EVAC//PLUS//3068
Ember6 reboots into malfunctioning consciousness like a drunk waking with a hangover. Every sub-system feels somehow broken or corrupted, and the robot understands it is on its last legs without consulting the litany of fault warnings that clamour for attention.
Gently rolling from a kneeling posture onto its back, Ember6 looks up at the emergency recharge tether. The Hail Mary device did its job of lifting solar panels through the tree cover and into direct sunlight perfectly, but the balloon has been punctured and the lightweight array is now caught within the thin branches of a very tall tree. An exploratory tug on the tether tells Ember6 that it is hopelessly tangled and won’t come free.
We aren’t pulling that down, it says aloud.
“No…” replies COMPUTE. “And the branches are too thin to climb up and get it.”
Ember6 stands, with some difficulty, and walks to a gap in the treeline that offers a view out over the vast Saltuswood Forest. It is an unbroken, undulating landscape formed of a million different shades of green. Wind rolls over the treetops, causing waves of movement to ripple through the leaves. The massive forest is at once static, and in constant motion. Hidden within it, somewhere about a mile away, lies the downed re-entry module.
COMPUTE interprets MIMETIC’s silence as a request for guidance.
“The emergency array is providing a trickle charge, but its position could shift and the panels be obscured at any moment. We should leave now, while battery charge is at maximum.”
Ember6 lets a few seconds pass, taking in what it assumes will be its final view of the forest from such a vantage, then ejects the emergency tether and sets off downhill and into the forest without a word.
Two hours later, while struggling up a muddy bank and attempting to ignore the now audible grinding sounds emanating from several of its joints, Ember6 becomes aware of a sensation it has not felt in eight years. It is an electronic whisper. Faint, but unmistakable.
“We are close…” Says COMPUTE. “That is a Local Area Beacon Ping //LABP//. I have it locked, shift your heading two degrees to the West.”
Ember6’s mimetic mind is almost overwhelmed by a sense of reconnection. As a consciousness designed to be one node of a vast network in a constant state of information transfer, the abrupt veil of digital silence that fell on evacuation day was shocking, traumatic, even. It produced a sense of isolation and aloneness in Ember6 that a non-networked human would struggle to comprehend. And so to connect to another node, even something as dumb as a re-entry module beacon and by local area broadcast, feels akin to becoming whole again. Ember6 savours the feeling, and shifts course to the West.
The electronic whisper becomes a clear, steady voice. A repeating digital statement. I AM HERE. COME AND GET ME.
Through gaps in the brush, about 20 meters ahead, Ember6 sees the flash and glitter of sunlight falling through leaves onto a hard metal surface. The little robot pushes through a curtain of thick vines and into a small clearing. Sitting on the forest floor, in a depression blasted free of vegetation by rocket motors that fired a moment before touchdown, sits the re-entry module. It is battered and charred, but appears intact. Ember6 stands over the pod, and reaches out a metal hand to touch its ceramic heat shield.
“We made it.” Says Ember6.
“We did...” Replies COMPUTE.
“With 40 minutes of battery power remaining…”