I do not own anything relating to the Teen Titans.
Opening the Closet Door a Crack – Chapter 7
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Upon seeing Raven fall to the floor, Beast Boy immediately pushed Robin and Starfire through the door into the repository. He slammed the door shut behind them. Morphing into a gorilla, he picked Raven up in one arm and pounded on the door back to the antechamber. Dr. Warren, seeing the situation, threw the override switch on the control panel and opened the door. With the outer door opened, Beast Boy ran out of the airlock cradling Raven in one arm. He went immediately over to the door to the corridor and, with one arm, splintered the door. Putting his shoulder against the remains, he pushed through the wreckage and moved his way down the corridor, continuing to hold Raven gently in his arm.
Dr. Warren and Cyborg heard the sounds of shattering glass. Cyborg turned to the president.
"Doc, what the HELL do you have in there?"
"I told you, we have the finest, most complete set of arcane works in the world. In addition to the ONLY complete copy of the Necronomicon known to man, the other five known copies are missing numerous pages, we also have the largest collection of fragments of the Pnakotic Manuscript in the world. There is not a known complete copy. We also have two copies of Unaussprechlichen Kulten by Von Junzt, one in the original German, another in a very rare French translation. D'Erlette's Cultes des Goules in the original French and an incredibly rare Italian version. We also have one pristine copy of Ludvig Prinn's De Vermis Mysteriis and two other copies that are not in as good a condition. We have one of the only two known copies of the Liber Ivonis. We've even managed to find an almost complete copy of the Book of Dzyan and a large portion of the Book of Eibon, both of which there are no complete copies anywhere in the world. And, and…we have the ONLY known copy of Chamber's The King in Yellow." All the while, Warren became more and more animated as he discussed these esoteric and malignant tomes. "And these are only the MAJOR works in our collection. There are a number of minor works that comprise our eldritch library." Pausing for breath, he continued, "Scholars of the arcane come from all over the world for just a brief exposure to these volumes."
Pausing for reflection, Dr. Warren continued, "As I said earlier, sometimes I wish the entire collection would go away, the responsibility is so great. Yet, this may be the greatest aggregation of, well, for lack of a better term, 'evil' works that have ever been gathered under one roof."
"Shit. Hope Raven's all right."
When Beast Boy crashed through the door from the rare book repository, he saw the corridor that the titans had taken to reach the room, and at the far end was a large window. Racing towards the window, the green gorilla picked up a nearby chair and, without missing a step, threw it at the window ahead of him, shattering most of the panes. Turning sideways to shield Raven from any remaining glass, Beast Boy threw himself through the window.
Although they were five stories up, as they fell Beast Boy transferred his grip on Raven to his feet. Once he had a solid grip, he transformed again from a gorilla into a giant condor, his arms becoming the wings and his legs grasping Raven. Carefully, he lowered the two of them to the ground.
Once on the ground, he changed back to his normal form. Raven continued to be hunched over in apparent agony. Barely pausing, Beast Boy put Raven on his back and put her arms around his neck.
"Hold on Rae, I'll get you out of here." With that, he transformed once again, this time to a large horse. Galloping at full speed with Raven's arms secured around his neck, he raced away from the library towards a distant copse of trees. As a thoroughbred is one of the fastest animals on earth for a short distance, Beast Boy was rather quickly safely among the forest branches. Running deeper into the woods, the green teen finally stopped by a small pond within a grove and morphed back to a human shape. Bringing Raven over to the water's edge, he gently helped her down and laid her alongside the water.
Raven tried to rise. The nausea that she had felt from the overwhelming evil within that room was still present, although lessened. She promptly threw up. Then she laid back down, more like collapsed, only this time Beast Boy got his lap under her so that her head was raised and he was supporting her. Stroking her hair, he quietly waited until she woke and would be able to move.
Robin and Starfire were stunned, to say the least, when they felt hands in the middle of their back pushing them into the room. Turning quickly around, they saw the transformed Beast Boy carrying their grey teammate through the antechamber and out the door.
"Robin! Should we not assist Beast Boy with Raven?"
