New York.
The New York Times building.
The editorial office door was opened. A man in a black suit soon walked in briskly, and he placed a handful of documents on a desk nearby.
“Anders, here’s a survey about the Ares program. I hope you can integrate it into the next interview and hand it to me before the end of the day.”
“Okay, boss.”
The man named Anders took the documents, licked his index finger, and began flipping through the documents.
Even though this action seemed unsanitary, it was one of his professional habits. Whenever there was exciting news, he would lick his finger, even if the document was in electronic form.
Anders finished reading the survey data. He sat up straight and spoke with excitement.
“… I can’t believe it, the approval rate for this administration increased by 14.3%.”
The editor-in-chief, Duke, took out a document from his desk drawer. He grinned as he quickly wrote something with a pen.
“That’s right, people are very interested in the Ares program and the volunteer selection. Columbia TV has contacted us. They want to do a talk show.”
Anders looked up and said, “Talk show? With who?”
Duke: “Of course it’s the three lucky people who got chosen for the Ares program.”
Anders’ eyes were wide open. He stood up and said, “Oh sh*t, have the three already been chosen?”
Duke: “They were chosen last week, but they haven’t announced it yet. My friend at NASA told me that the three astronauts are already training in the Arizona desert, as well as learning some basic space knowledge.”
Anders said, “They’re all normal people?”
Duke: “Apparently, two of them are normal civilians, and the other is a professional.”
Anders shook his head and sighed as he said, “… Alright then, it seems like I wasn’t chosen… This is the first time I’ve paid for a volunteer project like this, guess my US$100 is down the drain. I was hoping to be the first reporter in history to be on Mars, but it seems like all hope is lost.”
Duke was in a good mood, and he said with encouragement, “Not necessarily, this is only the first group of colonists, there are many opportunities in the future.”
While the two were chatting, the office door suddenly opened.
Duke watched the lady step in, and his eyebrows furrowed.
“Camille, you forgot to knock.”
“Sorry, but there’s no time for that,” Camille said as she walked to Duke’s desk. She flipped her blonde hair and perched her laptop on Duke’s desk. She said, “Something big happened in Asia! Trust me, this is definitely going to make headlines tomorrow!”
When Duke saw how excited Camille was, he paused for a second and began to take this more seriously.
Camille was no longer the rookie.
Duke knew that Camille had a calm personality, he guessed that something incredible must have happened for her to be this excited.
Duke looked at the laptop, and less than ten seconds later, he froze.
He immediately asked, “Is this reliable?”
“I am certain!” Camille excitedly said, “I contacted an old friend in Beijing and confirmed it with them. Yesterday, China held a conference. The State Administration for National Defense and the China National Space Administration published the meeting content on their official website!”
Anders was still sitting behind his desk, and he asked, “What is it?”
Camille: “In response to our Ares plan, China has announced plans to construct a space station in lunar orbit. Apparently, it’s going to be called the Moon Palace!”
Moon Palace?
What a weird name.
Anders wasn’t only surprised by the name…
“Are they crazy? Do they even know what a space station is?”
“I don’t know?” Camille took a deep breath and calmed herself down. She looked at Duke and said, “There is no doubt that this is going to make headlines tomorrow.”
Duke stared at the laptop for a long time. He took a deep breath and spoke with a trembling voice.
“Good job, nicely done!”
Duke became more and more excited. He even began to think about what tomorrow’s headline should be.
China Wants to Build a Space Station? Can They Do It?
The only word I can think of to describe this situation is arrogance. The Chinese are out of their minds.
…
China’s announcement of its lunar space station plan caused a worldwide sensation.
The New York Times, the Washington Times, and other American media outlets reported on this matter.
Compared to landing a man on the moon, this piece of news was obviously more eye-catching. After all, building a space station in lunar orbit was much more difficult than throwing a lunar module on the Moon.
Even the Americans were still in the research stage, and their lunar projects wouldn’t launch until 2022.
There was no doubt that for most Americans, China’s plan was nothing short of impossible.
They thought, China only just landed on the moon, and now they’re running before they learn how to walk?
The media outlets and newspapers were slightly biased when reporting on this matter, but the daytime and late-night talk shows teased and ridiculed China.
Of course, even though the Americans said China was overconfident, there was still reason to believe in China’s plans.
After all, the Skyglow flight was a success. Even the radical media outlets did not rely on NASA experts’ quotes, and they outrightly claimed China’s Lunar Gateway program was going to fail.
Even though there was a 80% chance China was going to fail.
What was more interesting was that most of the criticism came from inside China…
Lu Zhou didn’t know if he offended someone or not, but he didn’t care.
Even if he did offend someone, so what?
Most intelligent people weren’t offended.
And as for the non-intelligent people…
Lu Zhou didn’t have anything to do with them.
After Lu Zhou returned to Jinling, he gradually became busier and busier. He didn’t have time to pay attention to things on the Internet.
He was sitting in his office, reading documents. He heard a knock at the door.
He looked up and asked, “Who is it?”
“I am Xu Wenhao, from the Institute of Biochemistry laboratory. I am here for a report!”
Lu Zhou nearly laughed out loud.
What is this, the military?
Lu Zhou remembered he asked the biochemistry laboratory for a favor. He adjusted his facial expression and spoke.
“Come in.”
The office door was pushed open. Xu Wenhao walked in with a pile of documents in his hand.
“Professor, the tests you wanted are here. The rest of the samples are here as well!”
The young man solemnly placed the test results and remaining samples on Lu Zhou’s desk. Lu Zhou was a little fazed.
“… Oh, thanks.”
“No need to thank me.” Xu Wenhao smiled and scratched his head as he said, “Um… Can you sign something? Just sign this electrochemistry textbook.”
Like magic, an electrochemistry textbook appeared out of nowhere.
Lu Zhou said, “… Okay, bring it over.”
Xu Wenhao smiled and said, “Sure thing.”
Signing a textbook wasn’t a big deal for Lu Zhou. He signed plenty of documents a day.
Lu Zhou flipped through the textbook and saw there were notes written inside, so he asked, “You’re studying electrochemistry by yourself?”
Xu Wenhao smiled and said, “Yeah, I’m on the grind! I want to work at the Institute of Computational Materials.”
The Institute of Biochemistry used to be part of the Institute of Computational Materials. Even though they had a decent amount of research funding, they were nowhere near the level of the Institute of Computational Materials.
After all, one was a newly-born research unit, while the other was a world leader in the computational materials field. Forget about domestic scholars, even foreign PhDs had a hard time getting into the institute.
Most of the people in the Institute of Biochemistry had PhDs or master’s degrees. All of them were motivated to get into the Institute of Computational Materials.
After all, materials science was similar to biochemistry. They wanted to go where the research funding was.
Lu Zhou knew what Xu Wenhao was thinking of. He shook his head and smiled. He then signed his name in the textbook.
He suddenly remembered something and said, “I remember you’re in biochem, right?”
Xu Wenhao didn’t think Lu Zhou would remember a nobody like him.
He was flattered by it.
“Yeah, I am.”
Lu Zhou put down his pen, thought for a bit, and spoke.
“Actually, you don’t have to worry about getting into the Institute of Computational Materials. The Institute of Biochemistry is going to be one of the key development institutes in the next coming years.”
Xu Wenhao’s eyes widened, and he said, “Really?”
“Why would I lie?” Lu Zhou smiled and gave Xu Wenhao his textbook back. Lu Zhou patted his shoulder and said, “Do your best, son, I look forward to seeing your success.”
