be ready.” Penelope moved on, taking point, her gun at the ready. Scott brought up the rear, noticing now that the doors in the hallway were all smeared with blackish blood, and there was a strange symmetry to the markings. He almost slipped on the first carpeted step, grabbing the banister to right himself.

Parker visibly grimaced. “Try not to shoot me in the ‘ead if you can ‘elp it, Mister Tracy.”

“Sorry, Parker.” Scott licked his lips, forcing the jitters back down. The old lady had left a smear of blood that trailed all the way down to the hall, and he was desperate to be out of the house. Penelope quickly unlatched the front door and beckoned them forwards. Scott breathed a little easier despite the murky air that swept in after her. She left the doorway open to let Parker through, he walked fast and Scott took a few steps to catch up. He put his hand on the edge of the door to get out.

“He’s coming,” the old woman said. Scott froze, his unfamiliar body reacting in total, useless shock as her fingers closed over his arm. She came out of the cloakroom space with awful speed, pale grey eyes staring through him, her teeth slightly bared. She’d covered her face in smaller versions of the markings; Scott recognised their symmetry from a place deep in his nightmares. She whispered too sanely, “The Mad God will give me anything, and you will not stop him…”

He didn’t see the knife until he heard the shot and she became inexplicably heavy and almost pulled him down with her. Then he saw the blade fall shining from her hand, and the luckless student’s head rolled off to her left and down the threadbare hall. Scott gave a small, strangled choking noise and another hand closed on his arm. It was Parker.

“C’mon old son, we need to make a move on. It’s kinder for ‘er, anyway.” Parker hustled a now numb Scott down the driveway, and Scott paused just once to almost-retch into what remained of the landlady’s rose bushes.

Slamming the car door seemed to cut out the ringing in his ears. Scott took a deep, chilly swig from a bottle of water and leaned heavily on the rental’s dashboard. He said, “So this…madness is really spreading?” Scott was surprised to hear his voice. It had almost felt like he wouldn’t speak again.

“In Arkham at the very least,” Penelope murmured from behind him. “The sooner we find Virgil, the better. Perhaps he’s learned something useful.”

“That would be a break.” He took another swig of water, sealed the bottle, and leaned back. Reminded of Virgil’s sketchbook, he asked Penelope to pull it out and opened it up. The same strangeness met his eyes; he took it all in this time, searching for that marking again. He’d seen it before the mad woman, it scratched at his mind like a cat wanting in, or a rat trying to get out. He kept flicking. “There.” He recognised it again, behind a charcoal drawing of two fierce creatures devouring a pile of humanoid meat. “Shit, what does it mean?”

“I don’t see a pattern,” Penelope said, peering over his shoulder.

“It’s hard to see, it’s just in that…in that part of it.” Scott tried to point to it.

“I still can’t see it.” Penelope sounded annoyed.

“The light isn’t so good,” Scott conceded, although he’d had no trouble picking it out.

“Parker, do you see it?”

Parker glanced down. “I don’t see much except some ‘orrible brutes, Mr Tracy. But then, I ‘ave to keep my eyes o the road…”

“Yeah,” Scott conceded. “Well, there’s something there. I can’t wait for Virgil to explain these. How much longer until we’re at the Miskatonic?”

“About ‘alf an hour, Mr Tracy,” Parker informed him. “A little music, per’aps?”

“Yeah,” Scott rubbed his eyes, “Let me hear the news, first, OK?”

“Right you are.” Parker flicked on the radio and found a station. It played some inoffensive pop music for ten minutes, then as it rolled around to 4am the news came on. “This is KBBL news. Unseasonal forest fires continue to rage across vast areas of New England. A full alert is under effect and many communities have been evacuated...an earthquake has devastated parts of Tehran with over three hundred thousand lives thought lost and five million made homeless. More unexpectedly, there has been no sign of the International Rescue team. They have been called to many similar disasters over the last two months…”

“Lots of rescues?” Scott said.

“Yes,” Penelope said.

“Damn.” Scott couldn’t ignore the guilt that swamped him, even if it wasn’t his fault. He should have been able to do something. Now he would.

When they pulled up at the Miskatonic University campus at 4:30am the air had clogged thick with fog and a miserable, thin drizzle. They reached a barrier and waited with the engine running as a guard came over to them from his booth. He peered in the window, shining a flashlight. “Passes, please.” He sounded like an older man.

Parker, Scott and Penny exchanged glances. Penelope said, “I’m awfully sorry but we didn’t have time to acquire one.”

“We’re here to visit a friend,” Scott added.

“What’s your friend’s name?” the guard asked.

“He’s more of a…friend of a friend…” Scott started to say. Then the guard pointed the flashlight at Scott’s face.

“Mr Curwen?” the man sounded truly surprised. “This is…I’m sorry, sir, I thought you weren’t coming back until after Christmas?”

“Yes,” Scott said after a pause. “Yeah, but I got back early. I’m meeting up with an old friend and we got a little, er, held up in the fog.”

“And who are your…companions, sir?”

“They’re with me.” Scott made a smile as appealing as he could, remembering Edmund Curwen’s clear blue eyes and making his tight recessed jaw open into a brighter grin. “Can you let us find our way? He said he was somewhere down from the Orne Library. I could find it if you could point us that way…”

“Sure, I know, this fog, like, plays major tricks with your brain.” The old guard gestured with his flashlight, “Just keep going along here until you reach the science annex, you can’t miss the pillars and the Orne is still just there on your left. Dome and everything. You just can’t miss it.”

“Ah, yeah, the left, thanks buddy.” Scott nodded.

“No problem, Mr Curwen, have a good night!” the guy tapped on the roof and went back into the little hut. The gate barrier opened up.

“Well, he was helpful…” Penelope murmured.

“And people know Curwen. Guess they didn’t all hear what he did…” Scott tapped his fingers restlessly on the dashboard until Parker cleared his throat loudly and Scott quit it. He kept his eyes peeled on all sides as they drove through the quad and past some more buildings, but nothing shifted in the fog. Not the slightest thing. He noticed that the Miskatonic’s buildings resembled his own University, equally venerable Yale. Even in fog like this, Yale had never appeared quite so old. Then he saw the tall pillars of the science building that the young guard had talked about. He straightened up. Behind him he heard Penelope shuffling things together. Scott clutched the hard back of Virgil’s sketchbook on his lap. His brother was going to explain plenty, justify more. He didn’t want to consider that there was the distinct possibility that Virgil had no idea, either.

They parked directly in front of the Orne Library, on a disabled spot (Penelope had pointed out that it was almost 5am and an emergency to boot, mainly as if justifying it to herself). The campus was quiet as they left the car, but for a second Scott made out a strange, muffled collected shout that pierced the murky air.

“Did you guys hear…?”

It came again. Distant, but he could start to hear the steady voices, building to that one shout, as though a good sized bunch of people were chanting at a church rally. “What the heck is that?”

“We must find Virgil, Scott,” Penelope said, although she was looking around too, her eyes flickering back and forth nervously.

Scott agreed with a small grunt and quickly climbed the short set of stone steps to the large doors. It was brightly lit inside, the light warped through thick reinforced glass. They were also tightly locked. Scott swore, “How does he expect us to meet him, if…” he noticed a folded up yellow square on top of the security swipe. He picked it up – it was a note printed from a computer, wrapped around a small, rectangular key card. The note read in bold, clear capitals:

“IN RECORDS ROOM, BASEMENT LEVEL. HURRY. V.”

“At least he’s here,” Scott murmured.

Penelope said, “Let me see?”

“Sure,” Scott handed it to her as he swiped the card. The security light beeped to green and a faint buzzer sounded. He pushed one of the doors open and held it open for Penelope and Parker.

Inside, the library had a huge domed roof made almost entirely of glass. Latin words were inscribed around the edges, and it was dark above them with just the slightest hint of the rolling fog at the edges. The room within was surprisingly vast, decked out in smart red wood finishes. Stacks of books fanned out on either side, but the middle of the room was taken up by a large bank of computers. It smelled of electrical servers and fresh book glue.

Penelope handed Scott back the note and padded forwards on the thick carpet. “Keep alert, everyone,” she whispered.

Scott said, “I don’t hear anything…can’t even hear those voices in here…”

“I hope it remains that way,” Penelope said, moving ahead of him. Scott hurried to catch up with Parker just behind him. They moved quickly past the stacks, which were left in shadow compared to the rest of the room. Scott kept so close to Penny as they made their way to the Basement entrance that he bumped straight into her when she stopped abruptly.

“I really would have expected at least one student to be in here,” she said, her eyes flicking around again. “Even at this hour in the morning.”

“Maybe they went for pizza,” Scott said impatiently.

“This is no time for flippancy… Aren’t you the slightest bit concerned, Scott? We really are rushing into this.”

“Penny, I know damn well what it could mean, but I need to find Virg. I have to know what this,” he tapped the book, glanced up, “all of this means. My family could be…” He couldn’t make himself say it, just glared and looked away, and Penelope sighed deeply and squeezed his arm.

“I know this is the strangest situation we’ve ever found ourselves in. But we must be careful, Scott. I believe that given what’s happened almost anything else is possible.”

“Let’s just find Virgil, Penelope. I need to know he’s safe, at least.” Scott pushed open the door that led to the basement level, and held the Desert Eagle against his hip. He ignored how heavy it felt. “Let’s go.”

“Very well.” Penelope tried to get in front, he wasn’t quite able to stop her and Parker got behind him. The stair lights flickered on. This part of the library didn’t appear quite so new. Bare bricks were exposed, clean but weathered and very old. A few smooth, bright library boards that cheered ‘Go Cephalods!’ and ‘Learning Within History!’ decorated the top of the stairs, but these quickly turned to more unfinished stone wall as the trio descended.

Scott and Penelope pushed open the next double door between them, and these actually creaked. The air down here was different, cooler, and musty, like wine cellars he’d spent some time in during his European ‘tour.’ Some of his friends had owned substantial collections requiring similar deep storage away from the sun. Overhead lights only came on when they opened the doors and walked into the hall, sending shadows fluttering to the corners. It was cooler and quieter here, the hall was a concrete floor with several doors in each wall, and a big chest with a reference book spread out on top of it.

“Spared no expense,” Scott murmured. The smell down here was so musty it was rank, and Scott raised his voice to call out, “Virgil?!”

“There’s the records room,” Penelope said. As they turned to look, the door she had named began opening slowly.

Scott’s hands went clammy again and he broke out in a stinking, sudden sweat that immediately went damp and cold against his skin. A hand appeared around the door and Scott steeled himself, breath tight, hand on the Desert Eagle’s impossible weight. “Virgil?” he croaked.

Virgil’s face appeared in the dark and he emerged from the door with a sheepish expression. His hair stuck out in all directions, and he looked somewhat haggard, but his features lifted when he laid eyes on them all. “Thank God!”

“Virgil!” Scott rapidly crossed the concrete hall and pulled his brother into a very weird hug. Jeez, he’s tall. “Virg, dammit, you scared me to freakin’ death, where the hell have you been?”

“Down here reading. I guess there was no cell signal, huh? I’ve turned up some really interesting things. I had a lead, someone called me. It’s easier if I just show you. Come here.” Virgil ushered him inside the records room and Scott went with him. The record room was larger than he’d expected. It was dirty, full of books of course, but with a great big flat bench right in the middle of it. Virgil said, “Take a look at that book, Scott.”

“OK. Virg. Hey, we found your sketches. They were crazy, where did you come up with that shit?”

“My sketches?” Virgil murmured. “Oh. Yeah, they just popped into my head. Like a migraine.”

“Oh. Well, I wondered where you saw the symbol…” Scott trailed off as he approached the huge tome that Virgil had gestured to. The book was open on a page full of spidery, dark brown handwriting with the occasional set of triangles and numbers scrawled in between. Scott put down the sketchbook and turned a page. He whistled through his borrowed body’s teeth. “Hey, this is your work, Virg! This is where you saw…!” As he lifted his head, his body went rigid with shock.

Penelope had come inside as well, wrinkling her nose in obvious distaste at the smell, commenting on how glad she was that Virgil was still alive. His brother was smiling and nodding, and then as Parker entered Virgil very suddenly and deliberately slammed the heavy door shut against the older man’s head.

Parker reeled sideways, falling to one side, his face bleeding. Penelope had already turned towards them and Virgil grabbed her, throwing her bodily against the wall. Books and thick dust went flying. She kicked and struggled but he had his arm wrapped tightly around her slender body, and with his free hand he clamped a pale piece of cloth across her face. Penelope shrieked and wrestled against him, kicking out and screaming furiously. Virgil weathered it until her struggles stopped and then he released her. She slid, boneless, onto the dirty floor.

Parker let out an enraged howl and threw himself forwards, connecting his fist against Virgil’s jaw. Virgil reeled for a moment but reacted swiftly, overpowering Parker in one punch and with another strong arm around the neck he pinned the older man against the bench and clogged his airway until his struggles stopped, too.

Breathing fairly hard now, Virgil drew himself up to meet Scott’s gaze, his expression that of a man who performed a tough job but now feels rewarded by the effort. He grinned. Scott held the Desert Eagle up level with his brother’s head.

“Who the fuck ARE YOU?” Scott demanded.

The eyes weren’t Virgil’s. It was that simple. The man behind them narrowed his gaze. “Scott, Scott, don’t you recognise me? You’re wearing my meat, after all.”

Scott took a moment to get it and then a moment longer to be able to say it. “Fuck. You…you’re Edmund.”

“That’s right,” Edmund smiled with Virgil’s lips.

“It wasn’t you back at the Arkham institute…”

“No.”

“So where the hell is my brother?” Scott lifted the heavy gun again.

Edmund remained fairly relaxed. “Scott, you’re not going to shoot me…”

“No?” Bastard…

“No. Not when I’m in this.” Edmund plucked at the flesh of Virgil’s left cheek, patted his chest, grinning appreciatively. “No way you want to hurt your beloved Virgie, am I right?”

“Where is he?” Scott fought to keep the Eagle’s shiny barrel pointing straight.

“Safe.” Edmund said. “I promise you that, Scott. He’s tucked away until I need him again. But for now, I need his meat to make things happen. That flesh you’re in is much too fragile for what I have in mind. Look how you’re shaking already.”

He’d been edging closer to Scott and now stood directly in front of him across the bench, arms spread. Virgil’s broad chest was almost the width of the huge open book. Edmund suddenly slammed the pages closed, raising clouds of dust and that foul musty smell.

Scott read, “NECRONOMICON” in embossed letters on the dark leathery cover, seeing the symbol lit faintly beneath the letters, he stared at it for a second too long. Edmund lunged across the bench again and grabbed him, easily pulling him onto its surface by his arms and shoulders. He twisted Scott around onto his front and used brute force to pull Scott’s right arm out at the side. He snapped cold metal around Scott’s wrist, smacked the side of his face. Scott saw swirls of light before he could wriggle out of Edmund’s grip. It took mere seconds for Edmund to push Scott onto his back and snap another manacle around his left wrist. Then it was easier still for him to fasten both of Scott’s ankles tightly in the same way. Scott strained against the restraints, swearing at the man wearing Virgil.

“Will you shut up?” Edmund shouted, Virgil’s deep voice boomed around the enclosed room. “Listen! Listen to me!”

“Fuck you!”

“Idiot!” Edmund grabbed Scott by his hair, glared into his face. “I’m doing this for a very good reason, but I don’t think you’ll appreciate it in your current state of mind, so just bloody pay attention, all right?”

“Reason? What…what did you do to my family? To that…that old lady at the guest house! Why am I in your body?”

“What old lady?” Edmund released Scott’s hair and moved back to Penelope and Parker. He set about tying up Parker with another set of hand cuffs, chaining him to a heavy metal radiator. “What are you talking about?”

“This shit that’s happening. The world’s going crazy. People are going nuts. It’s all your fault, you bastard…”

“It really isn’t. I’m just…adjacent to it all.” Edmund finished tying up Parker and patted the chauffeur’s face as the older man grunted, dazed. Edmund quickly stuffed a rag in Parker’s mouth and wrapped tape around it. Parker’s dark eyes bulged, the whites of them blazing bright with anger. “The end of the world wasn’t my idea. Not on these terms, anyway.” Edmund lifted up Penelope, cradling her unconscious body; he stroked her light blonde hair away from her face and looked at her almost affectionately. “Such a pity.”

Scott almost bit his tongue in fury. “Get your damn hands off her…”

“She’ll get it easy, don’t worry. And you, you’ll get to rescue everyone else. Really I’m humanity’s guardian angel.” Edmund flashed another grin at Scott.

“So what are you going to do then, Edmund?”

“I’m going to save the world, and you’re going to help me by shutting up. And she is going to help me by passing away peacefully in her sleep.” Edmund propped Penelope up on a narrow wooden classroom chair and tied her to it with more tape. He was careless about where he put his hands and Scott almost wrenched his – Edmund’s – shoulder trying to get free.

“If you hurt one hair of her I swear I’ll…”

“I’m not going to hurt her. But she will die in her sleep, at the right moment. The poor dear.” Edmund slid Virgil’s hands over her face and through her hair. “But a lovely sacrifice is exactly what’s required. Grandfather always taught us that. Thank you for bringing her – or did she bring you?”

“Penny! Penny, wake up!”

“Shut. Up.” Edmund finished tying her up and patted her cheek. “Now, to you. Sorry, it’s chilly in here, as well.” He picked up a large pair of scissors from a desk drawer and proceeded to snip away at Scott’s borrowed sweater and jeans. Scott continued to swear and threaten. Edmund cuffed him a couple times. When everything Scott had worn was in pieces, Edmund said, “Now we can really get going.”

“So…so what are you trying to do?” Scott shivered in the cool air.

Edmund raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you remember anything since we last met?”

Scott shook his head. “I woke up…in a straightjacket.”

“What’s the last thing you do remember?” It stung, hearing concern from Virgil’s lips and knowing that someone else was using him.

“I was at home. Then I was flying…that’s all.” Scott revealed as little as he could.

“Wow,” Edmund shook his head, “Grandfather did a good number on you. No wonder you were in the loony bin.”

“Grandfather?”

“Grandfather Grendel.” Edmund was pulling a long dark cloak over Virgil’s shoulders. “He’s the reason you’re in this mess. It would be a lot simpler if you could at least remember what he did to you.”

“What…who is he?”

