Chapter 17 Chapter fifteen

I'm sorry if I made people think Secretary Martinez was stupid.At first, no one believed what would happen to the slug.You've got to see one for yourself—then you'll be convinced. Air Force General Rexton was no fool either.They must have worked all night and made more calls to known dangerous areas, each with the rare "technical glitch".They just believed it.They woke up the old man at about four o'clock in the morning, and the old man woke me up with a special phone—the implant should never be used as an alarm clock; They were in the same conference room, Martinez, Rexton and his two senior officers, and the Don.As soon as I arrived, the President came in in his dressing gown, followed by Mary.

Martinez was about to speak when the old man stepped forward, "Let's see your back, Tom!" The president looked surprised, and Mary signaled to the old man that it was okay, but the old man ignored her. "I mean it," he insisted. "That's right, Andrew," the president said calmly. His nightgown slipped from his shoulders, and his back was uninfected. "If I don't set an example, how can I expect the cooperation of others?" The old man tried to help him into his nightgown, but the President ignored him and draped the nightgown over the back of the chair. "I've had to form new habits, and it's hard at this age. How about it, gentlemen?"

I secretly think that it takes a while to get used to the fact that everyone is naked.Our group, for example, looked very strange: Martinez was lean and dark, smooth as mahogany.I think he has Indian blood.Rexton had a suntanned face, but the skin below the neckline was as white as the President, and a large swath of black body hair ran from left armpit to right armpit, chin to belly.The chest and back of the president and the old man seem to be covered with a layer of gray fur. The fur on the old man's body is so thick that mice can make a nest in it. Mary looked like a propaganda poster calling for adaptation to the new situation—carefully posed, shot from the bottom up to accentuate her long, slender legs—that kind of poster.And myself, uh, I'm an inward-looking person.

Martinez and Rexton have been plugging markers onto a map, red for infected areas, green for uninfected areas, and a few more in amber.The reports kept pouring in, and Rexton's aides kept adding new signs. Iowa is like the measles, New Orleans and the Texas area are not much better, and Kansas City is the same.The upper reaches of the Mississippi River Valley in Missouri, from Minneapolis and St. Paul to St. Louis, are clearly enemy-occupied areas.There are a few more red signs to New Orleans from there - but no green ones. There is also one hotspot around El Paso and two on the East Coast.

The President looked at the map calmly. "We need help from Canada and Mexico," he said. "Any new reports?" "Nothing in particular, sir." "Canada and Mexico are only the beginning," said the old man gravely. "You need the cooperation of the whole world in this matter." The President ran his finger across the map. "Have you had trouble getting the message to the Pacific coast?" "Not likely, sir," Rexton told him. "They don't seem to be able to interfere with direct-line communications, but I've diverted all military communications and relayed them through the space station." He glanced at his watch, " Now via the Gamma Space Station."

"Well—" the President said, "Andrew, are these things going to attack the space station?" "How would I know?" the old man replied impatiently, "I don't know if their spaceships have this capability, but they are likely to infiltrate the space station through the spaceships that deliver supplies to the space station." We discussed the possibility that the space station might have been taken.The Naked Back project was not implemented on each space station.Even though the space station is paid for by us and built by us, in theory it is the domain of the United Nations and the president has to wait until the United Nations responds to the whole thing.

"Don't worry," Rexton said suddenly. "Why?" the President asked him. "I'm probably the only one here who has worked on the space station. Gentlemen, the clothes we wear here are what we wear on the space station. On the space station, well-dressed people are as eye-catching as long coats on the beach. But we'll figure it out." He gave an order to an assistant. The President continued to study the map. "As far as we know," he said, pointing to Grinnell, Iowa, "it all started from the only landing spot, here." The old man replied: "Yes, as far as we know the situation, it is so."

I said, "Oh no!" They all looked at me and I felt embarrassed. "Go on," the president told me. "There were at least three other landing sites - I know there were - before I was rescued." The old man was dumbfounded. "Are you sure, boy? We thought we'd drained you." "Of course I'm sure." "Then why didn't you say it earlier?" "I never thought of that before." I tried to explain the feeling of being controlled, that you knew everything was happening, but it was all in a dream, everything was equally important and equally unimportant.I feel very uneasy.I'm not the neurotic type, but the experience of being controlled by a master changes a person in some way.

The old man put his hand on me and said, "Calm down, boy." The president also said something to comfort me, with an encouraging smile on his face.Stereoscopic television has shown the president's character to the public, and that is the real character, not something imposed by TV people. "The important thing is, where did they land? It's still possible we could capture a craft," Rexton said. "I doubt it," replied the old man. "It only took them a few hours to erase the traces of the first landing site-if that was really the first landing site." He thought , while adding.

I went to the map and tried to remember.I pointed at New Orleans, drenched in sweat. "I'm pretty sure one is here." I stared at the map. "I don't know where the others landed, but I know they did." "And here?" Rexton asked, pointing to the east coast. "I don't know. I really don't know." The old man pointed to another danger zone on the east coast. "We know this is an indirect infection area." The old man was very nice and didn't say that it was caused by me. "You can't remember anything else?" Martinez said angrily. "Think about it, man!"

"I really don't know. We never know what they're up to, really." My skull hurts thinking about it.Then, pointing to Kansas City, I said, "I've texted here a few times. But I don't know if it was a delivery order." Rexton looked at the map; there were signs all around Kansas City and the state of Iowa. "Let's assume that there is a landing site near Kansas City. The technicians may be able to solve this problem. Then by means of logical reasoning, another landing site may be deduced." "Perhaps a few landing points," the old man added. "What? 'Perhaps a couple of landing sites.' Oh, sure. But we'll have to wait for further reports." He turned back to the map, staring at it thoughtfully.