Chapter 867: Bright Stars (XII)
"We have only made three mother cores, so the launch must not fail..."
General Ross looked at the old general standing on the stage, and the old general said in a sonorous tone: "In the past five years, we have invested countless manpower and material resources, and finally made the mother core and the launch device that can launch it to the vicinity of the sun..."
When he said this, Ross found that the two generals in the front row looked a little unhappy.
In fact, Ross also knew what was going on.
The Red Gate Orchid Plan is called extinction, but in fact it is nothing more than using super weapons as bargaining chips to negotiate with mutants.
At that time, Professor X and Magneto were too dominant in terms of military force. The military coveted this power, but they could not get any benefits from them. In order to reverse this situation, they planned to make a bargaining chip themselves.
However, five years ago, humans even had a hard time launching probes to Mars. At that time, it was a fantasy to develop a launch device that could directly hit the vicinity of the sun.
The Red Gate Orchid Project was proposed under such a technical background. At that time, the upper limit of the military's imagination of the radiation range of weapons was the solar system.
At that time, they thought that as long as they could deploy a super weapon near the sun, they would definitely be able to solve the problem of mutants once and for all.
In the first three years of the five-year plan, they spent countless wealth and combined the military expenses of the three armed forces to finally build this ridiculously expensive equipment.
To explain why it is so expensive, we have to start with the so-called mother mold core.
The "mother mold" is a super artificial intelligence developed by the military. The military used various means to force many scientists who mastered the technology to hand over their technology, and used these technologies to develop a super artificial intelligence.
However, even if the scientists they could find to study artificial intelligence were added together, they were not as good as Stark alone. Therefore, this super artificial intelligence is not as good as Jarvis. It has a fatal flaw, which is that it needs a special core to carry its powerful computing core.
Although this special core does not look big in the design drawing, it also depends on the size of the entire Red Gate Orchid base.
In the design, the Red Gate Orchid Base should be stably hovering near the sun, with a volume of about one hundredth of the earth.
The core installed inside the base is about the same height as a 20-story building, and most of the parts need to use vibranium.
At that time, vibranium was ridiculously expensive. The military took out its old money with tears and barely made three cores, two of which were simplified versions.
Many people know what happened later. About three years ago, Schiller came to this world, and then the earth ran towards an unknown road like a wild horse.
Schiller stepped on the accelerator, and humans accelerated into the cosmic age. The Iron Demon accelerated again, and the entire solar system became a human territory within reach.
The military never dreamed that their grand plan at the time would look like a clown now.
At the beginning, they were very far-sighted. According to the development speed of mankind, it would take at least hundreds or thousands of years to touch the sun. As long as they could use leading technology to build a base near the sun, they could not only threaten mutants, but also realize more ambitions.
Driven by such motivation, the US military has exploded with endless potential, especially the Tartu faction, whose philosophy has always been "the army is more than the army".
Although this plan, which ran smoothly in the first three years, was like a gold-eating beast, it progressed relatively smoothly. The core was built, the launcher was successfully completed, and then the Iron Devil came.
From then on, Stark, who was seriously paranoid, seemed to have suddenly become enlightened and began to spend a lot of technology without money.
It doesn't matter if the rocket can't fly up. It fell the day before, and you can get a series of design drawings given by nature the next day. It doesn't matter if the satellite orbit is unstable. You are only responsible for sending it up, and naturally someone will maintain it for you.
In the following time, Stark became a billion-dollar subsidy, and he didn't care whether you have the ability to explore space or not. As long as you want to explore, I will solve the technical problems.
After the fall of the Schiller Iron Curtain, most other countries also saw clearly that if they did not rush forward to grab the cake, they would only be able to eat the dregs behind. With the global space enthusiasm exploding violently, it took one month to land on the moon, three months to explore Mars, and half a year to develop solar energy...
In just over a year, the attitude of human civilization towards the solar system has changed dramatically. Before, I belonged to the solar system, but now the solar system is mine.
In this case, throwing something around the sun is quite novel, but now the countries on the earth have either thrown it or are planning to throw it. Even if you can fix it there, everyone will be able to do it sooner or later. If you dare to open fire, no one will be good.
What makes the military feel even more distressed is that when they made those cores, the price of vibranium was at a high point. In order to prevent the price increase, they also stockpiled a lot.
Now, due to the popularity of smelting steel, the cost of making the same thing is only one ten-thousandth of the cost.
Moreover, due to the explosive growth of technology, the technology about five years ago is now a generation behind that of today, which means that they are only now confident that they can send the launch and transportation devices that are several generations behind into the predetermined orbit.
And they are not completely sure yet, and they have to rely on Ross to ask his daughter for information about Mercury to prevent it from being shot down by the guard weapons of the Mercury base.
In this way, the military became the pioneer of human exploration of the solar system. It is not accurate to say that it is a pioneer. It was the first, but it did not drive it.
It is also human nature to chase the rise and sell the fall. The military launched this time, and it was also forced to do it. Now the launch can at least win over the forces that dislike mutants participating in the solar system construction plan and gain their favor, so as to get more support in the future.
