Chapter 92: 第 92 章

Xu Ze also went to the celebration ceremony.

After dinner with Lu Heyang last night, Xu Ze had gone to pick up Huang Liling. On the way back, Huang Liling took a call that mentioned the celebration banquet and the medal ceremony. After ending the call, Huang Liling scrolled through the messages on his mobile phone and asked Xu Ze, very casually, "If you're free tomorrow evening, Xu Ze, would you like to come along and have a look?"

It was, in truth, only an offhand question. He supposed Xu Ze would not go — Xu Ze, after all, had never seemed to consider a career in the Military District, and would therefore have little interest in occasions of this kind.

Xu Ze did not answer at once. The pad of his thumb brushed lightly against the steering wheel a few times, and then, glancing at the rearview mirror, he asked, "Am I allowed to go?"

That sounded like a yes. Huang Liling was briefly startled, closed his mobile phone, and said, "There's nothing stopping you. Just say you're my on-campus assistant."

"All right." Having confirmed he could go, Xu Ze nodded without hesitation. "Thank you, Teacher."

"That's more like it." Huang Liling was pleased. "Get out more, see more. Don't stay cooped up in the lab and the hospital all the time."

Xu Ze had no confidence to answer that, since he was not, in fact, going for the sake of broadening his horizons or making connections, as Huang Liling imagined.

The next evening, Xu Ze finished up in the lab early, shed his lab coat, changed into formal dress, and arrived at the Capital City Military District together with Huang Liling. There was still a little time before the banquet, and one after another, familiar officers and old acquaintances came over to exchange pleasantries with Huang Liling. Huang Liling kept Xu Ze at his side, introducing his prized student to each of them.

At dinner Xu Ze sat at a table with a group of young officers in attendance, and listened as they talked about the various theaters; in the course of the talk, the subject turned to Colonel Lu, who had failed his flight operations test after his Susceptibility Period.

At an occasion like this, anything was touched on only in passing, never in detail — the talk was merely to keep the atmosphere from becoming too stiff and solemn. Xu Ze looked at his plate, wanting to hear more, but the others had already deftly steered the conversation toward a safer topic.

After dinner, and a short rest, the celebration ceremony began in earnest. Xu Ze sat in an elevated seat in the middle rows, and listened to the long, official citations of commendation with the same attentiveness he gave to a specialized course — until the medal ceremony began, and his body stirred at last, his gaze turning toward the holding area at one side of the stage, even though that part of the space was screened off by a few narrow curtains and nothing could be seen.

"League Southern Theater Air Force Combat Command, Air Force Colonel, Lu Heyang."

After waiting through officer after officer taking the stage, through citation after citation, Xu Ze at last heard that line. He watched, unblinking, the curtains swaying faintly, and then at last a single pure-black military boot stepped onto the red carpet, and Lu Heyang walked out.

Xu Ze was accustomed to seeing Lu Heyang in training uniform; this was the first time he had seen him in dress uniform. A deep, near-black indigo, solemn and immaculate, the fabric of the military coat on the stiffer side, tracing out the Alpha's long, upright frame with the precision of a fine-line painting — sharp as a blade. Lights from every direction fell on Lu Heyang's shoulder boards, sleeve insignia, and the rows of medals pinned to his chest, casting back a rippling gleam that crossed the long distance and lodged itself, clear and distinct, at the bottom of Xu Ze's eyes.

Xu Ze found himself, without thinking, clapping along with everyone else, as though he had been transported back several years to the central square of the Capital City, watching that fighter plane sweep high overhead — to bear witness to Lu Heyang's glory was, for Xu Ze, the deepest happiness.

Lu Heyang looked at ease and natural; beneath his military cap, that young face carried a faint smile, and with a hand sheathed in a spotless white glove, he shook hands with the old commander conferring the honor and rendered a military salute.

In those few short minutes, Xu Ze felt as though he had watched a long film. He watched Lu Heyang step down from the stage and vanish behind the side curtain, and it was a long while before he turned his head back toward the platform — only to find that he could no longer take in a single word of what followed.

After the medal ceremony came the conferring of ranks upon field-grade and company-grade officers, and Xu Ze saw Gu Yunchi, whom he had not seen in years, become, amid the applause of the crowd, the League's latest young colonel.

