The Truth of Alchemy - Horror - PG-13
Oh holy sweet jeebus. This is my entry for the fmacrossover monthly challenge, and I think I broke my brain on it. I was hit with a sudden inspiration for it, and spent all my free time wrestling with Hohenheim's POV. You don't need to be familiar at all with Lovecraft or the Cthulhu mythos, as I relied heavily on FMA themes and ideas for this. But it is written in the style of Lovecraft's short stories, which is why it's in first person. And Lovecraft fans will recognize phrases/people/themes/artifacts from the mythos. This takes place in 1936, before the events detailed in 'The Dunwich Horror'.
Title: The Truth of Alchemy
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist/Lovecraft Mythos
Pairings: N/A
Genre: Horror
Word Count: 4,279
Spoilers: Full series
Warnings: Possibly mangled German, wordiness.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: It began with the discovery of a strange German text in the library at Miskatonic University. From there, Professor Hohenheim Elric embarks upon a journey of unspeakable horror as he delves further into the truth behind the power of Alchemy and seeks a way to return his son home.
It was late in the year of nineteen thirty six when I first crossed the Atlantic Ocean and arrived, sick from the sea voyage and tanned from the winds, on the coast of Massachusetts. I had nothing save for the clothes on my back and a small satchel full of necessities, having fled Germany under cover of darkness and in the company of only my son. Nestled in my satchel, among various small items of personal importance, was a letter. It was this letter that had drawn me to the area so quaintly termed ’New’ England. My destination was ultimately the town of Arkham, and a university that rested on the side of the dark and frightful Miskatonic river - and indeed, shared the same name as that fluid body of water.
It seemed I had gained something of a reputation as an occult scientist in Germany, and news of my reputation had reached the board of the university. I was both surprised and pleased with the letter, as I had long been considering leaving Germany for more peaceful climes. The double threat of economical depression and political unrest made me uneasy, and the invitation to join the faculty of a university with such a reputation was welcome. I had heard of the famed library, rich in occult and theological texts, and was quite eager to be given access to it.
I had first heard of Miskatonic University in 1924, when I came upon an article on the Alhazred Dig. My fascination was immediate, and I followed the dig with a keen interest. I found many of my questions unanswered in the few articles and essays I came across, and hoped to answer them at the university itself.
I parted ways with my son in Manchester-By-The-Sea, he having no interest in the occult and Miskatonic having little in the way of mechanical science programs. From there I took a bus to Arkham, arriving just an hour after sundown. It was quite clear, by the scores of spectacled and learned looking men who walked the narrow sidewalks, that Arkham was a university town. The town thrived because of the university, and catered to faculty and students alike. I took an instant liking to the place, with it’s Georgian balustrades and air of quiet, failing antiquity. Crumbling and dark though it was, steeped in mystery and occult rumors, I could not help but feel somewhat at home.
I was met by one Dr Robert Stross, the university Dean, and took a liking to him immediately. He was a tall man, dark of hair and warm of eyes and with an air of the intellectual about him. As he guided me on a tour of campus I became more and more certain that I had made the proper decision.
I asked about the library immediately. Stross’s expression turned to one of delight, and he clapped me on the shoulder and smiled broadly. He seemed quite eager to show off the famed library, and promised to turn me over to Dr Henry Armitage first thing in the morning. Armitage was the head Librarian, he explained, and would answer all of my questions.
The tour concluded, I was taken to my living quarters and informed that dinner would be brought to me as I’d missed the evening meal. I began settling in, my mind already on tomorrow’s venture to the library.
Edward, my son, had scoffed and laughed at the occult, dismissing it as nonsense. He turned his attention to machines and cold science, trusting in the booming market of rocketry and space travel as the means to return home. For you see, neither myself nor my son were born to this world. We came here through means that defy scientific explanation, originating in a world where the occult studies of Miskatonic University were everyday occurrences. I held fast to the belief that it was through the occult, through the less accurate and ancient sciences, that I could return my son to his world and his beloved brother. The university’s library would surely grant me the clues I sought, and Edward was residing in Boston. It would be an easy enough thing to telegraph him, should I find anything.
Once I had unpacked and eaten, I retired to my bathing chamber for a long hot soak. The cold weather came early, a fierce bite to the air even before the leaves began to change for autumn. I was thankful for the soak, and turned my attentions to my coursework. Teaching had never occurred to me for a profession, but I had to admit that I was enamored of the sound of ’Doctor Hohenheim Elric, Professor of Ancient European Occultism’. My doctorate was a forgery, but my knowledge was extensive and accurate and I doubted that anyone would question. The eyes of the world were turning politely away from Germany, it seemed, and I felt safe enough carrying on the charade.
Sleep came easily that night, high above the university grounds, and my dreams were pleasant and uninterrupted.
