Yellow City, Chapter Nine - a Malevolent AU
Arthur is getting a lot better at goals.
Real goals, not imagined.
And like a rock thrown into water, he is making ripples.
Chapter nine of Yellow City, a continuation of Cloud City. Note: explicit content.
AO3
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In dreams, Arthur remembered.
In dreams, Arthur saw.
In the beginning, four years ago, Hastur took Arthur unto himself to remake as he willed, for Arthur had been laid bare.
#
It began with healing.
Arthur fought.
“No! I don’t want… stop!” he tried as power flowed through him, soothing tortured nerves, easing blood flow, calming fever.
His ear was half-gone, blown off when he’d used the black mirror, and the taper in his lobe exploded.
“No,” Arthur moaned as Hastur replaced it with something that did not feel like an ear, did not feel like flesh, and Arthur wept.
It hurt in this place. Everything hurt, every time he opened his eyes and tried to comprehend more than three dimensions, a world that misshaped time like mud squeezed through clenched fingers.
Hastur healed all his wounds, and all his little illnesses (There. Now your heart will beat for many more years, unhindered), kept him and cleaned him and touched him and would not let him die.
Arthur refused to eat.
Hastur made him, anyway.
Arthur begged for death.
Hastur did not grant it.
Faroe.
Arthur was a remarkable human (according to Hastur, who knew humans, or at least thought he did), but even he could not hold on to sanity forever. After three weeks of simply being in Carcosa, denied death, Arthur could take no more, and he let go.
The cracks and scissures formed by Faroe’s wedged truth shattered, and his thoughts fell underfoot like pieces of filthy mirror.
#
In the beginning, Arthur woke.
The room shifted, blurred, settled (damn hangover) into his Cloud City apartment, perfectly safe to look at, ordinary in every way, and his partner (Hastur, for years now, Hastur) stood over him with odd limbs undulating and an eager, deep growl.
“H… Hastur?” Arthur mumbled, feeling like his lips and tongue might be made of caulk, of cotton strands and pine tar.
“Arthur,” rumbled He (funny Arthur couldn’t recall him having a body), cupping Arthur’s face with one tentacle (and his ear felt weird), directing his stuttering gaze. “Look upon me. Ah… I can taste your madness. You are ripe for picking.”
So none of that made sense, and Arthur weakly shoved at the limb under his chin. “Quit it.”
Hastur leaned in, frissoning all over in anticipation (and Arthur felt that delicate tremble against his throat). “Your mind aches. Your thoughts tremble. Love me, Arthur, and I will make it all better. It is time. Look upon me, and love me.”
And Arthur looked (and Hastur slid between cracked thoughts and seeped beneath splintered floorboards of the rickety mind-shack Arthur had built)
And Arthur loved (and always had because Hastur was his partner and it was the most natural thing to do).
And Arthur spoke. “Wh… where’s… the…” His lips were nearly numb. He licked them.
Hastur was growling (purring?) and brought a glass to his lips. “Beautiful,” he murmured.
Arthur drank. Some sweet juice; a fruit he couldn’t place, had never encountered, but oh, it was so good. He licked his lips again. “Late?”
Hastur had no eyebrows to raise. He gave the impression anyway. “Late? For what?”
“We… have a… client,” Arthur said, and rolled (slowly, agonizingly, every muscle aching) out of bed and onto the floor with a thunk.
Hastur seemed to find that funny.
“Ass,” said Arthur without rancor, and pulled himself up. “What… what did I…” It was so hard to think, like jumbled pieces of glass in a bag, clinking, impossible to put together without drawing blood.
Yes?” Hastur prompted, and tugged down Arthur’s second-best suit jacket (yellow itchy thing, too itchy, and Arthur began tearing it off almost at once).
“Don’t let… don’t… let me drink that much again,” said Arthur, disrobing like an irritated toddler. “This isn’t any good. If I…” His thoughts stalled.
Hastur tried again, tucking in Arthur’s button-down shirt (a different fabric this time, just as yellow, but Arthur did not like it on his skin, and had handfuls of it in shreds as he staggered away).
Arthur made it to the sink (some kind of… basin?) and splashed (perfumed) water on his face.
