The return procedure for the lunar module was simpler than he expected, but it was limited. He operated the instruments under the "command" of two astronauts in the lunar orbit like a first-year elementary school student, and returned to the lunar orbit without any danger.

When the airlock was opened, he saw the look of two people at a loss.

Because they saw almost the same person—the same appearance, or even the same hairstyle. So Li Zhen smiled and took a deep breath. The air in the lunar module had a strange smell, but it was much better than the oxygen-deficient environment in his space suit. After three deep breaths, he spoke: "When will you return?"

The response I got was: "Are you really... out of the spacecraft all the time?"

"Then I can't hide in the rocket." Li Zhen smiled, climbed the bulkhead with one hand and floated towards the two of them, and asked again, "When will I return?"

This time, the two of them were stunned for a while before answering: "It's not sure yet, I have to wait for news from the command center. Something went wrong with the communication."

Then one of them pointed at himself: "I am Qian Suidang."

He pointed to another person: "He is Wu Jiechao."

Li Zhen nodded, but focused more on the other party's words just now. He thought for a while: "There was something wrong with the communication - what is this? Is it expected or an unexpected situation?"

Wu Jiechao is a tall and thin middle-aged man, and looks a bit like the old farmer who has been poor all his life in the old feature film. Now that he heard Li Zhen’s problem, he blinked, and the fine lines on his face became more and more obvious, and he seemed to be worried about this matter. He thought, "Actually, it was expected... After all, this is not the earth, and even on the earth there are times when the mobile phone signal is not good."

After saying that, he paused. So Li Zhen breathed a sigh of relief: "So that's it."

But the next moment Qian Suidang added: "But it has been going on for a while - the communication has been intermittent in the past five hours, and we have lost contact for ten minutes just now."

"It's just a problem. It's either a problem here or a problem on the ground." Wu Jiechao nodded, "I've been flying so many times, and it's the first time I've encountered this situation."

These two people speak in this way...

Li Zhen frowned slightly. But obviously now is not the time to complain - he had to patiently ask again: "Is the problem big?"

Wu Jiechao grinned, making his body turn from flat float to vertical in front of the console: "What's the problem, this, I've flew so many times..."

With the lessons learned from the past, Li Zhen asked: "How many times?"

"In addition, there will be three times this time." Wu Jiechao said with a smile, "So I have flew so many times. The first time it was because of the spacecraft, but the second time it was nothing big. As for this time... it is the first time this lunar module."

Li Zhen had to interrupt him: "The first time you said, the spaceship, refers to the Sky II?"

Wu Jiechao nodded.

"What about the second time?"

"It's the International Space Station."

So Li Zhen took a deep breath and waved his hand: "Okay, it's nothing to do. Lao Qian, what do you think?"

Qian Suidang realized that Li Zhen seemed to be a little dissatisfied with his colleague, and hurriedly said, "This, in my opinion, may have caught up with the sunspot explosion or some other reason, and the problem will not be very big. We can wait a little longer, maybe it will be better in a few minutes."

Li Zhen had never been an astronaut before. And like most ordinary people, he felt that this kind of thing was mysterious and serious, and it should be an atmosphere of being cautious throughout the journey, as if facing a great enemy. But now, it was like two long-distance freight drivers who encountered a vehicle breakdown, and they didn't feel that the matter was so serious in their words.

If he had been to space for the first time, he might have felt the same way as these two. But the problem is that he had seen ghost machines outside.

At this time, communication is interrupted. Is there really something wrong with the ground?

But he couldn't imagine it, so he had to sigh softly and whisper: "Okay. Then wait a little longer."

It took nearly half an hour to wait. At this time, even Wu Jiechao and Qian Suidang's faces gradually became solemn. Although the moon landing spacecraft had the word "ship", the size was only equivalent to three lunar modules, and the supplies and fuel they carried were quite limited.

Currently they are in the orbit of the moon, but they are not able to easily move around circles and circles under the action of planet gravity as people imagine. Because the mass distribution on the moon's surface is not uniform, there are also "mass tumors" in some areas. The engines of the lunar spacecraft have to be fine-tuned to ensure that the trajectory of the spacecraft will not deviate.

They had to risk their return if there was no news after more than ten minutes of the ground.

Fortunately, the anxious waiting did not last long. After another three minutes, the communication finally resumed.

The sound of the ground command center is not clear, but it sounds like a heavenly sound. But the sound like a "natural sound" is somewhat serious and urgent, so the three people in the moon landing spacecraft knew that there was indeed something wrong with the command center. From the other party's brief description, they learned that not only the communication with the moon landing spacecraft was disturbed, but also the communication in other areas on the earth was also disturbed.

Li Zhen frowned slightly because something he was worried about might have happened.

The end of the aurora and the recovery of electricity do not mean that the familiar world begins to return to the right track, but is more like the beginning of some larger-scale abnormal change.

Now the atmosphere in the cabin has finally become as nervous and solemn as he had imagined before. Wu Jiechao and Qian Sui were responsible for controlling the spacecraft, and he was an absolute passenger.

The flagpole, or the Longineus gun, was grabbed by him, but the two of them kept silent about it, as if they were prepared in advance, and would only glance at the thing from time to time, but they could not see anything unusual.

Twenty-six minutes later, the engine of the lunar spacecraft started and the hull broke out of the moon's orbit.

The return process took longer. During the 88-hour period, the communication interruption became more serious. The three of them kept in touch with the ground command center for a total of no more than three hours. During these three hours, Li Zhen and Dai Bingcheng had a call to the other party to inform the other party of "that person". However, when he asked about the situation in South America, the other party's reply was "not clear yet."

