Kill Me If You Can

Zhang Youzhi had been forcibly dragged back. Zhang Shuke sat beside him with his head lowered, sobbing and sniffling.

"Bro, I couldn't get you out. Boo-hoo..."

The idiot thief had actually started crying.

Yang Donglin didn't know whether to be angry or amused.

The police officer first glanced at Zhang Shuke, then turned serious again as he looked at the restless Zhang Youzhi. He took a deep breath and forced a smile onto his grim face.

"Well, there's been a misunderstanding. You're an employee of the White Jade Capital Group, right? Your company's regional manager came in person to bail you out. Why didn't you tell us who you were sooner?"

Yang Donglin paused, then continued.

"Ahem. Mr. Zhang Youzhi, you're free to go now. Your luggage and bedding are by the door. Just pick them up on your way out. Would you like me to give you a lift?"

Zhang Shuke stopped his tearless sobbing and looked up at Zhang Youzhi in confusion.

Zhang Youzhi wasn't particularly surprised to hear he could leave. He merely asked tentatively, "Officer, what's the White Jade Capital Group? I'm not one of their employees. Do you think this might be..."

Yang Donglin cut him off.

"You've never heard of the world's largest multinational funeral services company?"

"Oh, right. I understand." He lowered his head and sighed.

So it really was someone from the Funeral Company. They hadn't forgotten their client after all. Their company was called "White Jade Capital," then? A pretty auspicious name. Still, today's "prison break" had been a complete waste of effort.

Zhang Youzhi wanted to put in a good word for Zhang Shuke before leaving.

"All right, go on. I know what you want to say. I've arrested this kid Shuke more than a dozen times, ever since he was fourteen, and I've given him more than one beating. But this time, he's gone too far. Breaking and entering, burglary-that's no minor offense! He needs a good ten years behind bars!" Yang Donglin watched Zhang Shuke's expression as he roared in "anger."

Zhang Shuke went deathly pale at those words.

The longest he had ever spent locked up before was a few months.

"Captain Yang! Captain Yang, save me! I really know I was wrong this time..." Terrified, Zhang Shuke burst into loud sobs and clung to Yang Donglin's arm, smearing tears and snot all over his uniform. This time, he was crying for real.

Zhang Youzhi couldn't bear to watch.

"Save you? Hah. I'm just a cop. How am I supposed to save you? You deserve a lesson. This time, you can stay in there until you're thirty before you crawl back out."

Yang Donglin snorted, then ignored his pleas.

As he escorted Zhang Youzhi out of the station, Yang Donglin reached over and patted his shoulder.

He could tell the young man looked distressed, so he volunteered an explanation.

"I was just scaring that little punk. If he keeps up this petty thieving, he'll get himself into serious trouble sooner or later. He actually did us a huge favor this time. Remember that USB drive? The evidence on it wasn't worth shit without the most important piece of physical evidence. That swing of his axe cracked open a big shot's corruption den. Together with what was in the safe, it completed the key chain of evidence. He's earned himself some serious credit."

Zhang Youzhi stared at the veteran detective in surprise.

"All right, there's your explanation. Now scram, scram. The replacement ID I got for you is in your bag. If you've got nowhere to go, stay at a hotel."

Yang Donglin shooed him away with a grin and lit another cigarette.

Zhang Youzhi thanked him gratefully and politely declined his offer of a ride. Then he really did shoulder his bags and walk away.

"Why are young people these days all so listless? Like they're about to die," Yang Donglin muttered as he watched Zhang Youzhi's retreating figure. He let the cigarette smell disperse before heading back into the station.

Life Countdown.

36h.

That afternoon, a student with a buzz cut tapped a glass bottle against the scrap yard's large iron gate.

Clang-clang-clang-

The glass bottle rang sharply against the iron gate.

It was Hao Shanzhi, the high school senior Zhang Youzhi had met on the bus, who had insisted on helping him to the hospital.

"Master! Are you here, Master? I'm coming in!"

Hao Shanzhi poked his head inside and entered. After checking the yard and confirming no one was there, he headed straight for the covered area.

"Master? Look what I brought you."

Hao Shanzhi called out in his booming voice again, then lowered a burlap sack from his back. It was packed with pebbles and looked to weigh at least a hundred pounds.

There were already two more sacks of pebbles like it in the yard.

