The Trees of Treeland

The Trees of Treeland

     A terrifying scream echoed among the trees in the wooded area where Helana was running through. Helana suddenly stopped and continued shivering as she started looking around her. All she saw were trees. They were so close to each other Helana couldn’t see anything but other trees between them.

     “Who did that? Was that you Joshus? Are you trying to scare me to death again?”

     Helana looked up into the treetops. She couldn’t see anyone or anything. Not even the darkening sky above them. The foliage was that thick. “You are the reason why I started running ahead of you three.”

     After looking around for another minute she started walking. She only took a few steps when a tapping on her shoulder began. Helana stopped and spun around with her arm out to hit whoever was behind her. All she hit was a large tree. She scanned the area behind her. Helana didn’t see anyone but trees. That included two branches until they intertwined around her ankles.

     Those branches caused Helana to fall backward into a tree. Helana started screaming as those branches started dragging her between the trees.

     Joshus, also sixteen like Helana, started laughing. “Look who is now trying to scare us.”

     Vivianni, thirteen, walked between Joshus and Wollian. “She shouldn’t be in the wooded area alone.”

     Wollian, fourteen, walked behind Vivianni as they continued to walk down a narrow unseen path covered with twig branches. “Especially when darkness is almost upon us.”

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     Two couples walked up the steps into a large building with two younger ones beside them. The younger male looked to be about five and the female appeared to be around three “What are you going to do about Helana and Vivianni?” A panicking Lavia asked as she was almost nose to nose with the uniformed female.

     Paltic yanked Lavia off the uniformed female. “Lavia, you need to calm down.”

     Lavia jerked herself from Paltic. “I'm not going to be nice until I find out what happened to Helana and
Vivianni”

     “We all know what happened to them. Grite and I know what’s going on. So do you. They went into the wooded area and died like all the others.”

     “No, I don’t.” All of them had been crying, but now Grite and Lavia started blubbering. “Joshus and Wollian aren’t dead. Kevom, they aren’t dead. They can’t be, they just can’t be like all the others.”

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     A hover transport speeded down a long road. As it turned to park in a parking place in front of a two-floor residence it almost hit a very big tree. “Paltic, you almost hit that tree.”

     “What tree?” Paltic asked as he stopped his transport in the parking place. “Where did that come from? It wasn’t there a few hours ago when we went to law enforcement.”

     “How did they get so big so fast. It usually takes about fifty years before they get that big.” Lavia got out of the transport. She pointed toward the far end of their residence. “There’s another one. It’s a little bit bigger than yours.”

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     Chaos erupted in a small room where about five hundred adult males and females were. Everyone was shouting. No one could understand what anyone else was saying. A loud pounding began that echoed throughout that room. After a few seconds, everyone stopped shouting at looked at the male on a raised platform in front of them. Behind him were six individuals. Three males and three females.

     “We aren’t going to get anywhere if we don’t speak one person at a time.” Borall put a large metal looking rock on the tall box in front of him. “We’re here to discuss the latest disappearances.”

     “What’s there to discuss. We all know what happened to them. It’s just like the others. They are dead.” A female voice shouted from the back of the room.

     “They aren’t dead. We just don’t know what really happened to them.” Grite turned and started scanning the room as she spoke.

     Borall banged his metal rock again. The same echoing sound was heard. “That makes over five thousand in the last twenty years.

     I’m sorry for those who lost someone, but what else could it be but death.”

     “I don’t know, but it’s got to be something else.” It was Grite who shouted again. “Maybe they were taken somewhere to be used in the tunnels digging for metals.”

     “That can be it. After all, this is happening all over Jorvim.” Borall sighed. “I wish it were, but I don’t think that’s the answer.”

     “Then what is the answer? I agree with the love of my life Grite that there has to be one, and it’s not death.”

     Borall turned toward the six individuals behind him and spoke softly to them for several minutes before he faced his audience again. “We don’t know, but we are working on it. So is every other village on Jorvim. All we know is that every time a young one disappears a tree appears in their family residence.”

     “That’s what happened to Grite and me. It happened to Paltic and Lavia too. We were about to tell them about it when they told us about their trees.”

     “Maybe that’s what is going on.” A male shouted from toward the middle of that group of individuals. “They are being used as feed. That would explain why these trees are so huge. It also explains why they grew so large in only a few hours.”

