Chapter 276. The Planetarium, Operation Hook Up: The Show. (4/5)
A deep-sea volcano was right before us. It exploded up again for an instant as fiery red lava before it instantly cooled and transformed into black. As the eruption continued to bubble, a cloud of dust rose up in front of us. It was time for us to resurface. The dome rotated so the dust took up half the dome while water occupied the other half. We ascended quickly and before we knew it, we passed by the dust cloud and the vent changed to cool air again.
We ascended at a forty-five-degree angle. Slowly, the ground rose until it caught up. Sand appeared beneath us as we passed by the aquatic life. When we broke through the surface we were on a beach. No, a desert.
We flew through the desert at high speed past many cacti. Tumbleweed blew in the wind. We stumbled upon a lion hunting a fox. An ostrich with its head in the sand digging around for food. Hyenas ravenously chomping down on a desert cottontail. A rattlesnake swallowing a rat whole.
All sorts of different scenes flashed across the dome. We crashed through a tropical rain forest rapidly weaving left and right through the dense trees. When we happened across a group of monkeys, the rapid movement through the dense trees slowed down. We got a good look at the monkeys who occupied the treetops eating bananas high above before we sped off once more.
There were too many scenes to describe. It was overwhelming, but something about it pulled you into a trance. It made you want to keep watching the dynamic constantly changing scenery. You’d be curious what sort of scene you’d see next. It was as if someone stitched together a giant collage of videos taking place in nature you’d find all across the world.
The editing was on point. So was the sound design. It really got your heart pounding. Excited. It made you want to go out there and see all these scenes in person with your own eyes.
The depressing feeling from our trip through time back on Mars had long been blown away. It was breathtaking to see, truly thrilling. Life, that is.
The show had both its highs and lows. It was the world we lived in, but it felt like a world we were unfamiliar with. There was so much out there to see in our world, but nowhere near enough time to see it all.
We emerged from the tropical forest and came across a plain of snow leading to a colossal mountain. We shot through the white blanket of snow and approached the snowy mountain. When we arrived at the foot we propelled ourselves up the incline and closed the distance to the top while dodging past the large rocky protrusions. When we reached the snowy peak, we stopped in place for a moment. The image projected on the dome rotated around to take in the full view for a solid ten seconds as a light blanket of snow fell.
We were given a chance to revel in the scenery. The snowy plains led into the forest, then desert, and the ocean far in the distance where the sun peeked over the horizon. The captivating orange sky, on fire, to our front contrasted greatly with the darkness behind to our rear where the moon hung in the sky.
Time fast-forwarded. The scene flickered between day and night and we could see the sun and moon closing in on each other. Suddenly we were engulfed in a thick blizzard, where we couldn’t see the sky at all. When the blizzard cleared up, the snow all around us melted. Summer had arrived for the snowy mountain. Vegetation began to spring up all around us.
While the mountain came alive, the sun and moon in the sky eventually overlapped perfectly one day and the sun was fully eclipsed.
We descended into a temporary state of pitch darkness. As soon as the sun peaked out from behind the moon, it acted as a trigger for us to embark once again on our journey.
We dashed down the mountain and returned to ground level while the scene changed between day and night. The vegetation had grown with each day that passed by during our descent down the mountain in a time-lapse.
At the bottom of the mountain, we came across a dirt road that had previously been hidden by snow. We traveled along the dirt road off to the side and encountered a dense herd of deer fleeing from predators. We dynamically weaved through their moving legs and bodies until we broke through them all.
Once free, we continued down the dirt road until we arrived at a concrete road, a highway. We turned onto the highway and journeyed forth in search of civilization.
We encountered large fields of wheat and corn. Cows, pigs, stables with horses, barns, different types of agricultural lands. Humans, who operated tractors to collect crops.
We accelerated further with a sudden burst of speed down the highway as the small outline of a city appeared in the distance. It quickly expanded across the dome and we found ourselves weaving left and right through motorcycles, cars, vans, and busses. Right as a bus crossed through an intersection in front of us, the camera angle changed as we flew up perpendicular to the ground and soared into the sky.
We weaved between the towering buildings on our way to an airport. When we arrived at the airport we found an airplane taking off below us. It flew up high into the sky and we followed along directly atop its wing.
