“Sula, I do not know where you found this ring, but it is the one stolen from me many years ago. The ring was given to me as a gift by a tribal leader on a distant world called Elpidios. It is a desolate world that appeared to be dying when I was there.
I landed in a desert not far from a range of mountains. I had been exposed to radiation poisoning when one of the power modules failed on my ship, and was deathly ill. I ejected the module into space, but I knew I could go no farther. Elpidios was the nearest habitable planet. In truth, I expected to die on that inhospitable world.
I abandoned my spaceship and set out across the sands. On the third night, a small group of native inhabitants came upon my camp. They could not understand me nor I them. While our skin was similar in color, my
