Because of the sublimation of matter caused by the sunlight, the mass of the meteorite had decreased by more than ten percentage points during these days of transportation. Distraught, Hawke was ready to eat as soon as he reached his destination.
After blocking the sunlight with himself, Hawke steered the cable winch on top of the ship and kept it turning, pulling the target meteor towards him at a speed of about one minute per second.
Or rather Hawke himself was pulled by the meteor. In cosmic space, any suggestion of who was close to whom was meaningless; Hawke was flying towards the stationary sun at twenty kilometres per second, or it could be said that the sun was flying towards the stationary Hawke at twenty kilometres per second, both statements being the same.
It took over half an hour before Hawke closed the distance between himself and the target meteorite to one metre. Then, after connecting the robot to his own hull with a cable, Hawke manoeuvred the robot to transport one of the already secured machines to the target meteor.
Securing the machines was a necessity. Because of its small mass, the escape velocity of the meteor was almost negligible, meaning that with the slightest force, the machines would break away from the meteor. That kind of damage was not something Hawke could accept at the moment.
The robot deftly manoeuvred the machines and set up a collection net with the meteor's back to the sun. Once the net was set up, Hawke retrieved all the machines back to the ship and slowly moved a little further away from the meteor, carefully shifting a little more to allow the sunlight to shine directly on the meteor.
Immediately, the solid water, hydrogen and oxygen on the meteorite began to evaporate, turning into a white mist that drifted backwards, only to be blocked by the collection net Hawk had set up and stored by the storage device behind the net.
Hawke's eyes almost lit up with little stars as he watched everything work out.
"Water, hydrogen, oxygen, all come to brother." Hawke silently recited the off-key words with unbridled excitement.
When the storage device was full, Hawke immediately moved over to re-block the sunlight, then drew closer again and manoeuvred the robot, transferring the collected supplies.
Looking at the fruits of his labour, Hawke's indicator lights flashed about with excitement.
"A hundred kilograms of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen! A full three tonnes of water!" This harvest made Hawke very satisfied. Hawke immediately processed the collected liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, separated out the impurities and met the requirements, and then poured this energy into the engine.
"It feels good to have plenty of energy." Hawke exclaimed, full of energy.
After several days of work, Hawke was able to collect all the water, hydrogen and oxygen from the target meteorite into his pockets. Looking at the meteorite, which was reduced in size by half and in mass by almost half, with only metal and some debris left, Hawke began to think about how to make full use of the remaining material.
Hawke was not very good at working with metal now. In order to reduce the mass and save space, Hawke did not carry large scale metalworking instruments, but only essential, small ones. The original plan was to land on Io and develop it slowly after the surroundings had settled down. Now, however, the original plan had to be changed.
Hawk had determined that most of the remaining material from the meteorite was very good steel, the kind of special steel that could be used to build the space shuttle. Although the quality of the steel had been slightly affected by the Earth's explosion, it could be restored to its original form with a little processing.
Even with Hawke's technology, it would be very difficult to process such steel. So Hawke really could not afford to give these up.
"This must be the remains of some steel mill on Earth." Hawke pondered, "No way, it'll take a bit of time so be it, anyway, now that the energy has been replenished a bit, it can last a bit longer."
Having made up his mind, Hawke brought out his most heavily protected metal working apparatus and worked on both sides, building in place while he began to cut the meteorite down piece by piece and transport it inside the ship to be put away.
Hawke had sensed the shortcomings of his development, the number of robots was too low, only one. That meant that if this droid was damaged, Hawke would lose most of his mobility. Although the rest of the apparatus could be operated under Hawke's control, they were not as flexible as the robot and there were many jobs they could not perform. In that case, Hawke would really be dead. Even if Hawke had the most unbelievable technology in his head and the most subtle methods of making the instruments, it wouldn't work. Without the power of action, who will carry it out?
So with the help of the special steel here, he dismantled the unused and not very useful machinery, and with enough materials, he immediately started the construction of the second robot.
The construction of the second robot took Hawke five days. When it was finally completed, Hawke looked at the four-unlike robot in front of him and laughed bitterly.
