I saw everything

Chapter 396 Distant Home
2045, April 3.

Asia Union Venus Colony.

Since the first Earthling visited Venus in 2034, after eleven years of painstaking efforts, the Asian Union has established a floating continent of approximately 70 square kilometers on Venus and has relocated a large number of people from Earth.

As of now, the Venus colony has a population of 17438. This population includes immigrants from Earth and the first generation of Venusians born in the Venus colony, numbering 2495.

After so many years of operation, Asia Alliance's dominance on Venus has become unbreakable, and no other force on Earth can stop Asia Alliance from monopolizing Venus.

Texas, in the North Union.

Lister, the second-generation president of SpaceX, looked at the promotional posters released by Asia Union to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Venus colony, without showing any emotion on his face.

His gaze swept over the oil painting on the side of the office; it was a portrait of the first president of SpaceX.

'It's a pity you won't live to see this day.'

The first president of SpaceX was assassinated in September 2033 because he refused to cooperate with the consortium's arrangements and made numerous revelations online, so he was dealt with.

Lister didn't have much of a relationship with the first president, and he wouldn't have had a chance to rise to power unless the other party had gone too far.

However, at this moment, Liszt was in a very bad mood.

The reason is very simple.

Because their contracted NASA Mars mission was a complete failure, the last of the 15 astronauts sent to Mars three years ago died of illness at the Mars base.

Although NASA and SpaceX jointly suppressed the news and used AI synthesis technology to create the illusion that the astronauts were still on a mission at the Mars base, Lister, as one of the people in the know about the project, naturally knew that they had failed, and failed miserably.

A soft footstep came from the doorway.

Bang bang bang.

"Come in…"

"Mr. President, Mr. David Andrew, the new NASA Administrator, is here to visit."

"Oh?" Lister was not surprised by the uninvited arrival of the new NASA administrator, because the other party must already know the true situation of the Mars base.

A short while later, David Andrew arrived at his office.

Upon entering, the other party, with a grim face, aggressively questioned, "Lister, you are responsible for the failure of the Mars mission."

“Director, please have a seat.” Lister remained very calm, because he knew that the failure of the Mars mission was a huge setback for the Northern Alliance’s space strategy.

That's precisely why he remained so calm. After all, if this matter were exposed, SpaceX's stock might plummet, but the impact on Beilian Weixin would be absolutely fatal.

It's worth noting that the Asian League has already dominated Venus.

If the Northern Alliance's colonization mission on Mars fails, and fails in such a disastrous way, the spirit and morale that the Northern Alliance has barely managed to maintain will collapse instantly. This is definitely not an outcome that the Northern Alliance's leadership wants to see.

Therefore, this situation has emboldened Liszt.

David Andrew, having been rebuffed, stared intently at Lister, but given Lister's indifferent expression, he knew that the other party was unlikely to back down.

“Phew, Lister, you should be aware of the problems with the Mars base. We must solve this now, otherwise…”

“Hehe, Mr. Director, I know the consequences, but these consequences are not something that SpaceX and I will bear alone, so please make that clear, otherwise I don’t think there’s any point in us talking anymore.” Lister said, picking up his coffee cup.

"Okay! You win, Fuck you... If I had known about this, I definitely wouldn't have taken the job as NASA Administrator."

Seeing that the other party had finally calmed down a bit, Lister poured him a cup of black coffee: "Now we can talk about serious matters. I have a solution that can keep your position and also prevent chaos within the Northern Union."

"What method?" David Andrew perked up instantly.

Lister said with a smile, "Mars is adjacent to the asteroid belt. If an asteroid were to collide with the Mars base and cause its complete destruction, what do you think of this plan?"

"..." David Andrew fell into deep thought, considering the feasibility of the plan in his mind.

A few minutes later, he had already mentally analyzed the consequences of the asteroid destroying the Martian base, and then he nodded: "Okay, but the timing needs to be arranged carefully."

"For example, when Mars and Earth are exactly separated by the sun?" Lister replied with a smile.

“You’re a smart man, so keep it clean. After all, there are a lot of astronomical telescopes around the world now. But how do you plan to keep this from Asia Alliance? They’ve deployed a lot of artificial satellites in Mars orbit and have three unmanned bases on the surface of Mars.”

"Heh, would you believe the propaganda of hostile forces?" Lister retorted.

