Sharon slept near constantly for two days, which gave Michael plenty of time to go through the supplies in her raft. It was filled with necessity after necessity, four solar stills, some unopened cans of water, a tub of dehydrated pudding and dehydrated milk, a knife, some nylon rope, a reflective blanket, and a massive book the size of the Guttenberg Bible, and in an equally foreign language. There was something else strange about the book. In the margins of some of the pages were horrific drawings of part human creatures and other abominations, along with diagrams of bizarre plants unlike anything known to man.

“So like…can you read that thing?”

“Huh? What thing?” Michael pretended not to know what she was talking about.

Carrie rolled her eyes. “Like, whatever.”

It was dusk and Michael was carefully going through one of the nylon ropes bit by bit, checking with his fingers more than his eyes if there were any knicks or other weaknesses in it. Carolyn sat down near him and let her feet dangle over the edge of the Golden Fleece.

There was an uncharacteristically silent moment between them before Carolyn spoke. “I can.”

“Huh!” Michael almost threw down the rope in surprise. “Wait, wait wait wait. You can actually read that creepy thing?”

“Well, like not all of it.” She said as she stared off where the sun had just set leaving just a faint reminder of its brightness in its wake. “The printed stuff is in some strange language I’ve like never seen before, but there are lots of notes in the margins. Like the pictures. It’s like weird though. Almost like hundreds of people have had that thing and all written their own notes.”

Michael had all but forgotten his task and asked, “What, the handwriting is different?”

“Well duh, but like…it’s also different languages. West Saxon, Latin, Chinese, French, Germanic, Greek, Icelandic, Akkadian, Sanskrit, Spanish, Sumerian, Egyptian, Arabic, even Basque, and I’m sure more I don’t know.” She said in an almost sigh, like not knowing was exhausting.

“You know all those languages?”

“Umm, no? Like it isn’t hard to recognize different languages Mikey.” She smirked. “I mean, don’t you remember me talking about my minor in linguistics? It was during that conversation where Becky and I had discovered her brother had been instigating…”

“Okay okay, sorry slow down.” He said hurrying to cut her off before she really got going. “Let’s get back on topic. If you can read even some of it, what’s it about?”

Carolyn furrowed her brow. “Like that’s tough. Half of them seemed totally like ramblings. A few were coherent, but the further you read their notes, the weirder they get, and the more you get those like totally grody drawings with them.”

“Well let’s focus on the abstract then. It seems they follow a pattern, so like do they find the book and say, ‘good show old chap I think this book may be some sort of Necronomicon, let’s take a look and see what horrors invade my mind what ho.’ “

Carolyn giggled. “No, nothing like that sadly. The most coherent things seem to be like different ways they found the book or like attempts to decipher the strange language it’s written in. A lot of nonsense throughout, but the end of like most writings from different people totally focus on fear. It’s like…” she paused as she mulled it over in her head. “Like they totally got terrified of all water. Even like drinking or the ink in their inkwell. It’s totally wild, but like crazy right? I mean…”

“From under the frigid depths…from the abyss…beyond the inky darkness…rise the Ancients…to put the faithful…into their bowl…and sate their lust for…flesh, heat, and blood…from the one most unwilling…”

Carolyn and Michael turned towards the cabin as Sharon had gotten up, and with her soft voice cut straight through both of their thoughts. The dusk barely illuminated her, but Michael could swear he saw the pupils in her eyes swirling around, like green clouds around an eclipse, or a whirlpool of an armada sinking down beneath the waves. She was standing there clutching the massive book against her chest as she looked out at Carolyn and Michael.

“Like Whoa!” chuckled Carolyn. “You totally should’ve warned us you were so good at ghost stories. Like that was a beautiful cadence too!”

She stood there in silence after Carolyn spoke, then she turned to look at Michael. As their eyes met, he felt like she was staring through him. As if she was weighing his soul and seeing if he held any true worth.

Eventually she spoke again. “Who…are you?”

“Like I’m Carrolyn, but you can totally call me Carrie, and that’s Michael. He’s our little savior.” Michael coughed and looked away as she spoke about him. “He’s got this totally awesome survivor thing. Like water, fish, fixing leaks, and so on. He’s like a one man problem solver.”

