The Pallid Mask by Rhys Ponsford

THE PALLID MASK
Entry by: Lloyd Ward, G.E.I.S.T. Operative
(Governmental Eldritch Investigation for Sanctity and Truth)

WARNING: FILE PARTIALLY CORRUPTED. (Corrupted? The only ‘corruptions’ I see are the self-assured, comforting deceptions of your ailing institution.)

INTRODUCTION:
***
‘Camilla: You, sir, should unmask.

Stranger: Indeed?

Cassilda: Indeed it's time. We all have laid aside disguise but you.

Stranger: I wear no mask.

Camilla: (Terrified, aside to Cassilda.) No mask? No mask!’

• The King in Yellow, Act I, Scene 2 - Robert W. Chambers, 1895 translation

***

BACKGROUND:
The Pallid Mask is a theatrical prop and artefact associated with the play, The King in Yellow - a centuries-long banned text, found and translated from a language that died long before humanity ever breathed its first words.

Little is known of the wearer of the Pallid Mask’s role in the play. The wearer, the Carcosan Stranger, goes by many names - The Herald of Carcosa, They who Know Hastur’s Truth, Bastion of the Yellow Sign. Invariably, wherever GEIST finds them, incursions are sure to follow. GEIST has managed to keep these incursions From Beyond to a minimum, but the continual loss of both civilian life and personnel to this entity is regrettable - particularly as we believe they do not die, as such.

They are instead subsumed into the plot, the mythos that blurs script and reality, bound to heed the mad proclamations of The King.

Supplementary Information:
Tags: Artefact, Eldritch, Missing
Security Level: Incursion Potential (Prime) - CAUTION ADVISED
 

EVENTS OF NOTE:

Carcosa has only risen once in GEIST history (And how we danced for that eternal night, awash in His Glory and Song!).

Records differ, but some occultist scholars place the fatalities at thousands, all swept under the sway of the King's Tune, set ablaze in His terrible half-born glory. GEIST’s attempts to prevent Carcosa’s rise were ineffective. Only due to the intervention of other powers was Carcosa’s full Apotheosis halted. 

The requisition of the Pallid Mask was costly. Again, we do not know if The Carcosan Stranger or their kin, the Lost Ensemble (bodies ALIVE with strange charge, pulsing and electric with HIS SONG) can even be killed. We are doing our utmost to try, however. (Yet your pain, earthly and fleeting, cannot compare to the ecstasy that is The King’s aural embrace, as His golden glimmer-tongue sings His aria, to raise Lost Carcosa from dream-woven depths - for all must hear His Song.)

WITNESS REPORT:

Statement of A. J. Walters, regarding an Incursion orchestrated by the Carcosan Stranger (recorded); transcript notes by Lloyd Ward: (Warning: notes also corrupted)

It isn’t worth it. None of it is. You know what I saw, there in the theatre? That carcass of a rotting town, with all the people dancing and singing as their flesh sloughed off their frames and their namesake was excised from them, even as they kept on circling and crying, in thrall already to Dead Carcosa. When the others were taken, when my friends were taken, none of them died. Even as I saw them mutilated, riven apart by crackling charge from the inexorable rift in the world. Instead they joined His Ensemble. Tore off what limbs remained and used their bones to rattle out a rallying march, an exultation slowly tearing from them the last tatters of their soul. One made a mask out of her skin. There is no single Pallid Mask. I think we’re all born with one, deep within us. Waiting to emerge. It’s all a sick joke. We’re a cosmic experiment. Do you think it’s because of the competency of GEIST or some bullshit like that that we’ve survived? No. They’re toying with us. It’s not just The King. The King is only the start. They'll all be joining us soon enough. This is but the First Act. The overture, even. Why do you think everyone goes mad after reading even just a sliver of Act Two? It’s punishment for prophesying. The King in Yellow, it’s just one play in a long, long canon. Humanity has so much to fear ... 

Wait. Can- can you hear that?

[Subject becomes unresponsive at this point. The audio becomes nearly incomprehensible over a new distortion. Walters begins to hum a tune - evidently, he was compromised during the mission. (The sound of ear drums shattering is dimly audible). There are cries from the staff on duty.]

Why, but we’ve so much to... to look forward to. 

[(There is the distinct sound of skin peeling off, then congealing. Rewoven entirely. A Pallid Mask remains. He is left to spread the Song of The King.)]

Why, don’t you know?
Can’t you hear it?
Can’t you see?
Come, come, sing along with me!

[Walters begins to laugh. It is a wet, pulpy thing, that sound. There is nothing of the man left in it. His words, his will, his flesh is no longer his own. (There is nothing human, yes; he has become something more. Remade in His Image, Masked and True.)]

We’ll DANCE and LAUGH and CRY, soon

ALL in THRALL to the TRUE KING’s TUNE!

[(The staff do indeed cry, though do not yet dance or laugh, at the sound of his ethereal mind-corpse shambling heavily towards them. They will make fine additions to the Cast, though.)]

So SING and DANCE and LAUGH and PLAY

ALL at ONCE in the KING IN YELLOW’S SWAY!

[(Exeunt the mind-corpse of A. J. Walters, as the staff are made ready for auditions for the Lost Ensemble.)]

***


CLOSING REMARKS:

(The Second Act approaches. 

Will you all please take your seats?

The Play is about to begin.)

- - FILE ENDS - -