Eldritch Lover: Part One (special preview)

The call came in at a rather late hour. Work usually never contacted me until the morning on weekdays. Never after six. Certainly never on weekends. This was something new, almost strange considering how consistent they had been. This job was strange to say the least, but at east they were professional.

It had been storming the last few days, nothing out of the ordinary really. The winds had been strong, and the rain came and went in spurts of showers or heavy force. Tonight it was drizzling, just enough to make it a bit difficult to see. I had rarely been to the main building of the company I worked for, and it was remote. It felt out of the place amongst the pine trees and rocky terrain. But this huge industrial looking building had been hidden amongst it al, safety tucked away from prying eyes.

“Sorry to call you in so late.” I was instantly greeted at the door by Dr. Yora, who had not only hired me, but sought me out specifically.

“You sounded urgent on the phone,” I said as I removed my raincoat. “What’s going on that I’m needed?” I was still confused about that and hoping for answers. I was hired as a linguistics specialist. I worked from home, I was never called in except for a sporadic meeting.

Dr. Yora was a tall woman, and that was as much as I knew about her. “Follow me. It’s not safe to talk here.”

I looked around, only seeing a few guards darted around the main floor. “Okay,” I said unsurely as I tried to keep up with her long stride. I’d never been beyond the second floor of this building, which was where I went through my interview process. It was also where most meetings were held. I’d never needed to go anywhere else until now. Dr. Yora lead me onto an elevator where she pushed a button for the basement floor.

My guts sank as the elevator did. I had a sudden impending sense of doom. I had to leave my bag and cellphone behind. The only person who knew I was here was the woman I was standing next to. I should have texted someone to let them know I had gone out. Maybe someone at my apartment saw me, I don’t know. It felt like the elevator would never stop. We went down floor after floor after floor. Each time I saw the number change another cold stone was added to my gut.

Once we reached the basement floor I let out a heavy sigh. “Nothing to worry about, Ms. Cleary.” Dr. Yora said to me. “I know this may all seem like an invitation to the underworld, but I assure you, this is still an earthly matter.”

“I wasn’t thinking that before,” I murmured under my breath.

When I hear basement, I usually expect a musty tomb of old furniture, stale pot smell, and stacks of cardboard boxes surrounding maybe a pool table or some other table game relic. This, was no basement I had ever encountered. The room was lit up with computers. Walls of tech, buttons, and things I could only describe as sci-fi wonderland.

Dr. Yora took me around a corner, and suddenly we were in an aquarium. There was a large tank positioned in the back center of the room. There were more computers monitoring the tank, along with several people busying themselves around it and the screens.

“Ms. Cleary, this afternoon we were called to investigate a discovery on Tofino beach. Something had washed ashore during the storms. At first, it was thought to be some sort of marine life. But upon closer expectation it was something unexplainable.”

I had come to accept that this place delved in things I didn’t believe in. Aliens, hidden monsters, demons, ghosts, all that sort of Scooby Doo mystery crap. They had me translate ancient texts, strange diaries, mystic relics, things I found fascinating. It was why I took the job. Well that and the amazing pay and benefits, along with getting to work from home. But the things they sent me, the odd pages I got to pour myself over, they were all captivating even if it did seem laughable.

“Did you find a mermaid?” I said jokingly.

Dr. Yora gave me a disdainful look from behind her glasses. It added a few more cold stones to my gut. “I wouldn’t have called you here if it had been something we already know how to communicate with.” We approached the tank. “No, Ms Cleary, what was discovered on the sand was something even I haven’t seen before. I need your help to discover how to communicate with it.”

A chill ran down my spine. I glanced back to the tank, not seeing anything inside it. “Do I need to believe in order to see it? Like...clap my hands for Tinkerbell?”