THE EVE

"Hey, Wen Qi!"Inside the suspended conical structure, in Room 001 of the Logistics and Maintenance Department, Rong Qiu tossed a wrench. Wen Qi, momentarily dazed, barely managed to catch it with his left hand. A crisp metallic clang echoed from his palm as the man opposite him, hands on hips, let out a sharp whistle.

Rong Qiu: "Wow... that left hand of yours gets cooler every time I see it."

The man, wearing a gray work apron tied around his waist and only a white sleeveless undershirt, pointed at the projector on the wall behind him. "What were you thinking about just now? I called you twice and you didn’t hear. I’ve tuned in to that military channel you always watch."

Wen Qi raised his grease-stained right hand, wiping sweat from his brow with his wrist. A year and a half ago, he’d been internally referred for a position in the headquarters' logistics department, which was short-staffed. Without a second thought, he packed his bags and smoothly settled in as a mechanic. Fortunately, he was a quick learner, and his battlefield experience had proven invaluable.

He had gradually grown accustomed to this life—punching in and out on time without constantly watching his back. It felt really good.

He smiled at Rong Qiu: "Thanks, Rong-ge."

Rong Qiu said nothing, merely picked up a cigarette box from the table and raised an eyebrow.

Wen Qi had a fair, clean face, with slightly long, straight black hair and a slender neck. His dark eyes were always curved, making anyone who saw him think he had a gentle disposition.

But now, those eyes were fixed intently on the TV, where a man with an icy expression, dressed in a military dress uniform with a black cape, stood on a platform, awaiting his commendation.

A year ago, headquarters had officially taken over jurisdiction of Falkbai Star and reorganized the First Unit, appointing Ji Yaoming as its captain, stationed at the Falkbai Star base. Yesterday, the First Unit returned triumphant after three months of support missions in the northern theater. Headquarters appointed him as the captain of the First Unit and CEO of the Eight War Zones.

The gleaming metal insignia on his chest highlighted his glory.

"Holy shit!! The Second Unit sent over two shipments of weapons again! Last week, the northern theater was fighting Alien Species like there was no tomorrow, but did they ever think about us logistics guys?!"

The door was swiped open from outside with a string of curses. A bare-chested, brown-skinned bald man directed transport drones behind him. With two loud clangs, the newly cleared space was once again filled with busted gear.

"Hey, isn't that the S-Class from the First Unit? What's his name again? Oh right, Ji Yaoming!"

Jiang Liangping, their head of maintenance.

Eyeing the person on TV, he sat down next to Wen Qi with interest and tapped the nearly repaired sniper rifle on the floor.

Wen Qi was highly skilled. Although he had started late, both Jiang Liangping and Rong Qiu honestly believed he had a natural talent for mechanical repair. Whether it was weapons or mechs, he could usually identify the problem just by looking at them.

"Guess we just don’t have that kind of luck."

Rong Qiu also walked over and sat down to his right, taking a cigarette, lighting it directly, and taking a deep, satisfying drag.

The department head on his left chimed in: "Yeah, born into a prominent family, a proper young master, and an S-Class Alpha to boot. If I were him, I’d wake up in the middle of the night laughing and slap myself twice to make sure it’s real."

Rong Qiu laughed: "Afraid you’d enjoy the dream too much, huh?"

As they spoke, the two beside Wen Qi started chuckling. But Wen Qi remained focused on the screen, watching the man receive the medal, salute, and then step up to give a short, firm speech.

Wen Qi thought, he’s still the same, hasn’t changed a bit.

Jiang Liangping: "But I heard his family relations aren’t great, and he has health issues too... right? I remember that, yeah!"

Suddenly, Jiang Liangping bumped his shoulder. Wen Qi snapped back to attention and looked somewhat annoyed at their boss.

"I remember, Wen Qi, didn’t you graduate from the same university as Officer Ji?" The two leaned in, gossiping. "Don’t you have any info about him?"

