Because she encountered a group of human traffickers on the way back, Su Ting was a little nervous for more than half a month.

Although the security in the area where we live is very good, the teenagers have no idea of ​​the time or how far they have walked when they are playing.

Last year, a few children made an appointment to go pick up waste during the holiday. At first they were picking up waste in the compound, but later they went out and didn’t come back until dinner time.

At that time, everyone in the compound was mobilized. Someone even borrowed two cars from the army and drove out to look for the children for several hours but couldn't find them. Finally, the county public security bureau called the army and arranged for people to go and pick up the children.

After the children were brought back and asked, we found out that when they were picking up the waste, one of the children had a flash of inspiration and suggested selling the waste directly after picking it up.

The proposal was approved by everyone, and one of the children remembered that the scrap collection station was in the county seat, half an hour away by bus.

At that time, two children were hesitant because they had no money, but the child who proposed it was wealthy and patted his chest to say that he would pay for the bus fare. So a group of half-grown children went directly to the roadside to stop a bus and went to the county town.

Before getting on the bus, they agreed to come back after selling the scraps, but when they really finished selling the scraps, they were hungry. There happened to be a supply and marketing cooperative across the street, so they went there for a while and bought some food.

After buying food and preparing to take the bus back, they ran into a group of children playing chicken fighting. They stood there and watched for a while. Two children went up and fought with the others for a while. It was not until dark that they realized what was going on. The group hurried to the station to catch the bus.

As a result, they waited for half a day but no car came. Finally, a kind young girl saw them shivering in the cold wind and took them to the police station.

The comrades from the Public Security Bureau found out where they were from and contacted the troops, and only then were they safely taken home.

When the children returned home, they were each given a meal of stewed bamboo shoots with meat. They never received any pocket money until the Chinese New Year, for fear that they would lose some money in their pockets.

During that time, Su Ting kept He Yan under strict control. She made him go home after school and didn't allow him to go out and play for too long on weekends, for fear that he would act up one day.

Later, when He Dongchuan had some free time, he started to teach He Yan martial arts, because after training he just wanted to lie down and didn't want to do his homework, so after school he didn't go out to play with his classmates, but went straight home to do his homework.

Gradually, Su Ting relaxed.

It was not until she met the human traffickers on her way back this time and thought back to what happened last year that Su Ting couldn't help feeling scared.

Those kids were lucky to have met a kind girl. If they were unlucky and had met a bad person, how could they have come back?

Therefore, before He Yan started school, Su Ting only let him play downstairs, and when she was reviewing, she would go to the balcony from time to time to glance down. If she didn't see him, she would look for him all over the yard.

Seeing how closely she watched the child, Meng Xiuzhen said something like, "What could possibly happen to a child playing in the compound? You're too nervous."

Su Ting heard this helplessly and said, "Of course I'm not afraid of him playing in the compound, but I'm afraid he'll run away. Have you forgotten what happened last year?"

"It shouldn't be that serious. Those kids have been taught a lesson," Meng Xiuzhen thought. She thought that there were kids in the compound who had been beaten for this, so no other kid would do this again. After thinking about it, she said, "Besides, they are fine, aren't they?"

"They are fine because they are lucky, but what if they are unlucky? You don't know, when we came back from the Chinese New Year, we ran into a group of traffickers..."

Excuse me for what happened on the train, Su Ting said: "If they are unlucky, they may be kidnapped by traffickers like those two children, and they may not even be able to find their own home in the end."

Su Ting is not someone who likes to talk about everything, so Meng Xiuzhen didn't know about their dangerous encounter on the train, which is why she thought she was a little too nervous.

But now, after hearing her talk, Meng Xiuzhen's face became serious: "That should be taken seriously, but how can this trafficker be so arrogant? He even dares to get on the train?"

“Because it’s convenient.”

What human traffickers do is destined for them to travel far and wide, kidnapping children from one commune to another. It will definitely be found out once you investigate.

