Year 205, Crisis Era(7)

Luo Ji and Shi Qiang drove off immediately after traveling back to the surface from the underground city. The city's inhabitants were pouring out in large numbers, which meant that ground traffic was so heavy that it took them half an hour to leave the old city and reach full speed on the highway to the west.

On the car's television, they saw that the droplet was approaching Earth at a speed of seventy-five kilometers per second and showed no sign of slowing. At that rate, it would arrive in three hours.

The weakening of the induction field power supply slowed the car, and Shi Qiang had to tap a storage battery to maintain speed. They reached the large hibernator residential area, but drove past New Life Village #5 and continued westward. They stayed silent along the way, speaking little and focusing their attention on the breaking news on the television.

The droplet passed lunar orbit without slowing. At this rate it would reach Earth in just half an hour. No one knew how it would behave, so to avoid a panic, the news didn't predict a point of impact.

Luo Ji made a determined effort to welcome the moment he had long wanted to postpone, and said, "Da Shi, stop here."

Shi Qiang stopped the car and they got out. The sun, now nearing the horizon, cast long shadows of the two men on the desert. Luo Ji felt the earth beneath his feet turn as soft as his heart. He almost lacked the strength to stand.

He said, "I'll try my best to reach a sparsely populated area. There's a city ahead of us, so I'm going to turn this way. You find your own way back, and get as far as possible from the direction I'm going."

"My boy, I'll wait for you here. When it's over, we'll go back together." Shi Qiang took out a cigarette from his pocket and looked around for a lighter before remembering that the cigarette didn't need to be lit. Like the other things he had brought from that distant past, his personal habits had not changed at all.

Luo Ji smiled a little sadly. He hoped Shi Qiang actually believed that, because at least that would make their parting a little easier to take. "Wait if you'd like. When the time comes, you had better move to the other side of the embankment. I don't know how powerful the strike will be."

Shi Qiang smiled and shook his head. "You remind me of an intellectual I met two hundred years ago. He had the same hangdog look you've got. I remember him sitting out early in the morning in front of the Wangfujing church, crying.… But he got out okay. I checked after I woke up: He lived to be nearly a hundred."

"What about the first guy to touch the droplet, Ding Yi? I believe you knew each other, too."

"He had a death wish. Nothing you could do about that." Shi Qiang looked up at the sky clothed in sunset, as if reminding himself what the physicist looked like. "Still, he was a truly broad-minded man, the kind that could accept any situation. I never met anyone like him in my whole life. Seriously, a great mind. My boy, you ought to learn from him."

"And again I say to you: We're just ordinary people, you and I." He looked at his watch, knowing that there was no more time for delay. He extended a firm hand to Shi Qiang. "Da Shi, thank you for everything you've done for me the past two centuries. Good-bye. Maybe we'll meet again in some other place."

Shi Qiang did not take his hand, but gave him a wave. "Cut the crap! Believe me, my boy. Nothing's going to happen. Go, and when it's over, hurry back and get me. And don't blame me if I make fun of you tonight over drinks."

Luo Ji got into the car quickly, not wanting Shi Qiang to see the tears in his eyes. Sitting there, he strove to etch the rearview-mirror image of Shi Qiang onto his mind, then set off on his final journey.

Maybe they would meet again someplace. The last time it had taken two centuries, so what would the separation be this time? Like Zhang Beihai two centuries before, Luo Ji suddenly found himself hating that he was an atheist.

The sun had now entirely set, and the desert on either side of the road shone white in the twilight, like snow. It suddenly occurred to him that it was along this very stretch of road two centuries ago that he had driven in the Accord with his imaginary lover, when the northern China plain was covered with real snow. He felt her hair blowing in the wind, its strands teasing him with their strange tickles on his right cheek.

No, no. Don't say where we are! Once we know where we are, then the world becomes as narrow as a map. When we don't know, the world feels unlimited.

Okay. Then let's do our best to get lost.

Luo Ji had always had the feeling that Zhuang Yan and Xia Xia had been brought into the world by his imagination. He felt a stab in his heart when the thought entered his mind, because, at this moment, love and longing were the most excruciating things in the world. Tears blurred his vision as he strove to keep his mind blank. But Yan Yan's lovely eyes stubbornly surfaced through the blankness, accompanied by Xia Xia's intoxicating laughter. It was all he could do to focus his attention on the television news.

The droplet had passed the Lagrange point,25 but it still sped toward Earth at constant speed.

Luo Ji parked the car at what he thought was the most fitting spot, the border between the plain and the mountains, where there were no people or buildings as far as he could see. The car stood in a valley surrounded by a U-shaped ring of mountains, which would dissipate some of the shock waves from the impact. He took the television from the car and carried it onto the open sand, where he sat down.

The droplet crossed the 34,000-kilometer geosynchronous orbit altitude and passed close by the space city New Shanghai, whose inhabitants all clearly saw the bright point of light pass rapidly across their sky. The news declared that the impact would occur in eight minutes.

The news finally predicted the latitude and longitude of impact: to the northwest of China's capital.

