From the Journal of Olivia Delacroix - First entry. It’s been nearly twenty-one days since The Golden Dove was blown off course by a truly malevolent storm. Had it not been for the peerless bravery of our good Captain Harrington and the courageous Lieutenant Littlefield, we most certainly would have been lost at sea somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. Though having lost our glorious airship and most of our supplies, some of...

From the Journal of Olivia Delacroix - Third entry. It has been, to the best of my knowledge, eight days since I detailed Emma’s discovery of the bright pink fruits which we have taken to calling lustberries. Since that first night we have made some significant discoveries about its properties. Its effects, which last anywhere from twelve to twenty-four hours, depending upon the mass of the imbiber and their metabolism ar...

From the sketchbook of G. McCrossen. Day by day, the desire to be rescued fades. Here, I no longer fear being found out. I feel free. Returning to civilization is far from my mind. Carter tugged insistently on Gavin’s hand as they walked along the beach, the sound of waves crashing against the rocks before sluicing through the tide pools their constant companion. They’d left the camp after devouring a meal enhanced by the...

From the Journal of Olivia Delacroix - Fourth entry. The last few days feel like a fever dream born of delirium. Emma claims that I was gone for a span of a week and I have no reason to doubt her and yet, I find it hard to fathom that so many days passed. I can only assume that my wits were sufficiently scrambled by my ordeal. Of what I do recall, the discovery of the swarm upon the cliff’s face, the overwhelming ecstasy...

From the Journal of Olivia Delacroix - Sixth entry.I have yet to share the truth with anyone, even Emma, with whom I have grown closer to than anyone else in my life. It tears at me, keeping secrets, here, where we have torn down the walls separating us. I feel apart suddenly, and it is not a feeling I find comfortable. Before, I would leave the thoughts within these pages for all too see. Now, I hide my journal, unwillin...

From the sketchbook of G. McCrossen. Captured! Thankfully, only James’ pride wounded. In hindsight, it was fortunate that his pistol misfired. The fight had been short. Although James did his best to defend us, his revolver failed to fire, much to his obvious chagrin. After a short, but spirited skirmish the lizard-men, as Emma has dubbed them, quickly overpowered him with their spears, disarming him of both pistol and sa...

Eventually, numbness and boredom eased my terror, pushing it to the back of my mind. How long I hung, suspended like a worm on a fisherman’s hook, I know not for I spent much of the time fading into an uncomfortable unconsciousness. And then, the terror returned in abundance as I felt a presence within the dark, my eyes having grown accustomed enough to see the displacement of blank emptiness by something much darker and...

From the Log Book of HMS Ravensong We have decided to set sail upon the morrow, satisfied that we have rescued all living survivors of the Golden Dove. We have spent the last week searching, at the insistence of Prof. W. Waites and his daughter, that one of their number still lives, lost somewhere beyond the city of serpents. With a fierce storm brewing upon the horizon, I fear that to remain would be folly. Today has bee...

Autumn. Eventually, I felt the need to feel the sun and the wind once more, and ventured to the surface, accompanied by my alien lover, Isshu.  It was nighttime, and the air was brisk upon my naked flesh.  I could not remember the last time I bothered to cover my nakedness – the memory was as distant as that of my life before this island. Paris and London had become places in barely remembered stories. I remembered my com...

Spring passed quickly and summer arrived, bringing with it a longing that drew me more and more to the surface and daylight.  With each passing day I felt more and more restless, the need to see the open sky overcoming my desire for Isshu, strong as that was.  Had he been able to stand the almost sweltering heat, I would have enjoyed his company here in a world that was more to my tastes.  With or without him, I needed to...

Strangely, Prel’s reluctance rekindled the spirit of motivation in me. I’d become complacent, losing myself in the haze of sexual desire and that of the potent berries that were so easily obtainable.  The Kintinku provided me with a challenge – not only that of learning to communicate with the cat-man, but to seduce him as well.  At first it was difficult.  I had, in a true sense, become addicted to a heady mix of heighte...

(First entry from the Diary of V.Dorofeyev, translated from the original Slavic by O.Delacroix) i. With the help of Pavel and Yngvild, I was able to close the portal, sealing the cavern behind us before we were driven mad.  Even now, a handful of days later, the site of divinity burns like a fever in my mind like a siren, calling out to me.  My companions feel it too.  Pavel weeps openly at the memory of our short sojourn...

A mockery of a woman, most decidedly feminine in feature, stood before me appraising me in silence.  In return, I examined her as well, more curious, at the moment, than afraid, although I wasn’t entirely without fear.  She would have once been regarded as beautiful, I surmised, despite that her features were somehow alien in cast – her single eye slanted and overly large, a lavender pupil filling the entirety and her fea...

From the Journal of Olivia Delacroix  Day twelve? upon The Eye of Thermisto (translated from the French). Be thankful for little mercies. My captor, who yet remains nameless has granted me small privledges or, more precisely, incentives to behave. In other words, she treats me like a pet which is, perhaps, an apt description of my new role aboard this fantastical vessel. I am, in truth, little more than a test subject to...

I awoke, eventually, the sound of her mechanical creations my only companions. Metal upon metal. The sound of whirring machines. The pulse of liquid being pumped through tubes. Opening my eyes, I was surprised to find that I was no longer in the cell that she’d been keeping me. Instead, I had been transferred to some sort of crystalline tube. It reminded me of the test tubes that I was once familiar with a lifetime ago. A...

I died. And yet I didn’t. Death was not what I expected. There was no tunnel, no light, no choir of angels nor a pearly gate. I found myself floating, untethered. Drifting, slipping in and out of dreams that may have been visions or perhaps glimpses of what transpired while I slept... They, whether visions or dreams, felt life-like, sometimes stimulating a particular sense – sight, sound, scent, taste, or touch, sometimes...