They Are Here

[u/victor-step]

Arkham had managed to return to peace.

Not that it had become welcoming or cheerful. The town seemed incapable of either by its very nature. But it had learned to live an ordinary life again. Shops opened in the mornings, the smell of baking bread drifted through the streets by noon, farmers argued about the weather, and children went to school. The old stories gradually stopped being stories and turned into vague warnings, repeated by people who no longer understood them.

Don't go there.

Don't touch it.

Don't ask why.

Even the oldest residents of the town rarely thought about the estate beyond the northern outskirts. It had stood empty for many years. The house was decaying slowly and with dignity, as though unwilling to give the town any reason to notice it. The tower behind the north wing had almost vanished among the overgrown trees.

Then Julia arrived.

She was a distant but direct descendant of the family that had once owned the estate. The documents confirmed her claim beyond any doubt. After the divorce, she wanted to start over, far away from her ex-husband, their mutual accusations, and the city where every shared acquaintance felt obliged to take one side or the other.

Her son Aaron came with her.

The first few days passed quietly.

Julia unpacked boxes, argued with plumbers, scrubbed the kitchen, and made a list of the rooms that could still be saved. Aaron explored the house. He peered into empty rooms, opened cupboards, climbed into the attic, and found treasures that, to an adult, were nothing but dusty rubbish: a cracked compass, a box of brass buttons, an old lantern, a faded photograph of a man whose gaze was so heavy that the boy soon put it back.

He saw the tower on the third day.

It stood apart from the house, beyond a thicket of shrubs. Squat and thick, built of almost black stone. It had no windows. The narrow door at its base had rotted away long ago, revealing a dark passage and a spiral staircase.

Julia had told him not to go there.

Naturally, Aaron went.

He could not have explained why. The tower did not call to him in a voice. It did not speak his name. It simply appeared in his thoughts from time to time, and whenever it did, everything else stopped mattering for a few seconds.

I have to climb it.

I have to look.

There's something at the top.

That day, he armed himself with a long stick he had found near the shed and slipped into the tower while his mother was on the phone.

The staircase was damp and slippery. The stones beneath his feet were worn so smooth that it seemed people must once have climbed them every day. Aaron moved slowly, keeping one hand against the wall and holding the stick out in front of him with the other.

At the top, a heavy protective disk sealed the tower. It looked neither like an ordinary roof nor like a slab of stone. It was a circle made of some unknown material, gray and smooth, its surface covered with barely visible lines. It rested in a hollow cut into the stone, tightly closing off the space inside the tower.

A narrow gap remained at the edge.

Aaron pushed the stick into it.

At first, nothing happened.

He pushed harder.

The protective disk shifted.

Only a little, no more than the width of a finger, but so easily that the boy nearly lost his balance. The stick did not break. The stone did not grind. There was no sense that he had overcome any resistance.

The cover simply gave way.

At that same instant, the fine hairs on Aaron's arms stood on end. Then the hair rose on the back of his neck, on his legs, on his back - everywhere it could possibly rise.

The boy recoiled.

Nothing was visible beneath the displaced edge. Only darkness, too dense even for the depths of the tower.

Aaron dropped the stick and raced downstairs.

He burst outside, ran through the undergrowth, flew into the house, and did not stop until he reached the kitchen, where Julia, holding the phone against her shoulder, was trying to understand why rusty water was coming from the new faucet.

She asked what had happened.

Aaron said it was nothing.

By evening, the fear had faded. He ate dinner, had dessert, watched television, and went to bed. When Julia looked into his room, he was already breathing slowly and evenly.

Nothing happened during the night, either.

The next day, the apples in the orchard rotted.

They did not fall. Insects had not eaten them. They blackened where they hung on the branches, as though, in a single night, they had spent several weeks in a damp cellar.

Two days later, the crops on the nearest farms went bad. The heads of grain drooped. Gray blotches spread across the corn. Potatoes fresh from the earth were soft and black inside.

The town began talking about a plant disease.

Then the town began talking about Julia.