Luo Ji knew that already.

Twilight had fallen heavily now, and the colors of the sky had shrunk to a small space in the west, like a pupilless eyeball watching the world indifferently.

Perhaps as a way to pass the remaining time, Luo Ji began to look back on his life.

It had been divided into two entirely distinct parts. The part after he became a Wallfacer spanned two centuries, but it felt densely compacted. He passed quickly back through it as if it had been just yesterday. That part of his life didn't seem like his own, including the love that was engraved onto his bones. It all felt like a fleeting dream. He didn't dare think about his wife and child.

Contrary to his expectations, his memories of life before becoming a Wallfacer were a blank. All that he could fish out from the sea of memory were a few fragments, and the farther back he went, the fewer there were. Had he really been to high school? Had he really attended primary school? Had he really had a first love? Some of the fragments bore clear scratches, reminding him that those things had indeed taken place. The details were vivid, but the feelings had vanished without a trace. The past was like a handful of sand you thought you were squeezing tightly, but which had already run out through the cracks between your fingers. Memory was a river that had run dry long ago, leaving only scattered gravel in a lifeless riverbed. He had lived life always looking out for the next thing, and whenever he had gained, he had also lost, leaving him with little in the end.

He looked around at the twilight mountains, recalling that one winter's night he spent here more than two hundred years ago, in the mountains that had grown tired of standing for hundreds of millions of years, and had lain down "like old villagers basking in the sun," as his imaginary lover had once said. The fields and cities of the northern China plain had long since turned to desert, but the mountains didn't seem to have changed. They were still plain and ordinary in shape, and withered grasses and vitex vines still grew stubbornly from the crevices in the gray rocks, no lusher and no sparser than two centuries ago. Two centuries was far too short for any visible change to come to these rocky mountains.

What was the human world like in the eyes of the mountains? Perhaps just something they saw on a leisurely afternoon. First, a few small living beings appeared on the plain. After a while, they multiplied, and after another while they erected structures like anthills that quickly filled the region. The structures shone from the inside, and some of them let off smoke. After another while, the lights and smoke disappeared, and the small things vanished as well, and then their structures toppled and were buried in the sand. That was all. Among the countless things the mountains had witnessed, these fleeting events were not necessarily the most interesting.

Finally, Luo Ji located his earliest memory. He was surprised to discover that the life he could remember also began on the sand. It was in his own prehistoric age, in a place he couldn't remember, and with people he couldn't recall, but he clearly remembered the sandy shore of a river. There was a round moon in the sky, and the river rippled under the moonlight. He was digging in the sand. When he had dug out a pit, water seeped through the bottom, and in the water there was a small moon. He kept digging like that, digging lots of pits and bringing forth lots of small moons.

That was his earliest memory. Before that, everything was blank.

In the dark of night, only the light of the television illuminated the small patch of sand surrounding him.

As Luo Ji worked to maintain a blank state in his mind, his scalp tightened, and he felt like an enormous hand had covered the entire sky overhead and was pressing down on him.

But then the giant hand slowly withdrew.

At a distance of twenty thousand kilometers from the surface, the droplet changed direction and headed directly toward the sun.

The TV reporter shouted, "Attention northern hemisphere! Attention northern hemisphere! The droplet has grown brighter, and you can see it with the naked eye!"

Luo Ji looked up. He could actually see it: It wasn't too bright, but its high speed made it easily distinguishable as it crossed the sky like a meteor and vanished in the west.

At last the droplet reduced its velocity relative to the Earth to zero and rested at a point 1.5 million kilometers away. A Lagrange point. That meant that, in the days to come, it would remain motionless relative to both Earth and sun, squarely between the two.

Luo Ji had a hunch that something else might happen, so he sat on the sand and waited. The mountains, like old men beside and in back of him, waited quietly with him and gave him a sense of security. For the time being, there was no more important information in the news. A world uncertain whether or not it had escaped catastrophe waited nervously.

Ten minutes passed, but nothing happened. The monitoring system showed the droplet suspended motionless, the propulsion halo gone from its tail and its round head facing the sun. It reflected the bright sunlight, so that its front third appeared to be on fire. To Luo Ji, some sort of mysterious induction seemed to be taking place between the droplet and the sun.

The image on the television suddenly blurred, and the sound turned scratchy. Luo Ji sensed commotion in the surrounding environment: A startled flock of birds took flight in the mountains, and a dog barked in the distance. It might have been a false impression, but he felt his skin begin to itch. The television's sound and picture jittered for a moment and then cleared up. Later it was learned that the interference was still present, but global telecommunications systems had quickly filtered out the sudden noise with their anti-interference capabilities. However, the news reacted slowly to this development because of the vast amounts of monitoring data that needed to be pooled and analyzed. It was another ten minutes or more before precise information became available.

The droplet was sending a continuous, powerful electromagnetic wave directly at the sun with an intensity far exceeding the sun's amplification threshold and a frequency that covered all the bands that the sun could amplify.

