“Without its own enemies, the mind will create more than enough.”

—anonymous

Day 1

:2116.306.00.00:

As the tiny transport shuttle, Delia’s Needle, pulled away from the massive anchor ship, Griff—accustomed to the sudden loss of artificial gravity—idly wondered if the same person who named the colors in boxes of crayons was also paid to name the legion of vessels that wove a lattice across the vast expanses of space? Small thrusters engaged and the g-forces pushed her firmly back against the seat as they began to make their way to the green planet below. Her fingers drummed on the molded plastic armrest. Maybe one day when she hung up her guns she’d get a cushy desk job like that. Then again, maybe not.

For the umpteenth time Griff looked down at the screen embedded into the left forearm of the form-fitting suit that ANR had provided for all the scientists and researchers and used two fingers to once again scroll through the ultra-compressed briefing summary:

She tried to shift her ass-cheeks to get comfortable in the seat as they descended through the layers of atmosphere, her sit-bone going all but numb with at least another hour before landing and a bit of relief. You’d think that since ANR had more money than God himself, they’d be able to provide their employees with something better than this; perhaps they could spring for gel-cooled seats, a cushioned head rest, or adjustable leg supports? Nope. A rigid plastic chair shaped like half an egg, an inch of orange padded vinyl, and two criss-crossing safety straps cinched tightly across her chest. Surely if the engineer of these seats was deceased, he was burning somewhere near the seventh circle of hell.

The elongated shuttle had a narrow cabin with a single aisle flanked on each side by six chairs, two empty, and each with their own acrylic windows, pitted and scratched on the outside from debris and leaving the view with a hazy, yellow tint. To distract herself, Griff took stock of the passengers. From the briefing she recognized her three teammates assigned to explore the island and knew the other six passengers would make up the research team.

The seating arrangement didn’t encourage chit-chat, so all the passengers in Delia’s Needle’s small cabin steadfastly ignored each other, regardless of their team assignment, sitting in an uncomfortable silence and lost in their own thoughts. The tall, thin scientist in the front with a scruffy beard and blond hair to his shoulders, looking vaguely like a homeless nomad, had his eyes closed and looked peaceful even as his lips moved in a silent meditation. Behind him sat their leader, a middle-aged woman with eyes that calmly took everything in—the people, the shuttle, the changing view outside her window—and Griff imagined all the information being stored away for future reference. The last member of their team sat immediately in front of Griff, and though she could not see him, she could hear his feet bouncing on the floor of the cabin with nervous energy and suspected the crash straps were straining against his bulk.

Mentally, she couldn’t help the military training that instilled in her a need to judge each team member by potential contribution and liability, to weigh their worth by making a plus and minus column for each person.

Having made it through the outer layers of the atmosphere, Griff could feel the shuttle adjust its thrusters, begin to decelerate, and bank sharply to her left before leveling out. She turned her attention to the viewport where, after several more minutes, she was able to watch their descent through the dense, green canopy and eventually touch down in a small glade.

The four-person island team unbuckled and stood for the first time in hours, their legs stiff and backs sore. When they exited down Delia’s short flight of steps, they removed their gear from the shuttle’s exterior compartments, re-secured the hatches, and gave a thumbs up to the pilot. She didn’t need to be told twice and took off for the mainland and her second drop, leaving three scientists, one armed guard, and a dozen crates alone in an alien forest.

An advance reconnaissance team had made contact with the natives, cataloged much of the flora and fauna, and identified possible threats—all part of the longer, extended briefing her team had endured. Now the two teams were being dropped off to do the dirty work. The rumor, however, was that her presence as security was requested not for any of those dangers, but because the three scientists needed to be protected from a tree. A tree secured within a cage. Not for the first time, Griff asked herself, What in the hell have I gotten myself into? A tree?

* * * *

First thing after the shuttle had dropped off the island team, Griff set up a dozen automated weapons in the trees surrounding the cage, programmed to remotely fire sonic pulses at anything that moved within the wire-like enclosure. All of them were linked to her com-pad that provided visuals—recorded for analysis at a later time in case there wasn’t enough left of whatever tried to escape to be identified.

She knew, however, that if it came to firing on the cage she’d most likely be pissing off some higher-ups and potentially risking their profit margin. Because that metal frame, partially covered with moss-like pillows of spongy green and surrounding what looked like a normal terrestrial tree, nestled amongst a forest of similar looking trees, was what this mission was all about.

Her munitions checked and double-checked, Griff dropped to the forest floor and again surveyed the immediate site.

Their focus was an area of less than ten square meters concealed in a primitive forest that normally would have been harder to find than a black marble in an asteroid belt. Well, except for the peculiar telemetric readings the lead analysts had received as they scanned the planet which raised the eyebrows of the scientists aboard and piqued the interest of the corporate liaisons.

The cage was about three meters across and four meters tall, topped with a steeply peaked conical metal roof, and seemed to be sunk securely into the ground of the island the team had been tasked to explore. Inside was a tree with a trunk that forked into multiple thick branches that twisted back and forth upon itself; with a thin bark and no leaves, it reminded Griff of a Hindu contortionist at a street fair on Earth. Only farther up did foliage appear: tear-dropped and smooth along the edges, each with a single thick central vein down the middle. It just looked so damn normal and bizarre at the same time, she had no idea what to make of it.

Whatever the tree was hiding, if it emerged and pumped blood, the pulse from any one of Griff’s guns would create rapid pulverizing waves that would literally vibrate the cells apart, leading to interior hemorrhaging from vascular rupturing—resulting in instant fatality. If it was mechanical, the sonic blast would disrupt circuits, gears, pistons, whatever.

Point was, Griff—lured by the promise of big easy money and working for the moment as a mercenary on loan from her battalion—was making sure nothing would survive outside the cage long enough to attack the team. Griff only got paid in full if everyone survived. And she really wanted to get paid for this gig.

Abruptly breaking her out of her study, Flynn called her over for help.

“Gunny, can you come over here and help me with this?”

Sure, she wasn’t acting in her capacity within the military so no one was obligated to acknowledge her rank, but a nickname like that only served to let Griff know where she stood on the team: a hired gun and nothing more. The muscle behind the ammo, the shield.

Flynn’s equipment came in three large industrial crates, each with base-to-lid locking cleats and double wide handles at each end. Not quite large enough to store a dead body, but close. From the looks of it, twice as heavy because the scientist had barely moved one of the boxes two meters and his face was turning purple from exhaustion, sweat running down his brow.

“Damned things are too heavy for me to move. Besides, you’re the brawn here, not me.”

With a disgusted look at the geologist, she walked over and began to move each of the containers to where he directed, a flat area to the side and a safe distance from the cage. Flynn watched and mopped his brow with the back of his sleeve.

“You know, a few years ago I wouldn’t have any trouble moving my own gear. But I’ve paid my dues just like everyone else. Anyway, these days I don’t do field work, least not if I can help it. Guess ANR decided that even lab chiefs like me need some fresh air, huh?”

