Interruptions
“Hey mom, how’s things going on back home?” I asked with a warm smile as I sat in front of my desk’s holographics. “I can’t imagine things with Tara have gotten any easier, have they?”
“Hey sweetie. No, Tara’s still misbehaving but what else would you expect from a two year old? She is showing signs of enhanced intelligence though, so maybe we’ll get a second superstar in the family, huh?” mom replied with a sigh and a hand on her forehead, sitting back from her own desk in the image to show off the blurry details of the house I used to call home. “How’s your trip going?”
“Well, I woke up again and this time I found myself crashed on an unregistered planet! The details of the crash are really strange and I haven’t been able to go through the data, but I should be getting to a point in building shit here to come up with something to do all that with.” I dropped my chin to my chest and crossed my arms to rest them on the desk before me.
“That’s great honey! Oh, you’re making us all so proud with what you’ve accomplished! We all love and miss you dearly!” Mom squealed with enthusiasm and sat forward to place a pair of fingers against the camera/my monitor. I did the same and placed my own two fingers against my mothers while a tear crept out from the corner of my eyes and shut down the desk’s holographics. I was never one for goodbyes, after all.
“Excuse me?” Luna’s voice broke the new temporary silence from outside my door. I drew in a heavy breath, sucking in the remnants of emotion and wiped my face off on my t-shirt. A quick check from the camera showed that I still had the physical evidence of starting to cry in the form of puffy red eyes. Shaking my head to clear my mind, I approached the door and unlocked the door.
The door slid open to reveal Luna, still in a similar outfit from yesterday/last night, sitting just away from the door to let me step out and pull in a breath of air again.
“Are… are you alright?” Luna’s eyebrows furrowed at the sight of my condition and stood to hesitantly approach me. “Did something happen?”
“N- no. I’m fine. Was just talking with my parents. It’s been over three hundred years, after all. I’ve never actually gotten a chance to talk with any of them till now.” I explained and leaned against the doorframe once it’d closed behind me. I wrapped an arm around my stomach, crossed a leg over the other and rested my face in my hand to hide my shame.
“I understand, the emptiness of being able to interact with your family is soul crushing; especially after more than three centuries of being apart.” Luna offered in a low and sincere tone of voice. She sat back on her haunches enough to lift both forelegs and hold them open. “Can I offer a consolatory hug? I can’t imagine that it would be the same as hugging your family, but i’ve been told I have very comfortable fur.”
I chuckled to myself and dropped my risen hand to my folded arm and looked up at Luna. A moment of consideration and I pushed off from the steel frame and spread my on arms wide to wrap them around Luna’s neck. She, in return, wrapped her forelegs around my back gently, careful not to risk squashing me or my exo-frame.
“Thanks Luna, I appreciate it.” I sighed, pulling free from the pony and collected myself. “Your friends are right though, you have very soft fur.”
“Thank you, I take pride in my coat.” Luna grinned and fluffed herself up a bit more as she landed on her forehooves to sit normally. “So, what are we doing today?”
“First, we have to set up the Processing Facilities. Without those, nothing else gets done. I’m going to get suited and lay out the mouth of the mine for the ponies to get started on while you finish welding the Refinery. After you’re done that, I want you to join me and help break ground.” I announced and stretched, having put the thoughts of family aside for later so I could get back to work. Of course being a certified Space Engineer meant that I would lose everyone I’d ever known since I was expected to go on exploratory or combat missions for centuries, but in place of that sacrifice my entire family and later generations would be well taken care of by the Galactic Alliance for the rest of their lives until I died and my death was registered.
“I’ve actually been thinking, if I may be so bold to suggest a thing,” Luna remarked, standing up to retrieve her pink welder from the confines of her magic. “But the Refinery and Assembler, being directly tied together, would soon run out of cargo space to hold materials and resources, would they not? I believe we should detour the processed materials into a large cargo container before it’s pulled into service by the Assemblers. Doing so will also allow for further expansion of the Production facility as the mining operation grows on.”
“You have a point, I suppose. No guarantee that we’ll be using materials as fast as they’re being produced.” I agreed and retreated into my room while leaving the door open as I began the process of suiting up in the Worker suit and it’s exo-frame.
Twisting my helmet into place and letting my entire suit pressurize, “Your welder will have been updated with my current pattern list. It’ll be much more cluttered and kind of hard to navigate, but it should have what you’re looking for. Feel free to make the appropriate changes to the Facility as you see fit.” I was joined at the Airlock out for a moment while Luna gave a giggling salute as she saw me out before heading to work.
“Okay…” I groaned with a heavy breath and set off trudging to my left to the stone wall I was going to punch into.
