The Seaside

Originally written on 2023/9/3, Slightly modified & Translated on 2024/1/19

Artificial Intelligence technology (DeepL Translator, DeepL Write) is used during the creation of this article.

Andy drives his car with Mico to the seaside.

The car stops at the border between greenland and wasteland. Nearby are some grayish green, lonely trees. Andy puts on his mask and gets out of the car.

“Is this your first time by the sea?” Mico asks as he opens the car door.

Andy is stunned for a moment, then turns back to Mico. “How do you know that?”

“This place is about 2km from the coast and the last rain was 982 hours ago. According to the data of my sensors, the radiation level here is far below the safe level for humans. Also, masks have little protection against radiation. At least a full protective suit is needed to provide effective protection.”

Andy takes off his mask and puts it in his pocket with an embarrassed smile on his face.

“Why didn’t I know he had radiation sensors before?” Andy thinks.

They walk along a narrow path to the top of a cliff, where they have a wide view of the sea. Andy takes out his tripods and telescopes, while Mico adjusts his optical zoom lens.

Seen from afar, the wasteland covers an area 2 km wide near the coast. Rocks lie on the ground, a thin layer of sand appearing near the seawater. There is a blurred line between the blue, purple seawater and the grayish yellow sandy beach. If Mico wanted, he could step closer to the sea, or even stand in the seawater to feel the waves, with a more spectacular view in sight: Blue, green, and purple liquids colliding without dissolving, forming a picture of chaos; the afterglow of the sunset shining on the seawater, reflected in a glowing, strange white color; the sea and sky tinted together by the twilight, as if the pale sky were caught by a hint of purple. However, if Mico had done so, he would not be able to return to Andy anymore, because the radioactive substances in the seawater will penetrate deeply into his metal body and follow him forever.

The sea is no longer the symbol of beauty, purity and freedom, but the end of the world and the forbidden zone of terrestrial life.

“What do you see?” Andy asks Mico.

“According to the infrared spectrum analysis, the composition of substances in the seawater are too complex to be known accurately.” Mico says.

“We are here for sight seeing, not for chemical analyzing.” Andy says in a slightly complaining tone.

“Then do you want me to record the panorama view near the coast?”

“No, I didn’t mean that.” Andy waves his hand, “This scenery is creepy to see too much.”

A group of birds fly over their heads, their trail being perfectly tangent with the border of the wasteland. Birdsong echoes in the broad sky.

“I remember my grandpa telling me when I was a kid that a long, long time ago, when humans were still living on Earth, the sea was a very beautiful place, where people would enjoy sunbath, play volleyball, swim and surf. Also the products from the sea used to form an important industry of human.” Andy says.

“Wouldn’t the radiation in the sea be harmful to human?” Mico asks.

“No no no, “ Andy shakes his head, “There was no radiation in the sea at that time. The seawater was so pure that it could even be filtered into drinkable fresh water, and had an awesome azure blue color under the sunlight, rather than being weird green and purple now.”

Andy takes his tablet PC out of his backpack. “I remember that I’ve seen an very old video about that.”

He finds the video on the tablet and taps the play button. The scene in the video is exactly the wonderful blue ocean that grandpa had talked about. The recorder stands on the board of a boat, with the clear vast sea shone by sunlight as the background.

“There was no holographic imaging back then, and all videos are on flat 2D.” Andy passes the tablet to Mico.

“Day 7 being out, nice gains today!” The white-haired old man smiles at the camera. The camera is turned and shows various kinds of fishing on the board.

“Most of these aquatic species have gone extinct.” Mico gives the tablet back to Andy. “So, when did the radiation in the sea start to appear?”

“Well… I don’t really know much about it,” Andy replies, “According to the history of the Earth, it seems that starting from a certain year, the radiation level of the sea began to increase rapidly, and then the beach went quiet, after that the seafood industry crashed, and finally… became what it is now.” Andy puts down the telescope and looks out at the blue and purple sea in the distance.

“It is said that a long time ago, people used to build power plants which are powered by nuclear fission near the sea, since the seawater is a convenient cooling liquid. They believed that it had barely no effects on the ocean environment, but they didn’t realize how serious the problem was until the radiation level rose up to a dramatic amount.”

“According to my calculations, if human transported the power plants into inland and store the nuclear waste water properly, the ocean radiation level would decrease significantly.” Mico says.

“Good idea, but it happened that many natural calamities stroke frequently, plus the interstellar travel became much cheaper, so a lot of people wanted to move on to Mars and they believed that the Earth was coming to its end. Coincidentally, it took a massive amount of energy to send people to Mars, so they just went ahead and built more and more power plants near the sea, until there was no one left on Earth…”

“If there were as many photothermic power plants¹ on Earth as there are on Mars, the ocean wouldn’t be what it is now, would it?”

“Maybe won’t.” Andy sighs.

A moment of silence. The setting sun has already touched the horizon in the distance.

“Do you think the Earth is a great place?” Andy asks Mico.

“Most of the plant and animal species and geographic landforms here do not exist on Mars. The landscape here is unique, but the climate is not suitable for long-term human life.”

“True indeed, living here is not so comfortable as on Mars, and you have to worry about winds and rains all the day.² It is really difficult for us to imagine how our ancestors used to live on Earth.”

“Do you mean the era before the rising of ocean radiation?”

Andy nods. “Life on Earth must be great at that time, with fresh air and green plants everywhere, and the awesome blue sky that has the same color as the sea before. Unlike Mars, everywhere is desert, just like the coast here, and sandstorm goes often.”

“Estimated at the current greening rate, there is about thirty years before Mars reaches the same level of vegetation cover as Earth.”

“You are so good at comforting people.” Andy rolls his eyes.

The sun sets as stars dot the eastern sky. Andy folds up his tripods and telescopes.

“It’s getting late. It will rain the day after tomorrow and we have a flight to the Moon to catch the day before that. By the way, when is the next flight back to Mars?”

“It’s 50 hours later, taking off from the 3rd Lunar Surface Station.”

“Let’s go.”

Andy puts on his backpack and walks back with Mico. The car follows the ruts in the ground back the way it came. After the car lights disappear into the woods, there is nothing but the moon shining silently on the dark earth.

(The End)

Meta Info

Spoiler Alert! Please make sure you have finished reading the main article.

Click to Unfold

This story happens in its independent (fictional) universe.

Characters

Mico (Robot, Boy)

Using the main settings of RoboMico.

Andy (Human, Boy)

Born on Mars. The owner and friend of Mico.

Settings & Backgrounds

After the Earth environment deteriorated because the sea was seriously polluted by radioactive substances, the whole human beings moved onto the Mars, left Earth as a natural park planet. This story is a slice of the travel to Earth of Andy & Mico, who mainly live on Mars.

The Moon is used as a transportation hub between Earth and Mars, since humans still have the plan to gather resources from Earth.

More detailed settings can be found in the footnotes.

Relations with Reality

• Andy is named after the real English name of the author of this article.
• This article is written to protest against the discharge of radioactive water of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

Easter Eggs

• “Do you think the Earth is a great place?” Andy asks Mico.

  This sentence is a play on a line from the movie The Wandering Earth 2.

Footnotes

1. A photothermic power plant is a clean energy power plant that collects the sun’s thermal energy and uses molten salts as the heat-conducting medium. They are common to see on Mars. ↩︎

2. Rainfall and sea breezes can carry trace amounts of radioactive substances from the ocean inland, and it takes at least 30 Earth days (720 hours) for the resulting radiation effects to be reduced to a safe level. ↩︎