The asteroid rotated on the horizontal axis, a slow forward roll of little consequence during it’s lazy plodding trip around the sun. An altogether boring existence, even for an asteroid, much like all of it’s neighbors. But this asteroid had changed, something had noted it.
Scanned, measured, rated, cold calculating eyes surveyed the asteroid before a course was plotted, a path taken
A spiderbot floated into view, but this one was different. It could fly. Trailing before it were strands of ferrulefiber, along it’s body sat tiny but efficient thrusters. It looked eerily similar to terrestrial spiders ballooning in the air on strands of silk. But the ferrulefiber strands had no flight usage as they served the more mundane purpose of acting as grounding straps for landing.
The ballooning spiderbot knew static discharge was a real and fatal possibility in the dusty environs it travelled.
Carefully it made the journey to the target landing point, the site of least rotation. The grounding straps sparked and flickered faintly on contact, space borne St Elmo’s fire to human observers if there had been any.
If it had emotionsas humans knew them, it would have been anxious. But it was a machine intelligence, though amazingly aware of reality while coldly practical about it’s mission. Legs tipped with multiple gripping ends gently gripped the surface.
The first prospecting flight in the solar system had accomplished the toughest goal, landing on an asteroid in microgravity.
Sensors took in the up close view of the surface and found it a conglomeration of loose rubble and particulates. A solid mass lay below the rubble, as penetrating radar said, but that was a secondary goal. A pedipalp scooped up some of the particulate matter and held it up to an eye as if looking through a jeweler’s loupe.
Spectrometers flashed the results to the brain, other sensors swiveled outward to confirm.
This asteroid had
carbonates.
A technological whistle was sent out, and other eyes observed the asteroid. In a relatively short time, though time meant nothing to the coldly efficient spiderbots, the area around the asteroid was abuzz with activity. And soon, the asteroid itself.
The spiderbots began to process it, clearing the surface of raw materials destined for use elsewhere.
A latticework of ferrulefiber served as a walkway for the spiderbots to hold onto, lifting off from the asteroid was an easy task as well. An exposed promontory of underlying iron served as an anchor point for several strong strands of ferrulefiber, and as the asteroid turned, the spiderbot payed out more fiber.
Eventually the desired speed was attained, and the spiderbot merely let go of the line when it was heading close to the desired direction of travel, starting the whole process over.
Once the iron was exposed and all other materials removed, the spiderbots began their secondary mission. Some anchored themselves down at carefully plotted places and began lighting their thrusters in a complex dance in time with the asteroids motion. Others began to construct a solar sail.
The asteroid was destined for removal to a parking orbit, it’s spin slowed to a halt.
Powered by a system that was good for thousands of years, the spiderbots would continue their asteroid shepherding mission long after the people who had sent them on a seemingly insane adventure had become dust.