"If you are we all are."

"Wonderful. I continue to be haunted by Nyarlathotep."

"Does he... does this happen often?" he says very quietly.

"I mean I have not specifically had voices before. Mostly mouths appearing places that mouths should not be. I guess it is harder for mouths to appear in the desert. It's been... better... since I left the asylum."

He immediately comes up with all sorts of ways mouths could appear in the desert, most involving gaping holes filling up endlessly with sand, which feels not very conversational. "I'm glad about that, at least."

On the morning of the sixth day Sister Waletta returns with a letter. It has one word, written in a shaky hand by someone who has not written anything in, well, eight years.

Come.

On the way to the halls, their mouths become so dry that, for a moment, swallowing is impossible. A moment of panic subsides after they finally — finally! — manage to produce enough thick spittle to lubricate your throat.

The night before they arrive, Mordred dreams: 

He's back home in New York. Outside. It’s cool and clear. The ground trembles. At the horizon, this way and that, he sees apartment buildings shaking and tumbling over, skyscrapers falling toward him, and long yellow fangs lurching out of the earth, climbing not just skyward but closing around him, swallowing the ground, swallowing the sky, swallowing him and his home into long, wet shadows, down into a vulgar hole lined with suckers and barbs, oozing honey and blood, and just as he catches sight of the grinding and churning organ where he is headed, the mouth closes tight, blocking out the light. He awakens slowly, uncertain where he is at first.

...Well, there's another image that won't be out of his head for a while.

That morning they arrive at the Dream Halls of Oloth-Waaq.

It is a geological formation of vast, fluted caverns that were carved out by the harsh desert winds. Arriving at the canyon is a rush out of the beating, desert sun. Just when they need it, a spot of shade appears-- finally!

oh thank god

Ayers appears, at first silhouetted against the rising sun.

He is a white American of European descent, very deeply tanned and profoundly lean. He’s not starving, and although his ribs and bones are manifest beneath his skin, he does not seem to be unhealthy. Ayers’s hair and beard are uncut and unkempt, and have been so for many years. He wears no clothing whatsoever and no protective gear of any kind. His feet and hands are deeply calloused, his skin like leather.

Across his stomach, there is a calcified mouth. The thing is a half-open and lopsided sneer of unwholesome lips and teeth turned chalk-dusty. It is completely still, entirely inanimate.

...better... than otherwise....

Somehow when he pictured this he was still imagining some kind of stereotypical professor, even though he knew that didn't make sense; the wildman before him, torso scarred by a horrible dead mouth, is hard to reconcile at first with the man they were looking for.

Lev stands perfectly still for a moment and says, "George?"

Then he says "George!" and runs into George's arms and begins to kiss him entirely unmindful of the nun right there.

The mouth will wake back up and they are going to DIE. Oswald feels frozen in place.

"His state is fragile!"

Lev does NOT look like he is paying attention to this fact.

I Don't Know What Any Of Us Were Expecting

"Lev, he-- the mouth-- it might--"

"Araari only told you of this place in the hope that you would be mindful, Mr. Aarons - "

"George, I missed you."

Ayers does not seem quite capable of making noises.

He opens his mouth and no sound comes out.

Okay no he can't just stand here -- he walks steadily forward towards and then realizes he doesn't have a plan.

Unpanicked, he simply continues to move his mouth until he says, "I missed you too."

It sounds more like a croak than like words.

It is the most beautiful sound he has ever heard.