Chapter 37 Chapter Seventeen

Since there was no meal in the morning, Jiulian's raid from Heifengjian to the 632 highland area was even more difficult. After returning to the company after the meeting at the battalion headquarters, Cheng Ming and Liang Pengfei quickly assembled the team by the forest; Ready to run and join the fight.After finishing all this, they went back to stand at the front of the queue, and the Seventh Company, who served as the vanguard, had just rushed out of the woods on the west side of Jianxi, and climbed up the big mountain ridge of Qipanling. The Ninth Company is a guard company, and they must wait until the Eighth Company is on the road before they can set off.If one of Cheng Ming and Liang Pengfei had a little more experience, he would have thought that when the whole battalion was marching in single file—not to mention climbing the steep Qipan Ridge under the threat of enemy artillery fire and minefields, the vanguard company and the rear company There is often a difference of half an hour between the departure times, and this time can be used for Quanlian to eat.Although one pot and one pot of rice in the Jiandi Cooking Team were blown away by the enemy's shells, the other two pots were still intact.However, due to their inexperience and some incidents during this period, Quan Lian still couldn't eat the two pots of cooked rice.

What happened in this half hour is: After the whole battalion received the combat mission, the moods of Cheng Ming and Liang Pengfei changed.Cheng Ming had performed heroically when the enemy bombarded Heifengjian. Since then, he has always believed that he has passed the "pass".Of course, he did not want to admit that the change of mood at this time was still due to fear. On the contrary, he believed that it was caused by another kind of anxious thinking that had nothing to do with fear: the company is really going to the battlefield now, but can it really fight?Since last night, he has successively had conflicts with the instructor, the first platoon leader, the second platoon leader, and the chief of staff. Will they really cooperate well with him on the battlefield?The most important thing is - he has never told anyone about this worry buried in his heart - except for the third platoon leader Shangguan Feng, these people who have wives and children like him will not be as focused on thinking about it as he was before this morning. Are you alive?If they went to the battlefield to shit on your company commander, wouldn't you be caught blind? !And those soldiers—Cheng Ming knows how the soldiers of the company treat him from what happened at the bottom of the morning—can you count on them to charge forward for you?The more he thought in this direction, the more he felt that today's affairs would be troublesome, and he felt that he should do something before leaving!

The change in Liang Pengfei's mood was related to the deputy of the sixth class who had just been sent down the mountain by him.Before sending the remains of the martyrs away, he only had mixed emotions of terror, pity, and disgust, and he didn't understand the shock it caused in his heart; The human leg on the grass in the forest, remembering the limbs of the sixth shift deputy sent down on the stretcher, the thoughts that had been hidden in my heart suddenly became active.These thoughts are: in the past, when thinking about death in battle, it was just imagination, but today I realize that death is like that of the deputy of the sixth class just now!When thinking of death in the past, it was always associated with his wife and house, but now he suddenly realized: death is only his own business, it is his own death!The latter idea was too new, too frightening to his soul, and could not calm his heart, which had been terrified since the previous night.When the whole battalion received the order to move to the 632 highland area, this kind of fear that seemed to soak the soul was suddenly strengthened again. He couldn't help thinking: You can still hide in the shelter here, and you have to face the enemy's attack when you go to the battlefield. bullet.What's more, the company commander Cheng Ming doesn't understand military command!

Secondly, when they returned from a meeting at the battalion headquarters, they found that the news that the deputy of the sixth squad was killed was still spread throughout the company.What happened was: the sixth squad leader didn't know when the body of the sixth squad deputy was transported away. When the company assembled, he crawled out of the cat's ear hole, only to realize that the deputy squad leader was missing, so he yelled everywhere and went to report the second platoon leader Cen Hao.In order not to let him shout, Cen Hao called him aside, told him the truth, and asked him to readjust the combat team in the class according to this situation.The sixth squad leader's eyes widened after hearing this, and he didn't tell anyone else when he returned to the squad, but since he wanted to adjust the combat team, he had to explain the matter clearly to the candidate for the deputy squad leader who was pre-selected before the battle.With such an explanation, the whole company knows.

