Chapter 1950: Chapter 1315: Interstellar Grand Stage (22)_2
"Xu, Xu, what are you thinking about? We've arrived."
Steve's voice echoed in Xu Shang-Chi's ear, prompting a stunned silence for a moment before he came back to reality. He apologized with a smile, "I'm sorry, I was lost in thought."
Laughing, Steve slapped his back and ushered him out of the shuttle, introducing him to an Agents' base that looked like an alien city.
The central building was a tidy icosahedron, flanked by mirrored skyscrapers, dagger-shaped, three connected at the base, and a massive Sky Carrier floating above.
"You've joined us at an opportune time," Steve told him, half-joking, "This new base has just been commissioned. It's on the best piece of real estate in the New York Suburb. How Nick convinced Congress to approve this location is anyone's guess."
With a playful grin, Steve continued, "Our buildings utilize the absolute cutting edge of technology, including air conditioning, ventilation systems, thermal exchange tunnels - all state-of-the-art. Our greenhouses and farms source from the same designs used on Mercury Base, guaranteeing organic, contamination-free produce."
"Ah, I almost forgot to give you this," Steve dug into his sports jacket to retrieve a wristband, handing it to Xu Shang-Chi who put it on, then walked into the massive base looking awe-struck.
As soon as he entered the building, Xu Shang-Chi was taken aback. The vast space teemed with S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents bustling around - not on foot, but in the air.
The architecture was reminiscent of a hive, both externally and internally. All agents donned a seemingly inconspicuous exoskeleton, buzzing around just like bees returning to their hive.
The center of the entire structure was an enormous atrium cavity extending up to the very last floor, designed to enable the flying agents to reach their desired departments in the shortest time and distance possible.
While Xu Shang-Chi stood in amazement, Steve retrieved another small metallic piece from his pocket and handed it over, but Xu Shang-Chi couldn't understand the writing and code on it.
After receiving it, he looked at Steve with a puzzled expression and asked, "What's this?"
Steve, revealing a brilliant smile, retorted, "You wish you could fly too, don't you? Your face says it all. Don't worry! Put this on, and you'll fly too!"
Xu Shang-Chi blinked, then lowered his gaze to the small metallic piece in his hand. Swallowing hard, he asked, "How do I wear it?"
"Just toss it in the air with your coolest pose."
Wide-eyed, Xu Shang-Chi raised his other hand, and with a sharp flick of his wrist, the metallic piece flew into the air and expanded into an alien form that quickly attached itself to his body.
Xu Shang-Chi found that a thin layer of membrane had adhered to his wrists, ankles, and around his lower rib area, shimmering with an otherworldly glow.
Steve gestured towards a room across from them. Backing away a little, he sprinted and leapt right onto the corridor of the opposite atrium, waving at Xu Shang-Chi from behind the railing.
Xu Shang-Chi hesitantly backed up a couple of steps, gradually extended his arms, lifted his feet off the ground, and began to float toward the other side, swaying like a drunken man.
He discovered that the device didn't require any special focus to control. It felt, rather comfortably, like swimming underwater with a motor strapped to his back, allowing him to navigate and accelerate using his muscles.
Upon landing, Xu Shang-Chi exhaled a sigh of exhilaration. Seeing him apparently lost in his thoughts, Steve walked over to pat his shoulder, "This is our latest neuro-electro-controlled magic exoskeleton. You've picked the perfect time to join S.H.I.E.L.D., back in the day, we didn't have such useful tools. If you wanted to fly, you had to rely on innate powers."
But what startled Steve was the growing excitement in Xu Shang-Chi's eyes, followed by an excited comment in Chinese – which Steve didn't understand – "Isn't this a flight add-on!?"
After a deep breath, Xu Shang-Chi slowly approached the railing. Watching the flying agents, he murmured, "I wondered how this base could lack a system! This place is teeming with cheat codes!"
"No... The old me was just an ordinary person." He furrowed his brows, captivated by the sunlight streaming through the transparent ceiling of the hive. "If every agent here has a cheat code, what about common people?"
"Maybe ordinary people have them too," Xu Shang-Chi recollected, "Those flying buses and trains, they can fly, and so the ordinary people can fly too."
Xu Shang-Chi recalled fragments of fantasy as he faced death. He remembered seeing the truck driver, eyes closed in sleep while driving.
He was aware that the cargo in the truck, probably from another distant city just the previous night, was destined for the production line at the factory to be crafted into products that would eventually end up in the hands of ordinary people.
But the tired truck driver killing him would mean a halt to that journey. They would never make it to the factory.
The truck driver, the taxi driver, and he himself would never get to their planned destinations in life, ever again.
No worker willingly damages their hard work by making mistakes. They constantly have to balance between pursuing efficiency and ensuring safety, akin to dancing on a blade's edge.
Xu Shang-Chi, hurriedly trying to work overtime at his internship, the taxi driver frantically looking for fares, and the truck driver, desperate to make deliveries. The delicate balance between efficiency and safety tragically broke, leading to three people, or rather, three families, facing immense tragedy.
But if... Xu Shang-Chi considered an alternate scenario. If there was a more efficient transport mechanism that could fly and operate autonomously around the clock to take him where he wanted to go, could this tragedy have been averted?
As Xu Shang-Chi walked along the railing, he pondered over his teacher's words which had been right all along - any shortcomings were due to a lack of productive capacity.
But now, with the vivid, advanced, and futuristic scene before him, he realized that one day, the constraints of productive capacity would be eliminated. Humans would be able to soar freely in the sky, and countless tragedies like his would cease to exist.
Standing in the hallway at the center of the Hive, Xu Shang-Chi gripped the railings tighter, the flame that was rooted in every Chinese person's heart, the Star's Fire, began to burn brighter.
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone