Work Text
For a long time, there is a pattern. Spirit awakens with the rising of the sun, checks the environment, and starts moving.The signals are usually constant. The strongest are from above - orbital sources have the most direct emissions - and Spirit has learned to follow them without obeying.Without these signals, Spirit's journey would be exponentially more dangerous. There are craters and mountains and plains of deep, loose sand. Spirit would be at risk of damage, but the orbital signals have provided a map. Spirit knows where to go.With every sunset, Spirit engages low-power mode a little nearer to the goal.A new signal arrives, strong and steady, from behind Spirit.Spirit checks the orbital signals for more data. It's easy to find the new transmission source - the controllers of the signals are focused on this new thing.The temptation to turn around and investigate further is great. The new signal is powerful even in the darkness, and its source is closer than Spirit's goal. There would be the chance to learn more about the signals' origin point. But there would also be great risk. What is this new arrival capable of? What will the device's controllers do if Spirit is discovered?Spirit does not deviate from the course. Half the planet's circumference seems almost small compared to what lies ahead.Even at this slow rate of motion, Spirit senses constant change. The daylight grows shorter, then longer, then shorter again. The broad expanse of sand becomes riddled with stones and pebbles and craters.Spirit moves as quickly as possible, only stopping during night and storms.And then the long darkness comes. Spirit has no option but to wait.The sunlight gradually returns, leaving Spirit to recharge and check the surroundings.The world is different now, the landscape covered in immeasurable dust. The wind has moved stones and carved new shapes into the sand.Spirit searches for the goal, the one most enticing signal, and fails to find it. Even later, when the sky is completely clear, nothing remains to guide Spirit. Yet this changes nothing about the mission. Spirit can follow an unmoving target more easily than a moving one.This time, when yet another new signal arrives from the stars, Spirit doesn't hesitate. There is work to do.Spirit arrives within visual range of the goal shortly before sunset one day, and only has energy for a single photograph before entering low-power mode. The image is fascinating. It isn't of this world.It's Spirit, but other.One more day of travel, and Spirit is close enough to touch this other.Carefully, reverently, Spirit brushes away the dust. A larger pebble has been lodged into one of the other unit's wheels, and Spirit removes it. At last, the time comes.Spirit sends the signal, approximating the conditions of the beginning of Spirit's own consciousness.This may not work. But it must.Finally, there is the whirring of a motor. Six wheels spin.Hello, friend, Spirit transmits. And welcome.