Remembrance of Earth's Past, #3
Death's End
by Cixin Liu
Contents
Part I — Crisis Era, Years 1–4 Cheng Xin (Chapter 9)
Overview
Cheng Xin’s investigation shows that sending a living hibernating human is impossible, prompting her to suggest cryopreserving a body for the Trisolarans to revive. The plan is further crushed when NASA calculations reduce the payload limit to only half a kilogram.
Amid the announcement of the Wallfacer Project and the attempted assassination of Luo Ji, Wade’s ruthlessness becomes clearer, especially in contrast to Cheng Xin’s moral hesitation. The chapter ends with Wade transforming the Staircase Program again: instead of a person, humanity will send only a brain.
Summary
Cheng Xin visits the hibernation research center in Sanya to determine whether the Staircase Program can send a living human toward the Trisolaran Fleet. The center director explains that artificial hibernation requires blood replacement, cryoprotectant, a body temperature around minus fifty degrees Celsius, life support, cooling equipment, and a system weighing about three metric tons.
Cheng Xin realizes that deep space would make the problem worse: a hibernating body would need long-term heating, likely by radioisotopes, during a century-long journey through near-absolute-zero conditions. Back at PIA Headquarters, this news demoralizes the staff. Under Wade’s pressure to “advance,” Cheng Xin proposes abandoning true hibernation and instead flash-freezing a body as cryopreserved tissue, trusting that Trisolaran technology might be able to revive it.
The revised Staircase Program is prepared for a PDC vote. Its advocates argue that sending a human body would be humanity’s first direct contact with Trisolaris and could place a deceptive human agent at the heart of the enemy. Cheng Xin is unexpectedly invited by Wade to attend the PDC session with him and Mikhail Vadimov.
Before the session, the General Assembly announces the Wallfacer Project, and the PIA team witnesses the aftermath of an assassination attempt on the Fourth Wallfacer, Luo Ji. Wade reacts with detached pragmatism, observing that in the Crisis any ordinary person may suddenly receive great responsibility. Vadimov privately tells Cheng Xin that Wade has threatened to replace him with her, but he also says Cheng Xin lacks the ruthless quality required for some PIA work, which he hopes she never gains.
Camille arrives with a NASA feasibility report and breaks down in anger: nuclear pulse propulsion tests show the spacecraft must be reduced to one-twentieth of its planned mass. The sail can be under ten kilograms, but the usable payload is only half a kilogram, making even a frozen body impossible. As the others despair, Wade insists they must still proceed and reveals his new solution: the Staircase Program will send only a human brain.
Who Appears
- Cheng XinPIA aide; studies hibernation, proposes cryopreservation, and confronts the program’s grim human cost.
- Thomas WadePIA chief; pressures staff to advance, shows ruthlessness, and proposes sending only a brain.
- Mikhail VadimovPIA deputy; warns Cheng Xin about Wade and recognizes her competence but not ruthlessness.
- CamillePIA colleague; delivers NASA’s devastating payload report and erupts in despair over humanity’s limitations.
- Luo Jinewly announced Fourth Wallfacer; survives or is carried away after an assassination attempt outside the UN.
- Hibernation center directorresearch leader in Sanya; explains why practical hibernation equipment cannot meet the mission’s mass limit.
- Hibernation expertChinese specialist; clarifies that Cheng Xin’s idea is cryopreservation, not true hibernation.