The deputy of the sixth class was an unknown person, and many people didn't even recognize him; but it was the death of such a person that made everyone suddenly feel the contingency of death and the mystery hidden in the contingency.No one paid attention to the deputy of the sixth squad while he was alive. People who knew him after his death immediately remembered his many advantages: kindness, not pushy, accurate shooting, never blushing with anyone, etc., two words: nice guy.But this good man became the first victim of the whole company!No one in the queue discussed this matter, but it didn't take long for many people to quietly realize that a significant change had taken place in their hearts.When the company gathered outside the forest, Zhao Guangliang, a new soldier from the third row and the ninth squad, was sobbing and crying!

The third row was at the back of the company, and it took Zhao Guangliang's cry to reach Cheng Ming's ears.His nerves were already tense, and the crying immediately made his pores open: Who is this?Didn't go to war, first on the number!What impact will it have on the fighting mood of the whole company? ! "Who is that mourning?!" He shouted angrily!Quickly rushed to the third row, and found Zhao Guangliang wiping tears from the queue.Zhao Guangliang stopped crying when he heard his angry scolding, and his twin brother rushed over to stand between Cheng Ming and his younger brother like a guard.

"Why are you crying?!" Cheng Ming didn't let the recruit go, his face flushed because he scolded Zhao Guangliang angrily. "What's your performance?! Ah?...Where's your platoon leader?" He thought of Shangguan Peak again.If something like this happened in the platoon, why didn't the third platoon leader ignore it? !He quickly found the person he was looking for in the queue, and he was shocked.Compared with the morning, Shangguan Peak has changed a lot!The anger that always appeared in the student officer's eyes was gone, and now there was a dreamlike expression that made Cheng Ming very unhappy. The blood vessels are also clearly visible.The unknown anger in Cheng Ming's heart rose again: No wonder there were people crying in the third row, look at this platoon leader, just when he heard about the war, he was so frightened that his face turned pale!

"Third platoon leader, what's the matter with this soldier?! What's the matter with you?!" He widened his eyes and shouted at Shangguanfeng, "You don't care about it?!" Shangguan Feng seemed to be awakened by him from a dream.He looked at his company commander, as if he didn't understand anything; suddenly, his pale face gradually became bloody, and his eyes became extremely sharp. "Commander, he's hungry!" he said loudly. The sarcasm in his words was immediately felt by the soldiers around him.The soldiers laughed quietly.Cheng Ming was further irritated, "What do you mean?!" He yelled at Shangguanfeng, turned around and walked towards the queue, unwilling to argue with the latter.At this moment, what he was thinking was: before departure, another cadre meeting must be held to unify the thinking. The army is like this, it cannot fight!

"Instructor, I suggest holding another cadre meeting!" He said to Liang Pengfei angrily, "You have seen it all! We are really going to fight, and the cadres are still like this, so what can we do?!" Liang Pengfei took a deep look at him, and Cheng Ming felt that he was taken aback by this man's expression again.Liang Pengfei's face was as pale as Shangguanfeng's, which made the several dark purple scars on the instructor's cheeks stand out.Liang Pengfei saw the scene between the company commander and the third platoon leader just now, and felt even more disappointed with Cheng Ming and the whole company, but the important thing was not this. During this time, he imagined the war and his own death (he Can't really believe that the 632 highland area is not dangerous to them), Liang Pengfei's spirit has a strange change.He wanted to live no matter what, but this war might kill him, so he suddenly felt that he had nothing to do with the company or the war.Cheng Ming's words only aroused the following thought in his mind: Whatever Cheng Ming wants to do today, let him do it. Anyway, the company and the war have nothing to do with me!

"I agree." He said feebly. But the meeting didn't work out.Correspondent Wu Bin took the cadres to the nearby forest. Just as Cheng Ming said he wanted everyone to express their views again, Lin Hongsheng, the leader of the platoon, blushed and yelled thickly: "Company commander, there is a dick meeting! Didn't you express your attitude last night?...Do you not trust us, or yourself!" The next thing happened: it wasn't Lin Hongsheng, but a person Liang Pengfei and Cheng Ming didn't expect—the deputy company commander Jiang Boyu—turned around and walked out of the forest as if he had suffered a great humiliation, turning his head and shouting:

