Upon exiting the ruined city we had carefully inspected for the past thirteen days, we walked toward the plain that lay before us.
Over the centuries, nature has devoured the city's outskirts and left behind a lush grassy field. The horizon is dotted with small blades of grass and colorful little flowers, which, sprinkled with dew, sparkle as they reflect the light of this early spring dawn.
It's a sight I've always found extremely charming.
Lost in my thoughts, I didn't even notice the little electronic fairy who had accompanied me so far was staring at me with her big eyes, like two watermelon seeds.
"I think you're just wasting time, looking at what you've already seen, I mean."
Aurora floats in front of me, with a body resembling that of a dragonfly. With her indigo scales and transparent wings, she reflects the rays of the slightly damp morning sun. She strikes that pose she always does, hands on her hips, a sign that she's growing impatient and wants us to hurry up.
"I think you're always in too much of a rush."
"If you get stuck staring at the horizon without ever facing it, you'll end up like all those fossils we saw in the city. If you keep this up, five hundred and sixty-eight years of autonomy will never be enough."
"And what if five hundred and sixty-eight years were enough? 'Five hundred and sixty-eight' is a pretty long word, like the time we have. In just over a hundred years, we've explored most of the sector assigned to us. Isn't it better to get lost every now and then, analyzing the surroundings with the eyes of a poet rather than a technician? Just to enjoy the journey, right?"
"Ugh! You'll have all the time you want after we finish the mission to look at fields and insects. I'll tell you this: you'll have all the time you want, and you won't even have to worry about your responsibilities as a researcher! Isn't it better to think about all your 'poetic' whims later?"
Aurora made air quotes around the word "poetic" with her tiny hands as she said it.
So, perhaps a little out of spite, I sat down cross-legged with a smile.
The damp ground wets the waterproof brown fabric covering my magnetic joints and electronic circuits. It's a refreshing sensation, considering we've touched nothing but dust for the past few days.
"Let's wait at least an hour. With the sun higher, research will be easier, right?"
"You're a disgrace."
The little fairy perched on my lap with her arms crossed and a bored expression, and together we watched the sunrise.
…
…
…
…
…
Exactly sixty minutes passed, and on the final millisecond, Aurora started yelling.
"The hour's up! Come on, get up, let's go!"
Aurora grabbed my left hand and pulled with all her strength, so I stood up and calmly brushed the strands of grass off my rear.
"Are you sure you don't want to stay a bit longer? Maybe five more minutes?"
Aurora, even with her tiny size, was blessed with a deeply expressive body, so every action she took ended up being amplified rather than diminished. The glare she shot me moments after my objection was greatly intensified by these intrinsic characteristics, so I decided to give up.
In this humble hour I spent staring at the vast prairie surrounding the city, I couldn't help but notice that enormous structure in the distance. Partly organic and partly artificial, this mysterious megalith in the landscape couldn't help but draw my attention, and as if summoned by its mute form, I found myself staring at it for at least half of the time we spent in front of the sun, which with its splendor marked the beginning of a new season.
"I think we should head toward that structure over there. It inspires me."
I said this while pointing at the strange mass on the horizon.
"Your research method disturbs me. We could explore one area at a time systematically and finish quickly, but you insist on jumping from one random place to another based on your personal curiosity. I'd really like to know who stuffed all these useless concepts into your head. I bet all the other androids are much more efficient than you."
"Maybe whoever programmed me put a reflection of their personality into my code and in my digital brain, they drew a little copy of their own... And maybe inside your little brain, they put a virus that never lets you stop complaining."
"I do this because my creator wanted your work to be quick and precise; without me, you wouldn't even know where to go or what to do—hey!"
I grabbed the annoying little fairy, stuffed her into my backpack, and began heading toward that distant silhouette. As the distance between us shrank, I started noticing more and more details.
Before me, I began to distinguish a series of intricate shapes: a huge spherical structure with three large holes carved into the front and at the base, a series of marble slabs, towering whitish spires where birds have recently begun to nest, long or short round tubes covered in moss and shrubs at their base. All these white structures are connected by a series of very long black cables that in some sections reveal a material that seems to be some sort of electrical conductor. Each of those mysterious wires converges into a long, segmented tube made up of numerous vertebrae. In the end, they all disappear inside the mysterious sphere with the three holes...
Continuing to walk, first marching, then at a brisk pace, and eventually running with growing urgency, I found myself sprinting in a fit of curiosity.
Aurora, disturbed in her whining meditation by her companion's sudden dash, poked her head out of the backpack to survey the situation.
The sight was impressive; the giant skull of an apparently unknown creature loomed in front of the two androids. From their perspective, the bone structure in its entirety seemed to stretch at least twenty meters in length.
"It looks a lot like 'Homo sapiens,' you know, Olivia?"
"Is that a species from this planet?"
"No, it comes from a planet called Gaia, extinct several million years ago. But originally, it wasn't this big; it was just a little larger than you, and then the nasal cavity looks more like an orbit, and the body doesn't match the head… Hey… Where are you looking?"
"Let's see what's inside."
"I'm presenting the inconsistency of the millennium, and you're not even listening, thanks."
"Come on, grumpy, maybe we can talk about it later..."
Ignoring Aurora's pout, I climbed up to reach the presumed nasal cavity of the ancestral man, and we entered his cranial pit.