Chapter 9: You Should Join The Airforce

Kenzo let go of her hand and looked at her skinny body. "Put on some weight." He simply said as he went back to reading his newspaper.

"...put on some weight...?" she felt she was going crazy. It had been one month since she had seen him. That should have been sufficient time for declaring a death sentence.

Kenzo put the newspaper aside again and grabbed her hand as he stood up. His tall body was like a tall wall standing in front of her.

"Generally speaking..." he said word by word, "a delicate woman only serves me one purpose."

At that moment, McAdams came into the door. "Boss..."

Kenzo left Emerald standing in the restaurant and walked out.

After leaving the restaurant and going back to the room, Emerald sat quietly in front of the computer.

What Kenzo had said made her heart sink again. Couldn't she change her fate for good?

She grabbed the clothes on the bed and threw them at the wall out of anger before sitting down. Grabbing onto her hair with both hands, she kept thinking about what to do for a long time, but nothing recurred to her.

Finally, after several minutes, she looked at the thin computer screen in front of her as she quietly said the word "earth."

A blue cursor was flashing rapidly on the screen. There was a computer with the internet and a search engine on this planet, far more advanced than those that she remembered.

Typing nervously, the search engine soon came up with the result. Then, in a cold male voice, she heard the response: "Sorry, madam, there is no result for 'earth,' please verify your keywords."

Laughing out loud, she paralyzed into the bed, resampling a corpse.

Emerald had waited to receive her sentence for several days. Wade Sterling had come by several times.

There was no doubt that Kenzo knew about his visits, but he didn't show up or interfere. Wade never mentioned helping her out and only stayed for a short moment every time but brought her expensive, exotic, and special stuff... treating her like a little girl.

All that changed when she suddenly heard a fighter's jet roar outside her window in the garden in the afternoon.

Emerald looked out of the window and saw the giant landing in the garden. It was a fighter the size of a cottage. Its black body and streamlined shape make it look like a goshawk. It carried cartridges of different sizes and shapes, shining like a warning sign under the sunlight.

McAdams had to say to Emerald at the garden after receiving the plane is even more deterrent.

"Ms. Wilson, please come here. This is the lord's present to you."

Emerald froze.

...plane?.... Did Kenzo give her a plane? A fighter?

With McAdams' help, Emerald stepped into the narrow shiny cabinet dimmed with cold lights. The LCD control screen was shining, and the leather driving seat was thick and solid.

The equipment inside was not new and had a hint of an oil smell, which made Emerald feel like she could live the experience of a fighter fighting in dangerous star wars.

"No. 9 Cheetah Fighter is equipped with extraordinary ammunition and can fly for 108 hours nonstop. In addition, the FTL jump engine can attain six jumps..." McAdams touched the dark gray control lever and joked. "Ms. Wilson, you can reach almost anywhere you want in this plane."

Anywhere you want.

Emerald even couldn't believe what she had just heard. She stared at McAdams until he touched his face, asking. "Anything wrong?"

Emerald couldn't keep her excitement and slowly walked toward the driving seat and sat down, even though she knew nothing about driving a plane. She felt herself tearing up when she stepped on the clutch and grasped the control lever.

Was this a fairy tale? Had she just met a warm-hearted helper?

Was Kenzo, the evil director of Hope City, feeling sympathetic toward her? Had he really just sent a plane to her after she had mentioned that she wanted to fly?

She really wanted to believe that there really was a Prince Charming in this world, even if he was cold-hearted.

"The Lord will come back later tonight and talk to you," McAdams informed her softly.

"About what?" Her voice trembled.

"...he will tell you the details." But, assistant McAdams smiles, "it is about a deal."

****

Kenzo didn't come back that night, or any other night for another two weeks, leaving Emerald looking at the giant plane, feeling more at unease with each day that passed.

Several days later, when fetching some documents, McAdams saw Emerald and repeated what he had said before. "The lord is attending meetings with other stars and will come back in a few days. I will join him today."

Since Emerald had come to live in Kenzo's home, she has rarely heard about Kenzo attending trans-stars meetings. She felt like he didn't care about personal interaction. Emerald had gathered from the servants that Kenzo always took his assistant McAdams or the deputy director to attend meetings for him. However, he himself had been gone for such a long time this time.

McAdams was careful and arranged for a soldier named Hunter Lake, who once had served in the air force to teach Emerald to operate and fly the fighter plane.

Hunter was a man in his early forties with well-behaved physical manners but was rude by speech. Perhaps he took Emerald to be the spoiled daughter of a wealthy family, trying to use his foul-mouth and reluctance to teach her a lesson.

Emerald learned quickly and diligently. She memorized all the details and points taught by Hunter and always had various questions the day after to reinforce her correct understanding. Some days she spent day and night in the plane, familiarizing herself with all the different parts. After ten short days, she had learned almost most of the information she needed to learn.

Hunter started to see her from a different standpoint. He was not a professional teacher but rather a rude soldier. He had taken Emerald up to the sky on the 5th day to fly around Hope City. On day six, he had let Emerald drive by herself. Given that she was still new to flying, she almost had hit a lighthouse, but with his help, she had regained control and landed vertically in Kenzo's garden. Hunter had proudly held up his thumb to Emerald in compliment.

"You learn even faster than men, with the exception that you are not as strong as men and cannot control the clutch yet. With everything, Emerald, you are about to become an expert," Hunter praises her, "you should join the airforce!"