Chapter 50.1
Trigger Warning: self-harm
Lagoon Nebula, White Tower.
Rain drizzled for nearly half a month. The sky remained gray and gloomy, with a hint of dampness lingering in the air.
Elisa cradled a steaming cup of coffee, her gaze tracing the rivulets of rainwater cascading down the glass wall.
The creak of a chair drew her attention. As she turned, she saw August. “Finished with your tasks?”
August, wearing a light gray trench coat, tall in stature, with eyes as blue as the deep sea, peered through the glass wall towards the two-story house across the street. “I’ve already submitted the results on the intranet. There aren’t any urgent projects for now. Let’s take a break for a couple of days.”
Elisa nodded. “Yes, let’s take a few days off and get a good night’s sleep. The weather lately can easily dampen people’s mood.”
The conversation halted there, and no one spoke further.
After another two minutes, August asked, “How’s Qi Yan…?”
Elisa’s eyes immediately reddened, her fingers tightening around the coffee cup, strands of hair falling over her ear as her gaze shifted to the side. “August, I’ve been thinking these past few days. What if I hadn’t suggested sending Qi Yan to Leto, or if White Tower had brought him back just one minute faster, even just a minute faster, would things be different from how they are now?”
Qi Yan felt like he had just woken up from a dream, but whatever he dreamt of had completely dissipated upon waking.
He sat by the edge of the bed, momentarily grappling with dizziness and a heaviness in his chest. He took a few steps barefoot on the ground before returning to put on his slippers.
Passing by the table, his features cold and clear, he ran a fruit knife along his arm, letting it draw blood before finding a bandage. With painstaking effort, he wrapped layer upon layer around his wrist, finally managing to tie a neat bowknot before opening the door to leave.
He walked along the corridor, his thoughts seemingly still in slumber, until someone called out to him, “Qi Yan!”
Qi Yan halted, following the voice until he spotted Elisa and August.
Elisa smiled and asked him, “Did you sleep well?”
Qi Yan’s response was slow, his voice hoarse as he replied, “It’s alright, I slept for eight hours. Seems like I dreamt, but can’t recall.”
Catching a glimpse of the gauze peeking out from Qi Yan’s sleeve, Elisa’s hand tightened around the coffee cup. “You’re injured again?”
Qi Yan lowered his eyes to the bowknot and slowly explained, “Mm, accidentally nicked myself with a fruit knife. It hurts a bit, but Lu Fenghan applied some healing gel and wrapped it with a bandage. He said it’ll heal quickly.”
Elisa and August exchanged a glance.
Qi Yan had been in a coma ever since he was brought back to Lagoon Nebula. Apart from the bite mark at the corner of his mouth and the nails that bled from being split open, there were no other injuries. Yet, he lay in the medical pod for two days without waking.
Elisa speculated that this must be Qi Yan’s own will—he didn’t want to wake up.
After three more days of fitful sleep, Qi Yan finally opened his eyes.
Elisa had prepared herself to answer Qi Yan’s questions, carefully considering her words dozens of times. But to everyone’s surprise, Qi Yan didn’t ask a single question. He got up, walked towards the door, then doubled back to slip on his slippers, all the while inquiring about the progress of Project E97-Z.
Elisa’s heart hung heavy. Hesitant to say anything else, she simply replied, “We’ve been running data since you went to Leto. August checks on it once a week, but we still don’t have any results.”
Qi Yan nodded, his lean frame swathed in loose clothing, an inexplicable emptiness surrounding him. He spoke hoarsely, “I’ll go take a look.”
Elisa followed behind him.
She mentally retraced every detail from Qi Yan’s awakening until now, and finally realized. “The slippers—”
Qi Yan’s expression was natural as he replied, “Lu Fenghan just reminded me to put them on, said I’d get cold otherwise. I always forget to wear them, but he says it’s okay, he’ll remind me.”
A sudden heaviness settled in Elisa’s heart.
Her worst fears had become reality.
The rain had lessened slightly. Qi Yan pulled out a chair and sat down. He and August exchanged a few words about the progress of Project E97-Z. Both agreed that there was no need to continue, as six months of no data had proven it to be a dead end, not worth persisting with.
August’s gaze swept over Qi Yan’s pale, gaunt face, noticing the faint bruises beneath his eyes, then settling on his slender wrists. Though a slight sigh tugged at his heart, he kept it hidden, steering the conversation towards mundane matters. “Have you taken your medication?”
“Yes,” Qi Yan replied, but after a few seconds, his eyes tinged with confusion. “I thought I took it, but I guess I was mistaken again.”
August paused, “He reminded you?”
Qi Yan nodded, “Yeah, he brought me water and gave me the medication.”
As Qi Yan was called away, Elisa set down her now cold coffee, a bitter smile tugging at her lips. “What are we going to do about this?”
