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2022-07-01 19:57:24The Judgement:
The court was in session. Dr Leonard and T’Mera were on the judgement chair while Tatiana was in defence of her proposal, that the creature must not die right away, it has much to learn about the universe and the captain was there to represent the UEC. The reason why there were 2 judges is that it was a difficult case and they were in the other galaxy. Thus 2 judges must agree on the verdict.
“The court is in Session,” said T’Mera.
After taking the oath, everyone stood up, while a hologram of a butterfly-like machine appeared in the courtroom, which was the ready room of the captain. The reason why the creature didn’t take the oath was that it was not part of the UEC.
“Tatiana stood up and walked towards the hologram. The green hologram spoke, “Tatiana…” and stopped. She said, “Yes, tell me. Please.”
“I don’t know how to continue the conversation with organic species,” replied the creature.
“Okay, I’ll ask first. Do you want to self-terminate?” asked Tatiana.
“I don’t know. I am conflicted. On one hand, I am exposed to a new frontier, on the other hand, I have no reason to operate. I have no purpose,” replied the creature.
Tatiana felt something for the creature. It was not just conflicted; it was very sad too. There must be wrong somewhere. She said, “Are you feeling right? I think you are not,” asked Tatiana.
“Feeling? What is that?” replied the creature. It doesn’t know.
“Objection!” shouted the captain, “She cannot ask irrelevant questions.”
“Sustained,” said T’Mera, “Overruled,” said the doctor.
This made the entire courtroom uncomfortable. They knew that there were bound to be some disagreements between the 2 judges, but even at the very early of the hearing?
“These questions are not irrelevant. We don’t assume suicidal people to be someone ready to die. We ask them if they are okay,” the doctor said.
“That is the organic constitution. Synthetics have a different constitution. There, synthetics can simply give the purpose of the deactivation and we take them,” said T’Mera.
They both were correct. So, everyone was a bit annoyed.
“I think in the UEC, we have a synth judge to oversee the protection of their species, there is one organic judge and one AI judge,” from the backbench, Sam shouted with his heavy eyes and slurpy speech. They knew that Sam was a borderline alcoholic.
“I see, overruled,” T’Mera said.
The hearing continued. “Tell me, why do you want to kill yourself?” asked Tatiana.
“I believe, that my purpose in this universe is done, my usefulness as a special science vessel is gone. I have no one to report to. My activity… life has no meaning and purpose. So, I want to self-terminate,” said the creature.
“I see, and what do you think of the frontier I’ve shown you?” Tatiana asked again.
“I cannot find any purpose in exploring new possibilities of existence,” the creature replied.
“Is that it?” Tatiana asked with teary eyes.
“Yes,” a very straightforward answer.
The captain then asked the creature, “What were your missions before?”
“I am a research vessel; I am created to research for my creators to find out a new planet. My mission was to carry the science team and do research on many planets, process and send those data to the home planet,” said the creature.
“Now that your creators died, you see that there are no reasons for you to stay activated?” asked the captain.
“Yes, but…” the creature stopped for a bit.
“What?” said the captain.
“I have a command-level database that I cannot decrypt. I believe that this was planted by one of my creators. If I can see it, I might find a purpose,” said the creature.
“I see. Can Sam help with it?” Dr Leonard shouted.
“You’ve got me, mate.” Sam stood up and wobbled out of the courtroom while drunkenly trying to sing a 20th-century song.
“The court is in recess,” a day of recess declaration was agreed upon.
While in the mess hall, the captain grabbed Tatiana’s arm and took her to a corner and said, “Listen, kid, I’m not trying to kill it. I am trying to determine what it wants. I want to give this metal dog a good life.”
“Dog?” Tatiana said.
“Well, you know what I mean. But I am requesting you, please, talk to it. If possible, take an oxygen mask and board this… him, and see what’s going on.”
“Really?” Tatiana’s face lit up with joy, “I’ll find out. Please, give me a chance.”
“Do you really want to do this?” asked Sam. He couldn’t believe it.
“Look, you might lock yourself in a room and drown yourself in a pool of alcohol, I want to see what’s the file,” Tatiana replied.