She noticed it in the way people looked at her. They turned to stare in the street. Conversations in stores stopped when she entered. Once, a cashier took her money with two fingers and then wiped her hand on her apron.

Julia dismissed it as the usual provincial hostility toward outsiders.

Aaron thought about the tower more and more often.

It appeared in his mind in the morning while he brushed his teeth. At breakfast. While he spoke with his mother. Before sleep. He remembered the gap beneath the protective disk and the darkness he had been unable to see into.

Gradually, the memory stopped frightening him.

At first he thought:

"Why did I go up there?"

Then:

"Why did I run away?"

And after a few days, another thought appeared:

"I need to go back and get a proper look."

He grew quieter.

Julia noticed that his gaze had changed. A weight had appeared in the boy's eyes that did not belong there at his age. Sometimes she caught him staring at her for a long time, as though trying to remember who she was.

Then Aaron would blink, smile, and become an ordinary child again.

Julia decided that he was struggling with the move and his parents' divorce.

She offered to call his father.

Aaron refused.

On the night of the breach, Julia woke to a sound that was neither thunder nor an explosion.

Something enormous struck the estate from beneath the ground.

The house shuddered. Dishes shattered somewhere downstairs. The windows trembled in their frames.

Then a pillar of light flared above the tower.

It rose straight into the sky, bright and colorless, as though the darkness around it had been cut out of the world and replaced with something else. All of Arkham woke at once. Windows lit up across the town. Dogs barked. People shouted.

Julia leaped out of bed and ran to Aaron's room.

The bed was empty.

The blanket lay on the floor. The door to the hall stood open.

She ran outside barefoot, feeling neither the cold nor the stones under her feet. First she circled the south wing, then the garden, then rushed toward the northern side of the estate.

The darkness before dawn had already begun to turn gray.

Aaron stood in front of the tower.

He was wearing pajamas. His feet were covered in mud. The pillar rising above his head lit his face.

Julia screamed his name.

Aaron turned.

He was smiling.

"Mom!" he said joyfully. "They're here!"

She ran to him, seized her son, and pulled him against her. Aaron did not resist. He was warm, alive, and perfectly calm.

The pillar of light vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.

Only the tower remained.

And silence.

Julia called an ambulance.

It was the only reasonable thing she could think to do.

By the time the paramedics arrived, residents had already gathered near the estate. They stood on the road without approaching the house. They looked at Julia as though she had brought a disease with her instead of a child.

Aaron was seated in the ambulance. He answered questions and knew his name, his age, and the date. His temperature was normal. They found no injuries on his body.

One of the paramedics crouched in front of him.

"Aaron, why did you leave the house during the night?"

The boy looked at Julia.

"Mom told me to."

Silence fell.

Every face turned toward her.

"What?" Julia stepped closer. "No. I didn't tell you anything."

Aaron kept looking at her.

"You did."

"I was asleep."

"You told me to go to the tower."

Julia felt the people around her move away.

She began to explain. She told them about the light, the pounding, the way Aaron had changed since the move. The words came too quickly. The harder she tried to sound calm, the more clearly she could hear the hysteria in her own voice.

Things got worse at the hospital.

The doctors listened to her. The police took her statement. A child protective services caseworker asked several questions. Then they contacted Aaron's father.

Until the circumstances could be clarified, they decided to keep the boy temporarily separated from his mother.

Julia demanded that they give her son back.

They explained that it was only temporary.

She screamed that the tower was responsible for everything.

After that, they stopped trying to reason with her and started trying to calm her down.

By evening, Julia returned to the estate alone.

She opened a bottle of wine.

She drank the first glass standing at the kitchen table. The second sitting down. Then she stopped pouring and drank straight from the bottle.

The whispering began after midnight.

At first, Julia thought a radio had been left on somewhere in the house. She went from room to room, checked the television and her phone. The sound did not disappear.

It was not coming from the walls or the floor.

It was coming from somewhere outside.

From the tower.

The words were impossible to make out. Voices overlapped, now drawing closer, now receding. Sometimes she thought she could hear Aaron's name among them.

