Chapter Text
He woke violently, sweat beading down his back as he panted, open-mouthed, against the solid wood grain of his workbench.
“Yingxing?” A voice said to his left, warm and familiar. There had been a hand on his shoulder, but sometime in his thrashing, he’d pushed it away, so now it hovered over him instead. “Yingxing, it was a nightmare. You’re alright.”
Alright? He almost laughed, but stopped when the noise came out thin. Was that really what he sounded like? He slapped his hand to his mouth and tried to breathe through the mounting hysteria. Something was wrong, something was so, so—
The figure in the corner of his vision moved until they were standing right in front of him; long black hair flowing smoothly over pristine white robes, and the sight was enough to slap him clean out of whatever spiral he’d been falling into. For a moment, he could only stare. Deep green eyes swam with concern, which only seemed to grow the longer he sat there, mute.
“You’re here,” Yingxing managed eventually. It was the only thought running through his head, frantic and riddled with disbelief. He’s here, he’s here, he’s here, he’s here.
“Of course,” said Dan Feng, nonplussed. “We have a reservation, remember?”
Yingxing didn’t. That hardly mattered. Nothing save the heat death of the universe was going to keep him from taking Dan Feng out right that second. In a rush, he slipped off his leather apron and tossed it to his coat rack, sliding the rest of his materials into a half-hazard pile on his table before spinning back around. “I remember. Lunch? We should go now, I’m starving.”
Dan Feng sent him a flat look. “The sun set four hours ago.”
“Ok, dinner. Who cares what it’s called? Food’s food.” Yingxing grabbed his coat on their way out of his workroom, his pace a touch too quick to be considered casual.
Dan Feng fell into step with him easily, a barely-there smile growing on his face. Although he refused to look at Yingxing until he had the top half of his buttons secured, a fact that sent a heady mix of frustration and pride through Yingxing’s nervous system. “I care when it means you haven’t eaten today.”
“You can’t prove that.”
The smile grew into a full-on grin, and Yingxing didn’t bother to hide his satisfaction, his answering expression big and cocky. Dan Feng sighed. “You’re incorrigible.”
“Part of my charm,” he sent back, and then paused to look around the workshop. “Is it a holiday?”
“Not that I’m aware of?” said Dan Feng, eyes following Yingxing’s.
“Cool. Then where the fuck is everyone?”
Though it was late, it wasn’t that late according to the large, Jade clock that hung above the forge’s entrance. Besides, Yingxing was far from the only workaholic on the Xianzhou's payroll. At this time of night, there should have still been a fair number of stragglers in the forge, and the sparseness returned the prickling feeling that had just retreated from Yingxing’s nervous system.
The only sign of stress on Dan Feng’s face was a slight pinch to his eyebrows. “I—”
“There you are, boss.”
Yingxing twisted to the side, anxiety deflating like a balloon. “Sensen,” he said, the syllables sitting oddly in his mouth, and then, reflexively, “Don’t call me that.”
As always, she ignored him. “You know, we were specifically scheduled so you could finally peel yourself from the forge,” she sighed dramatically, but shot Dan Feng a friendly smile. Right. Sensen had always been one of Yingxing’s better coworkers in treating Dan Feng like a person, not an idol. It had been part of the reason they’d become such good friends over the past few decades — that, and her being one of the few short-life craftsmen around his age.
“Bite me,” said Yingxing, another comfortable reflex. “If you people want me to come out, you have to make it worth my while.”
Sensen scoffed. “Do you see what we have to put up with? Shameful.” She looked to Dan Feng, inviting him in on the tease.
But Dan Feng’s brows were still furrowed, gaze pinpointed just over Sensen’s shoulder. “Were you there the whole time? Even when I came in?”
Sensen cocked her head. “Where else would I be?”
That should have been the end of it, but there was the slightest pinch to Dan Feng’s mouth; Yingxing could tell something about the answer hadn’t sat right with him. If Yingxing was being honest with himself, he didn't find it particularly reassuring either; there was something so placating… about that tone, he hadn’t….
“…Sensen always works at the very back,” Yingxing said, slowly. The knowledge felt so rusty — the move wasn't recent, in fact, she’d been there for longer than Yingxing had been working on the Thunderclap base — but it did, as though he was peeling back years of dust to get to the faded truth underneath. There was something — something he couldn’t quite get his thoughts around. Like he was fixing up a cruiser, but someone had removed all the bulbs from the indicator lights, so there was no way to tell what had gone wrong.
Yingxing chased that line of thinking for another moment but came up woefully blank. He rubbed his eyes; maybe that nightmare was still messing with his head. “You must’ve been here often enough; we've started rubbing off on you.” He smiled at Dan Feng. “Everyone here gets tunnel vision for our big projects.”
Dan Feng blinked. “Yes,” he said, at last. “That makes sense. Apologies, Sensen.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she said with a laugh. “Anyway, I came out to get some last-minute opinions on that artillery canon we were talking about for the starskiffs, but if you’re going out, it can wait ‘til tomorrow.”
“Oh!” said Dan Feng, quickly glancing between the two of them, “it’s fine, really. I can wait.”
“Nope,” said Yingxing, shaking out the sleeves of his coat to make sure it sat right. These plans were just high-clearance enough that Dan Feng shouldn’t be allowed to see them, and the idea of losing — leaving Dan Feng made his throat ache like he was about to heave. “You’ll be here for the morning shift?”
