Genius Club.

Chapter 301: A Contest of Geniuses

2024年3月27日，22：43
Above the east coast of the United States, in the atmosphere at an altitude of 230 kilometers.

The reverse thrust nozzle in front of the space plane continuously ejected gas to reverse thrust and slow down. In this thin atmosphere, the pearly white space plane flew over the US coastline at a seemingly slow but actually fast speed, heading for the Atlantic Ocean.

Wei Cheng was fully focused and put his best effort into flying this aerospace plane which had no navigation, no signals, no guidance, no radar and no positioning.

He has confidence.

He was the first person to ride in this space plane since it was built in the factory.

noob.

This is the name he gave to this national treasure.

"Since the real name and model are not disclosed for confidentiality, let's call it Xiaobai!"

This was a casual remark Wei Cheng made when he saw the space plane for the first time, as if joking. Unexpectedly, the name would stick around like this.

Wei Cheng is an ace astronaut of the Dragon King. He has carried out more than a dozen space missions. Except for spacewalks, he has carried out all space missions and has made outstanding contributions.

It was because of this, coupled with his superb flying skills, that he was selected by the country through layers of selection and eventually became the pilot of Dragon Country's first aerospace plane.

This is a unique honor.

Simultaneously.

It is also a unique responsibility.

He and Xiaobai had been living together in this narrow cockpit for countless days and nights.

Depend on each other for fate.

Xiaobai is the responsibility and expectation entrusted to him by the country.

Xiaobai is Weicheng’s life!

"Hold on, Xiaobai."

Wei Cheng gritted his teeth and looked straight ahead through the windshield of the aerospace plane at the dark universe outside and the land, ocean, and clouds that looked like plasticine and watercolor below.

As a professional astronaut and pilot.

Of course, they have to receive training in various extreme conditions, such as bad weather, loss of signal, no navigation, naked eye flying, etc.

At the beginning, when I was recruited as a pilot and trained in a special academy, many students complained that training under extreme conditions such as weather or loss of navigation was understandable; but the situation where all signals were lost, they were in outer space, all communication terminals failed, all satellites were silent, and ground radio could not be called was simply impossible!
For any space mission, the country prepares and simulates over and over again. There are backup plans after backup plans, and backup equipment after backup equipment. For this kind of navigation where there is complete loss of contact and the only way to rely on a pair of eyes is completely meaningless and is completely forcing people to do something impossible.

At that time...

The instructor said to everyone what he said to Gao Yang before this space mission:

"It is undeniable that 99% of the training we are doing now is redundant. Just like what you have learned in textbooks, most of it seems to be completely useless in life. The country will never need you to calculate gravity, use alcohol lamps to prepare oxygen, or recite classical Chinese on the battlefield."

"But life is always uncertain. Who knows what will happen in the future? 99% of insurance is bought in vain, 99% of caution is unnecessary, 99% of physical examinations are false alarms, and 99% of home medicines are expired..."

"But even so, why do we still have to do these things? Because what we need to prevent is that 1%!"

The instructor raised his index finger and looked around at everyone:
"Among you college students recruited to fly, only 1% can actually become pilots! And among these pilots, only 1% can actually become astronauts! And the vast majority of Dragon Country's astronauts will never have the opportunity to go to space in their lifetime, and only 1% of astronauts can actually go to space!"

"1%! 1%! 1%! You don't work hard, you are not better than others, you are not better than others! How can you be in the 1%!"

Boom.

There was a recoil shudder.

At an altitude of 210 kilometers, Wei Cheng's eyes were as sharp as torches, staring at the dark universe and the blue earth!

He just works hard all the way!
Became one 1% after another! Became the pilot of the only aerospace plane in the whole Dragon Country!
"I am the Chosen One..."

Wei Cheng held the operating lever tightly:
“And the only one!”

call----

In the vast space.

In the most remote corner of the earth.

This aerospace plane that had lost everything flew towards the rising sun and to the other side of the earth under Wei Cheng's determined gaze.

Fly towards.

That outsider who came from afar and does not belong to this world, this universe, or this time and space.

……

Inside the equipment compartment.

Lin Xian, Huang Que, Gao Yang, and Chu Anqing stood in a circle.

"Liu Feng's space-time particle tracker can be used normally, so not only did we not lose the space-time particle, but we also had direction navigation. This has no impact on our original capture plan."

Huang Que turned his head and looked at Gao Yang:

"In another hour, we will meet the space-time particles at the border of the Atlantic Ocean. It seems that the minimum speed of the space-time particles is 0.97 Mach, and they have not slowed down for a long time. This speed is very suitable for us. By then, this aerospace plane will also start the working fluid engine and run parallel to the space-time particles at a speed of 0.97 Mach."

