775 Before the Landing (1/2)
First, it was personal cleaning, then disinfection measures, and finally, wearing thin underwear with grooves all over, the man fitted the equipment, resembling heavy armor, over himself, piece by piece, following the guidance of the AI.
Finally, Ye Xuan sat in a chair, waiting quietly.
The silence continued until the second person who also looked plump wrapped up in the thick spacesuit, a lady with her helmet in her lap, walked into the cabin and greeted him, ”Dr. Ye, it's been a while.”
After paying the price for genetic modification, she acquired super-accurate vision, ultra-precise spatial perception, and an amazing ability to tell things apart, at the cost of her skin becoming excessively white and her pupils turning green.
She looked like a European.
The thought inexplicably popped up in the mind of Ye Qingxuan, who was spectating.
”Yo, Zhangsun, are you still busy with your work at the bilge?” Ye Xuan asked.
Zhangsun sat next to him nonchalantly. Despite being a woman, she had a wild and carefree nature, like that of men. ”It's one of the cons of being an engineer, we'll never run out of machines to repair. Sometimes I'm really jealous of Old Bai they all, they've no geology to study in space, so they always have time to take a break from work.
”What about you? Still researching humans?”
”That's just one of the topics I'm working on, I still have proper work to do.” Ye Xuan sighed resignedly. ”I think I may have to start researching about programming and circuits recently for the sake of my patients.” As he said so, he glanced at the corner where Peter stood silently, not breathing, his presence incredibly weak.
Peter said nothing.
He simply remained silent.
Zhangsun seemed to have understood something, and her gaze turned sympathetic. ”It must be really difficult for you. Hermes always has some weird ideas. He even pestered me yesterday, telling me jokes for half an hour...”
”Were the jokes funny?” Ye Xuan asked.
”It's exactly why I'm feeling depressed.” Zhangsun sighed in distress.
Ye Xuan took out a case from the pocket of his spacesuit and handed it over. ”Here's your medicine, don't spread the word. I'm going against the rules by giving you the medicine.”
”Thanks.” Zhangsun whistled and put a hand over his shoulder in gratitude. ”I haven't been able to sleep recently, how about we go grab another drink together some time soon? Liu Dongli, that loser, secretly planted some paddy at my place, and we made some wine...”
”Nah.” Ye Xuan smiled resignedly.
Ye Qingxuan sensed that Ye Xuan's emotions were stirred up. It seemed to be romantic feelings, as if the latter was recalling how he had once flirted with the woman.
Zhangsun curled her lips. ”You've probably given medicine to plenty of people in private recently? Which little girl have you hooked up with?”
”Forget it, I never sleep with my patients.” Ye Xuan shook his head. ”You are not the only one feeling depressed. The closer we are to the ground, the more cases of space-induced anxiety and depression we have on board.
”We originally claimed that it was not the earth that had abandoned us, instead it was us who had abandoned the earth. But the artificial gravity we currently have still can't be compared to the actual ground.”
”Aren't a lot of people choosing to spend most of their time being immersed in virtual reality?” Zhangsun asked.
Ye Xuan shook his head. ”Even in games, the frequency of malicious attacks has risen to a dangerous level.”
”Everyone can't wait anymore.” Zhangsun said, ”At such a crucial moment, don't we need even more psychological supervision and guidance? It's all on you.”
”What can I do? Create a Geneva Sanatorium server and coop them up?” Ye Xuan rolled his eyes. ”Everyone yearns for the actual blue sky and the ground. But despite the ground, and the blue sky being close at hand, we can't land because of the crappy colonial convention. The political turmoil in the upper levels has already affected the normal operation of the fleet.”
Zhangsun glanced at him. ”Aren't you a member of the crew committee? Your actual power isn't small, is it? Are you just going to stand aside and do nothing about it?”
”Didn't they choose me to fill the vacancy in the crew committee exactly because of how harmless I am?” Ye Xuan shook his head. ”If I make my position known, it will only make the situation even more complicated.