“You know it, boss.” Yingxing rolled his eyes, and Sensen grinned. “Enjoy your date night!” she called at their retreating backs, the one member of the forge that hadn’t given up teasing their non-relationship, at least with Dan Feng around.
Predictably, Dan Feng flushed all the way to the tips of his ears even while his stoic mask remained in place. Bittersweetness churned Yingxing’s insides as he fought a sad smile, not wanting Dan Feng to see. He’d long since grown used to the reality that he was likely to die loving this man at a distance, but it would still sting occasionally.
“C’mon,” he said, nudging Dan Feng ever so lightly, who relaxed immediately under his touch. Aeons, but Yingxing loved this man. Even the pain felt sweet. “We don’t want to lose our table.”
They walked along the quiet midweek street to what had initially been just Yingxing’s favorite restaurant spot, but quickly became theirs once it became clear how much time Dan Feng would be spending at the forge. Since then, they have made at least a weekly reservation, though when Yingxing was swamped with work, that number usually increased. The restaurant was open-air, and Dan Feng guided them to their usual booth near the back, shaded enough to give them a veneer of privacy and with a view of the park right next door, lamplights flooding the grassy paths in buttery yellow light.
He sat back to watch as Dan Feng scanned through the menu. He reasoned that Dan Feng did it to look polite; he’d order the same thing he always did. It was as Yingxing was watching him fondly that something small and bright meandered past him; it buzzed this way and that, seemingly directionless, until it landed sedately on his hand. He blinked at the little insect, stared. Why did he feel it staring back?
“Yingxing, I think I’ve — oh, look at that.” Dan Feng leaned in closer and dropped his voice to a whisper. “I didn’t realize we had fireflies on base. I wonder where she came from.”
Dan Feng reached out a hand to try to entice the firefly over. Still, it remained fixed to Yingxing, its blinking pattern leaving afterimages when he closed his eyes. He was woozy, he realized, as he watched it glow.
The nausea broke into a headache, blooming behind his skull. The quick jump in intensity confused him, but soon that pain expanded, bright spikes making it impossible to think, doubling over and curling his body into the restaurant table.
…His body? He could feel his heart beating a frantic rhythm against the cage of his ribs. Bile climbed up his throat. Soon, he was blind to anything and everything outside of what he could immediately feel. The worse the pain became, the more Yingxing was convinced his senses must be tricking him; the booth’s padded seat turned to hard metal underneath his back, his hand clenched around a weapon that wasn’t there, his chest itched, as if it were layered in stiff scar tissue, there was something tight around his arms —
Then, a voice he almost recognized, so clear it was as if they were speaking right into his ear: “Oh shit, he’s waking up, Blade —”
“Yingxing?”
When he uncovered his hand from his face, the firefly was gone, and he had the distinct feeling that he’d remembered something important, but the more he tried to reach for that thought, the farther away it slipped.
In the firefly’s place was Dan Feng’s fist, clenched tightly in his own; the man crouched low next to him. As Yingxing blinked him into focus, Dan Feng reached upwards to cup his face, his attention drifting from one eye to the next.
“Your pupils are normal,” he declared, before dragging the back of his hand to Yingxing’s forehead. “No fever, either.”
Yingxing held back a sigh. “I’m sorry,” he said, even though he knew exactly how that would go over.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Dan Feng, right on cue. It was enough to put a smile on Yingxing’s pale face. Dan Feng huffed when he saw it, but his tone gentled as he asked, “Are you sure you’re alright?”
He would be. That had to be enough. Yingxing opened his mouth to reassure Dan Feng, his other hand coming up to give the words some weight, except what he saw stole every bit of strength he had been trying to collect.
His hand was shaking.
For a moment, Yingxing could only stare. Horror sat dull in his stomach, turning his insides cold and grey, but it was soon overtaken by a sense of disgust so visceral that he nearly gagged.
Yingxing made masterpieces. There was no tool too small, no part too intricate, no plan too detailed. He did what others could only dream of, and he knew he could because he trusted his body to work with him completely. Even in the heat of battle, when death was inches away, and abundance monsters were baying for their blood, his hands were steady.
These were not his hands. They couldn’t be. Yingxing felt a sudden, profound desire to reach for something sharp so he could gouge out the wrongness, but a voice screamed at the back of his head that it would be useless. Still, Yingxing’s eyes were fixed on the steak knife, neatly wrapped in cloth, that lingered right next to his elbow, its polished metal reflecting his manic, red gaze.
He reached for the knife. He didn’t see his body move. He reached for the knife. It was like seeing double, two branches overlaid in his mind: the vision of the restaurant, and the other dark and cold and metal. The metal was on his back, around his arm. They had trapped him. Those people in the other place shouted with alarm, but he paid no attention to them as he struggled to cut to stop to end. His hands were so cold. He could hear something tear. He reached. He reached. He reached. He reached.
Something grabbed his wrists, and he thrashed like he was clawing out of his grave, dirt in his mouth, decay all around, buried right in the filth where he belonged.
“Silver Wolf, he can’t — !”
“I know, dammit. Blade, I’m so sorry we — ”
Yingxing stood so quickly that something crashed to the floor. He did not look back to see what.
His eyes tracked around the room. He couldn’t remember what threat he was searching for, but there must have… he was missing something. There was nothing wrong. Both thoughts crammed into his brain, overlapping. But there was nothing wrong.
