Chapter 210: The Sea Party (Part 5)

“With three thousand Mosin-Nagants, the bullet supply would be even more strained.” Bei Wei knew more about the bullet problem than they did. Although all the transmigrator group’s ammunition was purchased by the North American branch, the usage status and ammunition inventory were top secrets known only to the Executive Committee. Although Bei Wei didn’t know the specific bullet inventory, the ammunition issued to the Special Reconnaissance Team Command was now divided into training use and combat use. Training use was all black powder reloads. This type of ammunition not only produced a lot of smoke but also left a lot of residue after firing, making maintenance particularly troublesome.

“Is it difficult to make 70/30 brass? Didn’t the metallurgical department make zinc brass for sheathing the bottom of ships? That can also be used to make shell casings.”

“We’re short on copper.” Qian Shuiting, working at the Planning Commission, of course knew the specific situation. Zinc was plentiful, and if the Planning Commission was willing, they could continue to increase the reserves. The copper shortage was significant. “Let’s put it this way: for electricity, telecommunications, and now shipbuilding, copper is an irreplaceable resource. Since the Minie rifle with its mercury fulminate cap and paper-cased Minie ball works, switching to fixed ammunition is not a priority. Besides, many of the Minie rifles were newly made in the last two years. We can’t just phase them out right away, can we?”

The group looked over the firearms, and while talking, they began to move the selected guns and ammunition to the aft deck, ready to have some fun.

On the foredeck, the few ladies were sitting in the hot tub, enjoying the water massage. With soft music playing, they chatted while drinking tropical drinks of rum-laced fruit juice soda, feeling very comfortable.

Sarina closed her eyes, almost completely submerged in the water. The leisurely atmosphere felt so unreal to her, as if she were at a resort in her original timeline. All the experiences she had gone through since the transmigration seemed like a dream. Tears suddenly welled up in her eyes. She grabbed a towel from the side of the tub, wiped her face and head haphazardly, and then said she was going to get another drink. She got up and went into the upper cabin. Sitting on a high stool at the bar, she stared blankly out of the boat, letting her tears flow freely.

Suddenly, a hand gently patted her on the shoulder. Sarina turned to see Ai Beibei looking at her with concern.

“It’s okay, everything will be fine,” Ai Beibei said softly. Sarina said “sorry,” tidied herself up a bit, and when she turned back, she had recovered her usual composure. As expected of a trained law enforcement officer. Ai Beibei continued, “You don’t have to worry. You’ve been accepted as a full elder now. Those rumors can’t pose any threat to you anymore, unless someone is prepared to challenge the authority of the Senate.”

Sarina couldn’t help but say, “But you still think I’m different from you. I’m not talking about you, I’m talking about…”

Ai Beibei interrupted her. “I know. Acceptance is a process. We all have to gradually adapt. For a long time after we came to the United States, even after we became citizens, we had the same thoughts. But it requires effort from both sides. You should learn to think and act like one of us, not just treat this as a means of making a living. Just as we had to adapt to the ‘American way of life’ back then, now we all have to learn to adapt to the ‘elderly way of life’.”

Sarina had actually been observing the actions of the transmigrators. In her opinion, although this group of elders had copied the organizational model of a socialist country, imitated the working methods used by socialist countries and parties, and flew flags and symbols with a distinct leftist color, it was a far-right regime she had never seen before. This ruling group openly advocated for a permanent dictatorship under a republic of elders. This made her very uneasy, even though she was now an elder herself.

Ai Beibei’s words made Sarina fall into deep thought. In the ATF where Sarina used to work, although they were not responsible for handling political cases, they often came into contact with various political organizations when dealing with gun-related cases. But she had never seen a peculiar political organization like the transmigrator group. It wasn’t that she was having a fit of democratic and liberal political correctness, but out of the simplest instinct to protect herself. Sarina had realized since D-Day that she was in a precarious state. From being attacked and almost raped at the beginning, to later having to live in seclusion for a long time in the heavily guarded Political Security Bureau compound, a terrible threat of being either executed or reduced to a sex slave had been hanging over her head.

Now that she was an elder, she no longer had to worry about her personal safety and freedom in this regard. Integrating into this group as soon as possible was indeed her top priority.

Ai Beibei added, “You have your strengths, and you don’t have the language barrier like Mendoza. You also know a lot about Chinese culture. As long as you’re willing, it won’t be too difficult.”

At this moment, a few men came up from below, carrying ammunition boxes, and the two women temporarily stopped their conversation. Perhaps to show off his muscles, Xue Ziliang had not changed into dry clothes but was bare-chested with a large bath towel wrapped around his waist.

