Chapter 55
When Ji Mingchen heard that his son had a fight with Yang Qiujin's son and even wanted to kill Yang Qiujin's son, Ji Mingchen was shocked and hurried to the clinic.
At this moment, Shi Fangfang was holding Kong Yu's hand, crying and making a fuss, "Principal Kong, Feiwu is still a child. All children make mistakes. Forget about other things. Just look at the children in our army. Which one has not quarreled with other children, fought, and accidentally hurt each other? It's not a big deal. Why does Yang Qiujin keep harping on the little mistake my son made?"
"Comrade Shi, that's not a small mistake." Kong Yu frowned and said, "Your son wants to kill children of the same grade at such a young age. He is too vicious. We must not allow bad apples to remain in our military schools."
Shi Fangfang wanted to say something, but suddenly saw Ji Mingchen in the corridor. She thought someone was helping her, so she ran to Ji Mingchen and cried, "Mingchen, you are finally here. Look how badly Feiwu was beaten by Yang Qiujin's son... Yang Qiujin didn't even know right from wrong and wanted to kick Feiwu out of the school..."
At this time, Chen Shengqing also received the news from the military camp and hurried to the hospital.
Knowing the whole story, he looked up at Ji Mingchen after hearing what Shi Fangfang said, and the mockery in his eyes could not be concealed.
Ji Mingchen felt ashamed and his face was very ugly. He glared at Shi Fangfang fiercely, holding back his anger, and said through gritted teeth: "Shut up."
He turned to Chen Shengqing and apologized: "Captain Chen, I didn't teach my son well enough. I'm here to apologize to you and your child. I'm sorry, but I will do my best to compensate you for whatever you want."
"Just say sorry and pay you back, and that's it?" Chen Shengqing curled his lips, his eyes full of anger. "If I killed your son, said sorry to you, and paid you some money, would you forgive me?"
He was a soldier who had actually been to the battlefield and killed enemies. At this moment, he was wearing a neat military uniform and a military cap. When he said this, he was filled with murderous aura, and his handsome features looked extremely sinister in the backlight of the corridor.
Shi Fangfang and Ji Feiwu were frightened by his appearance and hid behind Ji Mingchen.
Ji Mingchen's eyelids jumped, "Shengqing, I know my child has made a big mistake. As a father, I have an unshirkable responsibility. Tell me, how can you forgive us?"
"My words don't count." Chen Shengqing walked over to Yang Qiujin and her son, reached out and touched Chen Tianyou's head, "What do you say we should do?"
Chen Tianyou said bitterly: "Kick Ji Feiwu out of the military school, otherwise he will try to bully me every day, and I will have to be on guard against him every day, which is so tiring."
"He bullies you every day?" Chen Shengqing's face darkened, and he looked at Ji Feiwu with murderous intent, "What did he do to you? Someone bullied you, why didn't you tell your father?"
"I'm afraid you and mom will scold me. When I was back home, mom always scolded me and asked me why I always got into fights. She always had to clean up my messes. She was so annoyed that she said she would beat me the same way I beat others in the future. I'm afraid you guys will beat me."
Chen Tianyou felt very aggrieved. "Every day, Ji Feiwu would either set up traps on my way to school, causing me to fall and sprain my ankle, or deliberately pour water on my desk to wet my books and papers, or spit into my lunch box and water cup, and put snakes, rats and insects in my schoolbag. When I saw these things, I screamed in fear, and Teacher Li scolded me, saying that I screamed like a ghost, didn't study hard, and made all kinds of noises that affected other students' studies. There were so many things like this that I didn't dare to say anything, and could only fight with Ji Feiwu in private."
Chen Shengqing felt very uncomfortable after hearing this. He half-knelt in front of Chen Tianyou and looked up at him. "Tianyou, I'm sorry for you. It's because mom and dad didn't give you enough sense of security and trust that you have to deal with so many things by yourself. Dad promises you that in the future, unless you make a big mistake, dad will never scold or beat you. If you encounter anything, tell mom and dad first, okay? You have to remember that mom and dad are behind you to support you. No matter what you say, mom and dad will believe you unconditionally. If you encounter something in the future, don't bear it alone. Tell mom and dad about it. We will face it together and solve it together."
