A few days later, Mars South Pole.

　　 Two landing vehicles dragged a drill-like device, slowly advancing on the snow.

　　 At the back of the landing vehicle, there are five scientists wearing protective suits. These people are chatting with each other on the back of the landing vehicle, and behind them, a hemispherical building has been erected.

　　 The diameter and height of this building even exceed the size of the Ares spacecraft. It is built from countless pieces of steel plates. These building modules are almost identical. Even if one piece is broken, it can be quickly replaced and repaired.

　　 More than thousands of steel plate modules together form a hemispherical building, and the top half of the building is even completely replaced by glass to form a transparent dome.

　　 This building built by XTN engineering robots will be the scientific research station for everyone in the future.

There is a small inertial fusion reactor in the scientific research station, which can provide electricity for more than ten years. The inside is divided into three floors. In the center, there is a large garden from the bottom to the top dome. The plants inside are from The life-tolerant plants brought on the earth, every morning, the light of Mars will shine in from the dome, forming a greenhouse effect, but also can provide sufficient photosynthesis for plants.

　　 It is not so much a scientific research station as it is a small ecological park.

The scientific research station is surrounded by a circular area, where there are scientists’ living rooms, dining rooms, meeting rooms, various laboratories, and warehouses for storing materials. The total indoor area is more than 5,000 square meters. Enough for the scientists here for daily work and life.

At this time, about one kilometer away from the scientific research station, a drilling well has been elevated. This is the weak part of the ice sheet found during geological exploration. At this time, as the drill bit was erected, several XTN engineering Under the control of the robot, it began to drill into the ice sheet under the feet.

　　 The five scientists stood aside, silently watching the drill bit go deep into the ice cap.

　　 ten meters.

　　 twenty meters.

　　 fifty meters.

　　 one hundred meters...

　　As the drill bit went deep into the ground, a few hours later, with a soft sound, a green indicator light suddenly lit up on the control interface of the drilling port, and everyone was refreshed.

　　 Because this means that the drill has successfully penetrated into the previously expected position.

　　 A scientist came up and looked at the screen next to the XTN engineering robot, only to see a light shining downward on the screen, and the illuminated part was sparkling.

　　 "Found it, it's an underground lake!"

　　 The scientist yelled in excitement. Then he turned on the contactor and said loudly towards the contactor, "This is the drilling crew, report to the headquarters. We have found the underground lake. Repeat, we have found the underground lake!"

　　 While everyone around the well was celebrating, Hannibal was wearing protective clothing in a laboratory of the scientific research station. He took out pieces of ice and snow samples and kept observing them under a microscope.

　　 A little bit of time passed, but apart from some crystals and iron filings from beginning to end, he did not find any traces of microorganisms.

　　 "Is it true that Mars is really without living things?"

　　 Hannibal raised his head, frowned and muttered in a low voice, but at this moment, the door of the laboratory suddenly opened with a beep.

　　 A man who was also wearing a lab coat walked in happily. He brought in a test tube rack with three test tubes inserted into it, and the test tube was filled with a transparent liquid. I don't know what it was.

　　 At this time, as soon as the man rushed in, he immediately said excitedly, "Hannibal, come and see this!"

"what is this?"

　　 Hannibal questioned.

　　 "This is the underground lake water that the drilling group has just extracted from under a hundred meters of ice."

　　 The other party replied, and put the test tube rack on the side shelf.

　　 "Have you drilled into the underground lake?"

　　 Hannibal raised his brow,

"do not you know."

The other party laughed and said, "Yes, you stay in the laboratory all day and don't go out to enjoy the scenery of Mars. No wonder you don’t know. Just half an hour ago, the drilling crew just hit, and they found that there are A lot of underground spaces exist. These spaces are full of carbon dioxide. Below is an underground lake with a temperature of about zero degrees. Do you know what this means?"

　　 "The groundwater, the temperature around zero degrees... This means that there is likely to be life in the underground lake..."