Luo Ji began to giggle, and then laughed until he choked. Yes, he really was self-absorbed. He should have thought of all of this long ago. Luo Ji wasn't important. The sun was important. From now on, humanity could no longer use the sun as a powerful antenna to transmit messages to the universe.

The droplet had sealed it off.

"Hah! My boy, nothing's happened! We really should have wagered on it." At some point, Shi Qiang had made his way over to Luo Ji. He had flagged down a car to get here.

Luo Ji felt like something had been drained out of him. He lay limply down on the sand, which was still warm from the sun. It was comfortable beneath him.

"Yes, Da Shi. We can go and live our lives now. Everything's finished."

* * *

"My boy, this is the last time I help you do Wallfacer stuff," Shi Qiang said on the road back. "That occupation must cause mental problems, and you've just had another episode."

"I hope that's the case," Luo Ji said. Outside, the stars that were visible yesterday had vanished, and the black desert and night sky joined into one at the horizon. A section of road illuminated by the headlights stretched out ahead of them. The world was like the state of Luo Ji's mind: darkness everywhere, with one spot incredibly clear.

"You know, it'll be easy for you to get back to normal. It's time for Zhuang Yan and Xia Xia to reawaken. Although, with the recent chaos, I don't know if they've suspended reawakening. But even if they have, it won't be for very long. The situation will quickly stabilize, I think. After all, there's still time left for several generations. Didn't you say you can go and live your life?"

"I'll go inquire at the Hibernation Immigration Bureau tomorrow." Shi Qiang's words reminded Luo Ji of the bit of color that existed in his dull mind. Maybe a reunion with his wife and child was his only chance for redemption.

But humanity was beyond hope.

As they neared New Life Village #5, Shi Qiang suddenly slowed the car. "Something's not right," he said, looking ahead. Following his gaze, Luo Ji saw a glow in the sky cast by a light on the ground, but the high embankments on the roadway meant they couldn't see its source. The glow was in motion. It didn't seem like the lights of a residential area.

When the car turned off the highway, a strange and spectacular sight met them: The desert between New Life Village #2 and the highway had been turned into a shining blanket dense with lights, like an ocean of fireflies. It took Luo Ji a moment to realize that it was a crowd of people. All of them were from the city, and the light came from their clothes.

As the car slowly approached the crowd, everyone ahead of them raised their hands to block the glare of the headlights, so Shi Qiang turned them off, leaving them facing a bizarre, gaudy human wall.

"Looks like they're waiting for someone," Shi Qiang said, looking at Luo Ji, who tensed up at his expression. The car stopped, and Shi Qiang went on, "You stay here and don't move. I'll go have a look." He jumped out of the car and walked over to the crowd. Against the glowing human wall, Shi Qiang's stocky body stood out as a black silhouette. Luo Ji watched him walk to the crowd, then exchange a few words with the people before turning and walking back.

"Turns out they're waiting for you. Go," he said, leaning on the door. Seeing Luo Ji's face, he reassured him, "Relax. It'll be okay."

Luo Ji got out of the car and went over to the crowd. He had grown familiar with the wired clothing of modern people, but in the desolate desert, he still had the feeling that he was walking toward the Other. But when he drew closer and could make out their expressions, his heart began to beat faster.

The first thing he had learned when he awakened from hibernation was that the crowds of every age have their own unique expression. The differences across time to this far-off age were remarkable—you could easily distinguish between moderns and hibernators who had only just reawakened. But the expressions Luo Ji saw now weren't modern, nor were they twenty-first century. He didn't know what era they belonged to. Fear nearly rooted him to the spot, but his trust in Shi Qiang propelled his steps mechanically forward.

When he had gotten closer to the crowd, he finally stopped, because he saw the images they had on their clothes.

Their clothing displayed pictures of Luo Ji—some still photographs, some videos.

Luo Ji had rarely appeared before the media since becoming a Wallfacer, so he hadn't left much of a visual record, but a fairly complete set of those videos and images was now on display on the people's clothing. On some people, he even saw photographs of his pre-Wallfacer self. The clothing took its images from the Internet, which meant that these images must be circulating worldwide. He also noticed that the images were in their original state and had not been subjected to the artistic deformation that the moderns liked to do, which meant that they had just appeared online.

When they saw him stop, the crowd moved toward him. When they got as close as two or three meters, the people in front held back the rest of the crowd, and then knelt down. Those behind them knelt down successively in a wave of glowing people that receded along the sand.

"Lord, save us!" he heard someone say. The words buzzed in his ears.

"Oh god, save the world!"

"Great spokesman, uphold justice in the universe!"

"Angel of justice, save humankind!"

Two people came up to Luo Ji, and he recognized the one whose clothing wasn't glowing as Hines. The other man was a soldier with glowing badges and ribbons.

Hines said to him gravely, "Dr. Luo, I've just been appointed your liaison to the UN Wallfacer Project Commission. It is my duty to inform you that the Wallfacer Project has been revived, and you have been named the sole Wallfacer."

The soldier said, "I am special commissioner Ben Jonathan of the SFJC. We met when you had just been reawakened. I am also instructed to inform you that the Asian Fleet, the European Fleet, and the North American Fleet have agreed with the revalidation of the Wallfacer Act and have recognized your status as Wallfacer."

