"Look, what's that?" Zhou Xin's surprised cry suddenly sounded in the command cabin, which had already calmed down. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

However, except for Zhou Xin, everyone in the command cabin didn't seem to notice the abnormality in the picture, and after hearing Zhou Xin's shout, everyone's faces showed a blank look, and Spred even asked, "What's wrong, what did you find?" ”

"Look there." Zhou Xin pointed to the screen and said, "The area near the morning and dusk line. ”

With Zhou Xin's reminder, everyone focused their attention on the direction that Zhou Xin pointed to in the picture. Then they noticed that there was a series of narrow areas near the sunny side of the dawn and dusk line that were somewhat similar to other shaded areas on the planet's surface. It's just a little puzzling that the long and narrow areas are intermittently arranged along the direction of the morning and dusk lines, and even the long sides of each narrow area are in exactly the same direction as their overall spread.

"That's just a shadow—right?" Dart looked at it carefully for a moment, then said uncertainly, "Maybe it's just because of the strange phenomenon near the dawn and dusk line, at a special angle of light?" ”

"Some of these areas should be the same as you said." Spred followed up and said slowly, "But if you look here, here, and here, it's clear that these places are completely different from the shadows around them. As he spoke, he marked the areas he had mentioned.

"Brother Captain, these places seem to look a little bit alike-" Atlas was also watching the conversation between them, and at this time she seemed to analyze the outcome. With a hesitant tone, the little girl continued, "Those areas that Big Brother Spred pointed out, visually, are a bit like the surface of the water? Hearing this, many people in the command cabin showed a look of surprise. Then, Atlas added, "Or a liquid surface similar to the surface of water." ”

"Are you sure?" This conclusion made Zhou Xin, who was already surprised, even more surprised, and he hurriedly asked.

"Unless it's unique to this planet, there's a 90 percent chance it's liquid." Atlas gave the results of the analysis.

"Then it should be." At this time, Zhou Xin had calmed down a little, and he said to himself thoughtfully, "What could those liquids be?" Is it water? ”

"But, it stands to reason that it should be difficult for liquids to appear on this planet." There was a hint of confusion in Atlas's words, "It's so close to the star, and the temperature on the surface of the planet is definitely not low, how can there be liquid?" ”

"What is there to wonder." "Just let the probe go to that area and do a little bit of investigation." ”

"Well, that's right." Zhou Xin nodded, and before the words fell, Atlas received the first detection reports from the probe.

"Hey, there's gas near the surface of this planet? Brother Captain, the probes have reported that they have come into contact with the planet's atmosphere. Atlas said to Zhou Xin with a slightly surprised tone. After a while, she reported the results of the analysis of the planet's atmosphere by the falling probe, "The atmosphere on the surface of this planet is very thin, less than one-tenth of the Earth's atmosphere, and its main component is carbon dioxide, followed by methane." The oxygen content is not high, only less than 10 percent, and it is basically difficult to survive life. In addition, the planet's atmosphere contains about five percent of hydrogen. ”

"Hydrogen?" The previous series of data is nothing special, but the last sentence makes Zhou Xin a little strange, "The content of hydrogen is so high, it is a bit rare." ”

"Maybe it's because this galaxy was formed for a relatively short time. So a large amount of hydrogen has not had time to escape the planet's surface. Atlas guessed casually, and then she added, "Oh yes, Brother Captain, the planet's atmosphere is also rich in water vapor, which is slightly less than hydrogen. ”

"So there's really water on this planet?" Spred said, "Could the liquid in the area that I just saw contain liquid just now be water?" ”

"Even if there is water, it is impossible to remain liquid on this planet." There was a palpable disbelief in Atlas's tone, and she thought for a moment, then said to Spred, "That conclusion should be a bit problematic. But the probe is about to reach the planet's surface, and we'll soon find out. ”

After waiting a little longer, Atlas received the news that the first probe had successfully landed. Subsequently, other probes began to send back the same message one after another. However, because the first probes to arrive on the planet were concentrated in the center of the sunny side, it was still too far away from the current morning and dusk line, so there was no way to investigate the areas where Zhou Xin and the others might have liquid for the time being. However, under the deliberate control of Atlas, a large part of these probes landed near the striped area of the planet's surface. Naturally, they prioritized the investigation of the striped area.

With the landing of the probe, the picture on the screen also shifted from space to a certain probe, and Zhou Xin and the others finally saw the specific scene on the surface of the planet for the first time. At first glance, there is nothing surprising about the screen on the screen, similar to the other lifeless planets that Zhou Xin and the others have visited before, there is a large amount of rubble under the feet of the probe, and there is only a dead silence as far as the camera can see. The only thing that caught everyone's attention was the faint whistling sound of the gas flowing back from the planet's surface. The camera looked around, and Zhou Xin found that the probe seemed to have landed in the center of a small basin. Because no matter which direction you look, you can see the mountains that are rolling together. After identifying its surroundings, the probe began to move in one direction.

The camera from the probe remained on screen for a long time, but disappointingly, nothing of note was seen in the rest of the frame. So, at Zhou Xin's orders, Atlas began to switch the scene to other probes that had landed.