Robin examined the scene quickly. "Star, he hasn't been taken over by his animal instincts since he morphed. He's not the Beast, so he's in control. It seems that he's trying to get her out of the vicinity of the library as fast as possible. Much faster than either of us could do so right now. Cyborg doesn't seem to be moving to help, so it doesn't look serious. Besides, you KNOW Beast Boy will never let anything happen to Raven." He had a touch of a smirk on his face as he made that last statement. "We'll catch up with those two later and find out all of the details. I need to see what's on that missing page."
Starfire looked at the titan's leader with some puzzlement. He was always concerned with the safety of his teammates, yet he was also driven by his need to solve a mystery. Obviously, these conflicting impulses were at play here. Yet, it was odd that he so cavalierly assumed that Raven was safe.
"Perhaps," she thought, "he FINALLY realizes how much Beast Boy cares for Raven, and that as long as Beast Boy is alive, he will protect her from harm. If only he would let himself feel the same way, and understand how I feel."
Starfire and Robin were in the rare book repository. The air had the aroma of old, musty books. Furthermore, there was something else, an unidentifiable trace of something ancient. Not old as books tend to be, but ancient, as in forces that are beyond human reckoning. If either had been a fraction aware as Raven had been, they would have understood the malignant forces that had been concentrated in that room. Still, perhaps for their own safety, it is better that they did not. The two looked around the room, trying to locate the library's version of the Necronomicon. Off to the side, the two saw a pedestal with a large book on top. Moving over to it, Robin recognized it as the tome they were searching for.
"This is it, Starfire. Now, to FINALLY see what's on the missing page."
Robin opened the Necronomicon to page 359 and began the laborious process of trying to read the latin verbiage. Trying to read the written text, he muttered, "Damn it, wish Beast Boy was here. He could get through this a lot faster than I can." Slowly working his way through the text, Robin came to a sudden stop. "I don't know this. It doesn't seem to be in latin anymore." Pausing, he tried sounding the text out mentally.
"You know, Starfire, it almost looks like that galactic tongue that you were originally, speaking back at the tower. Here, it says 'Cthulhu' and here it says 'fhtagn'. Would you take a look, maybe you'll understand it." Robin moved to the side of the pedestal and let Starfire look at the book.
Starfire moved over and began looking at the page in question. After a moment, she turned pale. Turning the page, she continued to read. Finishing the page, she turned back to the start and read it again. As she turned the page, her hands clenched into fists. As she finished the second page, a snarl passed across her face.
With one quick motion, she tore the offending page out of the book. Holding it in her hand, she marched towards the glass wall separating the repository from the antechamber. Without a moment's thought, she walked through the glass wall without blinking, towards the, already shocked, Dr. Warren. All the while, she was saying something in Tamaranean, something that didn't sound pleasant. The wall shattered and fell into shards around the titan from the stars. Moving over to Dr. Warren, she grabbed him by the collar and held him aloft.
"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU HAVE HERE? YOU STUPID, FOOLISH HUMAN!"
Running after her, Robin tried to hold her back, "Star, don't hurt him! What does it say?"
Turning to her leader, she shouted, "I SHOULD NEVER HAVE LISTENED TO YOU. I SHOULD HAVE EVACULATED THE PLANET IMMEDIATELY THREE DAYS AGO!"
"Star, what is it?" said Cyborg.
Attempting to get her emotions under control, she said, "It is the most dangerous information in the entire universe. It is the END of the universe!"
Robin, Cyborg and Dr. Warren looked confused. "I'm sorry, Star, I don't understand." Said Robin.
"It is a ritual for raising dead Cthulhu. A detailed description of the steps needed to raise R'yleh and resurrect Cthulhu. It describes the steps and the necessary celestial forces that will bring him back."
"Would it work?" asked Robin.
Starfire looked incredulously at the Boy Wonder. "Would it WORK? NO SANE BEING WOULD TRY IT! Do you not understand? Resurrecting Cthulhu means the end of EVERYTHING! I would not begin to experiment on this. This information SHOULD NOT BE!" With that, she held aloft the page and, with her energy bolts, incinerated the page before their eyes.
"NOOOOOOO!" Cried Dr. Warren, "That page is priceless, irreplaceable."
"Good. This knowledge is too dangerous to exist."
"No information is too dangerous to exist." Replied Dr. Warren. Starfire looked at the president as if he were insane.
