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Chapter Text

The 24 hour cafe’s fluorescent yellow lights were too bright, and Shen Qingqiu’s eyes burned as he stumbled out of the car, miscalculating the distance down and hitting the pavement with a grunt of pain. He lifted the hem of his robe before heading into the restaurant.

He had stumbled over the cursedly flowy fabric several times from exhaustion and he was so tired of these clothes. Pushing open the heavy glass door, he nearly fell into the room, momentarily blinded by the flickering yellow ceiling lights. The buzzing was like a hoard of mosquitos that attacked his ears and made his head pound.

Shen Qingqiu squinted, opening his blurry eyes as much as he could stand. He quickly picked out the darkest corner of the room and took a seat there, peering out of the window. Only a flickering lamppost illuminated the darkened parking lot, overlaid in the glass by the glare of the light in the diner.

It became too hard to look at, and Shen Qingqiu dropped his eyes, massaging his temples. He sighed, trying to get his racing heart under control.

“What can I get you today?” A waitress asked from somewhere off to the side. Shen Qingqiu startled violently; his knee hit the bottom of the table as his eyes flew open. Instantly his headache flared, as painful as if his very brain had been struck.

Shen Qingqiu forced himself to calm, stiffly smiling as he looked up at the woman. His hands shook as he pushed his hair back from his face. It was long, filthy, and unkept. He made a mental note to visit a barber, but not before bathing. “Just some rice, thank you,” he told her.

She was keeping a distance from him nervously with a polite smile. “Right away,” she said, and then disappeared into the back room.

Then Shen Qingqiu was alone, cringing away from the harsh fluorescents in the darkest corner of the café. He rested his forehead against the cool plastic of the once-white table. It was stained and yellowed, and while Shen Qingqiu would have cared about things like that a few months ago, now he was just gulping in harsh breaths, trying to get enough air into his lungs.

He didn’t have a way to pay. This fact shouldn’t have affected him like this, but he hadn’t had to think about money —working or buying food— in months.

Escape from that place had taken everything he had. Shen Qingqiu had stolen a car. He chuckled, a small, slightly manic noise. He had starved himself, stolen a car, then drove off, disoriented and exhausted, in the direction of the city lights over the horizon in the dead of night. He had no idea what country he was in, never mind how to get home.

He had planned this escape just trying to get to where he was now. But he hadn’t thought beyond this point.

He was free, but only in principle.

The waitress arrived with his food, he could see her feet from where his forehead was pressed against the table. Shen Qingqiu straightened his posture, keeping his face carefully blank as he ran through what he would say to get out of this without being arrested.  

The rice bowl was set in front of him with a soft clink. He stared at it, and his stomach churned nauseously.

Even if he were somehow able to convince the waitress to let him off for free, he still didn’t have the money to pay for transportation. The car he took was nearly out of gas, and besides, it was too conspicuous. If someone was tracking him with it, he would be caught in a matter of days.

The blinding light of a car’s headlights momentarily blinded Shen Qingqiu through the wide window, cutting mercilessly through the darkness outside and igniting his headache in a burst behind his eyes. He shut them tight, unable to ignore the prickling of tears from under his lashes.

He had come so far, thinking that this would be the finish line, only to be faced with an entirely new mountain.

As he silently despaired, there was a jingle behind him as the beaded curtain was brushed aside.  He felt a brush of fabric against his robes as someone walked past him, then a soft sigh as the person sat down in the opposite seat.

“You should eat,” came a gentle voice drifting across the table, and Shen Qingqiu froze. Dread spread like creeping ice down his spine and to his extremities. Slowly, almost as if he were unwilling, he opened his eyes.

A sweetly soft smile greeted him. This gaze was like a lamb’s, imploring and understanding. The way this youth looked at him was like the sun looked at the moon, bright without refrain and bursting with unconditional effulgence.

That face lurked endlessly behind Shen Qingqiu’s eyelids, that sweet smile that promised unceasing agony.

Shen Qingqiu hid his hands under the table as he straightened. He didn’t want to see how badly his hands were trembling.

“I’m not going back there,” he said, holding his head high and peering down his nose at Luo Binghe. This was only one man, and not even a full-grown one. Even though every cell in his body was telling him to flee, he took a deep, steady breath and calmed his voice.

Luo Binghe tilted his head, light brown hair falling in waves around his face. His eyebrows came together in concern and sympathy. “Why not? Wasn’t I taking such good care of you?”

Shen Qingqiu was struck speechless at this audacity. Suddenly his face twisted in rage and he thrust his arm under Luo Binghe’s nose. “Care? What good care?” he scoffed, shaking in anger. Luo Binghe didn’t even look at what Shen Qingqiu was showing him, instead taking the offered hand between his own with incredible gentleness.

Shen Qingqiu’s pale skin was a stark contrast to the black metal shackle fastened securely around his wrist like a collar.

Evidence of brutal captivity, and the way Luo Binghe caressed it was like it was delicate and beautiful. He spoke so softly that Shen Qingqiu had to strain his ears to hear him.

“Is it so hard for you to accept that you liked it?” Luo Binghe dropped his eyes, letting his curly bangs fall over his face.

“Drugs,” Shen Qingqiu spat, eyes flashing as his face warmed. It had been the drugs keeping him complacent and docile, nothing more! How dare Luo Binghe say something like that! A shameless, brazen lie delivered through a mouth like a kitten’s.

Luo Binghe took one hand off of Shen Qingqiu’s arm to point at the bowl of rice. “You’ve been starving yourself, you should eat.”

As if Luo Binghe didn’t know exactly why Shen Qingqiu hadn’t eaten in a week.

The drugs they put in his food made escape impossible, so during a rare moment of clarity, he started hiding his meals in a pillowcase. With everyone’s guard down, he had taken his chance and stumbled out of the abandoned missile silo into the open air, where he picked a car at random to drive off in.

Shen Qingqiu picked up a pair of chopsticks, face still creased in rage. With his other arm still dangling limply from Luo Binghe’s grasp, he started to eat.

Luo Binghe’s eyes on the side of his face burned, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t dare look up.

Luo Binghe had to have something planned. He wanted to get Shen Qingqiu to come back with him, Shen Qingqiu was sure of it. Whether it would be by the power of persuasion or something else, Shen Qingqiu had to be on his guard.

Sure enough, Luo Binghe started talking again in that same placid, gentle voice. “You’re a god. Here you’re nothing, but over there, only I know who you really are.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t look up, but his chopsticks faltered. “I am Shen Qingqiu, top fencer in China and three-time Olympic medalist. I am no god of that filthy mob.”

Luo Binghe clicked his tongue, and Shen Qingqiu suddenly realized Luo Binghe still held his arm. He yanked it away, but Luo Binghe’s grip tightened painfully around the thin, pale wrist and Shen Qingqiu lurched forward instead.

“You’re right. You don’t belong to them.” Luo Binghe said lightly. His smile never seemed to falter. “You’re mine.”

Shen Qingqiu shivered. “I’m not yours,” he stated contemptuously, but it was something that he had repeated to himself again and again, his mantra in his seclusion. It sounded rehearsed.

“Over these months, haven’t I cared for your physical needs?” Luo Binghe pleaded. Shen Qingqiu brow twitched, mouth pressing into a tight line.

 Luo Binghe still continued, “I’ve fed you, given you water, provided you with means of rest…”

Lies, all lies. None of that would have been necessary if Luo Binghe had let Shen Qingqiu leave.

“Cleaned up after you, offered comfort when it all became too much for you and you started to cry…"

Shut up, shut up— Shen Qingqiu shut his eyes, as if he could block everything out with the thin lids.

“I’ve accepted and loved you at your worst, most dirty and soiled.”

Shen Qingqiu could bear it no longer. He burst out, “Lies! You made me that way!”

Luo Binghe’s grin widened at receiving a response, and Shen Qingqiu’s stomach dropped. He shouldn’t have spoken. “I made you a god.”

Shen Qingqiu stood suddenly, vision blurring with rage.

The waitress was at his side in a second. “Sir? Is everything alright?”

She didn’t sound worried for Shen Qingqiu, and instantly Shen Qingqiu realized the precariousness of the situation. He looked like a drug addict, with red-rimmed eyes, wan complexion, and the trembling of his body.

With the way he was glaring at this bright-eyed youth, the waitress was worried he would lose it and attack. Shen Qingqiu stared at the waitress for a second, searching for pity or understanding in her gaze, but found none.

Shen Qingqiu sat down again with a flick of his hem. He had gotten so used to wearing these ‘god’ robes, it was a natural movement to sweep the fabric out of the way. The waitress left, but Luo Binghe had none of his bright-sun gaze to spare for her.

“Please come back to me,” Luo Binghe asked in earnest. “I promise, no more drugged stupor.”

“No more drugs?” Shen Qingqiu asked warily, and Luo Binghe shook his head sincerely.

“I can’t promise that, there are too many factors at play. But unless you want them, no more drugs. You will keep your head the entire time you’re in that cell.” Shen Qingqiu scoffed at Luo Binghe’s stipulation. He would never want to be drugged and helpless.

Although Luo Binghe was acting like he held all the power here, he was also trying to get Shen Qingqiu to come back of his own volition. It didn’t matter, there was no way Shen Qingqiu would ever willingly go back to that place.

Shen Qingqiu had to find some way to obtain money, after he had eaten, then he could travel far away from here and forget these months had ever happened. He returned to his rice, resolving once again to ignore Luo Binghe’s presence.

“I really…I really just want what’s best for you,” Luo Binghe admitted. Shen Qingqiu wasn’t listening.

“You’re not acknowledging what’s really making you happy, and that’s just hurting you more.” Shen Qingqiu still wasn’t listening.

“I can help you to face that part of yourself that you don’t let yourself see. The meek, scared child in you that just wants comfort.”  Shen Qingqiu wasn’t—

Shen Qingqiu’s vision started to darken at the edges as the world tilted alarmingly. He shot to his feet, heart pounding in his chest. He recognized these symptoms, how could he not?

He had spent months drugged out of his mind in that cult’s holding cell.

He had to get out of here! Shen Qingqiu stumbled as quickly as he could towards the bead curtain towards the door. The buzzing of bright harsh yellow lights suddenly seemed to sound like a scream in his ears, and he crashed to the ground as the world finally went dark.

Chapter Text

When he came back to consciousness, the first thing he noticed was the biting, familiar cold. He opened his sticky eyes, surprised that Luo Binghe had kept his promise.

Shen Qingqiu was fully conscious, after having woken up from whatever that knockout drug was. There was a remainder of the drugs still circulating in his bloodstream; he could feel it in the way his limbs felt heavy and he knew his reaction time would be slowed. But he had been through the worst of the withdrawal symptoms during his time starving himself, so this was fine.

Another surprise greeted him when he sat up, groaning when his head still ached.

Luo Binghe wasn’t in the room.

Shen Qingqiu had stayed locked in here for months, all the way from his capture to his eventual escape. While his memories of it were hazy, he could still recall day in and day out having nothing to do but stare at these three bare, painted-white walls.

The last wall wasn’t a wall at all but rather a set of iron bars separating him from a hallway, as if he were some sort of animal in a zoo. There were two guards posted outside, facing away from Shen Qingqiu and just out of reach. They weren’t looking at him.

Since Shen Qingqiu couldn’t grab them by their lapels, he pounded one wall with his fist.

“Hey!” he yelled. “Let me out of here!”

The guards didn’t even look at him. Instead, the two of them walked off, their footsteps echoing down the hall and out of sight.

Truly alone now, Shen Qingqiu pounded his fist against the wall again. It didn’t make him feel any better.

This room was sparse and unfurnished, and it also lacked insulation. Shen Qingqiu, in the process of escape, had figured out that he had been locked in an abandoned missile silo buried far underground, which explained why it was freezing cold at all points in the day.

Shen Qingqiu sat down on the concrete floor, blowing on his hands to warm them. Without the insulation in this room, there was no amount of body heat that could keep him warm for long.

He grimaced as he looked at the mattress in one corner of the room.

He hadn’t actually been restrained at all during his stay here. Drugs had kept him complacent, and he had been left alone on that mattress for days at a time, unable to move or speak, thoughts drowned and slow.

The only one allowed into the cage of the three white walls, within touching range of that small, filthy mattress, was Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t resist a full-body shudder.

He paced around the room to warm himself. He was out of breath after a few minutes. His body had really fallen into disuse. Without the adrenaline of escape, he was weaker than he had been since he was a sickly little kid.

As an Olympic medalist, he had kept up a strict training regimen, but all that was gone now. He had little muscle mass, and, since he had been denying himself food, poor fat mass as well. Combined with the cold, he was shocked he hadn’t fallen ill and died by this point.

Then again, if the hazy memories of Luo Binghe visiting were to be trusted, maybe it wasn’t so shocking. Now that Shen Qingqiu was completely lucid, the humiliation of what Luo Binghe had done for him when he was drugged and helpless was intolerable.

Speaking of, he really was starving. Rubbing his hands up and down his arms to calm the raised gooseflesh, he cast his eyes around for the food he smelled.

A small porcelain bowl filled with rice sat waiting for him by the bars on the far side of the room. It was nearly identical to the one he had just eaten at the diner, but it wouldn’t be drugged if Luo Binghe was trying to build up his trust.

Shen Qingqiu retrieved the bowl and began to eat with perfect posture, head bowed to not spill a single grain. The rice was fresh but cool, so it didn’t help warm him at all in the freezing room.

Then again, he supposed the solitude was nice. Shen Qingqiu had always been a solitary person. He would never spend more than a day alone because his training regimen always included sparring with an opponent, but even when he was a child, he preferred playing alone to playing outside with the neighbor boys.

The only other person he would allow in his house or hotel room would be his girlfriend of that week, he wouldn’t even let housekeepers enter. His space was his own, and he didn’t want people interrupting his peace and quiet.

While he was eating, his sleeve rode up and he realized that the black metal shackle on his wrist was gone. He stared, confused.

The reason he hadn’t noticed before was that the shackle, despite being iron, was very comfortable. There was a silken lining on the inside that made the iron more snug than strangling, and although it was very tight, Shen Qingqiu never felt any pain or discomfort with it.

Shen Qingqiu finished his rice quickly and set the bowl aside. He was still hungry, but he knew if he ate any more then he would throw it all up. The drugs made him very nauseous, which is how he had escaped in the first place.

His first moment of lucidity had occurred after a violent bought of vomiting that had lasted for what felt like days, on and off. Combined with the fact that Luo Binghe had been away for some reason, Shen Qingqiu was able to regain enough awareness to start rejecting the food. The nausea never faded, though.

A few days, Shen Qingqiu promised himself. He just had to drink enough water, and then all the effects would be gone and he wouldn’t have to go through this anymore.

He walked over to the sink.

It was a sink only in theory. It consisted of a small spigot with a heavily reenforced drain under it, and Shen Qingqiu was only able to drink with cupped hands. He steeled his resolve against this small indignity, reminding himself that there was nobody here to witness.

He washed his hands and face, splashing the icy water over his pale skin, then patted himself dry with his robes.

Then he was left with nothing to do but wait for Luo Binghe’s visit.

More recently, as he grew more and more tolerant to the drugs, he had noticed how Luo Binghe’s visits lined up with his circadian rhythm and started to use them to keep track of time subconsciously.

Luo Binghe hadn’t been there when Shen Qingqiu awoke, but he would almost certainly stop by when night fell.

Or… when day broke? Lunchtime?

It was hard to tell. Whatever the case, it would be a strict schedule. And Luo Binghe, anxious to build a good relationship, would need to visit soon to make the best possible next-first impression.

Shen Qingqiu scoffed. There was no point, not only was Shen Qingqiu smarter than that, but he was also resilient and willful.

Also, he had never really liked children.

Back straight and face placid, he brought his hands to his knees and began to meditate.

He hadn’t done this in years. Long ago, it used to be a way to control his emotions before a big competition. He didn’t get his skill from rage or impatience, and it was of the utmost importance to keep his head while fencing, so he used to meditate to regulate himself. He hadn’t needed to do this in years.

However, he remembered the way time seemed to slip away like sand in the wind while he meditated, and waiting for Luo Binghe to come wasn’t going to help him calm down at all.

Meditation was easy when the only sound in the room was his own breathing.

Shen Qingqiu let his thoughts slide out of his mind, passing through each one emotionlessly and then letting it disappear.

And then there was nothing except for the steady count of his breath.

Gratitude washed over him for this solitude.

He quietly acknowledged the relief from hunger pain.

The minutes passed in peace as all sensation dulled.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t hear the footsteps when two men took their posts outside of the iron bars.

When he finally opened his eyes, he had no idea how long it had been. Even if he were to have complete recollection of the amount of time he had been unconscious for, he would still be disoriented after that intense session of meditation.

He stood slowly, aware that his vision would darken if he moved too quickly. He shook out stiff, painful muscles and walked across the room to alleviate the pain of sitting on the stone floor and to warm himself up.

It was much easier to regard the situation with clarity, now.

While he walked, he accidentally kicked a small bowl laying on the floor. It seemed to be four steamed buns, cold as ice but incredibly soft.

 It was then he realized that he had company.

The hand holding the bun faltered halfway to his mouth, and he dropped it back into the bowl contemptuously.

“Do you enjoy watching me eat with filthy hands, you brainless pigs? Leave me to my peace, it’s far cleaner to eat with you two out of my sights!”

Surprisingly, the two guards left without a word or a single glance. It felt like they hadn’t heard Shen Qingqiu at all and had just decided to take a stroll at that coincidental moment.

It was, without a doubt, Luo Binghe’s doing. The guard’s obedience and the fact that they weren’t allowed to look at ‘their god,’ both of it seemed like his doing.

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t quite sure how the power dynamics were organized, but he knew that Luo Binghe was in charge of him, the central focus of this religion. He knew of a surety that there were no others like him, this cult had kidnapped no other ‘gods.’

He was alone.

Now quiet, he picked up the steamed bun again and started to eat.

Once he finished, now pleasantly full without being strained, he wondered why Luo Binghe hadn’t shown up by now.

It was almost an insult. What could possibly be more important and more pressing than Shen Qingqiu, that Luo Binghe couldn’t even spare a moment to talk?

Though it was supposed to be a good thing that Luo Binghe wasn’t here, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help but wonder. The wait was torturous, even more so because Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure what would happen at the end of it.

Shen Qingqiu was getting less and less sure that Luo Binghe wanted his trust. He had originally thought that when Luo Binghe knew he was awake, he would dote on his captive lovingly, conversing with him and negotiating both of their needs to reach a compromise. The more time passed, the more it became clear that this wasn’t the case.

Luo Binghe really wasn’t willing to negotiate. He thought he had all the power, and Shen Qingqiu was unable to do anything to correct him because he wasn’t here. It was such a great indignity that Luo Binghe thought he could force Shen Qingqiu’s actions. He was a fully grown, nearly forty-year-old man, and last time Shen Qingqiu had checked his credentials, this youth hadn’t even been sixteen.

Time and time again, Shen Qingqiu’s friends and family had forsaken him as they realized that they couldn’t force Shen Qingqiu to do anything. No one could influence him in any way and there were absolutely no compromises with him.

It was why every single girlfriend had left him. It was why he was well and truly alone, even before he had been kidnapped and forced into solitude.

Shen Qingqiu shook those useless thoughts from his head. He was losing it a little because he was tired. It was harder to emotionally regulate without rest.

He gingerly sat down on the stained mattress.

The cold was just as bad on the bed, with the surrounding concrete sucking all the body heat from the air.

The sheet that Luo Binghe provided was almost like tissue, prone to rip at sudden motion. Shen Qingqiu twisted it back and forth for a confused moment, trying to find the purpose of using such a material, but then he realized it was for his own safety.

After all, they couldn’t have ‘their god’ kill himself.

No wonder the guards were so comfortable leaving him alone. Shen Qingqiu shook his head and lay down, his long, filthy hair pillowing around him.

But what about his robes? Couldn’t he strangle himself with those? Then again, the thought of being found both dead and naked, pale body swinging from the ceiling, made him shake his head. There was no point thinking about that.

He was racked with shivers as he tried to relax enough to fall asleep, the papery sheet doing nothing to keep him warm. The memories of being delirious in this bed swam through his mind, intrusive and sharp every time he tried to clear his thoughts, and he quickly realized that he wouldn’t wake up rested even if he were able to sleep.

Shen Qingqiu cursed Luo Binghe inwardly. That demon spared nothing, though he had the power to change everything.

The rest was indeed not very restful. Despite his exhaustion, Shen Qingqiu kept startling awake, convinced that the frigid air was the icy gaze of Luo Binghe looming over his bed. It was only when he would sit up and look around that he would be able to convince himself that it was just the image behind his eyelids.

Luo Binghe wasn’t really there.

No one was there, except two new guards that had returned to their posts at some point while Shen Qingqiu was sleeping.

The loneliness was far from comfort now, in the throes of restless sleep.

Colorful, hypnogogic visions danced in front of Shen Qingqiu’s eyes, taunting him with sleep that was so near yet so far.

Shen Qingqiu had little choice but to manipulate those visions to convince his body that he was warm. He was safe in his own house. There was someone holding him close, he could almost feel the soft, forgiving body of a woman.

It was only then that he would forget his drugged, painful memories and his mind would relax enough to sleep, only to be jolted out again not long later.

Eventually he gave up. There was no night and day here, he didn’t need to stick to a sleep schedule. While it would have been nice to maintain a circadian rhythm, there was simply no way to measure time in this place.

Except for food, he realized. He quickly glanced towards the guards and the iron bars, searching for a porcelain bowl. He wasn’t particularly hungry, but he needed to know if there was something there waiting.

Huh. Nothing.

Had he really been meditating for longer than he had slept? That didn’t seem right. Either the food had no consistent schedule, or his perception of time had gotten far worse.

Shen Qingqiu spent a length of time pretending to be meditating, counting the beats between guard rotations. There was no consistency with that either, it seemed.

After doing this for a while, he was starting to get hungry again, and right on cue, more food was slid under the iron bars. This time, it was light berries, cool and fresh with dewdrops.

After washing his hands, he placed one on his tongue, smiling slightly at the way sweetness burst in his mouth.

The next meal came not a full two hundred beats later, confirming his theory. Mealtimes, like guard rotations, weren’t scheduled.

What dedication to this attempt to disorient! Since they couldn’t use drugs, they had resorted to other methods, it seemed. And by ‘they’, Shen Qingqiu could only mean Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu was far from well-rested, but meditation seemed necessary to get his turbulent emotion under control. It would be difficult, but he had to practice doing this if he was going to keep his head while talking to Luo Binghe.

He had to be sure Luo Binghe wouldn’t take him off-guard.

He meditated until he couldn’t anymore, then was left with nothing to do except pace in his cell. Boredom would be one of his greatest enemies here. Loneliness was something he was equipped to deal with, so he was sure that being alone wouldn’t be a problem, but boredom wasn’t something he’d ever been forced to endure for long.

Out of this abandoned missile silo, he had many hobbies. He had been quite the well-rounded man even from his youth, with proficiency bordering on mastery in music, art, and literature.

Literature and music wouldn’t be possible without instruments or writing implements, but art was possible anywhere. His instructor used to emphasize that in every lesson.

Shen Qingqiu looked around, scrutinizing the room with new eyes. The wall was white as paper, though a rough texture with the cement underneath. He didn’t have any liquid to paint with.

He glanced down at his pale wrists, tracing the thin blue lines of his veins.

Blood was out of the question.

It was sufficiently horrifying and would surely shock Luo Binghe into some kind of action, but it was unsustainable. He had to think of something else to stave off boredom for longer than a few days.

Water wouldn’t work because the dim lighting wasn’t bright enough to provide a glare, so water wouldn’t be visible even on a white surface.

Idly, he scratched at the paint, surprised when it came off under his fingernails to reveal the gray concrete underneath.

Shen Qingqiu had been thinking too narrow, evidently.

He could spend weeks learning how to outline by picking off millimeter by millimeter of paint with his nails, creating beautiful murals from the destruction. It was the perfect solution.

Suddenly re-energized by the prospect of a new project, he straightened his robes and surveyed the space for the least conspicuous spot for rough practice. The spot above the toilet was the prime candidate.

Not that it was really a toilet. It was barely more than a hole in the ground, small enough that it was impossible to fit a person but sufficient for human waste. It was so unsightly that it made the eyes slide right past that spot, perfect for practice with this new painting method.

It did require him to be bent over this filth-hole for hours at a time, however. He squatted, yelling over his shoulder, “Beasts! Leave, you perverted swine, no one needs you here!”  

Their footsteps faded down the hall while Shen Qingqiu turned to his work.

By the time new guards came back, he was in the middle of learning different methods of drawing lines showing shading with smaller stokes.

He waited a few moments for them to settle.

“I wonder…” he muttered aloud, and to his surprise, the guards left again. Were they trained to leave at any spoken word from Shen Qingqiu’s mouth? Shen Qingqiu couldn’t see the purpose in that, but he supposed it didn’t matter. He didn’t need them there, and they didn’t really impact him at all.

Having learned the basics of lines, he started work on the outline of a face.

Throughout his life, faces had been his strength. The faces he created, be it sketching, painting, or sculpture, had always looked practically alive, twisted with emotion or glowing with serenity.

He patiently picked at the paint. It might take a while to get the method down, but he would surely return to that skill level once this was mastered.

New guards took up posts behind the metal bars after awhile, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t bother dismiss them, too absorbed in his work to spare any attention for insignificant matters. The spiteful thought was directed towards them, but not spoken aloud, so they stayed.

He finished the twisted, deformed face that was supposed to be his own. It was so obscure that it wasn’t fit to be called his face. Shen Qingqiu sighed and decided to sleep, slightly disappointed in his lack of progress.

Well, he thought as he laid back down on that stained, hard mattress. It wasn’t like he was short on time. He could be in this room for years. He wasn’t sure when Luo Binghe would come, but he knew that it didn’t affect his residence here. Since he was trapped, he might as well make use of it and develop a skill.

Despite his optimism, Shen Qingqiu still couldn’t enough to fall asleep for more than a few minutes, by his approximation. His body kept startling itself awake; he was too cold and uncomfortable.

After the seventh or eighth time, Shen Qingqiu decided that the ‘night’ was over. His body was sore from crouching over the small section of wall, and he groaned as he stood, stretching out stiff muscles. He may be past his prime, but he still would dominate in competition, defending his title as the best fencer in China.

 Now, most likely, he couldn’t hold his own against a E-ranked teenager. He longed to have his saber to practice with. As it was, all he could do was run through basic forms.

After ensuring he still remembered them and could complete them with sufficient fluidity, he returned to the section of wall to recall what he had learned before his break. While he was working, he realized that he hadn’t eaten in a while, and his stomach was gnawing at him.

Why did it always take him a moment to realize there was food in his room?

He ate his portion of ice-cold dumplings while poring over his work, fixing what he could and trying to learn from those mistakes.

“I see,” he muttered to himself, and flinched with the sudden sound of his guard’s footsteps retreating down the hall. He clenched his jaw momentarily, despising the way he had reacted to something so insignificant, and resolved not to speak again. The slip of the tongue had been most unlike him.

He couldn’t do that again.

Picking the white paint out from underneath his fingernails, he started anew on a flower. It was a simple shape that would allow him to practice the shading of basic textures.

The beginning lines were delicate and slender, and he smiled in satisfaction when the preliminary lineart was complete. He was improving quickly. Giving himself an internal pat on the back, he continued.

When he finally straightened, the flower wasn’t even half-complete, but his back was protesting the hunch so it was time to meditate with ramrod posture to relieve the pressure on his spine.

It proved to be much easier to focus when he was feeling positive. His concentration didn’t waver at all, and when he was finished, he felt refreshed and clear-headed. Perhaps he should start meditating before he slept, he mused, but then dismissed it. He needed to be as exhausted as possible in order to get any sleep, so meditation wasn’t a good option for tiring him.

He finished this piece before going to eating and going to bed. This flower was better than the face by leaps and bounds.

The victorious high of success lasted until Shen Qingqiu realized that there was no one here to appreciate its beauty. It had all really been for himself only, he would receive no praise for this slender little poppy, painstakingly etched above a filthy waste-hole in a cold, secluded cell.

He glanced towards those guards, both female this time. Before, he would have the praise and admiration of hundreds of women like these ones for his art, music, and athletic talent. Could he gesture them over, make them see somehow without speaking?

No. They were the same as all the other guards. They were silent, staring down the hall away from the interior of the cell. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t call out or they would leave. Resigned, he set aside those hopes and went to retire.

Going to bed after that meal didn’t have the same kind of optimism and ambition as the bedtime before.

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t realized how much of his motivation stemmed from the opinions of others. Praise and acclaim used to be his breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and this was the norm since he had first started fencing.

Even Luo Binghe had offered words of praise when he visited this cell before, not that Shen Qingqiu was in any state of mind to notice it. Shen Qingqiu glanced at the door set into the far wall.

It hadn’t been for his art or music ability, but rather for his obedience. Shen Qingqiu remembered how he would follow some of Luo Binghe’s guidance, barely conscious of what he was doing, and his core seemed to glow with warmth every time he was praised for it.

Shen Qingqiu shivered, glad that he wasn’t drugged anymore. That indignity had been beyond humiliating, even with only Luo Binghe to witness.

Luo Binghe, Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu wished that Luo Binghe would suddenly die and he could leave, that way no one alive could bear witness to his humiliation and he could return to his normal life.

He supposed it was a long shot to assume that Luo Binghe really had died, and that was why he hadn’t had a visit yet. Until that was confirmed, Shen Qingqiu was forced to glance over his shoulder and spend every waking hour awaiting Luo Binghe’s arrival.

Shen Qingqiu was hungry, and a small platter of fish was sitting under the bars. The guards didn’t move a muscle as he quietly sat down and began to eat.

Food here was perfectly filling, not too much and not too little, but it always made him shiver for a hundred counts while the freezing meal was stealing his inner body heat to warm itself. He had never been truly hungry here, unless he was actively refusing food.

Which was strange, because mealtimes were so unscheduled. Except, the lighter foods were always followed by a quicker next meal.

Perhaps the mealtimes weren’t unscheduled, even though they weren’t based off time of day.

It was so simple that Shen Qingqiu failed to see it at first; he was fed whenever he was hungry.

Reaching this conclusion, he paused, puzzled. How on earth did Luo Binghe know when he was hungry? No one, not even the guards, ever looked into his cell, so they weren’t reading his body language.

Was it possible that Luo Binghe somehow knew how satiated Shen Qingqiu felt after each food, and scheduled the next meal based on that? It didn’t seem possible that Luo Binghe would know such specific inner workings of his body.

Shen Qingqiu glanced around the cell again as gooseflesh made his hair stand on end, feeling more exposed than ever with that revelation. His eyes caught on the door again.

It was painted white to match the wall it was set into, but the texture of the cheap paint clearly indicated the presence of wood grain underneath.

Shen Qingqiu brushed his fingers against the door, wondering if someone was listening from the other side now.

He paused, his fingertips against the painted wood. It was warm.

Whatever was behind this door, it was warm.

It was barely a trace, and Shen Qingqiu had to press his entire palm down in order to feel any sort of distinct heat, but it was unmistakable.

Immediately he turned and pressed his back against the door, shivering when the warmth didn’t immediately permeate his robes and seep into his skin. Patience, he reminded himself.

If he was correct and this door was actually warm, then he wouldn’t have to deal with the discomfort of insomnia. He could sleep with his back pressed against this door.

Sure enough, after a few moments, the heat seeped into his clothing.

Muscles that he hadn’t realized were tensed, relaxed, and some of the strain of his body drained away. He sighed, feeling his chest expand more for the first time since waking up in this room.

Last time he had escaped, it was because the door had been left slightly ajar, but now it was shut tight. It didn’t have a handle, and the only thing that indicated that it was a door were the miniscule hinges spanning across one of the seams. The only way to open this door was from the other side.

He wasn’t feeling particularly tired, so for now he pushed his tissue-paper sheet up against the door to warm it and moved to another section of wall to start on another project.

This time he planned the space to draw a massive, sprawling bamboo forest across one wall. Surely, by the time he was finished with this project, Luo Binghe would have already come to visit and perhaps then Shen Qingqiu could negotiate for canvas and paint.

If negotiation with that demon was even possible.

He was too agitated. Before he went to start outlining his first draft, Shen Qingqiu sat in the center of the room to meditate and calm his turbulent thoughts.

After several hundred breath counts, he opened his eyes again to find a bowl of congee waiting for him on the floor, along with two new guards, one male and one female, in their standard posts.

It was a reminder of Luo Binghe’s intimate knowledge of the workings of his body, and then all of that hard work in soothing meditation was wasted as his hands started to shake again.

He hated this.

This looming threat of Luo Binghe combined with the oppressive cold and silence was like an inescapable presence, like some large god had trapped Shen Qingqiu in cupped palms. There was nothing he could do to let his body free, and his mind firmly tethered here as well.

With the drugs, he hadn’t had presence of mind to be scared or humiliated, but now, there was no escape.

Shen Qingqiu ate his food, started on the bamboo mural, and then went to bed sitting upright, his back against the door and his face propped up on his fist. He slept fitfully, unused to the sleeping position, but the cold was a little better, and when he woke up for the last time, his muscles were relaxed and limber.

He started off with some more fencing forms, then ate, meditated, and continued to work on the mural. The outline wasn’t anywhere near complete, he was still marking where certain things should go and what design should go where.

Several times he would nearly ask himself aloud what the best option was for a specific area, and every time, his breath would catch in his throat and his eyes would dart towards the guards.

He never actually spoke, therefore they never left except to rotate out one pair for another. Shen Qingqiu decided he would have to speak up at least once every four or five sleep-cycles, to prevent his voice from falling into disuse.

And if those guards left, then so what?

The presence of those guards didn’t matter to Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu had always been okay with being alone.

He turned back to his bamboo forest, although it looked more like a collection of random black scratches on an otherwise pristine white wall. For this project, he had decided to scrape away all the paint expect for the design, leaving the bamboo, grass, creatures, and Taoist temple all in white, with extra scraped away for shading and depth. Using this reverse method, it would take several hours to scrape free one perfectly-shaded blade of grass, which would be perfect for taking up large swaths of time.

After all, if he was going to use an entire wall for this project, it had to take up enough time.

He finished marking where everything should go within four more sleep-cycles and then started on the first rough outline the next time he woke. Every ‘day’ was similar, but it was impossible to keep a strict schedule with the variance of mealtimes and guard rotations, so Shen Qingqiu quickly found himself losing track of how many sleep-cycles it had been. His circadian rhythm was falling and off-beat, and while it was far easier to sleep with his back against the warm door, his brain would often refuse to shut down despite his own exhaustion.

It was torture in its own right, and soon he stopped practicing his sword forms every time he woke up, with his body too exhausted to comply.

Once the outline of three more stalks of bamboo was complete, Shen Qingqiu stopped meditating, taking the time instead to throw himself into his work.

He hadn’t spoken a word since starting the mural because he had completely lost track of how many sleep-cycles he had been through.

By the time all of the grass was shaded in, he realized that it had most likely been at least a hundred days since he had spoken, possibly more. He had started talking to the guards daily within his own mind, contemplating and memorizing detailed monologues as if they were stories.

None of them made it past his lips.

He opened his mouth to speak, but he couldn’t bring himself to make a sound. The guards would leave again, if he did, and he would be left completely alone.

This shouldn’t affect him. Yet, they were the only proof that there was someone living here in the cell. Despite being worshipped as a god, nobody else besides them could stand as a witness to his existence.

On the off chance that one of them would someday turn and observe Shen Qingqiu’s work, admiring what he had done, he couldn’t risk them leaving. After all, why would he deprive any living person of observing his greatness?

Even though Luo Binghe refused to see him.

He thought about Luo Binghe, it seemed, in every waking moment. When he shivered, he thought of how Luo Binghe had held him. When he cleaned up after himself, he thought of how Luo Binghe did the same for him. When he ate the ice-cold food, he thought of the warmth of Luo Binghe’s fingers brushing against his lips as he fed him.

These memories would arise even when he was deep in the meditative work of art, often followed by a flood of humiliation as strong as bile rising in his throat, but time was weathering these reactions.

While he was working on the beginnings of the Taoist temple, he found that his mind would run over and over these events like a chicken worrying over her chicks, like he was sheltering them somehow.

But surely he couldn’t be that desperate for human touch?

Yes, he missed the soft embrace of a woman. His girlfriends, no matter how briefly they would linger, would always be tender as flowers and willing to provide when he wanted closeness.

Luo Binghe’s presence promised closeness and tender care, but not like that. It wasn’t like that at all. Shen Qingqiu was afraid of him near. Surely, that was the cause of his agitation.

When he went to sleep, those hazy, drugged memories were the ones that lured him there.

This Taoist temple wasn’t turning out quite like Shen Qingqiu had hoped. The space in between the columns looked empty, but the space above it, dappled with sunlight, looked sort of like a face. It was the perfect height, as well.

Shen Qingqiu spent the next few sleep cycles painstakingly carving out an immortal master looking out at the bamboo branches. The facial features of this lord were soft and gentle, lips curved into a contented smile.

But how could this immortal lord be completely contented if he was alone on this solitary mountainside? Shen Qingqiu began to carve out the outline of a disciple with his arms wrapped around the immortal lord’s waist.

Faster than he had ever worked before, Shen Qingqiu finished the master-disciple pair, their warm hug forming the center of the mural. Though he began work on other areas, he found his eyes drawn to these two, again and again.

In his dreams at night, he would escape into this lush mountainside. He would meet the smiling face of this bright-eyed disciple and be wrapped in a warm hug for his efforts.

After what must have been months of tireless work in the freezing cell, Shen Qingqiu was finally finished with this mural. His nails were broken and filthy, shredded and bleeding in places, but his face bore a satisfied smile.

There were no more adjustments he could make to this spectacular image, it was perfect. As he tended to do, he glanced towards the guards for approval, face falling like it had done with the poppy all that immeasurable time ago. There was no one to appreciate this except for him.

Unexpectedly, Shen Qingqiu felt crushed. All of this hard work hadn’t been for anything except to pass the time until Luo Binghe came. And he hadn’t. Luo Binghe wasn’t here. No one was here.

How dare no one be here? Shen Qingqiu’s face tightened as fury surged in his chest.

He stalked up to the iron bars and pounded on them with a clang that only made him flinch.

He wasn’t used to loud noises, but now he yelled.

“Bring me your boss! Or a woman, anything! I’m going to starve myself if I don’t have company, I’ll die, and what then, swine?”

The guards had already started walking off towards the end of the hall, but Shen Qingqiu wasn’t finished. He yelled, “I’m not going to eat, your god is going to die unless you meet my demands!”

After they had left, he sat back down with a huff. His throat hurt like it had been hit, aching with a sharp pain.

It might take a while for them to believe him, but he would do it.

He would refuse food in return for the company of a woman.

The next day, he began work on another side of the room, drawing with no real end goal in mind. The mural had taken an incredible amount of effort and willpower, with absolutely no reward or gain at the end. He couldn’t muster up the mental strength to do anything but doodle.

Strangely enough, the guards didn’t come back. Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure why, but he was satisfied that he had, at least, changed something about his environment of his own volition. The emptiness of the room seemed to oppress without them there. Like it was colder somehow without their body heat, although that wasn’t possible.

He took three sleep-cycles to draw his own robes, mainly focused on the fold of the fabric and the flow of the seams.

It was another seven sleep-cycles to draw a crackling fireplace next to his mattress, almost alive with nonexistent warmth and light.

The hunger pain was starting to get unbearable, but still he persisted. After the next eight sleep-cycles passed, the room started to fill with a foul smell. It was clearly chemical and came and went in timed waves. Instead of working on his art, Shen Qingqiu started to consistently meditate to control his breathing. There was nothing he could do to avoid breathing this stuff in, but he might be able to lessen the effects.

He should have guessed that this would happen. Because his food wasn’t drugged anymore, there was no way to sedate him besides infecting the air that he breathed.

He breathed out harshly to vent his rage. Why they wanted him sedated, he wasn’t sure. Were they moving him to another location before he could see someone, and they didn’t want him to escape on the way? This seemed like the most likely possibility.

When sleep finally came with his back pressed up against that unendingly warm door, Shen Qingqiu slipped down into unconsciousness peacefully despite his hunger pain, knowing that when he woke, he would receive the company of a compassionate woman.

His dreams were fevered and confusing, a mix of fantasy and memory, with Luo Binghe’s face the only thing consistent through it all.

He woke with a start, eyes flying open as he bolted upright.

Gasping with blurry vision, he looked around. Why was his heart racing?

This was just his normal room, he was laying on his filthy, stained mattress and staring at the mural on the opposite wall. He waited a moment for his adrenaline to calm down, unable to ignore the feeling that something was distinctly wrong.

Memories began to trickle back, and Shen Qingqiu’s brow furrowed in confusion. Hadn’t he been starving himself? Why did his stomach feel pleasantly full?

The smell was gone. Shen Qingqiu felt all the blood drain from his face. His method hadn’t worked. He had been sedated, force-fed somehow, and then left alone again.

Except, the force-feeding clearly hadn’t included any force. His body wasn’t sore or abused anywhere, and he could imagine how Luo Binghe tenderly placed food on his tongue.

“No,” he whispered hoarsely, listening while the sound of the guards leaving him alone again echoed in the empty room, since they always left when he spoke out loud.

Nothing had changed, despite fury powering his best efforts.

This couldn’t be it.

This couldn’t be all he could do.

For the first time since starting this captivity, there was a sinking feeling in his gut that told him he had absolutely no control over the situation. Whatever he did wouldn’t amount to anything, and even his rage, inescapable to anyone who knows him, was met only with a vacuum.

It didn’t matter who he used to be, it wasn’t who he was now. Now, he was less than his competitors, maybe even less than human.

Shen Qingqiu collapsed with his back against the door, defeated. Based on how much his hair had grown, it had been more than a year since he had seen Luo Binghe, more than two years in captivity total.

He was cold.

He was so, so incredibly tired.

For several sleep cycles he just sat there, back against the door, doing nothing but running in the same mental circles over and over again, all tethered in place around Luo Binghe.

He didn’t want to wait anymore.

