Pam was glad to have a break from answering phones but as usual when Michael called her into his office, she was a little concerned as to what he had on his mind. Also as usual, he managed to surprise her. He was sitting behind his desk, head in hands, looking tired. She took a seat near the door and opened her notebook and thought it was strange how tired he often looked given that he rarely did anything.

"How are you doing today?" he asked, looking up and greeting her with a pained smile.

"Fine," answered Pam, cheerfully.

"Good, good. Feeling okay? Healthy? Own a life preserver?"

Pam was startled. "A life preserver?"

"I, uh..... I need to build an ark," he said quietly.

"An ark?" Pam asked. She wrote it down, trying to take it in stride. Taking notes helped. It gave her something to focus on other than his odd behavior, and sometimes she would doodle if he got very longwinded.

"Yes, for the animals." He looked at her solemnly. "To save the world."

"Are you feeling okay, Michael? You look a little feverish."

He nodded, shook his head, and then shrugged. "Yes."

No I am not okay. I accidentally took one of Jan's boob pills this morning, Okay two. I thought it was Advil and I needed some pain relief from what she made me do last night. Actually, she had her bottle out on the counter and I remembered her saying how they made her moods go crazy up and down. I missed the sixties, born too late, and have always wondered what that whole experience was like. So I thought, now is my chance. To take a trip. But it didn't work out that way. It just made me feel really weird. My nipples aren't sore anymore though, so that's good. - Michael

Pam tried to figure a way to both make this break last longer and help her boss. "Maybe you should start from the beginning if you want me to help. What happened?"

"I went down to breakfast. Jan sleeps in late these days. On the table there was a note. It said ‘ARK,' in big capital letters."

"I see." She drew a little picture of a boat in the margins with ‘USS Looneytunes' on the side.

He went on, sounding worried and confused. "And below that it said, ‘Build It.' Right next to my Apple Jacks." A tear formed in the corner of his eye at the profound memory.

"There's no rain in the forecast," she offered reassuringly, smiling a little to try to calm him.

He waved his hand dismissively. "I know, I checked. I figure God will create the flood."

"But why would he create it and then try to get you to save people from it? Why not just not create it?"

"I don't know, Pam. I'm not even in corporate," whined Michael. "Ask Ryan, he's the fancy pants with the MBA and expense account."

"Okay, hmm." Almost ten minutes so far, she thought. This was a good break, if an odd one.

"Besides I'm not supposed to save the people. Just the animals."

"Oh. So..."

"Yeah you're all screwed. Except you maybe." he pointed at Pam's chest. "With those you can probably float."

Usually I have to button up my sweater earlier in our conversations so he's definitely not himself today. - Pam

10:14 a.m.

Jim had watched Pam come out of Michael's office with curiosity, and a few minutes later, being bored and wanting to talk to her as he did most days, he found a reason to make a stop by the reception desk.

"Here's that paperclip you asked for." He handed it to her carefully as if it was the only one of its kind.

"Oh thanks," Pam replied, smiling. "I wondered where that one went."

He motioned towards Michael's door. "What happened in there?"

"He has to build an ark and was asking me to take notes and help Dwight get supplies."

"An ark?"

"My reaction as well." She shrugged. "I have to take this call. Dunder Mifflin, this is Pam."

Jim frowned. This was stranger than he expected. He was genuinely concerned for his boss's well-being. "Did he bump his head or something?"

Pam covered her mouthpiece. "Let's hope," she said. "At least that would be fixable."

As they talked, Dwight walked in carrying a large box, dumped it on the conference room table, then went back for more, bringing a couple into Michael's office and leaving a small one on Angela's desk.

"Yeah, I am going to have to see if he's all right," said Jim.

How did it go in his office? Once I got past him adding me to his crew and asking if I wanted Karen or Pam to come along, and then his making remarks about how he bets Karen is sorry she broke up with me now, yes, I eventually got a chance to ask Michael if he'd bumped his head. He said no.

And then he asked me how many Foreman grills you need to feed a lemur. - Jim.

12:15 p.m.

Around mid-day, Kelly was talking with Pam at reception; Jim was filling out a few forms, while Stanley and Phyllis tried to drum up some sales on the phone. Nobody was sure what Creed was doing. Dwight walked up to his desk and slammed down a stack of books hard, making most of his coworkers jump and look over which was his intent.

"Listen up everyone! This is important," he said in his best authoritatively loud voice.

Stanley raised an eyebrow. "The last time you said that, it was just to announce that your World of Warcraft wizard had turned sixty," he pointed out.

Dwight wasn't sure why Stanley would bring up that now but it was true. "Seventy, and also to announce that he finally achieved his quest mount. It was important to company morale for people to know this."

Oscar grinned. "It did help break up the day," he said. "We all had a good laugh."

"You won't be laughing about this one. I have news. You're all going to drown."

"What?" asked a startled Phyllis, turning around.

Jim leaned back in his chair, put his pen down and settled in. He could tell this was going to end up in a mess and couldn't wait. "What exactly are you talking about, Dwight?"

Dwight pulled out a notebook and started making a list, jotting worthy animals down furiously as they came to him. "There's a flood coming, the end of the world, and Michael is going to build an ark to save all the animals. What we need you all to do is help us decide which animals are worth saving."

My first instinct was, this is crazy. My second instinct was, it would be crazy to keep working when I can kill an hour with this. - Oscar

Dwight brought me a pair of lovely inflatable waterwings, just the right size. He also gave me two snorkels, for Oscar and Kevin. I haven't decided whether they deserve them. - Angela

"Penguins!" squealed Kelly joyfully. "They are so cute."

