Little Pink Starfish

1.

An Zhe was in the vehicle.
Morning light filtered through the armored car’s sunroof.
This was his fourth trip to the Abyss with Lu Feng.

He had woken up.
But he didn’t get out of bed.
He couldn’t get out of bed.

Wrapped in a blanket, he refused to emerge until Lu Feng brewed a cup of milk and placed it in front of him.

Lu Feng asked, “Feeling better?”
An Zhe nodded.
“Still hurts?”
An Zhe shook his head.
Then after a moment, he nodded again.

Lu Feng frowned slightly and came over to pull aside the thin blanket wrapped around him. An Zhe let him.

The blanket was made of a fine, smooth fabric, soft to the touch, but even it seemed rough compared to the milky white skin beneath—like the delicate surface of a white mushroom after the rain, easily bruised at the lightest touch.

Right now, that skin bore overlapping marks. A bit below his left chest, the skin was broken and red. It hadn’t been serious—until he got dressed that morning and his shirt brushed against the wound. It stung, and he gave a soft hiss of pain.

Lu Feng opened a drawer and took out alcohol. He dabbed it with a cotton ball and gently cleaned the wound before applying medication.

—Which turned the skin even redder. An Zhe’s skin was too delicate—like a freshly grown mushroom during the rainy season.

After the ointment, the cool sensation made him shiver. He wrapped himself back in the blanket and let Lu Feng pull him close. He leaned his head on Lu Feng’s right shoulder.

—Then suddenly remembered this person was the one who caused the wound in the first place. He shouldn’t be so cozy with him.

An Zhe tried to pull away, but Lu Feng held him down.

He struggled to no avail, and in the process, the blanket brushed the wound again.

“Don’t move,” Lu Feng said.
An Zhe: “……”

There was not the slightest trace of guilt in his tone—instead, it sounded like a scolding. Infuriating.

From his angle, An Zhe could see Lu Feng’s throat and neck. He clenched his teeth.

—Lu Feng pulled him even tighter, making escape impossible.

An Zhe thought it over and was still very unhappy. This wasn’t a fleeting unhappiness, but a buildup of emotions over many days. He had been meaning to bring something up with Lu Feng.
Now he finally had a decent injury to mention.

He muttered, “You’re too mean.”
Lu Feng asked, “Am I?”
An Zhe said, “Yes.”

“No,” Lu Feng turned him over and said, “I’ve been very careful.”
An Zhe: “?”

If this was Lu Feng being careful, what would he be like if he wasn’t—tear him apart and eat him?

An Zhe frowned. “Impossible.”
Lu Feng: “Hmm?”

“When you’re too rough, I always struggle,” An Zhe said. “I even cry.”
Lu Feng looked at him.
“But you ignore me,” An Zhe said. “And become even meaner.”

A new day began with the little mushroom scolding him—Lu Feng looked down at the mushroom in his arms.
The voice was soft, tender, mumbling complaints.

An Zhe had finished talking.
But Lu Feng wanted to hear more.

So he asked, “Anything else?”

An Zhe glared at him. Wasn’t that enough?

“I thought that was how to show I cared,” Lu Feng said.
An Zhe: “?”
An Zhe: “Anything else?”

“Yes,” Lu Feng said. “You should learn to control your behavior.”

An Zhe: “?”
He couldn’t possibly have done anything wrong.

He stared directly at Lu Feng and said coldly, word by word, “You’re the one with the problem.”
“You see,” Lu Feng replied. “Now you’re acting cute again.”

An Zhe was now convinced there was a fundamental difference in species between them.

If he could reach a pillow, the first thing he’d do would be throw it at Lu Feng’s face.
But now both his hands were restrained, and all he could do was stare him down.

Eventually, Lu Feng chuckled.
He lowered his head to kiss the corner of An Zhe’s lips. An Zhe turned his face to avoid it but was held fast.

His chin was lifted, and he was kissed deeply several times until he couldn’t breathe. Then Lu Feng kissed the corners of his eyes.

Breath brushing his ears, Lu Feng’s right hand slipped under the blanket to rest on his waist—where there were surely more marks from the night before.

An Zhe shuddered.

He said, “Don’t.”

Lu Feng replied, “Didn’t hear that.”
An Zhe brought up the past: “Then what about when I cried? You couldn’t see that either?”

“I wasn’t hitting you,” Lu Feng said. “Crying doesn’t help.”

—A new day began with silently cursing the colonel.

2.

An Zhe was still in the vehicle.
Starlight now shone through the sunroof.
This was his fourth trip to the Abyss with Lu Feng.