After all this time, he would still glance over his shoulder every few minutes as his neck prickled, convinced that Luo Binghe had suddenly appeared in the room.

Shen Qingqiu stood up and walked to an empty section of wall. He was running out of space having already taken up an entire wall, but now he didn’t care. He took up a large swath of the next one to start planning, marking, from end to end, more than the distance between his spread hands.

He began to mark the outlines of a face.

It wasn’t his own, it would just mock him because of the differences in appearance from before to now.

He had always possessed the ability of lifelike faces. If he could paint a massive, lifelike face of Luo Binghe, he would stop having to look over his shoulder. He would always have a Luo Binghe to watch over him, except this one wouldn’t carry the threat of torture.

The Luo Binghe behind his eyelids promised comfort and security. Shen Qingqiu finished the planning within the sleep cycle. He hadn’t realized that he had been meticulously planning out the lines and planes of Luo Binghe’s face in his head, but now that he finally gave in and started in reality, it flowed out of him like a dam had broken. Fb

When he sat down against the door to end that sleep cycle, he found himself absently picking at the doorframe instead.

Through his work, he had found out some methods to keep his nails thick and strong, preserving what he had so that he wouldn’t be left without them while he worked at his art. Now, as he picked at the doorframe, he managed to get one long nail in between the door and the frame.

The door wobbled, a motion so imperceptible that he wouldn’t have noticed it if his entire back wasn’t pressed up against the pained wood.

He stood up so fast his legs ached. No, surely this was a false hope. Surely Luo Binghe wouldn’t allow something as glaring as this to slip his eye, and he had locked this incredibly obvious door.

Shen Qingqiu worked four of his fingernails with one hand between the door and the frame, then, when this was too slow, brought four fingers of the other hand to join the work.

To his surprise, bit by bit, the old, creaky door started to open, until there was a gap wide as his pinky finger leading off into the darkness.

Last time he had escaped, it had all been blurry with the remnant of the drugs in his system. He had stumbled out of this door, which had been left ajar, with his eyes locked on the next door, and then the next, until suddenly he was out under the bright glow of the stars.

He had no idea what lay beyond this thick layer of wood, except that it promised warmth.

Lazy streams of warm air poured from the gap he had created, dousing his body in a round of shivers as his temperature abruptly changed. Had it never been locked? Shen Qingqiu hated that he had never tried to open it until now. How had Luo Binghe possibly predicted that he wouldn’t try?

He only stalled a moment before working a finger into the small gap and then pulling the door open wide.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. The light in his room had always stayed perfectly constant, so it took a moment for his pupils to let enough light in to see.

It was a room. Sure enough, there was a handleless door on the far side that, presumably, led to the exit, but what Shen Qingqiu had failed to realize the first time was that he had clumsily stumbled through a bedroom.

He crept inside, his bare feet meeting the softness of plush carpet. There was a chest at one end and a bed in the center that took up most of the space on the floor, with more shelves and closets bathed in darkness on the far side.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help the harsh exhale of breath as his body relaxed against its will. It was too warm in here; he couldn’t help the way tension bled out of his muscles. His shivering was getting more intense, making his teeth rattle with the strength of it.

He crept forward, wondering if he could steal the thick blankets from on top of the bed. The door on the other side was also handleless, but he could open that one once he figured out—

He froze on the spot.

“If you want to stay in here, come into my bed. Otherwise, leave.”

Luo Binghe’s voice was muted in the insulated room, youthful voice tinged with sleep, but Shen Qingqiu flinched like he had been hit. He backed out of the room without another thought, stumbling and falling as he slammed the door behind him.

His breath caught in his throat and he gasped for air. This was the first time he’d been addressed in so long, but it had been Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe, the threat of comfort and torture, that all-seeing, all-knowing god, had been an assortment of painted wood planks away from Shen Qingqiu this entire time.

Through the door, Luo Binghe had been providing the only source of warmth and comfort in Shen Qingqiu’s meager half-life, he realized deliriously, head cradled in his arms. His head shot up and he scrambled as far away from that door as possible. His back hit the iron bars with a loud clang and he flinched, but he didn’t dare look at the guards.

If he shifted his gaze from that door for even a second, Luo Binghe would come after him.

For the next several—what would have been sleep-cycles, if he had been able to sleep— he sat stiffly, unable to close his eyes or relax even slightly as he kept his gaze trained on that door.

By the time his body started to protest, his adrenaline still hadn’t faded. He stood cautiously.

He understood that Luo Binghe didn’t want to see him, but now that Shen Qingqiu had actually done something, wouldn’t he be forced to visit?

Absorbed in thoughts of his captor, Shen Qingqiu went over to his work-in-progress and shakily continued to outline the face, ears straining to catch a whisper of sound from the door.

When he was too exhausted to continue, he decided to retire, but he couldn’t sleep up against that door again.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want Luo Binghe’s warmth. He didn’t need it.

He sat up against that serene bamboo mural, covering himself in the thin sheet as he waited for sleep.

Several fitful hours later, it became excruciatingly clear that this was pointless.

The cold seemed to press into his skin and down into his center, so much more obvious now that he had gotten a small taste of what it was like to be warmed.

No matter how hard he imagined himself being held, being comforted, being touched, his body was inconsolable.

He wanted Luo Binghe.

He jolted upright.

That thought was horrifying, passing through his skull deliriously yet innocuously. He couldn’t—he couldn’t want—

“No,” he whispered quietly, so soft and pained that the guards posted outside the bars couldn’t hear it. It was drowned even in his own ears by the racing of his heart.

He was Shen Qingqiu, the pride of China and three-time Olympic medalist. He wasn’t—

Cutting through the chaotic struggle of his thoughts was a single, sharp understanding.

His pride wasn’t helping him anymore.

He could feel the way his mental defenses were starting to weaken, he knew it whenever he would wake up from fantastical dreams about human touch. This seclusion was starting to harm him, and, for the first time, he was offered a way out.

“If you want to stay in here, come into my bed. Otherwise, leave.” Those words echoed, the only spoken words in the oppressive silence spanning what felt like years. They wouldn’t leave, he knew, and there would be no way to avoid it.

There was a way out from this seclusion.

Tears sprang to his eyes at the thought of being held, safe and warm in Luo Binghe’s arms.

He didn’t want—

Shen Qingqiu took a deep breath in through his frantically seizing lungs. Panicking wasn’t going to help him.

He straightened his posture, sharp pains flaring from the protest of muscles that hadn’t been used in months, and closed his eyes to meditate.

Letting the silence of the room into his thoughts, he focused on his breathing, which was hitching every few moments.

Eventually, his breathing was only hitching every hundred breath-counts, then every two hundred.

He meditated in the silence until the last dregs of the adrenaline had faded away, until his heart had calmed and his mind was as clear and reflective as glass.  

His eyes opened, once he was finished, with difficulty. He was exhausted.

He cast a glance at the porcelain dish offered under the iron bars, sighing at the proof that nothing had changed. Although he had broken into Luo Binghe’s bedroom and been offered an escape from this loneliness, his situation had stayed the exact same as it had always been.

He was hungry, but he was also too tired to eat.

He retrieved the sheet from the corner of the room and slept for an incalculable amount of time propped up against the bamboo mural.

Chapter Text

In his dream, he was naked and exposed in an icy mountainous tundra. Shen Qingqiu stumbled forward a few steps before weakness overtook him and he knelt in the snow, too weak to shiver. It was dark, but there were no stars in the sky, as if he were trapped in a great mausoleum instead of the icy outdoors.

The cold seemed to permeate his very center, causing ice to spread over his internal organs and his heart to still. He shook his head in denial, but there was nothing he could do but wait for death.

In the edges of his periphery, a bright light shone. Strength flowed back into his muscles, and he was able to sit up, blue hands pressed against the hard snow.

A little sun sat on the ice an arm’s length away, warm and bright, about the size of a palm. Shen Qingqiu could hardly stand to look at it, but he needed its warmth. He reached out, trying to cross the divide, but it was too great.

He reached, and reached, tears freezing on his face as he tried to stretch farther…

Shen Qingqiu woke with a start.

He shook off the last, uncomfortable dregs of that dream, blowing air into his palms. Although the temperature of the room hadn’t changed, waking up without the warmth of the door behind him made the room feel ten degrees colder.

Waking up without Luo Binghe’s warmth.

The thought made him stand up, and he busied himself with eating his breakfast. It was tofu pudding, today, a sweetness that made the corners of his mouth twitch upwards.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t truly smiled in…

There was no use thinking about that. Shen Qingqiu finished his sweet dessert and returned to his art. He was making progress more quickly than ever before, perhaps because this particular mural served a purpose beyond pleasing others.

This one was just for Shen Qingqiu.

He began molding the shape of Luo Binghe’s eyes, wide with compassion and youthful ambition.

Not many people in Shen Qingqiu’s life knew this, but he had an eidetic memory that psychologists had fawned over in his youth. Luo Binghe’s angled, silken face appeared in perfect image in Shen Qingqiu’s dreams, how could he not recreate those eyes with perfect accuracy?

The sleep-cycles started to blend together as Shen Qingqiu worked, but he didn’t feel the prickling in his neck anymore. Luo Binghe was no longer an invisible ghost over his shoulder. Luo Binghe was in front of his eyes, behind Shen Qingqiu’s lids as he fell asleep and etched into the wall in front of him as he worked through every waking hour.

There were several times that Shen Qingqiu felt the light tug of a hand against his robes, or brushing a lock of hair from his shoulder.

Even when it wasn’t complete, the mural sometimes seemed to breathe, light and delicate, against Shen Qingqiu’s skin.

It was so gentle, but Shen Qingqiu knew it wasn’t real. It was his desperate mind, fraying as it went longer and longer without feeling like a real person.

Whenever that happened, Shen Qingqiu would touch his wrist where the velvet-iron shackle used to stay, reminding himself that Luo Binghe had left. Luo Binghe had thrown away his ownership of Shen Qingqiu as if he were worth nothing. Luo Binghe didn’t care about him anymore.

Shen Qingqiu only felt truly seen with those bright, round eyes on the wall, watching him.

Though the design was simpler, and Shen Qingqiu was working a lot faster, this design seemed to take longer. Shen Qingqiu was worrying over every single line he created, looking back over his work again and again to search for any sort of flaw before moving on.

He fell asleep on this half-finished wall more often than not. Absorbed in his work, it was easier than he expected to resist falling asleep against Luo Binghe’s door. He didn’t have the warmth and comfort of the painted wood grain against his back, but those kind eyes seemed to watch over him while he slept.

The guards were making too much noise. Groggily, Shen Qingqiu peeled open his eyelids, confused.

This sleep had actually been a rare restful one, and now the guards had decided to interrupt it! Not only that, but they had interrupted it with a terrible, terrible screeching noise.

The second he saw what was happening, his eyes flew open wide and he flinched backward. The entire metal wall of bars was being lifted away!

Shen Qingqiu blinked, wondering if he was dreaming. The two guards still weren’t looking at him, but there was a bowl of congee on the floor next to his feet.

Now that it had been brought to his attention, Shen Qingqiu was quite hungry. Almost mechanically, he started to eat, watching as, millimeter by millimeter, the metal grate rose higher into the ceiling.

It didn’t even get halfway before Shen Qingqiu doubled over with a groan. His congee must have contained another knockout drug.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t have time to get angry at himself before the world went dark.

*_*

The lighting was different.

He hadn’t opened his eyes yet, but he could tell that the light from behind his lids wasn’t as bright as the ones in his cell. Wherever he was, it was different.

The next thing he noticed was cool air on his skin, colder, it seemed, around his wrists and ankles.

He blinked his eyes open, confused and disoriented. Where were his robes?

His breath caught in his chest as he realized he was naked.

The cool air didn’t circulate around his skin, stale and damp, so he must still be underground. This room was made of dark concrete, so deep that it seemed to absorb all light from the dim lanterns overhead, and it was massive.

Whatever it had been used for before the cult had repurposed this missile silo, it could have had held more than a hundred people easily. Ten doors were set into each wall, but the room was otherwise bare and empty.

He tried to turn to look behind him, but there were loose, gold-painted iron shackles preventing him from turning too far to the side.

A small, panicked noise caught in his throat as he tugged at them, glancing around for some kind of mechanism or escape.

These shackles were fastened to short, painted gold chains that were wielded to a similarly painted iron arch. He couldn’t see behind him without craning his neck, but arms were held taut enough that it was difficult, and the shackles kept his stance wide and exposed.

Someone could easily sneak up on him from the back. Shen Qingqiu’s entire body was exposed to this massive, empty room.

His breath was coming faster now, tugging on the restraints almost unconsciously.

No, he couldn’t work himself up like this. Until he knew what was happening, he needed to stay calm. Meditation was the best option.

He closed his eyes and tried to clear his head. No point in panicking, he reminded himself. Nothing had happened yet. It was quite possible nothing was going to happen at all, and Shen Qingqiu would be returned to his room soon.

If this cult wanted to keep Shen Qingqiu’s solitude a theme, then he would have no visitors.

Still, his mind refused to clear and his racing heart wasn’t calming itself.

Eyes still closed, he realized his concentration was completely gone when his shivering started up again, the subtle movements making the chains rattle.

His neck and back began to hurt with the strain on his shoulders, so he opened his eyes to adjust his stance. There was nowhere he could move, and no weight he could shift. This arch and its chains were made with Shen Qingqiu’s perfect proportions in mind.

A sound of a door opening, loud in the silence of the room, made Shen Qingqiu flinch. His head whipped around to find the source of the noise.

A young woman walked through a door on his left, head bowed. She seemed to be wearing some kind of ceremonial robe and was holding a small tray.

“Hey,” Shen Qingqiu called for her. His voice was weak and hoarse from disuse, and he cleared his throat painfully. “Help me. Find Luo Binghe, bring him here.”

She didn’t even look up, but she was still coming closer. A thread of unease worked its way down Shen Qingqiu’s spine.

The chains clanged as Shen Qingqiu tried and failed to shift. The shivers in his body grew as tension ratcheted higher in his muscles.

“Stop, don’t come any closer,” Shen Qingqiu warned.

The young women set the tray down between Shen Qingqiu’s feet. With her head bowed, it was like she didn’t see him or hear him at all.  Like his body was only a decoration, and Shen Qingqiu himself didn’t exist.

“Hey. Hey, what are you saying? Speak up!”

She continued her soft muttering as she lit a stick of incense on the tray and placed it in a small clay pot.

Shen Qingqiu’s breath became harsh and loud as he glanced around the room for a way to escape. It was like he was being worshipped, but this didn’t feel like honor.

Another door opened and he tore his attention from the girl, head whipping to the source of the noise. He couldn’t—this person was out of his line of sight, behind him. He twitched, filthy hair falling over his eyes as he tried to keep his breathing steady.

Panicking wouldn’t get him anywhere, he reminded himself. But no matter how much he repeated it, he couldn’t stop the way gooseflesh erupted over his skin at the intrusion, his skin crawling uncomfortably.

The girl stopped muttering.

Shen Qingqiu watched with wide eyes as she took the stick from the pot, smoke drifting from the tip like the twisting curl of a snake.

She turned her eyes to his feet, face completely expressionless. Shen Qingqiu froze as soft chanting started up from behind him.

Suddenly a bright, focused burning sensation made him yelp, a sound that cracked with stress on his unused vocal chords. It didn’t even sound like a human noise.

The girl at his feet had tapped the still-burning incense stick against his ankle. He kicked out, but the gold-painted chains didn’t let him go anywhere.

He closed his eyes in agony. This shouldn’t have hurt so much. It was so little contact and Shen Qingqiu’s pain tolerance used to be incredible. But after so much sensory deprivation, combined with the expectation of torture, it was unbearable instead.

The chanting from behind him stopped. He whipped his head around again, trying to catch sight of this person behind him.

Another focused burn pressed itself into Shen Qingqiu’s calf, and he screamed before cutting himself off with a silent snarl.

He could bear this silently, suffering in his dignity.

He could.

Then both cultists were gone and Shen Qingqiu was left desperately trying to get enough air into his lungs, the burning sensations lingering on his ankle and calf.

Several clangs sounded from around the room as door after door opened.

Shen Qingqiu tugged at the chains harder. He had stopped caring about the bite of the iron against the thin skin of his wrists.

“Stop,” he commanded in a whisper, but no one paid him any heed. They just approached with heads bowed, carrying their trays of incense with a small clay pot.

Chanting started up from around the room. Surely there couldn’t be more than five people in front of him, not many more behind, but with the haunting echoes bouncing off the vaulted ceiling, it sounded like the murmurings of an army, all bearing witness to Shen Qingqiu’s exposed and filthy flesh.

One of the men in ceremonial robes took the lit incense from its pot.

“No,” Shen Qingqiu commanded. It sounded more like a plea. He swallowed hard at the disgrace, but continued. “No, stop! Don’t—”

A yelp tore free from his throat before he could stop it.

Having completed his task, the man returned the incense stick to the little clay pot and left.

More of the doors opened in front of Shen Qingqiu, the sounds cutting through the quiet chanting.

There was nothing he could do but watch as two of the men at his feet took their incense from the pots. It was like his mind had been disconnected from his immobile body, powerless as each person burned his skin, the sensation multiplied by two people behind him.

The clangs of the doors echoed in his ears. Within moments, the room’s inhabitants had doubled, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t bear to look anymore. He dropped his head, painfully aware that he had been defeated. Luo Binghe had won, and there was nothing Shen Qingqiu could do. Shen Qingqiu was completely alone.

One of the chants had stopped, and the woman approached with bowed head to touch the stick against Shen Qingqiu’s ribcage.

The scream came from somewhere deep in his chest, and he shut his eyes tightly. His body wasn’t his own anymore, somehow, it had become theirs.

The tremors in his body became violent, and the rattle of the chains almost drowned out the chanting.

Shen Qingqiu tried hard to block it out, shoulders hiking up to his ears on his hanging head.

It couldn’t block out uncountable points of burning in his skin or the pathetic, miserable noises falling from his lips. Time seemed to blur as his skin betrayed him, alternating burning and sharp prickling that felt like knives raking over his skin.

Again and again he tried to bring him arms down to soothe the pain with his own touch, only to be stopped by those cold, unforgiving chains.

It was all too much, sensation and noise pressing in on him from all sides.

He didn’t want to be here anymore, he gasped. He wanted to be safe in his room, away from this cold, exposed place where his body had been taken from him.

Shen Qingqiu’s eyes rolled frantically. He wanted to be cared for in Luo Binghe’s gentle hold.

Didn’t Luo Binghe promise no more drugs?

Why did Shen Qingqiu feel like this? It was like his skin was being peeled off piece by piece, throwing his mind in the hazy agony of desperation.

Suddenly Shen Qingqiu was sure that these people were tearing him open, exposing his innermost parts. Surely Luo Binghe wouldn’t allow this, surely—

He looked and looked, craning his neck with harsh gasps. It was getting harder to breathe, where was Luo Binghe?

A flash of bright eyes flickered in the corner of his vision, but there was no one there. Just the wispy curl of incense smoke obscuring his vision with chaotic movement from all sides.

Another wave of agony raked cold nails over the surface of Shen Qingqiu’s skin.

His ears rang with the echoing racket of this cathedral-like room, and his body was out of his control, trying and failing to twitch away. He tried to stop his ears. He tried to cover his eyes. He tried to bring his limbs close to his chest to protect himself. He—

He was crying.

The realization was like ice water doused over his internal organs. Shen Qingqiu’s breath shuddered as he tried to muster up anger. He should be furious that he was made to suffer this, that these monsters were trying to break his body and spirit.

He was an Olympian, compared to a martial god in partial seriousness throughout all of China. He had the willpower and spirit of an unbreakable emperor, stubborn as a mule and proud as a lion.

Exhaustion stopped his anger as effectively as a thick wool blanket tossed over a sputtering flame.

He didn’t want to be here anymore.

The thought played on a loop over Luo Binghe’s face, beckoning him and encouraging him to just leave, to fall into this safe embrace. Shen Qingqiu reached out, but he couldn’t move his hands.

Shen Qingqiu went limp, falling apart like torn tissue paper. There was no way to vent the agony slicing through him every second in unpredictable places at unpredictable intervals. His traitorous body twitched with electric shocks when it became too much for his overloaded nerves, but it was already too much for his body and mind.

His mind shut down in a blurry fog as if to protect itself, his every single thought revolving again and again around the same face he painstakingly etched into a wall.

Nothing faded, his mind was firmly tethered down, but time started to slip away, moments stretching into hours as he waited for everything to stop.

Maybe it wouldn’t stop.

Maybe Shen Qingqiu would be stuck here forever, struggling and alone, while the moments felt like hours and Shen Qingqiu’s world finally went dark.

Shen Qingqiu could hear himself cry out and pant through an open mouth, though it was muffled. It was almost like he was underwater; he could hear and see his body reacting to what his mind wasn’t willing to face.

Except… why was he staring at black concrete? Shen Qingqiu’s brow furrowed, but he couldn’t understand why his vision was blocked. The curling incense smoke was gone too, he realized belatedly. Was he… on the floor?

Gradually, he struggled to his feet. A door in front of his face was open. Dazedly, his mind latched onto the dark, beckoning square. It seemed to eat at the rest of his vision, beckoning him with the promise of relief.

He stumbled forward on shaking legs. The dark rectangle swallowed him whole, and then another rectangle appeared in front of him.

He stumbled and fell, ears ringing as his body collapsed to the concrete.

He had to get up, Shen Qingqiu reminded himself. His limbs might be heavy as lead but he needed to get to that dark square.

Then, once the square had swallowed him whole, he would be safe. He would be warmed and secure, not exposed and vulnerable like he was now. This disorienting agony would leave as he was in the soft embrace of…

The thought evaporated before it could fully form. Shen Qingqiu didn’t know where he was going, but it had to be better than here, so he struggled to his feet again.

He put one foot in front of another, again and again.

The square’s darkness washed over him, and then another square devoured his broken body, and then he was met with white.

This room was achingly, painfully familiar.

Without really thinking about it, Shen Qingqiu crawled to the stained, yellow mattress and curled up on it, bringing his arms and legs close to his bare center.

Slowly, he began the process of convincing his mind to take stock of what had happened to his body. There was no one here, he reasoned. The thought made his throat seize, but he pressed on.

Only he could help himself. There was no one…

But he had come all the way here, back to his own bedroom, to fix this. When he got here, he was supposed to be fixed!

Why wasn’t he fixed? Why was he still covered in ice, his skin hallucinating gentle touches that it seemed to desperately need?

All the gentle care that he had been imagining, that had pervaded his dreams and bombarded his consciousness as he worried over it like a dog gnawing at a sore paw, it was all imagined.

Shen Qingqiu could feel the way his body trembled, but it wasn’t from the cold.

Tears streamed down his face and into the stained mattress as he sobbed like a comfortless child.

Why was it so hard for him to accept that he was completely alone?                                                                                                                                  

It was like he was in denial, every cell of his body trying to convince him that comfort was right there, that relief was so close.

Shen Qingqiu shook his head into the stained mattress, pleading with himself.

No one…

His body jolted like he was being electrocuted before he could even finish the thought.

No one was here for him.

He cried while the world seemed to crash down around him, his tears flowing like they would never stop. His throat ached with every new noise torn out of it. His voice hadn’t been used in nearly a year, and now it was yelling, sobbing, and pleading.

It didn’t change anything. There would still be no one to answer.

Eventually, Shen Qingqiu ran out of tears, and he was left with the splitting headache in its wake, but he still couldn’t help the way his breaths heaved with despair.

Exhaustion crept up on him like a shadow and overtook him, forcing his breaths to calm and his heartbeat to slow. But his mind was still racing in those same circles of misery, perpetual and unchanging. How could he go to sleep?

Shen Qingqiu could do nothing but lay there like a shell of a person, exhausted and alone, all his emotions completely spent.

He lay there, as still if he had died, while his blurred vision finally came into focus through half-closed lids.

Even though his eyes worked, it took a long time for Shen Qingqiu to see what was in front of him, and even longer to process what it meant.

The door to Luo Binghe’s room was ajar.

The spiral of his thoughts suddenly changed their course, reminding him of his hazy, drugged memories that had inextricably wound into his fantastical nighttime dreams. Behind that door was a person.

Not only that, behind that door was Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu gathered every ounce of his strength to push himself into sitting position. His voice was completely shattered, but he tried to call out anyway. He couldn’t force more than a cracked-through whisper from his throat.

He needed—

Shen Qingqiu needed to be seen. Looked at, talked to, abused, violated, anything, so long as it included Luo Binghe’s caring, bright-sun gaze turned to his thin and shaking body.

He took a deep, unsteady breath before beginning to crawl. His head was spinning so hard that it took all his concentration not to careen sideways onto the concrete. How long had he been without sleep, food, or water? He had no idea.

It didn’t matter, he just had to get to Luo Binghe’s room.

His bare skin prickled painfully in the freezing cold of the room as he moved closer, like the air itself was trying to halt his progress.

Crawling was like moving through thick fluid, but he couldn’t stop and rest. If he stopped moving at all, he wouldn’t be able to continue. He would just give up, far enough that Luo Binghe might as well be a continent away, abandoned on the floor while cold concrete stole all the last dregs of warmth away from his bare skin.

He couldn’t let that happen.

Shen Qingqiu dragged his body across the concrete. He couldn’t feel anything, numb to pain, but surely the rough texture was tearing his bare skin apart. He didn’t care.

Suddenly he shuddered as warm air caressed his skin. The temperature change was so stark that he pressed forward more urgently.

At the first touch of plush carpet against his hands, he collapsed and went limp. He had made it.

He stared up at the dark ceiling, unsure what he had accomplished.

It was warm around him, but he still shivered violently.

He was still exposed, and his insides still felt covered in ice.  

And.. and…

Shen Qingqiu’s muscles started to twitch uncomfortably.

And he was still alone.

Before Shen Qingqiu realized what was happening, his body started to convulse.

He could only stare at the ceiling, uncomprehending and numb, as he spasmed and trembled. Once the attack had mostly died down, Shen Qingqiu was left trembling but otherwise motionless. Movement flashed in the corner of his vision, and he painfully tried to turn his head to look.

“Are you done?” a voice asked.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t have the energy to react. His ears weren’t ringing anymore, but his brain was still filled with fog. He didn’t understand this voice.

He didn’t even know if it was real.

Suddenly the world started to spin as he felt rough contact on his arms pulling him upward.

His head rolled back. A small chuckle sounded from somewhere behind him. “You’re not dead, no matter how much you pretend.”

A soft hand brushed a strand of hair out of his face and a dry sob wrenched its way from Shen Qingqiu’s chest.

He didn’t know what was happening.

“You’re safe,” the voice said, and it was so soft and gentle that it could only be Luo Binghe. “No more pain.”

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help but believe him.

Luo Binghe’s arms wrapped around his body, the points of contact so warm that Shen Qingqiu felt like he was thawing. If Luo Binghe abandoned him now, he would be broken.

“Don’t leave me,” he pleaded, but it didn’t even sound like words from his abused throat, it barely sounded like breathing. “Don’t—” but it was useless. Nothing he had said had ever mattered, even if he was able to speak. He was Luo Binghe’s to use or throw away.

It was all he could do to clutch at Luo Binghe’s hands that were wrapped around his slender waist, silently pleading that he wouldn’t be discarded.

He didn’t want to be left in the cold again, to weak to do anything but cry.

“Please,” he said, forcing the word from his unwilling vocal cords. His voice was tattered, but that word was, at least, understandable.

It had taken all his effort and he slumped down again.

Luo Binghe’s warm hands lifted away from his body and he choked, muscles tightening to prepare to convulse again. There was nothing he could do to stop it.

His eyelashes fluttered, but the seizure was suddenly halted as Shen Qingqiu felt himself lifted into the air.

He hung limply on Luo Binghe’s arms. If he was being carried back to his own room, away from the warmth and comfort, he couldn’t maintain this hope. It would just crush him.

He felt himself being lowered, and it took a confused moment for him to realize his bare body had been gently placed in water.

A… bathtub?

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been clean in more than a year.

“Just relax. I can clean you, but you have to keep your head above water.” It was that voice again, quiet and tender. Shen Qingqiu turned towards it, but he was distracted by the way his arm was being moved by gentle fingers.

Shen Qingqiu watched as his arm was cleaned with a soft washcloth, erasing all the burns and aches as the grime was coaxed from his skin.

The bathwater was pink, he realized. Dimly, he registered the pain in his knees. They must have been scraped from his crawling on the concrete.

He tried to whine, drawing them in closer to protect himself, eyes filling with hurt.

“Didn’t I say I would take care of you?” Luo Binghe asked, brushing a hand against Shen Qingqiu’s cheek.

He shivered and followed the touch unconsciously, relaxing in increments. “Trust me,” Luo Binghe said.

Luo Binghe cleaned his arms, then legs, then torso attentively, making sure to alternate gentle touches with the washcloth and soothing motions with his hands.

Shen Qingqiu was overwhelmed with sensation. He had been deprived but now it was like a tide of warmth and hope crashing over him in all-consuming waves. His breathing became harsh and cracked, and he knew that, if he had any tears left, he would be crying again.

Luo Binghe coaxed his head back towards the water, working soapy fingers through Shen Qingqiu’s hair and scalp.

Shen Qingqiu’s mind stuttered and skipped like a broken record as he tried to acclimate. Luo Binghe.

Luo Binghe meant care.

Luo Binghe meant warmth and safety.

This wasn’t new. Why did these thoughts feel like they were going to break through Shen Qingqiu with the force of their relief?

“Hey, it’s okay,” Luo Binghe murmured in his ear. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t realized he had started to shake again. “I’ve got you. No need to cry anymore.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to remember the pain and loneliness. He wanted all that gone, replaced by the loving care he received now.

Luo Binghe continued to speak in low tones. “You did so well. Letting those people show their devotion. You’ve been good for me.”

Shen Qingqiu looked up with red-rimmed eyes, desperately searching Luo Binghe’s gaze for a hint of truth. Had he really been good?

Luo Binghe…was happy with him?

Luo Binghe nodded, a slight turn of his lips brightening his face. “Yes, you were very good.”

A burst of warmth erupted in Shen Qingqiu’s stomach. He had been good. Luo Binghe was happy with him.

Luo Binghe cupped his hands to rinse Shen Qingqiu’s hair, running his fingers through it between every handful of water. Maybe this gentle care was a reward, Shen Qingqiu though dazedly.

Because he had been good.

Every time he thought it, it seemed to make his chest a little less constricted.

Luo Binghe produced a brush from somewhere and started to run it through Shen Qingqiu’s hair. He made sure he didn’t pull any of Shen Qingqiu’s matted tangles, so it took a long, undefinable amount of time until Shen Qingqiu was pulled out of the bath and spread out on a towel on the bed.

It wasn’t cold, but Shen Qingqiu’s hair and body were wet, and he was still frozen into a shocked stillness at the barrage of confusing emotions, so of course he trembled like a paper umbrella in a storm. The feeling of the slightly scratchy blanket under his torn skin grounded him while Luo Binghe left him alone for a moment.

He was as helpless as an infant. He couldn’t do much more than stare at the ceiling and try to breathe normally. He throat felt like it had been crushed with emotion, overwhelming him in a different way than in that dark cathedral.

Luo Binghe came back before Shen Qingqiu could start spiraling again, and he could feel the bed dip as Luo Binghe’s weight was added. He tried to turn to face him, needing to see Luo Binghe’s face. He couldn’t control the choppy whine, a product of his constricted breathing.

Luo Binghe pushed him back down, shushing him softly. He didn’t need to use very much force because Shen Qingqiu was so weak, and he fell back to the bed without stopping the noise.

Luo Binghe began to towel him off with a new washcloth, skirting around the edges of each burn and cut that had been pressed into Shen Qingqiu’s skin. His face was bathed in darkness.

Shen Qingqiu tried to get his attention, but he still couldn’t speak. He tugged at Luo Binghe’s sleeve, but Luo Binghe brushed him off like his touch was simply dust on his robes.

Luo Binghe wasn’t looking at him!

Shen Qingqiu started to twitch as terror flooded him, eyes flashing with scenes from the cathedral. Nobody was looking at him but everyone wanted to ruin his broken, exposed body—

He couldn’t cry out for help.

His eyes rolled frantically as he tried to move, but his limbs wouldn’t listen! The sound of chanting echoed through the room and he tried to block it out, tearing at his ears and kicking out with his feet.

“Stop,” came a firm, steady voice, and Shen Qingqiu went rigid. “I thought I told you already, there’s no pain here. Stop hurting yourself.”

Shen Qingqiu wilted, confused. Was that voice talking to him? There was pain everywhere, no one could offer him comfort in this dark, exposed place. It didn’t make any sense.

Half-in and half-out of the hallucination, Shen Qingqiu felt touches to his hands and feet, spreading his body out and nudging his muscles to relax.

But they weren’t burning touches, they were warm. Human.

He searched everywhere, his eyes eventually locking on Luo Binghe’s.

That patient gaze met Shen Qingqiu’s panicked one. There were no knives raking over his skin, he realized. He was cold but he wasn’t… exposed. He didn’t know how, but he knew he was safe here.

Gradually, Shen Qingqiu melted into the towel under him, falling completely still as Luo Binghe continued to dry his body with a washcloth.

 This darkness was a kind darkness, he decided. A forgiving one, where the texture of the concrete was more like a cloud, and the false touches to his bare skin felt so incredibly real.

Shen Qingqiu started to drift. His muscles had relaxed from their bow-taut pain and now his mind was following after. His eyes closed.

A soft chuckle from Luo Binghe made one of his eyes crack open. “Sit up.”

Shen Qingqiu really didn’t want to. But Luo Binghe wanted him to sit up, and Shen Qingqiu wanted to be able to reach for Luo Binghe’s touch, even though he was going to go to sleep soon anyway. Even though Shen Qingqiu was exhausted, he still moved his hands close to his body on the bed.

He struggled to push himself up, but his arms weren’t working. Shaky and weak, they couldn’t raise him more than a few inches before he collapsed back onto the bed. He couldn’t see Luo Binghe from this angle, but he knew he would meet a disappointed glance at his failure.

He couldn’t even sit up! Shen Qingqiu’s eyelids fluttered shut again, heart sinking.

A warm hand curled around his palm once Luo Binghe had seen that Shen Qingqiu had given up. Shen Qingqiu squeezed his eyes shut tighter.

Luo Binghe moved that warm hand from Shen Qingqiu’s wrist up to his shoulder, calming the tenseness there as he went.

He was pushing at Shen Qingqiu, and he started to panic. He was so helpless, he couldn’t get up if he were pushed off the bed—!

Instead of falling, Shen Qingqiu felt himself being levered up until he was sitting against several pillows. Luo Binghe started to talk again, and this time, Shen Qingqiu desperately hung on to every word.

“It’s okay if you can’t do it yourself.” Shen Qingqiu tilted his head, hope blooming in his chest. Was this forgiveness? “I’m here,” Luo Binghe told him, “And I take care of beautiful things that belong to me.”

Shen Qingqiu’s eyebrows came together as he tried to process this. Luo Binghe raised a hand to Shen Qingqiu’s face, rubbing a finger over his brow to smooth out the lines there. “Beautiful thing, are you in pain?”

Shen Qingqiu realized that, while he was more relaxed now, his throat was still damaged, and every exhale sounded like a whimper. He opened and closed his mouth uselessly, trying to stop the pathetic noise.

Luo Binghe brushed his fingers against Shen Qingqiu’s broken throat. “Don’t try to speak, it’ll hurt too bad. You’re going to eat, and then you’ll feel a little better.”

Shen Qingqiu swallowed painfully. He was so tired. He just wanted Luo Binghe nearby as he fell asleep.

He tilted forward, angling to try to fall into Luo Binghe’s arms, but Luo Binghe just pushed him upright again insistently. Betrayed, Shen Qingqiu could feel a dry sob building up in his chest.

Luo Binghe’s arms were warm and safe, so why was Shen Qingqiu now getting rejected?

Suddenly something soft and warm was pressed to his lips, and Luo Binghe had a hand in Shen Qingqiu’s hair to tilt his head back.

A savory taste melted across his tongue, and he swallowed on instinct.

He tensed against Luo Binghe’s hand as the savory food painfully worked its way down to his stomach. It felt like he had swallowed hot nails, but Luo Binghe waited until it was gone, and then Shen Qingqiu’s throat felt a lot better.

The warmth of it sat in Shen Qingqiu’s center and he stared dazedly at Luo Binghe’s face. After a long moment, Luo Binghe brought the spoon back up to his lips, and Shen Qingqiu obediently accepted another bite of warmth, which went down smoother.

After a couple bites, he recognized the savory taste of steamed egg.

After a little more, the dish had fully warmed up his body.

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t cold anymore.

Luo Binghe stopped feeding Shen Qingqiu and instead guided his body to lay down, taking the towel from under him and throwing it off to the side.

Shen Qingqiu watched the motion. Before, when Luo Binghe had cared for him, Shen Qingqiu was only allowed to sleep in his own bed, on that filthy yellowed mattress out in the white room.

Except, Luo Binghe didn’t bring him back there.

Luo Binghe brought him in close, gathering Shen Qingqiu’s bare, fractured body in close to his chest as if he were nothing more than a beloved heap of sticks.

Shen Qingqiu felt so heavy that he couldn’t move a muscle, but that was okay. He didn’t need to press in closer to Luo Binghe’s embrace, Luo Binghe was holding onto him securely.

He didn’t need to be able to reach out and beg for comfort, because he knew Luo Binghe wouldn’t let him go. Luo Binghe wouldn’t leave him.

“Now you go to sleep.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to dream and leave this place, but he couldn’t help it as he succumbed to the exhaustion that had been pulling at him, slipping into unconsciousness in the next moment.

He drifted.

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu felt… floaty.

He furrowed his brows in confusion, not only confused about that feeling but also confused about why he was confused.

Wasn’t it normal to feel floaty after sleeping for a long time? Why did this feel so different?

 He tried to open his eyes, blanching when he found that they were puffy and swollen to the point that they were nearly stuck together. He recognized the feeling.

For some reason, Shen Qingqiu had been crying before he went to sleep. As if they were hesitant, memories slowly began to trickle in.

He recalled the iron bars that had been raised into the ceiling, then Shen Qingqiu had eaten the bad rice for some reason and passed out.

With some difficulty, Shen Qingqiu forced himself to remember being strung up on that golden arch and tortured. He didn’t know how accurate these memories were, but he was fairly sure he had been there for more than several hours. It depended on how long he had been sleeping for, but Shen Qingqiu probably hadn’t eaten or drunk water in days.

No wonder his head hurt like hot nails had been driven into his forehead.

His skin ached, but it wasn’t a painful feeling. It was more like the pleasant soreness after a rough training session. Back when Shen Qingqiu was an Olympian, he would spend the day with a heated pad to soothe the aching muscles.

Speaking of… he wasn’t cold. Did his nerves finally give way?

Shen Qingqiu forced his eyelids open and weakly pushed himself away from his mattress. He hadn’t slept there in awhile, but he had often fallen asleep in weird places in his white cell.

Shen Qingqiu’s hand hit warm skin as he tried to push himself upright and he froze. He stared off into darkness, suddenly realizing that it shouldn’t be so dark here. Something was wrong.

“You’re awake,” Luo Binghe’s voice drifted towards his ears.

Shen Qingqiu flinched so hard he fell off the bed.

It took a second for him to get his sore, clumsy limbs to obey him, but he sprung to his feet furiously, blood rushing to the surface of his skin.

It was then that he was struck by the lightning realization—he was naked!

A shadow passed over him, and for a moment, he couldn’t speak as his face twisted in humiliation and fear.

Then fury rose up in his throat like bile. He pointed one shaking finger at Luo Binghe. “You— you—”  Except his voice didn’t quite work, and his words came out in an inaudible whisper. He remembered screaming himself hoarse on that golden frame and he roughly shoved that memory aside.

Luo Binghe just raised his eyebrows, looking almost amused.

Shen Qingqiu twitched. He desperately wanted to get his hands around this smug youth’s thin throat and just squeeze—

But as it stood, he was extremely weak. All he could do was point with a shaking hand. He wrestled for control of his vocal cords as his lips moved soundlessly.

“Does this amuse you?” He screamed, his throat convulsing in agony. He ignored it. “My suffering? Does this make you happy, you sick, perverted—”

Shen Qingqiu felt his throat completely close, and he had to cut himself off. Luo Binghe’s expression turned cold.

Some of Shen Qingqiu’s hot rage abruptly became doused in icy water.

He wasn’t—

He wasn’t afraid of Luo Binghe!

Luo Binghe simple set his book down on his chest, where Shen Qingqiu himself had just been laying. Shen Qingqiu shrunk back, eyes widening, but Luo Binghe didn’t move any further.

“I don’t have space here for small, insecure men who don’t know what they want. Leave, until you’re ready to be good for me again.” Luo Binghe said, then turned away.

Shen Qingqiu stumbled backwards without consciously deciding to, knocking open the door behind him and falling in a heap on the cold, unforgiving concrete.

The audacity of that boy! Shen Qingqiu sat on the floor for a shocked moment, unable to move as his skin was cooled by the icy air of the room.

He— he couldn’t quite understand what had just happened.

Shen Qingqiu curled his legs into his chest and wrapped his arms around himself. To preserve warmth, he told himself. There was no one here, not even guards were stationed at the front of the room.

So why did Shen Qingqiu feel so exposed?

It was like his skin had been peeled off by Luo Binghe, and then, when Shen Qingqiu lashed out, Luo Binghe left him with his rib cage open to the cold. Even wrapping his arms around his center, Shen Qingqiu still felt like his internal organs were going to fall out.

Don’t be a drama queen, Shen Qingqiu scolded himself. Sure, he hadn’t been naked, but it wasn’t like the cold was a new thing for him. He could handle this for now.

He still didn’t take his arms from around his body.

Internally, he took stock of all the aches and pains of his body. Since he had been thrown out—and he had been thrown out. He didn’t know what means Luo Binghe had used to push him out of the room but he certainly didn’t go of his own free will, like an obedient little lamb— the sudden movements of his body sent flares of pain through his skin and muscles.