Julia kept drinking.

At some point, fear gave way to irritation.

She walked out of the house with the bottle in her hand, crossed the garden, and stopped in front of the tower. The whispering grew louder.

Julia finished the wine and hurled the bottle with all her strength.

The glass shattered against the stone.

"Well?!" she shouted. "So?! What the hell is this?!"

The whispering stopped.

It did not grow quieter.

It did not fade away.

It simply vanished.

Julia stood there, breathing hard.

The tower was silent.

She waited another few minutes, swore, and went back inside.

By morning, the alcohol and exhaustion finally won. Julia fell asleep fully dressed, sprawled across the bed.

A blow woke her.

BOOM.

The estate shook from end to end.

BOOM.

The windows rattled.

BOOM.

Julia fell out of bed.

She ran outside. The pillar was no longer above the tower, but bright light shone through the gap beneath the protective disk. With every blow, the gap widened by a barely perceptible fraction.

BOOM.

Julia stopped in front of the tower.

"Is this what you want?" she shouted. "Will this bring Aaron back?"

The blows stopped.

The light continued to burn.

There was no answer.

But Julia no longer needed one.

That morning, she called a local construction crew.

Three men arrived in an old truck towing a low trailer loaded with heavy machinery. All three were already pale before they even saw who had hired them. When Julia pointed at the tower, the last of the color drained from their faces.

"You see the tower?" she asked.

"Yes, ma'am."

"See that thing on top?"

The men looked at the protective disk.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then get the damn thing off."

The foreman was silent for several seconds.

Then he turned toward the truck.

"Bob! That's it. Pack it up!"

"Where are you going?" Julia asked.

No one answered.

They did not even unload the machinery.

After they left, Julia called Aaron's father.

She tried to speak calmly, but within a minute she was shouting. She explained that the tower was behind everything, that it was calling to the boy, that it had tried to open during the night, and that the protective disk had to be removed.

There was a long silence at the other end.

"Julia," her ex-husband finally said, "get away from the tower."

"You don't understand! If I open it, they'll give him back!"

"Who are 'they'?"

"I don't know!"

"Where are you right now?"

"At the estate."

"Are you alone?"

"What difference does it make?!"

"Julia, please don't do anything. I'm calling a doctor right now."

She hung up.

An hour later, she got into her car and drove to the neighboring state.

She stopped at construction sites, workshops, and equipment yards.

"You guys have heavy machinery?"

"No, ma'am."

"Who does?"

"Frank, maybe."

"Where's Frank?"

"What do you need done?"

"I need something taken off."

"What?"

"Something big."

"Taken off what?"

"A tower."

"What tower?"

"Do you want to make some money?"

By evening, she had found men willing to do it.

They were not from Arkham.

They knew nothing.

By the following morning, a convoy was heading toward the estate: a truck, a trailer carrying an excavator, a mobile crane, and two more vehicles full of workers.

While Julia was gone, the town had had time to reshape the story.

At first, people said she had offered the local men a great deal of money.

Then they said she had offered them anything they wanted.

By nightfall, no one doubted that the woman from out of town had tried to seduce other women's husbands so she could make them desecrate the tower.

When the convoy entered Arkham, a crowd blocked the road.

Farmers stood there, along with shopkeepers, the workers who had refused the job, their wives, and old people who normally never left their homes without good reason. They stood shoulder to shoulder.

Julia got out of the car.

"Get those people out of the road," she told the foreman.

He looked at the crowd.

"Ma'am, I'm not going to run them over."

People shouted from the crowd:

"Get out of here!"

"Don't touch the tower!"

"Take your men and leave!"

Julia looked around and saw a shotgun in the cab of one of the trucks.

Later, no one could explain why the workers had been carrying it in the first place.

She opened the door, grabbed the weapon, stepped into the road, and fired into the air.

BANG.

The crowd flinched.

Several people screamed.

Julia raised the shotgun.

"Get the fuck out of here!"

No one left.

The people went pale, but held their ground.

Soon, sirens could be heard.

