The Cellar Gods

"The Cellar Gods" is a short story by American author Jeffrey Thomas which is loosely connected to the Cthulhu Mythos. It was first published in the anthology New Mythos Legends by Marietta Publishing in September 1999.
==Synopsis==
In 1944 America, the narrator , a young man medically excused from military service, develops a crush on a young woman who belongs to a group of labourers at a secretive warehouse, apparently all of Asian or Eskimo descent. When one night the bigoted locals put the warehouse to the torch and murder the workers, the young woman, whose name was Ng, fled unnoticed and sought sanctuary in the narrator's home.
The narrator hides Ng away in a secret room in his basement, a la Anne Frank, where she remains in happy, self-imposed solitude for many years, rebuffing any and all attempts to persuade her to go outside again.
One day, however, Ng begins to develop a facial deformity similar to one seen by the narrator on another woman of Ng's old group. When asked, she will only reply that she had been chosen, and must accept the gift. The deformity grows worse over the following months, until eventually something horrible burst from her body, and a mysterious statue emerges from the floor. The creature is swiftly killed by the narrator and his father.
The story concludes with the discovery of an odd little lens in Ng's room, one which shows visions of a nightmare worlds being consumed by colossal creatures very similar to that which was so violently birthed from Ng's body earlier. The narrator takes a hammer and smashes it to pieces, before noticing that the statue has vanished.
==Mythos Connections==
The story is loosely tied to the Cthulhu Mythos through a vague reference to the labourers possibly having connections to places called Leng or the Dreamlands. This, along with their general description of stockiness and an faintly Asian appearance, may hint that they are intended to be Tcho-tcho people.
==Publication History==
Since it’s first appearance in New Mythos Legends, "The Cellar Gods" has also appeared in the collection Unholy Dimensions (2005, Mythos Books) and the anthology Zart wie Babyhaut (2010, Festa, German translation).
Category:Jeffrey Thomas works
Category:Expanded Mythos Works