Little Mushroom

The warning from the northern base was concise.

Polly said: "They found it too."

Ann looked away.

The Highland Institute is on the highest mountain, and looking down, the abyss can be seen at a glance. The huge fracture zone resembles a scaly wound on the grayish-white skin of the ground. The dense forest and swamp layer by layer are the plasma and pus of this wound. Afar-The distant east coast is the sea, or a huge lake. In short, when the sky is silent, there is a whisper in the wind, and there is a faint grand wave in the mist.

In short, it's like a monster hovering quietly on the ground.

This is not an abyss that An Zhe is familiar with, he also knew before. The abyss of the past was a place full of blood and plunder, and never had such a calm moment.

A dark shadow appeared in the distant sky, the shadow grew larger and closer, and finally stopped over the white building.

With a stunned noise, Tang Lan gathered her wings and fell directly on the outside corridor, and opened the laboratory door.

"I'm back, sir." He finished, turned to Rum again, and said, "Are there any enemy attacks lately?"

Rum said: "No."

Polly Joan raised his head and looked at him from top to bottom, as if confirming his condition was normal. If the person doing this was Lu Yan, An Zhe would feel that he was trying this person to decide whether to let the shots go or not, but Polly ’s mild gray-blue eyes looked at Tang Lan, and he was sure it was just a kind The elders were concerned about whether Tang Lan was injured outside.

Sure enough, Polly said, "Are you in danger outside?"

"Dangerous, but not injured." Tang Lan said: "I have more experience there."

Polly said: "You have been reassuring me."

Tang Lan smiled, his eyebrows were sharp and beautiful, and there was a vicious spirit of killing the cold and cold. An Zhe remembered that Hubbard was the best mercenary leader, and his deputy was not necessarily a casual generation.

Polly Joan: "How is it outside?"

"It's pretty much what you expected," Tang Lan replied, "they're balanced."

Then, he pulled out a data cable from the drawer, connected the miniature camera in his hand to the computer, and hundreds of pictures were loaded and cast on the large screen aside.

At first glance, those pictures are empty, only the indescribable strange landscape peculiar to the abyss, as if it were just a landscape painting by strange hunters. However, if you look closely, you can't help holding your breath.

The most conspicuous chapter is a huge lake in overhead view, which has frozen, and the frosty ice has frozen the brown algae, floating stumps and fallen leaves on the lake. However, just below the empty ice surface, there was a huge irregular black shadow—the back of aquatic creatures. It just stood underwater like that, and the shadow was like an abstract painting.

Right on the shore of this lake, all the thick branches of gray vines are entangled in the dead branches of the dense forest. The next photo is a close-up of the vines. Its appearance is smooth like earthworms, and it has radial star patterns under the skin, dense The black blood vessels seemed to be agitating again and again. Anzhe immediately realized that this was not an ordinary plant. The vines throughout the jungle were all monsters with the same tentacles.

"Only one was taken here, and it found me." Tang Lan said.

Polina flipped through the photos one by one.

"They have gone through a period of three months of slaughter. Now they are all large monsters. Fragmentary small creatures are completely invisible." Tang Landao, "I fought with them a few times. Sir, I am sure that the entire institute is only me The strength is enough to escape from them. But I ca n’t fight them at all. Moreover, most of the monsters in the abyss are polymorphic, and I am not sure how terrible they are now. "

"I see." Polly nodded slowly, his grey-blue eyes showing a solemn expression: "If genes are a resource, they have completed the integration within the abyss. Now, the monsters have reached each other. With the balance of strength, their IQs have also been greatly improved during the integration process, and they understand that the battle may result in both losses. If this guess is correct, some monsters should now leave the abyss and hunt outward. Humans must be too One of the targets they hunted is that they haven't noticed for the time being, and we have to defend the collective attack of monsters at any time. "

"It's true," Tang Lan said, "but one thing is different from your guess."

Polly asked, "What did you find?"

Tang Lan controlled the computer and transferred to a picture. It's hard to imagine how ugly this picture is-Anzhe has no systematic aesthetic, but he is sure that this picture can be described as "ugly" because it impacts human senses to the greatest extent. On the surface of two dense mollusks, human language can be described on all organs that can and cannot be described, and the tentacles flowing with mucus touch each other. The next picture, their tentacles are separated, and the next picture, which has One went in the other direction.

