They left Trent clutching its bag of coffee. As
they walked back towards the fence, Crooker tried to make sense of the deformed fishman's fractured description, recalling the strange speech patterns and the nervous way those big black eyes had moved:
“They monkeys
say: ’We have it! With this we can stop the whispering servant!’ Ptag stay in
the shadows. Humans say: "We are all followers of great Cthulhu, why are
you hiding?"! Girl points her big gun at the darkness, shakes like a
little leaf. And then the ptag say "Cthulhu servants is not coming, little
things. Behold the power of Dagon" Then the priest of Dagon steps into the
square, and the humans raise their guns to shoot him. But he reaches into their
heads so fast - and so two humans went away with him, down, down, down.”
Crooker waited for Sams to start asking questions, but she
was silent the whole way, until they reached the gap they'd cut in the fence around the ruined town before. Then: "What is… he?"
"He was an old Innsmouther. Deep ones blood –
a result of their little ‘breeding program’ with the townsfolk." Crooker
hesitated. " You know the stories?”
“People with the blood were born looking human,
and…. changed into Deep Ones between thirty and forty.”
Crooker nodded. “The genetics behind it are…
well… poorly understood at best, and good evidence our
'neighbours' from the sea can do things with genes we can’t. But Trent didn't
change the whole way. So the Deeps tried to kill him.
"Nice to have family.”
“Yeah, well, they love genetic diversity, but only
when they’re in control of it. Just by breathing Trent discredits the rule of
the priests of Dagon and Hydra; He’s a source of human genes, strong enough to
resist their own, so he had to go. But he’s sharp, or at least he was before he
found out about coffee. To hear him tell it: He played up to their expectations
of a defective, and they just left him out in the ocean to die. He didn’t, he survived
long enough to find his way back to shore, and came back to the only place he
really knew.”
“And 'abandoned ones'?"
Crooker looked around at the chaotic vegetation,
then back to Sams: Something was tickling instincts he’d not used in earnest
since his army days. I should have sent her packing, he worried. ”Oh -
the deep ones have two real churches - Mother Hydra and father Dagon.” He cast
his eyes about to pin down what was nagging at him, continuing on automatic: “Dagon
and Hydra are supposed to be alive, and swim amongst them."
"And 'Cfooloo'? It rings a bell, somewhere,
but…"
He smiled at the mispronunciation, concealing his
tension as he saw it: signs of disturbed undergrowth around them. No point
scaring her if I’m wrong, no use warning her if I’m right. "You
wouldn't have heard much about him. Cthulhu is sleeping, somewhere deep under
the ocean. So they say his followers are abandoned, without his living
protection, and that's why they're the underclass…." He trailed off. I’m
not wrong, he realised.
Sams ducked through the fence. "Did we get
enough from Trent to back track our two humans - assuming he didn't maker the
whole thing up for coffee?"
Crooker said quietly. “Tell them everything”
"Wha-?" She looked back at him, with a
confused half smile. Then she stiffened. Her hand fluttered, half moving
towards her concealed holster. Crooker shook his head urgently.
Four marines emerged from the increasing drizzle,
weapons levelled.
Crooker didn't need to turn to know there were at
least two more behind him.
Pale, more likely with fury than fear, Sams raised
her hands. She knew this might happen, he told himself as his arms were
wrenched behind his back.
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