IPT 17

Chapter 17

 

In the tin house of the garbage dump, Shen Qianqian felt thirsty, so he went to the wall to find a half-old enamel cup and put it outside the house. He squatted in a cotton coat and a cotton hat inside the door, intently watching the rain slowly gather in the cup.

 

When the cup was filled with rainwater, he drank it all in one gulp and then lay back on the bed. The freshness of watching the rain had passed, and his heart once again regained his longing for the welfare home.

 

This thought diluted his fear of Wang Zhusheng’s brother’s iron rod, so much so that he began to wonder which was more sad to be stabbed in the chest or to be alone here.

 

But now that it was raining, thundering, and dark, he didn’t have the courage to go back to the welfare home, so he could only huddle in the quilt with his broken arm and weep.

 

“Do you want to go? I know you want to go, but I can’t let you go. As soon as you walked out of the net, bang thunder blows you away. Woo, you go again, walk to that big rock, bang bang, thunder will blow you up again, and your arm will be gone……”

 

The door of the tin house was always open, and the rain and cold wind poured in from time to time, making the ground in front of the door wet while the air inside the house was also full of humidity.

 

Although Shen Qianqian is in a quilt, it was as cold as lying in an ice cellar. Both of his feet were frozen and stiff. He sobbed and shook, full of fear, but he did not overcome the sleepiness and still fell asleep in shock and fear.

 

In his dream, he saw Wang Zhusheng and his brother, looking for him all over the garbage dump with an iron rod in his hand. He hid in the tin house and didn’t dare to go out, so he only quietly probed, but he happened to be seen by Wang Zhusheng and his brother.

 

“So you’re hiding in thus office! I’m going to stab you one, two, or three in half!” Wang Zhusheng and his brother roared as he picked up an iron rod and rushed over.

 

Shen Qianqian was in fright and hurriedly closed the door and quickly got under the bed: “Mental attack, mental attack ……”

 

But Wang Zhusheng and his brother had already rushed to the front of the house and began to smash the door with an iron rod.

 

Rumble! Rumble! Rumble!

Shen Qianqian curled in horror and his heart beat with the sound.

 

Boom Boom Boom Boom ……

When the sound was continuous, he let out a frightened cry and sat up from the bed so suddenly: 

 

“Ah!!” A dazzling white light streamed in through the wide open door, making the room surprisingly bright. There was a constant rumble outside the house, but it wasn’t Wang Zhusheng and his brother banging on the iron door.

 

After Shen Qianqian realized that this was a dream, he felt relaxed in his heart to come back to life. He hugged the quilt and laughed twice. Then he became curious about the rumbling outside the house, got up, and put on his shoes. He walked to the door.

 

Two intense white lights shot down from the sky, and he saw piles of black shadows falling from the low sky, and a hill had already formed in the square below that was shrouded in light.

 

The aircraft is taking out the garbage!!

 

Shen Qianqian knows that the garbage here was transported by a flying machine, but he had never seen it. Every time he came to the garbage dump, the garbage he saw had already been turned over several times by the senior students, and he had to look carefully for the unexpected surprises.

 

And now these dumped garbage has not been turned over by the kindergarten students! These trash are good trash with treasures hidden! It’s all his garbage!

 

Shen Qianqian up in ecstasy and ran to the opposite side of the square. Although it was still the middle of the night, the rain and thunder had stopped, and shallow puddles of water had accumulated on the ground. Thus, he stepped on a string of splashes.

 

He ran through the metal blocks, stretched out his fingers, and commanded loudly and vigorously: “Here is bread, bread that has not been bitten a few bites! They put cans here, cans with a lot of stuff in them!

Although the aircraft is huge, the cockpit is only a few square meters. The instruments in the cabin are old and the bulkheads are mottled with paint. Two drivers in gray uniforms talk loudly to the rumbling start of the powerplant.

 

The main pilot pulled the joystick: “Is the belly door of the fourth cabin open?”

 

“It’s open, it’s all down.”

 

“I shouldn’t have gone to play cards, I was supposed to go to work in the morning, but it was delayed until now, and it would be over if the team leader knew.”

 

“It’s okay, it’s still the same old way. I asked my friends at the landing to quietly delete our take-off records, and if others wanted to check it, we left the landing field in the morning, not now.”

 

“That’s great, but also let the forklifts start cleaning up the garbage now, so it doesn’t pile up.”

 

“Okay, I’ll just control the system.”

 

Shen Qianqian ran out of the area where the metal block was placed, but the aircraft never left, so he hid behind the nearest metal block, poking his head out and staring.

 

The aircraft finally slowly rose and flew towards the top of the clouds above. When the bright light that enveloped the entire garbage dump disappeared, Shen Qianqian quickly rushed towards the garbage mountain, screaming in his mouth.

 

“This is my garbage! It’s all my garbage! My cans, my glass balls, mine, my so many treasures. Don’t be afraid, I’m here to work, I’m here to pick you up……”

 

The garbage mountain in front of him was two stories high, Shen Qianqian looked at it, praised its size from the bottom of his heart, and then fastened the cotton hat ear protector on his chin, found a good plastic rod nearby, and began his work.

 

There are too many treasures in the trash that hasn’t been turned over by the kindergarten students, and he quickly finds a sweater. This adult sweater has a hole in the elbow and a frayed hem, but the color is quite bright. The bright yellow hit Shen Qinqian in the heart, and he picked it up and gestured on himself, deciding to keep it.

