The Unfathomable Arc

The book found its way into the hands of Jacob Crane quite by accident. Pulling into the sparsely graveled parking lot of the roadside antiques shop had been more of a survival maneuver than anything else. He had been left exhausted from little rest the night before and the grit in his eyes threatened to shut them permanently. He had made several attempts to encourage some moisture back into them with the palm of his hand but the maneuver had failed entirely. He had opened the windows and blasted the music but those elements conspired to form the perfect lullaby accompaniment to what could quite possibly have been his own fiery roadside death.

As the jagged stones kicked up into the wheel wells they evoked the specters of a thousand steel-shod hooves madly descending the raw silver spire into the caliginous wildwood at its root. Those dark and terrible steeds, armor glinting in the reddish glow of a blood-red moon with riders born of horror upon their backs. Curved silvery blades shimmered before that blood-red orb in a flickering motion conjuring the passing of its phases in his mind’s eye. Those very thoughts should have been some indication that Jacob Crane would have been wiser to simply pull through the parking lot and continue on his way. 

Instead, Jacob pulled his car into an unmarked spot on the passenger side of the lot’s only other occupant, a weatherbeaten Town and Country minivan. The woodgrain had half faded from its side panels and the rear bumper was affixed with the begrimed remnants of a doubled coil of orange industrial extension cord. Gently allowing his door to swing shut, Jacob noticed the van’s compartment was filled from floor to ceiling with all manner of subjective effluvium.

“One man’s trash is another one’s treasure.” He thought, turning on his heel with the crunch of gravel and the scatter of its forward push.

Looking up to the storefront he was given pause. He was forced to admit that he had not taken even a moment to consider where it was he was stopping. He had simply succumbed to the need to stop. Taking in the two spongey steps leading up to the dilapidated decking of the porch which served as the shop’s entryway he sensed that its contents would likely mirror its exterior, old and uncared for.

The board of the first step did not bear his weight well, sagging at the point of contact with the squeaky corkscrew sound of what he feared were ancient nails finally pulling free. The second step echoed the sentiments of the first and Jacob hopped onto the deck, whose soggy boards flaked beneath the pressure of his landing, resisting their grip entirely, and depositing him upon his back so that his gasping not only drew in oxygen to replace the air that had been driven from his lungs but also the musty spores of whatever unsavory contagion was thriving beneath, within, and upon the dilapidated structure he had already regretted visiting.

Blinking the dancing lights from his eyes he rolled to his side and shifted to his knees. He ran his hand along his side to brush the detritus free. And rested his other upon the seat of a rickety rocking chair against which an old metal sign was precariously balanced. Inevitably the chair fulfilled its function, tipping forward as the sign fell to the boards with like a cymbal crash and he was once again deposited upon his back.

“What is going on out here?” Asked a cheery voice, reminiscent of that of every grandmother looking in upon her mischievous progeny. 

“Sorry, ma’am,” Jacob said. “Your porch has gotten the better of me twice.”

“I could hear it well before I now see it,” she chuckled jovially. “I’m very sorry for that. Please, come inside. We’ll get you set to rights.”

She was a stout woman in a threadbare flowered house dress that struggled to conceal her form beneath. She was thick and well-muscled despite her age and her calves were deeply veined by lightning-strike patterns of varicose veins showing above the tops of her duck shoes. The left shoe was missing its laces and was held in place by a single zip tie loosely threaded through the third set of eyelets from the top. Her bristly gray hair was pushed back from her forehead by a faded and discolored band. She manhandled him to his feet without gentleness or concern for any previously sustained injury.

The screen door slammed shut behind them and Jacob had the sense that the world was conspiring to provide no definite details by which he could categorize the scene. Whenever his eyes would fall upon something, another equally distracting something would draw them away. Above him, there was a dim yellow light, not like that of the Edison bulbs that were now so popular, but of the incandescent bulbs which now were so not. Trying to search for consistency not even the light could provide it. Every source had been haphazardly fitted with a different type of bulb creating conflicting colors and power levels in a passive-aggressive bombardment of input which was now adding a headache to his growing list of concerns.

