Can Ci Pin/Imperfections(残次品)BL by Priest

Chapter 69

The door of Jingheng Lin’s temporary office was half-opened. Tulane came to hand Bixing Lu the list of mechs to maintain and inform her boss in passing, and just arrived at this spot. 

At the door, she stood upright and tidied up herself. The captain of the Ninth Squadron heard such words even before she was able to present herself. She held down her sound promptly, zipped her lips tightly for the gossip, not even willing to blink or breathe.

The culture of the Eighth Galaxy was “The Song of Smugglers and Rangers”, the city of the Eighth Galaxy was an exhibition center of “artificial unintelligence”, the administrative authorities of the Eighth Galaxy were the underworlds of each planet, the people of the Eighth Galaxy were all struggling in dire straits... in summary, after hearing his suggestion, Jingheng Lin deemed that the brain of the young scientist, Mr. Lu, must be burnt from overloading in the intense works this entire afternoon. 

He withheld his rude remarks and asked: “What don’t we have inside that you want to eat? Soil?”

“We haven’t been on a natural planet for more than half a year...” Bixing Lu softened his voice, putting his weight on one leg. Leaning on the table, his relaxed leg refused to stand in one place, circling back and forth. He was beaming, as if he never had a bad temper in his whole life. “Commodore, I didn’t even have a chance to travel around the Eighth Galaxy in my life so far — idling that many years on the Cayley, finally got out, then again sat around the Beijing-ß over years because I picked you up...”

While he raked up the past, the embarrassing scene when they were facing each other from day to night across the ecologic cabin reemerged in their minds again. Originally, it was just a normal embarrassment; now, with the romantic ambiguity Bixing Lu implied, it, unfortunately, became a super embarrassment. 

Jingheng Lin felt his scalp tingle: “Okay, all right. Go ahead, stay away from me. Come back before midnight.”

Then, the man with no recreational spirit looked downward to keep him out of sight and out of mind. He turned over a report from a nobody, had no intention to move any bit at all. 

Bixing Lu slowly stood up straight. His eyes shifted around and flickered awhile, felt the pretext he found might be a little muffed — Jingheng Lin was now pretending to not understand his implicit invitation. 

What a great civilization! Regardless of the invention of the anti-humanity nutrition paste, why did they also invent an AI to provide three meals a day at any time?

He got no better solution at the moment, and he also couldn’t tell whether Jingheng Lin seriously didn’t want to go. Peering into Jingheng Lin, he thought: “What a difficult task to pursue him? But never mind, there is still a lot of time.”

Consoling himself like that, he turned around to the entrance, directly facing Tulane who was coming in. Their eyes made a brief contact in the air; Tulane called out: “Commodore!”

Jingsheng: “At ease. Report.”

Tulane walked in with a serious face, speaking plausibly: “Commodore, we just expanded the scanning spectrum surrounding the base to 200 kilometers, and found that there is a bunch of unidentified people spying on us. According to the energy response, we suspect that they have a certain degree of arms!”

Both Jingheng Lin and Bixing Lu were slightly confounded.

As Bixing Lu grew up in the Eighth Galaxy, he knew those people. They definitely won’t take the risk of rebelling as long as any way to survive remains. He was quite surprised, thinking “People of Morning Star are so exceptional!”

Then, he saw Tulane wink at him from an angle that Jingheng Lin couldn’t see.

Bixing: “......”

Curiosity killed the cat, officiousness killed the guard captain. Tulane, this single woman, probably hated her long life.

“You hold on,” Jingheng halted Bixing, and asked Tulane, “How far outside the base? And the level of their arms?”

With his back to Jingheng Lin, Bixing winked to Tulane emphatically — to hint at her to not make it too exaggerated. Even though Jingheng Lin wouldn’t come, he himself wanted to go hang out.

Tulane showed her amazing talent in swindling. Realizing that she made the situation too serious, she modified her words without batting an eye: “The spot keeps moving. The level is ‘Ground-Minus’, not so professional. I suspect that’s because those of the AUG did some wicked things and the local citizens organized their own armed force.”

Armed forces had various levels. Like the mechs or the ground anti-missile system, they were definitely ‘Space Level’, while the non-interstellar arms would be ‘Ground Level’.