Chapter 517 - The New Position
The waiter swept in bearing a magnificent platter—a whole slab of roast pork, skin-on and weighing a full jin. The rind had been cooked to a deep golden-brown, crackling and blistered, dusted with some unfamiliar herb that released a heady fragrance as the fat beneath it sizzled and popped.
"That smells incredible!" Ruan Xiaoqi's throat worked involuntarily.
The platter was heaped with golden fried potato strips, lightly grilled tomato slices, and bright-green blanched broccoli—all "Australian produce" that had appeared only in the past year. In all of Lingao, only the Australians' own mess halls, the Co-op restaurant, and the trading post served them. The roast-meat sauce, carefully blended, pooled at the edges of the platter and mingled with the dripping fat in a way that made one's fingers itch.
The waiter wielded a two-pronged fork and carving knife with practiced ease, slicing the meat so that each portion included skin, fat, and lean in perfect proportion.
"This roast is magnificent!" Ruan Xiao'er exclaimed. "The price is equally magnificent."
"A rare treat. Besides, we can afford it now," declared Ruan Xiaowu, newly emboldened by his officer's commission.
"We still ought to save something for finding wives."
The three brothers were chatting when a commotion erupted outside the private room—shuffling footsteps and a confusion of voices. Then came the waiter's strained appeal: "Gentlemen, please don't crowd—please don't crowd—return to your tables—this is a chief, no gawking please!"
As they puzzled over this, a knock came at the door. Through it, the waiter announced: "Officers, a chief wishes to see you."
Indigenous folk had no right to refuse when a chief wished to see them. The door opened before the waiter had finished speaking. Pan Pan walked in.
She still had her black box slung over one shoulder, pen and notebook in hand.
"Xiaowu, I'm here to continue the interview." She produced her letter of introduction. "I've obtained authorization from your brothers' units as well."
The letter now bore additional stamps from the Navy's Bopu Fortress District and the Military-Political School, covering nearly half the page.
And so the three brothers' family dinner became Pan Pan's interview session. One by one, their expressions stiff, they endured questioning on all manner of topics—including what type of woman they preferred. When the interrogation finally ended, they were posed and photographed for several group portraits before she released them.
It was a relief to see the foreign-woman chief off at last. The three brothers wiped the sweat from their brows and slumped into their seats.
"Good heavens! That foreign lady has a powerful scent!" Ruan Xiao'er panted. "Something between perfume and musk."
"How did a foreign woman end up being a chief anyway?" The Ruan brothers exchanged puzzled looks.
"Apparently she's a chief's wife—or perhaps a concubine. There seem to be quite a few red-haired people among the Australians. Several chiefs have red hair."
"But they all seem to be women."
"The chiefs have peculiar tastes." Ruan Xiao'er was a bit older and possessed some acquaintance with matters between men and women; he relished discussing them.
The gathering lasted until eight in the evening, when the steam whistles of the Bairen industrial zone's factories sounded the nighttime signal and they dispersed. Any later, and the last ox-cart shuttle to Bopu would stop running. Ruan Xiao'er and Ruan Xiaowu would travel to Bopu together; Ruan Xiaoqi would return to his school alone.
After their farewells, the two elder brothers set off under the night sky and boarded the public ox-cart running between Bairen Fortress and Bopu. Both were slightly tipsy.
"Petty Officer and Ensign—do you have your IDs? No ID means you buy a ticket," announced the conductor-cum-guard, who sat beside the ox-cart driver wearing a uniform, a dual-use combat-and-work safety helmet, and a leather vest with front and back steel plates for protection.
The guard wore a bayonet at his waist and carried a short-barreled Minié rifle on his back. These were Army soldiers, assigned in rotation to duty on the ox-carts—first to protect the transit route and vehicle, second to deter anyone inclined to ride without paying.
Ruan Xiao'er and Ruan Xiaowu produced their military passes. The guard held them close to the lantern hanging at the cart's front, carefully comparing their photographs, before returning them. Military personnel rode free as a rule, but anyone without ID forfeited the exemption.
The late ox-cart was nearly empty—only half the seats occupied. The cart lumbered into motion. Once they passed East Gate Market, the lighting dimmed. Lamppost standards lined both sides of the road, but the lamps were merely candle-lit lanterns—less for illumination than for marking the road's boundaries, lest pedestrians or vehicles wander off the pavement. Actual visibility depended on the carriage lantern hung from the cart itself.
Every few kilometers, whenever the ox-cart passed a blockhouse, drums sounded from above and the guard tapped a small gong a certain number of times—a departure signal whose count varied by day, serving as a recognition code for the route-protection system.
