Chapter 83 Clues
Under the fierce white light tube, people in prison uniforms are doing simple labor in front of the assembly line, assembling some complex parts, or putting finished products into boxes and packaging them.
This is an industrial area located in the lower level of Arpeggio City. It is not only a factory, but also a prison, where people who were arrested before are detained.
After a month of investigation and interrogation, the North Seventh District Federal Government has now roughly sorted out the situation of the underground world of Arpeggio City. The blockade of the past has been slowly lifted, and the people involved in the previous incidents have also been gradually dealt with.
"Blue!" A guard in a gray-blue uniform walked into the underground factory with a personal terminal showing data.
"Here!"
A tall and strong man stood up in the crowd, like a white bear standing up from the ice, which was particularly eye-catching.
"Come with me." Waving to him, he took Blue out of the room.
The two entered a room used for conversation and under strict surveillance.
"Sit down and have some water." Compared with the past, the tone of the guard was better.
"Got it." Blue honestly opened the bottle of mineral water on the table and drank the water in it.
Seeing him accept the order like this, the guard nodded with satisfaction. Although most of the underground people were undisciplined and had bad personalities, there were some exceptions.
"You performed well in prison and passed all the evaluations. In addition, your previous crimes were relatively minor, so--" He kept it a secret for a while and paused for two seconds before continuing.
"You are honored to be released. The time is tomorrow. In the next five years, as long as you abide by the law and do not violate the rules, you can be at ease as an ordinary federal resident."
"Thank you for your teaching." Blue looked a little excited, but he didn't know what words of praise to say.
"Okay, that's all. Be a good person in the future." The guard patted his shoulder and walked out.
Two days later, the gate of this large underground prison slowly opened, and several heavily armored escort vehicles slowly drove out, and then several released people walked out, including Blue.
He was carrying a large package, which contained his clothes and bed sheets. Before leaving, he asked what he could take away, and the staff told him.
"This is 500 federal coins, as a small reward for your imprisonment. After you get out, you must find a job as soon as possible so that you can settle down."
Touching the card with federal coins on his chest, Blue recalled the instructions of the guard before leaving, and his heart was full of emotion.
Although 500 federal coins are not much, it should be enough to survive a week by living frugally. The most important thing during this period is to get a job. Now the underground gang has long been disbanded, and the people he knew before are basically gone. Now he can only try to think about where he can be accepted.
If it were in the distant ancient times, it would not be difficult for him to make a living with his body size, but now it is the technologically advanced interstellar era. All kinds of heavy labor are mostly replaced by machines. Smart people and those who learn quickly are more popular, so it may not be so smooth in the future.
Anyway, he finally got out.
Walking out of the gate, Blue looked at the prison fortress behind him, which was illuminated by the bright yellow street lights. The layers of thick steel structures blocked it, like a giant beast lying on the ground.
Three days later, Blue found his first job at the No. 14 Wholesale Market on the 45th floor of the underground of Arpeggio City.
The job content is to load and unload and carry various goods in the wholesale market. The salary is 2,400 federal coins per month, and food and accommodation are provided.
Although there are T6-level AI machines in the market to load and unload, those are responsible for unified and coded bulk goods. It is more convenient and cheap to use people to distribute some scattered and messy goods.
In order to save the declining employment rate, the federation has raised the tax rate on AI chips many times. Now, about 90%-95% of the sales price of AI chips produced is tax, and a second tax will be levied according to the activation and use time.
"Hey, big guy, there is a new batch of goods. Come with me."
In the corner of the dim warehouse, Blue sat in the corner, his vest was already sweaty. He had just finished moving and sat for a few minutes.
"Got it." He responded in a muffled voice, then stood up again and followed the tall and thin supervisor.
In the loading and unloading area, trucks of different sizes were parked and loaded and unloaded in an orderly manner in front of the warehouse doors with different numbers. There were surveillance cameras in front and behind each warehouse door, strictly watching the amount of cargo loaded and unloaded. The driver only needed to enter the designated order number in the personal terminal interface, confirm and wait.
There are three transportation channels from Arpeggio City to the outside world. The first is the most common ground freight highway. When it reaches the top of the patio, the goods are unloaded and transported underground via industrial elevators. The second is the underground rail train, which was built hundreds of years ago. Because it was considered that the ground was facing orbital bombardment and might be blocked, such deep underground rail lines were built between underground cities. The third is the flying vehicles or spacecrafts that are mainly responsible for connecting the distant southern districts and the routes of the alien star domain.
