Interviews
“The bad news is that the storm isn’t going to let up anytime soon,” Gries says in disgust, staring daggers at the bright sky outside the window. “As unbelievable as it sounds, there’s a full-on tropical monsoon going on out there. We were able to establish communication with the crew in Leyte for a half hour before the connection went down again. They’ve confirmed the severity of the storm—the city’s flooded, and many neighborhoods are without electricity. We won’t be able to do much beyond waiting it out and hoping the power comes back quickly, so they can send a rescue team.”
“Askal can’t take his boat to get help?” Hawaiian Shirt asks.
“Let’s not risk it. I don’t want anyone getting caught out there, even if looks peaceful.”
“We’re not that far from the mainland,” Hemslock says. “If there’s a storm out there, then we should fucking well see it from here.”
“This damn island’s cursed,” Straw Hat mutters again, an opinion the rest of the crew agree with, based on the growing murmurs. Askal whines quietly beside my chair, and I stroke his head to calm him down.
Gries raps loudly at the table for silence. “There’s little we can do. We’re in one of the few places in the country with good weather right now, so we may as well take advantage of it while we can. My son was able to get in contact with friends earlier, so there are people back home who are organizing to get us out of here. Have a little more patience. Once the storm’s passed, we’ll leave.”
“I’m staying,” Hemslock says abruptly.
“Reuben,” Gries protests, “this isn’t the time to—”
“On the contrary, Leo, I can’t think of a better time to do this. We now have goddamn physical proof that these ghosts are real. We’ve all seen them. We could find power beyond our imagination here, the one that Lapulapu wielded and Cortes wanted. And you’re choosing to leave?” He sounds almost disbelieving. “This is our chance to become household names, be set for life. And you’re turning down the opportunity? For what?”
“The ghosts got Karl, Reuben,” Hawaiian Shirt says nervously. “And from the looks of things, they’re going to get Steve soon enough. We can’t put our lives on the line for a show—”
“It isn’t just a show!” Hemslock shouts. “It’s my goddamn show! This is my chance to prove all those worthless Hollywood suck-ups wrong! All those glorified shitheads who laughed at me, told me I was playing Ghostbusters! If this show hits, we’re all gonna be rich! More than that—if the so-called power that this deity can bestow is real, then we can be like gods ourselves! Or will you all be nothing more than cowards?”
The others look nervously at each other.
“Reuben,” Gries says firmly. “They have every right to want to go home. We’re all professionals here. The crew will do their jobs until help arrives. This is about more than you and your legacy. If you care about Steve or Karl, you know that everyone’s safety should be the priority. No one signed up to be attacked by these tree creatures, whatever they are.”
“No one?” Hemslock asks, with unconcealed venom. “You didn’t give a fuck about this show, Gries. You still don’t. All you cared about was solving the mystery of your wife’s death. Are you ready to leave this island without knowing how that plane wreckage came to be underneath the Godseye? Or what is that thing hoarding keepsakes of your wife in the caverns?”
“I said to leave my wife out of this.”
“But isn’t that the problem? You can’t leave her out of this, Leo. Not when she’s tied to what’s down here. You know they just found Dan Heussman’s body? I got an email from one of the producers before we lost the connection. Guy was stripped naked, huddled underneath some banyan tree in his garden that his gardener swears wasn’t there before. He never even set foot on the Godseye. What makes you think these spirits won’t follow us back to LA? We’ve got to deal with this here.”
Hemslock’s words hit home. I see the fear on the crew’s faces.
“Alon,” Gries says. “What do you suggest we do?”
I wet my lips, knowing that my words will not be popular with them. “The time to act has passed. We need to stay put until help comes, then we all need to leave.”
“That’s not an option,” Hemslock says. “The Diwata will pick us off, one by one, before the storm clears. You and I know that the secret to stopping our destruction is within the Godseye, kid. I suggest we all arm ourselves and stay in groups. I’ll arrange another search for Karl.”
He looks around at everyone. “You’re gonna have to trust me on this,” he says, in a gentler voice. “That’s what I’m asking. For all of you to trust me. You know I’m right. You know I’m the only one with enough experience with these monsters to get us all out.”
No one speaks for a few moments. “So what do we do now?” Hawaiian Shirt asks nervously.
“The Leyte team managed to send us a few files.” Hemslock moves to his laptop and calls up a video. “Rupi and Maryjun spent the whole night translating and transcribing so they could send this to us. Let’s see what they have. In the meantime, I suggest not going anywhere alone.”
There are four videos.
The first is a short clip of a no-nonsense–looking woman who is introduced as the retired curator of the museum Lindsay Watson worked at in Leyte. “She came to us with excellent references,” she says. “She was friends with several other American expats living here, but she was very quiet at work. Her specialty was our collection of Spanish-era documents, and she was very good at finding the links to other firsthand sources we have in the museum. I had no idea her qualifications were forged, and that she only wanted the Cortes journal, the poor woman. That poor family.”
The second video is of a sad-looking man, the mayor of the city. “It was before my time,” he acknowledges, his command of English crisp and fluent. “I don’t know anything about a cover-up. Any official who destroyed documents concerning the cultists’ case should be arrested. I only heard the story as a very young boy.”
“You told us that you found something on the island after the aviation accident investigators left,” someone off-screen says.
“Yes. I didn’t know how important it was at that time.” The mayor pushes a piece of laminated paper across the table toward the camera.
It’s a one-page note. I’m sorry forgive us I’m sorry forgive us I’m sorry forgive us is scribbled all over the paper.
