If Laureen was supposed to crave something during the summer, it was coffee. And she wanted it hot—a sign she's staying in the tropics for too long. A sniff, and she loaded the instant packet into the battered machine she could never leave home without. Then again, it's been too long since she stepped foot inside her rented apartment in DC. This island might have been her home, if not for the humidity and the constant barrage of bugs during the night.

The machine beeped, shaking her from whatever daze she entered in a span of five minutes. With deft hands, she emptied the loading dock, chucked the pressed aromatic gunk into the wilderness beyond, and held her mug at the ear. She sighed, bringing the steaming cup to her lips.

Beyond the mite-infested wooden pillars holding up the awning covering the porch of their rented cabin lay the never-ending forests of Cangabayi. Green with occasional bursts of yellow and pink greeted her the moment she opened her eyes and stayed with her when she closed them for the night. Unlike the Amazon or the scattered jungles in almost every dig she has been assigned to for the past years, she had never experienced such a lush and calming presence in a forest before. Probably why she found it hard to pack up and leave.

She rested a hand on the plastic, monoblock table the local guides provided her team when they first got here. Passage of time could be told from the number of isolated coffee rings littering the surface. No one had bothered cleaning it over the years, and she and her team weren't about to start now.

The cabin was empty this time of day, with her always being the last to leave. Out of all the people in her team, she was the only one who cared about the safety of their equipment and their personal effects. Not that there were many cases of locals raiding tourist cabins, or in their case, archeologist housings.

Today was one of those times when she didn't feel like joining the rest of her team in the dig, though. She had worked her ass off for so long to deserve being a site manager and earning herself some free time in between digs. And she got to do it in the middle of an isolated island with nothing but the buzzing wasps and flies for company. What a perfect way to lose herself. Or maybe find herself too.

She set her half-drunk coffee down and checked the rest of the windows for any misaligned latches that might afford entry in favor of other people. It's best to follow the others before they wander too far and get lost again. For archaeologists, they sure have a terrible sense of direction. What would happen then, if Laureen wasn't around anymore? When they were assigned to different teams with managers less gracious than her?

She tried not to think about it, especially when a still-sealed envelope nagged at the back of her head. The university's seal compounded with her home country's seals and stamps told her it was important, but not enough to stop a whole day of exploration and research. Besides, she already knew what it entailed, what the folded letter inside said.

A few minutes later, she strode out of the porch with her boonie hat thrown over her head of muted red locks. She didn't bother washing her hair, not when the place she's going to was full of mud and dirt. Forest sounds accompanied her trudging, her boots squishing against wet splotches left by the rain two days prior. Traces of her team's pilfering showed on the trail, either as embossed tracks or signs of disturbed undergrowth. This time, Laureen took note of the trail symbols erected on the ground. Further down a familiar ravine, voices floated past the gaps between leaves and branches.

"You can't just barge in here and tell us what to do, Sir!" Stell, the youngest member, screamed at someone. "This is a sacred site to the locals and you just vandalized it."

At the utterance of the word, Laureen pushed past the stalk of serrated leaves and dark brown fruit away and emerged at the site. Everything was familiar—from the makeshift tents filled with yards of cloth, detectors, and survival tools—except for a man dressed in a faded camo shirt. The military? What were they doing here?

"May I help you?" Laureen prompted, leaning to the side to get the man's attention away from her junior. She extended a hand towards him. "Dr. Anston. Site Manager. You are?"

The man stopped staring daggers at Stell, the latter squeaking and diving behind Laureen the first chance he got. "Lieutenant Milton," the soldier said, taking Laureen's hand. "Arnie Milton."

"You may call me Laureen if you're comfortable," she replied. "What seems to be the problem here?"

Quid, their resident linguist and culture specialist, opened his mouth to answer, but Laureen shot him a withering look. He clammed up. It's better to hear it from the Lieutenant, himself. The soldier cleared his throat. "It appears the University has transferred the jurisdiction to the Corps," he said. "That makes Cangabayi our turf. What goes on here must be run through me."