Hastur fussed again, and Arthur let him. Wherever, whatever. He needed the help today to look put-together. “If I puke and lose this client, I’m blaming you,” said Arthur.
Hastur rumbled. “Well, we can’t have that. What are you trying to do?” And he helped Arthur into (another yellow thing, this one soft as whispers, absolutely sheer and hiding jack shit, but it felt good, it felt light, airy, unconstricted, and Arthur did not tear it away) a trench coat.
“Solve the case, of course,” said Arthur.
“What case, my little detective?”
Arthur turned to glare at him, and the world spun (too much too big too angled too wrong).
Hastur steadied him. “Careful, Arthur. We can hardly have you wounding yourself after all the work we’ve put in, hm?”
Whatever that meant. “The cat.”
Hastur’s many limbs went still. “The… cat?”
“Yes. You know. Mrs. Nickerson’s cat.”
“I do not know a Mrs. Nickerson,” said Hastur, thoughtful, sounding almost confused.
“You’ve got to start reading the case files,” said Arthur, taking his hat (there was no hat) and adjusting his tie (there was only a wide collar of a light, lacy gold that didn’t itch). “If you’re going to make full partner, you need to.”
Hastur looked delighted. “Am I close to making full partner, Arthur?”
“Close. But you know that. Did you get blotto, too? Guess today’s lesson is how to handle a case when both of us are stupid hungover,” Arthur said (because it made sense because that’s why Hastur didn’t know because they’d handle this together like they handled everything). He headed for the door.
He did not feel or register Hastur picking him up, carrying him away from the wall he’d been about to run into, and letting him out the front of this temple like releasing an animal to the wild.
#
It was too bright, and too fucked up, too leaning and tall and strange, and Arthur fell to his knees, whimpering, aware for all of two seconds that he cowered under two fucking suns, that utterly inhuman beings stared his way, that he wore little more than a sheer napkin and shivered In humiliation and a light breeze.
Then the glass shards in his broken mind shifted, clinked, and he saw the rain-spattered sidewalk of Cloud City, the elegant bronze towers dimmed by eternal gloom, the ordinary dark windows staring at him like eyes he’d grown used to, living here for so long.
And he stood. And then
(Is that… a human?)
(Hastur’s human. That’s the one who stopped Y’golonac.)
(Oh, shit. He’s fucking pretty.)
(Of course he is. Did you think Hastur would bother—)
remembered where the clues led, and what the ransom note threatened, and he turned and ran.
His square-toed oxfords slapped the wet cement (his bare feet slapped on the smooth, golden pavestones) as he ran, and Hastur—who had no need to run—floated alongside him, looking utterly fascinated.
“Little detective,” said Hastur, his many tentacles just hovering around Arthur as if to keep him from running into a telephone pole. “What are you doing?”
“He’s gonna kill the cat!” Arthur cried. “That’s what the note meant! That’s the riddle!”
(What’s he shouting about?)
(I don’t—)
“Oh?” promoted Hastur. “So you’ve solved a riddle?”
“Worthy does as worthy is,” Arthur recited off the top of his head, feeling his jacket pockets (he had no pockets) to find the note. “Cat’s paw claim is sure to fizz. Wills and airs both be choked out. Can’t catch me, I am a trout.”
Hastur laughed. “What?”
Arthur ignored that laugh. He knew Hastur sometimes struggled with empathy, and it was okay, he was growing, he was learning. “It’s a play on words! Air… heir. The cat inherited it all, and he’s gonna choke the cat so he can get the Nickerson fortune!”
“Really?” said Hastur. “Well, that certainly is crea–”
“There he is!” Arthur howled, yowled, bellowed, and flung himself physically at Thomas Nickerson, ungrateful grandson of belated Helen Nickerson, spoiled all his damn life, rotten with wastrel indulgence, and cut out of the will because he’d already spent more dough than there even was to inherit, and Thomas held the fluffy white cat by the throat right out in broad daylight because he was going to choke it and throw it into the Lake (and that’s where trout came in), and—
Arthur tackled a servant carrying an armful of white linens.
