The Horror Beyond Gable Way

The Horror Beyond Gable Way
Written by
Charles O’Connor

I am hanging fearfully from the edge of sanity. Every day I hear its angry growls and whenever I see a distant light tear through the unforgiving darkness, I know it is after me, to obliterate my existence. However, my present circumstances are far more vile than mere moments of mortal terror, for the bulk of it has passed. What I am faced with now is the knowledge that I cannot unlearn it or take something to ease my mind of its memory. I cannot kill it off if it were to take place; all I can do is accept the inevitable.

But whether it, in reality, took place can be debated strongly amongst those who believe in the supernatural and those who see it as pure folly. However, the only thing that is for sure is my friend, my dear friend Clarence has been taken to that valley of death and is decomposing from all the abominations imaginable.

I met this dear blonde haired lad about ten years ago while investigating the Mabel house, which had always been deemed as haunted by people in the neighborhood. I had heard some rustling in the back bushes of the place while purposely passing by one foggy afternoon. Thinking it would serve my mind well to investigate the noise, I walked over. Immediately popping out with surprise was Clarence, asking if I was a ghost.

After saying I was not, a look of wonder came about him as he asked who I was and why I was here, for no one in the neighborhood dares to come near this abandoned house. Introducing myself as Joe Ellington, real name Joseph, I began telling him the bulk of what made me, the odd and grotesque. I told him how I had always been an outsider in school devoid of companionship; the time spent in the morbidly dark atmosphere of my great-grandfathers study where he was rumored to of gone insane-reading his books of near inhuman stories to ward off loneliness and of how it led me preferring the unknown to the known.

Smiling, Clarence began telling his story. He found life to be dull and boring. The majority of his childhood and early adult years were spent seeking things to occupy his interests, but sadly he found nothing. Then one day his parents died in a car accident. The strange aftermath, at least for Clarence, was his mind came to life wondering where their souls, and any soul for that matter, go when death gobbles up life. It was from that occurrence Clarence began devoting his existence to seek out the strange sides of life.

I looked impressed and asked if he would join me for my nightly ghost hunts in the Mabel House. My enthusiasm brought upon a sharp nod and we agreed to see each other that evening.

Though we spent the night and majority of the following day in that house, we did not find any ghosts but managed to forge a deep friendship, a friendship that opened doors to studies and journeys together that would make ordinary earth walking humans transform into cannibalistic and deformed spawns of hell.

But it was over one particular finding that this madness, which is even now as fresh to me as the horror of being buried alive, had begun.

Terrible cases of insomnia began stalking Clarence and I one evening; causing us to be up for three days straight, and while trying to find something to fill our hungry intellect, we stumbled across a book in my great grandfather’s study that I remembered my father had told me, in my younger years, was made of human flesh.

The book was heavily caked with flour like dust and gave off the smell of rotten organs as I opened it- revealing Clarence and I to vast amounts of legends and horrific folklore written by crazed babbling idiots.

Carefully looking and turning through the mold covered pages, we came across an odd tale in a town that was said to have once existed on the outskirts of ours, Gable Way. It was most odd because, unlike the others, only the title, written in red, and directions were present. The way the directions were written gave me notions that the one recalling it was not sane. It read:

[Follow the feelings of the darkest day, A place where even the unholy wolfs bay, Look past the surroundings of mortal sight-for they will never do you right, Ask Lord Kadath for the thing I found, A town of mystery eternally bound, Though alone do not try, O’ Ye bastard do it and die!!].

A little unnerved by the strangeness of what we read, we looked each other in the eye- secretly asking one another if we truly wanted to disturb the ghosts that rest eerily beyond mysteries.

Night snuck eerily upon us when we decided to seek out the location of Gable Way. Our lack of sleep, one of the prime factors in us finding this most rabid of mysteries, was beginning to make us crazy. Sleep to Clarence and I was salvation, a return to that blissful state of oblivion and away from mortal pain, but since it seemed a return to that peace was not insight, we decided to seek out the mysteries of Gable Way.

A nerve-striking hoot from an owl atop an octopus looking oak tree resonated through the air as we began to walk that narrow road that led out of the neighborhood and into the darkness. We did not worry about light for there were vast amounts of it beyond the somewhat cracked windows of the box like houses on either side of us-lighting our way- as well as the dead glow of the corpse-white moon that continually looked down upon us like a huge zombie eye.

