Eisen walked up to the launch tower platform alone. The tower had been covered with a layer of canvas. It seemed to protect the tower from erosion and pollution from "cloud" particles. This was completely a daily protection of the base facilities.
People don't know whether the "cloud body" is useful, at least they just want to get some comfort.
Dark red "clouds" have covered most of the sky, leaving only a gap on the western horizon. The sunlight coming from behind is very weak, like a candle struggling before it is about to be extinguished...
Black flocks of birds were flying around in the low altitude, and their miserable chirping was depressing and sad. Then, many birds fell from the sky one after another, fluttering on the ground for a few times before becoming motionless. Eisen looked down at the dozen or so birds that had fallen beside him.
As for the little birds, their eyes are still blinking and their beaks are opening and closing, which means that they are not dead, but they may have just lost the consciousness or function of spreading their wings and flying.
He thought of the infected people he had met in the base hospital before...
"The 'Cloud Body' is 'attacking' the earth by invading the consciousness of humans and animals! Its method is so simple, but it is crushing!" Eisen realized.
He sat on the ground, closed his eyes and meditated. Birds kept falling around him, like dead leaves in autumn, like volcanic ash falling from the clouds...
Jacob's hourglass appeared in Eisen's mind - the sand flowed like very fine hair, and he could feel it flowing!
He saw the lowered peak of Mount Fuji, where the largest eruption in history was continuing. The entire mountain was dyed red by the hot magma. The black-gray dust column rising from the top of the mountain was like a thick pillar reaching several
Thousands of meters high in the sky, it spreads out in all directions from the high altitude, and the setting sun dyes its bottom layer with blood red...
He saw a tsunami nearly 100 meters high rushing towards the shore with the force of a mountain. Rows of low buildings were washed to pieces, and cars were lifted high by the huge waves and then smashed towards the shore.
, the people running around were swallowed up instantly like ants...
He was looking for Cao Ziming and his wife, and vaguely saw their confused and frightened eyes...
He saw the islands in the ocean being disintegrated by volcanoes and earthquakes and sinking to the bottom of the sea...
He saw Aisen and grandpa, but they didn't seem to see him, and seemed a little confused. They just flashed in front of his eyes and then disappeared...
The last thing he saw was a large area of densely floating, flashing, fantasy-colored, tiny light spots that were almost indistinguishable to the naked eye...
Eisen opened his eyes and was immediately dazzled by a red light. He looked up and saw that the sky had been completely covered by flaming "clouds", forming a high-speed rotating cloud with a white center above his head.
A huge whirlpool. Looking around again, everything was silent and soundless. The air seemed to have solidified, and there were no more fluttering birds - they all fell to the ground, like a piece of black stone.
At this moment, he had no fear at all. He stared at the vortex and conveyed his thoughts to it: "I want to talk to you!"
The rotation speed of the "vortex" obviously slowed down, and Eisen believed that this was a response to the message he sent. After a few seconds, he felt as if his brain was being pricked by a needle, and at the same time he seemed to hear a voice:
"Are you the ruler of this space?"
He endured the stinging pain in his brain and tried his best to keep his consciousness awake until he confirmed that he had not really heard the sound just now, but had instead perceived the information.
"What if I am?" he asked.
The "whirlpool" turned slower and slower, and then disappeared, but the center still retained a different white color from the surroundings. Eisen thought: This may be the first time the "cloud body" encountered such an answer, so it hesitated.
... He suddenly decided not to think anymore. He must strictly control his inner activities, because every question he is thinking about now can be accepted and perceived by the "cloud body".
The white patch in the center of the "cloud body" began to rotate again, and the vortex appeared again!
"Can you feel my presence when you stare at me like this?" A new "voice" appeared again.
"Where are you from? Why do you want to enter our space?" Eisen continued to answer questions and answers according to his own established logic.
The speed of the "whirlpool" changed again, sometimes faster and sometimes slower.
