An Absurd Turn of Events

Chen Meiling walked in. She stood at the entrance of the living room, saw Darnell first, and her brows immediately furrowed.

"Brother, you didn't shave again."

"I just got home."

"What does getting home have to do with shaving?"

She walked in as she spoke, hanging her faded canvas bag on the back of a chair with a swift, practiced motion.

The strap wrapped once around her finger before she hung it up, then she turned to face Darnell, hands on her hips, chin tilted slightly upward.

This posture made her look much taller than she actually was.

"You said you'd shave today, you said the same thing yesterday, and the day before that..."

"Alright, alright."

Darnell raised his hands in surrender.

"I'll shave tomorrow."

"You say 'tomorrow' every time."

Chen Meiling rolled her eyes, then shifted her gaze from Darnell to the third person sitting at the dining table.

It was as if a radio had been tuned to a different frequency.

Her shoulders relaxed, her hands dropped from her waist, and she unconsciously clasped them in front of her.

Her spine straightened slightly, her chin tucked back in, and the curve of her mouth shifted from disdain to a gentle, pursed smile.

"Brother Lin An~~ you're back too."

Lin An gave her a slight nod.

"Just got back?"

"Yeah, the tea restaurant was packed today. Auntie Li had me work two extra hours."

She walked into the kitchen to the sink to wash her hands, her movements precise... turning on the faucet, pumping the soap twice, scrubbing her palms, the backs of her hands, between her fingers, and her fingertips for three seconds each, rinsing clean, turning off the water, shaking her hands three times, and wiping them dry on her apron.

This was muscle memory honed at the tea restaurant.

Then, she dried her hands, walked to the refrigerator, opened the door, and took out two lemons wrapped in plastic wrap.

"Brother Lin An, would you like some lemon tea?"

"Thank you."

"Extra ice, less sugar?"

"Thank you."

Chen Meiling lowered her head, the corners of her mouth curving upward.

The lemon tea was ready in no time. She held the glass with both hands and brought it to Lin An, bowing her head slightly.

"Lemon tea."

Lin An took it and had a sip.

"Delicious."

He said this in Chinese.

Chen Meiling's eyes brightened for a moment, but she quickly suppressed the glimmer, gave a pursed-lip "mm," and turned to sit in her own seat.

Darnell watched the entire scene, his expression as complicated as if he had bitten into an unripe lemon.

"Meiling."

"Yeah?"

"Where's my lemon tea?"

"Don't you like drinking cola?"

"I want lemon tea now."

"Go make it yourself."

Chen Meiling picked up her fork, speared a piece of potato, and her tone returned to normal... fast-paced, high-pitched, and carrying that distinct rhythmic cadence of African American Vernacular English.

"Why should I be polite to you? You won't even shave, you wear that same blue Polo shirt every single day, and you look like a hobo squatting by the food truck eating a burger. Being polite to you is just a waste of my breath."

Mary let out a sound from the side that was somewhere between a laugh and a cough.

Darnell opened his mouth, then closed it again... he decided to shut up and eat.

The atmosphere at the dining table relaxed, like a pot of beef stewed to perfection... calm on the surface, but bubbling away underneath.

The Bullet Screen flowed quietly at the edge of his vision.

[Meiling's lemon-cutting technique is so practiced]

[It's from the tea restaurant, same with that three-second hand-washing routine]

[She is a completely different person when talking to Lin An compared to Darnell.]

[A bit of a tease.]

[The way Mary looks at Lin An, is that a mother-in-law looking at a son-in-law?]

[This meal was truly heartwarming.]

The meal was finished.

Mary's plate was empty, and Darnell's plate had long since been licked clean; he had even wiped up the sauce with bread, as if he were perpetually hungry.

There was still half a piece of cornbread left on Meiling's plate... she ate very slowly, taking tiny little bites.

There were still a few pieces of beef on Lin An's plate, not because he couldn't eat anymore, but because Mary kept adding more, and he couldn't keep up.