Because of the material limitation, this guy in front of Hawke looked more like a monster cobbled together from a large pile of blackened scrap iron. For example, the uneven shell, such as the black paint colour, such as a mess of exposed wires ...
But although the look is ugly, the function is not at all. Even more so, with the accumulation of Hawk's work these days, this robot was a little more powerful than the first one.
After the second robot was built, the cutting and transporting of the meteorite was also a little bit completed. With the addition of the second robot, Hawke's work efficiency immediately doubled.
Looking at the remaining materials, Hawke thought for a moment and made up his mind that he would just get another robot out of the way.
So Hawke assigned one robot to continue collecting meteorite materials, while the other robot began "breeding."
As he watched the chunks of good steel coming into his ship, Hawk wanted to emulate a certain emperor and exclaim, "All the heroes of the world are in my hands."
Two-thirds of the way through the meteor collection, a third robot was born. Hawke's mobility was further enhanced. So, while Hawke continued to have one robot collect materials, the other two robots began to manipulate the machinery, work on the materials and begin to repair the hull.
The damage Hawke had suffered during the Wooden Moon collision had been too severe. Now it finally got a respite of sorts.
Hawke had re-enforced the hull, repaired broken equipment, wiring, redesigned the solar panels, thickened the insulation, and finally brought the small ship he was inhabiting back from the refugee camp to the civilian class. The ship was not yet in perfect condition, but it was almost 80% or 90% functional.
Hawke stayed here for more than two months. After all the preparations were done, Hawke calculated the best orbit to Titan and left the place, heading for the sun.
After a long flight of more than half a month, an unusually bright planet came into Hawke's view.
It was Venus, the star of Eros, the star of enlightenment.
Hawke sighed, remembering the good old days when he was still above the Earth. Venus, for thousands of years, I don't know how many writers and writers had sung its praises and celebrated it.
"Since we're here, let's take a look around and go. And by the way, let's also assess how this Jupiter-Moon collision has affected Venus." Hawke made up his mind and, without affecting the overall course, adjusted his orbit slightly and flew towards Venus.
In the history of human astronautics, Venus does not occupy too heavy a place. This is because the environment on Venus is simply too harsh.
Although the thick clouds give Venus an extremely high albedo, making it the brightest star that can be observed on Earth, such a thick cloud cover also gives Venus an extremely severe greenhouse effect. The average surface temperature on Venus is over 400 degrees Celsius, the atmospheric pressure is several times that of Earth, and the planet is extremely geologically active with acid rain and raging surface magma.
Since the beginning of human astronautics, only a few spacecraft have reached the surface of Venus.
But now the face of Venus took Hawke by surprise.
Most of Venus' heavy cloud cover had actually disappeared. It was thought that the blowing of the Jupiterian winds had caused this. This meant that the temperature on the surface of Venus would slowly drop. Hawke made an estimate and came to the conclusion that in tens of thousands of years, the surface temperature of Venus, could drop to around one hundred degrees.
And, predictably, there will be meteorites from Earth hitting Venus some time in the future. And these meteorites, in turn, could carry the seeds of life.
The tenacity of life has been proven, and there are still bacteria that can survive under high temperatures and pressures at volcanoes under the sea, several thousand metres deep. It is thought that there must be some life that could be adapted to the environment of Venus. These beings, would have branched out and evolved on Venus, and after countless long hours, might even have evolved intelligent life.
"If intelligent life evolves on Venus, when they look up at the stars, I wonder if they will, like humans, develop a desire to develop into the universe? And what would they think when discovering the remains of civilisation in the Earth's meteorite swarm?" Hawke thought silently.
"The existence of the solar system would have been a miracle. And life, too, will always find a reason for their existence. Venus, good luck."
Hawke let out an exclamation as he swept by three thousand kilometres from Venus and looked at the fading figure of Venus.
After storing the data he had obtained about Venus in his hard drive, Hawke returned to his mind and looked into the distance, at the huge ball of fire suspended in the cosmic void, emitting infinite light and heat all the time, and suddenly a sense of pride came into his heart.
"Set off for the sun!"