Drummond held out the book. “You stupid bugs. What would you do with this anyway? It’s too late: the seals are broken. Where can you go? What can you do? Even if you made it back to the surface, the world you know will have ceased to exist. You are not even specks of dust compared to the Old Ones. They have slumbered below the earth and between the slim sheets of reality for nearly as long as this tiny world has existed. They have dined on the massive saurians, the megafauna, and billions of other forms of life who rose to believe they were the rulers of the surface domain.” Drummond’s face was contemptuous. “You are but caretakers, squatters, until the time is right for the Great Cthulhu – and that time is now.”

He stepped to the side. “Show them, Father. Show them the true face of beauty.”

Beside him, there came the bubbling viscose sound again, and finally the cowled figure reached up and pulled back the cloth.

Matt heard Adira draw in a breath at the revelation of the creature’s form. It was the first time he had ever heard the woman issue even the tiniest sound of trepidation.

Drummond looked over his shoulder, and then back to Matt, Adira and Abrams. His eyes shone with a manic love. “I’m so rude; of course you haven’t been formally introduced. I’d like you all to meet the first Father of us all.” He clasped his hands together like a teenager meeting a pop star, and he beamed up at the thing.

An octopus, Matt thought. The creature defied reality. It gave the impression of being bipedal with a vaguely humanoid shape, but now that Matt looked closely, he couldn’t actually see where the feet touched the ground, or if there were feet at all. As he stared, the thing actually looked embedded into the dark sand as if it grew up out of it. Upon its shoulders, there sat a bulbous, pulsating sack with two lidless, yellow eyes that stared dispassionately at the three of them. There was no nose: just a couple of slits for air holes. Below that, the real madness began, with a nest of tendrils and suckered tentacles that writhed and squirmed. In among the coiling mess, there was a dark hole that opened wide.

“Behold the beauty of our kingdom. You will serve us as Shoggoth or your meat will be our food.” It lifted an arm, and at first Matt thought it was going to point back along the way they had come, but instead, the dripping paddle-shaped hand extended long slimy fingers. To his horror, the fingers kept coming, shooting forward, splitting in two, and two again, then thickening to become branches. The first dark branch scooped up their guns and flung them away toward the rock face. Then the other appendages came for Matt.

Matt held up his hands across his face, but Adira never flinched. She just turned side on into a wide-legged combat stance and let one of her own hands flash out. The compressed salt dagger shot at the tall being nearly faster than the eye could follow, burying itself into the center of its disgusting face.