***
The library of Miskatonic University was everything I had heard it to be. Dr Armitage was eager to show off the library’s more hidden treasures, given permission by the Dean to allow me access to all of the tomes within the myriad stacks. It was there that I feasted my eyes on the cover of such rarities as Librim Prodigium, Parole Dei Morti, Unaussprechlichen Kulten, and of course, the dreaded Necronomicon.
It was an occultist’s paradise, and Armitage was more than happy to offer small anecdotes and information about each text. Discreetly, I inquired about texts on alchemy. Armitage’s eyes lit up and he hustled me away to a private corner and instructed me to wait there. I took in the aura of the library while I waited, comforted by the familiar presence of scores of books and the scent of wood and paper and leather. I was put in mind of my own study, back home, filled with rare and expensive volumes that had taken three lifetimes to collect. I could only hope that they were being well cared for.
Presently, Armitage returned, his arms laden down with heavy tomes bound in leather. He set them before me and bade me to browse through them as long as I liked. I thanked him and began sorting through the texts, scanning titles and indexes for anything of interest.
A book entitled Die Wahrheit von Alchimie caught my attention. Penned over two hundred years ago by a man named Ebner Gotz, the title grabbed my eyes immediately. Roughly translated from German, the text was apparently entitled ’The Truth of Alchemy’. I knew full well the truth of alchemy, knew it better than most. I had been ruled by the truth of alchemy, and then I had been its master, and then it had torn me apart. Adjusting my glasses and settling myself more comfortably in my chair, I opened the book and began to read.
It was three hours later when a touch at my shoulder jerked me from my reading. Armitage had returned, to inquire if I needed anything further. I blinked at him hazily, as though uncomprehending. Truthfully, my mind was still embroiled in the German text, and I had not full returned to the world of the living. I dismissed Amritage with a wave, but quickly called him back a moment later. I requested the book, seeking permission to take it back to my quarters with me. Armitage seemed hesitant - it was a rare book, and I had no personal reputation with my fellow faculty. But Armitage relented, with a small warning to be careful. There had been trouble, he said, with some of the books. I assured him I only wished to read it in the privacy and comfort of my own rooms, and would return it within the next few days.
It was not even a particularly interesting text, bogged down in tangents and archaic methods for achieving immortality between personal anecdotes. But one passage had grabbed me, set beneath detailed instructions on straining and crystallizing cat urine. My German was not particularly good, but I puzzled out one fragment of a passage that burned itself onto the surface of my mind.
I saw it again in my dream… loomed, like the gates of hell… eldritch limbs like those of a sea dwelling creature reaching for me, and all within the great stone columns the eyes…
I read it again and again. I copied it into my own journal, again and again as though the more I wrote it the more sense it would make. I needed to speak with the Professor of German, needed a clear and precise translation. A word mistranslated here and there could greatly change the meaning of the passage, and I wished for there to be no errors. But if I had translated correctly, spotty and fragmented as it was, then there was a chance I had already found what I was seeking! I had no wish to jump to hasty conclusions, but my mind could offer no answer but this: in his dreams, Ebner Gotz had seen the Gate.
***
It was two weeks before I was able to secure a meeting with Isaak Hudritch, the professor of German. Classes had begun and both of our schedules were quite full. I had since returned the tome that had set me on this journey to the library, but the necessary passage was transcribed neatly in its original German in my own journal.
It was late on a Saturday evening as October rolled in that I met with Professor Hudritch in a small restaurant in Arkham. I had my journal with me, and I hardly waited until pleasantries had been exchanged before I began questioning him.
“Have you ever heard,” I asked, eagerly, “of a volume entitled ‘Die Wahrheit von Alchimie‘?”
Hudritch’s expression turned queer and he peered closely at me, as though searching my very soul. It was the first time that we had met face to face, and he seemed to be taking the whole stock of me then and there.
“Why?” was his response, and it was not the one that I expected. Hastily, I pulled forth my journal and flipped open to the proper page.
“I was browsing through it in the library,” I explained, “and I had a bit of difficulty with a particular passage. My German is fine enough for conversation, but I’m afraid many of the older texts leave me stumped. If you would be so kind as to translate a small passage for me…?”
“From Die Wahrheit von Alchimie.” It was not a question and I pushed the journal gingerly across the table towards him. Hudritch glanced at it for only a moment before focusing his eyes some ways beyond me. I turned, and saw nothing but the wall at the end of his heavy gaze.
“What interest do you have in this book, Professor Elric?”
“Curiosity,” I answered easily enough. It would not be wise to reveal my true motives. I had little desire to find myself removed to the sanitarium!
“Do you know anything about the author?” Still Hudritch stared at the wall beyond me, gazed fixed somewhere I could not fathom.
“No. I simply found the book while researching alchemy and found it of mild interest. It seemed to be mainly anecdotal from what I could decipher, and Gotz had some rather queer ideas on alchemical components… why?”
