White Olive Tree

Chapter 28

Chapter 28
The snow is still falling.
The open space in front of the Tongzi Building in the Family Courtyard of Veteran Cadres was covered with snow, and occasionally there were a few large and small footprints.  Li Zan walked across the snow with his head lowered, without an umbrella.  Snowflakes covered his hair and shoulders.
He walked quickly into the corridor, patting the snow on his body unintentionally, and took a few strides up to the second floor. When he turned a corner, he stopped for a moment.  Chen Feng was wrapped in a military coat, smoking and stamping his feet in the cold, waiting at the door of his house.
Li Zan paused and said, "Instructor."
"Back." Chen Feng raised his hand and put out the cigarette butt on the snow-covered railing.
A dim sensor light was on in the corridor, and a thin layer of snow had already fallen on the cement floor.
"How long have you been here? I didn't even make a call." Li Zan took out the key, opened the door, and turned on the light.
Chen Feng followed him into the house: "You're busy with your work; I can't interrupt you. It doesn't matter if you wait for a while. Liangcheng has seen a ghost this year. It's snowing at this time."
"It's a cold spring." Li Zan threw the key into the bowl on the cabinet in the entrance hall, went into the living room, turned on the electric heater, and said, "You warm up the fire first, and I'll make you a cup of tea."
Chen Feng sat down, rubbed his frozen hands on the stove, and asked, "Where is your dad?"
"Back to Jiangcheng." Li Zan's voice came from the kitchen, "My grandparents are not in good health. He will take care of them when he returns."
"If you want to be transferred back to Jiangcheng, you can. Luo Zhan said that he would find a civilian position for you there." Chen Feng said, "You retain your status as a cadre, so you cannot volunteer outside forever. Don't even think about quitting, the organization will not  Will agree."
Li Zan didn't answer.
Chen Feng looked at the table in the corner of the living room.  The table is piled with books, chemical analysis, circuit analysis... and a pile of wires, plastics, metals, chemical powders, plus small tools such as scissors and tweezers.
Chen Feng felt uncomfortable.
Still thinking about it, Li Zan came out with a cup of hot tea and handed it to him.
Chen Feng took the tea and took a sip, then subconsciously glanced at the table. Before he could take a closer look, Li Zan threw a scarf on it and covered the table tightly.
Chen Feng also pretended not to see it and said, "How is your health?"
Li Zan said: "Very good."
"Where are the ears?"
   "same as usual."
He obviously didn't want to say more, and Chen Feng was also speechless.
Chen Feng put down his teacup, was silent for a while, took out a cigarette to smoke, then thought of something, and handed another one to Li Zan.
Li Zan refused.
"Still don't smoke?" Chen Feng smiled lightly.  I remember that Li Zan told him that smoking was a form of mental control.  He rejects this control.
"Don't think too much." Li Zan said, sitting down next to him and warming themselves by the fire together.
The smile on Chen Feng's face disappeared, he smoked a cigarette, blew out several smoke rings, and said, "I found the sealed file from Luo Zhan on September 26th last year."
Li Zan looked down at the electric heater, his rubbing hands stiffened, but his expression could not be seen.  The snow on the hair on his shoulders has melted, leaving some water stains on his clothes, and his hair is twisted together in clusters.

……
Chen Feng ran to Jiangcheng to find Luo Zhan over and over again, and it took a lot of effort before he could see last year's top-secret files.
That day, after bomb disposal officer Li Zan killed the first female suicide bomber, the detonator accidentally triggered.  As he fled, he discovered the second male attacker.
The bomb disposal team rushed forward to try to control the opponent and prevent him from detonating the bomb.
The previous explosion knocked people down, leaving a mess all around.  The injured bomb disposal soldier struggled with the attacker, but after a struggle, he was unable to deload the bomb due to lack of physical strength.  Seeing that the explosion was about to detonate, the bomb disposal soldiers rushed the attacker into an abandoned house on the roadside, closed the door and escaped.  At that moment, the bomb exploded.
The bomb disposal soldier fell unconscious on the spot.  Afterwards, the Dongguo military found many broken corpses in abandoned houses.  When it was pieced together, it turned out that in addition to the attacker, there was also a family of six hiding inside - a young couple, three little boys, and a little girl.
The Dongguo military completely blocked the news, and the peacekeeping headquarters also set up top secrets and hid everything from Li Zan.
"Originally, it should have been hidden. However," Luo Zhan said, "Judging from Li Zan's reaction after waking up, he knew it himself."
"The place with the most blood on the scene was on the wall next to the door, where the family was hiding. From this, it is speculated that the moment Li Zan closed the door and turned around to run out, he saw the family hiding next to the door.  People, six people. Maybe I even made eye contact with them. ...But at that moment, there was no time to react, it was too late to do anything."
"Perhaps it was because the psychological shock to him at that moment was so great that he failed to react correctly as a special forces soldier in the next moment - sprint away, dodge diagonally, or fall down and crawl. That's why he was so seriously injured."
……
Chen Feng sighed: "Why don't you tell the truth to the psychiatrist? If you don't tell the truth, who can help you?"
Li Zan said: "It doesn't matter anymore."
"It really doesn't matter. You will go to the United States to find Dr. Jackson by yourself? Are these things still on the table?"
Speechless.
Chen Feng said: "A-Zan, you didn't know there was anyone in that room. Moreover, if it weren't for you, the 13 soldiers who were injured in the news that day would not have been injured, but dead."
But Li Zan didn't hear it, there was a bang in his head.
He lowered his head deeply, clenched his hands tightly, frowned, and tried his best to resist the sudden wave of tinnitus.
Sometimes it buzzed and sometimes it thundered, causing him to lose any ability to think.
He didn't hear a word Chen Feng said.
It wasn't until a few minutes later that he slowly loosened his clenched hands and took a breath of exhaustion.  I heard Chen Feng say: "A-Zan, you are here to save people."
Li Zan said: "Just because the purpose is correct does not mean that the result is just."
Chen Feng said: "You are too kind-hearted and soft-hearted. Sometimes I even hope that you can be tougher and colder."
Li Zan didn't speak for a long time, and in the end he only said: "I am living a good life now."
After he finished speaking, he knew that Chen Feng didn't believe it.
As for whether he believed it or not, he didn't know.
……
It snowed all night.
When I wake up in the morning, the world outside is covered in silver, clean and white.
Li Zan rushed to the police station early to go on duty.
Today is the Lantern Festival, and it’s snowing again.  There were no people on the street, and the atmosphere in the whole city was a bit lazy and tired.
When we arrived at the police station, our colleagues were not very energetic.  There was nothing urgent to deal with in the morning. Several policemen and policemen were chatting by the fire in the office, complaining about the unusually cold weather in Liangcheng this year and complaining about hard work and little money.
Li Zan was a newcomer sent from a special field. He had only been on the job for a few days, and he didn't talk much, so he didn't participate.
During the lunch break, several colleagues fell asleep on the table.
The office was quiet.
He couldn't sit still and went out for a walk.
On the road, cars honked their whistles and people were noisy.
Perhaps because the air was fresh after the snow, he heard those sounds clearly.