SID's Journeys: The Past Awakened

Qibbi, a planet of indulgence. Many thought of it as a place to let loose. Or maybe a place to go and never come back. A place of hedonism, nothing of value comes from it. Nothing could be truly built there. Or so we thought.

The forces of the currents are strong at the bottom of the river. However, I've never felt more still, focusing on my discovery—a stone etched with an unknown language, dated before this planet was ever found in the system. I used the stone's dating markers and scanned the river for any related readings. A faint trail was detected in my sensory database. My new path was set; it was upriver. I rose quickly to the surface, and as I broke through the water, my lower body started to morph. Motors and blades emerged as I adapted my body to quickly traverse the water. Now I could move effectively on the river while keeping my torso upright to scan the area as I moved along.

River currents grew in strength. The surface now flows as fiercely as the river bottom. Qibbi's gases covered the surface, increasing in thickness. It was no problem for my visual unit, and I was still able to pierce through the toxic gases with no issue. How could anything truly settle here? If I were an organic breather, I'd definitely be dead by now! I rechecked my sensory trail, still leading forward. I thought it would divert off the river somewhere. As I continued, the water was now rushing. It was colliding with itself, and giving off sounds of power and nature. In front of me, the water was now bellowing, demanding respect. Looking above, the river current was now falling from the sky and crashing. A mighty waterfall stands before me. My trail didn't end here, though; my scanners now directing me to keep moving ahead...

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The scanner told me to move into the waterfall. What could be behind it? And, how should I do this? It was hard to even get close, the crashing water hitting like an orbital strike. Ripples of the impact pushed me away fiercely. Quickly, I shifted my motors to dive in the river. It seemed like the best idea to go completely under the waterfall. As I passed, the crashing water didn't stop at the surface and thrashed me everywhere, slamming into the rocks below. As I was getting rocked around, I luckily got thrown away from the waterfall on the other side. One more smash and I might've fallen apart. With that out of the way, I rose back up and moved out of the water. Now ahead of me was a wet cliffside. I almost thought this was the end of the trail, but then I noticed something. A structure, almost like a path, was built into the cliff.

Now approaching the structure, a better view showed it was a tunnel path. My sensory trail officially ended here, but I didn't need it anymore. I entered the cliffside tunnel, studying the walls. The path was moving upwards inside the cliff. Looking closer at the walls, I had a strong feeling they were manmade, showing marks of primitive tools and intentional pathing. Sunlight started to peek on the far end. I moved quickly as I didn't know how sturdy this tunnel would be. Leaving the tunnel behind, I found myself on the other side of the cliff and in front of something extraordinary.

Ruins all around. Walls, statues, stables, everything! This was it, a real settlement of a civilization on Qibbi! No one has ever discovered this until now. I had so many questions and theories running through my thought algorithms. How did they survive on Qibbi? What happened to them? Why was this never recorded? Quickly moving, I explored the settler area, reacting to the ruins like they were talking to me, recounting the past. I did notice the gasous haze was lighter here on the cliffside, which could explain some theories. As I moved about, there was an elevated mound by the cliff's edge. Climbing on top of the mound, I had a full view over the valleys of QIbbi. Everything was dead, covered in gas, and barren. However, with my scanners and dating measurements, I could tell there was life before. The valleys at one point were fertile, providing nourishment to the tribes lost to time. Looking over all the ruins, my uplink to the Anrachi orbital satellite was activated.

Scoutmaster, this was an amazing discovery. We could be changing the very concept of ancient history! I recorded samples of all the ruins and sent the recordings to Anrachi intelligence. This ends my briefing of my mission on the planet QIbbi.