[Content Warning]:
This work contains strong elements of psychological horror.
Nick took an involuntary step back as he watched his own head bounce off the floor, then tumble and roll away into the shadows. Its wretched eyes had flickered out, and its disturbing cries were silenced the moment it hit the floor, much to the frightened detective's relief. He clutched at his chest, screaming within his mind for help, for he was too scared to make even the quietest of sounds beyond his shuddering breathing. He pivoted on his heel, turning, at least he thought, in a complete circle. The blackness that enveloped him was impenetrable – like the void of space itself. He looked to his feet, only to find that although he perceived the space beneath him as solid, it was the same as the surrounding abyss.
"You're a fool if you think she loves you, if you think you mean something to her." The mocking voice of the pretend-Jennifer broke the desolate silence, causing Nick to jump violently. He snapped his head up, looking once more at the thing that seemed so hell-bent on breaking him. Without a second thought, he aimed his gun at it once more. Despite this, the abomination simply shook its head, and took a step forward. "You're a fool if you think she wants anything more from you than to rip you apart, use you for her experiments, and then sell the worthless leftovers for more efficient parts."
"Shut the hell up!" Nick was losing this mind-game, and quickly. He gave in to the creatures whims, and responded with hostility, allowing his mental barriers to crack even further.
"What's that, Nick? Can't handle the truth?" Its face twisted once more – this time into that of a ghastly pale hag, with long, knotted and matted silver hair. Its eyes were but milky, phosphorescent swirls of yellowish-white, and its terrible, fiendish smile stretched unnaturally from one ear lobe to the other, baring hideous, yellowed needles as teeth, and pulpy, black gums beneath thin, crusted lips.
"GET BACK!" The old Synth fired a warning shot past the monster's head. The sudden discharge echoed queerly in the strange void, filling his ears with a painful, disharmonious ringing. The creature's face had returned to normal, and was staring at him with a cruel, unforgiving sneer. "What do you want?! What do you want from me?!" His sights were trained on its forehead, his hands shaking violently, and his breath faltering. His trigger finger was twitching almost completely beyond his control. Every part of him was screaming at him to kill the unholy thing, and yet, he waited.
The thing's head bowed forward, hiding its ever-changing face. "I want you to suffer for letting me die, Nick Valentine..." It spoke his name with a vile hiss, then straightened itself out to gaze at him once more. The face had morphed into that of a ghoulish corpse, whose greyed flesh was rotting away as maggots chewed greedily at the necrotic tissue. One eye was missing, and the other was dangling out of its socket by a mostly devoured optic nerve. A decent chunk of its lips had been lost, and ants and grubs alike were gnawing at the putrid gums that housed yellowed, decaying teeth.
"You're not Jenny!" Whether it was fear, intuition, or by the manipulation of powers beyond his comprehension, Nick pulled the trigger. The bullet sank itself right into the nameless horror's forehead, a small stream of blood seeping down its deformed face. It crumpled to the invisible ground, curled up almost peacefully as though it were floating in the void. "And I'm not her Nick." Still cautious, he approached it to see if it was truly dead. However, its phosphorescence faded before he could get a clear look, and it dwindled away into nothingness.
Alone once more, the detective sighed in exasperation, lowering his weapon. He touched his face, and noticed that it was oddly wet. His eyes were wet, too. Had he been crying? The evidence pointed to it, but he knew that it should have been physically impossible for him to shed tears. As he turned around, he saw a new scene open up before him. It was the funeral of Jennifer Lands. Men and women draped in black circled a polished white coffin as it was carried down the grassy, winding path of an old Boston graveyard. Its destination was a freshly dug crypt at the base of a small hill. Oaks and maples swayed gently in the crisp autumn breeze at sunset, shedding their vibrant red and orange leaves as their branches rattled about, and yellowish-orange bands of light sifted in between their colossal trunks.
Unsure of where to go, or what to do with himself, Nick followed the crowd of people to the gravesite. No one noticed him, so he assumed that this was another one of the old Nick's memories that he was passively viewing. He groaned internally, wondering how long it would take for this nightmarish sequence to end, and if he would make it out alive. He was jolted from his thoughts as a gloved hand was placed on his shoulder. Whipping his head around in alarm, he was shocked to see Jill standing there in a long black dress, complete with a black veil that suggested she was supposed to be attending the funeral service.
Without thinking, Nick pulled her into his arms and held her tight, resting his head on top of hers. He shut his eyes, sighing quietly in relief as she returned his embrace. She rubbed his back gently as he trembled in her arms. "Jill...what the hell is going on?"
"Hush, my love." The young woman purred into his chest. "It's almost over." She shifted herself in his grip, sliding her arms up around his neck. Nick opened his eyes, realizing that they were in the void together. Jill's smile was warm and sincere. "There's something I need to tell you, Nicky."
