What Wonks Beneath

by Jack Purcell

I have come to know that which was never intended to be known. The questions that plague the darkest corners of our minds, with answers no human should ever seek, bear no more mystery to me. I stand outside now, in Friedham’s Quadrangle, and I know. The wonks, they think me out of my mind, another man lost to the pressures of maintaining a reputation as fifth most politically active. They don’t know, though. They’ve not seen what I’ve seen. The comforting facade of the hillternships and SIS group projects shattered and fell to the ground in front of me the moment my mind was opened to the truth of this campus. 

“Sustainability,” they claim. “The pipes need replacing.” Because of this, they broke the ground. They dug, opening scars in the unblemished earth of the arboretum. They dug, disturbing the tranquility of the countless years that the American University has remained untouched. They dug, past the spent chemical weapons, under the house of that cursed feline, to depths that even the Centennial Hall mold couldn’t permeate. All for sustainability.

They said that it was for our own good. That by digging these holes, they would increase our carbon neutrality. That they’d save the planet. Maybe that’s what they thought in the beginning. But everything’s changed. 

The ones who dig, they may not have even realized it. Perhaps they dug on, compelled by voices that were felt instead of heard. “Dig on,” they whisper, “dig on.” And so the holes are dug. Looking for something. No, looking for someone. The signs, they say “danger,” “no trespassing,” They don’t want us to know. They don’t want us to know what the danger is. On whose hallowed ground we’re truly trespassing. But I found out.

I set foot where no one was intended to. In the dead of night, I climbed the fences and crawled my way into the darkest corners of the maze of trenches painting this university. There, my eyes were opened. 

We are not the first to walk this soil. Millennia ago, before this university or any university was even an idea, before homo sapiens crossed the land bridge from Asia and settled these lands, there were others. These Old Ones constructed these eldritch structures, hewing them out of the barren earth and naming each for its creator. McKinley. Mary Graydon. Essayess. Eecuebee. And the most powerful, Kerwin the Destroyer.

For years, they ruled here in this realm. Yet, when the first people walked on this land, these buildings were empty. 

The Old Ones were nowhere to be found. For generations, we assumed them gone, another civilization lost to the sands of time. We took over their Cyclopean structures, turned them into places of learning, places where we thought we could come to understand the mysteries of the world around us. Little did we know how deep these mysteries ran. The Old Ones never died. The Old Ones never left. The Old Ones slumbered. Beneath our feet they have lain, awaiting those who might rouse them.

Over decades, they let their terrible knowledge seep into the ground around them, to be absorbed in the minds of those who they would choose to awake them. Over the years Burwell and AUSG have all felt their pull. As we dug deeper, the Old Ones grew stronger.

This I came to know as I stood in the far reaches of the trenches. I felt the power of the Old Ones from the freshman dorms to Hughes Hall. They made themselves known to me, as I came to be known to them. I was overtaken by a force that I cannot name, and I began to dig. I clawed the earth with my hands until I bled. Deeper. Deeper. Deeper. I dug, and I saw. I saw the suit jacket bearing the logo of the American University. I saw the pressed blue shirt. I saw the auburn hair. I saw him. Kerwin, the Destroyer. And he saw me. He saw me, and the earth trembled. God help us all.