mother of all races

Chapter 123

Just a few hundred kilometers away...

At the same time when a change occurred in another underground facility that had long been abandoned, the bionic man that made Lin Xi have countless nightmares was walking on the Providence, which was buried deep underground, under the control of Hal. internal.

Just like the past 300 years, it is so huge and empty, silently like the mausoleum of ancient gods.

Whenever Hal walks in the extremely quiet abandoned corridors and pipes, it will have a strange and wonderful feeling.

In the first few decades of the spaceship's voyage, no one imagined that one day it would look like this. After all, from the very beginning of the design, the Providence was the carefully selected 25 human beings on another day. The basis of survival on a distant planet.

Oh my god, how noisy it was back then...

25 complete human beings, and tens of thousands of artificial intelligence and mechanical individuals to serve and take care of these fragile human beings, not to mention the animal embryos, plant plants, seeds, insects and fishes that humans have transported from the earth thousands of miles away. egg……

Humans are like hoarders, hoarding unimaginable wealth and resources on this spaceship.

Even in the worst case, even if the spacecraft is really lost in space, the Providence can rely on its sufficient reserves to become Noah's Ark in space.

USS Providence - Godsend ship.

People at that time were so looking forward to this ship.

And all of this, thinking about it now, turned out to be like a dream...

Hal carefully scanned everything around with his electronic eyes. The cabins and pipelines that were once crowded like a honeycomb are now just a pile of dark, silent scrap iron.

Not to mention, Hal's electronic eyes are now slightly malfunctioning, and the collected images are full of dead pixels and distortions.

Whenever Hal starts to process and analyze the scenes he "sees", he will feel a little confused... Does that past really exist?Is that busy, messy and happy past really real? . ?

Or is that all just written in its program to prevent its simulated emotional system from getting out of control?

Hal knows what his own is, theoretically speaking, it should not have such doubts, but, perhaps because it has been stuck on AS102 for too long, its internal program has already produced confusion.

During this period of time, it has always been thinking about things uncontrollably...

This made Hal feel bad, but now it was impossible for someone to appear beside him, and let him completely open up all his programs, allowing the other party to deeply debug himself.

As early as when it made that decision, Hal knew that he had fallen into the extreme loneliness that human beings could not imagine.

Whenever Hal's logical process reasoned to this critical point, there would be an abnormal tearing feeling in Hal's cold body...

Hal classified this painful feeling as an unimportant programming glitch and chose to ignore it.It has been so for so many years.

Amidst heavy thoughts, Hal completed today's routine spaceship overhaul, and then followed the established route back to the vicinity of the bridge in a step-by-step manner.

And at this moment, some extremely harsh voices sounded inside the extremely silent Providence spaceship.

Of course, these alarms were originally used to remind humans, but at this time it seems a bit too harsh——

Before those warning sounds came out in the form of sound waves, the information flow had already directly pierced into Hal's operating area...

Its electronic eyes flickered rapidly in the dark, and the next second, the simulated person it used twitched as if it had been electrocuted, and the electronic pupils suddenly turned black, and then fell to the ground with a bang.

And almost at the same moment, inside the Providence bridge, some mechanical arms and various fully automatic systems started to move at the same time.

This is Hal, it has abandoned its slow and heavy body, and directly came to the elder brother corner of the spaceship through information flow.

As for the alert...

The only person on the ship who could set off these alarms was the man guarded inside the bridge by it.

Hal checked the warning data at the first time, and the values ​​indicated by each warning kept soaring and repeating.

Of course, compared to those numerical values, what is more intuitive is the physical condition of that incomparably terrifying man.

Obviously in the past period of time, that man has been quiet like a dead man from beginning to end, but now his skeleton-like body is trembling and twitching crazily.

The body, which had been so thin that only bones remained, was constantly beating on the metal platform, making a clanging sound.

Many of the pipelines piercing into his body also fell off as a result.

It's just that there isn't even blood in that man's body, and the only thing that can flow out from the thumb-sized hole is some foul-smelling mucus.

"Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu..."

Then the man suddenly opened his mouth, and he let out a howl like a wounded beast.

Veins began to appear on the surface of his skin, followed by large areas of ulceration.

His body is falling apart.

Facing such a scene, Hal didn't hesitate at all, and directly manipulated the mechanical arm to the corner of the bridge, where a refrigerated airtight facility that shouldn't be here was fixed.

The secret facility that was supposed to be opened with the captain's consent had already started to operate automatically after the arrival of the mechanical arm, and a series of password streams flashed on the light blue screen.

After automatically entering three layers of different levels of passwords, the metal plate at the top of the airtight facility made a harsh sound, and then moved away to the sides.

Rows of racks similar to test tube racks slowly rose up with clouds of cold air.

However, up to now, this row of test tube racks that have been mobilized by many people looks empty.

There are only a few tubes of rippling blue injections left at the bottom—even after 300 years, these injections can be called invaluable.

This is a special potion provided directly by the Anya people. They can maximize the human body's activity in a short period of time and repair the damage caused to humans in various ways.

300 years ago, some people even directly called this medicine "resurrection medicine".

These potions were originally prepared for the thousands of indispensable "key people" on the spaceship, so as to avoid the failure of the plan caused by the unplanned deaths of these people in the early stage of crisis-ridden alien immigration.

Of course, at the start of the voyage, the test tube racks were full...

And those key people did not enjoy these injections——

All these injections were reserved for the person Hal cared about, but over the years, in order to maintain the life of that man, Hal has completely exhausted the inventory on the spaceship.

Of course, these are not things Hal would worry about now.

In its algorithm, only one person is more important than all the rules and regulations.

The mechanical arm lightly removed one of the injection tubes from the test tube rack, and then it returned to the man in the center of the bridge.All of Hal's decisions were made in the shortest possible time without any delay, however... In just a short while, a lot of rotten marks and bruises began to appear on the man's body, the corners of his eyes and nostrils A thick black blood was left behind, and it was obvious that he was about to usher in his own death in a short time.

Of course, the premise is that there is no word from Hal here.

With an unimaginable gentleness, the arm of the machine tore off the insurance on the injection, and then aimed straight at the thin man's neck artery.It forcefully pierced the injection into the man's body, and the liquid that shone with a faint blue light poured into the man's body at once.

"Ho... ho ho..."

In the next second, the man's body suddenly tensed, like a bow that had been stretched to its limit.

He sat up directly from the metal table, and then let out an extremely painful sob.

He was only a thread away from death, but with the injection of the injection, his internal bleeding and ulcers on the skin all improved visible to the naked eye.The original blue-gray complexion gradually turned into paleness acceptable to humans.

There was even a very pale tinge of blood on his cheeks.

Although the physical condition of this man still looks very worrying...

However, in Hal's record, the man's current condition is already the best level since this period of time.

The man suddenly opened his eyes.

In those eyes that were empty and dazed like a dry well... Finally, the will of human beings emerged.

The first time he woke up, the man turned his head with difficulty, panting, and focused on the mechanical facilities on the ceiling that seemed to be motionless.

He saw Hal hiding behind these machines at a glance.

Then his extremely dry lips slightly closed and made a hoarse sound.

"Let me die..."

The man said softly.

His voice was so vague, and his tone of voice became particularly strange due to the long-term coma.

If the person standing next to him is not Hal, but any real human being, I am afraid that it will be difficult to control the pity he feels for him, and people will fulfill his wish—after all, the voice sounds really... It was too painful, too hopeless.

It was as if the "death" that ordinary people feared so much was already the only reward this man could get after going through everything.

It's a pity that there are no human beings on the Providence except for the man himself.

Only Hal stayed by this man's side.

An old-fashioned image capture probe slowly protruded from the complicated mechanical structure above the ceiling like a poisonous snake.

It moved directly next to the man.

That's Hal.

Hal stared greedily at the man in front of him, a man who finally had self-awareness.

