the Monument on the Bay (K'Tulu rising, the first phase)

“…Are you going in?”1

I’m thinking about it. I know I should be frightened to, but I'm not scared at all. I feel that I know every inch of this graveyard, which is impossible, seeing how big it is. Its haunted, of course, but I seem to recall that during the day they only whisper; the spirits calmed by the oppressive force of the sun.2

But it is night, now, and the whispers have become shrieks, and moans, and a multitude of squelches and splashes as they walk through the marshy grounds.3

It probably wasn’t always a marsh, for who would bury their dead in a place where they may be exhumed by the next rainfall? Or they may be pulled away by erosion to float along rivers or the sea until they catch the fancy of a passing gator, or wash up in underneath a bridge in the city somewhere, where the ghost will scream and howl, bemoaning the disturbance of its rest, until, bit by bit, it disperses, as ghosts tend to do, and makes noise no more.4

No, this was a graveyard on firm ground, before the floods. The dead buried here are old, save for them of the Monument.5

“Well? Are you going in?” he asks again. It’s the monument he wants me to go see. 6

How strange… Its not as if I haven’t seen the Monument before. In fact, I know it intimately; the largest funerary statue ever built in the United States, surpassing in size even the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier up there in Washington DC. It extends along the shoreline from one end of the graveyard to the other; death and his lengthy scroll, larger than life and cast in sealed, blackened bronze, staring evermore out to the sea.7

The statue of Death portrays him tastefully, without the unnecessary vanitas of the ever-present death’s head that bedecks his likeness usually. He is simply a cloaked figure, his features hidden by the intricate folds of his robe. In one skeletal hand, he has his scythe, and in the other is the scroll; an enormous list of names, unrolled all the way to the other side of the graveyard; at the termination of the peninsula. Under each name is the corresponding tomb. The names are many. The tombs are all full. It is only by chance that the Monument is in a graveyard. It’d probably have been built wherever their bodies washed up. But, as luck would have it, they washed up there; among the salt marshes and crumbling marble and granite of a cemetery so old it has no name. And, under the restraining hand of Death, that is where they remain.8

The statue of Death stares out to sea because that is where it happened, and his head is lowered in respect for the event. There is a plaque at his feet that explains what occurred, but we don’t need to read it. I can tell you. I remember the story in full detail.9

See, there used to be cruise ships that ran in and out of this bay. It was where they ported; in the city, on the opposing shore. The aptly named Charon was one such boat; returning to port with a capacity of passengers after a long roundabout tour of some of the islands that Louisiana’s second flood turned the bottom half of the state into. The journey had been picture-perfect. The weather was nice, and they’d encountered zero complications until the ship ran across the jetstream.10

They didn’t know what else to call it. The entire vessel shuddered and halted as it ran into the extreme water pressure of a vicious upwelling of cold water. A few hours passed, in which the Captain did his best to calm the passengers and assure them that of course he knew why they were stopped, and that the problem was being fixed right away. He told them it was a hidden hotspring, some kind of geiser that had opened on the bottom of the bay. And they couldn't move because of an engine problem, which was in no way related to the multitudes of black shapes lurking just out of sight in the deep water.11

Just when people were starting to believe him, the boat sank.12

Usually, a large ship takes time to sink, but this happened all at once. Though the wreckage was never recovered from the bottom of the bay, it is assumed that the entire hull just dropped out of the bottom of the boat, and it capsized. It went down so fast that not a single lifeboat was filled to capacity, and those that were jettisoned were overwhelmed by drowning stragglers and sank as well. 13

And that was the start of it all; when the rescue attempts ended in the death of the rescuers, and the exhuming attempts ended in the death of the exhumers. That was the first time a place was ever quarantined for being haunted, as the bay is now. 14

Officially, it was some kind of toxic aquifer; laced with a deadly bacteria and hallucination-inducing chemicals. They suggested that everyone move as far away as possible, but many stayed, sequestered in the city. They are fairly safe, still. There is no water drawn from it into the city’s water system. They built retaining walls at the bay’s mouth to close it off from the sea, and they’ve fenced off at least 50 meters of coastal area surrounding the bay on all sides. 15

That includes, of course, the graveyard, and explains why it is so haunted: it is a salt-marsh. The bay flows into and through it.16

So what was it, you are probably wondering? What was the thing at the other end of that jet of upwelling water? What would have the motivation and ability to quench the life of whatever it can reach, and reach whatever is in its bay?17

The last line of the plaque attempts to explain that, I think, as it reads:18

"That is not dead which can eternal lie,19

And with strange ćons, even death may die.20

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.”21

What? That is the only thing on the plaque? Then how did I know about the cruise ship, so intimately? In fact, how am I reading the plaque? I am not in the graveyard, after all, I am in a car on the outside of the graveyard, and he is asking me again:22

