The Adventures of Andrew Doran: Box Set Read online

  I could feel as the lines drawn in blood throughout the room began to surge with power. I could feel them grasp at something that I hadn’t known I had had a grasp on as well. They grabbed at my soul. The hieroglyphs in the room were written with the purpose of removing my soul so that someone else could step in.

  So that Adam Sturn could step in.

  My vision began to grow dark and I knew that I wasn’t going to be alive for very much longer. There was nothing I could do.

  I slammed down onto the floor before consciousness left me. I looked around, my eyes searching for why Adam had dropped me.

  First, my mind was filled with confusion because as I looked up from where I sat, I could see that Adam hadn’t dropped me. He still had me by the throat, but if that was the case, than how was I sitting on the floor?

  As I watched, Adam slowly stepped into my body, my own flesh turning rigid as he did. Sparing a glance at the me that held my consciousness, my surprise only grew. I glowed the same bright blue that Adam Sturn had been glowing before he stepped into my body.

  Adam, in my body, floated down to stand on the floor. He flexed and rolled his shoulders, but not in any sort of display of strength. He was trying my body out and testing his control over it.

  I jumped to my feet and ran at the other me, my hands outstretched. I slammed my palms into my chest, hoping to push Adam out of my body, but instead he didn’t even move. In retaliation, he backhanded me and I fell back to the floor.

  The pain to my spiritual self was exactly the same as if he had smacked me when I was in my body. I hadn’t expected that at all.

  I bounced across the floor and I could feel the pressure from the floor, but not the texture or solid nature of it. I quickly reached for one of the candles to throw at Adam, but my hand passed right through it.

  I was beyond frustrated and jumped to my feet again. I ran at Adam as he laughed at me, but I never made it to him.

  I tripped and went down to the floor again.

  Furious, I almost couldn’t even move. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have let this beast of a man into my life, into my body? I was a failure! I couldn’t even get to him without tripping...

  I had tripped. Something in this basement had been solid enough to my corporeal form for me to touch.

  I spun around and saw the culprit.

  My baseball bat.

  I don’t know if it was my love of the sport, my sentimental feelings toward the carved piece of wood, or my dire need for something, anything that could help me out. Whatever it was, I knew without a doubt that I could touch that baseball bat.

  Adam was still laughing as he turned away from my spiritual self and started for the stairs.

  I grabbed the baseball bat and rejoiced as I could feel it in my grip. I picked it up and rose to my feet.

  Gearing up for my homerun swing, I ran straight at my body and knocked it out of the park.

  The bat connected with my physical back and, for the first time ever, the King of Baseball kept his eyes open.

  The baseball bat did more than I expected it to. It didn’t just hit my physical back, but also Adam’s spiritual back. His soul leapt out of my body and onto the steps.

  Through the bat, I felt a tug and allowed it to pull my spirit through the wooden conduit and back into my body.

  It felt so good to be back in my body.

  I turned to Adam’s prone spirit and could see oddly yellow burns eating away at his back where my bat had hit him.

  Having funneled my spirit through my bat, the bat fell when I was no longer holding it. The sound of it clattering to the floor reminded me of it and I spun to scoop it up.

  I raised it up high above my head and brought it down again on Adam’s spirit.

  The bat hit him across the back just beneath the previous hit. He arched in pain as another hole burned through him and started to spread across his body.

  I jumped over Adam and ran from the basement and then the house.

  Running across Adam Sturn’s former lawn, I crossed the short distance back to my house and through the still open door. Without thinking, I slammed it as hard as I could and latched it. Once I was safe inside my home, the home that I now loved more than any other place that I had ever been. I collapsed against the door, and only stayed on my feet by leaning on my baseball bat.

  My parents must have heard me slam the door, because I could hear them rushing down the stairs.

  A sharp smell reached my nostrils and I looked up, trying to find the source. It was smoke, and I looked around the foyer for where it was coming from.

