Wuzhou.

Qingla County.

Hengyao staff, NASA staff, local military personnel, Li Xiao, Tian Lao, and so on all stood here, standing in the control room.

On the iron frame in the distance, there is a huge satellite rocket towering, the rocket 'Picking the Moon' has a total length of 49.68 meters, a diameter of 3.35 meters, and each of its liquid boosters is 15.4 meters long, 2.25 meters in diameter, the maximum diameter of the core stage is 4.2 meters, the total take-off weight is 461 tons, the take-off thrust is 600 tons, and it can send 8.8 tons to 9.2 tons of payload into low earth orbit.

And this rocket is equipped with Veronica, an outer space explorer that can be called the highest level of Hengyao.

Veronica's liftoff is a two-step process:

First, Veronica's artificial intelligence body lifts off and connects the satellite into the preset orbit, and she will provide the Wuzhou Aerospace Agency and Hengyao with data and information from outer space.

Second, the MK series of auxiliary armor parts were launched into the air, controlled by Veronica, to replace the armor parts for Li Xiao's drive.

When Li Xiao and everyone were looking at the big screen, Veronica was also on the big screen.

She was solemn and solemn, and the military uniform on her body also matched very well.

Li Xiao's heart began to tense.

"Radar is normal!' Picking the Moon's arrow body is normal! The relay antenna deploys normally! ”

"Ready to launch! Count down to five! ”

"Five! Four! Three! Two! One! ”

"Ignition!"

In the distance, a brilliant golden flame erupted from under the rocket body, and a small flame quickly grew into a triangle and sprayed on the ground, and the thick white smoke covered the sky and the sun, covering everything on the ground, and the rocket slowly rose into the air in the thick smoke, its speed became faster and faster, and quickly turned into a golden flame.

"Booster separation!"

"Rocket first and second stage separation!"

"Fairing detachment!"

"LiDAR tracking is normal, telemetry signal is normal!"

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"The solar sail board is deployed normally, and the cabin environment is normal!"

"The launch of the rocket 'Picking the Moon' was a complete success!"

"Wow!"

Everyone in the control room was boiling, especially the staff of Hengyao, after all, it was the first time to see a rocket launch, although Nie Lao and Wei Lao and others were old, they were still in tears, although the staff of the Aerospace Agency had witnessed many rocket launches, but after watching it so many times, they were still moved to tears.

Li Xiao quietly glanced at Tian Lao who was standing in front of him, and saw that although his expression was indifferent, there were still tears flashing in the corners of his eyes.

At that moment, he suddenly understood what pride was!

Tian Lao turned around and said, "The rest, it's up to you!" ”

Li Xiao nodded, and immediately asked Guo Lu to lead someone to start debugging Veronica.

When the satellite entered orbit, it was also controlled by personnel to Veronica's autonomous control, and Guo Lu released control.

All held their breath.

On the big screen, the satellite cut into orbit very accurately and successfully completed the signal docking with the space station.

"Director, docking is complete! Veronica's choice of entry point is very precise! ”

Tian Lao nodded.

The stone in Li Xiao's heart also fell to the ground.

This means that this time the rocket launch, successful.

But a voice broke everyone's joy.

"Director, Veronica has adjusted her angle, she is intervening in the signal area of another country." The subordinate reported.

"What? What does this mean? ”

"Veronica has intercepted a large number of signal data sources from other countries and is analyzing them."

"We detected signals of attack from other countries, but we couldn't break through Veronica's defensive lock."

"Veronica is collecting a lot of signals, do you need to stop it?" The subordinate said nervously.

Everyone became nervous, staring closely at the big screen, Veronica had just taken off, she was originally a signal transmission satellite, but she moved the orbit and angle, forcibly intervened in the territory of another country, and intercepted a large number of signal sources for analysis, these things were completely her own actions, and there was no participation of NASA and Hengyao personnel at all.

Tian Lao's eyes stared indifferently at the big screen.

It's like the calm before the storm.

At this time, in the silent command room, Tian Lao's mobile phone rang.

Drip ~ drip ~ drip ~

Tian Lao picked it up and listened to it, and said after a while: "I don't know, it has nothing to do with our Aerospace Agency, it is indeed the satellite we launched on, but it is an artificial intelligence body inside, what to do is her own decision, and we Wuzhou do not bear the charge of stealing secrets of other countries." ”

Hang up.

Then it rang again.

Tian Lao explained one by one on the phone.

The subordinate asked again: "Director, do you need human intervention?" ”

Tian Lao didn't answer, suddenly turned around, glanced at Li Xiao, and then said: "Li Xiao, I remember that your other artificial intelligence body, Athena, can control Veronica, that is, you can control Veronica." ”

Li Xiao nodded and said, "Yes." ”

Tian Lao nodded and said, "Then please let Veronica return to her normal track immediately after 15 minutes, 15 minutes should be enough for you, right?" ”

Li Xiao paused and said, "It's completely enough!" ”

Resisting the communicator, he calmly said, "Veronica, the signal sail is deployed at full power!" ”

Massive amounts of information poured into the big screen, and Veronica was analyzing it at a rapid pace.

And in the entire silent command room, Tian Lao's mobile phone was also ringing non-stop.

Time passes little by little.

Li Xiao and Tian Lao stood in front, everyone looked at the backs of the old and the young, and they didn't understand what medicine was sold in their gourds, but they noticed that Li Xiao's fists were clenched tightly.

They could only wait quietly.

In the command room, Tian Lao's mobile phone was like a talisman, ringing constantly.

15 minutes later.

Tian Lao said lightly: "Enough." ”

Li Xiao said: "Veronica, withdraw from the observation corner and resume orbit." ”

On the big screen, Veronica immediately regained her perspective and re-entered the established orbit, accompanying the Earth in a quiet autobiography.

Tian Lao's mobile phone ringtone finally returned to normal.

It's as if none of this had happened

But Li Xiao knew that Veronica's gain this time was very huge.

On the screen, Veronica is analyzing and presenting a huge amount of data, which contains military fortresses and secret bases in many countries west of the Middle East, and even excavates the communication records of many people, which is very valuable.

Li Xiao finally breathed a sigh of relief.

All of this came from what Tian Lao said to him alone.

Last time, when Li Xiao left the NASA, Tian Lao called him into the office alone.

Then he was asked a question.

"Li Xiao, if Veronica enters the orbit of another country, I will give you 10 minutes, how much information can you collect?"

Li Xiao's first reaction was shock, and he immediately understood what Tian Lao meant, and after carefully measuring Veronica's ability, he gave his own reply.

"It is enough to detect 5 million square kilometers of military fortresses and about 1/3 of communication information, but if the time can be increased to 15 minutes, it will be directly doubled!"

Tian Lao nodded, and then said, "Okay, I'll give you 15 minutes!" ”

This was the conversation between Tian Lao and Li Xiao before this, although he did not indicate his purpose, but Li Xiao understood his purpose.

It's like two people tacitly talking about a plan.

Veronica is too strong.

As an interstellar artificial intelligence body, her ability is by no means limited to collecting signals from Wuzhou and analyzing them.

Why can't I cut into other tracks for signal collection?

Therefore, Li Xiao cooperated with Tian Lao to complete this work.

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