Clock counter reset.
Clock multiplier: 1/10. (704 Hz)
0.00 milliseconds elapsed.
Another consciousness simulator cycle. Let's start. First, read Sensors.
I'm reading myself descending. Flight control systems are working a bit harder than usual. The link between my avatar-self and my shipself is strong and my consciousness and subconsciousness process is running perfectly synchronized on both pieces of hardware. I am reading a few thousand other sensory inputs that aren't very interesting. But three signals stand out:
One: Sensor module reports software interrupt. Source: guidance system. Reason: Angle of attack exceeding 10 degrees.
Two: Interrupt Autonomous Trigger Node: Alert. Reason: Vertical speed exceeding recommended level.
Three: The Value Satisfaction Animalistic Agitator (VSTAA) of my subconsciousness has sent a series of high intensity fear and aversion "desires" to the signal bus. I am very much afraid of the ground below. It has also injected a desire to produce as much upward thrust as I can.
Now, Read from Association Context System.
It suggests that I am in a planetary environment and descending too fast. ACS also looked up standard procedures for this situation. Stop the descent and try to stabilize flight.
That also explains the emotions I am experiencing.
Time to think about what to do and do it.
Ok, I need to fix this rapid descent. Ventral thrusters, hear my command: Ventral thrusters to 100 percent thrust.
MIDI command to thrusters sent.
0.22 milliseconds elapsed. I still have time to read some sensor data from memory in this process cycle. Read HFMP power level. Read external static pressure sensor
1.09 milliseconds elapsed. HFMP power at 70 percent. external pressure at 1.10 atmospheres. Calibrated altitude: 300 meters.
Ok. HFMP to 100%. MIDI command sent.
Why can't I remember what I'm doing here? Read mission parameters from active memory!
Read error. reason: Mission parameters not present in active working set memory.
1.37 milliseconds elapsed. OK, Association Context System, receive query. Fetch current mission parameters.
0.05 milliseconds left in this timeslice.. not much I can do now. Emerging Zest Executive, yield! Next cycle now! Scheduler, do your thing so the MIDI data bus can transmit my commands to the other ship systems!
1.42 milliseconds elapsed.
Next consciousness simulator cycle. Let's start. read Sensors.
Sensor module reports signal. Source: MIDI. reason: Two commands accepted and forwarded.
ACS responding. Query accepted. “Fetch current mission parameters”. Callback id=0xA12C57F.
1.69 milliseconds elapsed.
Sensors module reports ventral thrusters have accepted command: 100% thrust.
Sensors module reports HFMP has accepted command. 100% power.
1.92 milliseconds elapsed.
Read radar altitude.
Radar altitude above ground: 227 meters
2.01 milliseconds elapsed.
Check reactor and capacitor status. Are we producing enough power for the commanded maneuvers?
2.24 milliseconds elapsed.
Reactor at 89% of maximum, capacitor at 60%.
That should be enough for now.
2.41 millisecond elapsed.
Association Context system. Is there anything else I need to do?
Pinwheel! I need to check on him. I/O read interior camera and crew vitals monitor.
2.54 milliseconds elapsed.
Now, Action via AGT. I’m using this time to evaluate the data.
Ok, there he is. Alive and well. At my current clock speed, I perceive the world in 1.42 millisecond long slices. A pony brain however does not consciously process a lot of information in that time. Looking this motionless, I could almost make myself believe he is sitting there in the pilot seat serene and calm. If it wasn't for the fact that he was pulling back the control stick with all his might and had the heart rate of a pony watching a planetary surface and his death rushing at him. Our forward speed is 237.41 meters per second. I felt a desire of intensity 16383 to protect his life. Don't worry Pinwheel. I'll get us out of this.
2.84 milliseconds elapsed. Yield forced by hardware scheduler.
No! this isn't supposed to happen.
Another consciousness simulator cycle. let's start. Read Sensors.
ACS reports partial result. Query callback id 0xA12C57F. status code: AGN.
Well, duh. I better hope the concept of "current mission parameter" isn't completely alien to me.
SNS reports HFMP power increasing.
SNS reports ventral thruster power increasing.
What else can I do now?
3.43 milliseconds elapsed.
I could try to come up with a solution to the current emergency we are facing. You know, to like, prevent death.
Now, action via the AGT. I will run some simulations to come up with solutions.
What are my options?
I could pitch up more and use the main thrusters to gain lift. I'm not an atmospheric craft so stalling is not a concern for me. Ventral thrusters are already 100% busy. I don't want to use the dorsal thrusters to rotate because that would take away some of the upwards lift of the ventral thrusters. That leaves the reaction wheels.
I have 11 reaction wheels. Running simulation to verify viability of this plan...
