Chapter 3 Chapter One

Are they really intelligent beings?Is it really intelligent?I don't know, I don't know how to find a clear answer, and I will never find a clear answer.I'm not a researcher in a lab; I'm a secret agent. If they are not really intelligent, I hope we never see the day when we have to fight and wrestle with creatures that are both like them and truly intelligent.I know who the loser will be.Me, you—this race we call human beings. For me, it all started early in the morning on July 12, 2007.The phone rang loudly, like it was going to knock my skull off.I fumbled up and down on myself to find something that would turn off the bell, before I remembered I had kept it in my coat pocket across the room.

"Come on," I muttered, "I hear you. Turn that damn noise off." "Emergency," said a voice in my ear, "report immediately, in person." I told him to take care of his emergency by himself. "I'm on vacation. The vacation is 72 hours." "Report to the old man," insisted the voice, "and be right there." Something is wrong. "Come on." I replied, turning over and sitting up, the movement was so loud that it hurt my eyeballs. I found myself across from a blond woman who also sat up and stared at me with wide eyes.

"Who are you talking to?" she asked. I stared at her too, struggling to remember if I'd seen her before. "Me? Talk?" I procrastinate, racking my brain for an appropriate excuse.Then I cleared my head and realized that she couldn't possibly hear the other end of the conversation, so I could make up any excuse, not necessarily a decent one.The telephone used in our department was not the standard type; the voice receiver was surgically implanted in the skin behind my left ear—a bone conductor. "I'm sorry, honey," I said, "I had a nightmare. I talk a lot in my sleep,"

"It's really fine." "It'll be fine once you wake up." I assured her.When I stood up, my body was still a little shaky, "Go on to sleep." "Okay, huh—" She fell asleep almost immediately. I went into the bathroom and injected myself with a quarter-grain of "Spin" in my arm, and the ensuing shock shook me hard for three minutes, during which time the drug worked and I was refreshed.Walk out of the bathroom completely refreshed, or at least a lot like it.I took my coat.The blond woman was snoring softly. 【① Unit of weight, equal to 64.8 mg. 】

I let my subconscious go back and regretfully realized that I owed her nothing, so I left her.There was nothing in the room that would reveal my identity, and she wouldn't even know who I was. I entered our department's office through a restroom on the McArthur space station.You won't find our department's number in the phone book.In fact, it doesn't exist at all.I probably don't exist either.Everything is an illusion.I had another return route, through a small, dark shop with a sign that read: PREMIUM STAMPS AND COINS.But you don't go that way, they'll just sell you Black Beauty stamps for twopence.

If it's you, don't go either route.Didn't I tell you already?We don't exist. There is one thing no head of state can ever know: what is going on with his intelligence service.Only when the Führer has been crushed by this intelligence service will he possibly know.Our department is such an intelligence agency, as secretive as a garter belt.The UN had never heard of us, and the CIA hadn't heard of us—that's what I guessed.I heard once that the funds awarded to us were nominally allocated to the Department of Food Resources.But it is impossible for me to know the exact situation, my own wages are all paid in cash.

All I really know is my training, and what the old man assigns me to do.Some of the quests are fun - if you don't care where you sleep, what you eat, or how long you live.I can drink vodka without batting an eyelid; and I can speak perfect Russian—and Kurdish and a host of other damningly ugly languages. As long as I have any brains, I will quit my job and find a real job. There's only one trouble with that: I can't do it for the old man anymore.That's not okay. Not that he's a gentle boss.He could say things like: "Boys, we need to fertilize this oak tree. Jump into that hole by the root, and I'll bury you in it."

We will do as he bids.Any—one of us will do as he bids. And the old man would really bury us alive if he was fifty-three percent sure that the tree was his cherished Tree of Liberty. I walked in and he stood up and limped towards me.I thought again, why didn't he get that leg back right?I guess he was proud of the cause of his limp.Of course, the real reason I will never know.A man in the position of an old man can only enjoy this pride in private, his profession does not permit public admiration. A mischievous grin spread across his face.With his large, bald head and high, strong nose, he looked both Satan and Punch from the comedy Punch and Judy. "You're welcome, Sam," he said. "Sorry for getting you out of bed."

Hell, would he feel sorry for me? "I'm on vacation," I replied curtly.He's an old man, but a vacation is a vacation—and there aren't many opportunities for vacations! "Oh, you are also on vacation at the moment. Let's go and have a good vacation together." I don't believe his so-called "holidays" so I'm not hooked. "So my name is 'Sam,'" I said. "What's my last name?" "Kavanaugh. I'm your Uncle Charlie—Charles M. Kavanaugh, retired. Meet your sister Mary." I've noticed another person in the room, but only glanced at it, and put it on file for future reference.As long as the old man is here, you have to give him your full attention, unless he doesn't want you to.Now, I looked my "sister" carefully up and down, and then from head to toe.She deserves it.

