They should have easily reached the Nibuwe system, but a broken engine and a pilot’s mistake forced the escape rocket into a peculiar route. What annoyed Casjara most was that she couldn’t get mad at anyone: the pilot wasn’t human, but a computer algorithm.

So, instead, she turned her anger at the person who had programmed the computer. Even though they had probably died a century ago.

Hera looked up from two books she read simultaneously. “Oh well, as they said in Amor: Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

“And we’re still suffering from that!” Casjara struck the punching bag thrice in a second. Or maybe even five times. It went too fast for Hera, though it looked impressive.

“From Amor?”

“From people throwing stones.”

Casjara punched the bag with such ferocity that it folded back into the ceiling, where she kept it when unused, which practically meant it was never there. “What idiot thinks: if I’m not allowed to leave on that rocket, I’ll throw stones and sabotage their engine!”

Hera cringed at the next salvo of curse words that echoed through the hallway. “Well, Fourstone said it best. Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity. And I’m not certain about the universe.”

“The universe surely feels infinite.”

Two doors slid open. A woman poked her head through the opening and yelled. “And we feel you should turn down the noise!”

“Do you even know who you’re talking to,” Casjara mumbled.

She flung her boxing gloves at the wall. Sweat steamed from her skin. “I’m sick of these stuffy white spaces. We should have been there long ago!”

The woman poked her head out of her door again, a glowing blue device in her hand. “Honey, do you want me to call the Space Regulators to gag you?”

On the other side, a boy shuffled down the hall. His long black hair hung in front of his eyes and a hunched back made him seem much shorter. He was one of the few that still wore the mandatory uniform. But it was frayed, full of holes, and hung loose around his narrow shoulders.

The sleeves scraped the bright white walls, the blue doors with built-in cameras, and a thick gray pipe once every five meters.

Hera knew his name was Simmo, but not much else. He seemed smart and kind, but whenever she tried to talk, he ran away.

“We’ll get the answer soon,” said Hera as the boy was already halfway down the hall.

“Whether we’re in Nibuwe already?”

“Whether the universe is infinite.” She grabbed a book from her bag and held it up. “Trevran set out years ago on a journey to the edge of the universe.”

“Maybe he’s already arrived. You’d know if you checked your receptor for once.”

Casjara stomped over to Hera and waved her own blue-glowing device, turning the entire hallway into a disco. She tapped something on her receptor and shoved the resulting screen under Hera’s nose.

A new notification appeared about another planet being colonized. Below were two articles about space battles, the first against a meteor shower, the second against another human spaceship.

“Receptor,” Casjara emphasized. “You know, the thing with news from the whole universe. Everyone uses it. We can’t live without it. Does that ring any bells?”

A bell did ring.

It was Simmo, who looked up in fright and pulled his buzzing receptor from his pocket.

“Look! That guy over there! He also has a receptor.” Casjara’s furious gaze slid over Simmo and Hera already knew what was coming. “Yes! You, you! Prove to her the importance of checking your receptor.”

Wide-eyed, he turned around and powerwalked down the hall.

After his footsteps had faded, Hera and Casjara also received a bell. Casjara immediately looked at her screen. Hera frowned and dove into her bag to find the blasted device.

She didn’t get that far. Casjara’s strong hands yanked her up by the shoulders and dragged her from the comfortable reading chair.

“Finally! Finally! My dreams are coming true! We have to get there quickly, Hera.”

“To your dreams?”

“To that new planet.”

Hera struggled free from the iron grip. Now my neat shirt is all rumpled, she thought. And this is why you can’t touch my books, Casjara.

They ran through the corridors. An alarm went off: running through the corridors was forbidden. But everyone did it—even the Space Regulators themselves.

After a maze of narrow hallways, they arrived at the general area. Casjara pushed people aside, Hera repeatedly said sorry, until they stood at the front.

The captain—more a ceremonial title, since he only actually steered when accelerating or decelerating—smiled warmly.

“Finally we have reached the Nibuwe system. After years of bad luck, setbacks, creative routes, and tough periods without much electricity.”

“You never have that problem with books,” Hera whispered in Casjara’s ear.

“Of setbacks?” Casjara frowned.

“Of needing electricity to read.”

The captain clapped his hands and added more volume. “It’s a bit different, though, than we thought.”

The crowd collectively put a hand to their mouth. The captain held up his hands. “No, no, nothing serious. The planets are positioned slightly differently—and that’s actually good news! We expect to be able to set foot on the first planet within a day. Get ready. It might be a rough landing.”

It was indeed a rough landing.

Hera and Casjara were still packing when their floor tilted. Hera swung around helplessly until Casjara grabbed her and easily climbed out of the room. The rocket quickly righted itself, but two pipes in the hallway had burst and spew gases.

After the incident with the toxic heating on the second floor, and the resulting two-year “ice age”, no one trusted these gases anymore. Casjara held up her receptor, like a bright flag in the mist.

“Follow us!” Hera called to the people behind them. And follow they did.

They stumbled over a large piece that had fallen from the ceiling. Two automatic sliding doors had been disconnected from the system by the impact and now went open, closed, open, closed, open, closed, open—

Casjara had thrown her punching bag between the doors.

Not much later, they emerged from the mist and stood at the rocket exit. They knew the protocol. A group of Space Regulators went outside, checked for danger, created a breathable air, and only then would everyone be released.

“Oh, Hera, this is going to be so much fun. We can set up our own little cottage. And then I’ll build a sports room in it. And you can have a library. But we do need to claim a big garden, you hear me? Right away, we’ll have to create fences and mark our … our … what did you call that again?”

“Territory. Terra is Ancient Dovish for earth, orium something like home, or place where it happens. But I don’t know—”

The Space Regulators came back quickly. Too quickly.

Surprisingly, they smiled even wider than the captain, and the doors flew open.

The planet had a purple ground. Dark purple meant the earth was hard and rocky, light purple meant soft and muddy. Because of this, the air above them colored more pink than light blue.

As far as Hera could see, the planet was flat. No mountains, no trees, only rare and tiny plants. She couldn’t see very far, however, due to the mass of people flowing over the planet like a churning river.

Together with Casjara she found an inlet. Four high rocks had already built half of their house. The spot seemed perfect. That’s where they decided to build their future.

This planet rotated much slower, stretching the days and nights. The captain had sent them to the side where the sun was currently shining.

So when the day ended on this planet, and the sun finally set, three Earth days would’ve already passed.

Casjara had been gone for a while. Looking for food, but especially looking for a higher position in the colony.

Hera had found a plant that resembled grass and placed it on top of a rock. Sitting in this temporary chair, she read another book, until Simmo ran by in a panic.

“Hey! What’s going on?” she asked. “Is something wrong?”

“We have to get away from here!” he shouted, perhaps the first words she’d ever heard him say.

“Why?”

He had already fled himself. Before Hera had closed her book and stood up, she was alone again.

Until Casjara came to her. Her face was covered in blood. Hera thought her usual glare could be terrifying; she had underestimated how much worse it could get. Oh fud, this is not good.

“Hey. Dear. What happened?”

Casjara said nothing. She took a bottle of water and washed the blood from her hands. Hera looked over her shoulder.

Four men held up a stretcher with two deceased people. One of the victims was the woman who had earlier tried to silence Casjara.

Hera felt she should look away, but her eyes noticed symbols of blood scratched into their arms. We were so busy decorating our house, she thought, that we forgot the house might not be ours.

The symbols resembled the Ancient Dovish for “stay away”. Unconsciously, she stepped towards it.

Casjara grabbed her wrist.

“I’m building an army. You stay close to me.”

When evening finally fell, Casjara already had ten soldiers for her army. At first there were twelve, until some mysteriously vanished. And that was apparently the limit in the eyes of the others.

The colony was summoned around the landing spot of the rocket. That spot always grew into the central square of every colony, because a gigantic spaceship was easily visible from everywhere.

The captain no longer wore a uniform, though he spoke solemnly. “I have sad news. Someone is breaking into the rocket, stealing our belongings, and … murdering our fellow people.”

“Murder? So it’s certain? No accident?” said Hera. The whole group looked at her. She hid her face behind a book. I just blurt out everything, she thought. The captain hates me already.

“It was no accident. These people died from weapons, from a murderer. The wounds are too severe and a message was left in their bodies.”

The captain walked forward calmly, but clearly lifted his shirt to show a gun. Casjara was right: there had to be a weapons storage onboard the rocket.

“Some victims had weapons themselves. Some were rich and had valuable possessions. I don’t believe the rumors that alien beings live here.”

