Bossy Lover – CH 092

Chapter 92. Prequel 2: One Life, One Love

Inside the spacious and brightly lit operations conference room, pilots in dark blue uniforms sat in rows. Su Mi looked at one, then another, and said to the person next to her, “Has the division commander gone mad? What mission requires the nation’s top-tier air force pilots?”

The division commander, who had just stepped through the door, frowned upon hearing this: “Su Mi, shut up!”

The slideshow played continuously; the operations staff’s voice was cold and ruthless. On the screen was a massive, silvery-white circular object, suspended in the clouds, enormous yet exquisitely detailed. Most striking were the dozen or so rows of gun barrels scattered across its surface, demonstrating its superior combat capabilities.

Such a powerful and advanced device was enough to pique the interest of any soldier.

But if it suddenly appeared one day, silently hovering 30,000 meters above Beijing, and every other country denied ownership of it and was equally nervous about it, that would be no fun at all.

“Commander, could it be aliens?” Su Mi tilted her head and stared at the screen.

This time, the division commander didn’t get angry at her ramblings. He just gave her a deep look and summarized for everyone: “In short, the General Staff wants us to be prepared. If the other side has ill intentions, the Air Force must be deployed immediately to protect the capital!”

“Yes, sir!” The pilots all stood up and saluted.

“Su Mi, come here!” Su Mi had just stepped out of the conference room after the meeting when she was called back.

She jogged over and saw the division commander wave away the guards and stare at her with an unusually serious expression.

“Commander, you just mentioned free discussion, and I thought the atmosphere was too tense, so I was just trying to lighten things up…”

The division commander waved his hand and said sternly, “Su Mi!”

“Here!” She stopped smiling and stood at attention seriously.

“If war really breaks out…” the division commander said, enunciating each word clearly, “no matter who the enemy is, you must shoot down the first enemy plane for me.”

“…Yes!” she answered firmly, “I guarantee I’ll complete the mission!”

Su Mi kept her promise.

Three days later, she shot down her first enemy plane. But when she stood in front of the wrecked, crashed enemy plane, holding her helmet, she no longer felt the ease she had felt a few days earlier.

Her mood was gloomy like never before.

“Well done, Lieutenant!” The engineers climbed into the cockpit and pried open the hatch. Through the thick smoke, they were surprised to see a silver-white all-metal robot lying quietly in the pilot’s seat.

Its head was hit by shrapnel, leaving a large dent and revealing intricate wiring and chips beneath its metallic exterior. The metal body, however, looked light and delicate, as if it had once possessed a soul and life.

robot.

It turned out their adversary was an alien robot.

Two days ago, the sudden airstrike on the Northern Military District headquarters was carried out by robots; the ones that have already shot down more than fifty of their warplanes are robots.

At this very moment, it is the robots that are launching a full-scale attack on various military bases and are about to seize control of the cities.

Having been flying for over several hours, Su Mi said nothing, put her helmet back on, and climbed into her fighter jet despite the ground crew’s obstruction and opposition.

But at that moment, she was stopped by the division commander’s guard.

“Lieutenant.” The young guard’s face was expressionless with grief. “The division commander wants to see you.”

The vast command room was empty except for the division commander, who stood silently in front of the command platform, looking as if he had aged overnight.

Su Mi couldn’t help but recall that just two days ago, this place was filled with the nation’s best pilots, bustling with activity, both serious and lively. Now, more than half of them had been lost, and the remaining pilots were still tirelessly piloting their fighter jets, blocking the incredibly powerful machine enemy.

“Xiao Su, come here.” The division commander looked down at her as if she were his own daughter. “I heard you shot down an enemy plane?”

Su Mi’s expression remained calm: “Reporting to the commander, I will shoot down even more enemy aircraft.”

“Good, very good.” The instructor stared at her. “Your fiancé is a top hacker?”

“Yes, number one in the world.” She had never been so certain as she was today.

The division commander’s eyes shone brightly, and he grabbed Su Mi’s shoulder, somewhat distraught: “Bring him here! Quickly! Our experts are out of options; my command system has been hacked by the enemy. Your comrades are now fighting in complete darkness. Bring him here! I need him to help me fight back! Those robots!”

“Yes!” Su Mi turned and walked away, but after a few steps, she suddenly stopped and turned to look at her commander.

“Commander,” she said, enunciating each word clearly, “we will fight to the last man! They can’t take this city without stepping over our flesh and bones!”

Su Mi returned in a fighter jet. Despite nationwide and global support for the city, not a single plane or tank was deployed to the outer perimeter, allowing her to successfully break through the robot encirclement.

Once the army was defeated, the entire city would fall into their hands.

Su Mi forcibly parked the plane vertically in the square in the middle of the community, jumped off the plane, and saw countless people stumbling and running out of the community.

“Don’t be afraid! I’m from the Air Force; I won’t hurt you!” she shouted to the oncoming crowd.

But nobody paid any attention to her.

The neighbors seemed to be chased by a ghost, screaming and running away in an instant.

She ran against the flow of people towards the building entrance. After a few steps, she froze as if she had been frozen in place.

She wondered if her eyesight was failing from flying for too long. Otherwise, why would the air conditioner, refrigerator, and washing machine at the entrance of the building seem to have come to life, moving or jumping, step by step, as if they were moving outwards?

