00848

Shanghai, Qingfu Prison.

The pungent smell of tobacco filled an ordinary office.

A handsome young man with gentle features, wearing an orange prison vest and sporting a smoothly shaved head, lounged in a chair. His back rested lightly against it, and his feet alternately pressed against the floor, rocking the chair back and forth with a steady creak.

His name was Ren Ye, inmate 00848 at this prison. He normally served his sentence in the general cellblock.

Across the clean, tidy table sat a stubble-faced middle-aged man. He held a cigarette in his right hand and picked sleep from his eye with his left. "You've been inside for over three years?"

"Three years, three months, and five days." Ren Ye nodded.

"Oh, right. My name's Huang Wei." The stubble-faced man wore an old leather jacket. His eyes were heavy with sleep, his voice low, and everything about him radiated exhaustion.

"Hrrgh..."

"Cough, cough-ptui!"

After introducing himself, Huang Wei drew a deep breath and coughed several times before finally bringing up a mouthful of yellow phlegm. He looked around but failed to find a trash can, so he spat into an empty cigarette pack, crushed it in his hand, and tossed it onto the table.

Ren Ye studied him without expression, wondering who he was. An inspector? Someone from the psychological rehabilitation office? Or a resident prosecutor?

With manners that crude, he doesn't look like any of them.

Pinching his cigarette between his thumb and forefinger, Huang Wei took a hard drag. "How long until you get out?"

"With my sentence reduction, two years, eight months, and twenty-five days."

"Mm. Any regrets?" Huang Wei asked as casually as if they were making small talk.

"Heh." Ren Ye smiled.

"You were young. Too impulsive." Huang Wei pointed at Ren Ye, none too politely. "I read your record. A bit of a waste."

"Being young means I still have room to make mistakes. After six years inside, I'll still be Ren Ye. Nothing will have changed." Ren Ye looked perfectly relaxed. "Besides, it's pretty nice here. My roommates are all skilled craftsmen. They can play instruments, sing-the whole package. It's reassuring."

"Heh." A rare trace of a smile appeared on Huang Wei's dark, purplish face.

A little over three years earlier, Ren Ye had just started working in border anti-fraud operations. While escorting suspects, he had fired seven shots and killed two who had attempted a violent escape. They had died on Chinese soil.

A week before that incident, a colleague who had been Ren Ye's closest friend had been dismembered and buried alive abroad by the same gang of suspects. To this day, only his arms and torso had been recovered.

His colleague had been an only child and had only recently married. When he died, his wife was eight months pregnant...

His colleague had died abroad, making evidence difficult to collect. The charges they could likely substantiate against the two main suspects who had been shot were fraud and money laundering. Had they gone to trial... they probably would not have been sentenced to death.

Ren Ye's department had done everything it could to protect him, trying all sorts of approaches. The problem was that he had fired a full seven shots, shattering both suspects' heads.

In the end, Ren Ye had been sentenced to six years and ten months in prison.

Did he regret it?

Despite his easygoing, even slightly cynical exterior, Ren Ye had asked himself that question many times. After all, going from a respected authority figure to a murderer shunned by society had been a difficult transition.

It had been difficult not just for others, but especially for himself.

Judging by his current circumstances, he undoubtedly regretted it. But the interesting thing about life was that, given another chance, many of the things you regretted would happen all over again.

It left Ren Ye with an inner conflict he could never explain to anyone...

Huang Wei stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray, took out a fresh pack, and immediately lit another. "I'm with a special unit."

"I figured." Ren Ye nodded.

"Everything I'm about to tell you may be hard to take in, hard to understand. You might even find yourself overwhelmed by shock and confusion." Holding his cigarette, Huang Wei furrowed his brow, his expression serious. "But judging by your record, I believe you can keep your composure."

Ren Ye looked puzzled. "Shock and confusion? I don't follow."

"Let me tell you two stories first."

"Will this take long? I have to work the sewing machine tomorrow to earn my labor credits," Ren Ye replied jokingly.

Ignoring his reaction, Huang Wei carefully gathered his words. "In 1973, there was a reincarnation case. A family surnamed Jiang in the south had a boy just over three years old. We'll call him Little Jiang. One day, this three-year-old suddenly told his parents... 'Actually, I'm not your son. I'm the son of a family in Danzhou. Over ten years ago, I died in an armed brawl, then was reincarnated into your family. Now I want to find my old parents and see them.' At first, his parents didn't believe him. They thought he was possessed or something. But the child kept pleading and repeating stories about his previous life every day. So when he was six, they took him to Danzhou."

An episode of Approaching Science?

An urban legend?

This stubble-faced guy has either spent too much time jerking off or works for some occult agency.

What does he want? Ren Ye wondered.

Huang Wei's eyes looked bloodshot and lifeless, but as he told the story, he was actually watching Ren Ye's subtle facial expressions. He had expected the look that suggested Ren Ye thought he was crazy.

