Inside the chairman's office at the Aerospace Military Industry Group.
Gao Jianjun had just breathed a sigh of relief after resolving the urgent order for ten Long March 11 rockets and was about to make himself a cup of tea and take a break.
But the red encrypted telephone on his desk let out a piercing ring.
"Ring, ring-"
His heart lurched, and he snatched up the receiver.
"Hello, Gao Jianjun speaking."
A steady, powerful voice he knew all too well came from the other end.
"Comrade Jianjun, I'll keep this brief."
"The military needs to place a new procurement order."
Gao Jianjun picked up a pen, ready to take notes.
"Go ahead."
"Sixty near-Earth orbit satellites."
Gao Jianjun's pen paused.
"Sixty? If we pool our reconnaissance and communications satellites in stock..."
"Not stock models," the voice on the other end interrupted.
"Brand-new, semi-custom models."
"The weight must be kept under fifty kilograms."
"The dimensions must fit the Long March 11's payload fairing, with six satellites per launch."
"The functions must include high-precision geological scanning, signal transmission and reception, BeiDou positioning, an entirely new multispectral imaging array, and so on. The detailed specifications will be sent to your encrypted terminal shortly."
The corner of Gao Jianjun's eye kept twitching as he listened.
He set down his pen and rubbed his temples.
"Sir, do you have some sort of misunderstanding about modern satellite manufacturing?"
"Fifty kilograms, and you want to cram all that inside? How is that any different from building a temple inside a snail shell?"
"That's not even the main issue. The real question is, how soon do you need them? Don't tell me it's the same as the rockets!"
The other end fell silent for two seconds.
"You guessed right. Same as the rockets. We need them in