"Six cases have been observed in the same situation, and the monsters did not occupy their territories individually and began to stand still, as you originally predicted. They walked in the abyss, tempted each other, and then separated." Tang Lan's voice also became solemn and low: "I I suspect the worst has happened, sir. They seem to be communicating-I don't know what they communicate. Whenever there is contact between them, I can feel that the kind of fluctuations in them will become stronger. "

He continued: "I suspect they are perceiving each other and testing if they have the genes they need."

"It's very likely." Polly said, "You are the most sensitive of the senses in the institute for 'waves'."

"I've become more and more sensitive to it recently," Tang Lan's face paled. "Everywhere in the air, every monster has it. Sometimes I feel that even the stones on the ground are vibrating. I'm getting more and more The harder it is to keep thinking, I shouldn't have come back so early, but I feel that my own fluctuations are being incorporated into them. Sir, I ... I'm a bit abnormal. "

Polly took his hand, and his voice was quiet: "Don't be afraid."

"A hundred years ago, when the genetic sequences of organisms were the most stable, some species were originally extremely sensitive to changes in magnetic fields. You happen to be fused with this organism," he said.

"But that's not a magnetic field. I can feel that the magnetic field is another kind of wave." Tang Lan closed his eyes, he knelt down, his forehead was against the back of Polly's hand, and his voice was hoarse: "Sir, have you understood What's wrong? You didn't feel any surprise when I said this. "

"But you won't tell us because the truth is something we can't afford." He said, "But I really ..."

His voice grew more and more jerky, and in the end he could not sustain it.

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid ... child," Polly's right hand slowly held Tang Lan's shoulder, his voice was like a gentle and vast ocean, "I will protect you to the last moment of my life."

Tang Lan looked up. He looked directly at Polly Joan, as if making a solemn vow: "We will also protect you and the institute to the last minute."

"I never asked you, but if the day when the institute no longer exists," Polly said slowly, "I ask you not to plunge into the torrent of aliens and monsters, but to go north to protect Human base. "

Tang Lan: "But the judge will kill all aliens, and the base will never accept us."

Polly looked out at the vast twilight outside.

"But at the last moment, I still want to believe in human kindness and tolerance to the fullest extent," he said.

Tang Lan took his lead, and he looked up at Polly Joan: "That's because you have a high moral character, and you're brilliant."

Polly smiled and shook his head.

After Tang Lan's departure, the power savings of the Simpson Cage also reached a critical value. A dazzling scarlet light was shining on the wide platform below the white floor, and the heat wave came. If it is not clear, this is a machine made to capture the fundamental particle vibration frequency And the high energy field of the interaction trajectory, Anzhe almost thought that the downstairs was a burning sea of ​​fire.

The large screen in the laboratory is the terminal and operation table of the Simpson cage. However, due to design defects, to adjust the parameters of the Simpson cage, sometimes it is necessary to manually adjust the rods of certain precision devices when going downstairs.

On the big screen, those lines are still cluttered, but they are not static. Whenever Polly adjusts the parameters, those entangled lines will change from one kind of mess to another kind of mess-eventually cluttering together.

But Polly still analyzes lines, calculates functions, adjusts parameters, and changes the receiving frequency again and again. The ever-changing lines are jumping on the screen.

The music interrupted An Zhe's thoughts. The old tape recorder in the corridor played the ups and downs of "Symphony of Destiny", and Rum stood by the window with a staff in front of him. He played the harmonica against the score, imitating the melody of a symphony. Somehow, he stopped.

"Do you understand music?" He said.

Ann shook his head.

Rum pointed to the recorder: "After listening to one, can you know how to blow it out?"

An Zhe slightly increased the frequency of shaking his head. With such a complex symphony, he can appreciate the ups and downs of one ten thousandth of it, let alone reproduce it.

"There needs to be a sheet music." Rum turned the staff and whispered.

Speaking of "score", his gaze turned to the screen in the center of the laboratory.

As if a string strummed gently in the void, the chaotic thoughts were instantly clear. Suddenly, An Zhe opened her eyes slightly.

"Volatility is a symphony," he said, "sir wants to figure out its score. Then ... and then can do a lot of things."

Rum's dark eyes looked at him deeply and said, "You are smarter than me."

Anzhe also looked at the screen. Can the secret of the distortion disaster be analyzed from these lines? He was confused.

Or maybe this endless chaos is already a truth in another sense.