While observing the footage sent back by the probe, Zhou Xin and they listened to Atlas's report on the probe's analysis of the planet's surface soil, "The main component of the soil on the surface of this planet is still silica, it is worth noting that the content of metal elements in the soil is extremely low, I don't know if the area where the probe landed is this situation or the whole planet." However, people think that the latter is more likely, because in the spectral analysis, it is found that there are not many heavy metal elements in the star in the center of the galaxy, and it should be a second-generation star. ”

"It seems that there is nothing else to attract attention to this planet except for its huge size." After listening to Atlas's report, Dart said boredly.

"Not necessarily, at least we haven't figured out what the streaks on the planet's surface are, or what those liquids are." Spreed shook his head.

As he spoke, Atlas cut the camera to a probe moving towards the top of the mountain, and explained, "This probe is the closest to the stripes, and once it reaches the top, we should be able to see the stripes." ”

Everyone waited quietly for more than ten minutes, and the exploration successfully reached the top of the mountain. Adjusting the angle of view slightly, the detector's lens is aimed in the direction of the ground. At this time, Zhou Xin discovered that the mountain under the feet of the probe was actually quite high, perhaps nearly three or four thousand meters. But now was not the time to dwell on how tall the mountain was beneath his feet, and he immediately began to look for the stripes in the picture.

At first glance down the mountain, Zhou Xin didn't find any terrain or features similar to the stripes, and after a few minutes of careful observation, it was still the same. Just as he was about to ask if the others had noticed, Spred seemed to see some clues in the picture.

"You see, from the foot of the mountain all the way to the distance, is the ground getting redder and redder?" Because the signs of change were not obvious, Spred's tone of speech was uncertain.

Hearing Spred's words, Zhou Xin did not answer immediately, but began to observe. But before he could take a closer look, Atlas confirmed Spred's claim. Then, after looking at it for a while, Zhou Xin himself found out.

"Looks like there should be a transition between normal terrain and stripes, Atlas, let the probe go over and investigate." Zhou Xin said.

Before he could finish speaking, the probe had already begun to move in that direction. As it progressed, Zhou Xin saw that the ground in the distance became more and more red, until it finally became exactly the same color as the stripes he had seen in space.

Originally, Zhou Xin thought that the ground in the reddish-brown striped area should be very different from other places. However, when the probe lowered its altitude to get closer to the ground, he realized that the reddish-brown areas were actually the same as the normal areas he had seen before. In the field of view, the ground is also covered with a large amount of rubble. The slight difference was that the gravel was much smaller than anything I had seen on the normal ground before, and in some places it had been completely shattered into sand. Of course, the other most obvious feature is that the gravel all over the ground is reddish-brown, and when you look at it, it looks as if the whole land is burning.

At first glance, there is nothing unusual about it other than the color. However, the few moving stripes he saw not long ago still made Zhou Xin feel a little concerned. So, he opened his mouth and ordered: "Let the detector analyze the rubble and see if there is anything special." Before he could finish speaking, though, the probe was already in action.

Ten minutes later, Atlas received the analysis results sent back by the probe, "Brother Captain, the analysis results of the probe show that." There is nothing special about the gravel and sand in this place, except for the relatively high content of iron oxides. Iron oxides are one of the main causes of the reddish-brown color. ”

"Is that all?" Before Zhou Xin could speak, Dart blurted out, "If it's just iron oxides, then what's the matter with those moving stripes we saw before?" ”

Shaking his head, Atlas replied, "Based on the information available so far, people don't know what's going on yet. However, from our point of view, the streaks at the location of this detector have not changed. She then speculated, "Maybe the stripes looked the same on the surface, but in reality there are differences that we don't know about." The plan is for the probe to survey the stripes in various parts of the planet. ”

After thinking about it, Zhou Xin nodded and added, "It also makes sense, just investigating one place really doesn't explain the problem." What's more, the location of the probe is only a transition zone between the stripes and the normal area, and you may find something different when you go deep into the stripes. ”

So, according to what Zhou Xin said, the probe continued to fly deep into the stripes, intending to find the anomalies in it. As the probe progressed, everyone found that although the stripes on the surface of the planet were very thin from space, and even most of them could be called looming, the probe could not see the edges of the stripes at all when flying over the stripes, and it felt as if flying in an endless red desert.

At each distance, the probe will fall to the ground to analyze the composition of the soil on the ground. However, nearly twenty minutes passed, and the detector performed more than a dozen analyses, but all the results were almost unchanged. The only change may be that as the detector penetrates deeper into the stripes, the size of the sand particles on the ground becomes a little larger.

At the same time, while this probe was investigating, other probes also arrived at the location of other stripes on the surface of the planet and launched an investigation of it. Regrettably, after the analysis of those streaks by the detector, there are significant differences in the composition of the soil. However, the main cause of the redness of the ground is still due to the iron oxide in it. As for the other stripes of different colors, it is only because they contain other metal oxides. Obviously, that's not what makes those stripes look writhing.

While the probe was investigating those streaks, the streaks on the planet's surface were still writhing from time to time in the footage sent back by the probe that Zhou Xin had left in the sky above the planet's sunny side. Moreover, after a long period of observation, Zhou Xin and the others found that the twisting of the stripes seemed to have no law at all. Sometimes most of the stripes don't move for a long time, but sometimes many stripes move at the same time without warning. Of course, the long observation was not completely fruitless, and Atlas still summed up something from it that I don't know if it can be called a pattern......