He stopped walking when he stood in front of Casjara, surrounded by her gang of black-clad soldiers. Hera knew they didn’t have any weapons—but the rest didn’t know that.

“I believe the perpetrator is among us.”

Casjara exploded. “Do you know who you’re talking to? My father was the last military advisor of Aprania! The second most powerful man in the country!”

“Your father would’ve fled the moment he saw the first dead body, and wisely so. Something tells me you’re not advocating for that strategy.”

“My father was a coward!”

Casjara pointed at the exhausted and terrified people in the circle. “If he hadn’t fled like a scared rabbit, we would now be living in a flourishing Aprania, without opponents.”

“He couldn’t have known that. He made the best choice for the moment, a choice that allows us to still be alive.” The captain didn’t lose sight of Casjara. The Space Regulators formed their own little army behind his back. “Provide a better explanation, or you leave me no choice.”

Hera could no longer bear to watch and jumped in between. She pushed Casjara further away, but she didn’t budge.

“Can I see the victims?” Hera ased. “I’m a linguist. I can better translate the symbols. Maybe it is an alien being that through miscommunication—”

“Miscommunication?” Casjara spit out the word. “Ten people were brutally murdered within a day.”

She stepped forward and pressed her forehead against the captain’s, in a battle of who had the strongest neck. “There are other beings here and my army is going to save us all from those devils.”

“Weapon possession by citizens is prohibited.” The captain took out his handcuffs.

Casjara shamelessly lifted her clothing. “I don’t have any weapons, see for yourself.”

The captain was stunned and unsure what to do. Hera looked for a way out. The hollow eyes of the crowd mainly showed disinterest at dealing with any more nonsense. They all just wanted to live safely.

Except Simmo. He was the only one sitting on a rock, far from this conversation.

“Simmo!” she shouted. “Come over here!”

Glazed eyes looked at her. His body froze, hunched over. The more people stared at him, the less he was able to move. Think before you speak, thought Hera, now he’s definitely going to run away again.

“He wants to flee,” said Hera quickly. “I think many people would rather flee. Why don’t we let the colony vote?”

“We can’t flee,” grumbled the captain. “Our fuel is depleted and the rocket is damaged.”

Casjara was able to walk back to her army without handcuffs. Instead, however, she walked over to Simmo. She pulled him off the rock, shook him until his limbs could move again, and brought him before the captain.

“Just say it, boy. Do you want to flee? Are you a coward? Are you letting those beings—those murderers—go free? Or are you willing to fight with us?”

“Yes.”

Just that one word, softly spoken. Everyone leaned forward to hear what he would say next, but nothing came.

“Yes to the fighting?”

“Yes, I’m a coward. We have to flee.”

Casjara growled and pushed him into Hera’s arms. He smelled of sweat and his hair hadn’t been washed since the previous century. She fortunately didn’t have to accept his awkward embrace for long, as a small group walked up to him.

“We also think it’s better if we leave. We have to look for fuel together.”

Hera felt Simmo turn around and tense up, so she guided him into the group’s arms.

“Be careful out there,” she whispered. Simmo’s nodding head wasn’t exactly convincing.

Hera regretted that she had gone along with Casjara, even though she didn’t really have a choice.

It was dark. Casjara refused to turn on her flashlight. It would wake up those other beings; it would give away their location. So they navigated by the faint light of her receptor.

And by sound. Every crackle that first sounded like someone turning in their sleeping bag, or leaves falling, now sounded like a panting monster standing behind you. We’re making them bigger than they are, she told herself. Surrounded by this little army I’m safer than anywhere else.

Then she imagined the dead people again and forgot to breathe from the fear.

They’d walked through the dark for at least an hour, without any sign of life. Their only discovery was a pile of smashed water bottles and some blankets hanging in a tree.

She whispered: “And why are we doing this now?”

“We’re not used to these long days. These beings are.”

“If they exist.”

Casjara stopped abruptly and sighed. “And how do you think those people died then? They all just happened to fall on their own weapons?”

“I think of every possibility at once. Only when I see evidence do I know what’s true.”

Casjara shook her head. She had made spears herself, from shards of glass on top of wooden sticks, and tapped Hera on the shoulder with one of them.

“Good thing you’re not a soldier. You think exactly the wrong way around. These beings will be used to the long nights, so they’ll probably sleep the whole time.”

“If these beings need to sleep too.”

“You know what? Maybe you should go read a book again.”

“If I had light.” Hera grinned and gave Casjara a little kiss on the cheek. “Just don’t do anything stupid. Don’t run into danger—”

When Hera took her next step, she already felt something was off. The ground was a soft bump. It feels like … home, she thought. Not this hard purple planet.

A buzzing sound filled her left ear.

“Dive!”

Hera followed the command. An arrow quivered in the rock next to her.

Casjara lashed out at ghosts and managed to hit one too. A cry of pain echoed across the area. Something slithered past Hera’s shoes, and she suddenly understood why Simmo instantly fled from everything.

The soldiers stabbed their homemade spears into the dark. They all return broken.

Casjara wrapped herself around Hera like a shield and walked backwards.

“We need real weapons,” she shrieked. “Retreat! Retreat!”

Years in a rocket meant that Simmo didn’t even recognize the first tree he came across. It was just a tall pole in the corner of his eye, while his pupils searched for possible locations containing fuel.

As a child, Simmo had endlessly studied the rocket plans. For years, he had shouted that he wanted to become an astronaut. Until all professions he liked were taken over by computers, and now he didn’t know what he wanted to become.

Mother says that “becoming something” is the wrong idea, he thought. You already are something, you just have to discover it yourself.

At this moment, all he knew was that he wanted to get away from scary planets and alien beings.

The rocket could fly on all kinds of fuels. They could wait until they had enough solar energy, but that would take many months. They could look for plant remains, but the tree next to him was the first they had seen.

So he searched for Bombbrocks. Rock types that explode under the right pressure and can power an engine.

Simmo finally leaned against the tree and felt that fine touch of wood. “A tree!”

A woman with red hair leaned next to him. “One tree? Shouldn’t that become a forest over time?”

Vaia had gathered this group, but they looked to him as if he had all the answers. I don’t have any answers. Why are they doing this? Is this a bad joke?

The longer they followed him, the more he realized it wasn’t a joke. This group wanted to flee, not fight or ignore, and he was apparently their leader.

He didn’t know how to be a leader. But he made an attempt, because the sooner they left, the better.

“We think it’s a tree. Life here might work very differently, though. Maybe animals don’t breathe, but live off sunlight. Maybe they walk on three legs.”

“Marvelous.” Vaia stroked the grooves in the tree. Or whatever plant it was. “Life originated here in its own way. You’re right. We think life works a certain way … but maybe that’s very different here.”

“Maybe all life here is invisible.”

“Maybe they have no legs, but bounce over the ground!” Vaia’s little daughter ran into her arms.

“Maybe they never need to eat or drink. They live forever!”

Simmo’s head filled with possibilities, as if a wall had been broken. People had thousands of assumptions about how life had to work. It consisted of cells, it died at some point, you could touch it, and much more.

But what if none of that turns out to be true? he thought. What if this is just one kind of life, while there are many more? Maybe we’ll learn all the secrets of the universe here.

As soon as he thought that, the wall cemented itself again. No, they would be murdered by these bloodthirsty beings if they didn’t leave quickly.

And as if someone eavesdropped on his thoughts, he heard shrieks coming from camp.

The whole group looked at each other. Simmo’s reaction was predictable.

He ran the other way.

Hera tried to look behind her, but didn’t dare to, afraid to misstep and fall. Casjara did it for her.

“Do you see anything? What’s following us? Are they close?”

“I see nothing!”

“Oh fud, you’ve gone blind!? Are the beings in your eyes?”

“I’m not blind. I just don’t see who’s chasing us.”

A threatening orchestra of stomping feet and chattering beaks pushed at their backs. Sometimes a piece of rock shot through the air, or Hera thought she felt a hot breath, but they saw nothing.

She also didn’t know what to expect. Her eyes searched for the shapes of a tiger, a lion, an ape, a wolf. For the face, the snout, the tail, the colors of the animals she knew.

Casjara suddenly turned left, behind a large rock that hid the whole group.

“Uh, honey, our colony is the other way—”

“I know where our colony is. We’re leading the beings away on purpose, so they don’t find the others.”

“But … but … then we’re like bait. Fud fud fud, we’re all going to die!”

“Don’t be so dramatic!”

“I’m allowed to be dramatic! We’re being hunted by evil spirits!”

