Chapter One Hundred and Two - Airborne Terror (Part Two)

Two minutes had passed, and by then I had already studied the schematics thoroughly. In my mind, I had made a preliminary analysis of the altimeter’s wiring diagram. After thinking for a moment, I looked at the copilot and said, "Keep the plane steady. Don’t let it tilt again. I’m going to start working now."

"You found the problem already? So quickly?" The copilot stared at me in astonishment, his face full of disbelief. "How could someone so young know so much? Even an experienced mechanic would need..."

"That’s none of your concern. Just fly the plane properly." I had no time to explain everything to him. Taking the toolbox Siya handed me, I moved to the copilot’s side, crouched down, and began the repairs.

With practiced hands, I opened the circuit panel and started feeling my way through the rows of wiring inside. Siya, both curious and nervous, leaned over as well. I caught a faint, delicate fragrance and turned my head. Her eyes were fixed tightly on me, and I could only give a wry smile. "Sis, what are you doing here, getting in the way..."

In truth, I knew that the lives of every passenger on this plane were in my hands. I was the only hope they had.

If she was going to stare nervously at anyone, who else could it be but me?

"I-I’m helping you," Siya said, a little embarrassed now that she had noticed my gaze. She smiled awkwardly. "Xiao Qiang, I really never realized you were this capable when you were little. You’ve changed so much lately, so fast that even I, as your sister, almost feel like I don’t know my own brother anymore."

"Heh. Of course I’m Xiao Qiang. Who else would I be?" Seeing her eyes on me made me feel somewhat uneasy, so I found an excuse. "Sis, it’s a bit dark in here. Go find a flashlight and help me hold the light."

Siya, having been given a task, quickly found a flashlight nearby and shone it downward. But because most of my body was already inside the circuit board, buried among the tangled wiring, she had no choice but to kneel down and crawl in after me, imitating my posture.

I was feeling around for the two altimeter wires when a beam of light suddenly fell in. I turned my head toward it. At first glance, that was nothing; on the second glance, I was stunned.

Because of the cramped space, Siya’s flight attendant uniform had snagged on something and was being held tight. From where I was looking down, the view went straight into the pale hollow framed by her pink bra, and I was instantly dazed.

Seeing that I had gone still and was staring at her without moving, Siya first thought my light was too bright. Then she lowered her head to look and realized that, in her embarrassment, she had exposed a little. Her face immediately turned crimson, and she shot me a glare. I quickly turned away and pretended I had seen nothing, continuing to feel through the wires.

"You little pervert... and at a time like this, you still dare sneak a look at your sister..." Siya muttered under her breath. I heard every word clearly, and feeling a little embarrassed myself, I coughed dryly before bending back to my work.

Aircraft wiring was no joke. If I hadn’t been here today, any other person would probably have done nothing but stare helplessly at this dense mass of wires and sigh. Yet in my mind, I carried nearly all the knowledge human civilization had accumulated from antiquity to the present, and that naturally included the aircraft’s design drawings. And after studying the wiring diagram handed to me by the copilot, I had finally confirmed that the altimeter had failed because of a short circuit in the connection for Line 33.

Line 33 was also called the power-distribution line, the main circuit responsible for the aircraft’s instrument power. If this had been more than a decade earlier, airplanes of that era did not use electric display instruments, so there would not have been a problem like this. But modern aircraft used Line 33 to convert some of the displays into digital instruments. The issue was not that Line 33 was especially prone to failure; the probability was tiny. It was simply that a careless repairman had overlooked it, leading to the situation before us.

Sure enough, after nearly three minutes of probing, I eliminated all the other possibilities and finally caught hold of a thick cable tangled with many thin wires. Carefully, I began separating them one by one, peeling away the knot like unraveling a silkworm cocoon.

"Ha. So the problem was here all along!" I muttered happily to myself. Then I forcefully pressed the two slightly loosened connectors in my hands back into place. Very quickly, I heard the copilot shout excitedly, "It worked! You really did it! The altimeter is fixed!!"

"What are you getting so excited for? Hurry up and pull the plane back up!" I crawled out from the circuit board and said to the copilot seated at the controls, "Watch the instrument changes closely. If I accidentally touch anything else, I’ll still be able to fix it in time."

"Yes, yes, understood!" the copilot answered, his voice trembling with excitement as he slowly began to raise the plane, all the while hurrying to contact the airport by radio and indicate that the original plan had been changed to an emergency landing in the capital!

"Xiao Qiang, you’re amazing!!" The moment I emerged from the wiring and stood up, Siya’s warm, soft body flung itself into my arms. She held me tightly, trembling with joy. "We’re going to live! We’re really going to live!"

"Sis... you’re choking me..." I reminded the completely overwhelmed Siya helplessly. Only then did I realize that her earlier composure had all been an act. At this moment, her excitement and elation made it clear to me that she was, after all, just a woman. She had only forced herself to stay calm because of her role as a flight attendant. This version of her now was the real her.

With the altimeter malfunction resolved, everything that followed went remarkably smoothly. The aircraft climbed once more into the thin, oxygen-starved stratosphere, and the engine, having broken free from its loss of control, finally responded again. Since the copilot had no experience landing this kind of aircraft, and the captain was still unconscious on the floor after the kick I had given him, I once again had to take the pilot’s seat.

This time, however, the copilot’s eyes no longer held even the slightest trace of panic or distrust. All that remained in them was boundless admiration.

Through the clouds, I gradually saw the capital’s international airport. The feeling of piloting this great machine for the first time was indeed wonderful. Especially when you pushed the yoke forward and plunged downward, that overwhelming sense of command from high above was truly exhilarating. Of course, what I was flying was still a passenger plane with problems.

During my conversation with the copilot, I learned that the cause was not carelessness on the part of the repair crew. Rather, there were simply too few mechanics in the country who truly understood a Boeing 757. This particular aircraft had been acquired from the United States under a half-buy, half-gift arrangement, and before relations between the two countries later grew tense, there had not even been enough time to train skilled maintenance personnel. As a result, inspections were usually handled by mechanics from other aircraft types, which was why something as inconspicuous as Line 33 had been overlooked.

In the end, the blame still lay with a nation that was not strong enough. With nothing but another country’s finished aircraft in hand, yet no ability to repair or maintain them, no technology to rely on, tragedy was often the result...

After gliding nearly a thousand meters along the runway, the aircraft finally came to a slow stop. Amid the copilot’s face full of admiration and thanks, I quietly slipped out of the cockpit and returned to sit beside Chu Qitong and Fu Ming.

I did not want anyone to know that it had been a high school student who saved the entire plane. Even if others did not care, I myself felt it would be a disgrace to my country!

If not for the alien technology that had opened my mind, if not for the knowledge of aircraft that I possessed, this flight today would absolutely have become one of the rare and devastating air disasters of recent years!

A nation that is not strong will not prosper; a nation without technology will leave its people weak. That sentence truly carved itself deep into my heart today.

Before, I may have thought that rebirth existed only for my own dreams, only so I would no longer be bound by society, only so I could build my own commercial empire through my efforts. But now I finally understood that one person’s victory is nothing at all. The greatest achievement is to use one person’s ability to drive the progress of one’s own nation and people. That is the best way to prove the value of rebirth.