Then, the colonel offered a solution.

Expressionless, he leaned back against the bedframe and said, “Do it yourself.”
It sounded like he was next to some diagnostic equipment. “You do it.”

An Zhe faced him, hesitated for a moment.

Then he leaned in and kissed the colonel’s Adam’s apple.

Then kissed the side of his neck, pondering his next move.

He realized he was wearing loose white pajamas, while the colonel was still fully dressed, so he started struggling with his shirt buttons.

He was familiar with this shirt—he was, after all, an emotionless laundry machine.

But the shirt did not go easy on him, and the angle only made it harder.

After unbuttoning the first one—

—Just like how Lu Feng sometimes said things to him.

Colonel Lu remained unaffected.

Several threads of mycelium crawled upward.

The colonel finally deigned to unbutton the second one himself—slowly.

An Zhe kept thinking.

“People from the third basement,” Lu Feng said with a hint of laughter in his hoarse voice, “should be more skilled.”

An Zhe: “…”
He whispered, “I didn’t actually learn anything.”

And he couldn’t go back and relearn it.

“I can tell,” Lu Feng said. When he lowered his voice, there was a high, magnetic resonance to it that made An Zhe shiver from his ears to his spine.

He remembered the past.

When they first met, An Zhe had even said, “I work on the third basement level.”
Lu Feng had just responded with an “Oh.”

An Zhe was curious what the colonel had thought of him back then.

As if reading his mind, Lu Feng said, “At the time, I didn’t know you were a mushroom. I thought if you weren’t working on that level, you couldn’t possibly survive in the base.”

He glanced casually at An Zhe and continued, “Looking at it now—even if you were, you still couldn’t support yourself.”

More mycelium crawled.

Lu Feng stopped speaking.

An Zhe’s current wish was that the colonel would become mute—like that emotionless puppet from before.

His pale fingers rested on Lu Feng’s chest, planning to take his hand once the buttons were undone.

Then he noticed Lu Feng staring at the same spot, seeming deep in thought—an expression he only wore when considering something serious.

A few seconds later, Lu Feng said, “So I was fooled after all.”

An Zhe tilted his head.

“Slow-witted, didn’t know what sexual harassment meant, worked illegal low-wage jobs,” Lu Feng listed, thoughtful. “This can’t just be explained by naivety or low intelligence.”

An Zhe: “…”
He said, “Stop talking.”

But clearly, the colonel’s hearing was selectively impaired.

“That night was strange too. You invited me to stay in your room.”
An Zhe said, “Because you had nowhere to go.”
“You even gave me your toothbrush. You had no idea about human social boundaries.”

An Zhe remained silent, as if his hearing had also become selectively impaired.

“Unless that was just a clumsy flirtation you learned on the third floor. But you were very obedient that night,” Lu Feng added.

An Zhe knew he was referring to Judgment Day. That night, he had invited Lu Feng to stay in his room.

He hugged Lu Feng, forehead against his chest. Even through a layer of fabric, there was a warm and solid feeling. He could hear the steady heartbeat. The past, scene by scene, like a dream.

An Zhe imagined another possibility.

“So,” he said, “what if back then…”

What if, by coincidence—

If he really had been a worker from the third floor, or a naive mushroom following Boss Xiao’s advice to approach the Judge another way—what would he have done that night?

An ulterior-motive variant sheltering a homeless Judge.
Back then, when they barely knew each other and were still wary.

But it was also a time filled with death, protests, and betrayal.

What if he had kissed Lu Feng that night? Unbuttoned his shirt?

What would have happened?

An Zhe didn’t know.

He only knew that to this day, when he thought of the colonel’s back on Judgment Day, his heart still trembled. Looking into those green eyes, he felt pulled back into that moment. The blood-scented night wind howling through the city.

That expression returned to his face.
Quiet. Sad.

Loving the world.
Not loving the world.

The bed. The desk. The room’s layout resembled a standard base room.
At night, darkness filled the space. Distant wind howled like it had that night.

That night, An Zhe also wore soft, snowy white pajamas. His face was still innocent.

Lu Feng’s fingers pressed against his shoulder, his gaze almost tangible. An Zhe first lowered his lashes, then looked up to meet his eyes. His lashes quivered gently, like flower petals beneath a butterfly’s wings.

Lu Feng stared at him for a long time, like watching twilight settle over a snowy plain.

Until dusk fell, and An Zhe leaned down and kissed the corner of his lips.

Silently, he kissed his lips again.

Past memories flickered like flame.