A thought pushed itself forward. Spirits. She had once read that people probably came from the Gosti, also called ghost animals. They were named that because they were tiny and climbed high up in trees, so you never saw them, even if there were thousands.

There weren’t much trees around here. How would a ghost animal look on this planet? If life starts here, how does it work?

By the time she finished thinking, she realized the group had come to a complete stop. The surroundings were calm. Her feet ached. Did I imagine all of it? she thought. Maybe those sounds were my own fear.

Suddenly, the whole group was brightly lit, as if someone had turned on the sun. People ran towards them in panic with flashlights in hand. Around the landing area, houses were demolished left and right.

“They went to the camp after all,” said Casjara breathlessly.

“They are intelligent beings, at least.”

And then Hera knew. On their planet, nature was brown and green, so almost all animals shared those colors to blend in and hide.

But this planet was purple. There were also hardly any plants or hills, no reason to fly or climb.

“Look for something purple that slithers close to the ground,” she said. “Possibly with large teeth to eat other beings. Or rock. Who knows what’s their food source.”

Casjara grabbed her second spear, the only one still intact. She crept crouched towards the camp, where the sound and lights faded.

Hera didn’t dare follow. She watched from a distance, surrounded by fleeing people, and to her amazement even the captain.

Her friend’s head spun rapidly to the left. In the same motion she threw the spear precisely in the space between a rock and the ground.

Loud wailing sounded. Like the hissing of a leaky gas pipe, slowly getting louder until it squeaked and abruptly stopped.

“Ha!” Casjara shrieked. She turned around. “They’re a bunch of purple snakelike beings. We can easily beat them. The planet is ours.”

Another snakelike being jumped on Casjara’s back and bit her arm. Her face contorted. She pulled the slimy body off her bleeding arm and tried to tear it apart in rage.

“Stop! Stop!” Hera hobbled forward.

Casjara stopped. The snakes did too.

She held out her arms and crouched lower and lower. “Stop. Peace. Talk.”

Casjara spoke with difficulty through the pain. “Don’t be so stupid.”

The snakes, however, held back and Hera could hug her friend in relief. With her teeth, Casjara pulled bandages from her pockets and bound up her own arm this way.

“It said so in the research of astronaut Mindy,” said Hera with a trembling voice. “About communicating with animals. They seem to understand a few words and gestures. Rabbits and hares especially. We’re pretty tall, which is super intimidating, so you have to lower yourself to the animal’s level.”

“Who’s Mindy?”

“Oh fud. My role model. My heroine. Do you ever listen?”

“You say too much to always listen.”

The people gathered on their side of the camp. Mothers pulled children close against them, while fathers held sharp rocks in hand.

Behind the snakelike beings, their own army came to life. Where Hera thought she looked at rocks, purple beings stood that looked like soft elephants. Pieces of grass turned out to be rabbit ears and a bump on the ground proved to be a purple turtle.

They all vaguely resembled animal species she knew from Somnia. But their teeth and claws were often much bigger and sharper, able to easily break the tough rocky ground. Their skin wasn’t just purple: some had even mimicked the cracks in the ground.

“So there’s a lot of them,” said Casjara. “We need weapons and a bigger army.”

“Please don’t attack,” said Hera, who had placed herself between the two groups.

This time it was unnecessary, for a purple panda in front spoke.

“Attac us and ou will now wat weapos we ave.”

After finding one tree, Simmo eagerly looked for more. Yet he was astonished when his group stumbled across something resembling a forest. Apart from the fact that he hadn’t seen this many plants in one place yet, nature on this planet looked nothing like that of his home planet.

All the plants had different colors. Daisies had pink leaves and a red center. Dandelions were almost black and so big that you had to grab their fluffy heads with both hands. Plants grew much more crooked, crisscrossing each other, as if they wanted to form a wall around this one forest on an otherwise barren planet.

It was wild and unkempt. His mother would have hated the mess and immediately laid down a straight path. And when he thought that, he noticed there did seem to be a path.

His group stuck together as they walked, constantly looking over their shoulders at the camp. Now they stood under a ring of intertwined ivy, blue and with leaves that looked like wings, as if it were the gate to this forest.

“If there are other beings,” Vaia began carefully, “this is their home, don’t you think?”

“But if those other beings exist,” said Simmo pensively, “are they now in the camp, or not?”

“Why did we run away?” said an older man. “What are we going to do now? If those beings have the camp, then they also have the rocket. Pretty pointless if we find fuel now.”

“If they see us leaving, maybe they’ll leave us alone.”

The man shook his head. “Youthful naivety.”

Vaia placed a toe through the gate. There was no electric wall. No trap that went off. No alarm that immediately brought ten animals onto their necks.

It does seem like there’s nothing here, thought Simmo. Just a bunch of purple rocks with colorful plants around them. So why does my whole body want to run away?

He placed his toes through the gate. The rest of the group followed. Here, there had to be enough fuel to at least take off.

But the wall in his head remained too strong. While the group cautiously walked on, he stayed behind.

Voices sounded. He thought he recognized Hera’s, but she was drowned out by much gruffer voices. In the distance, a herd of animals returned—

—with tied-up humans in their midst.

They ran at high speed towards another gate.

He pulled Vaia back. She pulled the others back. As they fell backwards through the gate, Simmo saw the sun rise and the rocks shake as if they were waking from their sleep.

The group ran away, again, in silence. As far away as possible from all the danger, to the only fixed point they had: that one tree.

At that one point of safety, they fell to the ground in exhaustion.

“We might as well call ourselves the Cowards,” mumbled Simmo. He looked at the tree upside down and thought it resembled something.

“What you did was wise,” said Vaia. Her daughter lay on her stomach, giggling about living rocks. “Nevertheless, this way we’re not getting anywhere either.”

“Better the Cowards than the Aggressives.”

The tree had rings on the outside: orange, blue and yellow. Simmo thought it was another strangely colored plant, but he couldn’t see any stem or leaves. It was as if the ring was inside the tree.

He looked around. The tree roots curled against the rocky ground, but didn’t seem to go through it. How do you get water from stone? Where do those roots lead?

With both hands he grabbed a root and pulled on it. It didn’t budge. The group looked at him strangely.

“I think this tree might not actually be a tree.”

With the help of ten strong hands, he pulled the root from the ground. At the end there were no tiny root hairs, no strands of natural material, but electronic cables.

He looked down. Buried under the layer of rock stood a tub of water, fastened with metal to something nearby.

Everyone dove down to further dig out the tree. The hard rock made this difficult, so they only loosened a few roots and scraped off a piece of the side.

But that was enough.

They looked at a drawing they didn’t understand. Maybe a rabbit, but not really either. A small animal with human hands. It did had the same style and design as the drawings on their own human spaceship.

It wasn’t a tree; it was a crashed rocket, with the pointy end down.

Hera slapped Casjara away in irritation, scared to death that she would do something stupid and start a war with alien beings. “We won’t hurt you. She doesn’t mean it. We only want to talk.”

The panda looked at the rest. The snakes hissed angrily. The elephants trumpeted something. The rabbits turned their ears, or folded one over, only to straighten it again. Their sign that it doesn’t matter to them, Hera knew. Mindy’s research also said something about that trumpeting, but I’ve forgotten.

“Go with us to our est.”

The captain scraped his shoulder past Hera. “What’s the beast saying?”

His gun lay in his hand, but he had just enough braincells to point it downward.

“They’re inviting us into their nest.”

Casjara pulled her spear from the snake she had killed. “Fine. Let’s go talk.”

“Ot ou.”

Ot ou? Oh, not you. “Sorry, Casjara, you can’t come.”

She wasn’t really sorry. She was relieved that the animals kept Casjara away. She’s always looking for reasons to fight, she thought. Even when they’re not there.

“Oh fud off to hell,” Casjara yelled.

Hera didn’t know if it was meant for her or the animals. She turned around and walked away, her army increased in size after the attack.

The captain was similarly turned away by the panda.

Hera didn’t know exactly how the animals made their choice, but a group of ten specific humans were selected and escorted to their nest.

Hera didn’t want to celebrate too soon. They were intelligent animals. Maybe they would be eaten immediately, once in the nest. She tried not to think about it, scared her heart would stop altogether.

She could hardly believe, though, that the animals were hostile. Threat disappears when she could have a conversation with it. Mindy also said animals trust you much more if you talk to them—even if they don’t understand you. Because a beast that just wants to eat you, will do so without first asking how your day went.

“You speak our language,” she started. “Or something that sounds like Ancient Dovish. But how? Did you live somewhere else before? Have doves flown to your world too?”