He was far too small to knock the deeply confused being down. The servant spooked, anyway, three of its mouths sending up a panicked sort of hooting, trying to lift the linens, to which the human—an actual human—clung like its life depended (oh, like his life depended, that was kind of obvious, actually) on it.
“Give me the cat!” Arthur snarled. “Let go! You fucker, you’re going down for this!”
And everybody in the square (so many) stopped to see just what the hullabaloo was about, and Arthur battled (thought he fought a man half his age and half as smart) to rescue the still-breathing, panicked cat.
Hastur laughed.
And Hastur laughed.
(And the servant chirped wildly, and Hastur waved his tentacles and informed everyone that yes this was happening and the human would have his way.)
Arthur stumbled back, clutching sheets and towels, talking to them as soothingly as he could, petting between where he thought they had ears.
The servant took off.
“Go ahead and run!” Arthur shouted. “I know where you live!”
Stunned silence. Gods stood, mouths agape, staring with more eyes than usual.
Hastur laughed.
“Aw, cut it out, he can’t help having a flat face,” said Arthur, bringing the cat (warm fabrics) over. “Look at him. He’s so scared. It’s okay, buddy. It’s okay. We’ve got you now. Nobody’s going to hurt you ever again.”
Hastur was laughing so hard that golden tears splashed down his face and onto the pavestones like sparks, like drops from the sun. He struggled to speak. “You… ah… saved the cat, little detective?”
Arthur nodded, grim. “We saved the cat. That’s what matters. Let’s go get him some tuna, and then get him home. I think we got a can in the office.”
Hastur’s laughter resumed.
#
Nine years, Arthur thought as he opened his eyes this morning. Nine years was a long time to be together.
They’d solved many so cases. They’d saved so many lives. Their reputation was solid as Lester and Yellow, Private Investigators, so when Arthur had offered to take Parker in as part of that asshole’s probation, the judge agreed.
Truly, Arthur and Hastur had never hit a problem they couldn’t solve.
Except one.
Nine years. That was too long to have let this particular goal go. Arthur rolled into his partner, determined, because he’d still never made Hastur breathy, and today, by gods, Arthur would make it happen.
#
Arthur was drowning.
Arthur was bobbing to the surface for air though he’d never swum.
Arthur was
(“He’s beautiful like this, isn’t he?“)
(“About to be filleted like a fucking fish? No!“)
desperate to make Hastur sound like that, to bring him to the point of groaning, to
(“You are jealous. I understand.“)
(“Fuck you. I’m not.“)
(“You are, and you will watch as punishment.“)
find the place, discover the touch, unearth the spot that would make his partner shudder the way his partner made him.
Hastur was a hard nut to crack.
(“Oh, gods, what’s he doing?“)
(“Worshiping me.“)
And Arthur wasn’t quite sure what he did, how he did it, but somehow, he got Hastur to bloom.
To open, to spread, to expose some unknowable part of himself that Arthur chose to taste in spite of unknowability, and Arthur explored, kept his tongue busy and his hands busier (lucky birth defects, so many dicks to choose from), focusing and concentrating until
(Hastur’s breath quickened)
(So did Parker’s)
He earned a groan.
Hastur’s shudder, all those limbs writhing and twisting like waves, the heat flashing through Hastur’s hide like some kind of liquid fire just beneath that dark surface, and then
(“Oh… gods…” and Parker made a sound like going briefly airborne at the crest of a hill before coming down hard)
Hastur rumbled and the room caught on fire.
Not the room. Hastur’s pleasure, spilled and burning, and Arthur pushed through that small pain to hang on to this wildly difficult victory he’d dragged his partner through.
At some point, it blurred.
At some point
(Parker’s moan, soft, trying to stifle it, somewhere over in the corner)
Hastur took over, but he never said my turn, he never started the filleting, and when he wrenched Arthur’s climax from the roots of his soul, it hurt and fulfilled and emptied and eased and slowly calmed Arthur’s shakes and coaxed him back to breathing without screaming and wrapped him tight in the impossible incredible many-muscled limbs Hastur was lucky enough to be born having.
Arthur could barely move. The burning from Hastur’s pleasure still lingered, there, but not terrible, a pleasant heat, like the sensation after a spicy meal.