His shoes were still muddy. Clearly, he had dug up the stones himself.

"Nobody here? Master's out?" Hao Shanzhi carefully skirted the pile of little trinkets and headed straight for the "bedroom" behind the tire wall.

The "bedroom" was as clean and tidy as ever. It seemed the homeless man really wasn't there. Once Hao Shanzhi confirmed that, he turned reluctantly to leave.

Who knew which street his homeless master had gone "wandering" down this time?

As a high school senior on the athletics track, Hao Shanzhi felt that studying martial arts under a reclusive master wasn't easy. Even the tuition was unusual: nothing but pebbles and lessons in reading.

But out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a card.

A message had been written on it, with pinyin mixed in.

"Huh? Master's learning to read so quickly! He even knows how to leave me a note now?" Hao Shanzhi was delighted.

Despite the mass of famous poems and quotations copied onto that white wall, the homeless man was actually illiterate. He only knew how to copy them.

Previously, he had only had time to teach his master pinyin. To think that after a semester, his master already knew some Chinese characters. Clearly, his master had been studying hard too.

The note read, once deciphered:

[For Shanzhi: I owe someone a debt. A man once stayed at my place, but I judged an honorable man by my own petty suspicions and drove him away, unaware that he was terminally ill and had little time left. Later, I discovered that he had also saved your junior fellow disciple, a cat. My conscience would not let me rest, so I have gone to find him and repay what I owe. Put your martial arts training on hold for now. Shanzhi, fill a burlap sack with pebbles, wrap it in several more layers, and strike it with your body. Train your sinews, skin, and bones for the time being. I will teach you other moves when I return-Wu Fuzhang]

"Terminally ill? Why does that sound familiar?" The buzz-cut student was a little bewildered.

"Also, when did I get a junior fellow disciple? And a cat, at that?"

Hao Shanzhi was even more bewildered.

Still, he obediently followed his master's instructions, added two more layers of burlap around the sack of pebbles, and hung it up. After testing the punching bag's hardness, he began training.

His training consisted of ramming the bag with his body in all sorts of ways. It hurt just to watch.

Life Countdown.

24h.

Zhang Youzhi had spent a comfortable day holed up in the hotel.

Then, using the six hundred-odd yuan he had left, he ordered a fried chicken and burger meal that cost over a hundred.

With cola, too.

"That hits the spot!"

"Fuck, life just keeps giving me more to look forward to." Zhang Youzhi laughed, then went back to wolfing down his food.

Number Two had been right. He might still be lively, eating and sleeping just fine, but his vitality had already been hollowed out. His current state was squeezing out the last reserves of his life.

Not that he had much in the way of reserves.

"Fuck, I need to eat something good again tonight. If I don't eat it now, I'll never get another chance." Zhang Youzhi devoured his burger, fried chicken, and cola while watching Empresses in the Palace on the hotel television, then put on a leather overcoat-a gift from Detective Yang.

He put on a mask and sunglasses too, then left his room bundled up nice and warm.

Zhang Youzhi had made his peace with it. If he couldn't live, he might as well enjoy himself. Judging by the time remaining, he would most likely die tomorrow night.

In other words, tomorrow at noon, Zhang Youzhi could take a taxi somewhere deserted, lie down, and quietly stay there until nightfall. He would hold his ID between his teeth so he could be identified, then wait for the Funeral Company to collect his body.

At seven that evening, a lovely time to be out, Zhang Youzhi wandered leisurely along the streets. With a skewer of candied hawthorn in his left hand and a puff of cotton candy in his right, he looked around, reluctant to let any of it go.

Because his outfit looked rather strange, Zhang Youzhi deliberately kept away from the crowds, eating his snacks all alone in out-of-the-way places.

As he walked, he somehow ended up in a dead-end alley.

"A dead end? Huh."

Zhang Youzhi turned around while licking his cotton candy, then saw a group of burly men with dragon and tiger tattoos, armed with knives, spears, and clubs. They had clearly planned this.

There were more than a dozen of them.

Their leader wore a suit. He hefted a knife and gave Zhang Youzhi a sinister smile.

Zhang Youzhi considered for a moment.

He squeezed his cotton candy into a ball, stuffed it into his mouth, and swallowed it in two gulps. Then he pointed his candied hawthorn skewer at the men.

"Kill me if you can."