Although he was just sitting there, the pains in his body seemed to multiply between being in Luo Binghe’s bed and being alone in his room. If this was his punishment for yelling, it made sense.

But all these other feelings…it was like his chest would be crushed if he sorted through them all without someone there for him. He decided to push those memories down for the moment, at least until time had weathered enough of the emotion away.

And Shen Qingqiu had nothing but time.

Months, maybe. Another year…

But this one would be so much harder.

Shen Qingqiu was struck by that same feeling that he had felt in that 24-hour café. He had been through so much, worked so hard to get here… but it didn’t matter.

This time, it wasn’t just that the finish line was far away—it was completely unreachable. There was no way that he could see out of this situation.

Its wasn’t only that, though.

Now, Shen Qingqiu knew what the future held, besides endless loneliness and cold. He would spend the next year in horrified anticipation of the iron bars lifting to shackle him up again, unsure when it would come but always on edge.

If the threat of torture had been lurking over his shoulder before, now it was dangling in front of his face. He shuddered. Hopefully this fear would fade, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t hold his hopes too high.

He also wasn’t entirely confident that he wouldn’t slip up. Luo Binghe—that demon— had offered him a way out of this horrible touch-starvation. With the promise of eternity trapped in this place, where every moment felt like forever and relief was just a wall away, Shen Qingqiu knew his mental strength would falter.

Frustrated, he knocked his forehead against his knees. He had never, in his life, been forced to question his own willpower. If something needed to be done, Shen Qingqiu would do it. If he wanted to become the best at something, all he would need to do was focus and practice at it, and he would succeed if only he worked hard enough. To know that he would eventually be weak enough to give in, to know for a surety that he would fail—

It was like Luo Binghe had already won.

Maybe it would be better for Shen Qingqiu to apologize now, while he knew Luo Binghe was there and willing to listen.

No!

Shen Qingqiu gave himself a firm, face-turning mental slap. The leftover pain and loneliness must be messing with his brain. Luo Binghe didn’t mean good things, he reminded himself. Luo Binghe didn’t mean comfort, he didn’t mean relief, and he certainly didn’t hold the hope in Shen Qingqiu’s life.

But here, without Luo Binghe, it was cold and lonely, and in the next room it was warm and safe.

It didn’t seem to matter how many times Shen Qingqiu told himself that Luo Binghe was the cause of all this suffering, right now, his warm comfort seemed like the sole balm.

Fully aware of all of this, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t resist the well of hopelessness that threatened to drown him. Nothing could change the outcome of his life. No matter what happened, he couldn’t escape, he couldn’t flinch away from abuse, and he couldn’t change his loneliness.

There was only one real decision he could make, and it was one he didn’t want to even think about.

That demon.

The thought held no malice, only exhaustion.

Shen Qingqiu glanced up at the face on the wall. It was only half-finished, but the eyes seemed to glow with the benevolent gaze of their reference.

Shen Qingqiu had originally tried to make this Luo Binghe haughty, putting little smirking lines near his eyes, but now that smile just made him look kind. Forgiving. Would he forgive Shen Qingqiu if he went back in there and apologized?

It was just a thought experiment. There was no harm in wondering.

If he was to apologize, Shen Qingqiu would have to stand, letting his arms and legs fall from his center, and face Luo Binghe without shame. He would gently pry open the door, then fall to his knees. It wouldn’t hurt, because of the plush carpet he had felt underfoot.

He remembered Luo Binghe’s promise, that Luo Binghe wouldn’t let him be in pain while he was in that room. He had called Shen Qingqiu his “beautiful thing.” Shen Qingqiu shivered as the memory surfaced.

Not important!

Shen Qingqiu returned to his thought experiment, momentarily derailed but eager to get back on track. If he were to make up with Luo Binghe right now, he wouldn’t have to speak, because his throat hurt and Luo Binghe wouldn’t make him try to force words out. He would just need to keep his eyes downcast and humble, and that might be enough for Luo Binghe to take him back into his bed and hold him close.

But then also, Luo Binghe would also probably ask him do to something. Shen Qingqiu had dull, hazy memories of those orders, issued several times a day with a voice that left no room for argument. They were never painful and never something that Shen Qingqiu couldn’t do.

Or, if they proved to be too much to ask of him, Luo Binghe would help.

In the very beginning, Shen Qingqiu was still stubborn, even under the haze of depressants. But he couldn’t bear how Luo Binghe would abandon him in his own filth whenever he disobeyed, refusing to bathe or comfort an unwilling servant, so he stopped resisting quickly.

By the time he had started to gain tolerance to the drug, he wasn’t even thinking about it anymore. He would follow those gentle commands without consciously deciding to.

When he was told to, Shen Qingqiu would retrieve Luo Binghe’s cloak from the closet. He would drink the offered glass of water. He would undress himself for a bath. He would speak up when the massage got too unbearable on his sore muscles. He would relax in Luo Binghe’s arms.

He would, he would, he would.

Luo Binghe was expecting someone who would to come to his door, begging for forgiveness, so if Shen Qingqiu were apologize, he would have to obey whatever Luo Binghe said next.

And if he really, earnestly gave the task his best effort, and still couldn’t do it, Luo Binghe would help him.

Shen Qingqiu realized that pressure was starting to build behind his eyes, as if tears were threating to spill.

This line of thinking wasn’t getting him anywhere! He stood, unwilling to look at his bare body. Instead, Shen Qingqiu did what he always did when he didn’t want to think about things anymore, and returned to the painting he was working on.

Which just so happened to be Luo Binghe’s face. Surely, just a coincidence that he was painting the very thoughts he was avoiding by doing so.

But Shen Qingqiu had just been with Luo Binghe, the memory of his face fresh in his mind. There was no better time to continue his work.

While he worked, he began to feel a flicker of hope.

He had escaped, once. It was a while ago, and he had been lucky to catch Luo Binghe off-guard and absent, but he had done it. That meant it was possible.

Now that he knew the door in his cell could open, it also opened endless possibilities.

The first possibility that needed to be eliminated was sneaking off. He didn’t know where he was, and he knew he wouldn’t get far if he tried to escape that way again. It would just lead to more humiliation.

The second possibility that wasn’t feasible was bribery. Shen Qingqiu was wealthy, but Luo Binghe and this cult didn’t want money. They just wanted their god.

The third possibility was a much more plausible one than the previous two, and that consisted of convincing Luo Binghe to set him free. This seemed like the only likely option, especially since Shen Qingqiu would need to physically cross through Luo Binghe’s room in order to escape. Likewise, he would also need to pass through Luo Binghe himself.

Shen Qingqiu began to try to fix the shading around Luo Binghe’s eyes. It wasn’t that it was wrong, per se, it was just that the emotion wasn’t quite what Shen Qingqiu was trying to portray.

Luo Binghe… Shen Qingqiu wasn’t quite sure what Luo Binghe wanted with him. The first explanation that came to mind was that Luo Binghe was endeared.

Luo Binghe didn’t worship Shen Qingqiu as a god; to him, Shen Qingqiu was more like property. Beloved, well-cared-for property, but a possession nonetheless.

Perhaps Luo Binghe wanted him for a perverted, sexual reason. Shen Qingqiu knew that some men were deviants who desired other men, and he had also heard that those people sometimes loved to hurt their partners.

Stranger still, he had heard that those partners, when faced with such a situation, liked the pain in a sexual way. Luo Binghe was young, but he wasn’t to be underestimated.

If Luo Binghe liked such things, then he would stop at nothing to get it.

Except, Shen Qingqiu had been drugged and completely helpless. If Luo Binghe wanted to defile him, he had thousands of opportunities. Unless Luo Binghe was determined to get Shen Qingqiu to crawl to him of his own accord, which was a possibility, but Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure why that would be necessary. Shen Qingqiu sat that explanation aside for now. It just made him uncomfortable.

Luo Binghe only showed Shen Qingqiu his caring, gentle side. The possibility that he would want to defile him, to personally betray him when he promised there would be no pain in that bed—it was hard to think about. Anyway, nothing about the plan changed, even if that were true.

Shen Qingqiu would need to endear himself enough to Luo Binghe in order to make his request.

And that meant that he would have to get on Luo Binghe’s good side, pandering to Luo Binghe’s every command. It would be shameful and terrible, but then, if Shen Qingqiu managed to be persuasive enough, then perhaps he could trade a few month’s servitude, where he would pretend to be the sweet, docile creature that Luo Binghe wanted, for his freedom.

Shen Qingqiu took a deep, overwhelmed breath, hanging his head against his artwork for a moment. It would be incredibly difficult.

It was easy enough to lay down like a corpse and pretend he was hanging on to Luo Binghe’s every word, but no matter what, Shen Qingqiu still had his dignity. How could he, a strong, intelligent, independent man, let Luo Binghe, another man, lay him in a bathtub like a child and brush through his wet tangles with a gentle hairbrush?

He would need to let Luo Binghe feed him soft foods that wouldn’t aggravate his throat, and then let Luo Binghe wrap him in strong yet affectionate arms as they both fell asleep. He would need to be in that warm room for hours and hours at a time while Luo Binghe both cared for his physical and emotional needs, and expected his unconditional servitude in return.

But then, after a pre-negotiated amount of time of this astonishing disgrace, Shen Qingqiu would be free.

Shen Qingqiu returned to work on his mural, lifting his head up high to see what he was doing. In a choice between this eternity of cold and misery, and freedom after a short time of humiliating— yet false— subservience, Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t hesitate to choose the latter.

It would work out for both him and Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe would think that he had finally gained a perfect pet, and Shen Qingqiu would be hiding his victorious smirk behind a docile mask.

He just had to figure out a way to do it. Shen Qingqiu went to bed that night with a grim kind of determination. He needed his voice to heal before pursuing this plan so he could negotiate their terms.

He had all the time in the world to practice his lies.

Chapter Text

Eight sleep-cycles later, his body was still feeling the remnant of his soreness, but he was mostly healed, and he could speak.

Probably. He hadn’t actually tried to yet.

The guards weren’t here anymore, Luo Binghe had sent them away after Shen Qingqiu had yelled at him. There was no real reason to keep quiet, but something stopped Shen Qingqiu every time he thought about trying to talk.

One time, when he had spoken, he had starved for days. After that, he had been taken from his room and tortured, and his speech used for screams to vent the agony. After that, his voice had been used for begging Luo Binghe not to leave him alone, despondent and terrified.

He didn’t want to open his mouth ever again.

A guard approached his cell, eyes firmly fixed on the floor, and Shen Qingqiu watched him from his place slumped against the far wall. A new guard came by every day to deliver food, never speaking or looking into the cell, just dropping off the food and leaving.

Except, this time, he didn’t leave after delivering the food, just stared straight at the opposite wall. Shen Qingqiu crept forwards curiously, not bothering cover himself as he stood.

Instead of the normal bowl of food, Shen Qingqiu found himself faced with double the portion in two identical bowls. He squinted at them, head tilted to the side. He had options now? Or was Luo Binghe trying to fatten him up, for some reason?

He held them to the light, one after the other, and then back again, trying to determine if there was something different between two of them. Surely, if it was just a double portion, they would be different foods? Shen Qingqiu was definitely being asked to choose between them.

They were both cold and identical in size, but looking carefully at the right one, it seemed to have a thin, almost yellow sheen, like something had been poured over the rice after it was cooked and chilled. Drugs, no doubt. Shen Qingqiu didn’t remember what food had looked like when he was refusing it, but he was sure that the extra ‘ingredient’ had been added later, not cooked in.

If that was the case, Shen Qingqiu was being offered a choice. Escape this pain with the haze of drugs, or endure it without.

Shen Qingqiu started, realizing a perfect opportunity had just fallen into his lap. With this, it didn’t matter how insincere he was. Luo Binghe would believe Shen Qingqiu was truly humble and repentant if Shen Qingqiu begged him for forgiveness in this state.

It would be incredibly embarrassing, if Shen Qingqiu’s memory served him correctly.

But he wouldn’t feel any shame in the moment, besides the little sentient voice that protested uselessly, buried deep in his heart. And Luo Binghe would definitely believe it, which was the important part.

In the end, Shen Qingqiu decisively chose the drugged bowl, pushing the regular rice back under the gap in the bars. The guard scooped it up swiftly without looking and departed back the way he came, and Shen Qingqiu was left to stare at the cold, drugged food. Even though he was hungry, he was still unsure about this. Even if he hadn’t spent months in a horrible, half-conscious state, it would still feel wrong to volunteer himself to something like this. It felt strangely like giving in.

Luo Binghe probably wanted to get Shen Qingqiu drugged without breaking his promise earlier, so he gave Shen Qingqiu a fifty-fifty shot, assuming that Shen Qingqiu would just choose one while not knowing about the differences. He wouldn’t technically be breaking his promise because Shen Qingqiu had, theoretically, chosen the drugged bowl, but it would still be an underhanded way to get what he wanted.

By purposely taking the drugged bowl, Shen Qingqiu had helped Luo Binghe’s actions to become completely valid, not underhanded at all. Luo Binghe had promised that Shen Qingqiu would keep his brain unless he didn’t want that anymore, and Shen Qingqiu had chosen the drugs with full intent to lose it.

Soon, Shen Qingqiu reassured himself, he would be doted on, safe and warm. Even though it was with Luo Binghe.

He wouldn’t care about his pride anymore, and he would be in an uncomplicated state that both he and Luo Binghe would benefit from. There was no way around this.

Shen Qingqiu sighed and started to eat the cold food.

By the time he was finished, he didn’t feel much different. In his previous experience, this drug took effect almost immediately, throwing him into a helpless, needy state.

Perhaps it was delayed release, for some reason. Or maybe…

Shen Qingqiu felt his heart leap into his throat. Maybe this was a different drug.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t planned for that.

In any case, the outcome should be the same, he assured himself. Shen Qingqiu would crawl pathetically to Luo Binghe for help, and Luo Binghe would, without a doubt, help him.

Shen Qingqiu sat back against the wall, bringing his legs back up to his chest. It was practically his default position. It would have been embarrassing for anyone to see him like this, but there was no one.

In fetal position, he could conserve the body heat that he lost to nakedness while also feeling the hug of his own arms. When he was especially exhausted, he would sometimes imagine that someone was wrapped around his body, helping him protect his vulnerable center.

Also, this position had the benefit of not letting Shen Qingqiu see his own body. He had been purposely avoiding it.

Back when he was an Olympian, his arms and legs were incredibly toned, with a healthy bone and fat mass that made him an incredibly strong competitor. Now, he wasn’t even sure what looked like, only that he didn’t want to look at his body anymore.

Wiry, maybe. His skin covered in burn scars. Eyes sunken into his skull with exhaustion and stress.

No, he couldn’t bear to look, even if it was just a glance downward.

If there were someone there to comfort him, to assure him he was still beautiful and treat his delicate state with great care, then it might be easier to face.

But as it was, there was only himself here. He couldn’t do any of those things for himself anymore. His dignity had been stripped away, and if there wasn’t someone else present to build it back up, something as minor as this would destroy him.

Shen Qingqiu’s skin prickled, like it sometimes did when he thought someone might be watching him. He looked at the face he had scratched into the wall. It was almost finished, but he couldn’t stop messing with it, improving on the smallest of insignificant details even though he would ordinarily say it was perfect.

He rubbed his hands down his arms, and that seemed to soothe some of the aggregated feeling. Like he was petting down the indignant hairs on his arms or coaxing them back to sleep.

It only worked for a moment, and then his skin was prickling again.

He stood, peering through the bars. Who was watching him? It couldn’t be the guards because they had just left. The door— Shen Qingqiu checked around his shoulder— that was still tightly closed.

That may be a problem, actually.

Shen Qingqiu quickly pried the door open a crack so that he wouldn’t run into an issue when he finally fell under the influence of the drugs. If he were left helpless here without the strength to go through the door, he would be suffering for absolutely no reason, alone in this white room.

Now that the door was open slightly, it would be easy enough to pull it open even if he were writhing on the floor. After the very first time he had opened it, Shen Qingqiu suspected that someone had oiled the hinges. The previously rusted, corroded metal had turned gleaming while he had slept through that sleep-cycle.

Shen Qingqiu sat back down on his mattress, but the prickling sensation didn’t go away. It just became more painful the more he moved around. Shen Qingqiu was starting to think that was one of the precursors to the drug’s true effects.

But then why did his mind remain perfectly clear if this drug was already kicking in?

Perhaps Shen Qingqiu misunderstood Luo Binghe’s intentions.

He thought that Luo Binghe’s motives and desires were fairly clear. They had been outlined to him several times as Luo Binghe told Shen Qingqiu what he should expect while they were together. There were usually no surprises or mysteries unless Shen Qingqiu himself purposely withdrew from Luo Binghe.

Except for in those cases, the punishment-reward system was painfully clear.

Shen Qingqiu had withdrawn, hadn’t he? He had yelled at Luo Binghe and then refused to apologize.

And now Shen Qingqiu had no idea what was happening to him.

His mouth was incredibly dry, either from fear or from the drugs. He stumbled over to the water fountain.

Last time he had emerged from Luo Binghe’s room, his hands had been washed clean. He had been able to drink crystal-clear water from his cupped palms. That wasn’t the case anymore. While he spent his hours picking off flecks of paint from the wall, there would always be some stuck to his hands. In his palms, under his fingernails, and in the crevices of his fingers. Sometimes Shen Qingqiu was convinced that the white dust was engraved into his fingerprint, until Luo Binghe easily wiped it all away.

Now, the drinking water pooled in his palm was flecked with white again.

Shen Qingqiu dropped the little handful into the drain without drinking it.

Hie noticed his hands were shaking, which had to be because of the drug. It was finally working.

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t getting the kind of brain fog that he normally did, but he curled up on his mattress anyway. His skin had become really sensitive while he was distracted by the water, and the rough texture of the mattress made him want to cry.

It was this or concrete, he reminded himself. It didn’t make it feel any better.

Shen Qingqiu still had his mind. None of the blurriness had invaded his consciousness, it was just harder to control his emotions, like suddenly his head wasn’t quite right and then everything seemed terrible.

He knew what he had to do before he had eaten that rice, he had eaten it with his head held high. But now fear roiled in his chest like a tidal wave. Shen Qingqiu could feel his heart batter against his ribcage while he stared at the dark gap in the opposite wall.

Why was it so hard to control his emotions right now?

He wasn’t scared at all, eating that rice. It was an easy thing to pick up the chopsticks and pretend nothing was wrong.

By the time the next meal arrived in a different porcelain bowl, Shen Qingqiu was still curled into his mattress. He stared at the gap in the door the entire time, wresting with himself.

His mind wasn’t gone yet, but he was in so much pain. Relief was right there, through the crack in that door, but he hadn’t lost his mind yet. Could he really bear Luo Binghe’s love with his mind intact?

So he waited as his skin was slowly enveloped in fire.

The only thing that made it a little better was the feeling of the rough mattress under his skin that was a halfhearted relief for the hot itch, but he quickly ran out of strength to move against the rough texture and that skin heated up again.

The bowl came through the gap in the bottom of the iron bars, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t even look up to see if the guards were looking at him. He couldn’t stop the pathetic noise that came from his throat, but since he still had his mind, he could still hate himself for it.

Revulsion battled with agony as he listened to the guard leave. He couldn’t delay it anymore.

 He… really didn’t want to go.

He tried to force his limbs to move, but they wouldn’t move anywhere.

He couldn’t face Luo Binghe like this.

No! Shen Qingqiu sucked in a deep breath to steady his thoughts.

The point was to face Luo Binghe like this. To escape. To regain his pride and his life. As long as he focused on those things and didn’t let his drugged emotions scatter his focus.

He wasn’t suffering from the effects that he had been expecting, but it shouldn’t change anything about his plan. He was going to come to Luo Binghe begging for relief from the pain, then endear himself to make the deal later.

It would be more difficult now that he knew exactly what he was doing, but perhaps emotions would overtake his conscious, levelheaded decisions as soon as he crawled into the room.

With this solid, ice-clear logic, Shen Qingqiu finally managed to unwind his body, letting cold air seep into the sensitive skin of his core, and start moving towards the crack in the door.

Since he was half-unwilling to move, half-absorbed in breathless anticipation, Shen Qingqiu’s limbs were shaking and unsteady.

To crawl to this demon, to give Luo Binghe exactly what he wanted voluntarily—there was no greater indignity. He couldn’t possibly do this.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t stop moving towards the door.

He had experienced Luo Binghe’s care so many times, but never like this. What if it was different somehow? What if it was unpleasant, and he hated every second of it, the abuse combined with the humiliation and pain would break everything Shen Qingqiu valued about himself?

Or, maybe even worse would be if Shen Qingqiu found that it wasn’t unpleasant at all, despite all the prideful, independent front that he had worked to maintain. If that was the case, then all of this fight, this vicious battle he had planned out meticulously and was willing to sacrifice everything for, it was all for nothing.

But Shen Qingqiu couldn’t stop moving towards the door. His skin really hurt.

Luo Binghe was bad, what lay beyond that door could only be bad, but it didn’t change the fact that Luo Binghe made everything feel better.

So Shen Qingqiu continued to move towards the room where everything would be better.

Luo Binghe... wouldn’t refuse him.

Right?

Shen Qingqiu had reached the door, straining to work his fingers into the gap quickly.

Luo Binghe had never let him suffer alone before.

But that was when he had a mind stuffed with cotton and had become docile as a kitten. He was so far from that now. The only thing similar was his body now was that he was in pain and needed help.

That help could so easily be refused.

If Shen Qingqiu had come all this way, sacrificing pride, dignity, and independence just to be thrown back out to suffer alone—

Shen Qingqiu shuddered when the warm air of the room washed over his skin.

Where was Luo Binghe?

He looked around frantically, not daring to speak. His questioning noise didn’t echo in the insulated room, but it still sounded almost like a whine.

It was useless.

Luo Binghe wasn’t here, or else wasn’t willing to see him.

Tears pricking at the corners of his eyes, Shen Qingqiu started to back out of the room.

His skin was on fire.

‘I don’t have space here for insecure, small men who didn’t know what they want,’ Luo Binghe had said.

Was he insecure? Shen Qingqiu was certainly very afraid and uncertain, shrinking inward to make himself less visible until he was a naked huddle on the floor.

He had no idea what he wanted. Luo Binghe being here would humiliate him as he was exposed to demeaning comfort, but staying out in the cold would devastate his fragile composure. He knew he would cry himself to sleep, if sleep would ever come.

Should he leave? Shen Qingqiu wavered in the entrance to the room, shoulders hitching higher to protect himself.

In the doorway, half in and half out of the room, he was both cold and exposed, and vulnerable to Luo Binghe’s humiliation. He had to choose!

This decision was too hard for him to make while he was in pain, and the tears in the corner of his eyes started to blur his vision.

He didn’t know what he wanted, just like Luo Binghe kept saying. If Luo Binghe knew that, shouldn’t he save Shen Qingqiu from this torture?

Luo Binghe knew Shen Qingqiu had trouble coming into this room to ask for comfort or forgiveness, he knew Shen Qingqiu was struggling, and he still wasn’t willing to save Shen Qingqiu from this awful decision!

That settled it. Shen Qingqiu unwrapped his arms from around his body and started to go back the way he came.

He had made a plan, he remembered, and stopped moving.

He was supposed to plead for forgiveness and endear himself to Luo Binghe so he could escape.

How could he keep forgetting? Over and over again!

What on earth was wrong with his mind right now, why was it so fragile?

Now Shen Qingqiu knew for sure that the drugs did have some kind of mental effect.

With frustrated tears threatening to spill, Shen Qingqiu turned around once again.

This time, he wasn’t going to waver anymore. He climbed up onto the bed with his shaky limbs.

Luo Binghe’s luminescent eyes seemed to shine in the darkness as he watched Shen Qingqiu’s reddened face rise up from behind the mattress.

“Hello,” Luo Binghe said quietly. His voice was drowsy and rough, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help the way his arms wrapped tightly around his own center. That voice had calmed him so many times before, but now he couldn’t stop shaking.

Luo Binghe propped himself up on forearm, the blankets covering his bare chest sliding down slightly. “I thought you might choose the drugged rice. It’s easier to face what you want that way, isn’t it?”

Shen Qingqiu was nodding without really hearing him. He was focused on the motion in Luo Binghe’s hands, which were sitting innocently on top of the sheets. When was Luo Binghe going to touch him?

“Do you want me to hold you?” Luo Binghe asked. Shen Qingqiu’s eyes snapped up to meet his while the rest of his body froze in fear and self-consciousness. But… no matter how blunt the words, Luo Binghe didn’t sound condescending or mocking. He sounded genuine.

Of course not, Shen Qingqiu tried to say, but the words stuck in this throat as he opened his mouth. Luo Binghe’s question was posed with warmth and openness, as if there really would be no judgement if Shen Qingqiu gave in and said yes.

Instead of saying anything, he just turned away with reddening ears.

He was afraid of Luo Binghe’s touch. He was afraid of it.

Shen Qingqiu tensed, waiting for Luo Binghe to reach for him anyway. He had never waited for Shen Qingqiu to say yes before, why would he do so now? Luo Binghe liked it when Shen Qingqiu looked pathetic, and right now, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t look much more miserable and wretched. 

But the sudden movement never came, and Luo Binghe just laid back down.

Luo Binghe… didn’t want him?

Shen Qingqiu stared uncomprehendingly as Luo Binghe closed his eyes again. He had come all this way, and Luo Binghe didn’t appreciate it at all.

Luo Binghe didn’t care.

As Shen Qingqiu’s worldview shifted, the tears finally spilled from his eyes and raced down his burning cheeks.

Was this Luo Binghe’s way of mocking him?

Luo Binghe was taunting him, making him look like the depraved fool. Shen Qingqiu was doing exactly what Luo Binghe wanted, and Luo Binghe was pretending like he never wanted it in the first place.

But the anger behind Shen Qingqiu’s thoughts wasn’t there, the void filled instead with anguish. He wasn’t good enough for Luo Binghe to acknowledge.

He knew he had messed up, but was he really this undeserving of comfort? The pain underneath his skin flared up in a wave, and Shen Qingqiu dug his nails into his skin to bear it. No matter how hard he worked to get here, it was still all for nothing.

Luo Binghe didn’t want him.

‘Leave, until you’re ready to be good for me again.’

Shen Qingqiu simply wasn’t good enough.

He cried out in pain, and glanced down at his arms. From beneath his tough, battle-hardened fingernails, small rivulets of blood pooled and ran down his bicep.

His arms seemed numb as his fingers twitched, ripping the skin open as much as he could bear.

Last time he was here, he was good enough, maybe because he was in so much pain. If here were in more pain now, maybe Luo Binghe wouldn’t push him away again.

He dragged his nails down another millimeter, and then another, rending the skin as they went. He couldn’t get control of his hitching breath. Soon it turned into gasping, and then it was like he couldn’t breathe at all, his chest moving wildly but only little sips of air getting through.

It was all too much! His eyelids fluttered as he tried to stay focused, but there was too much movement and the bedroom started to spin.

Suddenly his hands were ripped away from his body, taking large bites of skin with them. He tried to bring them back to protect his vulnerable core, but all he could do was tug.

He brought his legs up to his chest instead, thankful that his hands were at least held together instead of far apart from each other. This wasn’t like being strung up on the archway. This may be punishment, but at least it wasn’t like his torture.

Shen Qingqiu braced for some kind of impact despite himself, squeezing his eyes shut tightly. He could feel his blood drip down to soak into the bed, while the flames licking at his skin got worse. Combined with the tension in his limbs, it was agony.

“No,” Luo Binghe whispered. His voice sounded close. “Hey, open your eyes.”

Shen Qingqiu’s eyes fluttered open with some effort and he looked up at Luo Binghe questioningly.

“I didn’t mean—” Luo Binghe cut himself off. Shen Qingqiu abruptly realized that Luo Binghe looked deeply regretful. “I just wanted you to answer my question.”

Shen Qingqiu shuddered, both of his wrists still in Luo Binghe’s hand. He had failed to do that. Luo Binghe was going to punish him now or kick him out of the room because he wasn’t good enough.

Luo Binghe released his grip on Shen Qingqiu’s wrists, letting them fall limply to the bed. Then he moved away, and Shen Qingqiu stared listlessly down at the sheets.

“You held out without help for so long, you must be in incredible pain,” Luo Binghe said, voice reappearing from the other end of the room. One side of the bed dipped, and Shen Qingqiu felt himself being pulled over.

Shen Qingqiu nodded, not really hearing what Luo Binghe was saying. There was no pain here, Luo Binghe had said, so why was Shen Qingqiu still on the bed? Shouldn’t he have been thrown off by now?

Strong arms wrapped around his middle, and Shen Qingqiu realized that he was in Luo Binghe’s lap. Automatically, he tensed, waiting for the customary flood of mortification that always followed when he imagined this.

But there was nothing except calming reassurance.

Luo Binghe still wanted him. More tears poured down his face as Luo Binghe curled up around Shen Qingqiu’s aching body, massaging out the soreness of his skin.

Shen Qingqiu’s chest started to release, and soon his tight sobs turned into long gasps.

“Listen carefully. Are you listening? I need to explain something to you.” Shen Qingqiu nodded and focused on Luo Binghe’s voice. “You might have thick skin, but you’re not invincible. You’re vulnerable and, behind that thick shell of pride, your insides are tender.” Luo Binghe explained.

Shen Qingqiu wanted to hate what Luo Binghe was saying. But though his words should have been condescending, his tone was kind and his hands were gentle.

“That’s why you can’t hurt yourself. You can’t handle it. You wouldn’t abuse a child like this.”

Shen Qingqiu did feel like a child Luo Binghe opened a small box full of medical supplies, clinging on to Luo Binghe’s every word. His voice was like a raft on a stormy sea, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help the way he was white-knuckling Luo Binghe. “You don’t have to hate yourself for wanting comfort, you know. Doesn’t it make you feel better to be close to me? Why can’t you let yourself feel better?”

Shen Qingqiu knew that Luo Binghe didn’t want an answer, so he just watched as Luo Binghe wiped up the blood with a tissue and then spread a cream over the marks. “These will scar,” he said, expression anguished.

Luo Binghe finished bandaging every scrape and put the first aid kit away. Although the fire in Shen Qingqiu’s skin was mostly gone, he didn’t want Luo Binghe to go.

He had reached out, and Luo Binghe had reached back.

Even though he hadn’t been good, he had been in a lot of pain, so Luo Binghe had still helped him. Luo Binghe still cradled him now, without it.

Gradually, Shen Qingqiu stopped shaking, and Luo Binghe threw the covers over both of them before enfolding Shen Qingqiu in his body again.

Chapter Text

Sleep, for Shen Qingqiu, was normally pretty consistent. Since there was no time underground, no schedule and no routine, he would surface and fall back down in waves, waking up for hours at a time before falling asleep again. It didn’t mean he wasn’t tired, he had learned, it was just how sleep worked for him now.

He was always tired.

The longest stretch he had slept at once was in Luo Binghe’s bed after being strung up on the golden archway, and that wasn’t sleep so much as it was a coma.

A few hours after falling asleep in Luo Binghe’s bed now, he woke up again.

He pushed at Luo Binghe’s arms, trying to get them away from himself. It was hard to think with Luo Binghe’s arms wrapped around him.

What on earth was he going to say to get himself out of this?

He had to recover at least a bit of his dignity, but Luo Binghe had stripped it all away mercilessly without a second thought.

Shen Qingqiu stumbled out of the bed, narrowly avoiding falling flat on his face.

He straightened, spots dancing in front of his eyes, and cast his eyes around the room for a closet or something. Since he knew he was going to be out in the cold again soon, he didn’t want to be unprotected like last time.

“What are you doing?” Luo Binghe asked blearily, beckoning Shen Qingqiu back with his now-empty arms. “It’s, like, two in the morning.”

It was the first semblance of time reference that Shen Qingqiu had received in…

Shen Qingqiu didn’t know how long it had been, but time had long since lost all meaning for him. What could two in the morning mean to him?

Finally he spotted a short ottoman and strode over to it, surprised to find that it contained the bare minimum of clothing. There were two stacks of clothes and two pairs of shoes.

He didn’t need shoes anymore because he wasn’t venturing outside, but he held the first item up to himself to check sizing.

It was, of course, a ceremonial robe.

Luo Binghe suddenly appeared behind him, yawning and taking the robe from his hands. “Not that one. Here,” he said, rummaging through the stack to offer Shen Qingqiu something that would fit better.

Instead of handing it to Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe walked around behind him and started to ease Shen Qingqiu’s arms into the sleeves.

Shen Qingqiu found himself frozen. Luo Binghe brushed his knuckles against Shen Qingqiu’s arms while pulling the robe up to his shoulders, leaving a trail of goosebumps on his skin. Luo Binghe was in no rush and it seemed he was still half-asleep, but he was sure to brush Shen Qingqiu’s bare skin as much as possible, even while covering him up.

Luo Binghe knelt down to tie Shen Qingqiu’s belt and fasten the robe.

After he was finished, Luo Binghe draped both of his arms around Shen Qingqiu’s shoulders heavily and rested his head next to Shen Qingqiu’s ear.

“Aren’t you exhausted? Come on, now that you have some clothes, let’s go back to bed.”

The weight of Luo Binghe’s body on Shen Qingqiu was unexpectedly calming, like a thick blanket.

But no! Now was the time to be assertive, not comfortable. Shen Qingqiu had a mission to complete, and now that he had clothes on, he was feeling more confident in himself. It was easy to pretend like the events before he had fallen asleep had happened to another, less composed person.

Shen Qingqiu nudged Luo Binghe off him for the second time and sat on the bed. Luo Binghe looked delighted.

“We have to talk,” Shen Qingqiu started voice hoarse from disuse, and Luo Binghe’s face fell. He sat on the bed next to Shen Qingqiu and put a comforting hand on Shen Qingqiu’s leg. He nodded, a small motion to permit Shen Qingqiu to continue.

Shen Qingqiu sighed invisibly. He had been partially afraid that Luo Binghe would kick him out again. He still had to tread carefully, though.

Luo Binghe’s hand on his leg was a steadying one, so Shen Qingqiu continued.

“You lied to me, when you said no more mind-altering drugs.” He was sure to carefully separate the anger from his voice. Anger would just get his kicked out again.

Luo Binghe didn’t even take his hand away, expression understanding and sympathetic. “For that lie, you owe me,” Shen Qingqiu said.

“What do you want?” Luo Binghe asked indulgently. The response was so sudden that it took Shen Qingqiu aback for a moment.

Shen Qingqiu still made sure to phrase his next request carefully. “I want to earn freedom. A year with you, I can spend once a week here, and then you let me go.”

Luo Binghe thought this over. “How about… you spend the night once a week for the first six months, then every day for the last half of the year?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded quickly. “Done.” He hadn’t expected Luo Binghe to agree just like that. He hadn’t expected his request to be entertained at all, never mind accepted.

Maybe he should have only offered six months.

Luo Binghe seemed to have thought of something, and walked across the room to retrieve a small white object. He typed something into it for a few seconds, then handed it to Shen Qingqiu.

“To keep track of time. It will go off at this time next week, and then you know it’s time to come to my room.”

Shen Qingqiu nodded and took it. There were numbers and symbols everywhere the face of it, but the only symbol blinking was the “tues” symbol near the top. There was only one button on the front, plus several on the back for programming the alarm.

Was it Tuesday today?

Shen Qingqiu pocketed the little device, but then he paused. He couldn’t stay here anymore, he wasn’t in pain or feeling lonely.

He didn’t… need comfort anymore.

But Luo Binghe hadn’t said to leave. Shen Qingqiu looked up at him. Luo Binghe hadn’t told him one way or the other, and, despite the fact that Shen Qingqiu had woken him up in the middle of the night, Luo Binghe was in a fairly good mood. He would obviously like Shen Qingqiu to stay.

Shen Qingqiu tore his eyes away from Luo Binghe and stood stiffy. After floundering for a few seconds for something to say, he turned and silently left the room.

He absolutely did not watch Luo Binghe’s depressed expression as he closed the door.

As he slumped against the wall again, he was careful not to slide down in a way that could rip his new clothes. Then again, he was going to be visiting Luo Binghe every week. It’s not like he would be naked for very long.

Every week. A year was a long time, but even so, Luo Binghe had agreed to it so readily.

Was there some sort of catch?

Luo Binghe must have thought that he had something to gain from this exchange, other than the obvious. Shen Qingqiu must have unwittingly offered something else.

Shen Qingqiu tried to think of what it could be, but the terms of the agreement had been so simple that Luo Binghe couldn’t possibly have anything to gain, besides a year’s worth of time— once a week for the first half, every day for the second half— with Shen Qingqiu.

Perhaps Luo Binghe was convinced that he could change Shen Qingqiu’s mind about wanting to leave. A year was a long time, after all. Shen Qingqiu knew that well.

But even if that were the case, Luo Binghe would not go back on his promise, even if Shen Qingqiu said he wanted to end the deal. Whenever Luo Binghe promised something, he would add a provision so that Shen Qingqiu had a way out. No mind-altering drugs unless he wanted them. Shen Qingqiu didn’t have to stay in Luo Binghe’s room unless he wanted to.

There were no provisions added to this deal. Whatever happened in the next year, Shen Qingqiu would return to the world outside after the time was up. Luo Binghe… really just wanted Shen Qingqiu near, of his own free will. Perhaps Luo Binghe was lonely.

Shen Qingqiu sat, stewing in those thoughts, until the cold air seeped beneath his clothes and started to make him shiver.

He suddenly scoffed. Luo Binghe was a cult leader! How on earth did he forget that for so long?

The defining trait of cults was their charismatic leader. Luo Binghe had enchanted the masses, of course he wasn’t lonely. He had no need for friends, not when hundreds of devotees surrounded him.

Not that Shen Qingqiu was a friend, of course.

Although… he wasn’t truly a captive, either. If he asked the followers of the cult who he was, they would say a martial god. The people who used to be his friends and family would call him a heartless demon, and everyone else in China who knew his name would praise ‘Shen Qingqiu, best fencer in China and three-time Olympic medalist.’

Shen Qingqiu already knew what kind of answer Luo Binghe would give. Luo Binghe would call him ‘mine.’

His teeth started to chatter, and Shen Qingqiu gave up and curled back into his favorite sitting position, arms wrapped around his knees.

Before now, this room had felt so much colder in the short time when he was naked then in those years that he had spent clothed.

But that was after he had been kicked out of Luo Binghe’s room, and, with a similar situation right now, his clothing didn’t seem to make a difference.

Perhaps it was just being alone that was making the room feel less even less insulated.

He was as far as physically possible from being exposed to the elements, secluded in a small cell far underground. The small space still didn’t feel protective, especially not with the cold. Coming from Luo Binghe’s warm, dark bedroom, this cell made him feel defenseless against much larger yet unpredictable powers.

Shen Qingqiu sighed, putting his head in between his knees to try to soothe the headache. Had he always been this helpless?

He was only feeling it now.

Perhaps the reality of the situation hadn’t set in until this point. Shen Qingqiu himself hadn’t changed, or at least, he didn’t feel like he had. Then again, the Shen Qingqiu that had dominated last years’ Olympics wouldn’t have made that deal with Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu had only made that deal because he had no other choice and no other hope for escape. Unless he found a way to convince Luo Binghe to let him free, he would never truly escape.

He hadn’t understood that before, and he did now. That’s all that had changed about him.

Flooded with new determination, Shen Qingqiu stood up and stared at his murals. Even the exquisite detail bamboo forest couldn’t compare to the emotion of Luo Binghe’s face, and it wasn’t even all the way finished. There were still some final touches to be changed, just like there always was. Shen Qingqiu had truly mastered this art.

Shen Qingqiu decided to work on his Luo Binghe mural while he pondered what his next work should be. It was clear that Luo Binghe or the guards, or anyone, really, wouldn’t ever set eyes on this cell.

Only he would ever admire these painstakingly beautiful walls, the same way only he would ever reside in this room. There was no purpose in creating sprawling murals of stunning landscapes.

Shen Qingqiu could just do… whatever he wanted.

It was such a strange thought. He had never approached art that way, it had always been either to increase his talent or for other’s appreciation.

What did he want?

This was unexpectedly difficult for Shen Qingqiu to answer, though the answer felt like it was staring him in the face.

He continued to work on the fine details of Luo Binghe’s hair, refining each curly strand. After he was done with those small modifications, he decided to do something he hadn’t done in a very long time.

He went to sleep slumped against the warmth of Luo Binghe’s door.

There wasn’t any point in avoiding it anymore. Shen Qingqiu had already given Luo Binghe what he wanted. Now that Shen Qingqiu had been in his room, fully aware—although emotionally unstable—the dark hole beyond this door didn’t seem dangerous anymore.

It had nothing to do with Luo Binghe himself, of course.

Shen Qingqiu just couldn’t think of a good reason to avoid it anymore. Why shouldn’t he sleep where it was the warmest?

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe didn’t see how fencing had anything to do with power. It was about application of skill to fluid movement and memorizing techniques, nothing that would teach him control over large groups of people.

Still, Su Xiyan had insisted, and enrolled him in beginner lessons, and he had been doing this too long to quit. The Olympics were around the corner, and every coach, teacher, or critic that Luo Binghe had ever trained under knew he would medal there.

The press had different ideas. ‘National’s hopeful’? Yeah right.

Even Shen Qingqiu, the fabled legend of a veteran fencer, knew he had potential. Shen Qingqiu had known that Luo Binghe would outstrip him, but Luo Binghe had been rejected anyway, or perhaps because of that.

Luo Binghe sighed and held him tighter. Shen Qingqiu had fallen asleep a few hours ago, a small miracle considering how tense he had been today. Luo Binghe had hoped the exhaustion of the day would put him down quickly, and luckily, he had been right.

Shen Qingqiu had accepted the drugged bowl, like Luo Binghe knew he would. This beautiful, prideful man couldn’t possibly accept reality on his own. Except, Luo Binghe knew that the flickering candle of a man would feel worse with the guilt, with the knowledge that he had willingly drugged himself, than he ever would by just accepting that Luo Binghe wanted to care for him.