“He is the reason the world’s going mad. He’s spent a long time becoming a very powerful apostle of Azathoth, the Mad God, who is as we speak trying to claw his way back into our particular universe and wreak fucking havoc. And you are the reason he was able to do that.” Edmund finished the sentence with a flourish of a long silver knife he’d drawn from the same draw as the scissors. He pointed it at Scott. “International Rescue helped to end the world. How’s that for irony?”

“What?” Scott shouted. “That’s ridiculous! We would never allow…how?”

“For starters, Grendel is in your body. It took a while but he got remote control. Then full time occupancy. You squat long enough, someone has to let you stay. You were impressive, he worked on you for about five months…trust me, it usually takes a lot less time but he wanted to make sure you wouldn’t come back…”

“Five months?” Penelope’s words came back to Scott. He’d been in a coma after the Hungarian rescue, and acted ‘differently’ when he’d finally woken up. Oh, god…

“Yeah. He’s taken over your island – lovely place, by the way – and persuaded most of your people to cooperate with him. Once he let the rest of his followers on your base it was really all over and it didn’t take him very long to get his plan underway.”

“What plan, asshole?”

“There’s a gate, behind a sheet of ice about seven miles thick, where the god can be reached. And who has the technology to get through a pile of ice that deep?” Edmund pointed Virgil’s left index finger at Scott. “Calling International Rescue!”

Scott’s guts churned. He shook his head. “You’re insane.”

“We’re all going insane. Azathoth is coming, his piping horde are drawing near, and unless I swap you back and get Grendel here…well, you really don’t want to know. Although I’m sure you can certainly guess. Virgil’s drawings already gave you a pretty good idea… what was that about a crazy old lady?”

“So…what’s this for…?” Scott’s voice caught in his throat. Jesus, his family, he couldn’t worry about anything bigger than that right now. What the hell had Grendel done to them? “You…you’re going to put me back…”

Edmund began to place candles around the room. “That’s it. I’ll put you back, get Grendel stuffed into that,” he prodded Scott’s exposed stomach with just the point of the knife, “and stab the bastard before he can bring Azathoth forth. He’s been using your blood to help him along his way. One you’re back in your body you can bury the followers under the snow and fly your family out of there. How does that sound, Scotty?”

It took a second or two to sink in. Scott blinked. “So, you’re…you’re helping us?”

Edmund started lighting the black wax candles. “Sure. I’m helping all mankind. At least until I can make something better come along. But Azathoth really isn’t it. Trust me, you don’t want that muthafucker to wake up even for a second. Really, really you don’t.” Edmund grinned down at Scott. “Are you ready?”

“What about Penelope?” Scott said hoarsely. His mouth and throat felt like sandpaper, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth.

“She’s the sacrifice we need to make it all possible. Thanks again for bringing her here, Scotty. She’s just what I needed. It won’t hurt her for long, I promise. I’ll make it quick.”

“NO!” Scott struggled again, tearing thin skin against sharp metal edges. “No! Don’t you dare touch her!”

“Bigger picture, Scott. Please.” Edmund shoved tape over Scott’s mouth, tutting. Then he flicked off the overhead light and pulled up the hood, shrouding Virgil’s features in deep shadows. The air smelled weirder still, a foul perfume on top of musty damp and dirt. Scott breathed harshly through his nose, struggling, writhing against his tight bonds, banging his borrowed skull on the hard bench.

Edmund ignored him, chanting and making gestures in the air. Scott blinked through sweat and shivered as the air turned colder. Darkness began to crowd out the flickering candles and turn into the blue, icy side of a windswept sky. He yelled in horror and felt something vast and terrible turn and look directly at him…

Something very heavy landed over his chest and stomach, winding him. Scott tried to suck air through the sticky plastic, couldn’t, and was spiralling towards a much darker oblivion when something ripped the tape off his lips along with what felt like most of his skin and he leaned on his side, choking and spitting for air. His vision cleared enough that he saw Virgil lying across him, eyes shut, and Parker standing over Virgil’s back with a bloody, grim expression. A flash of worry…and then Scott remembered that it wasn’t Virgil at all.

“Try to ‘urt ‘er ladyship, will you?” Parker growled. He lifted Virgil’s unconscious body off Scott and roughly propped him against a pile of books and papers, fastening his wrists and feet together. “I don’t fink so, mate.” He turned his attention to Scott again. “You all right, old son?”

“Thanks, Parker. I…I’m fine, I’m OK. Just…how’s Penny?”

Scott and Parker turned to look at her. She was still fast asleep in the chair; her eyelids twitched. Parker checked her quickly. “I think she’s h’all right…”

“Great. That’s great. Can you untie me?” Scott said. “How the heck did you get free?”

“Keep a Parker tied up with ‘andcuffs? I ‘ardly fink so. I got free after a moment or so using an old family heirloom.” Parker used a small piece of metal to instantly unhook Scott’s cuffs. Scott looked down ruefully at the pile of shredded clothes and then over at Edmund. “’E was about to stab ‘er with that silver knife.” Parker said. “I hit ‘im but he’ll wake up soon enough. Thought we might need to question ‘im a little bit more.”

“You’re damn right there, Parker.” Scott shivered despite himself. “Shit. What the hell did he do with Virgil?”

Parker shrugged apologetically and began to untie Penny, lifting her up and reverently resting her head against some encyclopaedias. Scott pulled up the chair that she’d been tied into and pushed it against the radio beside Edmund. “Parker, we’re going to question this bastard and find out where he’s put my brother. Then the rest.”

“Certainly, Mr Tracy,” Parker cast a look down and Penelope. She slept on, oblivious. “Let’s cuff ‘im through the chair to the radiator, yes?”

“Right,” Scott agreed. Between them they lifted Virgil’s heavy body onto the seat and pushed his bound arms through the gap at the bottom of the chair back. The man gave a groan and Parker snapped the cuffs around each of his wrists and fastened him securely to the radiator pipes. Virgil’s face looked up blearily, wincing. A line of blood trickled from his nose.

Scott folded his arms, glaring down at him. “Edmund?”

“No, it’s me. It’s Virgil, let me go, Scott…!”

Scott looked hard at the man’s eyes. He shook his head. “Pop quiz, then. Where did I read you stories on the farm?”

Virgil returned the look, glanced momentarily to the right, and then said brightly, “The pig sty?”

“Shit.” Scott thumped the bench he’d been tied to with the ball of his fist. “Edmund, I know it’s you.”

“What gave it away…?” Edmund said blithely.

“Where’s Virgil?” Scott demanded.

“Virgil’s safe.”

“Where is he?” Scott repeated. “What did you do with him?”

“Why should I tell you? We’re all going to die anyway. He’ll pass away somewhere safe and dark and never know any different…” Edmund pouted through Virgil’s mouth, rolled his eyes at Scott and stared up at the dark ceiling. “Good god, my body was unintimidating…”

Scott gave him a short, hard slap across the face with the flat of his hand. ‘Virgil’ stared up, shocked, and let out a laugh that was almost a giggle. It’s Edmund, Scott reminded himself. Sorry, Virg… “Where is he, you sonuvabitch?”

“He’s fine. He’s…” Scott raised his hand again, glaring down. “All right! You people are so stupid, you have no idea what you’ve done!” Edmund made a huffy little sigh and raised his eyes upward again. “Virgil is safely locked away inside a trunk in the revision room next door. He might even be awake by now…”

“Watch him,” Scott said to Parker, already running from the room, throwing the door wide as he left.

The trunk was easy to find, although Edmund had covered it beneath a thin white sheet. Scott yanked it away, then unbolted and tore the lid off. A pair of slender, frantic hands grabbed at him, he helped a shuddering woman wearing faded jeans and a ripped plaid shirt to tumble and crawl out of the wooden box, she seemed uninjured. She gasped, “Thank you!” and caught her breath in deepening gulps. “That bastard…” she said between breaths. “Where did he go?”

Scott frowned, murmuring reassurance. After a few minutes the woman seemed better and leaned back a little. She had bright green eyes, creamy pale skin, and a bruise on her forehead. She stared at Scott with visibly expanding horror. “It’s y, you,” she said.

Scott said, “Virgil?” He’d been denying it. But…who else would it be?

The woman kept staring. “What happened to your clothes?”

“Virgil, it’s me…”

“I know it’s you, Scott, I know I’m me, and…and…” Virgil scrunched up the woman’s face, lip almost trembling, he patted the body over, eyes growing huge, he said, “What the hell is this?” he looked down, grabbed Scott’s thin shoulders again and shook him. “Scott what…it’s happened to me, too. Someone did this to me…!” he was shivering wildly. Scott pulled the sheet that had hidden the trunk over the both of them. It was freezing down here.

“We got a message that looked like it was from you and we came here to find you. Only, it was all a trap. That Edmund Curwen guy was around and he set us all up.” Scott filled Virgil in on what had happened as straightforwardly as he could. “…and Parker’s in the next room, keeping an eye on him. Penelope should be waking up soon.”

“I don’t believe this, I just don’t…” Virgil’s borrowed body had finally stopped shaking. “I…this is too bizarre.”

“I agree.” Scott said, “What’s the last thing you remember, before this?”

“I was…” Virgil shook his head. “I came to the library. That’s it. I think I was talking to someone, I…it’s foggy. Scott, seriously, no one on the island is answering?”

“Not a thing. We have to find out what Grendel’s doing with them.” Scott and Virgil both jumped as the door suddenly swung open.

Penelope stood framed in it, her expression serious but apparently relieved “Good, you’re both still alive. You should really come back to the other room.”

“How are you, Penny?” Scott asked.

“I’ll have to be all right. And…Virgil, I presume? How do you feel?”

Virgil looked away, long eyelashes fluttered and his cheeks reddened, “I’ll let you know.”

Scott stayed wrapped in the sheet, which was better than almost-nothing, and they made their way back into the Study Room.

Virgil took one look at Edmund in his body and let out an enraged scream, launching himself at him, kicking and thumping.

“What the ‘ell?” Parker leapt up, grabbing Virgil’s slender figure by the upper arms and pulling him off Edmund. Virgil kept struggling and kicking.

“I see you found my big sister!” Edmund cheered. Virgil swore again and kicked out, bare feet shaking the chair his body was tied to.

“Your sister?” Scott said, coming all the way in and shutting the door again.

“Yes. That’s Mercy. Grandfather picked her body to transfer into about ten years ago.” Edmund rolled his eyes over to Scott, “She got to live in what was left of his. She died with the old bastard’s body a year later, of extreme old age. She was only twelve, inside.”

“Put me back!”

“Oh, it’s not so bad,” Edmund smirked. “There are compensations. I should know…I lived in there for quite a while.”

“You did this to me, you sick fuck!” Virgil’s voice came out hysterically high from his borrowed throat, breath short and furious. He tried to tear himself lose from Parker, but the older man held his upper arms fast.

“Yes, and all for the good of mankind!” Edmund shouted back, equally hysterical.

“Shut up.” Scott growled, moving between his brother, in the luckless woman’s body, and the grinning bastard that currently possessed Virgil’s flesh. He said more evenly, “Virgil, we have to question this guy. I need you to get a grip. If there’s a way to put you back, I’ll find it. Virgil? Do you hear me?” He searched the woman’s face, anxious to see his brother’s mind working behind her eyes.

“I hear…” the woman’s chest rose and fell distractingly as she glowered up through wild strands of hair. “I…yeah, I hear you, Scott. Even if you’re roosting in that asshole’s old home.”

Scott almost grinned at that. Instead he awkwardly squeezed Virgil’s plaid-wrapped elbow and said to Parker, “OK, let…him go.”

“Uh, yes, Mr Tracy, at once.” Parker obeyed and Virgil hopped free, rubbing his upper arms and not taking his eyes from Edmund.

Edmund made a kissing noise with Virgil’s lips and Virgil almost went for him again.

“That’s enough!” Scott snapped, pushing Virgil back and rounding on Edmund. “I’ve had it! Now tell me, Curwen, can you put him back or not?”

Edmund’s expression turned sullen. He said, “It’s possible, I suppose, but you’ll have to find someone else to sacrifice.”

“Why?”

Edmund gave a deep sigh, “Because that’s how I swapped myself with Virgil using what little power I actually have. It’s how this works.”

“Yeah,” Virgil said quietly now, “Yeah, you murdered that poor co-ed. I remember now. She couldn’t have been more than seventeen, you bastard.”

“I made it quick,” Edmund said.

“So, to put this right, we have to kill someone? Oh, that’s just great…” Scott paced up and down angrily. “Now what are we supposed to do?”

“If I might make a suggestion?” Penelope spoke up. She had seemed subdued since she’d woken up. She said, “I will contact the IR agents network. There may be somebody amongst then with more knowledge of these ‘occult’ situations than we have.”

“Kind of a long shot, isn’t it?” Scott said.

“Not entirely, Scott. I had some opportunity to research this when Virgil first told us that you were locked up in Arkham’s sanitarium, apparently within someone else’s body. I was curious if it was remotely possible. I had a little luck.” She glanced around the room. “Anyway, it appears we have a few moments and I will follow up my leads. I’ll make some calls.”

“Thanks, Penny. Let’s hope you find someone. We’re at least going to need flight, and firepower.”

“There’s no point,” Edmund piped up, “We’ll all be dead soon, anyway. Azathoth will end us if the shoggoth doesn’t find us first…”

“The shoggoth?” Scott frowned.

“Remember? Great hulking shadow of tentacles and eyeballs? Grandfather sent it after you in the asylum to tie up loose ends, but he must be real distracted for you to have escaped. Probably halfway to Azathoth by now. But it’ll be back. That’s why there’s no time, and all this is pointless.” Edmund make a desultory sigh and Scott resisted the urge to slap him again.

Virgil said dryly, “If you die one way or another, I can almost see an upside…”

“That’s enough. Now, we’re all strung out. It’ll take Penelope a little while to get hold of someone who can help, so, let’s try to rest for a minute…” Scott heard Penelope speaking quietly and firmly to someone, jotting her notes on a palmtop screen. She seemed absorbed, but her lids flicked toward them and back for a second and he turned away. She knew what she was doing. He had no idea how she’d get any of IR’s agents to believe her, though.

“Rest? Are you fucking joking?” Virgil held his arms out, looking down at himself. “No, he must know something else. Ask him again!”

“I really don’t know any more,” Edmund assured them.

“Bullshit.” Mercy Curwen’s face crinkled with a delicate distaste, but it was Virgil’s glower that Scott saw in her now. He wondered, looking down at his own inadequate body, just how much of his real self Virgil had seen when Scott had been tied up back in Arkham. Virgil snapped, “His grandfather’s behind all of it, so this asshole must know more than he’s letting on!”

“What happened on the Island, Virgil?” Scott asked suddenly.

Pale green eyes flashed up at him. Virgil said, “You really want to know?”

Scott nodded.

“I don’t know if I want to tell you.” Virgil looked away.

“But how did you know something was wrong?” Scott pressed.

“It…it just was, OK? You weren’t you. I knew that, I just couldn’t figure out how. And head injuries, you know, they can mess you up all kinds of ways.” Virgil folded his arms tighter, still not looking at Scott. “We didn’t want to think there was anything else wrong. Brains ran tests, of course, but, we were so goddamn busy.”

“If you were busy how come Dad let you leave to go see a crazy person?” Scott asked quietly. “And how was everyone when you left?”

Virgil blinked Mercy’s green eyes and pushed a hand through her dirty blonde hair. “Tired. They were really tired. You…Dad sent me to Arkham to see…” Virgil scrunched his eyes shut. “I think he was desperate. I know I was. We wanted to prove…I don’t know…that it couldn’t have been you that…that..”

“Desperate?” Scott said, leaning forward and touching Virgil’s shoulder again, gently. “Virg, what happened?”

Virgil looked up, sniffed and rubbed his nose and looked down again, face hidden beneath hair. The gesture came across oddly feminine in his new body. Scott said, “Virg, tell me, what did Grendel do?”

Virgil murmured something. Scott couldn’t quite hear it, but he heard Edmund give a sordid little laugh. “What…?” Scott started to demand. Then he stood up straight. He shivered violently through the thin sheet. He could have sworn, just for a moment, that something above them had shuddered. Parker stood up straight, lifting his head to hear. Penelope stopped her phone conversation and turned around.

“What is it?” Virgil asked, also getting up. Scott pressed a hand over his brother’s mouth without looking at him, shaking his head.

Edmund started to chuckle louder and rock back and forth, nodding. “Shut him up,” Scott hissed.

“It’s here…it’s looking for us…” Edmund whimpered. “I tried to hide us but you broke the seal and soon it’ll figure out where…”

“What’s here?” Virgil hissed.

“Shoggoth,” Penelope said. She was very pale. “We must leave. Now.”

“It isn’t sure where we are, but it won’t take it all that long…” Edmund said.

“What is it?” Virgil whispered loudly, looking frustrated.

“It’s bad.” Scott told him. Something in his look seemed to convince Virgil. His brother gulped and glanced upwards nervously, clenching delicate fingers.

“There’s a staff entrance opposite the main staircase,” Edmund said suddenly, “If we can get somewhere narrow, it’ll have more trouble reaching us. Depends how smart and big this one is.”

Scott absorbed this, then he said, “Let’s move.”

They kept Edmund chained but unhooked him from the chair. He’d gone quiet and almost docile now, which was a small blessing as far as Scott was concerned. Apparently the bastard was as scared as the rest of them. Scott tied his sheet into a makeshift toga and picked up the Desert Eagle, which had been left on the floor next to a huge pile of dust bunnies. They opened the door very quietly.

As they stepped out of the room the hall lights flickered wildly. Scott paused a moment, then went first, Penelope flanked his left side and Parker kept at the back behind Edmund. Virgil reached Scott’s right side and glanced around. The air was damper and colder every second. Scott nodded to the door with the gun barrel, trembling in the cold air, barely feeling it through his fear. He got to the staff door and pulled on it. It was locked.

“Parker…” he said softly. The lights flickered again as the burly older man quickly worked on the keypad. The door clicked open. As it did, the lights all went out.

Hands clutched at Scott and the only sound was everyone’s harsh breathing. A second after that there was a tiny pinprick of light that flickered into a small circle, and Penelope held up her compact. It took a second or two more before Scott could see the staircase and the shiny green plastic of the banister. They all rapidly started climbing upwards; Scott made the others go ahead, except for Penny. She insisted he went first, not budging until he took the first few steps. As he reached the second flight of stairs a dark, sinking sense overtook him and he glanced down. The black shadow below him moved and stretched.

