"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

  – Arthur C. Clarke

  Anyone looking at the probe from more than a few miles away would have assumed it was just another lifeless rock hurtling through space, and they would have been partially correct. Of course, it was lifeless in the organic sense of the word, but it was far from being just another rock.

  It traveled at near-light speed and was dormant between systems. As it hurtled through space, it would passively scan through the light hitting it, and the artificial intelligence that resided in the computer would decide if the system nearby was worth closing in for a better look. This occasionally happened, like when a neutron star was explosively shot out of its system, leaving nothing but chaos in its wake. The intelligence had woken up long enough to record the incident and gravimetric changes. Then all the data was sent back to the Control System.

  The Control System was a bigger and more complex AI that directly communicated with the probe's creators. The organic beings that had built and sent the probe and its siblings out to explore space. That had been nearly half a galactic year ago.

  Since then, no planets with intelligent life have been found. There had been planets with intelligent life in its history, some even had cities on them, but by the time one of the probes had gotten near the planet, all life on it had gone extinct. Some of these planets made great colonies for the creators, or so the probe was informed by the Control System. And so, the probe kept going from system to system, searching for life, hoping to be the first to find some.

  The probe swung around a system with two stars but no signs of potential life. Then, another system, unseen by the probe before, came into view mid-swing. Somehow the local radiation and Oort cloud of this system had scattered or obscured the emissions from the system.

  Upon scanning the system ahead, the probe found that there may, in fact, be life. The system was a main-sequence star of a few billion years, so it was middle age and not prone to producing tons of deadly radiation. Four gas giants near the system's edge, protecting the inner planets from too many comets. The four inner planets are rocky. The first one is too small and too close to the star to have any life. The second, third and fourth are all in the potentially habitable zone for this type of star at this stage in its life.

  The probe initialized its main engine, a micro singularity drive, projecting a micro singularity just far enough from the probe to pull the ship along but not close enough to destroy it. The probe's velocity slowed, and its trajectory changed to swing around the star while passing each of the four rocky planets.

  The probe scanned each planet and moon for other potential resources as the probe entered the system. It found one of the gas giants had a moon with liquid water under its surface. It may even have life, but no other ice moon had harbored intelligence. It deployed a few microprobes to the ice moon's surface to bore into the water below and relayed readings back to the computer to sift through.

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  One of the planets ahead had little water on the surface and no magnetosphere. It was uninhabitable unless the species was technologically advanced enough to manufacture some radiation shielding. Upon scanning the planet for technology, it found no such shielding, but it did find something new. The planet had robots on and orbiting it; some were still active and roaming around. Querying the Control System about similar finds, it learned that there had been quite a few. However, all previous discoveries had failed before scanning. These were the first active robots discovered. Their creators were likely still alive and nearby.

  The next planet it passed was covered in thick clouds, making scans unreliable. A set of microprobes were dispatched to dive into the atmosphere. While the probe waited for the microprobes to reach the planet, it looked at the gas mixture of the planet with light and saw that it was mainly carbon dioxide. However, the local light spectrum around the radio range was way too high. It wasn't the star, and there were not enough probes on the last planet to account for how much radio was flying around. After a detailed scan around the probe, the probe discovered many artificial satellites across the system. Some were so far out the signal was barely visible anymore. Some were orbiting the planet it was passing. This system still had to be inhabited to have so many active transmitters.

  The microprobe entered the atmosphere of the planet. It was hot, and the pressure was high; if not for the microprobes' rapid self-repair, they would have been crushed quickly. The air was made of too much carbon dioxide and sulfuric compounds. This would limit the natural, technological growth of any life currently theorized and, so far, recorded by the creator's archaeologists.

  The probe used the local star's gravity to slow down to a sedate speed and approach the last planet. As the probe came upon the planet in question, the probe scanned the planet continuously. The planet still had liquid water! There is a magnetosphere to protect life, and, best of all, it has a multitude of artificial satellites orbiting it.

  Using its singularity drive to slow itself and enter a high orbit behind the planet's one natural satellite, it sent microprobes to the planet to get scans. While doing that, the probe opened real-time communication with the Control System.

  The Control System ordered the probe to keep out of sight of any local systems until instructed otherwise. Data acquisition was to be done covertly with the microprobes while the Control System communicated with the creators. The probe scanned local radio traffic, analyzing it in anticipation of future communication. The microprobes entered the atmosphere. To the local inhabitants, they would look like dust and micro meteors burning up in the atmosphere.

  The magnetosphere was uneven; some parts were thick, while others were barely there. The ice caps were showing signs of recent and rapid shrinkage. This caused the air and water currents to shift. The planet had to be heating up. The last few years had become increasingly worse. A new disease had recently surfaced. According to the information, parts of the species had even believed it to be fake. All of this was seen, recorded, and transmitted back to the Control System without judgment. It kept observing for long enough for the planet to orbit its star.

  If something wasn't done soon, this species would be in danger of extinction. Predictive models gave the species fifty more years than they were before the populace degenerated into anarchy and, inevitably, extinction.

  Finally, after two more orbits around the star, the Control System gave the probe new orders. To fulfill those orders, it carefully crashed into the moon's northern pole to look natural and hide under a thin layer of dust.