If it were up to Luo Binghe, he wouldn’t have let Shen Qingqiu choose the drugs. It hurt Shen Qingqiu, destroyed his sense of self in a painful way and made him think he was forced to do things that he wouldn’t ordinarily do. Luo Binghe wanted him here, but not like this.

Luo Binghe had been very careful about what symptoms Shen Qingqiu would experience, though. These drugs would never affect Shen Qingqiu’s mind and would only hurt him if he were tense. If he had chosen to eat all of the drugged food and then relaxed in his room, he would feel nothing at all.

The fact that he chose to be hurt, in addition to choosing the drugged food, meant that Shen Qingqiu thought he needed it to suffer through Luo Binghe’s care. Which meant that Luo Binghe would need to offer it again at some point if he wanted Shen Qingqiu to come back.

He sighed again and slipped out of bed. With Shen Qingqiu’s destroyed circadian rhythm, he would be awake any minute now and would immediately want his clothes back, except his clothes were filthy and Luo Binghe just cleaned him.

He picked up the robes from the floor and went over to the wash bin, filling it with warm water and adding a gentle detergent. He preferred this over a washer because he never had many clothes to wash anyway, and the physical work often helped him sleep better.

Any way that he could put his hands to work and provide for Shen Qingqiu, he would be happy to do.

 As he worked, he watched Shen Qingqiu sleep.

He was well aware of what changes were happening in Shen Qingqiu’s mind, even if Shen Qingqiu himself wasn’t aware of them.

In those two years that Luo Binghe followed him around, unnoticed, he had noticed some things about Shen Qingqiu.

For one thing, he never cried. Even when he was with a sexual partner, the only people he would ever allow into his house, he would never let himself look sad. It was like he was afraid to feel the emotion, so he always defaulted to anger.

Luo Binghe had seen firsthand where that anger had gotten him. All those girlfriends that he had taken home, they had all left him. Luo Binghe would always expect him to give up, or not ask, but it never took very long for him to find another one, almost identical to the last in the way they would look at him with admiration and worship.

He would never let himself be sad, but Luo Binghe knew that was because he also couldn’t be happy. By the time the decision was finalized and he spread the word to his followers that ‘Shen Qingqiu, three time Olympic medalist and pride of China was actually a martial god that had fallen from the Molten Heavens,’ he knew that Shen Qingqiu had, in all likelihood, never experienced true joy.

First had come sadness, because there is no happiness without suffering. Luo Binghe had accepted a shaking, terrified Shen Qingqiu into his room, skin red and pocked with fresh burn marks. The tears streaming down his face as he looked up at Luo Binghe was a frantic plea that he was unable to handle this massive burden alone.

Luo Binghe could never do something like that to him again.

He scrubbed harder at the robes, glad for the thinner fabric he had decided on. It was far easier to wring out and scrub at stains when the stains couldn’t go too deep.

At the time, admittedly, he had seen nothing wrong with throwing Shen Qingqiu to the mercy of his worshippers.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t shown Luo Binghe a healthy, normal emotion without being drugged out of his mind, and then after that traumatic event, he did. Mission accomplished, the plan was well on its way to completion.

Shen Qingqiu was totally at his mercy now. Now that he knew that Luo Binghe could do anything to him, how could Luo Binghe possibly throw him to the wolves again?

Shen Qingqiu had experienced and learned to express sadness now, defeat and misery, so now he could learn what it would mean to be happy. He would know life without his cold jail cell and endless hours of loneliness, because Luo Binghe would show him everything he really needed to be happy.

Shen Qingqiu, somewhere deep down, knew he was insecure and easily hurt. He needed to know he could rely on something and trust someone, especially now that he had come to terms with his own loneliness, and Luo Binghe had been preparing to be that for him.

He knew that this wouldn’t be the last time Shen Qingqiu would come. Whenever Luo Binghe would offer the drugged option, Shen Qingqiu would justify to himself with whatever mental gymnastics were necessary, and then come into Luo Binghe’s room again. It would happen again, and again, until Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to leave the only good thing that’s happened to him. He would be happy here forever.

Su Xiyan, the leader of the cult before him, and, ostensibly, his mother, had told him stories about his father, the ‘martial god’ before Luo Binghe had chosen Shen Qingqiu. Tianlang-Jun was Su Xiyan’s choice, a sweet, compliant man who was powerful in his own right, yet willing to give up everything for her.

He was so entirely devoted that even Luo Binghe had been able to see that from a young age. Anything Su Xiyan asked of him, no matter how strange or impossible, he would do, but if it were up to him, he would never leave their shared room deep underground.

Their religion was called The Faith of the Molten Heavens, a reference to their beliefs in immortals that had their places on earth, and Tianlang-Jun had played his part as their king.

More than that, though, Su Xiyan was alone. From the world, she had no connections that could create problems for their little society; from The Faith, she was lofty and untouchable. Luo Binghe hadn’t understood it when he was a child, but he understood it now. More than retrieving an ‘immortal’, on that day she brought Tianlang-Jun to the abandoned missile silo, she had acquired her only friend.  

They were both gone now, leaving Luo Binghe to manage what they’d left behind, and Luo Binghe had been left to make his own choice of the new ‘immoral.’ Someone that people could worship, someone unnaturally beautiful, someone that Luo Binghe was going to be completely committed to for the rest of both of their lives.

And then Shen Qingqiu arrived on Luo Binghe’s training grounds to personally deliver his rejection to Luo Binghe’s request of tutorship with a sneer. The way he had looked down his nose while delivering cleverly cutting words made Luo Binghe shiver.

He was perfect.

Chapter Text

The first thing he did when he woke up was check the alarm in his pocket. Nothing on the little display had changed. The little “tues” was still blinking.

Shen Qingqiu still didn’t know how many days had passed. Did the dial show the current day, and it was still Tuesday, or was it showing when the alarm would go off next?

Shen Qingqiu was admittedly curious about how long his self-designed sleep cycles actually were. There was no way to regulate them, so they varied in time length, but he didn’t know how consistent this sleep schedule was from day to day.

The display didn’t tell him much, so he pocketed the alarm again, turning back to the mural of Luo Binghe’s face.

Though, to his keen eyes, there seemed to be a few mistakes, none of them were ones he could fix without ruining something else. At long last, this mural was done.

Shen Qingqiu stood back and watched Luo Binghe’s eyes, rubbing his arms in the cold. They looked as real as if they had been torn from the person himself.

The opposite wall was mostly empty, filled with doodles and absentminded sketches that were intended to be easy to cover with larger murals. Shen Qingqiu stood as if he were starting to work, testing out how different it felt to paint on this wall. The paint was different textures on different patches of wall, so Shen Qingqiu ran his hands up and down it to get a feel of it.

His bamboo mural, he had learned, spanned the worst possible wall out of the three white walls. It was the one directly opposite of the bars and the first one that onlookers—not that there ever would be any—would see. The paint had been extraordinarily rough compared to the other ones and had ripped up his nails before he learned a better method.

After finishing that mural and doodling on the other walls, he had learned about the differences in the paint thickness and determined that he would save the best wall for last, using up all the space on the other two before moving onto the third one.

The only wall out of the three that had been totally used up was the bamboo mural. The one with Luo Binghe’s face still had room, but he instead turned to the last wall for this final project.

The end was in sight for Shen Qingqiu. He only had six months to make this mural, and then the last six months would be almost entirely spent in Luo Binghe’s room.

He would just have to settle for three murals total. While the first one had taken around a year and a half, by his hesitant estimation, Luo Binghe and this new one probably take around six months each.

Then again, this was all based on his hair growth, so it was all very dicey. Shen Qingqiu resolved to ask Luo Binghe how long it had been so that he could know how large to make this new mural.

For the moment, he started planning.

He scraped out lines from the thin, soft paint, marking the outline of a body. This lineart would be particularly complex because it was supposed to be a more emotional scene, painted like brushstrokes.

That would be easy to do with a brush or pen, but significantly harder with blunt nails on a wall.

Once the lineart was finished, however, Shen Qingqiu would be almost done. The goal of this piece wasn’t realism, but rather poignancy.

He outlined and marked the wall until he was tired, relishing in the ease in which the paint flaked off and the softness of the paint against the tender skin beneath his fingernails. Then he ate the cold, salty crackers that were offered to him under the iron bars and went to bed against the warmth of Luo Binghe’s door.

The next sleep cycle, he ate and went straight to planning again, energized by the thought of a new project. One that he wanted to do. The novelty of the idea was strangely intoxicating, even though no one would appreciate the finished work except for him.

If he were honest with himself, the Luo Binghe mural had been created, in part, so that if he escaped, the authorities would be able to recognize the true criminal.

It had been created to decrease the effects of touch-starvation, it had been created to serve as a reminder to Shen Qingqiu, or it had been created with the vague hope that some member of this cult would accidentally glance at it and find the depiction of their leader so incredibly stunning that it needed to be carefully carved out and set on display.

Even that mural, though, had been the closest Shen Qingqiu had ever come to spending hours on artwork purely for his own enjoyment.

This new piece would be a thousand times more groundbreaking for him personally. That is, if Shen Qingqiu could finish it in time.

He worked through that sleep-cycle with just the planning, and then the next, and then the next. He could feel the way his circadian rhythm would even out when he was doing consistent work like this. His body would measure the passage of time with the amount of work done.

Every so often, he would take the little alarm from his pocket to check if anything on the dial had changed. It never did.

Shen Qingqiu would put it back, rub his arms to calm the goosebumps that had gathered from the cold of the room, and return to his art. He would only be interrupted when he got tired or when food was passed to him.

After thirteen sleep-cycles, the alarm finally went off.

Shen Qingqiu was woken from sleep to blindly fumble towards the source of the noise. In a haze of confusion, he knocked the little thing a few paces away from him. Crawling away from Luo Binghe’s door, he finally managed to push the big button once his vision cleared a little.

It took him a moment to remember, despite the hugeness of what that alarm meant. After thirteen and a half sleep-cycles, supposedly a week, it was finally time to spend the night with Luo Binghe again.

Shen Qingqiu pulled his breakfast towards him, a bowl of cold, fresh produce this time. Before he took a bite, something caught his notice from the corner of his eye.

There were two bowls again.

Shen Qingqiu pulled them both closer to himself. Sure enough, it was the same as last time. One of the bowls had a shiny quality to the food that suggested an extra ingredient.

Shen Qingqiu was still being offered a choice. The audacity of that man knew no bounds! He left Shen Qingqiu no face, casually pointing out that he knew Shen Qingqiu had willfully chosen drugs, and then offered the choice again the next time!

Shen Qingqiu knew better this time and set the shiny bowl aside. He would absolutely not be doing that. The suffering was extraordinary last time, and while it did force him towards Luo Binghe and serve its purpose, he shouldn’t need that this time.

He would go easily.

…right?

Shen Qingqiu stared at the bowl, having suddenly lost his appetite. Surely, now that he had a promise to keep, it would be easy to go into Luo Binghe’s room?

Well, sure it would be easy to go inside, but might not be so easy to submit to Luo Binghe’s care.

At least while he was drugged, he had an excuse. A shield, almost. He could return to his room at the end of it knowing that Shen Qingqiu did what was necessary for his own survival, nothing more, nothing less.

In the end, Shen Qingqiu decided to eat a couple bites from the drugged bowl, then switching the food out so that no one would notice and pushing that bowl back under the bars.

He ate the rest of his drug-free breakfast in solemn silence, contemplating what he was going to have to do. With any luck, Luo Binghe was planning to wash him, because his body was becoming filthy again. It had been a long time since he’d been clean, since he would never stay for long enough and Luo Binghe never wanted to wake him even in the brief visit time.

He opened the door with a small creak, not bothering to wait for the drugs to kick in fully. In order to play the part of the eager little thing that Luo Binghe wanted, he had to pretend that he had wasted no time after the alarm went off.

Luo Binghe seemed to be ironing. Shen Qingqiu paused, feeling a little stopped short.

Luo Binghe glided an iron across a swath of fabric, moving the clothing expertly as to not burn himself or spend too long in one place.

Wasn’t Shen Qingqiu supposed to do things like that, as Luo Binghe’s servant? Why was he even bothering, when he really should have known that Shen Qingqiu was spending the night?

Shen Qingqiu usually didn’t even need clothes!

Shen Qingqiu’s face reddened a little as he followed his own train of thought. Whatever kind of sick thing that Luo Binghe wanted with him was really too messed up, he thought.

Caring for him like a child one moment, ordering him about the next… Luo Binghe’s intentions were either cleverly disguised or as capricious as the winds.

Luo Binghe set down the iron when he saw that Shen Qingqiu had arrived, a bright smile gracing his features. He unplugged the iron, storing it carefully in a box while it was cooling, as if he were afraid that someone would hurt themselves on it, while folding up the ironing board.

Then he opened his arms wide in an invitation for a hug.

Shen Qingqiu woodenly stepped forward, more stumbling than graceful as he fell into Luo Binghe’s arms.

After kneeling for long while planning the bottom part of the mural, his knees had grown weak, making it hard for him to stand for long periods of time. He had been planning to gradually reintroduce his legs to standing up, but hadn’t known that the alarm would go off at an inconvenient time.

Luckily, Luo Binghe seemed to sense that something was wrong and set him on the bed, arms still clasped around Shen Qingqiu’s body.

“For tonight, I would prefer you to not treat me condescendingly,” Shen Qingqiu requested, voice coming out slightly muffled because of Luo Binghe still on top of him. “Nor should you address me with superciliousness or contempt.”

Luo Binghe pushed himself up so that he was leaning over Shen Qingqiu’s body. “What happened to my sweet, silent soul? Aren’t you going to be good for me?”

Luo Binghe’s parting words had stuck with Shen Qingqiu, all that time ago, and abruptly Shen Qingqiu closed his mouth for fear of being kicked out again.

“Besides,” Luo Binghe sighed, snuggling into Shen Qingqiu’s chest while subtly undoing his robes. “I’ve never treated you with arrogance when you’re obedient, I would never. Actually, I become very proud of you, because I know how hard it is for you to expose that easily damaged part of your inner heart.”

Once Luo Binghe was finished undoing Shen Qingqiu’s robes, he climbed off the bed to help him out of the large swath of fabric.

“Do you need help walking to the bath?” Luo Binghe asked.

As always, he kept his promises. There was no arrogance in his voice, not that there ever had been. Shen Qingqiu’s throat ached a little, having wasted precious words on nothing. Luo Binghe, perhaps on purpose, hadn’t understood the request at all.

Shen Qingqiu’s legs and knees still hurt from all the kneeling, but he was sure he could stand. Luo Binghe hadn’t crippled him in any way, which he supposed he should be grateful for.

After all, if Luo Binghe just wanted Shen Qingqiu right there all the time, silent and obedient, he could have just cut out Shen Qingqiu’s tongue and torn off his legs.

Shen Qingqiu shook his head. Such dark thoughts! They had no place in this peaceful bedroom and only served to bring apprehension where there was none. Luo Binghe wouldn’t do that, and besides, after his deal was up, Luo Binghe would be done with him.

Luo Binghe took his head-shaking to mean no, and stood back to watch as Shen Qingqiu took to his feet.

And immediately tilted.

The world spun for a moment before it was righted again, Luo Binghe’s concerned face in his vision. A second passed before Shen Qingqiu remembered that the expression wasn’t what it seemed and jerked away.

Luo Binghe let him go until he wobbled, then Luo Binghe rushed back to support his body. Shen Qingqiu sighed harshly, begrudgingly accepting the help.

It like his body became more helpless when he was in Luo Binghe’s presence, which might have been because Shen Qingqiu was so accustomed to being helpless there.

Shen Qingqiu felt his face go hot and his brows twitched as he half-stumbled, half-trailed to the bathroom. His skin was beginning to feel hot.

The full effect of the small dose would kick in any minute now, and then at least Shen Qingqiu would be justified in leaning on Luo Binghe like this. Shen Qingqiu shook Luo Binghe away as they reached the lip of the tub. He could climb in by himself.

No matter how careful Luo Binghe was with him, he wasn’t an infant. He wasn’t going to break.

But Luo Binghe never seemed to get that, and Shen Qingqiu didn’t remind him. It would be pointless to waste his breath.

Shen Qingqiu slid into the tub, the jerkiness of his motions sending water splashing over the sides and onto the floor. He was distracted and unsteady, as well as a little overwhelmed.

After so long spent in that cell, of course he would be overwhelmed easily. Any human would. Even someone like Shen Qingqiu could be broken down eventually.

Not that Shen Qingqiu was broken down! He was strong-willed and hard to break, of course he wouldn’t—

Luo Binghe interrupted his thoughts with a hand pressed to Shen Qingqiu’s bare chest.

“Relax,” Luo Binghe commanded, “and stop thinking about things that stress you out. There doesn’t need to be scary things here, why does your mind always think about them when it doesn’t need to? I can handle everything that you could possibly worry about, so just leave everything to me.”

Shen Qingqiu blinked and let his body be pushed horizontal so that he was submerged to his neck in the water. Luo Binghe’s logic made sense. If Shen Qingqiu was going to spend so little time here every week, there was no point in torturing himself the entire time.

Well, torturing himself more than Luo Binghe was already doing.

Luo Binghe had made it very clear, very early on, that the only thing causing Shen Qingqiu so much pain in Luo Binghe’s arms was Shen Qingqiu’s own pride. So by that logic, Shen Qingqiu supposed, they would both enjoy these weekly visits much more if only Shen Qingqiu would get out of his own way.

Maybe it wasn’t Luo Binghe’s fault that Shen Qingqiu thought he was such a scary figure.

Luo Binghe was giving him everything that he was starved for, after all. Food, warmth, comforting touch. He shouldn’t be scared, but it was like he always reminded himself that he had to be.

Shen Qingqiu decided to shelve the thought for now. It would just bring more dissent on his psyche, which is what Luo Binghe said he should avoid. He splashed absently in the water, rubbing his arm with his free hand against his overheated skin. The water was making it feel better, he thought.

Luo Binghe squirted something behind his head and pulled up a stool, then massaged the soap into the roots of Shen Qingqiu’s hair. Shen Qingqiu stared up at the tiled ceiling, a familiar but strange sight. He had been here a few times, but never like this.

The silence was peaceful. Luo Binghe wasn’t completely quiet as he worked, he would murmur to himself or occasionally offer a word of encouragement to subtly praise Shen Qingqiu for being so compliant and still. Shen Qingqiu could never find a proper way to respond, so although the tops of his ears burned, he could do nothing but listen.

This bathtub was very large, large enough to fit multiple people. He wondered why Luo Binghe hadn’t tried to join him in here yet, always content to help him wash from the edge of the tub.

Didn’t Luo Binghe like being close to him? It was strange, then, that he never let them bathe together. Luo Binghe loved to hold him, he knew that. Holding him in the water shouldn’t have been any different.

Shen Qingqiu shrugged off the thought while Luo Binghe started to rinse out the shampoo. Luo Binghe was always thinking up new ways to treat him tenderly, he didn’t need Shen Qingqiu to contribute.

Though he would probably be over the moon if Shen Qingqiu consciously expressed a desire to be closer to Luo Binghe…

He decided he would have to employ that method, and ask for closeness when Luo Binghe least expected it. After all, he was fulfilling his side of the deal here. He wanted Luo Binghe to be satisfied enough to let him leave at the end of the year, since he was well aware that Luo Binghe had the power to change the terms of the agreement and there would be nothing that Shen Qingqiu could do about it.

Luo Binghe finished rinsing out his hair and moved off his stool, and Shen Qingqiu watched him with his eyes, although he didn’t move his head. The heat under his skin wasn’t even close to what it had been last week. His mind, although slow moving and confused, was fairly clear.

Shen Qingqiu spotted the soapy rag in Luo Binghe’s hands, and his eyes widened.

He sat up with a splash, all laxness in his muscles gone. Some of the uncomfortable itch under his skin rushed back, and he cried out. Luo Binghe shushed him, as he always did when he saw Shen Qingqiu’s distress.

Shen Qingqiu should be annoyed by it, except Luo Binghe always fixed whatever the pain was right after. The shush simply meant that there was no need to cry, and served as a quiet reassurance that Luo Binghe would take care of it. It wasn’t supercilious at all.

“You should know by now. Relax, and the drug won’t hurt so much. If you insist on taking it every time, you should at least attempt to avoid the brunt of the pain. Remember? You’re not allowed to hurt yourself.” Shen Qingqiu ducked his head abashedly even though Luo Binghe didn’t sound particularly angry, and leaned back again.

Luo Binghe coaxed his arm out from the thick layer of bubbles coating the surface of the water, and some of them slid down his slim wrist. Shen Qingqiu looked away, still unable to face the thinness of his body.

He had known that muscle tension increased the effect of the drug, or at least realized it to some level. Luo Binghe approached the arm with a washcloth and Shen Qingqiu tensed again before reminding himself to relax.

This happened several times in quick succession, but Luo Binghe just waited patiently with Shen Qingqiu’s arm held in his loose grasp.

Luo Binghe should really just wash him, whether or not Shen Qingqiu was ready, and be done with it. That way, Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be forced to be at ease with him and it would be way simpler. But Luo Binghe insisted on taking his time, and there was nothing Shen Qingqiu could do about it except try his best to untense and let Luo Binghe do what he wished with Shen Qingqiu’s body.

He had never tried anything strange or sexual. He had never tried to hurt Shen Qingqiu. Still, it was difficult to resist the urge to rip that arm from Luo Binghe’s gentle fingers and curl up in the corner of the room.

Luo Binghe’s treatment made him feel small and dependent, nothing like he had been when he was an Olympian. This was a hard thing for him to do, but he steadied himself anyway.

Where Luo Binghe was holding his limp back arm, the small prickles seemed to dissipate. Luo Binghe dragged a soft rag up his arm, teasingly slow, and Shen Qingqiu had to look away.

Was Luo Binghe making fun of him?

Shen Qingqiu could feel his face redden, but there was nothing he could do to hide it. Luo Binghe had a way of getting under his skin, like he could see everything that Shen Qingqiu was thinking. Like all of his fears and insecurities were on full display.

Luo Binghe kept washing him, every prolonged stroke like another nail driven in Shen Qingqiu’s consciousness. Finally, he couldn’t help it.

“Can’t you go any faster?” he burst out.

Luo Binghe paused mid-swipe. He raised his eyes, and Shen Qingqiu felt the blood drain from his face. He really shouldn’t have said anything.

Apology rose to his lips, but he sealed them off, tilting his head back in regret or defiance. He had made an innocent request, and Luo Binghe should be fine with that. Come what may, but at least Shen Qingqiu had stood up for himself.

Luo Binghe didn’t say a word while he studied Shen Qingqiu’s face. It was a long moment before he moved at all.

Then, with a single fluid motion, he dropped the soft rag into the bathtub and stood up. He slipped out the door and shut it silently.

Shen Qingqiu let his head fall again in Luo Binghe’s absence, a strange sense of victory tugging upward at the corners of his lips. Whatever Luo Binghe was retrieving, it would no doubt hurt. And if Luo Binghe hurt Shen Qingqiu as punishment like Shen Qingqiu knew he would, then everything would be so much easier.

Shen Qingqiu would rather endure a hot iron to his tongue than the soft rag caressing his calf.

A hot iron, he could at least bear with quiet dignity. He could leave this place with the knowledge that he persisted and was strong in his morals.

What Luo Binghe was asking him to do, to submit to this softness and feel pleasure in surrender… that was much harder to handle.

The silence of the room seemed to wrap around Shen Qingqiu, so he splashed a little to disperse it while he waited. He was used to silence in his white room, but in Luo Binghe’s space, it was unsettling.

Here, he was used to Luo Binghe’s soft murmurs, or the rustle of fabric against skin, or the hum of the bedroom’s space heater. In this bathroom, there was only the sound of his own breathing. There wasn’t any sounds coming from the other side of the door, so it was like the whole space was holding its breath.

Shen Qingqiu played around with the rag, batting it back and forth in the water until it sank to the bottom. Luo Binghe still wasn’t back yet.

What could possibly be keeping him? There weren’t noises coming from the other side of the door, so there was no struggle. Shen Qingqiu was important to Luo Binghe, but something over there must be even more important.

Shen Qingqiu sat up suddenly, splashing water and soapy bubbles over the side of the tub. Something out there was more important than Shen Qingqiu, and Luo Binghe had turned his attention away because of it!

Suddenly he shivered, scared. His skin was hurting the more he tensed, but he was so cold.

He had thought Luo Binghe would come back in, punish him, and then Shen Qingqiu would get what he wanted. Shen Qingqiu would be cleaned with ruthless efficiency, then put to bed.

Except, something had taken Luo Binghe’s attention, something that he cared more about. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t realized, when he spoke out, that he would be throwing away his good standing with Luo Binghe.

What if Luo Binghe didn’t care about him anymore?

Shen Qingqiu stared down at the rag, which was hardly visible at the bottom of the tub through the soapy water. He couldn’t get clean now. He wouldn’t be cared for.

Although he felt paralyzed, Shen Qingqiu started to panic.

But the deal! They had a deal, and Luo Binghe was supposed to be here for the night! Shen Qingqiu had been so prepared for that, for anything Luo Binghe could throw at him, but Luo Binghe wasn’t even here!

Had he fallen so far, become so worthless, in Luo Binghe’s eyes?

Shen Qingqiu didn’t move, and after a while, the bathwater started to turn cold. Then it was the same temperature as the room around him, and his shivers had turned violent.

Even though he felt like his core was freezing, his skin was still giving him flares of searing sensation, more irritating than painful. However intolerable the washing had been, this was so much worse.

Shen Qingqiu climbed out of the bathtub and got to his feet, muscles stiff.

He was out of the cold water.

…what now?

Last time, Luo Binghe had carried him to the bed and then snuggled him.

Shen Qingqiu still needed to be washed, dried, clothed, and put into bed, but Luo Binghe had better things to do. More important things.

Shen Qingqiu could wait here more. He could stand, naked, in the cold, for however long it took until Luo Binghe’s attention was turned back to him. It would be terrible, though. The longer it took, the more Shen Qingqiu’s anxiety would build up, and the worse Shen Qingqiu would feel.

It had already been a very long time. Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe should have been asleep now. Luo Binghe might have fallen asleep without Shen Qingqiu, having forgotten him completely.

Shen Qingqiu swallowed hard.

He took a step towards the door, and then another. Pushing the door open a crack seemed to take all of his effort, but then he could see Luo Binghe sitting on the bed.

Luo Binghe must have heard the door open, or Shen Qingqiu’s shuddering breath, but he didn’t look up. He was reading a book in the dim yellow-gold lamplight, face soft with a suggestion of a smile at the pages.

Shen Qingqiu pushed the door a little wider, opening Luo Binghe’s visibility to his entire body. He made a little noise of inquiry, silently pleading Luo Binghe to look up.

Luo Binghe set his book down, face impassive and cool. “What is it?” he asked in a neutral tone. Shen Qingqiu trembled harder. Luo Binghe could clearly see that Shen Qingqiu was suffering, but he didn’t seem like he was going to help.

Shen Qingqiu cleared his throat. “Can… can you wash me?” he whispered. His voice sounded so small, faded in places and trailing off at the end. It was the very essence of vulnerable, but Shen Qingqiu was too nervous to notice and hate it. It was exactly how he was feeling, after all.

Luo Binghe set his book down next to him on the bed, then lifted up the covers slightly. Shen Qingqiu only hesitated for a second before stumbling over and climbing onto the bed.

Did Luo Binghe really want him to curl up under his proffered arm?

The dark cave of the blanket draped over Luo Binghe’s arm seemed so small, but not uncomfortable. Shen Qingqiu had been standing in the bathroom for so long that his skin had dried, so his body curled up there shouldn’t bother Luo Binghe at all.

His long hair was still a little wet, but Luo Binghe didn’t seem to care. It was clean anyway. It was just his body that still felt unwashed.

Shen Qingqiu looked down at his hands, which were clutching the sheets under him. There was white dust in the creases of his knuckles and caked under his nails.

He crawled into the dark space under Luo Binghe’s arm, curling up around his center and tucking his filthy hands in close to his body.

Luo Binghe lowered his arm to enclose Shen Qingqiu in the blankets, where his body heat had already warmed the thick comforter and sheets.

It wasn’t an apology, but Luo Binghe had forgiven him.

Shen Qingqiu’s shivering tapered off quickly, and soon his eyelids were starting to droop. He had no idea how long he had been awake for, but it was too long.

As he drifted, he dimly registered Luo Binghe moving, shifting around and then leaving the bed. There was the sound of rushing water from the bathroom, and then Luo Binghe tapped him awake.

“It’s time for that bath,” Luo Binghe said. His voice was all smiles, bright and playful.

Shen Qingqiu twisted towards him, propping himself up on one elbow and extending a hand. But instead of picking him up and putting him in the bathtub, Luo Binghe pulled him to his feet.

Shen Qingqiu barely managed to recover in time to avoid falling on his face.

“Hmm?” he asked. What he meant to say was, what’s happening, are you going to make me leave?

“It’s time for the bath, remember? Once I’m finished cleaning you, we can go back to bed. But you’re dirty right now!”

Shen Qingqiu mumbled wordlessly as he half-climbed, half-fell into the bathtub. He wasn’t dirty, he was Shen Qingqiu. His eyes slid closed as soon as he was mostly submerged in the warm water.

Luo Binghe took the soapy rag and picked up where he left off. Shen Qingqiu dazed in and out of consciousness while he worked, but the bathwater was still warm when Luo Binghe finally dragged him to his feet again to towel him off.

Soon enough, he was dry and Luo Binghe extended his arms.

“Do you want me to carry you to bed?”

Instead of answering, Shen Qingqiu went limp and practically threw himself into Luo Binghe’s arms. Standing up was so hard when he was this tired. He didn’t mean to fall on Luo Binghe so heavily, but he couldn’t find it in himself to be embarrassed.

Luo Binghe chuckled, supporting his weight easily. “Come on, let’s go to bed.”

Shen Qingqiu felt himself being set down on his cot, and then he fell asleep, finally undisturbed. The sound of the space heater rattling in the corner and Luo Binghe’s shifting on the other side of the room put him to sleep like a lullaby.

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu woke up from the best sleep he had gotten in a long time. He hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night at all!   

He sat up sleepily. Luo Binghe wasn’t wrapped around him.  

There he was, reading his book by the light of the yellow-gold lamp next to his bed. It was a scene he recognized, but then Luo Binghe looked up and saw that Shen Qingqiu had woken smiled brightly.   

“How’d you sleep?”   

It was hard to admit, even to himself, that Luo Binghe’s forgiveness had granted Shen Qingqiu an excellent night’s rest. “I’m going to leave now,” he said, standing up to look for his robes. Luo Binghe hadn’t redressed him, so he snatched up the fabric from where it was draped over the chair.  

Luo Binghe started to get up, but Shen Qingqiu waved him back down.   

Luo Binghe got to his feet as if he hadn’t seen anything, helping Shen Qingqiu fasten the robe and putting his hands deep into Shen Qingqiu’s pockets. Shen Qingqiu swallowed an undignified yelp and tried his best to remain still.   

Victorious, Luo Binghe withdrew from Shen Qingqiu’s pockets, the alarm in hand. He reprogrammed it, then slipped it back into the pocket without a word.   

These goodbyes were never not going to be awkward, Shen Qingqiu thought as he pushed open the door to his cell and stepped out of the room. It was like stepping into a freezer, with a stark difference in lighting, temperature, and furnishing.  

For lack of something better to do, Shen Qingqiu fiddled with the alarm and paced around the room.  

The little ‘tues’ wasn’t blinking anymore. Now it was ‘thur’ that was flashing innocently up at him.   

Luo Binghe, for some reason, had planned for Shen Qingqiu to come back in a week and two days. That wasn’t what their deal was, although it did benefit Shen Qingqiu.   

Unless… he had gone into Luo Binghe’s room at some point on Tuesday, and had stayed until Thursday. Then it would be a week until Shen Qingqiu had to come back, and Luo Binghe would be staying true to their deal.   

He hadn’t felt like it was that long. Perhaps he had gone into the room on the turn of Tuesday, and slept through Wednesday until leaving at the break of the day on Thursday.   

Shen Qingqiu pocketed the little thing, deciding to put it out of his mind for now. He didn’t have a good grasp of time anymore. No point in trying to measure something he didn’t have any reference for.   

Brimming with energy, Shen Qingqiu paced around for a little more, thinking over the events of the past few days, before settling in to continue painting. After visiting Luo Binghe, he could much more clearly envision the forms he wanted to outline, so he abandoned his planning and went straight to that.  

He had enough confidence in this art style to let the lines and shapes flow without strict planning, and it would have more emotion that way anyway.   

Besides, he wasn’t afraid of messing up anymore. This was just for him, and there was no one to point out his flaws.   

He worked without care for consistency, squatting low for one line and then jumping to another near the ceiling for the next.   

Shen Qingqiu let himself take as many breaks as he wanted, but he was so focused on this task that he didn’t really want to. He paused only to eat and sleep when he absolutely needed to.  

The week seemed to pass in a blur, and Shen Qingqiu only checked the alarm a few times before it went off.   

It wasn’t a surprise this time, though. The two bowls had been passed under the bars, one of portions of freezing dumplings was coated in a subtle shiny layer.   

When the sound finally started to chirp from Shen Qingqiu’s pocket, he was already a quarter of the way through the drugged bowl and halfway through the normal one. He silenced it quickly, then replaced the missing food from one bowl and hurriedly shoved it back under the bars.   

It was only when he faced Luo Binghe’s door that he felt a thread of uncertainty.   

He was fairly sure he had eaten the right amount of each bowl this time, he shouldn’t be hyper-aware like last time or out of his mind with pain like the time before.   

But still. With the way he had been so anxious to get back into Luo Binghe’s room, Luo Binghe would think he was eager to spend another night there. It was like letting Luo Binghe win.   

Luo Binghe’s goal… well Shen Qingqiu wasn’t entirely sure what Luo Binghe’s goal for him was. He knew, though, that Luo Binghe wanted him docile for real, and this seemed very close to real.   

He stepped inside quickly. He had a mission to complete, and his side of the promise to carry out. Never mind winning or losing, Luo Binghe wasn’t really affecting Shen Qingqiu, so Luo Binghe’s feelings right now weren’t important.  

Once he got to the surface and out into the real world, none of this would matter anymore.  

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t find Luo Binghe with the first sweep of his eyes across the room.  

“Luo Binghe?” he called with a hoarse voice. The name sounded unfamiliar on his lips. Had he really never spoken it aloud before? It been mostly vulgar nicknames in the beginning, and he hadn’t spoken much at all recently, so it made sense, but it was still jarring.   

The chair sitting in front of the desk in the corner of the room swiveled, revealing Luo Binghe smiling brightly with a box clutched in his hand. “Hello!”   

Luo Binghe put the briefcase down on the desk and walked over to him as if pulled by a magnet while in the same room. He took Shen Qingqiu’s hand and brought him over to the desk.   

“For tonight I brought some supplies so you can show me some of your talent with art. Here, sit down!” Luo Binghe guided Shen Qingqiu into the comfortable office chair and leaned over him, unpacking a set of sketching pencils and several sheets of heavy paper.   

Shen Qingqiu watched him work, excitement overtaking his nerves. It had been so long since he had used a pencil! While paint and color were undeniably attractive, sketching and lineart were the talents that he had been working to improve on the walls of his cell.   

He glanced at Luo Binghe, who nodded encouragingly, so he chose a medium hardness pencil from the neat row. They had all been sharpened to fine points, and Shen Qingqiu savored the feel of it in his hand.   

He hadn’t realized how much he had missed this.   

Luo Binghe leaned over him as he thought about what he should draw first, a lock of his curly hair brushing Shen Qingqiu’s forehead. It needed to be something that would impress him, something that showed off his love of lines and flow.   

Shen Qingqiu started to outline the curling form of a snake.   

He loved snakes. The way they moved was fascinating and smooth, and they came in every color and pattern imaginable. They were like little dragons, slipping invisibly through sand, water, or grass.   

Instead of drawing a single figure, he drew rich scenery. Soon the paper was populated by waving blades of grass and slim trees, with snowy mountains in the far background. A human hand took up a significant part of the page.  

While he worked, Shen Qingqiu rubbed his arm with his free hand. His skin was starting to prickle painfully, and while Luo Binghe was well within his personal space leaning over him like he was, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t relax his stiff posture without Luo Binghe physically touching him.   

He didn’t stop the sketch, but every few seconds he glanced up at Luo Binghe, whose eyes were firmly fixed to the page. It seemed like Luo Binghe wanted him to ask for what he wanted, then.   

Shen Qingqiu steeled himself, taking a deep breath and setting down the pencil, before reaching for Luo Binghe’s dangling hand. He took it, but then paused. What now? He needed Luo Binghe to soothe him, but he certainly couldn’t ask for that out loud.   

He settled for pulling Luo Binghe’s arm across his own chest like a seatbelt, and the result was an awkward sort-of-hug, with Luo Binghe bent nearly in half and twisted over him.   

Luo Binghe hadn’t reacted yet. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been pushy or demanding; he made sure that his movements were careful and his grip was weak. Luo Binghe shouldn’t get mad, right?   

The body draped over his started to shake and Shen Qingqiu realized Luo Binghe was laughing. Before he could get indignant or embarrassed, Luo Binghe pulled away, taking both of Shen Qingqiu’s hands in his.   

“Okay okay, I’ll hold you while you work. Thank you for asking, I’m very proud of you.”   

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure how to respond, but he didn’t need to. Luo Binghe swept him off the chair and onto his lap before he realized what was happening, and then he was in Luo Binghe’s secure hold, facing his half-finished sketch.   

It wasn’t that different to when Luo Binghe was standing over him, so he refocused and continued to draw.   

The snake was half-curled into that relaxed hand, lying in the palm and looped lazily around one finger. The moonlight shone off the little garden snake, making it glow with the careful pencil shading that textured the scene.   

The mood of the scene was familiar, although it depicted an open field instead of Luo Binghe’s bedroom. This little garden snake seemed to slip onto this human’s hand, basking its cold-blooded body in the warmth of the human skin to shelter it from the night’s chill.   

When he was done, he set the pencil down and looked back at Luo Binghe, who hooked his chin on Shen Qingqiu’s shoulder to admire the piece.   

“Wow,” Luo Binghe breathed, massaging out Shen Qingqiu’s hand. He hadn’t realized it was cramping until he let go of the pencil. “That’s beautiful. The way you seem to get every line perfect is incredible to watch, and the end result is… wow. I have such a talented one, all for me.”   

Shen Qingqiu looked back down at the paper. He should have felt ashamed at Luo Binghe’s words, but they were undeniable. This piece wasn’t for anything except Luo Binghe’s viewing pleasure, started and completed only because Shen Qingqiu thought that Luo Binghe might like it.   

And he did. The praise he lavished was like sun on a withered flower. Shen Qingqiu had wanted someone to see his talents, to feel like he was worth something, and Luo Binghe gladly obliged as soon as Shen Qingqiu showed eagerness to cooperate.   

“Th—thank you,” Shen Qingqiu stuttered, a little overwhelmed. It’s not like he expected criticism, but he didn’t know if he really deserved all this.   

Luo Binghe had asked him to draw, so he did.   

“Are you tired? Do you want to sketch some more, or is it time to go to bed?”   

Shen Qingqiu had been drawing for so long that the fizzling had faded entirely, and Luo Binghe was just holding him now for no reason except that he enjoyed it. Wasn’t his legs going numb, with Shen Qingqiu on his lap? Shen Qingqiu wasn’t that much shorter, the top of his head came up to Luo Binghe’s nose.  

Then again, their body types were incredibly different. Luo Binghe’s body was strong and powerful from his daily training, while Shen Qingqiu was frail and slim. It would be difficult to determine, for on outsider looking at the two of them, that they were both masters of the same sport.   

There were no outsiders here, thank goodness, Shen Qingqiu thought. It was just him and Luo Binghe, and there was no one to judge him and make him feel ashamed except himself.   

Shen Qingqiu nodded. “I’m tired, yes. Can we go to bed?” He rasped.  

Luo Binghe rewarded him with another smile, silently praising him for the gentle tone that he used to address Luo Binghe. Shen Qingqiu had learned to be more polite with the way he spoke, and Luo Binghe always seemed to love it, so it stayed that way.   

There was no point ruining Luo Binghe’s opinion of him, and besides, he always got warm praise for doing something so basic.   

Luo Binghe shifted their combined weights easily, sitting on the chair one moment and carrying Shen Qingqiu to the bed in the next.   

Shen Qingqiu was reminded strangely of a baby bird in a nest with the way Luo Binghe placed him down. He curled into the blankets to wait for Luo Binghe to join him. After some shuffling and washing up, the other side of the bed dipped and Luo Binghe draped himself around Shen Qingqiu’s body.   

“Goodnight, little lamb,” Luo Binghe told him sleepily.   

Shen Qingqiu didn’t respond to that, but it didn’t seem to matter. He could hear Luo Binghe’s quiet, even breathing from behind him, dead asleep after a few beats.   

Maybe Shen Qingqiu had kept him up past the time he normally went to bed. Luo Binghe was clearly exhausted, and Shen Qingqiu had no idea how taxing the rest of Luo Binghe’s day had been.   

Then again, Luo Binghe had still offered him the choice. Would he like to keep drawing, or go to bed?   

Would Luo Binghe have stayed up even later? Would he have stayed up all night?   

Shen Qingqiu had no idea what Luo Binghe would do for him. But he was beginning to see the bigger picture.   

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe liked him.

He knew it before, but it hadn’t been a sure knowledge, just a shot in the dark. Luo Binghe had always wanted him for something, but Shen Qingqiu was starting to realize that Luo Binghe didn’t want to exploit him or for any specific function in this cult.

He wanted Shen Qingqiu for Luo Binghe’s own pleasure. Whatever that meant.

Shen Qingqiu’s mind seemed to loop over that while he fell asleep, and then again when he woke up. And then again while Luo Binghe shushed him back to sleep, complaining that it hadn’t even been a full hour.

Shen Qingqiu had been taking everything Luo Binghe said as a lie, or attempt to manipulate him, or just something nefarious. Everything he said, Shen Qingqiu would assign some kind of bad intentions to.

