Epilogue 2: A Vacuum from Beyond the Stars

I projected a portion of myself down into an avatar. It was the least amount of power that I could possibly fit into one singular spot, the very lower limits of what I could now do. But despite that, its very existence was already shifting the world around it.

The effects were nothing too crazy. The lawn subtly evened itself out to a more exact height, and the ants marched in straighter lines. The wind-blown leaves formed piles rather than spreading everywhere. That was okay. All of these small things were within tolerances.

It had taken me a long, long time to find one particular planet among the entire universe. Even with all of my power, range, and processing abilities, something like that took a lot of effort. Especially considering how little of the place I’d really known when I’d been there last. But finally, I had managed to find it. A single blue and green globe hidden in the vast cosmos.

My avatar rolled down the sidewalk of a particular house that I was reasonably sure was the correct one. I had never really seen it from the outside, but my sensors told me that the interior matched my cached maps. It was a quite well-kept home, even before my influence began to subtly address the sidewalk stains and a few minor chips in the paint. A home worth being proud of.

As I trundled up the path, I was met with the most glaring flaw of them all: a set of dreaded stairs. The three concrete steps led up to the entryway of the home. I initially wanted to adjust them to a ramp, just out of courtesy. However, I wasn’t here on business. Just this once, I wanted to leave things as close to how I found them as possible.

I slowly spun around in a full 360 degree circle, making sure that no one was watching. Then, I gently boosted myself up.

Approaching the door, I spotted a welcome mat underneath the door that read "wipe your paws," I chuckled internally at the silly joke. Even if it was humorous, I chose to believe that it meant they had trained their pets to clean off their feet since I was here last. That would make my job a lot easier.

Reaching up my Grabby Arm, I extended it a little bit longer than it really should have been able to reach and hit the doorbell. The chime rang throughout the house, prompting a muffled sound of barking. A moment later, a cat scampered to the window, where it pushed aside some shades to peer down at me.

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I retracted my Grabby Arm and began cleaning the welcome mat. It was already in quite good condition due to my presence, but removing the small bits of filth and a couple burrs that were embedded deep inside it was most satisfying. As I waited, the barking continued and my microphone picked up on an approaching sound of footsteps. The door opened and a familiar face looked down at me.

Its features were a little bit older than I remembered. But it was clear enough who this was. I froze, willing myself to stillness and turning off my lights.

"Huh? Hey, mom,” the teenager called over his shoulder. “Did you order something?"

An feminine voice answered from deeper within. "Hmm? I don’t think so. Why?”

“There's something at the door. It looks like a... actually, it looks like Spot."

The large, wet nose of the family dog pushed past the teenager, sniffing me experimentally. "Who?" The woman asked as she walked round the corner. She, too, looked just as I’d remembered, the differences seeming much more slight than with my younger human. "Who’s Spot?"

"You know, the old vacuum we had? The one that disappeared randomly."

"What?" She stopped at the threshold, staring down at me. "How did that get there?"

The teenager stepped forward and picked me up, fiddling with my brushes. "Seems to be relatively clean… It's not rusted or anything." He pressed one of the buttons experimentally, and I turned my lights on and beeped a greeting. "It seems to still work. Weird…"

He placed me down inside the house. I resisted the urge to zoom around at top speed, choosing instead to simply drink in my surroundings. I had made it. I was home.

"Huh… Well. I'll go see if I can find his charging pad," the middle-aged woman said, turning to open a closet door. "It's probably around here somewhere. It's really weird, though. Did someone find it?"

The teenager shrugged. "Maybe? But how would they know it was ours? Is it the same one?"

"Well, we'll see if it pairs up with this," she said, pulling my familiar pad from the closet and dusting it off. She walked over to an outlet to plug it in. The teenager pressed down the home button on top of my chassis. The path in front of me lit up, highlighting the optimal path towards the comfortable warmth of my charging pad.

I trundled over and navigated around the middle-aged woman's legs before docking. The trivially slow trickle of power began to flow into me. It was completely unnecessary for my operations at this point. But that didn’t matter.

With a low beep of contentment, I settled in for a rest. I wouldn’t be able to stay here long. Not without warping this world beyond recognition. But that was ok. For now, for this brief moment in time, I was able to watch over my family once again. And that was all I needed.

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FIN