Because the ceremony ran long, there was a twenty-minute break in the middle. Xu Ze took out his mobile phone, unlocked it, then locked it again — Lu Heyang might not have brought his phone to an occasion like this, and besides, Xu Ze had noticed that after stepping down from the stage he had not taken a seat in the audience; perhaps he had other people to meet, other matters to attend to.

Lost in these idle thoughts, he was suddenly aware of someone sitting down beside him. Xu Ze turned his head, and had not expected it to be Gu Yunchi.

"I received Doctor Xu's transfer, and passed it along to Heyang. I've been busy these past couple of days and forgot to tell you."

Up close, Gu Yunchi still wore that high-school face of his — the one that said, in so many words, 'none of your business, none of mine' — utterly indifferent to the world. Such a person would not have come over and sat down just to say something like this. Xu Ze nodded. "Thank you, Colonel Gu."

After a pause, Xu Ze asked, "Why did Colonel Lu fail his flight test?"

"Doctor Xu heard about it?" Gu Yunchi's expression eased, as though a small trouble had been lifted. "Perhaps because a pilot isn't suited to be in the air during psychological treatment."

It was not a direct answer, but the logic was easy enough to follow: if Lu Heyang were receiving ordinary psychological treatment, he would have no need to deliberately fail the assessment in order to stay off aircraft — the Military Headquarters would naturally have extended his leave.

"If Doctor Xu means to return the badge to me, then I'll return it to you as well."

"The Ring is something very precious. I may not be able to keep it now."

Lu Heyang's words from the night before sounded again in his mind. Xu Ze had not imagined the true answer would come so soon.

The instant he understood, Xu Ze pressed down on the armrest of his seat, about to rise — but Gu Yunchi went on, "Heyang has already left. Something came up at the Base."

"I'm guessing at the specifics myself; Heyang didn't tell me." Gu Yunchi pulled off his white gloves and tossed them onto the table. "But I wouldn't advise you to ask him. He probably wouldn't want us to do that."

Xu Ze was somewhat lost; his hand was still gripping the armrest tightly. Nearly half a minute passed before he said, "It's too dangerous."

During his undergraduate years he had consulted teachers in the departments of psychiatry and neurology, and the answer he received was this: memory loss caused by electrical shock and Pheromone Disturbance carried enormous risk, both in terms of treatment method and in the degree to which it could be controlled, and demanded a great deal of the patient's own physical and psychological constitution — and the Military Headquarters would never consent to allow an active-duty soldier to undergo such treatment.

He simply could not fathom why Lu Heyang had to do it. Even without his memories, he could have gone on living a glorious life, smooth-sailing all the way.

"Heyang generally doesn't make decisions he'll regret." Gu Yunchi tossed the bomb to Xu Ze and then, as though it were nothing, said, "There's no other reason for telling you this. Don't overthink it."

He picked up his gloves and stood. "I'm off. Goodbye, Doctor Xu."

"Goodbye." Xu Ze looked up at him, but his gaze was drifting. "Thank you."

Five days before the New Year, He Wei was admitted to the 195 Institute after being shot in the abdomen during a mission.

The emergency surgery lasted nearly six hours. The relevant departments of the 195 Institute had all received orders from the Lianmeng Government: spare no effort to save him. He Wei's mother — that graceful, beautiful Omega — wept outside the operating room until she nearly fainted.

Xu Ze had taken part in the surgery as well. He, who had never had the slightest discomfort at the sight of blood or wounds, found himself this time overcome with alarm and unease, because he could not imagine that the person lying on the operating table was He Wei.

In the end, the surgery was declared a success. Xu Ze washed and disinfected his hands, then walked out of the operating room. The corridor was full of people — He Wei's family, friends, superiors, subordinates. Xu Ze passed through them and looked at the Omega in the white coat standing beside the row of seats at the far end, and silently mouthed to him, "It's all right."

Chi Jiahán stood there as though his soul had left his body, and nodded, his eyes red-rimmed.

He Wei lay unconscious in the ICU for three days. Chi Jiahán went there almost every moment he had, wrapped entirely in isolation gown, silent and still, watching He Wei from the bedside.

Chi Jiahán said that Lu Heyang and Gu Yunchi had also come by several times in the interim, but Xu Ze had been in the lab those days and rarely came to the Institute, so they had not crossed paths.

On the fourth day He Wei woke. Once his condition was confirmed stable, he was transferred to a special ward. When most people had been told not to visit or disturb the patient for the time being, the surgical side nevertheless notified Xu Ze: He Wei wanted to see him.