Griff worked to finish moving the third trunk and did her best to ignore Flynn. She’d deal with his lack of respect later and in a way that suited her. Like letting some wild yelly drop from a tree and onto his back before saving him by shooting the animal. Pretty sure Flynn would soil himself if that ever happened. Shame she had programmed her automatics to recognize everyone on the team as friendlies. Still time to make that adjustment if he continued to be a flaming ass.

In her mind, a geologist was only needed for this mission because of the anomalous gravitational readings. Otherwise, useless. This fat and lazy geologist, however, was worse than a nuisance: red flags went up that said he might be an outright liability.

The two remaining members of the team, Emmerson and Chankonov, respectively a biologist and anthropologist, made a lot better sense for this mission based on the briefing they had received. Besides not being a hindrance, they had already set up their tents and were discussing which probes and sensors would best help them understand what might be kept locked away in the cage.

Before she could leave, a pained look came over his face. “Gunny, I think I’ve pulled something in my back. Could you do one more thing? Can you be a doll and set up my tent for me? I just don’t think I can do it.” To make his point, Flynn tried to stretch his back one way and gave out a low moan.

Years of training and tons of experience dealing with disrespect from male commanding officers were the only things keeping Griff from pulling her gun and shooting him immediately. Instead she gave him her best cold stare, a warning any fool would pick up on, and began to unpack his tent.

As she finished securing his bright orange tent to the ground, Flynn pointed at her face. “Where’d you get that beauty mark? Looks kinda fresh.”

Instinctively Griff turned her back to the man, hiding the scar that ran from just below her eye to ear.

“You piss someone off with your sunny personality?”

Her body tensed, the comments bringing back to mind the confrontation less than three weeks ago. She liked keeping her dark brown hair short, it made the job easier, but she might have to consider letting it grow some if this was the crap she was going to get.

“Making enemies everywhere you go, huh?”

Ignore the asshat. Do the job, make the money, get the hell out. Simple.

She’d dealt with worse over the years, which meant she should have had no problem giving him the cold shoulder and walking away. That was the plan, at least, as Griff headed back to the tree where her gear was stored so she could hang her hammock.

The social cue was lost on the scientist and he called out, “Hey! I was talking—”

Griff whipped around on him so fast that Flynn froze, his bluster instantly turning to fear at the unexpected naked aggression that faced him.

“What’s your story? You crap in the wrong cornflakes, huh?” She stepped forward and pointed her finger at him like a gun, the man stepping back briefly. “Why are you here? I mean, you said it yourself, you’re not really a field scientist anymore, are you? You look like you belong with the candies in some library flipping through moldy papers or in a lab picking cosmic dust off space rocks.” Griff advanced another step and feigned a look of realization. “Oh, I get it. Someone wanted a bit of peace and quiet so they gave themselves a holiday by shipping your ass off to BFE, right?”

If possible, his face turned even redder and he wasn’t even able to sputter a come-back response. Instead he turned to his duffel and pack to stow them in his newly pitched tent without a word.

“Your welcome.” Giant asshat.

The security officer moved on to sorting her gear including several hard-shell cases of weapons, but in her mind she saw the memory of Dolly, eyes bloodshot and wild, frothing at the mouth and brandishing a blade in her hand that gleamed in the industrial light of a sterile, white-walled hallway. As Dolly took a back-handed swipe at her face, Griff saw no recognition, no understanding, no memory of the affection they shared for one another. Griff remembered the surprised look as she dropped Dolly to the ground with a leg sweep and the sound of a wet knife skittering across the deck. Last she saw of her best friend, she was lying unconscious on the floor, the loud clatter of booted personnel, backup security and medics, almost as loud as the heartbeat threatening to explode from her chest.

It wasn’t until a medic stepped over Dolly and cautiously approached her that Griff realized she was bleeding from her cheek, blood spattering to make flower-like crimson petals on the textured metal floor.

* * * *

Griff hung her hammock between two nearby trees, and kept a watch on the cage. It made her skittish; something about that tree, rising against the inside of the peaked roof like Atlas pushing against the heavens, made her skin crawl. It was trying to escape, and when the tree popped off its roof, what hellish plague would it unleash? Her hammock was oriented so she could keep an eye on the damn thing, even while sleeping.

While the four-person ground team was tasked with exploring the island’s gravitational anomaly centered within the cage, the larger team was on the small planet’s mainland sifting through records and interviewing natives, led by Dr. Luce Caxton. This team was tasked with trying to work with the mainland population to determine what had happened on the island. Among members of this team were archivists, tech and telemetry specialists, psychologists, linguists, and sociologists.

The candies, the island teams’ unflattering nickname for the other group, had just begun their research on the mainland and so far Caxton had sent only one message, which came through simultaneously to everyone’s coms:

:2116.306.21.02: Natives refuse to set foot on island. Claim it is haunted. Mortal fear. Became agitated when asked to discuss further. Deeply superstitious and long memories. Abandoned for at least the last 100 rotations.

The hominids on the planet were squat and burly compared to terrestrial natives; think of comparing a medicine ball to a basketball. They were dense, tough, and muscular and tended to have small ears, square jaws, and wide noses. It took a while to get used to the fact that everyone, without exception, was completely hairless, from the top of their head to their toes. Even so, it was assumed that their similarity to humans had to be more than coincidental, that they shared some distant ancestry—beyond the body structure, the development of language and tools seemed to point to common DNA. How else could the similar mammalian glands be explained? But when the casein proteins found in the milk were analyzed and run through the database, not a single terrestrial animal shared more than a 28% alignment with these natives, leaving many biologists puzzled and the rest deeply concerned.

Darkness fell earlier in the forest than on the coast, the trees and hills blocking the sunlight and creating an early dusk. Some sort of insect chirped steadily in the trees overhead, their constant drone like a forgotten alarm in the distance that nobody would ever return to and shut off. All around the musky smell of the forest made the air feel thick with the dense tang of decaying organic matter, both plant and animal contributing to the reek of land left undisturbed for decades.

Sitting on the ground far enough away from the cage to feel safe but close enough to keep an eye on it, the team ate their dinner, soaking dense biscuits into reconstituted beef stew to soften them—a calculated blend of nutrients guaranteed to meet their metabolic needs. For a while, they ate in silence, each lost in their own thoughts.

Unable to sit quietly any longer, Flynn began to talk while chewing and spraying juice over the ground as he complained. “This ain’t no real planet. I’ve explored moons larger than this hunk of rock.” Another bite. “If it weren’t for that damned anomaly reading, none of us would be anywhere near here.”

With the back of her sleeve, Griff wiped her mouth. “Just because it’s a small planet, doesn’t mean there’s no danger.”

“That’s for damn sure. It’s those tree-swinging terrors I’m keeping my eyes on.”