Hines pointed to the crowd kneeling on the sand, and said, "In the eyes of the public, you now have two identities. For theists, you are the angel of justice. To atheists, you are the spokesperson for a just, superior civilization in the Milky Way."

This was followed by silence, with all eyes focused on Luo Ji. He thought for a while, but came up with only one possibility: "The spell worked?" he ventured.

Hines and Jonathan nodded, and Hines said, "187J3X1 has been destroyed."

"When?"

"Fifty-one years ago. It was observed a year ago, but no one was paying much attention to that star, so the observations were only discovered this afternoon. A few desperate people in the SFJC wanted to find inspiration in history, and they remembered the Wallfacer Project and your spell. So they looked at 187J3X1 and found that it wasn't there anymore. In its place was a nebula of debris. They scanned through all observational records of the star until its destruction a year ago, then pulled all of the observational data of 187J3X1 at the time it exploded."

"How do they know it was destroyed?"

"You're aware that 187J3X1 was in a stable period, like the sun, so it would be impossible for it to go nova. And its destruction was observed: A body traveling close to the speed of light struck 187J3X1. The tiny object—they're calling it a 'photoid'—was observed the instant it passed into the periphery of the stellar atmosphere by the tracks it made. Even though it was small in volume, its near-light velocity meant that its vastly amplified relativistic mass had reached one-eighth of 187J3X1's by the time it struck the target. It destroyed the star immediately. The star's four planets were also vaporized in the blast."

Luo Ji looked up at the night's dark sky, where the stars were practically invisible. He walked forward, and the people stood up and silently made a path for him, closing back together immediately behind him. They were all trying to push closer to him, as if yearning for sunlight amid the cold, but they respectfully left him a circle of space, a dark spot in a fluorescent ocean, like the eye of a storm. A man pushed forward and fell to the ground in front of Luo Ji, compelling him to stop, and then the man kissed his feet. A few others entered the ring to repeat that act. Just when the situation seemed about to go out of control, there were critical shouts from the crowd, prompting the people to scramble and retreat back into the group.

Luo Ji continued on ahead, but realized that he didn't know where he was going. He stopped, found Hines and Jonathan in the crowd, and walked over to them.

"So what should I do now?" he asked when he reached them.

"You're a Wallfacer, so of course you can do anything within the scope of the Wallfacer Act," Hines said to him with a bow. "Although the act still has restrictions, you can now mobilize practically all of the resources of Earth International."

"That includes the Fleet International's resources, too," Jonathan added.

Luo Ji thought for a moment, and said, "I don't need to tap any resources right now. But if I've really recovered the power granted by the Wallfacer Act…"

"There's no doubt about that," Hines said. Jonathan nodded.

"Then I'll make two requests. First, order will be restored in all cities, and normal life will resume. There's no mystery about this request. I'm sure you understand."

Everyone nodded. Someone said, "The world is listening, oh god."

"Yes, the world is listening," Hines said. "Restoring stability will require time, but because of you we have faith that it can be done." His words were echoed in the crowd.

"Second: Everyone, go home. Leave this place in peace. Thank you!"

The people were silent after hearing this, but soon began to buzz as his words were passed back through the crowd. The crowd began to disperse, slowly and unwillingly at first, but eventually the pace picked up and car after car headed off down the road in the direction of the city. The many people walking along the roadside looked like a long glowing colony of ants in the night.

Then the desert was empty once again. Only Luo Ji, Shi Qiang, Hines, and Jonathan were left on the sand littered with chaotic footprints.

"I am truly ashamed of my former self," Hines said. "Human civilization has a history of just five thousand years, yet we cherish life and freedom so highly. There must be civilizations in the universe with a history of billions of years. What sort of morality do they possess? Is there any point to that question?"

"I'm ashamed for myself, too. The past few days, I've even begun to doubt God," Jonathan said. When he saw Hines about to cut in, he raised his hand to stop him. "No, friend. We might be talking about the same thing."

They embraced, tears streaming down their faces.

"So, gentlemen," Luo Ji said as he patted them on the back. "You can go back. If I need you, I'll get in touch. Thank you."

He watched them go off, supporting each other like a happy pair of lovers. Now he and Shi Qiang were the only ones left.

"Da Shi, anything you'd like to say now?" he said, turning to Shi Qiang with a smile.

Shi Qiang stood rooted to the spot, as stunned as if he had just witnessed a thrilling magic trick. "My boy, I'm damn confused."

"What? You don't believe I'm an angel of justice?"

"You'd have to beat me to death before I'd say that."

"And a spokesperson of a superior civilization?"

"A little better than an angel, but I don't believe that either, to tell you the truth. I've never thought that was the case."

"Don't you believe in fairness and justice in the universe?"

"I don't know."

"But you're in law enforcement."

"I said I don't know. I'm genuinely confused."

"Then you're the most sober one here."

"So can you tell me about the justice of the universe?"