"That's when you'll come into play, Gao Yang. We've worked so hard for so long, and whether this plan will ultimately succeed depends on whether you can use the rice cooker to capture that space-time particle."

Gao Yang nodded and gave a thumbs up to show that he was fine.

"The two of you."

Huang Que turned his head again and looked at Lin Xian and Chu Anqing:

"Lin Xian will stand behind Gao Yang to assist him. An Qing will stand in the passenger cabin as the hub between the equipment cabin and the cockpit. No matter what happens here or there, you will contact them in time and run errands."

Lin Xian and Chu Anqing also nodded.

Now, some time has passed since the accident in which all network communication equipment was lost. The aerospace plane is running smoothly under Wei Cheng's superb driving skills, which also puts everyone's heart at ease.

It seems that, as Huang Que said, for professional pilots and astronauts, this is just one of many emergencies and there is no need to panic.

Lin Xian walked to Gao Yang's operating table, looked at the complicated operating lever, and supported the back of the seat.

What he is worried about now is not the problem of Wei Cheng’s poor level.

But...

Kevin Walker.

Without VV's suppression, Kevin has become lawless in this era. Hijacking the X-37B US unmanned space plane in high-altitude orbit is as easy as taking something from a baby.

Will he come to interfere?

He will definitely come.

Huang Que knew this, but still acquiesced to VV's death and used VV's death as a guarantee of "refusing to return".

So, where does her confidence come from?

Is there a back-up plan?

"Wait! What is that!"

Liu Feng's scream suddenly came from the cockpit.

He had been sitting next to Wei Cheng. In order not to disturb Wei Cheng's concentration on driving, he never said anything during this period. He just reported the position and distance of the space-time particles to Wei Cheng at fixed times.

This shout clearly indicated that something had happened!

"what happened?"

The oriole walked over.

"Look up in the sky! No... look at the space! In the space above us! There are countless shining things flying towards us!"

Everyone heard this.

They all leaned on the portholes or switched on the cameras outside the space plane to project the images in.

“What the hell!!” Gao Yang’s face turned pale!
"Oh my god...what is this?!" Chu Anqing was also shocked and pale: "This is...this is! A meteor shower!?"

"wrong."

Lin Xian looked at the display in front of him...

space.

In space higher than they are.

Front and back, left and right!
Countless spots of light were rapidly approaching them!

Too much……

Everywhere you look, it's like a sea of ​​stars!
Hundreds and thousands!

Thousands!

These light spots are not ordinary light spots, they are very large...the heads reflect the sun's rays, while the tails emit a strange blue light.

Seeing the familiar blue light, Lin Xian instantly understood:

"Argon Hall Thrusters! They are blue because they are argon ion streams. There is only one kind of thing in space that can use so many argon Hall Thrusters—"

"【Starlink Satellite!】"

He frowned.

It's really one crisis after another. Before I could even think about how to prevent the space shuttle hijacked by Kevin Walker, I didn't expect Jask's Starlink satellite to fall directly!
No wonder the reflected light looked so familiar. VV hijacked thousands of Starlink satellites at the World Hacker Competition and drew a five-pointed star for Chu Anqing in the sky.

And now!
Thousands of Starlink satellites dropped from the sky, emitting strange blue lights, and smashed towards their space plane!
This is more terrifying than the dark clouds pressing down on your head...

The stars are falling!

"What the hell! What the hell is going on?"

When Gao Yang heard Lin Xian say that the Starlink satellite had fallen, he jumped up:

"You mean, the world's richest man's tens of thousands of Starlink satellites are falling down? How the hell is he going to hide from this? This is too much! It's a saturation attack!"

"Quick, quick, get out of the way, let me see!"

Gao Yang used his body to push Lin Xian away and got in front of the surveillance monitor.

The monitor screen was showing the image being captured by the camera on top of the aerospace plane.

"God..."

Gao Yang was so shocked by this stunning scene that he was speechless.

The sky was full of blue light! The sky was full of blue-glowing Starlink satellites! They were glaring down fiercely from the sky!

There are at least thousands of fallen satellites, completely covering the entire space above the aerospace shuttle!

This is truly a giant blue hand that covers the sky and the sun, and the Five Finger Mountain that falls from the sky!

Let this little space plane have nowhere to hide! Nowhere to escape!
Now, the distance between the tens of thousands of Starlink satellites falling at high speed is very close, only tens of kilometers.

But in front of the high-speed falling satellites, this distance is nothing. Those satellites are even trying their best to accelerate and are not stingy with fuel.

"Hide quickly!"

Gao Yang screamed:

"Hide quickly, Brother Wei! If this falls on us, we're doomed! There are so many Starlink satellites, they're like fishing nets! If any one of them hits us, we're doomed!"

