Long-press a paragraph to send danmaku
The man nailed to the tunnel door was still breathing.
Lin Mo heard it before he saw it. Wet, rattling breaths. The kind that meant lungs filling with something they shouldn't. He'd torn up his market pass thirty seconds ago and walked into the dark, and now his phone light caught the guy's face. Young. Maybe twenty-five. Hands pinned above his head with rebar through the palms. Blood ran down his forearms in slow lines, dripping off his elbows onto the concrete.
"Lin Mo." Lei's boss stepped into the phone light from the other side. His name was Zhou. Older guy, maybe fifty, with a scar that split his left eyebrow in half. He wasn't holding a weapon. Didn't need to. Four men behind him, all carrying pipe or rebar. "Let's talk about what you owe."
Lin's left eye was still half-blind from the trade yesterday. The vision came and went in gray patches. He could see Zhou fine. Could see the nailed guy's chest rising and falling too fast.
"Three million," Zhou said. "That's the number. You ran. Made my guys look bad. So now it's four."
The guy on the door made a sound. Not words. Just a choked whimper.
"He's got nothing to do with this," Lin said. His voice came out steady. Good. "Let him down."
Zhou smiled. No teeth. "He owes too. Two hundred thousand. Tried to run same as you. You want him down? Buy him."
Lin's arm itched. The tattoo. It hadn't moved since yesterday, but he felt it under his sleeve now, warm and tight around his forearm like a hand squeezing.
"I don't have two hundred thousand," Lin said.
"No. But you got other things." Zhou tilted his head. "Su Jin's pissed at you. Dr. An won't take you now. You got no friends left down here. So here's the deal. You give me what I want, I let you both walk."
The guy on the door coughed. Blood came out. Not a lot. Enough.
"What do you want?" Lin asked.
Zhou's smile got wider. "You've been buying things. Selling things. Getting intel nobody else can get. I want in."
Lin didn't move. The tattoo was hot now. It hadn't done that before.
"You're working for someone," Zhou said. "Or you got a supplier. I don't care which. You bring me in, I clear your debt. His too."
The nailed guy's breaths were getting shorter. Lin looked at him. The rebar had punched through the center of each palm. If he pulled it out wrong, the guy would bleed out in two minutes. If he left him up there, he'd go into shock, maybe die anyway.
Lin's arm burned.
He pulled up his sleeve.
The tattoo had moved. It wasn't a band anymore. It was words, crawling across his skin in thin black lines.
*Trade available.*
*Item: Zhang Wei's life.*
*Price: 90 days.*
Zhang Wei. That was the guy on the door.
Zhou saw the tattoo. His smile dropped. "What the hell is that?"
Lin didn't answer. He was reading the rest.
*Alternate price: One memory, high emotional value.*
*Alternate price: Right hand motor function, 40% reduction, permanent.*
Ninety days. Three months of his life for a guy he didn't know.
Zhou stepped closer. "I asked you a question."
Lin pulled his sleeve down. His heart was punching his ribs. Ninety days. He'd already sold three days for the first intel. If he kept selling time, he'd run out. And if he ran out, the curse would take something else. That's what the clinic guy had said. The ones who burn through their span too fast don't die. They just stop being able to leave.
"I can't," Lin said.
Zhou's face went flat. "Wrong answer."
One of the guys behind him moved. Lin saw the pipe coming and ducked left. It clipped his shoulder. Pain cracked down his arm and he stumbled into the tunnel wall. His phone hit the ground. The light spun, caught Zhou's boots, then went out.
Dark.
Lin's breaths were loud in his ears. He heard boots scraping concrete. Heard the nailed guy wheezing. Heard his own pulse.
The tattoo burned hotter.
He pressed his forearm against the cold tunnel wall and felt the words move again.
*New trade available.*
*Item: Zhang Wei's life.*
*Price: One memory, high emotional value. Звук. Last auditory recall, deceased personal relation.*
Lin's throat closed.
Last auditory recall. Deceased personal relation.
His mom had died four years ago. Cancer. The last thing she'd said to him was in the hospital. He didn't even remember the words anymore. Just her voice. The shape of it. The way it sounded when she said his name.
That was the price.
"You got ten seconds," Zhou said from the dark. "Then I put him down and start on you."
Lin's hand was shaking. He couldn't see the tattoo but he felt it. Felt the words pressing into his skin like they wanted an answer.
He thought about the guy on the door. Thought about Zhang Wei, twenty-five, two hundred thousand in debt, rebar through his hands. Thought about his mom. Thought about her voice. The only piece of her he had left that wasn't a picture or a bill or a hospital bracelet in a drawer somewhere.
He pressed his palm flat against the tattoo.
"Deal," he whispered.
The burn spiked. Lin bit down on a yell. It felt like something was being pulled out of him through the skin. Not blood. Something else. A sound. A shape. He tried to remember what his mom's voice sounded like and it was gone. Not fading. Just gone. Like a file deleted.
The lights went out.
All of them. Not just his phone. The tunnel lights behind Zhou. The market lights fifty meters back. Everything.
Someone shouted. Boots hit concrete, fast. Zhou's voice: "What the hell—"
Lin heard metal scraping. The rebar coming out. Heard a body hit the ground. Heard Zhou yelling orders.
Then he heard something else.
Footsteps. Running. Coming from deeper in the tunnel. The sealed platform. The place Su Jin said nobody goes.
A voice. Zhou's. "Who's there?"
No answer. Just the footsteps. Getting closer.
Lin's tattoo moved one more time. He couldn't see it but he felt the words.
*My owner is in there.*