But transportation was very inconvenient in that era. An average family was lucky to have a bicycle. Buying a four-wheeled vehicle required a permit. Not to mention cars, even tractors were not affordable for ordinary units.

All the activities of human traffickers are illegal. These people are on the margins of society and naturally have no channels to buy four-wheeled vehicles. If they want to traffic people, they can only take public transportation.

In public transportation, shuttle buses are more often used for short distances than long distances, and the journey is very slow. It may take more than 20 hours, or even longer, to drive from the east to the west of a province.

In addition, the bus is narrow, and the berths on long journeys are very close to each other. If the ride is too long, the chance of being discovered will increase.

Although train tickets are a bit more expensive, they are faster, the journey is shorter, and a hard sleeper has six beds in a partition, so you need to be on guard against fewer people.

As for the train police, they don't patrol everywhere. As long as the people in the same compartment don't find out the problem, no one will come to check. If you are going to cross provinces, it is safer to take a train berth than a car.

It’s just that these businessmen are bolder than ordinary people. One of them is on the wanted list, yet they still dare to take the train.

But then again, there were no nationally networked electronic cameras at the time, so even if someone was on a wanted list, the station staff might not have seen the list, or might have seen it but forgotten their appearance, or they might have disguised themselves, changed their hairstyle, or grown a beard, and the chances of being discovered would be greatly reduced.

Just like this time, if He Dongchuan hadn't had a good memory and strong detective ability to recognize the disguised wanted criminal, the guys might have been able to get away.

After listening to Su Ting's explanation, Meng Xiuzhen couldn't help but sigh: "Terrible..."

Su Ting sighed: "Yeah, I was really scared this time." After returning home, she had nightmares for several days in a row, and only recently did she feel a little better.

"That needs to be taken seriously," Meng Xiuzhen nodded, then asked, "Have those two children found their families?"

"I don't know yet. We left our contact information with the police on the bus, and they said they would contact us if they needed anything during the trial," Su Ting said, shaking her head. "I don't know if the trial hasn't started yet or if there are no problems. We haven't received a call yet."

Meng Xiuzhen said: "Maybe there is no problem."

"I hope so."

…

Even until the 16th day of the first lunar month, when the military primary school opened, Su Ting did not completely relax. Every morning when He Yan went out, she would tell him not to run around after school.

In fact, she didn't need to tell him. He Yan had to do homework and practice martial arts after school every day. He was very busy and had no time to run around. So as time went by, she gradually saved herself the trouble of telling him.

However, Su Ting has always been thinking about this matter. She wants to know whether the two children have found their families, and whether the traffickers have been sentenced.

However, although they left their contact information with the conductor, they did not ask for the other party's contact information, so now she didn't know where to inquire about this matter.

Therefore, Su Ting could only pray in her heart that the two children could find their families, and that the traffickers would get their comeuppance and not be given the opportunity to bring harm to the world again.

Coincidentally, two days after Su Ting finished praying, the train police contacted He Dongchuan.

Su Ting asked immediately, "Why did the police officer contact you? Did he encounter a problem during the trial? Do you need us to testify?"

He Dongchuan was stunned for a moment after being interrupted, and said helplessly: "You think too much. The flight attendants were there during the arrest, and they saw the whole process with their own eyes. Moreover, we have already provided the transcript, so there is no need for us to come forward to testify."

Su Ting breathed a sigh of relief and asked, "Is the verdict out yet?"

"Not so fast, and this is a big gang. The police want to follow the clues and catch them all. The three people are still in the detention center for the time being."

"Can we catch them all in one fell swoop?"

He Dongchuan thought: "I didn't ask this, but it shouldn't be difficult. Among the three people arrested, one of them was not very courageous. He is the breakthrough point."

"You are so cowardly that you dare to kidnap people." Su Ting snorted coldly.

