The Instructive Tale of the Archaeologist and His Wife

The Instructive Tale of the Archaeologist and His Wife

Alexander Jablokov

Relative Dating

Most of the remains of the technological age were toxic or radioactive. Researchers into that era tended to have short lifespans. Shaky and despairing, with haunted eyes, they rarely achieved high academic standing.

So when the archeologist got a letter from a colleague in technological age studies who said he had come across some information relfecting on the Akaskids, he was at first dismissive.

Still, the man had a reputation for some brilliance, albeit levened with hostility and paranoia, and when the archeologist visited a nearby city for an academic conference a few years later, he arranged to stop by and see wht the man had.

By that point, the man had lost even the minor academic post he’d had when he wrote to the archeologist, and all of his research materials were now crammed into a basement storage unit, poorly lit and subject to floods and infestations of rodents.

As the man, shaking and mumbling, dug through mildewed remnants of printed books and fabrics, the archeologist tried not to get too close. It was clear the man had lost whatever trace of sanity he had once had.

The Instructive Tale of the Archaeologist and His Wife, Image by Elena

Just as the archaeologist was about to turn to leave, the man reached in and, with a triumphant grunt, pulled out a yellow porcelain cup, almost complete. It gleamed like sunlight in the dank storage unit. The archaeologist instantly recognized it as a piece of Akaskid ceremonial tableware, suitable for a dinner with the gods.

It ad turned up in a late technological age stratum. A museum?

No. Not a museum. Instead, some kind of manufacturing facility, with the remains of heating and annealing chambers. There had actually been a lot of other ceramic fragments there. This was the only one in recognizable shape. Then he tossed the cup to the archeologist, who caught it clumsily, almost dropping it. He responded with rage, maybe going too far because of the man’s low status. Later, he would regret this, though the researcher showed no signs of offense at the time.

Instead he explained to the archaeologist how the late technological age had seemed devoted to destroying every sign of themselves. Their remains were infested with bacteria that dissolved various materials such as plastic, metal, and cloth. He’d lost a lot of his own equipment to some still-living colonies of these. He hypothesized that they had also released small devices with long-lived power sources that had crawled endlessly through late technological strata, grinding every piece of evidence with comminuting teech, until nothing was left but indistinguishable powder,. He’d never found one of these mechanical rotifers, but was sure they had existed.