Yesterday
was the birthday of cult horror icon, HP Lovecraft. Thru his writing, he has indirectly had
massive impact on the world of fiction, so I decided to do another rewrite on
one of his old works. I have done this
writing exercise 3 times prior, One, Two, and Three.
Standard Introduction
I am a fan
HP Lovecraft. Not his god-awful racism
of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way. I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t
find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of
adjectives". But the ideas in the
stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern
horror are often great.
The idea
of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and
hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the
stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.
What is
also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain. They can be re-printed, referenced, and even
re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the
writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist. (Seriously, why did you name the cat that
Howie? Did you think it was funny?)
Today’s Entry
Today’s
entry is a continuation of yesterday’s.
As I said, the stub of a story “The Secret Cave” was written by HP when
he was 7 and could easily have been adapted to be a much larger story in his
adult years, but instead it was only published as the unfinished work of a
literal child long after HP’s death.
I have
already proven the story had more legs than the stub gave it credit for as this
is Part 2, each part of which is longer than the original. I hope this story makes sense and is
enjoyable.
If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least his work in horror. I believe he
wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.
Anyway,
here is the story. I hope you enjoy it.
The Secret Cave or John
Lee's Adventure, pt2
The melody
returned for a moment and then faded.
John and Alice began walking with quick steps as fast as they could
without their candles flickering out from the movement. They could hear the melody again every few
minutes, but kept step in a straight line as best they could and eventually
reached water.
“What?”
asked John.
“Look,”
said Alice pointing at something, the light of her candle reflected off a metal
plate hanging from a chain on the side of a rowboat.
They moved
toward the boat. It was old but in good
shape, there were oars, some dusty bottles, rope that looked stretched from
overuse and near its breaking point. It
had all the things a little boat would have.
It also had the small locked box from before.
“What is
that doing here?” asked Alice.
“I don’t
know,” said John, setting down his candle and picking up an oar to brandish
like a too long club. “But whoever put
it here must be strong.”
They stood
there thinking over what they should do, “We should get in,” said John.
“What,”
asked Alice.
“We should
get in and leave,” said John. “If there
is a boat it must be able to get in here, so there is a way out. We should get out.”
“This
shouldn’t be here,” said Alice. “You said
it, we went away from the sound of the ocean, there shouldn’t be water.”
They heard
the whistling melody, it was louder and clearer. It was closer.
“Yeah, we
should get in and go,” said Alice.
They pushed
the boat into the water and ever aware of the loud splashing sounds they made
tried to haul themselves into the little craft.
Alice dropped her candle into the water but John’s stayed lit and they
used it to light another, the last candle, from the box. John began rowing, but being 10 is not being
an adult, he was too small and not strong enough for powerful strokes. They moved too slowly out into the darkness
of the still water, away from the shore of the cave, and away as best they
could from whatever was making the melody.
The water
was salty, warm enough that they knew it was from outside. But the water was so still and so dark. Where was the movement water splashing in
from a beach should have? Where was the
current and tide?
Then they
heard it, the sound of something large dive into the water from the shore. Something was coming for the boat, and they
were not far enough away to be safe.
They felt the small waves of something moving toward the boat smack the
sides of the craft. John pulled up the
oars and again brandished one as a club but the unsteadiness of the boat kept
him from standing for a power swing.
As the
light of the candles reflected off the ripples cast in the water, the figure
took shape. It looked like a broad-shouldered
man, weighed down by heavy clothing like a black coat, bobbing wordlessly thru
the water toward the boat.
“What do
you want?” yelled Alice at the wordless figure.
The figure’s arms moved him closer to the boat with each wide
stroke. “What do you want!?”
His hand. No, it’s hand, clasped to the rim of the
boat. The black skin and blue
fingernails of its grip started to tilt the whole thing to one side.
“No!”
yelled John smashing the fingers with an overhead swing of the oar. The black skinned hand pulled back into the
water and everything was still once more.
