The Gauche in the Machine (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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fan_flashworks2019-09-21 10:29 am
china_shop) wrote in fan_flashworks2019-09-21 10:29 am
Entry tags:
Guardian: fanfiction: Xixi's Haixing Adventure
Title: Xixi's Haixing Adventure
Fandom: Guardian
Rating: G
Length: ~3500 words
Notes: OFC POV, post-canon, AU - nearly everyone lives, illegal immigration, epistolary fic. Oodles of thanks tomergatrude for beta and trobadora for read-through. This is a sequel to All the Colours of the World.
Summary: If I don’t like it, I’ll just go back—that’s what I told myself. But I don’t want to go back. I’m going to get a job. I wish I could send you this. I wish you had come with me.
Remember how I used to say if we came Up that I’d lie on my back and look at the sky for hours? Well, I tried, the first morning I got here, but it made my eyes feel strange, and after a little while I got dizzy and had to roll over and stare at the ground to keep from throwing up. My clothes got covered in grass stains.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter—there’s so much else to see and feel! Everything’s different here, not just the light. The low growl in the background isn’t the volcano; it’s vehicles rushing past. The air is sweet and cool. There are shops selling all kinds of things you can’t imagine—if you have money, you can buy a pastry whenever you want. And at night, the lights are steady; they don’t burn and flicker, and some are different colours.
The people are different, too. I don’t think it’s just because they’re human. They move like they’re brimming with plans, like they know where they’re going, and sometimes they laugh together, and—I don’t know. I suppose that’s what happens when you have real days and nights. In Dixing we spent our whole lives half-asleep.
If I don’t like it, I’ll just go back—that’s what I told myself. But I don’t want to go back. I’m going to get a job. I wish I could send you this. I wish you had come with me.
I’m getting better at looking into the sky. I can stare for ages now. It’s different shades of blue, depending on the angle, and there are lots of kinds of clouds—thin wispy ones like gauze, soft round ones like handfuls of cotton wool, heavy grey banks like folded blankets on the horizon. They make me reach up. They make me feel like I’m floating up there with them.
You know when it started, don’t you? You remember? When I was nine years old and you were eight, and you dared me to sneak a look in the window of the big house in Binghe Rd, where Lord Shui’s parents lived. I snuck up to the window as silent as a shadow and didn’t realise till I got there that you’d come too. You wanted to see for yourself, and you were scared to go alone. You’ve never mentioned it since, but I’ve never forgotten.
It was so brightly lit I felt the heat of the torches through the window glass, and Lord Shui’s mother was sitting with her back to us, very upright, pouring tea from a teapot. I still remember that. She was pouring two cups, even though she was alone. I wondered why.
But when I turned to ask you, you were staring into the room, and I’d never seen your eyes that wide before. It was like you’d been shaken awake for the first time. “What?” I whispered, trying to see what you were seeing. And then I did see it: that big painting on the wall. Blue skies and puffy clouds and trees and a river, like something from a legend. Like a window into a world where everything was cool and damp and alive. Where the air would smell different. I wanted to step right into it so much that I nearly cried.
I’ve thought of that picture every day. For ages, I told myself we wanted the same thing, that we’d come Up here together. But it wasn’t the picture in the painting that made you look like that, was it? It was the fact it existed at all, that such things could be made.
There are art supply shops up here. Paints and pastels in every colour you can imagine. I should have told you that, instead of going on about the sky and daylight all the time. Maybe then you would have come Up too.
The first day I got here, I didn’t know anything. I didn’t have money or a plan, only the food I’d brought with me, but I saw two girls about our age walking together, and one of them reminded me of you, so I followed them. I guess I got lucky. They went to a library, and I followed them right inside. No one stopped me. I kept telling myself, “Pretend you’re human, pretend you’re human, then no one will know.”
Yurong, there are thousands of books on all kinds of subjects in the library. When the girls left, I hid in a nook under the stairs, hardly breathing until everyone had gone, and I slept there. I’ve been back every night since.