Thinking of this, Ross looked up at the image of the transporter played on the screen. He had to admit that compared with the current pile of slightly sci-fi equipment of humans, this thing looks a bit too outdated. If it is launched now and discovered by other countries, they would think that Russia has started archaeology again.
However, things have come to this point, and they can only bite the bullet. After all, after launching, they will have one more bargaining chip to negotiate with the mutants, and perhaps they can recover some losses from them.
Ross thought viciously that when he negotiates with those annoying mutants, he must make them bleed heavily, otherwise, how can he recover the losses of the military?
On the day of the launch, New York was cloudless, and all the generals were waiting at the launch center. Standing behind the glass curtain wall of the high-rise, looking at the large screen monitoring the launch, a researcher came over and said:
"We have launched the satellite in advance and monitor the status of the equipment near the flight orbit. When the rocket successfully takes off, the generals can see the flight trajectory of the equipment..."
The leading old general nodded, and looked at the screen again. The countdown was completed, and the rocket took off.
Although it is not a very advanced technology in this era, it is completely different from traditional rockets. The ignition process is shorter, but the speed is faster. Almost in an instant, the rocket is no longer on the screen.
The screen switched to the sky above the earth, and the rocket was flying in the distance. The young generals were excited, but the more mature generals standing in the front row frowned. They said:
"What is that thing in the upper right corner of the screen? Is the screen dirty?... It doesn't seem to be, why is it moving?"
"That... looks like a ball? Am I seeing it wrong? Why does it seem to be glowing?"
"Rocket! The rocket flew towards the ball! No, it should be the ball that blocked the rocket's trajectory, move it away!!!!"
Accompanied by the last roar, the screen lit up briefly, and as it gradually went out, the explosion light lit up, and rocket fragments flew everywhere.
In an instant, the fire illuminated the dark night sky, and the universe was full of stars at this moment.
"What's going on!!!!"
The old general in the lead roared: "What did the rocket hit?! Why did it disintegrate?! Why didn't the equipment detach in advance?!!"
Soon, a pale-faced researcher ran over and said: "Sorry! Mr. Admiral! There is a space junk that we haven't detected. It may be left by rockets launched by various countries before..."
"This space junk is compressed by some special equipment. Its own gravity is abnormal, so our equipment did not detach safely, so... so..."
The old general glared at him and said, "You mean to say that the core we spent a lot of money to make is completely gone. The core is destroyed? ? ! ! "
The researcher's legs began to tremble, but in the end, he still gritted his teeth and nodded and said: "Yes... But fortunately, we originally wanted to launch a streamlined version to explore the way, so the loss was an incomplete core, and the most important core has not been launched yet..."
The old general's face looked a little better, but he still said with a dark face: "If this happens again, you should know what the consequences will be. The Hongmenlan Project must not fail. Continue to prepare for the launch!"
After preparing for about a week, the rocket was launched again. This time it approached Mercury smoothly according to the planned orbit, and then moved closer to the sun.
When the generals detected this scene, their faces finally improved. Ross heard his colleagues whispering, "It's already launched to this position, there shouldn't be any problems, right?"
"Is the equipment ready to be deployed? I think this distance should be just right. Look, there is the Mercury base..."
"The equipment is out of the warehouse, hurry up! Deploy it quickly! As long as the base can be anchored, the plan will be more than half successful..."
Amid a whisper, the last shell of the launch cabin fell off, and the equipment was ready to be deployed on the spot.
Just when everything was going smoothly, a striking laser appeared out of thin air, as if cutting the picture in half.
The generals instinctively covered their eyes with their arms, and when they opened their eyes again, the equipment that had been initially deployed had disappeared.
Everyone was stunned there. After a while, the researchers shouted: "We were attacked by unknown weapons!!! Someone destroyed our research equipment!! This is an attack!! This is an attack!!"
"What's going on?!" The old general roared: "Who attacked our equipment?! Is it Stark?! Contact him immediately!!"
After a while, the researchers ran up and said: "General, our equipment was attacked by unknown weapons. According to observations, it was not Stark's equipment. The defense weapons on the Mercury base have never been activated..."
Rose hurriedly stepped forward and said: "It can't be the defense weapons above the Mercury base. We have obtained the authorization code in advance and avoided the output range of the main weapons. It is impossible to be shot down so silently..."
"Then what do you say?!!" The old general's chest kept rising and falling, and he had lost his mind a little.
After all, as the proposer and executor of this plan, he knew better than anyone how much money they had lost in those few seconds just now.
"Find out who opened the fire!!!" The old general's voice almost broke through the glass curtain wall. He said, "We must make them pay the price and let them know what stupid things they did!!!"
"Yes, they must pay ten times or a hundred times the price for this!!" Someone echoed.
"Find it now! Find out who did it!!"
"We are going to declare war on them!!!"
At this time, another researcher ran over and said:
"According to the signal sent back by the black box, the energy fluctuations of the weapon that destroyed the equipment are very similar to the Rainbow Bridge that appeared on Earth before. It is suspected to be the weapon of the Asgard fleet..."
The generals who were just filled with indignation fell silent in an instant.
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