“...Can we go home?” he asked, pointedly not looking Dan Feng in the eyes, no matter how hard the High Elder tried to meet his own.
Dan Feng stood too, but slowly, projecting every movement and, blessedly, keeping Yingxing at arm's length, perhaps sensing how disgusted the idea of touching anyone was right at this moment. His breath beat out of his lungs harshly, and he sucked in air like he was starving for it. Every instinct in his body screamed at him to run, but where? Why?
“Of course,” he said. Yingxing had been expecting the easy acceptance, but the relief of not having to explain himself was still enough to make his knees weak. Yingxing could see other patrons trying to peer past their section to see what the commotion was about, but Dan Feng ignored them. Wordlessly, he led Yingxing through the back half of the restaurant, into the same park they had seen from the open windows, cutting across the promenade until they hit the street proper. Yingxing kept waiting for Dan Feng to cave to curiosity, but he should have known better. When it came to ignoring the elephant in the room, Dan Feng was always the expert.
The trek back to the Quintet quarters was short and passed in silence. Yingxing did not spot any more tiny, blinking lights in his periphery, but kept his gaze fixed on the road anyway, his hands fisted at his back. When they came to their familiar doorway, they were met with more silence; everyone else was either out or fast asleep.
“Wait,” Dan Feng said when Yingxing started towards his room. At Yingxing’s questioning frown, he clarified. “You still haven’t eaten.”
Yingxing grimaced. “It’s fine, I’m really not that hungry.”
Dan Feng carried on like he hadn’t heard him, searching through their cupboards until he came across two of the many instant meals the Quintet had stockpiled. Yingxing toyed with the idea of putting up a stronger argument, but the thought exhausted him so profoundly that he gave up before it had even fully formed. Instead, he sat quietly at their living room table and, when Dan Feng’s back was turned, finally removed his hands from where they had been resting underneath his thighs.
Normal. Yingxing sneered at himself, unsure what he’d been expecting, and gripped the chopsticks Dan Feng had placed in front of him tightly enough that they threatened to snap. His hands obeyed, the joints curving just how he wanted them to, and for some reason, that only managed to piss him off more.
If Dan Feng noticed Yingxing’s dark mood when he sat beside him, he didn’t comment. Instead, after a few quiet moments in which the only sound was them eating, he began regaling Yingxing with the details of an immersia he and Baiheng had been watching; something about a pair of star-crossed lovers who kept missing each other in their reincarnations? It all sounded a bit melodramatic to Yingxing, but it was clear Dan Feng liked it, so he kept quiet. As the soothing rumble of Dan Feng’s voice wove under his skin, Yingxing found his grip relaxing until the chopsticks were loose in his hands and he could no longer hear his knuckles creaking. Soon his eyelids grew heavy, and it was a struggle to understand what Dan Feng was saying. For the first time since waking in his workshop, he felt genuinely at peace. Yingxing did not remember the process of moving to his bed, only that Dan Feng was there, and then he wasn’t. Yingxing was unconscious before his head hit the pillow.
“Good morning,” Dan Feng said to him, what felt like only minutes later. He handed a bleary-eyed Yingxing a freshly brewed mug of coffee, and he downed half the cup without really tasting it.
Yingxing grumbled something unintelligible before gathering what he needed for the day that had been left scattered around their home: his satchel, early blueprints for the canons Sensen had spoken about, his notebook. By the time he’d finished, he was slightly more conscious and able to take in what he’d missed before.
“Where is everyone?” he asked, feeling a pricking sense of deja vu. He rubbed his chest, trying to quell the sensation, but his insides still churned with sourceless unease, which only worsened when Dan Feng frowned.
“Training, if Jingliu’s message is right. I’m not sure about Baiheng, but I imagine Jing Yuan’s with Jingliu.”
“She told you that?”
Dan Feng gestured to the note on the table where Yingxing found Jingliu’s neat script, almost textbook in its conciseness. No word about Baiheng, which was a bit strange, but not especially unusual considering how busy things could sometimes get on Base, even outside of active combat. Yingxing scanned the letter once again before setting it back down on the table.
“I’m going to stop by and see her after I’ve finished this morning's reports,” Dan Feng said, sending a tired glance at the separate mailbox Yingxing had built years ago to house the sheer volume of missives he received. “It feels like it's been forever since we last got together.”
A cold rush of fear went down Yingxing’s spine at the thought of Dan Feng and Jingliu in the same space as each other. “Are you sure that’s wise?” he said, his mouth working faster than his brain. “What if she’s busy?”
Dan Feng shrugged. “I suppose I can just watch. Or join, maybe, if Jingliu deems it necessary for Jing Yuan’s lesson plan.”
He said that last bit with a smile, eyes crinkling as they went to Yingxing’s to share in the joke, but Yingxing was already turning away, pretending to straighten his blueprints as he fought to school his expression. What in Lan’s name was wrong with him? First the restaurant and now this? His hands weren’t shaking this time around, but with his stomach sitting like a stone in his torso, he found it difficult to be grateful. He jostled around the papers with numb fingers, messing them up more than anything, as he fought to bring breath back to his lungs.
“Yingxing?” Dan Feng murmured, closer than he’d been before. He expected Dan Feng to reach out to try to comfort him, but Dan Feng’s hands remained fixed to the folds of his robes. Yingxing couldn’t decide whether that was a relief or a disappointment to him.
