Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume11 Chapter 3 (section)

===Part 4===

The civilian Venus-class space station was named the Princess Nikolaschka.

It belonged to the Legitimacy Kingdom’s Organization for the Peaceful Use of Space.

It was currently 20:30 Greenwich Mean Time and the space station was in sector I-9 above the South Atlantic Ocean.

A giant blue planet was visible below and an endless expanse of darkness was visible above. Directions, including above and below, meant nothing in outer space, but since he had been born on the earth, the astronaut named Marcus still found it to be a strange and dizzying sight.

Those aboard the space station called it the “Fish Tank” because it had lab modules and solar panels installed at right angles around a thick cylindrical main shaft. Several more facilities were similarly attached to the slave shafts that branched off, so overall, it resembled a fishing hole’s fish tank made from several rectangular wooden frames connected together. Those extra frames extended from the main shaft at 120 degrees intervals.

Wearing space suits and attached by a lifeline, the astronauts were clinging to the exterior of the station and working without the option of wiping the sweat from their brows.

They were working on a strange railgun that they referred to as the Debris Homer. Rather than an uncivilized military weapon that fired shells, the barrel opened wide and released a field of power to shoot back debris without touching it. It was a safety device to be used against the debris that arrived like a sandstorm at several kilometers per second.

“Marcus to control. The socket replacement is complete. It’s a perfect job. This peaceful station has been transformed into a military facility. To be honest, it kind of want to break my arms right now.”

“Those SOBs are all insane. Don’t they know this is a civilian station? I hate the smell of gunpowder. I came all the way up here to answer kids’ questions over the satellite line while I throw paper airplanes! As a kid, I loved watching those shows while looking after my little brother, but now I feel like I’ve ruined it all!!”

“Stop it, Robin. Space development has always been a proxy war. We have to do this dirty work while the kids can’t see us.”

The countdown from control began, so they restrained their chatter. They relied on their lifelines to move along the station’s exterior and reach the safe zone.

In that soundless world, the invisible stream of solar wind was bent and fired toward earth.

But the earth’s atmosphere was effective. It protected the life living below from the threat of ultraviolet rays, radiation, heat, falling objects, and more. Most of the unnaturally bent solar wind was blocked by the ionosphere. Hazy red, green, and purple light danced over one portion of the blue planet.

Robin spoke while watching the light spread with an amoeba-like motion.

“An artificial aurora, huh?”

“That’s not the main event here, Robin.”

The aurora occurred when solar winds – massive amounts of plasma launched from the sun – collided with the magnetosphere surrounding the earth and gathered at either the North or South Pole. When they contacted the magnetosphere, the solar winds had their electrons and protons separated and those particles reacted with the ionosphere to produce light.

And a few side effects of the aurora had been noticed.

One of those was of interest here.

“Loss of electromagnetic signals in the polar regions.”

Robin may have been starving for a chance to lead a children’s educational program because he began explaining.

“Very high frequency communications and microwave communications will ‘vanish’ in the affected area. Although this might be the first time in history it hit an Object-level radar emitter.”