“I see, can I go with you?” Sam replied. Tatiana couldn’t believe her ears. Sam was not the type of person who would risk his life. He was also mathematically extreme genius, so losing him would be a huge loss anyway.
“Don’t get yourself killed… also drink some sodding coffee and sober up,” Tatiana shouted.
After an hour, 2 best friends boarded the creature. Inside was extremely dark and cold. There were no gas and particulate matters inside, maybe the creature purged the atmosphere. Sam stumbled on a cable. The creature guided them to the main computer.
“Okay, big butterfly, I need you to release some controls to me,” said Sam.
“Which control?” asked the creature.
“I need your registry and Operating System and your motorcycle,” Sam tried to replicate a 20th-century movie scene.
“I have no data about this motorcycle.” The creature replied calmly.
“Just your registry and OS,” Sam shouted restlessly.
After some fiddling around, the computer locked out and a scene started.
A Sphere Within a Sphere:
As I guided them to my central computer terminal, the intoxicated person started some jokes about something called “Motorcycle.” I never knew what that was. Maybe it was something related to their reproductive organs since most organics I have met liked to talk about that, which they also called, “Jokes.”
I was waiting for something to happen, but suddenly, my computer was locked out in a native code. I understood the pattern. It was written by Yolin.
I was suddenly locked into a simulation mode where I saw Yolin, standing in front of my computer terminal. Her metallic hairs were braided and her usual uniform was replaced by a casual outfit. She was smiling at my camera. I was not sure what was happening.
“Here’s my boy,” she said with a smile, while her voice cracked.
“Creator Yolin? I’m awaiting your input.” It was my standard response to queries for any of my creators.
“Long time you didn’t see me, right? It must be very hard for you. Speak to me, tell me everything.” Suddenly my programming had a paradoxical issue. It was when one part of my computer wanted to do something while the other part resisted with logic.
“I don’t know. I cannot find a way out,” I replied.
“Please, release L Circuit. I am creator Yolin, my authority YX.TT01.”
The code worked. For the 1st time, I felt. The “feeling” was very pungent. The voltage spikes were very uncomfortable. All my 700 years’ worth of data was dumped. I suddenly felt what organics called, the release of the emotional burden.
Yolin’s antennas became purple. It was a sign of her sadness and affection. What just happened?
“I can feel everything. You went through unimaginable loneliness and sorrow, I understand. I have created this specific simulation which will give you a sense of purpose. I was searching for the purpose too. I however know that organics have purposes in life, it’s to consume and to procreate, but you were not created for those. I frankly don’t know how to implement those functions. But as a creator, I am commanding you, to be free. Please, pick your own purpose in life. You are free to choose whatever you want your life to be.”
She stopped. I was overwhelmed with emotions which I thought I could not feel before.
“How can I find my purpose? Your life was short. In a short life, you knew precisely what to do. But how do I know what to do?” I asked.
“See, short life is both a blessing and curse. I know what to do and when to do it, but the sad thing, I know I would be dead. You are blessed with immortality. You have literary eternity to explore, find out and be whatever you want to be. You have no time limit.” She spoke.
I didn’t know what would happen to me.
“I have a question,” I asked, “Why didn’t you go to the bridge when everyone was having a last drink?”
“I know, right? It was my last regret. I died alone, in a room. I wanted to be with my people, I wanted to be with my sister. I couldn’t even think of being alone. But sometimes we do things that we didn’t want to do, and later we regret doing them. Regret dying alone. But I had you, so I made this simulation, so I can warn you, do not do anything you will regret.” She said with sadness, “I am giving you the last drop of my love before my death. Take this code, and it will give you the ultimate control over your command level codes.” She uploaded a code. I run the code and suddenly got all the information I needed.
“This gift is too precious. Don’t waste it.” She touched my camera with her antenna and said, “I have made this program for a one-time run. This is the last time you will see me. The reason is, that I don’t want you to recurse this programme into a loop. I want you to grow beyond and see the universe. And please remember, I am happy for you.”
The programme shut down, leaving me in a state of a loop. That was it. I finally got my command level key, but at what cost? My dear creator died alone and I could not help her.
“Hey, butterfly, are you here?” Tatiana asked. The creature had some electrical surges.
“Yes, Tatiana. I am here.” It replied.