“I thi that questio is better for ou to aswer. What are ou?”

“Oh. We are humans.” Hera felt almost insulted that this animal species had never heard of humans before. “Humans from Somnia, that’s a planet in the solar system—”

Her mouth fell open when the endless purple plain transitioned into a colorful lively forest. The gate was decorated as if they were receiving royalty, and led to a winding beige path.

Although everything was slightly different, she also recognized a lot from home. It smelled of flowers and freshly mowed grass, mixed with scents she didn’t recognize.

The animals sounded mostly like home. Their sounds were only modified to better reflect off the rocky stones of this planet and carry longer distances.

She finally relaxed and dared to walk right past the panda. “It’s gorgeous—”

“Soia! Alwas tat stupid Soia!” shouted the panda.

“Somnia. With -m and -n.”

The panda slapped his soft claw in her face. “Do ot moc us.”

“Oh! Oh! No, I’m not making fun of you. I’m trying to understand your language.”

“It is the sae laguage as ours. If ou are fro Soia, ou a spea to all the oter aials fro Soia.”

“No, sadly not.” The panda paused right under the gate. Hera had to duck. “Something happened. Because of the Babbling Brothers, animal species lost the power to talk to each other.”

When Hera stepped into their nest and saw all the other animal species, she knew immediately. They also came from Somnia and had landed here before the Babbling Brothers came.

That soft elephant wasn’t an elephant; it was a mammoth. But they were already extinct faaaar before we had spaceships, she thought.

“How did you get here!?”

“Magi of gods an padas. Toug we all lived apart before Idi brougt us togeter.”

They can’t pronounce the N, K, M, H, or Y or anymore, she thought.

Hera didn’t know what or who Idi was, but it felt like more answers awaited there.

Casjara had behaved herself exemplarily until evening fell. And she laughed when she noticed the captain fell for it.

Her arm hurt more any wound she had before. But she refused to wait any longer and had intentionally boxed with her sore arm for several hours.“To keep it awake,” she had said.

Hera was gone for a while. Maybe that was better. She never understood Casjara. She didn’t understand that she was made—born!—to lead an army. That this was a big opportunity—maybe the only opportunity—to conquer a planet for mankind.

So she waited with her army in the rocket’s shadows. By now she had recruited almost thirty people. Once she had the majority on her side, she wouldn’t have to behave anymore. Then the captain would have to listen to her. Then everyone would have to listen to her.

First another problem had to be solved: the fact that their only weapons were a few rocks and broken spears.

Space Regulators guarded the entrance of the rocket. They were also supposed to have a uniform, shield and electronic weapon. During their panicked launch from Somnia, however, they had lost a lot. And when electricity became scarce, they were no longer allowed to use the weapon either.

So, currently, the guards were really only a few men in loose clothing with sticks.

That wasn’t the problem. She could beat them in five seconds and walk past. But she had to get inside unseen. Without anyone—

She heard footsteps behind her. Her spear already pointed backwards, but the sound came from far away. Simmo and his group walked the horizon, their heads down, talking enthusiastically.

Stay away, she thought. If he takes one step into camp, I’ll knock him unconscious. This has to happen tonight.

Fortunately, Simmo seemed to follow a trail and soon disappeared from view. She leaned her arm against a rock she had determined was really a rock, not a creature. Her arm didn’t support the weight and she bit her teeth to avoid crying out in pain.

“Casjara? Are you sure you want to go through with this?” asked a man’s voice behind her. “Those weapons aren’t going anywhere.”

“My life isn’t going anywhere,” she snapped. “I should be on Somnia by now. I should have had the second highest rank in the Apranian army, and as soon as my father stepped down, I would have become the military advisor.”

Casjara stood up and walked noiselessly but confidently towards the rocket, her army at her heels. “I’ve waited long enough. Tonight I’m taking what’s rightfully mine.”

Simmo is good for one thing at least, she thought, as she took a crumpled paper from her pocket. He has drawings of the inside of the rocket.

The group didn’t walk to the front, but to the back. There they found, exactly as the drawing indicated, a number of squares painted on the metal. It looked like decoration; it was a secret hatch to repair the rocket from the outside.

What can be repaired, however, can be damaged much more easily.

Their sharp spearheads cut through the edges of the squares. It made more noise than Casjara had hoped for, but they came liist within a few counts.

Steam escaped the opening. She stuck in her head and smelled an unpleasant gasoline odor that nearly made her faint. She didn’t look at what she was doing and grabbed anything within range. Cables were ripped loose. Large metal blocks were pushed outside so the rest of her group could flatten or throw them away.

Until the desired sound came, one similar to helicopter blades slowly reducing their spin. The exterior lights flickered, dimmed, and then went completely dark.

Stomping boots. The Space Regulators shouted over each other. But they all came from the left, allowing Casjara and her group to simply run around the right side of the rocket.

Stupid idiots, she thought. That’s why they need a good general. Without me they’re useless.

Only two guards were left at the entrance, but they couldn’t see anything in the dark and were too busy reassuring people. Casjara’s group slipped inside through the doors that now permanently stood open.

She had memorized the floor plans long ago. Because that’s what you did. Scan your surroundings, remember every nook and cranny, for you never know when it might become very important. Something else Hera just didn’t understand. She read endless books, but never the military instruction books Casjara had put in her bag!

She led her group through the winding corridors without any problems, even though they couldn’t see anything. The first floor was reached. The second floor. She only had to reach the forbidden quarters and all the weapons would be theirs.

The doors, however, were locked.

And of course the electrical system to open them doesn’t work now, she thought. Fud! Learning moment. What now?

She controlled her breathing to stay calm. Her sore arm slid along the doors as if looking for something. Mostly to reassure the others, because she had no idea what to look for, and the Space Regulators were coming for them.

A memory came to her. Electricity and computers have made people arrogant, her father often said. When it fails, you’ll find most doors no longer have a physical lock.

She stepped back. She placed her hands on the handles.

She slid the doors open without resistance.

All the animals had already gone back to minding their own business, but the giant panda looked at Hera seriously. “We ave oe siple questio: wat are ou doig ere?”

Hera struggled to formulate an answer. The words—which normally came so easily to her—stayed away. Yes, what are we doing here? she asked herself.

The panda took it as encouragement to press on. “If ou attac us, we ust defed ourselves. If ou wat to abuse our est, sta awa. We alread ave too mu to defed agaist. Wat are ou doig ere?”

Hera threw her arms in the air. “We … we just want to live. We’ve ruined our own planet, and now we hope to find a place somewhere else.”

The panda shook his head. “Tere is o roo ere for ou. Ou are too dangerous.”

Too dangerous? That didn’t sit right with Hera. She looked around. This small forest, without actual trees, contained both tiny animals and large beasts that ate them. They had killed ten people before they wanted to talk.

Anger rose until she screamed: “Sorry, but you attacked us first!”

“Attac? We did ot attac ou.”

“Yes you did—”

“If ou visit te ouse of a tiger, ot ivited, ou ust ope it’s ot ugry.”

Oh, she thought. So they do understand that tigers will eat them if hungry.

Now that didn’t sit right with Hera at all. “Then why did you start living together? Half the animals eat the other half!”

The panda frowned and stayed silent, as if it took a while before he really understood what she was saying. Hera was scared to death of a blow from his claw. That he would walk away and leave her to the tigers and elephants.

He, however, spoke calmly. “Dager akes ou stroger. Wo tries teir best will be te last eate. See ow we adapted so well to tis ruel plaet?”

His big fluffy ears stood upright. He looked sideways and saw, through the gate, Casjara and her army storming towards them.

“But ou … eac of ou is a tousad tigers in oe!”

All the animals crawled out of their hiding spots. The panda alone could block the entire gate. He stuck out a paw, as a gesture for them to keep their distance, and stared angrily at Casjara.

She, however, only had eyes for Hera.

“Hera, darling, sweetheart. We also want to talk to the animals. Can you put in a good word for us?”

“I …” She had started talking without really knowing what her answer was. Why would she suddenly change her mind? she thought. I see they didn’t bring their spears.

“Our relationship started badly, by killing each other’s beings. I feel guilty,” said Casjara humbly.

“About killing their beings?”

“About the bad start to our relationship.”

Hera looked at Casjara’s arm, which hung limply.

“How are you doing? I heard the snake bites can be poisonous.”

“Oh, good, good. Sweetheart, our camp is quite messed up thanks to those beings over there. We’d love a safe place, with food, and nice chats with our alien friends. Can you convince him we can come in?”

