Chapter 3: The Crews

Disclaimer: This is the rough draft of “The Terra Project”, a novel in progress. The story, characters, and events are subject to change during the editing process.

Please keep in mind that as a rough draft, the writing style and organization is expected to be poor and or lacking. As quoted by Ernest Hemingway, “The first draft of anything is shit.”

Comments and critique are greatly appreciated, though it is preferred that advanced critiquing be held off until later drafts. Anyone interested in the story or the novel project is encouraged to email me at fishbowlery@gmail.com.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy.

“So you're the expert on detonators?” Dr. Tro asked.

“Well,” Buck coughed modestly. “I happen to be relatively adept at them.”

“Relatively?” Dr. Tro prodded.

“Well, see, thing about these all is they're insanely difficult to control. Can spend your whole life trying to get good at them and get nowhere. Just gotta hope you're lucky and your brain clicks with 'em, and mine happened to click with this kind.”

“What do these particular ones do?” she asked.

“Well,” he began. He held out the palm of his hand and concentrated. The air just above his hand began to hum. He held it there. The humming grew, making a distinct electric sound. The air emitting the sound began to ripple visibly like the air just above a parched segment of land.

“I simply call any bots that I have to an area and I can make them detonate. Inside a target, around a target. Right next to a target.”

“So, you can only destroy with yours?” Dr. Tro asked.

“Well, no,” Buck said.

The air above his palm sputtered and began to glow and flare in a bright magenta flame like pure elemental potassium immersed in water.

“I can make fireworks instead.”

He moved his fingers around slowly.

“It is quite pretty,” Dr. Tro said warmly. “Do you have to use your arm, or are you doing it all in your head and just doing that for show?”

“Controller is in my wrist, so....”

“Ah.”

“It helps,” Buck shrugged.

Dr. Tro and nodded as she watched the ball of fire fizzle and sputter. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed something straight ahead. She turned to look, seeing what appeared to be a faint gray plane.

“What is-”

The ship passed silently through it. The moment it passed over her she lurched suddenly forward, as if a force that had been holding to her seat had suddenly gone, taking her by surprise, and yanked firmly in the opposite direction.

“One of the precautions we took,” Buck coughed. He had braced for the event, but seemed to be equally affected by it.

“What do you mean precautions?” Dr. Tro demanded.

“Let's just say that if the layer cake back home were to stop functioning, then both worlds would be destroyed.”

“You're kidding, right?” Dr. Tro asked with her eyes growing wide.

Buck shook his head. “Naw, but we made sure that it won't ever quit.”

Dr. Kaddix grumbled to himself as he pushed himself back onto the sofa.

“Lousy turbulence,” he growled. He was quite cranky about having just been woken up in that fashion.

“Aint no turbulence in space, pardner,” came a voice.

Dr. Kaddix grouchily parted his eyelids just enough to see Dusty saunter into the lounge deck.

“Whaddya' want?”

“I heard that you told poor Kyme off,” he replied casually.

“I asked what you want. Preferably so I can tell you who to go for it and you can leave me alone,” Dr. Kaddix growled in return.

“Simmer down, now,” Dusty chuckled. “Just wanna pass the time.”

“Like Kyme? Need I tell you off too?”

“She said you wanted to talk about rocks, beer, football, and women,” he replied. “I'd sure as hell like to talk about the first, third, and fourth while drinkin' the second.”

Dr. Kaddix considered this and sad up slowly. “Now we're talkin'. About the beer part.”

Dusty looked over to where the fridge was and reached a hand out. The door swung open. Dusty leaned over to better examine the contents, wand with a reaching motion of his arm two bottles launched themselves into the air and sailed into his grip, rattling the rest of the contents of the fridge and the fridge itself to the point where the door was rocked back shut.

Dr. Kaddix watched in amazement. “Damn, you can get beers without getting up, and without the help of a woman. Now that's a useful talent.”