Good morning sir! A pony who looked like he’d already just stepped out of a coal mine announced, turning to address me from behind a large barrier of yellow tape tied between large poles. There was the framework for what looked like a massive mine entrance already laying nearby, likely something for ponies to do while they waited to breach the mountain. Its an honour to get to meet something like yourself.
“Sure, sure.” I replied, the suit translating to the Griffic Language. “Let’s get started. I’m going to lay out the dimensions of the mine entrance for you guys. After that, we’ll all begin punching in and getting started. Hopefully Princess Luna will join us and give us magical assistance.” I announced over the loudspeakers as my suit retrieved my drill for me. Giving an approximation to where the Ore Collector should theoretically pop out in the wall, I pressed the chisel bit to the stone and blew a chunk out in one go.
Activating my jetpack, I began tracing a line upwards a good hundred meters before coming to a hover and beginning a horizontal travel; dragging the drill through the ground as I did so. Checking my distance so far, I continued on for another couple hundred meters across before coming to a temporary stop and beginning the descent again.
Hitting the ground, I deactivated my jetpack and drill, setting the drill aside for a moment as I stepped back to preview the future mine entrance.
I was not expecting a hole that big! The mine operator pony announced, whistling aloud as he held a hoof to his hard hat that had a massive spotlight attached to its front.
“It’s actually a bit smaller than the mines i’ve seen on Jupiter’s moons. The ones i’m used to are easily nine or ten times as big to permit the mining machines they used.” I replied and shrugged at the size, figuring it’d be enough for the lack of massive mining equipment we didn’t have. At least, not for now.
Celestia’s hide, you creatures are ever more remarkable than I’d imagined. Machines ten times larger than even that hole to mine, we could tear through this entire mountain in a single go! The stallion chuckled to himself, the act of doing so remaining untranslated. I don’t suppose you’d happen to be able to build any such machines, could you?
I looked down at the inquiring pony and chuckled to myself. While I certainly didn’t have any such blueprint, I did however have my training and imagination as a Space Engineer.
“No, I don’t. Sorry.” I announced and turned to address the growing mass of ponies at the barrier. “Attention! The mine entrance has been laid out before you!” I broadcasted with arms wide welcomingly. “Grab whatever equipment you need, let’s get digging!”
With shouts of eagerness and the stampede aiming for their homes to collect their gear, I set to temporary work with the nearby construction ponies trying to erect the light scaffolding system that would keep the mine entrance constantly lit 24/7 by welding their joints while they held the pieces up.
A handful of minutes later, give or take ten, and the entire workforce all appeared in their hard hats and mounted with picks on their shoulders. A lone pegasis approached me with what looked like a stick of dynamite on his flanks, looking eager to begin.
Sir, might I suggest the use of controlled explosives to clear the stone away and let the ponies get at the ores that much faster? He suggested with an eager and slightly disturbing grin. I just hoped he wasn’t as unstable as the mark on his flanks represented.
“After the ceremonial breaking of ground, might as well. I suppose you’ll be doing the blasting?”
I am well known for my explosive personality, so yes. The pony grinned wider before dipping his head in a quick bow to trot off to collect his gear. I shrugged and turned to the assembled workforce all waiting to put steel to stone.
“Alright ponies!” I shouted, drawing everyone’s attention as I eventually got myself to the head of the masses to address everyone. “Today marks the largest mining project in your history! Today marks the beginning of your struggle to survive and to flourish! Your hard work here in coming months will help secure your futures as a race, your families futures and the futures of further generations! The ore you mine out will become the life blood in your survival and will help guarantee you a place among the stars!” I shouted, feeling like I should have some kind of background music going to further enhance the feels I was trying to form. The crowd in front of me seemed to have gotten the idea from my weak attempts at a speech and thrust their various mining equipment above their heads with shouts and stamping of approval.
“Today, we embark on the rest of our lives!” I shouted and turned to the stone face to place the tip of my drill against the stone. Behind me, the entire herd of ponies joined me and set themselves poised to strike the stone. “For your future, for your race!” I shouted and hit the tip against the stone, blowing the chunk out of the surface as the axes created their crescents and tips struck stone all in perfect cohesion.
A massive bout of cheering behind the ponies and I turned me towards an even larger mass of ponies as they celebrated; probably their families as they congratulated their loved ones on this milestone.
With the ponies smiling away and congratulating each other as they retreated from the wall, I returned to my shack in the side of the mountain to check on Luna’s progress while the dynamite pony got himself set up.
“Hello, how goes things?” I asked as I strolled into the small station, following the sound of Luna cursing out her work followed by the sound of something heavy dropping and even more cursing.
“I’ll be damned if this cargo unit doesn’t kill me before I finish welding it!” Luna announced angrily as she pulled herself out from under the massive Azimuth cargo pod sticking out of the wall. She’d still have to hook it up to the conveyer system but it looked like it was progressing fairly nicely. “How’s things out there?”