Then his surroundings were a dark frantic blur until he hit the very top of the stairs. He smacked into Edmund, steadying himself on his broad back. They had all reached the top and were now at the rear of the library. A trail of destruction revealed that the shoggoth had smashed its way inside and gone downstairs looking for them. Computers lay in small pieces and books flapped in the fresh air as rain pelted down in swirls through the hole in the glass dome above their heads. Parker slammed the stairway door shut and they ran for the front entrance past the few stacks still standing.

They scrambled out of the front doors and directly into the rain. Despite their panic they all stopped dead at the view below.

Scott caught his breath and sized up the area. “What the hell is this…Woodstock?”

The quad had been completely empty when they first entered the library. Now, in the early morning haze, it bulged with people. There was no single type of person either, as it seemed that students, tutors, people in business suits and obvious slacker types had been caught in some kind of group hysteria. They all chanted simultaneously with one another, some wavering in the rain in time with it, others crying, but all were marched slowly forwards like zombies, gaining ground inexorably. From somewhere he felt drums beating; the sound was just beyond his hearing but the throb of bass reverberated through his blood. The atmosphere was electric.

Scott hesitated, desperate to continue running but very wary of the human mass below. The car wasn’t far…

Penelope went down a couple steps and asked a group of teenage girls who were marching, “What’s going on?”

The girl smiled at Penelope, saying in a light Texan drawl, “We’re giving God a big thank you.” Her friends giggled and they walked on, wearing little but their smallest nightgowns in the thickening rain.

Penelope called to the others, “We must get out of here!” She hurried down the steps.

“How?” Scott called after her, taking a few steps as well, “This place is packed, we won’t be able to get the car moving!”

“We can’t stay here!” Penelope called back.

“Agreed,” Edmund muttered, hurrying past Scott with his hands still tied, as Virgil and Parker caught up with him. They trailed Edmund and tried to keep up with Penelope, who weaved through the slow-moving crowd to their vehicle. Edmund reached it at the same time she did, his large borrowed frame shielded her from the never-ending crowd while she tried to open the door. Scott found Parker useful for this, too, as the sheer mass of bodies threatened to carry him with them. When he reached the car, Scott found it easier to half-climb on top of its hood, while Virgil took shelter beside Parker and Edmund.

“Did we lose it?” Virgil asked, his high voice hard to pick out.

“Don’t know. Edmund? Any idea where the…shoggoth is?” Scott demanded.

Edmund sent him a scornful, worried expression. “I don’t know!” He swung his cuffed arms out, hitting several of the people passing by who glanced at him but, mostly, passed on obliviously. “I can’t sense anything in…this! Let’s drive out of here!”

“We’ll never move it in this!” Scott shouted. “We’ll have to move with these guys! We’ll find another car!”

The chant kept going, the beat of its uneven but certain rhythm grated on his mind. He shouted again, “Penny, do you hear me?”

She turned back to him with a faintly confused expression, “Yes. Sorry, Scott, I was…” She shook her head, blinking in the cold rain. “You were saying?”

“We follow the crowd until we find a clear spot and another car!” Scott gestured with a chopping motion at the crowd that fed away from the quad. It wasn’t quite dawn, but it was light enough to see the extent of the Miskatonic’s buildings. “But we stick together, OK?”

Penelope nodded in a short, tight movement. Something about her look bothered him, but there wasn’t time to examine it. Scott climbed off the car’s hood. “Everyone, grab the person next to you.” Without waiting he grabbed Virgil’s hand and then checked everyone else was doing it too, even though Penelope and Parker didn’t hide disgust at being so close to Edmund. They did this quickly and began to move forwards with the crowd. The mob continued to chant something about “Keh-thewl-hue” and “fat-argh-gan”. It meant nothing to Scott at all but the sound of it continued to shred his nerves.

He still had no idea where the shoggoth was or if it had given up. Praying for the latter, Scott kept his right hand free to hold his gun, as did Penny and Parker with theirs. He nearly fired when a group of elderly people on his immediate left started screeching, pulling at each other, ripping off each others’ hair, clothes and then skin. Scott looked quickly away, pulling Virgil with him. Otherwise the tide of bodies continued. Scott tried to steer his group towards the edge of them, but the mass increased at the narrowest point – the east way out of the quad - and they slowed and almost stopped.

They’d almost reached the edge of the quad when Scott heard the whine of a helijet. The misty rain swirled away from rotor blades that he could hear clearly even through the mass of voices. A bright beam of yellow light swept over their heads.

“This is the police,” a voice boomed over a loud-hailer, “Everyone must disperse peacefully. This is an unauthorised gathering and we request that everybody leave the university immediately.”

The chant halted for a moment and the crowd half-paused, half-ignored this request before surging forwards. The sudden change in flow pulled Scott apart from Virgil – he saw his brother sucked into the crowd, heard Parker give a shout and saw Edmund fighting to keep his balance as he was also pushed backwards away from them.

Scott dived after Virgil, trying to pummel his way through a tightly massed bunch of what looked like frat boys. They had pulled Virgil into the centre of their group. The police shouted out another warning to the crowd but Scott barely heard it, frantically forcing his way to the centre of the teenagers. Virgil was kicking and struggling but they were easily holding him in his female body. One of them was ripping at his shirt and saying something and Scott saw Virgil’s face change from anger to pure horror.

“Back off!” Scott yelled and held up the gun. “Keep back!”

There was nowhere to move anyway but the teenage boys paused when they saw Scott and the gun, which still felt bigger than he was. A boy in a red t-shirt lunged at him. Scott fired into the air, the kickback punched into his shoulder, and the closer members of the crowd pulled away like startled sheep. Scott stood his ground, although the boys weren’t backing off. Their faces were strange somehow, bruised and reddish and oddly swollen. Scott said, “Let him go!” He pointed the gun directly at red shirt, repeated, “Do it!”

They released Virgil but stayed where they were, watching Scott with rictus grins, sniggering amongst themselves. Scott held the gun tighter, swinging it between them all. There were at least six of them. “Virgil, get over here.”

Virgil scrambled to his bare feet and over to Scott’s side. Scott pushed his brother behind him, barely having time to notice Virgil’s brief flash of protest. The boys took a step closer. Scott snapped. “Stay back!”

The boys laughed again, pressing forwards. The crowd shifted once more as police helijets buzzed overhead. They all glanced up and Scott took the chance to grab Virgil’s left hand and drag him into the suddenly appealing mass of bodies. They were quickly lost, he hoped, glad for the first time that he was much shorter than usually was. Then again, so was Virgil, now.

“Thanks.” Virgil shuddered, held onto Scott tightly. “Bastards!” he yelled into the crowd. “Scott, I will never, ever…”

“We’ve gotta get out of here.” Scott suddenly couldn’t hear a thing as the helijet swooped low overhead. It hovered over the crowd, the air blasting from it. He saw armed men inside looking down. Scott shivered in his sheet while the crowd stared up, distracted. “Move it. This could get ugly real fast.” He was trying to keep an eye open for Parker, Edmund and Penelope. They’d completely vanished and he could hardly see a thing through the people around him.

“Please disperse peacefully,” the police voice repeated, “You have five minutes to start clearing the university campus…”

“Where’s Penny?” Virgil shouted into Scott’s ear. The chanting had started again, louder, more insanely ecstatic.

Scott shook his head. “No idea,” he mouthed and sensed drums again, louder this time, the bass swelling painfully.

The people nearest them suddenly began yelling like burn victims. The group of girls that had answered Penelope so cryptically were also howling, tearing at their faces with manicured nails. The air was growing thick with smells and screams, like their favourite rock star was about to arrive. It was getting harder and harder to make his way through the crowds of bodies, and now the people began gyrating wildly, flinging their limbs around like mad puppets, howling “Keh-thewl-hu!”

Scott panted for air, Virgil clinging onto his arm for dear life. Must be near the edge by now, must be…! Scott forged on, dodging kicks and giggling morons who pulled and prodded at them before carrying on their spinning, maddened dance. The helijet continued to thump thump thump overhead.

And they were out.

Scott half stopped, stumbling over his feet as he and Virgil shook free of the clinging crowd. They had emerged into an empty side path, a narrow, dim alleyway that led god-maybe-knew-where. It still seemed a better prospect than staying in the quad. Scott felt grime and worse beneath his feet. He said, “Down here.”

“You think?” Virgil gulped, close behind him. “Sounds like…the party’s going on…without us…”

“They can keep it,” Scott threw a glance back, glad to be out of the mess of bodies. Crazy bodies. “We need to find Penny and Parker. Maybe those cops can help…”

They emerged out the other side of the alleyway. As they did, the armed police started emerging from one of the helijets near the main entrance. The howling and shrieking was louder out here, the drums thumped from beyond anyone’s sight. Scott paused there, watching the police enter the area.

“Guns. Jeez. What the fuck happened to those people…?” Scott breathed, shivering in the damp fog.

“I don’t know. Scott – we’re on our own.”

“Yeah. Let me think. We’ll wait here for a minute,” Scott leaned against the cool hood of a big Ford, a real monster of a car, to catch a ragged breath. He held the gun in his left hand. Maybe if we drive back in, we can bust through…

“This car would be perfect,” Virgil commented. Scott finally looked directly at his brother, lit by the street light, and saw rather more of Mercy Curwen’s body than he’d been expecting to. He quickly averted his eyes. ”Hey, Virg…” he stumbled, “Virg, you’d better…” he blushed warm all over, felt grimy revulsion at his reaction. “Virg, you’re, uh…your shirt…”

“What?” Virgil sounded baffled, then he looked down, and swore.

Scott kept his eyes averted. This is even more fucked up than what’s going over there.

“You’d think you’d never seen a pair before…” Virgil sounded halfway embarrassed, half brazening it out. “Jeez, Scott. What’s the big deal?” he shook Scott’s arm. “Will you just look at me? What’s the matter with you?”

“With me?” Scott could still feel the glow of embarrassment, and – it’s Edmund Curwen’s body, not me and we know that he’s pretty screwed up… “Virg, you’ve gotta keep…aware of those things.”

“I’m not actually a girl.” Virgil had retied the shirt over his cleavage. Oh, jeez.

“I know,” Scott said awkwardly.

“I’m just wearing one. Involuntarily.” Virgil punched Scott’s arm with the same kind of force he’d used on the car. “It’s still me, you idiot… ” Scott bit back a whimper as Virgil struck a huge bruise. “Come on, Penny’s gotta still be in there, or trying to get out. We’ll go back in there in five minutes.”

Scott winced again. He really didn’t want to say this. “You remember what almost happened to you in there? What that bunch of frat boys were going to do? There’s no goddamn way you can go back in.”

“I wasn’t ready, they jumped me. Penny would be fine, and I can handle…”

“No. Virg, you need to look in the mirror. Seriously.”

“I was fine!”

“You’re deluded. Now, let me think…”

“You pushed me back! You’re not exactly at full strength, why do you think I’m…”

“Because they would have raped…!”

“Told you I smelled them.” Scott froze at the voice, cocky and close to them.

He raised the gun and immediately fired towards something that used to be a teenage boy. It was the same frat boy, wearing that distinctive red T-shirt. The boy howled at the gunshot and loped towards them. Scott had only winged him and the younger man moved fast as a cheetah. Four other boys had surrounded them. In the orange streetlight Scott noticed they were all distorted, all bulging in their skin, flesh swollen into writhing shapes that flexed and pushed to be free. Their teeth were sharp, eyes sharper but also very wrong. Black and red and flecked in them like spots of gristle.

In a moment one of them had Scott in a grip of pointed bone, his twisted face leering down at him. The gun slid from Scott’s hand before he could react or fire, he struggled and the boy laughed – the sound a wheezing, inhuman cackle, “Meat for the god.” The boy-thing hissed. The rest were going after his brother again. Scott heard Virgil yelling and swearing but couldn’t tell what was happening. He had a fair idea though.

“No!” Scott kicked out, headbutted the damned thing that pinned him – to his surprise it shocked the thing enough it released a fraction and Scott dropped down, head swimming, struggling to get at the dropped Desert Eagle. He felt the thing’s breath on his neck, struggled under its oily weight. One of the tentacles slid down his neck, running over his back, lower, and he felt terribly aware then of just how almost-naked he really was. Scott stretched out desperately, his fingers brushing the edge of the gun’s gleaming barrel. Please please come here you beautiful bastard please…

There were many gunshots then, bursting from inside the quad as the police opened fire. The deep unnatural drumbeats reached a peak and then halted, and there was an awful roar in the silence. The boys holding Scott – and Virgil now, he saw as he twisted his neck – all stretched up and howled into it. “Kuh-thewl-huuuue!” It became an awful screech and Scott wriggled free and snatched up the gun, twisting on his belly and firing.

The boy in the red T-shirt was smashed sideways, his body twitching and slurping as black and reddish blood spurted out of what was just barely a skull by now. Scott scrambled backwards, scraping his ass on the tarmac, horrified at the strange shapes the boy had started to take. A hoarse, “Scott!” from Virgil snapped his attention back and he fired at another boy that lunged at him, now mainly tentacles, extraneous arms and snapping teeth. Scott lurched away from it and fired again. It slumped dead as well, barely moving.

Scott swung round to shoot the last two closest to Virgil. He got off one shot and winged the creature, his body trembling with anger and exhaustion. The thing shrieked and twisted, shedding the last of its human features, it slid and hopped at him and Scott shot it once more between where he had last seen its eyes and up through what could be its scalp. It hit the tarmac with a wheeze that pumped black juices and an awful stench into the fog.

The last thing had pinned Virgil against the big Ford and had a long tendril shoved down his throat, hissing as it clung to him. Scott went to shoot. The gun clicked. Scott ran at the thing with the empty weapon, he brought the heavy butt of the gun down again and again on it, breaking the thing’s eye clean open. It retracted its tendril and twisted, the motion banging Scott backwards. It spat ichor at him from its sharp mouth. Scott twisted away, scrambling to get up, putting his hands in what was left of the other things he had killed. As he slid onto it the blinded thing sprang at him, landing above him and dripping and hissing. It was too strong…

A loud staccato blast cut the creature in two. Scott frantically attempted to roll clear as the dead creature split, splashing its goopy brown innards all over his body. Scott scrambled free through the mulch and climbed out onto damp tarmac, completely soaked through. He caught his breath, deliriously wiping the crap off his face and blinking up at the familiar figures in front of him. “Penny…” he croaked, “Parker… Edmund?”

“Are you all right, Scott?” Penelope hurried forwards. “Thank goodness we found you.” She held a large automatic weapon that she could only have obtained from the police. Parker and Edmund held one each as well. Edmund’s hands had been untied.

Penelope had also had some clothing issues thanks to the mob, her borrowed nurse’s uniform from the asylum was ripped at the edges and heavily splattered with blood. She clenched the gun at her side very tightly in her delicate fingers. Edmund stood beside her, but he’d apparently mastered Virgil’s ‘impassive’ face and Scott couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Actually he was amazed to see him at all.

“What…” Scott pulled in another breath. Gunshots were going off in the quad like the Fourth of July. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Agreed.” Penelope helped him up. Scott looked over at Virgil. His brother, trapped in Mercy Curwen’s blonde, slender body, gave him a shaky thumbs up. Blood trickled between his lips.

“Where are we going?” Edmund asked.

“I say we take this car and drive until an answer comes.” Scott thumped the side of the Ford. “Now.” He motioned to Virgil and Parker. “Get us in here.”

“Sure,” Virgil flexed his fingers, eyes darting at the noises coming from the quad. “In double-fucking-time. Right, Parker?”

“A-bloody-men.” Parker, his clothes also bloodied and torn, nodded and joined Virgil. They had the vehicle ready in under a minute.

The car stank. Scott was still covered in the boy-creature’s ichor and other fluids he didn’t really want to even consider. Everyone smelt of blood and the residue of insanity. Parker drove. He cracked a window open on each side, vetoing the aircon “to conserve the petrol,” but it still made Scott shiver. Nobody spoke until they were a good distance from the mayhem at the Miskatonic. Even now, they were nowhere near far enough for Scott’s liking.

“We have a little good news.” Penelope said finally.

“Good?” Scott said.

“Yes, it’s…while we were in there, there was a message. I couldn’t hear it and I only saw it just now. Our best lead so far is somebody called Bear, apparently known for some military connections from a long time in the past. He comes with the highest of recommendations when it comes to dealing with…this sort of thing.”

“Madness?” Scott asked.

“Occult madness, to be specific.”

“So he’s as crazy as those guys?” Scott shook his head. “This just gets better…”

“The contact that recommended him was connected to your father and grandfather’s military backgrounds. That should be at least a little encouraging…”

“So where does he live? How do we speak to him?”

“That’s the primary issue awaiting us.” Penelope looked around the car and gave a small, tired sigh. “He lives in Roanoake County, Virginia. Only his home is based in further into the Blue Ridge mountains.”

She handed Scott her mirror compact, which currently displayed a clear map to Bear’s location, part of the Appalachians and almost eight hundred hundred miles southwest of Arkham. Scott winced. “We have a real long drive ahead of us, you’d better step on it, Parker…”

Parker muttered something inaudible.

They drove fast. After fifty miles the fog had started to clear and Scott was shivering more and more. They pulled in at a motel and rest stop where Penelope insisted on getting Scott some proper clothes. By then, he didn’t feel like arguing.

Scott left the motel room they’d rented after a hot shower. The others had cleaned up, too, and had left him a pair of $10 jeans and a $3 t-shirt that proclaimed his love for ‘The Cowboys.’ He met them in the small rest stop diner where the others were eating, or trying to. Scott sat down and examined his pile of pale fries and a half-cold burger, the grease slowly turning the paper plate see-through.

“Try not to lose your clothes this time, OK?” Virgil murmured.

Scott smiled a bit at that and tucked into his food, while Virgil chewed on his burger, closing Mercy Curwen’s green eyes. Without seeing the eyes, Scott was shocked at how unlike Virgil she suddenly appeared. When they opened again, Virgil frowned at Scott. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I, I’m not used to this, that’s all…” Scott looked away. Mirrors to the soul. Right.

Penelope spoke, picking at the fries as she did, “We have a long way to go. My fear is that whatever is approaching is coming to a head.”

“It’s almost Halloween,” Edmund grunted through a huge pile of onion rings, wolfing them down as he spoke. Virgil glared again. “Azathoth is rising in two days. Maybe less. Face it. We’re screwed. The world is screwed!” he declared, rising up and punching Virgil’s fist into the air.

