text: [Themes: Lovecraftian]
  
  > Look around
  Airplane cabin (in your seat)
  Yes, the plane rumbles on. The man behind you is snoring, and the baby across the aisle is still howling. An in-flight magazine in front of you does whatever the opposite of beckoning is. The little lavatory at the end of the plane appears to be vacant.
  
  > About you
  This was a pretty spiffy suit when you put it on in Cairo, but halfway to Boston it's a bit of a mess. The shirt is rumpled, and there's a little spot of drool from when you dozed off around takeoff.
  
  Oh, and your eyebrow makeup is starting to rub off a little bit. You should definitely fix that.
  
  > unbuckle the seatbelt
  Click! You unbuckle your seatbelt.
  
  > take the bag
  Taken.
  
  > enter lavatory
  You would have to get out of your seat first.
  
  > get up
  You stand up in your seat. One of the flight attendants glares at you, pursing her cherry-red lips in disapproval. Since she's standing up and handing out drinks, you figure there's nothing to worry about.
  
  "I really have to go," you say, and feign a pained expression. She goes back to offering Sprites.
  
  > Continue
  Being in the country, you couldn't not visit your grandfather. It only took a short jaunt from Cairo (first class, which for reasons of integrity condemned you to ride economy on the way back to the states—but you didn't really mind). You had let him know you were coming, but he had still seemed surprised, somehow. That you came at all, that you had wanted to come. You felt guilty. But now you were starting to wonder if there was something more to it than loneliness... Grandfather had been acting strangely, all weekend. He never left the house. He spoke in whispers, even when grandmother was out with her friends. He spoke loudly to her, just to be heard. But never with you. He seemed afraid.
  
  And now he had sent you to get a key.
  
  It was the outermost chamber of the place your grandfather told you about. South, a shaft of daylight shone through the arch, beckoning to you. The street. The world. Further north, a narrow tunnel that once led inside was now blocked by a heap of rubble, ancient. It looked like it had been bombed. "That was where it happened," he would say, when you asked.
  
  > check your inventory
  You are carrying:
  a key
  
  > examine key
  An old bronze-ish key, caked in dirt. It lay heavily in your hand.
  
  > look at the arch
  A crumbling stone arch. You were half-afraid that one of the bricks would tumble onto your head.
  
  > go south
  You stood under the archway separating the dark room behind you, to the south, from the bustling marketplace outside. The sun seemed too bright against your face. People were rushing past, entreating each other for rotten apples and cell phone cases. A step southward would take you into their midst.
  
  > examine the marketplace
  People were hurrying past, doing their business. You had been too long in America; trying to understand anything but English spoken at that clip had become impossible. You knew what the general scene was, though.
  
  > look at the sun
  It glared, as if disapprovingly.
  
  > go south
  You stood surrounded by a throng of people. There was a stand selling counterfeit cell phones right next to you. The wide road continued east and west, filled with stalls. A gap between two buildings caught your eye, to the south.
  
  > go south
  You stood in a narrow alleyway between two old buildings. They loomed from either side—gray-brown stone. The ground was wet and puddled, even though it hadn't rained. You wanted to hurry out; the alley opened onto the street to the south, blessedly empty. To the north, the sounds of the bazaar wafted in.
  
  > Go south
  On the east end of this bumpy, crooked avenue stood your grandparents' house. It seemed to loom, almost chillingly. Absurd, of course; this was a warm place, and it had been your home before. But you couldn't shake the feeling that something terrible was waiting.
  
  > examine the house
  Old, falling-apart. You didn't much like the way your grandparents chose to live right in the middle of the city, but maybe it was just as well that they weren't driving. This place held a few fond memories for you, but today the old brown brick-stones seemed to radiate an aura of menace.
  
  > Go east
  You walked into the sitting room. It was cozy, and spare, the way your grandmother liked to live. Grandfather probably would have preferred to keep more of his books and baubles around the house, but for their part the baubles had been sitting in a storage crate since god knows when.
  
  Some of the books managed a happier fate; you could see them through the open door to the southeast, packed into shelves and stacked up on top of each other in messy piles. Grandfather was probably in there right now, reading and studying about...
  
  That thing. Whatever it was that he wanted you to do.
  
  Delicious smells wafted in from the closed kitchen door to the east.
  
  > Examine books
  books of every description were stacked in piles, crammed onto the shelves. Of those that were in English, you couldn't recognize a single title. The rest were even more mysterious—it seemed that
  almost
  every script in the world was represented, etched onto the cover of some codex that lay strewn on the floor, clearly read and read again. Your mind boggled.
  
  > Go east
  (first opening the kitchen door)
  Your grandmother, eagle-eyed, spotted you creeping in to get a look at the soup. "Out, out! Wait until dinnertime, boy, how old are you?"
  