We accelerated again through the sky when a rocket ship suddenly shot up directly in front of us and intercepted our path forward. We made another perpendicular turn up and traveled higher and higher into the atmosphere beside the body of the rocket ship. We passed by satellites orbiting around the Earth on our return trip to outer space.
When we suddenly reached the side of the international space station, we jerked to an abrupt stop. The dome rotated and we looked back down at the Earth we’d journeyed across. There was something about seeing it again from this angle that greatly stirred one’s emotions. A sense of attachment after seeing the abundance of life that lived there.
It was our home. It was quite the stark contrast to our desolate lonely journey through outer space.
The narrator’s voice suddenly reverberated throughout the room, “This... is Earth.” During our entire journey across the Earth, the narrator had kept dead silent. He’d allowed the flashy and memorable visuals to speak for themselves. It had told a story all on its own. One that would be ingrained in our minds for years to come.
“Unlike other planets in our solar system, there is so much to see. There is so much complexity to this planet where life has taken root and proliferated far and wide. The small taste of what you’ve seen is only a tiny snippet of what Earth has to offer.”
“This... is what Mars could have been. We must never take what we have for granted. Life can end at any moment. All this could one day be extinguished in an instant.”
“However… one may ponder, why is Earth so special? Why is Earth the only planet with an abundance of life? From a statistical standpoint, with how vast our universe is, it is improbable for it to be the only case where life has sprouted. However, if that is true, where are those planets with alien life?”
The narrator spoke of Fermi's Paradox for a while to give the riled-up emotions of the audience time to cool down. The atmosphere changed as the narrator spoke passionately about the high possibility of life existing out there. An air of longing gradually permeated through the room among the audience as he enthusiastically spoke of extraterrestrial life.
Haaaaah. It was nostalgic. I remember this feeling all too well. When I was young, I had such dreams. Deep down, I still did, but I’d long given up and faced reality. I wouldn’t live long enough to see those things.
Eventually, we set our sights on the yellowish-white Venus, the brightest and hottest planet with the most volcanoes in our solar system. As the bulk of its atmosphere was mostly carbon dioxide, it experienced an extreme greenhouse effect which made it hotter than the planet closest to the sun. Though this planet was quite close in size to Earth, the atmospheric pressure was ninety times higher than sea level on Earth.
After we zipped by Venus, we arrived at the final planet in our solar system closest to the sun. Mercury, which looked like no more than a dark gray rock in space, orbited around the sun fastest in the solar system. Strangely enough, despite this planet being so close to the sun, it had the most extreme temperature fluctuations among the planets we visited. At night it would reach as low as minus one-hundred-seventy degrees Celsius, but during the day, it reached as high as four-hundred-fifty degrees Celsius.
We didn’t stick around very long by this planet either, it was simply something we were passing on our journey to the sun.
As we got closer to the sun the vents started to blow warm air. The closer we got the hotter it got. By the time the sun occupied nearly the entirety of the dome, I was sweating.
It really felt like we were being cooked alive.
It was a blindingly bright ball of plasma, but some regions on the surface appeared dimmer than the rest. Those dim regions were sunspots. The sun on average was about 5700 Kelvin, but those dimmer regions were between 3000 to 4500 Kelvin.
That was more than enough to vaporize our bodies.
However, what was truly terrifying were the coronas. Loops, strings of plasma connected between different parts of the sun. If you thought the surface temperature of the sun was hot, these inauspicious strings were far hotter. Two to three million times hotter.
The sun was truly an imposing behemoth. It contained 99.8% of the mass in our solar system and could fit one million planets the size of Earth inside it. It was utterly domineering in nature. A force that mankind could only shrink back in the face of its sheer intimidating presence.
The audience held their breaths as thick strings of plasma suddenly bubbled up on the sun’s surface. Without warning or explanation, it exploded out and headed directly for us. We were given front-row seats to a cataclysmic event.
We found ourselves swallowed up in a giant cloud of plasma as the vent was turned up to full blast on its hottest setting. The image projected on the dome shook violently. Black tears and static appeared in the projection. The intensity of the sound from the speakers in the room caused the ground to vibrate.
And suddenly… the room descended into pitch-black as the vents shut off.