“I’m fine,” he lied. “Just…”
Eventually, Dan Feng took pity on him. “Tired?” he suggested.
Yes. He was tired. And not in the way of his body getting older, although that was there too, but deep, deep down in some unturned part of his soul. Fuck’s sake, maybe he did need to start attending those mental health workshops their commanders kept foisting on them. At least it was Dan Feng who caught him on an off day; the rest of the Quintet grew more anxious about his health every passing year, and, frankly, Yingxing didn’t know how much more he could take before he swore off the alliance altogether, hijacked a starskiff, and flew far, far away. The thought brought a faint smile to his face; maybe he’d bring Dan Feng.
“I’m fine,” he stressed again, more sincerely this time. “It will pass. I just need to push through today. I’ll be good by lunch.”
Dan Feng didn’t look convinced, but he let Yingxing go without a fuss, waving him off at the Quintet's doors. Oddly enough, the farther away Yingxing walked, the more unsettled he felt, as if he were truly forgetting something important. He thumbed through his blueprints on the journey, but felt like he’d been too distracted to make sense of them by the time he reached the forge.
“Sensen?” he called into the wall of heat that was the entrance to her workstation, head still buried in his notes as he racked his mind for some design element he could be missing. “You there?”
“Here, boss,” she yelled back. Metal bangs accompanied Sensen’s approach until she emerged before him, sweaty bangs plastered to her forehead and unwieldy, leather gloves strapped to her arms. Yingxing didn’t blame her; those things were a pain to take off.
“So,” he began, “I was thinking of ways we could increase the power output, and I know we shot down the jade idea, but maybe if— ”
“Actually, we might have to take a rain check,” she interrupted before he could really get going. “Some lady stopped by. Said she was a representative?”
“Of what?” Yingxing wondered aloud, trying to recall his schedule for the week, but came up frustratingly empty. He sighed. Dan Feng would probably know.
Sensen snorted. “Couldn’t tell you, I’ve certainly never heard of it before. Not that I was really listening — Yingxing, when you see her!” She let out a wolf whistle, slouching against the frame of her workshop. “I know you're gone on Imbibitor Lunae, but when I tell you she might be the finest lady I’ve seen in my life; nice hair, sultry voice, and don’t get me started on her legs — ”
“Where is she now?”
“Oh, right. I think I sent her to your forge station.”
Somebody save him. “You think??”
Sensen had the decency to look genuinely chagrined. “Sorry, boss. I promise I did a sweep first, so we don’t have anything confidential hanging about. And she had high enough clearance to get here in the first place, so…”
Yingxing sighed. He could feel a migraine coming on. “So you sent her to me.”
“She did ask specifically for our Furnace Master.” Sensen shrugged in a very ‘what can you do’ way that made Yingxing want to throttle her.
“Okay,” said Yingxing, gamely resisting the urge. “Fine. Whatever. Here.” He thrust the blueprints into Sensen’s clumsy hands and took a perverse amount of satisfaction in the way she contorted herself to keep any pages from slipping. “I guess I’ll go play diplomat.”
“Try not to swear at this one,” Sensen shouted as he trudged away. Yingxing didn’t dignify that with a response. If they didn’t want him to swear at diplomats, they would stop sending him ones that deserved to be sworn at.
Though it was only morning, the forge was alive with noise. He caught a few groggy faces - Nannan appeared to be asleep in his chair, dark glasses pulled over his eyes, and mouth hanging open - but the vast majority of his fellow smiths were hard at work. If there was one skill you learned working on a military base, it was powering through a hangover to finish the week's quota, even if you ended up drinking right until your shift started. Aeons knew he’d learned that the hard way.
Yingxing nodded to them as he passed, but the vast majority of his focus was dedicated to figuring out who exactly Sensen had let into his workshop. A member of the IPC? Perhaps one of their fringe groups - those people loved their acronyms - and Yingxing was convinced they kept creating more simply because it confused the people they made deals with. Eventually, he decided to put it out of his mind. Huaiyan had once taught him that going into some meetings blind would serve him better than overpreparing; he could only hope that this was one of them.
He knocked lightly on the frame of his door before letting himself in, only to be met with…a girl? Long silver hair fell loosely around her shoulders, and her gray-cream robes were patterned with little flying insects. She appeared shocked to see him, almost as shocked as Yingxing was to see her. Did…did he need to report Sensen? Just as Yingxing was considering turning around to have a very stern conversation with his coworker, another figure emerged from behind the weapons rack at the back of the room, her heeled steps clicking against the smooth stone of the furnace’s floor.
Oh, he thought. That makes more sense.
Sensen was right; the representative was tall, a feature emphasized by her almost scandalously short hanfu, the sleeves and trim adorned with pale swimming fish. Her hair wasn’t particularly short, even tied up as it was in a ponytail, but it was still enough that Yingxing took note of it—an outerworlder, then, and probably a decade or so younger than he was if she was short-life.
“I was told there was only one of you,” were the first words out of Yingxing’s mouth. The Huaiyan that seemed to hover permanently over his shoulder in situations like these winced, and so Yingxing, reluctantly, continued. “Regardless, it’s a pleasure to meet you both.”
