The rain kept falling incessantly.
Two man, both in long trench coats, entered the hotel and had a short conversation with the concierge.
Immediately after, they headed to the elevator bank and went up to the penthouse.
A short phrase whispered to the only door on that floor got it to open. They paused to pull up deep hoods before going in.
They found themselves in a lavish office, sparsely furnished, with a large window wall. The flash of lightning could occasionally be seen arcing from the dark clouds to the tops of the city towers.
A figure in long black robes and a deep hood was standing watching the storm with its back to the door.
One of the man cleared his throat.
"Ehem. We wish to register a complaint."
The figure in the black robes does not respond.
"Hello, Miss?"
The figure in black robes (let's call him Mr. Black for simplicity) turns.
"What do you mean 'miss'?"
The two visitors look at each other, confused. The other guest says "I'm sorry, he has a cold. We wish to make a complaint!"
"We're closed for the evening. Who let you up here?"
"Never mind that. We wish to complain about this world ending monster that we summoned this morning with your help".
"Oh yes, the, uh, Cthulhu...What's, uh...What's wrong with it?"
"I'll tell you what's wrong with it - it's dead, that's what's wrong with it!"
"No, no, it's uh,...it's resting"
"Look, matey, I know a dead elder god when I see one, and we've been looking at one all day."
"No no it's not dead, it's, it's resting! Remarkable elder god, Cthulhu, isn’t it, ah? Beautiful feelers!
"The feelers don't enter into it. It's stone dead"
"Nononono, no, no! It's resting!"
"All right then, if it's resting, we'll wake it up!
The two visitors raise their voices in supplication.
“Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn..."
A lightning bolt flashes outside followed closely by a loud crash of thunder.
"There, it stirred!"
"No, it didn't, that was just lightning!"
"No, that was the god stirring"
The two guests look at each other and in unison begin to murmur and gesticulate, their voices raising. The view outside the windows shift to a deep underwater vista of weird buildings, oddly lit, their geometry painful to loot at.
One guest takes out a small gong from his robe and the other strikes at it repeatedly, yelling "HELLO Cthulhu!!!!! Testing! Testing! Testing! Testing! This is your nine o'clock alarm call!"
They raise their hands again and black flames engulf various buildings in the underwater city, consuming them. Rips and cracks appear in other buildings and the whole sea floor shifts and shudders.
There is no sign of any god, sleeping or otherwise.
"Now that's what we call a dead god"
"No, no.....No, it's stunned!"
"STUNNED?!?"
"Yeah! You stunned it, just as it was waking up! Cthulhu is known to stun easily, it's a well-known fact."
"Um...now look...now look, mate, we've definitely had enough of this. That god is definitely deceased, and when we purchased the summoning ritual this morning, you assured us that its total lack of movement over the past millennia was due to it being tired and shagged out following the cataclysmic purging of the earth."
"Well, it's...it's, ah...probably pining for the void."
"PINING for the VOID?!?!?!? What kind of talk is that?, look, why did it fail to materialize even a tendril when we cast the summoning? There was a definite absence of anything you might call cataclysmic or even protoplasmic."
"Cthulhu prefers absence! It fuels the terror. Remarkable elder god, isn’t it squires? Lovely feelers!"
"Look, I took the liberty of examining that book when I got it home, and I discovered the summoning chant actually translates to 'In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming' – DEAD Cthulhu!! It's actually part of the chant!"
Mr.Black pauses for a second and clears his throat uncomfortably.
"Well, it also says dreaming doesn’t it? If it wasn't asleep, it would have risen up from the waves and VOOM! Bye bye world!"
"Well, that's what we want! Ending the world! And right now this god wouldn't perform if you put four billion volts through it! It's bleeding demised!"
"No no! It's pining!
"It's not pining! It has passed on! This god is no more! It has ceased to be! It has expired and gone to meet its maker! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If it wasn't at the bottom of the sea it would be pushing up the daisies! Its metabolic processes are now history! It has kicked the bucket, shuffled off its immortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleeding choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-GOD!!"
There is another awkward pause.
"Well, I'd better replace that summoning spell, then."
Mr. Black takes a quick peek behind his desk.
"Sorry squires, I've had a look around the back, and uh, we're right out of elder gods summoning spells."
"I see. I see, I get the picture."
Mr. Black takes another quick look.
"I got a slug."
The two guests look at each other.
"Does it eat people?"
"Nnnnot really."
"WELL IT'S HARDLY A BLOODY REPLACEMENT THEN, IS IT?!!???!!?"
"N-no, I guess not."
"Well.."
Mr. Black glances out the window at the underwater vista, visibly uncomfortable.
"Do you.... do you want to come back to my bedroom?"
Both guests look at each other, their expressions inscrutable under their hoods.
"Yeah, all right, sure."
