[ WP ] The Earth does not rotate . One side always faces the sun and is in continual daylight . The other side is in eternal night . Cultures on both side develop around this .

The wind tore at the canvas tops of the wagons. Elder Greg grimaced as he watched this. He was a fool. This was his fifteenth time as Caravan Master and each time he forgot to warn the newcomers about canvas covered wagons. The winds were not to be trifled with. 
 
 `` Elder!'' a voice called out from ahead. He turned his gaze in that direction and spied a young boy riding a horse towards him. 
 
 `` There is a fire!'' the scout yelled. 
 
 `` A fire?'' Greg asked, `` You saw the flames?'' 
 
 `` No, Elder,'' he said, `` But the horizon is gray with the smoke.'' 
 
 `` Does the smoke stand still?'' Elder Greg asked patiently. 
 
 The child was taken aback by this but nodded at last. 
 
 `` You see the Gloom,'' the Elder explained, `` That is the land that divides our world from that of the Morlocks. We make good time, child.'' 
 
 The scout seemed uncertain but nodded his acceptance. He ran along the trail of the caravan and passed word along of what he spied on the horizon. 
 
 The Gloom, Elder Greg thought, he should have remember how frightening it was when he first saw it. His people, the Eloi, seldom saw darkness at all save in the depths of the caves used for food storage. They tilled the sandy soil of the light side and coaxed green plants from the baked soil in the burning sun. Shadows and darkness were as alien to them as the frozen rains in the land of the Morlocks. 
 
 Snow, he thought. What a wonder it must be to see. He had only seen rain fall from the sky twice in his great life. The first time he had been a mere boy no older than that scout he had just spoken to. He had stood outside and watched the sky weep upon their village. The droplets had turned the sandy avenues into mud and the banks of the River Bayle had swollen with pride. He and his brothers had watched as their mud caked foot prints filled with puddles of water. Water flowing through the air and about their doors. Even the poor and the lame had full barrels of water that day. That day, he remembered, they were all rich men. Then the clouds parted and the sun returned. The sun robbed the streets of their puddles and baked the soil once more. Within a sleep or two all traces of the rain and the riches it brought were gone. 
 
 But the Morlocks... so much water. Water that not only fell from the sky but refused to leave? To turn solid and stack itself neatly so that rich and poor could carry as much as they wished without risking the bite of a crocodile? A fantasy. It must be. Such riches could not exist in this world. Could they? 
 
 He shrugged and looked back at the caravans. Sixteen wagons this year. A bounty. The pale people who lived in their caves beneath the world should be pleased. They brought forth minerals that were scarce in the lands of the light. Iron, tin, and copper. In exchange they took worthless vegetables. Madmen or fools, he guessed. To live in a land of water and to trade the bounty of the earth for grain and potatoes. 
 
 The winds grew stronger as they approached the Gloom. He tightened his cloak about his frail shoulders as the air grew colder with the wind. It was always windy at the boundary between their two lands. Almost as if the air itself was warring between the hot and frigid lands on behalf of the uneasy truce between the people that lived there. As the Gloom ahead deepened and swallowed more of the sky he fancied he heard strange howling sounds in the distance. The Morlocks once told him stories of animals called wolves that wandered the frozen wastes and hunted man and beast alike. Hunting in packs that herded and crippled their prey. Probably more nonsense meant to frighten children. 
 
 Three sleeps later the caravan arrived at the Way Station. A low ceiling building that sat atop a rocky crest that perfectly divided the boundary within the Gloom. The smelly wool covered beasts the Morlocks used as beasts of burden, oxen they called them, stood outside. Their fur glistened as if is were still damp from some recent rain. Greg eyed this dampness with envious eyes and wished for the showering rain of his childhood. Motioning for the others to stay behind, he stepped inside the door of The Way Station. Inside the windowless room was a place for the Caravan Masters alone. 
 
 `` Greg,'' a familiar voice hissed as he entered. Greg nodded once and stood silently as he allowed his eyes to adjust to the darkness inside. The wretched Morlocks had an aversion to light. They hid in the shadows and rarely ventured out into full light. Even their caverns, he had been told, were often lit no more than the light granted by glowing fungus they cultivated. 
 
 The inside of the Way Station was a compromise between the too cultures. The interior was lit with candle flames. The Morlocks claimed it was too bright for their comfort. To Greg it was too dim to really see more than a dark shape that appeared to be swaddled in furs. Still, he knew the voice well enough. 
 
 `` Francis,'' he said by way of greeting. He was not sure if Francis was male or female. The voice just sounded ancient. 
 
 `` Time has been kind to you, friend,'' Francis said, `` May your health be eternal.'' 
 
 `` And may you live a day beyond that,'' Greg stated, finishing the ancient greeting. Francis waved a hand at the table and Greg took a seat. 
 
 `` Shall we begin?'' he asked. 
 
 `` I am ready,'' Francis stated. 
 
 `` We carry sixteen wagons. A bounty of fine grains and succulent vegetables. This shall feed many of our starving babes. I could not bear to part with this for less than forty man-weights of iron.'' 
 
 `` Your babes grow fat and your thievery disgraces your family,'' Francis countered, `` Eighteen man-weights of iron and four man-weights of copper is fair and even then you are laughing at the blood spilled by my people with our labors.'' 
 
 Greg smiled a thin and humorless grin. 
 
 `` Your people are barbarians who spill their own blood for mere sport,'' he said, `` And at thirty seven man-weights of iron and ten of copper I will be flogged for my insults to the tribe. I could show you scars from the humiliation I suffered from you when we last met.'' 
 
 And so it continued. Outside the eternal winds shook the rickety building and threatened to topple its roof on the bickering elders inside. The oxen snorted and the the horses neighed. Eloi and Morlock alike cowered inside their wagons with the scant protection they offered from the driving winds. Below them the world continued not to spin. Tide locked in an eternal dance with the atomic inferno of an F class star, the half frozen and half baked world was oblivious to the tiny silvery object that dropped into a high orbit around its twilight band. 
 
 From the silvery object invisible rays burst forth and struck the planetary surface below. The rays reflected and scattered but left no sign of their passing. The rays swept over the landscape until they found the log building with the twin caravans on either side. The scanning stopped. The silvery object then spoke in a language not meant for human ears. Traveling faster than the light escaping the nearby star, the words were transmitted back to a distant planet and read: 
 
 STATUS OF LOST COLONIZATION SHIP GSS H.G. WELLS - LOCATED. DESCENDANTS OF SHIP FOUND TO BE CURRENTLY INHABITING A NOMINALLY HABITABLE PLANET. INDICATIONS OF PRE-INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY. POTENTIAL FOR COLONIZATION - POOR. POTENTIAL FOR MINING - EXCELLENT. PLANETARY CLAIM STATUS OF INHABITANTS - UNDETERMINED. AWAITING ORDERS. 
 
 Then the Weyland Corporation Mining Exploration Probe stopped speaking. It was now listening.
