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By John Stanley, Jan 6 2001
"Whatever," Bobbi sighed, as she waved her hand dismissively at Lepus.
Her legs were sore and she was done dueling with him. She began to walk
towards the door as she motioned to Harvey to back off. The perfume odor
that Mycroft/Lee had just spoken of wafted into the room, as if on a breeze.
Harvey caught the smell also as he relaxed his posture and began to move
towards the bound figure on the bed.
...Red Thomas could feel the pulse of the thing so near him. The others were pushing it on him. He could feel its appendages as they tried to gain purchase on him. There was fur or something like coarse hair rubbing on him from it. This thing was way too close to him; he could feel hot breath exuding from its various respiratory orifices. He screamed to the others to let him go. Their fear gave them strength as they pushed him farther into the folds of it. He felt its thoughts tickle his own and begin to fuse...
The bed creaked as Mycroft arched his back and strained at the bonds holding his wrists.
"They're with me...."Lepus said as he began moving towards the door.
"Burroughs, are you all right..." Harvey asked. He seen enough shit to know by looking at the savant that he was not all right, but he couldn't help asking anyway.
...Flashes of light and images of blasted scenery inundated Red Thomas's psyche. He felt terrified, but also sensed a growing peacefulness inside the very heart of him. The darkness inside Mycroft/Lee's head began to lighten a little. They opened their eyes as one to the images displayed to them of strange vista's on alien worlds. Spires of unimaginable construction rose from the land to pierce the bubble of space. Huge rings, concentrically orbiting one another; acting as some type of interplanetary bridge system. Innumerable worlds passed through their field of vision as they effortlessly swam through the aether.
A story began to unfold. A race of beings inhabiting a distant world orbiting triple suns. These creatures struggled to gain a hold on their habitat in much the same way that humans had, through genetic selection and trial and error.
They evolved into a form best suited to their environment; a murky soup of sulfuric acid and various ferrous substratic materials interspersed with islands of volcanic origin. They resembled a multi-lobed cephalopod with a hairy-chitenous carapace from which extended many sets of manipulative tentacular arms.
After untold millennium had passed, these beings had attained mastery of their surroundings and had begun to colonize other worlds. They had learned of the progenitor of the universe, and of the other Outer Gods. They became aware of the Great Old ones, and their incessant struggles with these Outer Gods, and of the servitor races of most.
Through more time and careful study they began to understand the Outer god Daoloth. They deciphered the complex mathematics involved with its existence; and through this scientific worship of it gave the race the ability to travel inter-dimensionally and to different epochs in the universal shift. They traveled throughout this multiverse, placing the codes to contacting them in the various races they encountered. It was during this time of universal expansion that they cast aside their physical carapaces for the freedom of a mental state of existence. They experienced the lurking evil of the Great Old Ones on Earth and other distant worlds. They sought to disarm this threat by placing certain equations into the minds of the cultists authoring their blasphemous texts of ritual worship; these formulae made their mark on the Revelations of Glaaki, the Necronomicon and most other indices.
It was during the reading of one of these texts that Agent Burroughs recited the equation that brought the entity forward from the folds of space to this reality. It immediately sensed the suffocating influence of the Great Old Ones and took up residence inside the decoder. Its influence was immediate. The fragile psyche of its host shattered upon its entry and trapped it for a time inside Burroughs consciousness. Eventually it was able to coerce the strongest of the personalities into action...
Strange lights played dapple music across the skin of his arms as he lay on the bed. He laughed a little to himself as the pieces of his sanity began to fall in to place. Not in the place they had ever been, but in a new order. The order they were always meant to be in. He felt a numbing sensation in his back as the bonds on his wrists dissolved into a gel-like substance. He ascertained that there were no threats in the immediate vicinity.
Mycroft sat up slowly, but in looking at the scene around him, he could see that he was moving far faster than he had ever imagined he could. The room was a blur. His head was one; he catalogued everything around him. He opened the door with a gentle push in Bobbi's direction.
Chaste Moon walked in with Ralphie. As she sized up her company, Ralphie pulled free of the leash and jumped up on the bed with Mycroft/Lee and started licking him all over his face.
"What the fuck is going on here Harvey?" Bobbi spat out. "Are we turning this over to Lepus and his goons?"
"No we are not," Harvey said, glaring at Lepus.
"It's all right," Lepus said handing Bobbi back her pistol holstering his own, and looking past Harvey to Mycroft/Lee grinning, "Besides, I think our circumstances have changed somewhat."
Mycroft looked at Lepus, looked into him. The good in him showed through despite his beliefs that the evils he had done could far outweigh them. His errors were understandable. He could not know his role in the final outcome of it all, for he would scarcely believe it.
"You may now call me Burroughs, just Burroughs..." He smiled, an impossibly wide smile. The warmth in his eyes was unmistakable as he let himself be bathed by the dog.
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