“Ebner Gotz was a scientist. A respectable one in his younger years, and many of his articles and thesis’s can be found in modern scientific journals. A truly brilliant mind who could have gone on to do many great things, Professor Elric.”
“What happened?” I found myself suddenly curious about this author, this supposed brilliant mind who’d descended into a hobbyist alchemist who dreamed of strange and horrific things.
“He had an amateur’s interest in archeology. He would dig about in the fields of Germany, unearthing bones and small figures and things of that nature. Apparently, somewhere in the middle of his life, he discovered a strange idol. It was carved of some odd bit of black stone and fashioned in a crude imitation of a human skeleton. Set within the skeleton’s hands was a stone. He assumed it a ruby, and took it for appraisal. It was no ruby, and to this day no one has been able to determine the true nature of the red stone Gotz discovered. He kept the idol until the end of his years, which was not very far off. He died a madman, Professor Elric, screaming into the night about creatures from some other dimension coming for him.”
“And the idol?” I could not help myself. My excitement grew with every word from Hudritch’s lips, and I contained it as best I could. A red stone! An unearthly gate seen only in a dream! Another dimension! I was practically quivering.
“Here, in the museum. But I would warn you away from further investigation, Professor Elric. No good has ever come of that idol.”
“Surely it’s simply a bit of stone and an unknown gem!” I announced, as blithely as possible.
“Professor Elric, you have not been here in Arkham for very long. Surely you have heard the legends, no man with an interest in the occult hasn’t. In time you will learn that there are things in this world that man cannot begin to comprehend. And that they are better left alone. Say what you will, but that idol is kept in a box of iron these days. In the last century, it has driven three different men to madness. I cannot keep you from it, but you have been warned.”
“Driven men mad?” That was preposterous. Even if the unknown red stone was connected to the Philosopher’s Stone in some way, alchemy had no power here. The stone would be nothing more than a pretty rock, holding no power. Hudritch looked at me finally, his expression still queer, and at length he began to speak. I shall never forget the words he relayed to me at that table, speaking in a voice heavy with years and something that I am tempted to call fear. And, upon hearing the accurate and full translation of that German passage, I cannot find it within myself to blame him.
“Again last night I was trapped in a dream of the Gates of Hell. They rose up before me, twisted and grotesque, and from within the depths of blackness between the gruesome columns there reached out limbs of eldritch black, like the tentacles of deep sea dwelling creatures. Beyond them, in the blackness, I saw a thousand eyes that burned like Lucifer himself.
“It calls to me..”
***
I did not telegraph Edward with what I had learned. I did nothing, in fact, for a good while. Though I stubbornly maintained the belief that alchemy had no power here, I could not escape the logical conclusion that the Gate did. It had to, to maintain the flow of alchemical power from this world to the other. The Gate linked them, and pulled forth the souls of the dead to feed the power on the other side. The Gate had power in this place, and somehow that power effected this idol.
Through careful and casual inquiry, I came into possession of Gotz’s journal. It detailed his descent into madness, his dreams of this mysterious gateway to hell, the strange voices which sang in his ear as he slept…
I admit I understood only half of it. I dared not return to Hudritch and ask for further translations and was forced to muddle through the colloquial and often shorthanded German myself. Truth be told, I was almost glad that I could only grasp the gist of what I read. The picture that Gotz’s words painted was a horrific one. And through every word, I saw again and again the horror that was the Gate. Gotz described the creatures within, black formless bodies possessed of preternatural strength and demonic eyes, reaching for him with a predatory ferociousness. I could remember the feel of their hands on my own flesh, the high pitched laughter that would forever be burned into the aural memory of my mind.
Had Gotz somehow summoned the Gate? His visions seemed to vivid and clear to be truly dreams. Gotz had been committed, and still the dreams persisted. Closer to the end of his memoirs the writing became frantic, the words more difficult for me to translate. But he felt as though the Gate were coming for him, that the creatures within hungered for his flesh, and worse, his soul. These were the gods of alchemy, his madness riddled mind professed. This was the truth of alchemy, these monstrous columns and the horrors contained within.
He died in the asylum. Some two hundred years ago, a mad German scientist from this world of machines and steam power had discovered a relic from the world of alchemy that did not lie dormant.
This discovery filled me with both horror and hope. I had long since reconciled the fact that I could never again return home, but my son was not one for this world. His home and place was on the other side of the Gate, and I had pledged to myself I would see him return. But the horrors of which Gotz spoke…
I had traveled through the Gate. It tore apart my mind and my body and my soul. I had lived through the horrors of which Gotz spoke and survived. And I considered myself no more mad than the next man. If this idol truly could summon the Gate, it was imperative that I have it in my possession.
Little did I know what horrors that idol truly possessed.
