Lancaster James pulls himself together, shaking his hair into place and tossing on his hat as he leans into the cockpit. He has been sleeping through most of the trip, and feels like he could sleep through a whole new trip, but Little Jack, his partner at the controls, would never let him. After all, this is for Lancaster's benefit.
They are arriving at the small star cluster known as Polaris; once the north star when humanity had lived on earth. Once they settled onto other systems, leaving their home planet behind like a spent soda can, Polaris became just another star in the sky. But it has re-emerged as an important spot for space archeologists, and anthropologists like Lancaster who are seeking out sentient civilizations.
Circling several of the stars are planets where an ancient civilization once thrived. Known as the Zeborno, they left behind empty villages scattered across their multitude of environments. It seems they adapted to every climate and, elevation, and style of living. But they were always dispersed. It seems that whenever a village grew to a certain size, a portion of their population split off and started a new village. This probably made them vulnerable to attack, and since no evidence has been found that they ever made it away from their tri-star home, they were probably overcome by one of the other space-faring civilizations Lancaster and Little Jack have explored.
"We're coming up on Mirsuvis," Little Jack tells him. "You might consider being presentable." Little Jack, dressed in pressed black with a shiny leather jacket and greased back hair, looks over at his partner in the rumpled clothes and dirty jacket. "You might reconsider your hat," he says. "You always lose them anyway."
Lancaster thinks about it. He is meeting with administrators of the Polaris Archeological Society, a highly respected organization that has been doing extensive research of the Zeborno civilization across the three star systems. Their many employees may get dirty in the field, but the money people in the offices respect a good appearance. "I better hit the shower then," Lancaster says, heading into the back of the ship.
It is as he expected. Though not wealthy, the society keeps up a respectable appearance of formality. Taro Makoto stands behind a desk made of a strong local wood. Lancaster recognizes it as a Zeborno make, carved in their fashion with a high surface and the sides angling inward toward the bottom as if they are at the top of a V that goes below the floor.
Makato and his assistant, who stands almost with a formality that borders on a military stance near the door Lancaster entered, stare at Lancaster with judgmental eyes. Taro breaks a little of the tension, walking around the desk and offering his hand to Lancaster, who shakes it firmly, perhaps too firmly.
After getting him a glass of their local version of water, Taro gets right in to telling Lancaster what is happening. "We found an island just off the coast of one of the continents," he tells him. "And by just off, I mean so close that a bridge connects to it."
"If it's that close, why are you finding it just now?" Lancaster asks.
"It's shrouded in a dense fog," Taro says. "We never even knew for certain where the continent ended, and we had no reason to believe anything important was there." He turns and walks to the far side of his desk, pressing a button that starts a hologram just above the desk. The hologram shows 3 dimensional images of the places he's telling about. "One explorer happened to be mapping the canyon at the end of that continent when he came upon this bridge. He was confused since it was commonly believed that nothing was out there. This bridge should be leading to empty air. We checked it out with satellite imaging, and a radiation scan through the cloud cover revealed evidence of buildings."
The hologram zooms in through the clouds and outlines in red several buildings, about as many and the size of a village.
"That's wonderful, doctor," Lancaster says, using the prefix he always wanted for himself, but never achieved because he wasn't willing to deal with the politics of the university. "But why call me in instead of using one of your own teams?"
"No one under my employ is qualified for this sort of work. They wouldn't come back alive, and my insurance would not cover it. But… I need to know what's in there. So I'm willing to pay you one thousand electros up front, plus nine thousand if you come back alive. All I need is for you to tell me what's there that's important so I can determine whether it's worthwhile to send in a team."
Ten thousand is money Lancaster could really use. It's not as much as this job is probably worth, but he'll get to learn a bit about another alien race, which he is willing to do for free, when it comes right down to it.
After he agrees, Taro shows him where the island is on the map, pays him, and Lancaster goes to take a look.
The entire area is indeed covered in fog, but in flying over, they see three possible entrances, the bridge, flying down on Lancaster's glider, climbing the canyon
Which will method will Lancaster use to get on the island?
