Abomination Roadshow
Oct. 11th, 2011 11:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hwrnmnbsolANNOUNCER: This week the roadshow has come to Richmond, Virginia. One of the oldest cities in the United States of America, Richmond has a rich and varied history that dates back almost to the original settling of this continent by Europeans. Prior to the coming of the Virginia colony, however, the Powhatan Confederacy also had an important village here, making Richmond possibly the oldest continuously settled community in the country. Any place with this much history is bound to have more than its share of sinister secrets, esoteric lore and horrors beyond the Ken of Man. And just look at all the people who have turned out to share with us the curiosities they have unwisely brought to light!
Edgard Wanthorpe III, Dealer in Pre-Human Antiquities
EDGARD: Alice, tell us a little about how this toad idol found you.
ALICE: You mean how I found it?
EDGARD: No.
ALICE: Well, I was at the Chesterfield County fair and a very strange little man asked if I would like to have my fortune told! Can you imagine?
EDGARD: Go on.
ALICE: I'm afraid what happened next is a bit of a blur of formless images and inhuman babbling. The next thing I knew, I had a Mercedes S-Class and I was driving home with this ugly little fellow in my front seat!
EDGARD: It's unwise to call it 'ugly'.
ALICE: Do you think it's valuable?
EDGARD: Well, it's very old. Would you please turn it over?
ALICE: You can hold it if you want.
EDGARD: I'd prefer not to. There, do you see those peculiar markings along the base?
ALICE: Yes, they look like seven hash marks carved into the curiously greasy-feeling stone. Do they mean anything important?
EDGARD: Well, that depends. Say, how many wishes have you made while holding the idol?
ALICE: Oh, I don't know. Five or six?
EDGARD: Or seven?
ALICE: Who knows, I've lost count.
EDGARD: Yes. Well, this relic was created before the last Ice Age by the Frog-Men of Gur.
ALICE: Really! I had no idea.
EDGARD: The last seven owners have died horrible deaths. Usually by drowning.
ALICE: What a macabre coincidence! I have a snorkeling vacation next week!
EDGARD: The only way you can be rid of it is to give it to somebody more wicked than you.
ALICE: That could only be my friend Sonya; she's deliciously WICKED!
EDGARD: I wish you the best of luck with those paltry few days remaining to you.
ALICE: Thank you!
UNPLEASANT TOAD IDOL – Pre-human – GENUINE CURSED RELIC
Asenath Collroy, The Collroy Collection – Rare Books and Unconventional Curatives
ASENATH: Phillip, I understand your family has been in the area for a long time.
PHILLIP: That's true. My great-great-grandfather, Maliki Cheever, lived in these parts before Jamestown. They say Sir Walter Raleigh threw him off his boat for practicing Satanism. He lived until he was two hundred and seven years old.
ASENATH: That's very interesting. Phillip, tell me about this marvelous manuscript you have brought with you.
PHILLIP: I was going through the basement a while ago, sorting the bones by size and shape, when I discovered a hidden basement below the basement.
ASENATH: So it was a sub-basement.
PHILLIP: No, it was above the sub-basement and well above the sub-sub-basement. It's more of a sunken mezzanine.
ASENATH: I see. Do go on.
PHILLIP: Well, in that place which surely must have gone untouched since Old Maliki's time, I found a cache of ancient folios. I opened this one and saw the Arabic writing and the pictures of men being torn to pieces by demonic birds. I said to my wife, Temerity darling, we've found ourselves the real deal!
ASENATH: I take it, then, that you have some idea what this book might be?
PHILLIP: What else could it be? The shaky handwriting of an author teetering on the brink of sanity; the unsettling diagrams showing impossible geometries and angles that hurt the mind to contemplate; the crabbed notes in the margins hinting at still darker, more sinister truths to be realized if one will simply chant certain passages aloud by moonlight during the equinox! What else could this be but the one and only Necronomicon, Libram of the One Thousand and One Dooms?!
ASENATH: Well you should ask. Phillip, I will tell you now that every year I am asked to evaluate thousands of old books, and at least a quarter of them are alleged to be the Necronomicon. Every amateur occultist hopes to find a copy of this, or the Pnakotic Manuscripts, or a tattered copy of Unausprachlichen Kulten. However, the real Necronomicon is incredibly rare. Only five extant copies are known to exist, and all are carefully watched and guarded.