Ai Beibei nudged Sarina. “He’s pretty good.”

Sarina smiled noncommittally.

“It seems you also have a good impression of Guo Yi?” Sarina’s eyes widened slightly. She thought: direct gossip like this is rare.

“In my opinion, Vinnie is more suitable for you than Little Guo,” Ai Beibei said meaningfully. “You have the same cultural background, after all. You’ll get along better. As for Little Guo, we all understand his thoughts.”

“I understand,” Sarina said, looking at Xue Ziliang on the aft deck, lost in thought. “Thank you, Beibei.”

On the aft deck, the few men began to compete. Bei Wei suggested not using firearms like the AR-15. Qian Shuiting knew he was afraid of criticism. After all, modern-made ammunition was a rarity now, and whether it was public or private, it was considered a shameful waste. So he went with the flow and suggested shooting clay pigeons with shotguns.

The shotgun shells were paper-cased, and the lead shot, black powder, and primers were not first-class controlled materials. There shouldn’t be any problem shooting them.

They first shot a round of shotguns. The North American group’s collection was mostly tactical shotguns with barrels of only about eighteen inches. To be fair, everyone used this type of short-barreled gun, leaving the long-barreled turkey guns in the storage room.

Bei Wei held a Benelli M2, Xue Ziliang an M4, both tactical semi-automatic shotguns. Qian Shuixie used a SAIGA-12 semi-automatic shotgun, which usually used a drum magazine but was now using a five-round magazine for lightness. Qian Shuiting used a very cheap Norinco 982, a copy of the Remington 870 Express tactical shotgun. Although it cost less than $200, many considered it superior to the original Remington 870 Express.

Because the space on the boat was small, they stood on the platform behind the helm to shoot. The boat had one automatic and one manual clay pigeon launcher, using locally made clay pigeons that Qian Shuixie had someone burn. Qian Duoduo volunteered to launch the clay pigeons but was pulled back by Ai Beibei.

A round of twenty-five shots ended in a draw. Xue Ziliang’s 22 hits was the highest score. Bei Wei and Qian Shuixie both had 20 hits. Qian Shuiting only hit 18, but since his gun was the cheapest, no one thought it was too bad.

After talking, they switched to long guns. To avoid the trouble of being accused of waste, Qian Shuiting simply took out the replica rifles from his collection, a Spencer rifle and a Henry-Martini rifle. The ammunition for these two guns could in no way be considered “modern ammunition,” and they used black powder.

They first used the clay pigeon launcher to shoot clay pigeons into the sea as targets, but the distance was too close, and everyone felt it wasn’t satisfying enough. Then, Zhou Weisen set up a pile of strangely shaped waste pottery he had picked up from Xiao Bailang on the breakwater. Everyone had a blast shooting at them with their rifles.

Because many of the guns couldn’t be played with, the Qian brothers felt bored and quickly packed up the guns and ammunition, collected all the shell casings on the deck by category, and volunteered to start the barbecue for everyone. Zhou Weisen played with a few of the male guests for a while longer, and then they decided to go swimming and diving. In the bay, Lin Shenhe had a set of Zhou Weisen’s snorkeling equipment and was enjoying himself. Bei Wei was also very interested in diving. When he was in the military region’s reconnaissance brigade, although he could swim a thousand meters with full gear and could hold his breath underwater for a long time, the conditions were limited at that time, and he had never had formal diving training. He would not miss such an opportunity.

Zhou Weisen immediately took out two sets of diving gear from the Feiyun. Because the water in the bay was very shallow, with the deepest part being less than 6 meters, they didn’t use wetsuits, only oxygen tanks and regulators. After a brief instruction on the basics, they started diving. Qian Shuiting also gave him a CO2-powered speargun. The underwater ecosystem of this bay had a coral reef and was rich in biological species. After mastering the basics of diving, Bei Wei used the speargun to shoot fish. But he had no experience shooting in the water, and after firing four or five spears, he still came up empty-handed. However, he did manage to catch a lobster with his bare hands.

When he returned to the deck, exhilarated, and rinsed off with fresh water, Bei Wei looked at the few North American gun enthusiasts with new respect. Their weapon experience and special skills were all very useful. When Qian Shuixie had requested to join the Special Reconnaissance Team, he had had reservations about this “American spoiled soldier.” Now it seemed that, at least in terms of military skills, they were all excellent officer material.

However, Bei Wei was, after all, educated by the Party. He knew that a person’s true political outlook was the most important thing, so he didn’t say much more. He just invited Qian Shuiting, Zhou Weisen, and the others to visit the Special Reconnaissance Team Command more often to exchange experiences in using weapons and to help train the soldiers in their professional skills.