Son of the Stars

Chapter 208: Useless
Zheng Yan is gradually waking up from a suffocating nightmare.

The low gravity on Mars would make floating in a medical tank feel better - it would feel more... comfortable than the gravity on Earth.

Zheng Yan opened her eyes in a trance. She couldn't tell whether she was still in a nightmare or had opened her eyes in reality. The world in front of her was blurry, and for some reason, everything she saw was filled with yellow.

But Zheng Yan was completely unaware that the world she saw was very different from usual, and her brain had not yet fully recovered to its normal operating state - the previous flood of neurotransmitters had caused almost all of Zheng Yan's synapses to be in a state of fatigue. To describe her condition in more understandable terms, "the gears in her brain are rusted."

In this state, it is even difficult for outsiders to judge whether Zheng Yan is still in a coma or has woken up - every movement and every thought of hers is generated and transmitted extremely slowly.

But Zheng Yan opened her eyes. This change was enough to make Stephen, Jin Yuzhe, and Field excited.

They had just lost two colleagues, and three of them were "captured" on the spot by S3C7 in the name of "protecting the fusion reactor." When a few black cubes first appeared around them, they didn't take them seriously - although they were shocked by the appearance of something that could move autonomously on Mars. But overall, a group of black cubes with a side length of about centimeters did not have the objective conditions to scare three experienced astronauts.

But it's still a bit scary to be catapulted seven kilometers across Mars over and over again by a group of cubes.

Well, not just a little bit, it's fucking terrifying.

Jin Yuzhe shouted "Hey, Baba" for seven kilometers, Stephen shouted "Mother Fucker" all the way, but Field didn't say a word. However, the first thing he did when he returned to the landing capsule was to turn around and go into his cabin to take a shower and change clothes.

He threw the clothes he took off directly into the incinerator.

The three returned to the landing forward base in fear, and then learned the news of Valentina and Watanabe Masao's death. Their already unstable emotions were hit hard again - even Field couldn't bear such a blow. He shouted at Wu Hou in a somewhat out-of-control manner, "How is this possible?!"

"If you are so shocked by this kind of thing, then we have something to do today." Wu Hou changed his usual calm tone and said in a tone that was very consistent with Field's impression of "looking for trouble". "This world has its own operating mode. What you need to do is to adapt to it as quickly as possible, instead of wasting time here questioning the world!"

A confrontational attitude can only do harm, but for Field, who has been taught to "be a man" since childhood, such an attitude is simply the best for him. Field subconsciously tensed up and was about to be slapped, but then he realized that he was on Mars, and the man who would slap him at every turn had been dead for more than ten years.

Field cleared his throat awkwardly, wiped the non-existent coffee stains on his lips with his fist, and then said, "Go on."

"The black cube you saw will complete the autonomous construction for you. Although its brain is not working well, it is still reliable in this aspect." Wu Hou continued his offensive and aggressive way of speaking, "Although there are some delays, I can confirm that large-scale cases of quantum energy release syndrome have begun to appear on Earth, and social collapse is happening."

The three astronauts looked at each other, all with worried expressions.

"The smart people on Earth who still have some working ability have come up with a solution, but this solution requires two fusion reactors to complete." Wu Hou explained the current situation to the three people, "But currently one of the two fusion reactors has been damaged - when Watanabe Masao suffered from the Quantum Energy Release Syndrome, the fusion reactor was blown up, and Ms. Valentina was also killed."

The atmosphere at the scene became even more heavy. Jin Yuzhe fell to the ground, and exclaimed "Oh shit" one after another. Stephen habitually wanted to take a cigarette from his pocket and put it in his mouth, and then he realized that he had quit smoking for ten years and this was Mars.

Field was the calmest one. He immediately said, "Take us to see the fusion reactor. Maybe it can be repaired." "The magnetic ring that binds the plasma is completely broken. It is not worth repairing even on Earth." Wu Hou shook his head and looked at the astronauts in front of him and asked, "This is the situation now - we need two fusion reactors to save mankind, but now there is only one left. I am just a tactical AI, and the square box outside is for civil construction. Now we can only rely on you - do you have any good ideas?"

There was silence in the landing module. No one spoke. Stephen was an engineer, Jin Yuzhe was a payload chemistry expert who worked on the Mars project, and Field was a professional astronaut. The three of them were rare talents on Earth, but it was impossible to build a fusion reactor with bare hands in the Martian environment.

There is a synthesizer in the landing module that can manufacture various parts, but the maximum processing size of the material synthesizer is limited. And this limit is smaller than the minimum size of the magnetic confinement reaction ring of the fusion reactor. In other words, the material synthesizer can only manufacture small-sized parts, and the installation process needs to be done manually.

The stress generated when the magnetic confinement device is in operation is extremely huge, and manually installed segmented structures cannot meet the force requirements, so this approach is simply not feasible.

"I must remind you that for every minute you hesitate, about a hundred people on Earth will die in the explosion or become the explosion." Wu Hou frowned and began to urge, "Is there any way?"

It couldn't help but be anxious. Unlike the construction robots like S3C7 that relied on independent individuals to think in groups, its existence depended on the clusters built by the human brain. And this cluster was underground, relying on life-support equipment to keep running. But the fatal thing now was that a person with the power of about tons of TNT was now in the equipment room that controlled the life-support equipment.

Wu Hou didn't know when the woman named Li Xiaohui would explode. But it did feel the urgent threat to its life, and this unprecedented panic forced it to constantly put pressure on the astronauts to solve the problem.

But it looks like... Wu Hou might be disappointed.

It was getting more and more anxious, and the frequency of pressure was getting faster and faster. In the end, Wu Hou insulted the three astronauts in a nearly inappropriate way, "The entire human society spent trillions of dollars to send you to Mars, but you can't even figure out how to save your own kind?!"

"Splash!" A sound of not too strong water flowing down the ground was heard, and Zheng Yan, who had been drowsy in the medical sink, climbed out of the sink.

With a somewhat dazed expression, she first walked slowly to the tool area next to the wall, took out a crowbar about 50 centimeters long, and then dragged the crowbar slowly towards her three colleagues.

After being scolded for more than ten minutes by Wu Hou, who was well versed in human hearts, the three astronauts were on the verge of losing control. Well, Jin Yuzhe's psychological quality was indeed not as good as that of a professional astronaut, and he had basically collapsed. This old man who liked to play tricks was kneeling on the ground and slapping himself, crying bitterly while slapping himself, hating that he had studied chemistry instead of fusion reactor manufacturing and maintenance.

After seeing Zheng Yan approaching with a crowbar, Jin Yuzhe became even more emotional. He stood up and strode towards Zheng Yan, shouting that he wanted Zheng Yan to end his meaningless and miserable life.

Then Jin Yuzhe was kicked in the face by a freshman's left leg that was not covered by a pressure suit.

After kicking Jin Yuzhe over, Zheng Yan swung the crowbar in her hand towards the screen where Wu Hou was, and easily smashed the screen into a pile of slag. She cursed with difficulty, "You son of a bitch, don't bully my passengers!"

There was complete silence in the landing capsule. The only sound in the air was Jin Yuzhe lying on the ground with his face covered, repeating "Xiba" over and over again.

"Get up after you're done crying." Zheng Yan's condition was improving at a speed visible to the naked eye. She put the crowbar on her shoulder and cursed, "There's still a person on Earth waiting for us to rescue - what's the point of crying? Get up and work!"

(End of this chapter)