My dearest colleagues,

I write to you of a monumental discovery that occurred earlier today. As you know, for some time now I have made of this dim lagoon something of a laboratory and observation post, and at last my efforts have paid off. Beyond my wildest dreams! This very morning I felt a disturbance along my lateral lines and looked up to see the keel of a human motor vessel -- the Rita, if I have correctly interpreted their orthography -- cleaving the water's surface overhead. Moments later the crude engines stopped and a huge anchor clattered and splashed, plummeting down within a whale's fluke of my entire library! Yet I was more excited than disturbed: here at last, an opportunity to observe these creatures at closer hand. Their females intrigue me the most, I must admit, though the thought unsettles me. It is almost a compulsion -- I fear it will be my undoing.

I must shake these black thoughts. Tonight I float in the pleasant gloom beneath the vessel's mossy keel, flexing my webbed talons idly and listening to their muffled primate mumblings reverberating through the vessel's hull. Now one of them is on deck! I shall approach and make an attempt at conversation. Wish me luck!

Yours,
Ricou

Dear diary, today Altaira took her first steps! Edward actually looked pleased; it's the first time I've seen him smile in days. He gets especially moody after visiting that strange Krell laboratory.... Oh, I hope the committee can prevail upon Edward to join us in requesting a transfer from this place. It disturbs me. Something in the dust storms that move across the plains....

but the unit will be billeted in this spot for the foreseeable future. It's a lot like home except for the palm trees -- and I never can get used to them. Just looking at them makes me itch in ways I never expected.

the Utoi began the shuffling, hideous dance that precedes the offering of their lunar sacrifice.