“Shut up and sit down.” Scott half-pulled Edmund back by the shirt. Edmund gave Scott a scornful look.

“Sit down? Sit down? You think this pissant town is going to matter when Azathoth is awake and the world melts around your fucking ears…!”

Virgil launched up across the table and shoved most of his paper plate down Edmund’s mouth. The motion pushed them both kicking and yelling off onto the floor. Scott rubbed his face up and down to refresh it and jumped up to his feet. “Virg!” he emptied two big glasses of cold cola over their borrowed bodies.

Virgil gave an angry yelp as the frigid liquid hit his back. Parker peeled him off and hauled him up while Edmund clambered to his feet, spitting fries and paper plate as he shouted, “You people are idiots! You ended the world and now you think you can just make a difference by…”

Scott pushed forwards with strength he didn’t know Edmund’s body had and forced Edmund back into his seat. “Give it a rest. We are going to the only help we have. You are going to shut up and deal, and…”

“Fuck you all, I’m going to…to Vegas! The end of the world is coming!” Edmund pushed past Scott, making for the door.

“Shit, we’ve gotta stop him…” Scott went after him, fully aware of the spectacle they were making in this sleepy rest stop. Three locals and a couple of truck drivers looked both amused and vaguely disgusted.

Edmund came to a halt by the road. Scott reached him and looked across to where he was staring. A thick swath of black smoke billowed out across the tree line in the distance, beginning to seriously obliterate the already grey sky.

“Forest fires? At this time of year?” Scott glanced at Edmund. “Where do you think you’re gonna get?”

Edmund kept staring at the trees and then gave a short, bitter laugh. He swung his face to look directly at Scott. He had tears in his eyes. “It’s over. We can’t make it to anyone. Anywhere. Azathoth will wake. Cthulhu’s not far in front. We’re all dead.”

Scott held his hopeless gaze and felt a deep, shockingly strong anger well up in him. “I’m not giving up you weasel, and neither is anyone else. Do you understand? We’re not quitting now!”

Edmund gave that laugh again, shook his head. “You’re all crazy.”

A helijet was landing nearby. It belonged to a big TV network – WNN. Scott even recognised the anchorwoman, who hopped out and ran toward the tiny roadside diner. The pilot and the copilot started to fill up the helijet, looking over their shoulders as they did.

“Hey!” The woman waved him over. “Hey! You all need to see this!”

Scott glanced at Edmund. “Are you staying or what?” he asked.

Edmund grumbled. “Let’s see what she wants…”

“Good.” Scott let Edmund go first, walking just beside him, and they went back to the diner as her crew pumped the petrol.

Inside the diner, she was connecting something to the small TV and said, “Everyone, you need to take a look. This is important!”

“What is it?” Edmund asked, putting a hand on her shoulder. She looked around and then shot Edmund a grin Scott had often seen directed at his brother over the years.

That odd, hotly nauseous feeling swept him up and down again.

She said, “Oh, this is big, big guy.”

“What’s going on?” Scott asked her sharply. “Are you Laura Fey?” he asked to be polite. He knew exactly who she was. He recognised her from the TV and the numerous rescues she’d covered. She didn’t appear to recognise Virgil’s body, anyway, however much she was clearly appreciating it.

“That’s right, I’ve been reporting on these fires.” She spoke up louder. “Everyone, all you people, you have to get the hell away from this forest. Head north and don’t look back!”

Outside, the petrol chugged away and the helijet pilot hopped out of the cockpit and headed into the restroom. The helijet, with its WNN colors and logo, was a large model with space for at least five or six people, and it had drawn some attention. Everyone was watching now; Parker chewed on the rest of a burger and Virgil stood beside Penelope with his arms folded and legs braced apart, intent on this new excitement.

“What’s going on?” Penelope said.

“Yeah, why do you want us all to leave? This fire getting too close?” a trucker piped up.

“No,” she looked nervously over her shoulder again, at the road they were on. “No, the fire…it’s hard to…it’s crazy even for a fire. There’s something wrong inside it.”

“Wrong how?” Scott asked.

“Let me show you.” She flicked a switch on the machine, found the channel for video footage.

At first there was just the fire and the fire-fighters moving above the flaming forest, spraying the conflagration with everything they had. It was hard to make out anything at all, but then Scott saw, and then they all saw, something very odd moving amongst the trees. It was big, sliding up and over the branches, and knocked the forest around as the footage from above played out. You could hear Laura Fey exclaiming in horror.

“There’s…something weird…” Scott agreed.

“Bigfoot’s pissed off!” someone nervously cracked behind him.

Scott said, “Just let me see it again.” He peered closer. “Edmund, take a look at this.”

Edmund leaned in with Scott’s head. Scott tapped the screen. “Do you see that? The shape in the smoke…”

“It’s found us.” Edmund stood upright. “We have to go!”

“The shoggoth?” Penelope murmured, turning pale. “That was the shoggoth!”

“Yes.” Scott turned to them all. The little group of Parker, Virgil and Penelope all looked at him expectantly. “We need to get driving again. We can escape it if we just…”

“What did you call that thing?” Laura Fey demanded. “Hey, Cowboy, what is it?”

“You guys need to fly out of here as well…” Scott said, walking after Edmund. “Come on, everyone.” The others started to move, too.

“That thing is almost here, oh shit, oh shit…” Edmund was already almost at the 4x4. “We’re wasting time!”

Laura ran over to him as he started to walk for the car. “You know what this thing is?”

“Forget it. Fly and don’t come back.”

“No, you’ve gotta tell me, Cowboy. I’ve never seen anything like it! It’s…it’s some undiscovered monster in the woods, right? Something the fire flushed out? What did that lady with you call it?” Scott ignored her, walking quickly on. “What is it? Come on, just give me a name for the midday news…!”

Scott opened the car’s front door, pausing to speak to her again. Her cameraman was right beside her, the pilot stood by the diner’s entrance. “You should get him to fly you out of here. That thing, it…it’s dangerous.”

“But, Cowboy…” she peered behind him into the car and frowned. Scott looked back and realised she’d seen the automatic rifles they’d scrounged from the chaos at the Miskatonic. He must have uncovered them as he’d sat down. She gasped, “Holy, shit…why do you…those are illegal…” She pulled back a little.

“Please, forget you ever saw us. I know you can keep a secret…” He was about to say something cutting and clever to hint about International Rescue and her loyalty, maybe even drop a hint, even threaten her, but only if he had to. Instead he watched her face change instantly from earnest intelligence to slackly shrieking fear. Scott risked a glance behind him as he ducked down.

It had already found them.

The shoggoth emerged out of the surrounding woods and out into the increasingly smoky air in a blubbery mass of black tentacles. It loomed just above the 4x4, fixing wet suckers around it. It shrieked, “Tek-li-li! Tek-li-li!”

For a hideously long second he thought that fear was going to root him there and it would rip him into iddy-pieces before he could even try to fight. But the second passed. Scott grabbed the rifle that was immediately behind him on the seat and yanked it around under his arm. It kicked but it was a good, familiar sort of pain from his military days, and he backed up and up, shooting at the thing.

It lashed out, he shot at one tentacle and another whipped out to wrap around the cameraman. Andrew dissolved into mush. The anchorwoman started screaming.

Scott scrambled backwards and broke into a run, firing once or twice over his shoulder. Gunfire barked on either side of him as Penny and Parker used their weapons. Virgil and Edmund ran for the only avenue of escape they had left. Scott fired again and again.

The gunfire almost held it at bay – it actually seemed scorched or unsettled by the flames that had also reached them… Maybe that slowed you down, he prayed quietly, waiting for everyone else to scramble onto the helijet. Laura was right behind him now; she went to climb up, helped by Parker and Edmund. A tentacle lashed out and wrapped around her leg, pulling her back. She gripped Scott’s Cowboy shirt, he tried to fire around her, to get the tentacle. She was yelling at him, eyes rolling in horror and the shoggoth pulled her backwards.

He didn’t hear the snap, but her blood sprayed his face and he fell backwards clutching her arm. He dropped it, gagging in horror. The ground began to get further away. He almost fell forwards. The shoggoth’s shrill cry pierced his skull and for just a second he saw it all over again. Darkness swelled behind his eyes. No, no, don’t…

“Scott?” Penelope touched his shoulder and Edmund used Virgil’s borrowed strength to haul him safely into the helijet as they lifted up and up. Scott leaned backwards heavily, pulling his feet out of the sky.

“She…I couldn’t…it…” he gasped.

“You couldn’t have done anything.” Edmund said.

Scott leapt up, smacked him hard in the face. Edmund, strapped into his seat, merely blinked and said, “Good thing Virgil has a thick skull.”

“Virgil…?” Scott’s surroundings were slowly coming into focus. He looked over at the pilot seat, not really surprised to see that it was his brother who had flown them out of there.

“We’re going to make it to Bear’s now, Scott.” Penelope tapped his shoulder reassuringly again. “I rather feel a seatbelt is in order, though. Just in case we run up against any further…turbulence.”

“OK.” Scott heaved himself up and strapped in tightly. The smoke and flames below were thick. He swore he saw something else moving down there. For a moment something in the flames almost blinked. He shut his borrowed eyes. “Fly safe, Virg.”

“Crashing is dangerous…” Virgil murmured.

A lump of bile and tears formed in Scott’s throat. He didn’t say much else for the rest of the journey.

It took them four hours to fly the next eight hundred miles. They closed in on a rustic cabin based high in the Blue Ridge Mountains, not above the clouds but away from the fog, at least. Virgil landed the helijet smoothly onto long grass about a hundred metres from the cabin itself, which nestled against the mountain as though it had been there for centuries. Scott climbed out first.

The view spread for miles below them, bedded with trees and more trees with only a few flickers of civilization visible as grey blobs amongst them. The sky was darkening, the sun at least visible but starting to dip behind the forest. Scott breathed deeply. His head was spinning, and he wasn’t sure if it was from leftover shock or from the purest air he’d tasted in a long time. Scott made sure the others were all out and then made his way toward the cabin. There were no weird wooden stick figures hanging off its porch. No freakish skulls decorating its windows. It was both old and strangely familiar and that always comforting sign of hearth and home, a chimney, pumped puffs of woodsmoke away into the sky.

Scott was close enough to see the front door was wide open when three huge dogs – a Great Dane, a Mastiff and some sort of wolfhound – all emerged from the darkness inside the cabin and stood in front of it. They didn’t bark, which was almost more unsettling, but they bared their teeth and the wolfhound gave a deep, warning growl that stopped Scott in his tracks. He felt the others do the same. A second or so after this the dogs’ master walked out the door to join them.

He was the biggest Native American, and the biggest man, period, that Scott had ever seen. Muscular and deeply tanned, he wore faded jeans of no particular colour, and a plaid shirt decorated with material badges, and his hair was long and shaggy. Scott guessed he was in his late fifties, but it was impossible to be sure. Scott also noticed the man carried a shotgun in his right hand. The man stood with his dogs for a long couple of Scott’s breaths, looking at the party that had arrived on his doorstep. Then his great, weathered face split into a welcoming grin.

“You must be the expected trouble!” he called to them gruffly.

“That’s right, sir.” What else could you call a man like this? “Are you…” Scott paused. “Bear?”

The man nodded, then motioned, “Come here, I won’t bite.” He put out an arm and the dogs dropped their tense poses, becoming no friendlier but no longer on sentry duty either. Scott reached Bear and stopped, and the others were right beside him.

“You must be Scott,” Bear said, taking Scott’s hand in his huge fingers and grasping it warmly. “You soul’s bursting from that body, friend, it’s a poor fit.”

He released Scott’s hand and moved to Virgil, who was staring and trying very hard not to look like he was. “You as well,” Bear said. “I bet you can’t decide if you’re in heaven or hell, Virgil.”

“How do you know…my name?” Virgil said, looking suspicious and blushing hard at the same time. Scott smiled despite himself, and Virgil also grinned suddenly and looked away.

“And you…” Bear turned to Edmund, who even in Virgil’s frame only just came almost to Bear’s shoulder. “Well, you had no business being in there from the start of it, boy.” He wasn’t angry. But it was apparent how angry he could be, if he had to call on it. Scott suddenly got an indication of how Virgil would look if he ever actually cowered. Edmund appeared to be quaking in his boots, and Scott hoped that was all the little weasel was doing in them.

Then Bear gave Parker and Penelope more conventional greetings, shaking their hands, and Penelope graciously returned Bear’s smile, too, as though she’d suddenly relaxed. Scott even thought he heard her giggle. Bear said then, “You’d better all come in. You’re being hunted, but you’re safe for now. It won’t find you here. There’s a couch and hot coffee by the fire.”

The cold, greasy meal at the roadhouse diner felt like a lifetime ago. The cabin smelt as good on the inside as it had out in the fresh air. Scott breathed in the oddly pure woodsmoke, and now hot coffee and something more savoury that was cooking, making his stomach rumble like the wolfhound. A fire crackled reassuringly in its place, and the group performed an almost synchronised collapse onto the thick furs that covered the two big, flat couches, sighing contentedly.

Scott was sure he hadn’t shut his eyes for longer than a few seconds, but when he opened them again he felt fully rested and refreshed, and the sky had become almost completely dark outside. He sat up suddenly, panicked.

Bear sat in a big chair right by the fire, stirring a pot of something over the fire. He lifted his head slightly. “I thought you’d probably be the first to wake up.”

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep like…” Scott stood up and walked over to the huge man. The dogs lifted their heads from by the fire, watching him. “What did you do to me?”

“That body you’re in, it’s weak. Like rice paper in a thunderstorm, although you’ve done well with it. Why do you think Grendel likes yours so much?” Bear stirred the pot; it smelt good, of hot soup. Scott’s stomach vetoed questioning and made its presence known again.

“Here,” Bear ladled some soup into a round rustic bowl and handed it to Scott. “Before you ask, I didn’t do anything to make you all sleep. You just got what you needed. You’ve had a bad day.”

Scott drank directly from the bowl, the soup at the perfect temperature. It was meaty and delicious, he had three long drinks from it before he could stop himself, and was mildly surprised that he hadn’t burned his tongue and the bowl was nearly empty.

“A bad day?” Scott said finally. “Yeah, you could say that. Worst day. Worst ever.” He leaned against the edge of the fireplace. “Penelope thinks you can help us. You sure seem to know a lot.”

“Not until you were asleep. I didn’t think you’d all go off so fast, but, I’m glad you did. Saved me some time.”

“Oh, you’re a mind reader?”

Bear just smiled a little, shaking his head. Scott said, “But you knew that Virgil and I…we’re in the wrong bodies. The only way to put us back is to kill some poor bastard, and on top of that, the world’s ending around our ears..!”

“The world ending part is true, but there are other ways to put you back where you belong. They just aren’t to Grendel’s taste.” Bear stood up. “I’m brewing something for that in my basement. What you need now, Scott, is some goddamn useful information. That’s what I need, too.”

“What more information could you need? You’ve already saved me about ten hours of explaining…”

“I can’t see everything. Grendel did something to you, locked up your memories. He’s hiding from me, too, even as his digging makes the world unravel. We’ve got to track that monster down. But you got here just in time.” Bear looked around. “Penny.”

“Hello.” Penelope spoke, covering her mouth in a yawn. “Oh, I’ve slept far longer than I meant to…”

“We all really needed to rest,” Scott said. Virgil and Edmund snoozed on, and Parker was stirring at the far end of one couch, his crinkled eyes blinking in the firelight.

“Yes, we did,” Penelope agreed, and came over to join them. Bear gave her the broth and she drank it without a moment’s hesitation.

“Bear thinks he has another way to put Virgil and I back where in our own bodies,” Scott told her.

Her eyebrows raised over the bowl, “Really? That’s wonderful news. How, Mr. Bear?”

“Just Bear, if you don’t mind, Penny,” Bear said with an amused glint in his eye.

“Of course, then, er…Bear.”

“I can put them back. Edmund over there is an amateur at best, but I know his grandfather. Or know of him at least, the slippery bastard. I got the outline of his plan from your messages, but we’re going to need more information to stop him before he can do his ritual and awaken the Mad God.”

Scott shivered, despite being right by the fire. Bear noticed. “I take it you’ve been hearing that a lot, lately, Scott?”

“Right. From everyone we’ve met…all the crazy ones, at least. What is this Mad God, anyway?”

“He dreams on the other side of our dimension. Technically it’s behind a gate, but more accurately he’s outside of our reality entirely. He’s what waits at the end of an infinitely reflected mirror. If he wakes up, all the mirrors break.”

“So how do we stop that?” Scott demanded, after a beat.

“The first step is to put you in Grendel’s head. Back in your head. Then we’ll know more about what we’re dealing with.” Bear looked at him steadily, and Scott nodded for him to continue. “I can’t put you there for good, not unless you’re a lot closer. But your connection to him can help us to find him and the gate, too. Then we can actually take some action.”

“How will you do it?” Scott said.

“Have another bowl of soup, first. You’re going to need all your strength just to get past this.” Grendel refilled his bowl and Scott drank again eagerly.

“Is it dangerous?” Penelope pressed.

“It involves Grendel, who’s not exactly new to this concept. It’s minds floating across vast distances. Yes, it’s dangerous. You still up for it, Scott?”

Scott finished the bowl and handed it back. “Put me there. Please.” He added.

Bear didn’t exactly smile, but Scott felt like his father had just praised him. Bear stood up; his skin appeared burnished in the firelight. “Let’s get started, then. The sooner you get this over with, the better.”

“What if they wake up?” Scott motioned to Edmund and his brother.

“My boys will take care of them, don’t worry.” The three dogs got up and padded close to Virgil, while the biggest sat beside Edmund.

“Thanks,” Scott said softly. The dogs glanced at him and then returned to their vigil.

Bear opened a wooden door covered in some sort of deer hide, and Scott and Penelope followed him down into the basement.

The basement was a little creepier than the rustic homeliness of the rooms upstairs. It was a wider space, but thick drapes cut off sections from view. There was another fireplace as well, but something different was bubbling on it, something dark red and opaque. It smelled like a bad memory. Scott felt sick again.

“When we do this, you’ll have full control of your body back. Now, remember, this won’t be a real return. I’m only sending you back for fifteen minutes, and as it is, I’m afraid it’ll give Grendel a steer to where we are.” Bear pulled back one curtain where a small red candle was placed on a desk. “I don’t know how much good you’ll be able to do while you’re in there, either. But do what you can, learn everything you can about the layout of that dig.”

“How are we going to get to the Arctic, anyway?” Scott asked.