Chapter 276. The Planetarium, Operation Hook Up: The Show. (4/5)
A deep-sea volcano was right before us. It exploded up again for an instant as fiery red lava before it instantly cooled and transformed into black. As the eruption continued to bubble, a cloud of dust rose up in front of us. It was time for us to resurface. The dome rotated so the dust took up half the dome while water occupied the other half. We ascended quickly and before we knew it, we passed by the dust cloud and the vent changed to cool air again.
We ascended at a forty-five-degree angle. Slowly, the ground rose until it caught up. Sand appeared beneath us as we passed by the aquatic life. When we broke through the surface we were on a beach. No, a desert.
We flew through the desert at high speed past many cacti. Tumbleweed blew in the wind. We stumbled upon a lion hunting a fox. An ostrich with its head in the sand digging around for food. Hyenas ravenously chomping down on a desert cottontail. A rattlesnake swallowing a rat whole.
All sorts of different scenes flashed across the dome. We crashed through a tropical rain forest rapidly weaving left and right through the dense trees. When we happened across a group of monkeys, the rapid movement through the dense trees slowed down. We got a good look at the monkeys who occupied the treetops eating bananas high above before we sped off once more.
There were too many scenes to describe. It was overwhelming, but something about it pulled you into a trance. It made you want to keep watching the dynamic constantly changing scenery. You’d be curious what sort of scene you’d see next. It was as if someone stitched together a giant collage of videos taking place in nature you’d find all across the world.
The editing was on point. So was the sound design. It really got your heart pounding. Excited. It made you want to go out there and see all these scenes in person with your own eyes.
The depressing feeling from our trip through time back on Mars had long been blown away. It was breathtaking to see, truly thrilling. Life, that is.
The show had both its highs and lows. It was the world we lived in, but it felt like a world we were unfamiliar with. There was so much out there to see in our world, but nowhere near enough time to see it all.
We emerged from the tropical forest and came across a plain of snow leading to a colossal mountain. We shot through the white blanket of snow and approached the snowy mountain. When we arrived at the foot we propelled ourselves up the incline and closed the distance to the top while dodging past the large rocky protrusions. When we reached the snowy peak, we stopped in place for a moment. The image projected on the dome rotated around to take in the full view for a solid ten seconds as a light blanket of snow fell.
We were given a chance to revel in the scenery. The snowy plains led into the forest, then desert, and the ocean far in the distance where the sun peeked over the horizon. The captivating orange sky, on fire, to our front contrasted greatly with the darkness behind to our rear where the moon hung in the sky.
Time fast-forwarded. The scene flickered between day and night and we could see the sun and moon closing in on each other. Suddenly we were engulfed in a thick blizzard, where we couldn’t see the sky at all. When the blizzard cleared up, the snow all around us melted. Summer had arrived for the snowy mountain. Vegetation began to spring up all around us.
While the mountain came alive, the sun and moon in the sky eventually overlapped perfectly one day and the sun was fully eclipsed.
We descended into a temporary state of pitch darkness. As soon as the sun peaked out from behind the moon, it acted as a trigger for us to embark once again on our journey.
We dashed down the mountain and returned to ground level while the scene changed between day and night. The vegetation had grown with each day that passed by during our descent down the mountain in a time-lapse.
At the bottom of the mountain, we came across a dirt road that had previously been hidden by snow. We traveled along the dirt road off to the side and encountered a dense herd of deer fleeing from predators. We dynamically weaved through their moving legs and bodies until we broke through them all.
Once free, we continued down the dirt road until we arrived at a concrete road, a highway. We turned onto the highway and journeyed forth in search of civilization.
We encountered large fields of wheat and corn. Cows, pigs, stables with horses, barns, different types of agricultural lands. Humans, who operated tractors to collect crops.
We accelerated further with a sudden burst of speed down the highway as the small outline of a city appeared in the distance. It quickly expanded across the dome and we found ourselves weaving left and right through motorcycles, cars, vans, and busses. Right as a bus crossed through an intersection in front of us, the camera angle changed as we flew up perpendicular to the ground and soared into the sky.
We weaved between the towering buildings on our way to an airport. When we arrived at the airport we found an airplane taking off below us. It flew up high into the sky and we followed along directly atop its wing.
We accelerated again through the sky when a rocket ship suddenly shot up directly in front of us and intercepted our path forward. We made another perpendicular turn up and traveled higher and higher into the atmosphere beside the body of the rocket ship. We passed by satellites orbiting around the Earth on our return trip to outer space.
When we suddenly reached the side of the international space station, we jerked to an abrupt stop. The dome rotated and we looked back down at the Earth we’d journeyed across. There was something about seeing it again from this angle that greatly stirred one’s emotions. A sense of attachment after seeing the abundance of life that lived there.
It was our home. It was quite the stark contrast to our desolate lonely journey through outer space.
The narrator’s voice suddenly reverberated throughout the room, “This... is Earth.” During our entire journey across the Earth, the narrator had kept dead silent. He’d allowed the flashy and memorable visuals to speak for themselves. It had told a story all on its own. One that would be ingrained in our minds for years to come.
“Unlike other planets in our solar system, there is so much to see. There is so much complexity to this planet where life has taken root and proliferated far and wide. The small taste of what you’ve seen is only a tiny snippet of what Earth has to offer.”
“This... is what Mars could have been. We must never take what we have for granted. Life can end at any moment. All this could one day be extinguished in an instant.”
“However… one may ponder, why is Earth so special? Why is Earth the only planet with an abundance of life? From a statistical standpoint, with how vast our universe is, it is improbable for it to be the only case where life has sprouted. However, if that is true, where are those planets with alien life?”
The narrator spoke of Fermi's Paradox for a while to give the riled-up emotions of the audience time to cool down. The atmosphere changed as the narrator spoke passionately about the high possibility of life existing out there. An air of longing gradually permeated through the room among the audience as he enthusiastically spoke of extraterrestrial life.
Haaaaah. It was nostalgic. I remember this feeling all too well. When I was young, I had such dreams. Deep down, I still did, but I’d long given up and faced reality. I wouldn’t live long enough to see those things.
Eventually, we set our sights on the yellowish-white Venus, the brightest and hottest planet with the most volcanoes in our solar system. As the bulk of its atmosphere was mostly carbon dioxide, it experienced an extreme greenhouse effect which made it hotter than the planet closest to the sun. Though this planet was quite close in size to Earth, the atmospheric pressure was ninety times higher than sea level on Earth.
After we zipped by Venus, we arrived at the final planet in our solar system closest to the sun. Mercury, which looked like no more than a dark gray rock in space, orbited around the sun fastest in the solar system. Strangely enough, despite this planet being so close to the sun, it had the most extreme temperature fluctuations among the planets we visited. At night it would reach as low as minus one-hundred-seventy degrees Celsius, but during the day, it reached as high as four-hundred-fifty degrees Celsius.
We didn’t stick around very long by this planet either, it was simply something we were passing on our journey to the sun.
As we got closer to the sun the vents started to blow warm air. The closer we got the hotter it got. By the time the sun occupied nearly the entirety of the dome, I was sweating.
It really felt like we were being cooked alive.
It was a blindingly bright ball of plasma, but some regions on the surface appeared dimmer than the rest. Those dim regions were sunspots. The sun on average was about 5700 Kelvin, but those dimmer regions were between 3000 to 4500 Kelvin.
That was more than enough to vaporize our bodies.
However, what was truly terrifying were the coronas. Loops, strings of plasma connected between different parts of the sun. If you thought the surface temperature of the sun was hot, these inauspicious strings were far hotter. Two to three million times hotter.
The sun was truly an imposing behemoth. It contained 99.8% of the mass in our solar system and could fit one million planets the size of Earth inside it. It was utterly domineering in nature. A force that mankind could only shrink back in the face of its sheer intimidating presence.
The audience held their breaths as thick strings of plasma suddenly bubbled up on the sun’s surface. Without warning or explanation, it exploded out and headed directly for us. We were given front-row seats to a cataclysmic event.
We found ourselves swallowed up in a giant cloud of plasma as the vent was turned up to full blast on its hottest setting. The image projected on the dome shook violently. Black tears and static appeared in the projection. The intensity of the sound from the speakers in the room caused the ground to vibrate.
And suddenly… the room descended into pitch-black as the vents shut off.