He Dongchuan said: "Courage has little to do with good and evil. Kidnapping destroys other people's lives and families. The person who benefits temporarily is the one who makes the profit, but after being caught, whether he confesses or not is related to his life and death. If you force him and scare him, you should be able to get something out of him."

"Even if he really confesses, it's better not to let him off too easily." Su Ting had never hated a person, or a group of people, so much that she wished they all died.

After this thought came to her mind, she didn't think she had done anything wrong. Such people only see interests and don't know good from evil. If they are not sentenced to death, they will most likely continue to commit crimes after they are released from prison.

It is better to let them die and waste the land than to let them live and waste the air.

He Dongchuan held Su Ting's hand and said, "The law always stands on the side of justice."

Su Ting hummed, then recalled the original topic and said, "By the way, you haven't told me why the train police officer contacted you."

Since there were no problems during the trial, and the trial results were not out yet, then...without waiting for He Dongchuan to answer, Su Ting guessed, "Could it be that the families of the two children have been found?"

He Dongchuan nodded, "Yes, the two children were not kidnapped in the same place. The older child can remember and knows where his home is. The traffickers contacted his family a few days after they were arrested. The younger child's parents were found bit by bit based on the traffickers' confessions, so it took some time. His parents only went to meet the child two days ago."

"It's good to find it."

During this time, Su Ting has been worried about this matter. It is certain that the human traffickers will have a bad end. In a few decades, human traffickers will be sentenced to heavy penalties, not to mention the strict laws in the 1970s. But before today, the fate of the two children was unknown to her.

Su Ting let out a sigh of relief and said with emotion: "The train police comrade is really enthusiastic. He even called to tell us about this."

He Dongchuan nodded and added: "But he called me not just to tell me this."

"What else?"

"Two days ago, the parents who found the child asked someone to make a few banners to express their gratitude. One was sent to the local police station, one was sent to the train police unit, and the other was handed over by the train police to be sent to me. He called me mainly to confirm the address."

Su Ting suddenly realized: "Did you tell him the address?"

"Um."

Originally, He Dongchuan had no intention of accepting the banner. In his opinion, as a soldier, if he encountered a fugitive on the road, it was his job to contact the local police to capture him. He did not think that the parents of the rescued child needed to repay him.

Moreover, the military discipline of the army is strict, and he was not allowed to take even a needle or a thread from the masses. This was taught by his instructors and leaders after he entered the military academy. After completing the task, the army would reward him, and it was against the rules to privately accept gifts from the people.

Although the banners were not edible and were one of the few things that the troops could accept, he did not want to accept them at first in order to avoid trouble.

But the flight attendant said that the parents of the abducted child had already taken the child back home, and it would not be appropriate to keep the banner in their unit, so it had to be mailed to him.

He Dongchuan had no choice but to agree to let him send the banner over. After hanging up the phone, he reported the matter to his leader.

The leader was quite happy to know about this. After asking about the details, he asked angrily and amusedly, "If the child's parents hadn't wanted to give you a banner, would you not have told me about this?"

He Dongchuan said: "It's not a big deal."

“It’s not a big deal, but it’s not small either.”

Although only three people were arrested this time, the whole criminal gang may be caught in one fell swoop based on the clues provided by these three people. By then, countless families will benefit.

Although the criminal gang has not been caught yet, even if they are caught, He Dongchuan cannot be awarded any credit because he only participated in the first arrest, but he will definitely be verbally praised during internal meetings, and the troop leaders will also keep this matter in mind.

In the long run, reporting this matter will definitely be beneficial to He Dongchuan's future promotion.

But he kept silent after returning. If the child's parents had not given him a banner, he might have kept it a secret.

Thinking of this, the leader said, "After the banner arrives, you should send it directly to the headquarters. I will mention this matter to Commander Zhang. Oh, and your wife is not bad. She is brave and resourceful. She is a good match for you."

He Dongchuan wanted to refuse at first, but when he heard him praising his wife, he just focused on having fun and did not express any objection.

