Die on Mars

The Orion 2 spacecraft's landing plan was aborted.

Maidong followed Tang Yue's advice and gave up the idea of ​​landing, but she did not leave the low-Earth orbit of Mars. It did not take much time for the spacecraft to change orbit, but there were still more than thirty days before the comet arrived, and Maidong wanted to stay until the last moment. Go again.

The old cat also said the same thing. He said that he was a robot, with rough skin and thick flesh, reinforced iron bones, no need for oxygen or supplies, and insensitivity to environmental changes, so he could try to delay his departure so that he could stay with Tang Yue for one more day. It's a day.

Tang Yue frowned: Don't you want to stay and die together... ah no, live and die together, right?

The old cat shook his head violently.

Maidong also shook his head violently.

This person and the cat looked at Tang Yue with a strong hint of hospice care, making Tang Yue look like a seriously ill patient who was not going to die soon. Tang Yue agreed to everything, eating food and drinking fresh water - —But there is really nothing to eat in Kunlun Station. Tang Yue has long been tired of eating compressed food, and now he feels like vomiting when he sees it.

Master Cat even condescended to serve tea and pour water himself. This was unimaginable in the past. Tang Yue, a serf, suddenly became the master.

Tang Yue: Ears.

The old cat moved over.

Tang Yue smiled and pinched the cat's ears.

However, Tang Yue has no intention of enjoying life. He must seize the time to complete the remaining work, race against time, and make a complete record of human civilization before the comet falls... There may be omissions and fallacies, but at least he must give It has an ending.

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. These eight folders have been sent to Maidong, and the remaining twenty files are being sorted."

"OK! All the data has entered the broadcast sequence."

"Have you finished compiling the information on the Centennial Translation Movement? Old cat?"

"It has been completed, a total of 120,000 words."

After learning about his death date, Tang Yue felt relieved. Since it was an irreversible outcome and a force majeure that could not be escaped, it would be better to work hard and devote his limited time to serving the people instead of crying and blaming everyone. Lao Mao estimates that the precise time of the comet impact is thirty-seven Martian days, five hours and thirty-seven minutes later, which is fifty-five thousand and sixty minutes. When converted into seconds, it is three million three hundred and three thousand. Six hundred seconds.

3309600 seconds, this is all the time Tang Yue has left.

He set a countdown and time ticked by as the numbers ticked by.

During this limited period of time, for every additional word he types, he can leave two more characters of information to the universe.

"Tang Yue." The old cat was lying on the table, tilting his head, but his paws were typing quickly on the keyboard under the table.

"Um?"

"I can stay with you. As long as you nod, Miss Maidong and I will stay with you."

"You have to go." Tang Yue said without hesitation.

"There is no need for you to put your sense of responsibility to mankind above yourself, not to mention that you represent all mankind now, and you have the right to make any choice."

"I've made my choice."

"Is the legacy of civilization more important than civilization itself?" asked the old cat.

"To be honest, old cat, if this were on earth and I knew I still had thirty-seven days to live, then I would definitely settle down my family and friends first, and then do everything I want to do. , leaving no regrets, but I am on Mars." Tang Yue smiled, "I also want to climb up to the Burj Khalifa and go skydiving, but you have to give me this condition."

"From a very young age, teachers have taught us to have a sense of collective honor. What is a sense of collective honor? That is, when you are in school, you represent the image of the class. When you are outside school, you represent the image of the school. You Abroad, you represent the image of the Chinese people." Tang Yue said, "Now that I am on Mars, I feel that I represent the image of all mankind, so I always unconsciously want to straighten my back... History There may not be that many great men in the world, but when he was pushed to that position, he became a great man."

"Times make heroes?"

"I'm not discussing a serious political or historical issue with you." Tang Yue said with a smile, "I'm neither a hero nor a great man. I'm just saying that Mars is so boring. You have to find something to do. You can't sit back and wait for death. Right? This actually has nothing to do with responsibility."

"But there's not enough time left for you to get the whole job done."

"It won't be completed until it is completed. In the words of Mr. Hu Shi, why are you afraid of the infinite truth? Every inch of progress brings joy." Tang Yue was very open-minded, "Besides, aren't there still you? You can continue to complete it."

The old cat leaned back on the chair and typed quickly with his feet.

"I have read the suicide note you wrote."

Tang Yue paused. He knew what the old cat was referring to. At that time, the old cat drove away from Kunlun Station to search for the Chelome detector. On the way back, the old cat and the car accidentally fell into the underground river ruins. Tang Yue was alone. He stayed at Kunlun Station in extremely bad physical condition. Just in case, he wrote a suicide note and left it at the station.

"After the impact, if I can still move, I will come back."

"Come back to collect the body for me?"

"At least I can't let you die in the wilderness. If you are unfortunately torn apart in the impact, then I will find you piece by piece and build a tombstone for you." Old Mao's voice was very calm, and Tang Yue's expression was also very calm. , they seemed to be discussing a person who was completely unrelated to them, "So you'd better install positioning devices on your torso and limbs, so that you can find him easily, so as not to be like Osiris."

"Osiris?"

"Pluto in ancient Egyptian mythology. Legend has it that he was an Egyptian pharaoh who was killed by his younger brother. His body was divided into fourteen pieces." Old Cat explained.

"So cruel?"

"So I hope your body won't be too fragmented. If the fragments are smaller than a fingernail, it will be too difficult to collect." The old cat shrugged.

Tang Yue also shrugged.

"What would happen if a comet with a diameter of 30 kilometers hits it?"

"It will be big." said the old cat.

"How big is it? Is it as big as an E?"

"It's very, very big. If you are close enough, it can even fill your entire field of vision. If you stand under it, you will even think that the sky is falling... But the impact point of this comet is between the Kunlun Station and Kunlun Station. The distance between them is about a thousand kilometers, and the computer has just further refined the impact location." The old cat replied, "You can see it burning across the top of your head, and then falling on the horizon."

"What happens at the moment of impact?"

"I don't know what will happen, but you can imagine the consequences of five trillion nuclear bombs exploding at the same time."

"How long do I have after I see it hit the ground?"

"The violent impact will reach Kunlun Station within twenty seconds."

"That way I still have time to express my feelings, say wow, how awesome it is, and then describe the spectacular scene of the impact to you." Tang Yue counted on his fingers, "Twenty seconds, you can say two words in one second. words, so there are forty words in total, 'Wow, that's awesome, the comet is so fucking big, and the flash is brighter than the sun. I'm telling you, it's definitely a huge regret that you can't see it with your own eyes'... No, the word count has been exceeded.”

"That's it: 'Wow, that's awesome. The comet is so big, and the fire is brighter than the sun. I'm telling you, it's really a huge regret that you can't see it with your own eyes.'... No, there's too much nonsense, not enough Concise, with too little useful information.”

Tang Yue shook his head.

"Wow, that's awesome. The comet is so big, the fire is brighter than the sun, and the smoke column is at least hundreds of thousands of meters high, covering the sky and the sun..."

"You have never seen what a comet collision looks like, so what's the use of saying it now?" Old Cat sighed, "I think when that moment comes, your forty words should be like this... "

"how is it like?"

"Wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow, let me breathe up, wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow, let me breathe again wow wow wow!"