Лю Цысинь - Hold Up the Sky

The ocean bed of former days looked like a snowy white plain, reflecting the intense sunlight—no one could open their eyes unless they were wearing sunglasses. But the white plain before them didn’t make Yan Dong think of the snowfields of her native Northeast because, here, it was as hot as hell. The temperature was near fifty degrees Celsius. Hot winds kicked up salty dirt, which hurt when it hit her face. A hundred-thousand-ton oil tanker was in the distance. The gigantic hull lay tilted on the ground. Its propeller, several stories tall, and rudder completely covered the salt bed. An unbroken chain of white mountains stood even farther in the distance. That was a mountain range on the seafloor humanity had never seen until now. A two-sentence poem came to Yan Dong’s mind: The open sea is a boat’s land. Night is love’s day .

She laughed bitterly then. She’d experienced this tragedy, yet she still couldn’t shake off thinking like an artist.

Cheers erupted. Yan Dong raised her head and looked to where everyone was pointing. In the distance, a bright red point had appeared in the silver ring of ice that traversed the sky. The point of light drifted out of the ring. It swelled into a fireball. A white contrail dragged behind the fireball. This contrail of steam grew ever longer and thicker. Its color became even denser, even whiter. Soon, the fireball split into ten pieces. Each piece continued to split. A long white contrail dragged behind every small piece. This field of white contrails filled half the sky, as though it were a white Christmas tree and a small, bright lamp hung on the tip of every branch….

Even more ice meteors appeared. Their sonic booms shook the earth like rumbles of spring thunder. As old contrails gradually dissipated, new contrails appeared to replace them. They covered the sky in a complex white net. Several trillion tons of water now belonged to the Earth again.

Most of the ice meteors broke apart and vaporized in the air, but one large fragment of ice fell to the ground about forty kilometers from Yan Dong. The loud crash shook the flatlands. A colossal mushroom cloud rose from somewhere in the distant mountain range. The water vapor shone a dazzling white in the sunlight. Gradually, it dispersed in the wind and became the sky’s first cloud layer. The clouds multiplied and, for the first time, blocked the sun that had been scorching the earth for five years. They covered the entire sky. For a while, Yan Dong felt a pleasant coolness that oozed into her heart and lungs.

The cloud layer grew thick and dark. Red light flickered within it. Maybe it was lightning or the light from the continuous waves of ice meteors falling toward the earth.

It rained! This was a downpour so heavy it would have been rare even in the Oceaned Days. Yan Dong and everyone else there ran around screaming wildly in the storm. They felt their souls dissolve in the rain. Then they retreated into their cars and helicopters because, right now, people would suffocate in the rain.

The rain fell nonstop until dusk. Waterlogged depressions appeared on the seafloor flatlands. A crack in the clouds revealed the golden, flickering rays of the setting sun, as though the Earth had just opened its eyes.

Yan Dong followed the crowd, stepping through the thick salty mud. They ran to the nearest depression. She cupped some water in her hands, then splashed that thick brine on her face. As it fell, mixed with her tears, she said, choking with sobs:

“The ocean, our ocean…”

Epilogue

Yan Dong walked onto the frozen-over Songhua River. She was wrapped in a tattered overcoat. Her travel bag held the tools that she’d kept for fifteen years: several knives and shovels of various shapes, a hammer, and a watering can. She stamped her feet to make sure that the river had truly frozen. The Songhua River had water as early as five years ago, but this was the first time it had frozen, and during the summer, no less.

Due to the arid conditions and, at the same time, the potential energy of the many ice meteors converting into thermal energy in the atmosphere, the global climate had stayed hotter than ever. But in the final stage of ocean reclamation, the largest blocks of ice were forced down. These blocks of ice broke into larger fragments. Most of them crashed onto the ground. This not only destroyed a few cities but also kicked up dust that blocked the sun’s heat. Temperatures fell rapidly all over the world. Earth entered a new ice age.

Yan Dong looked at the night sky. This was the starscape of her childhood. The ring of ice had disappeared. She could only make out the vestiges of the remaining small blocks of ice from their rapid motion against the background of stars. Sea of Dreams had turned back into actual seas again. This magnificent work of art, its cruel beauty as well as nightmare, would forever be inscribed in the collective memory of humanity.

Although the ocean-reclamation effort had been a success, Earth’s climate would be a harsh one from now on. The ecosystem would take a long time to recover. For the foreseeable future, humanity’s existence would be extremely difficult. Nevertheless, at least existence was possible. Most people felt content with that. Indeed, the Ring of Ice Era made humanity learn contentment, and also something even more important.

The World Crisis Organization would change its name to the Space Water Retrieval Organization. They were considering another great engineering project: Humanity intended to fly to distant Jupiter, then take water from Jupiter’s moons and the rings of Saturn back to Earth in order to make up for the 18 percent lost in the course of the Ocean Reclamation Project.

At first, people intended to use the technology for propelling blocks of ice that they’d already mastered to drive blocks of ice from the rings of Saturn to Earth. Of course, that far away, the sunlight was too weak. Only using nuclear fusion to vaporize the cores of the blocks of ice could provide the necessary thrust. As for the water from Jupiter’s moons, that required even larger and more complex technology to acquire. Some people had already proposed pulling the whole of Europa out of Jupiter’s deep gravity well, pushing it to Earth, and making it Earth’s second moon. This way, Earth would receive much more water than 18 percent. It could turn Earth’s ecosystem into a glorious paradise. Naturally, this was a matter for the far future. No one alive hoped to see it during their lifetime. However, this hope made people in their hard lives feel a happiness they’d never felt before. This was the most valuable thing humanity received from the Ring of Ice Era: Reclaiming Sea of Dreams made humanity see its own strength, taught it to dream what it had never before dared to dream.

Yan Dong saw in the distance a group of people gathered on the ice. She walked to them, gliding with each step. When they spotted her, they began to run toward her. Some slipped and fell, then picked themselves up and raced to catch up with the others.

“Our old friend! Hello!” The first one to reach Yan Dong wrapped her in a warm hug. Yan Dong recognized him. He was one of the ice sculpture judges from so many ice and snow festivals before the Ring of Ice Era.

As they neared, she recognized the others, most of them ice sculptors from before the Ring of Ice Era. Like everyone else of this era, they wore tattered clothes. Suffering and time had dyed the hair on their temples white. Yan Dong felt as though she’d come home after years of wandering.

“I heard that the Ice and Snow Arts Festival has started back up again?” she asked.

“Of course. Otherwise, what are we all doing here?”

“I’ve been thinking. Times are so hard…”