The moon and the light protruding through the boxlike houses served us well that is until the road turned heavily to the right, letting that unforgiving mouth of darkness devour our helpful guides. However my eyes picked up the vague outline of the usual fork in the road and as I saw it, I began feeling more hopeless, thinking that we would never find that town of myth I so eagerly hoped for. This solidified my hypothesis that mysteries, at least in vague reality, despite my strong wishes for them to exist, are entirely false.

Clarence on the other hand, did not despair. Getting down on his knees, he began shouting out strange chants in Arabic, pleading to Kadath for an opening to Gable Way. Silently watching in awe, I was unaware of his ability to speak Arabic and from the intensity of it, as well as his outward bowing movements, I began thinking he believed this myth to be true. Inside myself, which lies a piece of my soul untainted by earthly existence, a strong desire for his deep belief began awakening as I watched in amazement but the desire soon began to rot with the events that soon transpired.

The wind had suddenly awoken from its slumber, blowing leaves viciously about in never ending circles and snapping many branches from the many trees around us until they began collapsing to the ground like fallen soldiers.

We were on the dawn of one of the many deadly wraths of Mother Nature and were about to run to safety when I stopped Clarence in his tracks for my eyes had caught a most unusual sight.

The ground beneath was thumping like a heart, moving in and out- in and out. My nerves were paralyzed with bewilderment and I did not regain consciousness from this state until Clarence began tapping my shoulder and shouting over the loud-fierce wind, “What are you waiting for man let’s go”.

I told him to wait a second; I had a notion, a strong inkling notion to dig deep into this throbbing piece of earth. Clarence smiled and I knew he was on to the same possibility I was: this throbbing piece of land could be hiding the origin of Gable Way along with many other hidden mysteries not yet conceivable to man.

Spying a good-sized branch of considerable width a few inches from us, we began to use it as a shovel, digging eagerly through the earth’s surface. With each foot Clarence and I hit, we began seeing a yellow light rise from the ground. This prompted us to dig faster and deeper and the farther we went; the more we began to see things of astonishing nature.

We had hit the last bit of soil when we got a full glimpse at the product of our astonishment. It was a town, a town glowing in yellow. Clarence asked in amazement if we had found the lost city and though I did not know myself, my mind was aching to explore what this town might be housing.

Sliding from a hill thousands of feet down from what seemed, to us, to be the heavens, we noticed the sky below us was a rather dark purple and three two headed bats with werewolf faces flew and screeched hideously above us amongst the black clouds, carrying the dead bodies of some unnamable animals in their mouths. I gasped in amazement at the sight as we slid at terrifying speeds down the hill to the ground below.

The fall was hard and as I stood up to nurse the pain in my shoulders and back, Clarence noted to me that this place was thoroughly unusual. Looking up, an astonishing sight took over my eyes. It was so interesting I began to feel scared.

The entire ground below us was crystal, a beautiful, clear sparkling crystal that covered over vast miles of the clearest ocean water. In that water, fish, numerous varieties never before seen by man, except maybe in fairy-tales, swam emphatically around in circles. Becoming a bit dizzy by their speed I looked up and saw the same purplish sky I had seen while sliding down the huge green mountain sized hills, which by looking around I saw there to be many.

Numerous leafless trees stood up from the crystal ground and perched on the top of one was a creature with a muscular lower form of the human body but on top were two dragon like heads with one long horn on both but one red eye on the right one and two green on the left one. It hissed at the sight of us and within seconds, legions leapt out of thin air, hissing at us as if we were an abomination in their world and they wanted to dismantle our bodies.

Clarence and I carefully backed away and ran up another green, mountainous size hill. What was waiting for us on the other side was not odd, but frightening. The ground though comprised of crystal, covered mounds of numerous skeletal remains that looked to be human. All of the fragments were under the same blue water, unnamable fish, like the ones I had previously seen, swam in and out of the mouth, and eyeholes of the skulls while others munched on whatever fragments were attached to the skulls and other fragments.

The sight was beginning to make us sick and as I looked away, I could see huge golden figures in the far off distance. Clarence and I ran toward them and when we finally saw what they were of, we gasped in fear. They were statues of human beings.

Some of the statues were looking up with their mouth’s wide open and eyes widen, trying foolishly to protect themselves with their arms hidden in front of their faces. Other statues lied, split in half, in the jaws of monstrous tiger like statues and the rest, though statue like as well, simply were on the ground dead.