David Andrew did not refute: "OK, you've convinced me."

Lister picked up his coffee again and asked, "The Asia-Pacific Space Agency has invited heads of space agencies worldwide to attend the tenth anniversary celebration of the Venus colony. Are you planning to go?"

"What do you think?"

“I understand. It seems you don’t plan to go.” Lister smiled and shook his head.

David Andrew sneered: "I don't want to be humiliated by the Asia Alliance, and I'd like your SpaceX to rethink the Mars colonization mission! The asteroid impact base thing is good enough for one time, but no one will believe it next time."

"I know, but funding..."

“You helped me resolve the hidden dangers of the Mars base, so naturally I won’t make things difficult for you. But you should know that Boeing, Lockheed Martin, the European Space Agency, and the Russian Space Group all need a share of the profits. If you don’t want things to go wrong with the Mars base, I can’t give you the original share of investment and funding for the new round of Mars missions.”

Lister was not surprised; it was within his expectations.

Although the company's shares were divided among various conglomerates after the first president of SpaceX was purged, this does not mean that every conglomerate is easy to deal with.

Lister, who didn't want to be shot in the back and commit suicide, nodded: "I know, you can adjust the share, how about 50% of the original?"

"Hehe, are you kidding? It can only be 20% at most."

"That's too low. If we cut that much of the share all at once, our project might not be able to be completed on time. Let's say 45%!"

After a heated debate, the two sides finally agreed that SpaceX would receive approximately 33% of the share.

There was no way around it; the failure of this interplanetary colonization mission to the Mars base was known not only to the top executives of NASA and SpaceX, but also to the top executives of other conglomerates.

If SpaceX does not relinquish a portion of its profits, the consequences will be severe.

...

the other side.

On the floating continent of Venus.

This floating continent, covering an area of ​​over 700,000 square kilometers, is home to five core cities: Blue Whale City, Taibai City, Cloud Mist City, Crimson Glow City, and Tongtian City.

In Taibai City, a large number of automated robots are busy at work.

Gases extracted from Venus's atmosphere are continuously sent to processing plants, where they are separated into various usable components.

These separated components are then transported through a vast network of pipelines to various processing plants, where they are transformed into a variety of products. For example, carbon dioxide, the most abundant element in Venus's atmosphere, is currently the primary raw material for the expansion of floating continents. The carbon and oxygen extracted from it, after special processing, can produce carbon nanofilms, which can be used to manufacture airship gasbags.

Oxygen was used as a substitute for hydrogen to fill the airbags.

This approach would obviously not work on Earth, but it works on Venus because the main component of Venus's atmosphere is carbon dioxide, so oxygen airships can float in the dense atmosphere dominated by carbon dioxide.

Unlike factories on Earth, factories on Venus strive for automation, replacing ordinary human workers with various rudimentary AI programs and robots.

The entire city is an industrial complex. The Earthlings who immigrated to Venus are all doing management and technical jobs. Ordinary workers have no place here.

After all, at the current rate of immigration, only about 20,000 Earthlings can immigrate each year, which is a drop in the ocean for the entire planet Venus.

Therefore, every person in the Venusian colony is extremely valuable and certainly cannot be wasted on ordinary work.

After a busy day, Li Haodong took off his work clothes and changed into a more casual special protective suit. He and two colleagues then left the industrial area in the west of the city and took the internal tram back to the residential area in the east of the city.

Li Haodong, who has been living on Venus for six years, has now adapted to life there. Although he will be separated from his family on Earth, he doesn't actually like his parents and relatives. He chose to immigrate to Venus alone, which he did secretly without telling his family.

Perhaps distance makes the heart grow fonder.

After immigrating to Venus, Li Haodong actually made more phone calls or sent emails back to Earth than before.

"Haodong, do you think we have any chance to go back to Earth?" a round-faced colleague sighed.

Another middle-aged man with a long face patted the round-faced man on the shoulder: "Old Shi, are you homesick?"

Round-faced Shi Guzhi couldn't help but become sentimental: "A little, I do regret it now. I don't know if I'll ever be able to go back to Earth in this lifetime. I want to see my parents one more time."

"Just video chat more! What else can we do? There are no flights from Venus to Earth right now," Li Haodong said nonchalantly.

Shi Guzhi complained about the communication quality between Venus and Earth: "The delay is terrible. Sending emails is so-so, but video chat is so awkward."