  She shooed you back out through the door.
  
  The sitting room was cozy, and spare, the way your grandmother liked to live. Grandfather probably would have preferred to keep more of his books and baubles around the house, but for their part the baubles had been sitting in a storage crate since god knows when.
  
  Some of the books managed a happier fate; you could see them through the open door to the southeast, packed into shelves and stacked up on top of each other in messy piles. Grandfather was probably in there right now, reading and studying about...
  
  That thing. Whatever it was that he wanted you to do.
  
  The kitchen door to the east stood open, and you could see your grandmother bustling around, working on the soup. She clearly spotted you, and was looking at you quizzically. Maybe your face betrayed something.
  
  > go southeast
  You were in the library, your grandfather's "study" (as he called it). books of every description, from glossy magazines to ancient, decaying tomes lay open on the floor or spilling out of shelves. Grandfather was at his desk, furrowing his gray brow in concentration. He hadn't looked happy much, lately, nor did he now, but this was surely the next best thing.
  
  > examine Grandfather
  It was almost heartbreaking to look at him. His voluble face and his gray beard were still there, but his face was wan, and his eyes were sunken. Since yesterday, more bandages had been wound around his arm, and his hard voice had weakened to a tremble. An authoritative tremble, but nothing could disguise his increasing weakness. He seemed to steady himself on the desk.
  
  > examine the desk
  An old mahogany desk, in the French style. It had never occurred to you to ask where grandfather had gotten it from.
  
  > talk to Grandfather
  Be more specific—ASK about a specific thing or topic, if you
  want
  to talk to your grandfather. And remember, it may be useful to ASK more than once about the same topic, or to come back later and ASK again after pursuing other subjects. Not everyone is infinitely forthcoming!
  
  > ask Grandfather about books
  He shook his head. "The key, boy! Where is the key?"
  
  > give the key to him
  He snatched the bronze key out of your hand. "Good, good. I'm just glad it was still there," he said. Then slowly, gravely, he dangled the key over the pages of the book he was examining, and let go.
  
  It tumbled down, spinning, and then, when it hit the shimmering gold page laid out before him, it simply tumbled through, as if it had been dropped into water.
  
  > Examine book
  (the book)
  It seemed ancient, although not as ancient as it feels now to you. That thing must have come far. Its golden pages seemed to shimmer and ripple in the dim light.
  
  > ask him about the key
  "It unlocks something which is better left unopened. It's better for all of us that it should be hidden that way."
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  He looked dismayed for a moment, looking down at the rippling gold pages in an unknown language that lay before him. "That's the rub, isn't it? This thing has a curse. It is a curse. It's unreadable... and it kills you," he said.
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  "It has... strange properties," he said.
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  "I got it from Pierre. I've told you about him, haven't I? We studied together in Paris."
  
  > ask him about Pierre
  He said "Ah, I haven't told you about him? Maybe you just don't remember. Pierre was a, uh, a geologist friend of mine, when I was studying in Paris. We had wonderful times together, you know. And he would go out on these antarctic missions. That was where he got all his wonderful... gifts."
  
  > ask him about the gifts
  He gestured to the book in front of him, silently.
  
  > ask him about Pierre
  He shook his head. "I don't want to linger over old times. He is out of our lives now—and we are probably the better for it."
  
  > ask him about paris
  His patience was beginning to wear thin.
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  "Amundsen wasn't the first, you know. The Vikings made it further than anyone suspected, I suppose. That's what he said. That they found things in the ocean... and they left their knowledge at the end of the world."
  
  Again he fell silent. You opened your mouth.
  
  > ask him about Vikings
  "The vikings beat everyone to the north pole, of course. It would seem they found all kinds of things under the ice. That's what Pierre told me."
  
  > ask him about Vikings
  He huffed a little. "I'm not really an expert on these things."
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  "He found this book there. It must have been the Vikings—the writing almost looks like runes, doesn't it? Where they got the paper from, it's not ours to know, but they must have had contact with something else. Somehow. Because it isn't just a book... in fact it's hardly a book at all." You continued to find this maddeningly unclear, and you itched to ask him again.
  
  > ask him about the book
  (the book)
  "It's a summoner of storms. It's a portal to another world, in the most literal imaginable sense. You could step through it and emerge somewhere that no man has gone, perhaps since the Norsemen were the masters of the waves. It's very, very dangerous. And it carries... a rot. A rot that is yours, now, too." He shut the book with with a snap, and gestured to it, as if it was an offering.
  
  > get the book
  (the book)
  He looked at you sadly as you picked it up, and he mumbled something you could barely hear. It sounded as if he was saying you would see each other soon. His bones were breaking.
  
  You picked up the book. The book. That ancient, weathered
  thing. That thing of evil. And now its curse was yours, just as it had been your grandfather's...
  
  (Press any key to continue)