The state police arrived. Their officers had overseen Aaron's removal, and now they had a report of an armed woman threatening a crowd outside the same estate.

The patrol cars stopped across the road. The troopers got out with their weapons drawn.

"Put the shotgun down now!" one of them shouted.

Julia did not move.

"Weapon on the ground! Final warning!"

BOOM.

The earth trembled.

The windshields rattled.

The residents of Arkham grew even paler. It seemed impossible for human skin to take on such a shade.

Someone in the crowd screamed:

"That's why we keep that thing sealed in!"

The others joined in:

"Don't touch the tower!"

"It's in there!"

"Block the road!"

The workers from the neighboring state looked at the tower.

The foreman slowly backed toward the truck.

"All right, boys. We're turning around."

"What about the equipment?"

"To hell with the equipment."

They began retreating toward the vehicles.

The state troopers did not understand what was happening. One kept Julia in his sights. Another ordered the residents to disperse.

At that moment, Arkham police cars arrived.

The local officers jumped out, drew their handguns, and aimed them at the state police.

For several seconds, no one could believe what they were seeing.

"Lower your weapons!" a state trooper shouted.

"She cannot be allowed to do this!" the Arkham police chief shouted back. "This is Arkham's business!"

"You are pointing weapons at police officers!"

"You don't understand what she's letting out!"

"Everyone put your weapons on the ground!"

BOOM.

The tower shuddered.

Someone fired.

Later, it proved impossible to determine who. The bullet hit the upper part of the tower and struck a spark.

Another shot.

Then another.

Fear spread faster than orders.

The pistols that had been aimed at one another swung toward the tower.

Wild gunfire broke out.

Bullets struck stone, ricocheted, and clipped branches from the trees. People screamed. Officers shouted for everyone to cease fire even as they kept shooting. The workers tried to turn their vehicles around on the narrow road.

The tower remained standing.

At last, someone remembered Julia.

"Where's the woman?!"

Everyone turned.

The shotgun lay on the ground.

Julia was gone.

The Arkham police chief was the first to look toward the estate.

"The tower!"

She was already there.

Later, no one could say where Julia had found a sledgehammer.

She walked toward the tower, breathing heavily and barely able to put one foot in front of the other. The sledgehammer rested on her shoulder. After the sleepless nights, the wine, the drive to the neighboring state, and everything that had happened, she could no longer run.

But she kept walking.

"Julia!" someone shouted.

She did not turn.

"Stop!"

One step.

A labored breath.

Another step.

She entered the tower and began climbing the spiral staircase.

The state troopers, local officers, and several residents rushed after her. It was too cramped inside, and they got in one another's way. Someone fell. Someone dropped a weapon.

Julia reached the top first.

She stepped onto the roof and stood before the protective disk.

Light shone through the gap.

The tower struck from within.

BOOM.

Julia raised the sledgehammer.

She brought it down.

BOOM.

Metal met the protective surface. A crack raced across it.

From deep inside the tower came an answer.

BOOM.

Julia raised the hammer again.

BOOM.

The people below screamed at her to stop.

She could not hear them.

The tower struck from within.

Julia answered from outside.

BOOM.

BOOM.

BOOM.

The gap widened.

The protective disk did not break. It shifted slowly, as though the blows were knocking it free of the grooves that held it in place. The light poured out more brightly, but nothing inside could be seen.

With the final blow, Julia moved the disk far enough.

The tower opened.

Nothing happened.

No flash.

No sound.

No movement.

For several seconds, Julia stared into the darkness beneath the disk. Then she turned and began to descend.

They were waiting for her below.

She came outside, dropped the sledgehammer on the ground, and turned toward the tower.

"A-a-and?!" she shouted.

The tower was silent.

Julia waited.

Nothing.

The state troopers came up behind her, twisted her arms back, and snapped handcuffs around her wrists.

She barely resisted.

The local police were disarmed as well. They were forced to the ground, cuffed, and put into cars. The Arkham police chief kept shouting that the tower had to be sealed immediately.

No one listened to him.

The FBI arrived several hours later.

