The Elder Things: Part 2: From Decay to Disappearance

Even a quintessential civilization, millions of years old, can experience its decline and this is what happened to the Old Ones.

The passing of the Ages left deep marks and even the Elder Things began to feel the effects of the prolonged period of wars against powerful adversaries. It is not known when or how, but the species, at a certain moment, had also lost contact with the rest of its species. Millions of years on Earth have caused them to change and become increasingly aboriginal, incorporating traits that set them apart from those alien beings that had arrived millions of years before. In effect, they lost the ability to fly beyond the atmosphere and break the planetary boundaries - the Earth, initially its Colony, had increasingly become its definitive home world.

As a whole, they have adapted to the planetary conditions found here. Their webbed wings had stunted, their long, elegant tentacles were becoming shorter and more like fins and they were capable of breathing under water. The oceans became their main habitat, the sea depths watched the last breath of the race as they commanded the Shoggoth to build walls for their new underwater cities.

But about 65 million years ago, the Earth faced a new and more dramatic catastrophe. There are different conjectures about what hit the planet today, most researchers believe that it would have been the shock of a meteor of considerable dimensions, possibly reaching the current Yucatan Peninsula. This would have decreed the mass extinction of the great reptiles.

But there are rumors that this tragedy may have been caused as a result of some mysterious scientific experiment conducted by the Elder Things. The destructive meteor itself may have been attracted by their science, although there are other, even more frightening possibilities.

At that time, the Elder Things was involved with the creation of ever larger and more dangerous devices. Perhaps in search of a renewal of their cosmic importance, they plunged into a search for something great; a mechanism known as the Divine Trap. Its concept is too complex for the human mind to understand, but in general it would be like an artificial dimension, designed to attract, capture and confine beings of immense power. The purpose escapes understanding, but it is supposed to involve obtaining energy sources.

The daring enterprise was installed under the great Capital in Antarctica, under the mountains of the Continent. It would have been used only once, when it captured an unknown entity of immeasurable power. The machine was subjected to enormous pressure and almost ended up exhausted, but in the end it fulfilled its purpose. The process, however, may have attracted the meteor, or resulted in a monumental explosion, it is not known for certain. The only certainty is that something devastating happened shortly thereafter and the planet faced a period of instability. Indeed, the severe climate changes wiped out life forms that are unable to adapt themselves, especially the great Saurians. Which, in the long run, favored the development of mammals.

The same catastrophe also hit the Ancestral Race in full. Several cities were destroyed by the resulting earthquakes and were responsible for the rise of the mountain range mentioned by the Miskatonic Expedition in 1931. Many undersea cities were wiped out of existence, plummeting into underwater trenches that swallowed them forever. Fear took over most of the individuals suddenly plagued and they began to converge on the primordial city that had received them at the dawn of time. Gradually the other cities were emptied with their inhabitants migrating to Antarctica. Perhaps by this time, many already knew that the sunset was near and that the species needed to get together if it wanted to last for a few million more years. Another possibility is that the apparatus demanded the presence of members of the species that felt responsible for its permanent maintenance.

 

But despite all the obstacles, society endured by adopting a new posture in which it embraced its new condition as a spectator and not a protagonist. Not even the presence of the primitive Deep Ones bothered them, nor the wake of intelligent species on the surface. This was the cue for other species to emerge and develop on the planet, which until then was the exclusive domain of the Elder Things.

This brought a curious challenge, dealing with exhaustion and boredom after so many generations. Somehow, the Elder Things seemed to be purposely exhausted and knowing that it embraced the rapid decline. The Shoggoth realizing this, still attempted a final revolt, wich was stifled.

As the creeping cold intensified, covering the lush Antarctic jungle with a blanket of snow white, the Elder Things capital also declined. The buildings and terraces were abandoned and the walls without maintenance collapsed before the passing of the millennia. Gradually, its sleepy inhabitants voluntarily retreated to the icy oceans, not wishing to have anything more to do with the world on the surface. They began to live in a vast underwater complex formed by labyrinths of ice, where they possibly still live, hidden from all other beings.

Gradually the remnants of the passage of the Elder Things have disappeared from the Earth's surface. Although lasting, its spartan existence left a relatively small amount of artifacts on the surface. Even the cities, works of magnificent architecture, disappeared, being occupied by other races of Mythos, or being erased by the presence of the first evolved humans. Some of these places, naturally repulsed men and made them leave in search of places less haunted by their former inhabitants. In the Amazon, in the Arabian deserts, in Patagonia and in South Africa, the remains of their passage can still be found, buried under mountains or swallowed by impenetrable jungles.

The few who dare to search these locations, where the echo of the voices of the Elder Things can still be heard, are sorcerers, mystics and demented. Guided by dreams or tortuous lines written in forgotten tomes, they are drawn like moths to the flame. These adventurers eagerly collected what they could from past eras and kept these artifacts as treasures, some of which initiated cults and secret societies. Some have even reached our modern age, becoming the curious "artifacts out of time" that sometimes emerge from excavations causing surprise and amazement. Even the controversial "Astronaut Gods" theory popularized in the 20th century, seems to find a parallel in the Elder Things existence.

Few traces of the Ancestral Race remains, unless of course, by the confusing reports obtained by expeditions like the Miskatonic University (1930-1931) and by its successor Starkweather-Moore (1937) that supposedly found not only the ruins of the Capital Antarctica, but preserved specimens of the Elder Things. Considering the disastrous result of both expeditions, contact with the Old Race are strongly discouraged. As practical scientists, any interaction seems to be an opportunity for biological study. Nothing more.

There is a theory, defended by Russian scientists in the 1950s, that would have found records of the Elder Things pointing out that the human race would have been engineered for its mental potential. Going further, these same scientists claim that it would be a plan for our architects to use us as a resource when we are able to reach our full potential. The reports of the Kharkhov Project (currently deactivated), projected that the psychic training of man would be awaited by the Elder Things, that continues to observe us. But there is no corroboration of such theories.

Either way, it is essential to stick to proportions. In no way can humanity, a mere by-product of advanced genetic science, be considered on the same level as the Elder Things. The mere presumption of such a thing would be comical, if such beings were capable of understanding irony. The human race are an inferior and simplistic lifeform, although more developed than others planted on the planet.

Perhaps that explains why their scientists dissected all the humans they captured. Who can know what the implications would bring a sudden interest on the part of these creatures about us. Better not even contemplate such a possibility. If there is a truth about the Elder Things, is that attracting their attention represents a serious risk to our very existence.