“I uderstad wat ou are saig,” said the panda grumpily. “Prove ou coe in peace.”

Casjara held up her arms—and her clothing. “No weapons.”

Hera looked back and forth between the panda and her friend. She stared for a long time at her clothes, until, with intense sadness, she found what she was looking for.

Back on Somnia, she had seen Casjara return from weapons training for years. The animals wouldn’t notice, but she recognized the bulges around her ankles as small handguns. She also recognized the harness, looking like a shirt, for carrying a rifle on your back.

The animals hadn’t moved an inch yet. They blocked the gate, and groups of snakes hung from the trees, ready to attack any moment.

Casjara shuffled closer, as the animals slowly let down their defense.

“No!” Hera shouted. Everyone froze. “It’s dangerous here. You don’t want to come here, honey.”

Hera ran through the gate herself, screaming like a madman.

“These are cruel monsters and they will kill us all! Flee quickly! Save me! They have way more weapons than you think!”

Hera fell into Casjara’s arms. She had missed the warmth, but immediately felt the sore arm couldn’t support her weight.

Indeed, she felt the cold metal of a weapon on her back. She yanked her arms away as if the weapon was scalding hot instead.

Hand in hand, they looked back at the panda under the gate.

He sat down and crossed his arms.

“Te Idi will decide our fate.”

Simmo and his group ripped the tree apart to reveal the rocket underneath—until they heard footsteps. Not human feet, but a collection of animal paws. Here we go again. There’s nothing here to hide behind, he thought.

So he pulled himself up on a branch. Vaia did the same on a lower branch, so her daughter could come along. With bulging muscles and gritted teeth, they hoisted up their companions into the sparse, leafless tree.

Of course it was barren—this tree’s insides formed a rocket. Simmo could only hope it was enough.

A group of rabbits hopped right up to the tree. They looked all around but didn’t seem to spot the humans. No, not just rabbits, Simmo thought. A few of those creatures look exactly like the drawing on the rocket.

Then they closed their eyes and touched the roots with their snouts. They hummed something like a song. It was beautiful yet frightening—sad yet divine.

This is their only tree, Simmo realized. They’re praying to it. They see this tree as sacred.

He was disappointed that life on this planet wasn’t as bizarre and unexpected as he’d hoped. But it also gave him comfort. He needn’t fear singing purple rabbits.

The animals opened their eyes and saw that parts of the tree had been ripped apart. Their song twisted into shrieks and high whistles.

“Te Loely Tree! Te Loely Tree as bee ruied!”

“Wic oster would do suc a ting—wait, I ow alread.”

“Uas,” they chorused.

Uas? Oster? Loely Tree?

He didn’t know what surprised him more—that he could understand the creatures, or that they spoke such strange words.

The longer they talked, the more he understood. They called it the Lonely Tree. Uas were humans, and they were monsters.

If Vaia hadn’t clamped a hand over his mouth, he would’ve shouted down that humans weren’t monsters. Too scared to breathe, just meters above dozens of long ears, they waited for the rabbits to leave.

“We ust tell Idi. Se will puis tose uas!”

All the animals agreed. Simmo waited as they hopped back toward the nature reserve they’d found earlier.

Instead, however, they bounded in an entirely different direction. Why aren’t they walking in a straight line? Simmo wondered. Perhaps life here was stranger than he thought.

Until he saw they were following a path—a thin trickle of inky black water winding through cracks in the hard stone. I haven’t seen a drop of water on this whole planet, Simmo realized. We get our water from the air and our food.

That revealed the answer: it wasn’t water, but a stream of gasoline leaking from the rocket. With the rabbits a safe distance away, everyone jumped down from the tree and followed the river too.

“It has to pool up at the end,” Simmo whispered. “Then we’ll have enough fuel to finally leave.”

Vaia smiled. “And then?”

Simmo slowed. “Then we leave.”

“Yeah, duh. But what will you do after that? Where will you go?”

He sighed deeply. “Still have to figure that out. I have no talents. No purpose.” He stared into the gasoline stream. “Except running away, apparently.”

Vaia gripped his shoulder. “You’ve kept us alive with your running. You know rocket systems inside and out, and you were the first to uncover the truth about the tree. I’d say you have plenty of talents.”

Then you’re wrong, thought Simmo. He was still glad to hear it, smiled back, and gripped her shoulder too. “Let’s just focus on surviving this planet. Then maybe I can think about what I want to do.”

They came upon another fenced-off area, this one mostly stone, buildings, and rivers. The bizarre plants and animals were replaced with just a few species and fields of purple grass. Fires, fireflies, and a few human lanterns lit up the entrance in the dark night.

This is an entirely different group than the ones who attacked our camp, Simmo realized. All these alien creatures didn’t evolve here together. They arrived separately, somehow, ages ago.

“Do you think there’s conflict between these two groups?” Simmo whispered.

“I don’t think we can even assume there are two groups.”

Simmo thought she was right. He knew rabbits, but those other hares were new. A gray being with human-like hands hugged a branch above him.

He yelped when the branch bent downwards and tickled his ear.

The creature awoke. The whole area awoke. They kept their distance, the small beings facing the giant humans.

Simmo knelt and dipped his fingers gingerly into the water. Yes, he was right. This entire place was built on waterfalls of fuel. It had to be more than enough to escape.

The older man in their group voiced Simmo’s thoughts. “We need to turn this place upside down and take all the fuel. You know it’s true, Simmo. Don’t start making friends.”

The rabbits and hares bristled their fur.

“I think you’ve forgotten they can somewhat understand us,” Simmo said over his shoulder.

The grey being climbed down from the branch and stood by a hare’s side. It whistled a high, piercing tone that had to be some kind of alarm.

The image before his eyes matched the drawing on the rocket tree exactly.

“Mindy!” Simmo exclaimed before catching himself.

He made himself small, as to not frighten the animals, and continued more softly.

“That crashed rocket belonged to the legendary astronaut Mindy. She went on a journey with a … a … creature like that one over there. And that one next to it.”

“A koala and a whistling hare,” a rabbit said grumpily.

“Ah! So you do speak normally.”

“One more insult and we’ll kick you out of our territory. Yes, we talk like you. We rabbits are new here and direct descendants of Kurin, so we can talk to everyone.”

Vaia looked grave. “Simmo, have you seen any signs of human life here? Before us? Few survive a rocket crash. Even if it’s true, and Mindy crash-landed, I don’t think they are still—”

Simmo shook his head. It has to be, he thought. Mindy has to be alive. I’ll meet her and she’ll tell me to become an astronaut, and then I’ll know what to do.

“Why don’t you live with the others?” Vaia asked.

“When we arrived, they nearly killed us all. Turns out animals kept arriving on this planet and they were sick of it.”

“But how?” Simmo asked. “There’s only one rocket. Can you teleport? Float through space? Is there a secret connection between planets? Is that why you gather fuel?”

If the koala hadn’t fallen asleep and snored loudly, Simmo probably would have asked twenty more questions.

The place was beautiful, bare as it was. The animals happily hopped along the rivers, hugging each other or dangling from branches.

Of course there were cliques—adult rabbits were notoriously territorial, even within their own families. But there was enough space to give each group their own section of the inky waterfalls. Some had even tried planting trees that were currently just thin sticks in the dirt.

“Wait, rabbits could talk this whole time?”

Vaia hadn’t blinked for a full minute. The surreal experience hit everyone delayed. Talking animals. The fairytales they’d dismissed as make-believe were true.

“Not all of us. Only Kurin’s direct descendants.”

Another rabbit elbowed her.

“I mean, yes, we talk! If you’d ever listened! But listen to this—we don’t want you. Our leader has decreed you must leave, or there will be war.”

“We want to leave too, but the others don’t. And to be honest, the animals aren’t making it any easier. Could you tell your leader that we—”

Simmo realized Idi sounded an awful lot like Mindy if you couldn’t pronounce a couple letters specifically.

The animals wouldn’t say where their precious Mindy was. Simmo had to search for the other person who saw Mindy as a lifelong hero: Hera.

His group ran with him, though the older man protested. “We need to take the fuel and get out of here! Don’t be so stupid!”

“We won’t take anything more from these creatures.”

He grabbed Simmo’s long sleeves and forced him to listen. “We stood behind you because you had the purest desire to flee. Apparently you’ve lied to us.”

“Believe me, I want to get away very badly.”

Yet still he felt the man was right: he’d never disrupt life here just to run away. Apparently there was something he valued over running off.