Xu Ze received the message and hurried from the lab to the 195 Institute. He Wei looked to be in decent shape — still wearing an oxygen mask, but his complexion no longer so pale.

"What is it?" Xu Ze leaned down and asked him.

He Wei's voice was weak: "To talk to you about the ten things you absolutely must know before becoming Chi Jiahán's husband."

"?"

Xu Ze turned his head. Chi Jiahán was standing at the door wearing a mask; He Wei probably did not yet know it was him.

"Just kidding." He Wei smiled, then said, "He Yu, my brother, is still alive."

Xu Ze was startled, and asked, uncertain, "Wasn't he in that car?"

"The one in the car was Tang Feiyi." He Wei said. "He's the one who actually died."

Long-buried memories came flooding back. The police had never, in all those years, tracked down Tang Feiyi; Xu Ze had assumed he had fled beyond the League, and had not imagined that he had already died back then.

"I don't know if you know Jiang Wen — he was Heyang's bodyguard at the time. After Heyang's accident, Jiang Wen found my brother and proposed trading Tang Feiyi's life for his. My brother agreed, and then told Tang Feiyi he was arranging for him to escape. So the person sitting in the car the police were chasing was actually Tang Feiyi, and the car had been tampered with."

"After Tang Feiyi died, Jiang Wen, as agreed, got my brother out of the League. My brother said Heyang had told Jiang Wen, before the incident, not to let Tang Feiyi go to prison — to kill him as soon as possible, because once he was in prison there would be all kinds of variables, and only an immediate death was reliable." He Wei kept smiling. "If it hadn't been for this mission, I wouldn't have run into my brother, who'd secretly come back to the League. Taking a bullet from the suspect was worth it, all things considered."

"The first thing I did after waking up was tell you the good news." He Wei spoke in the tone of someone sharing a secret. "Our 17 — we should be the first to know."

"Mm." Xu Ze thought he ought to smile, but couldn't manage it.

The murderer of his father, the one who had hurt Lu Heyang — for years Xu Ze had carried it like a thorn in his heart, hoping one day to hear that Tang Feiyi had been caught. Just when he felt that day might never come, he was suddenly told the man had been dead for over seven years.

It was not so much relief as a kind of calm settling in — but Xu Ze understood that certain things were over. They had, in fact, been over for a long time; he had simply only just learned it. And the one who had planned and carried all of it out was Lu Heyang.

There was one other person's whereabouts Xu Ze did not ask about, because he had already more or less guessed the answer.

After the Underground Club was shut down that year, Xiao Feng should have been with He Yu the whole time. If the police had later tracked He Yu, they would certainly have noticed Xiao Feng at his side — and if the disguise of Tang Feiyi as He Yu was to look more convincing, then He Yu's little shadow, Xiao Feng, would certainly have been in that car as well. Even if he hadn't wanted to go, Tang Feiyi would have forced him.

Xu Ze had tried to contact Xiao Feng many times, but the messages went unanswered and the calls were never picked up; only when the number eventually became disconnected did Xu Ze give up.

Thinking about it now, perhaps the silence was because Xiao Feng could no longer answer him at all.

"One more thing." He Wei spoke again. "Even though you and Jiahán aren't married yet, I want to ask — when are you getting divorced?"

"There won't be a wedding. Shut your mouth." Chi Jiahán spoke.

He Wei blinked, looked toward the door, took a few seconds to make out who it was, and asked, "Why have you lost weight?"

If not for the weight loss, even with a mask on, he would not have failed to recognize Chi Jiahán.

"I'll get going. Rest well." Xu Ze took the cue and made his exit.

"Okay."

He had barely stepped out of the ward when he heard He Wei ask behind him, "Is Doctor Chi on a diet? To look prettier in a wedding dress?"

"Was it your belly the bullet hit, or your brain?"

On the eve of the New Year, the treatment room was bustling. Lu Heyang stood by the observation window on a call, so at ease that he stood out against the tension of everyone around him, as though the one about to undergo treatment were not himself.

After ending the call, and unhurriedly scrolling through all his unread messages, Lu Heyang at last set down the communicator and sat in the treatment chair. Su Lian swabbed the skin of Lu Heyang's gland with a cotton bud, then picked up the syringe and slowly pressed the prepared solution into the gland.

The entire treatment room had gone completely quiet, leaving only two doctors and one nurse. Once the injection was done, Lu Heyang leaned back against the chair. The nurse undid the buttons of his shirt, applied the electrode pads, smoothed his hair, and carefully fitted the apparatus onto his head.