***
The caretaker for the Arkham Historical Society was an elderly local woman. She had lived in Arkham all of her life, and spoke at length on the many oddities of the museum. I brushed aside her offers to show me strange and queer jewelry from down Innsmouth way and other antiquities of interest. No, my interest was only in the Gotz Idol, which the caretaker brought out to show me with much hemming and hawing.
“We don’t much like showing it off,” she explained, opening the iron box in which it was stored. “Lots of bad business about it, you see.”
“Yes, I’d heard some of the rumors.” Within the box was a black swath of silk, hiding the idol from my view. I was quivering with anticipation, eager to lay my eyes upon this strange figure and its red stone.
“No rumors, Professors. Anyone who’s laid eyes on this idol for any good length of time has gone mad from the sight of it. Everyone who’s ever studied it went to their grave a jabbering fool. Old Mr. O’Malley’s still up in the sanitarium, writing on the walls and screaming about black things with devil’s eyes coming for him in the night. Are you sure you want to see it?”
Black things with devil’s eyes. The creatures within the Gate. I made a mental note to visit this O’Malley at the Arkham Sanitarium and ask him what I could. The elderly woman shrugged and flipped back the silk.
It is difficult for me to put to words what happened at the moment my eyes fell upon the idol. It was not, in an artistic sense, anything of note. The skeletal figure that was depicted was crude, as though modeled by a child out of clay. It was black and twisted, as though some accident had befallen it during sculpting or forging. Or as though the skeletal figure were writhing in pain. Clasped within its malformed hands, there sat a red stone. It was smooth and rounded, and in the harsh lights it had a look of liquidity about it. I knew it in an instant.
But it was in my mind that the true revelations lay. As my eyes fell upon that red stone, visions flooded my mind. I knew them well, had seen before, knew them as the visions the Gate had imparted to me hundreds of years ago when I embarked upon a journey of the greatest sin. They were images that defied description, sensations that flowed into my brain as though I were nothing but a vessel for knowledge. In that moment I found myself again where I had stood, so long ago when I attempted the grave transgression of human transmutation.
The Gate loomed before me. The doors opened, creaking like the stone of some ancient crypt. Swirling in the loathsome darkness within I saw the aubergine light of thousands of ungodly eyes. From the eldritch darkness stretched blackened limbs, without form, without any substance more than a shadow. And the voices called to me. I heard my name whispered in a thousand ghastly voices as the creatures of the Gate reached for me, seeking to reclaim what they had lost when I escaped to the world of machines.
I gasped and recoiled, and in a moment I was standing in the Arkham Historical Society once more, the elderly woman peering at me as though I were ill. The swath of silk was back covering the idol.
I made some excuse of stomach illness and excused myself. The visions of the Gate lingered behind my eyelids. Hastily, I made my way to the Sanitarium. It had been the Gate, there was no doubt in my mind! And it wanted me still. I moved through the dark and chilling streets of Arkham in a rush, passing by gambrel roofs and sagging domiciles. My intent was clear, the horrifically imposing Sanitarium.
I asked for a patient known as O’Malley. The clerk at the desk gave me a queer look, but said nothing. A few moments later he informed me that my timing was quite terrible, as O’Malley had passed away not half an hour an earlier.
The news struck me. Half an hour ago I stood in the Historical Society and confronted the Gate. I asked the exact time, afraid of the answer. My foreboding was not without merit, as the time of the patient’s death was the very moment I had cast my eyes upon the accursed idol.
***
It has been a month since my visit to the Historical Society and my brush with the Gate. I attend my classes and teach my students and conduct my own research into European occult, but my nights are troubled.
It has begun to come to me, you see. The Gate, and the reaching limbs that seek to tear my soul from my body. I cannot escape it now, now that it has its eyes - those detestable eyes! - fixed solely on me. I wake in cold sweat, the terror of the Gate radiating through my failing form.
I know it will claim me. And I know it is all I deserve, I who laughed in the face of God and sought immortality. I who forged the Philosopher’s Stone, I who condemned the spirits of thousands, I who damned the very soul of my own first born son. But if I am quick, I have time yet. Time to telegraph Edward, to retrieve him from Boston, time to give him my notes and tell him all I have learned. The Gate will take me, tear me apart once more, but if it has its eyes on me, perhaps Edward can return home while it takes me.
There are things in this world that mortal man cannot comprehend. I am one of those things, a damned creature who should have died three hundred years ago. My fate was decided in another place and time, and perhaps I could escape it by placing a bullet through my own brain, but if somehow I can return my son home…
My only fear is that the warnings I have left behind in this journal will go unheeded. The idol must be destroyed! Every man who summons the Gate disrupts the natural flow of alchemy more and more, and I fear that one day the Gate will remain open. I fear that the two worlds will bleed and blend, and fall into ruin as the Gate takes the souls it so desires and the creatures within find purchase in the world of man! That cannot be allowed to happen!
