Chapter 13 Chapter Twelve

The spaceship sent them to the port along the Skynet, and the passers-by on the moving circular aisle looked sullenly at Quinn's face without the sun mark, squinting at the gold-edged badge on his body. They also stole glances at Mindy before walking away apprehensively. Mindy doesn't care about the hostility of pedestrians. "The Skylab was built to complete some dangerous projects," she told Quinn. "It was chosen here to take away the debris by using the solar wind. Your mother sent Skyfish here because it would not be affected by the sun." The attraction of great gravity and the harassment of the saints."

At the entrance of the laboratory, two guards raised their hands to salute Mindy, and then checked Quinn's badge with a laser forgery detector before opening the double trap door.The laboratory was pitch black, and the stagnant air was bitingly cold, mixed with a smoky atmosphere.Mindy found the light switch in the dark, and when the lights came on, they saw that the place looked like a big cave, with high walls and a metal floor with nothing on it. "This is Olaf's laboratory." There are lathes, drills, presses, metal molds, spools, ovens, sewage tanks, water tanks, etc. in the laboratory. "I like Olaf a lot, he's a big, unkempt guy who knows about nuclear fission but doesn't know anything about solar politics here.

"He's a troubled genius who built a reputation for designing the propulsion system for the cruiser Kirwan, but quickly made big mistakes. Your mother said he was stupid. "Although his design has good safety performance, it is too simple and too small to satisfy the people of the Kirwan family. Your mother warned him to give up as soon as possible. Kirwan's laboratory later cut his research funding, and the security department Some people came to question him severely. If Benito hadn't released him on bail, it would have been a lot of trouble." "Benito?"

At his surprise, Mindy frowned slightly dissatisfied. "Benito made a deal with him to build a private spaceship." She pointed to a slender silver spaceship, perched on a large ledge, which Quinn realized was about the same size as the one he and Jason Cowan had been in. "The ship was designed to fly back to Earth, which is its port. But it has never been launched because the company is worried that he will use it to test new engines, or to contact your mother's distant friends in the aperture One day Olaf and six or seven good friends suddenly disappeared, suspected to have defected to the Saints."

"It was a cruel thing for your mother, she was held up for questioning, but she claimed not to know where Olaf had been or what his intentions were. Eventually your mother was released, continue Conduct experiments on Skyfish, but only under the supervision of the guards." They continued on to Mother Quinn's lab.This laboratory is smaller, and the mess inside the house is the result of the bomb explosion.The tall metal partition was broken into two pieces, blackened by smoke, and there were some yellow bulb-like things in the middle, which were the traces left by the dry powder fire extinguisher when fighting the fire.

"Her chair is over there," Mindy said, pointing to an empty space. "A very powerful bomb. The Saints are experts in making bombs. She must have died on the spot. The three people who came to the rescue also Suffocated in the smoke." There was a big black spot on the metal floor, was that his mother's blood?Feeling unconscious, he turned and walked around the room: blown up work benches; burnt lab instruments and shards of metal; broken glass splattered underfoot.Mindy followed him, squeezing his hand sympathetically. He kicked aimlessly at the rubbish under his feet: strands of yellow foam squeezed from the surface of burnt paper; shiny computer fragments;The dust raised on the ground was mixed with a choking smell. He bent down and sneezed, and suddenly saw a photo.

Clay, balding, was smirking at him.He knelt down to pick up the photo and wiped the thin dust off his face.He rummaged through the clutter again and found a half-burnt photograph.The child in the photo is looking forward to the outside world, and there are several space bags on the bed in the small room behind him. "Your picture?" Mindy exclaimed. "It was taken at Jannot." There was a dull pain in his throat as if there was something hard. "It was taken in my mom's room in her spaceship, the day she was leaving and the last time I saw her." He crouched down and searched again, this time finding a perfectly preserved, unfaded photo of his beautiful young mother surfing, her long blond hair still blowing freely in the wind .