“My little detective,” purred Hastur, and closed Arthur’s eyes.
#
He woke gradually, warm but not burning, empty but not drained, and happy for it.
No thoughts. No memories. No things to shake this feeling, this safe place, this being-wanted, this—
“I don’t wanna,” said Parker, hoarse.
“You must,” said Hastur, amused. “The magic took you; embarrassment will not save you from dehydration.”
Them.
Parker.
Alive.
He remembered.
Faroe. Parker. Asenath. Hastur. Shub-Niggurath. Dag—
Dagon. He had something to do for Dagon. He had… there was…
Arthur’d had a plan, known it was good, and could not recall what It was for the life of him.
“Fine,” Parker said.
“There we go, my little traitor,” said Hastur.
Parker coughed, then spit. “Fuck you!”
Hastur laughed softly.
“I fucking swear. You get off, and you’re more of a dick than you were before!”
“Drink. Your. Juice.”
That one was a command, dark and terrible, and Arthur shivered though it only passed him by like a stampeding Waste Beast.
Parker apparently drank because he fell silent.
Arthur shifted. If he opened his eyes, would he lose his plan? He didn’t have his plan. He needed to get his plan back.
He had to be mad to find his plan.
“There you are, Arthur,” Hastur purred, turning his name into something not safe for kids.
Arthur chose to open his eyes.
It hurt and stabbed and made his eyes water until it didn’t.
Gloomy. It must be late in the afternoon. “Fuck, did I sleep all day?” he said, wiping his face.
“We are fine, little detective,” Hastur purred, touching a cold glass of some indescribable juice to his lips.
Arthur drank thirstily. Whatever Parker’s problem was, Arthur didn’t share it, and this was delicious. He finished the glass. “I had an appointment today. Did it get moved?”
“Yes, of course it did,” soothed Hastur, who seemed to be in a pretty good place and wanted Arthur to stay there, too.
“Oh,” said Arthur, and considered this seriously. “I’m not late?”
“You’re not late.”
“I… I still need…” The plan was there, clear as crystal. How could he have forgotten? “What’s your goon’s favorite food?”
Hastur purred. “Which goon, little detective?”
“Miss June’s. I don’t know her last name. Not trying to be disrespectful.”
“Her last name no longer matters. And her favorite food is fish.”
“Fish. Yeah, that tracks.” The plan was coming together. “Do we have a bunch of fish?”
Hastur chuckled darkly. “We certainly can. Why?”
“I want to pay her to go someplace. Wait, she’s not here listening, right?” said Arthur, raising his head to look around.
Parker stared up at him, looking wrecked. His hair stuck out. He was unshaven. He looked like he’d seen the ghost of his grandfather.
“No, little detective. She is not here,” said Hastur.
“Okay. Here’s what I wanna do. I want to hire her to come with me today, and I know we don’t have the extra budget to pay her properly.”
"Budget is not an issue,” said Hastur. “She will go where I say.”
“Sure, but I won't rob a dame of her time. I want to bring her with me to meet Dagon.”
Hastur went still.
“But... why?” said Parker, voice high, sounding lost.
“Because no father should be without his kid,” said Arthur, low, rough, and then fell into
(rolling twisting screaming sobbing)
something. A headache. Maybe being hungover. Yeah.
Parker was standing (when had he done that?) and staring at Arthur with wide-eyed horror.
Arthur’s cheeks itched, and his breath was unsteady. The light was different, as if time had passed. It felt like he’d been crying, and tears had dried on his skin. That made no sense. He tried to scratch.
“No, no,” Hastur gently chided, and cleaned his face.
Arthur immediately forgot about it. “So that’s what I’d like to do. I mean, we have that appointment. Might as well bring her along in an official capacity so… you know. She won’t just take off.”
“Wait, we're back to that? I’m not getting this,” said Parker, and scratched irritably at his five o’clock shadow. “Is this about the vote?”
“No,” said Arthur. “Dagon couldn’t be bribed, anyway. I mean, he’s not a good person, or anything, but he’s like a lot of these mob bosses: they have a set of standards, their own right and wrong. If I tried to bribe him, it’d backfire.”
Parker stared. “But what are you trying to do?”