Watching the man on TV stride off the platform and disappear from view, Wen Qi lowered his head again to work on the sniper rifle, his voice soft and his mood subdued.

"No, I didn’t know him well. I don’t really follow his news."

"Fair enough."

Rong Qiu stubbed out his cigarette butt, stood up, stretched, and smoothed back the hair tied at the nape of his neck before sitting back at his workbench. "You don’t seem like the gossiping type anyway."

"Alright, let’s get to work," Jiang Liangping said, picking up a large blade from the pile of junk just dumped on the floor and slinging it over his shoulder. His well-developed biceps made it look effortless. "Just two more hours and we can clock out. My partner’s called me more than fifty times in two days—if I don’t get home soon, they’ll come here and accuse me of having an affair!"

Wen Qi chuckled softly.

Their department head’s partner was an Omega—petite and soft-spoken. When things got really busy, they’d even bring home-cooked meals for everyone. Nothing like what he described.

So the guy was just showing off.

"Get out of here."

Unlike him, Rong Qiu was a confirmed bachelor, through and through. "Stop flaunting it, alright? Single people need love too!"

He picked up a large hammer and started hammering away irritably at his work.

Jiang Liangping: "Then go find someone. You’re not a kid anymore."

Rong Qiu: "Boss, you think it’s that easy? It’s not like I don’t want to! Damn it, you know how hard it is for Betas to find partners. Not everyone has your kind of luck, okay?"

Where differences exist, hierarchies often form.

Betas, as the most numerous secondary gender, are at the bottom of the AOB discrimination chain. They usually tend to pair with other Betas, but some also form bonds with Omegas, though Omegas are rare and precious.

Rong Qiu continued complaining: "Being a Beta is bad enough, but when I go on blind dates and they hear I work in headquarters repairing junk, they’re even less interested."

Wen Qi listened and retorted with a laugh: "It’s the Headquarters Logistics and Maintenance Department, and these are treasures. How can you call them junk?"

"Of course they’re junk!"

He scowled. "I spend two days fixing something, and those Alphas break it into scrap metal in minutes! Just because they have us, they don’t bother taking care of anything!"

With a clang, Jiang Liangping threw a wrench at Rong Qiu.

"Shut up already. Didn’t the vice-captain of the First Unit confess to you the other day? You ran faster than anyone... Serves you right for being single."

Huh?

Wen Qi looked up: "When was that? I didn’t know."

A bit annoyed, he applied more force assembling the gun barrel.

Rong Qiu’s face turned beet-red, and he stammered for a while without getting a word out. Jiang Liangping, enjoying the show, laughed and said: "Oh, you were off duty those two days."

"Last Thursday, I think. The First Unit came to pick up their weapons. I’d been on night shift the night before, and early in the morning I heard someone shouting in the workshop. I thought a fight broke out, so I grabbed something and rushed to open the door."

As Jiang Liangping spoke, Rong Qiu’s hammering grew louder.

"As soon as I opened the door, I was stunned. The vice-captain of the First Unit—you know, that tall, fair-skinned guy."

Wen Qi paused, then nodded.

"He just grabbed Old Rong and asked if he could accept his love letter."

"Shit, shit, shit!!!"

Rong Qiu tossed aside the items on the table, pulled the crumpled letter from his work uniform, thought for a moment, then angrily stuffed it back into his pocket as if it were bad luck.

"Whoa," Jiang Liangping deliberately craned his neck like he was trying to get a look. "Haven't read it yet? A love letter? Pretty romantic for someone your age."

"Fuck off, damn it!"

Rong Qiu lit another cigarette. "Hell no! I'd rather stay single till I die than be with him!"

Wen Qi carefully wiped down the sniper rifle he had just repaired, stood up, and placed it on the rack.

"Why not? Do you hate him, Rong Qiu?"

From Wen Qi's understanding, there wasn't any deep-seated grudge between the military personnel and their department. After all, as the backbone of the logistics division, their repair department was practically courted by every other unit.

