Escape to Safety

"Water." Lu Yu pressed his luck.

Having replenished the machine gun's ammunition, Wilk unscrewed the cap of a canteen, pinched Lu Yu's cheeks and poured a mouthful of water into his mouth.

"Honey, you need to rest. Don't mind him." Wilk looked at Song Zhi with watery blue-green eyes, full of concern and a trace of guilt.

"Your shoulder's hurt. Can I treat it for you, big guy?"

Song Zhi calling him "big guy" made Wilk lose himself for a moment, the guilt in his eyes melting into deep tenderness.

"Of course. Thank you, honey."

Wilk squeezed over and crouched in front of Song Zhi like an obedient big dog waiting for its owner to pat its head.

Song Zhi cut open the combat uniform over Wilk's shoulder, cleaned his wound with povidone-iodine, applied hemostatic powder and secured medical tape over it. That took care of it.

As pleased as if he'd been awarded a medal, Wilk returned to the machine gun.

Song Zhi lowered her head and continued sorting the medical supplies in the first-aid kit. She found two long-acting contraceptive injections in the medical pack.

Song Zhi: "..."

Sure enough, the French were thorough when it came to this sort of thing. She silently gave them the middle finger. Fuck!

The hangar doors overhead slowly opened, and the helicopter's rotors began to turn, picking up speed. As Kelante slowly raised the control stick, the helicopter lifted off and flew into the sky.

As the helicopter rose, it drew fire from the ground. The enemy set up a rocket launcher and aimed it at the slowly ascending helicopter.

Lai'en relayed the coordinates from the radar scan to Lu Yu. "Sniper, attention. Target on the ground at three o'clock, wind speed two meters per second, distance four hundred meters..."

Lu Yu narrowed his eyes and locked onto the target through his scope. He held his breath and decisively pulled the trigger. An armor-piercing round tore through the air toward the ground.

The enemy carrying the rocket launcher was shot in the head. As he fell, the rocket went off course and streaked toward the distant fuel drums.

Boom!!!

The shell detonated the piles of fuel drums, as though opening the gates of hell. Explosions erupted one after another, flames soared into the sky, and the blast was as powerful as tons of C4.

Wilk aimed his machine gun low, spraying the ground with a furious stream of high-speed fire. The enemies were riddled with bullets and reduced to bloody pulp on the ground.

The ground was a scene of utter devastation! Bodies lay everywhere!

Song Zhi took one look, and her face turned deathly pale. She lowered her head, closed her eyes and fought to keep her body from trembling.

Heavy attack helicopters were known as land-based meat grinders. Under intense covering fire, the helicopter rose rapidly and flew toward the sea. As they left Sri Lankan airspace, a dazzling white light flashed to the north. It drew closer and closer, then arced through the sky and slammed straight into Sri Lanka's power generation station.

A tremendous blast rang out, and the dazzling white light turned into a fiery red heat wave in an instant. Thousands of degrees hot, it vaporized everything on the land, reducing all to ash.

Soon, everything fell quiet. The cabin was utterly silent; no one spoke, and only the rushing sound of heavy breathing came through the headsets.

A few minutes later, they too would have been reduced to ashes in that heat wave. Their silence now came from hearts still pounding in the aftermath, and from the exhaustion that followed their escape.

Lu Yu put away his sniper rifle and sat down beside Song Zhi. He fastened his seat belt and rested his filthy head on her shoulder, as though he had found something he could lean on.

"I thought you were on that transport plane that got hit. I thought, if you were dead, I could die on that beach without regrets..."

"Can't you hope for something better? Miller said I'm Group A's mascot. I think he's right. I always manage to escape death." Song Zhi curved her lips. Though she was teasing Lu Yu, her tone had grown much gentler.

"A mascot? Sure enough, names can be wrong, but nicknames never are. Yeah, it fits!" Lu Yu had gone back to his flippant, punchable self.

