|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:20 pm
Quote: Threaded with Prince in google docs!
Strictly speaking, Liánlí did not expect the library to have a lot of materials that could help him out here. Like, what was he supposed to ask the catalog, exactly? “Hey, do you know anything about Saturn and/or its many assorted moons having pretty, pastel aliens with, like, lilac skin, and green hair, and they kinda look like dragons but also like qilins”? Asking questions like that of Google had mostly gotten Liánlí directed to a bunch of monster-boyfriend romance stories (many of which had gotten incredibly risqué and some of which had been surprisingly decent) and the “Archive Of Our Own” site that his Youtube manager was always telling him to avoid (which had also featured a bunch of monster-boyfriend stories, almost all of which had been incredibly slutty, but none of which had told Liánlí anything he actually wanted to know).
To the surprise of no one, throwing queries like that at the library’s catalog online had accomplished exactly nothing. Liánlí had accomplished a similar amount of Exactly Nothing by poking around the options for inter-library loans. Frankly, he expected to accomplish Exactly ******** Nothing by poking around the library’s catalog on the actual computers that the library provided so people could peruse what they had available to loan. And yet, here Liánlí found himself: grumbling under his breath, with slips of scrap-paper and a little golf pencil on-hand, hoping he could find literally anything that was neither remedial introductory How the Solar System Works stuff designed for children nor significantly more technical books that would mean less than nothing to Liánlí.
……Well, at least he didn’t need to grumble. For one thing, he looked cute today in his skinny jeans and red plaid skirt, and his shirt featuring the fanart of David Bowie as Jareth from Labyrinth. Besides, the fact that Liánlí had reason to look up anything related to the gorgeous alien he’d gotten that flash of up at his tower? Made his life significantly better than it could’ve been otherwise. Better to hum quietly and bob his head in time with the tune (still stuck in his head since he’d fallen into a cellar up at Kāifēng) instead of grumble: Mind the map now and watch your step, or you’ll end up in an oubliette. One wrong move and it’s down, down, down…
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:22 pm
Ming Lian loved living in Destiny City. There were just so many eclectic individuals out there to meet, so many people living their lives bombastically and beautifully. It was a wonderful city, the dangers aside. It didn't really bother Ming too much; it was, after all, the kind of stuff he'd grown up around hearing, even if he mostly had lived on the outskirts so he could bond and train with the horses he raced more often than some of the city jockeys. Today, however, he was in the library, enjoying the quiet. It was a different sort of quiet in here compared to the countryside where the horses were kept. A quiet he liked almost better (even with the buzzing of the AC and the computers; after all, the computers were why he was here, and the AC was heavenly).
Though, one patron's face caught his eye as he sat in the computer chair next to the stranger, and he couldn't help staring for a long moment. Where have I seen that face before? he wondered to himself, before gasping softly and pulling up his google drive. He navigated to the photos and pulled up the folder that, nowadays, made him wince in guilt. AI generated images of what Zhìháo may have looked like over the years. His spouse's favorite cousin, before he'd disappeared.
A quick glance between the images and the stranger's face proved it to Ming. Though the results were not exactly the same, something about it just… felt right, deep in his bones.
That man was…
"Zhìháo?" he whispered, locking his computer.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:26 pm
As predicted, Liánlí’s attempts at searching the catalog……mostly came up with nothing. Considering how little anything he’d ever learned in a science class actually resembled the way that Saturn had been for him when he’d visited Kaifeng, he rather doubted that any of the books that had come up would help him. Even the ones with university presses from Duke, Oxford, or ******** wherever listed as their publishers. Not unless said universities had secret departments of, Liánlí didn’t know, Magical Space Archaeological Studies or something (which sounded really quite difficult to justify on a university budget and therefore unlikely to exist).
At least some of the nonsense books that he’d dredged up about aliens sounded, if nothing else, incredibly entertaining. Not like Dr. Chuck Tingle levels of entertaining, but Liánlí realized that set too high a bar for anyone but the chief buckaroo himself. He was, he thought, almost ready to abandon this computer, go collect the books that had attracted his interest, and then return home to Táotáo and all the videos he needed to finish editing—but then whoever had sat next to him spoke. Said a name.
Liánlí froze. Felt one hand jerk back from the keyboard while the other clenched around the little golf pencil. Panic made his pulse throb in the place where the ER doc had stitched him up after that battle outside the bank.