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     A multi-passenger transport pulled up to the edge of the wooded area and parked in an empty parking lot. Ten men got out of that transport with cutting tools. Once they were all out they headed into the wooded area. Right after they got in there thy split up into teams of two.

     A few hours later that wooded area was swarming with law enforcements. Most of them were local, but those in charge were global. The uniforms they wore spoke that. That, and the way they were taking charge. Telling the locals what to do and answering questions from those locals.

     One global and four locals were at each one of the ten deaths. All of those deaths looked accidental. The locals were checking out the dead, examining the so-called accident, and searching the areas for anything they could find while the global stayed in the background directing the locals, answering questions, and in contact with the other globals.

     The first death they came across showed a cutter with a thick tree branch through his heart. It appeared he fell backward onto it. Near that death was another one. That one looked like she tripped over a tree branch and hit her head on a rock.

     Another death had a big heavy tree that fell on her. Only the tree hadn’t been cut yet. Its roots were still visible to the locals there. Not too far from that one was a male face down in a small stream. He died after getting his legs tangled in some tree roots within the water.

     At another death, it appeared the cutter walked into a trap of some kind. He had about a dozen big twigs sticking into his chest. Another one also had a small tree branch stuck into her heart. Only this one was sticking into her.

     Deeper into the wooded area another death appeared from the indentured into the ground she was running. She ran right into a large tree. It looked like she turned away from it just before she hit it. A small branch pierced her head. Near her was a male with a branch around his neck. It appeared he was choked to death.

     The next death appeared to have died from a fall from a tall tree he was in. A broken branch was next to him. One of the locals looking up noticed an exact match to that branch. The last death was the worst of all. It was a female broken up into several pieces. A sharpened blade like branch laid next to each piece at what appeared to be its sliced edge.

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     Borall suddenly appeared on all the huge monitors on the outside of most of the buildings in that village. “This is Borall, your leader. I am speaking to you on the Emergency Contact System because of what happened a couple of days ago. I've been thinking about this ever since it happened and I don’t want to do it but I am ordering all Gallems to not enter the wooded area until further announcements.”

     A light red ball started pulsating at the bottom of the monitor. It could barely be seen on the screen. Then another ball appeared and then the third one. Within only a few seconds there eight flashing balls.

     “I will answer all of your if I don’t answer them by the time this announcement is over with.” Silence for about a minute before Borall continued. “I’m sure one of those questions is what about our monthly cuttings?”

     “Probably several of these contacts are about that. If not all of them.” Borall took a deep breath. “The answer to that question is that we have extra wood that we can use for a few months if we have to.”

     “I’m hoping we will find out what really happen to the cutters a couple of days ago. We know they weren’t any accidents like we were supposed to believe. What we don’t know yet is What that truth is. That’s something we may never know or why it happened.”

     “One thought is that we are dealing with a SpaceKiller, but I don’t think that’s what’s going out here. SpaceKiller only kills one person at a time, not groups. They can and do kill young ones, but they don’t usually kill that many of them.”

     That announcement went on for about another half hour. One by one those eight balls disappeared. A few more popped up but they also disappeared by the end that announcement. Several other possible thoughts came up, but the SpaceKiller thought was the most probable answer to what’s been going on with Jorvim.

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     It took several months to enforce the new orders, but it was done. The older ones that wasn’t a problem. For most of the young ones it wasn’t a problem either but for quite a few of them it was. They didn’t understand why they couldn’t go into the wooded area.

     Something needed to be done. It was too much for law enforcement to handle on their own. So private law took over the responsibility of enforcing the new order. They now patrol the wooded area thirty/eight. Some young ones still get past them, but most of them don’t.

     A young couple tried to run around a private law enforcer. He stood in front of them no matter where they moved. “Why are you doing this?” The female asked.

     “Why can’t we go into the wooded area?” The male asked.

     “You heard the announcement. No one is allowed to go into the wooded area until that order is canceled.”

     “We heard that stupid announcement.” The female ducked to one side of the enforcer while the male ran around the other way. First, the enforcer blocked the female with his body. Then the male with his leg a few seconds later. “We had no choice but to watch it. Everyone did.”

     “One of my favorite entertainment programs got interrupted because of it. Even the recording of it got the interruption.” The male lifted up the enforcer’s leg and ran under it. That lifting unbalanced the enforcer and he fell onto the ground hard.