At first, I was afraid someone would catch me and I’d get sent back Downstairs or thrown in a Haixing dungeon, but it’s been a couple of weeks now and I’m getting used to it. I eat roasted sweet potato from the cart down the street, and make two cups of tea but only drink one of them. And when everyone’s gone, I curl up under a table and read. I can see—it never gets really dark here.
Mostly I’m reading stories about monsters and time travel and clones. I wish I could send you some. I don’t know if you’d like them, but you’d certainly find them interesting!
When there’s no wind, sometimes the clouds slide across the sky anyway, and I don’t know why. Are they alive? Is something pulling them?
You know, Haixing isn’t really anything like the painting on Lord Shui’s parents’ wall. That painting was eternally frozen, and everything here is always moving. The light sparkles on the river, and the grass ripples in the breeze, and there are birds and squirrels and rats and kittens and dogs. I know Dixing has its own wildlife too, but it’s different in daylight. I can’t explain, but it is.
The gates have closed. I can’t go back. I’ll never see you again, and I don’t even know if you’re okay.
Is Dixing still standing? Is anyone left? I’ve heard the most terrible rumours—that the palace fell down and crushed hundreds of people, that Mt Dixing erupted and flooded the streets with lava, that the Regent ordered half the populace be executed and the streets ran with blood, that someone had a power of poisoning the air and there’s no one left alive. Yurong, you have to be all right! You and your mother, and Grandma Tan, and even my horrible cousins. I don’t want to see them again, ever, but I don’t want them gone! Then I’d have no family at all!
Please, be all right.
I’m all right. Aunty Bo who owns the sweet potato cart told me her friend was looking for a cleaner, and now I have a job. I scrub tables and dishes and the kitchen at a restaurant late at night. When they asked me for identification, I didn’t know what they meant and I panicked, so they know who I am. I thought they’d call the authorities, but they still hired me, they just pay me less. The cook is mean and shouts a lot. The other workers are okay, and we’re allowed to eat the leftovers. The best part is there’s a bunch of kittens that hang around outside the kitchen door, begging for scraps, scrawny but so cute. You’d love them. You’d probably have given them all names by now.
My left index finger is so swollen from washing dishes it hurts to make a fist. What if it stays that way? I’d go home now if I could. I’ve seen enough. But there’s no way back anymore. At least now I’m working at night, I don’t have to hide in the library stairwell. I can go in when it opens, like everyone else. I pick a big book, sit down at a table in the corner and pretend to be reading for as long as I can, and then use the book as a pillow. The librarians think I’m a student. And I guess I must smell or something, because no one ever sits next to me. It’s peaceful.
I’m reading a book about a society that had to leave its home planet on a spaceship. I wonder if the author is Dixingren.
Wang Yurong! It’s crazy to think you might actually read this! So much has happened I don’t know where to start!
But I’ll try. Okay. Two nights ago, I was sneaking some scraps out to the kittens behind the restaurant, and a voice said from behind me, “Excuse me, are you Zhai Xixi?”
I nearly died. I nearly fled into the night, leaving my job and my things, never to return. But then I got a look at him, and he was like a young bamboo plant in human form—tall and reedy, nodding his head like leaves in a light breeze. He didn’t come any closer.
“Why?” I asked.
“Are you the Zhai Xixi who knows Teacher Wang Yurong?”
When he said your name, the metal bowl I was holding slipped from my hands. It clanged onto the ground and scared the kittens, but I hardly noticed. “Is she okay? Is she here? Who are you?”
“Oh, sorry. I’m from the Special Investigation Department.” He tightened his hold on the strap of his shoulder bag. “If you’re Zhai Xixi, then Teacher Wang wants to know if you’re all right, and she wants me to tell you she’s well and working at the school in Dixing, and there’s light Down There now.”
“There is no school in Dixing,” I said, as if that was the most confusing part. It was all confusing. And I’d overheard some terrible things about the SID—everyone from Dixing is scared of them—but he seemed friendly, and he said he knew you. It was the perfect trap. Would the SID try to trap me? I wasn’t hurting anyone! I don’t even have a power!