According to Police Headquarters regulations, all nighttime traffic—whether vehicles or pedestrians—had to carry a lantern as a signal. Anyone detected without one by a blockhouse could be fired upon at any time; casualties would not be investigated. In practice, shots were never fired except in emergencies, but anyone caught would be taken into the blockhouse and detained overnight.
The carriage lantern's glow spilled into the cart's interior, quite dim; the passengers were mere silhouettes. In the distance, Bairen Fortress and the industrial zone across the river blazed with light. The steelworks' smelting furnaces were apparently still in production; their glow reddened the sky, and the roar of machinery and the clang of steel carried clearly even from the opposite bank.
By now, these sights were utterly familiar to the brothers—no longer sources of the fear and wonder they had once provoked. The Ruan brothers vaguely understood that it was precisely these steel monsters, thundering day and night, that had enabled the Australians to transform Lingao—and to transform themselves and everyone in it.
Ruan Xiaowu's leave was full and eventful. Classmates and colleagues he had worked with came one after another to offer congratulations; banquets and dinners filled two days. On the final day, knowing he would take command of his ship the next morning and immediately set out on a mission, he shut himself in the Bopu barracks to rest and recharge—and to ponder how to manage his ship and his sailors.
Unlike the Army, whose ranks came mostly from honest peasants, sailors were predominantly former pirates, tainted with all manner of bad habits and correspondingly more unruly. Instilling discipline in them required far more effort than with Army recruits. Wei Aiwen and Chen Haiyang had devoted enormous energy to cultivating a disciplinary mindset and strictly reinforcing the concept of rank. Consequently, although the Navy's compensation far exceeded the Army's, hierarchy was more rigid and discipline far stricter. Thanks to civilizing influences from the twenty-first century, no one proposed restoring corporal punishment, but the threshold for court-martial was very low. A captain had the authority to arrest, confine, and interrogate anyone aboard at any time during a voyage. A military tribunal could be convened on board, composed of the captain, one officer or cadet, and one sailor delegate. Once conviction was rendered, the captain possessed authority to sentence the offender to death.
Of course, the captain's power was not as absolute as it might seem. Ruan Xiaowu had been a member of the "Group of Ten" and knew that every ship carried secret Group-of-Ten members; the captain's words and actions were reported continuously. When necessary, the Group of Ten had authority to take over a vessel—though any such takeover would be subjected to rigorous review afterward. During his training, the chiefs had repeatedly warned them: only when an officer committed a clear, imminent act of defection to the enemy—and no other force nearby was capable of immediately stopping the act—could the Group of Ten reveal itself and seize command. No other circumstance could justify taking command; otherwise it would be treated as mutiny. The consequences were severe.
"You must always remember: you are secret agents, not political commissars! Never undermine an officer's authority. Advocating for soldiers' rights is the business of the Soldiers' Committee," Ran Yao had reminded them more than once during training. "The moment you expose your identity needlessly, you lose that identity—and your purpose for existing."
In practice, the Political Security Bureau dealt harshly with soldiers who leaked their Group-of-Ten status. Several of Ruan Xiaowu's classmates in the training program had been punished for violating the Group's internal regulations—sent to the Political Section's disciplinary unit. Some had their military status revoked and were dispatched to the labor-reform camps.
Little had he imagined that he was now, himself, among those being monitored. Of course, his Group-of-Ten status remained unchanged despite his promotion to officer and captain. Once you joined the Group of Ten, it was essentially a lifetime posting. Now, naturally, a new Group-of-Ten member would be assigned to Linyun 7, while he would be tasked with monitoring other captains—even higher-ranking officers.
The previous night, an unsigned letter had appeared in his barracks-room drawer. The Political Security Bureau instructed him to report to the Bopu naval officers' mess during breakfast the following morning and await further directives.
While queuing in the bustling mess hall for breakfast, an indigenous naval officer he had never seen before approached him. After they exchanged recognition signals, the man handed him a document containing detailed instructions.
The letter—without salutation or signature—first congratulated him on his promotion to ensign and his elevation to captain, wishing him success in "shining brightly" and "achieving new feats" in his new post. Then came instructions for his next assignment.
His mission was changed to monitoring other captains in the naval detachment to which Yu Te 04 belonged. Reports were still monthly; in emergencies, he could report at any time. The letter emphasized that reports would be submitted by mail, giving the address: P.O. Box 119, Bairen General Post Office.
Somewhere on his own ship, one of the crew was a Group-of-Ten member. Given Yu Te 04's size and complement of roughly twelve to eighteen men, there was at least one. Ruan Xiaowu felt certain he could identify the agent—but on reflection, he decided it was better not to try.
(End of Chapter)