"I have nothing to say! . . . I said what I wanted to say last night, and I don't want to say it again! . . . It's shameful! . . . " Cen Hao, the leader of the second platoon, Lin Hongsheng, the leader of the first platoon, and the deputy instructor left afterward;Annoyed and ashamed, Cheng Ming wanted to yell at the people who had gone away, but he didn't yell, and there was another commotion in the queue! A few soldiers left the forest without asking for instructions, and ran to the bottom of the stream quickly! Cheng Ming rushed out of the woods impulsively, venting his anger on these soldiers. "Who the fuck is that!...don't stop!" he yelled at them.A shell had just landed in the stream, and a white jet of water exploded, making Cheng Ming shiver. "Do you fucking want to die? Huh?!..." The cooking squad leader who was leading the run to the bottom of the stream stopped on the half slope, looked back at Cheng Ming, turned around and went back to the queue, the expression on his face showed that he didn't bother to chat with such a company commander.Seeing the squad leader like this, the two or three cooking soldiers behind him also turned around and ran back to the queue.Only a short and stocky soldier wobbled, did not run back, but trotted up to Cheng Ming, his cheeks were red and purple, panting heavily, and said: "Lianlian...company commander! There are still two pots of rice below! Everyone is hungry! Our squad leader wants to bring it up for comrades... to eat!" Cheng Ming didn't immediately recognize who he was, but felt a little familiar.But what the soldier said aroused his anger.He yelled at the soldier: "You fucking think about eating at this time?!...Who wants to eat? It's you old cooks who want to eat! I'm calling you mothers. You are not familiar with cooking, and now you still eat your mothers ×!...Do you only know how to eat when you have a long head?!..." He scolded Yu Deshui for five minutes before ordering the soldier to "go back"!Finally, he didn’t remember who the latter was; Yu Deshui was confused by the company commander: he and the squad leader went to Jiandi to make food not only for himself, but for the whole company to eat, and the company commander didn’t let them do it. , then forget it, the company commander can't afford to lose his temper like that.In a daze, he felt that the company commander was not scolding him, but someone else; even though the company commander had finished scolding him, he still couldn't follow the company commander's order to "go back": he is a farmer's boy, so he feels that he can't be bothered. It's a pity to throw it at the bottom of the stream, and besides, they still occupy two marching pots.The squad leader said before the war that the marching pot is also a combat material, like a gun in the hands of a soldier, and must not be thrown away casually.He summoned up his courage and stammered and asked: "Then... company commander, do you still want the pot?" Cheng Ming was reminded: Of course, he was born as the chief of staff, he would not be ignorant of what Deshui knew; but now he thought of who this soldier was, and an unknown fire rushed up in his heart: If at the bottom of the stream in the morning, It wasn't this stupid cooking soldier, the secretary chief's fist would have hit his nose, but he still hated this soldier!There is nothing good in the cooking class!He took advantage of the topic and cursed at Deshui again: "Damn, do you want more?! What's the use of raising you?!... How good it would be to feed those grains to the livestock!..." He scolded for another two full minutes before shouting at Yu Deshui as if issuing an amnesty decree: "Hurry up and get the pot back!" Yu Deshui moved his feet, blinked his eyes, and asked again: "Then... what about the meal?" One sentence fanned Cheng Ming's anger again: "What food?...Dump it!" Yu Deshui felt that he understood.When I was in the army, my parents said that when I became the head of the army, I was like a father and mother. Today, it is nothing to ask the company commander to scold me a few words.Since the company commander told him to go down and dump the rice and get the pot up, he should do it!He quickly went down to the bottom of the ravine, turned the two pots of rice onto the beach, and carried the pots up. Those two piles of rice were left at the bottom of the stream, glistening white and seductive in the sun.No one said anything at the beginning, and after fifteen minutes the company hadn't set off yet, many people in the queue began to curse softly: "You bitch, you don't want to eat when you have food, what kind of fight!" "He bastard asked Wu Bin to bring something to eat!" "Following this kind of bear, the company commander will starve to death if he is beaten to death!" "Look, bad luck is yet to come!" "..." Cheng Ming also saw the two piles of dazzlingly white rice.As soon as there were curses in the queue, he regretted it a little. At this time, he himself experienced waves of hunger dizziness!But it was impossible for him to admit his mistake: who knew that the company would take so long to set off!And that Xiong Bing, if you tell him to pour his food down, he really did!As a kind of compensation, he wanted to inform Quan Lian to eat compressed dry food, but he didn't do it: he poured out the rice and ordered everyone to eat dry food, wouldn't Quan Lian scold him even more! So until the ninth company