Early the next morning, before dawn, Grandma, Auntie, and her cousin all woke up because of their previous routine.
Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao sensed their movement and got up too, rustling as they put on their coats and left the box van.
After a night had passed, Grandma’s body, which had already been mostly treated, was naturally in decent condition. Although Auntie and her cousin had not received treatment, they had done some simple cleaning and looked much better than yesterday.
Cao Yuanbai did exactly what he said he would. He really scooped out the two basins of bathwater that had been left overnight and rinsed himself from head to toe.
After all, he was young, and his skin disease was not that severe. Many of the scars and scabs left by wounds or skin problems were washed away with water, and there were not really any lingering issues.
As for the grease that had not been washed away, it could be considered a naturally secreted layer of oil protecting his skin. Although it looked dirty, as long as it was not excessive, it would have a certain protective effect. In that sense, it was actually just right.
Every so often, her cousin would borrow a manual hair clipper from the person in charge of ordinary people’s daily living arrangements and ask Grandma to shave his hair for him. So his head was either bald or had only a short layer of stubble that had not yet been shaved off. It was very easy to wash.
After he rinsed himself and got dressed, there were already many vegetables, fruits, potatoes, and other things that could be eaten raw placed on the table outside.
There was no way to light a fire here, so they could only eat cold, raw food. The three of them were already very satisfied.
Especially when they ate the fruit, they could almost feel a strong need in their bodies screaming constantly. They could not hold back and ate wildly.
Fu Erdie remembered last month, when they had fought the university town ability-user team. They had wrapped corrosive liquid inside vegetables and fruit and thrown them at the ability-user team, only for them to eat them without any guard up.
At the time, it was clear that ability users had an enormous craving for the trace elements contained in those vegetables and fruit.
Ordinary people probably needed them badly too.
So after Fu Erdie allocated thirty jin of potatoes to her cousin, she also took out ten jin of cucumbers and cabbage. These were crops produced by intelligently mutated plants, so they could be stored for one or two months in winter.
Fu Erdie packed everything up and instructed him, “Find a safe place to hide them, preferably somewhere only you know, then eat them slowly. I’ll come to see you in a month at the latest.”
Actually, Fu Erdie wanted even more to advise him to hand the food and remaining water to the person in charge of managing ordinary people, leave the things with them, and split them fifty-fifty. That way, although he would lose half the food, it would be safer, and he would be more likely to receive some care, rather than having everything swarmed and stolen if someone discovered it.
But after thinking about it, Fu Erdie swallowed the advice that had reached her lips.
Since she wanted to train him, she had to let him experience things himself and figure them out himself. If even she, his cousin, habitually gave him ideas, then how was that any different from what her aunt did?
She was not his mother. She should not worry so much.
Cao Yuanbai pondered for a moment and thought of a pile of rubble beside a road that very few people passed, but that he would pass when carrying cement raw material stones.
There was a very hidden broken box there. After putting the food inside, he could smoothly and secretly take a few bites every day when he passed by during work.
Auntie reminded him uneasily, “Don’t tell anyone, okay? Don’t think thirty or forty jin of food is a lot. If you eat a little every day for a month, it’ll be gone. If someone finds it, it’ll definitely disappear in an instant. Remember, no matter who asks you, even that brother you only met after coming to the base, you can’t say anything.”
Cao Yuanbai waved casually. “I know, I know.”
Auntie: “…”
One look and she could tell he had not taken it in.
But looking at her mother and niece, she still swallowed back her nagging reminders.
It was fine. Everything would get better now. Even if the food was taken away by someone, at most he would return to his previous life. It would not get worse.
Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao were currently “trial residents” of the base, so they could take their temporary identity cards and visit all around the base. If others saw them, they would at most ask a few questions. As long as they did not go to confidential places, staff would not interfere after seeing their identity cards.
The group found the ability user responsible for assigning ordinary people work, asked for two days off for Cao Xiufen, Cao Rui, and Cao Yuanbai, and gave some gifts, saying they wanted Cao Yuanbai to learn more things. If convenient later, they hoped he could rotate through different positions in the cement factory.
The ability user accepted the grain gift and cheerfully agreed.
After that, they went to the residence and packed some things. If they were leaving today, some items that were still useful or had sentimental value might need to be taken away.
Actually, Grandma and Auntie did not have much to bring, only some dirty clothes. They did not know what the supply situation was like on Fu Erdie’s side, and Fu Erdie could not conveniently reveal it either, so she carried the things away with them.
At ten in the morning, Fu Erdie arrived at the place where He Xuan and the others were unloading the electric minibus and found an inconspicuous corner by a wall to observe.
Over there, He Xuan was already holding the hand of a thin, weak little girl as they unloaded the goods. Everything was going smoothly.
After seven hundred jin of grain had been unloaded, Xu Qi, the person in charge, reluctantly closed the luggage compartment door, which clearly still contained a lot of goods. Then he used a walkie-talkie to instruct the gate to prepare to let He Xuan’s minibus through.
Seeing that there was no problem, Fu Erdie held Grandma’s hand and walked over from the corner, asking Xu Qi and He Xuan to wait.