“You have been answered,” said Hastur. “And… perhaps he is right. I have… kept her from him, though it was my right. It has also been my right to return her.” He seemed thoughtful. “And he did treat my pet very well.”
“What the fuck are you saying?” said Parker.
Instead of answering, Hastur changed the subject by picking Arthur up and dressing him. “Sing for me, Arthur.”
Immediately, Arthur sang, lilting into a folk-song that grew more haunting as he went. “‘Oh, where are you going?’ said Milder to Moulder / ‘Oh, we may not tell you,’ said Festel to Fose / ‘We're off to the woods,’ said John the Red Nose / ‘We're off to the woods,’ said John the Red Nose.”
Hastur chuckled darkly. “Of all things for him to choose…”
“What?” said Parker. “It’s just an old bar song.”
“Is it, though?” rumbled Hastur.
Arthur loved this song. It suited his voice, and he could make it achingly sweet, hinting with just tone at how dark it could be. “‘Oh how will you cut her up?’ said Milder to Moulder / ‘With knives and with forks,’ said John the Red Nose / ‘Oh that will not do,’ said Milder to Moulder / ‘Great hatchets and cleavers,’ said John the Red Nose.”
“It is a song of sacrifice and justice,” Hastur said. “It speaks of hunting a giant wren—a mythical bird so large it required a wagon to manage it—which would then be cut up and given to the poor. Humans sang this when deposing kings and portioning out their wealth! We chose to let them keep this one when we rebuilt the world.”
Parker shuddered. “Why?”
“Because originally, it was a sacrifice to us,” said Hastur.
Arthur was into it now. “‘Oh who'll get the spare ribs?’ said Milder to Moulder / ‘We'll give 'em all to the poor,’ said John the Red Nose.”
“Beautiful,” said Hastur, who meant it, and cupped Arthur’s face with one tentacle.
Arthur had forgotten the plan. The appointment. Everything except that touch and approval. He stared at Hastur, enraptured. In love.
(Which wasn’t quite what Hastur had wanted but who could complain?)
“Dagon’s waiting,” said Parker sneakily.
“Yeah,” said Arthur, mind jolting miraculously onto its tracks like a train dropped from the sky. “We should go.”
“Very well,” said Hastur.
Parker wasn’t done. “I’ve been looking at that letter from the Keeper,” he said.
“Mm,” said Hastur, who was smoothing down Arthur’s suit (sheer yellow cloth) and making pleased sounds.
“Matches other shit I’ve been hearing, you know?” said Parker. “When I was with Y’golonac.”
Hastur paused and looked at him. “Explain.”
“There isn’t another human here, apart from the witches and me,” said Parker, “and unlike all the rest of us… Arthur hasn’t died. He’s hasn’t been really claimed. He’s fair game.”
Hastur was very still. Arthur sat in the tangle of his tentacles, fiddling with the tiny tips wrapping around his fingers.
Parker shrugged. “My god—”
“I am your god now,” Hastur growled, warning, several of his limbs lashing.
“My god said once you got bored, he’d take him. Was gonna use him to torment me.” Parker shrugged again.
“You are trying to get me to hurt you,” said Hastur like far-away thunder. “No.” He put Arthur down.
Arthur headed for the door. “Let’s move, fellows.”
“I’m saying there’s a fucking pattern,” said Parker. “Shub-Niggurath talked to him. The Keeper threatened to take him. And I am not telling you this for your fucking sake, which you damn well know—”
“Should’ve castrated you,” Hastur muttered as if still considering it.
“—but for his,” said Parker. “Because I hate you. But he… he’d be worse off. With anybody else around here, it’d be worse for him. And I owe him that much.”
“You owe him? After he took your life?” said Hastur mildly.
“I was going to take his,” said Parker to the floor.
“How delightfully honest,” said Hastur like it tasted bad as they all stepped into the daylight.
Arthur took the lead, jogging, then stopped and turned. “Fish! I need fish. In some kind of container with ice, so it doesn’t go bad. That’d be a fucked-up bribe, right? Rotten fish?”
Hastur, sounding amused, produced a beautiful wooden box out of thin air. It was carved, top and bottom, with runes that changed with every blink. “What lies within will not go bad.”