“Director Shen and Chief Zhao are starting a school.” The man dug into his pocket and held out a small card with writing on. “If you come to the SID tomorrow, you can hear about it. Director Shen wants to meet you.”
“I—How did you find me?”
“Aunty Bo at the Sweet Potato cart knows a lot of the newcomers,” he said. “She told me you work here.”
My stomach tightened. I couldn’t trust Aunty Bo either? Should I run away and start again in another city? I stared up at him. He looked young and earnest, and I thought, why not just ask: “Is this a trick?”
“What? No!” He waved his hands, alarmed. “No, no, not at all. How did you get that impression? Was it something I—No. It’s definitely not a trick. Teacher Wang is worried about you, and the school is going to be networked with the SID soon, so we can communicate.”
My heart skipped a beat. “You can talk to Dixing? I can talk to Yurong?”
He nodded quickly. “One day soon. The technology’s a bit tricky. Anyway, you should meet with Director Shen. I’m just the messenger.” A strange look crossed his face. “It’s nice to have a message from a living person, for a change.”
Okay, that was just weird. I took the card and stepped out of reach. “I have to get back to work.”
He nodded and didn’t try to stop me, so I snatched up the bowl, ran back inside and locked the door after me.
All night while I was working, I tried to decide whether to go to the SID. The business card said Institute Director Shen Wei, First School and Research Institute of Dixing, 40 Wenhua Rd. That’s where the old haunted house is. You hate that place. I couldn’t imagine you going near it, let alone working there. It had to be a trick.
And if it was a trick, what did that mean? Someone knew about me.
But if there was a way to talk to you… When I finished at work, I drifted back to the library in a tired daze and sat on the steps till it opened. But even when I got to my table in the corner, I couldn’t sleep. I read for a while to try and calm down. I thought it might help me decide. And I must have dozed off, because I dreamt about you and your mother, and my mother too. We were standing in the dark in Dixing, the sun starting to rise, lightening the edge of the sky. A flock of birds rose from the ground into the dawn. Trees and a river. We were inside Lord Shui’s parents’ painting.
I woke when something grabbed my shoulder. It gave me such a fright I screamed and struggled free. My chair slipped out from under me, crashing down, and I landed on the floor too. I still have bruises. There was a split second where I thought—hoped—it might be the young bamboo man from the night before, and I’d be all right. Better yet, the decision about whether to go to the SID would be made for me. But it wasn’t him.
An older, heavy-set man in a dark blue uniform grabbed me off the floor and hauled me to my feet. One of the librarians was standing by, frowning. They’d caught me. I was so panicked, I didn’t hear what either of them said.
I wanted you to think I was okay, so I didn’t say this before, but I’ve seen people taken. Both times, they were people who’d been camping in the park, not hurting anyone, and in a flash they went from happily unaware to trapped and terrified. Both times, the guards who took them seemed big and intimidating. This time I was the one panicking, helpless, and it was just as frightening as it had looked.
I didn’t know what they’d do with me. The gates are closed, so they couldn’t send me back to Dixing. Maybe I could pretend to be human. I felt so stupid—I should have tried to get identification papers, instead of wasting all that time reading about space ships.
They took me to a building called The Station and locked me in a cell. They said I’d been stealing. Honestly, I had taken a few things. I didn’t have any money until I started working, and I needed to eat, so I took some bits and pieces from the librarian’s desk—just money and a few things I could swap for food. They have so much stuff, I didn’t think they’d notice!
I sat on the floor in the corner of the cell and shivered. No one had touched me in weeks, and then this stranger had grabbed me. I didn’t know what they were doing to do with me, I’d lost all my things including my writing paper, and I hadn’t even got to finish my book. I wanted to cry, but I didn’t think I’d be able to stop if I started. I leaned my head against the wall and stared at the ceiling.
The lights in the cell were ugly and bright. I actually missed Dixing’s torches. So I did the only thing I could think of. I got up, straightened my clothes and smoothed my hair, and I banged on the door. When a guard finally came, I gave him the business card in my pocket. “Send word to Institute Director Shen Wei. Tell him it’s Zhai Xixi.”