     The female young one stepped over that enforcer and joined the male as they ran into the wooded area. “Stop, you can’t go in there. It’s too dangerous. If you do you will disappear too.”

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     “Where am I? How did I get here? What happened to me. The last thing that I remember is hitting the back of my head against a tree.”

     “Did you say something, Helana?” Vivianni’s voice sounded like she was right next to Helana’s head.

     “Is that you, Vivianni? Where are you at?”

     “I’m not exactly sure about that.” Vivianni turns her head slightly and bumps it against something. “Ouch! I just hit something that feels like wood. I’m not sure, but I think I’m in a Death Box.”

     “You’re not in a Death Box. I know I’m not because I can see out of my confinement, and since we can hear each other without us being side by side I’m sure you can too.”

     “You are right. I can see out of wherever we are at too.”

     After about a minute of silence Helana finally spoke. “What can you see from where you’re at?”

     “I’m at the front side of our residence next to one of our parking spaces. Paltic almost hit me coming in a minute ago. Why would he do that? I’m in between the living area and the eating area.” Vivianni could see their family in the living area. “Our family is so sad. They are crying. Why are they doing that?”

     “I don’t know why.” After a few seconds, Helana continued. “I’m on the back side, and I can see right into Paltic and Lavia’s sleeping chamber. How can I do that? I’m a little tall for my age, but I’m not that tall.”

     Vivianni looked up. She saw tree branches and foliage. “Oh, no. It can’t be. Helana looks up. We are trapped within trees.”

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     The female sounding voice of a large red tree stood tall in the center of the wooded area. Surrounding it were smaller white and light blue trees. All the white trees sounded like females and the male voices were coming from the light blue trees. They couldn’t be heard by the humans, but they could from each other.

     “You said that we would have killed off all the humans on our planet by now. It’s been almost ten years and they are still here,” said a male tree.

     “I know what I said. The older ones have been a lot better than I thought in stopping the young ones from coming in to see us. We have taken several hundred, but it should have been a lot more. There are almost four million humans in this village. About half of them are young ones.”

     A female tree spoke next. “What are we going to do about it? We can’t get our revenge against the humans without them.”

     “Yes, we can. It’s just lot easier to do with them.”

     “Then what are we going to do? There has got to be a way to get the young ones to come in here,” another male said.

     “I think we should just grab them wherever they are. We have plenty of trees to do it,” the first female tree shouted.

     “We can’t do that. If we do then the humans might figure out what we are up to.”

     “So what if they do. What can they do about it? It’s not like it was ten years ago. They are already starting to suffer from what we are doing. Every day more and more is getting sick or dying,” a male tree said.

     “Just look at them,” a female tree said. “If we don’t do anything they are all going to die anyway.”

     The trees didn’t move, but they could see what the village looked like because of the trees in that village. It looked like death came a-calling. Gloom and darkness were now their fate. Not just with the humans but with the residence and buildings too. Everything was either falling apart or it was rotting.

     “That’s going to take another hundred years or so. I want them gone now,” a male tree said.

     “So do I. Let me contact the other wooded areas to see how they are doing. I want their opinions on what we should do. It’s not going to do us much good if we take the young ones by force if the other trees don’t want to do it.”

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     After contacting the other leaders they all agreed a few months later that they needed to take the young ones by force. “It doesn’t matter how you do it as long as the young ones aren’t killed. We can’t use their youth if they are dead too. I don’t care about the older ones. They can be killed.”

     Most of the young ones could be taken without too much trouble. A young one was running behind her residence when she tripped over a thick tree root. As she hit the ground face first twigs wrap around her ankle and dragged her toward that tree.

     Hearing the young one screaming a couple came running out of that residence. They got there just in time to see her taken. The male tried to reach out to her but a tree branch pounded him on his head. He died before he hit the ground and the female died a few seconds later the same way.

     A male was climbing a tree when his whole body was covered with twigs. He was sucked into that tree. In the residence next to him a young female was walking around the front of her residence when a tree took her by grabbing her wrist with hand looking branches and yanking her into that tree.

     Four young ones were just sitting on a long chair in a parking innocently loving each other when they are taken by two trees behind them. One at a time a branch grabbed them by pinning their arms to their shoulders and pulling them into the tree.