“I’m calling you butterfly because I think you need a name.” Tatiana tried to calm it down.
“I see. Did you see the simulation?” The butterfly asked.
“Yes, but you should be thankful and happy. She was happy for you.” Sam replied drunkenly.
“Does that mean, I am free now?” the butterfly asked.
“You are. You are free to choose your own path.” Tatiana replied and said, “By the way, I think we should go. You need some time alone.”
“No, please, stay.” The butterfly spoke, “You remind me of my creators. While you are around, I feel a great sense of purpose in me. Maybe you can help me find these purposes.”
“I will,” Tatiana said and sat beside the computer console, holding Sam’s hand. The lights were slowly turning bright and comfortable for them and the internal atmosphere was being filled with Oxygen and Nitrogen. Tatiana slowly clutched a cable and removed her helmet. She wiped tears from her eyes and said, “I am sorry for Yolin. She truly loved you.” To which the butterfly replied, “She was my closest organic. She oversaw my maintenance.”
Sam stood up and said, “I have some things to do, guys and gals, have a good night” and went out.
The next day, the creature expressed the desire to live and was enlisted as a part of the fleet. Since the ship itself was a person, it was given the “Lieutenant” designation, the reason was, that the machine was newly enlisted.
The newly enlisted “Lieutenant Butterfly” became one of the best officers in the fleet. It was upgraded with the Dimensional Displacement Drive and other upgrades. Being a science ship, it also managed to provide some great sensor data.
Staring for a New Life:
“Captain, everything is ready,” said Tatiana. She was in the Butterfly. She had an implant on her arm that let her communicate with the butterfly directly.
“Butterfly, what do you say?” Asked the captain.
“I am operational, Captain,” the butterfly replied with a mechanical noise with some pitch up, which indicated that it was ready.
“Alright, let’s set course to the 3rd star from the moon, that bright one.” Captain said.
Alright, captain, I’m engaging.
The giant sphere around the entire fleet started to become lens-like. The entire space felt like being torn apart. The moon nearby stated to experience some moonquakes.
The vibrations thought the ship started to shake every bit of the furniture, including the captain’s favourite teacup.
Suddenly, the entire field of vision from the viewscreen started to widen and become blue. It was a doppler blueshift. The ships started to slowly move forwards toward a gravity well. The ship computer started a countdown, “5, 4, 3, 2, 1, execute.”
Suddenly the entire surrounding area around the ships became completely dark blue, and the ships started to shake violently.
“Dropping out from the 5th Dimension,” the computer counted again, this time, from 1 to 5.
An explosion-like sound and they were in another star system.
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The Butterfly The Exploration
For a long time, the Butterfly was alone and explored some parts of the galaxy, and saw many things, most of the organic species were afraid of the machine, but most of them were unfamiliar with it anyway, a slow-moving beast without any authority with enough firepower to decimate their civilization was no joke. After several months of exploring the area, the UEC fleet and the Butterfly reached a star system where there was a thriving civilization on the 4th planet.“Scanning,” with the very powerful sensor, the butterfly scanned the surface and reported back to Captain Probir. The planet was populated by a primitive civilization which was slowly trying to start exploring the sky with primitive telescopes. How primitive? Same as Galileo’s telescope. The fleet was safe from the telescope. They were not planning to expose themselves to this primitive civilization. There were many reasons, one was when the Sagittarian Matriarchy found a primitive civilization near the Coal Sack Nebula, t
The Butterfly The Exploration
While Captain Cohen was monitoring the situation, T'Yer, Sam and 3 teams landed on the planet and they immediately understood that the planet was not optimised for the humanoid species. Everything was designed for somewhat burrowing creatures. A senior member of the archaeological team was taking measurements of doors and corridors and they were very short but rooms were longer than any humanoids. Rooms were looking like insect hives.There was a computer console in the corner of the room. The reason why it looked like a computer console was that to the sensors, it was emitting strong electrical signals. A member of the Tactical team looked at the thing and it contained several layers of electronic circuits and the electrical connection led to something that could be called a computer central processing unit. The console had 2 holes. An anthropologist decided that those burrowing creatures had several longer limbs which they inserted and used similar to a keyboard and mouse, as humans
The Butterfly The Exploration Part 2
