Atavism - Chapter 12
I followed the young lady downstairs with a bit of resignation. I couldn't just barge into this place, and there were definitely surveillance cameras around. Making up another excuse would probably attract attention.
"Judging from your tone, the security guards upstairs are pretty tough. It seems like no one dares to cause trouble here." I probed her tone.
"Anyway, in the past six months I've worked here, I've never seen anyone cause trouble. Besides, who would want to cause trouble when they're having a nice meal?"
It seems the waiter doesn't quite know who's staying on the upper two floors.
Haven't seen anyone causing trouble in over half a year? That means nothing happened this afternoon. More importantly, there were no gunshots, otherwise the staff on the lower floors would have known.
I slowly walked out of the restaurant, my doubts growing heavier.
Did Liu Er not come here?
Where did he go?
A thought flashed through my mind: what if he's watching TV when I get home?
Liu Er only gave me this address, where can I go now?
Looking back at the brightly lit restaurant, the clues had run cold, and a sense of powerlessness welled up inside me.
Let's walk around the area near the restaurant some more. If we don't find anything, we'll just have to go home and wait.
It was still drizzling, but the wind had picked up. I faced the wind, and it felt like something was being blown onto my face.
I wiped my mouth; it was a hair.
I flicked my hand, and the hair, thin and long, stuck to my hand. It took several shakes to get rid of it.
It was a completely subconscious action. By the time I realized what was happening, that hair had already disappeared into the wind and rain and could never be found again.
Where did you come from? There's no one in front of me.
I looked around and finally my gaze fell on a telephone pole not far away.
A piece of paper, its lower half still attached to a telephone pole, its upper half swaying in the wind.
This is a common sight in the city – simple advertising posters, mostly for sexually transmitted disease treatment or selling fake diplomas. On this piece of paper, a few strands of black silk flutter.
I walked over quickly and tore the advertisement down.
A nearly meter-long strand of black hair was stuck in a thin piece of advertising paper. Judging from the marks on it, there were originally at least a hundred strands, but most of them had been blown away by the wind. Who else but Liu Er would do such a difficult thing in this place?
Realizing that this was a message left to me by Liu Er, I immediately examined the advertisement on the paper.
This is an ordinary advertisement for making fake diplomas, with a mobile phone number provided by "Mr. Zhang".
Mr. Zhang certainly has no connection with Liu Er, so what does it mean that Liu Er left the hair on it?
The paper isn't of good quality; it's been wet from the rain and is already somewhat torn, especially the bottom half.
I looked up and examined the utility pole closely. There seemed to be some white marks where the advertisements used to be, but they were not very clear and did not look like words.
wrong!
The advertisement I just tore off was only partially detached from the top, while the bottom half was still stuck to the concrete pillar before I removed it. I tore the advertisement off almost intact, so if there were any tears, it should have been the top half that was blown by the wind that came off first, but the situation is...
After examining the remaining marks on the paper, I carefully reattached the advertisement to its original position, matching it with the white marks on it.
It's as if someone used a steel awl to draw a right-turning arrow on a piece of paper.
Of course it wasn't a steel awl. I knew perfectly well that this sharp awl must have been made of the hairs on my hands.
I looked in the direction of the arrow, and there was still a long way to go before the intersection.
I kept an eye on my surroundings along the way, trying not to miss the six-eared mark. When I reached the intersection, I turned right and walked straight to the next intersection, but I didn't find any new marks.
Which way to go? Go forward, turn left, or turn right?
Perhaps the mark left by Liu Er was blown away by the wind and rain?
Thinking about this, I suddenly realized that if I had arrived half an hour later, the sign in front of the restaurant would probably be gone. If Liu Er really wanted to make a sign, why didn't he make one that would last longer?
An answer surfaced in his mind: he didn't have the time. In fact, he didn't even have the strength; he could only do it hastily.
I stopped walking forward, turned back, and checked if there was anything I had missed.
I looked closely at the advertisements pasted on the utility poles I passed, and there were no traces of hair passing through them.
I grew increasingly anxious. I looked up at the traffic sign hanging above the intersection and suddenly wondered if Liu Er meant "turn right at the intersection ahead".
Liu Er doesn't drive. To any driver, this sign means turn right at the intersection ahead, but to the average person, it might just mean turn right ahead?
The absence of one "intersection" makes a world of difference.
I hurried towards the restaurant, and sure enough, there was a narrow alley less than ten steps from the entrance. It was so close that I'd been so focused on turning right at the next intersection that I'd completely missed it.
I went inside without hesitation.
There are factories on one side of this alley and restaurants on the other, so there are no residences.
The alley was filthy, filled with sewage from numerous restaurants, and the air reeked of a nauseating stench. It was raining, and under normal circumstances, no one would want to come in.
After walking fifty or sixty meters, the alley turned straight towards the factory. I turned around, and the end was not far ahead. It was a dead end.
The factory opened an iron gate at the end of the alley, but now the gate is tightly closed and looks rusty from a distance.
A huge pile of messy waste in front of the door took up more than ten square meters and filled the end of the alley.
I walked to the abandoned items and looked at the tightly closed iron gate. Could it be behind that?
Having come this far, there was no point in dwelling on the past. I stepped into the cardboard boxes on the ground, intending to walk to the iron gate and try to climb over to take a look.
Just one step away from the iron gate, I felt something strange under my feet. I quickly pulled my foot back, steadied myself, and bent down to push it away with my hand.
It is indeed the Six Ears!
I recognized it immediately: the long, narrow object lying in the gap of the tattered cardboard box. It wasn't the woman he had once conjured, nor the tall, muscular man, nor even Liu Er's original form. No one but me would immediately recognize that this wet, lying-on-the-ground object might be a person.
