Clayton was able to hire a private charter via steamboat from an old friend of his, back in his treasure-hunting days. We told the others to sit tight for a few days while we made the trip from London down to Cairo, then Mombasa and finally Nairobi. It was a pleasant trip, for the most part, but passing through Cairo via the Nile only brought back unpleasant memories... especially as I gazed at the Great Sphinx and the Great Pyramids behind it. I swore, standing on the deck looking over the desert, I heard a vague and almost familiarly chilling laugh, a murmur in His voice, the one I had worked so hard to forget about...
You simply could not stay away from me, could you, Sarah...?
I ignored it as a symptom of my fragile nerves, and retired to my cabin for the rest of the trip. It's what my doctor told me to do whenever I have the hallucinations. I hear Him in them on occasion, taunting me with threatening endearments and visions of those damned scarabs digging through my skin in my darker and less sure moments. Recently, they have lessened... but how long before they become all the more prominent again? And after I have worked so hard to rationalize all I have seen, too!
Arrival in Mombasa was smooth, but we could not get to Nairobi by train as apparently some sort of fire had caused damage to the train and its tracks. We instead ended up hitching a convoy heading out on a Safari near Nairobi, and ended up making it there in about a day's time. We visited Muuzaji and Francis in hospital briefly, and they explained what they had found. Two weeks for them to heal up, even when given casts and splints, they said. With what information they had gathered on Singh, however, we were able to formulate a plan and posit a stakeout at the tea-house. I'm certain Ludwig has told you about that already, however, so I will not repeat it here. What is important is that we had a plan and method of attack, one that easily was executed. We waited until nightfall a day later, then when we were sure Singh had left, Clayton picked the lock on the door and we entered silently.
The shop was quiet and fragrant, and eerily silent. Nothing about it seemed amiss - in fact , it reminded me of one of the many tea shops back home. We snuck into the back rooms, finding a private bathroom as well as the bedroom where Singh slept, and a storage area for the goods that arrived to be sold. Clayton brought to our attention a ledger hidden under the pillow in the bedroom, and traced back many shipments. Almost all of them were from an Ahja Singh in Mombasa, which Ludwig informed me was the man's brother. Perhaps we had been barking up the wrong tree this whole time? Tandoor Singh was perfectly above board, and we all felt a bit ashamed for assuming he was wicked.
That is, until we examined the store room, and found the trapdoor hidden under the finely crafted Persian rug.
I unfortunately know the stench of death better than anyone, save Clayton, and that is what came from beneath as I lifted the trap door and gazed below into its warm light. Nothing out of the ordinary could be seen, but I knew before going in - and so did my companions, I could tell from their faces - that what we were going to find down there would not be pleasant. Clayton, ever the explorer even in his hardened nature, went first to confirm the place's safety. After all, the last time he had been downstairs somewhere, a monster attacked him and his friends, and the time after that we had found an artifact cache and were nearly caught. Several tense minutes passed. Then he called up from below, not in fear... but in the chilling calm he always used in times of dread.
"Folks, you might want to come see this for yourselves," he said, and we all realized we were in for something far worse than we knew. Down we went, one after the other, and as we turned the corner and entered the room below, we realized our instincts had been all too correct.
The room was dark and near barren, save for a few things. First was the massive stone pillar in front of us, carved with what appeared to be hieroglyphs - a sour knot formed in my stomach as I recognized the familiar cartouche reading Ni-har-lut-hotep - and with metal shackles attached around the perimeter. The floor itself was barren dirt, except for a patch in the middle leading directly to the second thing we noticed - a cabinet off to one side, locked with a bronze metal padlock, and the altar directly next to it. On this altar were two unlit incense burners with cone incense in them, and between, a curious statue of a sort of strange dwarven male figure carved of basalt. The figure recalled the Hindu tradition of Shiva the Destroyer almost... well, except for the three writhing tentacles that served as the being's legs. It was like no Hindi god or goddess Clayton had ever seen in his travels, but it didn't take long for him to connect who or what this thing was...
"Singh is a cultist," Clayton murmured, glancing to the others. "He follows Nyarlathotep, I'll stake my life on it."
"What?" Enala looked concerned. "You mean to say, Bird-man, that this is another form of Sand-Bat?"
"The very same," was his reply. "Look at it. The figure has the same beguiling smirk and dark eyes, and even the same trilateral symmetry associated with the god. Reminds me of the Bloody Tongue aspect a bit, maybe this is yet another form."
"That would make sense," I added, drawing close. "And have you noticed the floor? There's all these... depressions there, radiating out concentrically. Long large ones..."
Ludwig looked to us with a vague distressed look, then pointed to the locked cabinet. "We must see what is in there," urged the doctor to us all. "I have seen these types of depressions before, far too many times during my time on the Front. There is only one thing they could be, and the tool used to make them is surely not far away."