“Oh shit,” someone on the crew mutters by me. “That was also in Key’s journal. And in the sinkhole.”
“Different handwriting, though,” Gries murmurs.
“I wasn’t sure if the paper was trash someone left behind,” the mayor says, “but there have been no tourists at Kisapmata since.”
“Until us.”
“Until you,” the mayor acknowledges, after a significant pause.
“It’s been confirmed that the letter matches the handwriting of one of Watson’s friends,” Hemslock says. “One of the missing expats. We’ve been in touch with his family back in Arkansas. They’ve been hoping to find out what really happened to him, and they provided some specimens. Looks like the Godseye got them all.”
The third is an interview of an old woman in her seventies or eighties. People behind her, likely part of the production team, fiddle with the lights and adjust the sound. “Mag-uumpisa na tayo, Lola,” someone says, and small English subtitles pop up below the screen for the viewers’ benefit: “We’re going to start, grandma.”
The old woman merely inclines her head and waits.
“All right,” someone else says. “Rolling in three. Two. And.”
“Grandma,” the translator says formally, speaking in Tagalog. “Can you please state your name for our viewers?”
“My name is Katrina Teresa Bantay. I have lived in Barásoain for close to seventy-four years.”
“You told us that your daughter was sacrificed by the cultists at Kisapmata many years ago.”
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.”
He finds the first recording and clicks on it. We stand behind him to watch. Askal claims the rug again.
“She sent someone care packages all the time,” the museum curator says. “The police already questioned us about it—I believe it was to a PO Box, but it was all done under her name, and they couldn’t trace who received them.” She also talks at some length about the Cortes’s journal but doesn’t say anything that we didn’t already know. Gries switches to another video.
“I don’t think they found any bodies on the island,” the mayor says, exasperated. “It isn’t about covering up any evidence. Yes, the villagers here are protective of each other, especially of the family involved, but my predecessor couldn’t have made any arrests if there wasn’t anyone to—”
Another video.
“—She was the true death the Diwata wanted,” the old grandmother was saying. “As punishment for taking my daughter’s life, it is she who suffers. The poor woman.”
“How do you know this, grandmother?”
“How do I know?” For the first time since the interview started, the woman grows passionate, angry. “A mother knows. My family worships the Diwata. Most of us here still do. We know He is just, and that He punishes the guilty. When He took the American woman, we started hearing of strange things on the island—things that were always crying, always suffering. That is her punishment. She is not the only sufferer there. We can do nothing but pray.”
She stares off into space for a few minutes. When she speaks again, her voice is wistful. “The Diwata knows. He knows all who come to his shores. He remembers us after we die.”
“What do you mean that ‘he remembers’?”
She laughs. “He sees into the heart of those who enter his domain. He can create dreams and nightmares to show you what lies there. My daughter is not the only one who has found bliss in His mercy. Over the years, He has given many sanctuary. Fishermen and travelers who did not survive our worst storms have found eternal sanctuary with Him. They are different from the sacrifices he demands. They are loved.”
“The legends state that the god will create a new world when he awakens.”
The old woman only smiles.
“Have you ever dreamt of him before?”
“I dreamt once of a plane that fell from the sky, how some of those poor souls found their way to His shores. And then I woke and saw what they say in the news.”
Gries makes a strangled sound.
“Do you think He was responsible for the plane crashing?” the interviewer asks intently.
“No. He is not a vengeful God. The passengers were unfortunate. He gave them peace.” She leans forward, her eyes on the camera. “You do not understand,” she says, more urgently. “Because of that American woman, the Diwata knows there is still too much cruelty in the world. He sleeps, but He is no longer lenient. He is—angry. He wishes to awaken.”
“I understand, grandmother,” the translator says, undeterred by her warnings, “that this is the first time you’ve chosen to speak of this. Many have come asking questions over the years, but you refused to talk with them. Why speak to us now?”
The woman gazes steadily at the interviewer until the latter repeats the question. “I want to pray for you,” she says gently. “You do not understand, hijo. We want him to wake. But he is hungry. He will need food. There is food on the island now.”
The video ends and Gries sits back, dazed.
“If the Diwata didn’t cause the plane to crash, then why all the wreckage on the island?” Chase asks his father, though his eyes are on me.
“Because he believes I’m a sinner,” Gries says. “This—this is my punishment.” He stands and pulls on a thicker jacket, picks up a safety helmet.
“Where are you going?” Chase asks, alarmed.
“Hemslock isn’t telling us everything, but that doesn’t matter. I’m going to help him look for Karl again.”
“Dad, no. After everything, you’re still going to—?”
“If there’s anything to learn about your mother here on the Godseye, then I’m going to find it. And if this god feels like he has to punish me first to know the truth, then—” He looks back at her pleadingly. “Please understand, Chase. I have to.”
Chase turns away angrily. “Yeah, sure. Do whatever the hell you want.”
“Chase, I—”
But it’s too late. The slam of the door tells us that he’s gone into his room. Askal lifts an inquiring head up from the rug, then flops down with a small grunt, quickly losing interest.
Gries turns back to me. “Are you going to risk returning to your family?”
“No. My father is being cared for. This is more serious.”
He clasps my shoulder. “I know I’m asking too much of you again, but I need you to promise that you’ll stay with him while I’m gone. Keep a weapon near.”
I know nothing I can say will change his mind. “I’d do that even without you asking me, sir,” I say quietly. “Come back quickly, for his sake. He doesn’t deserve this.”
Gries laughs—a hurt, painful sound. “No,” he agrees. “Chase doesn’t, but I do. That’s what you’re not saying. And I agree.”