If they were unhappy and tampered with the weapons, it could cost people their lives.

Of course, Wen Qi and the others had their professional ethics—if they had issues, they’d fight it out rather than resort to underhanded tricks.

Especially Rong Qiu, who was notoriously hot-tempered in the logistics department. If someone pissed him off, he’d curse them out one moment and throwing a punch the next.

"No, I don’t have a problem with him personally."

Rong Qiu finished another cigarette. "I have a problem with Alphas."

Wen Qi paused, flexing his stiff mechanical left arm, and listened as the other continued.

"What Beta would get together with an Alpha? Forget everything else—just the Alpha’s rut could kill you. We don’t have pheromones or anything like that. An Alpha in rut isn’t even human; they go all out. I have no confidence I could fight off an Alpha. The other day, I even ran into an A-B pair in an alley..."

"Shit! Never mind... Damn, just thinking about those sounds makes me uncomfortable."

Wen Qi rolled his neck. A 48-hour shift was really tough; even after all this time, he still hadn’t fully adjusted.

"That makes sense," Jiang Liangping chimed in. "Then try harder with the dating scene. If that doesn’t work, I can introduce you to someone. My wife knows plenty of Betas and Omegas."

Rong Qiu: "Damn! Boss, you’re not being a good friend. Why didn’t you say so earlier?"

"You never asked. How should I know your love lives were so pitiful?"

Rong Qiu: "..."

Wen Qi smiled as he watched the two bicker, occasionally dodging a flying screw with practiced ease.

Hiss~

His smile faded as Wen Qi looked down at his left arm. The area where the metal connected to his flesh was swelling again, tingling and numb.

He didn’t really know how he’d survived. He only remembered that when his arm was torn off, he couldn’t see or hear anything, and everything after that was a blank. But he was lucky—he didn’t die, and when he woke up, he’d been "gifted" this arm that was neither fully human nor machine. The blue-and-black mechanical patterns looked tough but weren't heavy. Over time, he’d gotten used to it, though it occasionally felt ill-fitting.

He thought he could hold out until the end of his shift, but working this long was clearly asking too much.

"Hey boss, I’m gonna take off early to go to the hospital. My arm’s acting up again."

"Sure, go ahead. There’s only half an hour left anyway," Jiang Liangping waved him away, then added, "Oh, right. Headquarters recently mandated physicals for everyone. I booked appointments for us today, thinking we could go right after work and then head home. In that case, you go first. Old Qiu and I will catch up later."

"Just give them your employee ID when you get there. They should have it on record."

Wen Qi nodded, took off his work uniform, stuffed it into his locker, grabbed his phone, and left.

The two men in the room watched him leave with concern.

Both of them knew something about Wen Qi’s left arm situation. Even with the mechanical arm, they’d occasionally seen him holding it and moaning softly in the break room.

"Ah! Shit!"

Suddenly.

Jiang Liangping rubbed his bald head vigorously, stood up, sat back down, looked at Rong Qiu several times but couldn't get the words out. After repeating this three times, Rong Qiu finally lost his patience and threw a nut at him.

"What's your problem? If you’re itchy, go take a shower."

Jiang Liangping sighed and plopped down. "It’s not that... I just forgot to tell you guys..."

"What?" Rong Qiu put down what he was working on and lifted his eyes to look at him.

"First, promise me you can’t get mad, and you can’t skip the physical."

Rong Qiu: "I won’t get mad. Just say it."

"Recently, the people from First Unit also have to come back to headquarters for check-ups. The good news is, there are a lot of them, so they’re doing it in batches."

"...And the bad news?"

"Captain Ji and that pretty boy, along with the other managers, are in the first batch."

Rong Qiu’s right eyebrow started twitching, but he clung to a shred of hope. "...When’s the first batch?"

"To... today." After a moment’s thought, he added, "They’re probably already at the hospital."

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