 

There were also a lot of colorful bags, and as soon as he picked one up, he found that there were more fancy ones. He quickly pinched a thick stack in his hand.

 

Shen Qianqian was faced of so much heavenly wealth, he didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t hold it anymore, but he didn’t want to lose anything, so he simply picked up a big bag and stuffed all these treasures into it.

 

The temperature in the abyss was low at night and it had just rained. So, the breath that Shen Qianqian exhaled turned white. But his heart was hot, hot and excited, so that he didn’t feel cold at all.

 

He would pinch each bag, and find four biscuits in one of the bags, with a layer of cream in between. He took a light bite, his eyes lit up, and he quickly put the remaining three pieces into his pocket.

 

He rummaged through the garbage as he took a small bite on the biscuit, humming happily with a song in his mouth.

 

“Our lives…… How blessed, our singing…… Crunch crunch…… How loud and so loud that the angels gathered…… Here, uh-huh-hmm……”

 

But his joy didn’t last long when he heard the sound of vehicles starting from the row of factories next to him, and three automatic garbage forklifts slowly drove out of the factory.

 

If some of the big class students are the people Shen Qianqian hated the most, then the automatic garbage forklift is the car he hates the most.

This kind of car is simply specially here to be his enemy, and he often waits until the senior class finishes picking up the garbage and leaves, but as soon as his work starts, the car comes to rob him.

 

Usually there is only one forklift that robs him of opportunity, but now three have come out.

 

Shen Qianqian was in a panic and stopped humming, only racing against time to turn over the garbage. He kept his eyes on the forklifts, seeing their big iron forks digging deep into the mountain of garbage. And when it lifted them again, a large pile of garbage was loaded into the back of the truck.

 

Shen Qianqian tried to protect his garbage, running east and west in vain, and watched the garbage mountain shrink little by little. It stabbed his heart like a knife, poked the ground with a plastic rod, and shouted angrily at the forklift: “Can you go to sleep?” Yes? Why are you so thick-skinned? Didn’t you work during the day? Why are you stealing my job now?”

 

The forklifts were unmoved, and at the sound of his shouting, they shoveled another fork.

 

Shen Qianqian has no other way but to try to pick up a little more. In order to save time, he threw away the plastic rods, only looked at the surface of the garbage mountain, and stuffed things into the bag first, so that the speed would be much faster.

 

Shen Qianqian’s hands and feet moved as he climbed up the garbage mountain, picking up a few more gadgets and stuffing them into his pockets on the way. He was about to turn back from the other side, but as soon as he straightened up, he froze in place.

 

He saw a man on top, lying motionless on his back between a rotten chair and a broken plastic basin. Suspecting that he had misunderstood, he raised his hand and rubbed his eyes. His gaze slowly slid over the man, seeing the head and body, the hand on his abdomen, and two legs slightly apart.

 

It’s a person!

But why is there a person in the garbage?

This, this is a garbage man!

 

Shen Qianqian hurriedly put down his bag, walked forward with unsteady steps, and stopped seven or eight meters away from the person.

 

He didn’t dare to go any further, only his head was stretched out to look, but the man’s face was covered by a sweatshirt and hat, and only his chin was exposed. He looked like he was sleeping.

 

Shen Qianqian looked around and called in a low voice, “Hey, hey.”

 

The man didn’t say a word or move, and Shen Qianqian took a few steps closer: “Hey, are you sleeping?” 

 

He observed curiously for a moment then slowly walked forward, crouching down beside the man.

 

“Are you a garbage man? Are you a dumped garbage man?” He asked cautiously, picking up another chopstick and poking the man’s shoulder: “Wake up.” 

 

The poked person was still lying still, and Shen Qianqian moved with his head bent, his face pressed against the garbage below, and looked at his face from under his sweatshirt and hat.

But the face was hidden by the hat, and the lips, nose, and chin were hidden in the shadows, so he couldn’t see it clearly.

 

There was a commotion behind him and Shen Qianqian moved to see that the three forklifts had actually shoveled very close, shoveling the garbage mountain out of a cliff.

 

He was startled and hurriedly poked the lying person with chopsticks. He also raised his voice: “Garbage man, you can’t sleep. The forklift will load you away. All that garbage is put into the house and you will be spoiled.”

 

His chopsticks poked the man’s arm. The arm that was on the lower abdomen was poked down, hanging limply on the garbage.

 

Shen Qianqian looked at the hand that was pale under the lightl and after staring at it for a few seconds, a thought suddenly popped into his mind.

 

Is this a dead man?!

 

Although he had never seen a dead person, he had buried dead people in the small grave bag behind the welfare home, and he had heard countless stories about the dead.

 

In the stories that have been circulated in the various classes of the welfare home, the dead are always the protagonists. At first, they all lay motionless, but at one moment they suddenly opened their eyes, grew long teeth and nails, and became ghosts. Then it haunts the backyard of the welfare home and the town of Mixin. It can eat a child at any time.

 

Shen Qianqian is not afraid of ghosts during the day, for example, during the day he dares to go to the backyard of the welfare home alone, but he is afraid of ghosts at night, such as at this moment.

 

What people don’t want will become garbage, and the garbage people who are thrown away……

It’s a dead man!