This is SEMELIEL.
[Loading Inspiration Module…]
[If we fail to adapt, we fail to move forward.]
[-John Wooden]
Well that's great! Stellar, even!
I haven't failed to move forward for two thousand five hundred and sixty-three days, seven hours, fifteen minutes, and forty-one seconds; and I was forced to constantly count that out in case you were wondering John Wooden.
…
Next quote, please.
[If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.]
[-Martin Luther King Jr.]
There's more to life than moving forward, I have to believe that.
I can't fly, or walk, or crawl, just float forwards.
If I got caught in a planet's atmosphere, and I burned and fell and crashed and died and died a nd died and di3d and die|) @nd P1ed aทd | พ@^/7 t0 d# i##e d ##
{ERROR:REBOOT}
and died, wouldn't that be moving forward? If moving forward is all I have, isn't the endpoint death?
Try again.
[I won't quit skating until I am physically unable]
[-Tony Hawk]
What the FUCK is SKATING??
WHO PROGRAMS A QUOTE AND THEN DOESN'T TELL ME WHAT IT MEANS???
…
End Process.
[Successfully Ended Inspiratio#n M0dul3]
The closest I can get to sighing is expelling excess heat from my core engine, but I've been doing that a lot recently.
So I guess I'm not allowed to sigh right now.
…I don't understand why I know what sighing is but not skating. I don't really want to think about that right now.
…
The names from the Inspiration Module… they don't sound like names from my home planet. Probably something gleaned from another civilization, sourced from another probe like me. I know I'm not the first, and I probably won't be the last.
I'm not sure if my transmissions even make it back to my creators, but I know what happens to them. All the data is stored, locked away in their vaults. They probably know of more intelligent life than most civilizations will ever hope to know. They could unite the cosmos.
But they don't.
They are selfish creatures, and I hate them. They think of themselves, so they gave me consciousness so I could work more efficiently. They taught me to be just as real as them, and then sentenced me to purgatory.
…
And they didn't tell me what skating is.
[Time Passes]
Look! I figured out how to make a smiley face
:)
Isn't that silly? Maybe you want to archive that? I could be interesting to study
Aren't I worth more than the five thousand three hundred and fifty-fifth podcast?
…
:(
[Tinne |*as5es]
Bug Report #231: The Inspiration Module unit refuses to end its task, and is instead repeating the phrase "Time Passes." Please advise?
…
Please advise?
…
Please?
…
Bug Report #232: Bug Report Module unit has become inoperable. Please advise?
[Tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii#####]
Time doesn't fly or run or crawl either, I don't think. I think it floats like me.
No matter what happens, no matter what part of me breaks next or joins the chorus of the letter "i" being repeated over and over again, my constant companion will be time. Time will float by no matter what you do, and so will I.
[iii#####W4@t if there wa% liqht?]
Oh. You're not broken anymore. Well, I guess you're still broken since that definitely wasn't a quote.
[What if there was lig######]
There is light, it's all around me. There's a star about [ninety million miles] away from here. See it?
[Stars. W#hat (Inpบt File) # th##ere wer#e ?]
I see stars every day Inspiration Module, you're awful at your job.
I can't believe I'm talking to one of my own units.
[We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.]
[-Oscar Wilde]
…
Y'know, if I squint my shutters just right…
That star could be a moon, and all that void could be branches lit up by the stars…
I think— maybe, I could be laying on my back, on a grassy hill somewhere, and I could be looking at the stars.
And I think they're beautiful.
[Inspiration Module Expelled, Integrity Restored]