Chankonov sat like a yoga master, legs crossed and staring into the night sky. Finally, “The enemy here will be our unfounded assumptions, thinking like humans. We shouldn’t let our preconceived notions blind us to the truth of what’s going on here. An open mind may just be the key.”

In her head she had nicknamed him “Gumby,” but Griff didn’t disagree with Chankanov. Too many times what eliminated a team wasn’t the enemy that they had prepared for, but the enemy they never saw coming. Sometimes the real danger even looked like a friend. As she looked past the cage and into the heavily shadowed woods beyond, she reminded herself that the only way to survive was to be paranoid at all times.

Before speaking, Emmerson took off her glasses and wiped the lenses on her shirtsleeve before replacing them on her face. She had finished eating and now stared into the darkening forest; sitting back on her heels, arms folded over her chest, and her long gray braid down her back almost touching the ground, she presented the confidence of a leader, a title she had earned by age, experience, and rank within ANR’s corporate echelon.

“It seems to me that we have two questions to answer.” Each point was punctuated by a show of fingers. “First, we need to understand why the cage was built to contain a tree. This tree. Or whatever lives in this tree. Second, we need to determine why we are getting anomalatic gravity readings from inside the cage. Those are the priorities.”

Chankanov uncrossed his legs and cleared his throat to speak, not wanting to contradict his superior, but needing to make a point. “Perhaps a third question to answer? Where are the people who lived on the island? Why did they abandon it?”

“I just about guarantee,” Flynn inserted. “Something in that cage, maybe in that tree, is responsible. I’ve got a gut feeling about this. And I don’t like it.”

Emmerson stood and brushed the dirt off her rear, staring overhead as if she could see the massive ANR transport and research vessel that now orbited miles above the surface. The ship held a dozen shuttles, one of which had dropped through the hazy atmosphere to the surface below, depositing her team before continuing to the mainland to stay with Claxton’s contingent. Flynn might have been a sack-in-a-sock, but she had to agree that there was something off here. Something they didn’t yet understand.

“First light, get fed and then everyone at their jobs.” To Flynn, “We need sensors up ASAP. I’ll do the same.” Turning to Chankanov, “I need you to scout what we’re not seeing. What’s immediately under the surface that the island has reclaimed? Drones, probes, fingers in the dirt, I don’t care. Figure out what happened here.” Looking back to the sky but addressing everyone, “In the sack in 15. Get some rest because tomorrow is going to be a long day.”

Griff watched it all—the cage, the tree. What was that wireframe hut hiding besides an everyday tree? She watched her team—each suited up in the light gray jumpsuits with the ANR insignia—two narrow ellipses, slanted in opposite directions with a red dot in the center. Could they all be trusted to do their jobs? Probably, even Flynn. But could they all be trusted to have each other’s back in case the mission went sideways? She knew how cliché it sounded, but the team was only as strong as its weakest link. Emmerson might be a competent leader, and part of her job was to manage the personnel and deal with stressed team members. Griff’s job? To make sure no threat on the planet had the chance to strain any of the links in the first place.

After everyone else was zipped tight into their tents, she clambered into her hammock, hoping to get some decent shuteye.

But as the night dragged on, the perpetual buzzing sound from the forest was joined by screeching creatures that could be heard swinging through the canopies up above—named “yellies” by the team for both the color of their short fur and infernal noise they could make for hours on end. The beasts were herbivores, but the claws at the end of their long arms were sharp to snip off foliage and their teeth were flat to grind leaves into a pulp. Often they would stop their swinging to simply stare at the humans, the green glow of their eyes no less frightening in the dark than their claws. Protruding, swollen stomachs and pug noses did not take away from the hostility that the gaze of the beasts communicated.

The sounds could drive anyone insane.

Day 2

:2116.307.00.00:

At some point in the middle of the night, Griff reflected on the vid briefing they had received from a corporate tosser in a labcoat (sporting the ubiquitous ANR logo) and a tie (she assumed to add a perception of truthfulness to the information he was relaying) seated behind an empty desk. She cataloged several gross failures on his part.

Top of that list, the overnight temperatures on the island pushed 35oC with a relative humidity of 95%. The tech embedded in the weave of Griff’s suit was supposed to wick away sweat from her body, allowing her skin to experience the endothermic reaction of evaporation and cool naturally. But this was completely beyond its specs, leaving her to baste in a soaking wet layer trapped within the fabric. She spent time wondering if the tropical climate they were enduring on the planet was normal or if they were experiencing the height of its summer. Hell, for all she knew they could be experiencing the planet’s winter, god help them.

And the infernal noises from the forest—screeching, wailing, hissing, and clicking—never, for even a minute, let up.

When dawn finally arrived, Griff dropped down from her hammock sweaty and cross as a crab in a tank, her boots landing on the forest floor with a gentle thud, eyes bleary from the lack of sleep. The ground was oddly spongy in an unsettling sort of way, especially after being used to the t-plate flooring standard on most military vessels. She’d spent a bit of time on Earth roaming its preserves, so knew what natural soil should feel like. This was different, squishy without being wet; if Griff needed to move fast, she’d have to compensate for the terrain.

She stared at the cage and the tree inside with a look that held equal measures of curiosity, wariness, disgust, and irritation. Regs allowed for only three energy tabs a day, but today might need to be an exception if she wasn’t going to shoot somebody out of spite.

Griff watched Flynn crawl out of his tent with a similarly cantankerous disposition; somehow he reminded her of a toad trying to escape a boiling pot of water. Emmerson emerged with a sweat-soaked pony tail, large bags under her eyes, and a grimace as she got to her feet and adjusted her sleeves and cuffs.

With military experience in the field, Griff knew that these conditions could play havoc not only with a person’s psyche, but everyone’s ability to function at a high level—attention to detail and maintaining focus were often mission critical. What she saw was anything but ideal: a strange planet with an unexplained anomaly, a team thrown together at the last minute without any cohesion, and all working in a diminished capacity.

Only Chankonov seemed not to have suffered any ill-effects, yawning and stretching as if he got a normal night’s sleep before finding a flat patch of grass to kneel and breathe deeply. Soon he was in a child’s pose that transitioned into downward facing dog, and then a three-legged dog. All with the practiced grace and ease of a dancer. Griff could really learn to hate him.

Overnight, the latest report from the mainland team via Caxton was waiting for the team on their coms, blinking with a bright green alert:

:2116.307.05.41: Archival research shows two tribes settled island, but fought for control. Factions separated by unknown schism— political? Religious?

First thing after breakfast, most of the team got to work deploying their pods, sensors, cameras, and probes knowing that every single piece of data, video feed, and conversation would be sent to the Astral Native Resources ship orbiting above, out of sight, but never out of mind, like Big Brother. Chankanov took his time to program his drones, each one set to map the contours of the surface, ping for artifacts hidden below the soil, and catalog a thousand readings.