“It’s too wide!”

Wei Cheng looked up through the windshield and his face turned pale:

"The range is too wide! There's no way to avoid it! Our radars and scanners are all damaged! There's no way to avoid this kind of dense impact! And the speed at which these satellites are falling is too fast! The speed is still accelerating! Just like a meteor!"

"No...even faster than a meteor! They have thrusters at the back to accelerate! It won't be long before they hit us at an altitude of 200 kilometers!"

"What...what should I do! Senior Lin Xian!" Chu Anqing took a step back and grabbed Lin Xian's arm.

She just glanced up through the porthole and was also frightened.

Who could have imagined that such a dense mass of satellites would come crashing down.

The strange blue light was like the eyes of the god of death, and countless gods of death fell from the sky!

"This...can't be avoided."

Liu Feng is a serious science student. He knows that at this relative speed and with such a dense satellite array, it is not an exaggeration to describe it as a hail of bullets.

If Weicheng was given a radar, he believed that with Weicheng's technology, he would be able to avoid the falling satellites. But!

Now this space plane is blind!
Even if Wei Cheng is an ace pilot, he only has two eyes looking straight ahead. He can't look ahead or behind, not to mention that these satellites are falling from the sky!

"I have a solution."

Lin Xian quickly ran into the cockpit and looked at Wei Cheng:

"Start the working fluid engine!"

"Now?"

Wei Cheng didn't look up, drove seriously, and asked:
"Lin Xian, at this distance, even if we start the working fluid engine, we can't avoid such a dense satellite rain. More importantly, we are now in the deceleration stage. If we rashly start the engine to accelerate, our orbital speed will increase again, and we will definitely miss the Alpha Matter at the 100-kilometer rendezvous point."

"By then, it will be too late for us to slow down, and we will definitely miss the Alpha Matter!"

"No, not accelerating forward."

Lin Xian shook his head and pointed downwards:

"【We dive down faster! Pull those satellites into the atmosphere!】"

Hearing Lin Xian's words.

Liu Feng suddenly realized:

"I understand! I understand! Lin Xian is planning to drag the high-speed falling satellite into the atmosphere! The satellite is so fast that even if the atmosphere at 100 kilometers is very thin, at such a high speed, it will still rub against the atmosphere and burn like a meteor!"

"I've studied [Meteor Showers]! I know a lot about meteors! Meteors generally burn at an altitude of 80 kilometers to 140 kilometers! Most meteors burn out or even disintegrate at an altitude of 80 kilometers in the atmosphere!"

"And the Starlink satellite is such a fragile thing. Once it falls into the atmosphere at such a high speed, it will burn up or disintegrate in less than a few dozen kilometers! At most, it can only last up to an altitude of 60 kilometers!"

"Although they are so fast now, once they enter the atmosphere and encounter air resistance, they will quickly slow down! They can't catch up with the space plane with its engine turned on! As long as we drive the space plane to dive to an altitude of 60 kilometers, we will be safe!"

"We don't need to avoid these Starlink satellites at all! Just like Lin Xian said, pull them into the atmosphere! Pull them into the dense atmosphere! Let them turn into a [meteor shower]! Burn up in the sky above us!"

"Genius...Lin Xian! You are truly a genius!"

Liu Feng was so excited that he almost stood up, but the seat belt restrained him.

He said quickly:
"Although we can't merge with the space-time particles at an altitude of 100 kilometers, it's the same if we merge at an altitude of 60 kilometers or 50 kilometers! Moreover, our aerospace plane has wings, which will make it more flexible in the atmosphere and easier to capture. It's nothing more than losing some capture time!"

"Commander Huang!" Wei Cheng shouted, "Please give instructions immediately!"

The yellow bird nodded:
"Do as Lin Xian says!"

boom----

Against the falling stars, the Xiaobai space shuttle finally started its working fluid engine.

A column of fire like a rocket spurted out from the tail.

The huge push on the back carried everyone who had already returned to the passenger cabin, diving towards the Earth's atmosphere.

You chase me.

This is a race between a space shuttle and thousands of Starlink satellites.

“高度下降！180公里……150公里……120公里……100公里……突破卡门线！90公里！80公里！我们高度继续降低！”

"The falling Starlink satellites have also entered the atmosphere and started to burn! Their speed has dropped sharply! It seems that most of them have begun to disintegrate! Liu Feng and Lin Xian are right... Starlink satellites are not as strong as meteors. Once they enter the atmosphere, they will be torn apart by resistance and high temperature!"

Wei Cheng was flying the space plane while reporting the altitude to everyone.

At this time.

Chu Anqing and Lin Xian fastened their seat belts and leaned against the porthole, looking up at the sky.