Yang Qiujin was also very sad to hear this and reflected: "Tianyou, it was my fault in the past. I shouldn't have been biased and didn't believe you. I will reflect on myself. If you are wronged or bullied in the future, you must tell me as soon as possible and I will help you, okay?"
Chen Tianyou nodded with tears in his eyes, "I understand. I will tell my parents if I encounter any problems in the future."
Yang Qiujin looked up at Ji Mingchen and said coldly, "Ji Mingchen, you heard it, didn't you? Your son bullied my son so much. According to my previous temper, I would not have let my son down if I didn't beat him to death. But today you are here, I will give you a favor. In addition to compensating for my son's medical expenses, your son must leave the military school. You should take your wife and children and get out of here. I am upset when I see your family."
"I'm sorry, Qiu Jin. I will give you the compensation tomorrow." Ji Mingchen felt very uncomfortable to be treated so badly by the person he loved. After apologizing, he angrily pulled Ji Feiwu home.
He has always had a good temper and always had a smiling face, but now he had a stern face and forcefully dragged Ji Feiwu home, not caring whether Ji Feiwu could keep up or not, and just dragged him by force.
Ji Feiwu was frightened by his expression. He struggled and shouted, "Dad, it hurts, you hurt me."
Ji Mingchen ignored him and walked home.
Shi Fangfang and her eldest daughter Ji Feiwen followed behind him, and when they saw his expression, they did not dare to step forward to stop him.
After the family entered the house, Ji Mingchen tied up Ji Feiwu and kicked him on the knee. Ji Feiwu immediately knelt in front of him. Ji Mingchen raised his hand and slapped Ji Feiwu, "Tell me, at such a young age, why do you have such a vicious mind? You actually teamed up with Deng Gangzi and those little hooligans to drown Chen Tianyou!"
"I didn't!" Ji Feiwu's head was buzzing after being slapped by him. He held his head high and refused to admit his mistake stubbornly: "Why do you believe Chen Tianyou's words and don't want to believe mine? Who is your son? Or, you can't forget your old lover and you are so self-indulgent that you regard his son as your own."
"What are you talking about?!" Ji Mingchen couldn't believe that these words came out of the mouth of a six-year-old child. He was so angry that he raised his hand to slap Ji Feiwu again.
Shi Fangfang grabbed his arm and begged, "Mingchen, please don't hit the child. It will hurt the child."
"It's all because of your bad thoughts as a mother that you've brought harm to the child!" Ji Mingchen was furious and slapped Shi Fangfang hard on the face. "What on earth do you say in front of the child all day long? Listen to what you said. Is that what a six-year-old child should say?"
In a rage, he used all his strength and slapped Shi Fangfang so hard that she fell sideways. Her head hit a stone at the gate of the courtyard and blood came out immediately.
"Mom, are you okay?" When Ji Feiwen saw Shi Fangfang was injured, he immediately went over to help her.
Shi Fangfang only felt a burning pain on her face and head, but the pain in her body could never compare to the pain in her heart.
She couldn't believe that the always gentle Ji Mingchen would hit her. She covered her bleeding wound, looked at him with tears in her eyes and yelled, "You actually hit me?! Whose husband are you? You beat your wife and son for an outsider. What kind of drug did Yang Qiujin feed you that you don't even trust your own children and wife!"
"You refuse to repent and are still stubborn. Listen to yourself, are you talking like a human being?" Ji Mingchen was so angry that his chest kept heaving. He raised his hand and slapped Shi Fangfang in the face again. "You and I know exactly what kind of person Yang Qiujin is. From the past to now, she has always been upright and has never done a bad thing. On the contrary, you have made mistakes again and again and never changed. Now you have led the child astray. If it weren't for the good luck of Chen Tianyou, if there were no other children to help that child, Chen Tianyou would have been killed by your son! Your son is now a murderer! The facts in front of you, you still don't admit it, you really disappoint me!"