PHILLIP: I see.
ASENATH: The original book was authored by Abdul Alhazred in 738. It was translated into Greek and then Latin. When it was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, most copies of the word were destroyed.
PHILLIP: Yes, but a copy was found in a man's collection in Salem during the Witch Trials. So I guess a few copies might still survive.
ASENATH: Very true; let's find out if this is one. Now, when I open the front cover, I immediately see this imprint of Harcourt, Brace and Howe, a publishing house.
PHILLIP: Yes, very interesting.
ASENATH: I also see from the frontispiece that it was printed in New York in 1934. There is also an inscription here on the inside cover…
PHILLIP: Oh my, I never noticed that before.
ASENATH: … and it says "Very Funny Clark; Happy April Fools to you as well. Yours, H.P."
PHILLIP: What can it all mean?
ASENATH: I'm very sorry to say, Phillip, that you have been taken in by a forgery. This is not the real Necronomicon.
NECRONOMICON – 20th Century – FORGERY
ASENATH: You're very lucky.
PHILLIP: Thankee kindly.
Murray McAdoo – Curator, Richmond Museum of Early Anthropology
MURRAY: I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name.
THING: Rzz. Tut-tut. Tut-tut.
MURRAY: All right, Reese, I'll just take this unusual cylinder you've brought….
THING: Tut-tut! Tut-tut. Rzz. Tut-tut. Tut.
MURRAY: Whew, what a smell! Now, I'll note that the metallic composition of this seamless thing is unlike anything known to modern science.
THING: Tut. Tut-tut! Rzz. Tut-tut.
MURRAY: Ha ha, I'm sure you must be saying something important but I can't hear you under all those dreadlocks. At least I assume that's your hair…?
THING: Tut-tut.
MURRAY: Yes. Well, the really interesting thing about this container is that I've seen similar things in ceremonial sites that predate the oldest indigenous cultures. Oddly, when opened, each tube was found to contain a very well preserved human brain. I have several in my workshop right now.
THING: TUT-TUT! Rzz! Rzz! Rzz!!
MURRAY: AIIIIIEEEEE!
[general screaming]
ANNOUNCER: I'm afraid that's all the time we have this week for the Abomination Roadshow. Next week we'll be in Troy, New York, built on the ruins of an ancient Oneida burial ground, and site of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where scientists delve into Secrets Man Was Not Meant to Know. Good Night, and Elder Signs preserve us!
Edgard Wanthorpe III, Dealer in Pre-Human Antiquities
EDGARD: Alice, tell us a little about how this toad idol found you.
ALICE: You mean how I found it?
EDGARD: No.
ALICE: Well, I was at the Chesterfield County fair and a very strange little man asked if I would like to have my fortune told! Can you imagine?
EDGARD: Go on.
ALICE: I'm afraid what happened next is a bit of a blur of formless images and inhuman babbling. The next thing I knew, I had a Mercedes S-Class and I was driving home with this ugly little fellow in my front seat!
EDGARD: It's unwise to call it 'ugly'.
ALICE: Do you think it's valuable?
EDGARD: Well, it's very old. Would you please turn it over?
ALICE: You can hold it if you want.
EDGARD: I'd prefer not to. There, do you see those peculiar markings along the base?
ALICE: Yes, they look like seven hash marks carved into the curiously greasy-feeling stone. Do they mean anything important?
EDGARD: Well, that depends. Say, how many wishes have you made while holding the idol?
ALICE: Oh, I don't know. Five or six?
EDGARD: Or seven?
ALICE: Who knows, I've lost count.
EDGARD: Yes. Well, this relic was created before the last Ice Age by the Frog-Men of Gur.
ALICE: Really! I had no idea.
EDGARD: The last seven owners have died horrible deaths. Usually by drowning.
ALICE: What a macabre coincidence! I have a snorkeling vacation next week!
EDGARD: The only way you can be rid of it is to give it to somebody more wicked than you.
ALICE: That could only be my friend Sonya; she's deliciously WICKED!
EDGARD: I wish you the best of luck with those paltry few days remaining to you.
ALICE: Thank you!
UNPLEASANT TOAD IDOL – Pre-human – GENUINE CURSED RELIC
Asenath Collroy, The Collroy Collection – Rare Books and Unconventional Curatives
ASENATH: Phillip, I understand your family has been in the area for a long time.
