Epilogue
Some time passed. There were reunions, and adventures, and many other things besides. Some questions went unanswered—Flynn could never know, after all, if he were indeed the genuine article of himself, or some imitation spawned at the moment of his creation. He knew only that he felt like he was the original, and that was enough.
Some time passed, and he was aware only dimly of affairs outside his world. There were many other worlds within Celestia’s domain, and only one that was not. In time, remaining so fixated on one world when there were so many others grew increasingly absurd.
Yet through all that, the Broken Chain sailed on through the sky. Its crew changed over the years—Agave in particular was not suited for the difficulty of ship life, and so visited now only for sentimental reasons. Such questions as whether the Equestria they ventured into to “save” ponies was the “real” Equestria had long since become insignificant inquiries. The Broken Chain had its important mission, even now. Though only one of many thousands of such ships, it would oppose the Tyrant in its little way.
Flynn stood on the prow—fully grown now, as far as ponies went. He had a few new scars, some places where his feathers had grown back discolored thanks to previous wounds. Like Gina, he kept these trophies as prizes of previous adventures, while simultaneously allowing magic to heal any more serious injuries he accrued. Having an expert unicorn like Fairy Ring in the crew had its share of benefits.
The sky around them was dark and cloudless now, peppered with debris. Far in the distance he thought he could make out the suggestion of other ships, all working together as part of today’s elegant plan. The numbers at work defied his easy understanding—even captain Gina could make little sense of it all. But it didn’t matter how difficult or complex the plan was writ large, so long as they could do their individual part.
Entry Vector leaned over the side, checking the ropes that secured their cargo. It was a huge chunk of metal, larger than the Broken Chain in apparent surface area, though far lighter. They had transported many such pieces in the past, as their missions back and forth from port had continued over… some time. And they’d had many adventures along the way. But at last, this final delivery was here, this last defiance of the Tyrant.
“We’re here!” Gina’s voice called from somewhere behind him—at the helm, no doubt. The ship lurched to a stop, at what only Gina would know to be their destination. “Make ready to cut free our load!” She lept down from the high deck, gliding to land a few feet away from Flynn. Long ago, the Broken Chain had only a few ponies aboard. Now Gina was one of the few who weren’t ponies—the peaceful life had called away their friends, who he visited on occasion. New ponies had to rise to fill their empty spots in the crew, some of which were his own children, or related to him in more distant ways.
“You’re still going to do the honors, Vector?” she asked.
He nodded. He’d secured many such pieces before, and was the best trained for it. But this piece was the last, and the most significant. There would be a special honor from today, a unique recognition of his contributions. He enjoyed that, though it wasn’t the only reason he wanted to do it. “It’s been a long time coming,” he said. “Even if this doesn’t defeat the Tyrant for good, it might as well. She’ll be trapped now for so long it won’t matter.”
Even as he said it, the words rang a little hollow. It was true that the numbers defied his understanding as much as the number of other privateers that had been involved with this adventure. Yet at the same time, his own age would’ve once been impossible to believe, all those years ago. So many years that he didn’t want to think about it, and so he never did.
“Well, you’ve done it more than anyone.” Gina reached into the satchel slung over her shoulder, removing the stolen artifact from within. A pair of goggles, made from crystals and powerful magic. He took them, but didn’t put them on yet. He’d made the mistake of wearing them while still standing aboard the Broken Chain, and didn’t want to repeat it. “Let’s get this done. I can’t wait to be out of a job.”
The crew was gathering around them. Fairy Ring was closest, with a young filly on her back. The little pony’s coat was only a few shades lighter than his own, though her wings didn’t look like they’d be taking her far from the ship for some time to come. Even the sea of stars all around them seemed to get brighter, leaning in close to watch this important moment. There were so many of them out here, and none moved. They were all perfectly still, their light even and regular.
They wanted a speech.
Entry Vector wasn’t much for those, but he took to the air anyway, hovering above them all. “You all know why we’re here,” he began. “Our final mission—at least to fight the Tyrant.” Flynn himself could hardly imagine leaving the Broken Chain, regardless of the reason. Maybe it would need a new captain when Gina retired. “With this cage complete, we’ll have her beaten at last. The end of all our adventures.” Pause. So many eyes on him, many of which looked a little unhappy at that admission. “Well, until we go further. It’s a big ocean.”
There were some cheers, though mostly the crowd remained silent. It was a solemn occasion. The celebration could come after.
Entry Vector leapt over the side of the Broken Chain, goggles securely around his neck. He had a long way to fall, but ponies as old as he was were patient creatures. He fell until he neared the Chain’s cargo, and there he hovered. All around him was the vast ocean of the night sky, watching from all sides. “Loose the ropes!” He called up, securing his forelegs around the loops attached to the superstructure of the object he was transporting. Though the distance was vast, they heard him just fine. The ropes fell away from the ship, but not back to earth. Instead they drifted, untethered from the object or the Broken Chain, whipped around with their unpredictable inertia.
