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LONG JOURNEYS THROUGH the black emptiness of space require recovery times lasting months and even years. In the care of space medicine experts, recuperation can be reduced to weeks or months, but a woman in the advanced stages of pregnancy posed special circumstances and challenges even for Dr. Sarah Millstone. Still, Mrs. Sogguth had successfully delivered her child soon after arriving on Earth. Both mother and child were doing well. Fatty Millstone’s chief concern at that stage was keeping the public at bay while the Sogguths settled down and accommodated to their new life in the tenement.
Meanwhile, history had not stood still. For example, the Cracked Bell pub had once again been swept up in the controversy over the perennial issue of alien rights. The tabloids had taken sides, and daily arguments about the current direction of public sentiment led to a spate of op-eds that filled the news hole and sold newspapers. Mind you, there was no new evidence to support allegations on either side, and the same tired verbiage was reengineered to support the liberal agenda to expand healthcare services to include free-range tentacles as the conservatives maintained their adamantine position that fiscal responsibility must take precedence over expansion of services lest the Crown go bankrupt.
None of the newshounds who habituated the pub seem to have recognised that the return of the Sogguths might be significant. Sheriff Fatty Millstone was glad that Straight and Crenshaw were focused on their respective causes rather than digging into the implications of the birth of Cthulhu Jr. The two contentious reporters had apparently not noticed the many evident pregnancies of women within their field of view. What with Olive, Sarah and Lucille being now visibly gravid as was the PM’s amanuensis’s wife with her second such and Mrs. Prbzt with twins, the proliferation of children about to be born or already born resembling the octopus god seemed remarkable to the PM and the sheriff.
In the hot tub in the basement of the tenement, Sir Douglas suggested that the many babies born with tentacles over their faces might portend the very End Times that prophets had foretold. ‘The precocious children seem to carry genetics harbouring high intelligence as well as wisdom well beyond their years. What, Sarah, is your opinion of these phenomena?’
Dr. Millstone, who was gently rubbing her tummy to comfort her embryo, seemed to ponder the question for a moment. Then she said, ‘Statistically, the number of little Cthulhus—the seven we know about—exceeds all possibility. I can only account for them as occurring by the power of suggestion operating across the mothers, of which I happen to be one, and your Lucille is another. What I mean to say is there is no genetic explanation, but our common remote months-long study of the pregnancy of Mrs. Sogguth may have triggered psychological and physical responses in our bodies that eventuated in the same tentacle-rich ontology.’
The PM seemed even more perplexed by the doctor’s answer than he had been by the phenomena themselves. ‘It seems we have an aberrant sample upon which to base a study to prove or disprove your hypothesis. Such a study would seem to fit within the purview of your space medicine clinic. Anyway, the study seems worth pursuing from my layman’s point of view.’
‘Prime Minister, I shall take the matter under advisement. As the prenatal imagery confirms the Cthulhu genotype in all the known pregnancies, we can do a prototype study. Perhaps this humble beginning can be extrapolated in time over all such births across the universe. Of course, any correlation of the likenesses to Cthulhu must be linked with external effects to conflate our data with those anticipated in the prophecies.’
Fatty Millstone here interrupted his wife to say, ‘The care with which we handle the imputation of any conflation or linkage to world events must be extreme as we don’t want to stir fears in the multitudes of impressionable believers.’
As a scientist, Sarah held her peace while she deliberated on her husband’s admonition. She naturally wanted any political dynamics to be handled separately from the biological data. She sincerely hoped no overwhelming evidence associated the cluster of propitious births on Earth with the End Times. As she considered this remote possibility, she felt a frisson of fear course down her spine, and she trembled so much that her husband became alarmed.
‘Sarah, are you all right?’
‘Oh, yes. It is just the stirring of the little fellow in my womb. At times, he seems to know just what we are all thinking and to act accordingly.’
‘On that note, perhaps we should all be leaving the hot tub and getting to bed,’ the PM said. The bathers began to depart two-by-two. Later that evening, Fatty tucked his wife into her bed. ‘I don’t want you to worry about the ultimate meaning of our many Cthulhus. There may be nothing we can do to alter what is coming.’
Sarah said, ‘I do wonder about that, Fatty. I have the odd suspicion that we are destined to alter what is coming absolutely. In fact, the seven assassins who were discovered during the space vessel’s journey to Earth might have succeeded in their dastardly quest. Yet they all failed. And the eighth assassin, who was fortunately killed by the robotic snakes, failed too. Whether we like it or not, we are already playing a role in whatever is to come. So, please kiss me goodnight and let me sleep on my suspicions. You will have to brood on the matter as well. Don’t worry, as I have the strong feeling that everything will turn out for the best in the end. Goodnight, then!’
In preparation for Sarah’s labour, Fatty had spent time closely observing the behaviours of the two baby Cthulhus whose arrival might offer clues about what was about to happen on Earth. The Sogguth newborn was remarkably alert and seemed to require little sleep, a symptom the sheriff understood implicitly. Ironically, the tabloids contained indications and warnings that might be associated with the advent of the octopus god. Those signs included many breakthrough discoveries indicating alien visitations long before they had been theorised, evidence of mating of aliens and humans all over the world and identical prophecies about the beginnings and ends of distinct eons in diverse documents whose interpretations depended on new ekphrastic interpretations of images and poetry.