I can only hope that those at Miskatonic will give consideration to my warnings, and that the idol will be cast into the very depths of the ocean. And there may it lay until man is long gone, and alchemy nothing but a fleeting memory in the eye of the world.
Title: The Truth of Alchemy
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist/Lovecraft Mythos
Pairings: N/A
Genre: Horror
Word Count: 4,279
Spoilers: Full series
Warnings: Possibly mangled German, wordiness.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: It began with the discovery of a strange German text in the library at Miskatonic University. From there, Professor Hohenheim Elric embarks upon a journey of unspeakable horror as he delves further into the truth behind the power of Alchemy and seeks a way to return his son home.
It was late in the year of nineteen thirty six when I first crossed the Atlantic Ocean and arrived, sick from the sea voyage and tanned from the winds, on the coast of Massachusetts. I had nothing save for the clothes on my back and a small satchel full of necessities, having fled Germany under cover of darkness and in the company of only my son. Nestled in my satchel, among various small items of personal importance, was a letter. It was this letter that had drawn me to the area so quaintly termed ’New’ England. My destination was ultimately the town of Arkham, and a university that rested on the side of the dark and frightful Miskatonic river - and indeed, shared the same name as that fluid body of water.
It seemed I had gained something of a reputation as an occult scientist in Germany, and news of my reputation had reached the board of the university. I was both surprised and pleased with the letter, as I had long been considering leaving Germany for more peaceful climes. The double threat of economical depression and political unrest made me uneasy, and the invitation to join the faculty of a university with such a reputation was welcome. I had heard of the famed library, rich in occult and theological texts, and was quite eager to be given access to it.
I had first heard of Miskatonic University in 1924, when I came upon an article on the Alhazred Dig. My fascination was immediate, and I followed the dig with a keen interest. I found many of my questions unanswered in the few articles and essays I came across, and hoped to answer them at the university itself.
I parted ways with my son in Manchester-By-The-Sea, he having no interest in the occult and Miskatonic having little in the way of mechanical science programs. From there I took a bus to Arkham, arriving just an hour after sundown. It was quite clear, by the scores of spectacled and learned looking men who walked the narrow sidewalks, that Arkham was a university town. The town thrived because of the university, and catered to faculty and students alike. I took an instant liking to the place, with it’s Georgian balustrades and air of quiet, failing antiquity. Crumbling and dark though it was, steeped in mystery and occult rumors, I could not help but feel somewhat at home.
I was met by one Dr Robert Stross, the university Dean, and took a liking to him immediately. He was a tall man, dark of hair and warm of eyes and with an air of the intellectual about him. As he guided me on a tour of campus I became more and more certain that I had made the proper decision.
I asked about the library immediately. Stross’s expression turned to one of delight, and he clapped me on the shoulder and smiled broadly. He seemed quite eager to show off the famed library, and promised to turn me over to Dr Henry Armitage first thing in the morning. Armitage was the head Librarian, he explained, and would answer all of my questions.
The tour concluded, I was taken to my living quarters and informed that dinner would be brought to me as I’d missed the evening meal. I began settling in, my mind already on tomorrow’s venture to the library.
Edward, my son, had scoffed and laughed at the occult, dismissing it as nonsense. He turned his attention to machines and cold science, trusting in the booming market of rocketry and space travel as the means to return home. For you see, neither myself nor my son were born to this world. We came here through means that defy scientific explanation, originating in a world where the occult studies of Miskatonic University were everyday occurrences. I held fast to the belief that it was through the occult, through the less accurate and ancient sciences, that I could return my son to his world and his beloved brother. The university’s library would surely grant me the clues I sought, and Edward was residing in Boston. It would be an easy enough thing to telegraph him, should I find anything.
Once I had unpacked and eaten, I retired to my bathing chamber for a long hot soak. The cold weather came early, a fierce bite to the air even before the leaves began to change for autumn. I was thankful for the soak, and turned my attentions to my coursework. Teaching had never occurred to me for a profession, but I had to admit that I was enamored of the sound of ’Doctor Hohenheim Elric, Professor of Ancient European Occultism’. My doctorate was a forgery, but my knowledge was extensive and accurate and I doubted that anyone would question. The eyes of the world were turning politely away from Germany, it seemed, and I felt safe enough carrying on the charade.
Sleep came easily that night, high above the university grounds, and my dreams were pleasant and uninterrupted.
***
The library of Miskatonic University was everything I had heard it to be. Dr Armitage was eager to show off the library’s more hidden treasures, given permission by the Dean to allow me access to all of the tomes within the myriad stacks. It was there that I feasted my eyes on the cover of such rarities as Librim Prodigium, Parole Dei Morti, Unaussprechlichen Kulten, and of course, the dreaded Necronomicon.