"You know you can tell me anything." The detective's arms tightened around her waist, unwilling to let go. He locked eyes with her, giving her a stiff nod, letting her know that whatever it was, it would be okay.
The General laughed quietly, shaking her head. "Do you know where we are? Care to take a guess?"
"I'm not sure, but my gut says it's a lot like Hell."
"Not quite, actually." Jill shook her head almost rhythmically now, as though she were listening to some distant music that was inaudible to her lover. "Right now, you and I are existing outside of space and time. I know it doesn't sound possible, but I need you to just go with it on this one." She removed her arms from around his neck, gripping his arms firmly. Her expression turned serious. "There's one more thing."
"What's that?" The old Synth's head was spinning, and he hadn't the slightest clue of how to handle the information of his whereabouts. Question after question popped up in his mind, threatening to overtake him and drive him mad.
"I'm not your Jill." Her familiar, welcoming face then twisted into a hateful snarl, eyes hollowed out, and baring those detestable, bloodied needle-teeth that haunted the detective's every other thought. The nightmare wasn't over yet. He screamed pitifully in terror, attempting in vain to wrench himself from the monster's iron grip. It sank its dreadful fangs into his shoulder, gurgling a deep, hideous growl that matched the one from earlier on in the bedroom. It stung like salt on a freshly gouged wound. Nick panicked, grabbing the thing's head and pulling on it, desperate to get it off of him. The creature released its hold on him, removing its foul teeth from his synthetic flesh, and allowing him to fall aimlessly into the endless void.
The Synth cried out in pure terror as he plunged through the starless depths. He was wholly unaware of the passage of time, and unsure of how long he'd actually spent in that abysmal drop. It dragged on for what felt like hours, until the darkness spat him out, and onto a cold, damp stone floor. The sound of the impact echoed sharply around him, suggesting that wherever he was, it was underground. The noise was accompanied by a deep, distant, monotonous tone, which resonated evilly in the stagnant air. This tone, although far away and mysterious, vaguely resembled what only the most eccentric and open-minded, or insane and animalistic, could call "music." Nick listened closely for a moment, noting the additional accompaniment of faint drums and pipes. They impressed upon the unholy music with their rhythmic and arrhythmic rising and falling, and their queer, outright alien-sounding harmonies and dissonances that could not be compared to any sound produced by any Earthly instrument. He groaned as he scrambled to his feet, getting hit with a sudden wave of nausea. This new environment reeked of the miasmal stench of a thousand open graves. The horrendous odor pierced the detective's nostrils, causing him to promptly wretch up any liquids that were left in his system from the previous day. Luckily, there wasn't much, but it was still downright unpleasant.
Once able to look up from the rocky ground, he felt his already tortured mind cracking even further as his vision was filled with the monolithic terror before him. He could only guess at what kinds of unspeakable acts of evil were committed in such a place, judging by its stench alone – he could only wonder if the ancient structure was somehow related to the book Jill had acquired from Dunwich. If asked, he would have described the fantastical architecture as something akin to a temple, or perhaps even a cathedral. Cyclopean walls of black basalt loomed ominously overhead, their spired towers jutting spikes of various, sickly green hues. Immense arches towered above him, adorned with a myriad of spiral patterns, and a diverse collection of strange, otherworldly symbols. A cracked and worn stone staircase – with steps far too massive for a human – extended upward to a rusted iron gate. Its bars were overrun with a thick, mossy substance that sprouted tiny, spiraled purple flowers which glowed with an eerie phosphorescence. A low rumble crept in from behind the gate, and it creaked open with a dreadful metallic screech.
A heavy, polypous tendril wormed its way into view, wrapping itself around one of the great iron bars. It lurched forward revoltingly, another one following in its wake, reaching out and gripping the curved wall just beyond the threshold. Even from a distance, the petrified detective could see that the unsightly things had eyes and mouths in random places all along their grotesque lengths. The foul monstrosity jerked forward, using the wall to assist it in exiting its dwelling. At first, it appeared to be composed of globules of light, but the oddly mystifying spectacle was over in an instant. A cluster of eyes surrounded a central maw that dripped a black, viscous fluid, which sputtered outward and almost hit the old Synth as the beast let out an unearthly howl. His heart stopped abruptly for a few moments as he processed what he was seeing – it was the unspeakable horror from that accursed book. He was standing before the Great Yog-Sothoth himself.
