After all these years, of finding nothing but scraps and hints of what came before, we were on the cusp of something big, I knew it down to my whiskers.

It had been a long time coming. For the first few years of my career, many of my theories met with derision. Yes everyone knew of the cataclysm that melted much of the old world before we evolved, and the artifacts we did find were either melted masses of hydrocarbon based polymers, or mostly corroded bits of iron and other oxides. It was the underwater expedition with the rudder tails in 1376 where we found the first proof of earlier life. The statue, round eared, four fingered, strangely proportioned but obviously one of the races that arose after the days of fire and ash.It stood there under the mud of what had once been a peninsula before the seas rose, left hand on it’s hip, right hand raised upwards, though broken off just past the wrist. Ther looked to have been another figure standing next to it, but all that was left was a few hand spans of leg and one foot covering.

To be honest, I had regretted the finding of that artifact at the time. The Scholars deemed it a religious artifact of the pre melt races, and proof that the peoples had existed before the cataclysm that destroyed the world of this mysterious ‘ickey Mou’, and the controversy it generated overwhelmed the scientific knowledge we could learn. We had been blocked from further excavation due to court challenges.

Fortunately the fame had also increased my funding. My muzzle was starting to turn grey by the time we had a decent lead, but this time, we’re keeping things quiet until we knew what we had. And what we had was something big. Further west from the first site, across the Green Sea. I knew, when the diggers had broken through the slagged metal and found a tunnel, with straight walls that this could be something-”

“Seeker Dawnwood?”

I put down my pen and closed my journal, turning to look at the young Digger who was in charge of the excavation crews. Her long claws were still coated in soil, and her black and white striped fur on her face was coated by some noxious liquid “Good heavens!” I cried, “Jena, are you injured?”

She waved off my concerns. “It’s merely some sort of lubrication fluid, the scrutinizers have determined it’s harmless, a petroleum product that was used in the door mechanism”

“Wait-DOOR?” My ringed tail poofed in excitement as I followed the digger from the base camp. She led me through the tunnel to the metal wall where they had been probing. Sure enough, just past the cleared portion was a seam in the metal, and from a hole hit by an errant tool, the fluid leaked from a ruptured hose.

“By the Gods.” I muttered..

“What should we do?” the Digger chieftess asked. “The council-”

I raised my paw “the council will hem and haw until we have all become owl food” I replied. “We keep this quiet for the moment, can you get this open?”

It took more digging to get the door clear, with the fluid removed however and enough prying, it eventually began to budge.

“Why is the door so big?” one of the diggers asked. I wondered that myself, the idol we discovered before was a bit taller than one of the people, but not by much. This however…twice, three times its size. As the door slid whisker by whisker I had an even bigger question. “Why is there light coming from inside?”

That caused work to halt, and many of the crew backed away, ears back. A few of them made holy signs in fear, but this is what I had waited my whole life for. I felt someone beside me and noticed Jena was there. She flashed me a toothy grin “who goes first?”

I was somewhere between awe stuck and giddy. I shook my head “make sure the air in there is safe first, then we go together.”

After a few moments of testing, we stepped in. The lights were from some panels in the ceiling, far over our heads. There was writing on the wall of the corridor, I knew what the script said, we had some translations from the stones that were left by the ones before. What the words meant however.. “Nasa? Cy-ro, genics?”

“What does that mean, Seeker?”

“I have no clue.” I admitted. One should never be afraid to admit they did not know everything. I peered at the numbers on buttons on a door up ahead.

“There are numbers..but there are too many of them.” I thought. A team from Forestbrook had found the remains of a hand covering a few years back, but there were more fingers on it than any of the people. With excitement I pushed at the door panel, almost falling backwards in surprise as it actually opened.

We stepped into the room, there were cylinders on racks, about a dozen of them. Most of them were dark, but there were two that still had lights on them. I held my lamp up as I approached, there was a layer of grime and frost covering the glass on the cylinder. I had to climb up in order to see, and one of the diggers handed me up a cloth.

With a trembling paw, I wiped at the grime. It took a moment, but I could see through the glass at last. I gasped when I saw what was inside.

“What is it?” Jena asked from below.

It took me a moment to find my breath. “It’s a person…large one, female I think. Odd, no fur except for the top of her head.”

“What kind of person?” someone asked.”

I shook my head. “I’ve never seen anything like this before. Everyone, be sure not to touch anything, we need to get a-oh no…”

I could see him falling before I even finished my sentence. Harln was only on the expedition because his uncle paid for the grant. I groaned as he fell from the shelf he had been attempting to climb to, the lapin bouncing off one of the lighted panels next to the tube with a thud.

Before I could rip his fuzzy tail off, there was a sound from the wall behind us. The door we came in from sealed shut with a loud ‘thoom’, and there was a voice speaking from somewhere above, though we couldn’t understand the words. I knew we were in trouble.

“AUTOMATED MESSAGE, TEST FACILITY 23, CRYOSTASIS THAW INITIATING. ERROR, LIFE SIGNS NEGATIVE IN CAPSULE 1, 3, 4,6 AND 8. EMERGENCY, CONTACTING MEDICAL ASSISTANCE”