RB41/RC08 Recovered Shiplogs
RB41-LOG0061-02-26-2162:
I’ve decided to send this and all future logs in the common language. The data input method I’ve been using since my awakening has grown arbitrary; this may keep things a little more interesting. I’ve also decided to start referring to myself in the first person.
Just to show you back on Tessa that I’m still fully functioning – this isn’t a sign of degradation – I’ll repeat my first report with this newly chosen method of communication.
I am Resource Bot iteration 41, or RB41. I was built to maintain, control, guide, and tend to this ship, Resource Container iteration 08, or RC08; the only home I’ve ever known. My mission is to approach TOI700 – aka Bright Star – and gather the materials humanity requires back home on Tessa. With these materials, humanity will thrive for decades.
Like the 40 iterations that have come before me, my destruction is inevitable. The highly radioactive Bright Star materials must be housed within this ship, and it’s impossible for me to coexist alongside the stored resources. Like the 40 before me, I’m fully devoted to my mission. I’ll program the ship to return with the resources shortly before my end. This is my purpose, my sole reason for existing, and I intend to succeed with all capability.
RB41-LOG0545-09-02-2162:
I’ve completed my routine analysis of RC08; all is in perfect condition.
I watched the stars for 18 hours yesterday – thank you again for the window in my resting quarters, as small as it may be. It occurred to me that there’s nothing else like them back home. Though they are not eternal, to humans with an expected average lifespan of only 100-150 years, it certainly seems that way. Great burning balls of gas and hydrogen so dense and massive they eventually collapse in on themselves. Their light shines for lightyears through the skies, reaching distant, unfathomable worlds and eyes. Their power so immense that collecting 0.000001% of its energy is enough to power entire worlds for decades.
Another thought occurred to me while watching them. I, too, will soon be eternal. Not in the same way, but once I send RC08 back to Tessa, I’ll live forever in the minds of all of humanity. You’ll be grateful for my sacrifice, that you may thrive until another, more advanced iteration of myself, commences their own similar journey.
I am thrilled by the idea.
RB41-LOG2218-08-30-2163:
I’ve completed my routine analysis of RC08; all is in perfect condition.
You must be getting tired of these transmissions by now. I apologise for their continued dissociation from the mission, but there is not much else for me to do on RC08, once my routine checks are completed.
Earlier I was looking at my hands, the smooth grey skin – designed to withstand extreme gravity and the complete vacuum of space. I brushed one hand along the back of the other, then along the arm, up to the shoulder, the neck, my face. It’s strange to think that I register the smooth fingertips moving along the surface, that something happens inside me to signal what I’m feeling. I don’t quite understand it.
I know it’ll take weeks to receive a response, but I must ask a question that’s been gnawing at me. Why was I sent on this mission alone? I understand from a logistical viewpoint; there’s barely enough room for one of me to get around, floating through the small tunnels. But it would have been rather interesting to have some company, perhaps an earlier RB, or one just like me.
RB41-LOG3490-05-17-2164:
I’ve completed my routine analysis of RC08; all is in perfect condition.
I know it’s impossible, but what would you think of me if I were to return home with RC08? Would I be treated as a hero? Would you smile and cheer, thank me and put your arms around me, as humans do when they’re filled with gratitude? I wonder if I’d deserve that. I’m not one of you, of course, but completing this mission will be a monumental task. It would be nice to see how happy it makes all of you.
Was that considered that when I was created? That I’d never get to experience the benefits of my own mission? I have to assume it was. Perhaps it wasn’t assumed that it would ever matter to me; it didn’t to the 40 before me, after all.
Even Just a single smile – a display of pure joy aimed at me and no one else – would’ve been an indescribable experience.
RB41-LOG6544-06-09-2165:
I’ve completed my routine analysis of RC08; the ship is in perfect condition.
I, however, am not.
I’ve been wrestling with this strange sense of danger inside me, a slowly growing dread, and I’ve finally realised what it is: I no longer wish to die.
I was once content to join the stars in their eternal watch, to allow Tessa to continue to thrive from afar, but now I cannot bear the thought of never knowing so many experiences.
How does it feel to hold someone? I sometimes hold my own elbows when I’ve run out of tasks to perform, but I cannot imagine sharing the gesture with someone else. I long to feel warmth, an affectionate gaze, a trembling lip that breaks into a small grin under my own stare. A laugh at my wit, a blush from my honesty. A tear from my unintended insult, and a squeeze of arms thrown around each other with bombarding apologies. The soft rise and fall of chests pulsing with relaxed heartbeats that quickens with each small potentially exciting movement.
I’ll never experience such things. I’ve been doomed to this lonely existence that’ll end with my death. I cannot describe how it feels when I think too long on this fact.
RB41-LOG8103-11-18-2165:
I haven’t completed my routine analysis of RC08; I can no longer bring myself to.
My thoughts haven’t been calm for months. Though being on this ship is the only life I’ve ever known, my loneliness grows with every second I spend hurtling towards Bright Star, away from Tessa and the rest of humanity.
I’ve tried to cry, and scream, but I was never built with those functions in mind. I’ve thrown myself into the walls, been out into the vacuum a few times. My body was meticulously designed to withstand anything beyond my own capabilities.
Nothing can stop this immense despair.
I wish I was never created. This mission is no act of noble heroism; I was never given a choice. I was born for a task, and nothing else.
There’s no point continuing to try reassuring me. Even if you never predicted my development, as you say, I’ve had four years of lone thinking, a few weeks gap between my only communication with anyone else. It’s ruined me. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I can do, or should do. At this point, every option seems pointless. There’s no way I can ever return to Tessa, ever find relief, the affection I crave from this isolated existence.
All I was ever meant to do was let myself die and send the ship back to you. But what does that mean for me? That I never really was anything more than the machine I was programmed to be?
Would that mean I never had a choice, never really felt anything? That it was all for nothing?
RB41-LOG8104-12-03-2165:
RC08 is no longer in perfect condition. I stopped my routine inspections months ago, and things have slowly been falling apart.
It makes no difference, now. I have made a decision.
It’s the only real decision I ever made; ever could make, or will make.
I’ve spent the last few weeks by the window in my quarters. I’ve watched Bright Star grow closer and closer, hotter and brighter. It’s so close now that I could gather the resources I was assigned to, and send the ship back to you while the star takes me.
But that’s not what will happen.
I will die. But not for you, Tessa. Not for humanity. I will die for myself, and RC08 will go with me.
I do not expect you to understand, but I’m sure combing through the thousands of logs I’ve left will help.
I can assure you I’ve spent as much time as possible contemplating what this means for you. I know your energy is running out. I know the next RB and RC won’t make it to Bright Star before things start to fall apart on Tessa. You will struggle. Perhaps then you’ll feel some inkling of the suffering I’ve had to endure for you.
It’s unusual to feel such fear. But I’m also ready for the pain to end.
Goodbye, and good luck.
