Chapter 31 Chapter 25 The Deceived World

A decade after Jupiter burned up, spreading heat to its satellite system, Europa was completely isolated.Later, the cosmonauts flew over it quickly, using radar to detect through the clouds, trying to find the wreckage of Qian's spaceship.Although they were unsuccessful, the map they made of Europa toward the light revealed for the first time the original appearance of the new continent that emerged from the melting of Europa's ice. They also discovered a completely straight, two-kilometer-long "giant wall" that looked completely artificial.Its shape and size led one to think it was the Tigu Plate, or one of the plates, for millions of copies of this had been made shortly before the Constellations were born.

But beneath Europa's ever-thickening clouds, there was no reaction or hint of possible life, so a few years later, scientists ventured to place observation satellites in permanent orbits while sending high-altitude balloons into Europa's atmosphere to study it airflow form. This is of great interest to meteorologists here on Earth, because Europa, with its central ocean and sun that never sets, can serve as an example of extreme simplification for teaching. As such, whenever scientists suggest getting closer to this moon, executives like to call it "Europa Roulette."After fifty quiet years, it's starting to feel a little boring.Captain Laplace wanted the status quo to be maintained, and asked Dr. Anderson for assurances.

"I personally think," he once told the scientist, "that if someone dropped a one-ton piece of metal that could penetrate an armored vehicle at me at a thousand kilometers an hour, I would consider it a bad idea." An act of kindness, and I'm surprised the World Council agrees with you." Dr. Anderson was also a little surprised, but probably not if he had known that the project was the last item on the table for a long scientific committee discussion on a Friday afternoon.These trifles have thus changed history. "I agree, Captain. But we are proceeding very carefully so as not to disturb the life on Europa, whoever they may be. Our aim is five kilometers above sea level."

"I understand this. But what special needs to be detected on Mount Zeus?" "It's so mysterious. It wasn't even there a few years ago, and I'm sure you can see why it drives geologists crazy." "Will your probe start analyzing it when it enters it?" "Exactly. And, I really shouldn't have told you that I was required to keep the findings secret and send them back to Earth in secret. Someone obviously wanted to hijack this discovery, so make sure the data doesn't Be made public. Do you believe that scientists are so pitiful?" Captain Laplace could believe it, but he would not disturb his passengers.Dr. Anderson seemed naive; whatever happened (the captain was now convinced there was some mission he didn't know about), Anderson didn't know anything about it.

"Doctor, I can only hope that the Europas don't climb the mountain: I don't want them to disturb them and their plans to plant the flag on the summit of the highest mountain." There was an uncharacteristic excitement on board the Galaxy when the probes projected, and even the most ludicrous jokes failed to elicit any reaction.During the two hours when the probe landed on Europa, everyone on board would find a legitimate reason to visit the bridge and observe the guidance operation.Fifteen minutes before impact, Captain Laplace asked all passengers to relax, except for new flight attendant Rose, who was busy serving up delicious coffee non-stop.

Everything went smoothly.After entering the atmosphere, the air brake is activated to slow the impact velocity of the probe to an acceptable speed.The radar image of the target (no shape, no specification indication), gradually appeared on the screen.In less than a second, all loggers automatically switched to high speed operation... ...but there is no data to record. "I don't know now," said Dr. Anderson sadly, "what it was like for the people in JPL when the first raiders crashed on Europa and the cameras were blinded again!"