“Let me get you something…” There was a question mark hanging like a noose at the unspoken end of her sentence.

“I’m Jacob.” He supplied.

“Nice to meet you, Jacob. Call me Betsy.” She meandered away out of sight through pillars of stacked magazines, skirting old furniture precariously placed upon the uneven and buckling floor.

Jacob couldn't see beyond the turn around which she disappeared. An ill-favored, moth-eaten taxidermied squirrel perched upon a nearby bookshelf, its front paws clutching its top as it leaned over to read the cracked and flaking spines of the tomes arranged beneath. It was by far the most unsettling squirrel he had ever seen.

“Have a bite, dear. It will do you good.” She replied sweetly, returning from around the corner with a plate upon which rested two buttered biscuits and a steaming cup of tea. 

Betsy continued to talk and Jacob raised the biscuit to his nose, searching for a hint of the fusty decay which seemed to permeate the place. The aroma set his mouth to water, promising all the goodness of a cooking channel country kitchen. He took a nibble and then a full bite. Betsy’s housekeeping might be horrible, and her laxity in facility maintenance was deplorable, but this biscuit was amazing. He finished the first and took a tentative sip of the warm tea. It soothed his throat and calmed his nerves and he was forced to admit that he was feeling better.

His eyes once again lingered upon the taxidermied squirrel. Its nose was pointed toward the broken spine of a fabric-bound book whose title was illegible from his vantage point. So, he stood carefully not wanting to once again wind up on his back. After making sure his footing was sound he made the three strides to the bookshelf and gently collected the squirrel’s recommendation.

“You break it, you bought it,” Betsy said without irony, angling past him so that her frame unavoidably pushed his chest into the shelves.

Jacob sat back in the chair upon which Betsy had seated him and opened the book. The resultant crackle and snap of the spine made him instinctively cringe and look around guardedly, hoping Betsy had not heard. Once he was sure it was safe to do so, he reached for the cup of tea and took another sip, closing his eyes as the warmth traveled to the core of him. Replacing the cup on the table he turned to the title page.

The Unfathomable Arc by Frank Elwood.

Jacob reached into his front pocket and liberated his phone, unlocking it with his thumbprint. He first searched for Frank Elwood, but the search yielded no results save a mention in a 2004 NASA report.

Then he searched the entire title and was directed to a single entry entitled Altering the Unfathomable Arc which led to a dead end. The page had been removed. Once again he turned to the book, thumbing off his phone and placing it beside his tea. He turned the page and began.

“Not that I mind the company, Jacob,” Betsy interrupted. “But were you on your way somewhere? Is someone out there worrying after you?”

Jacob blinked. The nature of the mismatched lightbulbs had made him oblivious to the fact that the sun had gone down and he had spent his day considering the impossible geometry of the work of Frank Elwood. He shook his head as if trying to clear it from too much of a good thing, reclaimed his phone, and thumbed it on to check the time. Eight fifteen. 

“Do you have anything else by this author?” He asked, holding up the book before tossing it onto the counter where her ancient push-button cash register sat with its cash drawer slightly open to reveal a half-full penny slot and no other change.

“I don’t think Frank Elwood ever got much traction,” Betsy remarked. “Attended university not far from here.”

“Was he a scientist?” Jacob asked. “I found his name mentioned in a NASA report.”

“Once took a ferry from Mystic, Connecticut to Long Island. Drove through Nassau on my way to New York City. That was something.” She reminisced. “It was Christmas time and all the Macy’s windows were done up and we saw the Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center. Just like on TV.”

“No… not…” Jacob stopped, smiled, and nodded his head. “I’m sure it was a wonderful trip.”

“It surely was.” She smiled. “That will be seventy-five cents please.” She added.

Jacob fished in his pocket and emerged with a billfold, critically thumbing through the three twenty-dollar bills it contained. He tapped his pockets as if it would conjure spare change and came up short.