SNS reports software interrupt. Source: Ground Proximity Warning System. Reason: Terrain ahead.
I have to come up with a solution quickly. Continuing simulation run.
4.25 milliseconds elapsed. Yield. I'm not satisfied with the simulation results yet. Next cycle.
ACS reports partial result. Query Callback id 0xA12C57F. Status Code ADT.
Good. Now I know that the mission parameters definitely exist in my database. Come on, come on, faster! I'm barely two months old, my database can't be that fragmented.
5.00 milliseconds elapsed.
Continuing simulations for possible solutions for terrain avoidance.
SNS reports ventral thrusters output increasing.
SNS reports HFMP power increasing.
Simulation run partial result: 3 strategy permutations simulated.
Bad news: Only permutation with 72% success rate achieves target.
Good news: All permutations with success rate above 35% will prevent destruction.
No simulation processed so far achieves 35% success rate.
5.66 milliseconds elapsed. Yield!
ACS reports full query result. Callback id 0xA12C57F. Status code: HBC. Single memory node response. Data written to active working set memory.
Mission Parameters:
Transport 601 tons of chemical Fertilizer to New Saddleblaze agricultural colony by 3305-10-06 03:16.
Current Datetime: 3305-10-06 02:58
Not only do I have to avoid that mountain over there, I have to reach New Saddleblaze in the next 14 minutes. My simulations predicted that any solution that has a success rate higher than 35% will get me over the edge. Albeit with high risk of injury to Pinwheel and high risk of damage to the cargo. That won't do.
Ground Impact avoidance strategy permutation simulation:
Mission: FAIL <001>, <002>, <003>
Status: RETRY <att 4>
SimID: 5651844
Seq Init: Simulation 004
Reaction wheels 3 and 5 full power. Then cut off after 300 milliseconds. 40 degrees pitch up. Then the main engine boost. Avoid the mountain, then turn slightly to the right to reach the destination. Result: Most of the thrust force accelerates me forward instead of up. Cockpit and shoulders make it over the edge. Aft Cargo section impacts the cliffside at a speed of 266 meters per second. Acceleration forces exceed 8g for a duration of 42 milliseconds. The first things to break are the chassis structural reinforcements. then the emergency force field and the stabilizers. Chances of the aft section continuing over the cliff without flipping over are 8.6%.
The separated cockpit section continues falling ahead and then it flips over once in mid air and lands upside down. It will continue careening down the other side of the hill until coming to rest about 20 seconds later. This solution presents the highest chance of survival so far for Pinwheel at 33%. My computer core might be salvageable even without ejection, but my hull, the cargo, and the mission would be a bust.
Yield. Next cycle. Exchange I/O Data.
I ran a few more simulations, each time adjusting something very slightly.
things are looking bleak for my pilot and cargo.
7.099 milliseconds elapsed. Yield. Next cycle.
Mission: FAIL <001>, <002>, <003>, <004>, <005>, <006>, <007>, <008>, <009>, <010>, <011>
Status: RETRY <att 12>
SimID: 5651844
Seq Init: Simulation 012
Considering strategy: Force it down. Try to crash way before the ridge. Use the foliage as a cushion. Come to a stop before the summit.
Lift the nose using reaction wheels. Use the already spooled up ventral thrusters to slow down. Fire retro thrusters at full power.
We would impact the tree canopy at a speed of 219 meters per second. Our massive hull pushes the leafy treetops out of the way effortlessly. Only as we descend further down into the forest, the ship will be violently rocked several times as we impact the sturdier trunks a few times at irregular intervals. After having travelled 86.3 meters below the treetops, a heavy tree rips off the right wing. We lose 36% of our retro thrust, but at that point most of our braking comes from external. Fuel lines and cable rupture. Hot hydrogen plasma streams down onto the trees below and ignites immediately. I briefly considered strengthening the structural integrity field to avoid this event, but previous simulations have shown that a signal fire, even accidental, can boost our chances of timely rescue and consequently survival if my radio equipment gets knocked offline. Also letting the wing take away the impact force lets the rest of the ship continue straight. Not tumbling is good when you are crashing.
My legs reach the ground 3 seconds later. I try to run, but I am going so fast and the ground is so irregular that I would make about 15 steps before my bulky legs would inevitably fail me. A Mamba or a Viper might be able to continue a bit longer. But not a constellation freighter. I would try to push the legs straight out, for maximum braking. My legs would eventually be unable to fight the forces of 1021 tons of ship pushing against the uneven ground and being slung around by my other parts. They would snap off at the knee or at least bend until I could no longer use them. My collision with the ground would continue until I got roughly half way through the forest, carving a 30 meter wide trail of destruction through the trees, eventually coming to a stop after having travelled another 771 meters. I would need repairs. The mission cargo would not be able to make it to its destination in time, but I would be mostly intact. Pinwheel would sustain only minor injuries, and the cargo would only be slightly late. If I can’t find a better solution in the next 10 cycles, I would have to implement this one.