Dusty laughed and held one of the bottles flat on it's palm. “Ready?”

Dr. Kaddix blinked, then held out his hands ready to catch.

Dusty held his palm flat, and without him moving the bottle lifted itself into the air and flew gracefully into Dr. Kaddix's hands.

“You're not supposed to be drinking, but Kyme's volunteered to be designated driver. You should really be nicer to her, she deserves a lot more credit than you give her.”

Dr. Kaddix gave his beer a chagrinned look, then popped the cap off anyway and took a hearty swig. “Alright, fair enough. Any D.D. Deserves a second chance, eh?”

Dusty nodded.

“So, how exactly are you doing all that with the bottles and such?”

“Though you only wanted to talk about rocks, chicks, and football?”

“Changed my mind, tell me how you're doing that.”

“Nah,” Dusty said. “I wanna talk about chicks.”

Dr. Kaddix sat back and took another pull at his beer. “Hell with it, go on.”

“What do you think of Dr. Tro?”

Dr. Kaddix blinked. “I probably shouldn't comment, seeing as how she was warming up to you pretty well.”

Dusty snorted into his beer. “Naw, wasn't me she was hangin' out with. That was my twin, Buck.”

“He make beer fly too?”

“Naw,”

“Waste,” Dr. Kaddix said. “Anyways, I still probably shouldn't say anything about your brother's woman, then.”

Dusty snickered loudly. “Y'know what, let's talk about rocks.”

“So, what's the total number of people on all three ships?” Dr. Harrow asked Taco casually.

“Bueno, yo creo... en eso, hay tu, yo, y Alex. En el Binky, hay Dr. Kaddix, Dusty, y Kyme, y en el Aften Stjerne, hay Dr. Tro, Buck, y Zant. Nueve.”

Dr. Harrow looked at Taco in disbelief. “TimeSpace has sent a team of nine to fulfill all of Earth's duties to interact with Terros?”

“Tres equipos de tres,” Taco corrected.

“Thank you, three teams of three, but you get my point, don't you?”

Taco looked at Dr. Harrow blankly. “Que es?”

“Simply that it's a big job and that we're a little short-handed for an undertaking like this, Dr. Harrow replied.

“Bueno,” Taco shrugged. “Hay un Juaquin en cada cohete.”

“A... Juaquin as in the name?” Dr. Harrow repeated. “Jack you mean?”

Taco nodded.

“Oh good, I'm completely relieved to know that there's a Jack with us at all times.”

Taco rolled his eyes. “El es un roboto.”

“A what?”

“Se creyeron los tres Juaquines por 'AI bots' de nanotechnologia,”

“Right,” Dr. Harrow replied. “It would probably be best if you showed me.”

Taco hopped off his chair and meandered on to the rear decks of the ship, with Dr. Harrow close behind. After a short bit of walking they came to what appeared to be a three foot tall model of a children's toy robot.

“Not to be picky,” Dr. Harrow said tensely, “But Jack looks a bit like an oversized speak'n'spell.”

Taco shrugged. “Puede cambiar a formas diferentes para servir para muchas cosas diferentes.”

Dr. Harrow nodded thoughtfully. “What purpose does this form serve?”

“Decoracion.”

“I thought so.”

Back at Dengris the layer cake emitted three more pulses of faint blue light, in the exact same timing that it had emitted the previous ones.

The ships slipped silently through space. In an atmosphere the noise of the engines and thrusters would have been noticeable for miles, but in the vacuum of space they were less noisome than ghosts.

Electric signals jumped from sensors to processors as the ships passed through the altitude for geosynchronous orbits. Each one, as they passed through the invisible barrier, launched a metallic box. Each of those boxes unfolded slowly and slipped away, falling down to Terros to vaporize in the atmosphere. Left behind were twelve satellites, each unfolding solar-panel wings. They flashed to life, then tiny thrusters on each sent them scattering to where they would eventually remain forever suspended directly above the planet.