It was an occultist’s paradise, and Armitage was more than happy to offer small anecdotes and information about each text. Discreetly, I inquired about texts on alchemy. Armitage’s eyes lit up and he hustled me away to a private corner and instructed me to wait there. I took in the aura of the library while I waited, comforted by the familiar presence of scores of books and the scent of wood and paper and leather. I was put in mind of my own study, back home, filled with rare and expensive volumes that had taken three lifetimes to collect. I could only hope that they were being well cared for.
Presently, Armitage returned, his arms laden down with heavy tomes bound in leather. He set them before me and bade me to browse through them as long as I liked. I thanked him and began sorting through the texts, scanning titles and indexes for anything of interest.
A book entitled Die Wahrheit von Alchimie caught my attention. Penned over two hundred years ago by a man named Ebner Gotz, the title grabbed my eyes immediately. Roughly translated from German, the text was apparently entitled ’The Truth of Alchemy’. I knew full well the truth of alchemy, knew it better than most. I had been ruled by the truth of alchemy, and then I had been its master, and then it had torn me apart. Adjusting my glasses and settling myself more comfortably in my chair, I opened the book and began to read.
It was three hours later when a touch at my shoulder jerked me from my reading. Armitage had returned, to inquire if I needed anything further. I blinked at him hazily, as though uncomprehending. Truthfully, my mind was still embroiled in the German text, and I had not full returned to the world of the living. I dismissed Amritage with a wave, but quickly called him back a moment later. I requested the book, seeking permission to take it back to my quarters with me. Armitage seemed hesitant - it was a rare book, and I had no personal reputation with my fellow faculty. But Armitage relented, with a small warning to be careful. There had been trouble, he said, with some of the books. I assured him I only wished to read it in the privacy and comfort of my own rooms, and would return it within the next few days.
It was not even a particularly interesting text, bogged down in tangents and archaic methods for achieving immortality between personal anecdotes. But one passage had grabbed me, set beneath detailed instructions on straining and crystallizing cat urine. My German was not particularly good, but I puzzled out one fragment of a passage that burned itself onto the surface of my mind.
I saw it again in my dream… loomed, like the gates of hell… eldritch limbs like those of a sea dwelling creature reaching for me, and all within the great stone columns the eyes…
I read it again and again. I copied it into my own journal, again and again as though the more I wrote it the more sense it would make. I needed to speak with the Professor of German, needed a clear and precise translation. A word mistranslated here and there could greatly change the meaning of the passage, and I wished for there to be no errors. But if I had translated correctly, spotty and fragmented as it was, then there was a chance I had already found what I was seeking! I had no wish to jump to hasty conclusions, but my mind could offer no answer but this: in his dreams, Ebner Gotz had seen the Gate.
***
It was two weeks before I was able to secure a meeting with Isaak Hudritch, the professor of German. Classes had begun and both of our schedules were quite full. I had since returned the tome that had set me on this journey to the library, but the necessary passage was transcribed neatly in its original German in my own journal.
It was late on a Saturday evening as October rolled in that I met with Professor Hudritch in a small restaurant in Arkham. I had my journal with me, and I hardly waited until pleasantries had been exchanged before I began questioning him.
“Have you ever heard,” I asked, eagerly, “of a volume entitled ‘Die Wahrheit von Alchimie‘?”
Hudritch’s expression turned queer and he peered closely at me, as though searching my very soul. It was the first time that we had met face to face, and he seemed to be taking the whole stock of me then and there.
“Why?” was his response, and it was not the one that I expected. Hastily, I pulled forth my journal and flipped open to the proper page.
“I was browsing through it in the library,” I explained, “and I had a bit of difficulty with a particular passage. My German is fine enough for conversation, but I’m afraid many of the older texts leave me stumped. If you would be so kind as to translate a small passage for me…?”
“From Die Wahrheit von Alchimie.” It was not a question and I pushed the journal gingerly across the table towards him. Hudritch glanced at it for only a moment before focusing his eyes some ways beyond me. I turned, and saw nothing but the wall at the end of his heavy gaze.
“What interest do you have in this book, Professor Elric?”
“Curiosity,” I answered easily enough. It would not be wise to reveal my true motives. I had little desire to find myself removed to the sanitarium!
“Do you know anything about the author?” Still Hudritch stared at the wall beyond me, gazed fixed somewhere I could not fathom.
“No. I simply found the book while researching alchemy and found it of mild interest. It seemed to be mainly anecdotal from what I could decipher, and Gotz had some rather queer ideas on alchemical components… why?”
“Ebner Gotz was a scientist. A respectable one in his younger years, and many of his articles and thesis’s can be found in modern scientific journals. A truly brilliant mind who could have gone on to do many great things, Professor Elric.”