Of course, his objection was useless, because the banner had to be handed in, and the troop leaders would certainly know about it. As for whether to give verbal praise or not, his words would not count, as it depended on the leaders' thoughts.

He Dongchuan did not mention these things, but only repeated what the leader said about Su Ting.

Although the leader only said one compliment, Su Ting was still very proud. After all, it was the first time she had heard someone praise her for her courage and strategy. She asked, "Did your leader really say that?"

"How can I still lie to you?"

Su Ting snorted softly: "Who knows if you are just trying to coax me."

He Dongchuan smiled and asked, "How about I take you to his house some other day and you ask him in person?"

"Then forget it," Su Ting refused decisively, "Since you said so, I will take it as his compliment."

“It’s true.”

"Okay, okay, really, really, I believe you're okay now."

…

About a week later, the banner arrived. After He Dongchuan handed it over, the troops arranged for someone to contact the local police to understand the cause and consequence of the incident.

As expected, although he was not commended, the base commander mentioned the matter during an internal meeting and praised He Dongchuan in front of everyone.

Although it was just verbal praise, it was enough to make He Dongchuan stand out.

That night, an officer who had returned home to rest mentioned the incident to his wife. By noon the next day, the news had spread throughout the family compound.

When people from the Military Family Resettlement Office and the Women's Federation learned that Su Ting was involved, they came to inquire about the whole story. The next day, they called a meeting of all military wives, one to promote anti-abduction efforts, and the other to commend Su Ting.

So after He Dongchuan became famous in the army, Su Ting also became famous among military wives.

The two units had not finished their meeting yet. They followed Su Ting's suggestion and discussed organizing an activity. They were going to strictly enforce anti-abduction education. On the one hand, they set up small anti-abduction classes and organized military wives and children to attend classes in batches at regular times and locations. On the other hand, they were fishing for law enforcement, looking for unfamiliar people from the surrounding brigades and sending them to deceive the children at the school gate.

In the beginning, many military wives were reluctant to attend the class, thinking that it was enough to talk about abduction prevention once. It would be annoying if they kept talking about it every now and then!

But when the fishing law enforcement came into play, these military wives had nothing to say, because the people hired by the two units always caught the right fish.

Children are not very cautious and have greedy mouths. They will easily take a stranger away if he or she gives them a piece of candy, which makes their parents very angry and they all feel ashamed.

Basically, the next day, people from the two units would use this as a negative example and talk about it in a small classroom. Other parents would see it and go home and warn their children not to be greedy and not to follow strangers easily.

After several negative cases were discussed in the class, the people sent by the two units could no longer catch children with candies and snacks. The parents were very proud when they found out. Some even thought that since the children would not be deceived, this anti-abduction class should be over.

As soon as the idea was brought up, another child was fooled. This time the child was not deceived by the food, but was deceived by their kindness.

After failing to fool people with the food, the two units changed their strategy. They found old men and women from the surrounding brigades and had them pretend to fall or get lost, and then ask passing children for help. As soon as the children agreed, they were taken away.

Therefore, this anti-abduction class has to continue.

The principal of the military district primary school saw that the anti-abduction education in the compound was well done, so he started to implement it in the school. The students in the school included not only children from the compound, but half of them were from surrounding brigades.

When anti-trafficking education was in full swing, Director Wang of the Military Family Resettlement Office and Director Zhao of the Women's Federation both invited Su Ting to join their units.

Although there are many units in the compound, the most popular jobs among military wives are those in the Military Family Placement Office and the Women's Federation.

The clerks in these two units not only have an easy and respectable job, but are also capable of managing people. No matter how rebellious the military wives in the compound are, they have to be polite when they meet them.

But it is not easy to get into these two units. There are two reasons. First, there are not many positions. The two units together only have 20 to 30 positions. It sounds like a lot, but it is very small compared with the number of military wives in the compound.