Luo Binghe had always seemed like he didn’t want Shen Qingqiu to hurt, like he could soothe anything that Shen Qingqiu put himself through. Shen Qingqiu had always assumed that was a lie of some kind, because clearly, Luo Binghe loved to see him in pain.

Although, Shen Qingqiu realized as he continued to scratch paint off for his latest mural, he supposed that might not be entirely true. Shen Qingqiu had been in pain when he tore open the skin of his arms with his nails, and Luo Binghe had nearly cried after seeing that.

Luo Binghe only calmed down when Shen Qingqiu offered his arms to be disinfected and bandaged, meekly submitting to what he had so vehemently refused only minutes before.

Maybe it wasn’t about the amount of pain, maybe it was about how much Shen Qingqiu would allow Luo Binghe’s relief.

The more Shen Qingqiu was hurting, the more willing he was, and then the happier Luo Binghe became. Luo Binghe never did anything to physically put Shen Qingqiu through more suffering, even though he had many opportunities to. Once Shen Qingqiu submitted himself to the care, he would find relief.

It was a clean sort of system, Shen Qingqiu supposed. A reliable structure in this place.

Other than encouraging him to rely on Luo Binghe, though, Shen Qingqiu didn’t understand what purpose it was supposed to serve. Why couldn’t Luo Binghe just be a cruel captor, who didn’t care at all and just acted like the heartless demon that Shen Qingqiu had assumed he was?

*_*

The week was seventeen sleep cycles, this time, which meant that there was approximately 2.43 sleep cycles, on average, per actual day. A vast difference from the thirteen sleep-cycles of week 1, so these cycles probably weren’t consistent at all.

Shen Qingqiu had forgotten to count the sleep cycles of last week, but at least he only stayed at Luo Binghe’s room for one night this time. The alarm blinked a little “fri” every time Shen Qingqiu looked at it, and when the double portion was finally slid under the door, he ate quickly so that he could walk into the room as soon as the alarm went off.

Before he dismissed the food, though, he paused. He didn’t know how long these drugs were going to be offered, and a year was a long time. Quickly, he snaked a handful of drugged dumplings into his pocket and took his robe off to serve as storage. He could get another one from Luo Binghe.

He held the alarm in the palm of his hand as he pulled the door open and walked onto the plush carpet.

“In the bathroom!” Luo Binghe called, and Shen Qingqiu followed the voice. Luo Binghe was sitting next to the bathtub, pouring soap into the water to make a layer of bubbles.

Shen Qingqiu appreciated the gesture because he didn’t like to see his body. This way, if he watched Luo Binghe wash him, he would only have to see himself in sections. Not that he would, because he always closed his eyes.

Shen Qingqiu got into the water gratefully. He had been feeling filthy, falling asleep in Luo Binghe’s bed. Carrying white dust into the fold of the clean blankets was uncomfortable, even if Luo Binghe didn’t seem to mind.

It seemed easier to get comfortable this time. Luo Binghe didn’t change his pace, but since Shen Qingqiu was more at ease, the process seemed much faster. Luo Binghe dried off Shen Qingqiu in the bathroom and then guided him back to the desk.

The drawing of the garden snake in the hand hadn’t moved, but the pencils had been sharpened and put back in their places. Luo Binghe took out another piece of thick paper, and set Shen Qingqiu back in his lap.

Shen Qingqiu looked up at Luo Binghe inquisitively.

“Run me through some basic drawing forms. Human shapes, cohesive lines, shading, whatever you want. You don’t have to speak, just show me,” Luo Binghe said. He sounded so encouraging, like he had the ultimate faith in Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu was glad that he didn’t have to talk, strange as it was to teach without his voice. Using it too often hurt him, and while he could usually whisper to get his point across, it felt better not to speak at all.

He remembered that he used to teach. Being a prodigy even until his late 30s meant that he was highly requested to coach. Instead of accepting those extremely hefty sums to teach spoiled rich children, though, he took on his own students based on displays of skill he found promising.

Luo Binghe was one such child.

But it had been a long time since Shen Qingqiu had first met him at that competition, and it had almost faded from his memory. Shen Qingqiu had acted differently towards him, back then. Luo Binghe was a different child.

Shen Qingqiu’s methods had always been strict but effective, and his skill for spotting young talent and honing their minds had earned him widespread acclaim.

Luo Binghe wasn’t a child anymore, though. Shen Qingqiu picked up a basic pencil, beginning with a circle-and-triangle torso. He could show Luo Binghe this, but it wouldn’t be the same as teaching. At least not the way he had done it before.

Shen Qingqiu showed him the basic shapes in the human form, creating an almost animation-like progression of an outlined man fencing. While he worked, Luo Binghe watched as if he were memorizing Shen Qingqiu’s every move.

It should have made him feel nervous with that kind of pressure, because Shen Qingqiu had never had someone so close to him, focusing this intently on his ability, before. But he was good at this. He knew how to draw and he knew how to fence, so he knew that he hadn’t made a single mistake that Luo Binghe would catch.

Luo Binghe murmured in his ear while he worked, everything from wordless sounds of admiration to assurances that he understood the lesson being taught. It was like he was taking mental notes, and some of those were coming out of his mouth. Luo Binghe always spoke to himself when he was focusing on something, Shen Qingqiu was starting to realize.

Shen Qingqiu moved on from fencing forms and more towards forms that he thought Luo Binghe might enjoy. He started with silhouettes of extreme emotion.

A man crying into his knees, then a woman cringing back in fear, then a child longingly reaching out. He changed up the perspectives of each rough outline, challenging himself with more complicated concepts of foreshortening and perception distortion to add to the basic forms.

Then he started to draw silhouettes of multiple people interacting. He drew a man with a hand raised towards the cringing woman, and Luo Binghe wrapped his arms around Shen Qingqiu’s body comfortingly.

“If it makes you feel too unhappy, you don’t need to draw things like that. There doesn’t need to be pain in your art to make it meaningful, do you understand?”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t usually use outward emotion in his art. He could paint it, and he could make others feel it, but he didn’t need to feel it outwardly for himself. Emotions were a hard thing for him to show, but Luo Binghe acted like his art revealed what he had suppressed.

Hesitantly, he began to draw a new form similar to the one of the man crying into his knees, but this was younger and less curled up. Once he finished with that one, he could tell Luo Binghe was curious, because he had gone silent and leaned forward slightly until he was nearly covering Shen Qingqiu’s body. This young man seemed to be almost floating with the way his balance was so skewed.

Shen Qingqiu watched his reactions carefully from the corner of his eye as he began to draw the other part, the other person that was holding him up.

This person was androgynous, with shoulder-length messy hair that flowed off of the shoulders and fell in a curtain-like wave on one side. The young man was laying, half-curled, over the bigger person’s knees, but they had their arms around him, and their head was bent down to kiss his forehead, obscuring the androgynous one’s features.

Shen Qingqiu lost himself in the emotional lines, adding thin robes to both figures and a terrified, gasping face to the young man. After a moment’s hesitation, he added tear streaks to those flushed cheeks.

Once he was done, he set down his pencil and looked at Luo Binghe to see his reaction. Luo Binghe hadn’t really spoken while he was working on that, and it was so large that it nearly took up half of the page. It was a beautiful sketch, but a familiar one.

This was the last mural Shen Qingqiu was halfway done with, etched into the wall.

Luo Binghe didn’t say anything for a long time, eyes downcast and concealed. If he didn’t like it, Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure he would be able to continue to work on the mural in the other room, and if he couldn’t do that, then he would have nothing to do between visits other than wait.

“You know…” Luo Binghe paused, like he wasn’t sure Shen Qingqiu was listening, or that he wasn’t sure Shen Qingqiu was ready to hear. “I care a lot about you. Maybe it was hard for you to believe at first, but I hope you believe it now. I really just want you to be happy.”

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure what this had to do with his drawing. Wasn’t Luo Binghe supposed to praise him? Maybe he was supposed to forget about the drawing for now. This seemed important.

“What’s more important than your pain, is your relief. I want you to believe, with me, that you can be someone who doesn’t have to yell to get what he wants. Who doesn’t have to lash out, or get embarrassed, or become hurt without someone there for comfort. I want that to be you, because I believe that’s who you have the potential become.”

Luo Binghe wanted to do what, then? Shen Qingqiu tried to understand what that meant, or what Luo Binghe’s goals really were.

Change Shen Qingqiu? Fix him?

So Shen Qingqiu had been broken before, then, and Luo Binghe was trying to make him less miserable? Shen Qingqiu didn’t know if that was true.

He hadn’t changed, and he was still the same…person. He was the same as he was when he had gone underground, with a few new tools for survival. There were new rules with Luo Binghe, and he had adapted. Luo Binghe hadn’t changed him, no one could do that. He was who he was.

But he didn’t yell as much. He didn’t lash out. He cried, but that was different. Crying with someone there wasn’t a destructive thing.

He wasn’t as alone anymore. Luo Binghe provided him with relief in a way that was hard for him to accept, at first.

Would he miss this place, then? When he left to go back to the world with no one who would hold him?

Shen Qingqiu swallowed hard as he stared at the two hunched figures. They were both so full of pain but the drawing depicted relief. Then again, he supposed, there was no relief without pain.

There was no warmth without the freezing cold.

Shen Qingqiu glanced towards the bed, turning his face into Luo Binghe’s body. He didn’t want to draw anymore. It was time to go to bed, so he didn’t have to think about this more than he had to. Luo Binghe seemed to understand, and they went to bed.

Chapter Text

Several more visits passed in a blur. The weeks were spent painting, with no middle or end until the alarm went off. Since it was the only way to keep track of time, Shen Qingqiu started to anticipate that little sound, and he would catch himself thinking about it constantly.

When he was waiting, he thought about Luo Binghe, when he was eating the cold food he thought about how Luo Binghe’s was warm, and then he would go work on a painting of a hug that reminded him of Luo Binghe’s. Luo Binghe occupied the space behind his eyelids, in his dreams, and in every waking thought.

If the progression hadn’t been so slow, Shen Qingqiu would have been bothered by this a lot more, but as it was, this came on quick enough for him to notice. Shen Qingqiu just didn’t have anything else. He didn’t have anyone else, because the guards had stopped coming a long time ago.

Besides his own failing body, there was nothing else here that even moved.

Still, every time he received the two bowls, he would ferret a few pieces of drugged food into his stash. Luo Binghe might be everywhere, but Shen Qingqiu still couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t suddenly take away this shield from him.

And yes, Shen Qingqiu was aware that he could just ask Luo Binghe for the drugged bowl to be a permanent fixture, because Luo Binghe’s promises were as solid as iron boulders, but the thought of asking for drugs aloud, instead of pretending that he had been choosing the drugged bowl by chance, was difficult.

Even though Luo Binghe obviously knew that Shen Qingqiu was choosing it every time.

Once, Luo Binghe left him with a small paper crane. They had been practicing folding paper into shapes, and there seemed to be no end to what Luo Binghe could make. When the night was over and Shen Qingqiu left for the morning, Luo Binghe had tucked the crane into his pocket along with the alarm.

Shen Qingqiu took it out so often, bending its little wings and adjusting its head, that he threw it in the toilet-hole before the week was over just so that he would stop.

Luo Binghe would bathe him and change out his robe often, so he didn’t feel filthy in his cramped cell anymore. The white paint under his fingernails wasn’t a permanent fixture, so there wasn’t a feeling like Shen Qingqiu stood out in the dark warmth of Luo Binghe’s room.

He was starting to feel like he belonged there, and it should have been a scary thought but it wasn’t. Luo Binghe liked him, so he liked being there.

Everything was happening as it should, and Shen Qingqiu was on track for freedom.

“You know,” Luo Binghe whispered in his ear one time, as they were both laying in bed. “This is the last time you’re coming here. One more week alone, and then you’re staying for every day.”

Shen Qingqiu, half-asleep and disoriented by the sudden noise so close to his ear, just hummed in confusion.

But Luo Binghe didn’t respond, and Shen Qingqiu didn’t actually realize what he had said until he left the room. As soon as the door clicked shut, he jolted.

That was their last meeting. After that, they would be living together for six months.

Dazed, Shen Qingqiu slumped against his bamboo mural. Six months had passed, and it felt like the blink of an eye. He thought he would be more prepared for this moment.

By this time, he had assumed, he would have gotten a good enough handle on Luo Binghe’s character that he would be able to keep his dignity even though he would be completely subjected to Luo Binghe for half a year.

He was sure that everything would be sorted out by now. The mural would be done, Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t need the drugs anymore, and he would be ready to leave everything behind for a glorious home-stretch sprint.

But… the mural wasn’t done. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t yet faced the reality of his body yet, hadn’t looked at himself. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t weaned himself off the drugs, so he hadn’t even faced Luo Binghe sober yet either.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t know if he even could.

He couldn’t use the drugs he had stashed away for every single day, for six months. If he asked, Luo Binghe would probably let him drug himself like that, but he couldn’t ask for that, and Shen Qingqiu would never want that anyway.

He had thought about this moment, made so many careful plans, but hadn’t prepared for it at all. Time seemed to pass so much faster with a consistent routine. It was as if, now that his brain had some way to track time, it was skipping through the days to try to catch up.

Shen Qingqiu remembered that time in the diner, the one time he had seen the sky since being put down here. He had been so confident when facing Luo Binghe, determined to place his will over anything Luo Binghe could offer. He had underestimated Luo Binghe back then, and he hadn’t made that mistake in a very long time.

Luo Binghe knew him through and through, from his body to his spirit, and while it should have been terrifying that Luo Binghe possessed that knowledge, Shen Qingqiu trusted in Luo Binghe to honor for his promises. He had not tried to trick Shen Qingqiu, hurt him, or force him to stay close.

Anything Luo Binghe did for him, Luo Binghe only seemed to do with the intention of making Shen Qingqiu more comfortable. He didn’t use his assiduous knowledge to invade Shen Qingqiu’s body and demolish his spirit, but Shen Qingqiu needed to remember that he could.

He needed to be able to handle Luo Binghe, or, more accurately, he needed to be able to handle himself around him.

Shen Qingqiu was a strong man. He had a strong body and a stronger will, with the intelligence to place his force where it would be most effective.

Except, his body wasn’t strong anymore, and his will…

He couldn’t even look down at himself.

Shen Qingqiu spent the next four sleep-cycles thinking about it, abandoning his half-finished mural to stare in silence, slumped against the door to Luo Binghe’s room.

Wild horses needed to be broken before they could be ridden. They were trained exhaustively until they would stop bucking off riders or getting irritated by equipment. They went from untamed and free to docile under their trainer’s hand.

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t a horse. He couldn’t be broken like that, and something like this couldn’t change the person he was.

So then why did it feel like it had?

Something occurred to Shen Qingqiu a few sleep-cycles later.

Since nothing had changed about himself, then the reason must be because Shen Qingqiu had started to underestimate himself. Luo Binghe had been treating him like he’s emotionally helpless and in need of comfort, so then he started to think of himself that way.

He could absolutely handle looking at the state of his body. He could probably handle eating his entire drugged stash at once.

Luo Binghe hadn’t stopped offering both bowls, so the stash had grown bigger without shrinking until now, when it was no longer needed.

Shen Qingqiu would be moving out next week, and he wouldn’t be able to take that with him.

He hesitated. He couldn’t back out now. He hadn’t changed, he still had his willpower and spirit, of course he could bear the full effect of the drugs with his head held high! It was just harder to think about, now that he had unwrapped his little stash.

Some of the fruit and produce was rotten, so he threw a small portion down the toilet-hole before gathering the assorted food in his hands. All at once, he chewed and swallowed an entire handful.

Then he scooped up another.

The crumbs and juices left on the robe seemed to stain through to the ground. If someone were to come in and look at it, it would incriminate him. But there was no one else here.

Shen Qingqiu swallowed another massive, disparate bite.

It was hard to taste all the different flavors, but it was even harder to push past his full stomach. He hadn’t had a stomachache in a very long time, because Luo Binghe always knew when he was hungry and always gave him the exact amount of food to eat before he became too full.

On his own like this, eating hurt. The food tasted awful, with mostly dry crackers and hard bread. The dumplings were slimy, and although it should have been easier to swallow, it was difficult to eat.

After Shen Qingqiu forced down the last bite, he instantly felt his stomach roll and knew that he was going to throw up. He sat back against the wall, breathing deeply through his nose and out through his mouth.

The drugs hadn’t kicked in yet, and he was already imagining how much better it would be for Luo Binghe to be here, to massage his stomach and help him throw up or drink water.

That wasn’t going to happen, but Shen Qingqiu should still drink some water.

Groaning, he crawled over to the spigot and took small sips from his cupped palms. It made him feel a little better, but he still collapsed next to the drain when he was done. He was incredibly full, like he had been stuffed with oily trash. It was an unfamiliar feeling, and it shocked him to the core when he identified it.

After a little while, the nausea started to fade, and Shen Qingqiu was able to sit up.

His skin was starting to itch. Although it was cold, the robes didn’t seem to do much for him anyway, so he stared up at the white-painted concrete ceiling while pulling his arms out of the sleeves.

For this to work, he had to be able to feel the touch of his hands on his arms and legs. Being relaxed was the only way to decrease the burning, and the only way for Shen Qingqiu to relax was to be touched.

This might not have been true before Luo Binghe showed him, but Luo Binghe had taught him a lot of things about himself that he didn’t know before.

The important thing now was that he could recover on his own and keep his head the whole time. And he knew he could do that, even though his thoughts were becoming more scattered and confused as he stared up at the ceiling.

The kind of person he showed to Luo Binghe was just an act.

He knew from past experience that it would all kick in at once, so he sat back against the wall to meditate so he wouldn’t be caught unprepared.

After a few beats, it became very clear that emptying his mind would be harder than he remembered.

He shifted uncomfortably. The wall and floor were too cold for this. Relocating to Luo Binghe’s door, he sat back down.

And then shifted again.

Why was this so difficult? Shen Qingqiu’s skin started to burn, and he knew he was as tense as a bowstring.

He tried to relax his muscles as if he were going to sleep, but it was impossible to focus and Shen Qingqiu found himself panting for air far too quickly.

His entire body felt feverish and weak, more so than he expected. It seemed to sneak up on him and then attack with a viciousness that Shen Qingqiu hadn’t had time to adjust to, and this wasn’t even the full extent of the effects yet.

He twitched when a bright flare of pain burst over the surface of his skin. He shouldn’t have taken so much.

He shouldn’t have done this at all.

He doubled over with a sickened groan. What was the purpose of this again? To prove that he was strong?

No, he wouldn’t do something like this just to bolster his pride. His pride just hurt him, Luo Binghe had said. Shen Qingqiu remembered it as clearly as if the words were spoken in his ear. Luo Binghe seemed so close.

It was to prove to himself that he could keep his head for six months. That was why he was doing this.

Luo Binghe…

Shen Qingqiu blew gently on his hands, hoping to use them to cool his feverish forehead and help relax his face.

Luo Binghe could solve this for him so quickly. But Shen Qingqiu couldn’t go to him, that was the point. He had to be able to do this himself.

He couldn’t rely on him for everything, even though Luo Binghe offered.

Even though Luo Binghe offered!

Luo Binghe offered him so much, but Shen Qingqiu couldn’t accept this thing.

His breathing came in harsh gasps while hot tears squeezed from the corners of his eyes. Luo Binghe would always wipe them away.

No! There was no one here except himself, and this was a good thing. It meant that Shen Qingqiu was doing the right thing, even though it didn’t feel like it. Even when it hurt, and Luo Binghe had promised him that there would be no pain in his bed.

 Shen Qingqiu’s hands on his own face weren’t helping him relax at all, so he moved them down to his arms to soothe the muscles there instead. He was still against Luo Binghe’s door, where he usually slept, but the warmth didn’t feel soothing at all.

His shivers rattled the wood against the doorframe. Surely Luo Binghe could hear him, and knew something was wrong, but he made his rules very clear. If Shen Qingqiu wanted him to solve the problem, then Shen Qingqiu would need to open the door and cross the threshold.

Shen Qingqiu needed to relax. He needed to calm his tense muscles, and then, although the fever would take a while to recede, most of the ache and chill in his skin would be gone. But Luo Binghe wasn’t here to help him, and he needed to do this without the touch of another.

There must be some way to trick himself into thinking that someone else was touching him, there must be. It was, by far, the easiest way for him to relax, and if he could manage that, then all his problems would be solved and Luo Binghe would never even need to know what he’d done to himself.

You’re not allowed to hurt yourself.

Shen Qingqiu swatted away Luo Binghe’s voice next to his ear when the guilt crept up on him unexpectedly. He shouldn’t have done this.

He… had lost track of what he was trying to do.

Trick his body, he remembered after a moment. He had to do something to convince himself that another person was there to comfort him. Take a strange hand, or a strange body, somehow.

His body was already strange to him. It was an unexpected revelation, and it made him gasp weakly. He still hadn’t faced the state of his body.

So if… if he looked down at this unfamiliar body while massaging out its tense muscles, then it wouldn’t seem like there was only him here.

With this half-baked logic, he carefully unwrapped his arms around his knees and lowered the protective enclosure of his legs. He was going to do something that he hadn’t, before, and it was difficult to convince himself to track his hands with his gaze.

His hands, at least, he was familiar with. He ate with them, drank with them, and when he crawled or knelt, they were always in front of his eyes.

Now, he followed them with his eyes, watching as he dragged one up his arms and to his shoulder.

He could see each bone in his shoulder, as pale as if he was really a skeleton. A small circular burn mark discolored the front of it, and it almost looked like a birthmark. But it was an ugly, unfamiliar one.

Shen Qingqiu jerked away from it, but it was his own shoulder. He couldn’t escape from a part of his body, no matter how alien it seemed.

He was so tense he was shaking, and it burned.

Miserably, he cried out, but he had forgotten that Luo Binghe wasn’t here. He let himself sit there uselessly until it became unbearable, and he had to try again. No matter how unpleasant and ugly, he had to try again.

He followed a hand to his other shoulder, which he was more prepared for. There were no burn marks here, but the bone structure looked distinctly wrong. The bones wasn’t completely in line with each other, and now that Shen Qingqiu had noticed, there was a piercing pain in the center of it. This was his painting arm, and too much time spent in one position had clearly misaligned something important.

His body had been clearly damaged, and he had no idea how long it had been like this. Had no idea what happened to him.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t do more more than stare as he watched his hand fly over the joint, trying to fix what was wrong and soothe the irritated muscles. He forced his eyes to stay, although his vision went in and out of focus.

His stomach churned, and he swallowed down bile. He had to keep going in order for this to get better. He couldn’t stop now, or this was all for nothing.

Although his shoulder had stabbing pain, there was nothing he could do to fix it so he moved down to his torso instead. His ribs were stark and skeletal, not starved, but thin and weak.

He had known that he wasn’t strong anymore, but he hadn’t realized that his stomach was flat and soft. That there were no bands of muscle over his ribs or around his middle anymore. It was like they had been taken out of him while he was sleeping, ripping away those pieces until there was nothing left except bone and fragile insides.

The touch of his hands against the thin skin of his ribs was strange and ugly, almost horrific with the way those familiar fingers traced distended burn scars. It wasn’t comforting at all.

How could Luo Binghe touch this misshapen, scarred-over body with such care? How could this possibly be the same Shen Qingqiu?

He still hadn’t seen his legs yet, but he didn’t need to. He knew that they would be white and bony, strange and disfigured. He could never love something like this, could never live with something like this, but he didn’t have a choice.

It wasn’t like he could abandon his shoulder, or his arm, or his ribcage.

Everything burned as he thought about each in turn, what little muscle he still possessed tensed as he thought about them. He sprawled on the cool ground, trying to calm himself, but the fever made him feel freezing.

This wasn’t supposed to be like this, the drugs Luo Binghe offered him shouldn’t feel like overdose!

Except Shen Qingqiu had done this to himself. Luo Binghe didn’t want this for him, had even warned him not to.

He was more fragile than he realized, Luo Binghe always said. He wasn’t allowed to hurt himself.

He gasped roughly. His lungs felt like they were seizing, and his skin was attacking the rest of his body. The full extent of the drugs had kicked in, now, and he couldn’t move anymore.

He was so tense that his body wouldn’t obey him, but he didn’t want to face his body anyway.

Why hadn’t he thought this through?

Even if the plan had gone perfectly, Shen Qingqiu would still be in incredible pain. It was like the only purpose of choking down his stash was to disobey Luo Binghe. Like he was trying to grasp at any hint of rebellion before being completely under his care for six months.

He had disobeyed Luo Binghe’s guidance, and it was only too late that he wished he hadn’t.

Only Luo Binghe could make this better. Luo Binghe would forgive him, he knew. As long as he was good, Luo Binghe would take him back.

Shen Qingqiu twitched towards the door, but the motion made him groan, his vision blurring. Luo Binghe would make this better.

But Shen Qingqiu couldn’t do much more than twitch. Any motion too great, and his weak, tense muscles would shake. He couldn’t get up to crawl, never mind stand.

His arms were thinner than they had ever been, and the bone of the upper arm was so delicate it looked like it would snap before holding Shen Qingqiu up. There was no muscle there, so how could it do anything but shake?

And his shoulder. His shoulder cramped with a sharp, steady pain that he hadn’t realized was bothering him. It had felt stiff before, when Shen Qingqiu was working on his art, but he hadn’t realized that it had come out of place. If only he hadn’t looked, then he might never have realized there was anything wrong. Luo Binghe could fix this the same way he always fixed Shen Qingqiu’s pains, if he were in Luo Binghe’s room.

He just couldn’t get to Luo Binghe, because this arm seemed so useless. And besides, he hadn’t been good, so why would Luo Binghe want him anyway?

He had a deformed, damaged figure. Luo Binghe needed to want him first, if he was going to fix all of the things wrong with this body of Shen Qingqiu’s. But he had intentionally hurt himself, even when he wasn’t allowed to; his body was ugly and his mind was uncooperative.

He wasn’t worth Luo Binghe’s efforts.

Shen Qingqiu felt wetness on his cheeks, and he wasn’t surprised anymore that he was crying. This pain made every muscle lock up, tears squeezing out of the corners of his eyes while his breathing came in gasps.

This all seemed so unnecessary. If Shen Qingqiu just hadn’t done this to himself, he wouldn’t be suffering, but nothing could change that now. Eventually he gave up on trying to relax himself. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t speak, there was nothing he could do but lie there in agony.

Several times he tried to call out for Luo Binghe. It was difficult, more so than he expected, to speak anything above a whisper. It was impossible to get his breathing under control.

He just wanted Luo Binghe. He didn’t care anymore that he wouldn’t be able to keep his head. He would be good for Luo Binghe, because now he understood the natural consequences of his disobedience.

He understood that Luo Binghe could help him fix whatever Shen Qingqiu had broken in himself, but no matter how much he understood that now, he couldn’t undo what he had done to himself. He couldn’t get himself to relax and he couldn’t fix his broken body.

The overwhelmingness of it all ebbed and flowed in waves for what felt like hours, but Shen Qingqiu had no way to measure time so it would be impossible to know. The high points just seemed to get higher, and the low points lower, until all sensation started to fade.

Shen Qingqiu’s tears had long since dried up by the time he could get the energy to move. The burning was gone, but the tenseness had never left him, so when he tried to stand, his limbs were too stiff and he crashed to the ground.

He stared down at his arms and legs before trying again. They looked so frail that it was hard to believe they could ever keep him up. It was as if the circular burn scars that dotted his skin were hundreds of heads of nails, driven deep into his bone.

Ripping his eyes up and away, he ignored the protests of his body and rose to his feet, swaying to the wall when his vision went completely dark. He felt along the wall, running his fingers over the textured mural as he went.

Chapter Text

When he finally reached Luo Binghe’s door, he slumped against the wood of the frame. Working his nails into the gap to open the door was something he simply didn’t have the energy for, so he just took a breath for a moment to get back some of the energy. It was like treading water. He just wanted to lie down, but he needed to get to Luo Binghe’s room. Everything would be worth it if he got there.

He paused. The door was already open, barely a pinky-nail’s width of dark gap from floor to ceiling, but it meant that Shen Qingqiu didn’t need to pry the door open this time.

Did he forget to close it fully when he left? He was sure he couldn’t have, but he did leave the room in a daze. If he did…

Luo Binghe heard, maybe even saw, everything. He knew exactly what Shen Qingqiu had done to himself and how much he suffered for it, but Shen Qingqiu hadn’t come into his room. Would Luo Binghe even help him this time?

Shen Qingqiu pulled the door open wide. There was nothing he could do but trust Luo Binghe, because he couldn’t handle this on his own. Even with no pain, he needed Luo Binghe to make this better for him.

Shen Qingqiu’s head hurt.

It was such a minor complaint compared to what he had just been through, but he knew Luo Binghe would care. He stepped through the door and onto the carpet, and instantly, he felt a little better with his feet on the soft rug. Luo Binghe’s room, this feeling under his scarred feet, meant safety for him.

Luo Binghe looked up from his book, smiling slightly. He didn’t seem repulsed or angry, so Shen Qingqiu stepped forward again, towards the bed. He softly pulled the door closed behind him.

Shen Qingqiu knew he wasn’t supposed to be here. The alarm hadn’t gone off yet, and Luo Binghe had just heard him disobey his single request, that Shen Qingqiu not hurt himself. Shen Qingqiu also wasn’t in any particular pain that Luo Binghe could help, because the drugs had already worn off.

So Shen Qingqiu had prepared himself to do something he had never done before in his functional memory, and that was apologize.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, tears springing to his eyes. The guilt and regret had been unbearable in the grip of the drugs, and he just wanted it gone. He needed Luo Binghe to forgive him for everything.

For thinking that he could do this on his own. For ‘not needing’ Luo Binghe. For hurting himself where Luo Binghe could hear.

Luo Binghe helped him lay down on the bed, where Shen Qingqiu felt the tension start to come apart in his body. He was so incredibly tired.

“What’s hurting you now?” Luo Binghe asked in reply, and Shen Qingqiu knew he could make everything better, so he motioned listlessly towards his injured shoulder.

Luo Binghe must have noticed how he couldn’t bear to look down. Before he had avoided it, but now it was clearly causing him distress.

Luo Binghe nodded and held his hand. “I was wondering when you would notice. I didn’t tell you because want to force you when you weren’t ready.”

Well. Shen Qingqiu had forced himself when he wasn’t ready, instead.

But then again, he would never have been ready without Luo Binghe right there, he had known that for a long time. At least Luo Binghe was here now.

“I’m… my body is…” Shen Qingqiu struggled to find the words. His body wasn’t his, couldn’t be his. It was hideous and scarred, something that he couldn’t possibly connect to himself.

How could this unchanged mind of his possess such a different body than that Olympic fencing medalist? Shen Qingqiu had been destroyed to the point where he wouldn’t even be able to recognize himself anymore.

Only Luo Binghe would recognize him.

Luo Binghe reached across from him and traced the lines of his ribs. He had done this often, but never when Shen Qingqiu was aware that his body was thin and weak.

Shen Qingqiu flinched away. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to be touched, but how could he let Luo Binghe, this bright-sun soul touch him? He had grown so used to being in the dark.

Luo Binghe smiled at him. “This body of yours isn’t new to me. Do you remember? I know you at your worst and your best.”

Luo Binghe had. And he had accepted Shen Qingqiu as he was, the entire time, never caring what Shen Qingqiu looked like or how filthy he was. The only thing that seemed to matter to Luo Binghe was how willing Shen Qingqiu was to come back to him.

Right now, Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to leave.

“And do you know what I think? I think you’re beautiful as that perfect fencer I saw you as, but you’re even better now. Because now, your outsides look like your insides. You’re easily broken but easy to comfort. Fragile to the smallest of harsh words.”

Shen Qingqiu remembered how he used to fly into a rage at petty insults. Fragile. It was a strange word to assign, but it seemed to fit.

His body was brittle and his skin stretched over his bones with no muscle mass in between. Luo Binghe always carried him as if he were light as air.

Luo Binghe continued in a low voice, “You will always be beautiful to me. It’s in your spirit and the insides of your bones, and that’s never going to change no matter how many surface-level scars you have on your skin.

“Your body now has been through so much, just like your spirit has. But you’ve learned to be brave and to get around harmful pride. You’re here now, aren’t you? That’s proof that this body of yours is strong.”

Shen Qingqiu gathered himself with a quick breath before following Luo Binghe’s touch with his eyes. Luo Binghe was running his fingers over the translucent skin of Shen Qingqiu’s forearm, tracing every strikingly blue vein there.

There was so much adoration in his gaze, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t understand why. He didn’t feel strong. The way Luo Binghe looked at him had never changed, even though Shen Qingqiu’s body had changed so much.

“You’re here now,” Luo Binghe reminded him. “I‘ll get you a brace for that shoulder, but for the next few weeks, don’t use that arm. I’ll help you do everything else, like eat and wash.”

Shen Qingqiu nodded. That fixed his physical problem, but didn’t help how he felt. He had hurt himself, and the guilt from that sat in the bottom of his stomach like a stone.

He couldn’t meet Luo Binghe’s eyes as he brought his legs back up to his chest. Since he was sitting up, he propped his head on his knees and wrapped them tightly with his arms, only remembering at the last minute to let his injured arm drop. “I hurt myself.”

Luo Binghe paused, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to see the expression on his face so he stared hard at the bedcovers. Saying his wrongdoing aloud made a lump rise up in Shen Qingqiu’s throat, as if he were going to cry, and he hid his face. It didn’t make him feel any better like he thought it would. It just put him in more danger of being punished.

Punishment meant abandonment, most of the time. Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to be left alone right now, but Luo Binghe needed to know what happened in order to make Shen Qingqiu feel better.

Instead of leaving, Luo Binghe just wrapped an arm around his trembling body. “I know. But you’re here now, and that means you want me to forgive you. So I will.”

Shen Qingqiu blinked as Luo Binghe got up from the bed and crossed the room.

He knew that Luo Binghe liked doing things for him. Shen Qingqiu didn’t usually ask for much, but whatever he could want, he received, as long as he showed Luo Binghe respect in return.

But of course, Luo Binghe was right. The only thing he wanted right now was forgiveness.

Luo Binghe sat back down on the bed with a small smile, gently swiping his thumb across Shen Qingqiu’s cheek before moving down to his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, it’s not dislocated. Just displaced. It’ll take  a lot longer to recover from, but it should hurt less, as long as no nerves or tendons get pinched,” Luo Binghe explained quietly. Luo Binghe loved to explain stuff to Shen Qingqiu, which was good because sometimes, he was Shen Qingqiu’s only way of knowing what was going on.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t use his arm anymore, he realized. He couldn’t paint anymore. His mural hadn’t been finished, and now it never would be.

Of course, he could just ask to go back there and finish it, but he didn’t want to leave Luo Binghe again, or make Luo Binghe think he wanted to go back.

…Shen Qingqiu would never be going back to that white room. It was a strange thought, and if his new living space hadn’t been comfortable, safe, and familiar, it would have been a devastating one. He hadn’t even spent his last few scheduled days there, having come to Luo Binghe before the alarm went off.

While Luo Binghe was strapping the shoulder brace onto him, he spoke up in a whisper. “The alarm… I’m here early.” He could never seem to speak louder than that because of the damage to his voice. Those muscles got tired and achy if he ever tried, so he had just been whispering, and even then, using words only when necessary.

Luo Binghe didn’t seem to mind. “That’s okay. I never said you couldn’t, and besides, I’m always here for you whenever you want me. Stay here, I’ll get an ice pack.”

Shen Qingqiu ran his hands up and down his arms, which were covered in goose flesh, but Luo Binghe was back quickly.

“Are you feeling a little better?” Luo Binghe asked, and Shen Qingqiu catalogued the aches in his body before nodding. His body didn’t hurt as much, and it didn’t feel as ugly and terrible now.

The itchy, invasive horror had faded a little, now that it was clear Luo Binghe had cared for him while he looked like this, and hadn’t minded it. Plus, Shen Qingqiu was curled up around his middle, and so his body wasn’t visible and exposed.

Luo Binghe carefully put the ice pack over the brace, where the cold would seep into the joint but wouldn’t hurt Shen Qingqiu’s skin. They stayed there until Luo Binghe decided it was enough time and helped Shen Qingqiu stretch out the muscles in that shoulder by moving his arm around for him and asking what positions were painful.

After that was a hot pad, then more ice pack, and then stretching again. This repeated several more times, until Luo Binghe got off the bed and motioned for Shen Qingqiu to follow.

“We need to stretch out your shoulder more, or else the muscles there will hurt a lot more and you won’t have any mobility.” Shen Qingqiu hesitated, one arm still around his knees. He knew that Luo Binghe would make it better, but he really didn’t want to get up.

Luo Binghe offered his hand, content to wait. He teased, “Come on, up. After this I’ll help you take a nice hot bath and then we can go to bed.”

Reluctantly, Shen Qingqiu uncurled and reached for Luo Binghe’s hand. It was only when Luo Binghe pulled him up to standing that he realized his posture had become hunched over. It made sense, his preferred sitting and sleeping position was curled in on himself, and he also spent who knows how many years hunched over his art on the walls.

He pulled his shoulders back to his full height, but could only stay there for a few seconds before the position became painful. “You need to stretch,” Luo Binghe reminded him. “That’s why you can’t straighten up all the way, it’s because your back and shoulders aren’t flexible enough yet.”

And Luo Binghe could help him fix that, was implied. Shen Qingqiu hunched in on himself a little more, feeling like a child who was being taught to walk for the first time. He expected to lose a lot of his ability to move and muscle mass, but the ability to stand upright? That was something he never even realized he could struggle with.

It was a good thing he was staying with Luo Binghe, because Luo Binghe would help him increase his flexibility and strength better now that Shen Qingqiu was staying with him every day. Luo Binghe had much better access to him now, and that was how life was going to be.

It wasn’t as daunting of a thought as it had once been, but Shen Qingqiu thought that was fine. He had been scared of Luo Binghe enough for a lifetime.

He couldn’t remember any of his reasons for that, now. Luo Binghe hadn’t even done anything to deserve anything except love and respect.

Luo Binghe guided him through several stretches, filling the silence in between with pleased sounds and idle remarks. “I am glad that it took you this long to notice. It really must not have been bothering you that much.”

Shen Qingqiu sighed and switched to an overhead stretch with Luo Binghe’s nonverbal direction. It bothered him now. Luo Binghe really could have just told him and helped him, and then maybe it wouldn’t have gotten this bad, but Shen Qingqiu knew that Luo Binghe had greater designs beyond his comprehension.

Luo Binghe didn’t like seeing Shen Qingqiu hurt, he knew. This was a critical fact that he would be careful not to forget. Luo Binghe should never have been scary.

“It also gave me a few months to do research on how to fix it, so thank you. We’ll work on your posture so it won’t happen again.” Luo Binghe reassured.

Shen Qingqiu abandoned his stretch to wrap his arms around Luo Binghe, pressing his face into Luo Binghe’s shoulder. He didn’t know how to show how grateful he was for this acceptance and healing.

Luo Binghe seemed to like it, letting Shen Qingqiu hug him for a little while with a chuckle until he reluctantly pried the two of them apart. “I think we’re done with stretching. How about a bath, and then a nap?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded quickly. A bath would wash the filthiness of his cell away to prepare to stay here with Luo Binghe, and he would never have the white dust under his fingernails ever again.

He would never have to be cold or alone as long as he didn’t want to be. It was a freeing thought, and it made him smile again.

Luo Binghe hadn’t been prepared for Shen Qingqiu to come so early, so Shen Qingqiu had to wait on the bed while he filled up the bath.

He heard the sound of water, then Luo Binghe returned to sit beside him. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said, wrapping his arms around Shen Qingqiu’s back. The corners of his lips twitched up, as if to mirror the smile in Luo Binghe’s voice, and Shen Qingqiu realized he was glad he was here too.

Luo Binghe would do anything to make him smile, he knew, so he hummed happily and rolled his head back so he could see Luo Binghe’s face.

Luo Binghe seemed to stop once he caught sight of Shen Qingqiu’s expression, gasping just loud enough for him to hear. It was barely an extra intake of air, but Shen Qingqiu could almost feel it on his skin.

“You look beautiful like this,” Luo Binghe whispered, as if he were afraid that Shen Qingqiu’s smile would startle and leave.

Instead, Luo Binghe’s adoring gaze became too much for him and he hid his red face in his palms. Luo Binghe didn’t seem to mind that much, settling for rubbing his hands up and down Shen Qingqiu’s back. The dry rasp of skin on skin was accompanied by the familiar feeling of Luo Binghe’s calluses on Shen Qingqiu’s sensitive skin.

This time, he could identify when Luo Binghe passed over a circular burn mark, but Luo Binghe passed over them indiscriminately with the unmarred skin, so he didn’t seem to care at all. It was easier for Shen Qingqiu to forget about it, then.

The bath was full, so Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu walked to the bathroom in a very familiar pattern. It was so easy for Shen Qingqiu to slide into his normal place in the bath, head on the edge where it Luo Binghe had the best access to wash his hair.

Even that part of him had changed, he realized. He had never had hair this long, it nearly reached his waist after going this long without even a trim.

Luo Binghe settled in to start the process while Shen Qingqiu watched the way his own limbs moved in the water. Luo Binghe hadn’t put any soapy bubbles in, maybe on purpose.

Even though the white-flecked haze of the water, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t possibly connect this body with himself. He squirmed in discomfort, trying to move his head, but Luo Binghe was washing his scalp right now and wouldn’t let him. Knots of tension started to bunch up in his shoulders and legs, and while it didn’t cause burning pain like it would with the drugs, Shen Qingqiu’s unease was obvious.

Luo Binghe’s hands left Shen Qingqiu’s head and he immediately twisted, reaching out for Luo Binghe in return.

He really couldn’t face this alone, Luo Binghe should realize by now. He needed Luo Binghe to be here with him, telling him it was okay and…

It was really, so incredibly pathetic, he realized. Luo Binghe just being behind him wasn’t enough, he wanted Luo Binghe to be holding him like a child who wasn’t receiving enough attention.

He wasn’t drugged or anything, either. Not hurt, or alone, or starved for affection. He just wanted Luo Binghe closer for no other reason than he did. But he wanted it, and Luo Binghe would give it to him with no judgement.