"Very well. Come with me." Then Luo Ji walked straight out into the desert, with Shi Qiang following close behind him. They walked a long while in silence, then crossed the highway.

"Where are we going?" Shi Qiang asked.

"To the darkest place."

* * *

They crossed the highway to where the embankment blocked out the lights of the residential area. Groping about in the dark that surrounded them, Luo Ji and Shi Qiang sat down on the sandy ground.

"Let's begin," Luo Ji's voice sounded in the dark.

"Give me the easy version. At my level, I'm not going to understand anything complicated."

"Everyone can understand, Da Shi. The truth is simple. It's the kind of thing that, once you hear it, you'll wonder why you didn't come up with it yourself. Do you know about mathematical axioms?"

"I took geometry in high school. 'Only one straight line can be drawn between two points.' That kind of thing."

"Right. So now we're going to set out two axioms for cosmic civilization. First, survival is the primary need of civilization. Second, civilization continuously grows and expands, but the total matter in the universe remains constant."

"And then?"

"That's it."

"What can you derive from those little things?"

"The same way you can figure out an entire case from a bullet or a drop of blood, cosmic sociology is able to describe a complete picture of galactic and cosmic civilization from those two axioms. That's what science is like, Da Shi. The cornerstone of every discipline is quite simple."

"So let's see you derive something."

"First, let's talk about the Battle of Darkness. Would you believe me if I said that Starship Earth was a microcosm of cosmic civilization?"

"No. Starship Earth lacked resources like parts and fuel, but the universe doesn't. It's too big."

"You're wrong. The universe is big, but life is bigger! That's what the second axiom means. The amount of matter in the universe remains constant, but life grows exponentially. Exponentials are the devils of mathematics. If there's a microscopic bacterium in the ocean that divides once every half hour, its descendants will fill the entire ocean in the space of a few days, so long as there are sufficient nutrients. Don't let humanity and Trisolaris give you a false impression. These two civilizations are tiny, but they are only in their infancy. Once a civilization passes a certain technological threshold, the expansion of life through the universe is frightening. For instance, take humanity's present navigation speed. In a million years, Earth civilization could fill the galaxy. And a million years is a short time measured against the universe."

"So you're saying that, taking the long view, the entire universe might have that kind of … what are they calling it, a 'dead hand'?"

"No need for the long view. Right now the entire universe has been dealt that dead hand. Like Hines said, civilization may have started in the universe billions of years ago. Looking at the signs, the universe might be packed full already. Who knows how much empty space there is in the Milky Way or the universe, or how many resources are left?"

"But that's not right, is it? The universe looks empty. We haven't seen any other alien life apart from Trisolaris, right?"

"That's what we'll talk about next. Give me a cigarette." Luo Ji groped about in the dark for a while before taking the cigarette from Shi Qiang's hand. When Luo Ji next spoke, Shi Qiang realized he had moved to a spot three or four meters away. "We need to increase the distance to make it feel more like outer space," Luo Ji said. Then he lit the cigarette by twisting its filter, and Shi Qiang lit one of his own. In the dark, two tiny red planets stood in distant opposition.

"Okay. To illustrate the problem, we now need to establish the most elementary model of cosmic civilization. These two balls of flame represent two civilized planets. The universe is made up of only these two planets, and apart from them there's nothing else. Erase all of our surroundings. Can you locate that feeling?"

"Yeah. That's an easy feeling to find in a dark place like this."

"Let's call these two civilized worlds your civilization and my civilization. They're separated by a great distance, say, a hundred light-years. You can detect that I exist, but you don't know any details. However, I'm completely ignorant of your presence."

"Right."

"Now we need to define two concepts, 'benevolence' and 'malice' between civilizations. These words themselves aren't very rigorous in a scientific context, so we've got to restrict their meaning. 'Benevolence' means not taking the initiative to attack and eradicate other civilizations. 'Malice' is the opposite."

"That's a low bar for benevolence."

"Next, consider your options for dealing with me. Please remember that the axioms of cosmic civilization should be kept in mind throughout the process, as well as the distance scale and the environment of space."

"I could choose to communicate with you."

"If you do that, you should be aware of the price you'll pay: You'll have exposed your existence to me."

"Right. In the universe, that's no small thing."

"There are different degrees of exposure. The strongest form of exposure is when I know your precise interstellar coordinates. Next is when I know your general direction, and the weakest is when I only know of your existence. But even the weakest form of exposure makes it possible for me to search for you, because since you've detected my existence, I know that I'll be able to find you. It's only a matter of time, from the standpoint of technological development."

"But my boy, I could still take the risk to talk to you. If you're malicious, then it's my bad luck. But if you're benevolent, then we could have further exchanges and ultimately be united into a benevolent civilization."

"Okay, Da Shi. Now we've come to the crux of it. Let's return to the axioms of cosmic civilization: Even if I'm a benevolent civilization, can I determine at the start of our communication whether or not you are also benevolent?"

"Of course not. That would violate the first axiom."

"So once I've received your message, what should I do?"

