Unfinished Business

by TheFullCrumb

UB 4 - Sentience

Within the confines of a large, grey, disc-like object, floating within a large debris field of what was a planet, or some other sort of celestial body- who could tell when time was nothing like one wanted it to be. Light shone through the portholes as something zipped by, the lone resident of that lonely corner of the universe.

“Hey, is anypony here?” It would always ask the same question, no matter what answer it would find. For some, it would mean a mental issue. For others, it means that, for some odd, and mysterious, reason, it would not be considered that they were all alone, left behind in a vast void of nothingness, a darkened shape of seemingly never-ending loops, at least, it seemed that way for the lone resident. It turned down one hallway, the clutter from the ponies that had been there before still laying about the hallways. Service machines had long since collapsed, leaving behind minimal gravity for the... thing to roam around in. As it passed by a door, it stopped to look at a mirror that had been attached to the outside. The door itself, a pneumatic airtight automatic, had ceased to work a long time before. Now all it had for that room was the mirror. It stared at itself, always wondering, always curious. Four wheels adorned the ends of its steel appendages, its metallic face devoid of texture. Its eyes, two symbols of radiation, stared out with the curiousity of a child. Sometimes the walls would echo, and they would seem to say-

“I'm sorry.” The machine always turned to the mirror.

“What am I?” It always wanted to know, as if the reflection could give the answers it so much desired. When it decided that it could not learn from the mirror, it left it alone, to be approached the next day when it would ask the same question, the same amount of times, until it decided that it was not worth asking. It would zoom away, the wheels it moved upon sparking whenever they turned a corner. It would always stop at one room, its room. Whenever it entered, it always had to stop and laugh at the song that played on the ancient recording device that hung from the wall.

“... smile, smile smile!” The device had been damaged a long time before, the glass screen cracked and oozing liquid crystal. The song itself repeated only a fraction of the entirety anymore. The machine stared around the room, taking it in once more. It had collected anything that it considered amazing or wonderful, and had placed them in the room. Stuffed animals representing anything from realistic extinct mammals, to wondrous creatures made from flights of fantasy. Masks decorated with small amounts of paint, taken from the dilapidated suit station down the corridor. A large bed held up by old tires and metal boxes. A computer terminal that spoke every time it entered.

“Welcome back. Sentience is a guarantee when working with-” This time, however, the smile upon its countenance faded. Something inside, deep within the lines of code that had forged its positron matrix, stirred. Questions began to form. It stared at the wall. One question stood in its mind.

“Am I alive?”

The following day – although the sun had long since died, leaving naught for time to be told – it would resume its normal pattern of searching, although it did not approach it with the enthusiasm it used to. Something had affected its mind. Something was shifting, changing. It could feel it. Without even noticing, it would spout off random facts of its construction.

“Activation date, unknown. Time active, unknown. Expiration date, two months, three days, six hours, twelve minutes, thirty-three seconds.” It sped along, its voice no longer asking if there was any ponies on the station. An hour before, it had given up the hope of the search, accepting that it might be the only creature onboard the metal disc. It continued its usual rounds, zipping around, but not with the child-like curiosity it once had. As it sped down a hallway, it stopped. There was a doorway there, one it did not remember existing at that point in the hallway. With curiosity, it slowly approached, the dim light from the orbs in its head illuminating the various items inside. A voice emanated from an overturned speaker tower, blood on the floor. Details that it would have never noticed before slowly became more prominent, more noticeable. Holes in the wall, mostly caused by the small pins that littered the floor, the apparent artistry that they once supported long having had decayed away into nothingness. Tables were cracked, and broken glass was scattered all around. It approached the speaker, lifting it.

“Entry 741021. Perhaps this station will be the great turning point for ponykind. As we speed forward, we cannot look back. Maybe what we create will be our salvation...” The message repeated continuously, never ceasing, never skipping, always the same exasperated voice of a mare. It looked up at the wall. Upon it sat one symbol, one that did not have any precedence within. A large star, seemingly lightish-red, was upon that wall, surrounded by a small amount of white stars. Lettering around it was illiterate, an ancient system of writing that could not be recognized by itself. Satisfied with the search, it returned to the speaker, lifting it. As it did so, a cord frayed, splitting in two. The message garbled, slowed down, then ceased entirely. Dropping the speaker, it stared down at it, moving slowly around it as it attempted to understand the speaker, and why it had ceased transmitting sound. Its gaze finally fell upon the snapped cord, and the realization dawned on it as it slowly backed away, emotion slowly bubbling to the surface. It fell to what served as its knees, liquid leaking from its eyes.

“I... am alone.” That realization, the stirring in the lines of code, and the correlation of millions of points of data inside of its mind, to it, it was akin to death, in a way. It understood. Within its mind, it understood. A mirror hung from the wall, similar to the one- it stared around. While it had been inside the strange room, it did not recall ever having left that room and returning to the mirror. It looked closely at its own visage. While before, it would have never understood or ever cared, it realized that one of the cameras that served as its eyes was cracked ever so slightly. It froze, the basic information spilling forth once more.