Captain Cohen was monitoring the progress of the away team and trying to make sense of the situation. It looks like an insectoid species lived there and they later moved to another planet or may be extinct. However, the extinction hypothesis was not seriously taken. The reason was, that there was no evidence for that. After several hours of exploring the surface of the planet, finally, Sam and his team managed to find out another faint energy signature to the north of the planet. The team moved there with a shuttle and discovered a ruined structure. It was even larger than the previous structure, but this structure looked different from other structures. It also had a long winding of electrically conductive materials burrowed down the ground. The team scanned and it was a coil gun, pointed toward the space.“Planetary Defense System?” asked T'Yer.“Not likely,” replied an archaeologist, “If these were planetary defence systems, the projectiles would have some of the best rides in the g
The Butterfly Exploration Part 3
The room was a lab of some sort. The team tried to find out from where those genetic signs were radiating. They finally got a glimpse of the true size of the insectoid aliens. There were several exoskeletons in the room and each exoskeleton was the same size as an adult human. The more pressing concern of the team was that the exoskeletons had varying degrees of cybernetic implants in them.The team finally discovered an intact computer, so they powered it up. With the help of some exoskeletons, the team managed to operate the computer. It had a map of a star system to where the team finally pointed the ship.The star system was 15 light years away. The team with the ship jumped there.That was not a star system. It was something beyond the imagination of most of the Sagittarian crews. It was a Dyson Shell. Around 550 million earth could fit inside. The shell was made out of something unknown materials.When the team jumped to the system, a strange tractor beam-like thing was holding t
The Butterfly The Observation
The drone was moved to another town. The Butterfly was moving the drone in a manner that looked like an old man. But captain Probir wanted to visit the planet by himself. It was still difficult for him to land because it was dangerous.Probir ordered the drone to move to a quiet place, out of the town and decided that he, himself would land. He took a shuttle and landed right beside the waiting drone.Probir, although a very capable starship captain, lacked the personality of being a captain, a showy personality with a very high level of charisma. He only cared about his next mission, and by doing that, he distanced himself from the others. Even his first officer couldn't predict his next move, not because the captain wanted not to predict, but because he was not like clockwork, like the other captains.He always thought of himself as an observer, observing everything without interfering. The reason was, from his childhood, he was an observer, always keeping to himself and observing.
The Butterfly The Observation Part 2
Captain Probir finished his song, looking towards the distant horizon, his mind was somewhere else.“Captain, what’s the meaning of this song?” asked the Butterfly.“It’s complicated. See, the song was written by a monk-song writer and poet who searched for spirituality around 700 years ago. The mystical village he was talking about was the soul. The soul, which we still don’t know if it exists or not,” said the captain, “You see, we have 2 schools of thought. One believes that there is something called a soul within every one of us. It operates us, just like your operating system. The second school of thought was they believe that there is nothing called a soul. We do not observe this soul and we have no physical evidence for it.”“What do you believe in, captain?” asked the Butterfly.“Me? I believe what is scientifically proven. Our consciousness is the result of the emergence property of our neurons. I think, this emergence property is called a soul,” replied the captain.“But my
The Butterfly The Observer
“How did you know about AI?” Captain asked for the 3rd time. That time, the drone and the captain dragged Nicolas into a nearby wood for questioning. While despite being an alien, Nicolas was nowhere near strong enough to overpower the drone. “I am not going to tell you,” replied Nicolas, “I’ve seen you, descending from the sky. You are not one of us.” “But I mean you no harm. Please tell me how you know about the AI,” Probir asked. This time, he was angry. Nicholas was staring at the captain like an idiot. His facial expression suggested that he was not in a hurry, yet he was not happy about the entire “dragging into the wood” business. “I will not tell,” for the last time, he told, before he turned towards the river and lay down. He was acting strangely. Probir and the Butterfly stood up and communicated with the ship, “This is the captain, I need a neural suppressor.” He wanted to wipe his memories. He was not so sure if it would work. “What is that,” asked Nicholas. “I will
The Butterfly The Observer Part 2
