The fourth day of the space station accident.

There are still seven days left before the arrival of the Tianzhou-37 cargo spacecraft.

The old cat squatted on the chair early in the morning staring at the computer monitor, crackling on the keyboard, and when Tang Yue came out of the crew compartment, it was communicating with the United Space Station, "Miss Mai Dong, can you see anything?" ”

"What's wrong?" Tang Yue had a towel on his shoulder, sleepy-eyed, "What's wrong?" ”

The old cat raised a finger to signal silence.

"It's too far away, it's too dim to see clearly...... I could hear it, though. Mai Dong replied in the channel.

"What kind of sound?"

"It's very regular." "It's kind of like the sound of a clock's second hand walking, but it only rings every few seconds, clicking...... Click...... Click. ”

"It's shaking." The old cat's voice could be heard solemnly, "Actually, the frequency of the vibration is higher than what you hear, it is a fairly high-frequency vibration, and the sound you hear should only come from the impact of some loose part." ”

Tang Yue was at a loss, he still didn't know what was going on, the old cat frowned, and tapped the table with his fingers, and the two cat's ears spun around anxiously.

"Old cat?"

The old cat squinted, "The space station is disintegrating. ”

The girl had taken off the helmet of the spacesuit in the capsule, her ears were pressed tightly to the side of the exposed metal inner wall of the crystal module, and she listened to the sound with her eyes closed, the vacuum could not conduct sound, but the vibration could travel along the structure of the space station. There was silence in the core cabin, all the systems had stopped working, and it was the most soundproofed quiet room in the world, and the slightest sound would be noticeable.

Mai Dong left the inner wall, leaned in front of the porthole, and tried to look out.

There is still a lot of debris floating outside the window, but it is much cleaner than when the impact first occurred, the impact of the Orion spacecraft caused fresh water and gas leakage, and the water vapor quickly condensed at low temperatures, which made the space station shrouded in a large cloud of fog, and it was difficult for sunlight to penetrate, and after three days, the ice crystals gradually sublimated and evaporated in the sunlight, and the space outside the crystal capsule became transparent again.

The vast majority of the debris is not strictly in the same direction as the crystal module, and after dozens of circles around Mars, a considerable part of the space junk has moved away from the space station.

Huge trusses cross the top of Mai Dong's head, and at the end of the trusses, the four remaining solar panels reflect the sunlight.

The subtle sound spread across the metal frame, like a viper in the shadows, like a death knell sounding before the death of the space station, Mai Dong didn't know where the tremors were coming from, she looked around, every place could be the source of the sound.

"The space station is disintegrating?" Tang Yue asked, "What's going on?" ”

"Normal." The old cat replied.

"Normal?" Tang Yue breathed a sigh of relief, "That means the problem is not too serious?" ”

The old cat glanced at him, and it looked like it was looking at an idiot.

"I'm going to stab you right now, and you'll have pain cramps, excessive blood loss, and finally burps for the next three minutes - that's normal, it's the anomaly that you don't die." The old cat said, "The space station was smashed head-on by a mallet the size of the Orion spacecraft, and it is normal for it to disintegrate at any time." ”

"Holy." Tang Yue shuddered.

"Hell...... It may be stress, after the impact, the stress inside the structure of the joint space station gradually accumulates, and then the thermal expansion and contraction of the external environment with a large temperature difference, and the structure of the space station has been destroyed. The old cat grinded his canine teeth, "The space station didn't start disintegrating today, it started from the moment after the impact, and the effect was only obvious enough until today." ”

Mai Dong heard what the old cat said, the United Space Station has actually been slowly collapsing, and it is not until today that they realize it, which is a normal situation - the collision between the United Space Station and the Orion spacecraft is the worst space accident in human history, killing two super spacecraft at one time, and destroying the extraterrestrial base that mankind has invested heavily in for more than ten years.

If it is allowed to continue like this, the United Space Station will one day be completely disintegrated.

"How much longer?" Mai Dong asked.