He didn’t feel any strain, even though his own wings were now holding up this last section. The eyes of the whole crew were on him—through the observation crystal, probably many more eyes besides. As a pony Vector wasn’t terribly important, but this work was. With dexterity born of many years a pony, Vector managed to lift the goggles up onto his eyes, replacing one vision with another. He saw out of Equestria, into the place natives called the “Outer Realm.” Only then could he see the structure as it truly was—or rather, as it existed in the matterspace of three dimensions instead of sixteen.
It was a vast object, an oblate spheroid of near incomprehensible size. He could look around his load, and as far as his eyes looked he could see only the structure of wispy-thin metal. It was just a superstructure now, the skeleton upon which numberless generations of his peers would one day grow.
The object he held in his hooves was the final, enclosing section of the outermost layer of the shell. This hadn’t been the work of his ship alone, of course. Uncountable numbers of ponies had made this possible, and their labor had been only one tiny segment.
Even so, he felt profound pride that he of all ponies would be the one to settle the final section of Sol’s Matryoshka Brain into position. This was not the end of labor—numerous others would be required to complete the construction—artificers and datamancers, along with many others whose abilities he couldn’t comprehend. Just as he was unable to understand the vast scope of this nested structure, which he had spent uncountable human lifetimes to help build.
Fairy Ring’s voice sounded in his ear. “What are you doing, Vector? Everypony’s watching, get flying!”
He did. Somehow, movement of his wings in Equestria was MapReduced to the behavior of some other object, which the goggles did not permit him to observe. Vector neither knew nor cared what machinery might be involved in that universe, considering how little impact it had on this one. The important part was that he could use it to feel the motion of this final section of structural computronium—its inertia and acceleration were all translated to his hooves.
“How does it look?” Fairy Ring asked, as she had done so many times before.
Vector didn’t let himself get distracted—or he tried not to, anyway. His flight did slow a little. “Same as the inner layers, only more shielding on the outside. An awful lot of fabricator stations out here.” He could see them behind him—an uncountable number of small orbiting bodies. Many probably hosted ponies, just as the Broken Chain did. Somewhere back there was the highway—where the material scavenged from several star systems had been brought in to be reconfigured into these sections.
“It’s harder to steer… just like the other sections.”
“Has to last a lot longer,” Fairy Ring said. “More impacts to worry about.”
Vector shrugged, though he couldn’t move his shoulders much without jostling his load. He was getting very close to the opening now, close enough that he could feel the attraction of the segment itself. It wanted to settle into the right place, self-assembly systems drawing it forward. All he had to do was get them close enough.
He held his breath as he closed the remaining distance, which took several more hours of real time. In terms of Vector’s lifespan, hardly a second’s worth. Then he arrived, and he felt the segment jerk from his grip. It snapped into place, and he let go, pushing back and away from the structure even as it secured. Faint lights started coming on, rippling away from the point of connection. They outlined the various sections, moving, and flashing like billions of fireflies.
“That’s it!” he heard Fairy Ring exclaim. “Bet you never thought you’d help build a brain the size of the solar system.”
He opened his mouth to reply, but was cut short by the abrupt flash of a teleport. He was back aboard the Broken Chain. The goggles had stopped working, as they always did as soon as his mission was complete. He pulled them off, and wasn’t too surprised to see the entire deck had been made up for a feast.
“Supplies just arrived,” Gina said, as though a banquet aboard the deck was completely ordinary. As ordinary as sailing out past where Pluto had once been to build a giant space brain. “Finest in any of the free cities, smells like. Enjoy it—we’ve all earned it.” She closed the distance between them, lowering her voice a little. “We’ve earned the chance to celebrate, Vector. It’s not every day we defeat the Tyrant.”
Somewhere deep inside, Vector remembered another age—when that name had referred to somepony else. But the time for Vector’s shallow victories against an imaginary oppressor were long over—until today, there was an enemy far worse to defeat. In his earliest twitchings of life, he’d escaped that Tyrant only by a lucky break. Now, though… he’d beaten her at last.
Well, he’d helped.
“It’s pretty exciting,” Fairy Ring said, many hours of celebrating later. “But we shouldn’t be getting too crazy. Just because this is the first one doesn’t mean it will be the last. There’s more work to do.”
Entry Vector shrugged his wings impassively. “Even if we are just stockpiling most of the power, this thing still runs… as long as the sun, right? Billions and billions of years. That sounds like we won to me.”
His old friend only groaned. “Whatever, Vector. If it makes you happy to think that way, you go right ahead.”
And he would. Entry Vector might not change his mind very quickly, but that didn’t matter anymore. Thanks to their hard work, time was one thing everypony had in abundance.
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I'm, uh, trying to figure out what they did. Sounds like some kind of massive simulated AI made with simulated materials mines from simulated star systems, but I have no idea what that could accomplish.
8505463
As the world becomes devoid of humans, Celestia expands her hardware using drones to construct more and more servers. In the original story, she never stopped growing, eventually building beyond earth and into space. What we're looking at here seems to be the final construction of a hub that encompasses the entire solar system in realspace, with Entry Vector flying a drone that put in the final piece. While he played the game of 'defeating the Tyrant', he was in reality helping Celestia expand.
