“That’s a lot of supposition,” Sanders said.
“Okay, have it your way,” I said, and then turned to walk away. Behind me, I heard a soft plop; one of the crabs had dropped off the tree and was now fully on the ground.
“Wait!”
I turned; Sanders spared me the briefest of panicked looks. By this time, three of the crabs were on the ground, and one of them had begun walking, at a very casual and measured pace, toward him.
“This is just between us,” he said.
Despite myself I had to admire his need to try to bargain while he was, or so he thought, on the verge of being eaten. “Go on,” I said.
“I wanted to get a sample,” he said.
I frowned at this, and noticed the crab nearest to Sanders was now within jumping distance of him. I flicked the screamer on and off; the crab stopped and reared, confused.
“What do you mean, you wanted to get a sample?” I asked.
“I brought a syringe with me,” Sanders said. “I told them it was for my insulin.”
“You’re diabetic?” I asked, pulsing the screamer again.
“No, I just told them that.”
“Where’s the syringe now?”
“It’s in my pocket.”
I pulsed the screamer. “Show me.”
Sanders fished into his jumpsuit pocket and produced a sealed package that included a syringe and needle. It was very small. I laughed.
“What?” Sanders said.
“You weren’t gonna get that into Bella, my dude.”
Sanders looked annoyed, or as close as one could be to annoyed while panicking. “It wasn’t for Bella.”
The tumblers fell into place in my brain. “Ahh, I get it,” I said, and pulsed the screamer again. I might have been imagining it, but it seemed to me the crabs were getting exasperated by that point. “You wanted to get a sample from one of her eggs.”
“Yes,” Sanders said.
“But we already have kaiju genetic material on file.”
Sanders shook his head. “Not on the other side. We have the data about the genetics. But not the genetics.”
“And you thought you would just get your sample past everyone on the way back.”
“I have the insulin bottle,” Sanders said.
The forward crab had finally had enough waiting and leapt at Sanders. He screamed and pivoted, and the crab sailed past him. I turned on the screamer full blast while the crab was midair; it landed and ran off and the rest of the crabs did likewise.
I walked up to Sanders. “So you thought you would just land, at an active kaiju site, stroll over to the natal jelly, which is crawling with creatures like these”—I waved in the direction of where the tree crabs went—“but much, much worse, take a sample without any of the rest of us noticing, and bring it back to the other side.”
“Yes, basically, that’s it,” Sanders said.
I turned off the screamer. The crabs poked out from around the tree again.
“It must be amazing to have that much confidence,” I said.
“In retrospect, I see this plan had flaws,” Sanders said, eyeing the crabs.
“A few,” I agreed. I turned the screamer back on. The crabs ran away. A slow dawning look on Sanders’s face indicated he finally figured out the tree crabs’ actions seemed all too well synchronized. I smiled and pulled the screamer out of my pocket. “Keeps them away,” I said. “Unless I turn it off.”
“You brought me down here on purpose,” he said, eyes narrowing.
“I sure did,” I agreed.
“Why?”
“Because I know you better than the rest of them, and I was curious. And also, you were an asshole to me. I wanted to return the favor.”
“Well, nicely done,” Sanders said. “You’ve definitely done that.”
“Not done yet,” I said, waggling the screamer, and then putting it back in my pocket before Sanders thought to try to take it from me. He couldn’t—I was better in shape than he was; I lift things—but why let him think about it.
“What else do you want?” Sanders asked.
“There’s the matter of your punishment,” I said.
Sanders’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”
I gave him a look. “What, leave you out here to be eaten by the tree crabs? Not very subtle. I mean, I could, and I could make them believe me. You were stupid enough to want to land at the kaiju site. No one would doubt me if I said you just ran off in the trees and left a skeletonized corpse behind.” This wasn’t true, of course; the tree crabs wouldn’t kill him, even if they would happily strip his corpse to the bone. I was not telling him that. “But then you would be dead, and you couldn’t learn.”