Second, the staff turnover is low. The clerk jobs in these two units can be said to be the best jobs that military wives can find. As long as they can get a foothold in them, no one would want to transfer away unless they are transferred to another job.

However, throughout the year, there are only a dozen or twenty soldiers who are transferred or retired from the compound, and not all of these people's family members work in these two units, so these two units basically do not recruit people.

When the leaders of the two units extended the invitation to Su Ting, they were not short of people in their units, but they all valued talents, and Su Ting was the talent in their eyes.

Outsiders may not know, but as organizers of anti-abduction education activities, they all know how much Su Ting contributed.

First of all, it was Su Ting who proposed to start this anti-abduction class, then she came up with the idea of ​​enforcing the law during fishing, and finally, their endless fishing methods were basically her ideas.

Every time they had a meeting to discuss the issue, Director Wang and Director Zhao were puzzled as to how Su Ting could think of so many ways of kidnapping.

In response to this, Su Ting said: It’s all thanks to the short video.

In short, after working as a non-staff member for a while, the two directors of the Military Family Placement Office and the Women's Federation both felt that Su Ting was a good candidate for their work.

If he is a good seedling, we cannot let him go. Their unit is not short of people, but they are short of talents!

Therefore, before the anti-abduction education activity was over, the two of them took action and sent invitations to Su Ting one after another.

Su Ting is very conflicted.

It's not that she is struggling with whether to work for these two units. If this opportunity had appeared two years ago, she might have considered it seriously and even agreed to it.

After all, whether it is the Military Family Resettlement Office or the Women's Federation, the work is not heavy and can even be said to be easy. It is close to home and there is no need to work overtime. She can work during the day and draw comics at night. It is stable and does not affect her side job to make money. It can be said to be the best of both worlds.

But in another six months, the news of the resumption of the college entrance examination will come out, and the examination will be in December, leaving her with little time to review.

No matter how easy the work was at these two units, she still had to work eight hours a day, and it was not a good idea to slack off on studying during work. Firstly, it would be difficult for her to explain, and secondly, it would have a bad impact if her superiors saw it.

If she really goes to work, her time for review will definitely be greatly reduced, which will affect her final exam results.

And if she passes the exam, she will go to college after the Chinese New Year. Although the country supports working people to take college entrance exams after the college entrance exam is resumed, there are many policy inclinations. For example, after passing the exam, the unit cannot lay off employees during the study period and must pay normal wages, which means that they can go to school with pay.

But Su Ting felt that even if she really went to work at the Military Family Placement Office or the Women's Federation and went to college with pay, she would most likely not return to her original unit after graduation, and she still wanted to draw her own story.

If one day the stories she draws are no longer popular, she would be more inclined to find a related editing job, or when she has money, she would start her own comics magazine and discover more new talents.

Therefore, Su Ting felt that if she agreed to work for Director Wang or Director Zhao, it would not be out of sincerity, but to take advantage of them.

But she didn't want to take advantage of this. Firstly, she could make money from painting, so there was no need for her to do so. Secondly, if she really took advantage, she might feel bad.

What Su Ting was struggling with was how to reject Director Wang and Director Zhao without making them feel uncomfortable.

Generally speaking, if she doesn't want to go to work, she doesn't have to go, and no one will beg her to do so. But the situation is different in the military compound. Those who work in these units in the compound are basically military dependents.

These units are all filled with different jobs and the staff turnover is low, so unless one has extremely high abilities, most people have to work their way up to get there.

The jobs of military dependents usually follow the men, and they can stay in one place for ten or eight years or even longer. Their husbands will also be of high rank. For example, Director Wang and Director Zhao, one husband is the deputy political commissar of the base, and the other husband is a division commander.

Although these two people have no control over He Dongchuan, it is not easy to offend them. So if Su Ting doesn't want to do this job, she has to find a suitable reason so that people will not think she is perfunctory.

