“Hello.” He stepped in closer, his smile widening. “Mr Amphistium, I believe.” He held up the lamp to the plate-sized fossil pressed in the stone. “And you, sir, are proof of evolution.” Jim knew the species was an ancestor of the flatfish, but where the modern variety had an asymmetric head with both eyes on one side, this fossil fish had one eye in the center of the head, and the other near the edge – evidence that evolution had only half finished her job.

He wished he had his camera, but the device was way too bulky, and he had needed to pack light for the journey to the cave. He satisfied himself with digging out his notebook and quickly jotting down some details, and doing a quick pencil sketch that he would enhance back at the camp.

Jim waved the lamp around – two cave entrances. He’d stick to the left, and pray it didn’t branch too many times. To help, he reached into a pocket for a fat stick of caving chalk, and wrote directions and a short message on the wall.

He stepped in further, and exhaled, looking around and whistling – on the wall there was cave art. Some of the images were faded by countless centuries, but others were more recent, perhaps only decades old. There were small figures, standing on the dark water’s edge, spears held high. There were drawings of water creatures – fish, sharks, turtles, and strange shapes Granger couldn’t recognize. There were men pulling the creatures onto stone shorelines, or in turn, they being pulled into the water. The final ones showed the unlucky ones in the dark sea being ripped to pieces, shredded and consumed by the denizens of that dark water.

Granger had been following the ancient tableau as he continued on, moving ever lower, the temperature, strangely, getting warmer, much warmer. He entered a large flat room; must be nearly a hundred feet around, he thought, judging by the way the multiple echoes bounced back at him. He was about to continue on when a melon-sized rock caught his eye. He squatted before it, and rolled it towards himself. He drew a small pick from his belt and looked for a fracture point. He tapped it several times, the echoes mimicking his sounds before the rock split neatly in two.

Jim’s eyebrows shot up and he snorted softly. Like a window on a world long past, the ancient continent gave up its secrets to those it deemed worthy. He smiled, and lifted one half of the stone. There was an enormous tooth embedded in the matrix. He placed his hand upon it and spread his fingers – the triangular, serrated blade extended well beyond his palm and fingertips. It was just like the Nantouk elder’s tooth, but bigger and age darkened.