Flynn, however, ignored the cases of tech he had brought with him, leaving them shut by his tent. Instead, he was busy pulling up the groundcover. The rich green vegetation that covered the small flat clearing where the team had camped resembled bright shamrocks, but about the size of a hand instead of a thumb. In the bare dirt he searched for small flat stones that he collected on a fallen log until he had near a dozen.

“Hey, Gunny. You shut off that firing squad you got for a minute?”

Griff tamped down her anger at the human toad and looked pointedly at Emmerson who stood and weighed the situation. A slight grimace and then a single, reluctant nod in Griff’s direction, confirming Flynn’s request.

With a practiced movement, the security agent activated the com pad on her arm, then pressed and swiped for several seconds until she had overridden the guns, placing them all on pause.

Several meters from the cage, Flynn took aim at the tree inside and threw a stone which, once it passed through the wireframe, seemed to briefly accelerate towards the tree before making a sudden downwards turn to where the trunk branched. And disappeared. Without a sound, the stone was gone. “Huh,” he muttered. “Kinda expected it bounce or make a noise, or at least roll out of the tree towards the ground.”

Emmerson jogged to the other side of the tree. “Again.”

Flynn threw another, then a third. From every side, it appeared that all of the rocks fell into the tree and vanished. He shrugged at her with no shame at his less-than-scientific methods. “Low tech, but effective.”

“Well. That didn’t go as expected,” Emmerson’s face was briefly unsettled by what she had witnessed, but quickly recovered.

Flynn nodded. “Nope.” He stooped to pick up another stone and shook his head. “But you gotta believe what your eyes see.” He demonstrated with a fourth rock and the same bizarre result.

With pursed lips, the leader pushed her sleeves up to her elbows. “Griff, guns back on, now.” She turned to Flynn. “Data. I need data that supports whatever the hell you think you just found, not parlor tricks. Set up your sensors and figure out what’s going on inside that cage.”

Flynn gave a mock salute and blinked his eyes in an odd manner that somehow conveyed disrespect. “On it, Boss Lady. No more stones.”

Whatever just happened didn’t seem like a security threat, but still Griff pulled a gun, gripped with both hands, and pointed it at the ground, legs slightly spread and eyes completely focused on the spot where the stones had gone but were no more. Not an immediate threat, but that could change in a split second. Besides, the energy tabs had completely kicked in and she was a bit wired.

She had re-armed her mounted sonic weapons even before Emmerson directed it. If they had just pulled the short and curlies of a bogeyman with a quick temper, there was no way she was getting caught with her knickers down.

* * * *

Two hours later, Emmerson vocalized her observations for the sake of documentation:

“Our sensors are reporting a slight temperature differential between the surroundings of the cage and the air inside the cage. The cage itself has no door or obvious manner of entry. Hydraulics have been unable to move the cage and the metal wire has resisted every form of entrance we have attempted: heat, saws, and lasers. The best we could do was to scrape some shavings off—ANR scientists are analyzing them now.

“The trunk and foliage of the tree appear to be consistent with local flora—nothing special. Photosynthesis and vascular respiration normal. Leaves appear deciduous and currently at peak season. The standing seam metal roof is conical-shaped and constructed of an impregnable material, similar to the walls of the cage. Conclusion: whatever is being kept inside, the builders of this structure had no intention of letting it out.

“Final note: based on the estimated growth rate of the moss clinging to the bars, the age of the cage appears to be consistent with the last known report of the existence of either tribe on the island—roughly 100 years. Seems unlikely to be coincidental, but any inferences drawn from that information at this time will be largely speculative.”

Griff paced the perimeter as Emmerson listed her immediate findings, keeping an eye on the caged tree, the reactions of the scientists, all while surveying the edge of their camp. Chankanov sat sukhasana on the ground surrounded by his tech, legs folded and eyes closed, his face inscrutable. On the other hand, the geologist sat looking distinctly uncomfortable, tugging at the jumpsuit that was tight around the folds of his neck while a bead of sweat ran down the side of his head.

“Flynn. Report.”

“Only completed an exterior analysis of the region immediately surrounding the cage.” He wiped his damp face with the back of his sleeves, the fabric drying nearly instantly.

“And?”

“Nothing interesting. Everything seems normal, as far as I can tell. We’ve got a standard planet, obeying all the laws of physics and motion. The geology is nothing too special either—rock covered in dirt, giving rise to plant life. Aquifers flow beneath the immediate surface, roughly eight to twenty-four meters deep.”

Griff noticed that under Emmerson’s questioning, Flynn had turned bright red, starting with his neck and rapidly rising to his cheeks. Did he feel threatened by the simple exchange with their leader? Did Flynn chafe against any authority figure, or perhaps there was something specific, personal, against Emmerson? Or, Griff supposed, she could just be imagining things and his reaction was simply an involuntary response to the heat.

“But there’s still a gravitational anomaly? Inside the cage?”

The geologist shuffled his feet. “Absolutely. Bizarrely, the disruption does not seem to extend outside the metal cage. It’s like some sort of Faraday cage, but instead of keeping out an electrical field, it keeps the gravitational force inside. I’ll be doing that research next. Just wanted to get a baseline first before studying whatever the hell is going on inside there.”

Without a word to the team, Chankanov left the clearing to learn what the rest of the island could tell them.

* * * *

Periodically Emmerson pushed a data stream and report summary to the ANR scientists and mathematicians that orbited above them in the primary research vessel that also served as transport for the dozen or so teams deployed in the system. The conglomerate of tech, policy, suppliers, and industrialists that came together under the umbrella of ANR specialized in sending advance scout teams across the galaxy, discovering and laying claim to underdeveloped intellectual and natural reserves, then selling them to the highest bidder at an enormous profit before moving on to the next big thing. The company seemed to have an uncanny instinct for what next big thing might be most profitable.

Griff had lobbied for an exorbitant fee to provide security on this trip and eventually ANR had given in to her demands with certain strings attached. For example, everyone returns alive. The evening the offer came through, she went and celebrated her imminent windfall and her savvy skills as a negotiator.

The ANR negotiator also celebrated, for the company had authorized him to offer four times what Griff accepted. Really, the workers simply had no real conceptual understanding for the scale of potential profits that were at stake here.

* * * *

Seven hours later, Griff heard him before she saw him.

With grunts at every step, Chankanov returned to camp, clearly in severe discomfort, only to prop himself on a fallen log and call the security officer over.

After readying his tech that morning he had set off to explore the settlements of both tribes in hopes he could discover what had become of their two civilizations. Now each of the scientists’ ankles were ringed with what looked like bloody bracelets; ghoulishly they had begun to drip towards the soles of his feet, the ground ready to drink the dark crimson beads.

Squeezing his eyes shut, he explained, “I rolled up the cuffs of my pants to get some relief from the heat and something got me.”