“Where did you get this? Did you steal it?” The guard glanced at the card and rolled his eyes. “This isn’t even a cell phone number; it’s a landline. Do you think an institute director is just sitting around waiting for your call?”
“Please,” I said. “Call for him.”
He shook his head and shut the door again without promising anything, and I sat down again, hugged my knees and waited.
And waited. I tried to pass the time thinking about the book I was reading and guessing what would happen next, but I kept imagining the guard throwing the card away, or Director Shen getting the call and not caring enough to come. I waited so long, I knew I was late for work. They’d think I’d run away.
Finally the door opened, and a different guard came in with a man and a woman. The man was wearing a suit and glasses, and he looked serious and very sure of himself. The woman had short hair and dark lipstick, was wearing trousers and a black leather jacket, and she seemed furious.
I scrambled to my feet, keeping my back to the wall.
“Zhai Xixi?” said the man with the glasses. “I’m Director Shen.”
He’d come! I was afraid that if I tried to say anything, I’d cry, so I pressed my lips together and nodded.
Director Shen indicated the woman. “This is Zhu Hong of the SID. Are you all right?”
I nodded again, but I didn’t feel all right at all. I felt as small and insignificant as a grain of rice. I’d just wanted to see the sky.
Director Shen looked at me steadily. “Zhai Xixi, I need you to tell this police officer where you’re from. If you do, we can help you.”
My heart started pounding. If I said I was from Dixing, the SID would send me back. Everyone knew that. But the gateways were closed now, so—what did that mean?
The guard—no, the police officer shook his head. “She’s just an ordinary girl, a thief and a vagrant. What makes you think she’s one of yours?”
Zhu Hong glared at him so fiercely he backed a step towards the door.
“Zhai Xixi,” said Director Shen again, gently, still watching me. “Teacher Wang Yurong sent us to find you.”
“It’s all right,” said Zhu Hong, and I realised her anger was for me, not at me.
I crumpled inside. I wanted you there so badly. I still didn’t know if it was a trap, or why, or what would happen to me. But I opened my mouth and said it: “I’m from Dixing.”
It sounded loud in the small concrete cell. I had to be defiant, or I would have choked.
The police officer scowled. “Fine. She’s all yours.” And Zhu Hong put her arm around my shoulder and said, “Well done.” And then I couldn’t help it, I did start crying.
They took me to the SID. They gave me food and let me wash, and introduced me to Lao Chu, who lives Up here and works for the SID, even though everyone knows he’s Dixingren. The young bamboo man, Guo Changcheng, arrived with my things from the library, including my clothes and writing paper. And Director Shen gave me your letter. (That made me cry too, but in a good way. By this stage, they’d all decided I was a cry-baby. Oh well.) The school sounds amazing! I can’t believe you’re working with Haixingren!
And then we all sat around one end of a big table, and Director Shen asked me what I wanted to do. “You can go back to Dixing, or you can stay here. It’s up to you.”
I looked at my hands on the table and didn’t know what to say. It had been such a horrible day.
“If you stay, you’ll need somewhere to live,” said Zhu Hong. She looked at Director Shen. “Li Qian’s taken in a couple of Yashou boarders who are studying so they can attend the university next year. She still has one room free.”
“I don’t have any money,” I said.
“The SID currently doesn’t have an HR manager or a librarian,” said Guo Changcheng, “and Zhai Xixi seems to like libraries.” He smiled at me.
“I don’t have identification papers,” I said, but I wasn’t scared anymore.
“I can arrange that,” said Zhu Hong, decidedly. “The Yashou Tribes are already in talks with the Department of Supervision about IDs. I know exactly who to ask, and he has a crush on me.” She looked pleased at the opportunity to exploit this advantage.
Director Shen looked at me. “It’s your decision.”
I looked around the table at them: Guo Changcheng and Lao Chu, Zhu Hong and Director Shen. All of them trying to help me. But if it wasn’t for you, they wouldn’t have known I existed. You were the one who really saved me.
“What do you want to do, Xi-mei?” asked Guo Changcheng, as if he couldn’t wait for my answer.
