"Are they firing on each other?" I asked unbelievably, because that was how it appeared.
Who could the other fleet be comprised of in this sunken world?
Colt and I looked at each other in sudden comprehension and said in unison, "No way!"
It couldn't be, but the unexpected was to be expected down here.
Colt abruptly left my side to run down to the shore and into the surf. What on Earth was he up to?
I saw him pull the scroll out of his belt. He tied a rock off to it and then he chucked both the rock and the scroll out into the ocean an impressively far distance.
Colt came back to me then and grasping my shoulders tightly he roughly said, "You've never seen or heard of an old scroll, got it!!!"
I nodded numbly unsure of anything right now.
"Why Colt?"
He looked off for a moment and then back to me, "I studied the scroll some."
"How could you do that it's in some script that I've never seen before?"
"I'm not sure how, but the words turned to English and I could read it. I stopped within a few sentences though. It was bad! I mean bad in the dark evil variety kind of way!"
"What did it say?" I asked anxious to know.
"It was basically a treasure map for something old. Something better left buried going by what little I read. I stopped reading because it was like something was overcoming me the more I read the scroll. Like something within the scroll was compelling me to continue reading. It was almost hypnotic in the force that it exerted on me! When I realized how I was being drawn in I threw the scroll into the fire, but it wouldn't burn! Instead it started flashing. Now that I think about it I think it was flashing out an alert beacon."
"Why would it do that?"
"I guess because it couldn't control me. I rejected it and now it's looking for a new master. Look! They're coming! Whatever you do don't breathe a word about the scroll Kim!"
I nodded, as I watched the not so foreign looking boats plow into the sand of the beach. We were suddenly surrounded by American clothed Marines from a different century.
Feature wise the men had elements of mixed heritage, a testament as to how their forefathers must've intermarried with the indigenous Polynesian peoples that seemed to have arrived to this sunken world first. The Japanese were likely no different in how they had maintained their numbers.
These two warring factions were far removed from the instigations of a bygone war on the surface, but down here they were still apparently locked in a bitter proverbial war. Would the surprises of this place never end?