Griff was incredulous and made no effort to hide it. “So. You negated the protection provided by the ANR jumpsuit?”

“Yeah. I know, stupid.”

Her military field training had her double as the team medic. She looked on the bleeding wounds around the ankles and asked, “Animal or plant?”

“Honestly, I have no idea.” His breath came in gasps now. “Can you do something for this?”

Out of a medical bag, Griff produced wipes and cleaned his legs to see the wounds more clearly—tiny punctures surrounding the base of each ankle. Already they were beginning to bleed again.

“Pain?”

“A little. But more itching right now.”

Griff cleaned the areas again, using antiseptic wipes to insure nothing remained on the surface, then wrapped the ankles to help stop the bleeding. Finally, she pulled the jumpsuit pants down over his legs to the top of the low boots he wore.

“I’m not going to lecture you on your choice of footwear. But keep this area covered and let me know if the pain increases. I’ve got stuff I can give you for that.”

“Good stuff?”

“Whatever I give you,” Griff answered, “it won’t be so good that you forget this lesson. You walk around an alien planet thinking that you’re getting in touch with nature and instead pick up some bleeding rash from God-knows-what.” Gumby. “I’ll save the good stuff for the smart ones.”

* * * *

As the light of the day waned and the two scientists sat to hear Chankanov’s report, Griff stood a little behind the group to have a better field of vision, a hand on her pistol.

“There are two distinctive settlements made by different tribes, each centered on opposite sides of the island. The one of the north side of the island seemed to have a military culture, while the one on the south had a spiritual focus, perhaps some sort of native religion. If the two tribes—”

Flynn interrupted, “How can you tell?” Emmerson eyed the geologist, but didn’t comment.

The anthropologist spoke slowly, clearly surprised. “I’m sorry, what do you mean?”

“I can understand that one settlement could have shields, arrows, or guns, but the absence doesn’t necessarily imply being spiritual, does it?”

Clearing his throat, Chankanov began again. “Not at all. But the extant architecture of each building had large spaces open to the sky, with open windows. There were basins and pools that resembled shrines, meant to capture both sunlight and moonlight. Carved figures with their arms held up to the sky were scattered among the ruins.” He stopped and stared Flynn down, but a grunt was all he received.

“The northern tribe’s architecture was defensive in nature with iron gates and small windows, roofs appeared to have been covered with slate. Inside the ruins were rudimentary ballistic weapons and I would say they were on the verge of using gunpowder to fire missiles.” As Chankanov finished his report, he began to look uncomfortable.

“And…?” Flynn prompted.

The anthropologist chewed his bottom lip for a moment before answering. “I found the remains of a very large mass grave.” The man was clearly affected by what he had found, the inhumanity of such a thing weighing on his conscience.

Emmerson followed up. “Any signs of recent habitation?”

“None.”

“Most recent activity?”

“My data is consistent with what we’ve been told. At least a century ago.”

She pressed for more information. “The southern tribe?”

Chankanov looked up and stared at Emmerson. “That’s the thing. Not a clue that would indicate their wholesale extinction.” He shrugged and dropped his head to stare into the ground.

“Anything else to report?”

“Only this.” Chankanov was doing his best to leave the dressings on his ankles alone, but something was clearly making him uncomfortable. “Neither of these tribes should have one of these.” From out of a pocket in his jumpsuit, the scientist produced a small battery, the size of a thumbnail and half a centimeter thick. The plastic casing had cracked with age and from a beveled rim chemicals had leaked. In the passing years, the fluid had dried to a crusty reddish-brown that reminded Griff of blood spilled and baked onto a metal floor.

Flynn scoffed. “You obviously dropped it earlier, then found it. Mystery solved.”

“No. I didn’t. I never contaminate a research site. Never.” Chankanov’s voice gained an edge as his professional integrity was questioned and he paused to put the battery into a plastic container and sealed the lid. “Besides, I found it while digging at a spot that one of my drones had tagged. It was three to four centimeters below the surface. So no, I didn’t drop it.”

Griff continued her role as observer, noting the mounting tension between the two scientists. Nothing like a pissing contest between men to make a bad situation worse.

Emmerson must have noticed as well because she immediately redirected the conversation by asking for an update from the geologist, who again looked terrified to give his report.

“All we know is that there is a gravitational anomaly inside the cage. As scientifically demonstrated by several petrified inert probes.”

Emmerson clarified, “A rock.”

“I prefer p.i.p., thank you.”

Changing the subject, Chankanov asked, “Could it be acting like some sort of magnet?”

Flynn huffed a bit and settled into the topic, as if explaining to an elementary school student. “Gravitation and magnetism are two completely different phenomena. Gravity is a force exerted and created by mass, and magnetism is a force created by charged particles. Gravity only attracts, while magnetism can attract or repel.” He paused for a moment and softened his tone. “Though it would be easy to see in this case how the two could be confused based on casual observation. My probes, however, are not so easily tricked. They have virtually zero iron content.”

The geologist fussed with his suit a bit before continuing.

“There is another problem.”

Their leader was out of patience. “Don’t make me drag it out of you.”

“Very close to the cage… my sensors for the magnetic poles go … haywire. A planet’s magnetic field is generated by a geodynamo process. This planet has a defined magnetic field, with associated poles. Inside the cage and close to the tree, there are conflicting poles and magnetic fields.”

“And this is different from gravitational anomaly?”

“Yes. But it seems ridiculous to believe that they are completely unrelated. I’ve just got no idea what it means.”

* * * *

Sometime after 1 AM, screams of anguish woke the entire camp. Griff jumped down from her hammock, gun in hand, and ran toward the cries coming from Chankanov’s tent. Emmerson was next jogging towards the noise, and finally Flynn who was clearly struggling to wake up.

Griff opened the tent and pulled Chankanov out by his armpits, while Emmerson knelt and tried to talk to the stricken man. The part-time medic peeled back the legs of the jumpsuit and removed the dressings from Chankanov’s ankles and stifled a cry.

At the sight of the wounds, Flynn quickly stepped to the side and vomited.

It looked like snakes were tunneling through the skin inside his legs—three or four on each side—leaving bloody trails that started at the base of the heel and were working their way up towards the knees. The long, ropy, crimson swells the obvious source of the agony, leaving the anthropologist nearly incoherent.

Griff popped out of her belt a small cylinder and shoved two pills into Chankanov’s mouth, then worked to close it quickly to make sure the painkillers were taken and could reach the blood stream.

Next she ran to find two strips of cloth that she cinched tightly around the base of his legs to try to prevent further spread. Lord knows, she thought, the pain he’s going to feel if these buggers make it to his knee joints. She followed with an antiseptic to keep clean the infected regions and then finished with numbing cream slathered over the legs.

When Chankanov’s screams had subdued to low moan, Griff provided a sedative to help him rest and made him as comfortable as possible on an improvised pallet outside his tent.