I smiled. I miss you, I really do, but if we can talk, it won’t be so bad. And the humans might own Haixing, but they don’t own the sky—no one does. I have as much right to it as anyone else. So I’m staying.
END
Fandom: Guardian
Rating: G
Length: ~3500 words
Notes: OFC POV, post-canon, AU - nearly everyone lives, illegal immigration, epistolary fic. Oodles of thanks to
mergatrude for beta and trobadora for read-through. This is a sequel to All the Colours of the World.Summary: If I don’t like it, I’ll just go back—that’s what I told myself. But I don’t want to go back. I’m going to get a job. I wish I could send you this. I wish you had come with me.
Remember how I used to say if we came Up that I’d lie on my back and look at the sky for hours? Well, I tried, the first morning I got here, but it made my eyes feel strange, and after a little while I got dizzy and had to roll over and stare at the ground to keep from throwing up. My clothes got covered in grass stains.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter—there’s so much else to see and feel! Everything’s different here, not just the light. The low growl in the background isn’t the volcano; it’s vehicles rushing past. The air is sweet and cool. There are shops selling all kinds of things you can’t imagine—if you have money, you can buy a pastry whenever you want. And at night, the lights are steady; they don’t burn and flicker, and some are different colours.
The people are different, too. I don’t think it’s just because they’re human. They move like they’re brimming with plans, like they know where they’re going, and sometimes they laugh together, and—I don’t know. I suppose that’s what happens when you have real days and nights. In Dixing we spent our whole lives half-asleep.
If I don’t like it, I’ll just go back—that’s what I told myself. But I don’t want to go back. I’m going to get a job. I wish I could send you this. I wish you had come with me.
I’m getting better at looking into the sky. I can stare for ages now. It’s different shades of blue, depending on the angle, and there are lots of kinds of clouds—thin wispy ones like gauze, soft round ones like handfuls of cotton wool, heavy grey banks like folded blankets on the horizon. They make me reach up. They make me feel like I’m floating up there with them.
You know when it started, don’t you? You remember? When I was nine years old and you were eight, and you dared me to sneak a look in the window of the big house in Binghe Rd, where Lord Shui’s parents lived. I snuck up to the window as silent as a shadow and didn’t realise till I got there that you’d come too. You wanted to see for yourself, and you were scared to go alone. You’ve never mentioned it since, but I’ve never forgotten.
It was so brightly lit I felt the heat of the torches through the window glass, and Lord Shui’s mother was sitting with her back to us, very upright, pouring tea from a teapot. I still remember that. She was pouring two cups, even though she was alone. I wondered why.
But when I turned to ask you, you were staring into the room, and I’d never seen your eyes that wide before. It was like you’d been shaken awake for the first time. “What?” I whispered, trying to see what you were seeing. And then I did see it: that big painting on the wall. Blue skies and puffy clouds and trees and a river, like something from a legend. Like a window into a world where everything was cool and damp and alive. Where the air would smell different. I wanted to step right into it so much that I nearly cried.
I’ve thought of that picture every day. For ages, I told myself we wanted the same thing, that we’d come Up here together. But it wasn’t the picture in the painting that made you look like that, was it? It was the fact it existed at all, that such things could be made.
There are art supply shops up here. Paints and pastels in every colour you can imagine. I should have told you that, instead of going on about the sky and daylight all the time. Maybe then you would have come Up too.
The first day I got here, I didn’t know anything. I didn’t have money or a plan, only the food I’d brought with me, but I saw two girls about our age walking together, and one of them reminded me of you, so I followed them. I guess I got lucky. They went to a library, and I followed them right inside. No one stopped me. I kept telling myself, “Pretend you’re human, pretend you’re human, then no one will know.”
Yurong, there are thousands of books on all kinds of subjects in the library. When the girls left, I hid in a nook under the stairs, hardly breathing until everyone had gone, and I slept there. I’ve been back every night since.
At first, I was afraid someone would catch me and I’d get sent back Downstairs or thrown in a Haixing dungeon, but it’s been a couple of weeks now and I’m getting used to it. I eat roasted sweet potato from the cart down the street, and make two cups of tea but only drink one of them. And when everyone’s gone, I curl up under a table and read. I can see—it never gets really dark here.
