Work Text:
2023, August. It’s an ordinary sitting room in an ordinary photo studio on an ordinary street in an ordinary city. But, Zhang Jiale thinks, isn’t that so often how these stories go? The shop of wonders tucked away in an unassuming corner of mundanity.
He sits in the low-cushioned chair and takes it in—the green walls, the sunlit plants. He’s heard that Tiny Herb’s headquarters has a similar aesthetic; he doesn’t know what to do with that thought once it’s crossed his mind. He’s not here because of Tiny Herb, no matter what the media might think if they saw him now.
There are two workers here, both young men no older than himself. Cheng Xiaoshi, the one with a short tuft of a ponytail, tosses himself onto the couch on Zhang Jiale’s right and proceeds to fill the silence with whatever small talk he can—the weather, the transit. He reminds Zhang Jiale a bit of an overeager puppy, perhaps, or of Huang Shaotian, if Huang Shaotian had the capability of running an apparently-supernatural small business.
The taller one, who’d introduced himself as Lu Guang, sets a glass of water in front of Zhang Jiale, and then seats himself at the chair across the coffee table. Close enough for intimacy, far enough for comfort. Even though it’s a 2v1, Zhang Jiale thinks wryly, it doesn’t feel like a confrontation. He wonders how long they’ve been doing this.
Lu Guang speaks first. “So what brings you here today?”
Zhang Jiale says to them, “I hear you can erase a person’s memories.”
There’s a pause.
“That’s not—” Cheng Xiaoshi begins, frowning, but he’s interrupted by his partner.
“What is it,” Lu Guang says, “that you are asking for?”
Zhang Jiale had readied a photo, just as the stories had told him to; he passes his phone across the table now. “I know you can’t change what’s already happened in the past,” he says, even as he wishes he’s wrong. If he could, he would rewrite this entirely. As it is, this is the next best thing. “But I know—I’ve heard—you can live this moment in my place. I can’t carry this memory anymore. Take it from me. Please.”
Cheng Xiaoshi looks at the photo first, before handing the phone to Lu Guang. There’s nothing special about that photo, at first glance. A pre-match selfie that his once-teammates had bullied him into taking. In the photo, Zhang Jiale is grinning. A distant emotion.
“You can do this, can’t you,” Zhang Jiale presses. The miracle-workers of Haibula, said the stories, now moved to the city. Solve any of your problems with a photograph. “I can pay. Whatever it takes.”
A look passes between the two partners, a tacit understanding; something in Zhang Jiale aches in recognition. And Zhang Jiale, too, can already see the answer before Cheng Xiaoshi opens his mouth. “I’m sorry,” the young man says, handing back the phone. His earlier frivolity is gone, replaced with a surprising gravity. “We can’t take this job.”
Can’t, or won’t? But even if Lu Guang’s expression remains stoic, Cheng Xiaoshi looks genuinely pained to deliver this refusal. And so Zhang Jiale forces a light-hearted laugh, shoving his phone back into his pocket and squeezing his fists. “That’s okay,” he says. It isn’t, but that one is a well-practiced lie. “I just thought—it would be easier, if I could forget.”
It’s Lu Guang who replies to that. “The future is the accumulation of infinite present moments; the present is the accumulation of infinite pasts,” he says quietly. “To erase any part of that would be to render your present meaningless. Is that what you truly want?”
Zhang Jiale thinks of a desperate madness, choking him from the inside out. “It would be easier,” he repeats, whispered.
“Can you tell us what happened?” asks Cheng Xiaoshi, almost too gently.
“What, you guys do therapy too?” It’s an automatic instinct to lighten the mood; he regrets it immediately when Lu Guang’s gaze flicks to Cheng Xiaoshi and Cheng Xiaoshi’s expression shutters. “Sorry—that’s not a bad thing,” Zhang Jiale hastily adds. “But I mean…”
He doesn’t want to talk about it. He really doesn’t want to. He wants to shed this burden and be done with it all. Isn’t he well on his way? Isn’t this the final step?
“I’ll be straight with you,” says Cheng Xiaoshi, and something about his casualness seems a little forced now, but the grin he flashes is one of determination. “What you were asking, we can’t do that. But we still want to help. Me and Lu Guang here, we’ve solved almost every problem that’s come our way. You’re talking to the best agents in Guidu.”
“Help,” Zhang Jiale repeats blankly. “How?”
“Why don’t you start from the beginning,” says Lu Guang. And… despite Zhang Jiale’s initial reluctance, something about their combined sincerity, mixed with his own longing, has him rooted to the chair. The power of a dual core, huh.
He considers. Where was the beginning? Eleven months ago, when he’d fled in the night? Thirteen months ago, when the last of his spark burnt away? Three years ago, when they’d denied the reality before them? Five years ago, when two hadn’t been enough? Seven years ago, when he’d taken the hand of that bloodied stranger and said yes?
“It started,” says Zhang Jiale softly, “with a shared dream.”