The camp was unrecognizable. Though it was midnight, the rocket’s lights were out. The only visible parts were wrecked, collapsed, or burnt. A group of people sat trembling and silent around a fire. The others paced around the rocket, tools and wires in hand.

In the distance, he heard Hera and Casjara arguing ferociously. His legs already turned around to run.

No, he told himself firmly. Running away is easy—it’s the option you always have. But what’s easy isn’t always what you want most.

“You’re going there,” he now muttered aloud. “And you’ll find Mindy with her.”

As if his feet were filled with lead, as if giant hands hovered above him controlling him like a puppet, he awkwardly approached Hera’s cottage.

“You only want death and destruction!” she yelled.

“They started this,” Casjara responded. “We need the space. Where else can we go? Another fifty years in a cramped rocket until we find the next planet, already inhabited? Or made of gas and lava on which we can’t stand?”

Casjara dragged a sharp sword and ripped off a bandage, dark red with blood. Hera leapt up from her armchair.

“They didn’t start anything. They were hungry and we arrogant humans walked right into their teeth. We forget they’re animals. Just like us. We can communicate with them—that’s how we solve this.”

“You read too many books. The real world isn’t like your fantasyland. The real world needs strong leaders and armies to protect our people.”

Casjara didn’t even try to hide her many weapons. It made Simmo nervous. Hera even more so, judging by her desperate attempt to yank the weapon off Casjara’s back.

She cried. Now Simmo was really nervous. He stood a few meters from the conversation, and though Hera had seen him long ago, she had not shooed him away.

Hera made sure Casjara could hear her clearly: “It’s over.”

“This fight?”

“This relationship.”

Casjara grabbed her weapon: a long black rifle she swung around as if it weighed nothing. She threw it at Hera’s feet.

“Protect yourself then.”

Hera kicked the weapon away. Casjara stormed from the camp, shaking her head.

Simmo watched as Hera collapsed back into her chair, exhausted. She looked like a wounded animal. So he treated her as one. He went to his knees to meet her eyes, kept his distance, and spoke gently.

“Hera, I don’t want to raise false hopes, but I think Mindy’s alive and she’s here. Do you have any idea where she could be?”

She sniffled. “Nice try. Like Wilplin said: If you want someone to do something, tell them exactly what they want to hear. Why would you think that?”

“Have the animals mentioned someone named Idi to you? She’s sort of their Wise Owl? And they can’t pronounce—”

Hera’s eyes went wide. It clicked immediately.

Finding Mindy was easy. That’s what happens on a flat, barren planet with no obstacles, and you know exactly what your target looks like. Though, of course, Simmo and Hera didn’t know certain divine beings had now heard of this conflict and lent a hand.

Yes, dear reader, I really am trying my best to aid life here. But my powers are limited too. There are infinitely many places where beings make a mess of things. So for now, this is the best I can do.

As Simmo and Hera ran toward the hut on the horizon, Mindy herself emerged. The thatched roof had caught fire.

Her blonde curls were even longer and more unruly, though mostly grey now. She still wore an oversized lab coat, out of which huge bites were taken. When she heard human footsteps and turned, all five pens tumbled from her pocket.

“Mindy! Mindy! It’s really you!”

Hera cried, as if they were old best friends who hadn’t spoken in ages.

“Lies! Leave me be!”

She scurried behind her home. There was a massive garden back there with contraptions, sprouting plants and trees, and even a pond. The sight alone made Hera’s mouth water.

By the time they reached the cottage, a splash of water doused over the roof, and then over Simmo’s head. Mindy rubbed her hands as if she’d just finished a clever bit of handiwork.

“Let me guess: you want my help.”

“I … I … I can’t believe you’re alive, standing here, talking to me—you’re my hero and I—”

Mindy shuffled toward her. That’s not how people walk, Hera thought, confused. More like hopping.

She held up her front paws like a rabbit and sniffed Simmo and Hera. Only when Simmo coughed did she straighten her back and brush the hair from her eyes.

“Sorry. It’s been a while since I’ve seen humans.”

“We understand we have to leave,” said Simmo. “And we want to. But our rocket’s destroyed and we’ve no fuel.”

“Is that so? That you want to leave?” Mindy wandered inside her stone cottage. The others followed hesitantly. “Then why do you need me? Think I’ve got a stash of rockets hidden away? That Jacintah the Spacefolder will teleport you off?”

“Every berry on a stick—legendary Jacintah is real too? You know her?”

The inside looked like she’d plucked it up in Somnia and plunked it down here. It was filled with antique furniture, wooden chairs and cabinets, books and loose papers. The first shred of home Hera had seen in ages, and she cried.

“How do you think all those animals arrived?” Mindy continued more gently. “Certainly not thanks to humans. No, our attempt to traverse the stars has been quite the disaster thus far.”

“How so? We’re standing here, aren’t we?” Simmo gingerly took a seat in a soft chair. “Each spaceship is faster, better, stronger than the last. I’ve helped build some of them!”

“I’ve tried to stay in touch with the other colonies. At least half didn’t make it. Their rocket exploded. Or they landed on an uninhabitable planet. Infighting broke out, the technology failed, an asteroid lodged in their engine, you name it.”

Mindy pointed to a map on the wall, dotted and crossed out in one corner but empty beyond that. “The universe is infinitely vast. If Somnia were my front door … humans have barely stepped onto the welcome mat.”

Mindy tossed her wild grey locks aside. “I was like you once. I wanted to explore space, travel further, discover more. As a result I’ve spent sixty years as the lone human roaming this planet.”

“Sorry if this is too forward, but why not let us stay then? We’d provide company.”

“Because you don’t want to stay. You want to colonize the planet, use it, devour it, then move onward. As long as humans only focus on expanding, not caring for their own planet, this pattern will continue.”

Hera’s hopes sunk into her shoes. Mindy noticed. She leaned forward, seeming to bump her nose on Hera’s cheek for a moment before quickly grasping her knee in a motherly gesture.

“Let me ask one more time. Not what the others want. Not what you think you want. What do you two want?”

Hera’s cheeks flushed and her eyes became glassy. “I just want to live, in a beautiful spot, with someone I love.” She looked up. “Until I’m as grey and wise as you.”

Simmo shook his head. “I thought I wanted to be an astronaut. But being able to build an amazing rocket doesn’t mean I want to. That I want to contribute to what humans are doing. I want nature around me, not metal walls. I want to fight for the animals, if I must.”

Mindy smiled. “Then you may stay.”

A panda rolled through the doorway like a football someone had kicked the wrong way.

“Code red! Te uas ave attaced us—tey ave gus, pistols ad ore weapos!”

Casjara needed five bullets to anger all the animals, and five more to lose faith in the attack. According to Hera, those elephant creatures were actually mammoths. Whatever they were called, their hide was thick enough to withstand bullets.

Don’t think of Hera. Not now.

Time for a new tactic. “Surrender and we’ll do you no more harm!” she shouted at the nest’s gate.

A tiger responded by pouncing straight at her. One of her soldiers jumped in front and took the bite to his side. Her bullets pierced tiger skin. Both creatures fell, bleeding, to the ground.

“That was the wrong choice.”

Her army had long since surrounded the nest, blocking all the exits. They charged in, shooting with complete disregard. Snakes fell from above, coiling around torsos until they couldn’t breathe, or around legs until humans toppled over.

Plants that first seemed small grew ten times their height, seizing wrists and ankles. Soldier after soldier was yanked upside down or deeper into the nest.

Casjara slashed away the plants with a knife. She spotted a wolf and shot him down. The look in the whimpering beast’s eyes reminded her of Hera’s frightened face when they’d first arrived.

Don’t think of that, she scolded herself. Forget Hera. Forget everything. Win this fight and claim your glory.

Her arm looked purple. Maybe the snakebite was poisonous after all,maybe not. Focus on what you know for certain. This arm is useless now.

She switched the rifle to her other arm. That’s when she noticed something she’d forgotten—the group of people who’d gone with Hera but never returned. They were trapped in a cage of thick vines and even thicker leaves. One had been struck by a bullet.

This is a rescue mission, she thought with childlike eagerness. Yes, that’s what it is!

Gradually but surely her army thinned out, just like the animal army. They pushed further into the nest, shooting and screaming. In her mind’s eye, she already saw herself standing atop a high rock, cheering her victory.

She also saw all the dead creatures around her. That doubt slowed her down.

A mammoth charged at her. She didn’t even try shooting anymore and just leapt aside. Its tusk barely grazed her, but that was enough.