"Dad, please don't hit Mom." Ji Feiwen stood in front of Shi Fangfang and cried to Ji Mingchen for mercy. "Mom didn't mean it. She just wanted you to come home. She just wanted you to treat her well. Mom was actually very good to me and my brother. When you were not at home, she would find ways to make money and buy us delicious food and drinks..."
Ji Mingchen felt sad watching his daughter crying. He didn't understand why he couldn't think straight and take responsibility and married Shi Fangfang home, causing trouble for the whole family. He clearly had a bright future in life, but it was ruined by Shi Fangfang's hands.
He now not only hates this woman, but more of it is hatred. If Shi Fangfang had not plotted to destroy him back then, he would have a better life now. But now, he is stuck in the quagmire and cannot extricate himself.
He looked at Shi Fangfang with disgust: "I am fed up with what you have done. I am tired and don't want to be entangled with you anymore. Let's get a divorce and let each other go. I will send the children back to my hometown. I can't let someone as vicious as you lead them astray again."
Shi Fangfang was like being struck by five thunderbolts, her expression became fierce, "Ji Mingchen, you are dreaming! Even if I die, I will not divorce you, and I will not send the child back to my hometown!"
She had considered everything before marrying him and having children, and then joining the army to live the good life she wanted. Now he wanted to divorce her and send the child back home. When she thought about the villagers' mocking and sarcastic remarks after knowing all this, she would rather die than leave him!
"Whether you leave or not is not up to you." Ji Mingchen said this with a cold face and left without looking back.
**
As the saying goes, good news never travels far, but bad news travels a thousand miles.
The news that Ji Mingchen beat Shi Fangfang and wanted to divorce her soon spread throughout the family compound through his neighbors who were eavesdropping.
Zhao Erfeng went to Yang Qiujin's home to see her off. When talking about this, he clapped his legs with joy, "She had bad intentions and raised a bad son who did bad things. Now, the military doctor Ji is determined to divorce her, but she refuses to divorce him. These past two days, she has been looking for Political Commissar Liao's wife, the director of the Women's Department who manages our military wives, and has been crying every day, asking Director Fan to mediate between them."
"I don't care about their affairs as a couple. Just don't bother my child again." Yang Qiujin accepted the pancakes sent by Zhao Erfeng, turned around and took a rabbit from home that she had not won the day before and had lightly pickled with coarse salt, and stuffed it into Zhao Erfeng's hand.
He grabbed a handful of fruit candies and stuffed them into the hands of Li Dadan, Da Ni'er, San Ni'er and other children who came with Zhao Erfeng, and said to them sincerely: "Dadan, thank you for helping Tianyou drive away the bad guys. You are the little warriors of our republic. On behalf of everyone in my family, I pay my highest respects to you! You are so brave!"
It was the first time that Li Dadan and his children were praised and thanked so solemnly by an adult. They puffed out their chests and said proudly, "Auntie Yang, you're welcome. It's our duty to help those in need when we see injustice."
Yang Qiujin smiled and said, "You are all good children. When auntie comes back from playing, I will bring you some local specialties to eat."
"Great!" Several children cheered and discussed what Yang Qiujin would bring back.
Zhao Erfeng held the rabbit in his hand and complained, "Big sister, it's just a matter of convenience for the children to help. You shouldn't thank us over and over again. You and your husband came to my house before and gave us a lot of thank-you gifts. Now you give me more. I feel embarrassed to accept them."
Yang Qiujin said, "It was a matter of course. If Dadan and his friends didn't have the kindness and courage to fight against Deng Gangzi and his gang, my Tianyou would have been killed. In my eyes, they are little heroes and Tianyou's saviors. I give them small gifts, and if they like them, I'm happy too."
Several children in the yard pricked up their ears to listen to what they were saying.