The girl's mouth remained snapped shut. This close, he could tell that she wasn’t quite as young as he’d initially believed, but a fair bit of baby fat clung to her pale cheeks, in sharp contrast to the lithe figure her partner cut. The ladder trailed closer to him, fingers ghosting over a row of untempered swords in a way that made Yingxing’s jaw clench.
“How polite. I have to say, Furnace Master, we’ve both been so excited to chat with you.”
That voice. Yingxing’s breath caught in his throat, though he had no idea why. The woman stopped an arm's length from him, her smile sharp, and Yingxing raised a brow. He couldn’t tell if her tone was naturally that flirty or if she was genuinely coming on to him. Either way, she was about fifteen years too late - his interest had long lain elsewhere.
“...Thanks,” he said before dropping his gaze to the younger girl and trying to soften his tone. “I’m sorry, I don’t think I caught your names.”
The girl's lips flattened into a thin line. “I —”
“Aria,” the woman answered in her place, and Yingxing barely managed to keep his expression from twitching. He filed the interaction away carefully, nodding as if he found nothing amiss in the woman’s obvious cover for her partner.
“And you?”
The woman’s eyes crinkled, like she was thinking of an inside joke. “Call me Miss Spider,” she requested, and Yingxing had to fight once again to keep his face flat. Who were these people? “I don’t imagine you’ve heard of our faction, have you? The Acquisitions Department?” She pulled a glossy IPC business card from the folds of her robe and handed it to Yingxing, who turned it over. Sure enough, there was the name Ms. Spider emblazoned across the bottom, right under the woman’s smiling photo.
“What exactly do you acquire?” Yingxing wondered aloud before pocketing the card.
Miss Spider shrugged. “Oh, you know. Things, people,” she said the last bit with a wink at him. “Oftentimes, the deadlier the better.”
“I’m happy where I am,” said Yingxing, nipping that assumption in the bud as soon as he could.
“No?” Miss Spider paused, watching him, and her face did something odd: her mouth stayed happy, but her eyes turned… not sad. Something else. “What a shame. I get the feeling you and I would work well together.”
“Mhm,” he hummed, about as noncommittal as he could manage while still being professional. “Regardless, you said you’ve come here to search for talent?”
“Along those lines, yes,” she replied.
“Actually, we—!” Aria started confidently, but as soon as Yingxing turned his gaze to her, she lost a considerable amount of whatever nerve she’d been building up. Yingxing had been ignoring the girl’s staring, but it was more than a little annoying that as soon as he returned her attention, the spear over his shoulder suddenly became the most interesting thing in the workshop. “We’ve got a notice,” she finished, much quieter. “From the General.”
The letter she handed him was probably official, but the font was far too small for Yingxing to read without giving himself a headache. He reached into his jacket pocket and slid on his reading glasses, scanning through General Teng Xiao’s curt but diplomatic explanation: these were IPC representatives. Yingxing was to show them around. Maybe there would be an alliance. Yingxing could read between the lines enough to see that the General wanted someone to keep an eye on them, but he would’ve appreciated a little more to go on. With a sigh, he refolded the letter, handing it back to Aria.
“Well,” he said. “As much as I’d like to show you two around, I’ve got some orders that need to be finished by midday. It’ll probably only take an hour or two, if you don’t mind waiting?”
Miss Spider’s keen gaze flitted around his workshop. “Actually, Forge Master, that works out well. I was hoping to get a better look at the Base as a whole, but Aria was so curious how a master like you creates the pieces he does.”
Yingxing’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t know how wise it is for you to be travelling around Thunderclap Base alone.”
She waved her hand dismissively. “Alone? Perish the thought. I thought I’d ask the blacksmith who let us in to accompany me. She isn’t busy as well, is she?”
“We’re all busy,” he sighed, at the same time trying to recall what Sensen’s schedule was for this week. His mind came up strangely blank. He shook his head. “Ask her first. If she says yes, I’m sure it’s fine.”
The part of him that was also a Zhuming diplomat hated letting Miss Spider out of his sights, but, despite the stark reminder of the Ling Jie incident, forever at the back of his mind when it came to off-worlders, he couldn’t bring himself to treat the woman with the same wariness. Something in his gut told him that she was safe. For once, Yingxing decided to trust his instincts.
“If she says no,” he began.
“I’ll be right back, scout’s honor,” she replied cheerfully. “Be good, Aria.”
And with that, she was off, leaving him and Aria to size up one another awkwardly.
“So,” he eventually began, “you like swords?”
Aria froze for a moment like a prey animal, but eventually seemed to force herself to relax. She shrugged. “I prefer your practical projects,” she murmured, folding herself deeply into the stool she was sitting on, hands around her knees, in a way that made Yingxing’s back twinge just looking at it.
“Like the Arumatons?”
“Yes. The ones that carry things around.”
“Huh. Well, you’re in luck. Those are exactly what I need to finish, and I’ve been told that assembly’s the most interesting part. Pull your seat up closer so you can see.”
Yingxing was used to Dan Feng hovering over his shoulder, so translating his actions into words for Aria went almost entirely without thought. He expected her to be like other diplomats, feigning interest in the nitty-gritty of his projects to win some sort of favor with him, but Aria’s attention was keen throughout the entirety of Yingxing’s explanation, even when he knew the theory was getting a little too technical for a layman to follow along.
“Are you sure this isn’t boring you?” he asked, adding the tenth of fifteen fiddly screws to attach the leg pole to its socket.
