There 8217;s evidence that-due to occasional heat waves-ice in the Martian soil occasionally melts and flows as a liquid. When this happens, the trickle of water quickly dries up before it can get very far. However, we 8217;ve got a lot of ocean at our disposal.
有证据表明，由于火星表面时不时会有热浪产生，火星土壤中的冰会时不时地融化，并像液体一样发生流动。这种情况发生时，涓涓细流走不了多远就会蒸发完。不过别忘了我们手上可是有大把大把的海水的。
The water pools in the North Polar Basin:
海水开始灌进北极盆地：
Gradually, it will fill the basin:
慢慢地海水会填满整个盆地：
However, if we look at a map of the more equatorial regions of Mars, where the volcanoes are, we 8217;ll see that there 8217;s still a lot of land far from the water:
不过如果我们在火星赤道地区（有好多火山）看的话，其实还是有许多陆地离海水很远的：
[Mercator projection; does not show the poles.]墨卡托投影图，不包括极点
Frankly, I think this map is kind of boring; there 8217;s not a lot going on. It 8217;s just a big empty swath of land with some ocean at the top.
坦白来说，我觉得这张地图有点无聊：没有太大的变化，有的只是上面的陆地，还有海洋。
Would not buy again.
差评！
We haven 8217;t come close to running out of ocean yet although there was a lot of blue on the map of the Earth at the end of our last answer, the seas that remained were shallow; most of the volume of the oceans was gone.
可是我们手头上的海水还远远没用完呢。虽然在上篇的结尾处，地球从地图上看上去还有许多蓝色的地方，但它们都十分浅，大部分的海水已经不翼而飞了。
And Mars is much smaller than Earth, so the same volume of water will make a deeper sea.
而火星又比地球小很多，因而同样体积的海水会形成更深的海洋。
At this point, the water fills in the Valles Marineris, creating some unusual coastlines. The map is less boring, but the terrain around the great canyons makes for some odd shapes.
此时此刻，海水漫进了水手号谷，并形成了许多不同寻常的海岸线。这张图看起来就有趣多了，但大峡谷附近地区的形状有些奇怪。
The water now reaches and swallows up Spirit and Opportunity. Eventually, it breaks into the Hellas Impact Crater, the basin containing the lowest point on Mars.
海水现在刚好淹没“勇气号”和“机遇号”。最终它会涌入海勒斯陨石坑，火星上的最低点就在这个陨石坑里。
In my opinion, the rest of the map is starting to look pretty good.
在我看来，剩下的地图变得越来越好看了。
As the water spreads across the surface in earnest, the map splits into several large islands (and innumerable smaller ones).
随着水位继续给力地上涨，现在地图上只剩少数几座大岛（还有数不清的小岛）了。
The water quickly finishes covering most of the high plateaus, leaving only a few islands left.
海水很快就淹没了绝大多数的高原，现在只剩为数不多的几个小岛了。
And then, at last, the flow stops; the oceans back on Earth are drained.
最后，我们断水了！因为地球上的海洋都已经干了……
Let 8217;s take a closer look at the main islands:
现在让我们仔细看看这些主要的岛屿：
No rovers remain above water.
所有火星探测器都已经被淹了
Olympus Mons, and a few other volcanoes, remain above water. Surprisingly, they aren 8217;t even close to being covered. Olympus Mons still rises well over 10 kilometers above the new sea level. Mars has some huge mountains.
奥林帕斯山和其他一些火山依然坚挺地露出了水面。令人惊讶的是，它们离被淹没还远着呢。奥林帕斯山比新的海平面高出10千米以上，火星上还是有巨型山脉的。
Those crazy islands are the result of water filling in Noctis Labyrinthus (the Labyrinth of the Night), a bizarre set of canyons whose origin is still a mystery.
这些惊人的岛屿是海水涌入诺克提斯迷宫（注：火星上位于水手号谷和塔尔西斯之间的区域，因其类似迷宫、深而陡峭的峡谷而得名）的产物，这些奇形怪状的峡谷围成了一个找不到起点的诡异迷宫。
The oceans on Mars wouldn 8217;t last. There might be some transient greenhouse warming, but in the end, Mars is just too cold. Eventually, the oceans will freeze over, become covered with dust, and gradually migrate to the permafrost at the poles.
但火星上的这个海洋不会存在太长时间。在消失前，火星上可能出现短暂的温室效应，但说到底火星还是太冷了。最终海洋会彻底结冰，然后被灰尘覆盖，然后逐渐移动到极点成为永久冻土。
However, it would take a long time, and until it did, Mars would be a much more interesting place.
这个过程要花很长很长时间。不过一旦真的变成这样了，火星会变得更加有趣。
When you consider that there 8217;s a ready-made portal system to allow transit between the two planets, the consequences are inevitable:
考虑到跨越两个星球的传送门运输系统已经有现成的了，那么以下结果就是不可避免的了：