"Wow……"

Chu Anqing was so shocked that she had nothing to say:

"This... this is the real meteor shower..."

Lin Xian lowered his head, stuck close to Chu Anqing, and looked up into the sky.

That is……

Countless blue shooting stars.

So dense, like rain!
This will be the largest meteor shower in human history, and it will never be surpassed...

The Starlink project, which the world's richest man Jask had planned for several years and spent tens of billions of US dollars to build, was shattered at this moment and turned into an oil painting in the sky.

It turned into the most romantic and thrilling meteor shower in history.

Liu Feng raised his head in the cockpit.

stunned.

Watching the stars falling from the sky...

"Qi Qi..."

His voice was choked.

Qiqi said that she would turn into a star, watch him on the stage, bless him, and wait for the day when his cosmic constant would be recognized by the world.

Liu Feng clenched his fists tightly:

"I will."

……

At this time, the aerospace shuttle has circled half of the earth, passed the daylight zone, and arrived at the side not facing the sun.

Earth at night.

The people on land all raised their heads to watch this miracle whose second act might not be seen for billions of years.

The entire sky was filled with meteors.

Fireworks, blue, trail, light.

In the 45 billion years of Earth's night, the night has never been as beautiful and stunning as it is today.

"The crisis is over!"

Wei Cheng laughed out loud, as if he had just finished a game:
"We did it. We actually did it! We——"

suddenly.

The smile froze on his face.

Pupil trembling...

Eyebrows twitching...

"Then, what is that?"

Everyone looked up.

All they saw was a huge fireball in the sky, dragging a tail like a rocket engine, rushing towards them accurately and fiercely!
high speed!
The direction is accurate!

There's no way to avoid this distance!

"It's the U.S. space plane!"

Wei Cheng shouted:

"X-37B!"

He was all too familiar.

This is something that the Dragon Country astronauts have been coveting for a long time.

I have dreamt about it countless times!
The small white space plane manufactured by Longguo is targeted at the US X-37B!

but……

Why does this space plane appear here?
Because all the radars and scanners on the space plane have been destroyed...

Therefore, we have to wait until this US space plane rushes into field of vision before we can observe it!

X-37B is rushing towards us!
The working fluid engine running at full speed!
Comes with navigation and steering!

Aim firmly at their space plane!

This distance and this speed!

There is no way to hide!
A huge fireball is about to rush over!
The distance and altitude are only a few kilometers!

Wei Cheng held the steering lever tightly and turned!
But the burning space plane was also turning!

It’s like the devil descending from the sky!

boom! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
Another fast beam of light rushed up from below!
Straight as an arrow!

Shuttle like light!

The number of mark rings ejected from behind the object... is enough to represent that the speed of this unidentified object is close to breaking through the first cosmic speed!

"Rocket?"

Lin Xian stared at the shadow that flew by in an instant.

Can't go wrong.

That's a real rocket!
Even though it was just a flash, he still saw the font printed on the side of the rocket clearly -

【Space-T】

"It's Jask's starship rocket!"

Weicheng shouted:

"Why is its rocket here! And its target is——"

boom! ! ! ! ! ! !
boom! ! ! ! ! ! !
In the sky just two or three kilometers ahead, a huge ball of light like the sun suddenly exploded!
Red light, black smoke, and scattered parts!

The Jask rocket suddenly appeared like a missile and directly hit the huge fireball and the US X-37B space plane!

The violent explosion caused by the collision between the two blew away the nearby clouds!
Wei Cheng held on to the steering rod tightly and rushed out from the edge of the fireball and the ruins under the huge centrifugal force!

all.

Become calmer.

That ball of fire, that X-37B space plane that dropped from the sky, that Starship rocket that rose from the ground and appeared halfway...

All of them were left behind by the aerospace plane.

Wei Cheng's whole body went limp, and he leaned back in the seat, holding the steering wheel.

No one was talking on the radio channel, only heavy breathing could be heard... No one had recovered from the shocking space chase just now.

Lin Xian looked at the sky behind through the porthole.

The fire has gone out.

The thick black smoke was gradually blown away by the wind.

The aerospace plane and rocket parts that had just exploded and shattered in the field of vision...had already fallen to who knows where.

The whole sky is as quiet as before.

like……

As if nothing had happened.

Lin Xian inexplicably recalled the Science Charity Dinner, when Jask stood up in front of him, slowly raised his right hand and pointed to the sky:

"Mr. Lin."

Jask smiled, stretched out his index finger, and pointed it straight to the sky:
"See you in heaven."

suddenly.

Liu Feng's eyes widened, and he suddenly stretched out his right hand, pointing to the dark space above:
"Lin Xian! Look—"

"【Spacetime Particles!!】"

(End of this chapter)