Emmerson volunteered to stay vigil until she was certain he had gotten back to sleep and sent everyone else to bed. Before Griff walked too far away, she called out, “He going to lose his legs?”

Griff turned and faced the team commander. “No idea. Never seen anything like it. But this place creeps the hell out of me like nothing I’ve ever seen.” She thought for another moment. “What do you make of that battery?”

“We’re missing something. A piece of the puzzle. Big piece.” Emmerson rubbed her eyes with her thumbs. “I don’t know what it might be, but that cage is the key and tomorrow we’re going to figure it out so we can get off this damn island.”

Griff nodded and walked back to her hammock, hoping the team leader was right. But as she climbed in, the light from a frighteningly close moon pierced here and there through the canopy of the forest and leaves rustled against each other in a gentle wind. It was easy to imagine the trees were talking to each other in their own language and Griff was certain that they were plotting ways to get rid of the unwelcome intruders that had invaded their peaceful island.

As she tried to block out the noises and find some peace of mind in sleep’s oblivion—certain that her sensors would wake her should a threat appear—her fingers absently touched the scar along her cheek. Dolly. She remembered months ago falling asleep, her head in Dolly’s lap, after pulling a 24-hour shift providing an escort for a freighter traveling through space known to be rife with raiders and pirates. They had found an isolated viewport where they could be alone to watch the ship safely dock with a station badly in need of repairs.

After the incident with the knife three weeks ago, Dolly wouldn’t see her anymore; a week later she sent Griff a message, “Need some time alone. Sorry.” With care and compassion she showed to few, Griff had worked so hard to break through Dolly’s walls, but now the battlements and defenses were back up. The day the last message came through, Griff applied for the ANR job. With that money she could take extended leave, find her friend, and take her to a place where they both could heal again.

That last message had read, “You need to be safe from the monster I became.”

Griff finally drifted off to sleep with her thumb against the scar, and Dolly’s voice whispering in her ear that she was safe now.

Day 3

:2116.308.00.00:

A dense, heavy fog had rolled in overnight, shrouding everything in a warm mist and limiting visibility to less than five meters. Griff jumped down out of her hammock, already on high alert. Her jumpsuit was immediately soaked beyond what the tech was able to handle, the clover-like ground cover slick under her boots as she took note that there were only two tents, both still zipped tight after the previous night’s excitement.

While Griff inventoried the cases of gear and ammunition, Emmerson appeared next, yawning and stretching with the bags under her eyes turning into suitcases; first glance at the fog and Griff saw their leader scowl as she took it all in—the white wall hiding the forest from view, floating through the cage and circling the tree like ribbons of dense smoke.

By the time Flynn had ventured out, both of the ladies had eaten a self-cooking silver packet of cream-chipped beef on toast and were sipping steaming coffee from thermoses.

With wild eyes, the geologist noticed the missing tent, checking that the hammock was still hung between trees.

“Where’s the hippy? What’d you do with Chankanov?” His eyes darted around the clearing, trying to see through the fog. “He croak overnight? ‘Cause I didn’t sign up for a death sentence on a backwater. Savage. Floating hunk of rock.” At the end his voice became a shriek, the fear pushing him into something close to uncontrolled panic.

Griff stood, sipped her coffee, and watched, content to let Emmerson take care of this issue. “Take it easy.” The calming, rational voice of the team’s leader making it ever more clear how she had earned the command of the island crew. “A shuttle came in the middle of the night and took him back to the ANR sick bay for treatment. With any luck, he won’t lose his legs.”

She never got to see how Flynn would react to the news, because at that moment another report from Caxton came through:

:2116.308.14.31: Elder found who claims there were rumors of a third tribe on the island. Meaning unclear due to language barrier. Translation indicates possibly demons, angels, or wizards. Regardless, they are described as bringing both death and salvation. Reports include “lightning sticks.”

Clearly agitated by the report, Flynn immediately and forcefully gave a command. “Destroy that tree and the cage if you have to. Find a way to raze that thing now, even if you have to nuke the entire island.”

Emmerson tilted her head and stared at the man closely, then began as if speaking to a petulant child. “I am the leader here. You do not get to make decisions. And we are not destroying anything until we understand better what we are dealing with and if there is a threat.”

“Of course there is a threat! We have two entire tribes wiped clean from the island with no explanation except for the presence of this damn tree inside a cage!”

Once again, the leader spoke calmly, though Griff could have sworn her patience was beginning to thin. “We are here to explore and understand and report back to ANR leadership our findings in order to evaluate the natural resources and if they can be claimed and sold for a profit. Until we do those things, we will not, I repeat, be destroying anything.”

The man’s face turned bright red and he turned his back on the pair, mumbling under his breath.

In a softer voice, she tried again. “Why don’t you get some coffee and heat up a meal. There’s a dozen left to choose from. You’ll feel better and maybe by the time you’re done this creepy fog will burn off.”

Griff tossed her thermos into her hammock and tugged the cuffs of her suit down to get ready for the day, keeping an eye on Flynn. “I’m going to check on my guns and their sensors to see if they’ve picked up on anything going on inside the cage that we might have missed.”

“Sounds good.” The biologist teased out her gray hair to rebraid it fresh for the new day, a black hair band clenched in her teeth. When done she announced, “I’m going to run some additional tests on the tree to see why it’s so special it deserves its own cage, and what its builders were so afraid of.” Looking over at Flynn, she added, “You get a grip. When you’ve calmed down I want you to run tests on the rock outside the cage, under the cage, and inside the cage. It’s one or the other: the tree or the cage. Let’s figure this out, the sooner the better.”

Griff noticed that the constant noises coming unseen from the surrounding forest—nearby clicking of fist-sized insects, a skittering sound like mandibles chewing leaves, thumps of paws on the ground, and a distant squeal of larger animals in the trees—clearly put Flynn on edge. As he rummaged through his things, his eyes kept darting to see through the fog to the woods, most likely searching for incoming yellies. She heard him time and again swear under his breath what he would do to the beasts if he got hold of a gun.

Eventually he got to work and she relaxed a bit, enough that she could focus on the threats she didn’t know and ignore the fat one she did.

* * * *

While Griff climbed the trees to inspect her guns secured to branches and pointing at the heart of the cage, sensors flashing green lights indicated they were in proper working condition, Emmerson prepared several drones with probes, cutters, and pincers to enter the cage and take physical samples from the tree—bark, branches, and leaves. Flynn had calmed down and was using a hydraulic spade to dig in the requested areas.

Even with the morning wearing on, the sun far above the horizon by now, the fog still remained, persistently filling the space between the team members and their surroundings.

The next message to come through on their coms was from a scientist named Laudermilk, working from the lab on the ANR ship:

:2116.308.29.08: Analysis of shavings of metal sample taken from cage complete. Elements present not native to the planet. Proceed with tree and geologic analysis as planned.

