* X-NEWS: spcvxb alt.horror.shub-internet: 5P Relay-Version: VMS News - V6.1B4+SPC1 6/9/92 VAX/VMS V5.5-2; site spcvxb.spc.eduK Path: spcvxb!rutgers!headwall.Stanford.EDU!rock!taco!hsdndev!yale!yale.edu! {  newsserver.jvnc.net!howland.reston.ans.net!news.ans.net!cmcl2!psinntp!psinntp!news.columbia.edu!news.cs.columbia.edu!dupuy $ Newsgroups: alt.horror.shub-internet2 Subject: Re: The Festival. (Some kind of story...)8 Message-ID: <DUPUY.93Apr4223324@tiemann.cs.columbia.edu>- From: dupuy@cs.columbia.edu (Alexander Dupuy)  Date: 5 Apr 93 03:33:24 GMT  Reply-To: dupuy@cs.columbia.edu - Sender: news@cs.columbia.edu (The Daily News) / References: <1993Apr2.105948.246@cs.joensuu.fi> = Organization: Columbia University Computer Science Department A In-Reply-To: iak@cs.joensuu.fi's message of 2 Apr 93 10:59:48 GMT 
 Lines: 119   James Price writes:   G >  I was wandering around the UC library system and found this entry... I >  8. HAZRED, Abdul.                  Al Azif, or the Necronomicon,. 1589   4                         At the Library of Lost Souls  > 	It was a cold, bleak day in Albany as I set forth to discoverJ the secret entrance to the gates of madness guised as the book referred toN by the ancient scholars as "Necronomicon."  But I remember well the exact dateI that I set in motion the events that would lead me to write this journal, E here, by candlelight, at a terminal deep in the pits of this infested C hole of debased scholarship.  The date was February 13, of the year L 1991, when I first read the article revealing the final resting place of the dread volume Necronomicon.  ; 	It was a simple article relaying the findings of a scholar I researching the writings of an "Al Hazred" (as the common miscalque would H have it), who had stumbled across an entry in a highly esoteric indexingK system by the name of Melvyl.  What fortune that I had access to the Melvyl J indices myself, and could verify the entry!  It was with trepidation and aJ definite sense of dread that I ventured to the actual library where MelvylK promised the accursed volume could be found: a library at the University of * California at Berkeley, my own alma mater.  G 	The rain furiously swept down on the windshield of my convertible as I K drove down the twisted, crowded streets of central Berkeley.  The residents M of Telegraph Avenue seemed drug-crazed humanoids -- surely the victims of too M close a proximity to the very source of insanity itself?  I drove onto campus O using the secret pathways known only to those, like myself, who held membership G in the secret Skull and Key society.  How glad I was that the forbidden L society's membership dues were not paid in vain!  Soon, towering before me, / were the wings of the very library itself, Doe.   B 	Surely this library had been designed by a madman -- or madwoman,G like the Winchester Widow who had believed herself condemned to forever L construct rooms to her mansion or be terrorized by the souls of those killedJ by her husband's most notorious invention, the Winchester repeating rifle.K Could some founding Berkeley Regent have thought that the only way to keep  J the hounding spirits of former alumni (who rampage like the very Tindalos)N at bay was by constructing endless spiral staircases to oblivion, or elevatorsH leading to wings long since closed or abandoned to dust and spider webs?L Certainly the construction would indicate this.  My previous research of theD man Doe himself would leave the question begging, since records were1 notoriously -- perhaps intentionally? -- obscure.   > 	The silence of the library overwhelmed one much like a crypt.J California Hall's doors, tall, solemn, gilt-encrusted monuments to a long-M forgotten sense of grandeur, seemed to dampen my little remaining enthusiasm. H But madness and, yes, greed drew me to climb the stone, circling steps. K And even in my distracted state, I could not help but note the significance L of the twelve steps, one landing, three steps.  Twelve hundred and thirteen,K the very year the Necronomicon reappeared out of the sands of time, only to O be scattered to the twin winds of legend and rumor!  Emboldened, I hastened on.   A 	Before me was the main elevator, leading me to the depths of the L archives of the main library.  I could tell by the call number of the MelvylL reference that I would have to venture to the sixth underground level, to anJ obscure rare book archive where only a few scholars have ever been grantedK access: the Bechtel Foundation Library for Studies of Forbidden Matters and I Things Best Left Unknown.  Fortunately, I had my papers of recommendation D ready to show the misshapen youth entrusted with the grim, thankless( task of guarding access to the elevator.  E 	Once inside the clanking contraption I felt the metal sides begin to F close in.  Madness!  Only by reciting the Farras Hypothesis to myself N backwards was I able to keep the claustrophobia at bay.  Yet, suddenly, I feltI the elevator begin to sway in an unearthly, dithyrambic motion.  The twin J fulcrums of doubt and suspicion catapulted my unquestioning naivete into aG darkness as tangible as it was ironic, for the already-dim light to the L elevator had thoroughly extinguished itself, leaving me alone in the dark inN my self-imposed upright coffin!  And at the edge of hearing I could perceive aJ laughter, a cackling so hideous that it scars me to even recall it at thisH time.  And just as all hope fled my very being, I felt the bottom of the? elevator drop out from under me, leaving me falling, falling...    			      * * *  A 	When I awoke, my body bruised and sore, I was in utter darkness. G But through some last remaining scholar's sense of direction, I knew my F exact location: at the very heart of the Bechtel archive, close to theE very Necronomicon itself!  With trembling fingertips, I inspected the F nearby volumes, hoping to discern the distinctive bindings of the doomC work.  After what seemed hours of fruitless and desperate flailing, F success!  My fingertips had brushed against the rough, cracked bindingH of the work itself.  Grabbing for it, I knew the thrill of victory then.E I would be the envy of the others!  Jayembee, forever casting his net E of knowledge, hoping to dredge up this very work -- he was hopelessly D adrift in the wrong newsgroups.  Moriarty, misplacing his efforts byE searching in the monthly sequential literature that he loved so much. J Maroney, marooned at the Hoptoad Institute, forgotten by so many yet stillG working feverishly to achieve exactly what I had just achieved.  All of E them so close, yet so wrong -- I had done it, and I alone!  I laughed K aloud then -- and instantly regretted it, for I heard the echoes of madness D around me -- and heard also the scufflings and moanings of something< inhuman, something horrible, something very close behind me.  A 	I ran then, still clutching the book, ran as fast as I was able, J desperately seeking to get away from that terrible stench (did I forget toJ mention the terrible stench?), the insane mumblings, the endless deluge ofF crazed laughter.  But no matter how fast or far I ran, no matter whichL corridors I took, the hideous sounds followed me close behind.  With crystalK clarity, I knew what had to be done.  Sobbing, I carefully placed the dread K book on the ground, leaving it behind so that I at least could claim my own M mind.  It worked, for the noises stopped following me, and seemed far behind.   ? 	But I was lost.  I wandered, dazed and confused and ultimately I saddened by what I had owned but had had to let go.  My wanderings seemed K endless.  Weeks, months may have passed for all my knowledge of the passage J of time.  Eventually, by chance, I encountered this terminal, where, afterJ fighting uncooperative terminal emulations and ill-timed system shut-downsH for backup purposes, I managed to fight a crudely-implemented version of  vi to transcribe these warnings.  B 	I fear the Necronomicon is finally lost to humanity -- as is bothD my sanity and my immortal soul.  The rats!  The rats are closing in! -- inet: dupuy@cs.columbia.edu I Member of the League for Programming Freedom -- write to lpf@uunet.uu.net 