An unspeakable silence enveloped the laboratory. An Zhe lowered his head. The fate of humankind was as dim as that line. All of this may have nothing to do with the mushrooms, but he sometimes felt difficult to breathe.

It's hard to explain why, facing the communication channel with the North Base, his finger was on the keyboard.

The movements of the fingers are not flexible anymore, just like his mycelium can no longer stretch. When he hits the keys, his fingertips will tremble with difficulty.

Without fiber optics and base stations, the communication cost is very high. Like the ocean telegraph communication of human beings in the tenth century, words must be saved.

He issued.

"How is the base?"

As if it was an absurd coincidence, almost at the same time, the communication channel was bright and a similar message was sent from the northern base.

"How is the institute?"

The northern base can give everything for the purity of human genes. They hate monsters, and the trial court will not tolerate alien species. It seems that only a good scientist, Dr. Ji, will tolerate the existence of fusion and care about the situation here.

An Zhe replied: "Everything is fine."

Whitewashing Taiping seemed to be a human-specific skill that he learned.

A few seconds later, the other party responded: "So is the base."

Facing the communication interface, An Zhe groaned for a long time, and he slowly tapped the sentence: "Is the judge safe?"

After thinking about it, he pressed the backspace key and deleted a few times.

Just in the gap he deleted, the northern base sent a message.

"Did the Institute find new mutant individuals recently?"

An Zhe thought for a moment, and replied: "Not yet."

After replying, he sent out the revised sentence.

— "Are the trial courts safe?"

The other responded: "The trial court is operating normally."

An Zhe Fang relaxed a bit.

"Good luck," he politely concluded: "Good night."

The other party's reply was only a few words.

"good night."

Looking at those two words, Anzhe removed his finger from the keyboard, he took out the silver badge, his body was weakening faster, and it was the last moment. The knuckles were stiff, and he tried to hold the badge in his hand.

There was a noise from the stairs and Polly went upstairs, but instead of returning to the room, he stood silently on the corridor railing, facing away from here.

Anzhe stood up and pushed the door, and came to Polly. The music stopped, and downstairs, Simpson's cage was burning in flames, and the night came, and a long howl came from the dark and distant sky.

Polly said: "Aren't you staying inside?"

An shook his head, thinking about what Tang Lan had said before.

"Sir," he said, "do you already understand something?"

Polly looked at him.

"Sometimes, I think you are more receptive than everyone else," Polly said. "You are special. It seems to be weaker than everyone, and it seems that you are not afraid of anything."

Anzhe lowered her eyes slightly.

He said, "Well."

"But I haven't got the final answer yet," Polly reached out and fastened the first row of buttons on the Anzhe coat. "Would you like to hear a very simple story from me?"

An Zhe said: "Yes."

"It was a long time ago, a scientist's imagination." In the cold wind, Polly's voice was mild.

"If today, you travel through time and space and come one year later. There, you travel through time and space again, back to a year ago, and come here." Polly said: "Now there will be two identical in front of me You. "

An Zhe thought for a while and said, "Hmm."

"You know that a unit of matter is an atom. There are electrons in the atom. There are no two leaves in the world, but all the electrons are exactly the same. In this way, how do you tell if two electrons are two different individuals?"

An Zhe thought for a while and said, "They are in different positions."

"But space is not a measure of position, nor is time. These two things are only meaningful for four-dimensional humans. In higher dimensions, time and space are also just the abscissa and ordinate on a piece of white paper, like this "Poli took a piece of chalk out of his pocket and drew a dot on the railing in front of them, saying:" An electron moves freely in time and space, the left is the rear, the right is the front, and now it crosses Time, walking forward for a second. "

Speaking, his pen draws a slash to the lower right, punctuation: "After time passes, it is here."

"Then it crossed time again, walked back a second, and stopped here." Chalk draws a line to the lower left and punctuates.

There are now three points and two lines on the railing. They form an acute angle with the opening to the left, and the two points on the left are on a vertical line. Polly drew this vertical line: "Our time is in this second. What do we see at this time?"

An Zhe thought for a long time.

In the end, he said, "Two electrons."

"Yes, we see two identical electrons. But they are essentially one, but they appeared in two places at the same time." Polly clicked on countless star-like electrons next to them: " Inaccurate estimates, our earth has 10 51 powers which are the same electrons that make up what we can see. How can you prove that this is not the result of the same electron repeatedly oscillating through the time axis and traveling hundreds of millions of times? ? "

"Similarly, how can you prove that the existence of the entire universe as we see it is not the result of one or more elementary particles dancing in space and time?"