“All I have is a twenty,” He replied.

“That will be twenty dollars please.” Her sweet expression did not change.

He eyed her, looking for a hint of humor but there was none to be found. He handed her the twenty dollar bill which she folded neatly and, reaching into the overstretched neckline of her floral housedress, deposited it into the left cup of her sweat-stained brassiere. She smiled sweetly.

“It’s closing time dear.” She said. “Thanks for the visit.” She nodded meaningfully towards the door.

“Thank you for the tea and the biscuits. They were delicious.”

“Watch your step on the way out, Jacob.” She said with a final note of dismissal. “No more trips and falls, you hear?”

“Yes ma’am,” He pushed through the screen door, hopped down the two steps, figuring it was safer than making contact, and moved off towards the car. 

With the crunching of the gravel beneath his feet, he was reminded of the silver spire and the way the drops of silver would tumble down from its pinnacle to be collected by the denizens in the darkness at its base before they set them alight in the vacant skies. He raised his head to the heavens and was startled by how brightly the stars shined out here in the middle of nowhere. He stood there for a long moment before pulling his phone from his pocket.

“Where had three hours gone?” He shook his head. 

He could not find them, trying to retrace his steps led him nowhere. The trail of his feet through the gravel led here without deviation and then no further. Thumbing on the screen he opened his sky map. He held the camera towards the stars. In the upper left-hand corner, it read Arkham, Massachusetts. March 5, 2021. 11:50 PM. 

Observing the display he found the drops of silver gleaming in the facets of the heavens. He beheld the scythe-like blades of the dark riders, those unfathomable arcs mercilessly swinging as they reaped the bounty of the stars. He witnessed the asteroid as it streaked across the backdrop of the silver spire and he remembered the words of Frank Elwood echoing through his mind in a flood of excitement and fear. The inevitable catastrophic collision and the resultant cosmic indifference overwhelmed him completely.

His mind fractured. Soul wrenching calls to the void echoed forth, conjured from deep inside the pit of his stomach and fueled by the certainty of our world's destruction. All fueled by the work of Frank Elwood.

He could not clearly remember the flashing lights signaling the arrival of the emergency services workers. He did not remember the overwhelming panic that forced them to sedate him. He remembered vividly how those drugs meant to subdue him only pushed him further into his madness and despair.

How long he lay strapped to his bed within the confines of the asylum at Arkham he could not determine. He remembered calling out against those dark riders, chanting those ancient formulae that Frank Elwood had planted so deviously within his mind. They would come to him at that soft hour of the gloaming when sunlight was scarce and darkness equally so. The attendants who tended to his needs would switch their shifts and the wards would be locked down and when the riders came they were summoned by the sound of the electric catch which imprisoned him here behind his door.

A sliver of light filtered through the window in the doorway to illuminate a crescent shape upon his floor and through that impossible arc, he would see the cosmos open up before him. He could see Apophis hurtling through space. In his mind's eye, he could extrapolate its course. Frank Elwood's impossible geometry helping him to reason where and when it would make its final strike.

He saw the destruction of his world play out countless times as the dark riders brought the unfathomable arc of their scythes across the orbit of our own small planet. With each observation of those possibilities he would howl the formulae into the void, changing its course by microns at a time with variables so infinitesimally small that their impact could not be perceived by those Great Old Ones who awaited our destruction.

On April 14, 2029, Jacob Crane was released from his internment. His symptoms had mysteriously disappeared. As Apophis hurtled by, a mere twenty thousand miles from its once certain collision with the planet Earth, his madness fled.

Years later he tried to recall the words. He could not conjure up a single expression or equation. He had inquired about the book among his possessions when he arrived but it was not returned to him with his effects. He had never seen it again. The only thing he remembered was the path of the asteroid Apophis across the nighttime sky and the whisper of the dark riders as they passed.

“We shall return,” They crooned as their shadow blades fell across our celestial path. “We shall return.”