Hearing this, Li Dadan nudged Chen Tianyou, who was picking insects in the vegetable patch in the corner of the yard, and said, "Did you hear that? Your mother has been praising me. I saved your life, so I am your big brother. From now on, you have to listen to my orders."
Chen Tianyou deliberately put a fat caterpillar on his arm, which immediately scared Li Dadan so much that he jumped around.
Chen Tianyou put his hands on his hips and laughed, "You are such a coward, you still want to be my big brother? Dream on!"
However, Chen Tianyou also knew that if it weren't for the help of Li Dadan and his brothers, he would have died long ago.
So while Yang Qiujin was packing her luggage, Chen Tianyou secretly took out a box of wafer biscuits that his mother had bought for the trip and distributed them to Li Dadan and his brother, as well as Wang Songyue and his brother, who were waiting outside their yard. "One for each person, no more. I can't let my mother find out that I emptied the box of biscuits."
"Wow, chocolate wafer cookies! I've been wanting to eat them for a long time." Li Sannier was reluctant to eat the wafer cookies when she got them.
"If you don't want to eat it, give it to me." Li Dadan swallowed the biscuit in two or three gulps, licked his lips with an unsatisfied look, and made a gesture to snatch the biscuit from his sister.
Li Sanni quickly took the biscuit away and glared at him, "Everyone eats their own food, do you understand?"
Li Dadan snorted and went to ask Chen Tianyou for some biscuits.
Chen Tianyou insisted on not giving it to them, but when they were not paying attention, he secretly gave Wang Songyue an extra biscuit.
Wang Songyue was neatly dressed and pretty, with two red flowers tied in her hair. She looked as pretty as a girl in a New Year picture. She ate in a very gentle and graceful manner. Chen Tianyou liked to watch her eat and couldn't help but give her an extra piece of food.
Although they were going on a trip, Chen Shengqing was only a battalion commander and did not have a car assigned to him. Even if they did, it could only be used for official business. So to go to Ulu, their first stop, they could only take the regiment's cargo truck to the transfer station and then take the train to Ulu.
Yang Qiujin could tolerate riding in a truck, but she could not tolerate riding in a green-skinned train.
The current domestic situation is not good. More and more people are fleeing from the mainland to the border areas, and most of them are heading to large farms and mines. These places are sparsely populated and require a large population to reclaim wasteland and complete planting tasks or to mine to complete production tasks.
The leaders of the farms and mines turned a blind eye to the arrival of these vagrants. As long as they did not cause trouble, they would register them as residents and let them work and earn money.
This also resulted in the green-skinned trains heading to various border areas being packed with refugees from all over the place, with some people even clinging to the top of the trains.
There were a lot of people, it was the end of autumn, and the weather was still a little hot. Sitting on the crowded train, it felt like being rushed. There were all kinds of smells, and when Yang Qiujin smelled those smells, she felt dizzy and wanted to vomit.
In order to make her and the child feel better, Chen Shengqing acted as a pedestrian seat and let them lean on him. After barely sitting on the train for a day and a night, they finally arrived in Uru.
As soon as they got off the train, Yang Qiujin vomited violently. Chen Shengqing had no choice but to find a hotel and book a room for her and Chen Tianyou to rest for a while. He then found a mule car to take them to see the famous attractions in Turpan, and then spent money and food to find a Turpan family to stay overnight.
The family was Uyghur. Knowing that Chen Shengqing was a border officer and was traveling with his wife and children, the host was very hospitable. They slaughtered a sheep and roasted it for them. They also asked his wife to take Yang Qiujin and her son to their grape field to pick bunches of fresh grapes. Then they took them to the room where they dried grapes.
It was the first time for Yang Qiujin and Chen Tianyou to experience such scenery and see a grape drying room. Both mother and son were so curious that they forgot about their tiredness from the journey.
In the following days, they went back and forth by train, freight car, truck, buggy, and ox-drawn cart to visit the rocky and sandstorm-ravaged Devil City.
The autumn is picturesque, with flowers blooming everywhere, lakes flowing, and red maple forests growing by the lake. We visited the absolutely beautiful Yili, and then went to Altay, with its majestic mountains and green grasslands that stretch as far as the eye can see.