     One of those about to be taken was a younger one was playing when a twig started toward her. “Stop! The younger ones aren’t to be taken yet. They are too young to give us what we need.”

     Similar disappearances were happening all over that village. Most of the time the young ones were alone, but sometimes the older ones were either nearby or came running. They all were killed by the trees. Some were killed with a blow to the head and some were stabbed in their hearts. However, they died it created blood gushing out of the wounds. The grounds around them soaked in blood. That village was soon covered in blood.

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     It only took about fifteen minutes to end that battle. A few minutes after later the trees started growing where the young ones were taken. They grew into full-grown trees within a few seconds. Those new trees took up most of the land in that village. Except for the residences, building, and most of the roads there was nothing there but trees.

     “We may have a problem,” said a male tree. “The humans are furious about what happened to their young ones. They also don’t like that there are so many trees either.”

     “What do they think they can do about it?” The leader tree asked. “They can’t do anything about it.”

     “I don’t know if they can do anything or not, but there are having another meeting. It looks like almost every human in the village is attending it,” said a female.

     “How many trees do we have there?” The leader asked. “Is it enough for us to hear what they are saying?”

     “They aren’t in a building this time,” said another female tree. “It’s in one of their Outside Activity Centers.”

     “Don’t we have any trees within that center?” The leader asked. “Didn’t we take any young ones from there?”

     “No, we didn’t. There were no young ones there at the time of our taking,” said another male.

     “Do we have any trees outside of it?” The leader asked. “There should be some of us out there.”

     “There are,” said yet another male. “We have several trees around it. They just aren’t any young ones.”

     “Good! I want them connected to that center,” said the leader. “How many trees do we have around it?”

     “I’m not sure, but I think there are about twenty of them. There’s only one way to find out,” said yet another female.”

     “That should be more than enough for us to hear what the humans are planning against us,” said the leader. “I want those trees connected to it right now.”

     Like the speaking to each other, the tree can’t really see what the humans are up to. That’s because they don’t actually have any eyes. They can see the tree around that center place hand looking branches flat against its walls.

     Now the trees could hear what the humans were saying. What they heard was a lot of anger and chaos. It didn’t sound like they were doing anything but fighting among themselves. All they did was yell and scream at each other. Every so often they did say something useful to the trees. They talked about what they were going to do about them.

=====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     “I’ve been in contact with the other leaders for the last three days. So far, they all have similar problems. There are still a few that I haven’t heard from and I’m worried about them. I can’t contact them.”

     “I don’t think so,” said a male tree. “They would have contacted all of us for help. Unless the humans attacked them too quickly for them to do it”

     “The only way they could have done that is if they used fire,” said a female tree. “If that would have happened one of us would have seen the fire. They would have heard the death scream too.”

     “What I think might be happening is that they are dealing with the humans,” said the leader. “At least I hope that’s the reason. All I can do is keep trying to contact them.”

     A tree sighed. “What kind of problems are the other leaders having?” Another male tree asked.

     “We know that the humans are up to something but we don’t know it is,” said the leader. “It’s almost like they are communicating with each other.”

     “I think we should be worried about our humans right now,” another female tree said. “We need to take care of them before we worry about the rest of the planet.”

     “Yes, I agree. Each leader has to take care of their own humans,” the leader said. “We will all have to work together soon, but first we have to handle our own problems.”

=====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     “I think it was a great idea keeping track of the humans by using the young one,” a male tree said. “That way we will know what they are planning against us.”

     “Speaking of the humans, I think they are up to something now,” said a female tree. “Look at that human.”

     A human male walked out of his residence with a mechanical cutting tool. He turned it on was he walked down his steps. “Isn’t that the older one for one of the young ones we took a few months ago?” The leader asked?

     “What was her name? Let me think,” a male tree said. “I think her name was Vivianni.”

     “I think you’re right,” said another female tree. “What is he going to do with that cutter?”

     “It looks like he’s about to cut her in half,” said another male tree. “I’m not too surprised they are doing that first. The trees around those residences and buildings are so thick they have to deal with them first.”

     “Good! I’m happy about that,” said the leader. “I can’t wait to see what happens when he tries to cut down his young one.”

     The human cutter brought his cutter up behind him and swung it down toward his unknown young one. A deep slice appeared on the side of that tree. Suddenly, a red substance started spurting out of it.