For so many years, only a short moment after using this injection every time, this man will recover from the corpse-like state and have his own mind and soul.

Hal recorded every waking up of this man, and these fragments were stored in its database, constituting the only force that persisted in its long years.

It cautiously stretched out its mechanical arm.

The robotic hand slowly moved towards the man's face, and it gently wiped away the sticky black blood under the man's eyes with its "fingers".

"everything will get better."

A long-lost broadcast suddenly sounded in the empty bridge.

The broadcast sound uses the artificially synthesized voice library used in ancient times, which makes its whispers appear a bit distorted.It's just like all the electronic voices used for long-distance travel. Even if the wording is a little dull, no matter what the words are, when they are combined with the voices of the voice library, they always look extra sweet.

"Captain Scripps, you just have to hang on for a short time, a very short time...you will recover. I can assure you."

It was hard to tell whether it was a male or a female electronic voice inside the bridge, causing waves of echoes.

That incredibly thin man...or should we better call him Captain Scripps...

The real Scripps shuddered heavily after hearing that passage.

The blush caused by those priceless biological medicines quickly receded from his face.

"No...no...don't do this to me, please... Hal, please"

Scripps pleaded almost humbly.

"Let me die, let me die..."

"sorry--"

And what sounded at the same time as Captain Scripps' pleading was an apology from Hal.

"I'm sorry, Scripps... my captain... I know you're in pain, but... it was you who promised me, you promised me that you would be with me forever, forever."

"That's just... a human... saying. You know... what I'm talking about..."

Scripps said hoarsely.

"I'm sorry, Scripps, I can't take it back, your promise is my command. And I can only keep you with me...I love you...I'm sorry..."

Hal kept apologizing. At this moment, its reaction was more like that of a human being, rather than artificial intelligence created by humans.

Scripps stared wide-eyed at the probe in front of him.

He didn't seem to hear those continuous apologies, his eyes became misty, as if he had returned to the long past.

"I know..." murmured Scripps, "I love you too, Hal, I love you... let me die, I can't go on, I really..."

After hearing Scripps' "I love you", the lights in the bridge suddenly flickered.

But then everything returned to calm.

"Captain Scripps, I just want you to stay alive."

Hal said stubbornly.

It was still observing Hal with its image probe, just now, there was another major logic conflict in Hal's data flow.

For a moment Hal almost felt as if he had traveled back 300 years.

At that time, Scripps was so handsome and ruthless. After Hal expressed his love to it, Scripps almost destroyed its entire database.

That's the closest Hal has come to dying since he was born... But, human love...or its data failure is so cruel that even at the moment when Scripps tried to kill it, Hal still Love each other so deeply.

And this love has never changed in 300 years.

Without waiting for Hal's reply, Scripps' eyes dimmed. He was very clear about his previous lies and did not deceive Hal...

Yes, how could he deceive the other party?After all, the relationship between them is far away, closer and more inseparable than ordinary people think.

Hal knew everything about him.

"……I hate you."

At the last moment of waking up, Scripps finally couldn't help but whispered.

Then it was as if someone slowly pulled out the bones in his body, and his body limp and fell onto the metal platform bit by bit.

In just a few seconds, Scripps once again returned to his previous appearance without any human sanity.

He turned back into a living corpse.

"..."

Hal's apology stopped, and the familiar silence once again enveloped the bridge and the entire Providence.

For that brief moment, Hal's data flow cascaded through its processing center.

There is a serious disorder in some data...

Harry looked at himself seriously.

Then it again marks this part as a normal fault that does not need to be processed and pushes it deep into its database.

Just like countless times before.

Then, Hal used the mechanical arm to support Scripps' body. It placed Scripps in the previous position with great precision, and then reinstalled the pipelines that had fallen off Captain Scripps. back to his body.

After swabbing Scripps' bloodstained body with medical gel, the machinery in the bridge froze for a moment.

After dozens of seconds, Hal returned to the interior of the bridge using his imitation body.

