>State of the art automaton is developed for one of the most ambitious space exploration missions ever
>A mission to the surface of Proxima Centauri b to study its viability for human (and monstergirl) colonisation
>Over the course of months, the automaton is programmed, taught, and nutured by a team of scientists, engineers, and roboticists who all grow to love her as a daughter
>She's incredibly proud of the fact that she's able to take part in a pioneering mission that will hopefully open the path for the residents of Earth to inhabit another planet
>And also a little nervous, but her team - her family - is there for her
 
>On the day of the mission, five years after her creation, she's ready to be loaded up on the rocket that'll take her to the Orbital Deep Space Launch Platform
>She knows that this is the last day she'll ever see her family
>The last time she'll ever see Earth again
>Her AI developers taught her how to experience and define emotions, but she's having trouble with the one she's feeling right now
>Bittersweetness?
>When she asks her family, a lot of them start crying
>She can't cry, but she thinks she knows why they are, so she walks to each individual in turn, embracing and saying her farewells
>Soon, she's loaded up, and the last thing she sees through the porthole before she powers off is the teary, smiling faces of her family
 
>The automaton wakes back up, and the view outside the porthole is now very, very different
>She's outside, the sky is dark purple, and to her left she can see the dim orange of the Su- of Proxima's glow
>She checks computer logs to get her bearings
>After she was loaded up onto the rocket, it took 2 hours to go through launch prep, and 8 hours to dock with the ODSLP
>1 hour to transfer onto the experimental, one-of-a-kind craft that would carry her to Proxima b
>A further 1 hour and 20 minutes to go through launch prep
>And 36 years, 4 months, 1 week, 0 days and 40 minutes to land on the surface
>Flight was uneventful
>There's messages stored, ready for her to read too
>Her family, wishing her well, sending pictures, congratulating her on leaving the solar system, on reaching the halfway mark, talking about how they're doing back on Earth
>How the programmer who helped teach her how to walk passed away ten years ago, and the physicist who created her power source passed eight years ago
>Over 4000 messages, talking about children, new families, world news, a new orbital colony, plans to turn the existing colony on the moon into a city
>She could read through them all in seconds, but she spends two hours pouring over every word and picture in her head
>When she's done, she sends back a single message
>"I'm here. Thank you so much. I love you all."
>It'll take over 4 years for her message to reach Earth, and another 4 years to receive a reply
 
>Plenty of time to get started with her mission
>Exploring, studying and recording
>Alone, on a distant planet unpopulated by humans, or monstergirls
>Save for one single automaton, under an alien sky, on alien soil, orbiting a star 40 trillion kilometres from the Sun
>And all the hopes of Earthkind's dreams of interstellar travel engraved into every circuit, bolt, rivet and fibre of her body
 
>The landing pod opens up, and she takes the first step onto her new home.
 
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