They’d said “Zhìháo.” Whoever they were, they’d said that name.
Biting his tongue didn’t rouse Liánlí’s brain from the stupor like he’d gotten slapped upside the head by a particularly vicious, fish-themed youma. Why had they said That Name? Maybe it was some weird coincidence? Not the most common name, no, but there were plenty of other “Zhìháo”s in the world.… Cautiously, taking a deep breath in the hopes of calming his whirl of absolute headless-chicken panicking thoughts and schooling the crack off his face, he turned to face the other patron. Put on a pretty little smile, confused but polite.
The fact that he found himself face-to-face with Qiye’s stupid fiancé made Liánlí feel 5,000% justified in what he planned to do.
“Ahh, apologies. Gege must be mistaken,” he said, deliberately calling Lian Ming “gege” because he himself would never otherwise have acknowledged which of them was older. Shaking his head because all the body language interpreters on the Youtubes said it could make his lie look more sincere, since he was refuting an idea, and in so doing, rustling the charm on his necklace. Hayden had found it on Etsy back when they’d been in undergrad and given it to him for his birthday, a little gold charm engraved with the Rider-Waite version of the Death tarot card, dangling off a silver chain. As it moved, it made a tinkling sound, and Liánlí let his smile slip into something more mischievous. “Perhaps gege had a dream about me? Confused me for his friend?”
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:28 pm
whee For a moment, Ming almost believed him. Then the necklace jingling drew his attention to it—he definitely remembered Zhìháo wearing that as a birthday gift from… someone. And… gege? Well, if Zhìháo had run away and was trying to keep Ming off the scent, it only made sense for him to do something he literally would never do if they were acknowledging each other as who they were instead of Zhìháo insisting on playing this silly little game where he hadn't been caught.
Which. Made it sound bad. He didn't want Zhìháo to feel caught, not when he wanted to forge that connection with his cousin-in-law once more.
"I'm sure I'm not, didi," he said with a bit of snark leaking into his voice. "That necklace… Look, I know why you don't talk to us anymore, but… my husband, Qiye?"
That word wasn't the most accurate word to describe his spouse, but it would be the most attention grabbing to Zhìháo, he was sure.
"He really misses you," he finished softly. "I'm sure you would understand why."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:29 pm
No matter how much he told himself to stay in character as Someone Who Definitely Did Not Recognize Lian Ming-er, Liánlí couldn’t help the slight twitch he got at being called didi. Sure, he’d invited it by kicking open the door with gege, but last he checked, most normal people didn’t immediately give up gege/didi privileges to random strangers at the library. His hands itched to cover up the necklace, but that only would’ve made him look more guilty—both of (technically) being Huáng Zhìháo and of very rudely lying about it. So, instead, he busied them with closing everything on the computer and ending his session. The sooner he got out of here, the better.
And then Lian Ming went and used a word distinctly unexpected: <******** dammit.
“Hǔ tóu shé wěi,” Liánlí sighed, significantly more at himself than Ming-er. After all, only one of them deserved the sentiment of tiger’s head, snake’s tail, right in this moment. Rubbing one of his eyes and not looking back to this infuriatingly hard-to-refute little interloper, Liánlí told him, “Not Zhìháo anymore; Liánlí. Got a judge to make it official and everything. And—is he really still ‘Qiye’? Or did that change, too?” Looking around them, Liánlí felt acutely aware of how many people were in the library. “Or would Ming-er rather not go disclosing that where people could eavesdrop? My place isn’t far, if privacy’s better. Only one who can eavesdrop there is Táotáo, and she’s a dog.”
Because having his favorite cousin’s idiot husband over for tea was a thing that was happening now, apparently. In theory, anyway.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon May 22, 2023 5:30 pm
Lian Ming quirked his lips into a smile at the acquiescence, even if he'd still been wrong about the name at the end of it. He had the right person. Quickly, he tapped out to end his session on the library computer and stood up, nodding.
"Ming-er definitely doesn't want to discuss anything here," he said a bit dryly. "I'd love to meet your dog."
Despite his dry tone, he couldn't help his smile twisting into an even brighter one, excitement coursing through him as the reality of the situation began to hit. He'd found Líanlí, he was alive and well. As far as Ming could tell, anyway. Qiye would be elated, as well.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