“Perfect. Hastur, you’re a genius.” Arthur took it. “Where’s June?”
“Hastur,” said Parker.
“Play along,” warned Hastur.
Parker sighed. “Hastur. He’s not gonna be solving any fucking cases in a freaky old library, is he? How’s he gonna be if he can’t solve cases, huh? How do you think? What’ll he have left to think about? I’ll tell you what, he’ll think about Fa—”
Hastur gripped him by the jaw. “You want to be punished,” he said. “I know this. You seem to think the only two options are permitting you to be offensive, or smacking you around. There are many other options, and I warn you now that you do not want to know what they are.”
Parker trembled.
“You two okay?” said Arthur, suddenly and inconveniently aware.
“I think we understand each other,” said Hastur, and let go.
Parker looked pale again. “Fuck,” he said quietly.
“Parker?” said Arthur. “Are you feeling all right?”
“Oh, look,” said Hastur flatly. “Here she comes.”
June no-last-name-anymore came jogging around the corner, eyes only for Hastur, clearly already on the job.
Hasur held up one hand, palm facing her.
She stopped.
Arthur cleared his throat. He thrust the box into Parker’s hands and adjusted his (non-existent) tie.
“Are we really doing this?” said Parker.
“Shh,” said Hastur.
“Miss? Could I have a moment?” said Arthur.
June tore her gaze from Hastur reluctantly.
“I’d like to hire you,” said Arthur, cutting right to the point. “Just an escort deal. A few hours. You don’t have to bodyguard, or anything.”
June looked back at Hastur.
Arthur took the box back and held it out. “It’s fish. Enough for at least a few good meals. You do the escort job, it’s yours.”
“I serve the King,” she said, her voice husky (hot, Arthur thought).
“Hastur, help me out here,” said Arthur.
“Do as my pet wishes,” said Hastur. “It seems we will be entering more elaborate schemes, now that we have a bigger cast. Delightful.”
“Who are you even talking to?” Parker said.
Hastur chuckled low. “Little traitor, we always have an audience.”
Parker looked around.
Perhaps The Defiler, in spite of sycophants, did not garner much focused attention outside of immediate need, but Hastur…
With the Hastur the Unspeakable, it was always a show (and Parker knew that), but the addition of his absolutely loony, lovely human guaranteed a special kind of entertainment (and Parker had not known that).
The ones Arthur tackled complained. The rest got a good laugh out of it, and from all windows, from entrances to the deep, from between the cracks in tree bark, from around shady corners, thousands of eyes watched.
Parker hunched, shoulders slowly rising toward his ears.
“Lead,” said June. “I’ll follow.” She flexed her hands, long and tipped with claws (and Arthur saw strong hands, scarred hands, hands that maybe got their knuckles often split).
“Let’s do this,” said Arthur.
“Yes… with a detour,” said Hastur. We shall swing by the warehouse.”
“Sure,” said Arthur, and took off (again) at a jog.
Parker groaned and followed.
#
No father should be without his kid.
This was not a good idea.
No father should be without his kid.
This was the most important idea.
Arthur’s awareness already trembled before they reached Dagon’s enclosure, and people were speaking but it all just became smeared vowels, and the day was hot but he wouldn’t remove jacket or hat, and the sweating maybe was due to what he now did instead of the hot, hot, day, and he knew Hastur asked if he wanted to stop but he knew he could not stop or he wouldn’t be able to remember this plan again because it hurt too much.
It mattered. At least one father here should get his child back.
He was hitching, crying, when he ran through the hedge into Dagon’s enclosure, followed by Hastur this time (whose side trip to Nath-Horthath’s temple had taken so little time), and Arthur was pretty sure he called Dagon’s name.
Reasonably sure.
He might have said She’s here she’s alive please look at her she’s alive but maybe he just thought that instead.
And there was roaring (too much) and trembling ground (too much) and the box was lost and Arthur was lost and the world turned upside down and lightning words clashed in a growl-language battle above his head.
Arthur fell to his knees, covered his ears, and screamed.
#
He didn't know he'd gone unconscious until he woke.
