Insights Chapter 48: Dreaming

Chapter 48: Dreaming

Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations

Editor: Karai

Shen Junci remained in a dream. A man’s calm voice came from the phone, very serious, analyzing the case step by step and assigning tasks. The effect of alcohol made him feel that this dream was particularly real. The familiar voice seemed to take him through time and space, back to the past. It seemed like a dream, yet also like fragments of memory, everything he had experienced before.

The ward was the best-conditioned single room, somewhat spacious. When the curtains were pulled open, the sunlight would shine in. Even through closed eyelids, he could sense the brightness, allowing him to distinguish between day and night. Someone was massaging his fingers, a voice came into his ear, “Lin Luo, can you hear me? The doctor said you need to be spoken to regularly for you to wake up. If you can hear me, you can move your fingers to let me know.”

Then his hand was placed on someone’s palm, the movement gentle, the palm warm. The person by the bedside seemed to anticipate his response. He lay in bed, completely unresponsive. He couldn’t even blink his eyes, let alone move his fingers.

“Your fingers are really long.” The man didn’t seem to expect a response from him, just engaging in conversation.

After a while, the man asked again, “Is your wound still hurting? The doctor said you’re slowly getting better. Now, it seems the situation is not bad.”

Getting better? He could hear the beeping of nearby instruments, feel a mask on his face, he couldn’t eat, a gastric tube was inserted into his chest, how could this be considered not bad? It seemed that he wasn’t the only one who was ill; Gu Yanchen had also become somewhat abnormal. He remembered reading in a book that vegetative people couldn’t sense the external environment, but his current situation was hard to explain.

Occasionally, his consciousness was clear. He tried hard to wake up, but his will seemed completely unable to control his body. Eventually, he gave up struggling. After Lin Xianglan’s death, he often felt like there was a net around him, suffocating him. When he fell into a coma, everything changed.

His consciousness seemed trapped in a small box, time stretched out. Suddenly, he had a lot of time, able to revisit past details.

Gu Yanchen’s voice continued, “When you get better, I’ll take you to the yard to see the sunlight, trees, birds. Where else do you want to go? By the sea? Tourist attractions? Want to watch a movie, or eat something delicious? You said you liked the fried rice I made, so I can make it for you every day. And I bought you new headphones, I’ll bring them to you when you’re better.” Gu Yanchen paused for a moment and said, “It’s almost the Ghost Festival. I went to burn paper in front of your dad’s grave and put two bouquets of flowers. One was sent by me for you, I picked white carnations.”

Mentioning his father, his heart felt a pang, finally a tear welled up in his eye.

Gu Yanchen, sitting by the bedside, seemed to discover something extraordinary, reaching out to wipe away that single tear. “You really can hear me.”

He could hear, he could still sense this world. Relatives, friends, former colleagues, and subordinates of Lin Xianglan… He knew many people had come to visit him, but most only stayed for a short while, some came just to see if he had died or if he posed any threat to them. Gradually, fewer and fewer people came, and it seemed like he had been forgotten by this world.

Only Gu Yanchen persisted.

Gradually, he began to anticipate his visits more and more. When Gu Yanchen accompanied him, most of the time he talked about his own experiences, family, work, life, movies he had seen, and he even brought ads into his hospital room. Talking to the air wasn’t an easy task.

He thought Gu Yanchen would give up like others eventually. But Gu Yanchen found something new again. He said, “I looked at your space and found a quote from Dostoevsky —” Then he recited the quote, “‘Ordinary people must be obedient, they have no right to break the law because, you see, they are ordinary people. Extraordinary people, however, have the right to commit all sorts of crimes, the right to break the law arbitrarily, to behave outrageously, and this is just because they are extraordinary people.’ This quote is from ‘Crime and Punishment’. Today, I brought you a copy of it. It’s a thick book, so it might take me a while to read it.”

The sound of pages flipping came to his ears. If he could move at that moment, he would definitely stop Gu Yanchen, cover his ears, and say, “Stop reciting.”

It was nothing but a celebrity quote copied down during his teenage years. He didn’t care at all, nor did he want to know what else Dostoevsky had said. He wanted to tell him, if it’s too difficult to read, please get him an e-book, or find An Nanchor to read it online, it would be much more convenient. He had a rough idea of what ‘Crime and Punishment’ was about. Such books were too heavy for his age, they sounded like lullabies, making him sleepy.

He hoped the other party wouldn’t be so stubborn. But Gu Yanchen took this matter very seriously and persistently. Except for when he was extremely busy, he was basically unwavering. He came to the hospital room every day, then started reading diligently. Even the nurses in the ward expressed surprise at his determination.

Gu Yanchen said, “It’s nothing. I used to train as a sniper, could stay still for hours. Coming over every day to read a bit is like taking a break.”