As the ships descended closer and closer, a few more satellites branched off the ships in other orbital levels, ready to travel over different areas of the planet's surface.

As a minor oversight, the designer forgot that vacuums cannot travel sound for a brief instant, along with the fact that there is no audience in the area anyway, and so nobody heard the beeping as all the satellites began to transmit their various signals into the deep recesses of space.

Within minutes the ships all slipped into the atmosphere. The reverse engines began to kick in, slowing the ships along with the increasing air resistance, the air around the ships glowing bright red.

This continued as the ships continued slowing down in their descent. From inside, the passengers watched as the fire of the atmosphere slowly faded and died and the waters below slowly became closer and closer.

Finally, the three ships stopped themselves, hovering motionless in the air above the churning oceans.

“My God, we're finally here,” Dr. Tro whispered to herself. She stood up and looked over the dashboard to get a better view of the ocean below her. “I can't believe this... it's all too much...”

Buck nodded to her.

“Calling to everyone else,” Kyme's voice chirped from the dashboard. “Binky here, do we have a plan of attack?”

“I say we cut off their resources and then take over the capitals,” Buck joked. “And if that don't work, we nuke 'em.”

“I have a better idea,” Dr. Harrow's voice replied. “The three ships should separate. I'm pretty sure that the locals won't be giving anyone who arrived in a giant ship any trouble. The most likely response will be fleeing in terror, so given that safety isn't a real issue at this point, the best option would be to split up and cover as much ground as possible.”

“I'd have to agree with that,” Dr. Tro said, speaking loudly to ensure that her voice was carried over the transmissions. “Dr. Kaddix, what do you say?”

“Dr. Kaddix is busy being a Grumpy Gus,” Kyme replied cooly. “So I've taken over for him, and I say that we go with your plan, Dr. Harrow.”

“You should look into taking over for him all the time,” Dr. Harrow noted. “You're already doing a much better job than he would. And much more pleasantly too.”

“I'm flattered, I really am,” Kyme replied.

“Now, does anyone know where we are?” Dr. Harrow asked. “I remember seeing three landmasses as we flew in. One that I think was directly south of here, another to the northwest, and another east northeast.”

“The one to the east looked the most interesting geologically,” Kyme noted. “I think I'll be nice and give that one to Dr. Kaddix.”

“The one to the south looked like it would have been in temperate type climate,” Dr. Tro added. “I think I'd like to start in that environment since they tend to be more tame. If any of you locate any tropical areas let me know immediately as those will be the most interesting areas to look into once I've gotten a feel for the job.”

“Excellent thinking,” Dr. Harrow observed. “And that would leave me with the continent to the west. I'll head right on over. Hope to meet up with you all soon.”

“Sounds good.”

Outside the cockpit window she spotted the Lovable Dictator turning slowly, then accelerating off, rapidly growing smaller into the distance.

“See you later,” Kyme said as Binky turned in the opposite direction that the Lovable Dictator had and flew off.

“We don't have to be close for the communications to work, do we?” Dr. Tro asked.

“No,” Kyme replied, her voice still crystal clear even as a rapidly increasing amount of distance was put between Binky and the Aften Stjerne. “I just figured we'd run out of things to talk about or that we'd be preoccupied with flying or something like that.”

Dr. Tro rolled her eyes slightly and grabbed at the controls for her ship. Eying her compass, she slowly turned the ship to the southeast.

“Um, how do I make it go?” she asked to Buck.

“Accelerator pedal by your feet,” Dr. Harrow replied. “They did attempt to make this as predictable and intuitive as possible.”

“Good,” Dr. Tro said. “How do I turn communications off?”

“Probably a button somewhere,” Dr. Harrow answered. “If not, there's always not talking.”

“You're such a charmer,” Dr. Tro sneered. She kicked around lightly until her foot found the pedal and she pushed it firmly. The Aften Stjerne reacted smoothly and without delay and the ocean began to pass swiftly underneath them.