“Where did
it go?” asked John.
“Down,”
said Alice. “I think.”
The water
was still and the boat floated along its surface in the darkness with no more
sound than a leaf on a pond.
“John,”
said Alice. “Look up.”
John turned
his eyes to what should have been the blackness of a cave ceiling, what he saw
instead were stars. It was a night sky
glittering above them. “What?” he said.
“I don’t
know,” said Alice. “We didn’t leave the
cave. And even if we had, it wouldn’t be
night time.”
Gazing
harder John saw one star in particular glowing bright green. “That shouldn’t be there,” said John.
“What?”
asked Alice.
“Do you see
any constellations?” asked John. “I
don’t see Orion or the Big Dipper.”
“I don’t
know any constellations,” said Alice.
“But I don’t see the moon.”
The boat
started listing. Something was knocking
it from side to side from underneath.
“John!”
screamed Alice.
“Get
ready!” John yelled. “We might have to
make a swim for it!”
“I can’t,”
screamed Alice.
“Just hold
on to me!” said John as the boat barrel rolled.
The candles
extinguished as they hit the water, but the world did not go dark, instead the
starlight seemed to intensify and the water became clear like the fresh air of
a glade with rivulets of light cast thru the surface, like beams of the sun
thru a tree canopy.
Alice
flailed trying to orient herself but seemed to be tumbling thru the water in
terror. The heavy lock box sank a short
distance and then hung under the water.
The rope unspooled in the water like the roots of a lily pad. The oars and boat were floating along the
surface along with all the bottles. The
man in the heavy cloths outlined against the light of the night sky was still
visible, gripped onto rim of the now upside down boat.
John was a
strong swimmer, he was able to dive for longer than a minute and knew a half
dozen different strokes. Alice was set to start swim lessons in the summer and
aside from treading to the edge of where her toes touched the floor of the
beach, she had never swam before.
I need to get Alice to the boat, she can
float in the air pocket, thought John.
The plan was good, but incomplete.
First, I have to get that thing
away from the boat. He lamented that
he did not have Alice to advise him on how to do that. She would have a plan before needing to take
another breath.
As he
hovered in the water looking at the flotsam drifting thru the still water in
the starlight, it all came to him at once.
His hand snatched out and took hold of the drifting rope and started
moving toward the thing while creating a looping knot. The thing kicked in the water at John, but
was slow in the water logged heavy cloths and only succeeded in getting its leg
lassoed.
John dived
away from its grasping black hands and toward the heavy box that hovered in the
water. Like the boat an air pocket was
keeping it from dropping any lower in the water, John would fix that. He lashed the other end of the rope to the
box while casting a glance to Alice who had managed to reach the surface but
was still flailing trying to keep her head above the surface.
The rope
secured he took hold of the latch and yanked it hard. The skin on his finger broke with blood from
an edge on the metal, but he didn’t notice the blood for the whoosh of bubbles
escaping the box and it dropping down beyond the reach of starlight. The rope pulled tight and the figure that had
the shape of a man and the black flesh of a monster gripped the edge of the row
boat, but its grip was wet and slipped from the boat's lip.
It found something else to grab, the foot of Alice.
It found something else to grab, the foot of Alice.
It began to
sink ever lower and now Alice was pulled with it below the surface. They only slid down a few feet below the
surface, hovering in the water as if frozen, Alice no longer clawing to get
above the surface, just stretching up as there were no more bubbles coming from
her mouth and her eyes lost the light of consciousness.
Dangling
below her, caught between the weight of the box and the buoyancy of the girl
was the thing stretched out and completely unobscured by bubbles. Lit by starlight, John could almost see its
face. The skin was black as coal, gaunt
as a skeleton, and flesh stretched tight as a leather rack. The hollows of its skull where eyes should be
showed no emotion, and the place where a mouth should be agape and screaming in fear, there was only a smooth place where no sign of lips had ever been.