In Qi Yan’s memory, Lu Fenghan hadn’t died saving him but had instead come to Lagoon Nebula with him. As for the time lost due to his coma, Qi Yan seemed to tacitly accept this “gap” without probing further.
In his conversations, Lu Fenghan’s name would occasionally pop up.
Like today’s instance of “accidentally nicked myself with a fruit knife,” Qi Yan would repeat such phrases almost every day.
What frightened Elisa was Qi Yan’s meticulous efforts to reinforce the authenticity of this fabricated memory he created himself. Despite his acute sensitivity to pain, he would deliberately cut his arm with a sharp object every day, then carefully bandage it and tie a bowknot.
It was as if he used this as evidence to prove that Lu Fenghan was truly still by his side.
And yet, Qi Yan clearly couldn’t sleep through the night, couldn’t eat anything, growing weaker and more emaciated with each passing day, all while fabricating memories of having slept for eight hours each night, with dreams he couldn’t recall.
He drained every ounce of his life force, lost in a world that was half false and half real.
As if that person had never left, as if everything were just as it used to be.
As long as he avoided deep thoughts, avoided probing, he would never disrupt this delicate balance.
The now chilled coffee tasted extremely bitter, numbing her tongue. Elisa propped her hand against her forehead.
“It’s like walking on a tightrope over a cliff… you know? I’m terrified. I’m afraid Qi Yan will get trapped in this state, constantly cutting himself, enduring night after night, day after day, until he can’t bear it anymore.
“And I’m afraid of pulling him out of this swamp. If everything he’s built will come crashing down suddenly, how could he withstand it? He’s barely managed to hold himself together, cobbling together those fragments of memory to deceive himself, keeping himself barely afloat…”
Her voice trembled as she spoke.
No one dared to tell Qi Yan that Lu Fenghan was already dead, that he no longer existed in this world, fearing that his psyche and spirit would instantly shatter.
Having watched Qi Yan grow up since childhood, and having been his psychologist for a full eight years, Elisa knew better than anyone that Qi Yan had always harbored thoughts of death.
Starting from eight years ago, as his reality distortion worsened, Qi Yan struggled through each day.
He had to discern what was false, had to question and deny himself entirely, then piece together what was real, yet he couldn’t even be certain if the “reality” he pieced together was truly real.
No one knew the kind of pain and hopelessness this entailed.
Sometimes, Elisa looked at Qi Yan and felt he was like a faint flame in the wind, never knowing when it might be extinguished completely.
It wasn’t until they had their first conversation after Qi Yan went to Leto that Elisa distinctly felt he seemed to have clung to a thin straw.
It was by clinging to this very straw that he managed to survive until now.
Like a drowning person pulled to the surface, allowing him a moment to breathe.
He even began to improve day by day, growing more hopeful with each passing day.
But what to do if that straw snapped?
On an unnamed star.
Faint murmurs of argument could be heard.
“Such peace is rare, but also dangerous. The people of the Alliance are kept safely within their walls for too long, and over time, they’ll lose their vigor, becoming complacent. This includes the Central Army and the garrisons from various administrative regions. With too much idleness, blades will rust and sword handles will decay.”
Another person responded, “But it’s the duty of soldiers to defend the Alliance. Using the Expeditionary Force as a barrier to block external threats isn’t wrong. Moreover, within the human genetic makeup lies the elements of discord and aggression. Without space pirates, without the rebels, there will naturally be others.”
The first speaker sighed. “No one has the power of prophecy. All you and I can do is focus on doing what we can at the moment, and then deal with challenges as they come. As for the affairs of future generations, they will naturally be handled by the people of those times.”
Lu Fenghan vaguely recalled a rainy night when he was not yet ten years old, when his father, Lu Jun, rarely took a break and invited his comrade, Nie Huaiting, to their home.
He was assembling a starship model while listening to them talk about things he didn’t quite understand.
Starship…
The microstarship he piloted had shattered in the wormhole, just like the medium-sized starship chasing after him.
He sluggishly realized that his entire body seemed to ache, but the pain felt somewhat distant, not quite tangible.
The sound of rain in his ears gradually diminished. Lu Fenghan recalled the time he and Qi Yan had been stranded on a desolate planet. Qi Yan, holding a pack of nutritional supplement, mumbled something unclear in his direction.
Qi Yan.
Qi Yan…
In that instant, the name jolted Lu Fenghan awake. He exerted all his strength to try to move his fingers, but to no avail. It felt as though his thoughts had become disconnected from his nervous system.
I can’t die.
I need to wake up.
If I die, who will remind that Little Scatterbrain to wear slippers when it’s cold and to eat properly when he’s hungry?
He had to go back. Qi Yan had promised to wait for him.
Qi Yan was still waiting for him.
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