Phillip slipped and landed on his backside.

Thick, translucent goo shot up from the soles of his feet and splashed against the side of his car. Phillip wasn't watching, but the sticky substance hissed and crackled on the door panel and then skittered away, leaving long, smoky stains that looked as if they might be etched permanently into the finish.

Phillip raised his hand. Mucus hung from his fingers as if he'd just caught a copious sneeze. His overcoat and trousers must be covered in the stuff. Standing, he threw his briefcase onto the lawn and kicked at the goo. The trail of slime led, as he knew it would, from a gap in the tall hedge that separated his property from that of his neighbors. Knowing that he was fulfilling every stereotype of the angry neighbor, but too furious to care, Phillip raised his fist and shook it. "Damn you, Akeley! This is the last straw!"

The house, a massive, pre-colonial structure of indeterminate rooms and uncertain pedigree, did not respond. Phillip stormed into the house and called the police.

"What do you think might have caused such a thing?" The responding officer asked. It had taken the Miskatonic Valley Police nearly thirty minutes to respond to Phillips' many calls, and now that they had arrived, there was little enthusiasm to their inquiry.

"I don't know!" Phillip said. "How should I know what that crazy old man is doing over there! The house is dark all day, but he's up all hours of the night, chanting, yelling-"

"We've heard screams." Phillip's wife Veronica interrupted. The officer's ears seemed to perk up at that.

"Yes, screams." Phillip said, encouraged by the officer's reaction. "And all kinds if gibberish: Yog-soggoth, mithgoloth, nyarlathotep ..."

"Mi-go." Veronica said. "He's always yelling at someone named Mi-go."

"Yes, that's right." Phillip agreed. "Does he have a Chinese nurse or something?"

The officer turned and looked at the old Akeley house. Only the steeply gabled roof and the peaks of several jutting towers could be seen rising above the tall hedge. The gray, weathered structure was a stark contrast to the new homes that had gone up all around it on the area that had once been called Blasted Heath but was now known as Pleasant Valley Community.

"We know he keeps livestock." Phillip continued. "Cows. Goats. That's got to be against some city statute or other."

The officer looked more skeptical than ever. "Cows?"

"We've seen them," Veronica said. "They come in by truck, two, three at a time, maybe twice a month." She thought for a moment. "We never hear them again, though."

"We hear the goats enough." Phillip said. "Loud as anything, bleating all night. Maybe his livestock got loose and did this? Do cows ooze any kind of slime at all" The police officer shrugged. Phillip turned the idea over in his imagination. "I'm going to take another shower," he announced. He gave the policeman a stern look. "Can I trust you going to have a word with old Mr.Akeley while I go clean up?"

"Certainly, sir." The officer said, skepticism audible in his voice. "I'll go speak with him now."

Phillip showered and dressed. When he returned to the kitchen, Veronica was seated at the small table, eyes fixed forward, staring towards the microwave. There here was mud, grass and slime on her hands and wrists, but Phillip didn't notice this at first. He looked through the window over the sink and saw that the police car was still parked in his driveway, blocking him in. Phillip swore.

"Honey, is that cop still over Akeley's?" he asked.

"I went with him," Veronica said. "Old man Akeley wants us all to come over there."

Phillip poured himself a cup of coffee. "I guess I have to, if I'm going to get that damn cop to move his damn car." He looked at his wife for the first time. He saw the stains on her hands. "What happen, honey, did you fall down?" he asked.

"Down..." she replied in a croaking whisper. "Down with the fungi from yuggoth..." A sliver of clear liquid ran from the corner of her mouth to her chin.

Phillip stared at her. She'd never been a morning person, but she'd seemed awake enough before his shower. He looked at his watch-whatever was bugging her, it would have to wait. "You've got something on your chin," he said, and stepped through the kitchen door onto the driveway.

Phillip walked straight to the front door of the old Akeley place. The high towers and gray walls loomed up, throwing deep shadows across the front yard. Phillip hated this house, and what it did to his own property values. He pounded on the door.

What answered the door wasn't human.

At first, Phillip couldn't comprehend the thing: an almost human mass of translucent liquid, speckled with swimming motes that flashed like startled fish. The thing had a mouth, an obscene ring of crude, melting flesh lined with serrated rows of hard tissue that might have been teeth.

The thing was wearing a Miskatonic Valley Police Officer uniform. It reached out for him, a gesture of unendurable agony, a once-human thing drowning in its own corrupted flesh.

Phillip ran. Half mad with fear, he ran. He rushed in through his kitchen door. His wife was still sitting at the table.

"Honey!" he shouted. "We have to go, we have to go right now!" He shook his wife. Her arms compressed beneath his clutching fingers as if the sleeves of her robe were filled with wriggling jellyfish. As Phillip watched, Veronica's head sink into itself with the look and stink of a melon going bad.

In the last moment before he slipped forever into madness, Phillip heard the thing speak: "Mr. Akeley wants to welcome you to the neighborhood!" it said, a thick, clear liquid running from the formless tear of its mouth. "He hopes that you can stay forever!"