"Once I asked my mother what the earth looked like and she showed me this picture." His voice was a little hoarse. "She said it was my dad who took the picture and I always wanted her to tell me who my dad was." Tears blurred his vision.He took the photo and blew away the dust attached to it, and suddenly found that there was something written on the back, a string of numbers, and the ink had faded.He blinked his eyes twice and read out. "It's a phone number," said Mindy. "My dad's?" He glanced at her. "yes?" She nodded, looked at him inquiringly and said, "Maybe."

Tianyu was kept in a dark place at the end of the laboratory.He looked in between the steel pillars, it was too dark to see anything, until Mindy pointed to a gray thing in the corner, he didn't know it was a skyfish.At this time, he smelled a fresh breath from the dull and smoky smell, a strange, sweet, faintly mysterious breath. He knelt on the ground and looked at the sky fish imprisoned inside.The lines of Tianyu are slender and graceful, and the tail is getting thinner and thinner.Finally, it is thinned into a point, and there are two coverings on the body, hanging down to the bottom of the groove, like wings and fins.Why is Tianyu's face missing?He involuntarily stretched his hand in and touched Tianyu's soft skin. When he touched a long and thin scar, he retracted his hand in horror.

Laser burns! Inexplicably, he felt sorry for himself.Here is an animal in space, which is at peace in the eternal darkness without air, but human beings need complex equipment to survive here.Tianyu swam towards them, perhaps with no malicious intentions, perhaps hoping to make some human friends, but it was imprisoned here and lost its freedom. "I used to come here with your mother," said Mindy, "and she got him out of the Earthlab, where the specialists doubted its intelligence after trying to get him to talk, but your mother found out It's as smart as we are." "Maybe even smarter. It has electronic senses. Your mother is sure it can pick up radio waves without any equipment. I've seen it read and read newspapers. It turns pages as fast as it can read."