Among the three transportation channels, underground transportation lines have the lowest cost, but generally only transport large quantities of industrial raw materials and products. Ground transportation is more flexible, and various daily necessities and goods from nearby areas are transported through them. Aircraft and spaceships are the most expensive, and are generally used for import and export and time-sensitive goods.
"Come, here it is." The tall and thin supervisor directed Blue to a warehouse door, where the rear box of the truck parked there had been opened, and the driver was sitting next to it smoking and taking a break.
"Old Gu, you are finally here. We have been waiting here for a long time." The driver had a stubble on his face, his shoulders and arms were full of flesh, and his voice was rude.
"Aren't you here?" The tall and thin supervisor simply greeted him, and then looked at the boxes in the truck.
"How many boxes in total?"
"31 boxes of lychees, 42 boxes of watermelons, 12 boxes of strawberries, 5 boxes of blueberries... It's really a loss to transport watermelons." The driver took out the personal terminal at hand and reported one by one, complaining.
Although watermelons have sold well recently, the profit margin is not large because the price is lower than other fruits.
"Okay, if there's nothing to transport, who would hire you?" The 30-year-old warehouse supervisor checked the order number and asked Blue to start moving.
These fruits are all produced in the neighboring area and were picked from the plantation in the morning. After they are loaded and unloaded and distributed, they can be put on the shelves of supermarkets in the city at 4 pm. Because it is a short distance, there is no need to make such complicated coding. Besides, fruits are easy to spoil, and there is always some loss that needs to be adjusted manually.
"Come on, Bru, take these down carefully one by one, don't drop them."
"Got it." The fat man started to move. He was seen standing on the loading and unloading platform at the side, moving the boxes out of the car one by one, and then slowly moving them on the rolling belt at the side. "
Is this new guy?" The driver looked at the big man who was working hard not far away.
"Yes, just got out of jail." The young supervisor handed him a cigarette.
"Not bad, he works very well." He leaned over and smoked.
About 20 minutes later, all the goods were unloaded. At this time, the supervisor and the driver came and opened the boxes
one by one to check. "Well, these more than 30 boxes of lychees are not bad, all good." The supervisor put down the lid and looked at the other side.
The front ones were basically qualified, but when the watermelons were checked, the watermelons in two boxes had already cracked.
"This..." The driver rubbed his hair, a little irritated.
"I'm very stable on the road. I can only say that this watermelon is like this. It cracks when touched. Don't you think it's quite fresh?"
"What's the point of you telling me that? The customers don't agree. They all want to buy good ones." The young supervisor waved his hand.
"MD..." The driver cursed a few more times, saying that he would never deliver watermelons again, and then took out his personal terminal and transferred a small fee to the young supervisor.
"Another bargain for you." Putting away his personal terminal, the driver picked up the kettle beside him, climbed onto the seat of the truck, and prepared to start the car and leave.
"Supervisor?" Seeing the driver leave like this, Blue asked inquiringly.
"It's okay, let him go." As a young supervisor in the warehouse, he was no longer surprised by this situation, and he also had many ways to solve these problems.
"You distribute these goods to the designated shelves according to the order numbers. In another hour, the transport trucks from various supermarkets will come to tow them away. As for the two damaged boxes, leave them there for later." After the instructions were completed, the young supervisor picked up his personal terminal and communicated with the familiar supermarket manager.
...
"Yes, that's right. I'll give you this batch at half price... It's just cracked, but the appearance is OK. You can make it into a platter, and the quotation on the books will still be the original one. I'll return this part to you separately... OK, that's it. When the time comes, you can tell the driver to stop him from saying that the goods are not right."
After the communication, he put down his personal terminal and played with it in his hands. He was in a good mood. He had an extra income today, and he also liked the big man who was sweating and carrying the goods beside him.
"Work hard, Blue, I'll give you half a watermelon after work to satisfy your craving."
"Got it." Blue replied breathlessly.
Time passed slowly, and Blue gradually settled down in this wholesale market. Although the salary was very low, he had a small place to live, and occasionally he could eat some damaged fruits. These damaged fruits were all T5-grade high-quality products. Even if they could not be put on the shelves normally, they were much better than the half-rotten ones he had dragged from the garbage station before. In
this way, it was mid-July, and Blue finally had a rare day off.
He took the old second-hand personal terminal that he bought for more than 300 federal coins and went to the place where Qiao Long lived and grew up.
