Are you there Dagon? It's me, Asenath

Chapter 1

Are you there Dagon? It’s me, Asenath. Yes, I’m moving to Innsmouth, dad got a promotion in the Order. Will it be any different from Leeward? What if everyone at my high school school hates me? Ever since you have come into my head two months ago, I feel like I have had less control over my life than before. Growing up is supposed to be about independence, but yet my parents and everyone in my life has attempted to groom me to submit to you.

I woke up finding myself still in the back seat of the family’s car with a giant puddle of drool on my pillow on the middle seat next to me. Yuck! Well, at least my nose didn’t bleed, isn’t it the worst thing when you have a nosebleed in your sleep and totally trash your pillow? Unless you put one of those plastic covers on your pillow so maybe I should stop complaining. My parents let me sleep in the car as long as I kept my seat belt on, I kind of always cheated a bit though and put the shoulder strap behind me so it would be easier for me to lie down. Though, I couldn’t put my feet up but it was still better than nothing. I also was curled up in a fleece blanket. It was very lot weather all the way down the week before Labor Day, but dad cranked the AC up so the whole fleece blanket thing is appropriate and why I’m not sweltering. We stopped to rest once in a cheap run-down motel at one of the Lake Eerie colonies. Speaking of dad, he has been stinking the car up quite nicely. It is though you were driving down with your great uncle to a wedding and he convinced you to stop and get Mexican food for lunch only to continuously fart for the remainder of the trip and stink of the whole place as a result. Thankfully it is hot enough to be able to unroll the windows, but still, he would just complain about how the wind was making his unblinking eyes dry and my mom didn’t really like the hair in her face while driving I was at least allowed to open them partially in the back seat though, but even then, it was short lived because mom and dad roared to turn them down. It almost became a game of sorts. See how long before they told her to roll up the windows. My record it ten minutes. It was a fun, but I was defeated by the child locks and dad soon disabled it, which, it was an older car so there were no child locks that disabled the window unrolling so dad just smashed it. He said he was meaning to do that anyway. Why didn’t I bring my Gameboy? Oh wait, I don’t have one, duh.

Oh yeah, so you are probably wondering about my Dad, yeah, my dad is a Deep One, he comes from a line of missionaries known as the Carlson’s. They were called by Dagon to come here after the invasion in the 1920s. Basically, the Great Lakes ecosystem has been threatened by invasive species. These invasive species reduce the diversity of the ecosystem and overall health of the lakes. So, that is where the Esoteric Order came in. Looking for a new home, they saw the Great Lakes as some new sort of promised land and who wouldn’t? Well, if you don’t then that is because you aren’t a fish person, duh, but with a fishing industry in peril, they did sort of what Obed Marsh did and came and reduced the population drastically. They vowed that no child will never again have to step on a zebra mussel and get their feet cut up because that really sucks believe me. Some of them have been developing some incantations to kill off the zebra mussels and even use their shells for building material, some of these people are very wealthy as a result. They keep the invasive species and native fish populations at bay and then everyone is chill and it is a good system. The irony of course is that they are the invasive species, but I’m sure I didn’t have to explain that to you. The Carlson’s were one of the founding families in Leeward, Michigan. My mom is a human. She was a childhood friend of his that still loved him even after he turned into a fish and converted to the cult. Most humans usually breed with Deep Ones involuntarily by being hunted and captured and forced to bear their children. It’s been our way of life for thousands of years, to them, humans are expendable. Yes, it sounds really dark and rapey because it is, these are Lovecraftian horrors we are talking about, what do you expect? Freddy Fish? Doesn’t mean I find humans any less interesting. I wonder what I would be like if I was born full human instead.

We were already in Essex county by now and approaching Innsmouth, already the scenery was appearing more desolate. The best way I can describe Innsmouth is that it is basically a town that is looks like a throwback from pictures in the 1930s, but very ill-preserved. There is chips and dirt and peeled paint everywhere and even the colors of the building were stuff you never typically see like that mint or avocado green or that pastel poodle skirt pink or those 70s desert sunset browns that you see in some failed attempts to upgrade or if Disney’s Wonders of Life and all of its 80s tackiness and color scheme (seriously, I don’t care how great Body Wars or Cranium Command is, that place aged miserably, admit it) fertilized the place with its menstrual fluid like some dirty hippie does to her boyfriend’s weed crop little does his clients know. I don’t know how else I can explain it to you, like, you know Napoleon Dynamite and how everyone is sort of behind the times? It’s like that but worse. It’s kind of funny though, after a few decades, people cycle back to previous fashion trends so you would almost want to keep all the old stuff, but then again, typically they might update the fashions ever so slightly so maybe not... This place would definitely be the urban explorer’s paradise, that is, if there aren’t a bunch of horny Deep Ones roaming around. The skies were cloudy, yet it was still very warm and humid. It was one of those skies were the clouds pass by the sky and cover the sun, but once in a while the sun moves past the holds and then the sun peeks out and it is all bright for a seconds before returning.

Oh, maybe I should tell you about when I first found about the move. I first found out about the move the day when I went home from a two-week computer programming camp, which was when I started to hear the voices of Dagon. All it did was not make me want to be a computer programmer and everything I learned there I could probably learn on my own on the internet. Since I’m going to probably be turning into a Deep One soon, if I did want to be a computer programmer it probably would be better to do that anyways. Maybe it wasn’t me, maybe it was just the fact that Java is really hard to learn? At this point though, I’m too disillusioned to try. I wasn’t even really seriously thinking about computer science; I was just looking for something I want to be when I grow up because apparently I don’t want to grow up is not an acceptable answer during Kindergarten graduation when they ask you the question of what you want to be when you grow up. I almost didn’t graduate. Nah, it’s kindergarten, unless you were born in the summer or fall and your parents wanted you to go two years of kindergarten... I think they call it young 5’s these days? You would get held back, but that is really the only instance I could think of where that is the case. Anyway, when I got home, mom fixed me a welcome home dinner of fish of course and then she told me the news.