Without a moment's windup, Song Zhi elbowed Lu Yu in the chest.

"Oh! Ah! That feels so good..." Lu Yu, wearing his bulky bulletproof vest, grinned shamelessly.

Song Zhi: "..."

Hill sat across from Song Zhi, arms folded and eyes lightly shut as he rested. His long legs took up the entire aisle, forming an absolute domain that kept Song Zhi's feet firmly between his.

Wilk sat across from Lu Yu, his blue-green eyes fixed tenderly on Song Zhi, never looking away. He opened a packet of dark chocolate and handed it to her. "Honey, have something to eat. You should rest."

"The pilot needs supplies too. Would some kind soul spare me a bite?" Kelante looked at Song Zhi in the rearview mirror, a warm light in his amber eyes.

Lai'en also glanced at the rearview mirror, but he never spoke.

Song Zhi took the dark chocolate from Wilk and bit into it. Then she looked down, took glucose rehydration solution and compressed oatmeal biscuits from her supply pack, and handed them out to the others.

Kelante accepted the glucose solution, its cap loosened by Song Zhi. The corners of his lips rose slightly as he opened the bottle and took a sip. It was very sweet!

Lai'en remained silent, but his gaze lingered on Song Zhi's fingertips. There was a complex, contradictory emotion in it, seemingly touched with an overly cold gravity, yet mixed with an indescribable gentleness.

The helicopter roared over the deep blue sea, chasing the horizon where sea and sky met.

Song Zhi's grip on the chocolate loosened, and she leaned back in her seat and dozed off. In her drowsiness, someone removed her heavy helmet. She rested against a solid, broad shoulder, completely at ease, and slipped into darkness.

When Song Zhi woke, daylight had faded and everything around her was dim and gray. As she sat up, she bumped into a solid wall of muscle. The person she had bumped into slowly woke too. It was Kelante.

He had been catching up on sleep beside Song Zhi. Perhaps because he had just woken, his amber eyes were bloodshot. When he spoke, his voice was low and hoarse, heavy with fatigue. "You're awake?"

"Mm. Where are we?" Song Zhi looked around and found that the others were not in the cabin.

"An unnamed island. The aircraft didn't have enough fuel, so we had to land here." Kelante sat up too and rubbed his sore eyes.

"Are you all right? Do you want to rest a little longer?"

Song Zhi sensed that something was wrong with Kelante. Looking worried, she raised a hand to his forehead. His skin was cool to the touch, and only then did she breathe a sigh of relief.

After all, getting a fever in such harsh conditions would be no good.

"I'm fine. Don't worry." Kelante took the hand Song Zhi had placed on his forehead, brought it to his lips and kissed it gently.

Just then, there was a sound outside, and someone pulled open the aircraft door. It was Hill. His gaze swept over Kelante, then Song Zhi, before settling on their joined hands.

"Come on. The lieutenant and the others found a place to hide." Hill's face was grim as he slung Song Zhi's tactical backpack over his shoulders.

Song Zhi felt a guilty pang, as though her husband had caught her in the act of cheating. She stood up and was about to jump out of the aircraft when she saw Hill reach out a hand to her.

She hesitated, then placed her hand in Hill's palm.

With a slight pull, Hill lifted Song Zhi down from the aircraft, full of possessiveness.

Kelante gave a quiet, amused snort and jumped down after them. He pulled the cabin door shut and picked up the fuel can beside him.

Hill had already camouflaged the entire helicopter.

In the faint light, Song Zhi made out the scene before her. The vegetation here was extremely dense, so dense it was almost excessive.

A breeze blew past, carrying the sound of waves. A solitary lighthouse loomed in and out of the mist. It was very eerie.

Song Zhi's brain froze on the spot-

Where the fuck have we ended up?

Did the script change again?

Is this deserted island survival now?

"Stranded on a deserted island, I began a shameless life with five muscular soldiers"?!