Mostly I’m reading stories about monsters and time travel and clones. I wish I could send you some. I don’t know if you’d like them, but you’d certainly find them interesting!
When there’s no wind, sometimes the clouds slide across the sky anyway, and I don’t know why. Are they alive? Is something pulling them?
You know, Haixing isn’t really anything like the painting on Lord Shui’s parents’ wall. That painting was eternally frozen, and everything here is always moving. The light sparkles on the river, and the grass ripples in the breeze, and there are birds and squirrels and rats and kittens and dogs. I know Dixing has its own wildlife too, but it’s different in daylight. I can’t explain, but it is.
The gates have closed. I can’t go back. I’ll never see you again, and I don’t even know if you’re okay.
Is Dixing still standing? Is anyone left? I’ve heard the most terrible rumours—that the palace fell down and crushed hundreds of people, that Mt Dixing erupted and flooded the streets with lava, that the Regent ordered half the populace be executed and the streets ran with blood, that someone had a power of poisoning the air and there’s no one left alive. Yurong, you have to be all right! You and your mother, and Grandma Tan, and even my horrible cousins. I don’t want to see them again, ever, but I don’t want them gone! Then I’d have no family at all!
Please, be all right.
I’m all right. Aunty Bo who owns the sweet potato cart told me her friend was looking for a cleaner, and now I have a job. I scrub tables and dishes and the kitchen at a restaurant late at night. When they asked me for identification, I didn’t know what they meant and I panicked, so they know who I am. I thought they’d call the authorities, but they still hired me, they just pay me less. The cook is mean and shouts a lot. The other workers are okay, and we’re allowed to eat the leftovers. The best part is there’s a bunch of kittens that hang around outside the kitchen door, begging for scraps, scrawny but so cute. You’d love them. You’d probably have given them all names by now.
My left index finger is so swollen from washing dishes it hurts to make a fist. What if it stays that way? I’d go home now if I could. I’ve seen enough. But there’s no way back anymore. At least now I’m working at night, I don’t have to hide in the library stairwell. I can go in when it opens, like everyone else. I pick a big book, sit down at a table in the corner and pretend to be reading for as long as I can, and then use the book as a pillow. The librarians think I’m a student. And I guess I must smell or something, because no one ever sits next to me. It’s peaceful.
I’m reading a book about a society that had to leave its home planet on a spaceship. I wonder if the author is Dixingren.
Wang Yurong! It’s crazy to think you might actually read this! So much has happened I don’t know where to start!
But I’ll try. Okay. Two nights ago, I was sneaking some scraps out to the kittens behind the restaurant, and a voice said from behind me, “Excuse me, are you Zhai Xixi?”
I nearly died. I nearly fled into the night, leaving my job and my things, never to return. But then I got a look at him, and he was like a young bamboo plant in human form—tall and reedy, nodding his head like leaves in a light breeze. He didn’t come any closer.
“Why?” I asked.
“Are you the Zhai Xixi who knows Teacher Wang Yurong?”
When he said your name, the metal bowl I was holding slipped from my hands. It clanged onto the ground and scared the kittens, but I hardly noticed. “Is she okay? Is she here? Who are you?”
“Oh, sorry. I’m from the Special Investigation Department.” He tightened his hold on the strap of his shoulder bag. “If you’re Zhai Xixi, then Teacher Wang wants to know if you’re all right, and she wants me to tell you she’s well and working at the school in Dixing, and there’s light Down There now.”
“There is no school in Dixing,” I said, as if that was the most confusing part. It was all confusing. And I’d overheard some terrible things about the SID—everyone from Dixing is scared of them—but he seemed friendly, and he said he knew you. It was the perfect trap. Would the SID try to trap me? I wasn’t hurting anyone! I don’t even have a power!
“Director Shen and Chief Zhao are starting a school.” The man dug into his pocket and held out a small card with writing on. “If you come to the SID tomorrow, you can hear about it. Director Shen wants to meet you.”
“I—How did you find me?”