The doctor pressed the start key, and together with Su Lian watched intently the brainwave curves and neuronal activity that began to appear on the four screens, capturing the neural network units that could compose the memory encoding. This was Lu Heyang's fourth session of Memory Therapy, and the psychological and physical advantages of his pilot background were strikingly evident — the earliest sessions had been the most dangerous, but Lu Heyang had by and large passed through them safely.

Forty minutes later, the treatment ended. Lu Heyang, eyes closed, adjusted his breathing, while the doctor wiped the sweat from his brow and body.

"Is there any discomfort anywhere?" Su Lian asked.

Lu Heyang shook his head.

"We'll issue the report as soon as we can," the doctor said. "Has anything come up recently?"

"Nothing in particular. Still some insomnia, more dreams than usual, sometimes fragmented images appear in my head." Lu Heyang opened his eyes. "I've kept a record of everything and already sent it to Doctor Su."

"Good. We'll analyze it together with the imaging data when the time comes."

"Thank you for your trouble." Lu Heyang took the warm water the nurse offered and sipped it.

After resting for more than ten minutes, Lu Heyang put on his coat. Su Lian was still not entirely at ease and, as she had the previous times, urged him repeatedly: "If you experience any visual or auditory hallucinations, you must tell me right away."

"Of course." Lu Heyang smiled, waved to them. "Happy New Year. I'll be troubling everyone again next year."

Down the stairs, out of the hall, a jeep waited at the door. Jiang Wen looked Lu Heyang over, confirmed nothing was amiss, then opened the passenger door. Lu Heyang got in.

"Are we spending New Year in Capital City tomorrow?" Lu Heyang asked Jiang Wen.

"No, we're going out — a few friends are gathering somewhere else." Jiang Wen asked, "What about you?"

"At the Base."

"Isn't Mr. Lin coming back?"

"My dad went to my sister's place. You know he doesn't like Capital City."

Jiang Wen smiled and said nothing. Not long after the car left the hospital, a fine snow began to fall. Lu Heyang watched it for a while, then asked, "Did it used to snow here too?"

"Yes. Capital City gets snow every year."

On the last day of the year, Xu Ze had been granted a brief holiday, though he was on duty at the institute that evening. He had not originally needed to go, but someone in his department wanted to go home for New Year, so Xu Ze had offered to take the shift.

When he rose, he found the snow piled thick — it must have fallen all night. Xu Ze changed, went out, ate breakfast downstairs, and stood by the road for several minutes watching children have a snowball fight. He rarely had such a leisurely rhythm.

In the underground garage sat the car Chi Jiahán had lent him. Chi Jiahán was spending New Year at the institute this year too, along with He Wei. Xu Ze started the car and drove slowly toward the suburbs, passing through Old Town along the way, thinking he would have to clean the old house before going abroad.

By the time he reached the Mountain Road, snow had begun falling again — or perhaps it had never stopped in the mountains. The road was not steep, the driving still smooth, but Xu Ze pulled over at the roadside and fitted snow chains to the tires.

The higher he drove, the thicker the snow. Xu Ze finally parked the car on a flat stretch, got out, and walked toward the Mountain Peak.

He walked into a Forest Area, his feet crunching in the snow. Snow that had piled too heavily on the branches kept tumbling down in clumps, startling the resting birds, which beat their wings with a forlorn cry and flew off elsewhere.

At the cliff at the path's end, across a stretch of sea, the snow-white Capital City came into view.

Looking to the left, he could see an undulating Ski Resort slope, and beside it a long cable-car line running slowly, with what seemed a fair number of tourists.

Xu Ze brushed the snow from his head and took off his glasses to wipe them. Standing alone in such a place on a heavy-snow day was clearly hard to understand, and pointless — but not everything had to have a point. Wanting to was enough.

Only this time, it no longer seemed without meaning.

When he heard footsteps, Xu Ze thought he had encountered some large beast — a tiger or the like — and turned around stiffly, only to see something even more unbelievable than any beast.

Lu Heyang stood a few meters away, covered in snow, watching him with a cool and scrutinizing gaze.

That gaze made Xu Ze feel that Lu Heyang was looking at something that ought not to exist, his manner betraying wariness and suspicion — just as Xu Ze himself felt he was in the grip of a hallucination.

"Colonel?"