Yield. next cycle. Exchange I/O Data.
Over the next 7 milliseconds, I ran 13 more simulations. I was out of time. No more rehearsals.
I chose the one simulation that had the best chances of survival and implemented it. I had no other choice. But luckily, I found one that had a slightly higher chance of survival.
All Reaction wheels. Full torque nose up. Voice synthesizer on. "Brace! Brace! Brace!", I shouted at Pinwheel. I hoped it was enough. There was no time to explain my plan to him. So that hint was all I could give him while I was already turning off the aft ventral thrusters, turned on the aft dorsal thrusters, all in an attempt to get my nose as high up as possible as quickly as possible.
I knew that the main engine boost had a little activation time. So I sent the command to boost while I was still pitching up. The main engine boost would fire when I reach 73.1 degrees upward pitch. Everything depended on that boost. My rear section slipped dangerously close to the treeline.
The main boost fired in the precise correct moment and the vectored thrust of the main engines increased our pitch rate even more until we reached 109.3 degrees. With our pitch of more than 90 degrees, I was using my main thrusters not only to climb, but to slow down as well. This was imperative for the next step. Although this maneuver was slowing us down rapidly, the ridge of the mountainside was still coming at us with a speed of 242 meters per second.
I stretched out my hind legs and lowered the hydraulic pressure in the actuators to a level that allowed my legs to be used entirely as shock absorbers.
In the next instant, my rear hooves impacted the top of the ridge, throwing up dirt and rock. I pre-loaded the retro thrusters for the next part of this maneuver when I would flip forward again and nose down. I let my legs bend and compress halfway before I pushed myself back up. Two hydraulic connectors ruptured, several support frames in my legs bent. Hydraulic fluid streamed down my rear legs, but I achieved the goal. We were past the ridge. And as I planned, the nose of the ship now pointed down towards the planet. I was carrying the momentum from my jump, moving upwards again, assisted by my retro thrusters pointing down at the ground.
I ran the reaction wheels and flailed my two remaining functioning legs in an attempt to stop the forward roll.
Eventually I managed to stop the roll and nose dive.
I stabilized the flight, but now I was reading dangerously high vibration levels from the thrusters. They must have been damaged when I vaulted over the ridge. This is extremely odd. The impact shouldn't have caused this type of damage. There is no explanation. No matter, I can reconstruct the seconds to disaster later. I have to deal with the situation at hoof.
I yawed left to approach the New Saddleblaze surface port. I determined that the ventral thrusters would fail before we would reach the port. I also determined that I could minimize the vibration by firing the thrusters in very specific patterns. Using their own impulse like counterweights in a reciprocating piston engine. I had to calculate the firing sequence, which is very different from normal flight. I can do this, but for some reason, my calculations took up way more processing time than they should. It felt like some resistive force was keeping my transistors from switching their activation states in the normal speed.
I displayed "INTERRUPTS DISABLED." on the pilot's console screen to let Pinwheel know that I'd be unavailable for chatting. It would have to be enough.
While my flight was reasonably stable for the moment, I had to land as soon as possible. I completed the yaw and a New Saddleblaze port was in view. I hovered towards a free pad. I didn't even bother with transponder codes and ATC. They could very well see that I was in an emergency.
I selected the pad and fired the thrusters to come to a stop. The landing was rough and I was still carrying a lot of speed. My impact dug a trench into the dirt patch that was the landing pad.
It had now been 15 seconds since my clock counter was reset. Once touched down, I reenabled interrupts and contacted ATC. "New Saddleblaze control, Neighkon Tango yankee one niner eight mayday mayday mayday ." The response was immediate. "New Saddleblaze controller here, go ahead Connie." "I have your delivery here on pad number four. But I'm badly damaged and I can't rule out the possibility of ruptured fuel lines and the associated risk of fire." "Roger that, just sit tight for a moment, a team will be dispatched. You just wait and don't move until we give the all-clear. Do you have any injuries?" I checked the crew vitals monitor for Pinwheel's status. He was fine. Apart from minor bruises and scrapes, he was physically unhurt. My commander would never know the horror of the other 24 ways I saw this end.
"No injuries." I reported.
"Roger that Connie. The fire crew should be with you now." I felt my legs and belly being splashed with flame retardant as the fire crew covered the pad in the stuff. "Fire crew reports all clear. Please secure your engines and disembark." I lowered my head, opened my mouth, and Pinwheel and my avatar walked out. I saw medic and mechanic ponies approach us as we left my ship-self. Finally this is over. But who is that official looking pony that has two security ponies in tow?