Gradually, he began to get used to his voice. Sometimes he would listen for a while, the stories were really good, not as dull as expected, and some parts even gave him insights and resonated with him. Later on, book after book was replaced, and he had become accustomed to falling asleep to his voice.

Reading became the only remaining connection between him and the outside world. His favorite was still ‘The Little Prince’, he never grew tired of it, he could even recite many passages from memory. For example, that passage he liked the most, “The Fox said: ‘To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need for you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world.'”

Lying on the sickbed, he felt that he had also established some kind of strange relationship with Gu Yanchen. Destiny was strange; they met in the vast sea of ​​people, and for him, Gu Yanchen was the only one in the world.

Later, when he woke up as Shen Junci and couldn’t hear those reading voices, he often suffered from insomnia. Fortunately, he finally met Gu Yanchen again and cleverly recorded his voice. Those recordings were edited and played on loop, extremely effective for hypnosis. The only downside was that occasionally the volume would suddenly increase, waking him up from his dreams.

Like now, he mumbled sleepily, “Lower your voice.”

“What lower my voice?” Gu Yanchen’s voice asked in his ear.

“The volume wasn’t this loud just now…” Shen Junci murmured.

There was a light laugh from the other side, “Doctor Shen, wake up.”

When Shen Junci talked to him, he thought he was listening to him talk about the case. Shen Junci rubbed his forehead, not wanting to answer this question, feeling a sense of déjà vu.

After three seconds of silence, Gu Yanchen decided to let it go, “How’s your health? If you’re still uncomfortable, I can call another medical examiner.”

Shen Junci got up and said, “I’m fine now. No problem finishing the work. Shall I go?”

Gu Yanchen said, “Then freshen up and have some breakfast. We’ll talk in the car.”

Shen Junci asked, “Do we need to go to the City Bureau first to get the tools?”

Gu Yanchen said, “Qi Yi’an has already gone to the City Bureau to get the forensic investigation kit. We’re going directly to the scene now.”

Penang has had a lot of rain recently. It could rain at any time during the day. The light rain had started early this morning and had been falling steadily since then. The rain hadn’t stopped yet, it just turned a little lighter. The rain rustled, leaving a fine mist on the windshield of the car.

In the car, Gu Yanchen briefly recounted the case to Shen Junci again. This morning, a dead man was found in the basement of a house.

The female landlord called the police, and officers from the sub-bureau arrived. The man had been beaten badly, his whole body a bloody mess. After receiving feedback from the City Bureau, Director Ding assigned it to the Special Criminal Division. Shen Junci listened carefully, looking at the raindrops sliding down the car window, not saying much.

The crime scene was located in the west of Penang City. At around six in the morning, when it was getting light, the earliest arriving police had already sealed off the courtyard and put up cordon lines. It was an old farmhouse. The yard was isolated, the owner usually didn’t live here, and it was filled with miscellaneous items.

The one who reported the case was the landlady, Fu Meng, 38 years old this year. She said her house had been empty for a long time. Last night, a neighbor who got off work late saw that her house’s door was open and the lights were on, so he told her. After hearing this, she felt a bit suspicious, afraid of being robbed, but also afraid that she forgot to close the door and turn off the lights. She couldn’t sleep all night.

At around five in the morning, she hurried over and found a man who had been dead for a long time in the basement. She called the police in a hurry.

Lu Ying asked Fu Meng, “Do you know this dead man?”

Fu Meng said, “I don’t know him.”

Lu Ying asked again, “Who do you think might have committed the crime?”

Fu Meng looked embarrassed, “Robbers? Or someone else? Maybe they thought my house was unoccupied because I don’t live here often.”

She hesitated before emphasizing again, “I really don’t know this man.”

She was just a middle-aged rural woman, seeming to know nothing. It seemed that she thought if she emphasized this point, the case wouldn’t affect her.

Bai Meng had been standing aside, listening for a few sentences.

When Lu Ying finished questioning, Bai Meng turned his head and whispered to Lu Ying, “The landlady who reported the case seems a bit suspicious.”

Lu Ying said, “Be confident, remove the ‘seems.'”

Gu Yanchen didn’t respond to their words and lifted the cordon line, walking into the crime scene.

As soon as he entered the door, Gu Yanchen smelled a strong smell of blood. In the small room, several old sheets hung crookedly, and the floor was covered with plastic sheets with many bloodstains on them. The man lay on the ground, already dead for a long time, his hands tied behind his back, already stiffened in rigor mortis. Just by observing with the naked eye, it was evident that the man had died a very tragic death. His eyes were swollen, his nose broken, blood streaming down his chin, making a mess.

Qi Yi’an also arrived, carrying things and going to the basement to start measuring, taking photos, and drawing baseline. Shen Junci took over gloves, shoe covers, and a mask, put them on, and checked the corpse. After taking photos, he carefully cut off the knots on the man’s hands and feet, which were important evidence. After removing the ropes, due to rigor mortis, the corpse’s posture looked a bit strange.