"But it doesn't talk, not even to your mother. The security department used all kinds of coercive methods, such as strong lights, noises that seemed to hurt it, and even thorns with bull horns. Your mother tricked it into talking. The method is much gentler, but it still doesn't tell, not even to your mother." "I said—" He knelt down to look at Tianyu again. "Your mother thinks that because we have come to this aperture, the animals in space are frightened. She thinks that the sky fish is sent to watch us, so it is determined not to reveal any secrets, so as not to betray its world." He clicked Nodding, he reached out to touch Tianyu again. Thinking that the mysterious sky fish could not swim freely in the endless darkness, his trembling hands stopped again, and his heart was filled with pity. "And now?" he asked, "what now?" "I don't know either," Mindy said, shrugging uneasily. "I ordered the lab to be sealed up to protect the skyfish. But no one knows what it needs. It doesn't eat, it doesn't breathe. It takes you Mom's embalming suit was torn off. Its metabolism is still unknown. Scientists from the security department tried to take blood samples, but it damaged their needle clips and blades. Scientists tried to use X-rays, but Tianyu Mysterious rays that radiate themselves blur the pictures they get." "Your mother gave up these methods and asked Olaf to design a magnetic field device. Olaf discovered that there is a huge magnetic field in the body of Tianyu, and he believes that its structure is similar to the structure of the magnetic field in the new engine he designed.He wondered if its energy was nuclear energy. Many people scoff at his idea, but why can Tianyu survive in space?Why doesn't it need food, air and heat? " Curiosity made him tremble with excitement, he bent down and looked at Tianyu again. "Do you think it understands what we're saying now?" "I believe it won't understand." She took his hand and took a few steps back.He felt her hands trembling. "I'm scared for no reason. A lot of us are. A lot of people are horrified to know your mother read it. They're worried that it'll learn our secrets and escape." "That's probably why there was a bomb attack here." Tianyu lay there, a flat and dusty ball.He tried his best to imagine its life in space, how many secrets it has learned about human beings, and how it feels.Thinking of this, he couldn't help trembling all over.In addition to the biting cold, there are more biting things here. "Do you think—" He was too scared to speak, and pulled her away a few more steps. "Will it be killed?" "There is no judgment yet." Her voice was also a little hoarse. "The Giant himself appointed a Committee of Thirty to look into all the reports. Perhaps there will be a debate later. Some in the Kirwan family want to renew their efforts to make it speak, and before the verdict—" She said with a sigh, "I hope it hasn't heard our conversation." Quinn shook his head, and before leaving, he turned sideways again to look at the scar on Tianyu's body. When they returned to Benito Baraka's mansion, they saw many servants, all dark and dressed in white, preparing a great dinner.These servants have no sun mark, nor do they wear yellow badges.Quinn's machine translator had been taken away by security personnel, so he had no idea what they were talking about.Mindy led him to a slender man who was ordering servants to do this and that. "Quinn, this is Benito." Benito's skin was as dark as his servants.A handsome man, Quinn thought, with neat, smooth hair and a set of teeth gleaming under a neatly trimmed black beard. "Hello, Quinn." Benito nodded casually, but still looked at him carefully with his sharp eyes. "Welcome to Ernidu." "thanks." Quinn stretched out his hand, but Benito pretended to ignore it, and embraced Mindy sideways.Seeing them embracing each other passionately and kissing long and passionately, Quinn was so jealous that he could only look away from them.What he envied was not Benito's high position and wealth, but that he took away his beloved Mindy. Mindy finally let go of Benito and returned to Quinn's side. "There are still a few hours before dinner." Her voice was gentle, her eyes fixed on him for a long time, and he thought, she must have felt his strong jealousy. "You'd better go get some rest, okay?" He swallowed the sudden jealousy in his heart, and silently followed her back to the spacious living room.He felt trembling all over again, as if he was sick, as if the effect of the medicine was still taking place in his body, and he almost doubted whether he could still speak. She began to talk about Benito with gusto.His mother was a huge star in Azteca.His father (according to his mother) was a journalist of the sun's blood, and when he went to Azteca to interview her, he stayed behind and became her lover and her agent. "The love affair pissed off the saints, who called his mother a temptress, and dropped a bomb in her bedroom, where his father happened to be. Both died. Benito was five years old." "My uncle Claudio Baraka took him in. He has always sponsored Benito's mother's career. He must have been her other lover - I believe he was Benito's father, which is why Benito It's because of Toya's surname Baraka." They were just at the drawing-room door, and she stopped and looked at him, as if very displeased. "Mindy—" he whispered in pain, "you and Benito—are you going to get married?" "Of course not, Quinn!" she giggled. "That's illegal. Although the people of the Sun Empire don't want to murder us like the Holy Clan, the punishment is unavoidable. It is to perform surgery to erase the sun mark, and then expel us from the Sun Clan." "Do you love him?" "Oh, Quinn!" He saw tears in her eyes. "It breaks my heart to have to leave you. But that was a long time ago, and there were many twists and turns in the middle." She leaned over and kissed him, a light kiss, a short