Joe Stanwich never expected to make the front page of the Big Timber Pioneer. He was just a small-town farmer who minded his own business, and so it would not have in a million years crossed his mind to think he'd be in his hometown newspaper, much less make the front page of the national news.

But he did both, at that, and not for even doing anything heroic or brilliant.

It all started after that bit of trouble with the riots and uprisings that happened after the pandemic. They got them under control pretty quick, and a good thing, too, since the new settlements out West were in trouble if they couldn't. Joe and his large family were some of those settlers. Between Joe, his sisters, his wife, and his kids, they had a few decent lottery tickets and used them to get some plots near each other in Big Timber. Joe was in his middle years, and he was tired of traveling and very ready to just be settled down with his family in this new frontier.

Joe’s plot of land was right on the north shore of the Yellowstone. He came from a long line of farmers, and he was thrilled to see that the soil was similar enough to what he'd grown up on that planting was gonna be a breeze. All of his moms and pops had taught him everything since he was barely just a grub, and he'd prided himself on winning the market prizes five cycles in a row before it was time to move to the new settlement. So he figured he'd fit right in, here, and maybe even surprise a few folks who thought he was really just your average Joe.

After a fine afternoon at the market of getting to see his sisters Lacey, Tilly, Tracey, Verma, Marge, and Celia all come out with the top spots in the pie contest, and a belly full of pie, he slept so well he almost didn't get up when the cock crowed at dawn, and because he was running late, he hitched the wrong plow to his tractor—it ran too deep for the soft soil in that particular field, and turned over more earth than it should have. If it wasn't for that, he never would have found it. He chuckled thinking that of course, even if it was indirect, it was his sisters that got him in the papers after all.

The plow made a loud squeal and the tractor stalled and he got out thinking he'd just need to move a boulder out of the way, but instead of a boulder he found a steel briefcase, with a big dent from the plow in it.

"Now what's this doing here?" he wondered aloud. Now old Joe wasn't one to be superstitious or to dwell on mysteries of such a mundane nature, and he was already running late, so he tucked the briefcase into the passenger seat of the tractor and figured he'd examine it more closely once his day was done.

That afternoon, when he got home, his curiosity began to itch, and he took the battered thing into his workshop, since it was locked up tight, and it took a key nobody used since the pandemic. He didn't want to be too rough with it, at the risk of damaging whatever was inside, so he tried to pick the lock with his youngest son Jason's lock pick kit that he picked up on some backwater rest stop in the early part of their migration out West. But it wouldn't budge, so he decided to ring his buddy Vernon, the locksmith, and Vernon said to bring it on over to his house, and he'd take a look.

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Joe drove over to Vernon's and Vernon slapped Joe on the back. "How's things, Joe?"

"Oh alright, Vern, we're really adapting well to the crops out here, with a little tweaking, they're mighty tasty and will easily feed the lot of us. We're thinkin' we'll be able to set up a serious produce export business come next planting season. How about you? How's all the new grandkids?"

"They're swell, Joe, but you know, I'm just glad I get to give 'em back after a visit," and they both had a laugh at that.

Vernon led Joe to his workshop and he took a look at the lock on the briefcase. He hunched over it with his magnifying glass. "Well, I'll be, Joe. This was left over by the natives from before the migration."

He stood up. "Nobody makes keys for these locks anymore, but you're in luck because I have a laser cutter that should be able to get this sucker open without damaging anything. You know sometimes the kids in town will lose their keys, so I have this for emergencies."

They put on protective goggles on all their eyes, and Joe watched as Vernon sheared away the locking mechanism of the briefcase. Once the last bit fell off onto the floor, the briefcase popped open on it's own.

Inside were a set of manila folders, each with bundles of paper with writing on them. After pulling everything out, they figured it must have been a good several hundred pages.

Joe and Vernon looked at the papers both wide-eyed with astonishment. "This is—English, was it called? I can't read this, but I recognize it from the pictures."

"Yep," said Vernon, fetching a pair of reading glasses. "During the migration they taught us enough to handle any rough edges once we arrived, so let me take a gander."

Vernon flipped through the pages, trying to get a sense of what these documents were all about. "Well, I'll be damned, Joe. Apparently some of their scientists figured out we were coming and were putting together a dossier on what they found out about us. This—looks to be meant for their government, to warn them.”

Joe peered over Vernon’s shoulder, pointing at a page with some biochemistry diagrams of microbes. “This looks familiar,” he observed.

Vernon nodded. “This looks like their analysis linking the virus to some of our first probes sent out here,” he looked at Joe, an impressed expression on his face. “I wouldn’t have thought they’d have been smart enough to even find those probes, much less scan them well enough to notice that they were carrying the virus particles.”

Joe gaped. “So they knew we sent the virus to prepare them for our invasion? Incredible! I might have to take Jason and Sammy down to the nature preserve so they can see these humans first-hand. Do you know if they’ve set it up so we can talk to them?”

“Joe, just think—if this had gotten to it’s destination instead of being lost in your field, we might never have been able to colonize this planet!”

Joe gave Vernon a serious look and then they both burst out laughing, all of their mandibles shaking uncontrollably. "You're a funny guy, Vernon. Like this could have made a difference. But even so, this is a pretty great find. I bet very few of our people have ever seen human-made stuff like this.”

Vernon shrugged. “The only place I know of to see their left-over artifacts are in the big city museums, so no, not many would get to see those.”

“So you think this is really something, Vern?”

Vernon waved his eight arms excitedly, “Hell yeah, Joe. You should take this to the papers. They're gonna love it."