6: Chapter 6 Million Spaceship

When Professor Hoffman rushed in, even his wig was crooked.

This was the first time Daniel had seen his wig askew; in his memory, this sixty-three-year-old German man always had his wig fitted seamlessly every day at work, as if it had been calibrated with a spirit level.

Now it was tilted at an angle he had never imagined, followed by the remaining five people from the entire department, some even wearing only one shoe.

"What's going on?" Hoffman's roar drowned out the alarm. "Who told you to pull the alarm? Do you know what a Level 5 alarm means? The White House Situation Room is already connecting! You'd better give me a reasonable explanation!"

Daniel turned around and pointed at the screen with a panicked expression: "They're here, they're here!!!"

Hoffman's gaze swept over his shoulder and landed on the screen.

Then he stopped moving too; everyone's eyes stared silently at the screen like living statues.

The whole room was left with only the sound of the alarm and those points of light on the screen, inexorably lining up in formation.

"Oh my God!"

Hoffman exclaimed and turned around, shouting anxiously: "Quick, contact the White House!"

No one moved.

"Now!!!"

Someone rushed out, the sound of footsteps gradually swallowed by the alarm in the corridor.

Hoffman turned back to the screen, reached out, adjusted his wig, and pressed several white marks into the edge of the console with his fingertips.

Soon, the piercing alarm cut through the night sky of all of New Mexico.

Daniel watched this scene, suddenly feeling a strange sensation, a feeling of personally participating in a major historical event.

He, Daniel Kowalski, an astrophysics graduate who had sat in this chair for five years, drank about 1,800 cups of cold coffee, and reported ten meteorites and a comet someone else had already discovered.

How would future history books record him? An alien whistleblower?

——————

Washington, White House, Oval Office.

President Trump sat behind the historic Resolute Desk, holding a can of Diet Coke in his hand.

Three people sat opposite him.

They were Bernard Arnault, the French luxury emperor and head of the LVMH Group.

Elon Musk, the man who sets off rockets like fireworks.

And a pot-bellied old man named Sheldon Adelson, the owner of the Las Vegas Sands Corp. and one of the Republican Party's largest donors.

The three sat there, not because President Trump had invited them for tea.

But because he was going to pull off something big.

"Listen, guys," President Trump said, thumping the Coke can onto the table with a dull thud. "Nobody knows the market better than me, nobody. You know that."

He stood up, walked around to the front of the desk, and began to pace: "Tomorrow, I'm going to post a message about peace on Twitter."

He held out his hand, fingers spread: "I'll say we're ready to have friendly peace negotiations with the Persian cats."

Arnault frowned slightly: "Mr. President, I don't quite understand. Is the peace you're talking about real peace, or..."

"Fake!" Musk said for President Trump: "He's going to use peace to speculate on stocks."

Trump pointed a finger in Musk's direction in approval.

"Elon gets it, Elon has always gotten it. That's why his rockets can be recycled, while those idiots at NASA can't even keep their budget."

He sat down again, hands propped on the Resolute Desk: "Once the news is out, the market price of crude oil will surely drop, and then we'll buy in bulk."

He leaned back into his chair, the pull-tab of the Diet Coke spinning around his finger.

"Then, twenty-four hours later, I'll post another tweet saying the negotiations have broken down."

The room was silent for a moment, then Musk laughed: "So you plan to create a surge, then a crash, eating up both the shorts and the longs on both ends."

"Elon," President Trump said, "you're a genius. That's why I like you."

Arnault was still frowning, calculating how much he could rake in.

Adelson had already raised his glass and poured some whiskey.

"To money," he said.

Trump raised his Diet Coke can. Musk casually picked up the water glass on the table. Arnault finally raised his glass, his brow finally smoothing out.

"To money."

The four containers clinked together.

The next moment, the door to the room was suddenly pushed open.

"Bang!"

Secretary of Defense Hegseth stood at the door, whispering anxiously: "Mr. President, a top-level emergency."

Trump didn't stand up, or even put down his Coke can. "Speak."

Hegseth didn't speak; his gaze swept over the three tycoons again.

Arnault was the first to stand. He straightened his suit and nodded slightly to President Trump: "Mr. President, then I won't disturb you."

The other two also got up to take their leave.

"Speak," President Trump said, placing the Diet Coke on the desk.

Hegseth took a deep breath: "Just now, NASA's deep space observation department detected a large number of unidentified objects."

"The coordinates are on the outer edge of the Kuiper Belt, about 47 astronomical units from the Sun."

President Trump looked at him and then laughed: "Aliens?"

He picked up the Coke can and took a sip: "Hegseth, do you know how many times I've received these 'alien discovery' reports?"

"I received them no less than ten times during my last term. Every single time, it's those NASA nerds trying to trick me into increasing their budget."

"It's a ten-year-old trick. You tell them there's no way they're getting money; I'd rather spend it on renovating the White House ballroom."

Hegseth didn't move, saying seriously: "Mr. President, you may have misunderstood. It's not one alien, but a massive fleet."

"According to our preliminary identification of mothership-class targets, the number has exceeded ten thousand. The largest one is about one hundred kilometers long."

"Mr. President, the length of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier is 332 meters. The length of this ship is equivalent to nearly three hundred Nimitz-class ships placed end to end."

"And around it, we have preliminarily identified targets at the frigate or fighter jet level, numbering over two million."

He handed over the tablet in his hand.

On the screen was an optical image. Against the dark background of the Kuiper Belt, an entire alien fleet was suspended in a neat formation, so dense that even the Sun at the edge was no longer dazzling.

"They are decelerating. Two million targets, all at the same moment, decelerating with the same curvature."

"Mr. President, this deceleration curve is not any form of propulsion known to mankind."

Hegseth gave a military salute: "They are about to enter the Solar System. Please give the order, Mr. President."

The Diet Coke slipped from President Trump's hand, the dark brown liquid splashing out and soaking into the beige carpet of the White House Oval Office.

He was silent for a full seven seconds, then asked tremblingly: "Is the news confirmed?"

"The Europa Observatory detected the same situation. The signal characteristics are identical. The Europeans have already begun internal briefings."

"We cannot confirm the observation capabilities of the Great Eastern Power and the Polar Bear in real-time, but based on their orbital coverage, they'll be at most an hour or so behind us."

Hegseth's expression was grave: "Mr. President, this is not a drill. The doomsday catastrophe for human civilization has arrived!"

President Trump stood up, walked to the window, and looked out at the Rose Garden.

In November in Washington, the roses had long since withered, leaving only some neatly trimmed dead branches.

"Assemble everyone for a meeting in the Situation Room. I want the military, the intelligence system, outer space experts... everyone who can have an impact on this event."

"Within half an hour, I want to see their faces in that room."

He walked toward the door and took his phone out of his pocket.

Hegseth saw that movement.

"Mr. President, according to the National Security Council's standard procedures, all external communications should be prohibited until the situation is completely clear."

President Trump waved his hand: "I know what I'm doing!"

After typing, he turned the screen toward Hegseth, like a painter showing off his new work.

Trump: Today I will be the greatest president in the history of the United States. May God bless the United States.

"Let's go!"

He put his phone back in his pocket and pushed open the door to the Oval Office.

In the corridor, the White House Chief of Staff, the National Security Advisor, Secret Service agents, and a large number of experts from various disciplines were running toward him.

The red alarm lights of the Situation Room began to rotate on the ceiling.

President Trump walked ahead of everyone. His stride regained that rhythmic, bouncy pace.

Meanwhile, the number of likes on that tweet began to jump, and the top comment was: "This old geezer is at it again! A daily boast, is it?!"