“Carrie…Michael…” she said softly as she clutched her book tighter. “I’m sorry…”

“Like why?”

Michael looked at her apprehensively. He felt a deep instinctual fear. His body itself was twitching slightly, as if trying to run away. Yelling at him that whatever she was about to say could destroy everything he held dear. That it could shatter reality itself.

Before he could do anything rash, she continued. She seemed to steel herself, and after a deep breath explained herself. “This book…is cursed…it’s a path…to the ancients…knowledge beyond…human understanding…” she sighed and shook her head before looking directly at Carolyn. “Anyone who…reads it will…go mad…it wants to…be read…human minds weren’t…made to understand…what it says…”

“Wow, that’s like totally creepy,” giggled Carolyn. “Honestly, I’ve totally got chills running up my spine, and I bet you do to, right Mikey?”

Michael shook when she said his name. “Umm…I…”

She smiled sympathetically at Michael. “He knows…good instincts…working to keep…him alive…” then she frowned as she turned to Carolyn. “Not you though…like a rat…trying to chase…a lion.”

“O M G! That’s so sweet Shar.” She said as she turned around and stood up. She stretched slightly and put her hands on her hips. “I totally do have a habit of like sticking my cute little nose where it like doesn’t belong.”

“Not…a compliment…”

“Well, I think I’ll like take it as one anyway.”

“You talk…like an idiot…”

“Like O M G! You totally did not just say that.” Carolyn still sounded playful, but there started to be a bit of a bite behind her words, like when she had first met Michael.

Before things could escalate any more, Michael stepped in, quite literally. He put himself between both of them. “Alright, let’s calm down,” he said as he held his hands up. “We’re all lost at sea, and we need to relax and focus on surviving.”

“Ah, what’s surviving if you’re not like living you know?” said Carolyn with a wink.

“It is…too late…” sighed Sharon. “The Ancients…will rise…survival is…unlikely.”

“Okay, maybe you both have your own points...” He tried to ignore how insane both of those statements sounded to him, but he just couldn’t let it go. “No, no I just can’t let that go. You both sound insane.”

He turned to look at Carolyn. “This is a crisis; we need to focus on surviving right now. Quality isn’t as important, okay? I mean we’re probably going to have to squeeze raw fish out to get some water if it doesn’t rain enough. That’s not great quality. The solar stills will help, but it definitely won’t be enough, especially not with three of us.”

“Sharon,” he said as he turned to face her. “We’ve all heard of Lovecraft and Cthulhu or whatever, but this is reality. Nuclear war has destroyed a lot of land. We’ll probably never see anything without damage from the fallout. You need to focus on reality, not some ancient book that makes you learn some crazy language that drives you insane.”

Carolyn seemed to have backed down somewhat, as she crossed her arms again with just a small scowl on her face, but Sharon didn’t back down.

“Tell me…where is the cold…where is the ash…the clouds…the dust…Ocean is normal…as if...nothing happened.”

Michael was taken back slightly. He had been wondering about that for a while. Whenever he stopped to think he kept getting distracted by something that needed immediate attention. “I…”

Sharon didn’t give him a chance to finish his thought. “The bowl…We were scooped…up in it…Preserved to feed the Ancients.”

“Like she means it at least.”

“Wha…” Michael stammered as his body seemed to want to believe everything she said, but his mind just couldn’t rationalize something so ridiculous.

“Umm, look Shar, like I think we got off on the wrong foot.” Continued Carolyn. “That book has got to have something in it about what to do. Like some way to totally survive these Ancients, or like whatever.”

Sharon shook her head. “I don’t think so…only a record of…how to find them…their great deeds…rituals…warnings of deeper beings…no…nothing of how lowly…beings like us could live.”

“Well, you don’t seem to be crazy, or rambling about being afraid of water,” interjected Michael. “So maybe we can find a way out of it? Or if we can all get along we can work together to survive day by day and never have to run into these ancients. I mean if we’re so lowly to them, we’re below their notice too, right?”

“Like yeah, you may seem bitchy, but not like totally crazy.”

“Of course…” added Sharon with a small smirk. “I’ve never…read the book…because I’m blind…”