Dead on Mars

Chapter 202 - Sol Three Hundred and Twenty-Six, Mutation
Chapter 202: Sol Three Hundred and Twenty-Six, Mutation

Fifth sol after the space station’s incident.

There were another six sols before Tianzhou 37 arrived.

Tomcat had finished the usual work of moving all the solar panels. When it entered, it found Tang Yue sprawled on the table, sleeping as he drooled over the keyboard.

“Wake up, wake up Tang Yue.” Tomcat placed the items in its paws on the table, then prodded him. “Your drool is about to drip onto the floor.”

Tang Yue opened his eyes, looked up, and gazed around in a daze. Half his face had the red imprint of AWSD.

“Why are you so tired?” Tomcat held a pipette and stood in front of the rack to take care of the tomatoes. It rotated the containers to allow the plants to receive uniform lighting. “Eight, Ten, and Eleven… are growing well. Grandpa is very happy.”

“We played too late into the night.” Tang Yue yawned as he rubbed his aching neck. “Where’s Mai Dong?”

Last night, the trio had played till half-past one in the morning. Ever since graduation, Tang Yue hadn’t pulled such a stint. Over an intense night, he had consecutively lost dozens of matches. It was the same with Mai Dong. Eventually, the two were bankrupt, leaving Tomcat the big winner.

“I’m here,” the girl replied. She too was yawning. “I’m tired too… I’m tired, cold, and hungry.”

There were only two pieces of compressed biscuit left. Mai Dong ate a tiny piece of the biscuit once a sol and tried her best to maintain her strength. Now, her daily routine was to sleep most of the time and eat a little. Tomcat remarked that she was like sleeping beauty inside a coffin, but there was no prince to kiss her. As for Tang Yue, he called her a fat hamster curled up in its cage.

“What’s this?” Tang Yue noticed the items that Tomcat had brought back. It was a plastic container with one palm-sized glass petri dish.

Tang Yue took out the petri dish from the container and studied it out of curiosity. At the bottom of the was a layer of translucent gelatin. It was like a colorless jelly that had random specks of different colors. The biggest one was the size of an adult’s thumbnail which occupied an oval area itself. The smaller ones were like scattered grains of rice. Some even had thin “hair” growing from them.

“Rotten jelly?”

“A bacterial colony I reared.” Tomcat turned to glance at it. “I have to leave behind some seeds to life for this world, right?”

“What do you mean?” Tang Yue asked. “This bacteria is the seeds to life? You want to scatter them and let them evolve into higher-order lifeforms?”

“Why not?” Tomcat carefully watered the tomatoes. “Don’t forget that you humans were once such simple lifeforms. Given enough time, they will one day be able to create a miracle.”

“But we took three billion years.”

“The Universe will give them three billion years.”

“Where did you get the bacteria from?” Tang Yue asked.

Tomcat turned around and gestured at Tang Yue with its chin. The meaning was clear: Who else on Mars could be the source of bacteria contamination?

“I used the compressed biscuits and fertilizer as a nutrient substrate. Then I used agar as the cultivation medium. The bacteria basically came from you. The bacterial colony here includes Staphylococcus epidermidis, Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus, Veillonella, and E. coli.” Tomcat walked over and took the petri dish. It then observed it against the window. “It comes from your skin, respiratory tract, and intestinal tract.”

“Intestinal tract?” Tang Yue was alarmed as he subconsciously held his ass.

“What did you do to me while I was asleep?”

…

“After spending so much time on Mars, even bacteria seems cute.” Tang Yue held his head as he slowly spun the petri dish. “How many different kinds of bacteria are there?”

“The number of bacterial colonies is the number of different bacteria,” Tomcat replied. “Those light yellow or white circular ones are Staphylococci. The other opaque grayish-green circular ones are Veillonella… I placed them outside to test their endurance in a Martian environment. But most of the bacteria died. Only a few anaerobic bacteria survived.”

It was a rather complicated task rearing bacterial colonies on Earth. It needed strict sterilization processes to prevent contamination. However, doing so on Mars was a lot simpler. As long as Tomcat left Kunlun Station and Tang Yue’s vicinity, it would be able to avoid nearly all kinds of interference. It could use anywhere on Mars, and it would far exceed the clean rooms on Earth in terms of cleanliness.

Tang Yue stared at the bacterial colonies in the petri dish. These microbes weren’t growing well. Most of them were on the brink of extinction. Perhaps it was due to the lack of nutrients in the environment Tomcat created, or perhaps it was because of the harsh Martian environment. However, they still tried their best to spread, trying hard to cover every millimeter of the substrate.

“If they can really be spread, the ecosphere they ultimately form will be completely different from Earth’s,” Tang Yue said. “The ones that can survive are anaerobic bacteria. Then, the creatures they eventually form will not need oxygen. They will be a brand new life form.”

Life’s appearance was determined by the most basic energy utilization. Most of the life on Earth relied on breathing to provide them with energy. Breathing was an oxygenizing reaction, turning glucose into pyruvic acid before turning into adenosine triphosphate. This energy chain existed in almost all creatures; therefore, there was a need for a respiratory system to circulate the energy.

“Then you will be God,” Tomcat said. “They will be the grand legends like Pangu’s creation of the Universe and Nüwa’s creation of humanity… But who could have imagined that such a legend started off on an ordinary afternoon when a man got some saliva from his mouth to slather over a petri dish.”

“No matter how drastic the turn of events is, they were just normal days,” Tang Yue said. “After all, life doesn’t come with background music.”

He looked up and felt that the wheels of history were rumbling over his head.

“It sounds magical, but it’s nothing like that,” Tomcat said. “Do you really think these bacteria colonies in the petri dish can become the origins of the next civilization? Even if they do not rely on oxygen, they were a result of evolution on Earth. Mars lacks sufficient opportunity, so bacteria from the human body has no way of surviving… To survive in this godforsaken land, what’s needed is anaerobic bacteria, such as sulfur-reducing bacteria or other ancient bacteria.”

In response, Tang Yue frowned.

“You just mentioned that they were the seeds to life?”

“It was just utter nonsense,” Tomcat said. “I have no plans on producing the next civilization with some bacteria. My lifespan isn’t that long. It’s just a small experiment I did to see how radiation on Mars affects human bacteria.”

It walked over and picked up the petri dish and observed it. It pointed out the bacterial colonies on the substrate to Tang Yue and said, “Oh… See, these Staphylococci are about to die. The colony is shrinking. It was about twice the size yesterday. Half died in twenty-four hours. The Streptococci are about to die as well. This color isn’t healthy. There’s also the Malassezia. They can’t even be seen. Clearly, they have become extinct.

“Then what about this?” Tang Yue pointed at a black colony on the petri dish. It wasn’t the biggest one, but it didn’t show signs of decline. It was still relatively active. “This seems to be growing really well.”

Tomcat stared at the oval spot and rubbed its chin as it frowned.

“This is Candida albicans? Or is this Pseudomonas? No… That’s not right…”

Tomcat slowly shook its head.

“Huh?” Tang Yue asked. “What’s wrong?”

“It mutated. It’s likely a mutation.” Tomcat eventually passed judgment. “It’s a mutated bacterial strain.”