Words weren’t coming easily to him, now, as if speaking would somehow destroy this precious façade he was putting up for Luo Binghe and bring back his normal self, the one who would never allow something like this to happen.

Instead he just wordlessly tugged down at Luo Binghe’s hand, hoping that his eyes would show what he couldn’t ask for out loud.

Luo Binghe only looked surprised for a second, but it was a heart-stopping one. If Luo Binghe denied him this… Shen Qingqiu didn’t want him to realize his heart was made of glass, but it would break anyway.

Luckily Luo Binghe only drew away to shed his clothes before slipping into the bathtub.

It was a large one, nearly the size of Luo Binghe’s bed. Even though there was ample space, Shen Qingqiu was still moved fit in Luo Binghe’s lap while Luo Binghe finished washing his hair.

Shen Qingqiu held one of Luo Binghe’s arms captive, secretly delighting in the way Luo Binghe didn’t even tense or pull away. If he wanted it back, it was going to have to bargain for it!

Luo Binghe finished his one-handed washing job, then poked his head around Shen Qingqiu’s shoulder to look at him. Shen Qingqiu laughed and tried to turn away, but he still had Luo Binghe’s arm clutched against his chest so Luo Binghe just turned with him.

“Excuse me,” Luo Binghe said playfully, using his other hand to tilt Shen Qingqiu’s chin so they were facing each other. “If this humble one may request his arm back, I need to brush and condition your hair, sir.”

Shen Qingqiu let go, mock-begrudgingly, and but couldn’t hold back the suppressed laughter and bent over with the force of his giggles.

“So silly,” Luo Binghe admonished fondly. He returned to Shen Qingqiu’s hair, beginning the laborious process of undoing the tangles.

Shen Qingqiu settled in, relaxing against Luo Binghe’s body.

The swish of the brush and sounds of water were broken up by Luo Binghe’s occasional comment from Luo Binghe.

“You know, I rarely use the bath. I prefer showers, they’re quicker and more efficient.” Luo Binghe bunched up some of Shen Qingqiu’s hair in a knot to access the lower layers.

“I framed your snake and fencing drawings, I don’t know if I’ve told you that. It’s in my practice locker, so I see it every day.” His hair was finished, so Luo Binghe moved around him to start scrubbing his body.

“I’m very proud of you.” Luo Binghe worked at his fingernails, cleaning each one with incredible attention.

“I’m glad you’re here.” As if he hadn’t said that a million times already, it was so casual that the statement was almost absentminded..

“You’re so pretty.” Luo Binghe finished with one foot and moved to the next.

“Okay you’re done!” Luo Binghe gradually got to his feet, droplets falling onto Shen Qingqiu like little flecks of rain as he towered, offering his hand to help Shen Qingqiu stand too.

Instead of walking out of the tub right away, though, Shen Qingqiu fell right back into Luo Binghe’s arms with a sigh.

“The effort of standing was too much, huh?” Luo Binghe asked fondly. “That’s okay, I can carry you. Let me just get out of here and dry off first, and then I can dry you off too.”

The drying process went by quickly, since Luo Binghe was an expert in this by now and Shen Qingqiu knew exactly what he was doing, helping whenever he could. Soon, they were both in bed for the promised nap, although it felt more like the end of a sleep cycle to Shen Qingqiu.

He wondered if Luo Binghe would ever introduce a consistent sleep schedule for Shen Qingqiu to track the days. Then again, Luo Binghe hadn’t been telling him how many weeks were going by, so Shen Qingqiu couldn’t see a reason why he would.

It wasn’t like he had commitments, meetings to get to, or work to do. He was in Luo Binghe’s care, and that meant that he didn’t need to worry about things like time of day. Luo Binghe would let him sleep when he was tired, and Shen Qingqiu was grateful for that.

Right now, they were both tired, so Shen Qingqiu curled up in his spot on Luo Binghe’s chest and closed his eyes.

Luo Binghe had claimed him, and no one else, to live with him in this safe space. Shen Qingqiu fell asleep with a small smile on his face.

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe was looking at him when Shen Qingqiu woke up. This startled him for a moment, because usually when he woke up for the first few times, Luo Binghe would be asleep. A ‘night’ together usually had a lot of these instances, but Luo Binghe would coax him back to sleep every time.

“I have to leave,” Luo Binghe said softly, almost in a whisper with how close their face were.

Shen Qingqiu nodded a little and waited for Luo Binghe to roll off the bed and get out of the room, but neither of them moved.

Luo Binghe sighed, the soft puff of air fanning across Shen Qingqiu’s skin. “I really don’t want to though.”

“Then stay,” Shen Qingqiu whispered. His voice was as hoarse and painful as ever, but Luo Binghe pet his head anyway with only a slight reprimand in his expression.

They stayed there for a while while Luo Binghe watched his face. Shen Qingqiu didn’t know if Luo Binghe would let himself be persuaded, but he was here for now.

“You came here midway through last week, so I can give you an extra week before you’re staying here every day. Do you want another week alone?”

Shen Qingqiu hesitated. He hadn’t thought about it, but Luo Binghe was right. He did still have extra time on the metaphorical clock and cashing it in now was the only way to use it. If he rejected the offer, he would never receive it again.

The door to his old cell would be closed, and with it, everything Shen Qingqiu had experienced there. He hadn’t finished his latest mural and it was lacking most of the touches of light and shadow. Still a stunning piece, but incomplete.

The wall wasn’t done, but… Shen Qingqiu realized that the piece had been finished. He had done a complete rendition on paper with pencil in this room, under Luo Binghe’s watchful eyes nearly six months ago.

His time in that room, however incomplete, was finished for him. Luo Binghe gave him his own space to share, and the door to his other lonely life was shut.

Shen Qingqiu firmly shook his head. He didn’t want another week there.

Luo Binghe smiled at him for a moment before rolling out and away, dressing quickly, and then the door was quietly shut and Shen Qingqiu was alone again.

Not for long, hopefully. Luo Binghe never left for too long. Shen Qingqiu decided to go back to sleep, as if Luo Binghe had shushed him and pleaded, like he normally did, instead of leaving the room.

Shen Qingqiu closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, he felt the other side of the bed dip. Luo Binghe had come home. Shen Qingqiu waited for Luo Binghe to wrap his arms around him, to drag him, move him, or come closer, but nothing happened for a long moment.

Luo Binghe was just…laying there. On the other side of the bed.

Shen Qingqiu made a split-second decision and turned around to face him. The sheets slid off of him, but he ignored them and crawled over to the other side of the bed. The space heater had been whirring in the corner of the room since Shen Qingqiu had stumbled inside, and added to the quiet shuffling of the sheets.

Luo Binghe started a little when he caught Shen Qingqiu’s drowsy gaze. “Good morning,” Luo Binghe laughed, but opened his arms wide for Shen Qingqiu to crawl into.

Was it morning? No, they had just taken a nap together…

Luo Binghe must be teasing him, Shen Qingqiu concluded sleepily as he curled up on Luo Binghe again and shut his eyes.

Luo Binghe let him drift for a while, but Luo Binghe didn’t seem like he wanted to sleep. He was talking quietly to Shen Qingqiu like he always did when he didn’t care if Shen Qingqiu was listening.

“You know, they aren’t many people I can talk to. Most of them won’t listen because I’m so young, the others respect me too much to hear what I’m saying.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t really understand, but he knew wasn’t supposed to. If Luo Binghe wanted him to get it, he would explain it in a way that Shen Qingqiu could understand.

“It’s not like I’m a child anymore. I’m practically retired, by Olympian standards. I’ve already competed my first Olympics—I medaled higher than you did on your first, by the way—and I’m twenty-one.”

An Olympics had passed…?

Shen Qingqiu blinked. This was the first Olympics he had missed since he started.

…it wasn’t like he could fence anyway, not with his body like this. But all that renown, all those people that loved to see him perform, they would all be disappointed.

He sighed and relaxed against Luo Binghe, finding it surprisingly easy to dismiss the thought. The only one that really cared about him was right there with him anyway.

He didn’t care that he hadn’t competed. He didn’t fence anymore, and the thrill of wielding a sabre couldn’t possibly compare to the comfort of being here, in Luo Binghe’s arms.

Here, it was hard to remember why the hollow, diluted love of the masses was so great.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t changed at all, but his time with Luo Binghe had shown him that there were better options, and he couldn’t imagine why he had acted the way he did for so long.

Maybe he had always needed this kind of comfort to be happy.

It wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility, he had been thinking about this for a long time. Had always thought there could be a reason why everyone around him seemed to leave, why he was so dissatisfied with life no matter what turn it took.

He had been waiting for Luo Binghe to make Shen Qingqiu his.

*_*

Time passed.

It was impossible to tell how much, but Shen Qingqiu knew it because Luo Binghe and him seemed to settle into what Shen Qingqiu had started calling ‘normal life.’ Luo Binghe would leave for a little bit on a schedule that Shen Qingqiu couldn’t figure out without knowing how long a day was, but he was there for most of the time and tried to keep his absences limited to when Shen Qingqiu was asleep.

Luo Binghe didn’t encourage him to go back to sleep in the middle of the night anymore, now that they had unlimited time together. He fed Shen Qingqiu when he was hungry, let him sleep when he was tired, draw when he was antsy, and care for his shoulder when they had time to spare.

Shen Qingqiu was grateful that Luo Binghe was so willing to help, especially since the ache had just gotten worse. Luo Binghe helped him stretch in doorframes or exercise with wrist weights, followed by ice and hot pads.

More than that, Luo Binghe helped him work on his back posture so his injury wouldn’t reappear. Every time Luo Binghe made a correction, which usually consisted of a fingertip touch to the back or shoulder, Shen Qingqiu would fix it immediately and earn a few words of praise.

He was also getting shoulder massages every once in a while, where Luo Binghe would push him face-down on the bed playfully and proceed to make him see stars with magical, lotion-covered hands on his neck, shoulder, and upper back.

It shouldn’t have felt good, since Shen Qingqiu didn’t have basically any muscle mass and was just bony and sharp points, but Luo Binghe seemed to know exactly what soft parts to press on to release the strain that built up when he was exercising.

With this extensive, near-religious care, Shen Qingqiu’s shoulder was getting a lot better, and he was able to move the arm without any clicking, catching, or instability. He wasn’t quite as flexible, and it still hurt to move his arm a certain way, but it was so much better than it once was.

Luo Binghe started leaving less and less, too. He seemed to have more time on his hands, although when he walked into the room every time, he seemed shed more tension at the door. He complained to Shen Qingqiu about it, once.

“Do you remember what you mean to them? Those people that worship you?” Shen Qingqiu nodded, but Luo Binghe wasn’t really looking at him, so this must be one of those times that Luo Binghe just wanted someone he could talk to, not necessarily someone to listen and respond.

Shen Qingqiu let the gentle words wash over him. He didn’t try to understand what Luo Binghe was saying, but he listened anyway. If there was something he could do to make Luo Binghe’s life a little easier, he would do it.

Luo Binghe’s life outside of this room seemed difficult. He never let it affect Shen Qingqiu, of course, but he could see it in the way Luo Binghe seemed distracted, sometimes, drifting off in the middle of bath time or stretches.

“They don’t understand why they haven’t seen you in two years. They’re getting impatient, and harder to manage.”

Shen Qingqiu frowned, and Luo Binghe noticed that he was listening. With a small smile, Luo Binghe set a fingertip in the space between Shen Qingqiu’s brows and rubbed until all the little wrinkles of concern were wiped away.

The cause of Luo Binghe’s stress was…him?

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to give you to them,” Luo Binghe said, assurance and some unidentifiable emotion thickening his voice. “I… can’t, not anymore. You’ve changed me, you know that?”

Shen Qingqiu tried to understand what he was talking about. Luo Binghe had never given him to anybody, had always had this kind of kindness and care for Shen Qingqiu! What change? People didn’t change, at least not how Luo Binghe was describing it, like a permanent, fundamental thing.

But that probably wasn’t the part Luo Binghe wanted him to focus on. Shen Qingqiu was absolutely and completely safe here, in the middle of a dangerous cult that wanted his blood and tears. Luo Binghe would protect him, would never give up his most beautiful and beloved thing.

Shen Qingqiu smiled up at him, and Luo Binghe pet his hair back from his face. It was getting easier and more common for Shen Qingqiu to smile like this, but Luo Binghe would beam at him with effusive praise every time.

“I need to leave for a week. It’s something I truly can’t avoid, but there’s a lot of food in the fridge and as long as you do your shoulder care and are able to sleep without me, it won’t feel like too long.” Shen Qingqiu’s smiled faded a little.

Luo Binghe was leaving, and he would be fine on his own but… a week was a long time, he was pretty sure.

Shen Qingqiu knew Luo Binghe had his own life, that he talked to and met with other people and practiced fencing. Luo Binghe couldn’t be there for him every second of every day, of course.

This would be no different. Shen Qingqiu hummed, trying to express that he was okay. He would be fine, Luo Binghe had bigger problems to worry about, it seemed.

For now, all Shen Qingqiu could do was ease some of Luo Binghe’s stress here. He scooted upright, using his arms around Luo Binghe’s neck to pull himself up. Luo Binghe’s hands lifted off of his body, surprised, while Shen Qingqiu moved from his lap to tuck his head into the crook of Luo Binghe’s shoulder and neck.

He breathed in deeply to the familiar, clean smell of Luo Binghe’s skin while Luo Binghe settled back to card his fingers through Shen Qingqiu’s hair. He had been sleeping in Luo Binghe’s bed and living in his space for a long time and he would never forget this smell even if had gone a hundred years nose-blind.

“You’re right,” Luo Binghe sighed. “No point in talking about that. I’m not gone right now, am I?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded resolutely. Luo Binghe was solid and real, undeniably there no matter how ethereal and untouchable he seemed sometimes.

Even after all this time of knowing him, Shen Qingqiu was still reminded of a white lamb when Luo Binghe looked at him with that pure devotion. This little white lotus of his was incomparably sweet, and he would never leave Shen Qingqiu if he didn’t have to.

When Luo Binghe finally left, it was with one last hug and a few words of direction so that Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t get confused about where to find the food or how to turn on the bath.

The door shut behind Luo Binghe with a click.

*_*

Shen Qingqiu wandered around the room aimlessly for a while after he was gone. His first instinct when Luo Binghe was gone was to go to sleep to wait for him to come back, but he was going to be gone for a week, and Shen Qingqiu was fairly sure he couldn’t sleep for a week.

He would at least need to eat or drink, right? He probably couldn’t survive a week on just sleep alone.

So he moved to his drawings, determined to make Luo Binghe happy with his work and the knowledge that Shen Qingqiu was doing okay even though Luo Binghe wasn’t here. After nearly falling asleep on the desk, he moved to the bed and slept for a while.

Several sleep-cycles continued like this, but Shen Qingqiu hadn’t tried to count sleep-cycles in a long time, so he didn’t know exactly how many. He tried not to eat too much food at once, like Luo Binghe warned him, but he was just getting so bored.

Surely, now that most of the food was gone, Luo Binghe would be back soon?

The week had passed super quickly, if that were really the case. Shen Qingqiu tried the door multiple times, but of course it was locked. Both doors were, and Shen Qingqiu had taken to opening closets, pretending they led somewhere where he could find Luo Binghe and take him back to bed for a well-deserved nap.

Speaking of nap time, Shen Qingqiu was tired again, so he backed up a few steps and fell backward onto the soft sheets. At this point, he could navigate the room with his eyes closed and his ears stopped.

Still, Luo Binghe insisted on leading him around the room whenever possible, even carrying him sometimes when he felt too sleepy to stand.

Shen Qingqiu wrapped the heavy weighted blanket around himself and pretended he was being tightly hugged as he went to sleep again.

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu woke up to a soft fabric pressed up against his face. It wasn’t covering his nose or mouth, just his eyes. He made a questioning noise, trying to look up, but a gentle palm held his head down and Luo Binghe made a quiet shushing noise.

Shen Qingqiu followed the command and let his head fall back against the pillow as the fabric was tied around his head in a secure knot.

“Just relax.”

Shen Qingqiu frowned instead. Luo Binghe didn’t sound quite right. His voice was lower and rougher than normal, and his tone was weird. But then Luo Binghe stroked a hand over Shen Qingqiu’s head, and Shen Qingqiu relaxed obediently.

“Good boy.” Shen Qingqiu shivered, a small smile silently spreading over his face. Luo Binghe had never really said that to him before, but it felt unexpectedly…

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t find a word for how it felt, so he let the thought dissolve in the pleasure of Luo Binghe’s presence. Luo Binghe was finally back!

Luo Binghe continued, in that same rough voice, “Now sit up for me, just like that, good.” He helped Shen Qingqiu to sit, and the sheets slipped down Shen Qingqiu’s chest and pooled in his lap. Luo Binghe lifted them away with a careful hand, and Shen Qingqiu smiled at him. Or, at least, smiled in his direction.

It was impossible to see anything but the light peeking out from under the blindfold.

“You’re already naked,” Luo Binghe breathed, and his tone sounded strange again. Luo Binghe would never make him walk anywhere without being able to see, but he clearly wanted Shen Qingqiu for something, so Shen Qingqiu leaned forwards to make himself easier to pick up.

He was stopped by the unexpected presence of Luo Binghe’s hand between his thighs.

Shen Qingqiu stopped moving, confused, as Luo Binghe started to make strange petting motions there.

Luo Binghe had never done this before, so Shen Qingqiu had no idea what he was trying to do now, or if this was encouragement for Shen Qingqiu to get up or lean back or something.

A memory surfaced sluggishly from the recesses of Shen Qingqiu’s mind. Sometimes, women used to do similar things, and Shen Qingqiu had usually been naked there as well. He tried to remember even more, and thought about what this would usually lead to.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t had a sex drive in a very long time, but maybe he could try? For Luo Binghe? He remembered that it used to feel good, and he used to love this with a gentle woman.

Women were so soft and warm. Back when Shen Qingqiu didn’t have Luo Binghe, he used to use memories of them to comfort himself when he was lonely and depressed.

But now Shen Qingqiu did have Luo Binghe, and Luo Binghe was so much better than even the best memories of those women.

Shen Qingqiu made himself relax again while Luo Binghe kept moving his hand. If this had felt so great with those faceless women, of course would feel even better with Luo Binghe! Shen Qingqiu might not have wanted this, but Luo Binghe always knew what actually made Shen Qingqiu feel happy and warm, instead of what Shen Qingqiu thought would work.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t really know how this was supposed to work with two men, instead of a woman and a man, but he trusted Luo Binghe. No matter what happened, he would take it in stride, and it would turn out good for him in the end.

Luo Binghe stopped rubbing, and Shen Qingqiu realized he was hard.

This happened sometimes, after Shen Qingqiu woke up from a long nap or Luo Binghe accidentally brushed something sensitive when they were snuggling. Shen Qingqiu used to get embarrassed and try to hide it, but Luo Binghe had never seemed to notice or care, so then Shen Qingqiu stopped noticing too.

Now, instead of ignoring it, Luo Binghe made a satisfied hum that sent traces of pleasure down Shen Qingqiu’s spine. Luo Binghe’s praise always made Shen Qingqiu feel better, and most of his misgivings about the situation dissolved with that small noise.

Shen Qingqiu was blindfolded, so he couldn’t see the expression on Luo Binghe’s face and their bodies were so far apart now. He squirmed needily, wanting to be touched again, and Luo Binghe obliged with a soft laugh in that same rough, deep voice.

“So desperate for it, aren’t you?”

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure what that meant, but Luo Binghe clearly wanted a positive answer, so he nodded vigorously.

“Alright, you should know what to do. Lay down and spread your legs.”

Once Shen Qingqiu obeyed, Luo Binghe got off of the bed, muttering to himself, opening and shutting cupboards and drawers. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help him find anything because he couldn’t see, so he just waited patiently from the bed.

Luo Binghe exclaimed softly when he found what he was looking for, and the bed dipped slightly as he sat back down. Except, he didn’t touch Shen Qingqiu again, and instead, strange squishy noises started up rhythmically from that side of the bed.

“Are you ready?” Luo Binghe asked, and his voice sounded even rougher and deeper than before. Shen Qingqiu nodded resolutely.

Luo Binghe grasped his ankle and forced that leg up towards his chest, making Shen Qingqiu flinch with the unexpectedly harsh motion.

Luo Binghe wasn’t usually this rough with him, and that combined with the mystery of the situation thanks to the blindfold made Shen Qingqiu’s heart start to pound. He didn’t want Luo Binghe to know he was nervous, but he couldn’t hide the way his breath caught.

“Relax for me. Don’t struggle, stay perfectly still,” Luo Binghe commanded. His face sounded suddenly very close to Shen Qingqiu’s, and Shen Qingqiu let those directions focus his racing thoughts.

Luo Binghe breathed, “Such a good, sexy little thing.”

Shen Qingqiu hummed happily up at him, warmth blooming in his chest. No one had ever called him that before!

Then he froze.

There was something wet touching him… in a place he didn’t expect.

He trusted Luo Binghe, but he couldn’t understand what was happening, and usually Luo Binghe would explain it to him but he was silent now.

Only loud, unfamiliar breathing came from somewhere above Shen Qingqiu’s face.

Suddenly every one of Shen Qingqiu’s muscles locked up as fire flared in his lower half.

Under the blindfold, his eyes went wide.

A second passed in still, silent shock.

Then, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help the way his entire body tried to jerk away, but there wasn’t anywhere to go. Luo Binghe held his leg, using his rough grip on Shen Qingqiu’s ankle to pin him down to the bed.

Pathetic, hurt cries tore from his lips, but Luo Binghe made no effort to shush him, and the pain didn’t stop.

Shen Qingqiu was supposed to enjoy this, and if he didn’t, it was his own fault because Luo Binghe had always been right. Especially about matters of Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t supposed to cry out, he remembered, and shut his mouth hurriedly. He was supposed to relax and stay perfectly still.

He didn’t understand.

Why didn’t this feel good? It felt like he was being ripped in two, the spark of pleasure drowned by waves of agony.

He couldn’t possibly relax, but Luo Binghe didn’t say anything about that disobedience.

Luo Binghe didn’t say anything at all, and Shen Qingqiu’s mounting panic made his breathing come fast and harsh as he twitched uselessly.

This wasn’t—this wasn’t anything like he thought it would be! Luo Binghe wasn’t showing him the softness that he promised!

Instead—instead Luo Binghe was—Shen Qingqiu’s mind reflexively bounced away from acknowledging what was actually happening.

Shen Qingqiu must have done something terrible to deserve this. This feeling was radiating from inside of him, under his skin, invading his body and hollowing him out.

He writhed on the bed, trying to vent the agony. Even though Luo Binghe had told him specifically not to, his muscles were so tense that his limbs were trembling. Should he apologize?

There was no way he could speak right now, hurt and stressed. The best he could do was to lay back and try his best to follow Luo Binghe’s direction to prove that he could redeem himself and show that he wanted to be comforted.

Luo Binghe’s motion stopped, and he ran his hands through Shen Qingqiu’s hair. Anguished, Shen Qingqiu leaned into the touch like a cat. His breaths were more like gasps, and sweat dripped down his forehead like tears. Aching, hollow pain pounded like in time with his heartbeat from his core, and Shen Qingqiu felt like he was going to choke.

“You took it all. Good job. With the way you’re crying out, it’s like it’s your first time. Don’t worry, it should be quick, you’re—” Luo Binghe grunted, and Shen Qingqiu screamed. It was a quick noise, and he cut it off with a snap of his teeth. “So tight.”

It was so much worse with the blindfold, Shen Qingqiu thought, before he could stop himself.

Being deprived of senses made it hard to focus on anything besides the awful sensation, like he was being ripped apart on the inside.

It didn’t stop as Luo Binghe moved rhythmically, each motion pushing tears from Shen Qingqiu’s eyes. They soaked into the blindfold.

Was this why Luo Binghe had blindfolded him? So that he wouldn’t have to see the pain in Shen Qingqiu’s eyes?

Luo Binghe would never do anything to hurt Shen Qingqiu, and he had promised that there would be no pain in this bed!

But Luo Binghe didn’t seem to care about that now.

Shen Qingqiu raked his brain for answers. He must have messed up somehow. Luo Binghe didn’t seem to care about him anymore! But that hand on his face, all this praise, it had been so tender.

Confusion made Shen Qingqiu panic-stricken as he cried under the onslaught of sensation. He just wanted to curl into a ball with Luo Binghe wrapped around his back.

For some reason, Luo Binghe wanted Shen Qingqiu to be hurt like this.

The realization was like a knife to the chest.

“Hey now, what’s wrong?” Luo Binghe’s voice cut through the fog, and Shen Qingqiu jerked towards it on instinct. The stabbing pain was gone, he realized. Blindly, he groped around towards Luo Binghe. He couldn’t breathe, his panic squeezing his lungs and breaking off his air supply.

Luo Binghe sat back against the head of the bed and Shen Qingqiu could hear the frame creak with the weight. Before he could think about it, he threw himself towards the noise. The sudden motion aggravated the harsh ache low in his body and he whimpered.

Luo Binghe wrapped Shen Qingqiu securely in his large arms, speaking lowly in his ear. “You were so good. You did so well. I’m sorry you couldn’t enjoy it, but that’s alright. You made me feel so good with your body.”

The praise washed over him like gentle waves and Shen Qingqiu went boneless in Luo Binghe’s all-encompassing hold. He had been wrong, and Luo Binghe still loved him. He should never have doubted that.

Now that only good things were happening, the ache didn’t matter so much. Luo Binghe would protect him. All Shen Qingqiu had to do was trust him, so he relaxed his head against Luo Binghe’s shoulder and let himself drift.

This was so much better.

Shen Qingqiu let himself be comforted, letting out a few more dry sobs before going still.

“There. You feeling a little better, sweetheart?” Shen Qingqiu nodded. Luo Binghe liked it when he wasn’t crying, and Shen Qingqiu would be sweet and pliable for weeks after this terrible experience. He needed to redeem himself before Luo Binghe decided to punish him again.

Luo Binghe nodded too, and Shen Qingqiu felt Luo Binghe’s chin brush against the top of his head. “Good. We’ll only start again when you’re calmed down a little.”

Shen Qingqiu’s blood turned to ice.

Start again?

No. He must have misheard. Luo Binghe shifted Shen Qingqiu away and he collapsed down to the bedding without moving.

They wouldn’t—Luo Binghe wouldn’t do this again, surely. Not when he knew how miserable Shen Qingqiu was.

He could hear people speaking from outside the cracked door, but he couldn’t understand what they were saying and he didn’t want to focus on them anyway.

“How was it? How did he react?”

“The martial god exceeds all expectations. He really is defenseless, so whatever Luo Binghe did to get him to stay on earth has made him sweet and submissive.”

“Luo Binghe wasn’t lying, then.”

“No. After doing your business, cuddle and praise him a little so he’s calm for the next time.”

“He really likes physical touch that much?”

“He’s like a flower that’s suddenly turned towards the sun, I swear. Just go in there, you’ll see what I mean.”

The quiet sound of the door shutting drew Shen Qingqiu’s attention back to Luo Binghe, and he gradually released his death grip on the sheets. He didn’t want to do that again. It was skin-to-skin touch, but in a new, very bad way. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t known it was possible for snuggling to hurt that much.

He wasn’t so blissfully ignorant now.

Luo Binghe hugged him, and Shen Qingqiu relaxed into his hold, shaking his head in denial and hoping that Luo Binghe would get the message.

“You’re okay,” Luo Binghe reassured, rubbing Shen Qingqiu’s back. “Nothing’s even happening right now, why are you so scared?”

He sounded different again, but Shen Qingqiu was too weak to investigate why. He didn’t care, as long as Luo Binghe kept holding him.

This… didn’t seem like Luo Binghe. That thought kept crossing him mind, over and over, but Shen Qingqiu knew it couldn’t be anyone else doing this to him.

He was invisible to everyone, no one except Luo Binghe talked to him, and there was no one else that could come into this room. Only Luo Binghe could touch him, and certainly only he could own Shen Qingqiu.

Luo Binghe pushed him down to the bed again. The unexpected motion hurt and Shen Qingqiu cried out, but Luo Binghe was too busy spreading Shen Qingqiu’s legs apart to notice.

No.

This couldn’t be happening again!

Shen Qingqiu tried to plead even though his tongue felt heavy in his mouth, but Luo Binghe didn’t seem to pay any mind to his distressed whimpers.

“Looks like a murder scene, there’s so much blood,” Luo Binghe muttered absently. “Really ripped you open last time, didn’t it?”

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure what that was supposed to mean. It didn’t sound like sympathy and it didn’t sound friendly, even though those words from Luo Binghe’s mouth should have been.

Luo Binghe sighed. “You should be a lot easier now, though. You’ll be good for me, right?”

Shen Qingqiu moved his head wildly, torn between nodding yes and shaking no. Anything but this again. He still couldn’t speak.

Luo Binghe moved off the bed for a moment before settling back in.

As the distant squishing noises started up from the other side of the bed, Shen Qingqiu forced himself not to move. If he was going to be good, he couldn’t struggle away. Luo Binghe wouldn’t hurt him if he just followed directions, he knew that. Luo Binghe had told him that.

He had done bad last time, he had cried and whimpered and tensed, but it would be better now if he didn’t. It would even feel good, maybe. A little spark of hope flickered to life in Shen Qingqiu’s chest as he made his decision. He would be good.

He would earn Luo Binghe’s praise.

As Luo Binghe moved again, hunched over Shen Qingqiu’s sprawled body, he let out a shaky breath. It was harder to relax this time, now that he knew what was coming, but he released his locked muscles and imagined he was sinking into the bed.

Or that he was sinking into Luo Binghe’s embrace.

Shen Qingqiu wished he could see Luo Binghe’s eyes right now. His actions didn’t make much sense, but if Shen Qingqiu could only read his face, then it might be a little easier to understand and he wouldn’t feel quite so alone.

But this room was secure, and it was the safest place that Shen Qingqiu had ever lived. Luo Binghe wouldn’t let anyone come in, especially not someone that wanted to hurt him.

No, if Shen Qingqiu was feeling bad, it wasn’t Luo Binghe’s fault, because Luo Binghe never let him feel bad for very long. Unless Shen Qingqiu had done something seriously wrong, Luo Binghe wouldn’t let him feel like this.

Shen Qingqiu bit back a yelp, muscles in his neck straining as he tried to turn his face away from Luo Binghe.

He had to enjoy this, this was supposed to be friendly and comforting and sweet—

His heart pounded as he tried to sink back into the bed and release his locked muscles. It was just so hard with sensation slicing through him like a knife.

He usually got help when he was told to do hard things like this, but Shen Qingqiu had never felt so alone with Luo Binghe right there.

He whined through his locked jaw, and the sound came out jagged and thin. Help, please?

Luo Binghe didn’t seem to notice. He was huffing foul-smelling breath into Shen Qingqiu’s half-covered face. Shen Qingqiu wilted at the rejection, anxiety tightening his chest. He stopped trying to hold back his tears.

This didn’t feel good at all, no matter how hard he tried to relax.

It just hurt.

Shen Qingqiu reached for Luo Binghe, mindlessly seeking comfort. He couldn’t have relief, but if he could just feel Luo Binghe’s unspoken sympathy, he might feel a little better.

Shen Qingqiu brushed his fingertips against the heel of Luo Binghe’s hand that was planted on the bed next to his side, a silent plea to hold him.

Luo Binghe groaned, long and loud, making Shen Qingqiu flinch at the onslaught of pain that accompanied it.

After that, Luo Binghe pulled away from the bed with a quiet noise, leaving Shen Qingqiu truly alone as the hand he was touching pulled away also.

Shen Qingqiu’s chest seized as he felt Luo Binghe start to leave.

As loud as he could manage, he whined again, trying to conceal how much this hurt while also trying to invite Luo Binghe closer.

Luo Binghe sighed in annoyance, and Shen Qingqiu instantly regretted making the wordless noise.

Luo Binghe started to hug him, but Shen Qingqiu shook his head. No, he didn’t need comfort! He was doing well and enjoying this, Luo Binghe didn’t need to be bothered!

“Stop,” Luo Binghe grumbled, and Shen Qingqiu desperately tried to hide the way his breath hitched on every exhale.

The hug was tight and protective, though, and Shen Qingqiu could feel his breathing come easier the longer he was held.

His blindfold was soaked in sweat and tears.

It wasn’t long enough before Shen Qingqiu felt himself being pushed away, back onto the bed, and he was too weak and tired to do anything but comply.

It was over now. Luo Binghe surely would have told him if this would happen another time, but he hadn’t said anything.

His ears rang.

“Boss told you what to do?”

“Yeah. Touch and praise, right?”

“Yup.”

The door shut again, making Shen Qingqiu jolt. He hadn’t even heard it open.

“Hey—he—hello,” Luo Binghe said, voice high and stuttery. Shen Qingqiu blinked in the direction of the noise.

Luo Binghe went around to the other side of the bed, gingerly lifting up one of Shen Qingqiu’s legs.

Shen Qingqiu heard a short, sharp intake of breath. “Oh. That’s… that’s cruel.” Shen Qingqiu tentatively shook his head no, wondering if this was some kind of test.

What was Luo Binghe looking at?

It was a place no one had really looked at, nothing there except…

Shen Qingqiu’s brain stuttered to a halt.

It hurt so, so much. He didn’t want to think about why, exactly, he hurt so bad, but…

He was crying before he could fully realize it.

Luo Binghe had torn him open there.

The thought was invasive and hideous, but Shen Qingqiu couldn’t do anything to stop himself from realizing what Luo Binghe had been doing to him.

Luo Binghe had gone inside of him, ripping open his body in his most private place and leaving him bloody and aching. He didn’t even know that was possible, but it happened to him anyway.

This body of Shen Qingqiu’s wasn’t his own, he knew that. He was Luo Binghe’s in every way.

But Luo Binghe had never needed to do this before.

He had staked a bloody, painful claim on Shen Qingqiu’s insides.

Rhythmic, familiar squishy noises started up again, and Shen Qingqiu abruptly went very still. There was no way Luo Binghe was going to…

Again?

No.

Definitely not, Luo Binghe would never.

Luo Binghe crouched over Shen Qingqiu’s body again, and he stopped breathing.

His eyes flew open wide under the blindfold.

Shen Qingqiu was already so broken, Luo Binghe wouldn’t ever ask for any more out of him. Especially not without warning.

Something wet and big nudged him there.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t stop it.

He screamed.

He didn’t care if he was supposed to enjoy this, he didn’t care if Luo Binghe knew what was best for him. This was unimaginable in its savagery, and unthinkable in its filthiness.

He dimly heard the door thrown open with a bang accompanied by the sound of footsteps. He thrashed, but then there were Luo Binghe’s hands, too many of them, all holding him down to the bed.

His lips moved but he only heard his own wordless cries as agony tore through him again, shredding his lower body.

It seemed to last forever and then finally all those hands released him. He slumped into the bed, exhausted.

Surely, now that he had yelled, he was going to be kicked out of the room and he wouldn’t suffer any more on this bed.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to be near Luo Binghe anymore.

He still clutched Luo Binghe’s shoulders, silently begging him not to leave just yet.

Then he was held down again by many hands, and no amount of struggling could stop Luo Binghe from invading his body again.

He cried throughout the whole thing. He didn’t care anymore that Luo Binghe knew he hated this, because Luo Binghe made it clear that it would continue anyway.

The waves were always punctuated by a short time where Luo Binghe would hold him while his tears petered out and he gave into exhaustion. But then as soon as he started to droop, Luo Binghe would start again.

Every single time he was held, despite himself, he would feel warm and loved. Sometimes Luo Binghe would wrap him tightly, sometimes gently, sometimes awkwardly, but every single time Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help but give in to the soothing comfort.

Even though he knew what was coming after.

Even though he knew Luo Binghe was going to do as soon as he ‘calmed down a little.’

Gradually, he stopped crying, even though the pain just seemed to get worse. He didn’t move anymore, so he started to pretend like he was far away where this horrible thing could never happen to him. He drifted, not really processing anything.

At long last, when hands and strong arms wrapped around his limp body while gentle words sang into his ears, but he just stared distantly. He didn’t feel the warmth of Luo Binghe’s touch or the kindness of his voice, he just felt vaguely numb.

Goodbye, he thought. Shen Qingqiu isn’t really here anymore, haha. Who are you violating?

His thoughts felt delirious, but his face was still slack and his muscles didn’t respond to promptings. He was slumped heavily against Luo Binghe, who was trying to get Shen Qingqiu to hug him back, but Shen Qingqiu’s arms kept falling back down.

What was he saying?

Shen Qingqiu stared vacantly.

His voice sounded different again, cold with suppressed fury. A few seconds late, Shen Qingqiu blinked and realized that the very familiar voice had spoken from the other side of the room.

“You’re not allowed to hold him. Get away.”

Shen Qingqiu was falling, and between one slow blink and the next, Luo Binghe’s dreaded touch was gone and he was staring at a dark expanse of insulation.

A… ceiling, his mind prompted belatedly.

He nodded. He mind was so…

The thought faded into nothingness before he could fully grasp it.

Oh. Someone was shaking him. His eyelids fluttered as he tried to focus on the face, but then he decided it wasn’t worth the effort and shut them instead.

This was a weird break in the routine. He wondered what it meant.

He also wondered why Luo Binghe was screaming at him.

“Come back! Come back to me! What did they do to you?”

His head rolled back and he waited to be set down again. His body must be as light as air, with the way Luo Binghe liked to move him. Maybe he should eat more food and make it a little harder for them. Discourage anyone from touching him ever again.

Huh. Even though he was being held tenderly, Luo Binghe was still shouting in his ear.

Shen Qingqiu was, once again, wrapped in Luo Binghe’s arms.

They felt strong before, a comforting, safe kind of strong, but it wasn’t like that now. Now it was a burning, painful strong that would rip him apart in his most vulnerable places.

Be quiet, please, Shen Qingqiu tried to request. It was like having a very loud gnat buzzing in his ear, but he couldn’t bat it away. The most he could do was make his fingers twitch, and coax his mouth into leaking a wordless, nearly imperceptible little noise.

Luo Binghe set him down again and Shen Qingqiu drifted away from his body, trying to get as far away as possible before that started again. His thoughts slowed until they stopped completely.

He blinked. Going up and down, up and down…

He was being carried, he realized. The soft bed under him was replaced by Luo Binghe’s arms, and he was feeling Luo Binghe’s steady gait.

Well, but… he needed to be on the bed for Luo Binghe to do this to him. Right? Where could they be going?

Shen Qingqiu’s curiously dissolved into vacant apathy, his thoughts scattering like fallen flower petals.

“No, no, no. They couldn’t have—what did they do to you?”

He imagined he was floating for real. The waves lapped at his consciousness, and he drifted on them calmly. They were his friends. He smiled inwardly as he petted them.

The feeling surrounded him as if water was actually touching his skin. It was warm and dull, but distinctive. He had never been here before.

Well, he had kind of been in this headspace before. Never this deep though.

A bathtub.

He was floating—what?

The thought was intrusive and unbidden, drawing him unwillingly closer to his body.

He was in a bathtub. He was wet.

Shen Qingqiu moved his fingers experimentally, dimly registering the way water flowed between them. Wet.

He didn’t really want to go back.

Ow.

Yeah, nope.

Shen Qingqiu floated away again, leaving the bathtub and his broken body behind.

Some time later he felt himself being pulled back again, this time by little sparks of pleasure from someone’s fingernails lightly scratching his scalp.

Pain, he could guard himself against. He had no defense against this.

Even though he didn’t want to, he was pulled a little closer to reality.

Luo Binghe was talking to him. He wasn’t yelling anymore, which was good. But the noise was still a little annoying.

It was okay though, because Luo Binghe sounded normal. He didn’t sound rough or high or stuttery, he just sounded like Luo Binghe. He didn’t sound, at least, like the kind of person who had torn Shen Qingqiu apart.

He drifted a little more.

Was Luo Binghe… crying?

Shen Qingqiu tried not to care, but curiosity got the better of him. He came a little closer.

Those quiet sad sounds echoed in the porcelain bathroom. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t move, so he certainly wasn’t the one making those sounds. It had to be Luo Binghe.

It’s okay, Shen Qingqiu tried to reassure aloud, but his mouth wasn’t working so he only said it in his head. Nothing bad happened to you, and I’m not really here. We’re both okay.

Luo Binghe didn’t sound okay though.

Shen Qingqiu started to register sensation. The ache in his lower half was excruciating, making his consciousness flinch away for some more time before he could truly face the state of his body.

The water was warm, but cooled significantly from the normal temperature, as if Shen Qingqiu had been sitting there for hours. His fingers felt shriveled with the water and almost numb when he pressed them lightly against each other.

Luo Binghe was behind him, with arms wrapped around his chest to keep him above water. Luo Binghe’s face was pressed into the back of Shen Qingqiu’s shoulder, his voice coming out shaky and muffled, completely unintelligible.

Every few seconds, it was punctuated by a sob.

Shen Qingqiu tried to listen. He didn’t understand what was happening, but maybe it was all over?

Luo Binghe had stopped and taken off the blindfold, so maybe that was all done.

It was hard for Shen Qingqiu to convince himself of that, though. Luo Binghe was holding him, same as he always would right before… before terrible things happened.

Shen Qingqiu’s breath hitched and instantly, Luo Binghe straightened, arms releasing Shen Qingqiu’s body.

“Are you back with me?”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to respond, so he let his body slip deeper into the water. Luo Binghe caught him just before his face went under, dragging him back upright.

Luo Binghe’s face appeared in Shen Qingqiu’s vision. “Come back to me.” Luo Binghe’s eyes were red and puffy in a way Shen Qingqiu had never seen before. “Don’t leave again, I can’t help you if you go.”

He let his eyes go hazy. Luo Binghe wouldn’t help him. There was no one here who could help him. Only he could protect himself, but he was so helpless and fragile.

“I promise I won’t hurt you,” he heard Luo Binghe offer desperately. “No more pain. It’s safe to come back.”