A blurry image instantly appeared in front of Eisen's eyes. Before he could see it clearly, it flashed past. He tracked the image hard in his mind and finally captured it - it was a hazy halo, a halo.
It was pitch black inside! He immediately thought of a photo of the M87 black hole he had seen...
"They come from black holes?!"
The moment Aisen realized this, the ground suddenly began to shake violently...
An earthquake happened...
"Clouds" enter the Earth's atmosphere starting from the North Pole and continue to extend toward the equator.
Pan Zhaoyu and Liu Wei were stunned by the scene outside the porthole - looking down from the orbit, the "cloud" looked like a huge reddish-brown octopus, and its outstretched "tentacles" were slowly moving towards the Pacific Ocean, Siberia and
Northeast Asia, Europe, the North Atlantic and the North American continent stretch and cover, and their tops occasionally emit clusters of blue and white flashes. And in the space tens of thousands of kilometers above the space station, there is a larger area that blocks the sun.
From the "cloud body" of the stars, a long and slender "cloud body" extends from its interior, connected to the "octopus" below...
Ten minutes ago, the "Tiangong" space station received a distress signal from another nearby space station, the "Union", saying that they had an accidental contact with a "cloud body", resulting in serious damage to the circulating oxygen generating device and the outer shell of the space station.
Requesting the "Tiangong" for response and rescue. Pan Zhaoyu immediately took Liu Wei to drive the small spacecraft "Wukong" carried by the space station to the "Union" for rescue.
The "Union" space station is a small space station jointly developed by NASA, ESA and CNSA in accordance with the overall strategy of the "Pan-regional Cooperation Mechanism" and launched into orbit six months ago. Currently, there are two astronauts from the United States and Japan on board.
, Their main task is to observe and study the causal relationship between the "cloud" activities in the corona and the sudden decrease in solar energy, and to analyze its possible impact on the Earth's atmosphere, magnetic field, climate, and the Earth-Moon system.
Not long after the "Wukong" left the "Tiangong", it lost the position signal of the "Union" due to interference from the "cloud body" magnetic field. Pan Zhaoyu could only follow the initial course to find traces of the "Union" by visual inspection.
Fortunately, the communication between "Wukong" and "Tiangong" is still in normal contact because it uses quantum transmission technology. This can at least ensure that they can return smoothly after receiving the astronauts on the "Union".
docking.
The "Wukong" walked alone between the two "clouds" covering the sky and the bottom, as if they would be flanked by them at any time. Pan Zhaoyu and Liu Wei felt unprecedented oppression...
They finally saw a small black spot under the "cloud" in front of them, and they could vaguely identify it as the "Union" space station. At this moment, it was like a weak insect, swaying feebly and struggling under the entanglement of the "cloud".
With.
Pan Zhaoyu controlled the spacecraft to approach the "Union" little by little from below, trying to keep a certain distance from the "cloud" above his head. At this moment, the instruments of the "Wukong" had failed, and the "cloud" above was boundless.
, it was impossible to judge the height difference between the two. Pan Zhaoyu realized that carrying out rescue in this state was tantamount to gambling with his own life!
However, when they were still about 1,000 meters away from the "Union", they saw a "tentacle" suddenly protruding from the "cloud body" above and involving the "Union" in less than a second.
In a matter of minutes, the space station was disintegrated into nothing, as if it melted into the "cloud body"...
After the shaking of the building subsided, Cao Ziming and Qi Qi slowly opened their eyes. The scene in front of them made their hair stand on end and shuddered——
They seemed to be in a room floating on the sea, with a vast expanse of ocean outside the window - the sea water had almost risen to less than two meters from the bottom edge of their room window; the beach and coastal road not far away had disappeared, and even
Several nearby ten-story buildings are now submerged by the sea water. Only the roofs are exposed, and they are full of people. Due to panic, people are constantly being squeezed into the sea...