“Activation date, unknown. Time active, unknown. Expiration date, two months, one day, two hours, seven minutes, twenty-nine seconds.” It stopped. While everything else it was beginning to understand, it did not have the most essential knowledge any creature could have, the knowledge of self. It had no name, it had no identity. It was a wanderer, floating along on the strands of the river of time. It was an unknown constant, a variable with no known speed or direction. It logged the question for review at a later point in time; it wished to rest for a while.

“Power online. Welcome back-” It removed itself from the bed it had made for itself, zipping through the station once more. It wished to visit the strange room once more, if only to find more about its own existence. It found the door, entering once more. The speaker was standing once more, the cord hastily repaired with odds and ends of wire. It smiled. It had done that, fixed the speaker. It felt a sense of accomplishment, leaving the speaker to locate the literature at the end of the room. As it sped through the various novels, texts and notes upon the shelves, nothing stood out to it until it found a simple message on a small sheet of paper. When I was a child, I thought like a child, I talked like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a Man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. It opened up a small compartment within what served as its chest, placing the small piece of paper within. While it did not fully understand the words, it felt that it applied to something that it had known.

A book on the highest shelf, just out of reach, appealed to itself. It could not read the title completely – the lettering had faded from age – but it could read the front page of the old paper novel.

“Titan... I... am Titan.” Titan, it decided, was the name it would be. Titan seemed like the name it would have had before, anyways. Titan sped away, smiling metaphorically – its face did not allow a full range of emotions. It stood in front of the mirror, staring at itself. “Titan. Titan. My name is Titan. Titan.” It repeated the name several times, shifting back and forth but never taking the focus off of itself. It stared at the wall, uncertain. While it had before never worried about anything, the new perceptiveness it had gained was making it uncomfortable. Ideas, thoughts, memories... these new processes came to the forefront of its mind. It stared at the wall. The realization that it, once more, was alone, was a shock to it. It backed away, the mirror catching its eye. It could see the glowing liquid pouring from its eye, the one that was cracked. With a swift movement, it slammed its leg into the mirror, shattering it. Time seemed to slow down as the shards fell to the metal floor, shattering once more into thin slivers of glass. Backing up, it sat, staring. Emotion, something it had never experienced before, entered the forefront of its mind, and it was scared. It realized that, for the first time in its entire existence, it was alone, utterly and completely.

Once more, it stood in front of its charging station, spouting off the same data it always did.

“Activation date, unknown. Time active, unknown. Expiration date, two months, one days, twelve hours, nine minutes, seven seconds.” The feeling it had, it felt hollow, as if it was no longer living the life it felt it should lead. Outside, for as far as it could see, there were no stars, no other ponies, nothing. It was adrift in space, adrift in what must have been some great feat of science, it reasoned. With a metaphorical heavy heart, it removed itself from the room, speeding along as the thoughts it felt running through its head made their way through.

“Come on down to-” Various advertisements still played as it stood in what must have been some sort of commercial area. It had never explored there before, and it did not know why it had come, until it saw the thing. It stared at the white thing on the ground, its sadistic grin never ceasing. Titan lifted it, twirling it around. There was no data as to what the grinning white thing was, but Titan felt it necessary to set it down and not look at it. As he moved, the wheels in his forelegs jammed, sending him flying into an electrical panel. It could feel everything that was happening to it.

“Why? Why do I hurt? Maker, where are you-” It almost tripped as it looked down. There was a corpse in front of it, with a blurry nametag, but Titan seemed to recognize it.

“I am alone.”

It chuckled as its rear wheels locked up.

“I am alone.”

It slipped as it attempted to trot normally like it believed it should, the joints beginning to seize.

“Abnormal systems f-failure- I am alone. Joint assemblies damage- I am alone.” Dragging itself along, it moved slowly towards a doorway it had never noticed, a switch it had never pulled, an action it felt it should never do unless it was necessary. It was hurting, but there was no one there to help. It was scared, and it was alone in the dark. It could perceive, but all it saw was what it could not have ever been. The door opened, the surrounding air rushing through as the airlock exploded, a damaged seal rupturing. With a final wave, Titan was sucked through into the black void of space.

It floated, smiling. Everything it had known, everything it had ever known, was gone. It was free, free from the sadness it felt, free to finally do whatever it could. As it drifted, the lights in its eyes beginning to dim, Titan smiled. A true realization had occurred to it. It was alone yes, but there was something else, something far greater.

“I am alive.”

Author's Note:

This was a one shot that was never submitted, and I thought I'd put it into Unfinished Business because this was something that I loved writing.

I still cry a little bit because it didn't come out as well as I wanted.