Hannibal suddenly woke up. He looked at the three test tubes, walked forward without a word, took one of the test tubes into the biological cabinet, and then began to extract the liquid in the test tube and drop it into a petri dish through the gloves. .

　　 Then, he quickly put the petri dish under the microscope and looked down.

　　 "How is it, did you find it?"

Seeing Hannibal's movement like clouds and flowing water, the voice of the man on the side trembled a little. If new life is found in the lake, it is equivalent to a milestone in human history, whether it is him or Hannibal, or this Everyone in the second scientific expedition team will be recorded in human history books...

　　 At this time, Hannibal didn't have the time to pay attention to the other party. He just stared at the drop of liquid in the microscope. In his sight, he seemed to have entered a vast unknown world...

　　 "Hannibal?"

The man next to 　　 called out again.

　　 Until then, Hannibal raised his head. He nodded and said solemnly, "Call the captain and let everyone know by the way. We have a major discovery..."

　　 half an hour later.

　　 Sixteen scientists gathered, and all have arrived in the conference room of the scientific research station.

The reason why we did not return to Ares is because all the scientific instruments and living facilities on the Ares were almost evacuated, and all the materials were transferred to the scientific research station. In the near future, Ares The spacecraft will return to Earth with a large amount of soil, water, air, minerals and other materials that are only found on Mars.

　　 "I believe you already understand why you are asked to focus this time."

　　 Without any delay, Ares’ captain Zhou Xiong stood up and said, then looked at Hannibal, “Hannibal, tell you what you found, I think everyone can’t wait.”

"it is good."

　　 Hannibal nodded, and then walked to the podium. Suddenly, a large screen automatically appeared behind Hannibal, showing a pattern full of small black dots.

　　 "This is the microorganism found in the water after the underground lake was drilled in the previous drilling."

Hannibal said softly, "Now it is the picture seen under a ten times microscope. Most of the black spots are some impurities, including minerals, soil, ice particles, etc., but after 30 times magnification, there will be New discovery..."

　　 As he talked, the picture behind Hannibal continued to zoom in, and a gray spot appeared. Until then everyone discovered that the original screen was not a still picture, but a recorded video.

　　 At this time, inside the gray spot, there are a few weird-looking worms with six or seven short legs swimming freely in the water.

These little worms are transparent and can only see a single outline under the microscope, but they are still clearly distinguishable. They have two long tentacles, even more than the body itself. At the same time, there is an obvious truncated body in the abdomen. Obviously a very common worm creature.

　　 "Chaetognathus."

Hannibal cherished every family, "Well, is this tiny worm resembling a chaetognathus? Except for it has no eyes and longer tentacles, it is almost exactly the same as the chaetognathus in the ocean, about 0.1 in size. -0.2mm or so..."

As he said, Hannibal turned around and swiped with one hand, the video on the screen automatically moved down, and a new scene appeared. I saw that the previous worm creature was devouring a creature smaller than its size, as if Pear-shaped bugs like lice.

　　 "And after my observation, I found that they are a very ferocious carnivore,"

　　 Hannibal said cautiously, "And what it eats is another marine worm. This worm is about 0.04 mm in size and has negative Gram stain, which is a kind of algae."

"In addition, we also found three kinds of algae organisms. These algae organisms are large single-celled prokaryotes and do not contain chlorophyll and chloroplasts. They should be anaerobic organisms and do not require photosynthesis. What they need is water temperature. , Relying on the temperature of the water to produce chemical reactions for life."

　　 With several weird appearances but strangely normal microorganisms placed in the world of microorganisms, Hannibal's expression became more solemn, "Next, I found something special..."

With that said, the camera of the video behind him again pointed to one of the round transparent bubbles. The size of the bubble was obviously several times larger than the previous worm. Not only that, there was a red thing in the bubble. , And as time passed, that group of red things was still beating slowly.

　　 is like a heart.