“Aunty Bo at the Sweet Potato cart knows a lot of the newcomers,” he said. “She told me you work here.”
My stomach tightened. I couldn’t trust Aunty Bo either? Should I run away and start again in another city? I stared up at him. He looked young and earnest, and I thought, why not just ask: “Is this a trick?”
“What? No!” He waved his hands, alarmed. “No, no, not at all. How did you get that impression? Was it something I—No. It’s definitely not a trick. Teacher Wang is worried about you, and the school is going to be networked with the SID soon, so we can communicate.”
My heart skipped a beat. “You can talk to Dixing? I can talk to Yurong?”
He nodded quickly. “One day soon. The technology’s a bit tricky. Anyway, you should meet with Director Shen. I’m just the messenger.” A strange look crossed his face. “It’s nice to have a message from a living person, for a change.”
Okay, that was just weird. I took the card and stepped out of reach. “I have to get back to work.”
He nodded and didn’t try to stop me, so I snatched up the bowl, ran back inside and locked the door after me.
All night while I was working, I tried to decide whether to go to the SID. The business card said Institute Director Shen Wei, First School and Research Institute of Dixing, 40 Wenhua Rd. That’s where the old haunted house is. You hate that place. I couldn’t imagine you going near it, let alone working there. It had to be a trick.
And if it was a trick, what did that mean? Someone knew about me.
But if there was a way to talk to you… When I finished at work, I drifted back to the library in a tired daze and sat on the steps till it opened. But even when I got to my table in the corner, I couldn’t sleep. I read for a while to try and calm down. I thought it might help me decide. And I must have dozed off, because I dreamt about you and your mother, and my mother too. We were standing in the dark in Dixing, the sun starting to rise, lightening the edge of the sky. A flock of birds rose from the ground into the dawn. Trees and a river. We were inside Lord Shui’s parents’ painting.
I woke when something grabbed my shoulder. It gave me such a fright I screamed and struggled free. My chair slipped out from under me, crashing down, and I landed on the floor too. I still have bruises. There was a split second where I thought—hoped—it might be the young bamboo man from the night before, and I’d be all right. Better yet, the decision about whether to go to the SID would be made for me. But it wasn’t him.
An older, heavy-set man in a dark blue uniform grabbed me off the floor and hauled me to my feet. One of the librarians was standing by, frowning. They’d caught me. I was so panicked, I didn’t hear what either of them said.
I wanted you to think I was okay, so I didn’t say this before, but I’ve seen people taken. Both times, they were people who’d been camping in the park, not hurting anyone, and in a flash they went from happily unaware to trapped and terrified. Both times, the guards who took them seemed big and intimidating. This time I was the one panicking, helpless, and it was just as frightening as it had looked.
I didn’t know what they’d do with me. The gates are closed, so they couldn’t send me back to Dixing. Maybe I could pretend to be human. I felt so stupid—I should have tried to get identification papers, instead of wasting all that time reading about space ships.
They took me to a building called The Station and locked me in a cell. They said I’d been stealing. Honestly, I had taken a few things. I didn’t have any money until I started working, and I needed to eat, so I took some bits and pieces from the librarian’s desk—just money and a few things I could swap for food. They have so much stuff, I didn’t think they’d notice!
I sat on the floor in the corner of the cell and shivered. No one had touched me in weeks, and then this stranger had grabbed me. I didn’t know what they were doing to do with me, I’d lost all my things including my writing paper, and I hadn’t even got to finish my book. I wanted to cry, but I didn’t think I’d be able to stop if I started. I leaned my head against the wall and stared at the ceiling.
The lights in the cell were ugly and bright. I actually missed Dixing’s torches. So I did the only thing I could think of. I got up, straightened my clothes and smoothed my hair, and I banged on the door. When a guard finally came, I gave him the business card in my pocket. “Send word to Institute Director Shen Wei. Tell him it’s Zhai Xixi.”
“Where did you get this? Did you steal it?” The guard glanced at the card and rolled his eyes. “This isn’t even a cell phone number; it’s a landline. Do you think an institute director is just sitting around waiting for your call?”