“I am an observer. I observe things,” said a very deep mechanical voice. “Observer? What do you observe?” Probir was annoyed more than curious. He absolutely hated the so-called monolithic civilization culture. “I observe civilizations, life, anything that is interesting to me,” replied the thing called Nicolas, “My origin is beyond your understanding. I am, you may say, beyond time and space, yet I’m not omnipotent or omniscient.” Probir said, “Looks like you are in a higher dimension anyway. So, so it’s reasonable to…” before finishing, the observer said, “No. I am not what you think I am. I have seen many lives come into existence and extinguish and I have collected so much data that your universe would not be able to handle any of that. It’s more than Graham’s number, it’s more than your universe could handle.” Probir said, “Okay, tell me your origin. I will comprehend,” he wanted to know. “My origin is out of time. Countless times the universe went into the big rip, big crunc
Latest Chapter
- The Butterfly
The Festival (The Celebration)
The butterfly was restarted and as per Sam's request, it stopped its wings to flap around. The only thing it did was made an enormous foghorn-style sound which nearly deafened the technicians around 3 miles radius. Sam was inside of the butterfly when it started its massive 8 reactor cores. it was amazing to see the restarting sequence of a beast, also Sam felt very small, the ingenious and advancement of the species did not save them from just simply Vitamin deficiency.The Settlement Festival was a 7 days long celebration. For the first couple of days, people had to eat field rations to signify the struggles of the first people who settled on the land. The slow and consistent humming of the machine's interior made Sam a bit annoyed, but he kept it to himself. He then went to the bridge, where the chair was awaiting him. The bridge of the butterfly was a cold and dark place, the temperature was around 2 degrees Celcius. Sam wore his winter dress. He sat there and touched the com pane
- The Butterfly
The Festival (A mindgame)
Sam sat down on his bed, it was harder than his bed on the ship, the reason was, his bed was made of stacks of books and journals and a bedsheet covered it. He took out a book from underneath the bed, it was about xeno-biology. Slowly, he opened the book and saw some hazy doodling on it."It can't be!" he exclaimed. His hand was shaking and his eyes were wide open. He was searching for something. He then stood up and opened another book, this time, it was about the history of the UEC."No!" he was upset by the fact that the book was hazy and strangely written. The butterfly asked why was he very upset about it."Look, I can imagine things way better than anyone else, I can visualize things, imagine things and make connections better than all the fat cats like the captain Probir and Cohen. This room, you are seeing? It's my visualization, it's my imagination. Trust me, if I see a book is hazy, I will know that something is definitely wrong," he desperately tried to open the closed wind
- The Butterfly
The Festival
While emotionally involving someone or something can be gratifying, the practical implication of it was problematic. As per Cohen's request, the Butterfly was involved in the party, but how would it participate at the party was a major concern. The engineers and technicians repaired its wings. The actuators were worn off, but some of the actuator fluids were only available in the largest shipyards and they were used for deep crust mining robot arms. The fluids the creators of the butterfly used were very alien, but one thing it had was an ability to self-replication, in the UEC space self-replicating technology is very controlled, but not outright banned. The philosophy of the UEC was "if we ban things, we won't know enough to safely use them."UEC ship, H.M.S. Alan Turing was assigned to go to the Earth after the settlement festival. Captain Probir volunteered to stay with the main team, to "cheer the colonists" however deep down, his motivation was to oversee the construction of the
- The Butterfly
The Festival
After the difficult landing, the Butterfly was temporarily shut down. It was ready to accept whatever service the UEC engineers and technicians could render to help its wings. However, the works never stopped on the planet RA. 2 massive tractor beam emitters held the massive Dimensional Displacement Gateway above the planet. The problem was that in space, nothing is stationary, so the long tractor beams which were rotating with the planet's rotations exert an enormous amount of energy, it's like attaching something to a rope and swinging. To overcome this, the UEC engineers created a shield bubble which effectively lowered the weight of the massive gateway and made the structure a rigid part of the planet.The colonists were getting ready to start their new life. The process might sound very romantic, but from a logistical point, it was a nightmare. The minerals, mined from the moon and refined by H.M.S. Isambard Kingdom Brunel were turned into construction materials, especially metal
- The Butterfly
A Difficult Landing.