Buck helpfully reached over to the dashboard and pressed a bright blue button on the console. “This one here will turn the comms off for you, ma'am. Also, once you see land, push the yoke in or out to ascend or descend, and there's a kick pedal, just hit it when this light comes on, means that we're above terrain that is suitable for landing on and close enough for the ship to land itself.”

Dr. Tro smiled warmly. “Thank you sir. Shouldn't you have let them hear all that? Sounds like it would have been helpful.”

“Looks like Dr. Kaddix won't be flyin' anyway,” Buck shrugged. “And apparently it's completely intuitive and predictable enough for Dr. Harrow.”

Dr. Tro laughed and smiled. “Wow, you are absolutely vicious,” she said.

“Er, sorry, didn't mean to be,” Buck apologized with a short cough.

“Oh no, I quite like it,” Dr. Tro replied as she pushed more firmly into the accelerator.

Buck gave another short cough. “Gonna go to sleep,” he said as he reclined back in his seat. “It's about eleven forty somethin' right now and I'm whipped. What a day it's been.”

Binky zipped over the thin beach that quickly gave way to grassy plains, which in turn began to roll and become hills. Jagged rocks began to pop out occasionally along with trees. As miles and miles passed underneath the ship, the trees popped up more and more frequently as did the rocks protruding pointedly through the soil. Long after the ocean had vanished from view, the land had turned into a thick forest beneath them with the occasional small clearing where soil had failed to cover the jagged rock and provide a foothold for trees.

Kyme held her gaze straight ahead except for the occasional glance at her altimiter to make sure she was maintaining only two thousand feet above sea level. She knew for a fact that she had seen something very interesting and did not want to miss it.

More and more miles vanished beneath them, and still nothing. Setting down right then would probably have yielded passable information with reasonable energy into studying, but she had seen something that surpassed that by far.

Her odometer read about three hundred and eighty miles when she spotted it.

Far off, just barely visible against the haze of the horizon was an enormous mountain system, about sixty or so miles off.

“Dr. Kaddix!” she called back to the rear of the ship. “Dr. Kaddix, get over here!”

“Did you find a diamond mine? An erupting volcano?” He shot back. “Otherwise I might not be all that interested.”

“Get up here!”

Dusty sauntered up to the front of the ship and Dr. Kaddix followed reluctantly. When he spotted the formation ahead of him he froze.

“Now that's a mountain chain,” he said. “Let's climb over it and look, it looks like it goes pretty far back.”

Kyme nodded and Binky sped up. With a slight adjustment to the yoke, the ship lifted itself slowly until it was high enough to clear the wall of mountains ahead. It zoomed straight over, revealing flat, grassy plains below.

“The devil,” Dr. Kaddix muttered. “You didn't even give me time to even bloody look at them.”

“There's better,” Kyme said. The mountains disappeared behind them as she sped on.

“Well good,” he said flatly. “But we have to start somewhere, and those mountains would have been a good start. I'd say they were about a eight hundred feet relief, probably interesting rock samples and the like.”

He went silent as another wall of rock came into view ahead of them, but this one did not appear to stop at being just a wall.

“Now wait a minute...” Dr. Kaddix muttered. “That... now that's pretty... expansive looking.”

“Pretty high too,” Kyme added. She pushed the pedal in a bit more and pulled back on the yoke, causing Binky to sweep up gracefully over the mountains as they began to slant upwards at an unceasing upward grade.

Dr. Kaddix watched the rocks swoop below him, still climbing ever higher as the odometer tracked more and more miles inland.

They pressed up and onward.

“My God,” Dr. Kaddix muttered as the odometer hit one thousand miles inland. By now the slope had lessened, but the rock was still climbing higher and higher. “If it keeps going like this it'll be higher than Everest.”

Dusty nodded thoughtfully. “I think it just might.” He looked to Kyme and smiled. Kyme returned his look with a proud nod.

