Dunwich Honeymoon (Inspiration: Alas, I don't have a very good answer. I was thinking that I wouldn't enter this year after all, because I had nothing, no ideas whatsoever. I wasn't even thinking about it. And then the opening scene and premise just came to me while I was stuck in traffic. It was a true "road to Damascus" moment. So I can not pinpoint an inspiration. The story does have its obvious literay predecessor in "The Dunwich Horror", but I hadn't read that in years and only re-read it after writing the initial draft to see if there were some details I might appropriate.) The look on her face as she came out from under the drugs said more than words possibly could. The confusion, the distress as she desperately tried to make sense of it all: the standing stones, the near bare ground and the dancing flames that were the only light except for the cold moon and the distant, uncaring stars. And of course the ropes that held her tight. Staked out near the center of the looming stones, she could barely move. A whimper escaped her. She struggled, looking left and right: hoping for some sign of rescue or any familiar sight. "You're awake! That's good. You're gonna want to see this." She squinted into the flames and the darkness, but could only make out a silhouette framed between the stones. "Harry? Is that you?" she barely whispered. "Of course it's me, Sylvia," he was coming towards her now, smiling. "Who else would it be?" "Harry? What's going on?" "Oh, Syl. Did you really think we were honeymooning in Dunwich, Massachusetts? Who does that?" He was laughing now. Laughing! "Harry you untie me, right now!" "No, no; I don't think so. We're just getting to the really good part!" He turned his back on her. Raising his arms up to the sky, fingers spread wide, he began chanting. It was nonsense to Sylvia, and it grated on her ears. It was guttural and had far too many consonants. It seemed a language not meant for human ears, let alone a human tongue. He was repeating something, over and over; his voice rising to a shout. It sounded like a name but who or what was a "Yog Sothoth"? "Harry!" She screamed. "What?!" He bellowed back without turning around. "Little busy, summoning an Outer God from beyond time and space, here." Harry went back to his chanting. "Harry, are you going to kill me? If you are, I wish you'd just get on with it." That got his attention. Harry turned and came to her side. He reached out to touch her, but she flinched away. "Sylvia, how could you say such a thing?" "Well, let's think about that, Harry. You've apparently lied to me, drugged me, kidnapped me - and on our honeymoon, I might add - and tied me out here like some kind of heroine in a bad Western." "Syl, I'm not going to kill you. Be reasonable. I spent eight years just finding you. Besides, I love you Sylvia!" He sounded earnest and exasperated. It was a tone that Sylvia knew well. It had been one of the first things about him that she found endearing. "You love me, Harry? I hope you can see how I'd have a hard time believing that right now. And what did you mean: 'spent eight years just finding you'?" "Oh, Sylvia... you had to be perfect," Harry stood and wandered a little way off. "You had to have been born at the right time, and it seems like a thousand other little things!" He turned back towards her, his voice rising: "Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a virgin these days? "When I saw you, that first time, I knew you were the one," he was getting earnest again. Sylvia tried to take advantage of his distraction, stretching out her fingers, hoping to catch a hold of the knot at her wrist. Without warning, the ground shook violently. Sylvia screamed, and grabbed the ropes restraining her wrists. Harry was almost thrown to the ground. The tremors were accompanied by deep cracking sounds that seemed to come from all around. Harry stumbled to Sylvia's side. "He's coming, he's coming! I mean, he's already here, he's everywhere... but he's paying attention to us here." "Who's coming, Harry? You're not making any sense!" "He is the gate and the gatekeeper, the guardian and the key. He knows the way, he is the way! He's coming and he's going to give us the most beautiful child, Sylvia. You're going to be its mother, and I'll be its father... well, sort of anyway!" "What?!" Sylvia shrieked and recoiled away from Harry. "That's why you had to be a virgin, silly. He couldn't father his child on someone who'd been touched by human seed. That just wouldn't do, no not at all!" The night was growing brighter, though the dawn was still far off. The air was filled with a liquid lapping sound, as if of waves breaking gently on the shore. Sylvia saw dawn break in miniature as a glowing, iridescent orb crested the edge of the hill. Its light dimmed the moon. And then another rose. And another; a dozen and more, sickly pulsating, shimmering in the night air. They saw her. It saw her. And as it beheld her, she came to know it. She walked with it, in the cold spaces between the stars; alone, outside our world of warmth and touch, flesh and blood. And she caught just a glimpse of its enormity; a glimpse was all that her mind could grasp. So vast; such a thing, woven within, between the fragile strands of reality: everywhere and all at once. It touched everything. And in its glance, she saw reflected her entire life: her past, her present, her future; every moment from crying birth to cowering death, all of it in the space between heartbeats. In the rush of it, she was lost. Sylvia didn't feel it as Yog Sothoth swelled over her, and passed within her. She couldn't know the ghastly pleasure that convulsed her womb as the seed of an Outer God coursed into her. The spark as it fused with her egg lit her from within, and for a moment she glowed as if there was a miniature sun inside of her. Harry was stroking her hair, kissing her hand; but she didn't feel it, she was too busy screaming. "Oh, Sylvia, it's going to be wonderful. And we're going to be so happy...." 1,000 words on the nose