followed the eighth company to climb to Qipanling, the whole company did not receive the order to eat dry food.But it's all the same anyway, the hungry soldiers have already gnawed on the compressed dry food automatically. As soon as he got on Lu Ming's stomach growled, his legs felt weak, and he felt dizzy.After all, like Quan Lian, he has not eaten anything since last night.However, when the correspondent Wu Bin also handed him a pack of compressed dry food, he pushed it away as if he had been insulted.He didn't order Quan Lian to eat dry food, so he shouldn't have eaten it!He Cheng Ming has no other abilities, but he still has a bit of self-esteem! He stepped up his pace.The mountain road was curved and steep. Looking up, the mountain ridge seemed to be stretched in the clouds, which made him feel that it was impossible to climb up; The little two-colored banner also pushed the premonition of death into his heart from time to time.Somehow, however, he found himself less afraid of them than he had been before.Only later did he understand that the reason for this was that the two piles of white rice at Heifengjiandi occupied most of the space in his heart from the very beginning.The more he felt weak under his feet and lack of strength, the more clear and attractive the image of those two piles of white rice became. ... "It was a mistake for me not to let the cooking soldiers bring them up," he finally thought angrily, "if they were brought up at that time, everyone in the whole company could have a bowl of rice in ten minutes.  … It is very different to have a bowl of rice in your stomach or not to have a bowl of rice in your stomach. I shouldn’t have fought with the chief of staff in the morning. Without that fight, the entire company might have eaten, and you yourself would not be here now I'm still hungry..." But this kind of self-blaming thinking is rare in him, and as he continued to move forward, Cheng Ming felt aggrieved and complained again in his heart. "...but am I willing to do this? I don't know how to fight, and I don't have the ability to lead a company to participate in battle, but the superior still asks me to lead this company!..." After a while, the dizziness caused by hunger interrupted his thinking again, and two piles The white rice came alive like a character in a cartoon, and he shouted at him with a smile: "Eat us! Eat us! We are sweet and delicious!..." Suddenly his consciousness came to life, a bird The foot has stepped into the middle of the small red and white flags on the side of the road! Cheng Ming shivered greatly. "Death..." He suddenly thought.For a long time after that, he didn't think about hunger and white rice.But a new feeling of despondency stirred up in him. "...Other companies also have company commanders, and they are also fighting, but everyone has eaten, and the company commander himself is not hungry. ... I am incompetent, and it will be bad luck for the Ninth Company to follow me. What will happen next? ?..." A shell landed in the Eighth Company, and a soldier died instantly.When the martyr was being carried down the mountain on a stretcher, Cheng Ming saw that there was still blood dripping down, but his heart was not deeply touched, but his thinking changed into a new deep and dark tunnel. "...The next step is to go into battle. I just didn't let the whole company eat in the morning, and when I arrived at the 632 highland area, my incompetence will cause the soldiers and myself to die." Thinking of this, he shivered again. , I feel that the weight of war on my life is even more unbearable. "...But will the deputy commander really let me lead the Ninth Company into battle?" For a moment he thought of another question, although it was an old question, but at this moment it was firmly grasping his heart. "The deputy head of the Ninth Company knows about the situation. He doesn't trust me and Liang Pengfei. The deputy head really trusts the Seventh Company and the Eighth Company, especially the Seventh Company..." The dark and deep tunnel suddenly widened , there was some light indistinctly in front of him, and before he figured out what kind of light it was, his heart began to get excited. "The deputy head let the Ninth Company go into battle, and the battle will definitely be lost. What good would that do him? ... The deputy head warned me and the cadres of the Ninth Company with a military court. Once the Ninth Company makes a mess of the battle, the military court Wouldn't he be held accountable?..." He accepted this new idea with joy, and followed it with pleasure and firmness. "If the deputy head knows that the Nine Company can't fight and won't send the Nine Company to fight, why would he take the Nine Company to the 632 highland area today? ... The reason why he did this today is because he can only do so. The deputy head can't do it Leave the Ninth Company in Heifengjian alone and not let it go to the battlefield with the whole battalion." This conclusion made him happy for a while, "Then what is my mission?...My mission is to put this company on the horse Ridge, and then bring it to the 632 highland area!..." Compared with the Seventh Company and Eighth Company who were walking ahead, the Nineth Company entered the stage of exhaustion, sweating profusely, decreased sensory perception, and blank brain from time to time on the way to the raid because they did not have breakfast.Not