To sleep, perchance to dream

 A nightmare gripped me last night, somehow I have torn my bed covers and the sheet is tangled out of place, literally drenched in sweat.

There were creatures, more fish than man, blazing yellow eyes, bulbous and baleful.  Transparent needles for teeth and unnaturally wide mouths, drooling greenish saliva.  They hopped, frog like, sudden and terrifying, their eyes split apart, pointing wildly around with a feverish aspect, hunting for prey.

Draped across them, dragging behind were rotting fronds of some vegetable matter not unlike sargassaum, the stench filled my unconscious mind, making me reel with something akin to sea-sickness.

In the darkness their mottled skin worked as excellent camouflage, they expertly stuck to the shadows as they inevitably made their way across the quad towards my dormitory - their razor sharp claws glinting in the moonlight.

Up the main staircase, dripping and drooling on the already spoiled carpets and straight to my door - clawing and bubbling angrily from their sub-aquatic gills.

God only knows how, but the door held - when I awoke, in a panic I spent a while just curled up like a fetus in the ruined bed, breathless - listening in abject terror expecting knife-like claws at any moment - the dream has been so vivid.

When I gathered my courage and checked the door it was covered in sticky groolish discharge and marked by many bite and claw marks - I shan't be able to cover this up.

It was real.  What can these creatures want from me?

In the miserable light of this, I have decided to expedite my move of residence to Arlington - I shall charter a flight from Arkham Aerodrome as soon as is humanly possible - I have to face the reality that there is actual horror lurking in the shadows.

A pleasant distraction

A pleasant day, my aunt came to town, making some excuse about other business in Arkham to pay me an extended visit, it was unusual for a Tuesday - but once it was in progress I found it most welcome to actually speak to another human being - I wasn't aware quite how misanthropic I had become until it was unexpectedly interrupted.

She had stopped along the way for supplies - a foil sealed container of British tea (sourced from the indies) and a classic Banbury cake -  an oval aspect with three slashes across the top.  In 1869, Robert Chambers wrote, in his Book of Days, the cakes “are exported to the most distant parts of the world, one baker alone, in 1839, disposing of 139,500 twopenny ones.  It was quite delicious.

Conversation was of the normal puerile sort, but against my misery it was somewhat welcome to just airily chatter about very little of consequence.

I avoided the subject of the odour in the halls, explaining that it was a malfunctioning W.C. on one of the other floors.  I couldn't help but notice my Aunt was wrinkling her nose at times and obsessive with her nosegay - a floral affair drenched in cheap perfume.  I didn't blame her - the reek was as bad, maybe even worse than yesterday.  I don't expect another visit in the near future - well, at least until the carpets are stripped out - there are already rude notes on the notice board on the ground floor - other residents are enraged - and the trail leads right to my door.

Collapse

I'm on the verge of collapse through lack of sleep, so these words may not tally with sense, but please God - curse the idiocy of the jealous.

After a terribly long night (neither you or I need the dreary details), I crawl back here only to find a fearful mess in the dormitory halls around my room.

This "prank" (as I can only assume it to be) was to deposit several heaps of sea kelp, in an advanced state of decay all around the path I normally take upstairs, and if that wasn't bad enough, it was spread about in a peculiar fashion, as if kicked around with some venomous vigour (obviously just to make the job of tidying it up all the more tiresome) who would be so gratuitous?

Although the unhappy and onerous task of cleaning up is now largely complete, I must make further comment, if only thanks to the strangely horrid and foetid stench - it was almost impossible to bear (not to mention the blackened stains on the carpets from the effluent that oozed from this flaccid and slimy matter) and despite several good sessions with a nail brush and disinfectant, it has proven quite impossible to remove all traces of the reek from either the carpets or my fingers, thus the smell is destined to remain in my nostrils despite the removal of the bulk of the source material to the communal trash, outside the apartment block.

I shall have to bury my hands away from my face in order to sleep well tonight, or dreams of rotten things from the depths are more likely than the ever-distant "sweet dreams" of fairy tale.

Quite how these disgruntled individuals discovered my news, or why they would visit upon me such a peculiar torture if not, I simply cannot fathom. I have kept everything perfectly quiet from those I believe may wish to undermine me, but none-the-less these closet pranksters have fallen upon me with their usual venom and in a typically pathetic fashion. Thank goodness the door to my apartment held, despite the obvious signs that some measure of force was applied thereupon. Perhaps they were disturbed before they could spread the muck anywhere more damaging, and embarrassed by their actions, fled.

I can't help but cling to the hope (in revenge) that the stink of the crime will taint the guilty, as it has my innocent self, but at least I know that things could have been worse, and come the next few days, all this petty nonsense should be far behind me.

Delivery

It came this morning!

Not quite what I was expecting - either a letter of rejection or acceptance, but what did arrive is clearly good news.

It was waiting for me in my pigeon hole at the foot of the main stairs. So unassuming, just a plain white window envelope, the postman had been forced to peel back a little of the paper in order to see my dorm room number, as the contents were improperly folded.

It read simply -

"Dear Dr Lynch,

I'm pleased to inform you that after merit review by our expert panel, application reference #23428DDP, has been successfully approved for funding.

As requested in the original proposal, the third party (NPY Industries) has been automatically informed of your willingness and valid grant to assist in their endeavours.

Please expect further clarification of duties to be communicated, by the third party, in the near future.

Yours Sincerely,

Mr R Morris, Finance Director

National Science Foundation, Arlington, Virginia"

This is terrific, quite beyond all hope! I can't wait to hear more, the original advert was rather amiguous, but now is the time! I can put all my learnings to some useful function. No more the dreary corridors of academia!

And, most importantly, if God will help me, I'm sure I can find my sea legs.

Aloneness, Alienation

I'm not sure quite why I had my hopes held up so high, it's embarrasing really. Why would they have wanted me?

I don't even know why I am typing this, he must have driven me neurotic, all those hours spent listening to the Professor, frequently the only witnesses were he and I to his ramblings, and as insane as he might have seemed, in those moments outside his normally lucid self, there was always a note of truth to his nonsensical babbling. There was something about his voice that made even the completely ludicrous something I could never quite perfectly dismiss...

It wasn't a shock though, I always knew when an attack was coming, we might be in a tutorial, or even laughing over dinner, and suddenly, he would get that look in his eye. I can only describe it as abdject horror.

It was like a different man was seated across from me, all the usual kindliness left his face, sweat beaded upon his brow and frequently his whithered, clammy hand clutched mine. He spoke, desperately, as a lunatic, but through all his nonsense, one theme stayed clear, the key to his madness, the "key to everything", lay to the east, in the Indian Ocean, I suppose that's why, when I spotted the job advert, it was auto-pilot, I couldn't resist.

The professor, God rest his soul, never remembered these episodes afterwards, repressing them perhaps, or maybe they were an outpouring of emotion from an event in his distant past, I don't suppose anyone will ever really know.

Damn it, I apologise, perhaps it's the weather, the rain hasn't stopped all day, the slack ropes on the flag pole in the courtyard have been rattling noisily through the windows since I got here, I guess the Janitor forgot to raise the flags today, or was put off by the weather.

Damn New England in the Fall. Especially being so alone, there must be some joy somewhere in the world.