She looked around and saw that throughout the community, electrical appliances were constantly falling from the high-rise windows and smashing to pieces on the ground; various electrical appliances were moving on their own at the entrance of each building; and at the entrance of some units, several people were lying on the ground with blood streaming from their heads and bodies, clearly having been attacked.

Who attacked?

Machine awakening.

The word sent a chill down her spine. She felt that the bizarre scene before her was definitely related to the invading robots. However, without the slightest hesitation, she drew her sidearm and made her way to the fire escape behind the building.

Her heart skipped a beat.

Meng Xicong’s cell phone was switched off, and his landline was unreachable. Where was he at this time?

The door was wide open without a doubt. Gripping her gun, she nervously squeezed inside. The house was in complete disarray; the television, air conditioner, and refrigerator were all gone, as if it had been robbed. She took a deep breath and rushed into the bedroom.

She almost burst into tears.

On the large bed, Meng Xicong slept peacefully, his handsome face radiant. He was wearing pajamas, remaining in the same position she had been in when she left, as if he had never moved.

A sense of foreboding washed over her, and she stumbled to his bedside, her hand trembling as she reached out to touch his nose—

The familiar, warm breath brought tears of joy to her eyes. She held him in her arms, feeling a sense of peace she hadn’t felt in days.

That’s great, honey! Were you attacked by a machine, which is why you’re unconscious?

It’s alright. I told you, I’m here. If this city falls, I’ll fly my fighter jet and get you to safety!

She dragged Meng Xicong along, her heart pounding with fear, and boarded the seemingly normal fighter jet again. Perhaps due to the presence of the aircraft’s defense system, it did not “awaken” like other machines.

She piloted the plane through the clouds and over the city, telling herself everything would be alright. Once at the base, she would immediately find the medic to see Meng Xicong, and with his genius, she was sure he could hack into the robot spaceship’s system and defeat them!

When her plane finally reached the airspace above the base, she could no longer complete the simplest and most basic action of landing.

For the first time, she took her hands off the control panel and covered her face.

“Commander! Commander!” She cried out, almost bursting into tears as she looked at the billowing smoke from the base from a thousand meters in the air.

That’s all.

Everything was gone.

The command post was razed to the ground, the lighthouse collapsed and died, and the tarmac was engulfed in flames. The sky was filled with fire and thick smoke, as if it was witnessing the demise and fall of the last air force division base of the Northern Military Region.

She flew low overhead, and in her blurry vision, she saw many plane wrecks emitting thick smoke; many people lay motionless on the ground.

“Honey, the base is gone,” She said, looking ahead without turning her head.

“Honey, maybe I shouldn’t have gone to pick you up. It’s more dangerous here than in the city. But I promised the division commander I would bring you back and defeat the robots.”

“Husband, do you know that I told the division commander that we would fight to the last man? They can only win by stepping over my dead body.”

“Honey, I might be the last person, the last fighter jet…”

The plane quietly landed where the former division headquarters was, now a scene of ruins and inferno, with not even a single intact body to be seen.

After climbing into the driver’s seat, Su Mi held the still unconscious Meng Xicong in her arms. Looking at the raging flames, she quietly said, “Commander, I’ve brought the world’s most skilled hacker.”

“Commander!”

The iron-gray fighter jet, like a wounded eagle, perched alone on the ground.

Alone, waiting for the enemy, waiting for death.

As the radar screen gradually filled with enemy aircraft targets, Su Mi slowly loosened her grip on Meng Xicong’s hands.

She turned her head and could see with the naked eye a vast expanse of silver-white enemy planes roaring in from the sky. On the ground, giant machines, each as tall as a twenty-story building, were taking heavy steps toward her.

Is this their true nature?

Su Mi resolutely jumped back into the driver’s seat.

Three hours later.

They wanted to capture her alive.

Perhaps because she was the last survivor, or perhaps because she had shot down three enemy planes and angered them, they surrounded her in a valley near the base. With no ammunition or food left, she was trapped and unable to advance or retreat, and she reached a dead end.

But she won’t surrender.

She stepped on the thruster, closed her eyes briefly, then opened them again.

She launched a suicidal attack.

Amidst the intense heat and flames that could have reduced her to ashes, Su Mi suddenly remembered many things.

She recalled when she applied to the military academy, her father looked pleased, while her mother cried and disagreed.

She recalled her first day in the army when she was punished by the company commander to run ten laps because of her arrogant attitude, which made her lose face.

She recalled the exhilaration of successfully piloting a fighter jet solo for the first time and soaring through the blue sky; she also recalled the past few days, as her comrades’ planes crashed mercilessly before her eyes.

She also thought of her division commander and chief of staff, how they spoiled and doted on her, and how her division commander told other leaders, “This girl is a natural-born pilot; I wouldn’t trade her for mountains of gold and silver…”

Finally, she remembered a day long ago. She and a group of brothers were squatting under the shade of trees outside the military academy, watching Meng Xicong, tall and handsome in a white shirt, walk by with a cold expression and without glancing at them. She put a Coke bottle on the ground and blocked the way.

She said to him, “You’re Meng Xicong? Hey, hey, don’t go; let’s be friends…”

She thought her smile must have looked incredibly roguish and infuriating, which was why Meng Xicong, who was always arrogant, stopped and stared at her without saying a word.

From then on, she pulled him into her life, for all eternity.

Forever and ever.