Dr. Kaddix glanced at the altimeter. “Damn, we're already three miles up.”

Kyme nodded and nudged the accelerator a bit further in. Binky gracefully careened over the still-rising rocks.

The odometer continued ticking more and more miles, as did the altimeter.

“These damn things keep going, don't they now?” he said loudly to himself.

“Damn right,” agreed Dusty. “They do.”

Binky pushed onward still, zipping over the jagged terrain. Finally they spotted what appeared to be a gentle, rounded top to the mountains. Kyme guided the ship over to it from the far distance and set down at the top. As soon as Binky had gently touched down on the rock surface Dr. Kaddix bolted to the rear deck for a side window and gazed out.

“You can see for miles upon miles upon miles!” he shouted back to the cockpit.

“What can you see?” Dusty hollered back in reply.

“Mostly more mountains and shit,” Dr. Kaddix replied. “But damn, this is amazing anyway.”

Dusty chuckled. “Damn right it is.”

Dr. Kaddix began towards the door. “What's altitude?”

“Four miles,” Kyme answered.

Dr. Kaddix looked at the door. “Y'know what, it would probably take us way too long to adjust to the atmosphere before we could work or study outside at this altitude to make it worth it. What time is it?”

“Local time is about eight in the morning,” Kyme read off of the dashboard. “But it's about one o'clock Dengris time.”

“I have a great idea,” Dr. Kaddix announced. “Let's all just call it a night. In the middle of the morning.”

The Aften Stjerne finally spotted land and soared over it. They sailed inland about on hundred miles further until the land had transformed from a thin beach line to dense shrubbery to grassy hills to a thin forest area. Dr. Tro located a small clearing just big enough for the ship and eased the Aften Stjerne into it.

“Well, here we are,” Dr. Tro announced. “Should we name the continent then?”

Buck looked around. “Good question.”

Dr. Tro prodded the comms button. “Hey everyone, we're naming the continents.”

“Do we know how many there are?” Dr. Harrow called back.

“No idea,” replied Dr. Kaddix. “Have you found one yet?”

“Yeah, just came across it. I'm scouring it for any kind of civilization,” Dr. Harrow answered. “Maybe we should wait to see what the locals call it before naming it for ourselves, shall we?”

“Well, that kills all the originality,” Dr. Tro scoffed.

“Oh, if you really must,” Dr. Harrow said with a hint of exhasperation. “I suppose they will need names in English as well.”

“Well, I'm sure most of us have noticed that the continents back on earth only use a few different syllables across the seven of them.”

“Across the six different names, yes,” Dr. Harrow acknowledged.

“Well, what do you want us to do about it?” Dr. Kaddix bellowed.

“We just scramble them up and name our new found continents after them,” Dr. Tro answered. “Short, sweet, fun, and there, we have a name. That way at least we'll have done something.”

The other two captains were silent in response to this.

“I'll go first,” Dr. Tro adventured. “I'll call mine...” she thought. “A... Aesis.”

“Half Asia. Now, what continent are you referring to with 'sis', though?” Dr. Harrow asked.

“Oh shut up,” Dr. Tro replied. “You think of one.”

“Astica,” Dr. Harrow replied flatly.

“Half Aus-” Dr. Kaddix began, but he was interrupted by Dr. Harrow.

“No, I actually put a lot of effort into that.”

“As I was saying, half Australia and half Antartica?”

“Half America, of course,” Dr. Harrow corrected. “Not nearly as cold as Antartica. Though, from the looks of what I'm seeing of it so far, equally barren. I should find a river soon and when I do there should be something along it.”

“Dr. Kaddix, how about you?” Dr. Tro asked. “Have you thought about what you want to name yours yet?”

Dr. Kaddix apparently thought about this for a moment. “How does Eurica sound?” he ventured.

“I already used the 'ica' sound, come up with something your own,” Dr. Harrow joked.