“I have some military friends on their way. Don’t worry, we’ll get there. But I need a location first,” Bear said.

Then Scott noticed there were manacles on the heavy chair in front of the candle. “No fucking way.”

“I’m sorry, Scott. When you’re swapped back it means that Grendel will be right here. He has to be restrained.”

Scott said tightly, “Don’t tie me…”

“I have to. It won’t be for long, Scott. Can you trust me? If you can’t do that, we can call this off now.”

“No. No, it…” Scott grimaced; the sick feeling wasn’t going away. Against his better judgement he sat right down in the chair and turned his head to Bear. “What do I do?”

Bear tied Scott’s wrists, and then lit the candle wick with a long match. The flame flickered, growing brighter as Bear pulled the curtains across. “If it goes badly, if they realise it’s really you, then you’ll need to come back immediately.”

“How do I do that?”

“Imagine this candle. Blow it out.” When Bear said it, it didn’t sound completely stupid.

“A candle?”

“Picture it and then picture yourself blowing it out. You’ll understand soon and you’ll be able to see it when you’re back in your body.”

“OK.” Scott gazed into the flame. “So, what do I do now?”

“Just what you are doing now,” Bear said, “That’s good, Scott. Let it warm you. Watch the candle flame, breathe in and out…slowly…you’re safe here…”

“This is…stupid…” Scott said quietly, although he breathed as instructed, wondering how he was meant to calm down like Bear wanted.

“Just keep it up, relax into the flame, and watch the blue light at the centre…”

Scott blinked, narrowed his eyes to take a closer look. To his astonishment there really was a blue light in the centre of the candle flame. It beckoned him, he leaned closer.

He was lying on his back in a wide bed and the lights were dim. He sat up, blinking. The very next thing he sensed was that he was finally back in his own body. The sense of fitting into it was indescribably right. He smiled, stretched out his limbs, testing the feeling luxuriously, and then sat up to take a look around. Now he recognised where he was; he was in Thunderbird Two’s sleeping quarters. A huge mirror at one end was a new addition. He recognised it as a gift someone had sent his father many years back, and it had ended up in the indoor swimming pool on Mateo Island, the second most secret base they had. If Grendel had been there to get it… Oh, shit.

There was some movement either side of him. A sleepy blonde woman was waking up on his left. Then on his right he saw the top of a darker head. He pulled back the sheet. It was Tin-Tin, and she was naked. He noticed the bruises all across her back before quickly covering her up again. She slept on, twitching and whimpering now. Oh no, no…

“Sweet of you to let her stay.” The blonde on his left said. She had that odd, puffy face he recognised from the boys at the Miskatonic. Similar gristle flecked eyes.

“Get out of here,” he muttered, looking away. “I have to…get on…” She paused. “Go on, go!”

She looked pissed off, then appeared to think better of it and climbed quickly out of the bed, picking up her clothes and leaving the room without putting them on. Scott wrapped more covers around Tin-Tin. As he did, her dark eyes flickered open. She didn’t say anything, but immediately tried to worm backwards into the sheets out of reach. Hating himself, he stopped her and held her where she was, wrapped in the bedclothes.

“Tin-Tin it’s me. It’s Scott. It’s all right, I won’t hurt you.” He leaned in, she cowered again. “Honey, you have to tell me, where are the others? What did Grendel do with them?”

She remained a silent, terrified shape. Scott sighed and let her go. She scrambled deep underneath the covers like a scared cat. Then he glanced over at the huge mirror. He expelled a long, intricate set of curses under his breath and scrambled off the bed to stand in front of it. The bastard had customised him. Tattoos were scrawled over his entire body, his skin resembled pages of the Necronomicron he’d seen the university library. Unholy black and dark red words were etched into his skin in shamelessly bold print, spread over each part, each limb, each line of his body was marked with the weird symbols and writing. Scott turned all the way around, looking at it. The symbol he recognised from Virgil’s sketchbook and the old woman’s face formed an intricate design on the arches of his back. He swore again.

“Tin-Tin, when did he…?” Scott bit back all the questions about this. He could probably fix it in the weeks after this…but first he had to make sure there were weeks after this. “Tin-Tin, where are the others, what did he do with the others?”

She had peered over the covers to watch his tirade and hid her face again when he turned to her. He pulled on the nearest clothes – they seemed to be wearing the thin but amazingly effective subzero gear that Brains had designed some time ago. He saw a telecomm watch on the floor and strapped that around his wrist too. Then he gently shook Tin-Tin, saying, “It’s me. It’s Scott. I’m sorry, I wasn’t…here…” I’m sorry I let this happen…

“Liar…” she whispered, keeping her head down, looking utterly terrified. His heart sank.

Scott stood up. “I’m sorry, Tin-Tin.” He hated to leave her. Hated to. But he was running out of time. All pity, including any at all for his own situation, would have to be put on hold until he could figure something out. He pictured the candle and it appeared at the bottom right of his vision, still glowing, reassuring him that Bear was around. Let’s find them. See what else Grendel’s been doing.

He left the cabin and went through the sick bay, past the kitchen, turning right through the hatch into the cockpit. He could see a wide extent of the dig from here through Thunderbird Two’s sweeping forward shields. She seemed to be settled on the side of a mountain that continued to stretch up and up above her. Scott made out Thunderbird One’s silver shape some way to the right. He clicked on the external camera screens, looking for a better view. He was able to make out the Excadigger chugging away, halfway into the mountainside. “Who’s controlling you?” he whispered aloud. He lifted up the microphone, flicked it on. “Hello? Calling Excadigger, come in.”

“Yes?” an unknown voice answered. His heart sank again.

He tried to sound casual. “This is Grendel. Report.”

“Tracy reckons we’ll be at the gate in seven hours, sir. Appears that some sort of rock here is causing trouble.” The voice answered. “Er, is that er, ok, sir?”

“I…” Scott closed his eyes for a moment. “Did you put the others back where they’re supposed to be?”

“Er, no I , er, I didn’t personally, but Anton did…”

“And where’s that, friend?” Scott said, keeping his voice quiet and slightly threatening.

“With the rest, sir. In the crates. With the others.”

“Good,” Scott scanned the video images, searching for the ‘crates’. “You…you haven’t moved any of them out yet?”

“No, sir, they’re still in the pod, just like you wanted. They won’t die of exposure before we get to the gate. No, sir.”

Scott said briskly, “Good work.” Then he dropped the radio mike and headed back through the hatch to the elevator that would take him down into the Pod. He heard the whimpering and crying as the elevator doors opened to a gust of cool dry air that smelled very strongly of…people. Scott covered his nose as he exited; it was getting overpowering and the pod door was closed.

Now he saw what the man had meant by ‘crates’. There were stacks of IR’s heavy-duty-plastic carry crates, not much bigger than a small city car, each containing six or seven people huddled miserably together behind thin slats. It made the crates resemble a human version of dog or cat carriers. He could hardly even see inside, just the odd hand hanging out at the sides, a pair of eyes that quickly pulled away into interior shadows.

Scott called out, “Father! Gordon… Alan..? John..?” He walked between the crates, looking hard. Another thing he hated – wanting desperately to release these poor bastards, and knowing that if he did they’d freeze to death in minutes. He wasn’t about to let them out on a mountainside in a temperature that was probably at least twenty five below when the wind wasn’t blowing.

“Father!” he called out. Some of the people in the crates nearest him peered over with terrified eyes. Tin-Tin’s eyes. Scott stopped and said, “I’m sorry.”

It disturbed him that there was no defiance at all from the captives. What did Grendel do? After a minute or two he made out the colour of Gordon’s hair, then his brother’s face pressed up against the sharp edge of the plastic crate, staring at him. Scott was there in a few long strides. He hunkered down beside his brother. “Gordon!”

“What the hell do you want? Where’s Tin-Tin?” Gordon demanded.

“She’s asleep.” Scott reached out to touch Gordon’s hand without thinking, and Gordon yanked it back, eyes blazing.

“You no-good-monster sack of shit…”

“Gordo, it’s me. I, I’m back – for a little while – I had some help. One of our agents, if you can believe that. We’re coming to stop this.” Scott tried to peer past his brother into the crate. “Are the others in there?”

“They’re around. You should know, you ordered us separated.”

“Shit,” Scott glanced around the vast pod and called out for them. No one replied. “It’s me! It’s Scott!” Nobody answered.

“I wish you were just Scott and that he’d gone nuts,” Gordon said viciously, “But Virgil was right, you’re someone else. This whole thing is…is impossible.”

“I agree,” Scott said, “I’ve been saying that for two days. But Virgil was right and he and Penelope and Parker found me. Look, take this…” Scott had suddenly had an idea and now handed Gordon the wristcomm he had found in the sleeping quarters. “Listen out for us. We’ll be coming to stop Grendel.”

Gordon took the wristcomm after a moment’s suspicious glaring. He put it around his wrist, still glaring. “Call Penny,” Scott said.

“What?”

“Call her. Call Virgil – although he’s not…himself right now.” Oh great, explain the whole fucked-up mess right now, how hard can it be? “Do it, Gordo. I don’t have long.” He reckoned he had about five minutes to go.

Gordon frowned mightily but clicked on the watch. The little screen lit up – Scott felt a violent pang at the illuminated bruises on his brother’s face, the rest was mercifully in shadow. “Calling Lady Penelope,” Gordon said softly.

There was a long call signal, and then the screen flickered into life. Gordon said, “Penelope? No way!”

“Gordon?” she sounded cautiously pleased, which probably meant she was elated. “Oh, thank heavens. That bruise looks dreadful!”

“Penny, is it…is it you? Is it Scott?”

“Yes, to both of your questions. Virgil is here as well, but he can’t answer as himself. We’re working on that.”

“Oh, jeez, oh my god.” Gordon looked up at Scott through his puffy eyes and blackened cheek. “Scott? You’re here!”

“Yeah. But I can’t stay like this for long. You know there’s something weird going on, well, this is where I need the info to fix it. Can I get you out of this thing?”

“Maybe not.” Gordon rattled the crate door with his foot. “There’s a lock on these but Grendel’s changed the damn code from when we all last used them.”

“Damn.” Scott tried a few combinations and couldn’t get it to open either. He went back to the small gap. “OK, how many more guys does Grendel have working for him?”

“When he took over he seemed to have about a hundred followers, crazy, sure, but well armed. They all came in on a sea plane. We fought him, but he…he had worked it all out. Didn’t take him long, either. Then when he…he persuaded us to fly him here, they stripped the island down and used it as a base while he interrogated Brains. Brains and Tin-Tin are the only ones not tied up here.” Gordon stretched out a hand. Scott took it. “You have to find Brains, Scott, he had to help Grendel to keep the rest of us alive!”

“Where’s he being kept?”

“He was taken away with Tin-Tin. I really don’t know…Scott, I’m sorry…”

“OK, don’t worry,” Scott squeezed Gordon’s wrist tightly. His brother felt like he was freezing in there. “I’ll go and look…”

“Scott!” the entrance hatch he’d used was opening again, Scott could hear it.

“Get to the back of the cage,” Scott hissed. He stood up and walked briskly to the hatch.

The blonde girl from the bedroom was coming out of the elevator; the subzero gear fit her snugly. “Were they giving you any trouble?” she asked sweetly. “Shall we go back and play with their pretty girl again?” She gestured towards the cabin.

Scott shook his head, suppressing all revulsion from appearing on his face. “No. How’s the dig doing?”

“Actually, they sent me to tell you, they’re about to reach the gate.”

“Good, I’ll go there now.” Scott followed regretfully toward the external hatch. He had to see the site layout, as much as he’d wanted to find and reassure the others. He thought of the candle, it was shorter but still burned bright in the corner of his mind’s eye.

“It’s amazing,” the girl said, taking his hand. “They told me that it’s a great golden gate covered in the most incredible jewels.”

“Nice. That’s great.” Scott kept walking impassively until they got to the exit. He went through it first. As he came out into the snow, he realised the air was still and quiet. The Excadigger had stopped its work and had reversed out of the long tunnel it had built. That can’t be good… He saw lots of people coming towards them now, some with lighted torches. They wore long dark cloaks. Your basic crazy cult, he thought, putting up a hand to greet them. “Hi.”

The girl smiled and took his arm. She wrapped herself around him and lifted up to give him a long, deep kiss. Scott struggled to stay in character. She sounded happy and released him. “What’s my name?” she asked brightly.

Scott stared at her. Damn. He began to take a step back.

“Oh, no…” she said and took a step away then waved a finger in front of his face. Scott understood a fraction of a second later, using it to step backwards again.

The crowd hurled themselves towards him, shouting angrily. Several men surrounded him as he tried to get back into the ship. He landed a couple punches before they grabbed and wrestled him to the cold ground.

The girl screamed at them to back off. Four men held Scott down on his knees whilst she knelt in front of him. She grabbed his overlong hair and hissed at him. “My name is Lucy Curwen! And the Mad God’s prison is not a glittering treasure. He would know, you stupid fool. Grendel!” She uttered some gibberish that sounded similar to whatever Edmund had spouted back at the Miskatonic. Scott strained against the men, but they had him tight.

The girl undid the top of his Arctic gear and exposed his chest to the freezing air. “Grandfather’s coming back,” she whispered to him, traced the markings on his chest and began chanting again. Scott balked at what she’d just said, Lucy Curwen? This is his granddaughter?

He frantically tried to picture the candle. This time it wouldn’t appear. Scott gave a pained grunt as something dark and terrible spread out heavily behind his eyes; they began to stream with tears that spattered blood-coloured down onto the snow. He struggled, desperate to rub them, to do something. Hideous laughter rolled around inside his head, mocking his efforts – he tried to fight it, swearing at the people who held him, his breath lifted away by the cold air. The darkness slid over his eyes and he looked directly into it. Sorry, Bear. Sorry, Dad. Sorry, Virgil…

“You’re not as weak as I thought.” A strange voice, sexless but old, reverberated around his head, the presence weighing heavier and darker, crushing Scott’s thoughts. “Let’s make sure you know exactly what you’re up against. I’ll tear a few barriers down to help you.”

A sound nothing less than the tearing of flesh cut into Scott’s brain. Then he remembered. Started to scream and didn’t stop.

He was powerless. There was no light, no up or down, just weightless space and something unnatural sliding all over his body. He was exhausted; it had him and there was no escape. He was lost. Falling, always falling. His mind retreated from the thing that held him close, slid into and invaded every inch of him.

When it finally left his body Scott curled up on the hard concrete floor, unable to even move. A door opened. A pair of young blonde women came in, both wearing grey dresses with their hair tied loosely back. They looked a long way off to Scott, who drifted in a haze, every part of his being concentrating on forgetting what had just happened to him.

One of them waved a hand in front of Scott’s eyes. He barely blinked, her motion was slow and distracting but not drawing his attention for more than that blink. “He’s still alive, Ed,” the girl said. “Lucky for Grandfather.”

“Grandfather knows exactly what he’s doing,” the one called Ed said. She reached down and prodded Scott’s face, snapping fingers in front of his eyes. “Look at him. No more resistance. The shoggoth did an amazing job on him. My idea worked.”

“It could have squished him like a bug,” the other one said sniffily.

“But it didn’t.” Ed reached forward, her blonde hair tickling Scott’s inert shoulders. “Let’s get him dressed before Grandfather comes home. If he needs to it’ll only take a few more tries, I bet you any money, Lucy.”

“What use will money be when the dark one wakes?” Lucy said dramatically.

“Azathoth is money, didn’t you know that? You didn’t pay attention to Grandfather at all. He’s a metaphysical entity with the power to end the entire known universe and every thought…”

“Shut up, wiseass…” the two girls dragged Scott from the room. Scott still barely reacted even when they shoved him in a lukewarm, murky bath and scrubbed him all over.

“So you’ve never even thought of asking Grandfather for a better body?” Lucy asked Ed as the tepid water rinsed a layer of thick mucus off Scott’s skin.

“I’ll get one soon. I don’t want to end up playing musical meat, you know. I want something that’ll last. Like one of the men on that island he’s on, maybe. You have to be healthy in the rescue business. Selfless boy scouts, the lot of them…”

“I like boy scouts,” Lucy said wistfully, “I thought you did, too…”

“Well,” Ed peered down at Scott and rubbed a damp flannel over Scott’s face, “They always try to do their best. I always appreciate a trier…”

“I thought you said it was because you liked the noises they made when you…” Lucy paused her cleaning and peered at Scott too. “Did he move?”

“He’s out of it. Grandfather might reappear, though, that would scare the crap out of you…”

“No, look, he’s…” she watched Scott intently for a minute. “Ah, no. It’s just creepy, how he keeps staring like that.”

“He’s catatonic. Just how Grandfather needs him.”

“Right. But not dead. He could so be dead. Look at these bruises!”

“The shoggoth was only playing.” Ed prodded Scott’s chest, grinning down at him, she said. “You liked what it did to you, didn’t you? I could hear it all night! Don’t worry, Scott Tracy of International Rescue. You’ll get another chance with it again tomorrow night, and the next one. Then we’ll bring your whole bloody team to play.”

Scott pushed up out of the filthy, slime covered water and dunked the two girls headfirst into it. He held them down and they thrashed and squealed. Scott kept holding them there until they both went limp. He waited no longer, running from the bathroom and down through an old decrepit house.

Scott ran out of the front door and saw a car parked in front. He hid behind it, shivering and looking around. He seemed to be out in the sticks, in some far off neglected countryside where the weather was just turning chilly. His body felt weak, cold. He tensed as he heard another car approach and ducked down by the trunk of the stationary one. Everything they’d done to him over the last…however long it was, was fresh in his mind. They’d questioned him for hours about International Rescue; he’d told them nothing, he was sure of it. Then there had been the room. The creature. He’d rather die than go back.

The car pulled up by the house. Scott ducked around it, keeping low. The occupants opened the door. Scott waited for the driver to get out and a well-dressed man in a grey suit stepped out of the back. Scott dived for the driver, who was a lot bigger than he first appeared. Fury and panic made Scott duck and slam into the man with his shoulder, tipping the driver up in an old high school football move. The man didn’t quite go over but Scott slid into the car seat and kicked him in the stomach with both feet. The man staggered to his side, winded.

Scott slammed the door and frantically restarted the car. He succeeded on the second try, pushed down hard to accelerate away; he drove off in a roar of engines.