At their last stop, they arrived at the entrance of a Kyrgyz village located in a valley in the western mountains of the Tianshan Mountains.
A family here was about to hold a wedding. The man holding the wedding was a Kyrgyz company commander of the border defense department. He was marrying a Kyrgyz girl of the same ethnic group, so he invited Chen Shengqing, who used to be his superior, to attend the wedding. Chen Shengqing brought Yang Qiujin and her son to attend.
Their arrival was warmly welcomed by the Kyrgyz people, who have more than a hundred households here. The people here live in tent-like felt houses and make a living as nomads. At the same time, they also voluntarily guard the security of the border.
They enthusiastically pulled Chen Shengqing and his family into the felt room where they lived. The bride and groom wore traditional white Kyrgyz wedding clothes, sang and danced in the felt room, and even pulled Chen Shengqing and his family of three to dance.
Yang Qiujin refused at first, mainly because she was shy and thought she couldn't dance and wasn't good at it. But then she saw Chen Shengqing, a grown man, following the Kyrgyz people's Dadao Dahu dance and dancing quite well, so she stopped refusing and followed them.
After eating and drinking to their heart's content and having fun in the bridal chamber in the evening, the groom Tahar arranged a separate felt room for the family of three.
This place is close to the border and the weather is relatively cold. There is a stove in the felt room and a window for ventilation. Yang Qiujin and her family of three slept on a woolen mat on the floor and felt quite warm.
Because the Tahal people were very warm and hospitable, Chen Shengqing and his family of three drank a lot of wine under their enthusiastic treatment. All three of them were drowsy and sleepy. In the middle of the night, Yang Qiujin heard some noise outside the felt room and thought it was an illusion because she was still drunk.
It was not until Chen Shengqing suddenly jumped up and quickly put on his clothes, and at the same time, there was a fire outside the felt room and the sound of the Kirgiz people speaking in their language came, that Yang Qiujin realized that something was wrong. She stood up in a daze and asked, "Shengqing, what happened?"
"When Tahareh and his tribesmen were patrolling the nearby valley at night, they discovered nearly 200 people approaching Post No. 17. If everything goes as expected, this should be someone organizing a large-scale escape to Su. We have to stop them."
Yang Qiujin was shocked. "So many people are fleeing? What are they thinking? Have they forgotten that after the mass escape from Tacheng in 1962, the local government issued a policy that anyone who fled to the Soviet Union would be regarded as a traitor for treason and shot once they were caught?"
"The Soviet Union is vast and rich in resources, but its population is very low. In order to stir up ethnic conflicts in our border areas, they have been sending spies to our country, spreading the word that the Soviet people eat meat and drink wine every day, have rice and are full, no one is hungry, and do not need to do hard labor. The Soviet people live a good life of true communism, and that going to their country means enjoying life."
Chen Shengqing buttoned his collar and sneered: "No one with a brain would believe these words. However, many people are defeated by the poverty of our country and are unwilling to work hard for the rewards they deserve. They just believe in getting rich without working hard. This kind of small-scale escape incident has occurred frequently in recent years. Our border guards are no longer surprised."
As he spoke, he pulled out a domestically made pistol from the bag he was carrying, loaded it, and said to Yang Qiujin, "You and the child should not run around. Wait for me to come back."
"Is it dangerous for you to go this time?" Yang Qiujin half-supported herself and looked at him: "You and Tahal are the only two border guards with weapons. Can you handle so many people fleeing?"
"Don't worry. The Kyrgyz people guarding the border are all soldiers. They are allowed to bring their own hunting weapons and guns. If they encounter spies, counter-revolutionaries, or traitors, they have the right to shoot. Now Tahal's people should send someone to Post No. 17 to inform them in advance. The soldiers guarding there will use the radio to ask for help from the regiment headquarters. We just need to delay for a while. I don't want to fight with those civilians unless it is absolutely necessary."
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