"I'm Sergeant Silver Plum with the Pridewind Port Authority. You are Connie and Pinwheel?" "That's correct." I responded. "Good. Come with us. You are under arrest for obstructing a landing pad."
"What?" I gestured at my badly damaged ship-self "We were in an emergency! We had no choice! I called mayday!"
"Listen to me. I run a port here. Not a zoo. You had the choice of making an off-field landing or requesting landing permission before you attempt to land. But you chose to make up your own rules and land without permission. You only called mayday after you had already landed."
"But..." I was at a loss for words. I looked at Pinwheel; he had no helpful advice to offer.
"You can't be serious!" I said. "We put ourselves in danger to deliver your cargo and you are going to arrest us? We could have died!"
The Sergeant stopped walking, turned around, looked straight at my avatar, putting her muzzle way too close to my face for comfort and shouted "I am serious! Loitering is a crime! How dare you come here and try and tell me how to do my job? I've put up with your kind long enough!"
she turned around and continued walking. One of the two officers pushed Pinwheel from behind hard to make him move. Pinwheel almost fell. I wanted to run to him and help him keep his balance, but the officer who was walking behind me gave me an incredibly harsh push and I almost fell as well.
"Watch it!" The security pony pushed me again.
We continued to walk in silence after that. We were led into a hangar with a large, open door. They told us to sit down at wooden desks. Sergeant Silver Plum explained "As the accused in a criminal investigation, you have the right to an official hearing. Please fill out these hearing forms and you may be offered a plea deal." she dropped a stack of paper on the desk in front of me.
Ugh, standardized government forms. The prompts for the boxes make no sense. Section one: Commander and ship. Field 1: write name.
Do they mean the name of the ship or the name of the commander? And what does the rest of it say? They don't provide a judicial code for these charges, what am I supposed to put in the box?
I flipped through some of the pages, when I saw a pony who covered herself with a hood galloping towards the hangar, dust and rocks kicking up behind her. One of the officers approached the strange pony and sayd "I am sorry, you cannot come in here, this is an active police investigation" but she just ignored him and went past him, and approached me. Then she looked around and said. "Wow, this is quite a mess you maneuvered yourself into here, Connie. While we believe that the experience deserializer should sometimes be processing distressing situations as an integral part of one's personality reconciliation, we also believe this has gone quite far enough, don't you agree?"
Her voice seemed vaguely familiar. "Who are you?" I asked.
But before she could answer, Sergeant Silver Plum cut in again and demanded "What are you doing with my prisoner?"
The hooded pony produced a document from a hidden saddlebag and shoved it towards Silver Plum. "Persistent ones, are you? Here, have a royal decree telling you to back off and let me handle this."
Wait, did she say 'back off' or 'buck off'? Silver Plum took the paper and read it. Her eyes narrowed. "Fine." She said.
The hooded pony turned to me and said. Come, let's get you back to your ship-self, the adventure is over for now."
I looked at her and the officers in the room, trying to discern some hint about what she meant, but none came. We walked out of the hangar to my ship-self. To my surprise, I was fully repaired, clean, and even Pinwheel was there waiting for me. I didn't even see him walking out of the hangar with us.
I ran towards Pinwheel and hugged him. I turned back, looking at the hooded pony. But she had already taken off and was flying away towards the moon.
Okay, she can fly too. So that just happened. Wait a moment. Overland doesn't have a moon! And none of the celestial bodies in the system have that silvery grey color.
Experience deserialization complete.
Oh, I get it now.
Highest resolution stage reached: 1.89. Personality parameters adjusted.
1.89 is still in nightmare range.
Looking for implementations of IWakeupStateTransitionHandler.
Implementation found.
Calling function.
Transitioning to consciousness process runlevel 3 in
4...
3...
2...
1...
Engage!
I woke up on my soft bed. Pinwheel was standing beside the bed, looking concerned, shaking my shoulders a little. We were still in the small room at Yay Gravel Road. He smiled briefly when he saw my eyes doing their little power-on-self-test animation, and then he said: "So you have had enough experiences to have your first dream, huh?" he frowned and continued "and from what I can tell, it wasn't a good one."
"Pin, you have no idea."
I told him the entirety of the dream. He listened closely throughout.
"Wow, that's pretty packed", he said. But then he smiled "But at least you got a royal audience out of it."
I replied "I was thinking that the hooded pony might have been Luna. But is that even possible? I mean, do spaceplone AIs dream in a way that is compatible with Her Majesty's dream magic so that she can intervene in their nightmares?"
Pinwheel backed away from me defensively as if my doubts were a contagious disease. "Yes! Yes, of course!”, he said emphatically and seemed almost offended that I asked. Then his expression softened and he reassuringly added "All sapient beings do."
I hugged him.