Sheyan appeared to be deep in thought. He then looked into Professor Xavier"s eyes earnestly."I"m sorry to tell you this, Professor, but I don"t think it was an accident that killed your friend."
"What do you mean?" asked Professor Xavier, apparently shocked.
"It"s a premeditated murder. With the fearsome power of 46 countries together with 3796 megrich billionaires around the world united....creating an accident to kill someone is even easier than killing a bug."
"But why?" asked Professor Xavier with his eyebrows raised.
Sheyan replied unhurriedly, "This terrifying force"s motive for eliminating someone is usually to stop the news of the end of the world from spreading and causing ma.s.s panic, thus disrupting their plans to build Noah"s Arks. I have here a list of the second batch of a.s.sa.s.sination targets, most of which are people trying to publicise the news to the public. Right now, my fellow men are trying to save them and bring them to a safe place."
"Besides that, building Noah"s Arks requires a lot of rare resources and materials. Prof. Xavier, since your friend had been working tirelessly on a survival plan, he"s likely h.o.a.rding some important materials but had refused to sell them. That"s an unforgivable crime in the Noah"s Ark plan where every minute counts. May I know your friend"s name?"
"Ze Villa Bolton," replied Prof. Xavier.
The name did not ring a bell. Sheyan immediately made a call to enquire and found that he was actually quite well-known in the scientific community. Not only was he a 2008 n.o.bel Prize winner, he also enjoyed a high prestige among his peers. If such a person had started to prepare for the end of the world in advance, he must have had some results to show for it.
Sheyan told Prof. Xavier, "If Mr. Bolton had tried to invite you before, he must have invited others too. My offer stands. In order to fight against the wrath of the Earth, the strength of any individual is far from enough. I believe that Mr. Bolton must have tried to a.s.semble a strong team before his death to try to stand against fate! Their research is likely very useful for us. Besides, Prof. Xavier, don"t you want to know the real cause of your friend"s death?"
Prof. Xavier closed his eyes and pondered for a moment. Then, he nodded. He had apparently been persuaded by Sheyan.
"Let"s go."
***
Charles Xavier"s driver was also a mutant, a mutant who was proud of his strength. He also enjoyed a good relations.h.i.+p with Bobby. Therefore, when he shook hands with Sheyan, he added some force to his grip. Much to his surprise, Sheyan took it with a smile as if nothing happened. Right before their hands broke apart, Sheyan gripped back. The driver, Hank, turned pale at once! He rubbed his hand after that with his teeth gnas.h.i.+ng.
Sheyan sighed. Their power was still far from enough. Construction was always going to be more difficult than destruction. The second generation of X-Men had not matured yet, while Professor Xavier was a telepathy user. Unfortunately, all contestants had innate mind barriers. The strength of this driver was only about the level of a Growth Hunter. There was still a long road ahead of Sheyan.
Xavier"s face had been gloomy all this time, albeit with a statue-like indifference. His mind recalled the few strangers who was wandering around his old friend"s funeral this morning without a hint of sadness in their faces. Their eyes were alert and sinister!
The recollection of those people made him anxious to get to Bolton"s former residence at once, but he did not rush Hank. The driver who had followed him for twenty-five years must know his mind.
Through the spotless clean winds.h.i.+eld of the Volkswagen Phaeton, they saw the road sign for 156th Street. Hank slowed down, gave the signal, and turned the corner with familiar ease. The red spire villa ahead was Mr. Bolton"s house. Xavier had enjoyed talking with his old friend on the neat lawn while taking pleasure in the afternoon sun and Mrs. Bolton"s homemade cookies.
Unfortunately, the lawn had now been roughly trampled on. A group of men in black suits were currently standing on the lawn. Mrs. Bolton could be heard crying under their threats. Everything in the house, including the furnitures, had been moved out. Even the wooden floor had been prized open.
These men seemed to be very professional in their search, but they apparently did not know anything about handling things properly and putting them back in place, so the whole house was in a mess. There were few onlookers due to the presence of police cars and police tapes.
Xavier closed his eyes. His face remained calm, but Jean knew from the way Professor Xavier"s knuckles turned white from grabbing the handles of his wheelchair that the old man was angered.
Hank skillfully stepped on the brakes, pulled the handbrake, and then opened the door at once. Sheyan heard a series of strange clicks behind him. He turned around to look and saw Xavier"s wheelchair transforming rapidly!!
That"s right, it was transforming!