“What happened?” I found myself suddenly curious about this author, this supposed brilliant mind who’d descended into a hobbyist alchemist who dreamed of strange and horrific things.
“He had an amateur’s interest in archeology. He would dig about in the fields of Germany, unearthing bones and small figures and things of that nature. Apparently, somewhere in the middle of his life, he discovered a strange idol. It was carved of some odd bit of black stone and fashioned in a crude imitation of a human skeleton. Set within the skeleton’s hands was a stone. He assumed it a ruby, and took it for appraisal. It was no ruby, and to this day no one has been able to determine the true nature of the red stone Gotz discovered. He kept the idol until the end of his years, which was not very far off. He died a madman, Professor Elric, screaming into the night about creatures from some other dimension coming for him.”
“And the idol?” I could not help myself. My excitement grew with every word from Hudritch’s lips, and I contained it as best I could. A red stone! An unearthly gate seen only in a dream! Another dimension! I was practically quivering.
“Here, in the museum. But I would warn you away from further investigation, Professor Elric. No good has ever come of that idol.”
“Surely it’s simply a bit of stone and an unknown gem!” I announced, as blithely as possible.
“Professor Elric, you have not been here in Arkham for very long. Surely you have heard the legends, no man with an interest in the occult hasn’t. In time you will learn that there are things in this world that man cannot begin to comprehend. And that they are better left alone. Say what you will, but that idol is kept in a box of iron these days. In the last century, it has driven three different men to madness. I cannot keep you from it, but you have been warned.”
“Driven men mad?” That was preposterous. Even if the unknown red stone was connected to the Philosopher’s Stone in some way, alchemy had no power here. The stone would be nothing more than a pretty rock, holding no power. Hudritch looked at me finally, his expression still queer, and at length he began to speak. I shall never forget the words he relayed to me at that table, speaking in a voice heavy with years and something that I am tempted to call fear. And, upon hearing the accurate and full translation of that German passage, I cannot find it within myself to blame him.
“Again last night I was trapped in a dream of the Gates of Hell. They rose up before me, twisted and grotesque, and from within the depths of blackness between the gruesome columns there reached out limbs of eldritch black, like the tentacles of deep sea dwelling creatures. Beyond them, in the blackness, I saw a thousand eyes that burned like Lucifer himself.
“It calls to me..”
***
I did not telegraph Edward with what I had learned. I did nothing, in fact, for a good while. Though I stubbornly maintained the belief that alchemy had no power here, I could not escape the logical conclusion that the Gate did. It had to, to maintain the flow of alchemical power from this world to the other. The Gate linked them, and pulled forth the souls of the dead to feed the power on the other side. The Gate had power in this place, and somehow that power effected this idol.
Through careful and casual inquiry, I came into possession of Gotz’s journal. It detailed his descent into madness, his dreams of this mysterious gateway to hell, the strange voices which sang in his ear as he slept…
I admit I understood only half of it. I dared not return to Hudritch and ask for further translations and was forced to muddle through the colloquial and often shorthanded German myself. Truth be told, I was almost glad that I could only grasp the gist of what I read. The picture that Gotz’s words painted was a horrific one. And through every word, I saw again and again the horror that was the Gate. Gotz described the creatures within, black formless bodies possessed of preternatural strength and demonic eyes, reaching for him with a predatory ferociousness. I could remember the feel of their hands on my own flesh, the high pitched laughter that would forever be burned into the aural memory of my mind.
Had Gotz somehow summoned the Gate? His visions seemed to vivid and clear to be truly dreams. Gotz had been committed, and still the dreams persisted. Closer to the end of his memoirs the writing became frantic, the words more difficult for me to translate. But he felt as though the Gate were coming for him, that the creatures within hungered for his flesh, and worse, his soul. These were the gods of alchemy, his madness riddled mind professed. This was the truth of alchemy, these monstrous columns and the horrors contained within.
He died in the asylum. Some two hundred years ago, a mad German scientist from this world of machines and steam power had discovered a relic from the world of alchemy that did not lie dormant.
This discovery filled me with both horror and hope. I had long since reconciled the fact that I could never again return home, but my son was not one for this world. His home and place was on the other side of the Gate, and I had pledged to myself I would see him return. But the horrors of which Gotz spoke…
I had traveled through the Gate. It tore apart my mind and my body and my soul. I had lived through the horrors of which Gotz spoke and survived. And I considered myself no more mad than the next man. If this idol truly could summon the Gate, it was imperative that I have it in my possession.
Little did I know what horrors that idol truly possessed.
***
The caretaker for the Arkham Historical Society was an elderly local woman. She had lived in Arkham all of her life, and spoke at length on the many oddities of the museum. I brushed aside her offers to show me strange and queer jewelry from down Innsmouth way and other antiquities of interest. No, my interest was only in the Gotz Idol, which the caretaker brought out to show me with much hemming and hawing.