He had to get to a phone, a radio, even the police. Anyone would do. Scott drove crazily down long country roads as the morning sunlight rose muted and hazy over mountainous hills. Scott finally saw signs of human life, in the form of a family-sized RV parked at the side of the road. He stopped his stolen car beside it and honked the horn. “Wake up! Please!”

Much to Scott’s relief the RV door finally opened and an angry looking man with a dressing gown and a baseball bat came over to him. Scott wound down the window. “I need your help, sir!”

“It’s five-thirty in the middle of nowhere, what the hell is the matter?” the man said in an accent that suggested he was from somewhere in the South, maybe Florida. Just an ordinary guy on vacation with his family. “We’re all trying to get some sleep, do you know how hard it is to sleep with two kids and pregnant wife in an RV in when the countryside is this goddamn quiet?”

“Please, I need to use your phone,” Scott said again. If the guy still didn’t get it he’d just keep driving.

“You do? Where’s yours?” the guy peered at Scott, his eyes clearing. “Where are your pants?”

“Please, just, let me borrow it…” Scott caught a glimpse of a blond man in the car’s rearview mirror. He stopped talking, looked behind him, stared at the mirror again. He said, “No, no that isn’t possible…”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” the man lifted the baseball bat just a little, threatening.

“No, that’s not…that’s not me…” Scott peered at the face in the mirror, “That isn’t…how the fuck…” he looked at the guy. “Who am I?”

“I don’t know! Get out of here!”

Scott ripped the mirror off the car ceiling and got out of the car, looking at his image in the weak daylight. “This isn’t me! Who am I?” he lifted his head, “I need to use your phone! Please, I…”

There was a weight pushing behind his eyes. He flinched, shaking his head to clear it. The RV guy was saying something about him not coming any closer, brandishing the bat threateningly. Scott couldn’t hear anything, a buzzing like a million pissed off horse-flies filled up and crawled into his brain, he leaned on the side of the car, paralysed and groaning.

The family man was still speaking loudly at him, his wet red mouth opening and closing slowly, white teeth strangely bright against his tongue; Scott stared, fascinated, and then the dark weight behind his eyes pushed down hard.

The next thing he knew he was holding the baseball bat and he was screaming blue murder. There were four bodies lying on the muddy earth, and blood had been scrawled into a huge symbol all over the RV and the ground, too. Then a police car drove up. The cop jumped out and pointed a gun at him, shouting something Scott couldn’t bring his mind to understand. The world fell away and the last edges of his sanity were unpicked. He didn’t care. He wanted to stay there, right there, huddled in the dark…

Scott woke in another bed, the sheets felt softened and old as he clutched at them; dizzy and not trusting that he could feel anything at all. He felt as bad as he had after a near-attack of the bends following a haywire underwater rescue. He badly wanted to throw up, and then he saw the person sitting beside the bed. In horror he pulled away, across the far side of the sheets, almost falling off entirely. He slid to the other side of the bed and huddled there a minute.

“Scott!” the blonde woman stood up, putting down a book she’d been sketching in with a lump of charcoal. She came towards him. “Hey, take it easy will you?”

“Get away from me!” Scott hissed, making a break for it around the bed and scrambling for the door. The woman caught him by the wrist; Scott lashed out, shoving her backwards easily and lurching out of the room. Get out of here, they can’t catch me, they can’t not again I won’t let them no…

“Scott, hold on there a minute.” A big, deep voice boomed from the doorway of a room opposite the one he’d escaped from. Scott hesitated halfway down the staircase. There was something familiar about the voice. Something not bad.

“Scott,” the blonde woman appeared at the top of the stairs, “Scott, it’s me. He said you’d be confused when you woke but this is…” She had put him in that room, left him to the creature which pressed and prodded and invaded his flesh.

“No!” Scott ran down the stairs into a big living room…he was in a cabin…and crashed directly into a big framed man with a once-broken nose and very surprised expression.

“Bloody ‘ell, mate, watch where you’re goin’…..”

“Scott!” the blonde woman ran down the stairs and caught up with him. Scott wrestled free of the older man, looked up. Recognized him in a rush.

“P, Parker…? What are…what you…” he realised he was shaking and trembling, probably crying too; he rubbed fiercely at his eyes. “Parker…?”

“Scott,” the blonde woman put her arms around him, “It’s OK, calm down.”

Scott pushed her off, put his back against a door lined by an animal skin. “Don’t touch me!”

The woman looked hurt by this, frowned at him. “Come on, remember, will you?” she said more impatiently.

“Remember…” Scott choked on the word. He glared at them all. “I remember all of it!”

Penelope entered through what looked like the front door. She stopped when she saw them gathered. “Is Scott all right?” she directed the question at Parker.

“A bit ‘ard to tell,” Parker said.

Scott took in the big, comfortable lounge, the big couches and the big fireplace while the reality of where he was slowly sank in. He braced his arm – Edmund Curwen’s skinny arm – against the wall by the door and took several deep, laboured breaths. His throat ached and his eyes were still stinging. He couldn’t stop trembling.

The man he now recognised as Bear was at the foot of the staircase. His concerned expression almost made Scott descend back into weak, useless tears. Scott forced back some self-control, shuddering. He clenched Edmund’s weak fist. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, looking at his bare feet.

“Fink nuffing of it,” Parker said warmly. Scott managed to smile a little.

Then Virgil touched him with Mercy Curwen’s fingertips and the nightmare crawled back up his spine. He jerked away from her body. Virgil said, sounding baffled, “What’s the matter with you?”

“When Grendel was taking over my body, they had me – the real me – locked up. You…that body was there.” Scott glared at Edmund now, who was sitting up on one of the couches, still wearing Virgil’s body with a smirk.

Virgil came forwards. “What are you talking about?”

“He means that when Grandfather decided a woman’s body was no good for casting ancient, powerful spells, he thought mine would do.” Edmund looked up at Scott. “You can see why I preferred your brother’s form.”

“Musical meat…” Scott repeated the phrase, disgusted.

“What?” Virgil said. “I don’t get it.”

“I remember everything that happened. Grendel unlocked my memories when he kicked me out.” Scott took a deep breath. “Edmund was trapped in Mercy’s body after Grendel took mine. You told him to leave me in a room with that thing.” Scott pushed past Parker and grabbed Edmund by the shirt. “You sick piece of crap…!”

“That’s enough.” Bear put his hand on Scott’s back.

Scott stared down at Edmund. The eyes really made things clear. Despite the outward appearance, he could see no trace of his brother there, just a mocking, snivelling weasel who had suggested their best torture, allowed Grendel to get hold of his family, his life and his home. Bear’s hand was the only thing stopping Scott from getting the shotgun he’d seen on the big man’s porch.

“Scott.” Bear’s voice was firm. “We’ll deal with him. Let him go.”

Scott waited a long moment, glaring down at Edmund. “All right,” Scott finally. He relaxed a little, moved back.

“You know what they did to you, then?” Edmund murmured.

“All of it,” Scott said. “Everybit of it.”

Edmund whistled and met Scott’s gaze with a sort of benign pity. “I’m so sorry, Scott.”

“Fuck you, Curwen. You and your entire fucked up family.”

Penelope said quickly, “Everyone, please listen. We have good news.”

Scott looked at her, let the anger sink down into the marrow of his borrowed bones, and said, “Great, Penny. So what’ve we got?”

“A location and a helijet.” She smiled. “We will get that sonovabitch, Scott, I promise you.”

“And I thought you might be interested to hear, Scott, that we’re now ready to put Virgil back and Edmund in his place,” Bear said from behind Scott.

Scott was suddenly grinning down at his brother’s face.

Edmund glared up from his seat on the couch, appearing much less impressed by this news. “Well, shit,” he said with Virgil’s mouth.

They were in the basement again. All the drapes were pulled back to allow the most room. Scott sat on a chair with his arms folded, watching curiously while Bear brought a bubbling pot round from the smaller fireplace. Virgil sat on his knees on a long rug opposite Edmund. Edmund sprawled on the other end of the same rug with a very dark expression on his face. The handcuffs Scott had insisted on were probably a significant cause of this expression. That, and both he and Virgil were stripped to their underwear. That really wasn’t helping Scott’s mood, either.

“Let’s get on with this!” Virgil turned his head to Bear, sent a long wave of blonde hair falling over his shoulder. Scott took another deep, controlling breath.

“Nearly there, Virgil. Scott, pay attention to this. I’ll teach you the words, too, but Virgil got to learn them while you were…recovering…” Bear put the metal pot down. It gave off that bad memory stink again, and Scott remembered now exactly where he’d first smelled it. Down in the Hungarian cave system where Grendel had first got hold of him.

“This method is specifically used by the person usurped by another. It’s to reclaim the self, using your will and a little extra juice to put your soul back where it belongs. Expect a lot of resistance from whoever’s inhabiting you.” Grendel stirred the pot and dipped in a small animal bone. “It’s all a little witch-doctery I’m afraid, but this is a much purer way than however Grendel taught his followers.”

“He didn’t teach just anybody,” Edmund said snidely. “He kept it in the family…”

“There’s a surprise…” Scott muttered.

“Both of you shut up. This isn’t going to be a cake walk,” Bear said gruffly. He handed the bone, now drenched in the thick, dark red liquid, over to Virgil, who held it gently on the tip of his fingers. “Are you ready, Virgil? This is up to you.”

Virgil furrowed his pale eyebrows and nodded, looking pleased but scared. Bear looked him over once more and then nodded back, standing up and stepping off the rug. “All right, Virgil. When you’re fully prepared, do it.”

Virgil glanced once over at Scott and met his eyes. Scott gave him a short nod back, You can do this, Virg. I know you can. And I really need you back where you belong.

Mercy Curwen’s lip twitched with a smile, as if Virgil had guessed Scott’s next line of thought. Then Virgil was facing Edmund head on. He made several deep, guttural noises that Scott hadn’t thought a twenty year old woman’s throat was capable of producing. Then he shouted something in rapid succession, some mix of languages Scott couldn’t even begin to unravel. Edmund edged away to the length of the manacles. Virgil leapt up to his feet and took seven big, certain strides towards his own body. With another yell he brought the edge of the bone down in a cutting motion between Edmund’s eyes and all the way down his torso. He reversed the action and then shoved the bone directly forwards. The bone’s bloody tip hit right between Edmund’s eyes.

There was a shimmer, not between but definitely around the pair. Later Scott would struggle to really picture it, but he could sense a deep shift in the room’s atmosphere, like a tinny noise had been switched off or a washing machine had finally come to a halt, and the basement’s electric lights performed a crazy flickering routine before finally settling.

Mercy Curwen’s body slumped sideways. Virgil’s body did the same. The bone rolled away from her fingertips – Scott was shocked to see it had been crushed and half snapped away. Without waiting another second he was at Virgil’s body’s side, tapping his brother’s face, urging him to wake up. “Virg!”

He heard Penelope speak to Bear, “Do you think it worked?” and Bear’s soft, deep reply, “If he was strong. If he believed.”

“Dammit, Virgil, open your damn eyes!” Scott shook him.

His brother’s body twitched like a sleeping lion. Then he came awake all at once. Big dark hazel eyes opened wide and stared up at Scott. “Did I…did it work…?”

“Where did I read to you on the farm?” Scott whispered.

Virgil replied just as quietly, “The chicken coop, dumbass.”

Scott felt a hysterical laugh coming on, so he just hugged Virgil tightly instead, until his brother requested, “Any chance of letting me out of these ‘cuffs? Maybe handing over some pants?” and then Scott couldn’t stop the laughter, either.

An hour later, they were waving down another helijet. Two marines were flying it. They were apparently old friends of Bear and had called in some favours to make this mission. Bear had been hazy on exactly why, saying they should ask them themselves. The two men landed by the cabin and ran over to the group. One was a grizzled veteran in his forties, his name was Diazlowski. The other marine was called Leon, about Scott’s age, and when they greeted Bear the air briefly turned blue.

Penelope watched all this with ever-so-slightly raised eyebrows. Scott cleared his throat, “Uh, just military talk.”

“I’m sure it is,” she said, sounding amused.

“We’ve got enough good shit here to blow up a mountain!” Leon said cheerfully, clapping Virgil on the back as he walked past. “Nothing to worry about!”

“Oh really?” Virgil had been in a foul mood despite being returned to his body. Edmund very wisely appeared to be staying out of his way.

“We’ll pack the last of the gear and go,” Scott said, standing up.

“Right, right…” Leon said. “We’re going to get us a few shoggoths. Too bad they don’t have heads, but…”

“How do you kill one of those things?” Scott asked.

“Same way you kill anything big and disgusting. With thirty tons of artillery.” Leon slapped Scott on the back, too, pointing at the military helijet. “Not going to be a problem, I guarantee it.”

Scott looked over at Virgil. Virgil raised his head in a ‘sounds good’ nod and Scott smiled. Then he shivered, chilled down to his core. “Uh, do you feel that?”

Edmund was suddenly at his side. “Of course I bloody do!”

Penelope lifted up one of the automatic weapons and swore, too. “The shoggoth is here…?”

Bear said, “It’s about a mile away. It hasn’t figured out exactly where we are yet. We have two minutes.” He bent to his three dogs, whispered something to them. The dogs whined, but after a moment they began to run away from the helijet and the cabin, safely away into the woods. Scott had an odd moment of pure relief.

They all started to run towards the helijet. Diazlowski, so far still silent, hopped into it first and got it going. Lifted up, seeming too slow. Scott could see the thing slither over the mountainside, crawling up to the cabin. He shuddered, remembering all too well how that slick translucent goo felt when it touched you. The dark places in his mind were too exposed now. He stared at the thing, watching it slide across the roof of Bear’s cabin. Its body stretched upward, a cry of “Tek Li-Li!” audible over the whine of engines.

“Pull up faster!” Scott yelled.

Leon appeared over his shoulder. He nudged Scott. “Mind out, my friend. Here goes.”

He had a rocket launcher. He used it.

Heavy fire pummelled the creature, drawing out an awful deafening scream, it tried to shy away and reform but Leon kept hitting and hitting it with his missiles. They hovered higher up now. Scott could still see it, hissing and writhing below. “How is it still alive?” he yelled.

“Diz, are you ready?” Leon shouted.

Diazlowski made an ‘OK’ sign with his left hand, and flicked a switch.

“Mind your eyes,” Bear started to say.

The cabin exploded. They all flinched away, but looked again immediately. The shoggoth whirled in the flames, twisting, then another set of explosives delivered the power to split it in half. Then several halves. It sputtered into non-existance, its obliteration sending up strange smoke coloured shades of purple and green. It smelled like a burning fish market.

Virgil crouched down beside Scott, staring down at the wreckage. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah.” Scott was grinning, despite himself. Virgil was too. “It’s really dead?”

“Dead. Done. Dusted,” Leon said. “Don’t everyone thank me at once.”

Virgil laughed and slapped Leon hard on the back. Leon coughed in surprise at the friendly but clearly painful thump.

“Too bad about your cabin, Bear,” Scott murmured.

“I think it was worth it. Don’t you?” Bear murmured back.

Scott nodded. They flew away from the mountain, but he could still see the fire burning, the smoke turning black as Bear’s cabin burned. There really was no going back.

The journey had taken about fifteen hours now. There were another five to go. So far, Scott had spent his time studying like he never had before. The trip all the way to the Arctic had taken two stops. Now they were almost at the site which Bear had pinpointed following Scott’s trip back to his own body. It really wouldn’t be long now. The helijet whirred mechanically, everyone around him was sleeping, including Leon. Diazlowski piloted for the last stretch.

Scott looked up at Virgil, who’d fallen fast asleep with his sketchbook balanced on his broad chest. Scott grinned, putting down his own fist of notes. Virgil had taught him the ritual for a while, until the noises he had to make visibly disturbed the others. So he’d read and whispered them and read it again until he’d started to see double. He hadn’t been able to relax or sleep for longer than a few minutes at a time, despite the protests of his unwanted flesh.

Scott picked up the sketchbook instead. Whatever had captured Virgil’s imagination kept throwing up more unsettling creatures, and the new medium of charcoal meant that the images had become scratchier, darker. In each one the symbol he’d seen was standing out more boldly than before.

“A shame his gift’s been put to that use,” Bear rumbled beside him, making Scott start. “Better he draws it than dreams it, though.”

“Edmund said that Virg can…can pick up on weird shit like this. Occult crap that’s in the air, like radio waves…because of his artistic side or something. It’s worse now that the world’s ending.” Scott pointed to the symbol. “And what the hell does that mean?”

Bear took the sketchbook and examined where Scott had pointed. He frowned deeply. “That’s not something just anyone can see, Scott. It’s a warning you’ve been more affected by this than you think. When did you first see it?”

“Just in here. Then…” Scott explained about the crazy old landlady and the decorations she’d made on her face, along with the tattoos that Grendel had added to his own skin. “But you can see it?”

“Yes.”

“What does it mean?” Scott stared at Grendel. “Please. I have to know, why am I seeing it? Is it…is it important? It’s there when I shut my eyes.”

Bear shook his head. “It is important. It’s a symbol of enormous power. It binds you to Azathoth, to his darkness. I think the Mad God is reaching for you. He wants your own blood, your life. For it, he’ll grant you anything you can imagine. If your will’s strong enough. Even Grendel’s not stupid enough to risk an invocation with that.” Bear slammed the book closed. Virgil woke with a grunt. Bear handed Virgil back the book. “It’s incredibly dangerous, Scott. Forget you ever saw it.”

“You mean it’s a ‘wishes granted’ deal? Why can’t we use that? There’s got to be a way!”

“You must not use it.” Bear said in a flat voice to Scott. “You won’t use this.”

“But if we could get it to work for us then perhaps…” Scott abruptly understood Edmund’s unreasoning terror when this look had been cast at him. Bear was angry.

“No. We stick to the plan, Scott,” Bear said after a moment.

“All right, we stick to the plan.” Scott tried to swallow. He said, “I just want to stop this. I want all of it to just fucking stop.”

“Yes.” Bear relaxed a fraction, his big frame sitting up. “You’ve survived so far. Now let’s go over what I taught you again.”

Scott suppressed a groan and began to recite the words he’d learned.

Deep, pervasive fear, more unnatural than nerves before a mission, made Scott and the others twitchy and their breath harder to take. There was no real accounting for it, but it had begun to creep over them as soon as the helijet set them down twenty miles from Grendel’s ritual site. They’d made the rest of the way on the military jetskis that Bear and Penelope, had ‘appropriated’ between them, leaving long skimmed tracks in the thick snow. In his pocket, Scott kept a bone that had been dipped in Bear’s ‘brew’; it was wrapped up in deer hide and cloth to keep it wet and warm until he needed it.

