Squad leader Yueyang retired from the army, and from then on the reconnaissance squad no longer had the cheerful suona sounds and passionate banhu sounds.
The company officially appointed Wang Ke as the reconnaissance squad leader, and Da Guo was transferred to the artillery platoon as the deputy squad leader of the fifth squad. The command platoon remained stationed at the divisional farm.
Good deeds are forgotten in the blink of an eye. In another half month, the defensive company and the farm field department will enter the field. Spring plowing and wheat watering were about to begin, so everyone in the command platoon was ready to move directly to the defense and head to Xishan to participate in station training.
Xishan is familiar to all veterans. It was a place called Langya Mountain where five Eighth Route Army soldiers fought against the Japanese invaders and died heroically.
There are mountains and complex terrain here. In some deep mountains and old forests, there are no homes within dozens of miles.
And the famous Qingxi Mausoleum is there, where four or five emperors, big and small, slept underground, as well as nine queens, and more than 60 concubines, princes, princesses, etc.
Being able to carry out scout training there is really a romantic thing, and it makes me laugh just thinking about it.
What are you afraid of, the mountains are high and the road is far, the scenery is different every step you take, what you are afraid of is the rain and the wind, the growth you get is step by step.
On this day, the reconnaissance squad leader Wang Ke was organizing the whole class to do drawing work. What is called drawing board work? This is a training subject in military topography. It involves flattening the map and placing it on a two-foot-square drawing board. According to the reported geographical coordinates, quickly use coordinate pins to pin down fixed points on the map. Or conversely, based on a certain point on the map, quickly use the transparent ruler board to find its coordinates.
What are the coordinates? It is said that a German named Gauss inherited the research results of his predecessors and drew the world's first real map. He used a British town called Greenwich where he once worked as a starting point and traveled through it. After crossing the North and South Poles of the earth, it was like cutting a watermelon. The east side is called the Eastern Hemisphere, the west side is called the Western Hemisphere, the place in the Eastern Hemisphere close to this town is called the Middle East, and the place far away from his home is called the Far East. The eastern and western hemispheres are evenly divided into 180 equal parts. The meridian passing through the small town of Greenwich is called the prime meridian. As the zero-beginning meridian, it not only divides the eastern and western hemispheres, but also serves as the starting point of standard time. Later, someone cut the north and south ninety times horizontally to form the southern and northern latitudes. The point where the longitude and latitude intersect horizontally and vertically is the coordinate of this place.
Later, with the advancement of science and the emergence of the north compass, people discovered that the true north of the earth is not the North Pole, but the country of Canada. Therefore, true north and magnetic north appeared again. The real military map is based on magnetic north. The true abscissa and ordinate are formed, represented by the X and Y axes respectively.
Being able to quickly find the location on the map and the actual location based on the coordinates has become a skill that scouts must master. When fighting in the future, you only need to report the coordinates, and the artillery hidden behind can report them based on your coordinates. The coordinates came out, and the shooting elements were installed, and the cattle were shot across the mountains, and each shot was accurate.
Don’t underestimate the coordinates on this map. If you use a sewing needle to poke an eye on the map, the eye will be 30 meters different on a 1:50,000 scale map. The location of the needle will be wrong by a few holes. , the artillery shell may miss by several hundred meters, then it will be unable to hit the enemy and easily expose its position.
Therefore, there is a saying among artillerymen that the first shot hits the target. You must ensure that your bullets are not missed in order to protect yourself.
Have you seen the movie "Reconnaissance Crossing the River"? That's why our scouts have to determine the enemy's artillery positions according to the standards.
The additional recruits are already on the way. After arriving and joining together, they will probably be able to go directly into the mountains. The recruit who took over as the calculator heard that his surname was Song, and he was personally selected by the platoon leader Hu Zhijun. I’ve never seen it before, but I believe it’s definitely not a coward.
I was working on the drawing board here, and I saw a woman walking towards here on a crutch with a girl of twelve or thirteen years old.
"Uncle, uncle!" the girl far away shouted.
Wang Ke took a look and saw that it was the girl he had picked out from the rubble of the earthquake.
He stood up quickly. The woman next to the girl must be her mother.
When she was still seven or eight meters away, the woman threw away her crutches and knelt down with the little girl. Wang Ke and several comrades rushed over and helped her up.
"Sister-in-law, sister-in-law, what are you doing?" Wang Ke still doesn't know the names of this woman and the little girl.
"Benefactor, we are here to thank you." The woman tremblingly handed over a basket with more than 20 eggs on the straw.
Through this contact, Wang Ke learned that her husband's surname was Li, called Li Laifu. People in the village called her "Sister-in-law Fu", and her daughter's name was Li Xueying. I am thirteen years old and in the sixth grade of elementary school. Both her husband and son died in the earthquake.
The eggs cannot be collected, but the affection can be left behind.
"Sister-in-law, has your home been rebuilt? Where do you live now?"
Mrs. Fu's tears flowed down again and she let out a long sigh. After her husband passed away and the backbone of the family was gone, there was no talk of rebuilding, so they built a shack on the original site and guarded a few chickens and the pig to see if they could save some money in the autumn.
Hearing Mrs. Fu's narration, Wang Ke's heart tightened. Although winter had passed, the shack was not a long-term solution after all.
"Sister Fu, I will go to your village in the next two days."
Wang Ke, with the approval of the platoon leader Hu Zhijun, poured a few kilograms of cooking oil and 20 kilograms of rice from the small warehouse in the platoon for Mrs. Fu.
Wang Ke couldn't calm down after sending Mrs. Fu away. He didn't know how much it would cost to build a new house. He had a savings of 70 yuan, and before joining the army, he still had 800 yuan for work-study, which was far from enough.