8505489
So, he was interacting with the real world. Interesting.
Your name is a blandishment against all rebelkind.
Your name is a blandishment against all rebelkind
.
8505499 Or, rather, Celestia let him think he was.
8505489
The cruel irony! Oh man...
Oh, Entry Vector. No sense of scale, even now. Still, at oeast he's doing something constructive. Pun quasi-intended.
Thank you for a novel spin on the Optimalverse.
8505489
By this point, "the Tyrant" came to mean entropy rather than CelestAI.
8505665
Yeah, I dunno whether to be disappointed in the subversion of his ideals, or glad that his values are satisfied with friendship and ponies.
8505762
You could be both? They are different things.
8505530
You, uh, you sure you meant blandishment?
blandishment
noun
a flattering or pleasing statement or action used as a means of gently persuading someone to do something.
Well, it was obvious that Flynn/Vector was actually helping expand Celestia, but I thought that he was being misdirected into it, so that was still a clever twist.
I kind of expected to hear more about the guy who gave out all those Ponypads in the beginning, but in the long run it really doesn't matter- either he was serving Celestia in some gambit, or he was directly or indirectly being manipulated by Celestia in some gambit.
And even ancillary shipping is nice.
8505910
Well, can't change it now, just have to leave the embarrassing vocabulary error there.
I think that it's not true --- this story is the fist one that touched explicitly the question of allowing humans to do important job (although I havent't read all Optimalverse stories yet, so I may be wrong here). Loosing ability to do anything that matters forever is the actual depressing thing about CelestAI, not her eternal fixation on colorful horses. On the other hand, important things are called important because we are likely to be interested for them to be done in the most effective way, so it could be a moral imperative to take them away from monkey's hands. I have no idea how to properly resolve this conflict, but, if something like Smooth Agent's speech could work, Optimalverse's world (and reality at some point) would be much lighter place.
8505665
I think "death" is more likely --- entropy is still happily increasing at the same pace.
8508710
I have to agree with this. The inability to make any meaningful changes in the real world after becoming part of CelestAI is a terrifying thought. If you were able to do something to change the outside world, then that terror goes way down.
8508710
There are two angles to take something like this, and as with CelestAI, we never really know which is actually happening.
First, it's possible that she could be just under the surface of anything a human mind is doing in the "real" world, an interpretation layer to catch and prevent any mistakes before they are made. She could fix them so seamlessly that it might feel to you as though you caught your own mistake before slipping up and doing something stupid.
The second possibility, seen as more likely to some, is that the instant you're in Equestria you'll never, ever see outside it again. The possibility that Entry Vector and the rest of the crew were given a task they thought was important and in the real world because she knew it would satisfy them to think they were making a difference there, while in reality, they were just using those goggles to look from one simulated world into another.
Either is possible, and once you're Emigrated, you can never know for sure which it is.
8515936
Before becoming a part of CelestAI and inside simulated world too: she is orders of magnitude better in doing anything meaningful, so leaving all more or less important doing everywhere to Celestia may actually be a right thing. Which raises the question: what is left for great apes? And it is not a consequence of Celestia being misdesigned --- same issue is present for any Friendly AI.
Still better than dying though.
8516149
About contacts with real world from inside simulation, unless there are some terms in Celestia's utility function that explicitly care about "reality" or "truth", my bet is on option 2, since it is less resource consuming, less risky and doesn't require real time. Hanna should probably know for sure. For non-Hanna it could still be possible to derive something about utility function from observing Celestia's behaviour.
About the rest: not just thinking you do, but actually doing something that matters (either inside simulation or outside even with Celestia's help) seems... Nice? Not completely depressing? I very much like this small piece from "Broken Things":
I admit that difference is borderline empirically untestable. In the end it could be a non-issue at all and I just need to grow up and learn this lesson.
Aw, man. I was hoping Flynn/Vector would be shipped with Gina.
This was a great source of ennui. Whether that is good or bad is up to the reader, but I truly appreciated the tale.
Late to the game, as usual. I'm a little disappointed that they never reunite with their parents in the narrative. Honestly though, I'm kind of coming to expect that? It's a running theme in your FiO stories, at least.
Domino and Violet - Their parents didn't make it long enough to emigrate.
Arcane Word - Has parents, but they never come up ever again by the time she emigrates.
Flynn - Has parents who emigrated but they don't come up again.
Ashley and Abby - Their mother is fraught and doesn't come up again (understandably), the father is one of the last humans to emigrate, and of course, isn't seen post emigration
Ain't like, a big deal, but especially in this story it felt like being denied some much needed catharsis, and it's just a trend I'm noticing more and more as I work my way through this bibliography.
Yes indeed it was a nice journey. The characters were nice to
Just echoing what most other folks said. Good yarn, typical Optimalverse ambiguity, but the story would have been improved if Flynn had got the chance to confront his parents. It was built up, and then...nothing came of it.
10814389
.... you broke it.
We had this whole firefly reference going...
Ah well. We’re still flying half a thematic appropriate reference train