“Officially broke ground so now we’re waiting on a demolitions pony to set up explosive charges to get us further along.” I sighed and leaned against the back wall while Luna righted herself to continue working. Turning her back to me, I watched her work with frustration as she worked at continuing a weld while her tail lightly swished behind her. I pushed off the wall and retrieved my own welder, opting to join in and make the process go faster.
“Careful on that joint there, you’re putting too much strain on the welder.” I warned and set the tip of my own welder to work. Since the materials were all already in place, it was just a case of welding the parts into each other and as such, I wasn’t suffering the strange lapses of time caused by blackouts.
“Like this?” Luna lightened up and hazarded a quick look over to me for approval while I finished my own joint.
“Little lighter. It should sit only a few millimeters away from the surface you’re trying to weld. If it’s dragging, then it’s too close.” I replied and lowered my welder to watch Luna work.
“Could you show me?” Luna smirked to her side, away from where I could see but I could still notice the light turn of her lips. “Hop onto my back.”
With a mild shrug, I did as requested and climbed up onto the princesses back to wrap my arms around her neck and move the welder held in her magic. Lifting it just off the surface, I let Luna’s blue aura surrounding it do the rest once I’d gotten it into position.
“There you go, that should do it.” I announced, sitting back before climbing down off my friend’s back.
From the main hall, the sound of something crashing to the floor told me that not only had another pony entered my space but was now destroying my property.
“I’ll be right back.” I sighed and put my tools away, letting Luna work on her own while I met with the newcome- The room was empty.
“Hello?” I called out in Griffic, checking my room for any intruders but found the door remained locked as I’d set it. Perusing the rest of the main room, I found the object that had crashed to the floor and shattered on the metal: the crystal vase that Celestia had brought in for the flower arrangement last night. “Is someone in here?” I called out again.
Expanding my cone of view to encompass the possibility that the intruder was somehow on the ceiling, I thoroughly checked the entire room but found it otherwise empty save for Luna and I.
Connecting to the airlock terminal, I checked it’s log to see when the last time it was used was but the strangest thing was that it was when I had entered. With a click of the tongue, I retreated from the room and rejoined Luna whose head was stuck into the cargo container itself while she completed another weld.
“Who was it?” she asked, her voice echoing from the expanse within the cargo space.
“No one, that’s the strange thing.” I remarked and remained by the door, just in case it happened again and I could respond quicker.
“Could have been just a breeze that blew whatever it was off where it sat, right?” Luna suggested as she lifted her forelegs up and into the container to get deeper in.
“Not likely, it was the crystal vase that your sister brought last night that was sitting in the middle of the table. It would’ve had to have been quite the breeze to push it all the way off.” I replied and sighed, dropping my chin to my chest.
The sudden sound of flesh being slapped and the followed yelp from Luna had her extract herself from the tube rather quickly while her tail covered her rear.
“I am surprised, I didn’t think you were the type!” Luna chuckled nervously and made the noticeable attempts at keeping her derriere away from me. “But please, at least give me warning before you do that.”
“Do what? I haven’t done anything.” I looked back at her in confusion before removing my helmet to hang it on my hip.
“But, did you not just slap my rump? It certainly felt like a hand than a hoof.” Luna stared at me in confusion comparable to my own. The same sound of a slap and another yelp from Luna had her scurry away from where she stood, taking up a defensive position near to me as she could get. “There it was again! I do not appreciate it!”
“No kidding, I don’t blame you.” I grumbled back as my suit retrieved my rifle for me, arming me as my eyes searched the area. “Whoever is in here with us, identify yourself!” I commanded and hit the button to close the door behind us. Sweeping the barrel of the weapon over the limited space, the two lights above us began to flicker uncharacteristically before the light against the back wall shut off entirely.
“What’s going on?” Luna whispered up at me as her eyes searched the darkness with mine. I flicked on my suit lights just as the second light flickered off entirely. “Who’s doing this?”
“I don’t know.” I whispered back as the lights illuminated the back wall before swinging left, then right. Swinging back left, a shadow briefly was cast against the wall and disappeared again before I could properly zero in on it. Since we couldn’t quite make it out, we couldn’t tell if it was pony or human in nature but since the light was ahead of the both of us, we knew for certain that the shadow wasn’t caused by Luna or I. “We’re not alone in here.”
“...she… goes…” a faint whisper echoed in the room, emanating from everywhere and nowhere all at once. “... I… Stay…”
“Who are you? Identify yourself Immediately!” I shouted back before putting a single round into the back wall as a show of force. “Don’t make me come after you or you will be shot!”