“Please,” I said. “Call for him.”
He shook his head and shut the door again without promising anything, and I sat down again, hugged my knees and waited.
And waited. I tried to pass the time thinking about the book I was reading and guessing what would happen next, but I kept imagining the guard throwing the card away, or Director Shen getting the call and not caring enough to come. I waited so long, I knew I was late for work. They’d think I’d run away.
Finally the door opened, and a different guard came in with a man and a woman. The man was wearing a suit and glasses, and he looked serious and very sure of himself. The woman had short hair and dark lipstick, was wearing trousers and a black leather jacket, and she seemed furious.
I scrambled to my feet, keeping my back to the wall.
“Zhai Xixi?” said the man with the glasses. “I’m Director Shen.”
He’d come! I was afraid that if I tried to say anything, I’d cry, so I pressed my lips together and nodded.
Director Shen indicated the woman. “This is Zhu Hong of the SID. Are you all right?”
I nodded again, but I didn’t feel all right at all. I felt as small and insignificant as a grain of rice. I’d just wanted to see the sky.
Director Shen looked at me steadily. “Zhai Xixi, I need you to tell this police officer where you’re from. If you do, we can help you.”
My heart started pounding. If I said I was from Dixing, the SID would send me back. Everyone knew that. But the gateways were closed now, so—what did that mean?
The guard—no, the police officer shook his head. “She’s just an ordinary girl, a thief and a vagrant. What makes you think she’s one of yours?”
Zhu Hong glared at him so fiercely he backed a step towards the door.
“Zhai Xixi,” said Director Shen again, gently, still watching me. “Teacher Wang Yurong sent us to find you.”
“It’s all right,” said Zhu Hong, and I realised her anger was for me, not at me.
I crumpled inside. I wanted you there so badly. I still didn’t know if it was a trap, or why, or what would happen to me. But I opened my mouth and said it: “I’m from Dixing.”
It sounded loud in the small concrete cell. I had to be defiant, or I would have choked.
The police officer scowled. “Fine. She’s all yours.” And Zhu Hong put her arm around my shoulder and said, “Well done.” And then I couldn’t help it, I did start crying.
They took me to the SID. They gave me food and let me wash, and introduced me to Lao Chu, who lives Up here and works for the SID, even though everyone knows he’s Dixingren. The young bamboo man, Guo Changcheng, arrived with my things from the library, including my clothes and writing paper. And Director Shen gave me your letter. (That made me cry too, but in a good way. By this stage, they’d all decided I was a cry-baby. Oh well.) The school sounds amazing! I can’t believe you’re working with Haixingren!
And then we all sat around one end of a big table, and Director Shen asked me what I wanted to do. “You can go back to Dixing, or you can stay here. It’s up to you.”
I looked at my hands on the table and didn’t know what to say. It had been such a horrible day.
“If you stay, you’ll need somewhere to live,” said Zhu Hong. She looked at Director Shen. “Li Qian’s taken in a couple of Yashou boarders who are studying so they can attend the university next year. She still has one room free.”
“I don’t have any money,” I said.
“The SID currently doesn’t have an HR manager or a librarian,” said Guo Changcheng, “and Zhai Xixi seems to like libraries.” He smiled at me.
“I don’t have identification papers,” I said, but I wasn’t scared anymore.
“I can arrange that,” said Zhu Hong, decidedly. “The Yashou Tribes are already in talks with the Department of Supervision about IDs. I know exactly who to ask, and he has a crush on me.” She looked pleased at the opportunity to exploit this advantage.
Director Shen looked at me. “It’s your decision.”
I looked around the table at them: Guo Changcheng and Lao Chu, Zhu Hong and Director Shen. All of them trying to help me. But if it wasn’t for you, they wouldn’t have known I existed. You were the one who really saved me.
“What do you want to do, Xi-mei?” asked Guo Changcheng, as if he couldn’t wait for my answer.
I smiled. I miss you, I really do, but if we can talk, it won’t be so bad. And the humans might own Haixing, but they don’t own the sky—no one does. I have as much right to it as anyone else. So I’m staying.
END