"this is……"

　　 Everyone talked in a low voice.

　　 "Yes, everyone is right, this is a biological egg."

Hannibal said with emotion, "The closest thing on earth is the eggs of fish. Some small fish can indeed lay eggs smaller than one millimeter, but this also shows one thing, that is what everyone sees. In the underground lake, there are still life similar to the earth fish, but I have not seen the original owner of this egg, so I am not sure whether it is a vertebrate."

　　 Following Hannibal's words, everyone was even more shocked. One of the men immediately asked, "So, doesn't it mean that we can fish in the underground lake?"

　　 Everyone burst into laughter upon hearing this.

　　 "I don't know if you can fish, but I found that some algae in the water require methane and sulfide."

Hannibal added, “This is similar to the deep-sea archaeal community of the earth. It is important to know that there is no sunlight and oxygen in the deep sea of ​​the earth, so the early earth’s archaea co-existed with seabed worms. Archaea depended on the continuous supply of sulfide from seabed chimneys The energy is supplied to the worms, and the worms secrete a hard shell to protect the archaea. This deformation becomes the basis of the biological chain of the seabed chimney, and obviously, these creatures are like this.

　　 submarine chimneys, also known as submarine hot springs, refer to the fountain effect in the depths of the ocean floor. The principle is similar to that of a volcanic fountain.

It’s called this name because the hot water spouting from the seabed fountain looks like a smoking chimney from a distance, and the “smoke” also contains sulfide and methane. Once in 1979, A doctor named Bischoff saw this strange sight for the first time on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean at 2,500 meters.

Generally speaking, this kind of chimney near the bottom of the sea should be extremely poisonous, and no creatures can survive, but the miracle of life is amazing. Those diving scientists discovered that there are all kinds of things around the chimneys that should be barren. There are species of organisms. These organisms live by the heat, methane and sulfide emitted from hot springs. Just like fish need oxygen and algae need sunlight, they also have their own unique survival system.

At this time, hearing Hannibal’s explanation, everyone suddenly realized that, indeed, if life exists on Mars, it will indeed be such a situation. Since the ice cover blocks the sun and there is no oxygen, so here is Life has evolved a new form of survival based on local materials.

　　 But whether they live on oxygen or methane, these organisms still belong to the category of carbon-based.

　　 "Everyone, next, we will have one more task."

At this moment, Zhou Xiong stood up again and said, "The discovery of living things on Mars is a great discovery of the century, because the existence of these living things confirms for the first time that humans are not the only ones in the universe. Then, next, Everyone in the biology group may need to get more busy. I hope to get all the data about this group of creatures, including their past, and their possible future."

　　 "Don't worry, Captain Zhou Xiong."

One of the scientists who is also engaged in biology suddenly laughed. “Although the existence of life on Mars is shocking, I have to pour cold water, because these lives are quite primitive, we don’t even Determine whether there are mammals, but according to the current environment, the living environment of this underground lake is not optimistic. According to previous geological scans, its diameter is only about 20 kilometers. Although it is already very large, it is For enough mammals to evolve, this size is not enough..."

　　 "In simple terms, the environment here is too harsh, which fundamentally leads to the inability to produce intelligent enough life, such as dolphins and whales."

Another scientist followed and said, "Even if there are intelligent species in this environment, at most they can only live in groups similar to primitive human tribes like killer whales. Civilization can only be passed on from generation to generation by an old grandmother. It’s not a climate at all."

"maybe."

Zhou Xiong took a look at Hannibal when he heard the words, but he saw that Hannibal nodded in agreement. He then smiled, "Although I say that, these alien life are indeed very valuable for research, and the life on Earth People are also eagerly waiting for our news. We must screen out a batch of biological samples and all statistical data before the Ares returns to the voyage, and bring them back to Earth."

　　 "This is naturally no problem."

　　 Everyone nodded.

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