Gresh - Sherlock Holmes vs. Cthulhu: the Adventure of the Innsmouth Mutations

Contents

Also available from Titan Books and Lois H. Gresh

The Adventure of the Deadly Dimensions
The Adventure of the Neural Psychoses
The Adventure of the Innsmouth Mutations

TITAN BOOKS

THE ADVENTURE OF THE INNSMOUTH MUTATIONS
Print edition ISBN: 9781785652127
Electronic edition ISBN: 9781785652134

Published by Titan Books
A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd
144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

First edition: July 2019
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This is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents are either products of the authors imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2019 by Lois H. Gresh. All Rights Reserved.

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A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

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DEDICATED TO MY READERS

WITH LOVE TO ARIE, RENA, AND GABBY

WITH GRATITUDE TO ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE AND H.P. LOVECRAFT

PART ONE

Innsmouth

PROLOGUE

cthulhu

January 1891

Filaments brushed his flanks and spun circles before his eyes, before sinking into the crevassea hole so deep that no human had ever ventured into it. The water swirled with microscopic creatures and vegetation, some of this world and some from the other dimensions. Fish etched in glowing color swept past him. Some darted into the hole, others swam too close to him, and he sucked them into his feeding tubes.

Cthulhu ruled here, and soon, he would rule all of the oceans, the lands, and the air. His hunger hurt. It was a hunger born from loss, an ache that flared to fiery pain and never burned out. A hunger for what was, for what had come before, for what must come again.

Like a giant star, I spread my tentacles across the hole, I latch my suckers onto all, I writhe, I feel the trembling of the earth, I hear the stirring of those who have awaited me for eons. Rising from Rlyeh beneath the Pacific Ocean, I swam long and hard and claimed my home here, deepbeneath the crevasse beyond Devil Reef, Dagon, and Innsmouth. I call to Yog-Sothoth, to the Elders, to the Deep Ones, to the believers.

Cthulhu rumbled, his vast body quivering over the ocean floor, his tentacles stretched taut, their tips probing for food. Sorrow, pain, unbearable, and with no end.

Green phosphorescence rippled up from the crevasse, slashed the black water, split it. He felt the invisible creatures tumble from the dimensions beyond human knowledge. Following them were creatures of great and varied scope. Nyarlathotep, the crawling chaos, changing shape, slipped into and out of view. Azathoth, he of tentacles and eyes and mouths, shrilled his cosmic flutes and drummed his hide with muscular appendages, his sound killing sea beasts hundreds of miles away. Yog-Sothoth, ever-faithful keeper of the door to the dimensions, he of the glowing spheres, showed them the way.

The weak race on shorethe humansrecoil in fear from us. Theyve seen those unleashed upon the River Thames, those of Dagon and the Deep Ones at Half Moon Bay in far-distant England, and nearby, at Devil Reef off Innsmouth. The weak race rages, it loves, it hates. Jealousy, greed, ego. The weak race kills to satisfy its emotions. Those of us from beyond: we feel only the need to exist.

Ah, to reclaim the Earth, where eons ago we ruled.

Anticipation sparked, and Cthulhus spirit lifted. He felt energized, ready to take what had been his all along.

Miles above on the ocean surface, a huge boat fought the waves. Cthulhu sensed the human fear onboard, felt the movement of tides and sea. The fish fled, dove deeper. Many slammed up and down on the waves along with the boat. Cthulhu smelled excitement. He knew that Dagon and his worshipers upon Devil Reef felt the human fear, as well.

Cthulhu had waited long enough. It was time to show himself to his followers. It was time to take the Earth back from the humans, who had been destroying it for centuries.

Calling to those who had broken through the dimensional void, he released his suckers from the ocean floor. He unfurled his tentacles and surged upward. The crawling chaos followed him, as did Azathoth, Yog-Sothoth, and the others. Hundreds of creatures rose from the depths.

On the surface, the waves rose sixty feet and thundered down. Cthulhu tightened his tentacles and rode a wave up, and at its crest, he looked down at the boat, saw the humans scream in horror and point at him before toppling over from the impact of the crashing wave. Cthulhu was bigger than the boat. His eyes swiveled, magnified the human faces, saw the blood, the broken bones and bodies. Hunger gnawed, but he had no taste for human flesh. Bugs, all of them. Disgusting.

The glowing spheres of Yog-Sothoth billowed into the sky. Azathoths tentacles flailed, his mouths opened to reveal teeth longer than the tallest humans. His flutes shrilled, bursting their eardrums.

Come, let us swim to Innsmouth, where Dagon and his followers await. Finally, we will live as we did beforehumans swarmed over the Earth, defacing everything with their filth, their trash, their very presence.

A wave lifted both Cthulhu and the boat. He would swim toward shore, get as close as he could without injuring himself in the shallow waters.

As the wave crashed, Cthulhu tensed his muscles and fell full-force upon the boat, flattening it. The wood broke. The metal broke. The humans broke. Splinters and flesh and blood and all the debris of humanity surged up with the next powerful wave. Cthulhu broke free of it all, dove beneath the heavy waves. The others came with him. Together, they swam toward Devil Reef, Innsmouth, humanity.

Professor Moriarty

Innsmouth, Massachusetts, January 1891

The fog settled like scum on my shoulders. My gloves were slick with it. The dirt road had turned to mud, and my shoes stuck with every step.

Pulling my hat low, I shivered as the fog leaked a freezing drizzle that pooled in the mud, and farther out, fell like nails into the black water. A screech shattered the night, and I almost jumped but kept my nerves under tight control.

Devil Reef lay a half-mile off shore. I couldnt see it in the darkness, but I knew it was there. Craggy, the holes and the tunnels beneath the reef filled with bizarre beasts, its pointed rocks jutting