Shade. Cool water, dripped onto his head from a handkerchief (a bit of yellow cloth, torn from somebody’s garment). Arthur came to, feeling like he was waking from a dead faint, barely able to keep his eyes open, dizzy.
Parker sat by him, dabbing his forehead.
The storm of sounds was gone. Had it even existed? It seemed like a bad dream. Birds chirped. The gentle sound of lapping waves caught his attention (because water was bad, the Lake was bad, the ocean was bad), but when Arthur turned his head and squinted, he saw clear, shining water, not at all the scum-skin pond that had been before, and he had absolutely no idea where he was.
“He fixed it up,” said Parker, who’d been on enough crime scenes with Arthur to read his expressions pretty well. “Since you been here. He cleaned it all up. Guess that timing was good.”
“What?” said Arthur. He felt like an overcooked noodle. “Where’s Hastur?”
“Knocking at a damn door that won’t open,” said Parker firmly.
“What?” said Arthur. He felt like fruit so rotten that picking it up meant being knuckle-deep in mush.
Parker sighed. “Why in fuck should I even tell you? You won’t remember.”
Arthur huffed. “Try me, you asshole.”
Parker side-eyed him. “Fine. Turns out your girl June was indeed one of Dagon’s—his line, anyway, though not directly his. But after… fuck.” Parker looked away for a moment. “I didn’t know how bad it got, okay? I didn’t know. I thought… I thought getting rid of the gods would be good. I didn’t know that it would’ve been curtains for all of us.”
Arthur stared at him. “Having trouble following you, pal.”
Parker rubbed his face and sighed. “After the Fire of Y, and Earth got locked up by Shub-Niggurath, and so fucking few humans remained, they harvested everybody they could here, and when all the pure-bred humans were gone, they went after half-bloods. That includes Dagon’s family, since he made most of them. Look, there just… weren’t any humans left. Okay? Shub-Niggurath had her witches, and the rest of the gods hadn’t… I don’t know. Planned ahead.”
“How could anyone plan ahead for something like this?” said Arthur gently. “The Fire of Y killed billions.”
“More than billions.. Because it took out lives here, too,” said Parker.
Here. As opposed to there. Here, which was not Cloud City.
Arthur almost lost the thought, then closed his eyes tightly, putting his hands over them and breathing deeply. Not now, he thought. Don’t lose it now. Stick with it. Keep it together.
“You okay?” said Parker.
“How could the Fire of Y destroy people in another world? Do you mean the gods fucking eating everybody?” said Arthur, each word carefully chewed on and chosen.
“No. This is the Dreamlands, Arthur.” Parker sounded hollow. “It exists because people dream. Everything in it comes from dreams. So when everybody’s dreams turned to burning radioactive nightmares, followed by mass extinction…” He sighed. “The Dreamlands are fucked. Fucked, Arthur. There aren’t enough humans left to dream it into better shape. Not even the gods are safe out there.”
Arthur’s breath was quick, shallow; it was so hard to hold on, felt like standing on a ledge, maybe high on the outside wall of a building, barely pressing against the brick by core strength alone. “Dagon threatened to throw me out there, though. Like a joke.”
“It was a threat. Because even if you did survive, Hastur could never have found you. It’s hell out there. Why in fuck do you think they’re all here?”
“They’re… what’s here?” said Arthur, sure the world was trying to spin to the right, then resetting, then spinning to the right again, over and over, vertiginous.
“All the damned gods,” said Parker. “Your fucking King in Yellow gets away with so much because this is his home. He read the writing on the wall. While everybody else was freaking out and trying to get humans, he reinforced his city. He made it big, with places for everyone, with enough power and enough protections that when the gods needed a place to go, they had one. But he’s fucking in charge.”
That’s why I can do what I want and nobody can tell him no. “But he’s not. The Outer Gods…”
“Don’t get involved much. The one who gave the formula for the Fire of Y? Banished. The Keeper? In her weird hidey-hole. Shub-Niggurath? In her Wood. They fucked off, Arthur, abandoning everybody under them just like those gods abandoned us.”
“But they didn’t,” said Arthur, his voice weak. “They saved us.”