The situation was so absurd he wanted to laugh out loud.

Their trail had started to curve upwards when Bear radioed for a halt. “We walk from here.” He pointed up. “Keep a lookout for those ‘birds of yours.”

Scott murmured agreement that he would, peering up at their destination. The angles of the mountain were strange, spread out in long, high coils. There were smooth edges everywhere he looked; maybe the place was volcanic. He was cold, and was almost glad when they started to climb, even if Virgil was ‘babysitting’ him and Edmund through this step of the journey. Not for the first time since landing, Scott wished he had the streamlined and highly effective snowgear designed by Brains, which Grendel and his lackeys had taken a liking to. They all climbed for a good hour across black rock and ice. Scott ached with cold and exhaustion but kept up through sheer bloody-mindedness. Edmund required more help, playing up to his sister’s female attributes. At least he tried to until Virgil cuffed him and growled at him to “buck up or I’ll push you back down again.”

Edmund swore at him. Virgil grinned. Scott did, too, but hid it from their view. Teasing someone else stuck in the wrong body had really lost its appeal.

Bear had taken the lead, making his way up the mountainside like it was his front porch. It was impossible for anyone else to catch up with him, either. Finally, when Scott thought his limbs would drop off altogether, Bear said, “We’ve made it.”

This wasn’t strictly true. They were still outside and some way from their final destination. At least it was flatter here. Scott climbed up onto the edge of the ridge and immediately recognised the area. The huge tunnel entrance yawned before them, chiselled out of the mountainside with International Rescue machinery. There was nobody around. Thunderbirds Two and One were still sitting some way up from the dig and Thunderbird Two’s pod door was wide open.

“Oh, shit.” Scott murmured. “Those people…” He made to go up. Bear yanked him down again by the shoulder.

“Wait. It’s not safe.”

A second or two later Scott, and the others, saw what he meant. A shoggoth was guarding the tunnel entrance; at first its gelatinous mass had blended into the snow, but then it shifted and slithered around onto the floor, like a horribly agile jellyfish. A cold, terrified sweat broke out over Scott’s skin. “Now what?”

“We blow the crap out of it,” Virgil said. “Like before.”

“No, you’ll bring the whole tunnel down,” Bear said. “We use this.” He brought out a pot of a strange blue liquid. “This stuff was hard to come by, but it should stop it from seeing us. Do this.” He painted it onto his forehead in the shape of a five-pointed star and handed it to the group. They rapidly copied him. It had the texture of styling gel, and Scott couldn’t smell it, but it immediately gave him an ice cream headache after applying.

“How do I look?” He nudged Virgil.

His brother grinned back, eyes a little too wide. “Really, really blue,” He whispered.

“You’re sure it won’t see us, Bear?” Scott said a little louder.

Bear said, “It shouldn’t.”

“Great. How about hearing us?” Scott hissed.

“Oh, it’ll hear us. So keep it down, everyone. Let’s move.”

Edmund muttered something under his breath. Virgil cuffed him again and he yelped, echoing the noise across the mountainside.

The shoggoth instantly reacted, lurching in their direction, its many eyes blinked as it sought the source of the noise.

Virgil clamped a hand over Edmund’s mouth, hard, and the group huddled against the ridge as the unholy creature squirmed a patrol around the cave entrance. It burbled some nonsense language after five minutes, and then slithered back up to its original position above the tunnel entrance.

No one said anything. Bear directed them with hand gestures and they slowly, carefully, climbed out onto the snow. The Excadigger’s heavy tread had worn the powder very thin here, the rock was slippery and exposed. Bear led the way and Scott was right behind him, peering up at the creature. It moved almost like a big, gelatinous cat. He could almost assume it was purring. The thing’s stink was potent, dripping and oozing onto them as they scurried beneath.

They walked down the long tunnel, deeper into the mountain. The coil pattern of the mountain seemed repeated in the rock itself; although Scott was no expert on geology, even he could tell this wasn’t a natural formation. The air went quiet and still, the wide tunnel lit only by their striplight torches, flattening out the features of his companions. They walked close together and Scott couldn’t blame them. Here and there he made out footprints and more tyre tracks. Probably trucks of the crates containing human beings. Grendel’s people had been very busy in the day since uncovering the gate.

“I don’t think the shoggoth will be able to hear us now,” Bear said in low tones after a while. “We’re deep enough.”

“How far in do you reckon this place goes?” Virgil whispered.

“There’s a belief that the Mad God was buried here during a polar cap shift about a thousand millennia ago. That’s just a ballpark figure, of course. And he’s not exactly here, he doesn’t really exist anywhere, but he is all around.”

“Like Jesus,” Edmund said.

“Shut up,” Bear said evenly.

“How much time do you think we have, Bear?” Virgil said after a while. “I mean, will we actually make it there before it happens?”

“We still have some time. Not much, but we’ll need to find them before they finish the ritual. Hopefully save a few more lives, too.” Bear kept going.

“Good to know we’re not already too late,” Scott murmured. Then he noticed something, “Isn’t that…”

“Everyone quiet!” Edmund squeaked.

They stopped talking. After a few minutes another slimy mass of eyes and tentacles slithered past them. The sense of dread increased a thousand times, Scott tried hard not to think about the room at the Curwen’s house. They held their breath until Bear and Edmund gave a cautious all clear.

“How many of those things does Grendel have?” Scott hissed.

“It’s likely that some were always here. Shoggoths are older than man.” Bear pointed up ahead with one of his ropelike arms. “They could have lived down in the mountain all this time. You see those markings?”

“It’s the gate?” Scott saw it, too. The round shape of the Excadigger’s trail was coming to an end. Now the tunnel opened up by itself, and the group stepped out onto a ledge overlooking a huge inner cavern.

“Not quite the gate, not yet,” Bear said. Although he whispered the older man’s voice spread around the walls, repeating like cool air in the distance. “Now we’re in the city where the gate is protected. The shoggoths have been sealed in for years. Not all of them are under Grendel’s power.”

“So where’s the gate itself?” Scott demanded.

“It must be deeper. We might have to decipher some of these writings before we can find directions.” Bear looked thoughtfully at the strange mosaic shapes that covered the smooth walks.

“Or, we could call Gordon again. You have a tracker on there, Penny?” Scott said.

“Luckily for us, yes,” she answered. “Here he is.” She handed the compact over to Scott.

“Thanks, Penny. Gordon?”

“Scott!” Gordon squinted at him, the bruise now a deep purple colour over his swollen eye. “Wow, is that really you?”

“Afraid so.” Scott assured him. “And Penny and Parker are both here, plus three others, we’re going to be able to get everyone out.”

“Thank God, where are you guys?”

“We’re almost with you. We’re at the entrance to a city…”

“Then you’ve gotta go down again. They put us on trucks in these things, we travelled for about about ten minutes.” Gordon glanced over his shoulder. “Grendel’s doing something I can’t see. People are…screaming, Scott. Please get here soon.”

Scott tightened his lips. “We’ll be there very soon. Sit tight. Are the others near you?”

“I can get a message to Dad, and to John. I think Brains is still by Grendel and I don’t know what they did with Alan. I wish I did…”

“We’ll find him,” Scott wasn’t sure how, yet, but he knew he had to bolster Gordon, make him less afraid if he possibly could. “Gordon, can you see anything at all near you?”

“Yeah. A great big pile of cages. Some curved, greenish rock. All of Grendel’s people are too far away. Sorry.”

“Don’t worry, Gordon, we’ll get you and everyone else out of there. I’m going to stop Grendel.”

“You are?” Gordon frowned and leaned a little closer to the watch. “You have no idea what he’s done! Tin-Tin…”

“I know what he’s done, Gordon. It’s going to stop, I promise. We’re going to follow your beacon and end it here.”

“OK.”

“Be ready.”

“OK.”

Scott switched to tracking, the screen flashed up Gordon’s location. His brother was right. Grendel, the gate and the rest of the nightmare was about half a mile below them, somewhere along the network of huge tunnels that made up this mountain city.

“Let’s go.” Scott started to walk and the others were close behind him.

They walked along the vast empty tunnels, not speaking much between them, wary of the shoggoths that were loose down here, even if they weren’t all there for Grendel’s benefit. They finally came to a point where the tunnel they were on opened up and the sound of a lot of people chanting came closer, echoing up and up towards them through the rock. They followed a curving pathway around; the ceiling was higher here and the area was higher and a little lighter.

Finally they came to a wide open doorway edged with what looked like thick, greenish marble. The noise was much louder from here. From the outside it resembled a huge coliseum. The smooth walls were covered in circles that dripped red liquid, clearly hand painted on. A body lay discarded near the entrance, probably the source of the blood. Scott had a brief, shameful moment of gratitude that it wasn’t any of his family.

“Grendel’s in there…” Scott murmured. They cautiously approached the structure, and then stopped dead.

A shoggoth shifted near the entrance, its eyes flickered in cloudy patterns like schools of ugly fish. Penelope quietly ducked beneath the creature before Scott could stop her, looking into the space beyond. Grendel didn’t seem to have posted a single human guard, it seemed that they were relying on their tame shoggoths to prevent anyone trying to stop him. She quickly came back around and shook her head, then pointed up. Scott saw where she meant. There were smooth edged gaps in the masonry above that they could perhaps reach and get above the ceremony. Scott agreed and pointed to their left, suggesting through hand signals that they should try to find a way up, whilst keeping well away from the hideous guard.

Diazlowski and Leon had ropes. When they reached a good spot Scott signalled to use them. They climbed. The gap in the wall was about twenty feet up, and Scott scrambled along the smooth surface. He looked down into a vision of pure hell.

The coliseum contained a deep circular cavern that stretched a long way down up and to a gargantuan circular rock embedded deep into the wall. That had to be the gate. Most of the cult were facing and chanting towards it. Three big trucks had been parked at the top of the cavern, directly below the wall where he stood, and the cages were being unpacked. The people inside were being led, some screaming, towards a killing ground about halfway down the slope. A small group of cult members were hacking into the luckless people, and from there their victims’ blood ran along deep grooves in the ground, carrying their blood towards the gate itself, forming a deep red pool that curved around the circle.

Scott lunged towards them without thinking, stopped by Bear grabbing his shoulder with a big hand. “Not yet,” the big man warned. “See where Grendel is?”

Scott looked past the carnage and then there he was; Grendel paraded in his body, tattoos on full display, standing right in front of the circular stone. The bastard was calling out in that obscene language and praying to the gate. Scott could hear the drums again, they rattled the shadows left in his thoughts. He clenched the rope in his hands, “I’ll get you…” he breathed. “Goddamn it we’re too fucking late…”

“We can still save many of them,” Bear murmured to him.

Scott nodded. “OK, here’s the plan. Virg, Diezlowski, you both set off the distraction. Get back to the trucks as soon as it works, we’ll need everyone to find Gordon and the others. We need to evacuate this place as soon as we can.”

“OK, Scott,” Virgil said, his voice strained. He was having a hard time not looking at the carnage going on below them.

“Penny, Parker and Leon will get down to the trucks now and start getting them ready to evacuate. Find Father and the others, too.” Scott looked over at the gate. Grendel was shouting something, throwing blood from the disgusting pool onto its surface. The gate vibrated every time he did this and the drums grew steadily louder.

“What about Grendel?” Virgil inquired.

“Bear and I are going to take care of him. He’s already isolated but we’ll move fast once you set off the charges. Are you ready?”

“Yeah,” Virgil said and the others agreed. “Good luck, Scott.”

“You, too. Five minutes, guys. Let’s get this done.” Scott sent Virgil and Diezlowski on their way with a small salute. They started to climb to the other side of the coliseum.

“See you soon, Scott. In your true form, I hope.” Penelope looked pale but determined. Scott gave her a small smile.

“Hope to see you, too. Thanks, Penny. For everything.”

“Don’t even mention it,” she squeezed the top of his gloved hand and began to climb down the wall on their ropes.

“And we’re going left,” Scott said.

“You know, you’re just like Grant,” Bear said, smiling with his eyes.

“Who’s Grant?”

“Grant Tracy. I swear you’re his double…from what I’ve seen…”

Bear dropped down and around the outside of the coliseum entrance.

Scott dropped down after him, hissing, “Grandpa Grant? How’d you know him? How old are you, anyway?”

Bear just said, “If we survive any of this, I’ll tell you plenty.” Then he started to hurry around towards the next opening, closer to where Grendel was performing his sick, ancient rites.

Scott opened his mouth to ask Bear more about his grandfather, but remembered they only had five minutes. He hurried after the huge man, suddenly even more grateful that Bear was working on their side.

The huge gate was visibly turning round and round as Scott and Bear climbed up into the next window. Another shoggoth had passed them on the outside, disappearing deeper into the city tunnels, and now the area directly beside Grendel appeared wholly unguarded. Grendel seemed oblivious to his surroundings now, panting hard, splashing more blood and gore on the disc. Inner circles within it swirled.

“Come on, Virgil, come on!” Scott hissed. Every second meant another death, another chance that his family would soon join the pile of bodies and feed the gate with their blood. Grendel shouted something else, smeared the blood once more. The gate visibly vibrated, the drums deepened. It began to reflect something, its surface moving so fast it was mirrored.

Virgil and Diazlowski’s explosion sent everyone off their feet. Cult members fell backwards, howling in outrage. Grendel staggered and went down on one knee, looking up and around in confusion through what looked like some kind of trance. There was no better time. Scott slid on the rope down the wall and ran towards his own body, ignoring Bear’s angry yell to stop.

Before Grendel got back on both feet, Scott landed right on top of him. Grendel swore at him, rolling along, they struggled together. Grendel, in the bigger, stronger body, easily pushed Scott off and Scott tipped over into the pool of blood. He emerged choking and spitting – he caught a bizarre glimpse of his own mad blue eyes before Grendel shoved his head beneath the surface again. Thick metallic tasting wrongness clogged his mouth, clotted his throat, the horrible taste slid into his pores and Scott struggled violently.

Thankfully, right before he was forced to swallow, the pressure left his head and Scott scrambled upward, pushing out of the revolting pool, choking and half-vomiting. Bear had his huge arms around Grendel’s chest, pinning the struggling body-thief in an rib crushing hug. Scott stripped off most of his thick, restricting clothing and advanced on Grendel, breathing blood and air through his nose. He pulled the prepared bone from his pocket and carefully unwrapped it. Every single breath threatened to make him throw up, but he held his nerve, ignored it, made himself care only about the task ahead. He would be out of this body soon if it killed him.

Grendel began to shout again, arching his neck up towards the slowly rotating gate. Bear held him fast while Scott began to recite what he’d learned, finding that the more he said the words the easier they came. Scott held the bone up and made his final seven strides towards Grendel, uttering one more gasping syllable before Bear shoved Grendel forwards, letting him go altogether. Scott struck between the eyes of his true face with the bone.

For long luminous moments Scott floated in Zero-G, doing a spacewalk across an endless city. He drifted, lost for a moment, reality a distant memory. There was something hideous moving in the darkness around him, a mad thing that hissed and spat while Scott spun through above the inhuman buildings. A warm light glowed in one of them, he kicked more purposefully towards it. His body waited below in a fountain square, inert and lifeless, and his mind pushed him closer, eager to return.

Bloodied hands closed around his back and shoulder, pulling at him, scratching with long nails, biting at his throat. Scott ducked to push him over his shoulders, he turned over and over to fend off the ancient creature that hissed, “Mine! Always mine now! You were powerless! You were weak!”

Scott ducked and kicked the creature hard in the stomach. The white haired, shrivelled thing screeched at Scott, its naked limbs wriggling against the stars, howling with uncontained madness and fury. So you’re Grendel, he thought.

He caught his breath more from reflex than any real need. He took another deep inhale and peacefully sank downwards to where he belonged.

It took a little longer for his eyes to finally open, for dingy cold light to help him reach full bright awareness.

He heard gunfire echoing and snapped sharply to his senses.

Scott Tracy stood up. He was back in his body; his own form fit like a Saville Row suit, the pure sense of rightness had returned and his mind was clear, soothed. The mark from the bone tip still tingled warmly between his eyes. He felt less naked now than he had within Edmund at any point, and despite his exposure to the icy cold air he was more intent on what he saw before him. Bear easily held onto a squirming, shrieking figure about one third of his size, a vast hand clamped over his prisoner’s mouth. The little man was covered in thick black and red blood from head to toe, his pale blue eyes rolling almost completely white with apoplectic fury.

“He can’t call the Mad God forth,” Bear said loudly, “He can’t call up anything, now. He’s lost all his power along with your body and your blood!”

“No power?” Scott walked up to the pathetic specimen before him. Grendel glared back at him. “No power at all, huh? I know just what you mean.”

Bear lifted his hand a little and pushed Grendel at Scott. Scott had pictured this moment since learning the truth.

He punched Grendel very, very hard on the jaw. The man skidded backwards and lay half in, half out of the pool of blood, out cold. Scott flexed his arms, looking at the blood and tattoos all over his skin. “Home sweet home,” he grimaced.

Gunfire ricocheted again. Apparently some parts of the cult hadn’t heard the latest news. Virgil was doing a good job of keeping them away. The fight up there had definitely been bloody but appeared to have been brief. The cult members all had their heads down on the ground, and were guarded.

“Where are the shoggoths?” Scott suddenly remembered. He turned around, looking, half expecting one to just pluck him out of the air.

Bear said, “We don’t interest them any more, now that Grendel no longer has any power over them. I think they’ve disappeared back to their pit. For now, anyway.”

“For now?”

“Here,” Bear put the blue mark on his forehead again, it tingled like before. “We should all use this just in case. But I don’t sense them. Not anymore.”

Scott ripped the shirt he’d worn whilst in Edmund Curwen’s body in half, and shoved it into Grendel’s mouth, tying it in place with the other half. Then he tied Grendel’s shuddering form tightly with a rope Bear handed to him. Satisfied, he turned to the action on the other side of the river of blood.

The two marines and Virgil were shepherding the cult up to a corner of the coliseum. Parker and Penelope seemed to be working near the gates with the survivors of the attempted massacre. Scott grabbed a robe that Grendel or one of his followers had discarded, wrapping it around his waist.

“Thanks,” he said to Bear. “What would you do with him now?”

“He can’t hurt us for now, but I’d prefer to get him out of here as soon as we can.” Bear peered at the gate. The circles were still spinning, behind the shimmering dark mirror Scott heard the drums, fainter but still unsettling, off in the distance. “We’ll need to settle that down. It’ll take your blood to do it.”