This scene brought ruthless dread upon us, as Clarence’s mouth began shaking as a wicked laugh filled the air causing us both to look around. Except for the surrounding scenes of hundreds of Buddhist looking temples with slight smiles and calculating eyes staring at us, we found nothing to fear and attempted to retrace our steps in preparation for our return to civilization.

Climbing back up the hill, we did not see the same scenes we saw when coming here. Rather now, huge insufferably moaning trees with millions of grotesquely staring eyes stood before us. The only thing remotely close to a safe haven was a huge church sitting on a small hill. It was made of silver with a huge brass oval shaped dome on top and numerous arches protruding out the sides.

Walking carefully to the church while looking cautiously from every angle for danger, pictures of those tiger like statues with people in their mouths hideously struck my mind causing me to ask Clarence if he believed in God. Looking a bit confused, he said no, that he found it much impossible to conceptualize even if he wanted to. Even though he asked me the same question, I kept silent; I knew it was odd that we, true deliberate unbelievers, were going to one of the earthly most pinnacles representing something we held no faith in, to hope for salvation.

The inside, covered in deep decay, destruction, and shadow appeared more like a satanic chamber than a church. The numerous pews made of some unknown, but beautiful material, laid on their sides, cracked and broken. The walls on all sides were busted open and upon that altar stood one of the most horrific things a human mind could ever conceive of.

Above a huge plate that bore the inscription: “Thou shall have no gods besides me”, a huge horned creature stood straight up on all fours, bearing a decomposing human corpse in its mouth of dreadful fangs.

The sight was enough for all sanity to be lost. Calvin and I howled in mortal terror and attempted to run toward the front doors when an extreme state of tiredness came over us. We both looked at each other and knew that that peaceful state of oblivion was calling for us. In our eyes, it was God Almighty saving us from all evil, earthly and supernatural, and delivering us to our peaceful kings, sleep.

Sadly, our arrival in the state of peaceful oblivion was short lived for I heard human voices coming from outside.

Turning toward Clarence to awake and inform him of another’s possible presence, I found he was nowhere in sight. Had he gone out to do some exploring or had he met a fate to horrifying to face? I knew not the answer but as I stood up to rub my eyes and begin looking for him; I found the church to be unusually different. The walls were of fresh oak and no mammoth sized holes were present. The pews were only single chairs made of huge sticks tied tightly together and the floors were merely dirt. The altar was homemade and bore no monstrosity of the mortal terror that I had glimpsed upon before falling asleep.

I was astonished by the drastic change in scenery outside the church, too. The sky was a baby blue, various wooden houses could be seen and all the other interesting but frightening scenery were gone. The people that were around, and there were a considerable number, had on black clothing and white bonnets for the women and black hats for the men.

Observing from behind a bush near the church, they seemed to be merely working and tending to the house chores when a man from town ran toward them claiming to of found gold. Now mere human memory plagued by ghastly shock cannot recall all details perfectly, but to the best of my ability-, it was Gable Way along time ago and here is all I remember.

A crazed man had entered the town, name Erwin, claiming to of found gold. My guess is they looked upon him as sort of a “village idiot” because they all laughed at him until he pulled out a huge gold bar that left them in awe.

Asking how he found it, Erwin said an angel visited him in a dream showing him the magnificence of unknown dimensions and spheres, saying the lord wished him to see this to find the cave of wonders for purposes of transforming this town from poverty to riches. Erwin, between the town people’s gasps, told them to follow his Lord Kadath that Kadath would take them away to dwell forever in glory.

Upon those words a white haze fell upon the eyes of the towns’ people, allowing them to see lands of unthinkable beauty and wealth, and it was after this that most of them began following Kadath.

Nightly voices visited their dreams, leading them to the cave of wonders. When they awoke, they found numerous amounts of gold around them and later, they made the town into a temple. The people were so happy they pledged their earthly life and trust to Kadath.

When the sun went down, the people carved statues, as gifts, that bore likenesses of hideous creatures and other images they had seen in their dreams.

No one notice the change in the people except the town priest. He noticed the pale and lifeless features that developed on their faces and of how they began to talk of their master Kadath taking them home. The priest warned that they would burn in hell if they kept worshipping this false idol, Kadath. Many people cursed the priest, saying Kadath has done more than your lord ever has and he wants to take us to never ending glory and bring his world into ours; uniting the two.