An Zhe frowned, and he couldn't prove it.

He struggled to digest the sentence with limited cognition.

"So are both me and my husband the same electronics?"

Polly smiled mildly, and he stretched out his arms around An Zhe's thin shoulders, holding an innocent young child like an elder.

"This is just one of the countless conjectures of human beings about the nature of the world. It is not the truth, or it is inconsistent with the truth, but it is difficult for us to verify." He said, "I give this example just to illustrate that our body, mind And the short-term existence of the will, the existence of the entire earth is, on a larger scale, smaller than an electron. "

An Zhe looked into the distance. He was just a simple structured mushroom, without the brain of a scientist, without such rich knowledge and far-sighted thinking beyond the dimensions. He could not understand such a system, only knowing that the world was really in front of him. He whispered "But we are all true."

The words fell, and the expression on his face suddenly blanked for a second, his brows frowning, and his lungs hurt.

He clutched at the railing, his body trembling violently, spitting a big blood, and fell forward.

Polly's arms trembled, and he caught An Zhan's weak body and held him in his arms.

"Rum!" He shouted loudly in the direction of the laboratory, anxiously.

Anzhe knew that Polly wanted to treat him again, or to find his cause, using temperature, antibiotics, defibrillator ... those things.

He spit another blood, and Polly reached out and wiped him with his sleeve.

Blood stained the sleeves of the snow-white shirt. An Zhe looked at Polly and smiled reluctantly.

"No more." He grabbed Polly's arm slowly with his fingers, gasping for a few moments, and whispered "... really no longer needed."

Polly grabbed him tightly: "Just hold on."

"I ..." An Zhe looked into his eyes, as if he saw the boundless sea and sky.

He's actually fine, he hasn't reached the weakest moment yet, at least he can still move and his mind is clear.

But he will die, either today or tomorrow-he could die like this. Polly is the best elder in the world. He treats him as a beloved child and is so good to him ... At the end of his life, he can die with such a tender love, this is the other people in this era Don't dare to expect anything. But if he died like this, Polly would accept his death for no reason, he could not find the cause, and he could do nothing. Anzhe knows that for human scientists, the unsolvable problem and the unexplained truth are the most profound depression.

He could also die as a monster--he wasn't afraid that Polly would hate him, and Polly had given him enough.

"I'm sorry ... I'm sorry," he looked at Polly. After making that decision, he was much relaxed. The pain in his body was nothing, and he said again, "I'm sorry, Polly."

Polly stared at him.

"I ..." An Zhe smiled. He coughed a few times, and his tears fell down, exactly the same as the temperature of the blood. He gasped hard and said to Polly: "I ... lie to you, I am not a monster infected person. I was a monster originally, I am not a human, I just ... just eaten a person's genes, I just ... look like a human. "

Polly seemed to hesitate for a second, and the next moment, his gray-blue eyes showed a more gentle sadness: "Whatever you are, hold on, okay?"

Ann shook his head.

"I'm not sick," he said. "My life ... is only so long, I can't change it ... don't save it."

As the words fell, Polly hugged him. They looked at each other and fell into a sad silence.

Species' life expectancy is more irresistible than disease and injury. From the moment of birth, it is doomed to end. No one can step over that threshold, the threshold set by God-if God exists.

In this unspeakable silence, the cold wind roared. In the sound of the wind, An Zhe heard Polly say a word.

-The moment the voice fell to my ears. His heart trembled suddenly. This sentence was so familiar that he seemed to return to the night of three months ago and faced the landing puppet, the wind that day was very strong.

Polly Joan said, "What's in your hand?"

To him, An Zhe had nothing to hide, and he slowly opened his fingers.

A silver badge lay quietly in the palm of his hand, a token of the judge's identity.

Polly's gaze fell on the badge, and Anze swore he saw some kind of sorrow in those gray-blue eyes.

Then Polly Joan reached out and took something out of the tight pockets of his jacket and held it in his palm.

An Zhe opened her eyes slightly.

It was also a silver badge.

-Almost identical badge.

"You ..." An Zhe paused. "Are you ... the judge?"

"It used to be," Polly whispered, "I am a defector."

The author has something to say:

The theory is Feynman's one-electron universe hypothesis.

Not the world view of this article.