I will also be away from my grandma. She is a bit pushy with me trying to make sure I grew up a faithful cultist. I wasn’t sure if it was a blessing or a curse because on one hand, she always was the one to give me money and make me food whenever I come over to her house making her really easy to mooch off of. She also sews me all of my cult robes I have had since a child and they always come with a thoughtful card which I usually opened and tossed aside disappointed there was no money in it. My parents would often make me read the card though. Still, if I did ever go to her place, I would usually have to listen to her ask me if I was eyeing any human boys when I think I’ll take the Third Oath yet. I can start taking the Third Oath as soon as I grow my gills and my fishy reproductive tract is fully developed, which I will know is fully developed when I grow my gills according to grandma.

I don’t know why she does all of this for me. All of her love bombing is making me want to willingly go to church outside of being dragged by my family less. It’s also gotten a lot worse. She has left me stuff on my doorstep like cookie dough that I was supposed to bake myself, but why would I because Lord Cthulhu knows how long that stuff that been left out for on the porch considering it has raw eggs in it. I still have no idea where she gets all this money from anyways, but I never really bothered to ask. It’s not like my family is poor or anything like that and even though I have many half brothers and sisters living underwater, I am functionally an only child and it sort of happened that way after mom had an emergency hysterectomy due to complications. My grandma doesn’t have a car and like any Dagon cultist doesn’t trust byakhees being servants of The King in Yellow and having a rivalry with Cthulhu, the other deity we worship along with Father Dagon and Mother Hydra, there are other cults that are predominantly of a human demographic who worship primarily Cthulhu that also are just as eager to wait for his return even if it means they will die anyways, just die quicker. I probably won’t see my grandma for a very, very long time. We arrived at our new house with the U-haul. The house’s street was on Mermaid Drive. It made it sound like some sort of romance novel.  The house on the other hand, was more like something from a horror model. They really did spin it pretty good on the real estate side of things. They used the word kitsch and patina a lot. Kitschy is apparently like cool now, but all I can think of is those Kitschy catalouges you get near the fall or December that has a bunch of old lady clothes and out-house-themed bathroom décor or a casserole carrier with the words Kick-asserole on it. I even found one with one of those portable urinals and one of those funnels if you are female and want to pee standing up for whatever reason. The house came with most of the furniture and the shag carpet looked like lava and had a dank odor. Everything about this was dank, like this interior was like the stereotypical dirty stoner hippie interior with the brown wood panelling and everything. This was exactly one of those houses that really desperately tried to upgrade, but everything was out of date now so it didn’t matter.  Time to get unpacking.

Chapter 2

I haven’t even done five minutes’ worth of unpacking, when I heard a little knock on the door. I was the only one anywhere near the doorway so I decided to answer it. It was a girl around my age or maybe a little older. She was taller than me and had pointy teeth and bulging green eyes. Her hair was dark red and wispy. Her nose was almost flat, rivalling Michael Jackson’s and her ears laid flat against her head. She carried a bowl of some unknown salad. The Esoteric Order of Dagon potlucks bring out some very interesting dishes. If you thought green jello with carrots was bad, then you haven’t even tried what the do with fetuses. The Esoteric Order of Dagon is proudly Pro-Death, unless of course it was a Deep One.

Hello neighbor! she said in a deep voice bearing a toothy grin

Um... hello? I said

You must be Asenath Carlton, I’m Calista Gilman, I live down the street by the big hotel! she said handing me the dish Here, my mom made this!

What the heck is that? I asked looking in the bowl. It had a bunch of tiny little clear gelatinous orbs smothered in sauce with some mixed fruit thrown in. I swear one was blinking at me.

It’s fish eye salad. It’s an Innsmouth classic! Callista explained You got to tell me all about what it is like in Michigan! I heard you father has a well... missionary position in the Esoteric Order of Dagon and he got promoted.

I... I still have packing to do, I don’t even know what bag my swimsuits are in and wait how do you know all of this. I said

Cult newsletter, but you need a break you know, Callista winked I’ll be at my house, it’s pretty hard to miss, you can come to the beach with me I have a swimsuit you can borrow anyways... it’s not like I’ll need one soon she muttered the last part

I sighed, it was quite a hot day out and I did do a lot of work anyways. Dagon was practically calling me to go. I made up my mind.

Mom, I’m going to Callista’s house down the street! I called from down the stairway It’s hot and I need a break. I already unpacked eighty percent of my bedroom anyways.

Okay, Azz, just be home before dinner, okay?

Alright I affirmed and ran to catch up to Callista who was walking there with a slight sway in her gait. I know am totally making a mistake accepting her offer, I thought to myself, but it was so hot out and I did not want to go to the beach myself since Lord Cthulhu only knows what lurks in those depths.

Asethath! You decided to join me! Callista turned around and stopped so I can catch up

Yes, I am here I told her It’s really hot outside and I could sure cool off I stifled a giggle twiddling my fingers

Well, I have to show you around my family’s inn. It’s not exactly a five-star hotel, but we do get some interesting people. Our main demographic are pilgrims from other regions, people visiting their families often to celebrate the cult holidays with, sometimes people who do it out of a dare, those people are the most fun since we are always pleased to give them quite the thrill... if you know what I mean... Callista said with a coy grin. "It is kind of funny you mentioned you were from Leeward, we are opening pilot Love Hotel near there soon. We also have some concept art