“Saved.” Old bitterness seeped through, virulent and acrid. “Saved us for what? For them! The few who are left, trapped in those fucking cities, dying off slowly.”
“No,” said Arthur. “No. My family was from Harper’s Hill. It was a little tiny village. We traveled to Cloud City. We weren’t born there.”
“I know that, fucker,” said Parker. “That isn’t my point.”
“Then what is your point, Parker?” And Arthur threw his last chip on the table. He sat up and met Parker’s eyes, knowing as he did that he wouldn't have long in clarity. “We fucked it up. We destroyed the world. They didn’t have to save us.”
“We didn’t come up with the Fire of Y!”
“Yes, we fucking did. Just because somebody said ‘here’s how you make it worse’ doesn’t absolve us! It makes us the bad guys, because they knew it would be worse, knew it would cost lives—not just soldiers, but children, grandmothers, cats and birds and puppies—and they did it anyway!”
Shouting, for whatever reason, had kept Arthur focused through that, and for a few moments more.
Parker stared.
The world smeared. Cloud City’s Priest Park spilled over it Carcosa’s wild glory like paint, and Arthur could actually see it, actually look around without it hurting so much, and so he did.
Dagon sat cross-legged by the water (and she barely came to his knee). Before him stood June. Neither made eye-contact; they spoke quietly, words Arthur could not hear, but seeing them like that, seeing them talk, was all it took to undo him.
“Hey,” said Parker, thumbing away some of Arthur's tears. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s good. I… are you still there? Fuck. I was trying to explain…”
“You don’t have to. Family… family’s important,” said Arthur.
“But I do. Listen. Something’s going on with your god, okay?”
Dagon raised his enormous hand, bigger than June’s whole body (about the size of a loaf of bread in Arthur’s mind) and somehow, gently, lightly brushed her cheek with his knuckles.
Parker sighed. “Your god is possessive. He traded for June fair and square like… I don’t know. Centuries ago. Before the Fire of Y. Dagon agreed back then because who the fuck cared? He had thousands of offspring. But she’s the only one now.”
“I know she’s all he’s got left,” said Arthur, hearing estranged family, mother dead, siblings killed in war. “She ran away because she wanted something more than her father could offer with his crime shit, but she ended up with a mob boss, anyway.”
“Uh.” Parker took a moment to adjust. “Sure. But. But the thing is… Hastur gave her back. I don’t think you’re getting this. He gave her back. He doesn’t do that.”
“I told you before, Parker,” said Arthur. “He’s not who he was. He left that life to work with me to help people, instead of hurting them.”
Parker stared. “You can’t be right,” he whispered. “Gods don’t change.”
The world still tried to spin. Arthur lay down in the soft, clean grass. “Where’s Hastur now?”
“Trying to visit the Keeper.”
Arthur blinked at him. “Why?”
“To bribe her.”
Arthur frowned. “Why?”
“Fuck if I know. I think so she leaves you alone.”
Arthur wrinkled his nose. “Why?”
“What are you, two?” said Parker.
Arthur stuck his tongue out.
Parker laughed weakly; it came out wheezy, creaky, as if he hadn’t done it in a long time. “Yeah, go on, you whacko.”
“I’m… I’m tired,” said Arthur.
“Thought you might be. Just fucking rest. I’ll keep watch.” Parker stared over at Dagon and June. “Fuck, he’s being weird, too. But you only talked to him for like thirty minutes!”
Arthur snored.
Parker stared. He swallowed. He looked down at his hands. At the fingernails that had been ruined by fungal infection barely a month ago, and now were shiny and strong.
Breeze carried the scent of blooming flowers over them both. A fish leaped from the water to catch a bug and splashed back down, joyous.
Parker shook. “If I were a crazy man,” he said to nobody, and only said because there was no one near, “I’d almost think my god wanted you so bad because of whatever this is. Fuck. You got to me, too.” He looked at Arthur in the grass, staining his golden sheath, unselfconsciously splayed in sleep like a child. “What the fuck are you?” Parker whispered.
There was no reply.
-------
Notes:
The song Arthur sings is called Cutty Wren. This version is sung by Chumbawamba (yes, Tubthumping Chumbawamba) because the world we live in can be an amazing place.