"Are you mad? Robin, I cannot believe that humans are this stupid, this insane, this childish, that they can not believe that there is knowledge that is better off destroyed."
Robin looked at the princess from the stars. "Uhh, actually, that is the philosophy of most scientists and human beings." Starfire looked at Robin with absolute astonishment on her face. She began talking rapidly in Tamaranean, none of which sounded polite.
"Well, it doesn't matter. I'm not giving this a chance to survive. We are going BACK to the tower and I'm going to call the Grand Council like I originally intended and we are going to clear this planet."
Thinking quickly, Robin answered, "Starfire, listen to me. There's still no proof that R'yleh is on earth. You admitted that there was no way to know if the ritual would work. The author was a madman, everyone admits that." Starfire nodded. "This could just be the ravings of a madman. The fact that it is in the galactic tongue only means that he was in contact with SOMEONE from the galaxy, not that he knew what he was doing. So, we are still back where we were. We need to find Dr. Carter and find out what is going on. We can't evacuate seven billion people without proof. The populace wouldn't be able to handle it."
Dr. Warren looked startled at this last pronouncement. "What do you mean evacuate the earth?"
While Robin and Starfire were in a battle to determine the fate of the planet, Cyborg explained the situation that had arisen with the knowledge of Cthulhu. Dr. Warren paled and looked like he was about to faint. "But, but, where would we go, what would we do?" he asked.
"Starfire, do you see this? This is an educated, knowledgeable human. And he would not be able to handle being relocated to another planet." Robin responded.
"Robin, it doesn't matter. The safety of the universe is more important. Are you telling me that the seven billion humans on this planet are more important than the billions upon billions of inhabitants on thousands of other planets?"
The Boy Wonder had to think fast, he could tell he was losing this argument. "Starfire, we still have no PROOF. I'll make an agreement with you, if we can determine that R'yleh is on earth AND that Cthulhu is in danger of rising, I'll agree to the evacuation of the planet."
Starfire looked uncertain at this, she had grown to love the earth and its crazy, childish inhabitants, but this was CTHULHU.
"Starfire, for me," said Robin, looking tenderly into Starfire's eyes, hoping to convince her to spare the planet.
Slowly, reluctantly, Starfire nodded agreement. She would continue to wait until there was proof.
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A short chapter I'll admit, but one, I hope, packed with considerable action. OK, not fighting, but some interaction between characters and explanation of the situation. We've got one more chapter in Arkham, then on to Innsmouth.
Meanwhile, although I've very few readers, I'm enjoying writing this. I am starting to wonder if I shouldn't change the categorization from horror to just pure action/adventure. No, I'm not changing my storyline. (It will ALWAYS be a tribute to Lovecraft), but I'm wondering if it doesn't fail the test of being classified as horror. Maybe there really hasn't been much horror. I tend to think it's more suspense myself. I can in no ways compare to the master in building atmosphere and tension. Much of HP's horror came from the finale (as will this little tale), so I leave it to my (rare) readers, should I recategorize this or not?
By the by, all of the books, save one, are mentioned prominently in Lovecraft's work. Only ONE book I cheated on. Robert Chamber's King in Yellow is a real book. I have a copy (took me years to get one). NO, it's not an arcane book of evil, but a collection of stories. Lovecraft mentions it in two essays, one on the Necronomicon, where he attributes the book to being inspired by Chamber's reading of the Necronomicon, the second in his essay on supernatural horror in literature, where he pays tribute to Chambers as inspirational and wishes he had continued in the genre.
Meanwhile, as always, my thanks to my reviewers. Only two this time, but two faithful friends.
Novus Ordo Seclorum - Yes, I've tried to make it seem as if there is a 'daredevil' aspect to looking into the Necronomicon. Given the first category of readers, you have to wonder, how many 'normal' people have read the book and are walking around. And what is the REAL influence of the book. That remains to be seen. There is much to go in our story.
The Force is Strong With This One – Personally, I liked the idea of a liability waiver. I thought it a 'cute' idea regarding allowing the titans access to the book. Glad you've enjoyed the latest chapter.
Meanwhile (sigh), so few readers. Still, I'm grateful to those of you faithful out there. I consider you friends.
Until next time, sleep well.