kiss. "Please, forget everything that should be forgotten!" How he longed to hold her in his arms, but at this moment she was ready to open the door.There was only a click of the lock, and the door behind him opened quietly. Standing alone in the living room, Mindy's fragrance could still be heard faintly, he felt so completely helpless.Baraka's mansion was far more comfortable than the guard's interrogation room, but his future was less bright. He couldn't help hating Benito Baraka, and he couldn't help wondering whether Mindy would really be happy with him, but even if she wasn't happy, so what could he do, there was still nothing he could do.Self-pity pierced his heart like a knife, and he thought of the skyfish imprisoned in the laboratory, as helpless as he was, waiting for the judgment of others, maybe the result would be a dead end. However, if he could find his father-he took out the three photos he found in the laboratory.Clay, bald, was giggling.The kid with the big eyes.His mother's withered beauty, and the faded phone number written on the back of the photo. Can I find Dad on the phone?After so many years, he thought, it is unlikely! But he still walked to the big bed, picked up the phone, and after a blind tone on the phone, a computer prompt came: "The user's circuit is faulty. The user—" He tapped the numeric keypad indiscriminately, and the computer prompts stopped abruptly.At this time, a woman flashed on the computer screen, singing a foreign song that seemed to be sad hoarsely. He ignored her and just let her sing.The medicine the guard had given him now left a bitter aftertaste in his mouth.He sat on the edge of the bed, staring blankly at the computer screen. The headshot of the singer disappeared in the blink of an eye, and a series of news appeared on the screen, reporting the crimes instigated by the Revelator: a power station was destroyed; a food factory was bombed; Azteca's strike was bloodily crushed. "The following points are his illegal signals." A sinister black face flashed on the screen, black eyes sparkling with rage and a white beard glistening.This is the Revelator, who blows and beats, sings and dances, with a magnetic voice that makes people drowsy.At the beginning, I didn't know which language it was in, but after the avatar disappeared in the blink of an eye, it changed to English. "I'm the Alpha, breaking a holy path for God's blessed child. I'm Omega, stepping up to kill the evil spawn of Satan, those guys are born without liver and lungs, destined to die after their illusory heaven collapses To all the idolaters, the evil seeds of beasts, after their death, I will come to save their souls, wow! wow! wow! "I prophesied that the end of their world was at hand, and that their blasphemous Tower of Babylon would fall, because I saw the red dragon that Saint John said brought them the key to hell. They drank the saints blood, living in sin is sweeter than ever. "I've seen monsters coming toward them. Their fleets of air, their evil minions, giants they were born to go to hell, can't save them. The sun-mark is the symbol of their curse, and they have no way of redemption. They Will not repent because they have no soul. They have heard the apocalypse, but they will not believe it. "But a witness lives among them, a poor mistreated man who swears he saw the monster too. This child of Satan, conceived in the darkest places of hell, who warned them of the end, yet they still No. Not until the Tower of Babylon which they built in the air falls, and all the evil masters and their purple whores are buried in it, will they believe it. "Now, they are going to kill this poor child who saw the monster, because the demons who rule them forbid them to believe that the end is coming." Quinn was terrified, and frantically tapped the numeric keypad with his hands. It was he who had seen the monster that the revealer said! It had been a long time since the queen flew away from her mother's planet, and she had not eaten during this time.There is no new metal food in the stomach, and the children waiting to be fed will only devour her body.Her new nest had just been built, and the pain before labor made her faint. When she woke up again, she found that her stomach was gone.The newborns had eaten her belly, and wrapped her armor around them as well.She was crippled and without her jet-like fluid sac, she could no longer fly. She also lost her second chance at motherhood.The precious semen in her belly was like little sparks of holiness that could have burned in thousands of warrior sons to make up for their father's sacrifice.But now she has lost the ability to reproduce. Dragging her crippled body to tend to the hatching eggs, she limped to the mouth of the cave to protect herself from predators.Her ears were filled with the sickening sound of mosquitoes. She clings to the unconquerable spirit of her samurai family.Her prince had not died in vain, and neither would she.She will start a new life with her children, a happier and more splendid life. Eagerly she felt new life sprouting in the first egg.As the fiery eggshell begins to crack, she helps free her firstborn son.She licked off the shell that was clinging to her son's body and lowered him into her tiny jaw. He was not a prince, just a small seeker.But her mother's heart was full of kindness and pride. Saint Phil: The name of the industry for synthetic nutritional products. The raw materials are industrial waste and human garbage. There are rumors that the dead can also be used as raw materials.Due to the joining of the Sun Empire, this industry has quickly monopolized the market by using energy from space.During the Sun Century, the importance of this industry increased due to uncontrolled population growth, soil erosion and urbanization that reduced the area of ​​arable land.By the day Skynet fell, about 80% of the world's population depended on nutrition for a living.