An internal wince pulled at the ghosts of Laureen's facial muscles. He butchered Cangabayi's pronunciation in the most pathetic way possible. Sure, it took her three tries to get it right, but still...

If he was supposed to take over the island and every activity from his country going on in it, shouldn't he at least do his own research?

Laureen wondered what kind of atrocity this dude pulled in the army to get sentenced out here. And the University transferring control to a bunch of bulletheads with no regard for foreign culture and the archaeological process was a questionable move in itself. She glanced at the mess of soiled tarps and frayed twine scattered behind the lieutenant.

"And the thing that brought you out here is...?"

"The absence of notable things to report for the past month is alarming," Milton answered in a deep, sultry voice. He wasn't trying to intimidate, but for Laureen, who stood a head shorter and pounds lighter, he might have been. "We need to get a move on, and I need you people to stop resting on your asses and get me something."

Possibly gearing for promotion or attempting to crawl back to the good graces of his superior—Laureen understood that. Heck, she might even try and help him by sending in a good word. But with him bitching around, lowering his evaluation ranks at the end of the season proved to be more tempting.

Instead of voicing her sentiment out, she flashed him the sweetest smile she could muster in this sweltering heat and grimy site. "I'm sure our weekly reports are enough to convince the Director we deserve to be here," she said. "We're in the middle of confirming the existence of a lost civilization in Asia, much more in the Southeast, and—"

"I'm not hearing the end of that archy talk," the Lieutenant held up a hand and interjected. "Bring me something of importance by the end of the week or you won't receive funding anymore. Worse, your team will be disbanded the moment you step foot on American soil."

A gasp filtered out of her team's lips with one of her own almost through her mouth. She swallowed her surprise and faced the officer. "The University can't defund us when they're the ones who sent us out here in the first place," she said. "They wouldn't transfer the project out of the blue either. Are you sure you're in the right place?"

Milton scoffed. Muscles rippled against the camo when he crossed his arms. "Their words, not mine," he said. "I'm just a messenger bird. An overqualified one, to be exact."

Distaste curled at the base of Laureen's gut. Nobody particularly cared about this dude's credentials or how ripped he was. "You should go with us to the cabin," she said instead. Her crew's heads whirled towards her in shock and confusion. "If you're stranded here like we are because of our jobs, might as well do it in an organic paradise."

The lieutenant laughed. It wasn't mocking nor done in amusement. It was just a laugh—a noise in Laureen's ears. He braced his hips with his meaty hands. "Thank you for the offer, Doctor," he said. "But me and my men are stationed on the east side of the island. I just dropped by the site after threatening a few bands of savages to give you the message. Thought you'd appreciate the in-person delivery. You're welcome."

Laureen's fists clenched at her sides. The east meant they're eerily close to the settlement, where they have to compete with the locals' access to food, water, space, and other resources. And savages? This wasn't the nineteenth century. Anyone who viewed people who have been living a different way than what one was used to as savages didn't deserve to be out here. They're supposed to be locked in their little white cages, slapping each other in the butt until their laughter turns to tears. Or something like that.

Before she could be swallowed by the otherwise disturbing imagery, she cleared her throat and dusted her hands. Dirt lined her fingernails, making her hope Milton didn't spot that and shook her hand thinking she's someone who cared about hygiene in the middle of nowhere.

"My only advice is to steer clear of the locals' sacred sites," Laureen said. "It offends them if you vandalize their places of culture."

"Heh, if it comes to that, Doctor, we have something else to remind them of who's boss," Milton smirked, a hand resting calmly on the belt slung around his waist. Laureen's heart clenched. He wouldn't—

Oh, but he would. These men definitely would. That's why Laureen had to hurry. The faster they're out of Cangabayi, the better it was for the locals. And the only way to remove the officers from here was to find something of value, something that could change everything humans knew about the ancient timeline of civilizations and the prehistory world as they knew it.

She gave Milton one last smile and turned to her crew. All of them had doubt dancing in their eyes and fear lingering in their stances. "Well, you heard the man," she jerked her chin towards the officer who started walking back to where he came from. "Let's get to work."