"Full?"

Mary watched him put down his fork.

"Full."

"Really full? There's more in the pot."

"Really full."

Mary scrutinized him for two seconds, confirming he wasn't just being polite, and then nodded with satisfaction.

"Meiling, clear the table."

"Why is it me again?"

"Because your brother brought a friend home today, so that counts as a contribution."

"How does him bringing Brother Lin An home count as a contribution? He didn't capture Brother Lin An."

"Enough talk."

Meiling stood up and began to clear the plates.

As she passed by Darnell, she bumped the back of his chair with her knee, using just enough force to make the chair wobble.

Darnell didn't say a word.

Lin An also stood up and pulled a few banknotes from his pocket.

Three one-hundred-dollar bills, folded neatly as if they had been specially prepared.

"Auntie."

Mary turned around, and upon seeing the money in his hand, the smile on her face vanished instantly. That reaction wasn't anger; it was the instinctive response of a Chinese parent when faced with a "child trying to give them money"—first refuse, then hesitate, and finally accept it with half-hearted reluctance, all accompanied by a theatrical performance.

"An, what are you doing?"

"This is for this month's food and lodging."

"I don't want your money."

Mary's voice rose by half an octave. She wiped her hands on her apron twice, then placed them on her hips, lifting her chin slightly to strike a "I'm about to get angry" pose.

"You're a student, where would you get so much money? Don't you need money for your research at school? Don't you need money to buy books? Keep it for yourself! You're just one person, you don't eat or take up much space in my house, what would I want your money for?"

"This is my scholarship."

"Scholarship? What scholarship?"

"A scholarship from Columbia University."

Lin An's tone was calm, and he lied without changing his expression.

Mary's eyebrows shot up, her face showing surprise.

"Columbia University? The Ivy League one?"

"Yes."

Mary dropped her hands from her apron completely. She turned to look at her son, who was pretending to wash dishes in the kitchen, and her voice rose by a full octave.

"Darnell, look at An!"

Darnell didn't turn around, but his dish-washing speed increased significantly, as if he were trying to escape the coming storm in that way.

"I know, Mom."

"You know what? Tell me, what do you know?"

Mary stood with her hands on her hips.

"An is the same age as you, he's at Columbia University, getting a scholarship, and what about you?"

"Mom..."

"Why can't you study hard and strive for progress?"

Darnell walked out helplessly and cast a glance at Lin An.

The latter was holding a lemon tea, sitting on the sofa, taking a slow sip, the corners of his mouth curling up slightly.

Darnell took a deep breath, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a stack of small-denomination dollars. He counted them and placed the bills on the table.

"Mom, here, this is my contribution to the household for this month."

Mary's lecture came to an abrupt halt.

She looked down at the dollars on the table, then back up at Darnell.

"What is this?"

"Money."

"I know it's money. I'm asking you where this money came from."

Her volume didn't drop, but the direction of her anger shifted.

"Darnell Washington."

Her voice suddenly deepened, transforming from a loud megaphone into a subwoofer.

"Did you go 'zero-dollar shopping' again?"

"I did not!"

"Then where did this three hundred dollars come from? Can you earn three hundred dollars in a month? Last time you did those side hustles, you only made a few dozen dollars in three months, and now you suddenly made three hundred in just a few days? Did you rob a bank?"

"I..."

"Tell me the truth."

A hint of fear appeared in Mary's voice... she was afraid her son was going down the wrong path, afraid he would end up like those gang-banging Ni Ge on the streets.

"Auntie."

Lin An set down his lemon tea and stood up from the sofa.

"That isn't money from zero-dollar shopping."

Mary turned toward him.

"Then what kind of money is it?"

"It's from a project Darnell and I are working on together."

Lin An's tone was sincere.

"The research project Professor Jero gave me requires extensive surveys in the Jamaica Community, and Darnell has been working very hard riding his bike to take me around."

He glanced at Darnell.

"The professor is very satisfied with me and gave me a scholarship, so I gave him three hundred dollars of it as a transport fee."