“... she… goes… I… Stay… No… Delete…” the whisper replied, making Luna take a fearful step backwards and behind me.
“Delete? Could it possibly...” Luna whispered back in confusion, her mind likely in the same train as my own.
“No, that would mean that she’d developed into a full AI and has breached her storage unit.” I replied for the sake of my own mind. At the forefront of our vision, directly where the two lights from my suit overlapped, a single entity briefly flashed into shadowy existence with what looked like a hollow cheshire grin.
“...She… goes… Blue one… not… welcome…” The female voice announced through whatever planes of reality it was crossing. It’s very essence seemed to seep into everything and escaped from everywhere all at once, making it impossible to pinpoint a location. I remained vigilant though, and kept my gun trained at the point that the disconnected shadow on the wall had appeared. “He’s… mine… Not leaving… planet… stay…” the voice seemed to wait for an eternity before offering it’s final opinion, “Forever.”
“I wish to leave, now.” Luna announced as her horn fired up with an orb of blue light and shot it off towards the wall as a distraction. I reached back behind me and hit the button to open the door, letting the pony out and quickly followed her out. Hitting the door button again, the shadow reappeared on the farthest back wall with hollow eyes and that evil grin that pierced that walls of sanity in the mind just as the doors closed back up and locked shut.
“We have a problem.” I announced as I lowered my weapon but kept it handy and turned to Luna. “We have a serious problem.”
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1. Open case; check your Power Supply unit.
- Is it a P.O.S? Replace it with a quality Thermaltake or Corsair 700W or greater Unit.
2. Open case; check your Graphics Card.
- Is it seated properly? Pull it out gently and then reseat it.
- Is the GPU fan dusty? Get some compressed air and blow it out.
2. Check software.
- All up to date? If not, update Windows first, then update your Graphics Card Drivers.
- Running any third party software for things like mice, or webcams, etc. Disable it all.
7608493 I know it'll be the PSU. I've already reseated the GPU so that's out and all my software is up to date now. The PSU, however, is approximately three years old now, a 650W. I plan to eventually upgrade it to an 850W when I get some spare change.
Ah... Space engineers... The one game I've always wanted to play, but could never play because my computer is absolute shit.
:( :( :( :(
7608573 Yeah, my computer is showing its age now too...
7608985 means that the ponies know the planet is dying. They don't and wont know specifics until deep earth seismic equipment is constructed to give a full rundown on the situation.
I thought I told you to take out the AI before it went crazy.
7608938
Pulling that as a point would be rather well, dumb, anyways.
Excuse me French, but I don't think comparing Pinkie to her Season One character is a good idea. She's definetly grown past that small childish stage and is growing more and more mature as the seasons go on. So anyone who thinks actually comparing that to this scene is a smart idea has obviously not seen her improve.
I am sick and tired of the AI sub plot. I really am.
7609370 in my defence, I haven't read many stories with an AI subplot, so my apologies.
7609373 Long story short, Mass Effect, Terminator, I-Robot, even Halo all have evil AI's. I prefer the Star Trek version where the AI's are given a minimum of Respect even if they are Second Class citizens, or other stories where they are just people as well. A lot of people people assume AI's will turn evil upon creation, which makes no damn sense, that is like saying a newborn is going to be evil because of it's skin color.
It is just something that is... annoyingly prevalent. I am not trying to degrade your story, it is just something that bugs me anymore.
7609845 Fair enough, but lets keep in mind that because of how early this AI sub-plot actually is, there's no guarantee that it'll follow those same criteria that you've giving for Evil AI. Even forgetting that the only reason why Vinyl is beginning to turn into an evil AI is through a couple reasons: Galactic Law decreeing the immediate destruction of AI and prevention of AI research, as well as the environment Vinyl is suffering through during her development. She's only just waking up as an AI and is developing her opinions and if forming her personal connections, first and foremost being the Pilot whom she's been with, essentially, for over three hundred years. Even if he's been asleep for 297/whatever years, she'd still have come to develop an attachment to him and the sudden arrival of another female entity would undoubtedly create the feelings of jealousy that she is unfamiliar and susceptible to corruption by. I do plan for Vinyl to become a force of good later down the line, even going so far as having Pilot build her her own frame to walk around and interact with the ponies with. In the end of the story, she'll be giving her life up to ensure the safe departure of the ponies.
7610893 god dangit, Spoilers suck
Okay, so this chapter's going to be a bit since I have no idea what's actually going to happen this chapter... Just a heads up.
Vinyl's jelly.
What is Space Engineers?
7620561 It's a sandbox game on Steam where you're in space or on a planet and you can build whatever you want. It's comparable to Minecraft, but with better graphics and in space.
for those who think the vi/ai is crazy I actually thin it is jealous of luna