Born to Be Rebellious c9: Garbage Star
Ge Xiu’s face was blank, his soft and messy hair got rubbed all around, two skinny hands were raised up to protect the back of his head, and a pair of bright eyes that appear bigger and darker on his thin face were stunned and looked a little pitiful.
Lulai calmly withdrew his evil hand, without any guilt on his face.
His posture relaxed slightly, leaning back on the back of the chair, staring down at Ge Xiu, half-truthfully asked:
”You are still young, what do you think so much about?”
Ge Xiu pouted. He flattened his messy hair and when he raised his head again, his expression had already returned to the previous level with ease.
Lulai couldn’t help feeling a little regretful.
He saw the boy shrug carelessly, and the arc of laughter that curled up on his lips was so stubborn that it seemed a little heartless: “All forced by life, sir.”
Lulai’s eyes were half drooping, and under the thick light golden eyelashes, there was a pair of silver-blue eyes that were waveless, like the unpredictable ocean on a windless day, the cold and stern breath restrained in his body.
Ge Xiu raised his eyes to meet his gaze, still with a no fear on his face, even with an innocent smile.
Their staring at each other only lasted for a few seconds.
Lulai hooked his lips: “That’s good.”
These words weren’t finished, but Ge Xiu already knew that he agreed to let him join the group.
He smiled and bent his eyes and stretched out the skinny hand to Lulai:
”Happy cooperation.”
Lulai also extended his hand to hold it and almost gathered Ge Xiu’s small cold fingers in his wide and slender palm.
”Happy cooperation.”
The simple ceremony ended, but Lulai’s palm was not loose, his fingers with well-knotted joints were steady and calm, and the power contained in them was powerful, like an iron hoop that could not be removed, and the quiet voice deliberately prolonged, the magnetic tone fell down at the end:
”But…”
Ge Xiu was a little surprised, he raised an eyebrow and waited for his next words.
”——That will be after you become an adult.”
Lulai added slowly.
Ge Xiu raised his eyebrows and stared at him with a bad manner, his brows furrowed tightly and he could hardly believe his ears: “…Huh?”
Lulai didn’t seem to be affected by his attitude at all. He looked calm and indifferent, and even looked at him jokingly:
”Do you think that after being in the army for so many years I can’t feel the bone age?”
He leaned forward with warm and powerful fingertips, squeezing Ge Xiu’s thin wrist.
He shook it lightly:
”The Alliance Constitution stipulates that the galaxy residents become adult at 22 years old. How old are you at most? Nineteen? Twenty?”
To be honest, Ge Xiu didn’t really know how old he was.
He was arrested with no memory, sentenced in confusion and then he was thrown into this world of punishment without any information.
But no matter what, he surely is an adult!
And he must’ve been one for a long time already!
Ge Xiu became angry from embarrassment. He crunched the remaining candies, gritted his teeth and said an arrogant attitude: “Aren’t you going to overthrow the Alliance? Why do you care about what the Alliance’s Constitution says?”
Lulai’s expression remained unchanged. He shook his head lightly:
”I just don’t agree with their way of governing, but I don’t object to the regulations in the constitution-for example in the area of adulthood.”
”…”
Ge Xiu and him stared at each other.
Lulai finally let go of his thin and warm wrists that was covered by his palm at the moment, stood up, placed the chair under the table neatly again without a sound.
He looked at Ge Xiu:
”From today, I will be your guardian. Wait a moment. Hall will arrange a room for you and your crew. They can stay here until the Leviathan is repaired, and your treatment will be the same as my crew.”
Ge Xiu lied down on the table sullenly.
Looking at the young boy who was obviously irritated because of him Lulai finally had a real smile in his eyes: “Wait a moment, I’ll let someone deliver the candies to your room.”
Ge Xiu finally had a reaction.
He lifted his eyelids and said reluctantly:
”…send more.”
Lulai’s eyes smiled deeper and his cold, thin lips lifted up a tiny arc: “Okay.”
He straightened his clothes, turned away and walked out of the ship’s cabin.
Hall, who stood guard at the door without squinting his eyes, followed closely behind.
After they left that cabin and walked away a bit futher, Hall endured and endured and finally said with doubts and grievances: “…Captain, this subordinate was put under your command at the age of nineteen.”
Lulai continued to walk forward without turning his head back: “You are not the same.” Hall was stunned. He stared at his captain’s straight and broad back. After a while, he heard his calm and indifferent voice that came from the front:
”When you were nineteen, were you able to turn the world into chaos?”
Hall’s answer was a little lacking in confidence: “…no.”
He was very young and energetic at the time, his eyes all on justice. They all served under the commander of the army whom he blindly admired. Even if he did not hesitate to report his age, at that time, Lulai said that he would never go right if he was ordered to go to the left and he would probably commit suicide with a gun on the spot without blinking and hesitating.
”More than that, in addition to ambition, he also has the ability to stir up the situation.”
The leather army boots on the two people’s feet knocked on the hard metal floor with a regular sound, echoing in the long corridor.
”If mastered it properly, he will be the sharpest weapon. Otherwise, his hostility and danger will harm the holder.”
Hall nodded thoughtfully.
After all, the unstable factors in Ge Xiu are extremely dangerous and too difficult to control.
They came to the end.