If he could have heard those words, instead of letting himself be buried in the oily darkness, Shen Qingqiu would have snorted in disbelief. Luo Binghe’s promises didn’t mean anything to him right now.

He drifted, releasing the slip of his consciousness that was still attached to his body.

Shen Qingqiu’s empty body was picked up again and moved back onto the bare mattress, since the bed had been stripped. Luo Binghe was still talking to him, but he wasn’t listening so the words fell on hollow ears.

He didn’t come back for a long, long time.

Luo Binghe eventually got too tired to talk, the flow of pleas coming more and more slowly until they stopped altogether. Shen Qingqiu’s body was fed and put to sleep on a small cot that Luo Binghe set up on the other side of the room.

Then Luo Binghe left, face creased in rage and pain.

During those hours he was gone, Shen Qingqiu’s heartbeat slowly started to even out. The uneven beats disappeared as the rhythm smoothed, and Shen Qingqiu’s breathing was like he was sleeping.

The fuzziness wrapped around his consciousness like a warm, sleeping snake, and Shen Qingqiu went to sleep.

Luo Binghe crashed back into the room, only remembering to shut the door gently at the last second. Shen Qingqiu was safe, asleep on the cot and snoring lightly, so Luo Binghe relaxed. He wiped his face with the back of his hand, leaving a streak of red behind, and washed his hands and arms in the bathroom.

He changed his blood-soaked clothes for lighter, clean robes, glancing at Shen Qingqiu every few seconds.

Luo Binghe had made all those men pay a river of blood for every drop they had pulled from Shen Qingqiu.

But it was over now, they were gone and Luo Binghe was left to fix the damage they had done.

Shen Qingqiu’s eyelashes fluttered as Luo Binghe carefully brushed through his hair with a comb, which had long since dried from the bath. He couldn’t reach the back of Shen Qingqiu’s head, so he set Shen Qingqiu in his lap.

Shen Qingqiu came back to consciousness gradually. The urgent adrenaline had faded, and he didn’t want to wake up from the deep escape of sleep, but the persistent rhythmic motions of Luo Binghe’s hands in his hair coaxed him awake.

Luo Binghe wasn’t really holding him.

He was sitting close to Luo Binghe, but he wasn’t being held and forced to ‘calm down’.

He was probably…

He hated to think it, because he didn’t want to be wrong, but it was probably over.

At least for now.

He opened his eyes, throat clicking as he swallowed. His mouth was so dry.

“Why did you do that to me?” Shen Qingqiu asked. His voice was so timid it was nearly a whisper. “What did I do wrong?”

It was a question that had been pressing on him like a heavy weight, and he was finally calm enough to ask it out loud. Luo Binghe was completely still for a moment while Shen Qingqiu let out a long, even breath.

“The blindfold. You couldn’t see them.”

Shen Qingqiu blinked. That wasn’t the answer he was expecting; in fact, it didn’t seem like an answer at all, like Luo Binghe hadn’t been talking to him.

Luo Binghe walked around to the front of Shen Qingqiu, taking his hand once he knelt to eye-level. “It wasn’t me. None of this was me. Those—I mean, he broke into my room while I was gone. You couldn’t see what was happening, but when I walked in, he was curled up with you. I didn’t realize what had happened.”

Luo Binghe’s eyes got very red as he continued, voice shaking more as he went on.

“I chased him out, but you weren’t responding. I went over and you weren’t blinking or moving. You looked like you were—like you were dead. So I picked you up, and then I saw… I saw… I…”

Luo Binghe’s body was almost convulsive as he cried. His eyes reflected what must have been the panic of that moment, the horror of what had been done to Shen Qingqiu while Luo Binghe hadn’t been there to stop it.

Shen Qingqiu just watched him.

If it hadn’t been Luo Binghe doing those horrible things, then he had let a stranger into his body.

His stomach rolled as he remembered what happened the very first time. He had begged for touch with someone who wasn’t Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu had let someone else into his body.

Revulsion and anxiety in equal measures overwhelmed him and his breath stuttered.

He didn’t realize his body was shaking.

Luo Binghe knew that Shen Qingqiu had been owned and violated by another person, he even knew that Shen Qingqiu had allowed it.

Before, punishment meant abandonment. Luo Binghe would leave him alone. But now, punishment was pain, was cuddling in the most perverse and excruciating way.

Luo Binghe seemed devastated and heartbroken, as if he himself could feel what had been done to Shen Qingqiu, but Shen Qingqiu knew better than to think he was safe.

Luo Binghe liked to hold and hug him. A lot.

Except, now Shen Qingqiu knew what came after that. Shen Qingqiu knew what the real purpose of that comfort was, and how incredibly painful it felt.

He knew what Luo Binghe wanted with him.

No amount of begging could stop it from happening, so Shen Qingqiu didn’t try to say anything about that.

“But…why? Would would you want to do that to me?”

 Luo Binghe shook his head, tears streaming down his face. “I don’t! I don’t want you like that! I love you— I would never hurt you. I love you!”

Shen Qingqiu dimly remembered that while he was floating away from his body, Luo Binghe had said that again and again, screaming and whispering it to his unresponsive body.

But love was ownership and caretaking, and Shen Qingqiu’s body had been owned and admired by someone else. Even if it didn’t seem true right now, Luo Binghe didn’t love him anymore.

There was no one to love Shen Qingqiu anymore. He was alone. Luo Binghe had broken his promise, hurt Shen Qingqiu, and left Shen Qingqiu to fix himself even though he clearly couldn’t.

Luo Binghe was a liar. That bed of his held pain, and Shen Qingqiu would never forget it.

Luo Binghe shifted forward with his arms outstretched. Shen Qingqiu watched him come closer, uncomprehending, until he wrapped his arms around Shen Qingqiu’s thin body.

Shen Qingqiu stiffened. His breathing started to come quickly, and the hold felt strangling. He didn’t want Luo Binghe this close to him.

“You’re shaking like a leaf,” Luo Binghe sighed in his ear, and released him. “I would never hurt you. You know that. I’ll never let anyone else in this room ever again. You’re mine.”

Shen Qingqiu was still Luo Binghe’s? It didn’t feel that way.

Luo Binghe was treating him like he was something treasured. But he was filthy and used, nothing like Luo Binghe said.

Luo Binghe would never claim something so thoroughly destroyed as Shen Qingqiu.

He placed his trembling hands in his lap instead of putting them around his body. He didn’t want to be here anymore. He was just wanted to go to sleep and escape from here, even though his body would still be vulnerable in Luo Binghe’s dark room.

Luo Binghe reached for him again, but not to touch. Luo Binghe was holding a water bottle. Shen Qingqiu opened his mouth obediently, and Luo Binghe held it to his lips to help him drink.

He was shaking too much, and the water was cold, so some of it spilled out of the bottle and onto the sheets, where it soaked the bed and Shen Qingqiu’s body.

Luo Binghe praised him anyway, wiping the water away with a towel. “Very good, letting me care for you. You’re so scared, but you’re being very brave.”

Shen Qingqiu closed his eyes. He didn’t feel very brave.

Not wanting to be blocked out, Luo Binghe took his hand again, grasping it loosely. If Shen Qingqiu wanted to, he could pull away. Luo Binghe would just take it again, though.

With one hand, Luo Binghe reached for something under the cot, placing folded fabric in front of Shen Qingqiu, who regarded it curiously.

“Clothes,” Luo Binghe clarified. “Until you’re feeling better, you can wear these. I won’t ever touch you under them.”

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t worn clothes in a long time. Luo Binghe had always liked it that way, where physical touch seems so much more real, and Shen Qingqiu had stopped caring after a while.

Luo Binghe helped him get his arms into his sleeves, and soon the heavy, soft material was draped over him. The weight felt like protection, and Shen Qingqiu stopped trembling once the soft wool warmed with his body heat. He took a deep breath, pleased by the weight of the fabric on his chest.

Luo Binghe smiled at him, offering out an arm for Shen Qingqiu to curl up in the fold of Luo Binghe’s body.

It was a choice.

Shen Qingqiu… was being offered a choice?

Luo Binghe would prove that he would keep his promise, Shen Qingqiu knew. Luo Binghe, at least for now, wouldn’t hurt Shen Qingqiu if he crawled into Luo Binghe’s arms. Luo Binghe wouldn’t touch him under the thick fabric that protected him.

Even if Shen Qingqiu screamed, yelled, or rejected him cruelly, this arm would still be held out in offering. Even if Shen Qingqiu had been defiled, invaded, or broken into pieces.

Shen Qingqiu’s stomach lurched with the hugeness of the choice offered to him.

He could accept Luo Binghe’s love in the only way that was possible for him right now, or he could go to sleep.

Shen Qingqiu closed his eyes and curled up on the cot, grateful that he wasn’t in Luo Binghe’s bed anymore. He wasn’t surrounded by Luo Binghe, but Luo Binghe was still there, watching over him and waiting for him to come near.

He heard Luo Binghe walk around, ears straining to catch Luo Binghe’s reaction to the rejection, but there was just a rustle of sheets and then silence.

Luo Binghe had fallen asleep.

Despite Shen Qingqiu’s exhaustion, it took a long time for him to follow suit. His lower body was aching and uncomfortable in any position, so he kept shifting and waking himself up.

Half-asleep and very upset, he whined aloud, kicking the sheets away because they were getting tangled and didn’t cover his body quite right.

Luo Binghe rolled out of bed, the noise startling in the quiet room, and walked to Shen Qingqiu’s bedside.

A mix of confusing emotions made Shen Qingqiu want to cry. Luo Binghe just shushed him quietly, petting through his neatly-brushed hair. Once Shen Qingqiu was sufficiently soothed, Luo Binghe brought over a large, heavy blanket, and wrapped him in it securely so that he couldn’t move.

It settled over his body and instantly he relaxed, the soreness fading to the background. Sleep washed over him and he was unconscious before Luo Binghe went back to bed.

Chapter Text

He couldn’t see anything. The fabric of the blindfold seemed to have physical shape, letting dark, disfigured faces laugh in Shen Qingqiu’s eyes.

From his lower half came the feeling of fire, ripping and burning his insides and pulling out screams from his throat.

Shen Qingqiu jerked awake, ready to run and hide, but found his own arms tightly wrapped around his body.

He instantly relaxed. There was no intruder here.

But it hurt still. He could taste blood from that horrible dream, could feel the ache tearing through his body.

Shen Qingqiu squirmed free of the blanket, finding himself untethered and alone despite the warmth surrounding him.

Luo Binghe—

Luo Binghe had offered him comfort before, right?

Had offered him a comforting place to sleep?

Shen Qingqiu had said no before, but now his body ached and his mind was tired, and he just didn’t want to be alone.

“Help?” He whispered softly. There was no reply from the other side of the room, and Shen Qingqiu’s throat started to tighten. He thrashed in his sheets, which were suddenly tangled around him like so many hands around his limbs

More desperately, he called, “Help?”

Was Luo Binghe not going to help him? Shen Qingqiu was just going to be left miserably alone in this crushing, laughing darkness.

A dim, low light flickered on on the opposite side of the room, and Shen Qingqiu watched through teary eyes as Luo Binghe stumbled out of bed.

“What’s wrong? Did you have a nightmare?” Shen Qingqiu didn’t respond, just reached out for him.

But as Luo Binghe tried to hug him, he abruptly flinched away. Luo Binghe suddenly seemed large, and while Shen Qingqiu did want comfort, he really didn’t want Luo Binghe to wrap his arms around him. His body was small and fragile, and he couldn’t forget the tearing pain.

His body curled up away from Luo Binghe, and he tucked his head in the circle of his arms too. He didn’t want to see Luo Binghe’s reaction.

He wanted Luo Binghe to come comfort him, but he didn’t want to be hugged. He was being disobedient and he didn’t know what he wanted—it was so frustrating!

“Hey, don’t cry. I won’t try to hold you, that’s okay.”

Shen Qingqiu peeked out from behind his sleeves, and he saw that Luo Binghe was eye level with him, kneeling on the floor next to his cot.

“It’s me, you know I would never hurt you. Give me your hand.”

Shen Qingqiu reached out immediately. Luo Binghe’s face seemed to glow as he took Shen Qingqiu’s hand in his. “Good, that was so good! You trusted me.”

Shen Qingqiu sniffled. That wasn’t praiseworthy because he still couldn’t be held. Why didn’t he want to be held?

Every time Shen Qingqiu was stressed or sad, Luo Binghe would hold him and everything would be better. But now, Shen Qingqiu desperately wanted to get better but didn’t want to be in Luo Binghe’s arms.

It was like the gesture didn’t mean love anymore, so Shen Qingqiu didn’t want it even though Luo Binghe hadn’t changed.

“You’ve been through something so horrible, but you still trust me,” Luo Binghe said, smiling, but he still looked sad. “Of course you’re going to feel hurt for now, but it’s just like every other time your body gets damaged. I’ll help you get better.”

It was hard to believe that. It didn’t seem possible to recover from this kind of injury. How could Luo Binghe cure a nightmare when he was asleep, or irrational terror in his waking hours?

Luo Binghe got to his feet once Shen Qingqiu stopped crying. He didn’t go back to bed, but instead walked around the room, looking in shelves and drawers and clattering around.

Shen Qingqiu heard a dull hum from inside one of the cabinets, and then several beeps. Luo Binghe retrieved something from there and then approached Shen Qingqiu. He could smell it before he saw the food in Luo Binghe’s hands.

Luo Binghe offered him a small piece of chicken. Still feeling the effects of the nightmare, it took a second for him to process.

He wasn’t scared anymore, but he was still stressed. Adrenaline and directionless anxiety were making his stomach roll, so how could he possibly think about eating?

“Eat it. You’re hungry, I promise,” Luo Binghe explained, seeing that Shen Qingqiu was hesitating.

Shen Qingqiu closed his mouth around the piece, carefully Luo Binghe’s face. Was this some kind of trap…?

As he swallowed, he realized Luo Binghe was right. He felt ravenous after eating that piece. Luo Binghe always knew when he was hungry, because he knew Shen Qingqiu better than Shen Qingqiu himself did.

Luo Binghe’s features softened as he watched Shen Qingqiu obey, his voice murmuring praise as he offered another piece.

The vivid nightmare seemed to retreat back into the dark corners of the room while he ate, away from the brightness of Luo Binghe’s lamb-soft smile. He was focused on the rhythm of taking the food, chewing, and swallowing. Luo Binghe’s soft voice never ceased, and Shen Qingqiu listened to it, hardly daring to believe that he was completely safe.

It seemed impossible that Shen Qingqiu could have ever confused that intruder’s voice with Luo Binghe’s. This was clearly different, a stark contrast from both his memory and the nightmare. The adrenaline started to dissipate, replaced by sluggish guilt.

“Sorry,” Shen Qingqiu said, staring down at his hands, which were cradled in Luo Binghe’s. His voice had come back, but it was still timid and small.

Luo Binghe’s grip tightened momentarily—Luo Binghe didn’t like him using his sore voice— before loosening again. “Never apologize for being hurt. You’re recovering, and that’s okay.”

Shen Qingqiu nodded. He wasn’t sure what to say, but he still wanted Luo Binghe to keep talking to him. He sighed. This would be so much easier if he would let Luo Binghe hold him.

Maybe he could ask Luo Binghe to force him into a hug, and then he would probably feel better. It was an idea worth exploring, although it would feel terrible at the time. That is, if Luo Binghe didn’t force Shen Qingqiu down right after and tear into him again, which…

Shen Qingqiu realized he was considering it as a serious possibility.

“You won’t hurt me again? Like he did?” Shen Qingqiu asked. Luo Binghe had said it before, had promised that he wouldn’t, but Shen Qingqiu needed the reassurance. If only to hear Luo Binghe say the words.

Luo Binghe didn’t say that though, or any platitudes Shen Qingqiu was expecting. There was silence for a brief moment.

“He’s dead.”

His voice had something in it Shen Qingqiu couldn’t recognize, so he glanced up to see Luo Binghe’s face. Although Luo Binghe wasn’t looking at him, his face was dark and unreadable. His eyes were half-closed, as if he were lost in thought, but the gentle slope of his lips seemed to speak of pleasure in cruelty. He didn’t know what had happened to the one who hurt Shen Qingqiu, but he knew that Luo Binghe had most certainly killed him.

Shen Qingqiu had never seen this side of Luo Binghe before. Luo Binghe had been very careful with him, so he had never realized that Luo Binghe liked violence like this. How often had Luo Binghe resisted violent or sexual urges with Shen Qingqiu, and how strong was that willpower holding him back?

Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to know. He just wanted to know that Luo Binghe loved him and would never hurt him. He intertwined their fingers together and squeezed.

That weak grip seemed to snap Luo Binghe out of the daze, and Shen Qingqiu relaxed once that gentle-lamb gaze turned back to his face. This was face that Shen Qingqiu he was more familiar with, the one that watched over him from the carving in the wall for those long years.

“You don’t ever have to worry about him again. I’ll take care of you while you recover, then you’ll forget all the bad things that happened to you. I’ll erase them, whatever it takes.”

Shen Qingqiu whined in displeasure. Luo Binghe wasn’t answering the question properly, but Shen Qingqiu couldn’t find the right words to ask him again, more clearly.

Well, okay then. Maybe Luo Binghe would hurt Shen Qingqiu again, since he was avoiding the same question twice.

“But… don’t you love me?” Shen Qingqiu asked, voice shrinking as he wrung Luo Binghe’s hand anxiously.

“What—of course I love you. You’re my treasure. I love you.”

Shen Qingqiu searched his face for any hint of a lie, but found nothing except aching gentleness. Luo Binghe repeated it a few times, once he figured out what Shen Qingqiu wanted, and the scary face from earlier was put out of Shen Qingqiu’s mind.

“I’ll do whatever it takes for you to believe me. Even though it might take a while, since I’m not going to hold you.”

Luo Binghe didn’t sound angry, but Shen Qingqiu’s heart sank anyway. He was such a failure for Luo Binghe, but Luo Binghe didn’t seem like he wanted to give up on Shen Qingqiu. Yet.

“What that man did to you was touch, yes, but that wasn’t love. He saw this vulnerable, soft thing laying asleep on my bed and—and he raped you.”

Shen Qingqiu’s blood ran cold. Surely that wasn’t true.

Rape was for girls that got abducted in dark alleyways. It was a term for a man drugging his girlfriend’s drink, or for another charge to add to murder in the trials afterwards.

What happened to Shen Qingqiu was violent, painful, and invasive. It was torture with consequences that felt permanent, but surely it wasn’t rape.

Luo Binghe leaned forward. “Hey, it’s okay. Listen to me, I would never do that to you. I love you, and love isn’t like that.”

Shen Qingqiu knew that instinctively. Luo Binghe loved him like warm baths. Like snuggling under the covers, or feeding him warm food piece by piece.

Shen Qingqiu always felt safe when Luo Binghe was touching his skin. It was familiar closeness, and Shen Qingqiu had never known it to be bad.

“Intimacy, even between two men, is never supposed to feel like that. I’m sorry that your first time was a nightmare—that’s not how it normally is at all,” Luo Binghe explained, but Shen Qingqiu couldn’t imagine how that was true.

Men who desired other men stopped at nothing to fulfill their unnatural lusts. Shen Qingqiu had thought that maybe Luo Binghe wanted him romantically, but after falling victim to someone like that, he was convinced otherwise.

If Luo Binghe didn’t have any desire tear into Shen Qingqiu like he promised, then he must not be attracted to Shen Qingqiu at all. A weird feeling bubbled up in Shen Qingqiu’s chest, but it was something he couldn’t recognize.

It slipped away before Shen Qingqiu could analyze it, so he let it go. Luo Binghe probably knew what it was, so it was fine that Shen Qingqiu didn’t, unless Luo Binghe got mad at him for it.

“I’ve never touched you with sexual intent. I care a lot about you, but the end goal has never been sex. I provide for your emotional and physical needs because I want to. Not because I think it’ll lead to something else. Do you understand?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded quickly. This was something he had been wondering about ever since his first moment of lucidity in his white room. If only he had heard this earlier, his mind could have been put at ease.

It had been so easy for that intruder to convince him that he was Luo Binghe, because Shen Qingqiu hadn’t understood Luo Binghe’s innocent intentions before. It had seemed perfectly reasonable that Luo Binghe would want to claim him that way.

But… there was another reason that Shen Qingqiu had so easily accepted that Luo Binghe had wanted his body.

Those women he used to date were his only points of real connection before he had been put in Luo Binghe’s care. He wouldn’t confide in them, but he would let himself be physically close, and they would take care of him in return.

Luo Binghe really didn’t feel that way about him? At all?

It should have come as a comfort, but it was hard to think about. Shen Qingqiu just wanted more assurance that Luo Binghe loved him, but he couldn’t be held. He just clutched Luo Binghe’s hand tightly, wishing that there was something more Luo Binghe could do to comfort him.

“You don’t want me?” Shen Qingqiu asked unsteadily.

Sometimes, it seemed like all he could do with his voice, whenever he actually managed to use it, was ask pathetic leading questions.

Luo Binghe seemed to pause, brow furrowing in confusion. “Want you? Want you… to snuggle with? What are you asking?”

Unexpectedly, Shen Qingqiu suddenly felt very close to tears.

Was he just a child then, in Luo Binghe’s eyes? Because Shen Qingqiu hadn’t ever thought of Luo Binghe as a parent. He was caring like a girlfriend, attentive like a wife.

Except Luo Binghe didn’t seem to think of him the same way. Tears silently dripped down Shen Qingqiu’s cheeks. There was no way he could possibly voice this concern—he knew he was going to get rejected.

He didn’t want Luo Binghe to think of him sexually, because men who felt like that towards other men were evil creatures. But Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu were just Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu.

They were them, together. If that wasn’t true for Luo Binghe, then what could they possibly be?

The more Shen Qingqiu thought about it… maybe this feeling was romantic. It was the name that seemed to fit best, although still very strange.

Luo Binghe spoke up. “What—of course I want you with me always, I just don’t know what you’re asking about. Why are you crying?”

Shen Qingqiu looked at him accusingly from beneath his wet lashes. It was like Luo Binghe was leaving him alone all over again, not understanding him at all!

It had been so long since he had wanted someone to be romantically attracted to him, and he got rejected. Not only that, but it seemed like Luo Binghe didn’t even know how Shen Qingqiu felt. Maybe he was just pretending.

“I want you to like me,” Shen Qingqiu mumbled sullenly.

Luo Binghe’s expression froze, and then it was a long moment before anything on his face changed.

Shen Qingqiu’s sour mood turned to an anxious one as Luo Binghe’s eyes widened slowly, face changing color. As if thinking that Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t notice, Luo Binghe subtly slipped his hand out of Shen Qingqiu’s.

Luo Binghe swallowed hard. “You… don’t know what you’re talking about. You just haven’t had a girlfriend in a very long time. You haven’t seen anyone else besides me, and you’re getting confused.”

Shen Qingqiu shrugged, trying to hide the open hurt on his face by turning away. Be that as it may, he hadn’t been lying to Luo Binghe. He thought that Luo Binghe knew about this but maybe he hadn’t.

Luo Binghe was supposed to know about everything in Shen Qingqiu’s head. He was supposed to control everything about Shen Qingqiu’s body.

Maybe Luo Binghe wasn’t nearly as omniscient as Shen Qingqiu thought. Maybe when Luo Binghe had let that intruder into his bed, it had really been nothing more than a slip-up. The realization should have been a comfort.

Hurt and betrayed, Shen Qingqiu drew his legs up to his chest and his arms in close. Tears stained the patch of the heavy robe that covered his knees as he silently cried.

“I—I’m—” Luo Binghe‘s hands came close but never touched him until they settled lightly on Shen Qingqiu’s jaw.

Luo Binghe tilted Shen Qingqiu’s face until eyes met. His index finger pressed against Shen Qingqiu’s lips in a shushing motion, and Shen Qingqiu’s red-rimmed eyes flicked up to meet his.

“Did anyone touch you here?”

Shen Qingqiu shook his head almost imperceptibly, a motion that Luo Binghe would certainly feel. The intruder of before had hugged him, petted him, poked him, bruised him, held him down, but he hadn’t touched Shen Qingqiu’s lips.

Luo Binghe moved until their faces were close and touched a featherlight kiss there.

When he pulled back a moment later, his eyelashes were low. “I like you. I like touching you, I like helping you, so of course I want you close to me. I would do anything to help you feel better, just—just no sex, or anything near it.”

Shen Qingqiu smiled a watery but sincerely happy smile. Kiss me again?  he requested, but his voice wasn’t working again so his mouth just moved pointlessly.

That kiss had been incredibly tender and careful, the touch that Shen Qingqiu had been missing for so long. It wasn’t all-encompassing like a hug or freeing like a bath, but it was loving and kind.

Luo Binghe hesitantly returned the smile, changing his hold on Shen Qingqiu’s jaw before pressing their lips together again.

Shen Qingqiu felt like flying as he basked in the tenderness of it. He had missed this more than he could have imagined. With Luo Binghe, this was so much more personal and loving than he ever remembered it being.

Luo Binghe didn’t seem to care that his partner’s face was wet with tears and snot, because he wasn’t doing this to appease his own desires. This was all for Shen Qingqiu’s benefit, and he could feel it.

How could Shen Qingqiu have possibly, even for the briefest moment, confused that intruder with Luo Binghe?

Luo Binghe loved him.

Luo Binghe cared about him, and would never hurt him.

It was easy to believe, now.

Luo Binghe drew back slightly to study Shen Qingqiu’s reaction. Seeing that Shen Qingqiu was breathing fast and closing the gap between them even faster, he laughed. “You’re glowing. I should have done this earlier then, huh?”

Impatient, Shen Qingqiu nodded. Yeah, sure, as long as he kissed him again! Luo Binghe laughed a little more before obliging.

It was over too soon. Shen Qingqiu’s lips weren’t even swollen because the kisses were so light and had taken nearly no time. “You’re tired. Now go to sleep, and don’t have any more nightmares or wake up again. If you’re feeling up to it, we’ll continue in the morning.”

Shen Qingqiu swallowed and laid back down, nervous about being left alone. He had to remind himself that he wasn’t, that Luo Binghe was in the bed right across from his cot.

Shen Qingqiu fell asleep. His dreams were turbulent and confusing, but not nightmarish. Although the dreamscape was large and scary, he had a way out. He knew he was dreaming and could wake himself up any time.

Except, Luo Binghe had told him to get a good sleep, and so he endured until the dreams faded into nothingness, and he slept through the rest of the night.

Shen Qingqiu surfaced from his deep sleep to a small buzzing noise coming from the other side of the room. From cracked lids, he watched Luo Binghe slide out of bed and stumble to the bathroom, silencing the alarm as an afterthought.

An… alarm? Shen Qingqiu sat up, yawning. Luo Binghe had woken him with an alarm. He wondered what that meant.

Luo Binghe came out of the bathroom with a toothbrush in his mouth, humming happily. As soon as he saw that Shen Qingqiu was sitting up, he darted back into the bathroom to spit out toothpaste before showing Shen Qingqiu a bowl of congee.

“Good morning. Did you sleep well?” Shen Qingqiu shrugged as he ate his breakfast.

Luo Binghe fiddled with the bowl for a few seconds before speaking again. “I’m going to make a few changes to make you a little more comfortable here, okay? They’re not bad changes, just new things for you.”

That sounded daunting, but Luo Binghe’s reassurance put him a little more at ease. This might have something to do with Shen Qingqiu’s request and Luo Binghe’s answer before they went to sleep.

Shen Qingqiu paused mid-bite. Did Luo Binghe… regret kissing him?

Was he not good enough?

Luo Binghe continued, “From now on, we’re going to keep track of the days. Scheduled mealtimes, bedtimes, and alarms. You won’t be so disoriented anymore.”

Oh. This had nothing to do with that, then. Shen Qingqiu had, instead of a penalty, been given a gift. He smiled buoyantly, wishing that there was some way he could show his gratitude besides letting Luo Binghe hold him.

From now on, him and Luo Binghe would really be normal, waking up together, eating and sleeping together, and spending their days in each other’s company.

“Also, I had something delivered while you were sleeping.” Luo Binghe gestured, and Shen Qingqiu realized there were a stack of square cardboard boxes sitting next to Luo Binghe’s bed. “I think you’ll like it! I’ll show you once we’re done with breakfast.”

Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe continued to eat but kept glancing at the boxes curiously. Whatever was in those, Luo Binghe clearly thought it would change their life together.

When they were finally done, Shen Qingqiu slipped off the cot and bent over the boxes. The heavy fabric of his robes fell down in a curtain around one of them near his feet, and Luo Binghe brushed it aside to pick the tiny box up.

Luo Binghe straightened the bedcovers a little before changing his mind and heading for the desk instead.

“We’ll open it here, okay? Sit on this chair.” Shen Qingqiu sat down, not once tearing his eyes from the box. What could it possibly be?

It wasn’t taped shut and the top was just folded over. It was unmarked except for the word ‘fragile’ printed on every side, and Luo Binghe held it the same way he always held Shen Qingqiu, like it was something precious.

Luo Binghe carefully unfolded the top of the box and Shen Qingqiu peered inside, excited, but he was quickly disappointed.

There was nothing there except a layer of soft wood shavings.

“Oh, hold on. I think he’s burrowed under the… yup! There he is.” Luo Binghe swiped his finger lightly against the shavings to reveal a fiery red-orange snake curled up on a little heating pad. Luo Binghe wound one finger under the middle of the snake and lifted it to eye level, a soft smile on his face.

“Do you want to hold him?”

Shen Qingqiu’s heart squeezed at the delicate way Luo Binghe was holding the little creature, who flicked its tongue sleepily. Instead of answering, Shen Qingqiu held out his hand, and, after a moment’s consideration, that little orange head poked at a finger before slithering onto his palm.

It was so smooth, the way this snake’s scales seemed to slide under Shen Qingqiu’s finger. The feeling of the snake gripping his skin with his belly was almost a tickling one, and Shen Qingqiu laughed quietly as it nudged at Shen Qingqiu’s sleeve.

Overwhelmed, Shen Qingqiu could only look at Luo Binghe and hope he would see the gratitude for this gift.

This was really—

Shen Qingqiu didn’t care if Luo Binghe thought he wasn’t ready, or if Luo Binghe thought he didn’t know what he was doing, he leaned forward and kissed him. As their lips met again, Luo Binghe stopped breathing.

Shen Qingqiu didn’t often take the initiative to do things without being asked, but Luo Binghe had done something incredible for him. There would be no way to repay him for it, but hopefully Luo Binghe could at least understand the magnitude of what this meant to him.

The snake poked at Shen Qingqiu’s sleeve while its owners kissed, drawn in by the dark space and promise of a burrow.

Shen Qingqiu broke off the kiss, giggling as the sensitive skin on his wrist was tickled by the funny feeling of the snake inching its way towards his elbow. The way the snake moved required it to grip onto Shen Qingqiu’s skin with its scaly belly, but the compress and release of its little body was something Shen Qingqiu didn’t expect from it.

He thought snakes just glided across surfaces like a pulled rope, but this little thing was alive. Shen Qingqiu coaxed it out of his sleeve by poking the tip of its nose, which the snake really didn’t like, and he realized that it had just gone under his clothes.

This creature had touched him under his protective robes, and he hadn’t reacted or even noticed. It wasn’t impossible, then, for him to keep calm while someone touched him with good intent. Even somewhere as innocent as the forearm would be a struggle to accept, but he didn’t mind it with the snake now.

Maybe, with some time, Luo Binghe could hold him again. Maybe Luo Binghe had been right, and Shen Qingqiu could be healed.

Luo Binghe— Shen Qingqiu’s heart plummeted.

Shen Qingqiu had just kissed Luo Binghe and then forgotten about it a moment later! He hadn’t even stopped to check how Luo Binghe reacted.

Under the guise of playing with the snake, he glanced up at Luo Binghe subtly. Luo Binghe was looking at Shen Qingqiu’s hands, but the expression on his face was tender and fond.

Was that the love Luo Binghe always professed to have? Shen Qingqiu couldn’t feel it anymore through his hugs or his physical closeness, but Luo Binghe had always looked at him like that. Like he was precious, just like with the snake in the box.

He was a fragile little thing curled up around his only source of warmth, waiting for Luo Binghe to brush away the wood shavings and bring him into the palm of a safe hand.

“Jello.” Shen Qingqiu declared in a whisper, holding the snake up a little. The snake’s head bobbed a little with the motion, like it agreed with him, and Luo Binghe chuckled.

“That’s a great name, perfect for his color. You can play with him for a little bit while I set up his terrarium and equipment.”

Shen Qingqiu nodded, trying to pet Jello’s head, but it kept ducking away from his finger. Its head was just so small, barely the size of a jellybean, and Shen Qingqiu was very afraid of poking Jello in the eye, so he stopped.

Luo Binghe brushed the bottom of Shen Qingqiu’s jaw until he looked up, and then he lightly pressed a kiss to his lips before drawing away. Shen Qingqiu, a little dazed, only remembered he had a snake in his hand when Jello found the desk that Shen Qingqiu’s elbow was propped up on and prepared to launch itself off of his palm.

Shen Qingqiu’s face felt hot as he quickly recovered, halting Jello’s escape attempt and shepherding it back into his sleeve. He whispered gentle admonishments to the distracted snake while Luo Binghe laughed softly in the background.

Luo Binghe set down a heating pad before setting the tank on top, then added more soft wood shavings to pack lightly along the bottom. It quickly became clear what the boxes had contained, and it was all equipment for this creature that wasn’t even the length of Shen Qingqiu’s forearm.

Shen Qingqiu ducked his head thankfully and held Jello close to his chest.

Jello poked at him a few more times before deciding to try to launch itself away again, and Shen Qingqiu gathered it into his palms again hurriedly. This snake really seemed to like exploring!

Or maybe it was trying to get to someplace warmer. Shen Qingqiu got up and trotted over to where Luo Binghe was setting up the heat lamp on top of the terrarium.

“Put Jello in here, and then we can choose some decorations for its tank.” Luo Binghe said, holding the top of the cage open. It latched shut, which was perfect for Jello’s penchant for exploring, and the heat lamp locked into a metal grate on the top so it couldn’t fall and burn anyone when the lid was lifted.

Luo Binghe sat down next to Shen Qingqiu, within the arm’s reach but not too close, and set several boxes down on the desk. One by one, the two of them unpacked all of the options.

There seemed to be everything, from seashells to green plastic leaves to skull-shaped caves. Shen Qingqiu picked some out and Luo Binghe arranged it for him, and together they figured out what decorations worked together and set everything carefully in the terrarium.

They had to be careful not to disturb Jello, who had dug a burrow for himself in the wood shavings to take a nap. With Luo Binghe’s help, Shen Qingqiu placed all the green plastic plants and log caves into the tank, transforming the bare glass terrarium into a leafy forest full of hidey-holes and hollow-log caves.

When they had placed down and filled up the water dish, Luo Binghe stepped back with a satisfied smile. “It looks good.”

It did look good, and Shen Qingqiu was proud of this. It was something Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu had created together, and now this baby snake was theirs.

When Shen Qingqiu went to bed in his cot that night, he knew it was nighttime. It was a strange feeling, but a pleasant one. Tomorrow—the next day after this one, because it had been an entire day since he had woken up, what a strange thought—was promising, and Shen Qingqiu was excited for it.

It was like he wasn’t untethered anymore, now he had a solid foundation and a grasp of what was going on in his life. He had a routine, a schedule, and something to care for.

Shen Qingqiu closed his eyes with a small smile on his face.

Chapter Text

His body realized it before he did. He was in Luo Binghe’s bed.

He was in Luo Binghe’s bed, and his lower half ached, and he could feel some massive, unidentifiable presence hovering above him and pressing down on his whole body.

In an instant his heart rate shot up until he hit a hard and uncrossable ceiling and slid sideways into nothingness.

“Are you awake?” Luo Binghe sighed in his ear, but he couldn’t do much more than twitch away before going completely numb.

His blank eyes stared into the darkness while Luo Binghe watched his face and sighed again.

“Come back to me,” Luo Binghe said.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t hear him at all.

Luo Binghe stood up, yawning a little, and gathered up the limp body in his arms. He sat it upright on the cot and sat next to it, holding on to Shen Qingqiu’s hand and watching those vacant eyes.

He brushed his thumb over the tops of Shen Qingqiu’s knuckles. “It’s safe. They aren’t here, it’s only me. Come back to me now, there’s no reason to leave. You’re not in pain.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t even blink, but his heart was racing. He was just so still, it was like he had died. He had always fidgeted, even when he was relaxed, but now, without his quick, panicked breaths, Luo Binghe wouldn’t know he was there.

Whatever nightmare Shen Qingqiu had come out of, it forced him down far enough that he couldn’t hear Luo Binghe’s voice. But that didn’t mean that Luo Binghe hadn’t stopped talking. He would be there when Shen Qingqiu broke out of this, helping where he could.

Shen Qingqiu knew that Luo Binghe never asked him to do anything that he couldn’t do, and always helped if he couldn’t do it on his own.

“It’s safe to come back. There’s no one here to hurt you.”

The sounds were distorted until they no longer sounded like words by the time they reached Shen Qingqiu. He blinked slowly.

They continued.

“I’m here for you whenever you’re ready,” Luo Binghe said.

Shen Qingqiu drifted for a while before he decided to listen. The noise sounded like words, the longer they went on, like soft things.

His eyes focused as he tried to hear what it was saying, and he realized he was staring at hands. Two of them, one wrapped around the other, cushioned on a soft, rumpled blanket. Shen Qingqiu made a quiet inquisitive noise.

After another moment, he realized that one of the hands was his, and his index finger twitched. Luo Binghe’s voice floated over.

“Hello. Can you understand me?”

Shen Qingqiu made his finger twitch again to make sure he only had control of one of the hands. The other one didn’t move. He twitched again. This time, the hand on top of his squeezed a little, just enough to let him know it was alive.

Luo Binghe repeated the question. Shen Qingqiu furrowed his brow, but slowly nodded. The hand squeezed again, then shifted so that the two were cupped. The thumb that wasn’t his made circle motions against his palm.

The sensation was muted, but it was undeniably there.

“Good! That’s so good, I’m glad you can hear me. You’re not hurt now, so come back, okay?”

Shen Qingqiu blinked through the thick fog. He couldn’t feel… almost anything. He could feel the hand loosely grasped around his own. Was there no pain? Why was he feeling like this, if there wasn’t?

“Take some deep breaths, you’ll feel better.”

The more he listened to Luo Binghe’s voice, the more his heart rate lowered, and the easier it became to understand. Shen Qingqiu forced his chest to expand and cut off the shallow breaths with one bigger one.

His breath hitched several times on the exhale.

“That’s okay,” Luo Binghe said, “Try again.” He sounded so encouraging, like he had total faith that Shen Qingqiu could do it, so he tried again.

Luo Binghe exclaimed softly, “There you go! Don’t you feel better?” It was a rhetorical question, but Shen Qingqiu nodded anyway. He focused on controlling his breathing.

Every time he did it right, Luo Binghe would encourage him, and it became easier every time.

Eventually he found himself hunched over, exhausted. Luo Binghe didn’t lay a hand on the small of his back and tell him to straighten, so he allowed himself to stay slumped.

“I’m going to braid your hair back. Sit forward.”

Luo Binghe helped him off of the cot and to the edge of the bed, where he slide into place behind Shen Qingqiu. He brushed his fingers through Shen Qingqiu’s tangled hair.

Even though he didn’t have a brush, he worked through every tangle, gathering the stray strands away from his face into a neat braid at the back of his head. “I’m glad you’re back with me.”

Shen Qingqiu took another deep breath, as if to prove to Luo Binghe that he was alright now. There was no need for him to worry anymore.

The light tugging motions of Luo Binghe braiding his hair felt grounding, like Luo Binghe was helping anchor him to the room. The room was silent except for the hum of the space heater in the corner and the rustling of Luo Binghe behind him.

It was safe. Familiar. This was his home, he realized.

Luo Binghe finished with the braid and moved around to face Shen Qingqiu. “Do you want to hold Jello? It might make you feel a little better.”

Shen Qingqiu did want to hold Jello. Luo Binghe lifted the fiery red snake from its tank and held it out on open palms.

After a moment of internal debate that consisted of two nose-pokes to the side Shen Qingqiu’s hand, Jello slithered away from Luo Binghe and began to meander around Shen Qingqiu’s fingers.

All despair was forgotten as Shen Qingqiu smiled again, laughing when Jello’s scaly belly moved over the ticklish spot on the inside of his arm. Looking for food, maybe?

Shen Qingqiu tapped his own mouth and looked down at the snake questioningly.

“He might be hungry,” Luo Binghe conceded. “We need to feed him every five days, but I’ll keep track of the schedule so you don’t need to worry about that.”

Luo Binghe showed Shen Qingqiu another one of his purchases, a box that was designed for Jello to have a place to eat.

As Luo Binghe warmed up the frozen mouse in hot water, he explained why. “That way, Jello will know he’s being fed when he goes in the box, and he won’t mistake your fingers for food when he’s outside the box.”

Shen Qingqiu held Jello up to meet his eyes, which resulted in Jello trying to climb onto his nose. Jello would never bite him!

“Don’t worry, corn snakes don’t have any teeth, and he definitely doesn’t want to bite you. He can’t see that well, is all. Look at that tiny little mouth!”

They put Jello in his box with the mouse and saw that Jello’s mouth was, actually, not at all tiny, and in fact big enough to swallow a dead newborn mouse whole. Shen Qingqiu watched with wide-eyed fascination at the baby snake’s speed, almost too fast to follow as Jello got it into its mouth and then began the laborious process of swallowing.

“We have to leave Jello alone for the rest of the day, or else he might throw it up,” Luo Binghe said. Shen Qingqiu watched the lump of food travel farther, and he really wanted to poke it, but Jello was busy digesting and probably didn’t want to be bothered.

After Jello finished undulating and the mouse-lump was mostly gone, Luo Binghe helped Shen Qingqiu place it back in its terrarium. Jello seemed so lazy, bathing in the warmth of the heat lamp from the safety of its log.

*_*

It was four weeks before Luo Binghe sat him back down on the bed and had another serious conversation with him.