“Oh fine, I'll take the C out. Euria now. How's that?”

“Oh I was joking,” Dr. Harrow called back.

“Well great, now I can't decide!” Dr. Kaddix fumed. “Good going, you!”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Dr. Tro yalped. “Does anyone have a pen or anything to write this down with? This is fairly important!”

“Actually, no it's not,” Dr. Harrow replied. “We could call it Ginandtonicland and if it became the official name people would just call it that and get used to it. And if it didn't, then I don't think it would affect much more than the paint they used for the signs at the tourist joints.”

Dr. Tro had already run back to the computer. She opened up a logfile and began entering 'First day's work: We have discovered three different continents and named them all. One to the South of our landing point, to be named Aesis. One to the east, named Astica. The third one, to the northwest of our entry point is to be named either Euria or Eurica.”

She hurriedly pressed send and the message vanished from the screen.

“Oh, I'm getting a log update message back here,” Dr. Harrow groaned. “Dr. Tro, please tell me you didn't.”

“I did,” Dr. Tro answered. “Already sent. The people back at Dengris and the rest of the world will want to know that we accomplished something today.”

“Bickering and naming things isn't accomplishing anything,” Dr. Harrow corrected.

“Did you put that it was Euria or Eurica?” Dr. Kaddix asked.

“I said still undecided,” Dr. Tro answered. “So you can still think on it and finalize it later.”

“Oh good, now you've told the world that we've accomplished less than nothing because we can't decide whether or not to include the letter C,” Dr. Harrow scowled.

“You all know what,” Dr. Kaddix growled loudly. “We're all tired and cranky.”

“Brilliant deduction there, Watson,” Dr. Harrow responded.

“It's about one thirty Dengris time. So what say we all call it a night?”

“It's midday here,” Dr. Tro whined. “I'll never get to sleep in this sun.”

“Dr. Harrow, you went East, so it should be later in the afternoon for you, you go on to sleep.”

“Thank you,” Dr. Harrow replied.

“Goodnight, Dr. Tro,” Dr. Kaddix called.

“Oh get back here! We can't sleep now! We've so much to do!” Dr. Tro exclaimed.

There was no reply on the comms.

“Oh well,” she sighed to herself. “At least we're here and I got something done, right?” she asked. The cabin was silent. Buck had gone to the bunks.

It was morning back at Dengris several hours later.

Alonso, as usual, was the first to rise, getting up to the first rays of morning light. Also as usual, he stretched, yawned, and hopped out of bed, then checked his messages first thing.

He had only one. He played it. It was the call that he had not picked up for the previous night.

He listened to it. When it got to the end, he played it again. After it finished playing the second time, he broke down and wept for Samuel.

Dan watched from his plane's window as Dengris swam closer and closer into view. His escorts had gone ahead and the way was clear. The pilot was already bringing the plane down lower and lower to land just in front of the towering building that undoubtedly belonged to the builders of the enormous circular structure that he was now seeing with his own eyes from the same window.

It seemed only seconds went by as the plane swooped down and ground to a halt right on the asphalt road in front of it.

He was guided out and began making his way up to the building, flanked by far more guards than could have been necessary. When he reached the steps to the door, they opened and several people in blue and gold uniforms stepped out.

One of them was crying.

“It is truly a pleasure to welcome you to Dengris and to the headquarters of TimeSpace technologies, Mr. President,” one of the uniformed individuals greeted kindly. “To what do we owe this most pleasant surprise, sirs?”

“We noticed that structure over there,” the secretary of defense growled.

“Well, it is quite large and it doesn't blend in much with the surroundings,” another one of the TimeSpace people commented. “But I fail to see how a shiny object in one's back yard would merit the honor of a visit from the president of the United States.”

The secretary of defense did not seem terribly amused by this. “Well, see, it's quite an impressive structure,” he spat sarcastically. He marched in front of the TimeSpace representatives like a drill sergeant pacing back and forth. “We just had to see it for ourselves.”