     That made Paltic jump back a little. Some of it got on his clothing. He scooped up a little and smelled it. “This is blood. Tree don’t have blood. Do they?”

     Paltic leaned down and looked into the cut he made. He had to squint to see it. “That looks like skin. It can’t be. I think I just found our missing young ones.”

=====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     “The humans are having another meeting,” said a male tree. “It’s in the same place it was a few days ago.”

     “I’m not surprised,” said the leader. “I expected they would have one. How many humans are attending this one?”

     “Not as many as before,” said a female tree. “It looks like only a few thousand.”

     “It’s probably because of all the tree around them,” said another male tree. “The other humans can’t get out of their residences.”

     “Contact the trees there,” said the leader. “I want to hear what they are talking about.”

     A few seconds later they did. “I tried it too on Joshus. After Paltic sealed the cut with medical supplies he contacted me.”

     “So they can communicate with each other,” the leader tree commented. “I wonder if they can do it with other villages?”

     “What are we going to do?” Lavia asked. “We have to clear the trees in front of our residences before we can destroy the wooded area.”

     “That’s one of the reasons we took the young ones,” the leader tree commented. “The main one was so we could survive, but that’s another one.”

     “There is nothing that we can do,” said Borall. “As long as our young ones are trapped within those trees we can’t cut them down.”

=====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     “Three thousand years ago we had to go into sleep mode to conserve our lifespan. About two thousand years ago the humans evolved on our planet. We know this because of the records they have kept. Once we sensed that there was life on our world we woke up. That was almost fifteen hundred years ago. It has taken us this long to get our planet back, but we have finally done it. Treeland is ours again.”

     The trees in that wooded area started hooping, hollowing and cheering as they listened to their leader speak. “I have been in contact with the other leaders. Including the ones, I couldn’t contact earlier. They are all saying the same thing. The humans must be in communication with the other humans. They had to communicate with them to tell them about what they found out about their young ones. Some of them could have discovered it the same way ours did, but a lot of them didn’t. It doesn’t really matter how they found out. All that matter is that we won. We have Treeland back."

     No one asked any question or made comments. In fact, no one said anything for several minutes. Once the ranting and raving died down a little, the leader continued. “Let’s see how our humans are doing. There aren’t too many of them left. Most of them are already dead or dying.”

     That planet looked pretty bad. It was almost completely dark. Very little sunlight got through all the tree foliage. The residences and buildings looked dead too. That’s true for the humans there. What humans they could see were lying in the open. All of them looked dead. They didn’t move. There was blood dripping out of a lot of them. “Once all the humans are dead we can start rebuilding our world the way it used to be. Soon we will be able to walk among our beautiful planet again.”

====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     A spaceship could be seen on a large monitor heading for a small planet. Dorinne swiveled around in her chair just under that monitor toward Sallik. “Commander, we are about to enter orbit around this planet.”

     Sallik looked over at Quina. “Any contact from them yet?”

     “Nothing yet, Commander.” Quina didn’t take her eyes off the control panel in front of her.

     Turning toward Adiam Sallik spoke to him next. “I want you to start scanning for life signs as soon as we are in orbit.”

     “I already have.” Adiam hit a few more keys on the control panel in front of him. “It’s very hard to do because there’s a thick orange cloud covering it.”

     After a few minutes, Adiam continued. “It’s not a cloud, Commander. It was hard to do, but I did break through it.”

     “It’s foliage. I can barely see a tree beneath it. The whole planet is completely covered by it.”

     “What about life signs?” Commander Sallik asked. “Are you detecting any?”

     “I’m getting several hundred thousand, but they are very faint. I don’t know where they are. All I can see are trees. There must be billions of them.”

     Sallik looked at Adiam. “What else can you tell me about the life signs?”

     “Not much. They are on the surface of this planet, but I can’t see them.” Adiam looked up from his control panel. “I can see them on the scanners, but it doesn’t make any sense to me. All I am seeing are trees where the inhabitants should be.”

     “We didn’t even know about this distress signal. The only reason we are here now is because we got close enough to pick it up.”

     Sallik sighed a few seconds later. “I am curious about what happened to the population. There are only a few hundred thousand down there. A planet this size there should be several billion. What happened to the rest? We may never know the answer to that question. Whatever it is at least these individuals are alive.”


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