The kitchen went quiet for a second.

"Transport fee?"

Mary's gaze shifted back and forth between Lin An and Darnell.

"Really?"

"The scholarship Professor Jero gave me is quite generous."

Lin An didn't change his expression.

"Really?"

Mary's gaze finally landed on Darnell's face.

"Is what An said true?"

Darnell nodded vigorously.

"It's true."

Mary stared at him for three seconds.

Three seconds later, her tense shoulders relaxed, and the subwoofer turned back into a megaphone.

"Why didn't you say so earlier!"

She reached out and smacked Darnell on the head. The force was much heavier than when she patted Lin An, and the sound was crisp.

"Since it's honest money, why didn't you say so sooner? You had me worried sick for half the day; I thought you went to Brooklyn to get involved in that messy stuff again!"

"You didn't give me a chance to speak..."

"I didn't give you a chance? When have I ever not given you a chance? You come home every day acting like a thief, how can I not be worried?"

She picked up the stack of bills from the table and stuffed them into her apron pocket with a natural motion, while the corners of her mouth couldn't help but curl upward, and the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes bunched up like a flower.

Meiling poked her head out from by the sink.

"Brother, you made three hundred dollars helping Brother Lin An with his project over the last few days?"

"Yeah."

"Then you're doing much better than me working at the tea restaurant; I only make 150 dollars a week... Brother Lin, can I work with you too?"

"No."

He said.

"You still have to go to school; studying is the most important thing."

Mary walked over at this moment, pulling Chen Meiling aside to lecture her. However, unlike the angry roars she directed at Darnell, her reprimand was very soft and gentle, without a hint of high-pitched shouting.

Darnell cast a glance at Lin An, and as their eyes met, he spread his hands and shrugged.

Over the next few days, Lin An's life became very routine.

He would wake up in the morning and have Darnell ride his bicycle to take him to the 103rd Precinct. He would spend the morning helping police officers and their families resolve tax issues, and after a full meal, he would wait for an available officer to drive him to the shooting range to practice for two or three hours.

In the afternoon, Darnell would drive him to the abandoned Queen Furniture Factory to inspect the situation there.

Old Joe was a capable man. Following Lin An's requirements, he had recruited ten more people, bringing the staff count up to fifteen.

Among them were several who, like the illegal Mexican immigrant Hector Gonzalez and the white woman Catherine Miller, had brought their whole families along.

Lin An was very welcoming of such employees, because having a family meant they had ties, even if it meant they needed more food and clothing.

For Lin An, these were not issues at all; clothing and food were essentially free to him thanks to the Bullet Screen rewards.

With a relatively sufficient workforce, Old Joe was finally able to arrange for people to go out and work... selling clothes in the neighboring community, scouting the local homeless population, and distributing cleaning service flyers to businesses on the commercial street.

A three-pronged approach.

Of course, perhaps because it had been too short a time, or perhaps because the homeless employees were inexperienced and acted timid rather than confident, the three ventures had yielded no results so far.

Only five pieces of clothing had been sold at retail, and the scouting of the homeless had only turned up a few retired special forces soldiers, with not a single talent related to high-tech fields.

As for the cleaning flyer business, they hadn't received a single call.

Lin An was used to this; if things were that easy to succeed at, there wouldn't be so few rich people in the world.

Throughout history and across the globe, making money has never been an easy task.

In the evening, Lin An and Darnell would return to his narrow but cozy little home.

Lin An leaned back on the old sofa, closing his eyes to rest while watching the Bullet Screen chat... Sometimes, the viewers were quite strange. When there was nothing fun happening around Lin An, they would either fly a Crow around or chat in front of Lin An, exchanging all sorts of inexplicable things.

For example...

[Brothers from before '16, take note: here in '16, the Americans are causing trouble in the South China Sea, and a war almost broke out...]

[Tell us the specific causes and the process...]