The next day, he asked for leave from the platoon leader and wanted to go to Dawangzhuang. He decided to go to the village chief.
When I met the village chief, he was also filled with regret when talking about Mrs. Fu. Li Laifu is a minor surname in Dawangzhuang. Mrs. Fu married here from Henan Province. The village is relatively poor. The village helped with Laifu's funeral arrangements. Now she needs to rebuild her home, and the village cannot provide more money to support her. .
"Village Chief, how much will it cost to rebuild this courtyard?"
"At the current price, it will cost at least three thousand yuan."
Wang Ke was stunned. He only had 870 yuan of money, which was still three-quarters short. When he returned to the company, he was unhappy. I lay in bed at night and couldn't fall asleep for a long time. He got up, lit the pony lantern, took out his pen and started writing a letter. Who can I borrow from? Find mother.
He wrote a letter to his mother and wanted to borrow a thousand yuan. Wang Ke knew that his family was not rich, so if he could spare one thousand yuan, it would be the greatest energy.
Who else to look for? Find Wu Xiangyu. Her family is rich. I remember she once told me that her parents are the CEOs of a large state-owned enterprise. Let’s borrow a thousand yuan, too. Spreading out the letter paper, I suddenly remembered that I haven't read her recent reply to myself. Yes, let's take a look at what she wrote first?
Wang Ke went into the room and took out a letter to himself from the grenade box. It was written in flying and phoenix-like handwriting. Wang Ke and Wu Xiangyu only wrote one letter, and he asked the health worker Yu Deben to send it on his behalf, but Wu Xiangyu sent it to him three times in succession. More than ten letters. Wang Ke didn't even read one letter in full.
He found the latest letter and tore it open. As usual, she filled three sheets of paper.
She was full of care and admiration, and especially praised him highly for winning the second-class merit again, saying that he was a hero in her mind and a role model for the youth of this era. In the middle, she introduced her job transfer, and in the end it was the same old story about longing, friendship, etc.
Wang Ke picked up the pen and told her what happened to Mrs. Fu in Dawangzhuang, his plans and conversations with the village chief, and tactfully proposed to borrow a thousand yuan from her to help Mrs. Fu. At the end of the letter, Wang Ke Suddenly wanting to play a prank, he wrote to Wu Xiangyu: "Here's a riddle: The sky is full of all things, and everything is in order, beat an animal!"
After writing this letter, Wang Ke forgot about it.
He went to Dawangzhuang again, threw 870 yuan to the village chief, and told the village chief that he would collect 3,000 yuan, hoping that the village would come forward to help Mrs. Fu and his wife rebuild their home. He also agreed to come back and have a look after returning from training in the mountains.
The day before he went to the mountains from his teacher's farm, Wang Ke received a reply from Wu Xiangyu. Because it was related to borrowing money, he quickly opened the letter. There was no mention of money in it, only two lines of fluttering words. The first line: You are the puppy! The second line: Baifu Yingxiang jade cup.
Especially this half of the poem seems to be a response to the half of the poem in his last letter. Wang Ke smiled. He didn't delve into the meaning of this half of the poem. All he cared about now was money.
The half line of the poem he wrote to Wu Xiangyu was taken from a poem by Ma Huaisu, a great writer in the Tang Dynasty who lived in Dantu, his hometown of Runzhou. The first two lines are: Thousands of doors in the sun and the universe are open at the same time, and all the features of the sky are revealed. The answer to this poem is the word "dog".
What Wu Xiangyu replied to himself was half of the two sentences that followed: Gold is the winner during the three-yang festival, and jade is the cup for Baifu to welcome auspiciousness.
It was originally a prank, but it made the combined half-que poem become confusing.
As for Wang Ke, he has always been confused and doesn't know what it means. It wasn't until I was stationed in the mountains for a long time that I accidentally learned about it. Finally, I realized that it was actually related to their two names, and it was full of ambiguity and flirting.
On the way from the farm to Xishan, you can see tanks rumbling by on one side of the road, and the loess fog can fly several feet high. The soldiers of the command platoon who were choking in the driveway quickly put down the tent cloth behind the car and covered their mouths and noses with towels.
The command platoon was divided into two groups and entered the mountain. A week ago, the telephone class and the wireless class, led by platoon leader Hu Zhijun, had already joined the company and stationed at the training point. Due to the handover of the farm, the reconnaissance class left a week late.
The car had been driving for four or five hours on the bumpy rural road.
The driver is still Tan Xiaoqing. Wang Ke, who was driving the car, asked him why he took this road. Didn't he know a good way to go?
Tan Xiaoqing said: "Old Wang, I took the shortest road so that we could arrive at eight o'clock at the latest. If we took the main road, I'm afraid you would have to camp on the road at night. There are many wolves in the mountains, don't you just Not afraid?"
Tan Xiaoqing is a veteran himself. He is five years older than Wang Ke. Since the last earthquake, he has changed his name to Wang Ke as "Old Wang". This is an honorific and a kind of gratitude from the bottom of his heart.
"So there are no wolves on this shortcut?"
"Because tanks often run around, wolves generally don't dare to come. As we go over this mountain ahead, the tank path is gone, so it's hard to say whether there are wolves or not. However, by then we will reach our destination in another 50 kilometers."
With that said, the car started to drive up the winding mountain road, and the air suddenly became better. The sunset lingered in the mountains, and the pine trees all over the mountains and plains were lush and green.
"After passing the mountain pass in front, there is a slope of more than 20 kilometers." Tan Xiaoqing had just finished speaking. When he was less than 20 meters from the top of the mountain, he saw a puff of white smoke coming from the front of the car, and then the car stopped with a "squeak" down.
"What's wrong?"
"It seems that the gears are broken." Tan Xiaoqing said frustratedly.