“We don’t much like showing it off,” she explained, opening the iron box in which it was stored. “Lots of bad business about it, you see.”
“Yes, I’d heard some of the rumors.” Within the box was a black swath of silk, hiding the idol from my view. I was quivering with anticipation, eager to lay my eyes upon this strange figure and its red stone.
“No rumors, Professors. Anyone who’s laid eyes on this idol for any good length of time has gone mad from the sight of it. Everyone who’s ever studied it went to their grave a jabbering fool. Old Mr. O’Malley’s still up in the sanitarium, writing on the walls and screaming about black things with devil’s eyes coming for him in the night. Are you sure you want to see it?”
Black things with devil’s eyes. The creatures within the Gate. I made a mental note to visit this O’Malley at the Arkham Sanitarium and ask him what I could. The elderly woman shrugged and flipped back the silk.
It is difficult for me to put to words what happened at the moment my eyes fell upon the idol. It was not, in an artistic sense, anything of note. The skeletal figure that was depicted was crude, as though modeled by a child out of clay. It was black and twisted, as though some accident had befallen it during sculpting or forging. Or as though the skeletal figure were writhing in pain. Clasped within its malformed hands, there sat a red stone. It was smooth and rounded, and in the harsh lights it had a look of liquidity about it. I knew it in an instant.
But it was in my mind that the true revelations lay. As my eyes fell upon that red stone, visions flooded my mind. I knew them well, had seen before, knew them as the visions the Gate had imparted to me hundreds of years ago when I embarked upon a journey of the greatest sin. They were images that defied description, sensations that flowed into my brain as though I were nothing but a vessel for knowledge. In that moment I found myself again where I had stood, so long ago when I attempted the grave transgression of human transmutation.
The Gate loomed before me. The doors opened, creaking like the stone of some ancient crypt. Swirling in the loathsome darkness within I saw the aubergine light of thousands of ungodly eyes. From the eldritch darkness stretched blackened limbs, without form, without any substance more than a shadow. And the voices called to me. I heard my name whispered in a thousand ghastly voices as the creatures of the Gate reached for me, seeking to reclaim what they had lost when I escaped to the world of machines.
I gasped and recoiled, and in a moment I was standing in the Arkham Historical Society once more, the elderly woman peering at me as though I were ill. The swath of silk was back covering the idol.
I made some excuse of stomach illness and excused myself. The visions of the Gate lingered behind my eyelids. Hastily, I made my way to the Sanitarium. It had been the Gate, there was no doubt in my mind! And it wanted me still. I moved through the dark and chilling streets of Arkham in a rush, passing by gambrel roofs and sagging domiciles. My intent was clear, the horrifically imposing Sanitarium.
I asked for a patient known as O’Malley. The clerk at the desk gave me a queer look, but said nothing. A few moments later he informed me that my timing was quite terrible, as O’Malley had passed away not half an hour an earlier.
The news struck me. Half an hour ago I stood in the Historical Society and confronted the Gate. I asked the exact time, afraid of the answer. My foreboding was not without merit, as the time of the patient’s death was the very moment I had cast my eyes upon the accursed idol.
***
It has been a month since my visit to the Historical Society and my brush with the Gate. I attend my classes and teach my students and conduct my own research into European occult, but my nights are troubled.
It has begun to come to me, you see. The Gate, and the reaching limbs that seek to tear my soul from my body. I cannot escape it now, now that it has its eyes - those detestable eyes! - fixed solely on me. I wake in cold sweat, the terror of the Gate radiating through my failing form.
I know it will claim me. And I know it is all I deserve, I who laughed in the face of God and sought immortality. I who forged the Philosopher’s Stone, I who condemned the spirits of thousands, I who damned the very soul of my own first born son. But if I am quick, I have time yet. Time to telegraph Edward, to retrieve him from Boston, time to give him my notes and tell him all I have learned. The Gate will take me, tear me apart once more, but if it has its eyes on me, perhaps Edward can return home while it takes me.
There are things in this world that mortal man cannot comprehend. I am one of those things, a damned creature who should have died three hundred years ago. My fate was decided in another place and time, and perhaps I could escape it by placing a bullet through my own brain, but if somehow I can return my son home…
My only fear is that the warnings I have left behind in this journal will go unheeded. The idol must be destroyed! Every man who summons the Gate disrupts the natural flow of alchemy more and more, and I fear that one day the Gate will remain open. I fear that the two worlds will bleed and blend, and fall into ruin as the Gate takes the souls it so desires and the creatures within find purchase in the world of man! That cannot be allowed to happen!
I can only hope that those at Miskatonic will give consideration to my warnings, and that the idol will be cast into the very depths of the ocean. And there may it lay until man is long gone, and alchemy nothing but a fleeting memory in the eye of the world.