China Entertainment Mythology 2004

Chapter 13 The Moon
At the same time when the movie "Myth" was about to wrap up and preparations for "Taken" started, the editors of Science Fiction World Magazine, who had been reviewing the manuscript for a long time, stood up and moved their bodies.

"How about it, did you get any good manuscripts reviewed today?"

"Not yet, the quality of this manuscript is too poor."

"Do you feel that the sci-fi environment is not getting better in the past few years, but getting worse?"

"I feel it, let's take my son as an example. He used to read every issue of magazines with gusto, but now this kid would rather read online novels than magazines. It seems that there is a website called Qidian. My son now spends every day reading it. On this website, the novels on Qidian are much more interesting than "Science Fiction World".

"Don't talk about others, let's take myself as an example. I must be a true science fiction fan, right? But except for the works of a few old authors such as Wang Jinkang and Liu Cixin, I read all the new works of science fiction. Don't go in."

"I feel the same way. The most uncomfortable thing is knowing that it is a bad work, but you still have to hold your nose and recommend it for the Galaxy Award. Otherwise, what should you do? Don't recommend worse ones, should you recommend worse ones?"

"It's okay if the work is a little bit. The most disappointing thing is that many of them are not science fiction works at all. Let's take an article I recommended in the previous issues. What kind of story is it telling? A woman sits in time The machine came to the Warring States Period, and then fell in love with the kings of the Warring States Period. The novel is quite interesting, but apart from the term "time machine" appearing in Chapter 1, what does this novel have to do with science fiction? But I still recommend the Galaxy essay Yes, because it was already a good work at that time."

"I recommended a story in which the protagonist travels to an alien civilization. Except for Chapter 1, which mentions that humans can marry alien life, it is basically a story about a person coming to a strange city."

"If this is also called science fiction, if Mr. Jin Yong sets the protagonist as a modern person, and travels through a time machine to become Guo Jing and Linghu Chong, then "Legend of the Condor Heroes" and "Swordsman" are not science fiction works?"

"It makes sense. From what you said, the best science fiction novel in China should be "Looking for Qin Ji"."

……

Yang Feng did not participate in the discussion, but was seriously looking at the backlog of manuscripts.She was transferred to the editorial department by the president Alai himself last year, in order to inject a fresh blood into the editorial department.

Like other editors, she is not very satisfied with the science fiction manuscripts she has received recently, but unlike other editors, she is still full of passion for domestic science fiction.

Maybe other editors don't want to read the manuscript because they think it is not good, but she has always maintained a strong patience with domestic science fiction works.

After reading more than a dozen works of unsatisfactory quality, she still opened another manuscript without being affected.

The title of the new draft: "The Moon."

Write about the moon?
There are so many sci-fi angles to write about, but this author chose the most difficult direction.

If you write about the distant interstellar world, then the author can set it at will. You can set the extraterrestrial people, civilization, and all kinds of strange things.

If writing about the earth, the author can also have countless places to use his imagination.

Only the moon, the only natural satellite of the earth, is no longer a mystery in the eyes of human beings, and the author cannot set it randomly.At the same time, this planet is a forbidden zone for life, and the way of writing a story on the earth into a science fiction novel without changing the background is also not applicable.

Because he couldn't figure out the direction the author was going to write, Yang Feng became even more curious.

This story is not complicated, it tells the story of an earthling mining on the moon.

The protagonist signed a three-year contract with the Moon Energy Group, and the remuneration was extremely generous.His wife was pregnant, and he hoped to provide a better living environment for his wife and unborn child, so he signed the contract resolutely.

He is the only living person on the entire moon, and there is also an intelligent robot assisting him. The real-time communication system of the moon base is damaged, so he can only regularly receive videos from his wife. In the video, her daughter has died. From a baby to a three-year-old cute little girl.

But just 2 weeks before the contract expired, he had an accident while driving the lunar rover to mine. When he woke up again, he had already arrived at the medical room inside the base.

At the same time, he lost his memory of the time of the accident, and then overheard that the intelligent robot seemed to be talking to the headquarters in real time, and mentioned the loss of a lunar rover, a mining vehicle and an employee.

This made the protagonist suspicious.

The order from the headquarters asked him to stay at the base and wait for the maintenance personnel to arrive, and the intelligent robot forbade him to leave the base.But the protagonist who already has suspicions obtained permission to go out by deliberately destroying the base.

After the protagonist left the base, he drove the lunar rover directly to the accident site.

Then he saw the lunar rover that was damaged by an accident. He wiped off the dust on the glass of the lunar rover, and saw that there was actually a person in a space suit in the lunar rover.

He carefully entered the lunar rover, wiped off the dust on the mask of the space suit, and found a person who looked exactly like him inside.

People are still alive.

He brought the injured back to the medical room, and now, there are two identical protagonists in the base.So does this mean that one of the two of them is actually a clone made by the company?
A cheap, mass-manufacturable clone for mining?
The rescued person thought he was the original body, because he had worked in the base for three full years, because he would communicate with his family regularly, because he watched his daughter from birth to three years old every day, So the person who rescued him was his own clone.

But the other he who rescued him said that since clones are cheaper, the headquarters won't just make him.

