Azathoth stood fiercely as the black cape billowed behind him. His hands were on his hip and even though the shape of his form was like a human male bodybuilder but twice the size, he had the grace of a woman and his stance was like a pose. His eyes seemed wide and alert, accentuated by shades of blue and red makeup and eyelashes that seemed much longer than appropriate for even someone his size.
“What could you possibly want with this human?” Danu asked and I looked up at the fierceness on her face.
“That thing is human,” Azathoth said in his deep voice that boomed from his deep red, full lips, “but he doesn’t act like one. What human stands with the Gods of Earth? What human taunts the great and fearsome Nyarlathotep? What human survives a fall from the moon?”
“Are you afraid of him, Azathoth?” Ala giggled through the tense anger on her face.
Azathoth threw his head back in a flourish and let out a laugh that made the desert floor rumble.
“Fear is a sensation Azathoth consumes, I could never experience it.”
“Why we still talking?” Nyarlathotep asked and there was an agitation about him that reminded me of a child denied some pleasure. “That man spit on my name, humans can’t do that to me!”
This made Ala, Danu, and Geb laugh out loud and they fell over one another like a group of bullies that pointed and laughed at Nyarlathotep.
“You’re a brat,” Geb said between his laughter and it made the two female Earth Gods laugh even harder.
Azathoth had a look of amusement on his face and he held up a hand to stop Nyarlathotep from approaching them.
“I’ll take the human now,” Azathoth said.
Geb, Ala and Danu stopped their laughter and looked at me and then at Azathoth. I could see pity on their faces.
“You have to go with him,” Ala said to me. “We can’t stop him here.”
“We should try,” Danu said bitterly.
Geb shook his head gravely.
“We will,” Ala said and glared at Azathoth who smiled with a smugness that seemed to make her even more upset. “But not today. Go with him, human. It is your best chance of returning to Earth.”
I was shaking at the words and when Ala, Danu, and Geb stood aside for Azathoth to seize me, I trembled at the devious pleasure on his face.
“What is he going to do to me?” I asked, looking up at the faces of the Earth Gods who refused to return my gaze.
“Nothing is worse than your imagination,” Ala said. “Remember that.”
Before I could ask what she meant, Azathoth lifted one of his arms to the sky and soon a pillar of darkness billowed around me. I tried to run and I’m sure that I looked like a cartoon character running in place before I felt myself rising through the darkness like I was being beamed up to a spaceship. When I felt my body stop, I was floating in a haze, a fog, and I knew that I was in the black cloud from which Nyarlathotep and Azathoth had descended. I yelled out for anyone, but there was only the sound of a gentle roaring of rushing wind.
I can’t know for how long I existed in that fog and surrounded by that noise. I think that it was a long time before I finally heard a voice that I recognized as Azathoth’s.
“Welcome to my home. Very few are allowed a glimpse.”
As the black cloud cleared, I was shocked at the utter darkness that enveloped me. I couldn’t see my own body in that darkness and something about it felt oppressive. Before I could panic that the darkness was a liquid that would drown me, I heard Azathoth speak again.
“Welcome to the center, human.”
PRL Serials 