“No,” said Aria. Sometime during his explanation, her expression had turned soft. It made her look years younger. “My friend does the same when he works. I like it.”
“Hmm,” said Yingxing, unconvinced. He’d seen too many eyes glaze over when he really got going to believe that fully. “You sound like someone else I know.”
“Oh? Who?”
Jade eyes, black hair. Yingxing shook his head. “No matter - want to do this final section?”
Aria blinked at him, mouth slack. Her hands hovered over the insulation screwdriver he held out for her, like she couldn’t bring herself to touch it. “You would let me?”
“Sure. I’ve finished all the magical electrical components; the only thing left is the casing aspects. You’ve watched me assemble enough of these that you almost certainly have the basic principles down. And the practical elements will help it stick in your mind.”
Aria took hold of the screwdriver, Yingxing leaning to the side to give her more room to work, and sliding over the box of nuts, bolts, and a few washers. She was nervous at first, routinely looking to him for direction, but when he kept giving her encouraging nods, she settled into the role nicely, her hands a little clumsy at the finer handiwork but not bad at all for a beginner.
“So,” he said, when he could tell Aria’s mind was suitably absorbed with the task at hand. “How did you meet Miss Spider?”
“Miss—? Oh, a long time ago,” Aria muttered, too invested in a wonky panel to notice Yingxing’s eyebrows shooting to his hairline. Were either of the “guests” names real? Did Teng Xiao know? Knowing the man, he probably did. Yingxing could already feel a headache blooming when he imagined explaining all this to the General.
“I see,” said Yingxing. For that matter, why didn’t Teng Xiao think to have Jing Yuan stop by? He was the real interrogator. The pipsqueak wasn’t even off base, if Jingliu’s note was anything to go by. Did he have another mission coming up that was supposed to be taking his attention? Yingxing didn’t know. He swallowed. Why didn’t he know?
“Master Yingxing?” Aria asked.
He shook his head. That wasn’t important, right now. “You seem pretty young to have been with the IPC for a ‘long time.’”
She frowned. “I’m seventeen,” she said, like that meant anything. Yingxing hid a smile behind his fist. He supposed that when he was seventeen, he’d felt like an adult, too.
Aria must have seen his eyes crinkle because her nostrils flared. “How old are you then?” she asked, a touch defensively. Her gaze dipped to his side pocket, where he kept his spectacles, before skittering away.
Interesting.
“I’m in my fifties,” he answered, easily, not even bothering to use his usual cop-out ‘in the Amber era’ answer when Aria herself was so young. The girl paused her ministrations, her head jerking in Yingxing’s direction, though she rushed to hide that reaction too.
“What?” he asked, amused. “Surprised?”
“I guess,” Aria murmured. The tips of her ears were red. “You’re just,” she paused, and Yingxing recognized that expression from when he was much younger, trying to bite down on the first thing that wanted to come out of his mouth. He could tell by the twitch in Aria’s jaw that she was losing. She finished with a whisper: “You’re really old.”
Yingxing blinked and then started laughing so hard he doubled over.
“Fuck’s sake,” he cackled, wiping a stray tear from his eye, “holy— oh man, I can’t wait to tell Baiheng about this. No, wait, Dan Feng,” he broke again, and, fighting to speak, added, “Aria, genuinely, you have made my week.” His body shook, and it was several seconds before he was able to get himself under control, lungs heaving so hard he felt it in his ribs.
When he lifted his head, it was to find Aria staring at him, wide-eyed and mouth agape, seemingly stuck in her seat.
“Sorry,” he managed, still wheezing a little. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”
“You didn’t,” Aria said, although her expression remained unnerved.
Yingxing tilted his head. “You sure, kid? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Aria opened her mouth to respond, but was interrupted by a sharp rap against the wooden doorframe of Yingxing’s workshop. He turned, expecting Miss Spider to have returned from her excursion, but instead was met by Dan Feng’s sheepish smile as he towed in several boxes of takeout.
“Hello,” he said, nodding politely to Aria and then to Yingxing. Show off, Yingxing thought fondly. He was never this formal when it was just the two of them. “I hope I’m not interrupting, but I heard we had guests. Have either of you eaten yet?”
“Nope,” said Yingxing, standing to help Dan Feng with the boxes and ending up with most of them. Dan Feng shot him an amused look, which Yingxing chose to ignore. “Dan Feng, meet Aria. Aria, Dan Feng.”
“It’s a pleasure,” said Dan Feng, smiling warmly in Aria’s direction. “Do you like dumplings? I ordered some specialty options in case of any dietary restrictions, although if you don’t like them, we can always get something else, I promise.”
Aria seemed momentarily stunned by Dan Feng’s presence before she stood up, blurting, “No, this is fine.” She jerked forward to help, but Dan Feng and Yingxing were too practiced at taking meals in the workshop. In a blink, the table was clear, bowls were distributed, and the food was unloaded.
Dan Feng settled across from Aria, explaining the different dishes and, when the girl showed even the slightest interest in an item, piling it onto her plate. Yingxing restrained a sigh. Dan Feng had paternal instincts so strong that Yingxing was sure he would give most fathers a run for their money. The thought sat uncomfortably in his gut, too close to a life that would never be his. As he had done many times before, he pushed it away.