The priest did not give into the towns statements and prayed daily for their souls, he knew they had looked toward evil to gain a better life. Though he managed to convince many to turn back to god, the majority still stood by Kadath, their lord and master.

From my view, weeks passed in flashes and I could see the towns people take the priest to his church as an offering to Kadath, upon his arrival. Alongside him were others who had taken wealth from the cave of wonders and had broken their promises of eternal devotion.

They tied the priest and other traders up on a cross and as the priest shouted that the lord watches over all, they sliced him up and put his body in the humungous mouth of one of the statues they carved and laid it on the alter under a sign that read: “Thou shall have no gods besides me”.

I knew not what happened after that, for the last thing I heard were blood-curdling screams before I awoke to find the church back to its creepy form and Clarence staring at me with concern. He asked what the problem was for I had been twisting, turning and uttering things about Kadath.

With much distraught, I began to tell Clarence of the happenings that had occurred in Gable Way, the actual secrets that the book did not touch on. Clarence’s eyes widened when I mentioned the cave of wonders.

He said a voice of love and tenderness had told him about the cave when he was asleep and that its exact location is here. This cave contains any jewel and or dream known to man and that he was offering it to me.

I tried to tell Clarence it was his imagination and that what we should concentrate on is finding our way back to civilization but he became demonically irate. He said his whole life has been filled with emptiness, and now his chance to obtain things beyond human comprehension had arrived. He was not going back to the realm of mortals empty handed.

Pushing me aside, he walked up a huge nearby hill of clouds and began to run, with the speed of a wolf, through a forest whose trees murmured things I never dare speak of. Clarence did not seem to hear the trees or maybe chose not to because he was laughing insanely and speaking things about far off abysses and treasures.

It was under a waterfall where Clarence stopped. He stood before a gigantic black cave holding legions of jewels and statues of hideous gargoyles guarding the entrance. I was so amazed by the sight that I was not aware of Clarence’s troubles until I heard his dread filled screams.

Immediately running into the cave, I was struck with a blow of ungodly force that sent me sprawling back outside. Slowly getting to my feet, I heard Clarence’s screams. “By God, please help me”. The loud rumble of chase filled the air as the small figure that was Clarence, came into view, trying with everything he had to get away. This was when a huge whitish blob with a mouth of unthinkable size leaped out of the darkness, devouring him.

Running up to the cave, I could see Clarence trying to struggle his way out and as I glimpsed inside the things mouth, I saw hundreds of rotting people, some from Gable way and others from far distant times, begin chewing Clarence to bits until he no longer had strength to scream and simply faded away.

The huge thing looked at me with its red eyes and said, “I am what lies beyond the spheres of human imagination and consciousness, stronger than fear and older than time. I watch from afar in forgotten realms of dreams for when evil was replaced by hope, dreams were the only place my kingdom could go, the only place that is possible for me to lead souls and other things down avenues of obliteration. I am the one who will come at the end of time to devour your race and bring about my kingdom”.

I know nothing of what happened next but I awoke to find myself being helped up from the dirt road by doctors and police. Clarence lied motionless on his back and as I turned him over, I found he had been brutally chewed up. The doctors, once I was on my feet, said they were taking me to a hospital for the criminally insane but I protested saying it was Kadath, the one who dwells beyond the summit of human knowledge and dreams, waiting to kill and dominate.

Though they did not believe my story and I am now behind bars, the nightmare is not over. The horrific visions and memories that lie in that kingdom of Kadath, which is, I believe, the source of every nightmare, continues to attack me.

Gable way was the only town I know to of been erased from human knowledge. Through the acts of idolatry, the people opened up the portal of evil to let Kadaths kingdom and all his satanic creatures in.

The knowledge of what awaits us in dreams I thought were fake but now that I know every horrible thing we dream are trying to break through the barrier between the real and unreal, I am afraid to drift away at night. For when I do, I can still see that evil satanic blob that is Kadath. I still see the things he has devoured, moaning insufferably in his mouth for eternity and, sometimes, when I awake from those nights I do sleep, hideous chew marks sometimes appear upon my body.

Yes, there is nothing we can do to stop the inevitable but later, when the warden comes to give me my meal, I may just pick a fight so that I can receive a bullet in my skull.