Chapter 25 Chapter Twenty-Four

From the perspective of living, Mars is not a place where people can live directly.In real estate parlance, this is known as a "rental that needs to be fixed up by the tenant to live in", but this kind of property has good prospects, if the occupants are willing to do some repairs.What Mars lacks are air, water, and proper temperature, what it has in abundance is land.Its land area is much larger than that of the earth, because unlike the earth, a large amount of precious planetary surface is taken up by the ocean.For the Heckley, that's exactly what's good about it.Strange matter-fueled engines on their ships can shoot energy into it.This energy can heat water from crystalline rocks, extract oxygen from oxides, smelt iron ore into steel to build the houses they need, and use rocks to make glass on houses to let sunlight in.These necessary energies happen to be available to the Hekri.Mars could provide space for them to thaw, hatch, and raise those 73 million frozen eggs.

In the landing boat, Lasander stared blankly at the silent screen.Silence belonged only to this end of the communication on the landing ship.The people on the screen, both Hekri and Earthlings, were anything but quiet, they were yelling, as could be ascertained from the way their arms waved and their lips and jaws moved as they argued.But Lysander had turned the sound off. Margerie didn't even look at the screen, her full attention was on Lysander.Her first impulse was to hug him tightly and comfort him.If anyone in the world needed comfort, it was him.But she dare not.His face was as rigid as concrete.She tried to touch his cheek, feeling a muscle pulsating under his skin with her fingertips.

Lysander avoided the touch of her fingers, his face contorted.He spoke, but the voice was so low that she didn't hear him until he turned to look at her questioningly. "What, Lysander?" He asked in leaden tone, "What am I? Am I even human?" She took a deep breath. "Dear Sandy," she said, "you are John, William Washington, and this is you. Biologists say you can do anything a human on Earth can do. You can think, you can walk, you can make love... " "I did it but it made you sick!" She shook her head. "It wouldn't have happened if I'd been on histamine allergies. We tried that, remember? They even..." She hesitated. "They even said, you might have a baby."

He glanced at her with pride and contempt. "This is impossible!" She said firmly: "It's not impossible, it's just difficult." "I don't believe you," he said sharply, "why does everyone lie to me? Even Marsala after all these years!" He covered his face with one hand, feeling something hot and wet.He looked at the hand and laughed. "At least I can cry like a human being," he said, his voice trembling. "To me, you are the real person," Margeley told him.He shook his head dejectedly.She thought for a moment, then changed the subject: "Sandy? Do you remember that on the plane, you said you were going to write a poem?"

He looked dazed, and after a while, he fumbled in his pocket. "I put it here, you can take a look." "Okay, of course I want to see it, but what I want to say is..." He wasn't listening at all, he had already taken the piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to her.The paper is folded and almost frayed.She was shocked when she opened it. "Is this a coffin?" she asked. "It's a poem," he said sadly. "Do you know what a poem is? It's a person's feeling on paper. This poem is my feeling." "Yes, I understand, but Sandy dear..."

"You don't have to read it aloud if you don't want to," he said sadly. "I don't know if it's well written." Margeley complied.She unfolded the paper and read it carefully. i am born of man still in empty space The copulating seeds of some weird creature? Am I a child of nature or a product of manufacture? Maybe it's better to be ignorant of everything Because oviparous or viviparous as far as I know People don't make me jealous much less I live with admiration; they reckless evil, doing all kinds of bad things i'm ashamed of them Pray that God will punish the

they, i truly Hope both sides fail! She looked down at him, both angry and funny. "Lysander, this poem is too dark. What kind of man can write such a poem?" "Anyone who pays close attention to the people around him can do it! This is a gloomy world, haven't you noticed? Margery, look at those people!" He pointed condemningly at the silent gesticulating people on the screen. people. Margeley looked at the screen.But what she saw baffled her.Boyle, waving his arms in front of his face, looked like a football fan trying to impress the peanut hawkers in the grandstands. "What is he doing? Does he want to talk to you?"

Lysander shook his head. "Why? There's no need to talk to me. They need to communicate with each other, but they don't want to." The landing craft suddenly tipped slightly, and then floated freely in space. Lysander glanced quickly at the control panel. "We're coasting right now," he said. "This will last about an hour. But you'd better get back in your seat and the landing craft will turn around before the engines start up again so we can slow down." Marge Li let out a low cry.He looked up at her frowning. "What's wrong?" "I thought you were going to hit the Heckley spaceship."

He looked at her face in disbelief, and after a while, he smiled. "Why would I do this? We're going to die." "Dear Sandy," she said earnestly, "you don't know how happy I am to hear you say that. But why did you sneak aboard?" "Of course it's to prevent your people from doing this," he said in surprise. "Later, I thought, I can go back to the spaceship and discuss with the elders." "With me?" "I didn't intend to bring you, Margeley," he pointed out, "You came by yourself." She sort of got it. "what about now?"

"What else can be done?" he asked. "Maybe the two of us can give them a wake-up call. It would be an adventure for you, wouldn't it? You'd be the first to visit the Hyaklei starship." Earthlings—the first native Earthlings?" Margeley thought about it. "It's . He blinks.She continued: "Look, when I asked about your poem just now, I didn't want to read it. I just wanted to tell you that I wrote one myself." "You never said you could write poetry." she laughed. "Maybe this isn't even a poem. Look at it, and tell me what you think."

He stared at the piece of paper she handed over in disbelief, then looked up at her again. "Oh God!" "Damn it, look!" He complied. sweet sandy Strong as a brick wall sensitive and kind you say you love me, I think I love you too. if you ask me to marry you I will say I do! "Are you sure?" he asked hastily. "Fool," she said affectionately, "stop asking questions. Kiss me." So, he kissed her, over and over.Suddenly, Margery caught a glimpse of the communication screen from the corner of her eye.People on screen don't seem to be arguing anymore.Hamilton Boyle is holding two thumbs up.Qing Taiqi Luo shed tears kindly.Demi and Bolton giggled and shook hands in greeting. "Sandy," she asked tremblingly, "did you see that? Are they trying to tell us they've reached a deal?" Without letting go of her, he craned his neck to look. "I don't believe it," he said, but his tone was also uncertain. "What else? They must be trying to tell us something." He said solemnly: "It's impossible to have two good things happen to me in one day. I can't believe they decided to cooperate." "Fool," she said coquettishly, "maybe it's true. Why are you not sure?" He just shook his head. "I don't believe it." He said stubbornly, but then turned on the sound switch... Marge Li guessed right.