Goat Mother and Others: The Collected Mythos Fiction of Pierre Comtois (57 page)

Finishing, I put the papers down, not sure what to think. Except for the photos of the jungle ruins, which were real enough, there was little direct evidence to corroborate Sanders’ outlandish story of alien beings in the jungles of Belize! Still, there was a shuddery logic to the events described although I had no idea how I’d put it into words for my report to Walker.

Gathering up Sanders’ papers and stuffing them back into the folders, I inadvertently jostled the desk phone, striking the replay button for messages left on its answering machine. Suddenly, the quiet of the room was filled with the whisper of the rewind mechanism that stopped and automatically began replaying the last messages left on the tape.

There were a couple unremarkable reminders from the electric and gas companies about unpaid bills before a low, susurrant buzzing sound came from the recorder. Immediately, my attention was riveted and as those weird notes rose and fell, so did the shivers up my spine. My blood froze and as I continued to listen, it seemed to me that words were being formed through the rhythm of the buzzing. But if there were, they were just below the threshold of understanding…or at least so they seemed to my muddled senses. I must have been more affected than I realized at the time because when I finally was able to stir myself, I noticed that the late season night had fallen outside shrouding the rest of the house in impenetrable gloom.

Still shaken by recollection of that infernal buzzing sound, I went to the kitchen and turned on the lights. The familiar surroundings of chrome appliances, formica counter tops, and humming refrigerator calmed my nerves until I realized how hungry I’d become. Recalling Sanders’ invitation to make myself at home, I checked the refrigerator and cabinets for something to eat and fixed myself a sandwich.

Feeling too sleepy to make the long drive back to Arkham, I decided to throw myself on the living room couch for a few hours and leave in the morning, confident that none of the family would arrive to surprise me.

That night, I had the most vivid dream, triggered I think, by the events described in Sanders’ notes.

I dreamed I was in Belmopan, the bustling capitol city of Belize. Next, in the strange way dreams have, I found myself working on a dig outside the city. I was left with the impression that I did some exploring around the ruins there before a pair of Indians were shown to my tent. They handed me photographs showing jungle covered ruins they said were located in the interior, beyond the mountains in the El Cacao valley. They would lead me there in return for payment. After that, I was walking along a dim trail over the coastal Maya Mountains that debouched into the El Cacao valley. The heat was oppressive and the insects voracious and aside from myself, there were only my Indian guides and a handful of bearers. Descending from the mountains, we entered a maze of jungle and had to hack our way along until we reached a small clearing indicated by our guides. We pitched camp but by the next morning, the two Indians were gone. I’m not sure, but somewhere along the way, the bearers vanished as well. It might have been hours or days after that when some natives of the valley appeared and I was as amazed as those in the Hughbanks Expedition had been to discover their origins in Mexico and the US before that. They recalled with fondness the Hughbanks’ Expedition that had preceded my own visit and happily volunteered to guide me through the valley. I don’t know how much time had passed after that when I found myself standing at the foot of a cyclopean pyramidal structure whose dimensions appeared to shift with every step I took. In walking toward it I wasn’t sure if it was receding or getting closer until the native guides showed me to a doorway canted into the base of the structure. It was already open and I found myself drawn inside by a cool draft that drifted out from the darkened interior. I don’t recall if the natives used torches or not, but the deeper recesses of the pyramid turned out to be well lit from sources I couldn’t identify. As we emerged into a large room whose dimensions I couldn’t ascertain due to a complete lack of angles and corners, the natives around me retreated and were replaced by strange beings whom I later identified as Mi-Go, the fungoid-based life forms that Sanders spoke about, who were visitors from Pluto, a planet identified in their own language as Yuggoth. But even Yuggoth wasn’t their home, any more than Earth was. It was simply a way station, a stepping stone used on their measureless journeys from the depths of time and space where their true home lay. Those visiting Earth were merely workers seeking a mineral not found on other worlds and worthless to men in our primitive age. Somehow, all that information was imparted to me by way of the creatures’ speech which sounded in my ignorance as hardly more than the buzzings of insects. Other knowledge imparted to me by the creatures was the strange method by which they rewarded their loyal terran servitors. I was led to a series of tables upon which lay a number of elderly natives of the valley, each displaying different stages of an arcane medical procedure that resulted in the removal of the brain for storage in metal cylinders which were vacuum-sealed against the intrusion of any kind of atmosphere. Inside the canisters the brains floated in a murky fluid with nerve endings and spinal column connected to sensitive electronic nodes within the base of the cylinders. I should have registered revulsion at the procedure, but in my dream it all had a sense of normalcy about it. I continued to watch the procedure as one of the fungoid creatures took a freshly sealed cylinder to a work table and connected a series of jacks into its base. Instantly, other nearby devices that I soon recognized as remote audio/visual equipment came to life and a trebly voice emerged from a speaker using the local dialect belonging to the natives. Unsure at first, as if the entity doing the speaking was orienting itself, the voice steadied and began to respond to questions put to it by the fungoid creatures. Apparently satisfied with the connections, the creatures detached the cylinder from the jacks, labeled it, and placed it in a storage area filled with scores of similar containers. The bodies, with their vacant skulls, were dismembered with key parts such as hands and the skin of the head including face and scalp, preserved for some future use. The rest was disposed of and the empty tables prepared for new subjects. I was then guided to one of the empty tables and it was indicated that I should lie down. With dawning comprehension that the hellish procedure undergone by the native elders was intended for me as well, I drew back. At first, the creatures tried to explain to me the wonders of space and time that would become available to me once I submitted to the procedure. I would be immortal and would be carried between the stars by the Mi-Go themselves and become privy to age old secrets not given for ordinary humans to know. I would visit the Mi-Go’s own black-litten planet and experience life within its sprawling fungoid cities and finally, I would roam where the hideous Shantaks flew, and witness the cosmic maelstrom where great Cthulhu and his brethren were born. And with my sanity thus strengthened by these experiences, I might even have the honor of being taken to the ultimate center of time and creation where the mindless Azathoth whorled and tittered for all eternity. All that would be mine if only I agreed simply to having my brain parted from mortal body. But by then, I was struggling to free myself from the hold the crab-shaped Mi-Go had upon me. Dream or no, I sensed the horror and madness that lay behind the creatures’ empty promises and screamed my protests. Perhaps realizing the futility of working on such an unwilling subject, the creatures yielded and instead, placed me beneath a device that they said would simply rob me of short term memory…but even then, as the plastic thing, punctuated with numerous needles and other unidentifiable instruments, was descending toward my unprotected head, I renewed my struggling and shouted my protests, promising that I would never tell, would never reveal what I’d found in the valley…