[I'm currently in February 2020. The Americans are causing trouble in Taiwan, intending to deploy strategic missiles. Friends who haven't reached this timeline yet, take note...]

[I have a problem I can't solve, the question is as follows... Brothers in the know, please send a Bullet Screen to help me solve it. It's an emergency, I have an exam...]

Lin An watched these Bullet Screens with great interest.

On the floor across from the sofa, Darnell sat cross-legged, boredly playing the Snake game on his Nokia phone, until he eventually grew tired of it.

"Bro, didn't you say we were going to find that Sergei? We've been in Jamaica these past few days and haven't really gone far."

Lin An looked up at the Chinese calendar hanging on the wall: March 20th.

"Not yet, it's still too early."

"Why is it early?"

"Sergei is still in the police station. The 60th Precinct caught him and hasn't released him yet."

"Huh?"

Darnell scratched his head.

"Don't the police release people after twenty-four hours?"

"Darnell, you really are well-versed in these matters... Sheldon's situation is a bit different. He spent money to bribe the police, so the 60th Precinct will intentionally hold him for longer."

Lin An shook his head at Darnell's store of obscure knowledge.

"Besides, we still have a problem we haven't solved, so we can't go looking for trouble with Sergei yet."

"What problem?"

"The gun problem."

Lin An spread his hands.

"Right now, I only have two handguns and one shotgun that are usable. I can't get anything done with that, and I'm trying to find a way to solve it."

"Ah, one long gun and two short guns, isn't that enough?"

Darnell was very surprised.

"Sergei is a mercenary broker. Have you forgotten that we were sprayed with assault rifle fire by his gunmen at the abandoned factory before?"

Darnell fell silent, and the Bullet Screens became denser.

[The streamer really does need more firepower now]

[Two handguns and a shotgun are enough for ordinary people, but they really aren't enough to deal with mercenaries]

[The problem is that rifles are hard to get. In 2009 New York, an AR-15 on the black market costs at least two thousand dollars]

[Buying black-market guns is too risky; it's easy to get caught in a sting operation.]

[The streamer is currently an undocumented resident, so he definitely shouldn't take that risk.]

[Wait, I have an idea.]

[Speak.]

[The streamer can have Darnell go to a gun shop to buy parts. As long as he doesn't buy the receiver, core components like barrels and triggers were easy to buy in the United States in 2009—as long as you have the money.]

[Right, handguards, stocks, grips, sights, magazines, and even the most important part, the barrel—these are all legal and don't require a background check.]

[Then we can gift the receivers, and the streamer can assemble them himself.]

[We might still need to gift the magazines, since civilian rifle magazines in the U.S. are limited to ten rounds.]

[That's not a big problem. I run a private workshop and have the machinery. Receivers are tricky to manufacture, but I can handle it. A three-axis vertical machining center for roughing, then some manual polishing, and it should be fine.

Magazines are the easiest part; just bend some sheet metal into shape, then buy springs online to assemble them. The barrel is the real problem.]

[That's a good idea, but there's one issue.]

[What issue?]

[Because the assembled weapons contain gifted parts, they can't be put into the Live Stream Store.]

[In other words, if the streamer wants to use them, he has to carry them around; he can't just summon them whenever he needs them like before?]

[Exactly. I think this is a major problem. Handguns are fine, but long guns are hard to carry.]

[The vast majority of weapons used in New York City gang shootouts in 2009 were handguns, precisely because long guns are hard to conceal. If the police find you with one, the consequences are disastrous.]

[But it's better than nothing. And the streamer doesn't necessarily need to carry them around; he can hide them somewhere in advance and retrieve them when needed.]

[Right, just hide the guns near Brighton Beach ahead of time.]

[Darnell is familiar with Queens; he should know where things can be hidden.]

This method is worth a try. The only thing is that after using the guns, if he wants to dispose of these assembled weapons, he'll have to break them back down into parts or just throw them into a river.

In short, destroying the evidence will be a bit of a hassle.