The door of the war room slowly slid open in front of their eyes. One second before Lulai walked inside, he paused for a while, and turned to look at Hall who was following behind him:
”Arrange his room next to my room.”
Hall straightened up subconsciously: “Yes!”
In the next second, he digested the order Lulai had just given and looked at Lulai who was walked inside the warship room in daze: “… Huh?”
Hall’s voice seemed to remind Lulai.
He remembered something, turned around again, and ordered:
”By the way, send all the high-quality candies that were previously seized in Area B to his room.”
The cold metal hatch closed in front of Hall and he was a stunned silly. Staring blankly at the metal plate not far from the tip of his nose, he scratched his head.
He didn’t know why… He felt that something was wrong.
——–
The efficiency of Lulai’s subordinates was very high. All the crew of Leviathan were received on the main ship and assigned their rest cabins. They were all placed in the same area near the sideboard. As Ge Xiu’s deputy, Xiao Yi even had his own separate room. He happily touched and checked everywhere and his excitement was beyond words.
The same went for the other crew members.
As all of them were residents from the edge of the abandoned galaxy they didn’t really want to come back to their harsh home planet and at the same time, they didn’t have any unrealistic illusions about the boy who took over the starship with his own power. After leaving, they didn’t expect that now they would actually have a stable place to live, with plenty of food and clothing and they all felt that they were dreaming.
Before they could enjoy peace of mind for a while, Ge Xiu appeared in full spirits.
He pulled out a chair and jumped on it, carrying a loudspeaker that nobody knew where he got that from and shouted in a loud voice:
”Assemble–“
Hall, who got abducted and deceived to come here, stood aside with a cold face.
Ge Xiu smiled and looked at his group of crew members that were brought out forcibly. They stumbled and gathered on the open space in the middle of the cabin, each of them as thin as sticks*, their eyes were watching him with enthusiasm. In the first battle, Ge Xiu’s position in their hearts had been completely promoted from an ordinary person with good luck and strong ability to a saviour who can reach the sky, they worshipped him and looked up to him with awe.
After a few minutes, everyone finally arrived.
Ge Xiu’s lazy voice came out wave after wave through the loudspeaker and echoed back from the wall behind, filling the entire space:
”If you have any skill, come here to register, and if you don’t have any abilities, you should also register what you want to learn. You can learn what you want but the basic machinery has to be learned, when you work more you get more, work less and get less, don’t work and get nothing**. Captain here said that there is no free food on this ship. Everyone understands it—right—”
Hall glanced at him with a complicated gaze.
Because there were not many people brought on board by Ge Xiu, so few uneducated people don’t bring any value in making them work. They can still afford to feed them and Lulai never said anything about the rule of “no food for free”, but when Ge Xiu spoke with such conviction even Hall was a little suspicious whether Lulai had actually mentioned this rule.
”Yes!”
The crew’s attitude was enthusiastic, but there were too few people and the answers were sparse and unimposing.
Ge Xiu put the loudspeaker in his pocket, jumped off the chair lightly and then turned his head to look at Hall with a smile:
”Come, come, please sit down.”
Hall had an ominous premonition.
He didn’t move, just looked at Ge Xiu warily. Ge Xiu didn’t mind, peeled off a candy and stuffed it in his mouth and then smiled without showing his teeth:
”By the way, your captain has promised me to let you help me with Leviathan. The number of things to do isn’t low, so I would like to thank Mr. Hall for his help in counting and assigning occupations.”
Hall: “…”
He got sold to Ge Xiu as cheap labour by his heartless captain.
While the crew of the Leviathan was busy learning new jobs, Ge Xiu began to wander around in the main ship. He seemed to have a keen interest in everything on the ship, and he would change to a new thing almost every day, from hull maintenance to intelligent AI, from the concentrated jurisdiction of the living area to the combat area that was never open at will. He could observe all day in one corner, like a skinny starving ghost, almost scaring people to death when they turned around.
During this period of time, Lulai was busy with military affairs and rarely appeared in front of Ge Xiu.
But as the captain, his incomparable control over the entire ship made all the relevant information of Ge Xiu delivered to him in detail.
Lulai glanced at the report on his desk and stopped for a moment on the finished product data attached to the back.
Streamlined, beautiful, completely unlike like what a novice can do.
During this period of time, Ge Xiu was like a sponge, frantically absorbing all the knowledge available to him. His learning speed was shocking and even Hall couldn’t help asking for Lulai’s opinion, if they shouldn’t curb this scary trend to prevent things from developing in an uncontrollable direction, but Loulai calmly suppressed all the objections, just quietly observing the rapid growth of individual in his ship.
Lulai cut off the brain projection.
At this moment, the hatch suddenly opened and Hall rushed in. He even forgot to follow the usual etiquette and his voice was so tense that his inner anxiety could not be concealed:
”He ran!”
Lulai turned his head and looked at him, there still was no extra expression on his face: “Speak clearly.”
Hall subconsciously stood up with his head high, gritted his teeth, his chest still undulating rapidly:
”Reporting to the captain! Ge Xiu has run away!”
The author has something to say:
Ge Xiu: Hee hee
*originally hemp stalk, can also mean a stick
** 多劳多得，少劳少得，不劳不得 (idiom, meaning give more pay for more work, less pay for less work and no pay for those doing nothing)
Little Theater:
Ge Xiu: It was nice meeting ya, bye bye
