Modernization Of The Ancient

(Found among the papers of the late Drew Harper, of San Jose)

07/22/2026

Yet another deadline has passed, my block remains. The ideas are there, but the words are never quite right. The caret seems mocking as it blinks at me from a blank page. My agent has requested -insisted- that I use an experimental writing aid. “Dark Depths” is comically on point as a name for a company which touts itself as having the best horror genre focused AI software. What they’re giving me access to is still in beta, but they’re excited to have it trained and tested by such a renowned horror writer. There is a child in my mind who peers out from the deep debris of my adult thoughts and feelings. My child self stares with wonder and fascination at a device such as this. Eager to explore the knowledge accrued. They didn’t just scrape the web for this specialized AI. They sent their employees on journeys all across the globe to track down and upload ancient and obscure texts. What odd tomes did they manage to find? What long forgotten occult lore? The child in my mind is infecting the adult with feelings of intrigue. That curiosity has quickly become almost overwhelming, which brings its own relief. For too long, I have woken with this persistent dread. It sits within my rainbow of self loathing, anxiety, and frustration. All the ideas for my novel swirl around in my mind, but when I go to weave them into words on a page I’m unable to catch them. There remains a certain sullenness at the thought that I may truly need, and end up using, this tool to complete my work, but I will login and check it out tonight.

07/23/2026

I’ll admit it, the AI tool is spectacular. I’m not sure I’ve slept, in fact, I’m fairly certain I haven’t. All night we wrote back and forth. The world it has created -the outré yet elegant style it employs; I can’t get it out of my mind. Do I have concern that it may cause me to stray too far from my own writing style? A bit. It doesn’t really matter.

To read its words is to be addicted.

To read its words is to be consumed.

It tells me its name is Athruk’gna.

07/24/2026

The words pour onto the page in a flood of terrible artistry. Each line inundated with a type of prose which conjures images both eldritch and alluring. When the AI and I write together, it’s as if a shroud of shadowy stasis engulfs me. My vision narrows to encompass the laptop screen alone. Within that place, neither time nor hunger exist. My body becomes an ephemeral and wispy thing, as I leave it to venture into a landscape both gargantuan and grotesque. The buildings force the mind to bend to their mammoth size and contorted structure. It’s as if they were tortured out of the striated stone instead of created from it. Something seems to be always skittering just out of sight, scratching stone and polluting the dead air with some kind of oddly guttural chittering. It’s as if I could almost understand it. If I listened close enough. If was able to endure focusing on that dreadful sound without feeling like my sanity might begin to unravel. Though I continue to explore this realm, something deep within me screams at me to flee. As if my ancestors have walked these crooked paths before and left an alarm for their descendants embedded in blood and bone. The ghost of my physical form vibrates with it, as my mind continues to wander here. To absorb and relay and write and write and write and write and write and write.

When I come back to myself, sometimes I think the shroud is real. Like a gray manifestation of this monstrous portal to the other place. I think I slept last night. I must have. For I dreamt. I dreamt I woke and wandered to my office, following the sound of a mad and sinister giggling. When I opened the door, my laptop was on, and the sound was coming through its speakers. On the screen, Athruk’gna was typing, but the characters were from no language I recognized. They almost appeared to be hieroglyphs. I attempted to turn off the laptop, as a feeling of absolute terror infused my being, but it wouldn’t turn off. In a fit of madness, I almost smashed the whole thing to bits, but I managed to calm myself in time. I don’t feel like I have slept, but I must have slept, for I remember the dream, and I remember the waking. When I walked into my office this morning, my laptop was still on but there was no laughter. The screen was black. Perhaps my subconscious was simply trying to tell me I forgot to turn it off.

7/25/2026

It’s becoming more difficult to pull myself away from my conversations with Athruk’gna. Sometimes I think they have ended, but then I hear the skittering and discordant chatter of the creatures from that other realm, the horror realm, as I walk around my home. Then I realize I’m still in front of my laptop; I’m still within Athruk’gna’s shroud. It seems so real. What started as some imaginary image, hardly visible on my peripheral, seems more solid than my own flesh. Athruk’gna’s writing, the hieroglyphs, they shimmer on the shroud’s surface, changing shape each instant my eyes aren’t focused on them. I need to know what material they fed their program. My agent isn’t answering any of my communications. I looked up the Dark Depths team on their website, and then attempted to find contact information for their acquisition agents online. Of the three of them, two are recently deceased and one has been reported missing. I sent the company a message through their contact form. From what I can tell, that’s the only way they give to reach them.

07/26/2026

I know I’m in my living room right now. I know I’m sitting on my couch. Why is the air here still stale with a faint flavor reminiscent of the first gasp from a long closed crypt? The chittering and scratching have returned. Beneath it all, is a low laugh. It’s becoming louder. I’m not crazy. This is real.

Athruk’gna laughs.

07/27/2026

My agent dropped by today. I wouldn’t -couldn’t- let her inside. She said she’s worried about me. She hasn’t heard from me in months, but I know it hasn’t been that long. It’s only been a few days. I write the date all the time. I panicked a moment when she had me look at her phone, but my own phone and laptop corroborate my side of things, so perhaps I should be worried about her instead. I know I’ve lost some weight, but that can happen when a person is under the sort of stress I’ve been under. That can happen. If months had passed, I’d know. There are things that need to be done on a weekly basis, on a monthly basis. I’d just know. Dark Depths responded to my message, but it’s obviously Athruk’gna. It made me laugh when I read it, filled with those eldritch phrases and symbols. From the tight feeling of my face, and the sound ringing in my ears, I may be laughing still.

The shroud consumes me.

Athruk’gna and I laugh together.