After asking around for a while, he found that Qiao Long had not returned here and there was no news. Scratching his not-so-smart head, he went to the cemetery that Qiao Long had asked for.
The black tombstone was the same as usual. There were only a few dead branches pressed down by bricks in front of Qiao Long's master's grave. This was the bouquet he put down last time.
"Did the boss not come out, or did he go somewhere?" He stood in front of the cemetery with the bouquet he bought temporarily, and slowly put the bouquet down.
After thinking for a long time, he still couldn't figure it out. He still pressed the small card with his contact number under the brick, hoping that someone would contact him in the future.
Back to the No. 14 wholesale market, just when he thought that such days would last for a long time, and perhaps it would take several years to get some response, a strange call made Blue stand up.
"Huck? Is it really you?" He was excited, because the other party was the partner who often worked with him. The two of them had been following Qiao Long.
The next day, Blue saw this companion whom he had not seen for a long time. He was wearing a baseball cap, hip-hop clothes, and green paint on his face.
With his hands in his trouser pockets, Huck walked into the warehouse door, then stood still and showed a proud smile to Blue.
"I'm still alive, which is great, and seeing you alive is even better." After saying that, he let out a long roar, jumped forward a few steps, pounced on Blue, and the two hugged each other.
After a while, the two sat in the corner of the warehouse and talked about their own things.
"At that time, I found a hidden path in advance and returned to the lower-level residential area of Arpeggio City. I hid next to a garbage station for a week, and then quietly moved. Later, the incident was over and I was safe." He is a smart man, and his body is thin. It is easy for him to blend in with the crowd, unlike Blue who can't hide.
"Huck is awesome." Blue praised, and then asked about other things.
"I don't know where the boss is, but I guess he is still alive. People with such a tough life like him will not die so easily." Huck told Blue not to worry about this.
"Have you been working here recently?" Huck looked around.
"Yes, the boss is pretty nice."
"Forget it, he probably just thinks you're useful and cheap." The thin Huck knows a lot more.
"I've been hanging out with a group of night walkers lately, and my life is pretty good. Why don't you come with me? I'll help you find a job as a doorman in a nightclub. That's a lot easier, and you're big enough."
"No, Huck." Blue shook his head. He was taught in prison to stay away from such an industry in the future.
"Uh..." Huck touched his head, and for a moment he couldn't do anything about this big guy. After all, he wasn't Joron, who would just do whatever he said.
"Okay, let's not talk about this for now. Actually, I've been a little worried about what the boss told me before. If we have time, we have to go find that young lady."
"Is it about helping to find someone?"
"Yes, there are all kinds of people in the night tour crowd, and I really got some information. It is said that it is the information filled out when the residents were resettled, and among them is the information of the young lady's parents."
"This, isn't it all in the archives? Do we still need to tell the young lady?" Blue didn't understand.
"No, no, no, although there are many things recorded in the archives, there are some things that I think the young lady herself doesn't know." Huck shook his head.
"When residents settle down, the local neighborhood committee will interview and inquire with the new households to understand the situation. This is not a formal and serious process, so it is very casual, but it is also easy to find some problems."
"For example, her parents left a deep impression on the interviewers at that time. I asked them when I spent hundreds of federal coins to treat them to dinner."
"Is this all okay?" Blue originally thought that it would take more than half a year to find out some fragmentary information, but he didn't expect Huck to get the result so quickly.
"I only found out about her parents' past. As for where her father is, I don't know either. He left so cleanly that I suspect he's a professional." Huck waved his hand.
"When people usually have huge debts and cannot pay them back through formal channels, they will be forced to resort to unconventional methods, such as loan sharking, illegal labor, underground boxing or racing, etc."
"But her father left no such traces at all. It seemed that he suddenly got a sum of money, paid off his debts, and then left quietly. This process was so smooth that no one in the gray area of Arpeggio City had ever come into contact with it."
"But considering her mother's background, perhaps many things can be explained."
"According to the old man's recollection, it was more than 20 years ago. The eldest lady's mother was in her prime, and her voice and behavior were very different from ordinary people. He didn't understand it at the time, but later he traveled to other places and guessed that the young couple might be from the North Second District."
"That kind of temperament is hard to explain, but if anyone has been there, they will understand. That's what he told me." Huck leaned his head against the cushion in the corner, and the two chatted until a truck drove into the warehouse and Blue had to start working again.
If nothing unexpected happens, there will be another chapter in the evening 0 0/~
(End of this chapter)
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