I was still screaming when I fell off the couch and bumped onto the floor.

It was a dream! Only a dream, I suddenly realized with vast relief. Nevertheless, my body was soaked in sweat and I shook all over in fear and desperation. Getting to my feet, I found that my legs were still wobbly and bracing myself against walls and furniture, I made my way to the bathroom to dash my face in cold water.

Anxious to leave the scene that had inspired my nightmare, I chose not to wait until full light but locked up the house and drove back to Arkham, arriving at my own apartment by mid-morning. Reluctantly, I turned my attention back to what I’d learned from Sanders and, after organizing my thoughts, began to write up a draft of the report I wanted to submit to Walker later that afternoon. My conclusion of course, was that Sanders was mad as a hatter and that the University of Pennsylvania would have nothing to worry about in the way of further scandal from him, if that was what really concerned them.

Ironically, that evening, I turned on the TV to a local news station while preparing supper and heard the news of Sanders’ disappearance. Hurrying from the kitchen into the living room, I stood and watched a reporter standing in front of the familiar red brick hospital building as he filled viewers in on Sanders’ background and suspicions aroused by a still unidentified prowler who’d been nosing about the grounds. A brief interview with Dr. Bross revealed that upon making bed check the night before, Sanders was found not to be in his room. When he failed to turn up after a search of the building, the Police Department was called in to take over. Since then, there had been no sign of the patient’s whereabouts, but the audience was informed that although Sanders was considered of little risk to others, citizens were cautioned to contact the police immediately if he was sighted and not to approach him themselves.

Coming as it did only a few hours after I’d seen Sanders myself, the news of his disappearance upset me and began to draw my mind along avenues that ended only in blind alleys. I felt a mounting anxiety that I really couldn’t account for until finally, I had to take a couple of pills to calm my nerves. They did little good however, as that night my dreams were again filled with visions of the jungle, of massive, unnatural ruins, of alien creatures, and buzzing, buzzing, buzzing…

I awoke exhausted, and it took me more time than usual to gather my things and get out the door and on my way to the university. With Sanders disappearance, at least I was relieved of the duty of bringing him the Mnar stone. It was then, while I was crossing the quad on the way to Walker’s office, that I met the stranger. He appeared to be a rustic of some sort, somewhat stooped and of medium build, and wearing a hunting jacket and plaid cap with the ear flaps pulled down around his head. He’d apparently been waiting for me because after I spotted him standing in the center of the walkway, he called me by name.

“Prof. Withins?” he asked as he came up to me. “Prof. Luke Withins?”

“Yes, that’s me,” I replied slowing to a halt and not at all in the mood for pleasantries. I was prepared to tell the man just that when I nearly coughed in response to an unpleasant odor that he seemed to bring with him. Was it the stench of some dead animal that clung to his hunting jacket?

“I understand you’re doing some research for the University of Pennsylvania?” the man was saying.

“How did you know that?” I responded, resisting the urge to cover my nose with a handkerchief. “Who are you?”

“A friend of Armand Sanders.”

“A friend in what way?”

There was something odd about his face as well. Close up, there was a kind of slackness to it as if the bone structure beneath had been rearranged.

“I’m the brother of one of his colleagues on the Hughbanks Expedition,” the man said.

“Oh?” I was interested, I have to admit. But I really didn’t want the net for this story to be cast any wider. If there was the possibility of new information being made available, I’d feel obligated in bringing it to Walker’s attention and was fearful that he would ask me to follow up on it. At that point, I really wasn’t sure why I felt that way, but after the nightmare I had at Sanders’ house, I was quite ready to drop the whole thing.

“That’s right,” the man was saying. “Like Sanders, my brother also had things sent to his home both from Belize and from the university. Items that I’m sure would be of interest to you.”

“See here, how did you even find out about my assignment? Did Dr. Walker bring you in on it?”

“No, it was…Sanders,” the man said. “It was Sanders, after I visited him in the hospital.”

In a flash, I remembered the prowler that had been reported creeping about the grounds of the hospital and I wondered if there could be any connection.

“Sanders has disappeared,” I said, my suspicions aroused. “Did you know that?”

“No,” he replied, in a manner that was less than convincing. “Anyway, I have more information about the Hughbanks Expedition at my home in Vermont that will help substantiate Sanders’ claims.”

“And those being..?”

“That he was brainwashed in order to protect the secret that alien beings have established a colony on Earth,” came the bland reply. “It sounds preposterous when spoken aloud, but the evidence in my brother’s possession is pretty convincing.”