Older Gods

Chris.

I'm out of time.

This is gonna be my last message.

You have the package I sent you and the address to bring it to.

I hope you get this because, the rest is up to you.

Well, everything's ready for your stay.

Where have you traveled from?

Denver.

How was the journey?

Long.

Well, please leave it as you find it and put the keys

in the post box when you go.

My number's in the visitor's book if you need it but, try not to need it.

Do you get many guests here these days?

Not these days.

Hello?

Where the fuck are you, Chris?

I'm just sorting a few things out.

Where are you?

I'll be back soon.

Karen said your passport is missing.

That's all she knows about where you are.

You've left Karen to just deal with everything and

she's pregnant for God's sake.

I'll be back in a few days.

You're about to have a kid, Chris.

Yeah, a few days.

That's it.

What about the faculty?

The staff don't need babysitting.

That's why I hired them.

I know the news has hit you hard, but Billy was sick.

Growing up in that house, it was inevitable, but you can't be blamed.

We all stopped listening to his nonsense.

I know you feel guilty that you weren't there when he did what he did.

Where the fuck are you, Chris?

Chris?

Chris

Thank you, for following the breadcrumbs.

I knew you'd be the one to find them, and probably the only

one that cared enough to look.

Now, listen to my voice.

My breathing is steady, I sound fully conscious.

I am not

what you all think I am.

Since what happened to me and my team, my rabbit hole

just got a little too deep.

Too deep for those around me to follow.

I know by now you'll have received calls about me.

And I know that you're hoping what you've been told isn't true.

Especially...

Especially as it's now too late to ask me.

Where all this started,

long before our expedition was a study on a psychological phenomenon

we called 'The Primordial Fear'.

The realization that the universe is so vast and so infinite, that you

see how horrifically insignificant we are in the grand scale of existence.

That inescapable thought becomes a dangerous obsession for some

mentally vulnerable people.

If you really think on it being so small, so unimportant.

What would be the point of anything?

Why go to work?

Why procreate?

Why keep in contact with loved ones?

Because it all makes no difference to anything.

That thought literally sends some people mad, usually leading

to a psych ward or suicide.

Unfortunately, it tends to be the latter.

What this study led to and what became our focus was a smaller

section of these people who actually embraced this spiral into madness,

refusing to take their own lives.

We found staggering consistencies in accounts by people from all walks of

life, in different corners of the globe.

Who all shared the same story, almost word for word of what they

felt was an inarguable truth.

That, existence is an endless dream of an ancient deity.

More omnipotent and omnipresent than

Whoever we pray to, who they call 'The Origin'.

Every one of these believers also asked the same question,

the basis of their belief.

What if this entity awakes?

Would we blink out of existence or would we join The Origin in its own reality?

Well, that's what these people hope.

They hope to wake this sleeper and put an end to a universe that ignores them.

No one can be insignificant if no one exists.

I'm leaving you our research into their accounts.

All I want you to do is fact check our findings.

Then if you feel fit to pass it on to the people who accuse

me of these, things, then.

Then I guess that's up to you.

But if you are here. God, I hope you are.

Then you have the time, to read, to listen, to witness.

If I'm being honest, Chris that's,

that's all I want, a witness to prove I spent the end of my life

on something tangible, something real.

If you can do this for me, then we're square.

I release you from that guilt you always felt, even though

none of it was ever your fault.

Do this for me, Chris.

Please.

I don't even know where to start.

Jesus Billy.

What was I thinking?

Gods and followers.

I saw you!

Okay.

Well, that's how it feels to shit yourself.

You couldn't have done it in a beach hut in Hawaii?

You asshole.

Okay.

Okay.

Open the door, light the way

Hello?

Mrs Duffy?

Yes?

It's Chris, Chris Rivers.

I was Billy's friend.

Chris.

Yes Ma'am.

How are you?

I'm okay.

Yeah.

How, how are...

You know, I heard about Billy and I know that I should have,

Yeah I'm,

I'm just, I'm so sorry about Billy.

I just wanted to say that.

It's okay.

Hopefully wherever he is, he's found some peace.

Something he didn't have a lot of in his life.

You we're such a brilliant influence.

Coming back to the UK was one of the worst things we could have done looking back.

No, we, you know, we understood why you left

and we were so proud of you.

It was so brave.

I appreciate that.

But whatever problems his father was causing, it was unfair to pull William

back and forth across the world.

He was always unsettled.

He just didn't know where home was.

Well, he knew it was with you, Mrs Duffy.

You are a good friend, Chris.

I dunno, I didn't talk to him for over a year.

I mean, I did try once, but I was, I was always too busy and

He wasn't easy to get a hold of.

And when you did catch him well, his attention was elsewhere.

Well, that's why I'm calling to be honest.

I'm sorry to drag things up, but I was wondering if you could tell me what

Billy was up to in the last few months?

You know, what he was doing and well, why he did what he did.

He had little time for chit chat, but he seemed focused.

For the first time in a long time after a project somewhere in...

Eastern Europe?

Czechoslovakia or...

Serbia or...

Bosnia.

Yes, that's it!

When he came back, he'd become obsessed with an area of countryside

we used to holiday at in the summer. A cottage in Wales.

He asked me all these questions about it and the woods nearby.

Endless questions about those woods he used to play in.

I found out he actually stayed in that cottage for months, walking across the

moors and into the woods each day.

I thought it was a peaceful way to live.

It seemed positive, unfortunately, soon after the landlord

found him in the outhouse.

Mrs Duffy?

Yes.

I'm sorry I wasn't there.

Neither of us were sweetheart.

And if we were, I doubt there would've been much we could do.

I think he made that decision a long time ago.

But, you are going to keep your head up and if you need anything,

you're going to let me know.

Alright?

Thank you.

I will.

And Chris?

Yes Ma'am.

Look after yourself, please.

Life isn't a rehearsal.

Don't waste it.

Yes Ma'am.

Bye Chris.

Goodbye

We started to focus all our time searching for signs of these people

who talked about this sleeping deity.

We looked wherever there were reports of, shall we say, overindulgent murders.

Anything ritualistic with a tell-tale signature left at the scene.

A circle within a circle.

We found, lots of them.

When caught, these people all spoke the exact same doctrine.

Endlessly droning about waking the one that sleeps.

They believe by causing so much death,

chaos and fear their ancient God would notice them, choose them due to the

sheer pleasure that it would feel.

They say it feeds off suffering.

The 'chosen' are apparently sent doorways of some kind to pass over to the other

side and join the very thing they worship.

Frankly, these discoveries were intoxicating.