“Well thank you,” another uniformed employee beamed.

“Oh yes, pass my compliments on to your leader. In fact, I want you to take me to your leader as you pass them on.”

The employee shrugged and turned to Alonso, who was still sobbing.

“Alonso, that mean bastard in front of me said that the Layer Cake looked nice.”

“That's very kind of him,” Alonso choked between sobs. “Tell him he's probably not as much of an asshole as I think he is.”

The secretary lunged at Alonso, with every employee intercepting and keeping his raging fists at bay.

“Stand down!” Dan shouted. He turned to Alonso. “I'm sorry for that. Both dropping in and this complete asshole here. I really should have appointed someone better.”

Alonso shrugged it off and wiped the tears from his eyes. “Mr. Sudineck, it's truly a pleasure to meet you. Is there anything you would like to discuss?”

Dan nodded. “I'd like you to tell me what you know about the planet that has appeared recently, as well as the Layer Cake behind your building. Also, if I may ask, why are you crying?”

Alonso waved into the headquarter building and began to trod back inside. “Come inside and we can talk about the first two. I'll tell you now, the reason you see me in this state today is I just found out about the death of one of our loyal employees, Samuel V. Denmoor.”

“You bastard!” roared the secretary of defense. “You had an operative acting as a member of the cabinet in the United States government?”

Dan was aghast. He recognized that name. He remembered the face of the blond-haired official who it belonged to. “Dead?”

“Killed in the line of duty,” Alonso confirmed. “Come with me, sir. And we would really prefer if you kept that asshole and the rest of your entourage behind.”

“Sir, I would advise against that!” the secretary of defense bellowed. “The security risks are far too great.”

Dan ignored him.

“Alonso, if the United States president is not back out safely within thirty minutes, we're demolishing that fucking cake of yours!”

“I appreciate your care,” Alonso called back as Dan disappeared behind the thick, heavy doors. “But we cannot allow you to do that. I'll try not to keep the president too long, but don't think for an instant that I would hurt him or that it would be a good idea to try anything.”

The employees all filed inside and the doors slammed shut.

Buck stirred and opened his eyes. Judging from the yellowing light pouring in from the side window onto the far wall, it was probably late in the afternoon now. And judging by the fact that Dr. Tro's bunk below his was still undisturbed, she hadn't slept. He looked around. She was gone. He panicked and ran to the door, opening it as fast as he could and bolting out into the woods.

Dr. Tro was already in a better place. She was in paradise.

She had woken up Chase and the two of them had forged into the forest, cameras in hand. Already Dr. Tro had spotted a mid-sized woodland herbivore and was tracking its movements.

So far they had been following it from a distance, which was excruciating for Chase as all his captures from a distance were flat, but Dr. Tro had managed to hold him back from trying to get a closer shot, knowing the animal would most likely to be skittish and difficult to find again.

“Look, it's still not even moving, it looks like it might even be bedding down or something,” he protested as the animal dragged a heavy foot across the ground in front of it several times.

Dr. Tro was too concentrated to argue. She was staring intently at the beast, taking in as many details as she could. She could make out some kind of hardening at the base of the foot comparable to hooves on earth, which made sense for a forest herbivore. It didn't have horns or tusks; it looked completely defenseless, and as such it most likely was a pack animal and relied on numbers for defense from predators, or that there were none in the environment, which was very unlikely.

She was midway through formulating a thought on a visible lack of antlers or other sparring appendages and the probably correlation to gender when a twig snapped behind her.

She spun around and found herself looking at a jet-black coat of fur with pearl-white fangs bared straight at her.

Her first thought was that the animal was definitely a predator simply judging by the pointed teeth. The black fur indicated that it was most likely nocturnal and it had probably just woken up with the approach of dusk. Logically, it had padded feet, as she could see, and that explained how it had sneaked up on her so well.

