He hurried over and knelt beside her. “What is it?”
She poked at a piece of metal. “Looks like it’s off a ship.”
He scanned the ground around them. “Look! Another piece.”
“Is it off theMercury?”
He studied the silver metal plate. It was heavily corroded. “Don’t think so. This has been here a long time.” It certainly looked like metal that formed part of a ship’s hull or something similar.
“Look at this.” She picked up a hunk of what could only be synth-glass.
“It’s old.” He turned her wrist over so he could see the other side of the fragment. “See the striations in the glass? This was made before they perfected the technique of making the stuff stronger and lighter.”
“Maybe there’s more.” She turned, stepping across the broken, rocky ground.
“Don’t get distracted. You don’t want to end up plant chow.”
She took a few more steps away, staring over a ledge that dropped away on the other side of the hill. “Goddess!”
In three strides he was beside her. He stared in disbelief. “Holy space dust.”
It was a crashed escape pod.
It had been there a long time, and was heavily rusted by the planet’s high humidity. But the vaguely round shape was visible even with the damage and the amount of wreckage strewn around it.
Nissa carefully made her way down. “It’s a really old style of escape pod.”
He followed her. “Yeah.” He circled the wreck and spotted some lettering on the damaged hull.
She picked something up. “Look. Tripton insulation. No one’s used these for over a thousand years.”
Justyn crouched, swiping a hand at the vague lettering.
She gave a shocked cry. “Unbelievable.”
He looked up and saw her holding a rectangular object. “What is it?”
“A book! An honest-to-Goddess, old-fashioned book.”
He frowned. “How would a book have survived?”
“It’s got some sort of leather cover. It’s sealed tight.” Excitement glimmered in her eyes. “Maybe the pages are even intact.”
“Maybe,” he said, dubiously. “Don’t open it, they’ll disintegrate on contact with the air.”
“Imagine…it might record the journey of some long-ago adventurer, or convoy member.”
He grinned. Looked like Nissa was catching the treasure-hunting bug. He turned his attention back to the metal under his hand. His smile dissolved. “Holy stars, Nissa! That book doesn’t belong to an adventurer or a convoy member.”
This was too unreal to be true. He stared at the letters etched into the metal, his heart racing in his chest.
She made her way over to him, the book clutched in her hand. “What are you talking about?”
He smoothed his hand over the hull of the ruined escape pod. Even though the lettering was badly faded, the wordNerowas visible.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Nissa couldn’t believe it.