"Naturally, you ought to determine whether I'm benevolent or malicious. Malicious, and you eradicate me. Benevolent, and we can continue communicating."

The flame on Luo Ji's side rose up and moved back and forth. Evidently he had gotten up and was pacing. "That's fine on Earth, but not out in the universe. So next we'll introduce an important new concept: the chain of suspicion."

"That's an odd term."

"The term is all I had at first. It wasn't explained to me. But, later, I was able to infer its meaning from the words themselves."

"Who didn't explain it?"

"… I'll tell you later. Let's continue. If you think I'm benevolent, that's not a reason to feel safe, because according to the first axiom, a benevolent civilization can't predict that any other civilization is benevolent. You don't know whether I think you're benevolent or malicious. Next, even if you know that I think you're benevolent, and I also know that you think I'm benevolent, I don't know what you think about what I think about what you're thinking about me. It's convoluted, isn't it? This is just the third level, but the logic goes on indefinitely."

"I get what you mean."

"That's the chain of suspicion. It's something that you don't see on Earth. Humanity's shared species, cultural similarities, interconnected ecosystem, and close distances means that, in this environment, the chain of suspicion will only extend a level or two before it's resolved through communication. But in space, the chain of suspicion can be very long. Something like the Battle of Darkness will already have taken place before communication can resolve it."

Shi Qiang took a drag on his cigarette, and his contemplative face emerged from the darkness for a moment. "It looks now like the Battle of Darkness has a lot to teach us."

"That's right. The five ships of Starship Earth formed a quasi-cosmic civilization, not a real one, because they consisted of a single species—humans—who were very close to each other. But even so, when they were dealt that dead hand, the chain of suspicion emerged. In actual cosmic civilization, the biological differences between different groups might be as high as the kingdom level, and cultural differences are even further beyond our imagining. Add to this the vast distances between them, and you have chains of suspicion that are practically indestructible."

"That means that the outcome is the same, regardless of whether we're benevolent civilizations or malicious civilizations?"

"That's right. That's the most important aspect of the chain of suspicion. It's unrelated to the civilization's own morality and social structure. It's enough to think of every civilization as the points at the end of a chain. Regardless of whether civilizations are internally benevolent or malicious, when they enter the web formed by chains of suspicion, they're all identical."

"But if you're much weaker than I am, you're not a threat to me. So I could always communicate with you, right?"

"That won't work, either. Here we need to introduce a second important concept: the technological explosion. I didn't get a full explanation for this, either, but it was far easier to infer than the chain of suspicion. Human civilization has five thousand years of history, and life on Earth might be as much as a few billion years old. But modern technology was developed over the course of three hundred years. On the scale of the universe, that's not development. It's an explosion! The potential for technological leaps is the explosive buried within every civilization, and if it's lit by some internal or external factor, it goes off with a bang. On Earth it took three hundred years, but there's no reason why humanity should be the fastest of all cosmic civilizations. Maybe there are others whose technological explosions were even more sudden. I'm weaker than you, but once I've received your message and know of your existence, the chain of suspicion is established between us. If at any time I experience a technological explosion that suddenly puts me far ahead of you, then I'm stronger than you. On the scale of the universe, several hundred years is the snap of a finger. And it might be that my knowledge of your existence and the information I received from our communication was the perfect spark to set off that explosion. That means that even though I'm just a newborn or growing civilization, I'm still a big danger to you."

Shi Qiang watched Luo Ji's flame in the darkness as he thought for a few seconds, then looked at his own cigarette. "So I have to keep quiet."

"Do you think that will work?"

They smoked. The balls of flame brightened and their faces emerged from the darkness like the gods of this simple universe, deep in thought.

Shi Qiang said, "No, it won't. If you're stronger than me, then since I was able to find you, one day you'll be able to find me. And then there will be a chain of suspicion between us. If you're weaker than me, you could experience a technological explosion at any time, and that would take us back to the first case. To sum up: one, letting you know I exist, and two, letting you continue to exist, are both dangerous to me and violate the first axiom."

"Da Shi, you've really got a clear mind."

"My brain can keep up with yours so far, but we're only getting started."

Luo Ji was silent in the dark for a long time. His face emerged in the weak light of the ball of flame two or three times before he said, "Da Shi, this isn't a start. Our reasoning has already reached a conclusion."

"Conclusion? We haven't figured anything out! Where's the picture of cosmic civilization you promised?"

"If neither communication nor silence will work once you learn of my existence, you're left with just one option."

In the long silence that followed, the two flames went out. There was no wind, and the dark silence turned thick as asphalt, connecting sky and desert into a murky whole. At last Shi Qiang uttered one word in the darkness: "Fuck!"

"Extrapolate that option out to the billions upon billions of stars and hundreds of millions of civilizations, and there's your picture," Luo Ji said, nodding in the darkness.

"That's … that's really dark."

"The real universe is just that black." Luo Ji waved a hand, feeling the darkness as if stroking velvet. "The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds other life—another hunter, an angel or a demon, a delicate infant or a tottering old man, a fairy or a demigod—there's only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them. In this forest, hell is other people. An eternal threat that any life that exposes its own existence will be swiftly wiped out. This is the picture of cosmic civilization. It's the explanation for the Fermi Paradox."