  That’s when it hit me, I knew where it was coming from.

  My father was the first to find me and my mother was close behind him.

  “Andrew! What’s going on? What are you doing?” My father was demanding.

  I looked from him to my mother and then back to him. “I smelled smoke!” Then I pointed toward the door. “Adam Sturn’s house is on fire!”

  My parents ran outside, and my guess at the source of the smoke had been accurate. In my rush to escape that phantom’s former home, I must have kicked over one of the candles. The house was engulfed before the firemen could arrive and my family only stood by and watched as the place collapsed in on itself and was consumed by the beastly fire.

  I never saw the spirit of Adam Sturn again, and for that I was grateful. It took a long time, but I eventually came to terms with the world as Adam had shown it to me. The world with the veil pulled aside and the truth laid bare for those who were willing to see it.

  Clutching those pages from that old book in my hand, I stared at the words and knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that my future would be as a student at Miskatonic University.

  The Statement of Andrew Doran

  Chapter 1: Miskatonic University

  The sun beat down on me with a ferocity that I'd only seen before in the boxing matches. This form of punishment had taken me completely by surprise. This surprise had lost its edge about three hours previously, and I was long since caring about it.

  My initial surprise was due to the nature of the execution. I was being hanged by my wrists in the Mexico sun and I was naked. This was completely out of character for the Night Watchers, the midnight tribe. An offshoot of the Aztec that managed to survive their collapse, the Night Watchers had taken to the worship of Night Gaunts, man shaped horrors with no faces and large bat-like wings. The Night Gaunts were known in most cultures as mythical beasts that would ride the darkness between reality and dreams. The Night Gaunts were to blame when people failed to come back to the waking world, having instead been devoured in the Dream Lands.

  So, to be strung up in the sun is an intriguing way to die, given the circumstances.

  As I'd mentioned previously, the surprise was quickly put to the back of my mind as I struggled to reverse my unfortunate situation. That was three hours ago. I hadn't given up.

  I like to think that I had decided to internalize my struggles.

  Pressing my mind to the furthest reaches of my being, I was trying to use the teachings found in the "dreaded" book by that fool Arab. In the past, under ideal conditions, I'd managed to enter the Dream Lands, and even once found that I could affect the walls of reality from there.

  Sadly, I wasn't mad as the Arab yet, and was a little too distracted by the sunburn on my more indecent regions. Surrendering, I opened my eyes, and looked down at my bright red feet. As I stared at them, only bringing more attention to the pain, I got my first real surprise in three hours.

  It felt that the shadow stared at me for as long as I stared at it. My eyes kept at the shadow cast on my feet for what seemed like an eternity before it spoke to me.

  "Andrew Doran?"

  "That's Doctor Andrew Doran," I croaked out. I obviously hadn't completely surrendered. I'd earned that doctorate, and I'd be damned if I'd die without it.

  "Yes, well, Dr. Doran then." The voice was educated and, judging by the shoes that had fallen into my vi
sion, not prepared for the climate. "I am Dr. Stoll. Benjamin Stoll, and I've come to return you to Miskatonic."

  This had to be a hallucination. My mind was finally breaking and creating the most preposterous of circumstances. Next my very beard would be crawling up my face to start a chat with my eye lids.

  I hadn't been back to Miskatonic University in almost ten years. This was mostly due to them banning me, but also because of my stubborn attitude. Miskatonic thought itself the center of all educational fronts and shunned looking too deeply into the texts they label forbidden, but that archaeology labels necessary.

  They had become a bunch of tired, old zealots who coveted their books and shared their real knowledge with no man.

  We shall refer to it as 'mutual disinterest.' And yes, I am an alumni. It's a more sordid past than with any lady I've ever met.

  I finally used the last of my strength to raise my chin from my chest. This created a cascade of fire over the back of my neck that threatened to steal my very senses. The energy to let my eyes examine his gave the image of a man slowly sizing him up. At least I hope that it did.