Pure, unadulterated horror washed over Nick as he shrieked, tripping over himself in a frenzy as he turned to escape. He cried out desperately as he ran into an unknown blackness, begging God, or anyone who could hear him, to save him from this unrelenting nightmare. The ground trembled beneath him as the Outer God bellowed again, and when he dared to glance over his shoulder, he saw the full form of Yog-Sothoth in all his putrid glory, chasing him at speed. There are no words in any known language that could describe what Nick was so unfortunate to behold. He remembered the mess of writhing tentacles, violently whipping about in the air, the indescribable snapping mouths filled with jagged, yellowed teeth, and the countless bulging eyes that all glared savagely at him. He remembered the way the Beyond One's luminous globules bounced hypnotically, and the way they almost seemed to be a strangely inviting feature of their host. But worst of all, he remembered the inexplicably primal fear that surged through him, which had elicited another cry from him, and had erased all rational thoughts from his mind.
"JILL!" As though acting on instinct, Nick screamed for his beloved. "JILL! HELP ME!" He wasn't sure what compelled him to do something so useless, for he didn't believe for a moment that she could actually hear him. As far as he was aware, he was lost outside of space and time, and God only knows where Jill ended up in all this. Yog-Sothoth had nearly caught up to him – it was apparent by the creeping purplish-blue glow that extended about three feet in front of him; a light that most certainly came from those mesmerizing globules. He wasn't foolish enough to look back again. Instead, he forced his legs to carry him faster through the cavernous abyss. He couldn't outrun his pursuer, though, and he knew it. All he could hope for was a miracle. The creeping light had grown brighter, and up ahead in the distance, he could see the outline of a cliff's edge. Unwilling to accept whatever fate the terrible cosmic entity had in store for him, he braced himself to jump into the inky depths of oblivion.
Just before the detective took the plunge, he was stopped by a sudden flash of blinding white light from above. As he looked up, Yog-Sothoth hissed loudly, practically breathing down his neck. The light had stopped moving, indicating that the Outer God was either right where he wanted to be, or the strange bright flare had earned his full attention, and he'd stopped further back. Nick had to tell himself not to look at the entity again, out of fear for his diminishing sanity. He watched a figure emerge from the light, terrified at first, but was then overwhelmed by a feeling of warmth that soothed him. As this new individual approached, he could see that they had a halo of golden light shining above their head, and outstretched white wings protruding from their back. The figure was ultimately feminine, sporting polished, full-body silver armor, with a peculiar golden crest on her breastplate. She extended her arm, wordlessly telling the Synth to take her hand, and the moment she was close enough within the light of the globules, he saw her for who she was.
"My guardian angel..." Nick muttered under his breath, reaching out and grasping her hand firmly. She smiled softly at him, and her powerful wings lifted him off the ground, taking him away from that dreadful place. Why the Great Yog-Sothoth had decided to let them leave, he couldn't understand, but he was grateful to have been shown that odd act of mercy from such a significant being. He kept his eyes on Jill as she carried him into the light she'd emerged from, but he soon found that his vision was going black. His last thoughts were of relief, but also of the unspeakable horror he'd experienced.
He awoke with a start, finding himself on the familiar wooden floor of the Old State House bedroom. Sunlight poured in from the windows, softly illuminating the room, the position of the slanted shadows indicating that it was about nine-o'clock in the morning. Glancing over at the bed, he saw Jill sitting upright, deep in a meditative state. Hancock was on the couch to his left, looking at him as though he too had caught a glimpse of an unspeakable cosmic entity. The Synth used the wall behind him to assist him in standing up. He was in a daze, unsure of the reality of everything that had happened overnight.
"Are you alright?" Hancock's voice trembled ever so slightly, giving away an underlying fear of something. He sat forward with his elbows on his knees, hands hiding his mouth as his eyes remained cast downward – he was staring vacantly at the wicked tome from Dunwich, which was open on the coffee table. He wouldn't look up at his friend, but could only continue to glare hatefully at the damnable book.
"I...I think so..." Nick rubbed the back of his head, noting that it was aching for some unknown reason. He turned to face his lover, who was just coming back from her trance. She breathed deeply, slowly opening her eyes, and looking at him for a brief moment before she jumped down from the bed, wrapping him in a tight embrace. He locked his arms around her, and although he was absolutely certain that he'd successfully escaped the terrors of the night, he couldn't help but wonder if this was just another rouse, meant to drag him into a false sense of security before torturing his mind yet again.
"I'm so sorry..." Jill's voice cracked as she trailed off, beginning to sob into the detective's bare chest. He was tempted to inquire as to what she was apologizing for, but decided against it as Hancock strode up to the two of them, and threw his arms around their shoulders. Nick decided it was best to accept a temporary silence, for there would already be much to discuss among the three of them. He resigned to the tranquility of the moment and shut his eyes, breathing deeply, and basking in the glow of the morning sun.