Cixin Liu - The Dark Forest

Two days later, Luo Ji attended the first hearing of the revived Wallfacer Project. He didn’t go to the underground UN headquarters in North America, but attended by video link from his spartan residence in New Life Village #5, where scenes from the assembly appeared on the ordinary television in his room.

“Wallfacer Luo Ji, we were prepared to face your anger,” the commission chair said.

“My heart has been burnt to ash. It no longer has the capacity for anger,” Luo Ji said, reclining lazily on the sofa.

The chair nodded. “That’s a wonderful attitude. However, the commission feels you ought to leave your village. That little place isn’t a worthy command center for the defense of the Solar System.”

“Do you know about Xibaipo? It’s an even smaller village not far from here. Over two centuries ago, that’s where our nation’s founders commanded one of the largest offensives in history.” [7] Translator’s Note: Driven out of Yan’an by a Nationalist offensive in 1947, Communist forces established a base in Xibaipo, a village in the foothills of the Taihang Mountains in southwestern Hebei province. From there they directed the Liaoshen, Huaihai, and Pingjin campaigns, the decisive offensive in 1948 and 1949 that pushed the Nationalists out of northern China.

The chair shook his head. “Clearly you haven’t changed at all. Very well. The commission respects your habits and choices. You should get to work. It’s not going to be like back then, with you claiming that you’re always at work, is it?”

“I can’t work. The conditions for my work no longer exist. Can you harness stellar power to broadcast my spell into the universe?”

The representative of the Asian Fleet said, “You know that’s impossible. The droplet’s radio suppression of the sun is continuous. And we don’t anticipate that it will stop for the next two or three years, by which time the nine other droplets will have reached the Solar System.”

“Then there’s nothing I can do.”

The chair said, “No, Wallfacer Luo Ji. There’s one important thing you haven’t done. You haven’t disclosed the secret of the spell to the UN and SFJC. How did you use it to destroy a star?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“And if it were a condition for reawakening your wife and child?”

“That’s a despicable thing to say at a time like this.”

“This is a secret hearing. Besides, the Wallfacer Project doesn’t have any place in modern society. The revival of the Wallfacer Project means that all decisions made by the UN’s Wallfacer Project Commission two centuries ago are still in effect. And according to those resolutions, Zhuang Yan and your child would reawaken at the Doomsday Battle.”

“Didn’t we just fight the Doomsday Battle?”

“The two Internationals don’t think so, since the main Trisolaran Fleet has yet to arrive.”

“Keeping the secret of the spell is my responsibility as a Wallfacer. Otherwise, humanity will lose its last hope, though that hope may already be gone.”

In the days following the hearing, Luo Ji stayed inside, drinking heavily, and spent most of his time in a state of intoxication. People occasionally saw him emerge with his clothes disheveled and his beard long. He looked like a tramp.

When the next Wallfacer Project hearing was convened, Luo Ji again attended from home.

“Wallfacer Luo Ji, your condition has us worried,” the chair said when he saw Luo Ji’s unkempt appearance in the video. He directed the camera around Luo Ji’s room, and the assembly could see that it was littered with bottles.

“You ought to get to work, if only to restore yourself to a normal state of mind,” the representative of the European Commonwealth said.

“You know what will return me to normal.”

“The reawakening of your wife and child really isn’t all that important,” the chair said. “We don’t want to use that to control you. We know that we can’t control you. But it’s a resolution made by the previous commission, so addressing the issue presents some difficulties. Bottom line: There must be a condition.”

“I reject your condition.”

“No, no, Dr. Luo. The condition has changed.”

At the chair’s words, Luo Ji’s eyes lit up, and he sat up straight on the sofa. “And now the condition is…”

“It’s simple. Couldn’t be simpler. You just have to do something .”

“If I can’t send a spell out into the universe, there’s nothing I can do.”

“You have to think of something to do.”

“You mean, it could be something meaningless?”

“So long as it looks significant to the public. In their eyes, you’re either the spokesman of the force of cosmic justice or a heaven-sent angel of justice. At the very least, these identities can be used to stabilize the situation. But if you do nothing, you’ll lose the faith of the public after a while.”

“Achieving stability that way is dangerous. It’ll lead to no end of trouble.”

“But what we need right now is to stabilize the global situation. The nine droplets are coming to the Solar System in three years, and we have to be prepared to deal with that.”

“I really don’t want to waste resources.”

“In that case, the commission will provide you with a task. One that won’t waste resources. I’ll ask the chairman of the SFJC to explain it to you,” the chair said as he gestured to the SFJC chairman, who was also attending via video. The SFJC chairman was evidently in some space-based structure, because the stars were shifting slowly across the broad window behind him.

He said, “Our estimate of the arrival of the nine droplets in the Solar System is based entirely on speed and acceleration estimates obtained when they crossed the final interstellar dust cloud four years ago. They differ from the one that’s already here in that their engines operate without emitting light. They don’t emit any other high-frequency electromagnetic radiation that could provide a position. This is likely a self-adjustment made after humanity successfully tracked the first droplet. Locating and tracking such small, dark bodies in outer space is incredibly difficult, and now that we’ve lost their tracks, we don’t know when they’ll reach the Solar System. We don’t even know how to detect that they’ve arrived.”

“So what can I do?” Luo Ji asked.

“We hope that you can lead the Snow Project.”

“What’s that?”

“Using stellar hydrogen bombs and Neptune’s oil film, we will manufacture clouds of space dust that the droplets will leave tracks in when they pass through.”

“You’ve got to be joking. You do realize that I’m not entirely ignorant about space.”

“You were an astronomer once. That makes you even more qualified to lead this project.”

“Making a dust cloud was successful last time because the approximate path of the target was known. But now we know nothing. If the nine droplets accelerate or change course while dark, then they might even enter the Solar System from another side altogether! Where are you going to spread the dust cloud?”

“In every direction.”

“You mean to say that you’re going to manufacture a ball of dust to envelop the entire Solar System? If that’s the case, then you’re the one who’s been sent by God.”

“A ball of dust is impossible, but we can make a ring of dust on the ecliptic plane, between the asteroid belt and Jupiter.”

“But what if the droplets enter outside the ecliptic plane?”

“That can’t be helped. But from an astrodynamics perspective, if the droplet group wants to encounter every planet in the Solar System, then the greatest likelihood is entry on the ecliptic plane. That’s what the first droplet did. That way, the dust cloud will be able to capture their tracks, and, once captured, the Solar System’s optical tracking system will be able to lock onto them.”