He could consider getting a few long guns first to test it out and give them to the security guards at the furniture factory. That way, if there's a need, they can be deployed immediately instead of scrambling to buy guns at the last minute.

Lin An shifted his gaze from the Bullet Screen to Darnell's face, and the latter noticed his look.

"Bro, what's up?"

"Never mind, no need to trouble you with this."

Lin An shook his head. He picked up his phone and started drafting a text to Old Joe. It would be better to leave the task of buying gun parts to him; Old Joe could arrange for someone to go to the gun shop.

[Streamer, what kind of guns do you want?]

"The AR-15 series, I suppose."

Lin An said.

"The civilian market is huge, parts are easy to buy, and it's easy to modify them into fully automatic weapons."

As Lin An said this, he recalled the battle inside the abandoned factory in Brooklyn. Several of the gunmen at the time were using fully automatic AR-15 rifles.

[Actually, the AR series barrel isn't suitable for conversion into a fully automatic weapon because it was manufactured for semi-automatic fire. If you want to convert it to full-auto, you have to machine the barrel. It's not only a huge hassle, but it's also not durable; you'd have to replace the barrel after firing a hundred rounds or so.]

"Then what is your suggestion?"

[I looked up legal civilian barrels and parts in the U.S. in '09. I suggest the streamer buy FN M16A2 mil-spec, Arsenal SLR (Bulgaria), IMBEL (Brazil), TRW surplus, FMP (Portugal), or BCM cold-hammer-forged barrels.

These barrels are high quality and can be assembled into fully automatic weapons without needing extra modifications.]

"Really?"

[Don't even think about it. Legal gun shops in New York City can't sell the barrels mentioned above. The guys above are only considering the modifiability, but they haven't considered how the streamer is going to get those barrels.]

[Physical stores definitely don't sell them, but you can just buy them online and have them mailed. I bought them many times in New York back in '09. Whether it was AK, AR, NATO-spec, or Brazilian goods, you could buy them all.]

[Give it a rest, don't mislead the streamer. You can buy one or two of these mil-spec barrels, but if you buy too many, something will definitely go wrong. Even if you use someone else's ID and a fake address, you won't be able to avoid the police showing up at your door.]

[Use a money order to pay, don't use a credit card. Also, ask the merchant to use unmarked packaging and ship it to a private mailbox; don't send it directly to your home. Then, buy and receive the shipments separately. Even if you bought twenty or thirty mil-spec barrels, you wouldn't get a visit from the police.]

Lin An watched the Bullet Screen argue. As he watched, he took out a pen and paper to record the information... some of these methods were actually quite viable.

"Ding..."

It was a text message. Lin An put down his pen and paper, picked up the phone, and immediately felt the argument on the Bullet Screen become boring.

"Brothers, stop arguing. Old Joe just asked Allen... you know, that retired soldier with the amputated leg. He has connections and can contact active-duty U.S. soldiers to sell weapons. Whether it's handguns, assault rifles, machine guns, or grenades, they're all for sale."

[??????]

[I typed so much just now, spent forever looking up data, and even dug out the 2009 barrel model chart, and you're telling me Allen has connections?]

[A retired soldier with a missing leg, connections, active-duty U.S. military, and even grenades? What kind of god-tier setup is this?]

[No, we just spent forever arguing about the difference between mil-spec and civilian barrels, and it turns out he can just buy the finished products?]

[I was just typing to teach the streamer how to find online gun parts platforms, and I saw this text halfway through.]

[Same here, I just finished looking up New York State's 2009 gun mailing regulations. What a waste of time.]

[I even pulled up the cutting parameters for a three-axis vertical machining center, ready to teach the streamer how to mill a receiver himself.]

[You bunch of military nerds, you're killing me.]

[So, is the Bullet Screen strategist division collectively unemployed now?]

[Unemployment +1, I suggest the streamer pays us unemployment benefits.]

Just at this moment, gunfire suddenly erupted from outside the window.

One shot, two shots, and then it became as dense as raindrops, a rapid-fire patter.