The wheelchair skillfully folded, spliced, and rea.s.sembled until it formed a unique-looking exoskeleton on Xavier"s legs. It actually enabled the crippled Xavier to stand up and stride towards the house.
Xavier"s expression remained stoic, but Sheyan could feel that something was wrong - something was seriously wrong, as if his thoughts were being interfered with! He started to slow down a little.
Wherever Xavier pa.s.sed, the people around him would freeze as if time had stopped for them. They all had the same expression - their mouths were agape and their faces distorted. They looked like wax figures.
"This power..." Sheyan frowned. "Memory Enslavement? Looks like the old man is really angry."
The policemen and FBI agents who stood there motionless only recovered after more than ten minutes. Their memories remained at the moment when Sheyan and the mutants arrived; they did not remember anything that happened after that. What was more frightening was the extremely violent headache that a.s.saulted them afterwards. At the same time that Xavier deprived them of their memory, he also killed the brain cells carrying the memory, as a punishment!!
The result was that these unlucky people would suffer from something akin to trigeminal neuralgia for the rest of their lives, with no effective cure.
( trigeminal neuralgia : )
That was the consequence of angering Professor X.
***
After settling down Mrs. Bolton and her family, Xavier told Sheyan with a frown on his face, "So they actually did set up an organisation, and their research has even entered the experimental stage, but the organisation is already on the verge of disbandment due to financial troubles and Bolton"s arrest. Most crucially, there"s no one among them who can take over the leaders.h.i.+p role left by Bolton."
Sheyan replied with a laugh, "Money shouldn"t be a problem for us. Our vampire allies are very strong in the financial aspect. More importantly, Professor, if the government can charge a billion Euros for a boarding ticket, we can charge 2 billion Euros! But only if our plan has a good chance of succeeding, of course. As for the leaders.h.i.+p role, let me think first. I believe there must be a way."
Professor Bolton"s research materials were stored in a USB stick.
Considering the terrible earthquakes that would occur during the apocalypse, places like underground nuclear bunkers were doomed to become graveyards. That was why a vast majority of scientists went with the Noah"s Ark plan.
Unfortunately, Professor Bolton apparently could not carry out the same plan. But, building an ark was not the only choice. The final plan they settled on was....to build an airs.h.i.+p!
A huge airs.h.i.+p!
From the theoretical design, it could roughly be seen that the airs.h.i.+p could fly at the alt.i.tude of 15,000 to 20,000 meters, entering the stratosphere. This way, it could avoid the lightnings, hails, rainstorms and other natural phenomena occurring in the troposphere.
The design of the airs.h.i.+p did not emphasise speed, but instead focused on weight, firmness and stability. If the plan was successful, the biggest enemy the airs.h.i.+p would face would be the strong wind. Therefore, the airs.h.i.+p did not have a high requirement for the engine and fuel. Under this design concept, the carrying capacity of the airs.h.i.+p could reach a staggering 800 tons!
It would be able to carry 5,000 people, and that was calculated according to the average adult weight of 60 kilograms ( 60 kg x 5,000 = 300 tons ) If they were willing to reduce the quality of life on top of the airs.h.i.+p, the boarding limit could even be increased to 10,000 people.
Airs.h.i.+ps would not have any fear of cras.h.i.+ng. Because the alt.i.tude of the airs.h.i.+p was unnaturally high - even volcanic ashes could only stay in the troposphere - solar cells could be used as a stable energy source. As for the water source, once they used up the water reserves, they could collect more in the troposphere. The design concept suggested the possibility of constructing two to three airs.h.i.+ps to act exclusively as freshwater and food supply platforms.
The people aboard the airs.h.i.+p may have to live under strict rations of freshwater and food, and their living s.p.a.ces would be comparable to that of prisoners, but the apocalypse was estimated to last for only about a month anyway. Enduring a month of prison life was much better than death.
Sheyan no doubt knew the specific circ.u.mstances of the apocalypse. He truly felt that this plan was very likely to succeed. He continued reading and found that the plan mainly had three major problems:
First, the metallic framework of the airs.h.i.+p was not strong enough. They could not find any solution for this problem at the moment.
Second, they could not generate sufficient force for lift-off.
Third, the power system could not generate sufficient propulsion force.
If these three problems could be overcome, the project could immediately enter the construction phase.
When Sheyan saw that these three difficulties were the only problems they had to resolve, he actually felt a sense of relief because he felt that the biggest obstacle had already been overcome. He could not help bursting out with joyous laughter.