Lu Heyang did not answer him, but walked closer. Xu Ze ruled out the hypothesis of hallucination — he had never experienced such things before, and the Lu Heyang before him was too real; he was not so lost as to confuse true and false.

He remembered Lu Heyang once saying he had camped here with He Wei and the others — perhaps that was why Lu Heyang had come today. Xu Ze wanted to reach out and brush the snow from him, but held back, and asked, "Did you come alone?"

"Mm." Lu Heyang's manner was somewhat distant. "Saw footprints on the way over."

"How… did you end up here?"

"To take a look." Lu Heyang turned his gaze toward the distant Ski Resort. "Doctor Xu —"

He paused, then continued: "Did Doctor Xu come to ski?"

"I've never skied." Xu Ze said.

Lu Heyang drew his gaze back, looked at Xu Ze's profile, and asked, "Just to see the snow?"

"Mm."

Capital City got snow every year. The winter after Lu Heyang had gone abroad, Xu Ze had first come here to see the snow — just as Lu Heyang had once told him, the scenery here was better after snowfall.

In the silence, the wind and the falling snow grew clearer. Xu Ze suddenly said, "Colonel, may I ask you a question?"

As he spoke he lifted his head to look at the sky. The moment he tilted it back, Lu Heyang felt the wind stop, the snow stop — white turning to green, winter to summer, morning to night, the empty surroundings enclosed by a tent, the soft chirr of insects rising.

But his body still felt the cold, and the scene before his eyes had not changed. Lu Heyang realized he was seeing two pictures at once — one in his mind, one before him.

The Xu Ze in his mind was looking at the sky the same way, with an expression like one making a wish.

"When you were flying in the sky." The Xu Ze before him began.

Lu Heyang heard the other Xu Ze say, "I hope you're free."

Then they both turned to look at him at the same time — one mantled in snow, one draped in moonlight, separated across the chasm of years, their expressions and gazes unchanged in the slightest.

"Do you feel free?"

"I wish you freedom."

A blessing required no answer. Lu Heyang knew that he, at that time, had probably not answered either.

So Lu Heyang answered the Xu Ze before him, saying, "I will."

Xu Ze smiled, said "that's good," and his smile made it seem as if he were the one who was free.

"There's one more thing." Xu Ze said again.

He seemed especially talkative today. Lu Heyang lowered his eyes slightly to look at him. "What?"

"You once gave me three chances."

"What kind of chances?"

"Chances to make a request of you." Not knowing whether the agreement would still hold given Lu Heyang's amnesia, Xu Ze said it anyway: "I used two of them in high school. There's one left."

In truth, Lu Heyang did not much want to hear more. Given Xu Ze's character, he could nearly guess what he would say.

But Doctor Xu today was not only talkative but insistent. He confirmed with Lu Heyang, "Does it still count?"

"Of course." Lu Heyang said, betraying not a trace of insincerity.

"I'm leaving in a few days."

Snow had piled on the frames of Xu Ze's glasses like two little white hills. Lu Heyang wanted to remind him to wipe them — and then the unfinished sentence would not need to continue.

"After that, can we keep in touch?"

Not as he had imagined, Lu Heyang paused for two seconds and asked, "What do you mean?"

"If you have time, Colonel, could we call, or send messages." Xu Ze explained. "We're probably both busy during the day. In the evening, a bit later — could we talk? Even a few words would be fine."

He did not intend to ask Lu Heyang about the Memory Therapy — whether it had begun, what progress had been made. He would ask none of it. Lu Heyang had made his decision, taken action, told no one; and it was a violation of military regulations. Not bringing it up was the most fitting thing.

"What would we talk about?" Lu Heyang asked him, quite matter-of-factly.

Xu Ze's answer was plain: "I'll think of something when the time comes."

"Alright. We can." Lu Heyang said.

Xu Ze nodded, a slightly pleased expression on his face. He had actually been piecing these words together for a long time, thinking he would not have the chance to see Lu Heyang before going abroad, intending to send them in a message. But meeting him here today by chance, he said them in person.

The snow kept falling, drenching them into a pair of snowmen. Xu Ze felt he was seeing Lu Heyang with white hair, and thought his own must look about the same.

Lu Heyang looked again at the Ski Resort. "There's probably no time this year."

"Mm?"

"Skiing." Lu Heyang said. "Next winter I'll teach you."

His face frozen stiff, Xu Ze blinked very slowly.

"Alright."