“Oh. How much blood are we talking?”

“Not too much,” Grendel nodded, “We still have time for that. A couple hours, at least. Go on. See your family.”

“Thanks, Bear.” Scott said it with feeling.

Bear just waved for him to be on his way and Scott nodded, then gave the bound and gagged Grendel another wary look before he rapidly climbed up the slope. Bear knelt over the man and began to chant something.

Scott approached the huddled mass of survivors. Virgil hurried over to meet him. “Good to see you again,” his brother said. “Really.”

“Yeah, it’s good to be back here, too.” Scott gestured to the three loaded trucks, “Any sign of Father and the others, yet?”

“Not yet. We’ve been keeping those freaks under control. Mad God or whatever, even crazy naked people respond to automatic weapons.” Virgil shook his head, “What about Grendel?”

“Out of action, for now anyway.”

“Great,” Virgil gave a strained smile. Scott patted him on the shoulder and they made their way over to Penelope and Parker. Edmund sat at the very corner, arms folded, not helping and not moving. Scott eyed him warily and hurried over to their friends.

Penelope was loudly giving instructions to the non-cult members who’d been taken out of their crates. The cult had managed to empty half of the first truck before Scott’s team had taken action. Those still in the cages were alternately begging and pleading to be let out, it was impossible to make out any one voice. They fell suddenly silent as Scott approached. Their fear was thick in the chilly air.

“Listen, Grendel has been stopped. I’m not him and I won’t hurt you. Father? Gordon?” Scott came towards the first truck, calling out, “I need to find Jeff Tracy. You will all be released but I have to find him, and the other Tracys first.”

There were shouts and he yelled at them to be quiet. The volume fell instantly but there was concerted murmuring while the poor bastards tried to figure out what was going on. Amongst the whispers, Scott suddenly heard a rasping shout quickly joined by two or three others, it became louder. Scott and Virgil climbed up after it, shifting the crate enough to see who it was. Parker scrambled up behind them.

“Scott!” Jeff gripped the slat and peered through, “Scott, is it…is it really you?”

“Yeah,” Scott came close and Jeff pulled a little away from the slat, watching him steadily.

“It is him, Mr Tracy,” Kyrano’s voice, cracked and tired, whispered from inside the same dark crate.

“Parker, get them out,” Scott said softly.

Jeff and Kyrano almost collapsed as they climbed out. The two people who’d been locked in with them hadn’t made it. They soon found John in a different crate with three women who were all still alive, and Gordon was in a crate right at the top of the stack, peering out with an actual grin.

Alan ended up being in a crate in the last truck, out cold with a nasty bruise on his head. Brains was beside him, looking worse for wear but also alive and in one piece. There was a long, horrible moment where Scott thought Tin-Tin was in the deep pile of bodies, people he hadn’t been able to save. Then Kyrano found her alive beneath two dead cult members. When she saw Scott she tried to scramble away, shouting what he – Grendel – had done to her. At that, Scott barely suppressed the urge to go and blast Grendel with one of the automatic rifles. Or strangle him with his bare hands. It had been all too close. But she was alive, and at the moment, that was what counted most.

“Scott, let’s get everyone out of here,” Virgil said. “Then we bury this place. Right?”

“Yeah, we’re going to blast it and burn it down. Hide it for another million years.” Scott agreed. “We’re going back to Thunderbird Two!” he called to the people. There wasn’t exactly a cheer.

Scott was almost completely exhausted by the time they were finished. He felt as though he’d been working on the mountain for a year, organising the evacuation and who went where, whilst making sure no one froze to death. When he could spare Parker and Gordon he sent them to place charges around the caves. After two hours, the end was almost in sight. He tried hard not to notice how everyone reacted to him, especially the occasional wary glances he got from his family. Grendel had done some serious damage that he was desperate to put right.

But now, after all their hard work, everyone captured by the cult was safely back inside Thunderbird Two’s pod, this time in relative comfort, ready to be taken to a hospital and then on to their homes. The cult members, all the survivors, were locked up in the crates, closely guarded by the two marines back in the coliseum. There would be plenty of time to come back for them, later. A big part of Scott would have been more than happy to leave them there. Even freezing to death seemed better than they deserved.

Grendel was tied up and gagged and hopefully still out cold in Thunderbird One’s small passenger unit, being guarded by Virgil. Edmund Curwen was under Penelope and Parker’s watchful eye in the Thunderbird Two pod, with strict instructions to shut up. Scott hadn’t figured out what he wanted to do with the guy yet. Bear had said it was up to him. “He’s a vicious parasite,” he’d said.

The weather had picked now to turn aggressive, settling a blizzard around them. Thunderbird Two huddled into the mountain along with its human inhabitants. Scott wanted to rest just for a few minutes in the big green Thunderbird and wait for the chance to leave.

But there was still something else he had to do.

Scott and Bear stood in front of the huge rotating disc in the coliseum.

“Thanks for the notes.” Scott said. “I can’t believe you had them typed up.”

“The Army prepares you for life,” Bear noted sagely. He grinned over at Scott “So, are your looking forward to your first real magic?”

“What about the swap spell…thing…?”

“Oh, that was just beginner’s luck. More like pressing a reset button on your laptop. This is real magick.”

“Magick with a ‘k’?”

“Oh, you bet.”

“Great.” Scott grinned back, looking up at the gate from his notes. “And this is basically a lullaby.”

“Right. We put the Mad God back to sleep, the world is restored, and Grendel or someone like him can’t do shit about it for another five thousand years.” Bear sounded very pleased by this.

“How’re you going to get rid of Grendel?” Scott murmured.

“I know some people who can keep hold of him. Somewhere secret and very safe. He won’t be causing any more problems.”

“Of course you know somewhere. You’re sure it’s secure?” Scott couldn’t help himself.

“You really are like your grandfather, Scott. Course, Grant was blond, and taller, and a lot more of a smart ass…”

“You said you’d tell me how you knew him.”

Bear tapped the notes. “Later. We only have an hour left.”

“Is that gonna be long enough?”

“If you read fast. It’s phonetic.”

“Good.” Scott looked down at the notes again. “Here we go…”

Scott started to read the text out loud, Bear to say the same words in unison. The gate swirled while ancient, unsettling drumbeats thumped just beyond their hearing. Scott never wanted to meet what waited on the other side. After around fifteen minutes the gate was noticeably starting to slow down.

They were both so very intent on their task, so focussed that the first Scott knew about the shoggoth’s return was hearing the marine’s shouts of warning. Then the rapid gunfire stopped, and the two men were thrown either side of him and Bear. The crates holding the cult were tipped over and ripped open.

A slick, slimy tentacle plucked Scott off the ground. The ‘lullaby’ paper notes fluttered away below him. Scott barely had time to yell, seeing Bear flung hard against a wall. The big older man didn’t move, sliding to a worrying stillness. Scott couldn’t stop himself trembling, watching as Grendel in Edmund Curwen’s body came towards him across the floor. His eyes were rotten, his smile wet.

“Bring him,” he gestured down with one arm to the shoggoth. It lowered Scott to Grendel’s height, its slick arms dripping onto the ground.

Scott found his voice, “H, how did you get out?”

“My grandson thought he could kill me. Me! I am Azathoth’s avatar on this plane, I cannot die! I used his blood to summon your old friend there. The creatures remember their old masters, if well-prompted.”

Scott said, “You’re a fucking asshole, Grendel. Who else did you kill?” The shoggoth squeezed him, Scott’s ribs protested with a worrying creak.

“No breaking!” Grendel snapped. “I need that body in one piece. These creatures are not subtle.” Grendel touched the gate, smiling. “At least the stars are still in my favour.”

Scott’s eyes darted over to Bear. The big man wasn’t moving, a smear of his blood trickled onto the smooth stone from his head.

Grendel kicked Diazlowski’s body, the man was still breathing. The creature stretched itself to pick up the marine. Scott struggled, starting to shout useless protests.

“Now, to put me back where I belong.” Grendel smiled. He called out more of that unnatural language, culminating in a sharp order to the thing holding Scott. The shoggoth obliged, tearing Diazlowski apart. The marine’s blood splashed the gate, the floor, and over Grendel and Scott.

Scott’s head went unbearably light and he opened his eyes. The view was new. He was free, looking up at his body in the shoggoth’s grip. Diazlowski’s tattered remains hung beside him. His body was laughing, cackling, “Put me down now!” Grendel uttered some more orders in the unpleasant language, and the dripping beast obeyed.

Scott tried to lunge for Diazlowski’s gun but the shoggoth snatched him up again. Grendel moved to the front of the gate. He spread his arms wide and began to call out to what lay beyond the circles. The cult members left were continuing their carnage, tearing each other to pieces with knives, making awful insane screams. Their blood was running down into the pool again. To Scott’s even greater horror the disc was starting to rotate faster and faster, all its multiple inner sections shone as a single dark mirror. There was something pushing behind it. As it slid open a crack, a thick globe of black light surrounded Grendel. The drums were suddenly on Scott’s side of the mirror. Unreasoning terror flooded him. Scott couldn’t tear his eyes away.

There was a huge explosion. The shoggoth threw Scott to one side. He rolled as well as he could, felt two nails snap off as he scrambled desperately for cover. He couldn’t believe it – the Excadigger had crashed through the top of the coliseum wall, sending crates and cult member’s bodies flying in all directions. The shoggoth squealed “Tek-LI-Li!” and hurtled towards it, turning almost red in its rage, splashing the blood in the grooves all over itself. The Excadigger whirred and met it head on. In mere moments it had completely diced the shoggoth, sent parts of it splattering over the walls. Two explosive charges smashed into the remains, and the thing squealed one final time before it dissolved in a disgusting, stinking gloop.

Scott pressed himself low up against the smooth icy wall as far up as he could get. The Excadigger aimed at the gate, headed straight for Grendel. As it hit the black light, the front of it the machine crumpled, grinding it to a shuddering halt.

Scott ran around the remains of the shoggoth and over to the Excadigger’s side. The cult members were scattered, the pool of blood had broken open, running around the protected area near the gate. They scattered further when Virgil opened the door, armed with two automatic rifles and plenty of rounds.

“Grendel’s opening the gate!” Scott shouted.

“No shit!” Virgil yelled back. He leapt down. Scott took one of the rifles and aimed it at the monster wearing his body again. Virgil grabbed his arm, “What are you doing?”

“No choice!” Scott fired at his own body.

The bullets sank into the black light, disappearing. Grendel cast a look over his shoulder, grinning. Scott fired again. Nothing. The Excadigger couldn’t get through it. Neither could anything else.

“Now what?” Virgil swore.

Scott looked at his brother, and said, “We blow up this place. Let’s take Bear’s body and leave.”

“Will blowing it up even work?” Virgil fought to be heard over the drums. Scott half-shrugged and between them they picked up Bear’s body and put it in the side of the Excadigger. Scott strapped him in to the small passenger seat while Virgil tried to get the machine moving again.

As he strapped him in, Scott felt Bear’s breath on his neck. Bear’s eyes flickered open. He gripped Scott’s arm. “You’re alive!” Scott exclaimed.

“Scott, he’s almost…finished what he’s doing.” Bear rasped.

“I know. I know what I have to do.” Scott murmured.

“There’s no choice, Scott,” Bear said weakly. “None at all. We failed.”

“I know,” Scott said quietly.

“What? What are you talking about?” Virgil said, turning around.

“This is what you must say to put the Mad God to sleep,” Bear pressed his palm against Scott’s forehead. Heat flared brightly for a moment.

“Scott! What the hell are you doing?” Virgil turned all the way around, eyes bright and worried.

“Get out of here, Virgil.” Scott said. “I’m sorry. Tell them all…”

“No! Goddammit, Scott…!”

“Go!” Scott stepped outside the Excadigger and slammed the door. He turned back to Grendel, to the gate and the thing trying to get through it.

He deliberately picked up one of the cult’s knives, and drew it across both his wrists. The pain was sharp, the cold air had made him almost numb.

He let his blood trickle onto the ground and used it to draw thickly on the smooth stone with his fingertips. The symbol stared up at him, somehow the shape grew brighter, more obvious, the Mad God felt him and spoke through his blood. Scott murmured, “Help me and I’m all yours, Azathoth.”

“No!” Virgil Scott heard his brother shout from behind him as he lifted up the knife, in a single slice he pulled the bitter edge of the blade all the way across Edmund Curwen’s scrawny throat. Life blood flooded hotly down his chest and all the strength left his knees. He buckled over, felt Virgil catch him, felt the cool air seep in cruelly through the deep cuts. He stared ahead at the gateway, focussing, aware only distantly that Virgil was holding the unloved body in his arms, whispering reassurance.

Scott had no time to admire the transition, to float serenely like he had last time. He caught a glimpse of Grendel’s real self screaming as he was thrown out. Then Scott emerged violently in his own body, his head throbbed and burned. Gleeful piping and laughter filled his ears. Now he stood immersed in dark light before the spinning, widening gate. The Mad God was opening his eyes.

Scott began to shout the words Bear had given him, repeating them until his throat burned and his eyes were scorched from staring into the mirror. The Mad God’s anger was distant and powerful, the piping reedy and panicked. “Go. Go away.” Scott ordered, over and over. Weariness overtook him. “Sleep. Sleep like I want to.” Scott began punching the slowing gate repeatedly with his fists, until blood spread from his knuckles, smearing the grooved stone disc.

The gate came to a single, shuddering, grinding stop, and the black light disappeared.

Scott took a few stumbling steps backwards and almost fell. Virgil came over to him.

“Scott? Scott, tell me…you’re in there…”

Scott couldn’t quite find words to answer. Then he rasped, “Crashing is dangerous.”

“Scott!” Virgil pulled him close, helped him over the slippery blood. “I think you did it. I have no idea how, but I think you did it.”

Scott grinned faintly. He looked down at the body he’d just been in, and the world did another swoop behind his eyes. Hangover didn’t begin to cover it.

A single screech came from Edmund Curwen’s body. It lurched out of the blood and shoggoth filth, rattling from its cut throat, stumbling towards them with gristly eyes and ripped hands outstretched. Scott gathered his fist and sent the remains of Grendel Curwen spinning backwards into the slimy mess he’d created. The body rose up again, maddened beyond whatever humanity it had left.

“Scott!” Virgil pulled him back. Scott immediately saw why.

The shoggoths had begun to reappear, their tentacles spitting, eyes rolling through the translucent porridge of their unnatural flesh. Virgil half pulled Scott away, and they hammered frantically on the access button. As the doors of the Excadigger slid shut behind him, Scott caught a single, hideous glimpse of the creatures surrounding Edmund Curwen’s body, and heard Grendel’s last screams as the door finished closing.

He hadn’t expected everything he’d wished for to come true.

Virgil finally got the machine going and it withdrew, protesting, backwards.

“Those things are coming with us!” Virgil hissed, pointing at the scanner.

“Great. Get more speed, will you? We’ll make it.” Scott frowned at the signals. His heart beat loudly; he tapped the inside of the pod vehicle. “Come on, come on…!”

Two minutes later they were back outside. The blizzard had eased off and they hurried inside Thunderbird Two, abandoning the Excadigger.

“What happened? Are you guys all right?” Gordon shouted as Virgil got into his pilot’s chair. “Scott? Virg? Will one of you just tell me?”

“Blow the charges the minute we leave,” Scott said. Thunderbird Two started to lift off.

Gordon sounded confused, “Of course we’re going to blow the…”

“Do it!” From the cockpit Scott could see the wreckage of Thunderbird One outlined against the white clouds, presumably from when Grendel had made his escape and killed Edmund to do it. He added his ship to the list of things he needed to rebuild when they got home. Then something slithered up out of the tunnel and wrapped around One’s broken nose cone, tentacles reaching for the sky.

Gordon hit the trigger switch. The top of the mountain exploded. Layers of rock and ice imploded, sinking deep into itself, and the mountain dissolved.

Scott leaned back and closed his eyes. Relief poured over him. It was finally finished.

Epilogue

It had been a whole year and it was already Halloween again. Scott was looking forward to a simple family barbeque. The appeal of celebrating ghosts, ghouls and monsters had fallen away this year, for all of them. It had taken this long for the little looks to stop, for the rest of them to relax again in his – this body’s – presence. But things were slowly improving. His father had assigned Scott an escort for the first two months, but by now they were almost all satisfied that there was no danger of Grendel’s return. Scott was finally getting more than an hour’s sleep at a time each night. The nightmares were easing off. Tracy Island had been rebuilt.

Tin-Tin was the lone holdout. She could barely stand being in the same room as him. She’d admitted she didn’t blame Scott, but the memories had proved just too painful. She talked even of transferring off the island. Scott had no idea how to fix that. So he’d spent his time fixing everything else.

Scott finished his shower and looked in the mirror. The white streak of hair above each ear still hadn’t turned dark again. According to Bear, that was the least-worst thing about the stupid – but necessary – thing he’d done to save them all. Most of his nightmares centred on the Mad God’s forbidden symbol. Around something he’d seen when he’d used it. It would be surreal, and laughable, except he knew it had happened, and had left its foul mark on everyone he loved.

He dried off. As he did, he felt the tingling in the scars left from having most of the tattoos removed. Not all of them had been full tattoos, but enough to add to their many stresses once they all returned to the island. He scribbled at the fogged up mirror to clear it. The symbol on his back began to burn more painfully now, he rubbed at it, wondering if Kyrano had something to take the sting off. He glanced forwards.

Scott reached out and touched the mirror. His breath misted it up, but it couldn’t remove the shape he’d somehow drawn without even thinking about it. Drums started again. He had time for a single, terrified shout before…

Virgil knocked on the bathroom door. “Scott? Happy Halloween! We’re ready!”

Damp mist had started to flood out from beneath the door. He heard far off, mad laughter that sounded somehow like Scott. The lights flickered like crazy. Virgil frantically broke down the door in two hard shoves.

He caught a single glimpse of Scott floating on the other side of the mirror, his mouth open

and eyes screwed up with laughter or pain, banging his palms against the impossible surface to be let out. Virgil ran towards him but too late – something pulled Scott away into the
darkness that shifted beyond. Virgil hammered desperately on the mirror’s flat surface, but there was no way to follow. The way back was closed.

All the lights went out. When they came up again, Virgil yelled and yelled until the others ran down to find out what had happened. But the scorched mirror had cracked for good.

Scott was gone.