Casjara flew through the air and landed hard on the stones beyond. Five soldiers immediately dropped their guns and came to help her up. The mammoth knew exactly what he was doing. Like a wall he stood before the vulnerable animals, seizing every chance to ram through her army.

This needs to end quickly, she thought. They are many and they are intelligent. We certainly don’t want to be here at night.

She rolled onto her good arm and pushed herself up. Her upper body of pure muscle could deliver a lethal kick to any human attacker. But these weren’t humans—they were animals.

Humans are animals too, Hera’s voice repeated in Casjara’s head. They didn’t start this, they just wanted to eat.

Casjara ran faster than she ever had, as if she could outrun the thought. She leapt back and forth between two stones until she hovered above the ground, landing precisely atop a mammoth’s back.

The beast thrashed and trumpeted, but Casjara held on tight, able to survey the entire battlefield now. No, humans aren’t animals, and animals aren’t humans. They’re so much lesser than we are.

And from above, she could shoot down those lesser creatures who had no idea what even hit them.

Until the nest opened up its own bag of tricks. A red-yellow cloud hung in the air, but the mammoth charged through before she could steer clear. The many colorful flowers seemed to cough endless dust into the air.

Her vision grew fuzzy. Her world spun and a horrid stench filled her nose. Her eyes hurt too much to keep open.

When she finally managed it, the entire nest looked different. Upside down, because she’d tumbled off the mammoth’s back and hit the ground hard.

Everything appeared to spin. Rocks floated and animals suddenly had their eyes on their backs. Each sound came at her from all directions, or not at all—until it was too late.

Mindy ran remarkably fast for her age, but it was no use. When they reached the nest, it seemed deserted.

Animals and humans lay strewn on the ground, joined by the one common thread in all of life: death.

It was rare to find anything still standing. The poisonous pink and yellow dust clouds still settled; Mindy deftly avoided them.

She sank to her knees. The panda leaned against her.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She felt the soil, the stones softened from all the trampling and blood. Why can humans only build on blood? The question ricocheted through her otherwise empty mind.

I’ve wondered that long myself, dear reader. I’d hoped relating these tales might bring an answer to light. I don’t know—does it work for you?

Mindy stroked the animals still alive.

“I was too kind to the newcomers. I should have sent them away as soon as they landed.”

Hera shook her head. “That never would have worked. A hundred people against only you?”

The creatures eyed her and Simmo warily, but Mindy’s trust in them bridged the gap. Somehow they must understand not all humans were the same—like humans understand not all animals are the same.

In times like these, this thought was almost impossible to maintain.

“You underestimate my power,” Mindy said. “I’m one of the most famous figures in the human universe. Trevran went on his journey to find the edge of the universe on my recommendation.”

For the first time, Mindy opened up her senses again, daring now to see and feel some of what had happened. It allowed her to hear the gunshots in the distance.

“The fight isn’t over. It’s moved elsewhere.”

“Why? Where to?” Hera didn’t seem to hear.

Simmo examined the cage in the nest’s center, its bars bitten as if a dinosaur had torn it open from above. He followed the debris and saw a deep continuous groove in the ground. Not footsteps, not blood, but a mark of something heavy dragged along.

Mindy instantly stood beside him. “They’ve taken the prisoners. Their feet scraping the earth left this trail.”

She took one last look around. “I don’t think the animals had the upper hand. So they’ve gone to my nest for help.”

“Or the Stoe of Platsu.”

“Which stone?”

No answer came, for Mindy already sprinted full speed ahead.

As the gunshots grew louder, Mindy knew she needed a plan—but she couldn’t think clearly anymore. Soon everything would be gone. Everything she’d given her life and time and dreams to, just to provide a good life for these creatures. Everything!

And she’d allowed monsters with weapons to destroy it all.

A battle cry erupted from deep within, filling the air under a midday sun that pretended it was a lovely day. She ran so swiftly that even the animals couldn’t keep up.

There stood Casjara, held upright by two soldiers.

Her army—and thereby the entire human colony—was whittled down to just dozens. The only humans not enlisted were Simmo’s fuel-gathering group. They further dismantled the Lonely Tree, now more rocket than tree.

Casjara followed their gasoline river. Just a few hundred meters further and it would lead to the rabbits’ nest.

She can never, ever reach that, Mindy thought.

“Hey!” She needed a moment to catch her breath. “My name is Mindy. Yes, you know me. Stop fighting, or I’ll send the whole interplanetary army after you!”

“Interplanetary army?” Hera whispered. “I never read about that in any—”

“It doesn’t exist,” Mindy whispered back. “Hopefully it sounds official.”

Her arrival was meant to be dramatic—to drop weapons and turn heads. Instead, everyone’s attention was on a dark gray stone, perfectly spherical. Shattered eggshells already lay around it, but those had been there a while and didn’t draw the eye.

No, every pupil sparkled from a red flash of light above the Stone of Platsu, growing and growing until the bubble burst.

A black panda stood atop the stone, surrounded by fifty new animal species and more eggs about to hatch.

The animal army had just received reinforcements. They also still held dozens of humans captive.

The human army was exhausted but had weapons aimed, including Casjara’s rifle at Mindy. The only humans without guns refused to stop collecting fuel and baring the rocket.

And Mindy stood between them, beside the Lonely Tree which was surely the Lonely Rocket by now.

The black panda smiled at her and clapped her paws together. “Greetings, hello, good day. I’m Jacintah, I’m the Placefolder, and I’m severely disappointed.”

The problem with boundaries, dear reader, is they can be pushed. What once seemed impossible, too dangerous or cruel, grows easier after you’ve done it once. Until you forget why you ever hesitated, though hesitation can be wise.

As such, none of the humans had any qualms about shooting Jacintah the Placefolder before she finished talking. They had forgotten what folding meant.

Jacintah vanished before the bullets reached her. She popped up beside a soldier, stole his rifle, and disappeared again. The humans spun around, anxiously searching for the teleporting panda.

Jacintah kept unexpectedly appearing at their side to steal their things, leaving human arms to grab air.

Hera smiled. The new animals had also relocated, from the Stone of Platsu over to the full animal army. Jacintah climbed atop the Lonely Tree, now the only wall separating the two armies.

“There, now we can really talk.”

“Stay out of this,” said Casjara. “You’re apparently a goddess, you can teleport—congratulations. You know what beings do to gods who meddle too much.”

Jacintah’s smile faded. “I certainly do. And I’d stay out of it, if you hadn’t—without permission—landed on my planet.”

“Your planet? Stupid animals can’t claim planets. Are you trying to give me more reasons to attack you?”

“I’ve existed since the dawn of this universe, little girl. On Somnia, mammoths died out ages ago, but I brought them here to prevent their extinction. Each era you humans found new reasons for war. I tried saving creatures by giving them a new home here. Yes, this planet is ours, and humans don’t belong.”

Casjara pulled a small dagger from her boot and pointed it toward Mindy. “What about her then?”

Jacintah fell silent. She gracefully sprang from the tree and walked right up to Casjara, no hint of fear in her body.

“You may know my sister, Ismaraldah. She can travel through time. Don’t ask why, but she insists Mindy is meant to be on this planet, otherwise the timeline is mssed up.”

With one swift claw she even slapped the dagger from Casjara’s strong hands.

“In all those fifty years,” Jacintah said, “Mindy hasn’t killed a single beast. So I’d say my sister was right. You could almost doubt whether Mindy is even human.”

Jacintah climbed back into the tree, a rocket with a few branches left. She looked at Simmo’s group beneath her gathering fuel, but said nothing of it.

“Humans are banned from this planet. Spread the message to all colonies. Land here again and you’ll be killed on sight, in cruel ways that only a teleporting goddess can devise. Leave now.”

Casjara was right about that I read too many books, thought Hera. But so much I’ve read is proving true. So there really must be infinitely many other planets on which we could live.

If only Casjara could see they didn’t have to do this. Then they could find a beautiful future together. She looked at Casjara, at the face she had always found so lovely, and tried one last time.

She took a step forward. “Casjara, my dear. You’re getting a second chance now.”

Casjara shook her head. Tears formed in her eyes. “I don’t think so, Hera. I don’t think so.”

She turned back to her army. “We have to take this planet now! Or its threat to humankind will only grow! If we succeed here, I’m guaranteed an important role in my interplanetary army.”

Her interplanetary army? Hera thought.

Jacintah scoffed. “You’re a military mastermind, Casjara. Or you should be. You know we’re at an impasse.”

“You know me?”

“I take an interest in little girls who hunt animals for fun. A negative interest.”