The earliest drawings done by the Sogguth infant resembled numerous human rock inscriptions reckoned to be forty-thousand years old. As the months-old child had never yet been exposed to those rock images, the baby must have generated them from inherited memory.
Fatty was intrigued by the rapid close bonding of the two little Cthulhus. Their empathy gave him hope that the other five newborns would join a community of like-minded creatures upon their arrival. The facial tentacles of the babies were sensitive to touch, and their limb-like extending tentacles were strong and pliable. Sarah and he spent hours observing the youngsters playing in their nurseries and together, the space doctor keeping detailed records, which became useful for the Prbzts. Ibngort drew comparisons between Sarah’s notes and drawings and ancient records. Hers were not the first of their kind. The question for Dr. Prbzt was, ‘How long ago did humans and hybrids first record their observations of such organisms?’
The babies with facial tentacles instinctively felt their mothers’ faces for signs of their tentacles. Desperate to achieve empathy with the small creatures, Sarah fabricated a multi-tentacle mask, and the little ones seemed comforted as they explored her new facial feature. Improvements to her design, including robotic elements to assist the tentacles in their movements, made the babies shout for joy of recognition regardless whether a male or a female wore the mask. Fatty wondered about an environment wherein facial tentacles might be the norm. Could it be that the newly discovered watery regions in the universe harboured such a population? If so, how did they make the transition to Earth?
The Sogguths increasingly felt at home in their tenement abode, and their child thrived in daily contact with his tentacled friend. The amanuensis’ child no longer pined for lack of companionship, and the denizens of the city park, now accustomed to seeing the newcomers, looked on them both with approval. Such was the transformation of attitudes since the alien issues had been publicly aired in the press. Even the tentacle-masks for adults were accepted.
Inevitably, when the newshounds saw the two little friends playing together, they realised the tentacle-faced creatures were becoming prevalent. So, they brought their artists to the park to study what would require illustration for their articles. There was nothing to prevent this open investigation. So, in the tabloids drawings of ‘the little Cthulhus’ began to appear alongside free-range tentacles and Dolly the cow—just a natural part of the park’s scenery by the oxbow bend of the river below Lucille’s Butterfly Paradise.
As the births occurred through the summer and fall, the numbers of the little Cthulhus swelled from two to seven. Crenshaw, who was photographed holding two of the babies at the time, said, ‘I am charmed. Who could have predicted I would witness medical history four years ago when the first of these children was born?’ This picture and his quotation accompanied the article he wrote for his newspaper: ‘Seven Little Cthulhus.’ The feature made such a sensation—and so many newspaper sales—that all the national papers had to do their own stories about the phenomena. Mr. Straight followed suit once the word had gotten out, but he was so charmed by his subjects that his op-ed was affectionate, bordering on obsequious.
Fatty was delighted that none of the tabloids treated the births as anything but curious and harmless anomalies. None of the yellow-press reporters speculated about other-worldly origins of the Cthulhu genotype. In fact, no explicit or implicit connection was made of the genotype with Sogguth or his with his interstellar travels.
No one was more surprised at the lacklustre reception of his child than Sogguth himself. He did not mind his child’s celebrity even when he was featured in the international media. To be safe, he doubled down on the child’s security, but the two robotic snakes had proven their worth and now followed the child in his cradle wherever it went. Similar devices were now being used by all the parents, a fact none of them made public at Fatty’s request. Home schooling for the little Cthulhus was essential as they were intelligent like no other children of any ages and extremely capable physically too. A picture of the seven babies was published by Crenshaw’s tabloid riding Dolly the cow in a special seven-seat saddle while the free-range tentacle surrounded them in a protective circle.
The notoriety of the children inevitably attracted the attention of the masses, but no one seemed offended. Moreover, no one foresaw any connection of their collective appearance to the ancient End Times mythos.
Contrariwise, in the hot tub, the talk about earthly consequences was constant.
The PM was saying shortly after the picture of the infants riding Dolly appeared in the tabloids, ‘After all the speculation here, I have seen no convincing signs of the little Cthulhus having any effects upon the cosmos. I am not suggesting that we cease our vigilance, but I don’t think becoming worried will help. Whether the old mythos applies to old Cthulhu or ‘the old ones’ or to our myriad of ‘young Cthulhus,’ circumstances of the universe change outside our solar system. Unless we are willing to subscribe to the theory that our experience is a consensual dream wherein during our sleep we can alter our circumstances with our own wills, we should vow to enjoy the precious time we have in this life while we can do so. What do you think, Sogguth?’
‘Prime Minister, I am inclined, as a pragmatist, to agree with your opinion. Also, practically speaking, I must keep a close watch out to protect my family, especially little Cthulhu. For all his life he must deal with the mythos. His physiognomy leaves him no choice. Besides, like his cousins, he shows signs of prescience far surpassing his contemporaries. Like the others, he is being trained to rule at the highest levels in the universe. As such, he will be a mortal threat to jealous, envious and spiteful people. Remaining under threat yet still be humane and gracious, is my great hope. I believe my wife feels likewise.’
‘Thank you, husband. I, like you, have great hopes for our son. May we remain worthy of him as he grows into his strengths with courage and fortitude and never forget the kindnesses we have been shown by our protectors here on Earth.’ She nodded toward Fatty and Sarah to show her gratitude, but they were playing with their own little Cthulhu and might not have noticed her courtesy.
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