Not a moment.

The three of them arrived at an indoor park.

The area is lush with greenery, and all kinds of plants from around the world thrive here. Insects and small animals transported from frozen Earth also multiply and thrive here.

Above the park is an artificial sky dome system that can simulate sunrise and sunset, wind, rain, clouds, and fog.

Venusians also use this method to determine their daily routine.

After all, Venus rotates very slowly, taking 243 Earth days to complete one rotation.

In other words, if we take Venus's rotation as the measure of a day, then a day on Venus would be approximately 5832 hours, which is simply impossible to maintain a normal daily routine.

Therefore, the time scale of the Venusian colonies is the same as that of Earth, with a day consisting of 24 hours and a year consisting of 365 days.

As for how Venus rotates and revolves, it's actually irrelevant.

However, in order to prevent the biological clocks of Earth creatures from becoming unbalanced here, a sky dome system has been set up in the residential areas and simulated nature zones of various cities to help stabilize the biological clocks of these immigrant creatures.

On a park bench.

The three of them drank beverages, and Shi Guzhi also bought a box of bird feed, then grabbed a handful and threw it at the small plaza in front of them, which was made of lava rocks.

Suddenly a large flock of pigeons and sparrows flew over and began pecking at the bird feed on the ground.

Li Haodong stroked a pigeon that had landed on his shoulder: "These pigeons should be edible, right? If you keep feeding them, they'll probably get used to it and won't forage in the wild anymore."

“These are creatures we’ve been raising. Are these simulated nature areas really in the wild?” Shi Guzhi continued scattering bird feed.

"These birds are actually lucky; at least they escaped Earth and became pioneers among the first birds to migrate to Venus," the horse-faced colleague joked.

"I'm so envious! They still have feathers." Li Haodong touched his bald head.

To be precise, all the Earthlings who immigrated to Venus are bald. They all underwent permanent hair removal while they were on Earth, and they also have bio-brainwave sensor rings on their heads for positioning.

Therefore, there are very obvious differences in the physical appearance of ordinary Earthlings and Venusians.

Many Earthlings like to call Venusians "bald guys".

There's nothing that can be done about it, because hair is a relatively troublesome body part for astronauts.

The main issue is that hair has the characteristics of regular shedding and rapid growth. Shedding hair can easily affect instruments and equipment, and it also requires astronauts to spend some of their energy on grooming their hair.

In addition, since all astronauts now have bio-brainwave sensors implanted in their heads, thick hair can affect the connection accuracy between the bio-brainwave sensors and external devices.

For these reasons, the Asia-Pacific Space Agency tends to take a one-size-fits-all approach and remove all the hair from astronauts, thus solving the problem once and for all.

Although it took some getting used to at first, everyone gradually got used to it because all of my colleagues were bald.

Those female astronauts were also bald.

After sitting for a while, Li Haodong and his two companions saw a mobile display robot not far away, and he waved to it.

The robot then drove over automatically.

"Hello, is there anything I can help you with?"

"What's the news on Earth?" Li Haodong asked casually.

"Today, the Asian Union is holding a celebration for the 10th anniversary of the founding of the Venus Colony..." the robot answered while playing related videos and pictures on the screen.

Li Haodong downed his drink in one gulp, then tossed the bottle onto a nearby trash can: "Not interested. Is there anything else?"

The robot honestly replied, "The second brain experiment has made a breakthrough. In the future, humans can use a second brain to back up their memories, thereby achieving a form of immortality."

"A second brain? Has this project been successful?" Shi Guzhi stopped scattering bird feed.

You're familiar with this project?

"Didn't I already say that my younger brother is doing research and development on biological computers? I know some things through his connections."

Li Haodong asked with concern, "Can a second brain really achieve immortality?"

Shi Guzhi replied with a deep gaze, "For those who are implanted from childhood, it is indeed a kind of alternative immortality, but for those who are implanted midway, the result may be that they become a different person."

“Old Shi, if humans could live forever, then maybe we really could go back to Earth,” Li Haodong suddenly reminded him.

“This…” Shi Guzhi was a little uncertain.

"Don't overthink it. At least we can see the future, right?" the horse-faced colleague comforted him.

"To be able to see the future..." Shi Guzhi felt a pang of melancholy: 'I wonder if the future will be good or bad, does immortality really have any meaning?'

(End of this chapter)