  Dr. Benjamin Stoll was bald, completely, and so pale that I figured him to burn up as I watched him. He was dressed in a full grey suit, complete with jacket. He had thin wire framed glasses and a thick mustache that put my beard to shame. It took my sunbathed brain a minute or two to comprehend, but he wasn't sweating, and he wasn't even red. I'm most likely the most traveled man to ever graduate from that cursed school and

  would normally take the time to place his clothing, his dialect, even his lineage based on physical characteristics. In this instance, there was no need.

  "Miskatonic sent you? You mean the Department of Archaeology sent you. Why send a Shoggoth when the sun would have done the job for you?"

  The man-shaped monster smiled. "While consuming your essence would satisfy me beyond your comprehension, I have been compelled, via the means at Miskatonic's disposal, to invite you to Miskatonic for a discussion. Sending myself is meant to be an indication towards the urgency of the request." He kept smiling, as if he forgot how to stop, and reached out and over my head. I hadn't seen a blade, and he obviously hadn't exerted himself. It was a shoggoth displaying his inhuman characteristics to a man in no place to do that which came normally to him.

  I've made it my occupation kill the soul sucking shoggoths and all of their ilk from the Necronomicon. Being aided by one disgusts me, but a slight smile found my burned and tired face as I knew that the Earth's sun wasn't healthy for a shoggoth. As a matter of fact, Dr. Stoll probably felt as burnt up as I did.

  On top of all of my deep seated hate for his kind, Dr. Stoll had also been sent by that damned school to collect me. As if I would ever be in their employ.

  I no sooner hit the ground then I raised my weakened hands and shouted in a harsh voice "Cthalgn Flthagnic!" It was mostly a bunch of crossed consonants with a vowel or two mixed together. It sounded like a phlegm-y barking cough and this was only made more cough-like by my sunbaked voice.

  These were words, though. Ancient and all powerful words that came directly from the book of the Necronomicon, and as with all knowledge gained from that book, it had come to serve me well over the years.

  Darkness leapt from my hands and engulfed the shoggoth, and all about his body came a stiffening and a final shudder as the shoggoth found that it could no longer move.

  The effort sapped the last of my strength and I collapsed to the baked earth, unable to even lift my head.

  Shoggoths, as with every monster and beastie in the Necronomicon, didn't need mouths to talk and this one was chattier than my beloved sister.

  Release me. You will not be able to leave this desert in your current condition. I have been compelled and am incapable of killing you. You will be safe with me.

  Of course the monster was right. We were hundreds of miles from civilization and the magics of the shoggoth could get me anywhere safer than here, but my hate for the evils that prey on mankind, no matter how domesticated, knew no bounds. From my prone position, I squeezed my fist, tightening my magical grip on the beast. This last effort drained me even further, and I dropped my head to the sand. Without looking, I could feel my spell snap as the shoggoth broke my ever weakening grasp.

  In the matter of an instant, I was at eye-level with the monster, but I was not upright. A slimy shadow had tentacled out of the monster's human abdomen and spiraled around my body, holding me upside down.

  You are food, and somewhere in the long line of your being food, you and your people have forgotten your place. You are known to us, Dr. Andrew Doran. We call you the Klgthorf. It has no equivalent in your mind, but the closest I can come to a translation would be 'the cockroach that bites.' You are insects to us, and you, Dr. Doran, above all of the other cockroaches, are in dire need of a lesson.

  During this intrusion into my mind, he'd began absorbing my soul through his contact with me. He couldn't kill me, as he'd said previously, but it didn't stop him from taking a sip.

  Even this close to death, you have so much...soul....

  Through gritted teeth I said, "Enjoy the taste and take note of its flavor. You're going to find something hidden underneath my strong survival sense. That's steel determination. Compelled or not, I will kill you and all of your kind." I spit as I said lastly, "Taste my conviction!"