"They are already on the list," announced Dwight, double checking as he said it. "They seem very disciplined and worth saving."

"Tigers," suggested Pam. "They are beautiful."

Dwight shook his head. "No, not tigers. First of all they would eat the other animals, which are precious food. And secondly, they are hard to kill and even harder to cook."

Jim glanced briefly at Pam; he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Wait," he said. "You're going to eat the animals?"

Dwight sighed and lowered his notebook. "That isn't the plan, Jim. But if the flood should last longer than the expected forty days, then yes, there may come a time when we will have to eat our cargo. Which is why I'll be bringing along many chickens and turkeys. And mayonnaise."

"Those are fine but fish is important to the diet," Jim explained. "It's good for the brain and a lighter meat."

"True. I could take a couple of salmon."

"You could take a couple of many kinds," suggested Kevin. "And a few lobster as well."

"And crabs," said Phyllis, brightening at the thought. "I love crab."

Oscar smiled and chimed in. "Flounder is delicious. Include a few of them."

Dwight added all these to the list, underlining some with a flourish. "Done. And haddock. And a killer whale or two."

"A whale?" asked Meredith, looking around to make sure she wasn't the only one who thought this was odd.

"Yes," explained Dwight. "The oil can be used to light lanterns and blubber is a long-lasting and nourishing food."

"But what will keep the whales from overpopulating?" asked Jim. "You can only eat so much blubber."

Dwight paused and thought for a moment. This was a good point, even if it came from Jim. "I guess I need a few sharks as well," he said, adding them to the list.

The loud kid with the glasses ended up removing all the sea creatures from his list after I offered to sell him a harpoon and two fishing rods that I keep in my trunk for five hundred dollars. Luckily he didn't ask me why I keep a harpoon in my trunk. I'm not really sure. Its just always been there. - Creed

1:18 p.m.

Darryl and Madge were sitting in the warehouse at lunch time, eating pizza out of a box and doing as much as they could to talk about subjects other than paper and lifting things.

Up above them, the door to the main office opened and their boss Michael Scott appeared, looking tense. He tossed down half a dozen life jackets, one after another hitting the floor with a thud in random areas. One of them knocked over a crate, spilling stacks of copier paper left and right. Michael gave a little wave, went back inside and closed the door.

Darryl watched this all unfold and then turned to Madge. "You want that last piece?" he asked "We can split it if you do."

2:42 p.m.

Kevin stopped his work for a moment and looked over at Oscar while wearing his snorkel. "Is it just me or is accounting a lot more fun with these on?"

Oscar nodded without looking up. "It's not just you," he said.

Angela scowled at them disapprovingly as she continued to try to inflate her waterwings.

3:25 p.m.

Later that afternoon, Michael was increasingly stressed about it all. He paced his office; he drank coffee and he went over ark designs with Dwight, which took a long time because most of the designs Dwight showed him were of Viking warships. Dwight was convinced that they'd need an enormous battering ram on the front of the boat in case God had spoken to someone else and there were rival arks. He had an image which he explained in detail to Michael of great "ark versus ark" wars on the high seas with the fate of humanity and wildlife at stake.

Eventually Michael did what he had to do in a crisis: he ushered Dwight out of his office and called Jan for help. He was reassured to hear her impatient, almost snappish voice on the other end and put her on speakerphone so he could continue to pace.

"Michael, what is going on? Why did you leave a message earlier asking if I knew how to navigate?"

"I'm building the ark, Jan, you saw the note. When you got up. Wait, you're not still in bed are you?"

"No Michael. I'm up, dressed and everything. What note?"

"The note about the ark. On the table."

"Michael. You asked me last night about Hunter's band. You said you wanted to buy the CD. His band is called Ark, because he's from Arkansas. Their album is called Build It. I was just letting you know."

Michael could feel the stress drain out of his body. He even managed to flash an embarrassed grin but still felt weak and disoriented. "Oh. That's a relief," he said. "I don't have much boat building experience. And what about the apostle I saw in my toast?"

"I can't help you with that one."

"I guess I shouldn't look at toast that closely." He loosened his tie and took his jacket off.

"What is wrong with you? You sound off. More off."

He paused, not sure whether to admit to her what happened. "I took some of your boob pills, by accident. I feel strange."

Jan sighed. "Michael, those are prescription pills. You shouldn't have touched them. Lie down and I'll be there as soon as I can."

"So there's no real flood or need for an ark?"

"Right." Jan sighed again. He could hear her picking up her car keys as she talked. "I'll be there within half an hour. Don't go anywhere."

He slowly lowered himself to the floor and stretched out in front of his desk. "Thanks Jan. I didn't even have a sextant."

3:39 p.m.

A little while later, Jim found a stopping point in his sales work and ambled over to Pam's reception desk, taking a couple of hard candies from a bowl and fidgeting with them while he waited for her to finish transferring a call.

"Good news," he said, smiling at her as she put the phone down. "I convinced Michael to let you come aboard as part of the crew. He wants us to help rebuild society after the flood."

Pam looked up at him with a serious face. "Just one date and you think you can repopulate the Earth with me?"

Jim stepped back and raised his eyebrows quizzically. "Am I getting ahead of myself?" he asked.

"A bit, yes."

"Is that a third date thing?"

"We'll see."

**********