Shi Qiang lit another cigarette, if only to have a bit of light.

"But in this dark forest, there's a stupid child called humanity, who has built a bonfire and is standing beside it shouting, 'Here I am! Here I am!'" Luo Ji said.

"Has anyone heard it?"

"That's guaranteed. But those shouts alone can't be used to determine the child's location. Humanity has not yet transmitted information about the exact position of Earth and the Solar System into the universe. From the information that has been sent out, all that can be learned is the distance between Earth and Trisolaris, and their general heading in the Milky Way. The precise location of the two worlds is still a mystery. Since we're located in the wilderness of the periphery of the galaxy, we're a little safer."

"So what's the deal with the spell?"

"Using the sun, I transmitted three images to the cosmos. Each one consisted of thirty points representing the planar projection of a three-dimensional coordinate system containing the position of thirty stars. Combining the three images into three-dimensional coordinates forms a cubic space populated by those thirty points. That represents the relative positions of 187J3X1 and its twenty-nine surrounding stars. There's also a label pointing out 187J3X1.

"Think about it carefully and you'll get it. A hunter in a dark forest, stalking with bated breath, suddenly notices that a piece of bark has been stripped from a tree in front of him. On the eye-catching bit of white wood that's been revealed is a position in the forest, written in characters all hunters can recognize. What will he think about that location? He's certainly not going to imagine that someone has laid out supplies for him there. Out of all the possibilities, the most likely one is that the blaze is informing everyone that there's live prey at that location that needs to be eliminated. It doesn't matter what motivated someone to leave the mark. What's important is that the dead hand has stretched the nerves of the dark forest to the breaking point, and it's the most sensitive nerve that's most liable to make a move. Suppose there are a million hunters in the forest—the number of civilizations on the billions upon billions of stars in the Milky Way could be thousands of times that. Perhaps nine hundred thousand of them will disregard the marking. Of the remaining one hundred thousand, maybe ninety thousand of them will probe the location, and, after confirming that it has no life, disregard it. But one of the remaining ten thousand hunters will surely make a choice to fire on that position, because for civilizations at a certain level of technological development, attacking may be safer and less of a hassle than probing. If there's really nothing at that location, then it's no loss.

"Now," Luo Ji concluded, "that hunter has appeared."

"That spell of yours can't be sent anymore, right?"

"That's right, Da Shi. The spell needs to be broadcast to the entire galaxy, but the sun's been locked down, so it can't be sent anymore."

"Was humanity just a step late?" Shi Qiang flicked aside his cigarette end. The flame drew an arc through the darkness as it fell, momentarily illuminating a small circle of sandy ground.

"No, no. Think about it: If the sun hadn't been sealed off, and I had threatened Trisolaris with sending out a spell against them, what would have happened?"

"You would've been stoned to death like Rey Diaz. And then they would have enacted legislation to prohibit anyone else from thinking along those lines."

"That's right, Da Shi. Because we've already revealed the distance between the Solar System and Trisolaris as well as our general heading in the Milky Way, exposing the location of Trisolaris is tantamount to exposing the location of the Solar System. That's a death strategy. Maybe we're a step late, but it's a step that humanity would never be able to take."

"You should have threatened Trisolaris back then."

"Things were too weird. I wasn't certain about the idea at the time, so I needed to confirm it. After all, there was plenty of time. But the real reason was that, deep in my heart, I really didn't have the mental strength. I don't think anyone else would, either."

"Thinking about it now, we shouldn't have gone to see the mayor today. This situation—if the world learns about it, then it's even more hopeless. Think about how the first two Wallfacers ended up."

"You're right. The same thing would happen to me, so I hope that neither of us says anything. But you still can, if you want. Like someone once told me: Either way, I've fulfilled my duty."

"Don't worry, my boy. I won't say anything."

"Regardless, there's no longer any hope."

They walked along the embankment and to the highway, where it was slightly less dark. The sparse lights of the residential area in the distance were enough to blind them.

"There's one more thing. That person you mentioned?"

Luo Ji hesitated. "Forget it. All you need to know is that the axioms of cosmic civilization and the theory of the dark forest were not my invention."

"Tomorrow I'm going into the city to work with the government. If you need any help in the future, just say the word."

"Da Shi, you've helped me more than enough. I'll head into the city tomorrow, too, to the Hibernation Immigration Bureau, to take care of waking up my family."

* * *

Contrary to Luo Ji's expectations, the Hibernation Immigration Bureau said that reawakening Zhuang Yan and Xia Xia was still blocked, and the bureau's director made it clear to him that his Wallfacer powers were ineffective in this regard. He consulted Hines and Jonathan, who were unacquainted with the details of the situation, but they told him that the revised Wallfacer Act contained a provision stating that the UN and Wallfacer Project Commission could take all necessary steps to ensure that the Wallfacer remained focused on his work. Which meant that, after two centuries, the UN was once again using Luo Ji's situation as a tool to coerce and control him.

