The N.L.R.S.S. Eternity was completely silent
It had been like that for over a century
With two exceptions
Two soldiers entered the airlock one after the other, weapons at the ready. They stood on either side of the doorway and saluted. A pony in a suit passed by them, not giving either of them as much as a glance. He walked through another airlock with the soldiers following closely behind. The room they had entered looked as if someone furnished an ordinary office and then abandoned it for a few decades. Everything was covered in a thick film of dust and dirt. The shelves on the wall were loose and contained a few rotted books and some figurines.
The chair was turned away from the desk. One of the soldiers pushed it lightly and found himself face to face with the remains of the captain. The one in the suit walked up to the corpse and pushed it off nonchalantly. He sat down and rubbed his hooves together. A keyboard emerged from the centre of the hardwood surface. He pushed a button and the shelves opposite the desk moved aside to reveal a screen that covered the entire wall. It flickered for a few seconds before displaying the generic operating system logo. The title flew in from the right side.
“Well, they made these things to last” said the one in the suit “I’ll give ‘em that much”
He clicked the item that read “cctv.exe”. The shelves to the left of the desk moved apart, revealing a console equipped with a multitude of screens. They shot into life from top to bottom, the lowest one broken in. Different sections of the ship appeared on the screens. The suit kept pressing a button that cycled the cameras until he found the one he was looking for. It was the camera on the third floor, B section of A wing, positioned right next to the elevators.
The screen displayed a red and white haired pony sitting opposite of the elevator doors. The suit gestured to one of the soldiers. He clacked his rear hooves together and saluted once again.
“Look here” said the suit, pointing at the display “Her. She’s the problem. Find her and kill her”
“Yes sir” replied the soldier. He motioned over to his buddy and they walked out of the office. The suit took a cigar out of his breast pocket and lit it. He fixed his eyes onto the display once again.
“Your time is running out, miss Skye.”
***
Aeris had been sitting in front of the elevators for the last two hours now, not moving, just silently staring into the black abyss of death. Occasionally she would move, wiping the tears from her eyes. The corpse had been observing her all this time. She wanted to help everyone. She wanted to save everyone but she was too late. Exactly a century too late. Aeris turned her back to the elevator, her head resting against the cold metal wall. The hallways felt even larger than usual in the darkness. Another tear fell from her eyes. She felt hopeless, adrift, alone.
A few drones flew overhead, examining the hull for signs of damage. One of them perched itself on a ledge above Aeris’s head and started welding something. She let out a small sigh, startling the robot. Its sensors hastily scanned her blue body. Something not unlike a clipboard popped out of the drone, sets of small electronic eyes reading the data on it. There was an anomaly in the strings of code that went up and down the screen. One of the sensors had picked up a heartbeat, something that hasn’t happened in over thirty years. The drone decided to investigate.
The whirr of its tiny gravitational engines alarmed Aeris, making her jump slightly. The robot beeped excitedly at the sudden outburst of activity. It flew to the left and beeped pleasantly after it found out that Aeris followed it with her eyes. The same thing occurred when it made a small loop. Soon, the silver robot was darting around and beeping ecstatically. It was happy. It felt happy.
She extended her hoof towards the blubbering machine and gave it a soft stroke. The sliver ailerons that kept it airborne moved up and down as it produced a mechanical purr. Aeris smiled. She really needed a friend and this robot was the next best thing.
“Hey little guy, wanna help me?” the little metallic shape bobbed its optics, nodding in agreement “Can you get rid of that corpse over there?”
Aeris pointed at the pile of bones in the elevator cabin. It was horrible. The robot hovered over to the corpse, its sensors examining it for a few seconds. A green light emerged from its body, engulfing the pile of bones. Slowly, they began falling apart and disappearing into a fine dust. Finally, it faded completely. Aeris got up and walked over to the elevator doors. She ran a hoof over the robot’s body as a reward. The little machine buzzed and moved aside as she pushed the button marked “Bridge”. She waved the robot goodbye and it waved back.
The little drone went back to work, all the while happily beeping to itself.
***
Aeris was now alone in the elevator cabin, silently watching the numbers fly by on the display above the door. She resigned herself to a quiet journey, her mind idly calculating something. Her fillyhood came to mind once again.
She remembered what her father told her when she had come back from her first day at school. It was a sunny day in early June. Aeris was sitting on the patio; the afternoons were spent sipping lemonade and watching the Eternity come together over the shipyards in the far west. The ship was so large that they literally built it in the sky. It overshadowed the industrial zones of New Rome.
Her father sat down next to her and took a sip of his beer. He stretched and turned to Aeris, giving her a little kiss on the forehead.
“Your first day in school. I can’t believe it, honey” His voice was filled with love and affection “Soon, you’ll go to college and have kids of your own”
He turned and looked deep into her magenta eyes. She felt love like never before. It surrounded her, it cradled her, it took her to a place only they knew of. The words he spoke next she would remember for as long as she lived.
“You are destined for great things, Aeris”
“Great things”