  The facial expressions of a shoggoth in human form are impossible to read on the best of days. They've never taken the time to learn our mannerisms, and why should they? We don't take the time to learn a cow's mannerisms as we're eating a juicy steak. Years of hunting them, killing them, and running from them, had taught me to look for little tells, and as the shoggoth drank from me, I saw one of these clues then. His entire image wavered. His mind had been hit by a strong enough surprise that he'd let his grip on his projected illusion slip, just for a second. I saw him then, as I always saw him, but also with my eyes. He was a perfect specimen of a disgusting species; a collection of mouths and tentacles all drifting in an amorphous blob of some dark and oily substance.

  Those many mouths had tasted my soul and he'd been scared by what he had found.

  Painfully, I was on the ground again, and before I could do anything to object, the shoggoth had reached down and touched my forehead with cold, imaginary, man-hands. In that moment, we were transported across space and through the void between distances.

  The nightmares of the mind dwell in the void, and I did my best to keep my mind's eye closed during the trip, but I was far too weak to keep all of the horrors out. We land in a library with a high ceiling and several chairs. The smell of a cigar touched my nostrils and reminded me of something that I couldn't place. Something dark and invasive from my split second trip in the void. I was shivering from the trip, not from the cold as it looked to be surprisingly warm in the New England town of Arkham.

  "Shoggoths: you can dress them up, compel them to do your dirty work, but they don't have the common decency to dress a man before dropping his naked self in my library."

  I don't like to beat around the bush, and I had no energy to jump up and punch Dean Brandon Smythe in his smug mouth, so I spoke my mind. "Smythe," I spat. "You're messing with monsters as if they were puppies. This one is going to break his leash, and I hope I'm there to watch him flay you alive."

  The Dean crouched before me and looked me in the eyes. "Yes, well, it's good to see you haven't lost your bark." He touched my chin and I felt dirtier than three hours in the desert sun and being touched by a shoggoth had made me. "If you've finished being disagreeable, I'd like to get you cleaned up and dressed, at which point I'd like to explain why we didn't just let you die in the desert. Is this agreeable?"

  I grunted, and he must have accepted it as an affirmative. I wasn't sure if it was, but I wanted pants, and a very cold shower. Besides, Miskatonic has always had something I wanted and I wasn't going to pass up a chance to finally get my hands on it, no matter how remote that chance was.

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nbsp; ***

  I don't remember how I got from the library to the shower, and that's probably for the best. The void holds very little for the sane man, and while I'd confronted things more sanity shattering than the void in the past, I'm normally less weak and sun baked when I face them.

  I was dressed in a plain button up shirt and brown trousers. It was my normal attire before I'd gone to live with the Night Watchers, and as loathe as I was to be in Miskatonic, it was a nostalgic feeling of comfort that came over me as I dressed.

  I looked myself over in the mirror and was surprised to see that I didn't look nearly as bad as I felt. My thick mop of brown hair had been cut short before my self-induced insanity to become one of the Night Watchers and then destroy them from within, but that was over a month ago, and had returned to its more unruly nature.

  I took a comb to it and managed to make it decent enough before turning the comb and clippers to my beard. I'm a firm believer that a trimmed beard is the only sign that humanity still has hope, and took my time with this.

  Twenty minutes after I'd left the library, I'd made my way back down there, without the aid of the shoggoth. I'll always take my own feet over void travel.

  Smythe hadn't left the library, and as I walked back in he was sitting and flipping through a book.

  Dean Brandon Smythe was the embodiment of the tired, old zealots running their vault of knowledge. He was clean shaven and bald except for wisps of hair that he combed from one side of his broad head to the other. He was old, but not old enough to have been replaced yet, although I had heard that he'd chosen a successor.

  In regards to the book he wasn't really paying attention to, it wasn't lost on me that this wasn't just any book. Smythe was holding the only reason I was willing to contemplate going along with whatever dirty work that Miskatonic's Department of Archaeology had concocted this time.