He thought that it was not perfunctory or intentional concealment. Perhaps it was really "not clear".

The information he received was limited, and it was really hard to get a glimpse of it and know the whole picture.

The spacecraft's scheduled landing location was on a sparsely populated plain in the northwest region. After more than 70 hours of travel, they contacted the ground command center for the last time to report the situation of the spacecraft. The earth had become larger and larger, and the moon was getting smaller and smaller. He did not see the "ghost machine group" on his way back. Perhaps just as they were stranding in the moon orbit, the lost bombers had already slid elsewhere.

At this time, the three people in the cabin finally breathed a little relieved. Because even if they lost contact with the ground command center again, they could land safely and wait for ground rescue.

However--

There are always many in this world, however.

What Li Zhen has experienced at the moment is undoubtedly the most deadly one.

Just 30 seconds after entering the outer layer of the atmosphere, an urgent and panic sound rang out of the communication channel. The sound was intermittent and blurred due to some unknown interference, and then completely isolated by the ionosphere formed on the surface of the spacecraft.

The only valuable information that the three people heard was "change courses."

"What the hell?" Wu Jiechao shouted first. At present, the three of them were fixed on the seats, and the spacecraft had entered the automatic navigation state. At this speed, "changing the course" in the atmosphere was unheard of by both Li Zhen and himself.

However, the command center will not be unable to ignore the issuance of such an order. All they can do is to react at the fastest speed and implement it quickly.

But just as he tried to get up, an absurd appeared.

They suddenly saw a blue sky and white clouds-

The blue sky and white clouds in summer. They were like three flying people in the air, maintaining their sitting posture and a shocked expression on their faces to find themselves appearing in the sky. The entire hull disappeared without warning, or the whole body became transparent. And they were still falling at high speed, and they could not hear the roar of the wind in their ears, and could only hear the roar of the hull when it rubbed with the air in the atmosphere at high speed.

Just as the shock on their faces had no time to disappear, the situation changed again. They were wrapped in the familiar and unfamiliar cockpit again.

The reason why it is "familiar" is because everything is what it is. The reason why it is "strange" is because this cockpit looks like it has been through decades of unmaintained care.

The surface of the originally clean and clean control table was rusty underneath, and large patches of paint fell off. The flashing indicator lights were covered with a thick layer of dust, as if they had been piled up in an unmanned warehouse for a long time.

In amazement, Qian Sui subconsciously stepped forward—

So I found that the strap that originally fixed him to the seat fell down like flour, and he himself fell to the console with a strong vibration. His whole body was weak, as if he had just overdrawn his life for decades.

He saw the surprised eyes of Li Zhen and Wu Jiechao, and then muttered from his dry and sore throat again - "...what's going on?"

Then he was stunned. It was not his voice at all, but it seemed to be from an old, hunched elderly person.

Then he saw Wu Jiechao's face more clearly.

Wu Jiechao originally looked much older than his actual age. But the fine wrinkles on his face have become terrifyingly deep, and his skin covered with age spots drooped like worn fabric, and even his eyebrows have turned light yellow. The other party tried to open his eyes in surprise, but his eyes were muddy and dull, just like a dying person looking at the world for the last time.

In fact, this was also the last glance he saw. Because after this moment, in Li Zhen's sight, their faces began to dry up quickly.

This process is like shooting an old man with a camera for decades, and then concentrating the decades in just a few seconds. The skin on the face is shriveled, the muscles under the skin are atrophy, the moisture on the eyeballs quickly dry up and turns into a wrinkled off-white substance, just like a dried grape kernel.

After these few seconds, the two men kept their previous posture and remained motionless. And their bodies seemed to be unable to bear the weight of the space suit anymore - the bloated clothes made a muffled sound and fell softly to the ground.

The mask of the aerospace helmet suddenly fluttered over the grayish white dust.

Everything happened in the flash of lightning—no more than ten seconds.

Li Zhen looked at everything in disbelief, opened her mouth at the first moment, and unconsciously shouted a word - "Ah-"

Just like when I went to a hospital for a check-up of my mouth, I tried to open my mouth wide, vibrate my vocal cords, and make sounds.

It was not that he was panicked, but that he tried to perform a physical examination in this way to determine his current condition. The result made him feel relieved. His voice still sounded young, his biting muscles were strong and powerful. When he closed his mouth, two rows of teeth hit one side, making a crisp "click" sound.

But the joy lasted for just one second. Because now all the instruments in this cockpit have failed. But if he guessed correctly...

Now the moon-landing spacecraft has just entered the outer layer of the atmosphere. The earth's gravity will become increasingly greater, and the acceleration of gravity will make the spacecraft finally reach a terrifying speed. If he cannot turn on the deceleration parachute and cannot turn on the deceleration engine...

This time he was really unsure of being able to survive in this world!

He stood up without feeling any obstacles and rushed to the console.

The return journey was long and boring, so Qian Suidang and Wu Jiechao once explained to him the operation procedures for returning. But the text on the surface of the buttons is now blurred, and hundreds of buttons and indicator lights are staring at him dimly like rows of dense eyes, but they cannot give him a little hint.

All he could do was follow the procedures in his memory, fiddling with those things, and trying to reconnect with the ground command center.

But if it was as expected that even the surface of the console and the seat belts on the seat had been deteriorated, how could he expect those extremely sophisticated instruments to still be loyal to their duties?

Everything was unresponsive, and some buttons had even rusted into the holes.

Just as despair just came to my heart, Li Zhen felt a violent impact. (To be continued. Please search for Astronomy, novels are better, updated and faster!)
Chapter completed!