Emmerson read the message and muttered, “Damn fine timing for that directive. Not sure what else we’d be doing with all this free time on our hands.”

At that moment two things happened nearly simultaneously. First, a remote sensor outside the cage began flashing an orange light and a gentle, but insistent warning neep-neep. Second, Flynn instinctively looked up from where he had collected samples into air-tight aluminum containers, keeping an eye on the cage, fog, and tree. With a chilled voice, barely audible over the sounds of the forest and the alarm, he whispered, “What the devil …” As Flynn stood and stared, it seemed as if he were trying to look under the fog. “Boss? Hey, boss. We’ve got ourselves another problem.”

Griff clambered down as quickly as she could, landing on the ground with guns in hand. They had already lost one team member, and God only knew how that was going to affect her pay for the job. She sure as hell wasn’t going to lose another to some creepy fog and tree. Not even the asshat.

The source of the alarm was on a tripod, about two meters away from the cage: a finger-sized thermal gun, used to take temperatures remotely. Emmerson had run over and was checking the readings on a small digital display when she looked to see what had unnerved Flynn so badly.

“Chief? You seeing this, right?” Griff, like Emmerson and Flynn, was staring into the cage where—for lack of any better description—the fog had begun to glow with a pale yellow light, from below. From the underside. Unlike the geologist, Griff’s voice had a hard edge to it, like waiting for the fog to make just the wrong move so she can shoot the bajeezus out of it.

Emmerson looked back down at the thermal gun, which over the past few minutes had climbed 0.8oC and was still on the rise. She stared at the drones she had been preparing to send into the cage. On the com mounted to her sleeve, she programmed one of them—smaller than her hand—to fly towards the tree.

Then, with both Griff and Flynn watching silently, she powered it up and let the drone hover just outside the cage.

This drone was equipped with one sensor. An accelerometer. And she wasn’t expecting it to ever come back.

“Griff. Disable all weapons trained on the tree. Now.”

The order was followed within seconds, though Griff felt more naked than ever before in her life.

With her fingers on the com pad, Emmerson directed the drone to carefully fly through the wire metal fencing of the cage and ever so slowly, closer to the tree. A half meter away, the drone began to speed up, out of its pilot’s control, and towards the twisted trunk; the closer it got the faster it approached until it was a blur before it disappeared completely.

The last reading Emmerson received from the drone, out of line of sight for more than 1.24 seconds, reported a constant acceleration of 13.58 m/sec2 and an instantaneous velocity of 28.52 m/s. Not a sound was made.

“Griff. Enable all weapons. Now.”

* * * *

The three of them stood apart from the cage by a safe distance, Griff and Flynn waiting for direction from their leader. Emmerson spun in small circles for a moment, her head bowed in thought and chewing on her thumb.

Abruptly she stopped spinning and began to snap her fingers. She looked up at the geologist. “Recap. Give me a recap of what we know.”

As Flynn ticked off each new point, he held another finger. “First, we have an acceleration inconsistent with the gravity of this planet, leading to what appears to be a gravitational anomaly. Weirdly, the tree is acting like a weak gravitational well. Second, the area within the cage seems to present its own magnetosphere—stable but not reconcilable with the magnetic lines on the rest of the planet.”

Griff joined in. “There are several other riddles that we haven’t solved, either: the battery, the cage’s construction, the rumor of the third tribe, the disappearance of the first two.”

“And now,” began Emmerson. “Now we have a light source that we can’t explain, largely because we haven’t been able to get inside the cage itself for a proper inspection.”

The fog remained thick and kept the overhead sun from breaking through; small bird-like creatures flew low to the ground, but avoided contact with the team.

Their leader looked up, an understanding slowly showing on her face with an array of conflicting emotions: fear, awe, and wonder all vying to come out on top.

“It’s a planet. It’s an ever-lovin’ planet.”

Flynn was incredulous as he asked, “The tree? The tree is a planet?”

Griff processed the data and facts as Emmerson shook her head and responded. “Maybe not the tree, but what else makes sense? Somehow that tree and that cage are hiding an entire planet in there.”

Flynn pointed vehemently toward the cage. “You’re not going to convince me that an entire planet—with a greater mass and gravity than the Earth—is housed inside that tree. No way.”

“I’m no scientist, so take this slowly for me. You said a planet, right?” Griff shook her head. “Not a sun. How does this explain the glow?”

“Albedo. The planet the tree is hiding has a high surface albedo and is bouncing its sun’s light back to us. We’re not seeing the sun itself, just the reflection from its surface.”

Still not convinced, Griff pressed. “What about the fact that we’ve been here for three days and this is the first we’ve seen this glow?”

Emmerson paced in small circles, working out her thoughts. “The planetary rotation of the hidden planet could be slower than this one? What if the hidden planet takes closer to 60 standard Earth hours and we’re just seeing the dawn for the first time? That’s consistent with what we’ve seen so far. We happen to have landed here when that planet was in its night cycle.”

Griff shook her head. “Again, I don’t have your background, but this seems highly unlikely.”

With a resolve on her face, Emmerson looked past the two of them and into the cage. “We have a unique gravity of approximately 1.38gs, an inconsistent magnetic field, and now sunlight. Sherlock Holmes said: ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however, improbable, must be the truth.’ ”

Something clicked. “What if,” Griff began, “it’s not a planet itself.” The ideas in her head developed slowly. “What if the tree, or part of it, has somehow managed to become some sort of worm hole?”

“Or … a portal? Some sort of tesseract or tear in reality?” Emmerson continued to think out loud. “Some dimensional anomaly that allows travel across a vast distance. Perhaps even through time, since we don’t know either where or when it transfers to.”

“So a portal? A rip in the fabric of space?” Flynn turned to look accusingly at the biologist. “Have we put eyes on the tree from inside the cage?” Emmerson’s expression was impossible to read, which he seemed to take as admission of guilt by omission. “So we could be meters away from a shimmering gateway to another planet and haven’t figured it out yet? Unbelievable.”

“We felt it was more important to keep the security measures in place for as long as we could. Griff’s guns would have to be disabled for an extended period for me to send the drones inside the cage to get a visual.” Through barely gritted teeth, she informed him, “It was going to be the next phase of analysis.”

Caxton’s next message shed no light on the island’s riddles:

:2116.308.37.15: Natives incapable of making batteries with specs delivered. Have neither technology nor resources. Have not harnessed even basic tools of electricity.

* * * *

The yellies seemed to have gotten over the fear that had kept them at a distance since the arrival of the scientists, their cries and screams becoming closer from every direction with each passing minute. Griff could have sworn they were somehow coordinating their approach, but she had bigger troubles on her mind at the moment, specifically the geologist in front of her who was rapidly spiraling towards full-blown panic.