The volcanic ash falling from the sky became more and more dense, falling on the sea like a layer of black mud. There were a large number of cars, planks and aircraft wreckage floating on the black sea, as well as countless bodies of victims and people struggling desperately in the water.
The people standing there, calling for help, and crying were heard...
Cao Ziming saw a white man holding a colorful swimming ring floating on the sea with both hands, and there was a little girl in the swimming ring. The man also saw Cao Ziming and his wife in the window, so he swam towards them while raising his hand high
Holding one hand: "Help!! Help!"
Since the guest room window had been locked for safety reasons and could not be opened, Cao Ziming grabbed the floor lamp by the window and smashed the window hard, breaking the glass; then, ignoring the glass shards remaining on the window frame, he leaned out most of his body
, one hand grasped the window frame tightly, and the other stretched out to them; the white man's eyes showed gratitude, first he struggled to lift the girl high and handed it to Cao Ziming, and then held the window edge, with the help of Cao Ziming
Climbed up.
"Thank you! Thank you!" The man hugged Cao Ziming tightly and asked in standard Chinese: "...Are you Chinese?"
"Yes." Cao Ziming looked at the shivering girl covered in wet volcanic mud and asked, "Is your daughter injured?"
"That's not my daughter... I only saw her alone. I don't know if her parents are still alive..." The man let go of his hand, turned to look out the window, and kept rubbing his hair with his hands. "Oh God.
!Is this the end of the world..."
There are many people on the sea swimming towards this side desperately...
Cao Ziming asked Qi Qi to take care of the frightened girl, then turned around and continued to rescue the people in danger in the sea with the man who had just been rescued...
It was completely dark, and the hot magma that continued to erupt from the top of Mount Fuji illuminated the sky and the sea red. The sound of explosions resounded through the sky. There was no water or power in the hotel, and only the red light in the distance flickered on the wall, like
Facing the open door of hell.
More than 20 people have gathered in the presidential suite, many of whom are women and children who were rescued from the water by Cao Ziming and white men. They are disheveled and have different skin colors. They are all gathered in front of the window at this moment, looking at the scene in front of them.
It was a horrific scene, with some covering their faces and crying for the death of their loved ones, and some kneeling down to pray for their own survival. The room was filled with an atmosphere of sadness and despair...
Qiqi opened the refrigerators in the presidential suite one by one and found food and mineral water. While concealing her inner fear, she distributed them to the women and children to comfort them.
The white man who was first rescued found a bottle of brandy from the refrigerator, drank a few gulps into his mouth, as if to calm himself down, and then handed the bottle to Cao Ziming. Cao Ziming waved his hand.
"The tsunami is beginning to recede!" He continued to stare out the window, "We have hope to survive!"
The man stared at Cao Ziming for a while, then stretched out a hand to him: "My name is Kwalski, from the United States. I hope I have a chance to see you again after the disaster!"
Cao Ziming shook hands with Kwalski and told him his name. He suddenly asked curiously: "How do you know we are from China?"
"Intuition! I understand your culture." A sincere and bitter smile appeared on Kwalski's face...
The entire "cloud body" is gradually spreading out, like forming white "typhoon eyes", and the land and oceans are beginning to emerge from their edges, appearing in front of the "Tiangong" astronauts.
Japan's Shikoku Island has been submerged in the sea, and Honshu has turned into several "islands" covered in white. The narrow waterway of the Tsugaru Strait has been "widened" several times to both sides...
The Hawaiian Islands, a string of green "pearl necklaces" in the Pacific, now only have two or three flashing red dots left, which are volcanic craters exposed above the sea that are still erupting...
A large part of the land at the western end of Alaska near the Bering Strait is like torn pieces of paper, scattered on the dark blue ocean...
Iceland...has completely disappeared!
"The earth is suffering an unprecedented catastrophe!" Pan Zhaoyu's eyes turned red.
"Is our home still there?" Liu Wei asked with a cry, "Can we still go back?"
"Yes! Can we still go back?" Pan Zhaoyu repeated...