Heaven Forbid: The Great Old Ones

To Amandah they’d given a small, yet lavish meeting room from which she was to conduct her talk with Madeleine and Dee. Fitting with the general neo-gothic feel of the house the room was ornately ordained with beautiful etched cement walls. Each section of wall was enclosed with a large arch.

The windows in the room were small and bullet shaped with metal patterns cut through them.

As far as the functional part of the room was concerned there was just an elliptical table made of sturdy oak and polished to a gleaming finish. Seven large, plush leather chairs stood around the table. At the head of the table, sat Amandah with her hands outstretched over the wood.

On the one side of the table Madeleine and Dee sat next to each other, leaning down on their arms. Madeleine riffled through her hair slowly as Amandah began to talk, “It’s been a long time since I’ve heard mention of the Great Old Ones,” there was a look on her face as if she were recalling something long forgotten. Her light blue eyes went up and to the side and she started to speak again, “I would be lying if I told you I remembered it all like it was yesterday.”

“It’s been over two thousand years…” Dee said.

Amandah gave a short forced chuckle, “Damn are you stupid—its been over four billion years.”

“That seems a little impossible,” Madeleine said, “For the first several years this planet was a molten ball of rock and junk.”

With a shake of the head Amandah sighed, “Do you think I always looked like this?”

“Until less than a day ago we had no idea what you even were!” said Dee.

“I’ll give you that one,” Amandah said, “But we Old Ones were immense creatures, we weren’t even created for planetary life. God meant for us to swim through the stars with the cosmos at our backs.”

Madeleine folded her arms, her green eyes staring hard into Amandah’s, “So what happened?”

“Same old story, we believed ourselves to be greater than God and with the great deal of power he’d given us, we resisted Lucifer and Michael’s attempt to warn us,” she paused, “They went on the warpath—I was spared because I hadn’t fought.”

“And that’s it, that’s how it went down?” asked Dee.

“More or less, but the thing is, they were banished here to sleep within the Earth—that mess about sacred objects is the cover story to keep people from searching for the real Old Ones,” said Amandah, “They’re just concealed in different spots around the Earth.”

Madeleine leaned down on the table, “So skip to the part where you tell us about the priest.”

Amandah ruffled her hands through her bistre hair and leaned down over the table some, “Do you think you could give me one of your cigarettes, Dee?”

In a smooth motion Dee plucked the pack from between her breasts and flung it down the table to Amandah. In turn Amandah slapped her hand down on top of the pack, “Don’t take more than one,” Dee’s tone was stern.

Amandah slipped a single cigarette out of the box and then placed it between her lips, “Will you do the honors?” she asked.

With a snap of her fingers Dee had lit the tip of the cigarette and Amandah slid the pack of Lucky Strikes back over to Dee’s waiting hand. “Alright now, are you going to talk.”

Now the cigarette rested between her fingers, Amandah sighed “I’m getting there—but you might want to know what I did for the few billion years I was here alone.”

“Got really bored?” Dee said, “I could really care less.”

A light hearted smirk appeared on Amandah’s face, “Well look who picked up their skirt and found a pair.” There was a short pause, “You could be nicer, I’m not even supposed to be telling you all of this.”

“So I’m guessing that you’re only doing it because you’ve got a bone to pick with God?” asked Madeleine.

“Heh, you think you’ve got me figured out?” asked Amandah, “I don’t have anything against God, he spared me the fate of having to take the long dirt nap and even gave me some pretty important tasks over the years—but I don’t want to get wiped from existence which is what will happen if the other Old Ones come back.”

“I could imagine that they’d be mad to see you walking around free,” said Dee.

“And I want to prolong that is much as possible,” said Amandah as she exhaled her smoke, “The priest was one of the worst of them.”

Madeleine slapped her hand down on the table, “Could you at least give us a name or something to go on?”

“It’s a name you might have heard before,” Amandah said finally.

“We’re going to need some way of doing research on this entity,” Dee said.

Amandah took another puff, “They call him Cthulhu and he was made to sleep in the deepest depths of the Mariana Trench.”

Madeleine froze, “The Cthulhu?” her eyes went wide.

Amandah nodded, “The very same.”

Dee stood up from her chair, “Looks like we need to go down the library and read a shitload of Lovecraft books.”

“Even if they were correct,” said Amandah, “It wouldn’t help you.”

“Is he that powerful?” asked Madeleine.

“No, more than likely the person trying to free him would draw in his power,” Amandah said, “If he can.”

Dee shook her head, “Things get far too complicated.”

“And all we seem is to get left in the dark,” said Madeleine.

Amandah folded her arms, “Well here’s a suggestion, find the person who trying to draw him out of the Earth and stop them.”

After a pause Dee spoke, “We kind of have an idea who it is,” she started, “Someone named Charon.”

The dead pan look on Amandah’s face was proof enough that she’d heard the name, “Oh that’s great,” she started, “Now we’re thoroughly fucked.”

“Reason?” Madeleine’s phone rang out from inside of her pocket, she dipped her hand down and plucked it out.

Amandah pulled her fingers down a tendril of hair, “Let’s just leave it at him being bad news.”

Now Madeleine held her phone open staring down at the screen, “It’s text from Brian.” The phone clicked as she pressed the button to scroll down, “He’s saying that he misses me.”

“You two are really something,” Amandah said.

Dee came close to talking right over her, “Text him back and tell him something.”

Madeleine closed the lid on her phone, turned it to the side and slid the top open to reveal a full keyboard. Without a word she wrapped away at the keys.

Amandah snickered, “You two don’t seem to know what’s coming.”

“What do you mean?” asked Dee.

“There is a huge storm on the horizon and you two are just oblivious,” Amandah shook her head in disbelief.

Madeleine headed for the door, “It doesn’t matter—this is a storm we’ll weather.”

Dee followed her to the door, “Thanks for the information.”

“Where are you going?” Amandah asked.

“Back to Houston,” Dee said.

“Well when this fight gets worse,” said Amandah, “We’re bound to be involved more often.”

Dee and Madeleine stood at the door gazing back inwards, “We’re going to try to finish this fight off as soon as we can,” Madeleine said.

“We might be able to end this war before it gets out of hand,” said Dee.

Amandah stepped down the side of the table with her arms crossed, “Darling…this is already out of hand.”