only did Cheng Ming not have breakfast, he also did not eat compressed dry food. He entered the upper state earlier than the soldiers.The real secret of why he could forget about hunger, artillery fire, and minefields, and persevere in climbing upwards, was that he had formed the above-mentioned clear belief in his mind.Jiulian won't go to war, he just needs to take it to Qipanling, to the 632 highland area, and he will complete all the tasks, and everything such as the military court will be far away from him.He didn't understand that the above beliefs were actually the result of a diminution of judgment caused by hunger, which in turn allowed him to look more indifferently than ever at artillery fire, minefields, and even the hunger in his belly.His series of thoughts are: death is connected with war, if Jiulian does not fight, of course he will not die; since he will not die, the artillery fire in front of him, the minefield, and the hunger in his stomach cannot affect him. cause some damages.This kind of thinking is absurd in the eyes of ordinary people, but it is very natural in Cheng Ming's mind.The reduction in the overall intellectual activity ability also made him instinctively take the compressed dry food from Wu Bin's hands and start to chew at some point.He didn't even realize that he was eating compressed dry food, and he hasn't stopped eating compressed dry food since then.It was this subconscious chewing and eating activity that gave him the physical strength and energy to climb up the Qipanling mountain ridge ahead of Quanlian. When the cool breeze blew on the mountain ridge, most of Cheng Ming's sense and perception ability recovered.The seventh company and the eighth company had already left, and only one foot signal soldier from the battalion was left waiting for them on the mountain ridge.Seeing him walking up staggeringly, the messenger quickly stepped forward and raised his hands in salute: "Reporting to Company Commander Cheng, the battalion commander asked me to stay and convey his words: the deputy commander ordered you not to delay after joining the company, go forward immediately, and speed up to catch up with the team in front!" The high-level dual-purpose machine guns on the No. 3 peak of Tianzi Mountain are firing fiercely at the big hillside in the south of Qipanling; the team of the Eighth Company has already jumped a long way down.Cheng Ming clearly realizes that a more difficult journey is still ahead! It was not the first and second platoons that followed him up the mountain ridge line, but the third platoon that was originally at the end of the marching sequence.Cheng Ming immediately ordered Shangguan Feng: "Third platoon leader, now your platoon will be the sharp knife platoon, quickly keep up with the eighth company! Pass back at the same time, let the first and second platoons speed up!" Compared with before departure, Shangguanfeng's face was paler; due to severe dehydration, the edges and corners of his face were also protruding.He seemed to hesitate for a moment, but immediately carried out Cheng Ming's order. When Shangguanfeng led three platoons to rush down Qipan Lingnan Dapo, Liang Pengfei had just walked up the mountain ridge supported by Zhao Jian, with a dazed look on his face.Cheng Ming felt angry again: Look at this instructor, he has to wait on him before he reaches his destination!Without thinking about it, he said loudly in a complaining voice: "Instructor, what happened behind you? Why didn't the first row and the second row follow?!" Liang Pengfei didn't answer him, but raised his eyelids at him reflexively.Liang Pengfei didn't eat in the morning, and his stomach was empty. He had been in office for many years, and his physical fitness was worse than Cheng Ming's. He started shaking after walking for a long time.Zhao Jian also asked him to eat dry food at first, but he only chewed a couple of mouthfuls, and his stomach started to hurt, so he had no choice but to stop eating.Liang Pengfei walked up the mountain ridge in the following state of mind: since he felt that he had nothing to do with the war before he set off, and then he was exposed to artillery fire and minefields, he gained a metaphysical sense of security This state does not prevent him from performing his duties on the way. When a shell severely wounds a soldier in a row, he can quite clearly arrange for a stretcher to carry the wounded down.Going further up, this mental state of separation of body and mind is combined with the exhaustion caused by physical exhaustion, making him a trance-like person, relying on the strong Zhao Jian to help him step by step on the Ridge Ridge Dashanliang.In the end, Cheng Ming's words woke him up, and made his half-conscious, half-numbed consciousness realize that he was on the mountain ridge.But then I took a look at the 632 highland area in the southeast direction, and vaguely thought that the road was still far away. The enemies on Tianzi Mountain were shooting wildly at their only way, and the god of death was still spreading its black and terrifying wings in this area. Soaring in the sky, Liang Pengfei's true self was unwilling to return to reality, and it left the war and his own body again! Finally, Cheng Ming didn't hear anything from him. He was surprised to see that with Zhao Jian's support, he didn't stop on the mountain ridge, and followed the third row down the South Dapo!