Although Director Wang and Director Zhao usually seemed straightforward and not petty, people's minds were unpredictable. In order to avoid future troubles, Su Ting thought about it and confessed the matter of her comic strip drawing.

Compared with Pingchuan Island, there are more children who love to read comics at the Shanghai base. With the solid foundation laid by the first story, the second story became even more popular during the serialization period. Sometimes when Su Ting walks on the street, she can hear children discussing the related plots.

It’s just that Su Ting changed the setting of the novel to a state-owned factory, and the characters in the novel didn’t use their real names. People in the Shanghai base didn’t know He Yan’s nickname, nor did they know what happened on Pingchuan Island. As for the fact that the author’s name is the same as Su Ting’s...

Maybe it's because the name Su Ting is very common, so people who read the comics thought it was a homonym, so after living in Shanghai for half a year, Su Ting has never been mistaken.

Therefore, when Director Wang and Director Zhao learned that Su Ting was the Su Ting who drew the comic strips, they were both surprised.

After being surprised, both of them expressed their understanding of Su Ting's choice. After all, she is now a well-known comic artist, has flexible working hours, and earns a lot of money, so it is normal for her not to want to go out to work.

…

Although she declined the invitations from Director Wang and Director Zhao, Su Ting would still attend meetings held by the two units to discuss anti-abduction education, and would rack her brains to give them advice.

She hopes that the anti-abduction work can continue, and it would be best if it could be promoted to encourage surrounding teams and even other schools to join in the activity, so as to raise children's vigilance and avoid being abducted.

One less child being abducted means one less family being broken up. Although her ability is limited, Su Ting also wants to do her best to help this matter.

In addition to being busy with anti-trafficking education, Su Ting has also been paying attention to the news, hoping to see news in the newspapers about human traffickers being caught.

She did get the news, but she didn't read it in the newspaper. Instead, she heard it from He Dongchuan.

It turned out that when the conductor contacted He Dongchuan to send him a banner, he had told them that if there were any new developments, they should contact him by phone.

In fact, the train police officer was not responsible for the follow-up matters, which were the responsibility of the local public security. However, he was also thinking about this matter in his heart and asked people he knew in the public security department about it.

Because this round-up operation was very important, the people the police officer knew could not reveal anything until the dust settled, so the other party only gave him the news after the arrest was over.

After the train police got the news, they immediately contacted He Dongchuan, and by the time it reached Su Ting, it was already third-hand news. But even so, Su Ting got the news two days earlier than the relevant news was published in the newspaper.

The operation was very successful. The police not only caught the human traffickers gang in one fell swoop, but also rescued more than 30 abducted children.

After reading the newspaper, Su Ting felt both happy and sad. She was happy that the children were rescued and that these traffickers would not be able to do evil again. But she was sad that there were only so many children locked up by these traffickers and no one knew how many more had been sold.

He Dongchuan saw her sighing and consoled her, "This matter is not over yet. The police will continue to track down the whereabouts of the sold children based on their confessions and try to rescue them."

"I know, but..."

But she felt that those human traffickers probably didn't know how many people they had kidnapped or where they had sold them to, so the number of people who could be rescued would always be a small number.

But she knew that there was only so much the police could do. They had already done their best, and this outcome was a happy one for everyone. They could only think positively.

The next morning, Su Ting took the newspaper to find Director Zhao of the Women's Federation, hoping that she could report more about the educational results during this period when she went to the county Women's Federation meeting, so as to convince the leaders of the county Women's Federation to pay attention to this matter and promote anti-trafficking education.

After hearing this, Director Zhao thought Su Ting had a good idea and that if this idea could be promoted, she would definitely get some credit, so he took the newspaper to the county that day.

While Director Zhao was busy, Su Ting was also not idle and began to conceive the third story of the Three Fires series.

She originally wanted to focus on reviewing this year and did not plan to draw a new story, but now, she wants to do more to help with anti-abduction education.