Because Liu Er has already revealed his true form.
The black fur that had once bared its teeth and claws in front of me, which Six Ears affectionately called "little guy," now hung softly and haphazardly, covering Six Ears' body, devoid of any life. He was covered in fur, and although I had removed the covering, I couldn't immediately see where his injury was.
I quickly checked Liu Er's breathing, and before I could even brush the fur off his face, I heard him say weakly, "You're not dead yet, you've finally come."
I was relieved and quickly asked, "What happened? Were you shot?"
He shook his head slightly.
"Let's...let's try to get back first." He spoke with great difficulty.
Going back? That's a problem. I can't just openly help him hail a taxi in his condition. However, the huge pile of junk in front of me does offer some cover.
I picked up two relatively intact long cardboard boxes, and put them into the two ends of the box to put Liu Er, who was curled up. I told him not to move around, because there were holes in the boxes and he wouldn't suffocate. He didn't look like he had the strength to struggle.
I grabbed a few ropes and managed to tie the box up securely, making sure it didn't come apart on the way. I'd already decided that if it did, I'd tell people it was a plush toy.
Carrying the overweight assembled cardboard box in both hands, I walked out of the alley, put the box on the ground, raised my hand as if to hail a taxi, then put my hands down again.
Such a long cardboard box won't fit in a taxi.
After thinking for a moment, I had no choice but to take out my phone and call Dazhong Taxi to book a small van. Normally, you have to book a van at least half a day in advance, but I pleaded with them on the phone and agreed to pay extra before I finally got one. The operator clearly told me I'd have to wait at least forty minutes.
The rain started to intensify. I hadn't brought an umbrella and didn't want to go into the restaurant to avoid trouble, so I was soaked in no time. Meanwhile, the six-eared dog in the cardboard box on the ground, though it wouldn't suffocate or drown, must be having a hard time.
I wonder where he got injured. He wasn't shot yesterday and it didn't turn out like this. I hope his wound doesn't get infected and fester, otherwise, sending him to the hospital will be big news.
I waited for almost an hour before the small truck finally appeared in the rain. When I was carrying Liu'er into the cargo bed, the driver kindly ran down to help me, which made me panic, but thankfully he didn't notice anything.
"What is this? It's quite heavy," the driver said to me, who was sitting in the passenger seat, as he drove.
"Uh, it's an art sculpture that my friend gave me."
“A sculpture.”
"Yes, it's made of the latest type of soft plastic." I added, worried that he might have felt the material wasn't very sturdy when he was moving it.
Fortunately, the driver didn't press the matter further. I secretly wiped the cold sweat from my forehead and remained silent until we reached our destination.
After getting off the truck, I carried the cardboard boxes out of the cargo compartment by myself as quickly as possible to avoid the driver having to help.
There's still quite a distance from the entrance of the residential complex to my building. Even though it was past eleven o'clock and raining, with only one or two pedestrians carrying large cardboard boxes, I still felt uneasy.
I finally made it to the elevator. The security guard at the door glanced at me a few times, making me feel extremely uncomfortable, like I had done something wrong.
I carried this shady thing into the room and placed it on the living room floor. I kicked the door shut, bent over, supported myself on my knees, and breathed heavily for a while before turning on the light and unpacking it.
They dragged Liu Er out of the box. He lay sprawled out, showing no sign of getting up, his chest heaving, looking utterly pathetic.
"Where is the injury? Let me see."
He didn't react. After a while, I realized I had to bend down, and then I heard his voice, which was as soft as a mosquito's buzz.
"I'm not hurt."
"Not injured?" This surprised me even more than the fact that he was shot more than a dozen times.
"If you're not hurt, why are you in this state?"
"I don't know, I don't know..." Liu Er's weak voice was filled with unease and fear. "I have no strength left, not a single bit." There was another emotion in his trembling voice. An emotion that seemed somewhat familiar to me. What was it?
Through his fragmented and somewhat incoherent narration, I learned what had happened.
Actually, everything is very simple.
Liu Er did not enter that hotel.
On the way there, he felt something was wrong with his body. He used to feel full of power every moment, but now that power was being slowly drained from his body.
Sensing something was wrong, Liu Er carefully surveyed the surrounding area upon arrival and prepared an escape route. However, after doing all this and preparing to enter the hotel, his power loss intensified.
He could clearly feel that the hair all over his body, as intimate as his arms, those "little guys," was withering away. They were rapidly weakening, making it increasingly difficult for them to support a normal human form; both the floral shirts they had transformed into and their skin were turning black at a visible rate.
The rapid loss of his strength threw Liu Er into a panic. He knew he would soon be exposed and might die. Remembering the dead-end alley he had seen while surveying the terrain, Liu Er used his last strength to mark it and desperately ran into the alley.
As he ran, his skin and clothes deformed. By the time he turned the corner and plunged into the pile of rubbish, he had completely transformed into a hairy man.
Liu Er tore off a huge pile of things to cover himself up. When he finished doing all this, he had no strength left, and was not even as strong as a child.
"When I was hiding in that pile of rubbish, I was thinking, the sky is falling, the sky is falling."
"I thought you would come to save me, you always can save me. But I've become a useless piece of trash again." Liu Er tilted his head back, trying hard to look at me.
"No, no." I didn't know what else to say, so this was all I could say.
"I can get better, right? I can get better. By tomorrow, I will have my strength again." Liu Er suddenly shouted desperately, but I was afraid I wouldn't be able to hear his faint voice if I stood up straight.
I remember now, that feeling.