The two groups met up. He Xuan explained that Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao were their teammates, and that they had now also found relatives inside and wanted to take them out together.
Xu Qi was an old fox. He immediately understood that this group had not felt reassured and had split into two routes.
Fortunately, they had not tried anything crooked, and the other side did not seem to care much about the two or three thousand jin resettlement fee either. The two sides exchanged a knowing glance and were both satisfied with this exchange. They opened the luggage compartment and continued unloading.
Xu Qi looked at the fresh crops and sighed sincerely. “We will definitely have more chances to cooperate in the future. Contact us by telegraph later!”
He Xuan nodded.
Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao went to the temporary residence to check out, then controlled the box van to fly onto the roof of the minibus.
After the base’s people unloaded another fourteen hundred jin of grain, Fu Erdie took Grandma and Auntie with her, said goodbye to her reluctant cousin, and left the base, boarding the bus home.
Finally, they were going home.
The base gate slowly receded into the distance. The numb, wretched refugees by the roadside also became scenery that flew backward like roadside trees. The scenes of the past half year of the apocalypse — sorrowful, difficult, frightening, life-risking — slid past her eyes, and finally gathered into the head of short, weathered hair before her that had long since turned silver-white.
Fu Erdie hugged her grandmother. “It’ll get better. From now on, we, Auntie, Mum and Dad — all of us won’t be separated again.”
Grandma’s eyes reddened, and her voice choked. “Mm. We won’t be separated again.”
To let Auntie and the little girl receive treatment and cleaning in time, Sang Wenhao opened up the part where the minibus roof touched the box van into a staircase passage. Fu Erdie held the two people’s hands and brought them into the box van, telling them that the box van was her ability.
She used the previous explanation that she had a “plant-type ability” and a “home” ability to answer their questions. At the same time, she also explained why she wanted to train her cousin.
“Auntie, don’t worry. I’ll come see him later. If our residential complex and the base establish trade relations, then either I or my teammates should come over often.”
After setting up water, two buckets — just enough for Auntie and Zhang Guya to each have one — they each washed.
Fu Erdie also took out clean clothes to replace their dirty ones and told them that after washing, they could continue staying in the box van and wait for it to slowly heal their wounds. Once they were mostly healed, they could come down.
After making these arrangements, Fu Erdie input a lot of ability into the box van, ensuring it could treat the two of them later. Only then did she go back downstairs, lean against Sang Wenhao, and fall asleep.
After such a long time, her wish to reunite with her family had finally come to an end after all kinds of fear and worry.
Her mum and dad were home. Grandma and Auntie were safe. She had once again protected her greatest soft spots in this world.
That was wonderful.
It was just that there was still no clue about Zhao Xiaolu’s whereabouts, and she also did not know what had happened to Cen Xiyang’s parents. Looking further ahead, if she gradually accepted more people, or rather, if she wanted to strengthen the cohesion of all her teammates, then she would also need to go find her teammates’ families.
Fu Erdie’s brows, which had originally relaxed a lot, unconsciously furrowed again because of more worries.
Sang Wenhao thought the sunlight shining in from outside was making her uncomfortable, so he controlled a small metal sheet to pull the curtain over the car window and fasten it to the metal window frame. His cheek gently rested against the top of her head. “Sleep. I’ll call you if anything happens.”
“Mm.” Fu Erdie fell into deep sleep in the bumpy but warm embrace.
The route from the D City base back to the residential complex had already been cleared once when they came. As for the other side of the blockage they encountered on the way back, the ability users had already become skilful at clearing roads.
Thinking that they would very likely travel this route often in the future, none of them slacked off at all. They directly moved all the vehicles blocking the road as far as the eye could see to places outside the expressway. Since they were not in a hurry, they cleared the entire wide, open road.
With stops and starts like this, the group finally returned to the residential complex the next day.
To celebrate the family reunion, and also to let all the newcomers and old members get familiar with one another again, Fu Erdie organised a big group meal. First, she opened an entire pack of pineapple beer from their collected supplies. Then she dug out various hotpot soup bases they had been reluctant to eat, including clear broth and spicy ones. After preparing the ingredients, they cooked hotpot. Besides the usual potato slices, there were glass noodles processed by Granny Zhang, as well as lettuce stems, water spinach, eggplants, and other things that had been planted later, creating a huge mixed feast.
Although it was winter, cold dishes were still very popular. Cucumber salad and cold glass noodles were both brought out.
The chick they had picked up outside before had now grown a lot.
Perhaps the chick had also mutated slightly. After a month of eating and drinking well, it now weighed four or five jin. The little yellow chick had not turned into a mud-coloured farm chicken, but into a fairly nice-looking big yellow chicken.
Fu Erdie was a little reluctant to slaughter it. But after all, this was a celebration banquet. Without meat, it would not feel right!
So Fu Erdie caught the chicken and planned to slaughter it in a while.
But just then, perhaps because the big yellow chicken sensed its fate of being eaten, it laid three eggs in a row at the critical moment. One of them was laid while Fu Erdie was holding it by the wings in mid-air, and it fell to the ground and smashed. The other two were laid temporarily after she put it down.
Fu Erdie: “…”
Granny Zhang, who had always been responsible for feeding the yellow chicken: “…”
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