Flynn’s voice was a little louder than it needed to be and definitely edged with fear, as he put more pieces together. “The third tribe. The message from the mainland. They came through the portal from the tree, didn’t they? These others, they wiped out the northern tribe. That’s what happened, isn’t it? Without remorse they completely annihilated an entire tribe leaving nothing behind but graves.” Flynn’s voice was rising in fear as he put pieces together. “They marched in and committed genocide, without a trace, and then went back.”

Griff wanted to pacify the scientist before he spun out of control completely and nodded in agreement even as each hand found its way to a pistol. “I agree. These are the ones that carried some sort of tech that looked like lightning. Except they did leave a trace—the battery that Chankanov found. He wasn’t careless, it was these others that made the mistake.”

Calmly, Emmerson did her best to ignore the howling approaching in the trees to speak in her calmest voice. “They must have somehow brought the raw materials from their own world to build the cage. The only loose end I see is what happened to the second tribe from the south. Flynn, what do you think happened to them?”

The geologist looked back and forth between his two colleagues, neither one soothing his fears.

As if by magic, Flynn’s right hand suddenly held a circular puck that Griff instantly recognized—a military-grade grenade known as a “big block,” so named because it held enough destructive force to level an entire, massive city block. She identified it so quickly for a very good reason. It was hers.

That toad of an overweight geologist had broken into her arsenal and stolen a bomb. Colossal asshat.

The device shook in his hand as he pointed at both Griff and Emmerson. “I told you we should nuke the thing. We need to destroy it. Now. We have no idea what tech those others have and they could come out of that tree any moment now and wipe us out. Maybe even track us to our homes.”

Griff’s fingers were wrapped around the grips of her guns. She had a small window to do this. She would bet that Flynn didn’t know how to work the safety on the bomb which required a quick twist of the safety ring while depressing the middles of the top and bottom from both sides. Then he would need to arm it …

“Gunny! Drop your guns! Now. On the ground.” His fingers shifted in his right hand to encircle the puck in a way that suggested that Griff might have lost big on her bet. Flynn brought his other hand over to the top of the bomb. “Like I said.”

Griff flipped the guns over by their handles and slowly lowered them to the ground. Then stood just as slowly, eyes never leaving Flynn. It was just possible after all that the idiot knew how to arm the big block and then they were all screwed.

With a calm that Griff was certain that Emmerson wasn’t feeling, their leader adjusted her braid and tugged at the cuffs of her suit. “Flynn. You still haven’t answered my question. What about the second tribe? How does this explain what happened to them? Were they killed and buried with the fist tribe?”

Flynn turned to face Emmerson. “I don’t know. Does it matter?”

“I think it does. I think it’s key to everything that’s happened. Everything that we have found from the records on the island, to what Chankanov discovered, to the cage itself. I think if we understand it, you might not need to do this. We don’t need to destroy the cage or the tree and you can put that puck down right now. I think that this third tribe felt threatened from the northern tribe and moved to protect itself.” Emmerson’s voice was slow and easy as she captured Flynn’s attention and made him focus on her words.

“Remember what Chankanov said on our first night here: It’s our preconceived notions that could be the real danger here. Don’t let your fears and emotions overrun your scientific mind and good sense. Where is the second tribe? How did they disappear into thin air without a trace?”

Griff said a prayer of thanks to the gods for Emmerson who continued to talk. Reasonably. Confidently. With authority.

“You know what I think, Flynn? I think that these others saw a blight upon the planet and decided that before the blight spread, to eliminate it. Like a bad spot on an apple. They measured the northern tribe and found them lacking a moral compass. Or perhaps those aggressive island natives started a war, never realizing how completely outmatched they were. We may never know.”

Griff’s fingers surreptitiously moved madly over the screen attached to the forearm of her suit, her memory for the layout taking over where her eyes dared not look for fear of giving herself away.

This is not Dolly. This was not the psychosis of space sickness with emotional and physical stress leading to full-blown paranoia and delirium. This was not pandorum. This was a single xenophobic jackwagon who has cracked. This is not Dolly. Griff shoved flashbacks of her unconscious friend crumpled on the floor out of her mind and focused on the terrorist in front of her.

The geologist’s hands twitched on the puck, but he listened to their team leader even as sweat trickled down his face; he made no move to release the safety on the bomb.

“Flynn. I believe with all my soul that the peaceful tribe chose to leave. That if and when we travel to this other planet, we will discover a peace-loving people who are willing to defend the security of what they have created. I believe they have taken with them the tribe from the south, have allowed them to escape this planet where they were attacked and hunted.”

Griff knew that she needed to cause immediate and maximum pain without warning. The kneecap. Didn’t really give a rip which one.

While Emmerson talked slowly, clearly stalling for time, Griff had reprogrammed one of her guns in the trees to take aim at Flynn—his physiological profile already entered into the system. Specifically, the lower extremities of the geologist.

She finally risked a quick glance down at the screen, confirmed her settings, and pressed “fire.”

Immediately both Flynn’s kneecaps vibrated with sonic pulses that tore the bones apart, exploding them into a thousand shards of pulverized protein and collagen, blood released from veins but trapped inside the skin adding to the agony as instant swelling caused them to nearly burst.

The puck dropped from Flynn’s hand even as he began to scream and drop to the ground in anguish. In seconds he was on the ground writhing and swearing incoherent obscenities. Griff kicked the puck away and ran for her medic bag. She was pretty certain she had just ruined any bonus she was hoping to receive from the job. Cosmically mammoth asshat.

Without a word, Emmerson established communications with the ANR ship and began to relay their situation.

By the time each of them had returned their attention to Flynn, the screaming had stopped. He had passed out in pain.

* * * *

For all the defenses she had constructed, it simply hadn’t been enough. You protect yourself and your team as well as you can, but in the end you let them down.

Emmerson sat with Griff on the ground, some distance away from Flynn, waiting for the ANR team to arrive and relieve them of their duties on the island.

Griff had injected him with a military-grade ketamine pain killer, but he remained unconscious.

Once again with arms folded over her chest and sitting back on her heels, Emmerson stared at Griff. “You had to do it. Really no choice.”

“I know. Still sucks.”

“Absolutely.”

Griff returned the steady gaze. “You’re a good leader, you know that?”

Emmerson merely nodded in acknowledgment before both ladies returned their attention to the cage, fully lit up with sun by now from whatever portal existed at the heart of the tree.

Just then a magnificent butterfly, each wing the size of an adult hand spread wide, emerged from the tree in beautiful colors of yellow, orange, and purple.

A single gun fired, one of Griff’s still lashed to a tree, and the regal animal was reduced to a bloody, pulverized mess. She hadn’t disabled the remainder of the guns after Flynn had been shot.

No door. No way in.

Griff suddenly realized the purpose of a cage without a means of entrance of any sort. The cage was not to keep any monster or evil locked within as they first had assumed. Chankanov had been right all along: it was the unproven assumptions that would be their downfall.

The cage wasn’t meant to keep the monsters inside.

It was meant to keep the monsters out.