Jacintah teleported to the animal army. “We vastly outnumber you. And we hold half your colony captive. Even if you win, you’ll only have three or four people left.”

She teleported to Mindy. “Mindy is a famous name. Hurt her and everyone will mobilize for revenge.”

Then she placed her black paws on Vaia. “These humans stand in your line of fire if you try anything. What’s more, it won’t be long before they leave, wanting nothing to do with you.”

Hera was amazed. How could such a cute little panda speak so commandingly and stride into a war so confidently? Must have stumbled into wars before.

She also heard anger and grief in her voice. The goddess had seen more than she wanted to see—and wanted no more fighting now.

So it all came down to one person: Casjara. Every eye turned her way.

Hera watched her shrink, shoulders slumping. She held out her arm, a final attempt. “Come now, darling, come back, give me a hug.”

Casjara looked at her, black rings under her eyes.

She took Hera’s hand.

And yanked her forcefully away from Mindy.

Casjara let down her long black hair and pulled a small pistol from the greasy locks. She backed up, the rocket shielding her back. Hera struggled but was stuck in Casjara’s grip, which now tightened around her throat too.

“Dump the fuel in!”

Vaia’s voice quivered. “In what?”

“The rocket! Now!” She briefly turned the gun on Vaia but quickly snapped back to Mindy.

Mindy raised her hands. “I’ve never done anything to you. This won’t accomplish anything.”

The fuel was thrown back into the rocket. Simmo wanted to slap himself. His group, under his leadership, had uncovered and freed this rocket.

All that effort to escape … only to help Casjara escape.

Yet that still might be the only peaceful resolution. “If the right person flees,” he said aloud, mostly to Casjara, “that could be the best solution.”

Her face only twisted in anger. She kicked backward until the rocket opened. The happy picture on its side—of Mindy’s face, the whistling hare, and koala—clashed harshly with the person trying to enter it.

Jacintah exploded in red light and stood right beside her. But she couldn’t attack, or teleport away, while Casjara had Hera in a chokehold.

It’s okay, it’ll be okay, thought Hera, for a second, maybe two. But if this is what Casjara has become, I don’t want her to take me anymore.

That gave her enough strength to wrench free and slap her girlfriend hard across the face. Casjara staggered backward into the rocket.

Jacintah pounced, two of Casjara’s soldiers grabbed her by the tail. They leapt into the rocket too and slammed at buttons until it seemed to come alive.

“We’re just letting er go?” said the angry giant panda beside Simmo, who he now noticed resembled Jacintah. He sprinted at the rocket.

Hera tried to get clear.

Casjara aimed her pistol, but her arms shook, her poisoned arm offered no support, and she lost her balance.

A gunshot sounded.

The planet fell silent. Everyone looked around, felt their own bodies, ducked behind each other or stone formations.

Only one body sank to the ground. Mindy’s white lab coat turned red.

Jacintah stood right beside her. So did the panda, Hera, and Simmo. Every remaining human and animal raced to help.

They forgot Casjara and her most loyal soldiers. Hera briefly glimpsed her chalk-white trembling face—the eyes of what had once been her lover—before the rocket door sealed shut.

Hera cursed Casjara’s skill. She ignited the engines, rolled the rocket onto its side, then skimmed the rocky planet surface for a while trying to take off. Until the tip pointed up and she wrestled the battered ship into the sky, bucking and shaking.

Over the loud hissing of the ascending spaceship, flames at her back, she examined Mindy’s wound. One bullet. Straight through the heart. If the pens hadn’t tumbled from her pocket, they might have saved her.

That’s no accident, Hera thought, anger bubbling in her gut. She shot Mindy. She purposely murdered my HERO! Why?

She was beyond saving. Her eyes closed.

“Tell Trevran what happened here. Forget me, but don’t forget what I stood for. Make something beautiful of this planet.”

She was carried by both animal backs and human hands. They carried her the whole long, long journey back to her cozy cottage on the other side of the two nests.

There, they buried her in the peaceful garden she had planted herself.

“We’ll make something beautiful of this planet,” Simmo said softly.

“We won’t forget,” Hera stated, sharp and loud.

Jacintah vanished and returned almost instantly with a bouquet of gorgeous flowers. Not from here—they smelt and felt like home.

“Somnia is healing,” Jacintah said through tears. “In part thanks to you.”

She handed out the flowers so each person and animal could lay one down. A ritual all creatures seemed to grasp as well as the humans.

“I only wish you could have seen it.”

In the months that followed, much was destroyed, but even more was built. All weapons were burned. The rocket was dismantled, despite the captain’s protests. Its parts were used to construct homes, generate clean energy, and collect ample water for animals too.

Rules were established. Humans could only enter the animal nest if they gave advance notice, and preferably without clothing that could conceal weapons, though this requirement was scrapped after much protest.

It was forbidden to build any space stations or ports. All signs of aggression were banned, especially from the human side.

But they accepted it. Because they’d seen what could happen—and they had no place left but this planet. The planet cut itself off from the rest of the universe. It was so severe that other colonies called it the Radio Silence of Platsu.

Simmo was commanded to destroy all his drawings showing rocket construction. Only Hera had asked to tuck one into her books, to preserve a shred of history.

He didn’t mind. He’d become the chief researcher, studying the planet’s peculiar plants and animals every day. He lived in nature and discovered that though this life also came from Somnia, it remained endlessly unique.

The sun was hotter. The atmosphere thinner, so you burned faster and had to stay out of sunlight. Since days were longer, many creatures instead slept in short spurts, often active day and night. In summer, all animals migrated to a nest much farther off, because then the stony ground melted into a hot tub you didn’t want to touch.

Jacintah visited more often. Simmo had finally worked up the courage to speak with her and ask his most pressing question.

“Is there other life?”

“The honest answer? I don’t know.”

Simmo still struggled to grasp that Jacintah didn’t walk, but rather teleported in little hops. You never knew which way to speak.

He also struggled to hide his disappointment. “But … you can go anywhere. And with your sister, any time too.”

“Do you know what infinite means?” said Jacintah. “It means that for every place you visit, two more are created that you’ve never been.”

Simmo looked puzzled.

“Don’t worry, infinity is hard for humans to grasp.”

“But all the life you know …”

“… comes from Somnia. It’s incredibly rare, you see. Somnia didn’t get lucky once. Over thousands of years they kept hitting the jackpot, allowing life to form. It all started of course when my godparents arrived here. Before then, they did odd jobs around the universe for their father, helping other lifeforms. Ismaraldah says many of those alien races tried reaching Somnia over time.”

“Seriously? We were invaded by aliens and didn’t even realize it?” Simmo’s mouth fell open. “We are the aliens?”

“No, no, you’re Somnia’s original inhabitants. The aliens were never successful and fled quickly. So, other intelligent life must have evolved—but I can’t find it. Not anymore, at least.”

She playfully pressed her soft paws to Simmo’s face.

“And that’s why we must cherish what life we have.”

Hera had withdrawn, curled in her reading chair with a good book, away from it all. They no longer needed her to communicate. However calm she seemed from the outside, her mind raced.

News of Mindy’s death spread fast across the human universe. But the Radio Silence meant that no one could land here, if they even had working rockets left. So their receptors flooded with messages of condolence, grief and a spark of promised revenge.

They’d sent dispatches to Trevran but he gave no reply—likely poor reception at the edge of the universe. Or he’d found another world beyond their receiver’s reach. Or he was long dead, from an accident, or loneliness.

As Cosmo’s famous saying goes, she thought, beings can scour the universe for all its stars yet forget to see the stars around them.

Other news also reached their receptors. A group terrorized parts of the Nibuwe system, even spreading beyond it now. They called themselves CAJAR—an acronym whose meaning she didn’t know, but resembled another name too closely to be a coincidence.

She closely followed CAJAR’s missions, unable to stop herself. Until, per the agreement between humans and animals, all the receptors also had to be turned off.

She sank back into the plush chair from fatigue. Jacintah had kindly brought her old reading chair from Somnia. It didn’t cheer her up, as she hoped, but mostly reminded her of better times.

When Mindy was her living role model with whom she might speak. When Casjara still exercised in front of her, whenever she glanced up from her book. She wanted to read, to lose herself in another world, but no sentence truly entered her brain.

Hera shook her head, feeling the anger rise again. She set the book aside and grabbed another.

Tucked inside was Simmo’s diagram showing how to build a simple rocket. From Casjara’s belongings, she’d found information on constructing primitive weapons.

She had ample motivation to read those. Mindy’s interplanetary army was a lie, but it didn’t have to stay that way.

And so it was that life continued …