A Lonely and Curious Country by Matthew Carpenter, Steven Prizeman, Damir Salkovic

in our dreams, and in the history of Innsmouth itself. How did I and my cousin not see the truth? For eighty-thousand years that which had been our great-great-grandmother had dwelled within Y’ha-nthlei. Were we to believe that for all that time that hidden metropolis had lain off the coast of Innsmouth and never before interacted with her neighbor? Why was it that only the men of Innsmouth were forced to take veiled brides? Why weren’t the women forced into unholy matrimony with new and terrifying husbands?
    I know why now. I know the secret of cyclopean and many arched Y’ha-nthlei. I know what lascivious purpose those rare, fertile male members of the Deep Ones and their hybrids are enslaved to. Stupendous and unheard of splendors indeed! We shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever, that was the promise. Yet that wonder is the thing called Y’ha-nthlei, an ancient and titanic thing, so huge that monstrous barnacles and corals and her own children have colonized her flesh, dwelling like parasites; like remoras and hagfish, like leeches on their own birth mother. And the glory for her rare sons is to be entombed in her own flesh, chained inside her birth canal to fertilize her eggs as they move through that terrible channel. My destiny is to live forever as a slave to the inhuman needs of an ancient and terrible goddess as she gives birth to thousand upon thousand perhaps millions of hideous spawn. This is the honor, the wonder, the glory promised me by Pth’‘thya-l’yi and her sisters. It is the promise made by Y’ha herself, who was once Y’ha-dra, but is now Y’ha-nthlei, the city-goddess Y’ha and her betrothed the nthlei, insignificant things that do not even warrant names. As I made that casual and cursed glance back toward her and saw from above that great black pool and realized that as I gazed into it, that huge single eye of cyclopean Y’ha-nthlei, so too did it gaze into me. I heard her speak as I she watched me leave, heard her terrible and monstrous words as she called me, her own rebellious child, back to where she said I belonged. I heard her, and her very voice bellowing in my head drove me mad.
    They are in the streets. Are those the furtive, cautious steps of men in boots, or Deep Ones with claws? Are those the sounds of guns on shoulders, or scales rubbing against themselves in the cold night Innsmouth air? Does it matter?
    In my head they call to me, and tell me of their plans. Innsmouth is finished; it is too dangerous to stay. Y’ha-nthlei must move, she and those who are bound to her in unspeakable betrothal, and all of her children must migrate to deeper waters, where men with bombs cannot find them; a place where they can once more lie and feed and breed in peace. They want me; they need me to come with them. She needs me. There is a place prepared, and it is a sin to leave it unoccupied.
    They’re at the door below, smashing through.
    I have only moments before I am captured. Whether I have been caught by the Daughters of Y’ha-dra or the soldiers that occupy Innsmouth, I cannot yet tell.
    I hope it is the soldiers; they at least might kill me.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Project Handbasket
     
    Rebecca J. Allred
     
     
    02/28/2017
    Name: George W. Denton
    Gender: Male
    DOB: 12/10/75
    Admitted from outside facility, Lincoln County State Prison
    Chief Complaint: Danger to self and others
    History of Present Illness: Mr. Denton is a former family medicine physician with no known personal or family history of mental illness. According to the patient’s daughter, Mr. Denton went on a six month humanitarian mission to South America last year. When he returned, Mr. Denton—a lifelong atheist—began regularly attending church services. When questioned about his sudden change of faith, Mr. Denton was said to reply only that he was “preparing.” Approximately six months ago, there was an acute change in Mr. Denton’s personality. He