“Are you going to go in?”23

I look over to him, and for the first time I realize that he is not there. He is dead. Died a long time ago, in the third World War. He was shot over a hundred times and then beheaded, of all things. Sure enough; there are all the bullet holes, riddling his ruined hands and any other places of exposed skin. His head sits crookedly on his neck, which is a ruin of black wire and thread where the coroners tried to sew it back on. This is how I saw him, when I peeked in his closed casket before it was sealed. If he were there, that is how he’d look. But he isn’t. Its just me, after all, speaking to myself in his voice when I ask:24

“Are you going in?”25

Of course I’m going in. That’s why I drove here, after all. I exit the car, hop a fence, and enter the cemetery, pulling one foot in front of the other as best I can through the viscous mud, trying not to breathe in the stench of decay that the place radiates like light from the sun.26

“Ok, good,” says my old, dead friend behind me. “and goodbye.”27

I’d turn and say farewell were he actually there. But he isn’t, so there’s no point.28

The dead grow silent and invisible around me as I walk near to them, and then make themselves heard and seen once more as they fall from the scope of my immediate passage. 29

“He will eat you!" something screams shrilly in the distance, "he will eat us all!". There is a chorus of moans that reaches a loud, cacophonic crescendo before settling into whispers and quiet, controlled sobbing again. 30

I count it as naught but the lunatic babble of the spirits, and push on. For ghosts are all crazy, you know. Only fragments of a person survive death, and those fragments are not oft totally coherent.31

It is too dark to see, and I continually bump into tombstones and forms that may or may not be other people, which flicker in and out of existence, the multitude of them displacing and replacing air so frequently that it has kicked up a light, erratic wind. Something dashes through the mud next to me.32

“Where is it?” it whispers softly, whimpering; the voice of a child.33

“Right there,” I reply, staring at my first glimpse of the Monument; the shadowy form of Death, partially hidden behind a mausoleum and a tangle of crosses.34

“Oh…” it says, gurgling as water issues from its mouth. I feel a tiny hand brush across mine. "You can still be real.." It says. 35

I look down at the whitish thing sliding its small, deformed hand into mine. It is ashen white and naked, though essentially bodiless. Its large, black eyes are perfectly round and oozing ichor, which streams down its face in stark contrast to the ivory of its skin gleaming in the moonlight.36

"I want to be real again..." It whispers, whimpering.37

It lets go of my hand and digs its large, disproportionate fingers into its eyes and tears downwards, ripping off either side of its featureless face. "I keep forgetting how to be something! I am forgetting me! I am not HIM!!!" Its head has caved in, and it grabs my hand, covering it in cold black ichor. "Help me," it gurgles. 38

I sit silently for a moment afterwards, listening to the muted sounds of a child screaming someplace in the night, and the multitude of maddening whispers and sighs floating through the air like gnats. It would be horrible, I think, to be dead; to go so steadily insane that, at last, you forget who you are, and piece by piece, you cease to exist. For that's what is happening, isn't it? First decays the body, then the spirit?39

I'd thought I was scared of ghosts, but I guess I'm not. If anything, I feel sorry for them.40

A pile of mud rapidly forms next to me, growing larger and larger until it is at least 7 feet high, and in the likeness of a person. It only stays for a second before collapsing on itself, raining down in a shower of muck and mosses.41

The lights of the city from across the bay have partially illuminated the Monument, and I am glad to step onto the vast, solid expanse of the scroll as opposed to the inconsistent slop of the marshlands. It is just bright enough to read the engraved names by, and I spend nearly an hour looking for a certain one.42

There is loud banging coming from the inside of some of the tombs as I look. I ignore them. The tomb I am looking for is empty, save for maybe a corpse.43

“THERE IS NO GOD!” screams a female voice from someplace behind me, “AND THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A SOUL!!”44

I am wondering if these facts disturb her as much as they should when I come across what I came to see:45

The name on the tomb is my own.46

I remember the feeling of dying. Its all I remember, really. That and my name, which is only known to me because of its inscription here, above my body.47

I remember that last breath of cold water, and the dark shapes that held my ankles and dragged anyone who was still above water down, holding them until they stopped kicking. 48

I am not sure where I have been, nor how I was able to leave in the first place. But I am back. He has brought me back.49

No, not my dead friend. And not myself. 50

Him. He who sleeps beneath these waves has called me back to him, to walk along the bottom of the ocean, where he keeps his kingdom, and to be of use to him, when he becomes hungry. 51

There was a time when he was contained to a lake under the earth. Then, the floods came, and wore the earth away. Now he is contained to this bay, and the cemetery, and the hearts and minds of those whose lives he has taken.52

One day, the waters will wash over all of the world, and all will be his kingdom. The earth will become one big Monument to him, composed of us, and even death will die.53

But now, there is only this place, for us. Pass close to the fence, if you are brave, and hear us speak. Listen well, for from the Monument comes my voice, not so much asking as pleading:54

“Are you going in?”55

It may sound like the voice of a dead friend, or a live one, or one who you think is alive, but has really died, and you’ve not yet received the news. And you may wonder to yourself;56

“Am I? Am I going in? What is in there?”57

Well, this has been my story.58

So now you know.59