Aria, for her part, was bewildered. She kept glancing between him and Dan Feng, as if requesting an explanation. Yingxing shrugged, feigning ignorance, though he couldn’t fight the smile tugging at his lips as he watched Aria’s pile of food grow from teetering to downright mountainous.
“Dan Feng,” he said, when it seemed Aria’s lunch might actually tip into the poor girl’s lap. “I think that’s enough for now.”
“Enough—? Ah, Aria, my apologies. Don’t feel pressured to eat it all if you don’t want to.”
“Yeah,” Yingxing agreed, pulling up a stool beside Dan Feng. Their knees brushed. Neither of them moved away. He nodded to the wall, where several layers of metal separated them from the cacophony of a forge at work. “Those animals will eat anything you throw at them.”
Dan Feng swatted him on the shoulder. “Yingxing, those are your coworkers.”
“Bleh. I’d say the same if they were in front of me— worse actually, you should see some of what they consider ‘food’.” He shuddered just thinking of it. In fact, he was fairly sure he hadn’t seen Mada eat anything but regulation food bars in the entire time he’d known her. “Like cardboard,” he murmured, haunted, and took a bite of beef dumpling to wipe the remembered taste from his mouth.
Dan Feng rolled his eyes and looked to Aria. “Ignore him.”
“Yes,” said Yingxing, reaching for another dumpling. “Ignore me. It’s been said I’m a ‘bad influence.’”
His friend didn’t dignify that with a response, but the corner of his mouth twitched in the way it did in public when he was fighting real laughter. Yingxing’s insides warmed at the sight until he remembered what Dan Feng had said when he first arrived.
“Hey,” he wondered aloud, not even trying to keep the conversation private. Aria’s attention had hardly drifted from Dan Feng since he’d entered the room, and he imagined ducking out for a moment with the High Elder in tow would cause even more suspicion on her part. (Besides, just because he semi-liked the girl didn’t mean he was trusting an outside agent inside his forge). “How did you know these two,” he gestured with his thumb at Aria, “were coming? Sensen basically blindsided me on the way in.”
Dan Feng lifted his wrist to his chin so his long robes hid the sight of him chewing. “It was the strangest thing,” he said around his mouthful. “I was on my way to the training grounds when one of the General's messengers waylaid me. They happened to mention in passing that you were busy with an IPC delegation, and I thought it would only be polite to introduce myself.” He finished that last bit with an easy smile directed at Aria.
The girl didn’t return the expression, but her shoulders lowered just a little bit from where they had been hovering near her ears. Privately, Yingxing wondered if she had something against Dan Feng, even though that made absolutely no sense. If anything, considering all the representatives he’d sent home crying during his tenure on Base, he should be the one she was keeping her guard up around.
Against his chin, Yingxing tapped his fingers once, twice. Something’s off, the sign meant, I don’t know what.
Dan Feng didn’t outwardly react, but beneath the table, his boot found Yingxing’s own and pressed against it. I see it too.
“Aria,” Dan Feng began, later, after most of the food was gone. “Usually we get a weekly report of the delegates on base, but for the life of me, I can’t recall any IPC personnel being scheduled.”
She shrugged. “It was a recent decision. Kaf— Miss Spider and I didn’t know we’d have to be here until a couple of hours ago.”
“That sounds like it must’ve been quite hectic,” Dan Feng offered kindly. Beneath the table, his boot bore a deeper groove into Yingxing’s.
“Yes,” said Aria. Her lips were pressed into a thin line. Yingxing had to admit, he felt bad for the girl. Lying to two adults as high up the Xianzhou food chain as they were took guts.
Not bad enough to ignore the obvious anymore, though. If the General wanted subtlety, he should’ve bothered Jing Yuan.
“What’s up with the fake names?”
Yingxing had been watching Aria for any sort of reaction, and react she did. Her eyes went wide as the saucer she nearly spilled onto the floor when her hands jerked. The ceramic remained intact when it hit the stone flooring, but the ringing sound of its crash echoed in the abruptly silent room.
Yingxing leaned down and picked the saucer up. He deposited it on the table with a clink. “Ok,” he said, steepling his fingers under his chin. “Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to explain to us who you are and why you’re actually here, and I promise that, no matter what, we’ll listen the whole way through. I can’t say that you won’t get in trouble, but we will listen, and we will treat you fairly. Sound like a deal?”
They sat in uneasy silence for several moments. Was it always this quiet in his section? As soon as he had the thought sound flooded back in, the regular clangs and clatters of a forge in the middle of the day.
“What the fuck,” he whispered under his breath, Dan Feng shooting him a curious glance. He didn’t have time to question it, though, since Aria had finally lifted her head, actually taking him in for perhaps the first time since she entered his forge.
“I’ll tell you everything,” she declared and then winced, ear scrunching to her shoulder, as if a bug had flown past. Before Yingxing could ask, she refocused on him. “But only you.”
Hm. Yingxing cast a surreptitious glance at Dan Feng and tilted his head to the side. Thoughts?
Dan Feng shrugged lightly. Yingxing took him at his not-word and turned his attention back to Aria.
“Deal,” he said, right as Dan Feng pushed himself to stand.
“It’s been a pleasure, Aria,” he said, perfectly sincere (which Yingxing thought was a little ironic considering Aria had basically just told him to go kick rocks) before turning to him. “I’ll be outside.”
If Aria was put off by the idea of Dan Feng sticking around, she didn’t show it. Instead, she tracked the High Elder with her eyes right until he disappeared into the clamor of the forge, at which point her gaze gravitated over to Yingxing. He smiled at her in a way he hoped was reassuring.