"I don't know...... Miss Mai Dong, I don't know. "It's hard to say which will happen first, crash or disintegration – maybe both will happen at the same time, and once there is enough atmospheric drag, the space station on the verge of collapse will be completely destroyed in an overload, I don't know the speed of the disintegration of the space station, but it will certainly not be later than the time of the crash." ”

"What can be remedied?" Tang Yue asked, "Make a plan!" Make a plan and we'll solve the problem! ”

"There's no way to remedy it."

Tang Yue was taken aback, "How can there be no remedy?" ”

"There's just no way to fix it, we don't have a plan, we can't fix anything." The old cat said, "I told you a long time ago that we have lost all means of interfering with the Joint Space Station, have you forgotten?" ”

Tang Yue's eyes widened, he didn't know what to say for a while, the old cat did say that they had lost all means of interfering with the space station, but he didn't take it to heart. In Tang Yue's subconscious, there is no problem that cannot be solved without answers, and they have been on Mars for so long, so many winds and waves, so many difficulties and obstacles, they have all relied on their powerful abilities to break through.

No matter what kind of problem, as long as they are calm enough, resourceful enough, and professional enough, they can find the key to solving the problem, and then formulate a complete plan, and finally cooperate with each other to overcome it.

There will always be a plan, Plan A can't and Plan B.

"We have lost all means of interfering with the joint space station." The old cat repeated again, "For us, the space station is purely another world, and the slogans of 'nothing difficult in the world, only afraid of those who have a heart' and 'where there is a will, there is a way' are no longer useful." ”

Tang Yue sat down slowly.

The old cat turned his head and continued to monitor the computer monitor, shaking his head and muttering something "Subjective initiative only works when it is active, and we can't move now." ”

"Then out of the cabin...... Is it possible for Mai Dong to get out of the cabin? ”

The old cat shook his head.

"The entire space station is disintegrating, and it's not something that can be solved with a welding torch...... What's more, we don't even have a welding torch now, Miss Mai Dong is very weak and doesn't have enough physical strength to get out of the cabin, and she doesn't have an extravehicular suit for operation in the cabin. ”

Tang Yue sat on the chair, his limbs were cold, and his palms couldn't stop sweating, the old cat was right, he was a little clever ghost, and it was impossible for him to come up with any way to break his head this time.

"So what should I do?" Tang Yue raised his head, "Why are you waiting?" ”

"If you don't want to wait, you can still eat and sleep and beat Doudou."

"Don't worry, Tang Yue, Mr. Cat." Mai Dong spoke, she floated in the crystal cabin, stroking the inner wall of the core cabin with her hand, and checking inch by inch, "The disintegration speed will not be so fast, the crystal cabin is very strong, there is no sign of breakage and cracking, and it will definitely hold out until it crashes." ”

"I don't doubt the sturdiness of the crystal capsule, it can survive the onslaught of Orion." "There is no stronger cabin in the world," said the old cat, "and the Patriarch of the Orthodox Church himself gave it light before the heavens." ”

"That's it." The girl squinted her eyes and smiled, her eyes bent into crescents, "Don't worry, it's okay." ”

Tang Yue wanted to speak and stopped, it was really the emperor who was not in a hurry, and the eunuch was in a hurry, and Mai Dong comforted him in turn when he was in such a broken ship that was about to sink.

"That's good...... Stay connected, keep monitoring, and report anything that happens! ”

“OK。”

The old cat continued to monitor the status of the Joint Space Station, and since the system computer of the space station had lost most of its functions, the only means of monitoring was Mai Dong's eyes - but there was nothing left of the space station that needed to be monitored, and the Mars Joint Space Station, a huge and complex composite permanent spacecraft, had overnight reverted back to the simple single-compartment structure of the Salyut and Skylab nearly a hundred years ago.

In the dark, Tang Yue prayed for the blessing of those ancestors, Solovyov, Atzikov and Beredov, their eternal heroic souls in the vast universe must protect the safety of those who came after them.

"Eh, Tang Yue."

"Huh?"

"I want to ask...... What would you do if you were given the last three days of life? ”