It was, for all intents and purposes, a wheel. Pale like our dying sun, what perplexed us, however, was its enormity.

F2329, my cellmate, could hardly believe their eyes (all eleven of them) when they saw it.

One-third of it was submerged, lining the bank of our hydration source that ran a few thousand steps from where we had spent a peaceful night while on our usual mission.

As to how the wheel had appeared there out of the blue, looking at least a trillion years old was beyond our imagination; all we knew was it rivaled our damaged moon in size (and probably mass as well).

Though F2329 was a little apprehensive, I convinced them to use our limited long-distance transportation resource: our limbs, to get to the wheel, without which it would have taken us a decade.
We needed to get back to the hive before the moon disappeared behind the horizon.

A nanosecond later, we got to where we could touch the wheel. Though I knew that we had taken a risk by using our limbs, when we noticed that it had sunk deeper, my gut told me that using our limbs had been worth it.

Standing not a head's length away, we could taste the powdery substance the wheel seemed to be shedding on the exposed tissues of our epidermis; it puzzled us.

"Salt?" F2329 quirked five of their brows; leaning closer, they wrinkled their noses, all three of them, before extending their finger, the least useful one of all, making it come in contact with the wheel.

"Enn!" My cellmate exclaimed, as right in front of our very eyes, the object that looked like it could house at least a million of us: salt searchers, disintegrated, leaving us feeling salty.

"Salt!" F2329's limbs danced excitedly. "Salt. Salt." They called, their limbs poked mine, stating the obvious.

We had finally caught a break!

Without another word, we did what was expected of us. We started collecting the salt the wheel had left behind with our limbs, extending them to their maximum capacity and sucking. The precious loot accumulated under our epidermis like it belonged there.

Soon, with our now saturated limbs, we turned towards our hive and aimed at it, but not before taking a vow to never disclose the location of the treasure trove the wheel had left behind.

A nanosecond later, we reached our destination proud and full of salt.
That evening when A0001 strolled in for the routine inspection, we were ready with our loot.

"Salt." A0001 demanded, and for the first time in forever, we flung our limbs at him and replied, "En, salt."

{Word count: 445}