Summary
At last a shape appeared, flapping above the ground on leathery wings. The thing which flew whirring toward me was followed by a train of others, wings slapping the air at incredible speed... I could ... make out many more details... Those huge lidless eyes which stared in hate at me, the jointed tendrils which seemed to twist from the head in cosmic rhythms, the ten legs, covered with black shining tentacles and folded into the pallid underbody, and the semi-circular ridged wings covered with triangular scales... I saw the three mouths of the thing move moistly, and then it was upon me.
—Ramsey Campbell, "The Insects from Shaggai"
The Insects from Shaggai, or Shan, are a race of pigeon-sized, interstellar refugees who arrived on Earth centuries ago. The Shan hail from the planet Shaggai, a world that orbits twin emerald suns. In its heyday, the technologically advanced Shan lived in globular dwellings in huge cities. As devout worshippers of the Outer God Azathoth, they erected pyramidal temples containing "multidimensional gates" whereby "that from Outside" (an aspect of Azathoth called Xada-Hgla) could enter.
One day, a mysterious object appeared in the sky. Day by day, this object drew closer to Shaggai, until the third day when the strange celestial visitor emitted a red glow that destroyed the planet. Only those Shan in their teleporting temples of Azathoth survived the catastrophe. The survivors teleported to their colony on the planet Xiclotl, where their brethren had enslaved the native inhabitants.
The Shan remained on Xiclotl for some time, but upon discovering the frightening nature of their slaves' singular religious practice, they teleported to the planet Thuggon. A horrific find on this world prompted the Shan to flee once more, this time to the planet L'gy'hx, aka Uranus. When this world proved unsuitable, a small band of the Shan teleported to Earth—in a curious cone-shaped temple—arriving in the Severn Valley region of England sometime in the Middle Ages.
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