"...Once they reached Danzhou, the Jiangs followed their son's directions and found a house with effortless ease. The boy didn't make a single wrong turn. When they arrived, he recognized the father from his previous life. The man thought he was talking nonsense, but... every detail of everyday life the boy described matched what the man knew, without a single discrepancy." Huang Wei told the story earnestly, his expression solemn.

At that, Ren Ye said, "Uh-huh. And then?"

"Then comes the second story." Huang Wei had a real gift for storytelling, and his voice was rich and resonant. "In January 1995, a scientific research station in Antarctica discovered an enormous mass of mist in the sky. Strangely, there were strong winds at the time, but the mist remained completely motionless, showing no sign of dispersing. Its shape resembled a circular doorway. To investigate, they tethered a balloon carrying precision instruments and sent it up into the 'mist doorway.' After the allotted time, they pulled it back down... only to discover that the instruments displayed a date and time in 1965. Initially, they assumed the instruments had malfunctioned, so they replaced them with numerous identical devices and repeated the test... but the results were the same. Every instrument showed 1965, with precisely the same time."

Ren Ye frowned and thought for a moment. "I think I've seen that news story online...!"

"What the news didn't tell you was that the mist reappeared several years later. Three people disappeared, and they still haven't been found," Huang Wei interrupted solemnly.

After staring blankly for a long moment, Ren Ye couldn't help asking, "That's it?"

"Yeah, that's it." Huang Wei nodded as though it were obvious.

"No, I don't get it. What are you trying to say by telling me these two stories?" Ren Ye asked, baffled.

Silence fell over the room. They could have heard a pin drop.

Huang Wei looked Ren Ye straight in the eyes. "I'm simply telling you that humanity knows far too little about this world, let alone the universe. Strange things may be happening in this world every moment of every day."

Ren Ye quickly regained his composure and considered the situation.

Someone who could meet him after eleven at night, who could keep the prison staff away and secure complete privacy for their conversation, probably wouldn't tell him two supernatural stories just to make a fool of him.

"There's an opportunity for you to leave this place," Huang Wei said calmly. "The price is... you might die."

The grating scrape of the chair against the floor stopped. Ren Ye sat upright and raised an eyebrow. "Die?"

"To be precise, this isn't a demand, or a chance to atone through meritorious service. It's a request," Huang Wei explained seriously.

"Heh. Who's asking, then?" Ren Ye asked with a smile.

"Until you sign a series of documents, I can't tell you much." Huang Wei paused, then abruptly gave their conversation a greater weight. "As for who's asking, that's hard to say. The public? Our superiors? Our colleagues? Me, too, I suppose... In short, our nation is going through something. Something difficult."

Ren Ye stopped asking questions, and Huang Wei concentrated on smoking, giving him plenty of time to think.

After an unknown stretch of time, Ren Ye suddenly looked up. "Do you remember what I told you earlier?"

Huang Wei hesitated, looking slightly puzzled.

"I get out in two years, eight months, and twenty-five days," Ren Ye repeated precisely.

Huang Wei immediately understood. "I told you, this isn't a chance to atone through meritorious service."

"I know." Ren Ye nodded slowly. "For the three-plus years I've been here, my sister and my dad have visited me every month. I have a family. During this time, they may have suffered even more than I have. They're waiting for me to come home."

"If you succeed, this opportunity could change your life." Huang Wei tilted his head up at a forty-degree angle, seemingly at a loss for words. "A... a dazzling life beyond anything you could ever imagine."

"You said it yourself. If."

Quiet. Silence.

"...All right. My work here is done." After a while, Huang Wei suddenly stood, stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray, and called decisively, "We're finished. You can take him back."

A moment later, a shout came from the corridor. "00848!"

Almost instinctively, Ren Ye rose, put his hands along his trouser seams, and stood ramrod straight. "Present!"

"Wait at the exit. Prepare to return to your cellblock."

"Yes, sir!" Ren Ye shouted.

Huang Wei picked up Ren Ye's file from the table, casually brushed the ash from his legs, and headed straight for the door.

Ren Ye turned and marched toward the exit on the other side, his arms swinging like a soldier's. Then he put his hands on his head, bent down, and crouched close against the wall.

He had ordered countless suspects into that very position...

Footsteps sounded as Huang Wei reached the office's main doorway. He had intended to leave, but when he saw Ren Ye quietly crouching in the appearance-check mirror, he suddenly stopped.

He turned and called out abruptly, "Ren Ye!"

"Huh?!"

Still crouching with his hands on his head, Ren Ye didn't lift his head, only his eyes.

Under the light, Huang Wei stood in the doorway, suddenly brought his feet together, and slowly raised his arm in a textbook salute. "Officer Ren. Well done."

Ren Ye froze.

"Those two bastards deserved to die." Huang Wei enunciated every word.

Just those words... and the crouching man's eyes instantly reddened. The seemingly impregnable defenses in his heart began to crumble. "What... did you just call me?"

"Officer Ren."

"Ah. Sounds a little unfamiliar." Ren Ye nodded and broke into a grin.