Premise: A tomboy scout had knowledge of where a forbidden treasure trove was. So she cut a deal with a spaceship pilot to risk taking them there. Now it was going to pay off in more ways than she could ever have bargained.

I had the pilot bring in the ship a little closer to the asteroid I pointed out on the display. It wasn’t easy, because the target area was crowded with rock particles ranging from dust to sometimes as big as a kilometer. I think me leaning over his shoulder made him a little nervous. Not because some cute girl was that close to him. I was just some tomboy still rocking a short haircut long after my time in the military. But people in general don’t like other people that close when they’re doing their jobs.

His ship was a decommissioned military scout, with a sensor array that maybe wasn’t the best you could get these days but was the best you could get twenty years ago. And it was good enough. I started to get a reading off of that asteroid.

I had him open the cargo bay and deploy the drones. Various screens commenced to show their telemetry and their video feeds as the drones moved carefully over to the asteroid while we held steady about a hundred meters away.

It didn’t take long for one of the drones to strike gold. Well, something even more valuable. I moved its video feed over to the main display.

It was a perfectly preserved Coke bottle, just sitting there on the surface of the asteroid. This must have been a chunk that used to be on the surface back before Earth… well, everyone knows the story, right? There’s no use going over that sad part of human history again.

Except a lot of people did like going over all the history before that day. There weren’t many artifacts from that time still around. I guess we were lucky humans had survived at all, let alone spread across the galaxy. When the lucky people evacuated, they were thinking more of food and other necessities to colonize other worlds versus memorabilia. Everyday things that were common to them, or even garbage.

But in today’s nostalgic galaxy? People were already paying too much money for replicas of antiques just like this. The real items couldn't be found anymore, except in museums. Well, and of course in the asteroid field here between Venus and Mars. But it was illegal just to come to this solar system, let alone engage in some speculative archaeology.

Full Script Here

Another script I had fun with, and while there are places where I realize I maybe needed some more material to bridge gaps in the story, I knew from past scripts that would be a slippery slope to this being far longer than I wanted it to be. I kind of have ideas for unanswered questions in the story, although in a lot of cases I just wing it and don't sweat the details. As it was, the story changed as I was writing it somewhat, which also tends to happen a lot.

This is the rare script where I actually like the name of it, as it's fitting for more reasons than might be initially apparent. But that can still be changed by someone if they want to record it and have their own idea. In fact, if anyone wishes to change any part of this, please feel free to do so.

Please feel free to comment, but I'd ask that you not tag others in your comments.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy the script.