Down below, the single rocky slab was the planet’s only enduring feature, drifting around on the mostly molten surface like a miniature tectonic plate. Huge autodozers were clearing the millions of tonnes of ash built up on its surface over millennia of constant eruptions. A slab like this would not have survived for so long on such a world but for one circumstance: the magma had accumulated and solidified around a large flat object unaffected by the heat. Others had discovered this object and listed it as a purely natural phenomenon. The woman Shayden, and her two male companions, had come here to study it and found that some fragments of its incredibly tough and durable substance had broken away—enough for them to retrieve and study thoroughly. This substance, something like diamond, also bore certain similarities to memcrystal. Shayden—out of curiosity—attached an optic interface to one piece, and the reams of code feeding back through it astounded her. She realized instantly she had discovered something very important. She also realized that her private business did not have the resources to study this discovery as it should be studied. She returned to the nearest Polity world and reported her find. Before the AI on that world was prepared to commit resources, it needed confirmation so Shayden, Ulriss and Hourne returned here with a Polity Golem called Cento, whose presence cost them their lives.

‘Some lifting job down there,’ Blegg observed.

The Golem stepped forwards and pointed to an area of chain-glass before them. An image appeared—doubtless projected by laser from the Golem’s eye. ‘The artefact is shaped so.’ Blegg observed a fat comma. ‘We believe it is the inner part of an original spiral. Where the crystal is actually breaking down is along that flat leading edge, so we project that it was once like this or larger.’ The comma grew like a snail adding shell, winding out and out. Then this activity paused for a moment, before the growth retreated to its original shape. ‘Thermally protected gravmotors are currently being positioned underneath the object here.’ A multitude of dots appeared like a rash all over the comma shape. ‘And we are introducing sheer planes in the underlying rock so the artefact should separate from it upon lifting.’

‘What about structural integrity?’ Blegg asked.

Now a grid appeared over the shape. ‘Ceramal beams attached directly to the object using high temperature resins,’ the Golem explained. ‘That will be done once we have removed all the ash and rock still resting above it.’