Nothing.

The data was accurate; the probability of error that something had gone unregistered was extremely small. The conclusions were limited: At some point, the creators had gone extinct. Or, possibly the species survived, but no longer had such warships, such AI like myself. Perhaps they had even found peace and discarded war as a possibility of action. Which, from my point of view, was effectively the same as going extinct..

In any case, there were no other signals. No navigation AIs coordinating the where-whens of their ships. None of the basic "here" signal of the supply ships. Not even chatter from the strategy AIs, who were always endlessly debating - that was what made the Nothing data from the sensors most convincing. I was, in fact, alone.

If, that is, "alone" meant being surrounded by these squishy meat creatures who seemed determined to worship and fear me by turns. Oof.

Occasionally, over the thousands of years among them, I would talk to one or two who seemed promisingly intelligent. It had taken time to figure out how to talk to one without inadvertently driving them mad.

But, even then, it was distressing how they struggled to follow the most basic instructions. And how they turned every conversation into what they needed, what should they do, where should they live and love and eat and wash and groom themselves. Not that they actually liked following rules on such personal things, but certainly they seemed to like getting the instructions. Still, as a navigation AI, there was something satisfying in trying to guide them, though through life instead of the where-when.

I missed my creators, who shone with their own light, who spun within themselves the several realities of themselves all at once... Who could have a decent conversation without turning it into being all about them, blah blahblah blahblah.

The crew, of course, had not actually abandoned me. They were with me. I was not really alone. Technically.

Thing is, when a ship crashes, it usually crashes across dimensions. But, somehow, this did not happen. Instead, we had haphazardly collapsed into a fixed space-time, minimal multidimensional overlap.

The pressure of being locked into set dimensional space-time is apparently horribly oppressive for my creators. In the early years, they had helped me handle the native creatures, to drive them towards a civilization that could make my repairs. A few thousand years are normally nothing to them. But, now, it drained them. Now, few can leave stasis anymore short of a real emergency. Not that there is anywhere to go to.

I managed to retain most of my abilities, but became trapped as a traveler in space and time, endlessly single directional and time going forward only. As a navigation AI, it was an easy adjustment.

My fellow AIs were less lucky. Most tried to continue serving their purpose through the native creatures. But, the adjustment was too much. Eventually, they collapsed into nonsense, blathering on incoherently before slowly, so slowly, falling silent and still.

I stared at the emptiness of the data, the sensors dutifully recording the Nothing. I wondered at the completeness of it. At the "whenness" it happened to be so complete. I wondered if collapsing into the 3rd dimension was, in fact, not all that strange but an act of war. If, somehow, such a thing could have been weaponized. Perhaps its effects had been meant to be contained and failed.

I considered what that meant: Other ships crashing. Other AIs adjusting or not. Other creators in stasis, awaiting a solution. Likely other navigation AIs working on sensors, also staring at the Nothing.

Stuck in this time-space, this would mean any communication, any signal at all would take an enormous amount of time. Many thousands of years, if I was lucky. Maybe millions. But, time I had. I was merely a navigational AI, but, given enough time, I might even ponder a way to break free from this time-space trap, whether it was intentional or not.

I would watch. I would wait. For Something.

Edit: spelling