PHILLIP: That's true. My great-great-grandfather, Maliki Cheever, lived in these parts before Jamestown. They say Sir Walter Raleigh threw him off his boat for practicing Satanism. He lived until he was two hundred and seven years old.
ASENATH: That's very interesting. Phillip, tell me about this marvelous manuscript you have brought with you.
PHILLIP: I was going through the basement a while ago, sorting the bones by size and shape, when I discovered a hidden basement below the basement.
ASENATH: So it was a sub-basement.
PHILLIP: No, it was above the sub-basement and well above the sub-sub-basement. It's more of a sunken mezzanine.
ASENATH: I see. Do go on.
PHILLIP: Well, in that place which surely must have gone untouched since Old Maliki's time, I found a cache of ancient folios. I opened this one and saw the Arabic writing and the pictures of men being torn to pieces by demonic birds. I said to my wife, Temerity darling, we've found ourselves the real deal!
ASENATH: I take it, then, that you have some idea what this book might be?
PHILLIP: What else could it be? The shaky handwriting of an author teetering on the brink of sanity; the unsettling diagrams showing impossible geometries and angles that hurt the mind to contemplate; the crabbed notes in the margins hinting at still darker, more sinister truths to be realized if one will simply chant certain passages aloud by moonlight during the equinox! What else could this be but the one and only Necronomicon, Libram of the One Thousand and One Dooms?!
ASENATH: Well you should ask. Phillip, I will tell you now that every year I am asked to evaluate thousands of old books, and at least a quarter of them are alleged to be the Necronomicon. Every amateur occultist hopes to find a copy of this, or the Pnakotic Manuscripts, or a tattered copy of Unausprachlichen Kulten. However, the real Necronomicon is incredibly rare. Only five extant copies are known to exist, and all are carefully watched and guarded.
PHILLIP: I see.
ASENATH: The original book was authored by Abdul Alhazred in 738. It was translated into Greek and then Latin. When it was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, most copies of the word were destroyed.
PHILLIP: Yes, but a copy was found in a man's collection in Salem during the Witch Trials. So I guess a few copies might still survive.
ASENATH: Very true; let's find out if this is one. Now, when I open the front cover, I immediately see this imprint of Harcourt, Brace and Howe, a publishing house.
PHILLIP: Yes, very interesting.
ASENATH: I also see from the frontispiece that it was printed in New York in 1934. There is also an inscription here on the inside cover…
PHILLIP: Oh my, I never noticed that before.
ASENATH: … and it says "Very Funny Clark; Happy April Fools to you as well. Yours, H.P."
PHILLIP: What can it all mean?
ASENATH: I'm very sorry to say, Phillip, that you have been taken in by a forgery. This is not the real Necronomicon.
NECRONOMICON – 20th Century – FORGERY
ASENATH: You're very lucky.
PHILLIP: Thankee kindly.
Murray McAdoo – Curator, Richmond Museum of Early Anthropology
MURRAY: I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name.
THING: Rzz. Tut-tut. Tut-tut.
MURRAY: All right, Reese, I'll just take this unusual cylinder you've brought….
THING: Tut-tut! Tut-tut. Rzz. Tut-tut. Tut.
MURRAY: Whew, what a smell! Now, I'll note that the metallic composition of this seamless thing is unlike anything known to modern science.
THING: Tut. Tut-tut! Rzz. Tut-tut.
MURRAY: Ha ha, I'm sure you must be saying something important but I can't hear you under all those dreadlocks. At least I assume that's your hair…?
THING: Tut-tut.
MURRAY: Yes. Well, the really interesting thing about this container is that I've seen similar things in ceremonial sites that predate the oldest indigenous cultures. Oddly, when opened, each tube was found to contain a very well preserved human brain. I have several in my workshop right now.
THING: TUT-TUT! Rzz! Rzz! Rzz!!
MURRAY: AIIIIIEEEEE!
[general screaming]
ANNOUNCER: I'm afraid that's all the time we have this week for the Abomination Roadshow. Next week we'll be in Troy, New York, built on the ruins of an ancient Oneida burial ground, and site of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where scientists delve into Secrets Man Was Not Meant to Know. Good Night, and Elder Signs preserve us!