“So,” he said at the same time Aria declared, “none of this is real.”
Yingxing blinked at her. Mentally, he was running through all the places he and his coworkers stashed liquor in the forge; he had a feeling he’d need a drink before this conversation was through. “Is that so?”
He could tell he’d taken Aria slightly off guard by the twitch of her eyebrow, like she’d been itching to argue and Yingxing had denied her. She frowned. “I’m not lying,” she said.
“I didn’t say you were,” replied Yingxing. “But even you have to admit that’s a pretty hard sell.”
Aria opened her mouth. Shut it. With a sigh, she leaned forward until her head collided with the table and began muttering something under her breath. Yingxing shamelessly listened in and heard something about a wolf Aria was planning to skin.
Graphic, he thought.
Eventually, she raised her head. “I’m not lying,” she repeated. Yingxing said nothing, just settled deeper into his chair, waiting. Aria bit her lip.
“You’re…I mean none of this….Augh, I don’t know how to talk to you when you’re all...”
She made a vague gesture in his direction that Yingxing decided not to feel offended by. Despite the fact that Aria was probably a corporate spy, Yingxing was starting to worry for the girl.
“Take your time,” he said, pausing to snatch another dumpling from the bowl still laid out in front of them.
“We don’t have time!” Aria exploded. Yingxing paused with the dumpling halfway to his mouth. “That…the thing that has you trapped here, we don’t know what it’s doing to your body, and usually, you’re safe from most regular injuries because of your, er, unique constitution, but this is all new.”
Unique constitution, Yingxing thought with mounting disbelief. He’d once thrown his back out getting off the couch. “And who is this mysterious we?”
“Allies,” said Aria, and, when Yingxing just looked at her, repeated, “I’m not lying.”
For some reason, her words made Yingxing vaguely uncomfortable. To cover his unease, he took another bite of the dumpling. “I have allies,” he said. He thought of how many late nights he’d spent with the Quintet, with his work force, with Dan Feng. Yingxing, for all he had been a deeply lonely child, had grown up to be surrounded by people.
“Yes,” Aria said, her gaze flitting briefly to the door where Dan Feng had disappeared. In her eyes, there was something like grief, just for a moment, before resolve took its place. Her stare was unflinching when she turned back to face Yingxing. “I don’t know how to tell you this because I don’t know how to say it without hurting you. I tried before, and you, well, do you remember? I think you were in a…an open space. With a table. And a knife.”
Bloody eyes. Hands that didn’t work right. Yingxing stiffened, and Aria perked up.
“You do,” she breathed. “Listen, Bl— Yingxing. What I’m about to say is really important. You can’t trust anyone here. No one is real, and they’re all listening in. If you can find out how to get away from it all, there’s someone on the outside of this whole thing who might be able to get through to you.”
Yingxing’s heart was racing. Who was this girl? “You act as if you know me,” he said.
“I do. Or, well, I will. This,” she gestured to the room at large, “all happened seven hundred—”
An explosion, right next to his ear, ringing and ringing and ringing, but also completely silent. Were his ears bleeding? They must be, right? Except dead things didn’t bleed, so maybe not.
Yingxing stopped listening until Aria was done.
“—sorry, sorry. I should’ve known that was too much information, I’m so…” Aria froze from where she’d been freaking out in front of him (she had been sitting before, how much time had Yingxing just lost?). Her hands were clasped tight to her person as if she couldn’t bring herself to touch him. Like she was scared of him.
Dan Feng would have touched him. Baiheng would have touched him. Why did he feel like crying when everything was fine? Why…?
He must have lost more time because suddenly Aria was closer, her mouth moving and her gaze intent. It took Yingxing a sluggish moment to realize she was speaking to him.
“I can’t hear you,” he said, or, at the very least, his mouth shaped words and his throat spasmed, and that must have been enough because Aria paused mid-sentence, eyes going briefly wide before narrowing in determination. Her gaze scanned the workshop, and though Yingxing wanted to point her in the direction of the loose graph paper he always kept at his drafting table, movement suddenly seemed impossible. On the floor lay the dumpling he’d been eating. The beef filling had spilled out onto the weathered stone.
I’m going to have to clean that, Yingxing thought nonsensically. He tried to work his vocal cords to say so out loud, but his tongue was like cement in his mouth, thick and unwieldy.
After some brief fumbling, Aria found the graph paper. The line of her shoulders was tense as she scratched something out against the surface of the table. She was still writing when she turned back around to face him, and only seemed to finish centimetres before she’d stumble into Yingxing. If she did, Yingxing probably wouldn’t have been able to catch either of them. He knew objectively the thought should be distressing, but to him, this was all like a dream, happening to somebody else, far, far away. He simply wasn’t there.
Aria flipped her note around.
They know I’m here. I need to leave before they find me. Maybe, they’ll reset things? Will be distressing, try to remember. Other friend can stay, i think- FIND HER!! We can help.
And then, written in sweeping characters and underlined twice.
TRUST NO ONE. ESPECIALLY NOT DF - NOT REAL. THEYRE WATCHING.
Aria was already looking at him. Yingxing stared back.
‘Do you understand?’ she mouthed, the words so slow they were impossible to miss.
Yingxing blinked. Opened his mouth to respond.