We all quickly agreed, and waited as Clayton skillfully unlocked the cabinet. Inside was a veritable treasure trove of information, enough to incriminate Tandoor Singh to anyone who knew anything about the occult. A thick tome titled Cthaat Aquadingen rested above a rack containing a box of more of those purple incense cones, a blue robe hanging on a hook, and a tulwar rested nearby a dirt-encrusted shovel. Both weapon and robe were emblazoned with a symbol somewhat like a decorated eye inside a pyramid, with tentacles and leaves coming from it.
As I pulled the book from the shelf and looked over its looping Hindi script, a scrap of paper fell out. "What's that?" I asked, pointing it out as Clayton stooped to grabbed it. His eyes fell on the page, and I saw realization hit.
"It's an English translation, probably of something in the book," he said. "It reads: And then shall the gate be opened, as the sun is blotted out. Thus the Small Crawler will awaken those who dwell beyond and bring them forth. The sea shall swallow them and spit them up and the leopard shall eat of flesh along the high Ganges in the Spring. A prophecy, like the several we've seen so far..."
"Yes, but knowing the world might end isn't anything we don't know," I responded. "You're sure you can't read anything in that book?"
"Not a word," was his admission, and I relented, turning to the others. Ludwig had gotten curious, grabbing the shovel and asking Enala for help in digging up one of the depressions in the floor, wishing to confirm his fears. I took to aiding them where I could, surprised at how well-packed the dirt was, and how shallow the depression was. Then on Ludwig's turn, he hit something - something hard, and all of us grew sick as he brushed away the dirt and the stench of rot doubled.
"Rainbow Serpent have mercy," Enala murmured, her voice cracking in despair as she saw the thin white femur bone of a young boy. Digging further and choking on the odor of death, we saw it was true - there was a child buried here, his limbs roughly chopped to pieces and thin red worms squirming in the rot left there. That could only mean one thing - this was not just a single incident, and the other depressions were other murdered children. We were standing in no less than a graveyard, directly under someone's home and business. The tea and herbs above must have worked to cover the smell, how else could no one have noticed this?
"We need to stop him," I declared, rage burning in me for these forgotten children. "And I have just the way to do it."
"You have that knife still, right, Sarah?" Clayton smirked wryly at me, and Ludwig realized as well, though Enala seemed highly confused.
"Of course, love," I replied, producing it. "The rest of you lot might want to wait upstairs. I'm about to set up a little ambush, and I promise you that Tandoor Singh will have no idea what hit him once it springs."
They were confused even more by that, but Clayton did well to escort them away. Once they had left, I drew from my focus, opening myself as I had learned to do so many months ago, and called forth the buglike creature. It had been some time, and I was unsure I could still do it, but it proved easy enough despite my misgivings. All the same, the creature I've named Shelly seemed to be rather displeased at the intrusion.
"I am sorry, it's been a while," I apologized to the creature. "There is a man that lives here, he has wronged many people including ourselves. I want you to wait for him here, and kill him if possible when he arrives."
The thing chirruped an affirmative response, and I gave it a scrap of an old silk handkerchief I'd saved for the purpose, petting its rugose, fuzzy head. It then rested in a corner to wait as I left. Now all we had to do was wait, and watch...
I am pleased to say the plan worked perfectly. We watched for Tandoor's return from our hotel rooms in what Ludwig would likely term schadenfreude, and not more than twenty minutes after he first entered the house, we heard the man shriek all the way from his basement. Then, glowing sparks from the storeroom window just like the ones Clayton had seen prior, and the entire building erupted in flame as the African Rifles began rallying around the shop. Finally, Tandoor Singh himself, weary and dragging his way out of the building from a broken leg and several cuts and burns, collapsed before the officers. We could hear his ranting and sob-story act from our rooms, as well as his hasty cover-up for why and how the fire had started. Sure, an incense burner tipped over. Of course it did...
The next morning brought even more gratification as we read the front page of the Nairobi Star. It read, in sensational bold letters, Fired! Local Tea-Shop Owner Convicted of Arson and Murder; Over 25 Children's Bodies Found.
"Looks like Tandoor Singh has been... singed," Clayton joked, smirking, and we all groaned at the terrible pun. But all the same, we smiled at it over our cups of chai, for the first time in quite a while. Tandoor Singh was going to be put away for a long, long time, and perhaps Nairobi could finally rest a little easier. We visited our friends in hospital and gave them the good news - they were ecstatic! Muuzaji also gave us a tip, that a man named Johnstone Kenyatta had an arrangement for us made when we were ready to deal with the Bloody Tongue cult once and for all. We intend to take it, once Muuzaji and Francis are healed up.
We had bigger fish to fry than Tandoor Singh, however, and more important things to do. The end to this whole horrid ordeal is coming, friends. Soon, we'll be off towards the Mountain of the Black Wind - the final location we must check, and perhaps the answer to what truly became of the Carlyle Expedition and why they went so mad, if what the others tell me is true. At the least, we might be able to destroy the stronghold of the cult, and foil their horrid plans for the world.
Is this the game that Nyarlathotep wished us to play? If so, then it most certainly is his move now... though I daresay the odds are still against us.
-- Sarah McCain, The End is Nigh (September 7th, 1928)