”Captain Xiao is making arrangements with the other colony ships. Although the results aren't exactly clear, at least the discussion has brought about the upcoming joint investigative landing.”
Zhangsun snickered and shook her head. ”We've yet to even touched the ground, but humans have once again stirred up disputes because of land.”
Heavy footsteps sounded and someone else came in.
Ye Xuan's expression became more and more resigned, and he lowered his voice. ”Here comes the recent PK madman in the server...”
Just as he said so, a rough voice sounded, ”I hear someone speaking ill of me again, Xuan Xuan, is that you?”
A bald man walked in, wearing a heavy black exoskeleton suit instead of a cumbersome spacesuit like theirs, with connectors of machine parts exposed on the back of his head and ears.
Ye Xuan rolled his eyes, unable to stand the girlish nickname.
”Even you are coming along?” Zhangsun subconsciously stood up, stunned. ”At the very least, everyone is from the same fleet, has the relationship between the various parties deteriorated to such an extent?”
”I'm not clear about what the higher-ups mean, one way or another, I'm only responsible for ensuring the safety of you guys.” Yuan Eryi patted the tag on him that read: Chief Military Officer. ”You are in charge of technical support, and Xuan Xuan is the temporary diplomat, and we also have a robot. A team like this is enough to fight a Level 80 Boss even, let alone handle an investigative landing. Xuan Xuan, have you stopped logging into your healer account lately? Everyone is waiting for you to team up.”
Ye Xuan rolled his eyes again and didn't want to say anything. After undergoing several times of modifications and transformations, this fella had nano-hormones and modified organs implanted all over him, half of him was human, and the other half resembled a machine more. However, it just so happened that he had both the shortcomings of humans and machines.
After the modifications removed the bipolar disorder, anti-social tendencies, and murderous impulses in his genes, he became a natural soldier, an expert in the operation of various weapons, vehicle driving, and a series of skills that would come in handy in committing murder and arson, destroying items, and blowing things up... The price he paid was a lack of empathy, as well as the inability to pick up social cues. He would offend people easily, yet he couldn't care less about it.
It was normal to have a bad relationship with such a person.
Ye Xuan would have stopped providing psychological counseling to Yuan Eryi had he not been worried that the latter might commit violence against medical personnel and hack him to pieces. But despite this, people like Yuan Eryi were still indispensable to the fleet.
Or rather, the fleet had chosen him exactly because of it.
The fact that he was part of the team taking part in the joint investigative landing mission meant that the relationship with other colony ships had deteriorated to a certain extent.
After the last few team members arrived, they wasted no more time blabbering. Only Yuan Eryi, who was sitting in the driver's seat, made a few dirty jokes that were not funny at all.
Then, the ship was thrown into space. Through the porthole, they could see the ship gradually moving away from the brilliance of the lights of the colony ship, as it was cast towards the arms of another monster of steel.
Everyone's expression became tense.
It was the seventh formal meeting of the inhabitants of the four colony ships, after drifting around in space for a long time. It was the communication channel that was re-established after they parted on bad terms the previous time.
When it involved the exploration of the new home, everyone inevitably felt nervous.
Only Peter sat in the corner, silently flipping through the old book in his end. Despite the fact that the information could be downloaded from the database in an instant, he chose to obtain knowledge through such a human method, reading slowly and seriously, word by word, his voice clear and deep.
”Seven are an abomination unto God. Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief; a false witness that uttereth lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren...”
Ye Xuan closed his eyes.
So, Ye Qingxuan was engulfed in darkness.
After God knew how long, Ye Qingxuan felt his body shaking. Then, the hull trembled wildly. In the end, a huge quake erupted, making one's vision darken.
The seat belt pressed against one so tightly that it made one breathless.
The centrifugal force was so strong that it was almost as if the force was trying to throw the passengers out of the cabin.
”I can't even drift with this crappy ship, I'm gonna leave a bad review!” Yuan Eryi complained disgruntledly, completely unfazed by the alarm. It wasn't just the people in the cabin who were shocked, but he probably even scared the people on the other colony ship so much that they were about to sound the alarm as well?