I've always been fond of adventurous tales and a romantic idea that surrounds finding

a message in a bottle, washed the shore by the winds and waves. I also just happen to

be a part-time history nerd. So, when I found a parchment-filled bottle on the sea shore

in real life, you can imagine my excitement. When I encorged it though, I discovered

no old forgotten love story, or no discovered chapter of history. What I found was

a truly disturbing answer to the unsolved fate of a ship and its crew. The bottle contains

several pieces of yellowing parchment covered in hastily written cursive, the writing scratched

across the page. The time it had withstood made it difficult to read. But nevertheless,

the large portion of it was still legible. The translation of what can still be made

out is as follows.

Sankta Selberdor, June 15th, 1556. Strange events have fallen the Sankta in the past days

after leaving the island. I write with haste because I fear that I may suffer the same fate

as the rest of the crew. We sit sail from the island several days ago and always well until

our ship's quartermaster, Diego, came down with a fever one eve. He was quarantined to

his bonk, thrashing about in his sheets like a madman, the agonising expression on his

face was highlighted by the sweat of his brow. Blood tinged foam gurgled from his lips when

he screamed and he seemed to worsen with each passing hour. The strangest part of the condition

though was that he kept scratching at his eyes. The corners were reddened, almost bloody

from his constant scratching. Sailors are a superstitious lot, and the most devout practitioners

of the old ways went to the captain in concern. These crewmates seemed to believe Diego

was suffering from the early stages of. This bit is unreadable on original parchment and

has been omitted from transcription. The captain disregarded the idea as absurd and

...