“Brilliant!” Chase declared. A bright flash flared from his camera and the animal made a pained noise that Dr. Tro would later describe as a “yark” as it fell to the ground with it's limbs shielding its eyes.

“Chase!” Dr. Tro shouted in horror. She turned around, and sure enough, the herbivore they were tracking had dove deeper into the forest and was already far out of sight.

“Oh come on, that was a brilliant shot, it'll win a Pulitzer for sure, and you can have it on your next article free of charge.”

“Look what you did to that poor animal!” she protested, pointing to the writhing predator.

“Oh come on, it was about to attack us, I saved your life!” he countered.

“It wouldn't have tried to eat us, since we're not its usual prey. It was probably tracking the same animal we were when it spotted us and decided to confront us because we are competitors intruding on its terrotory to it!”

“And it would have killed us less because of that?” Chase asked.

“Of course! Its only motive would be to remove us from the area, not to kill us for sustenance,” she said in the tone of someone explaining subtraction to a third grader that had just never paid attention. “I mean really, does that thing look like it could have eaten one of us, much less both?”

The black creature, which resembled a thick, short, grizzled dog with a whip tail, gave a pathetic yark and rolled onto its back.

“Look, it's showing it's vulnerable areas, which is most likely a display of submission out of fear, look what you've done, you monster!”

Chase clicked the shutter again at her description of another important behavior to photographically document, causing another burst of light and another pained yark from the stunned animal.

“Chase! You bastard! That thing probably has extremely sensitive eyes since it probably has to see in the dark, you could blind the poor thing!” Dr. Tro screamed. “And even if you're not you're likely to be causing excessive trauma which could very well remove a necessary predator and upset the delicate balance of life in this fragile ecosystem! We humans are already destroying this planet and it's all your fault!”

“Are you trying to deafen it as well?” Chase said defensively. “I took a fucking picture, alright? There's way worse I could do, I could kill the thing right now in the name of studying it's pelt for such scientific specifications like how much it would sell for over the Internet,” he spat.

The animal gave an apologetic yark and rolled onto its feet before padding off.

“Well there it goes, so much for causing it to have a heart attack,” Chase growled.

They turned as something pounded toward them. It was Buck.

“Dr. Tro!” Buck panted. “You had me worried to no end.”

“How'd you find us?” Dr. Tro asked. She was visibly pleased to see him, something Chase briefly considered taking a photograph of.

“I was able to track you, I think. Made some kind of line through those trees.”

“We didn't make those,” Dr. Tro said defensively. “We'd never disturb the environment like that.” She glared at Chase. “At least, I wouldn't.”

Buck gave her a confused look. “Then, what did?”

“The thing that we were following did,” Dr. Tro answered.

“Oh, good.”

“Should we get back to the ship now?” Chase asked. “Maybe write a report up on all of this?”

“What the hell kind of environmental photographer are you?” Dr. Tro demanded. “We've barely even gotten out here. We've only even observed two different kinds of animals.”

“I'm not one, I'm a freelance journalist, photographer, and videographer,” he corrected. “And won't we run into some kind of mean animal or something?”

“Animals are not mean!” Dr. Tro shouted. “They are probably better than most people, they are only called mean because they defend their territory from perceived threats, and so called civilized life is more of a threat to anything than anything else, I'll have you know.”

Buck rolled his eyes. “So, Dr. Tro, how have you liked your job here so far?”

“Oh are you kidding?” Dr. Tro asked, her composure brightening up almost instantly. “I'm in air that's fresher than any air back on Earth, discovering new animals, I've got my own photographer, and you-” she stopped herself, then continued, “Not to mention I'm doing what may be the most important ecological study ever before, cursory though it may have to be due to the situation at hand.”

Buck chuckled. “I guess as long as everyone's having fun, all's well, right? Chase, how are things for you?”

“She doesn't appreciate my talents,” he whined.