The stainless steel double doors of the operating room swung open with a dull, metallic scrape.
Three healers filed out, their steps carrying a strange sense of haste. The female healer leading the group still clutched a clipboard, her pen dangling precariously from the edge of her pocket.
Luo Yang followed behind them, wearing the white shirt that had been soaked in blood and dried into a stiff crust. The fabric was mottled with deep brown stains from his chest to his waist. A large chunk of his left sleeve was missing, revealing skin beneath that was now perfectly intact.
His pace was steady, even carrying a hint of casual indifference.
Zhang Xian’s complexion looked much better than it had a few hours ago.
He was sitting on the far left of the row of plastic benches outside the operating room. He had smoothed out the hem of his Zhongshan suit; though the dust and wrinkles remained, his overall spirit had mostly returned.
Qiu Shubai wasn’t sitting. She leaned against the wall on the right side of the hallway, arms folded across her chest. Her grayish-white hair hung over her shoulders, swaying slightly in the draft from the air conditioner.
The moment the door hit the rubber wall bumper with a muffled thud, both of them opened their eyes simultaneously.
Two pairs of eyes fixed on him at once, peering through the gaps between the three healers. They landed on the young man in the tattered shirt who looked as if he had just crawled out of a trash heap.
Luo Yang raised a hand toward them, giving a brief wave.
The speed with which Zhang Xian sprang from his seat was entirely uncharacteristic of a man in his sixties or seventies. He blurred across the floor to Luo Yang, his momentum nearly knocking the lead female healer off balance.
"You—"
Zhang Xian’s gaze swept down from Luo Yang’s face, his heart filled with an unspeakable shock.
"What is going on here?"
He reached out and squeezed Luo Yang’s shoulder with significant force, as if confirming the boy was actually solid.
"Weren't you severely injured? How did you... end up like this?"
Luo Yang winced at the squeeze and recoiled half a step.
"Hiss—take it easy, Old Zhang. I might be healed, but I'm still exhausted."
"...Healed?" Zhang Xian’s eyebrows knit together. "What do you mean, healed? What exactly happened in there? Explain yourself!"
Luo Yang reached up to scratch the back of his head. His fingernails caught on the dried blood scabs on his scalp, sending a few dark red flakes fluttering down.
"Well... how should I put it?"
He tilted his head for a moment, a less-than-convincing smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
"I guess I just have a special constitution? I recover quickly?"
Zhang Xian stared at him, his bloodshot old eyes practically screaming the words 'Do you think I'm an idiot?'
"Don't give me that nonsense," Zhang Xian said irritably. "If you had some special constitution, wouldn't I know about it? Your grandfather never mentioned a word of it when we were drinking back in the day."
"Maybe he forgot."
"That old geezer Luo Xingbang had a memory ten times better than mine."
Luo Yang’s expression twitched. Knowing the conversation would fall apart if he kept digging this hole, he quickly tugged at the rag that used to be his shirt.
"Old Zhang, look at what I'm wearing." He looked down at himself and then back at Zhang Xian. "I can't exactly hang around the hospital hallway like this, can I? At least let me go back and change first."
Zhang Xian’s mouth hung open, his momentum for further questioning cut halfway through by that statement.
He sized Luo Yang up twice. It was true; if the kid walked out like this, security would probably stop him, thinking he was a vagrant.
The old man’s eyes shifted, moving away from Luo Yang to glance down the hallway.
Qiu Shubai was still standing there, though she had shifted from leaning to standing straight, her hands hanging at her sides with her fingers slightly curled. She didn't walk over, but her gaze never left Luo Yang.
"Fine then." He patted Luo Yang’s shoulder, much more gently this time. "Go get yourself sorted out. I happen to need to handle some paperwork with the doctors—not just for you, I have to take care of Old Li’s side as well."
As he spoke, he turned and walked toward the three healers who were still rooted to the spot. When he passed Qiu Shubai, his pace faltered for less than half a second. He didn't look back or say anything, heading straight into the office area at the end of the hall with the three healers in tow.
The sound of footsteps faded into the distance. The sole of the last healer’s shoe squeaked against the floor tile at the corner, and then the hallway was left with only the hum of the fluorescent lights and the airflow from the AC vents.
Qiu Shubai walked over from the wall.
Her pace wasn't fast. Her shoes made a clear clicking sound with every step on the ceramic tiles. The hallway wasn't long; it was only seven or eight steps from where she had been leaning to where Luo Yang stood.
She stopped in front of him.
There was less than an arm's length between them, close enough for Luo Yang to catch the faint, lingering scent of blood on her.
Her complexion was better than he had expected.
The white marks on her left wrist had long since vanished, her skin returning to its normal color, though she still looked somewhat pale and her lips lacked color. Her grayish-white bangs hung down, obscuring half an eyebrow as she looked at him.
Luo Yang looked back at her.
His gaze met hers.
The spider lily in her pupil was gone. Her right eye had returned to its normal color, just as calm as her left.
The two of them stood there in silence, neither one speaking first.
At the far end of the hallway, a nurse pushed a medicine cart past. The rattling of the wheels over the tile joints grew louder and then faded as the cart turned into another corridor, leaving total silence behind.
Luo Yang’s mind was racing.
He was trying to think of what to say.
He knew that, logically, there should be plenty to say at a time like this, but his mouth felt as if it had been glued shut. Every sentence that rolled through his mind retreated as soon as it formed.
Counting this life and his previous one, he had been alive for thirty-six years and had never once been in a relationship.
It wasn't for a lack of opportunity; he simply never put any thought into it. Back on Earth, he had been busy with school, gaming, and anime, occasionally chatting with roommates—his days had been a blur. Here, it went without saying: mutant beasts, Heterosequences, missions, training. Every day was spent either fighting or on the way to a fight. Even in his rare moments of leisure, he just stayed home as a shut-in.
Because of this, his mental database for such a scene was probably inferior to a middle schooler's love letter.
Seconds ticked by. The cold air from the AC blew down from above, lightly swaying the few strands of hair on his forehead that were stuck together with dried blood.
He opened his mouth.
"You—"
At the exact same moment, Qiu Shubai spoke.
Their voices collided, merging into a jumble of indistinct syllables in the hallway.
The second half of Luo Yang’s sentence was "are you okay?"
Three words, dry as stones picked up from a desert, without a drop of moisture in them.
But he didn't hear his own words, because Qiu Shubai’s voice reached his ears at that very instant.
"Do you enjoy throwing yourself into danger that much?"
Luo Yang’s mouth remained open, frozen in the shape of his unfinished sentence.
He looked at her.
She looked at him.
The fluorescent light in the hallway hummed again. The fly trapped inside had finally grown tired, its buzzing much quieter than before.
Rate on N.U.