John
floated there in the water taking in the image and another idea came to him
then. He swam to the surface and
snatched a floating bottle and smacked it hard against the upside-down boat
shattering it, nearly dropping it with his already bleeding hand. John dove back down, kicking down deeper into
the water, and taking hold of Alice’s leg to steady himself.
John
slashed at the creature’s hand with the broken bottle, drawing a small mist of
blood but no sign of pain from the monster.
John began driving the sharp glass into the thing’s fingers, sawing at
them. Breaking the flesh, then tendon,
and tearing at the joint. The first two
fingers came free with a much thicker gout of black blood clouding the water.
John was
halfway thru the thing's third finger when Alice’s foot slipped free. The weight of the creature no longer pulling her down, Alice floated quickly to the surface.
Down, down,
down, and out of sight went the eyeless, mouthless, coal blooded thing.
John turned away from the abyss and swam to his sister, who was now floating face up in the water, eyes shut. The water remained still as he pulled her
over to the upturned boat and shook at her.
“Alice!”
A sudden
spurt of water and gunk sprayed from her coughing mouth as she burst back to
consciousness and shrieked with her sore throat.
“Alice,”
John said. “It’s me!”
“John?” she
was still yelling and flailing in the water.
“It’s here!”
“No!” John
yelled. Taking her hand and pulling her
to the boat. “It’s gone! It’s gone.”
Taking hold
of the boat Alice was crying and John was dropping off an emotional high. They had been stalked, been upturned, fought,
drowned, and he had sent something to the bottom of… an ocean? The water was brackish in his mouth, less
salty and warm than it had been in the cave.
It was not ocean water. Were they
in a sea or lake?
The sky?
The cave? Where are we? John thought.
“Alice,”
said John. “I want to go home. I think I have had enough adventure.”
“Yeah,” she
said thru tears, almost laughing, then coughing sickly to get more drool and
water out of her chest. “Me too.”
They heard
a ‘thump’ as their boat bumped into a large stone in the water. It was massive and smooth, the type they
might put off shore to break up too strong a wave and protect the coast.
Alice and
John climbed up on the stone, marveling at it, wondering how far they had
drifted under the sky of strange stars.
They left the boat to float near the stone. As they stood atop it the starlight allowed
them to look out and see, peeking out from the water were more stones, the
children were standing on the out most ring of boulders arranged in some kind
of pattern.
“Wow,” said
John. “What is this?”
“I don’t
know,” said Alice.
This was
when the starlight began to fade as clouds rolled over the sky and darkness
covered everything. John and Alice held
hands and sat on the stone to wait out the night.
“John!” There
was a man’s voice calling out. “Alice!”
The call
echoing as if off the walls of a cave.
It was the voice of their father.
The light of a lantern rested on the two children in the darkness
revealing them in their soaking cloths to their parents.
John and
Alice’s mother and father rushed to sweep them into hugs, followed by kisses,
and then admonishment for going in the cellar, and then more hugs and kisses,
and then more admonishment for going into these tunnels, “This is so dangerous
you are not doing anything or going anywhere for months! Years!” was the ultimate sentiment.
The
lantern’s light also fell on something no one thought to notice till all of
the, ‘we’re-so-happy-you’re-all-rights’ and ‘we’re-furious-with-you-twos’ were
said. The lantern light fell on a series
of stones arranged in the pattern of a twisted and curling star and the wall
beyond the pattern, covered in glittering bits of stone set into the wall and a
gleaming green gem as a point of prominence.
There was a
message, written in an old romantic language carved into the rock with some old
lost tool. It read, “Las estrellas son realmente preciosos”.
The stars
are truly beautiful.
The End
Additional Commentary
My rewrite
is lightyears different than the inspiring material. So much so that I almost regret associating
the two. If you at all enjoyed this story,
please comment below and share it with other who enjoy such adventure
stories. Thank you for reading.
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I really enjoyed reading this. You did a very good job!
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