Luo Ji requested that his hibernator settlement remain in its current state and be kept free of outside harassment. This request was faithfully executed. The news media and the masses of pilgrims were kept at a distance, and after calm was restored throughout New Life Village #5, it was like nothing at all had happened.

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."26

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."

"But what's the point of that?"

"We'll at least know that the droplet group has entered the Solar System. They might strike civilian targets in space, so all ships will need to be recalled, or at least those in the droplets' path. And the inhabitants of space cities will have to be evacuated to Earth, because those are weak targets."

"There's another matter that's even more critical," the Wallfacer Project Commission chair said. "Identifying safe routes for the possible withdrawal of spacecraft into deep space."

"Withdrawal into deep space? We're not talking about Escapism, are we?"

"If you must use that name."

"Why not begin the escape now?"

"Present political conditions do not permit it. But when the droplet group approaches Earth, a limited-scale flight might become acceptable to the international community. Of course, it's only a possibility. But the UN and the fleets must make preparations for it."

"I understand. But the Snow Project doesn't really require me."

"It does. Even inside the orbit of Jupiter, creating a dust cloud is an enormous undertaking and will require the deployment of almost ten thousand stellar hydrogen bombs, more than ten million tons of oil film, and the formation of an enormous space fleet. To accomplish that within three years requires taking advantage of your current status and prestige to organize and coordinate the resources of the two Internationals."

"If I agree to undertake this mission, when will you wake them?"

"Once the project is started. Like I said, it won't be a problem."

* * *

But the Snow Project never got fully off the ground.

The two Internationals were not interested in the project. What the public wanted was a strategy for global salvation, not a plan that would merely inform them of the enemy's arrival so they could escape. Besides, they knew that this wasn't the Wallfacer's idea. It was just a plan implemented by the UN and SFJC that exploited his authority. A full launch of the Snow Project would bring the entire space economy to a standstill and lead to a general economic recession on Earth and in the fleet. In addition, contrary to the UN's prediction, as the droplets drew nearer, Escapism turned even more repugnant in the eyes of the public, so the two Internationals were unwilling to pay such a high price for an unpopular plan. As a result, both the construction of a fleet to gather the oil film material on Neptune and the manufacture of sufficient stellar hydrogen bombs to supplement the fewer than one thousand from the Great Ravine that were still usable made very slow progress.

But Luo Ji poured himself entirely into the project. At first, the UN and the SFJC had only wanted to exploit his prestige to mobilize the resources needed, but Luo Ji immersed himself in every detail of the project, spending sleepless nights shoulder-to-shoulder with the scientists and engineers of the Technical Committee and proposing many of his own ideas. For example, he suggested that a small interstellar ion engine be installed onto each bomb to allow them a certain degree of mobility in orbit, enabling timely adjustments to the density of the stellar cloud in different regions. More importantly, the hydrogen bombs could act as attack weapons. He called them "space mines," and argued that even though stellar hydrogen bombs had proven incapable of destroying droplets, they might in the long run be useful against Trisolaran ships, because they had no evidence that the ships were also constructed out of strong-interaction material. He personally determined the orbit for every bomb's deployment. From a modern technological perspective, his ideas may have been full of a twenty-first-century ignorance and naiveté, but his prestige and Wallfacer status meant that most of his suggestions were adopted.

Luo Ji treated the Snow Project as a means of escape. He knew that he wanted to escape reality, and the best way to do that at present was to involve himself deeply in the project. But the more he devoted himself to it, the more disappointed in him the world became. Everyone knew he had only attached himself to the largely insignificant project so that he could see his wife and child as soon as possible. The world waited for a plan for salvation that never materialized. Luo Ji declared over and over in the media that without the capability to use stellar power to send out a spell, he was powerless to do anything.

The Snow Project ground to a halt after a year and a half, at which time only 1.5 million tons of oil film had been collected from Neptune. Even adding the 600,000 tons collected for the Fog Umbrella, the figure was still far from what the project required. Ultimately, 3,614 stellar hydrogen bombs packed in oil film were deployed in an orbit two AU from the sun. This wasn't even a fifth of the intended number. When detonated, they would form a large number of independent dust clouds orbiting the sun, rather than a continuous dust cloud belt, greatly reducing their effectiveness as a warning.

It was an age in which hope came as quickly as disappointment, and after anxiously waiting for a year and a half, the public lost faith and patience in Luo Ji the Wallfacer.

At the general meeting of the International Astronomical Union, a body that last attracted worldwide attention in 2006 when it revoked Pluto's eligibility as a planet, a large number of astronomers and astrophysicists were of the opinion that the explosion of 187J3X1 was a chance occurrence. Being an astronomer, Luo Ji may have discovered certain signs that the star would explode. The theory was full of holes, but more and more people came to believe it, accelerating Luo Ji's decline in prestige. In the eyes of the public, his image gradually transitioned from messiah to commoner, and then to fraud. He still enjoyed the Wallfacer status granted by the UN, and the Wallfacer Act was still in effect, but he no longer had real power.