I could see why he'd arranged for us to work together as brother and sister.For him, this arrangement would save him a lot of trouble.A well-trained agent would no more let his false identity slip through the cracks than a professional actor would miss his lines.Therefore, I must treat this person as my own sister--the most despicable move I have ever seen in my life. Slender and slender, with well-proportioned legs.True mammals - recognizable at first sight and very endearing.For women, the shoulders are fairly broad.A head of curly red hair like flames, wide at the top and narrow at the bottom.The face is not so beautiful as it is heroic.Teeth are beautiful and clean.She looked at me like I was a fan of beef.

I haven't entered the role yet, I just want to be like a rooster, flapping one wing and circling around her. That thought must have come through, because the old man said softly, "Hey, hey, Sammy, incest isn't allowed in our Kavanaugh family. Both of you were brought up by my favorite sister-in-law. Your sister Love you very much, and you love your sister very much, of course in the healthiest American boy's way: healthy, pure, and unbearably heroic." 【① Sam's nickname. 】 "Is it that scary?" I asked, still looking at my "sister". "It's that scary." "Hey, okay——hello, sister, I'm glad to recognize you" She held out a hand.It's powerful, looks as solid as mine, "Hi, man." Her voice was a deep contralto. Just one sound is enough.Damn old man! "I must add a few words," the old man went on in his gentle voice, "if you love your sister so much, of course you'd protect her with death, and with a smile on your face. I didn't mean to say that, Sammy, but yes Organizationally speaking, your sister is more valuable than you, at least for now." "Understood," I replied, "thanks for your eloquence." "Okay, Sammy—" "She is my favorite sister. I will definitely protect her. Don't let dogs bite her, don't let strangers harass her, and don't beat the drum hard. Okay, when shall we start?" "Better stop by the dressing room first. They've got a new look for you, I think." "Just give me a new head. See you later. Goodbye, sister." They didn't give me a new head, but they implanted a personal phone in the protruding part of the back of my head and glued hair on the outside.They dyed my hair the same color as the sister I just met, bleached my skin, and made some changes to my cheekbones and jaw.In the mirror, like my sister, I turned into a fake red hair.I look at my hair and think about what color it used to be - it was a long time ago.Then I wondered if my sister has not changed, this is her true face.I hope it will be.Beautiful teeth--stop it, Sammy!She is your sister. I put on the costume they gave me.The old man had evidently been to the dressing room too; he had curly hair now, somewhere between pink and white.They had altered his face, too, and I'll never for the life of me tell you what, but it seemed obvious that the three of us were related, of that rare red-haired subspecies. "Come on, Sammy," he said. "There's not much time. I'll talk to you in the car." We took a route I didn't know before, and out came the launch pad, high above New Brooklyn, overlooking the Manhattan crater. I drive and the old man talks.As soon as we were out of the control of the local control center, he told me to switch to autopilot and set the destination to Des Moines, Iowa. Once it was set, I went into the lounge to meet Mary and "Uncle Charlie."He briefly recounted our personal histories, adding some small details that were relevant to the present. "This is who we are," he said, "three tourists, a small family enjoying a vacation. If something unexpected happens, that's how we deal with it, doing all the things that nosy, irresponsible tourists do. .” "What is the mission this time?" I asked, "Just rely on your ears, we will do what you say?" "Well—maybe." "Well, but if you're dying, you'd better know why. I always say that. What do you think, Mary?" "Mary" didn't answer.She possesses a very remarkable quality: not speaking when she has nothing to say.This is rare among little girls and deserves praise. The old man looked at me, the way he looked at people was not indecisive, but judging me at this moment, and inputting the data he had just obtained into the machine between his ears. After a while he said, "Sam, have you ever heard of 'Flying Saucer'?" "Huh? It's not like I've heard of it." "You have always learned history. Say it, let's listen to it!" "You don't take it seriously, do you? UFO madness, before 'The Mess'. I thought you were referring to something real that happened recently. UFO madness in the past was a mass hallucination." "yes?" "Oh, isn't it? I haven't studied Statistical Psychology much, but I remember there seems to be an equation. That whole period is called the psychopathic period. If there's only one hysterical person, he'll be wearing tights." Clothes, lock them up firmly." "And this is a time of sanity and sanity, right?" "Oh, I wouldn't exaggerate that much." I rummaged through the unused drawers in my head and found what I was looking for, "I remember that equation--Digby compares the second sequence and Integer equation for the evaluation of higher sequence data. Using this equation, after excluding cases where the cause has been able to be elucidated, the probability that the flying saucer is a lie is as high as 93.7 percent. I remember this equation because For the first time in the history of science—these cases are systematically collected and evaluated by the government. It’s some kind of government program, God knows why.” The old man had a kind face, like a real uncle. "Sit tight, Sam, and I'll tell you something that will startle you. We're going to see a flying saucer today. Maybe we'll even saw off a piece for a souvenir, like real tourists."