A series of gasps erupt from the crew around me. Chase’s mouth drops open. “They found her,” he whispers, awed. Hemslock sits by, looking smug.

“Yes.” The old woman doesn’t look upset or anguished by the revelation. She talks as if she is reciting from memory, albeit an unpleasant one. “God has already punished those who were responsible.”

“And by God, do you mean the one that supposedly sleeps within the Godseye?”

“Yes. I remember as a child, making offerings to the island. When our beloved pets die, we would bury them there, ask Him for His blessing. They used to bury people there too, until the local government sixty, sixty-five years ago decided it was bad for tourism. Times have changed. But time has no meaning with Him.”

“Can you tell us what happened when you first realized your daughter was missing?”

“Oh. So, so terrible. We searched for hours. And then she—the American—arrived at our house. Our daughter’s body was with her. ‘I am sorry,’ she said. ‘Forgive me.’ Over and over.” Mournfully the old woman shakes her head. “As if that could bring my child back to me.

“Then the American died,” she continues, with a quiet, bone-chilling finality. “We saw balete roots encircle her legs, wrap around her waist. It took her. The ground opened and the balete took her down, down, underneath the soil. They killed my daughter for nothing. Those people—your people—killed for nothing. All you do is take, take, take.”

“Do you know what happened to the other cultists?”

“I heard rumors that some escaped Kisapmata. They had guns, the American told us. Guns were the reason the Diwata could not protect us from the Spaniards or the Americans or the Japanese, my great-grandmother said. She lived long enough to see them all.”

“Hear that?” Hemslock says triumphantly, pausing the video. “Whatever supernatural shit is on this island, bullets are effective. And I have more than enough to spare. We’re as prepared as we can be until we reestablish communication with the mainland.”

This seems to satisfy the rest of the crew but not Gries. “But how did you know to bring all these guns in the first place?” he asks, suspicious, after the others had left the hall to await contact from Leyte. “And bringing this many bodyguards is no coincidence, either. There’s something about the Godseye you haven’t told us.”

Hemslock smiles disarmingly. “You know me, Leo. I’m a regular Boy Scout. I like to come prepared. You should be grateful that I planned ahead.”

“What do you know about this island, Reuben?”

“Enough for me to take the lead on this one. So sit your ass down and let me do what I gotta do.”

Leo turns without another word and leaves the mess hall. Chase and I follow him. Askal trots beside me as Gries reaches the cabin he shares with Chase.

“He’s hiding something,” he says abruptly, striding toward his desk and opening his laptop. “I have the shared password to the files on our server. I want to take another look at the videos he showed us. There’s a reason he didn’t play them all the way through.”