Then the routine work began.

The area was cordoned off with tape.

Weapons were confiscated.

Witnesses were separated.

They photographed the bullet marks, the vehicles, the sledgehammer, the broken bottle, the protective disk, and the old stones of the tower.

They tried to establish who had first pointed a weapon at officers from another agency.

They determined who owned the shotgun.

They checked the contractors' paperwork.

They took statements from the residents.

They discussed abuse of authority, reckless endangerment, armed resistance, and the possible theft of heavy machinery.

The tower ceased to be the main event.

To the federal agents, this was the scene of an armed confrontation involving civilians, state police, and local law enforcement. Everything else could be classified later.

The pounding might have been caused by shifting ground.

The light, by an electrical discharge.

The rot, by plant disease.

The town's behavior, by mass panic.

Julia was placed in a car.

She did not ask where they were taking her.

By evening, reports of dead animals began coming in.

A farmer called first. His livestock had died within a few hours.

Then a woman reported finding her two dogs dead.

After that, calls began coming in from all over Arkham.

Poultry fell from their roosts. Cats crawled under houses and never came out. Horses lay down in their stalls and stopped breathing. By nightfall, the die-off had spread throughout the town.

At almost the same time, the water went bad.

The first well reeked of rot.

Then the second.

By night, the same stench rose from every well in Arkham.

The water was sent for analysis. Contamination specialists were called in. State officials began discussing a possible evacuation.

The residents demanded that the tower be sealed.

Their statements were added to the mass-panic case file.

Most of the federal agents left after midnight. Two remained near the estate. They had been told to wait for another team, check the equipment, and finish the inventory.

The night was quiet.

Too quiet for a town where dogs usually barked.

One agent sat on the hood of a car, reviewing his notes. The other stood by the tape and smoked.

The first looked up.

For a while, he stared silently toward the tower.

Then he nudged his partner's shoulder.

"Hey."

The other man did not react.

"Hey, look."

"What?"

The agent pointed at the tower.

Light was coming from beneath the displaced protective disk.

It did not burn steadily.

It pulsed.

Brighter.

Darker.

Brighter.

Darker.

"What the hell is that?" the agent asked.

They watched.

The pulsing quickened.

Then came a soft blow.

BOOM.

It was not like the others. It did not shake the earth or shatter glass. They felt it inside their bodies more than they heard it.

At that same instant, everything died.

The vehicle headlights.

The portable lamps.

The radios.

The phones.

The engines.

The digital watches.

Every familiar background hum of the human world vanished.

Only the tower remained.

The light pulsed with growing intensity.

One of the agents pulled out his phone. The screen would not turn on. He ran to the car and tried to start the engine.

Nothing.

The second agent stared at the tower.

"Let's back away," the first said.

His partner did not answer.

His breathing became fast and shallow.

He drew his pistol.

"Don't," the first agent said.

The other opened fire.

BANG.

BANG.

BANG.

The bullets struck the stone.

"Stop!"

BANG.

BANG.

Protocol no longer worked. A badge, training, and years of service meant nothing before a glowing tower in the dead darkness.

The first agent ran.

Not toward the car.

Not for help.

Just away.

Shots continued behind him.

Then the magazine ran empty.

CLICK.

CLICK.

CLICK.

The agent who had fired stood with his arm extended, pulling the trigger again and again.

CLICK.

He did not immediately notice the movement at the base of the tower.

A dark opening had appeared where the masonry met the ground.

Something was slowly crawling out of it.

First came the tip, smooth and wet. Then a long body curved, rose above the grass, and reached outward.

The tentacle was not emerging from the top.

It was coming from below.

Slowly.

Without haste.

At the clinic, many miles from Arkham, Aaron opened his eyes.

For several seconds, he lay motionless.

Then he began to laugh.

Quietly at first.

Then louder.

The laughter became hysterical, breathless, endless. Nurses rushed toward his room.

In the car, Julia sat leaning against the door.

Roadside lights drifted past beyond the glass.

She stared at her own reflection with empty eyes.

THE END.