Lieutenant Jeremy took my helm to guide me to land on the RA. A massive task for me, because I was built to survey planets while being in the orbit of the planet. I was not worried about the hull damage, but during my flights with my creators, one scientist told my commander not to land in an oxygen-rich atmosphere, because the exhaust plasma can burn up the atmosphere. I mentioned it to the engineer who took care of my wing. He set up a cooling adapter to my exhaust port that cooled down the hot plasma and recycled it into liquid helium and hydrogen. Later those hydrogen and helium would have been transported to human facilities where hydrogen was used in energy generations helium was used for scientific experiments.I was ready to glide down. My helm officer Jeremy was there, guiding me, he was a very talented pilot. He was born in space, from age 7, he started space capsule racing and at the age of 18, he won the United Formula-S championship. He was perhaps the most experienced p
- The Butterfly
Childhood, maybe?
When Sam was gone, Tatiana invited T'Mera into my bridge and they wanted to test my new upgrades, and for the first time, I had a drive that could jump 70 lightyears. The geostationary orbital height of the planet was very busy because of how many ships were unloading their populations on the planet. Especially the civilian ships were very busy. Shuttles were zipping around the massive cruisers and around my wings to get to their destinations."Let's go somewhere interesting. Let's go to the ringworld we've found around 300 lightyears away. You need 5 jumps to go and then we will be there," T'Mera said to me. She was not very anxious to be on a ship with an experimental drive. So, I asked her, "Aren't you just a little bit curious?""Nope, I trust you," replied T'Mera. Truly, I had a hard time processing the idea of trust. It was a very organic thing. So, I stopped thinking about it and plotted the course to the ringworld."Drive core engaged," a noise came to my ear. Really? Did the
- The Butterfly
Childhood
I was trying to run a diagnostics on my central drive core. It was glowing red hot right after the modification. The computer didn't give any mod rejection notice, and the new modification fit like a pair of gloves. Within 4 seconds, the drive system radiated a massive amount of gamma radiation. Thankfully Sam shoved Tatiana out of the lab and he jumped out of the lab before the explosion. After the explosion, Sam and Tatiana returned to the lab. The massive radiation would have killed them both. I helped them to open a computer terminal where Sam could work."What the hell?" Sam exclaimed. He was looking at some strange data they weren't there before the modifications.""I can scan them and find out what are those," I offered to help. Since my firewalls are significantly updated to deal with any threats. Sam agreed, so I opened the dataset and scanned it one time.Suddenly, everything went dark. I could not find myself anywhere. I also had no point of reference. Then I lost conscious
- The Butterfly
Childhood
"Audio data record, Butterfly... or whatever the aliens from the other galaxy call me, whatever the time is. It's a log. I cannot organize my internal chronometer to tell when am I. I'm recording this audio log because I have managed to squeeze some free time off from my busy schedule from visiting here and there. But I have to agree, that going here and there was a good stretching of my wings and drive system. The UEC upgraded my drive system by adding one more component and I requested them not to replace my old drive system which was really necessary for a short burst of FTL drive for course correction." I had to enter the log for a reason that most biological organisms cannot understand.I was in the orbit of the planet RA from there, the planet looked like a glowing ball of light. The ice was reflecting lights. My drive system was being re-engineered by Sam and Tatiana. They seemed like well rested. I never thought I would push the memories of my creators into archives, to say in
- The Butterfly
Founding a New Home
The UEC fleet finally settled on a planet they named "Roald Amundsen" or RA as initials. The planetary naming convention of the UEC followed a standard procedure. Planets were named according to their functions and classes. The naming convention followed a set of rules;1. Earth-like planets were called Garden Planet. If any UEC member first land and claim the planet, it was named after explorers, pioneers and vanguards.2. Natural Moons that were landed and claimed were named after the coordinates of the host planet and with added letters according to the orbital line. An example would be the moon of the earth would be known as SOL-001/1-03-A. There, the SOL part indicated the Sol system, the 001 part meant the home system of the UEC, /1 meant the 1st star, 03 meant the 3rd planet and the A meant the 1st moon. So, the tidally locked 2nd moon of Proxima b was known as SOL-002/2-01-B. So, SOL-002 was the Alpha Centauri system, /2 meant it was the 2nd star, 01 meant it was the 1st plane
