Ancestor's World by A. C. Crispin, T. Jackson King Read Free Book Online

her Nilotic-Semitic people had, for a time, ruled ancient Egypt. That was during the New Kingdom's Twenty-Fifth Dynasty.
    The Nubian kingdom of Kush had preserved classical Egyptian culture, and a black-skinned pharaoh had ruled the Kingdom of the Two Lands from his palace at Napata. But then the Assyrian interlopers arrived in 663 B.C. and drove out her people.
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    Later came the Ptolemaic Greeks and the Romans, but none of them could match the spiritual devotion of the second Kingdom of Kush, still in power above the Fifth Cataract at Meroe. But finally, after Kush had passed into the nearby kingdom of Aksum, which later turned Christian, the last Temple of Isis had closed in the sixth century A.D.
    Now all that remained of the greatness of ancient Kush, Meroe, Aksum, and her royal Amhara forebears were carved bas-relief walls, giant stone pyramids, memorial stele and piles of iron-smelting debris. Plus the stubborn faith of a people who'd long stood as a cultural bridge between the peoples of the Mediterranean and Arabia, and those of interior Africa.
    But Etsane had left Earth, had made her own bridge to the stars. Now she stood here, on Arooouhl, recording the ancient images of an honored CLS
    race. She was doing graduate work at the University of Kal-Syr. Perhaps her iconographic decipherments of these images would add a few lines of knowledge to the remarkable history of a proud people. Alien people.
    She signaled the autocam to "playback" so she could check the images it had recorded, and saw herself move across the tiny screen as she pointed out important features of the mural.
    She'd always been proudly tall, like most of the Amhara people of Ethiopia, and her eyes were smoky black. She was very dark, although her features were typical of her people ... thinner-lipped, with a high-bridged, Semitic nose. Her hair, when she let it loose, was an unruly, wavy black mane that reached nearly to her waist. When she'd been in college, the boys had flocked to pursue her, though some had been put off by her single-minded pursuit of her studies.
    Beside her feet, the combox beeped, shaking her out of her musings.
    Grumbling at being disturbed, Etsane bent down and signaled for her message.
    The flat screen flickered, and an image took shape. It was the face of Professor Greyshine, her former teacher and
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    mentor--and she could tell immediately that he was excited, wildly agitated.
    "Attention, my former students, fellow colleagues, and esteemed researchers of the Mizari Archaeological Society. Doctor Gordon Mitchell has entered the burial tomb of the First King of the Na-Dina aliens on Ancestor's World, and discovered a fabulous golden sarcophagus nearly six thousand years old."
    The Heeyoon paused and his amber eyes stared intently, as if he spoke to her personally.
    "This is just one of many ancient ruins that will soon be flooded by a dam now under construction. Time is critical. But most important of all, Doctor Mitchell reports the discovery of Mizari artifacts in direct association with the King's sarcophagus!"
    What? Etsane wondered if this find had anything to do with the Mizari Lost Colony.
    "The find is authentic," Greyshine said, calming a bit. "The tomb has been sealed for six thousand years. This is a call for help in carrying out emergency salvage archaeology operations. Mitchell's current team is very small, and lacks the equipment needed for a full-scale, multidisciplinary effort. He requests our assistance. I am leaving my own work at StarBridge Academy to help him, as is my mate Doctor Strongheart, who will conduct the Physical Sapientological Analysis of the burials. I'll head up the Settlement Pattern Analysis."
    In the flat screen image, Greyshine looked down at a flimsy held in his paw-hands. "Mitchell also needs specialists in Faunal and Floral Analysis, Iconography, Paleoenvironmental Reconstruction, Lithics and Ceramics Analysis, and a Chronologist." The Heeyoon looked up, and his muzzle stretched