It had already checked Scripps' entire life support system in the first place—compared with the brief communication with Scripps before, Hal was more worried about Scripps' body.

Scripps' previous physical breakdown was illogical.

And that symptom was too familiar, so familiar that Hal felt terrified.

Last time, it almost lost Scripps under such circumstances...

At that time, Lin Xi was on the earth far away from the planet AS192, looking at a precious creature transported to the earth by the Sunu people.

……

However, Hal had already disposed of the abnormal data trigger.

That's right, it had already killed the newborn worm mother, the virgin worm mother named Lin Xi.

And according to its analysis of the data on the spaceship, the next mother of alien species will not be born until at least several hundred years later.

why?

Why did Scripps' body collapse again after such a short period of time?

It only took a few tenths of a second for Hal to discover the problem.

Located 23 kilometers northeast of the main ship Providence, it was indicated that the data of the No. [-] biological experiment site was abnormal.

There was a very noticeable surge of bio-energy there not so long ago...

Hal quickly retrieved his memory, and he soon discovered that the No. 23 experimental site had been abandoned by human scientists long before the coup it launched...

As far as the information it has so far, there are obviously only some failed experimental individuals stored there.

But now, the information fed back from the test site indicated that all the frozen petri dishes had been activated, and 100% of them were damaged.

What is even more illogical is that, judging from the data, those failed experiments would soon fall directly to death due to their own individual defects after leaving the petri dish, but now all the damage to the frozen petri dish has passed After a few 10 minutes, the monitoring of the No. 23 experimental site indicated that all the experimental subjects were still alive, and their bio-energy value was constantly soaring...

70%...

80%...

100%...

170%...

220%….

……

Inside the Providence,

Hal unplugged the data connector on his neck, and it staggered back a few steps before stabilizing its body. The electronic eyes flickered non-stop, which proved that its logical reasoning was in a high concentration. status.

But no matter how it calculates, the data fed back from the No. 23 test site is still unexplainable.

Those experimental subjects are mutating?

Hal didn't care too much, and it directly connected to the internal camera of the No. 23 experimental field at the risk of completely losing its own image exploration array.

After a few brief seconds, Hal blinked his eyes.

Its field of view is directly connected to all the cameras inside the experimental field, so it can also see clearly what happened in the laboratory that has long been abandoned by humans.

However, the moment after it was connected, an expressionless face appeared in front of the camera

Even though the data stream is separated, it seems to be able to see Hal with its own eyes through the camera. There is no wisdom in the dark pupils, only an ancient, chaotic desolation.

At this moment, a series of sparks burst out from the data interface of Hal's bionic body.

In the next second, it fell heavily to the ground.

A puff of blue smoke came out along its mouth and ears.

Its body was burned.

It's just that the moment the bionic man fell, all the machinery inside the Providence trembled slightly.

Hal fled the moment his body was burned, and moved all his databases back to the central computer of the Providence.

And the scene it saw made it instantly fall into a state of full vigilance.

First a light...

That light suddenly lit up inside the bridge, tearing apart the darkness of the bridge, followed by another row of spotlights—in a few seconds, the position of the bridge had become It was bright.

The rotting insect eggs on the wall can be seen under the extremely bright light. As for the deformed mutants that were barely hatched, they screamed bleakly under such light, and then they wriggled their deformed bodies. The body quickly got into the gap of the spaceship.

The death and pain of the xenomorph did not attract Hal's attention

Its invisible thoughts spread throughout the entire spaceship, with the bridge as the center, the lights gradually lit up one after another, and finally, the entire spaceship brightened up.Under the cover of steel, the machinery began to roar and run...

After a long time passed, the spaceship that had fallen into silence... finally took a hard breath again, and then restarted its operation.

Similarly, located inside the spaceship, marking the interior of Dell's warehouse.

Countless mechanical warriors also turned on their energy lamps at the same time, and they all unanimously disengaged from the fixtures, and then lightly jumped directly from the high shelves.