Later, with the help of the intelligent robot, the injured protagonist unlocked some video materials that he hadn't seen before.

In the video, every self who completes the three-year contract will wade into a so-called dormant chamber. They think they are going back to Earth, but after they enter dormancy, these dormant chambers will directly turn into human refining furnaces.

Below the dormant cabin is the hidden cloning base, where the two protagonists also found countless selves waiting to be activated.

The two repaired the real-time communication system, and the injured protagonist made a video call to his home, but an adult girl answered the call, and this adult girl happened to have the same name as his daughter, but his daughter was only three years old.

The injured protagonist asks how the girl's mother is doing. The girl says that her mother died of cancer a few years ago. At this time, a man's voice comes from the phone, and the girl calls the man Dad.

With a bang, the injured protagonist all understood.

It turns out that the real protagonist Ontology has already returned to Earth after his contract expired in 15 years, and he is just the fifth clone of Ontology.

It turned out that all the videos he watched in the past three years were recorded in advance by the company, and I don't know how many clones have watched the videos.

Cloning is an illegal act, and the purpose of the maintenance personnel sent by the headquarters must be to destroy evidence, and whether it is the No. 5 clone or the No. 6 clone, it will be evidence that needs to be destroyed in the eyes of the headquarters.

Clone No. 6 convinces the intelligent robot, and with the help of the robot, he activates Clone No. 7. If the repair ship arrives at the base without finding the damaged body in the rover, they will kill all life in the base.

The No. 6 clone plans to put the No. 7 clone back into the damaged lunar rover, and then let the No. 5 clone escape back to the earth in the only return capsule, while No. 6 himself stays at the base to deal with the maintenance personnel.

At this time, the No. 5 clone was seriously injured. He knew that he would not live for a few days, so he was willing to give up the chance of life to the No. 6 clone.

He himself returned to the damaged lunar rover to confuse maintenance personnel, sent clone 6 back to Earth in the return capsule, and left clone 7 inside the base as a newly activated clone.

Finally, No. 6 successfully returned to Earth, and the secret of Moon Energy Group's illegal use of human clone mining was exposed, and the stock price of Moon Energy Group plummeted.

So far the story ends.

Yang Feng took a deep breath.

This is a work that makes people shudder after reading it. Why is the contract period of Yueneng Group three years?

It is not clearly stated in the novel, but the No. 5 clone that first appeared began to vomit blood, lose hair, and lose teeth when the three-year period was about to expire.

This is also true when watching the video of the previous four clones being incinerated on the 5th.

Which plot in the novel is the creepiest?

It is that every clone that has expired for three years will look at the picture of the three-year-old daughter with a smirk, and innocently say to the computer, have you seen it?I'm going back to see them!

Then wade into the dormant chamber, and then be burned with a bang?

But is this the saddest thing?Yang Feng didn't think so, because at least they were still happy in their hearts at the moment before they died.

The saddest is clone 5 because he knows everything.

He knew that his life was over, that he was a clone, that the wife and daughter he wanted were not his at all.He knew that four clones like himself had been burned to ashes in the dormant chamber before him, and he also knew that there were tens of thousands of himself in the basement waiting to be activated, and then continue to repeat this sad fate, but There was nothing he could do.

The most moving details in the novel are when 5 is finally able to talk to home in real time, and when the clone 6 is unprepared to watch the transcript of the call.

The video call was connected, and when clone No. 5 heard the girl answering the phone tell the news of his wife's death, his initial reaction was to think for a while, and then asked: "Are you sure?"

But then he found out that it was his daughter who answered the phone, and then all his attention was shifted to her.

When the No. 6 clone heard the news of his wife's death, his body couldn't help shaking twice, and he almost couldn't stand up.

This nuance is the most moving.

Because for clone No. 5, he and his wife haven't seen each other for three years, so the relationship is naturally weak.As for the No. 6 clone, in his memory, he and his wife have just been separated for a week. When he learned that his wife who was still glued to each other a week ago in his memory suddenly became a person who had been dead for many years, it was a big deal for him. The blow to No. 5 is obviously stronger than that of No. [-].

So what is the most shocking thing about this novel?

Was it discovered that there was a person who looked exactly like himself in the damaged lunar rover?

Or did they discover that both of them are actually clones, and there are countless clones in the basement?

Or is it that the clones whose contracts have expired enter the dormant chamber and are suddenly incinerated?

Yang Feng didn't think so.

It was the part where the No. 5 clone finally repaired the real-time communication system, and then called home on Earth.

When I saw clone No. 5 making a video call to my home, but the grown-up daughter answered the phone, I learned that my wife had been dead for many years, and that my daughter did not lack fatherly love, and I When all the memories are false.

Seeing this, Yang Feng's heart stings fiercely.

When you think that you are inextricably linked with another person, when you think that your wife needs you, and your daughter and your blood are thicker than water, then you suddenly find that no one needs you at all. You're just a clone of someone else, and someone you cherish doesn't even know you exist.

The only thing you have is this memory, and this memory does not belong to you, so what else do you have?
Yang Feng glanced at the contributor: Li Mu.

(End of this chapter)