Shen Qingqiu had relished the newfound ability to track time, and Luo Binghe had been supportive, even buying him a calendar so he could eagerly check off every day as it passed. They established a kind of routine together, and time seemed to fly by before Shen Qingqiu found himself watching Luo Binghe’s solemn face.

“We’ve made progress, I think,” Luo Binghe began. “You’re doing a lot better with touch and you’re not dissociating at all anymore.”

Shen Qingqiu nodded. He had never stopped waking up in a panic every three or four nights, but at least he hadn’t dissociated after the first few times. It was still a little hard for Luo Binghe to hug him, but Shen Qingqiu found that if he curled into Luo Binghe’s side or put himself on Luo Binghe’s lap, then it was easy to manage the irrational fears.

His shoulder was doing well too. His posture had improved enough that it was hard to tell anything was wrong in the first place, although Luo Binghe had never had him stop doing the exercises, ice, heat packs, or massage. It didn’t look damaged, it just looked like regular old poor posture.

“Do you remember the promise I made you when we established you staying here?”

Shen Qingqiu cast his mind back, though it was hard. He hadn’t had to think about anything but this warm room. “Extra week?” he asked. Luo Binghe had promised him an extra week in that cold room, if he wanted. But he had said no…

Luo Binghe shook his head. There wasn’t even a hint of his normal smile on his face, and Shen Qingqiu began to get worried.

“Before that. When you took the drugs and came to me— the morning after that we talked. Do you remember what we talked about?”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t. He remembered how he felt, but not what words were said.

He had been so scared that Luo Binghe wouldn’t accept him, and desperate for Luo Binghe to agree to a deal. The same deal that made Luo Binghe promise to keep him in this warm room.

“The first six months, you come to my room once a week. Then the next six months every day. Do you remember that you offered to do that for me?”

Luo Binghe studied Shen Qingqiu’s face intently, and Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help but fidget under the intense gaze.

“And I promised you that after that year was over, after you’ve lived with me and made good on your side of the deal, you would be free.”

Free? Shen Qingqiu tried to figure out what Luo Binghe was saying. What had Shen Qingqiu been thinking, when he made that deal?

Free, as in, away from Luo Binghe? Leaving this room to go outside?

“Why?” Shen Qingqiu asked hoarsely. His voice was still hard to use, but Luo Binghe wasn’t responding to the desperately questioning look on his face. Why would Luo Binghe bring up something that had happened so long ago that he couldn’t remember?

Luo Binghe’s calm mask seemed to crack a little, but underneath looked almost like despair. “Remember who you were, Shen Qingqiu. You wanted to get away from here and away from me. I gave you my word, and even if you don’t want to remember it, you have to know that you can trust me to keep every promise.”

Shen Qingqiu jolted when Luo Binghe used his name. Luo Binghe never used it, but old emotions started to surface now that he did.

He had been so scared of the unknown, which had included Luo Binghe. He had been unwilling to abandon his pride and dignity, but those were foreign concepts to him now. His head was held high so that he looked down on everyone he met, and Luo Binghe, this child—

Shen Qingqiu’s posture had been ruined by his time in his white cell, and while it had never returned to the ramrod-straight, shoulders-back perfection that it had been, Luo Binghe had helped him rebuild it a different way.

He swallowed hard and stood up, pushing his shoulders back and looking down his nose at Luo Binghe. The looming posture was almost familiar, but its authority was undercut somewhat by the way his arms shook.

“Don’t want.” Shen Qingqiu informed Luo Binghe. He was sure that Luo Binghe knew that already, because Luo Binghe could read him and he wasn’t hiding anything, but he wanted his voice for emphasis.

He didn’t want to leave. He could remember who he was just fine.

Still, the way Luo Binghe slowly shook his head made his stomach drop. “You have to. I promised that you would be free, and you will be. Tomorrow, when you wake up, you will be in a hotel in Beijing and you’ll get your chance to forget all about me. It’ll be like we never met, just like you wanted.”

Had Shen Qingqiu really wanted that? It seemed impossible, but too familiar to dismiss so quickly.

Remember who you were.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t changed, not really. He had always needed Luo Binghe, even before he realized it. It had just been so long, he had forgotten why he wanted to leave.

He must not have wanted to sleep in Luo Binghe’s bed, back then, if he was so scared of being near Luo Binghe. And look at that! Shen Qingqiu used his own cot now more often than not, and he hadn’t slept in Luo Binghe’s bed through the nights as much.

That usually wasn’t the case for naptime, but the point was still valid. Shen Qingqiu was still the same person. Maybe when he got back out into the world, the feel of his old life would help him remember more.

He ate his warm rice, then Luo Binghe ushered him to sleep by his side. “It’s all going to be okay,” Luo Binghe reassured, and it was the last thing Shen Qingqiu heard before fell unconscious.

*_*

Shen Qingqiu awoke, for the first time in six months, cold. There was air blowing across his body, he could feel the way the breeze brushed across his bare skin, and could hear the sounds of traffic from outside in a way that made him think of an open window.

And the smell. It was foul and choking, and Shen Qingqiu tried to bury his face into the soft pillows to avoid it.

But then he couldn’t really breathe, so he huffed and reached for his blankets to hide under. The alarm hadn’t gone off yet, and Luo Binghe would shush him back to sleep if he caught Shen Qingqiu awake.

He fruitlessly fumbled around for the blankets of his cot, but he couldn’t find it by touch alone, so he lifted his face blearily. Why on earth would Luo Binghe turn his lights this bright if the alarm hadn’t gone off yet?

Disoriented and barely able to see, Shen Qingqiu was forced to wait for his eyes to adjust before he could find the blankets and go back to sleep. It seemed unlike Luo Binghe to change the conditions of his room like this.

He shivered. This room… looked different.

What had Luo Binghe done?

It was hard to think with all the noises coming from outside (from the open window!) but he tried to remember what Luo Binghe had said to him before he fell asleep. Their conversation had been serious, he remembered.

Luo Binghe hadn’t wanted to, but…

Shen Qingqiu knew exactly what had happened.

Luo Binghe wasn’t here. He was gone, and he had left because Shen Qingqiu wanted him to.

Frozen by the shock of it, Shen Qingqiu stared out the window. This was Chaoyang, Beijing, just as Luo Binghe had promised. He could see his apartment, his eye drawn to it almost automatically, from the window of this hotel, and he knew Luo Binghe had gotten him this room as a final gift. A safe place to adjust until he was ready to go… home.

The word didn’t seem to fit, really. Shen Qingqiu stood up slowly, so his pounding headache wouldn’t get any worse, and struggled to close the window.

It was incredibly heavy, and after a few seconds of pushing, Shen Qingqiu gave up. He would just have to bear the smell and the light and the noise for a little longer.

Exhaustion seemed to overtake him—he had just woken up, after all, and finding Luo Binghe completely absent made him a little dizzy—so he took a short break on the bed before opening the closet. The only other door to open was the door to the hallway, and he wasn’t ready for that yet.

To his surprise, the closet had several outfits in it. They looked sharp and creaseless, exactly what he used to wear outside. Slim but not tight, charcoal grey, and polished. After the soft, heavy robes he was used to, he found himself resisting the urge to shut the closet door again.

This outfit looked mean. He remembered how the fabric used to chafe when he didn’t fit quite right, and he knew that the buttoned sleeves would irritate sensitive skin. He was used to walking barefoot on thick carpet, but now had to force his feet into shoes?

Unexpectedly, Shen Qingqiu found himself wanting to cry. Luo Binghe couldn’t even help him with all of this, because he wasn’t here.

Remember who you were.

He took a deep breath, just like Luo Binghe had showed him, and set his shoulders back. Olympic fencer Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t have cried when faced with his normal wardrobe, and the prospect of not having help to put it on.

There were a million lonely mornings were he woke up with no one. He didn’t remember them, having replaced those memories on purpose with happy mornings with Luo Binghe, but he knew this was true. One more of those meant nothing to him. Shen Qingqiu took the shirt and slacks off of the rack and started dressing.

To his surprise, the fabric wasn’t rough and unforgiving at all. It was deceptively soft, and Shen Qingqiu found himself warming up to normal temperature in the thick material.

It was still tighter than his robes ever were. The waist was thin with the fit of the shirt and the formal belt had to be tightened a lot in order to hold his pants up.

His fingers were shaking too much to do the buttons one after another, and he had to take several breaks to catch his breath and keep it all from overwhelming him.

Even when he was dressed, the fabric made noise. The shoes clacked against hard floor, the stiff sleeves rustled, and even when he was completely still except for breathing, he could hear fabric move.

Compared to the quiet consistency of Luo Binghe’s room, it startled him.

How could someone hold him, while he was dressed like this? All this pressed fabric would wrinkle in displeasure.

The point of it, Shen Qingqiu remembered, was to keep people away.

Well, that wasn’t necessarily true. It was to keep the respect of the masses while inviting distant admiration, like he was an untouchable thing. And he had been, he supposed.

But Luo Binghe had taught him that he was never an untouchable thing. He needed comfort and care to thrive, and, with Luo Binghe, he would get that no matter what he looked like. There was no need for elaborate presentation there, so perhaps there never had been.

Shen Qingqiu was supposed to remember though.

There was a time when he was aloof, cold, and lonely, and somehow, he had to get back there. Even though it didn’t feel the same.

The clothes helped, he thought. Looking in the mirror like this, drawn up, with the neatly pressed shirt hiding the changes in his body, he could almost be the same person as he was.

His eyes landed on a hairbrush on the counter. It wasn’t the same one as Luo Binghe always used, but it worked. Shen Qingqiu, for a moment, tried to drag it through his tangled hair, wincing, but quickly gave up.

Luo Binghe usually managed his hair, because Shen Qingqiu had never grown it long. He tried to remember how those magic fingers managed to work out every snag without pain, maintaining their endless patience…

No use dwelling on it! Luo Binghe wasn’t here, and Shen Qingqiu wasn’t supposed to be thinking about it anyway. If he thought about it for too long, he was afraid he would forget about the kind of person he was trying to be by breaking down again.

Besides, he was ready to go out now. His hair was a mess, but it was as good as it was ever going to get without a bath. There was only a shower in this hotel bathroom, and Shen Qingqiu didn’t think he could remain standing for long enough to learn how to condition his hair.

As it was, he was probably going to be forced to take several breaks to get back to his apartment. From the hotel, he could see his building, but it was difficult to judge how far it was.

Shen Qingqiu gave the room one final sweep to make sure Luo Binghe hadn’t left anything else for him to find, before heading out into the hall and towards the elevator.

The little numbers engraved overhead told him he was on the 14^th floor. When the elevator arrived, Shen Qingqiu stepped in and instantly felt himself tense.

How many nightmares had he suffered through about elevators? Every time he stepped on one in a dream they would fail and he would be falling to his death. There were never guardrails he could grasp or a way to cushion his fall, and he would wake up in a cold sweat every time.

He briefly considered taking the stairs, but the elevator doors had already closed after he pushed the button. His hands white-knuckled the handrail, and the initial jolt of the elevator made him stop breathing for a moment.

He didn’t relax the entire ride down. When finally reached the ground floor, the doors opened with a benign ding and the doors opened to reveal a man waiting. As they stepped past each other, the man shot him a confused glance but didn’t comment on Shen Qingqiu’s sheet-white face or the subtle tremors in his hands.

He needed to sit down.

Shen Qingqiu found a bench that was mostly hidden by a large plan and sat there to catch his breath. It smelled better here, where there were no open windows, although it was louder. The sounds of the city couldn’t be dampened by the thick glass set into every wall or the quiet elevator music that was just loud enough to draw attention, but not loud enough to appreciate.

Deep breath, and then push the door open. Shen Qingqiu stumbled outside, choking on the thick pollution in the air. Eyes watering from the brightness, he brought his hands up to his face. There was a brief moment of confusion as he tried to decide on covering his mouth, nose, ears, or eyes, but he started to make his way down the sidewalk and towards his apartment.

No one recognized him. Maybe it had something to do with the way he was hunched down against the current of people, trying not to run into anyone while protecting himself from the crowds that streamed past him. Or maybe it was the way he would flinch when someone brushed by him, unfamiliar touches that were products of carelessness.

The sun was high in the sky, heating up the pavement and Shen Qingqiu felt sweat drip from his neck down into his shirt, sticking long strands of tangled hair to his overheated skin. The sensation made his skin prickle, but no amount of adjusting his hair could fix the issue, so he had no choice but to keep going.

The hotel was already on a familiar street, but as soon as he saw the entrance to his complex, he let out a massive sigh of relief, he sat down on one of the benches through the door inside. As he laid his head in his arms, he couldn’t believe how weak he had become. It had taken all his effort to walk a few steps down a street, and he knew he couldn’t possibly have pushed that door open. He was incredibly lucky someone was leaving at that moment and decided to hold it for him.

Luo Binghe had just carried him if he was tired. Even if it was just across the room. Luo Binghe wouldn’t…

Well, Luo Binghe wasn’t here. It was only—

“Shen Qingqiu? Is that really you?”

Shen Qingqiu’s damp sleeve froze mid-swipe. Of all the times to be recognized, how had it possibly been when he was crying? He was tempted to deny it, but he needed access to his apartment and didn’t have any keys.

It was a rare moment of forethought, and he straightened, trying to clear his muddled mind even more. “Yes, it’s me. Can you grant me access to my apartment without keys or do I need to pay for new ones first?”

The doorman looked stricken for a second before shaking his head. He couldn’t quite seem to fit his polite smile back on his face, and Shen Qingqiu’s arms wrapped around his middle self-consciously. “I’m sorry sir, but you’ve been gone for years. Forgive me, but I don’t have access to it because your hukou has been marked inactive.”

The doorman’s tone was neutral and apologetic, but it was hard to see that past the poorly-hidden shock and confusion. Shen Qingqiu knew he didn’t look put together right now, but he wasn’t expecting this unknown man’s opinion to matter to him so much.

Why did Shen Qingqiu care so much about that? It wasn’t like this upright, elderly man, with a graying beard and a growing bald patch, would praise him and hold his hand if he made a good impression.

Wouldn’t he…?

No. Shen Qingqiu stopped that thought before it even finished. Luo Binghe couldn’t be replaced, and even it were possible, it wouldn’t be through a total stranger. No, men who weren’t Luo Binghe only liked to be close if it meant pain, ripping through Shen Qingqiu’s slender body and taking—

“Sir? Sir!” The man was waving a hand in front of Shen Qingqiu’s face, he realized belatedly. His breathing was coming too quickly and he felt so dizzy, like he was going to throw up or pass out.

He gripped his chest while he tried to get in a decent breath, nearly folded over on the bench. The noise of his wheezing was so loud that he could hear it over the roar in his ears. He wanted to curl into a ball or tear off his skin or just leave.

The world around him and the swimming face of the doorman seemed to fuzz at the edges, so he squeezed his eyes shut as a wave of nausea crashed over him. He didn’t want to be here anymore.

He blacked out.

*_*

It smelled different here.

Sterile, almost. Clean. It was better than the streets, but nothing like how Luo Binghe’s room was.

Shen Qingqiu knew instantly that someone had moved him while he was unconscious. He was in a hard bed, covered with scratchy sheets and a thin pillow under his head.

“-you awake? Hello? I would like to ask you a few questions.”

Shen Qingqiu opened his eyes and struggled to prop himself up on his elbows. His body was incredibly sore, from his core down to his feet, and everything ached when he moved.

The person who was talking was a young lady, and she looked familiar. “Oh good, you’re awake,” she said briskly. “Would you mind if I asked you a few questions?”

Shen Qingqiu blinked slowly, his mind still trying to catch up. What was this? This woman didn’t look like a nurse, and she seemed very out of place in the hospital room with a laptop and notepad set up on the table.

The insistent, businesslike tone was what finally tipped him off. This was a reporter.

The realization made his heart drop for a second, and it took him a second to remember why that was so bad.

Reporters determined reputation. Needless to say, Shen Qingqiu hadn’t had a good experience with them, ever. If he was going to start his life back up again, he was going to run into these people a lot, and he couldn’t deal with them by expecting Luo Binghe to help, or by crying, or by shutting down from overstimulation.

Remember who you were, Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu took a deep breath to prepare himself before swinging his legs over the edge of the bed and sitting up straight. It seemed like every muscle in his body screamed their protest, but he fought to keep his face clear of emotion.

It was difficult, when Luo Binghe had been showing him how to communicate using his body language, to erase everything.

“Are you the only one?” he asked, but his voice cracked on the first word and the rest of the sentence was nearly inaudible with his unused voice. For the first time since he woke up, the reporter’s professional façade cracked.

She hesitated before answering. “No. The hospital’s been fighting to keep your reappearance quiet, but last I heard, there are about thirty in the lobby waiting. What have you been doing in these years that you’ve been unreachable for?”

Shen Qingqiu startled at the question, hurled at him like it could catch him off-guard enough to force honesty. He couldn’t tell the truth, obviously. He couldn’t betray Luo Binghe, and he could never return to his Olympic veteran life if people really knew what had happened.

The important part was that he wasn’t changed from the experience, so it didn’t matter. People didn’t need to know. He lifted his chin up slightly, just like he remembered. “That’s confidential,” he replied huskily, “and I am not at liberty to say.”

She set down her notepad and closed the lid of her laptop. “There have been rumors that you’ve been training in secret, or that you’ve had a mental break. People are saying you’ve died, been kidnapped, or went insane. Mr. Shen, nothing you could say could be worse than that.”

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t think of an answer to that, so he just kept quiet. Hopefully, it would be taken as a contemptuous silence rather than a miserable one. He wished Luo Binghe were here. Luo Binghe would know what to say.

“Why were you off the grid? Why didn’t you reach out to anyone?”

“Who would I reach out to?” Shen Qingqiu whispered. It took all his effort to keep his aching shoulders squared back, but it was so hard to hide the dejection in his voice. However, if this reporter knew someone that Shen Qingqiu had trusted, Shen Qingqiu needed to know. He needed someone he could go to, because being alone was going to destroy him.

The reporter seemed taken aback by this response, which was thankfully enough to stem the tide of questions for now. When she spoke again, her voice sounded softer. More human. Maybe she hadn’t considered that the famous Shen Qingqiu, near-martial god of China, was lonely.

“I don’t know. Your foster parents? An ex-girlfriend? An old manager or coach? You have a therapist, I know.”

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t on good terms with his foster parents or siblings. He had been too prideful to contact exes, and didn’t contact coaches or managers for the same reasons. When people left Shen Qingqiu, they were gone forever.

…he didn’t remember having a therapist, though.

“Therapist?”

“Your training institution while you were an Olympian required psychological evaluations periodically, and these people are paid for you to use for the rest of your life. The name Yue Qingyuan should sound familiar to you?”

The name did ring a bell somewhere in the recesses of Shen Qingqiu’s mind. He remembered those psychological evaluations, although they had been overshadowed by competitions and more important events at the time.

In his memory, he could only remember a few times where he had met with Yue Qingyuan. The man had been patient and understanding with Shen Qingqiu’s cold demeanor in a way that most people didn’t, and it felt so close to familiarity that Shen Qingqiu bristled and despised that he was being forced to go.

He wasn’t anything like Luo Binghe. His name didn’t carry safety and didn’t promise warmth, but this was one man that Shen Qingqiu could not offend, and one man that couldn’t tell anyone if Shen Qingqiu broke down. He could help Shen Qingqiu, reteach him to act like Olympian Shen Qingqiu.

It was, admittedly, a long shot. He had never trusted this guy before, but he didn’t have anyone else to go to. Luo Binghe wasn’t an option, for the first time in a very long time.

Unexpectedly, Shen Qingqiu felt a physical pang in his chest, and he couldn’t hold his impassive face anymore. Luo Binghe was gone.

He turned away from the reporter and laid back down, covering his body with the starchy hospital blanket again. He waited, but the reporter didn’t leave.

There was no way Shen Qingqiu could hide the way his body started to shake.

After a few minutes, there was no way he could hide his hitching breaths either. The hum of the air conditioner and beeping of machines next door weren’t loud enough to cover him. The Shen Qingqiu that he was trying to be, would be disappointed. He was pathetic, and being pathetic never did him any favors, except with Luo Binghe. Maybe that was why it seemed to be his new default.

Luo Binghe couldn’t help him now, no matter now pathetic he was. No matter how much pain he was in, or how alone he had become in the short span of a day.

The reporter stood up, making Shen Qingqiu flinch at the sudden scrape of the chair.

“I’m sorry,” she said. Her voice was quiet. “I shouldn’t have sneaked in and invaded your space like this. I’ll give you time, but you need to call me as soon as you can. Here.”

She set something on the table next to Shen Qingqiu’s head.

“My phone number is in here, and I just put in Yue Qingyuan’s, if you want to get in contact with him as well. Whatever you’ve been though… you can trust me. I can get your public name out of the mud and on a pedestal—you just need to call me when you can.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t respond, but he didn’t need to. She had packed up her stuff and murmured a soft goodbye before shutting the door behind her.

He didn’t try to hide anymore. He sat up against the bed frame, pulling his legs close to his body and wrapping his arms around them.

Back in his white room, he had learned to sleep like this, crying into the circle of his arms with his back against the warmth Luo Binghe’s door. He would have given everything to be held by Luo Binghe, then, even if he wouldn’t have acknowledged it to himself.

He’d give just as much for the same thing, now.

When he’d finally cried himself out, he rubbed his eyes tiredly. He was in a bed, might as well sleep.

He didn’t bother with blankets or changing position. Nothing could compare to the warmth of Luo Binghe’s room anyway, there was no point in trying to get more comfortable. He just breathed in the smell of the expensive suit fabric and the stench of old sweat, and fell asleep sitting up with his head in his arms.

When he awoke, it was almost in a haze. Some man seemed to be standing a far distance away, chattering something about loans and government taxes and ‘calling in favors’—all stuff that Shen Qingqiu hadn’t even thought about in years. Money, what a source of stress it had been. Now it meant nothing to him.

Then he was coaxed to his feet, encouraged to change clothes, and guided into a small car, where he was driven… somewhere. He wasn’t fully awake yet.

Was it really that normal for him to keep his silence? No one had asked how he was doing, or if he was okay. Did no one see the way he was struggling to keep his eyes open and clear? He could feel himself shaking, as if cold, and he couldn’t take his arms away from hugging his core tightly.

There was no way he looked the part of a cold, untouchable immortal right now. He felt like a scolded, abandoned child, confused and lost in this place he knew nothing about. But no one seemed to see that.

They only knew the old Shen Qingqiu, the one that relied on no one and looked down on everyone.

They didn’t know Shen Qingqiu at all, and didn’t know anything about the person he really was, and had been his whole life.

They didn’t know that he was always secretly lonely. That his heart had grown thick calluses from the slashes it received in his youth. They had no idea that Luo Binghe was the only one able to break through it all, but in doing so, had broken him.

He was broken.

He stifled a small whine into his sleeve in the backseat of the little car. He wasn’t right for this world. He needed Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe knew what to do to put him back together again after his heart shatters.

But Luo Binghe wasn’t coming back to him.

The thought made his chest hurt and a hard ball rise into his throat, so he shelved it for now. Thinking about that would… be bad.

He couldn’t do this now. He needed Luo Binghe there to help him handle—

He just couldn’t do this right now.

The car parked with a short jerk, and then an unfamiliar woman opened the door for Shen Qingqiu to step outside. It was only when they reached the door to the apartment building that Shen Qingqiu realized his guide was talking.

“—and you’re really lucky, you know. Two tenets ago, the family moved out for an unknown reason, and the new guy bought back all your stuff and reset it to how it was when you were there. Two days ago, he sold it back to your insurance and housing people at dirt price, on the single condition that—”

Shen Qingqiu tuned her out. The words didn’t make any sense without the background, and he didn’t want to ask this lady to repeat everything. He didn’t have enough energy to make his voice work, so he instead set his face low and kept silent.

Once they got to the door of the building, the guide stopped walking to look at Shen Qingqiu expectantly.

Briefly paralyzed, Shen Qingqiu dropped his eyes. She was holding keys out to him.

With a slightly shaky hand, he took them from her palm. They were so familiar, but it felt like a lifetime ago that he owned these. Did he still know which halls to take, or which floor he lived on?

He looked up, and, in a haze, stepped through the door again. The same doorman was there, averting his eyes out of respect while he walked past. A cold drop of sweat slipped down Shen Qingqiu’s spine. It was exactly how everyone had regarded him when he was offered to the cult under the golden archway.

Chapter Text

He hurried into the elevator quickly, shoulders tense and breath quicker than such a short walk warranted. Shen Qingqiu needed someone here that would look at him, because if everyone around him averted their eyes like that, then he would never be able to relax in public.

Then again, if everyone were looking at him, then they would realize something was wrong, and he wasn’t acting like himself anymore. They would realize he was vulnerable, and then a group of them might sneak into his room at night with a blindfold—

Shen Qingqiu’s terrified breaths came quicker and he put his forehead against the elevator doors. Even alone, it was impossible to feel safe. He needed to get into his apartment, and then everything would be better.

He backed up a little, pressed the button, and the elevator started to move. It was a short ride, he reminded himself, but it was hard to resist the urge to sit on the floor. Nausea rolled through his stomach and his legs felt so weak that he had to grip the railing to keep upright.

When the elevator doors opened, Shen Qingqiu stumbled out and shoved his key into the nearest door. It was the correct one, he knew, but it still took several tries to turn the key and open the door.

He threw the door open and collapsed onto his living room couch.

Even the smell was the same as it had been. Clean, lemon soap from the bathroom and the uniform scentless disinfectants signaled like déjà vu in the back of Shen Qingqiu’s memory, but it didn’t feel like home.

The couch he was laying on was the same color as a cloud, a shade slightly off of white. Gray had been a calming color to him, back then. Gray carpets, a dark mantelpiece above a painted, white-brick fireplace, and a silvery draped window adorned his living room, just like it always had.

There was no stains anywhere, just like there never had been. No trophies or photos, no loose papers, and no pets.

He stared at his front door. Small motes of dust drifted through a beam of sunlight from the gap in the curtains. It was too bright in here.

The door was locked, he knew logically. He could see that the lock function was active. He had slid deadbolt into place after he had closed the door.

But.

He felt like someone could still come in. Someone could fit gas under the door, or have already tampered with the stove. This place was big, bigger than Luo Binghe’s room and without the promise of protection.

Suddenly Shen Qingqiu felt incredibly antsy. He stood up, unlocking and relocking the door. He threw aside the drapes and did a lap around the house.

There was no one there. It was only him.

He couldn’t resist going to the kitchen again.

He opened the refrigerator, then closed it. Oven went on and then off. He shut the kitchen door. There wasn’t a lock on the kitchen door. Was there a lock on the kitchen door before? He couldn’t remember.

Instead of checking that, he went to the bedroom. Under the bed, in the closet, and behind the door. Nothing.

Good.

He went back to the living room and turned on the tv. He remembered doing that when he was bored and had nothing to do, and it was habit to flick through the channels now.

He turned it off a minute later to go check on the kitchen again. There really wasn’t anyone here? In this large, empty house?

Well that couldn’t be right. He needed Luo Bin—he needed someone nearby. Why would everyone leave him alone?

He couldn’t possibly be alone in this house, because that would mean that there was no one to protect or comfort him here.

After digging through his pockets, he opened his phone.

Yue Qingyuan would protect him, probably. Yue Qingyuan…

Could Shen Qingqiu trust that man? Would Yue Qingyuan burn him, or expose him, or blindfold him?

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been alone with a man that wasn’t Luo Binghe since he was still underground, and that had been terrible. Luo Binghe had promised to protect him, but Luo Binghe wasn’t here anymore. Men could do whatever they wanted with Shen Qingqiu now.

But Luo Binghe had given him a command, and one that he couldn’t afford to forget.

Remember who you were, Shen Qingqiu.

Yue Qingyuan knew who he was supposed to be and wasn’t allowed to tell people who Shen Qingqiu actually was. Shen Qingqiu brought up the contact with shaking fingers and touched the call button.

He slid down the wall of the hallway, letting the cool texture soothe the overheated skin.

Yue Qingyuan could calm him and could help him stop feeling this way. Shen Qingqiu tried to even out his breathing before bringing the phone to his ear.

“Hello?” He whispered. His voice was a night and day difference from how it used to be, torn and hoarse, but hopefully Yue Qingyuan could still understand it, and coax it back to normal.

“Yue Qingyuan’s office, how can I help you today?”

Shen Qingqiu took another deep breath that only hitched a little on the way out. “Can you come over here? I need— ne —”

The voice at the other end turned alarmed. “Are you alright? Do you need to call emergency services?”

“No—no—but I need your help. I know that, before, I was…” Shen Qingqiu choked off the last part of what he was going to say as his throat tightened violently. He put his head in his arms.

“Okay. Who is this? I’ll be right there.”

“Shen… Shen Qingqiu.”

Yue Qingyuan gasped, and Shen Qingqiu could feel his phone start to slip from sweaty fingers. “He’s back!? Is he hurt? Are you with him at home?”

Shen Qingqiu’s phone clattered to the ground. He could hear the faint voice from the speaker, but he couldn’t breathe, his hands going up to grip white marks into his shoulders.

His vision blurred with tears, and soon he couldn’t hear the phone’s speaker anymore. Did Yue Qingyuan hang up? He was coming over, then. Then Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be so alone.

But Shen Qingqiu was defenseless if Yue Qingyuan wanted to hurt him. Yue Qingyuan had never wanted to hurt him before, but also he wasn’t vulnerable before. If something happened, Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t even be able to tell another person.

The wait seemed like hours, every creak or footstep nearby sending a shockwave of terror through Shen Qingqiu.

The two knocks on the door seemed to cut through the silence like a battering ram. Shen Qingqiu whined quietly, a noise that he couldn’t seem to stop, and swallowed hard. He needed to answer the door.

“Hello? I’m here to help, is everything alright?” Yue Qingyuan called. His voice was muffled and extremely concerned.

It was the kind of voice that Luo Binghe would use when Shen Qingqiu tripped, or fell, or cut himself on something.

Is everything alright?

Shen Qingqiu steadied himself on the window frame before pulling himself to his feet. He couldn’t bring himself to speak, but he squared his shoulders anyway. He needed to show Yue Qingyuan inside.

He needed to be Shen Qingqiu, the Olympic fencer, who could defend himself.

He walked over to the door and undid the deadbolt and both of the extra locks. He tilted his chin up, just like he used to when answering the door, and muscle memory helped him into a straightened posture. It made his body ache, but he held it, and pulled the door open.

Yue Qingyuan flinched. “Shen Qingqiu?” he asked quietly, like he wasn’t quite sure. Shen Qingqiu could feel his impassive face start to crack, so he turned and sat on the couch without responding.

Yue Qingyuan knelt in front of him to put himself at Shen Qingqiu’s eye level. “I can’t believe its you. Your voice…” he shook his head. “I’m sorry, I’ve lost my manners. What do you need help with? I’ll do my best, whatever it is.”

Shen Qingqiu cleared his throat, trying to get some of the hoarseness out of his voice before answering. The way Yue Qingyuan talked to him was gentle and patient, and it made it easier to fix on his mask.

“This one..” he cleared his throat again. “This one has been confused since his arrival here. He needs help returning to a normal, lucid state.”

Yue Qingyuan seemed to hesitate. “You want me to help orient you to your surroundings?”

That didn’t seem exactly right, but Shen Qingqiu couldn’t think of a way to correct him. He thought for a minute, fighting to keep his expression blank. “This master is not acting like his old self.”

With a sigh, Yue Qingyuan got to his feet and pulled a chair in from the kitchen to sit across from Shen Qingqiu’s couch. “I don’t know what you’ve been through, but even with a glance, I could tell you’re not quite yourself.”

Shen Qingqiu could only nod. That was exactly why he needed Yue Qingyuan’s help, so that people couldn’t immediately pick him out. It was a matter of safety. “What is different about me?”

There was a small moment of silence where Yue Qingyuan only appraised him. Trying to figure out how much to say, maybe, or how to phrase it. Shen Qingqiu had never tried to scrutinize facial expressions of others before Luo Binghe, and he was out of practice.

“Your sleeves aren’t buttoned. Your hair is long and untidy, and your posture makes me think you’re in pain. And… when you let me inside, you were leaning, nearly running into me when you walked me inside. Do you need support to stand for longer than a few seconds?”

Unexpectedly, a swell of hope made Shen Qingqiu’s breath stutter. This man was willing to support him? Luo Binghe would carry him whenever he felt weak or tired. Would Yue Qingyuan do the same?

No. No, this is exactly the opposite of what Shen Qingqiu, Olympic medalist, would want. This isn’t what he would think, this isn’t how he would act, everything was all wrong. He would be offended at Yue Qingyuan’s observations, embarrassed to be called out.

“N-no.” Shen Qingqiu only stuttered a little bit. “I am fine. I only need to know what to fix about my habits. How I can act fine. More like my normal self.”

He was aware his sentences were getting shorter. It was hard to maintain this act, however easily Yue Qingyuan saw through it. Hopefully it was like a muscle, and the more he practiced with it, the easier it would come to him.

“It’s my belief,” Yue Qingyuan stated slowly, “that if someone wants to change their habits or actions in a drastic way, they also want to change themselves. It seems like you want to… hm. Hide yourself, instead of changing who you really are.”

To change someone’s actions, they change themselves. He had adapted to life with Luo Binghe, changed his actions to allow him to survive, but now Yue Qingyuan was saying that this had fundamentally changed Shen Qingqiu as a person. Luo Binghe had changed him?

Shen Qingqiu realized that he was cringing against the back of the couch, and had, at some unknowable point, drawn his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. His face was turned away and eyes nearly closed.

Of course he wanted to hide himself! He was vulnerable, and he felt judged and exposed by everyone who saw him. This is precisely what he wanted Yue Qingyuan to fix.

He couldn’t stop himself from being this hurt, broken thing, but with Yue Qingyuan’s help, he could hide it for long enough that he could heal on his own time.

Frustrated, he bit his lip and pressed his face into his palms. “I can’t do this alone. I need help. What do I do to make it like the past few years haven’t happened?”

Shen Qingqiu could feel a hard knot rising steadily in his throat, and he knew a few tears had squeezed past his eyelids. Yue Qingyuan’s voice just got quieter. “I’m sorry. I don’t think it’s possible to act like the past four years haven’t happened. People have been looking for you. China hasn’t given up on its Olympian, and they’re expecting you to retake your place. The search parties and investigations over the years you’ve been missing have taught me that unless you leave again, having announced your absence, no one will leave you alone.”

Four years? It had been four years. It felt like a lifetime, like Shen Qingqiu, Olympian, had died and another person inhabited the body that got locked in the missile silo.

And now the world wouldn’t leave this new four-year-old child alone when he ‘came back.’

“You can’t help me?” Shen Qingqiu choked, voice barely audible. “I’m alone?” Pathetic tears poured down his face in earnest, proof that he was helpless.

There was a dip in the other side of the couch as Yue Qingyuan sat down, after a moment that seemed like shock. “I don’t know how much I can do, I apologize. I will try my hardest, as long as you want to work with me.”

Shen Qingqiu tried to whisper his thanks, but the words got caught in his throat. Luo Binghe never liked it when he talked too much, so thanks were usually expressed nonverbally. He wasn’t alone.

He didn’t have Luo Binghe, but at least he wasn’t totally alone.

It was like a fish being forced to survive off of a roadside puddle when he had been taken from the ocean. He just wanted Luo Binghe to hold him.

For now though, he had to prove he wanted to work. He swiped the tears from his face with his sleeve, forcing his shoulders back painfully and swallowing hard. He could do this. Luo Binghe never asked him to do things that he wasn’t capable of doing alone, or with help.

While Luo Binghe had never explicitly asked him to do this, to force himself back his own mold, this was something he needed to do.

He just needed to remember, and then everything would be okay.

Shen Qingqiu gradually unwound his limbs and set his hands in his lap. He looked up at Yue Qingyuan expectantly, only now aware of how hunched he was, and how impossible it seemed to straighten completely. He had never been shorter than Yue Qingyuan while sitting before.

The light coming through the open windows across from him were unforgiving to his sensitive eyes. When he tried to look Yue Qingyuan in the face, it was hard to keep his puffy eyes open.

“Okay. Do you want to start, or do you need a short break first?” Yue Qingyuan asked.

Shen Qingqiu answered, “Start.” It would have been a command, had he used his normal voice. But his words now were whispered and hoarse, more like a broken half-sentence than a command.

Sometimes he thought that maybe it was all in his head. That his voice should sound fine and perfectly healed, but something was broken in his brain that couldn’t recover how he used to sound.

Yue Qingyuan smiled a little, and Shen Qingqiu felt a spark of warmth at the approval. “If at any point, you need a break, always ask. For right now, can you do your sleeves? Button them, and then straighten out your shirt.”

Shen Qingqiu turned his attention to his arms. It was weird, to have someone that wasn’t Luo Binghe watching him while he did something so personal, like buttoning his sleeves. It was such a domestic thing, getting dressed to become presentable enough to go outside. It wasn’t a bad feeling though. As long as he did this right, he would get more approval.

And if he did it wrong… he didn’t know what Yue Qingyuan would do if he got this wrong, but with the gentle way he spoke and the fact that Yue Qingyuan hadn’t moved off of his chair the whole time, Shen Qingqiu doubted that he needed to be worried.

Even so, Shen Qingqiu was careful to keep one eye on the man in the room, just in case.

He straightened up to tuck in his shirt and untwist his sleeves, and tried to smooth out the wrinkles there. It didn’t work, so he patted the fabric more anxiously. Why wouldn’t it smooth out?

“It’s okay, don’t worry about that, just move on,” Yue Qingyuan reassured. “Your collar is flipped in the back.”

Shen Qingqiu reached back to fix his collar. Then he pulled a lock of his hair out from the back of his shirt, sighing in relief. He hadn’t realized the feeling of matted hair on his skin had been bothering him so much until it was gone.

This was… better. The sleeves felt too tight, the collar almost strangling, but he didn’t feel like his skin was in pain. This was how this shirt was supposed to feel, he thought.

Yue Qingyuan gave him a few more directions on the state of his clothes that made them more comfortable, like the correct buttoning of his shirt and the belt in its loops, and then they moved on.

“Do you have a hairbrush?”

Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure. The previous tenet of the house had left a lot of furniture and items for him, but he hadn’t looked through them all. He went to the bathroom to check, and sat back down on the couch a couple minutes later with a gentle hairbrush in hand.

Yue Qingyuan looked approving again. “That works perfectly. Good job. I want you to brush your own hair without hurting yourself. It’s very matted, so it might be hard, but I know if you go slowly you can do it.”

Shen Qingqiu exhaled shakily. He had never had to do this before. Luo Binghe always did it, and his singular attempt alone hadn’t gone well at all. Yue Qingyuan was going to be so disappointed in him.

He had sounded so confident that Shen Qingqiu could do it though, so Shen Qingqiu had to at least try. Shen Qingqiu’s hair reached his waist now, so he moved his hair over his shoulder to the front of his body.

Shen Qingqiu put the brush on his scalp and dragged down. Ow, nope. That didn’t feel anything like how Luo Binghe used to do it.

“Start by just brushing the ends,” Yue Qingyuan advised.

Shen Qingqiu was careful not to sink the brush in all the way on the next, far shorter stroke, just trying to untangle the very tips of his hair. It still hurt, but not as badly, so he continued. Brushing over the same spot was hard, pain prickling there again and again, but he forced himself to continue until the brush’s path ran smooth, and it didn’t hurt anymore.

After completing the ends of that tress, Shen Qingqiu glanced up at Yue Qingyuan for approval. There was nothing on his face.

Right. He had to keep going if he was going to complete this painful task. Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure why he thought Yue Qingyuan would praise him along the way, because that would be just unhelpful.

Shen Qingqiu worked his way through his entire head, going more slowly in places that hurt and speeding up when the knots started to give way. His head felt achy and sore, but soon his hair wasn’t knotted anymore.

It was creased and frizzy, damaged in places and it wouldn’t lay flat, but there were no knots.

“I want you to do that every morning, or before you go out. Fix your clothes and brush your hair,” Yue Qingyuan said softly. “If you don’t look so disheveled, you won’t feel like you’re dirty.”

Shen Qingqiu looked down at his hands, which were still holding the brush. He hadn’t felt dirty, really. He felt hyperaware and exposed, overstimulated and anxious, but never dirty. If he did his clothes and hair every morning, though, he might feel like his cover was safer.

Even things like his poor posture and sallow skin could be ignored if he was put-together and confident. Then people would believe he could defend himself, and no one would know how fragile he really was.

Yue Qingqiu interrupted his thoughts. “I think that’s enough for today. I’ll come back tomorrow at the same time, if you have nothing else scheduled.” Shen Qingqiu could only nod.

Brushing his hair had taken an incredible amount of effort and pain, and he just wanted to be alone now.

As soon as Yue Qingyuan walked out the door, Shen Qingqiu slid the deadbolt into place and darted into his room, where he locked that door, too.

After doing a quick lap around the room in which he latched all the windows shut and made sure the faucets were off, he finally settled in bed.

The bed didn’t seem as plush as before. It was a harder mattress than Shen Qingqiu was used to.

Yes, he had slept sitting up in a hospital bed, but now he was in his bedroom, in the only place on earth where he should feel the safest. Why was the bed so hard?

The sheets were thin as well, made to be used with the heater in the corner for the cold nights. Although Shen Qingqiu had used this system for nearly his whole life, it still felt completely unfamiliar. There was no comfort here, in this cold white room.

There was no snake sunbathing in the corner. The heater was built into the wall, and completely silent instead of whirring softly. All of his clothes were in a dresser, instead of a chest at the foot of the bed or a closet off to the side.

Worst of all, even when the curtains were completely closed, most of the light from outside, streetlights and moonlight, bled through the thin curtains and reflected off of the white-wallpapered walls. Even at nighttime, it was bright outside, and there was nothing to stop the light from pushing its way into the little room.

It wasn’t cold, but Shen Qingqiu’s body shivered in memory.

Shen Qingqiu slept fitfully, feeling uncomfortable in the bed and unsafe in the room. It was as if the bars on one wall could lift at any time and he would be dragged out, or the looming specter over his shoulder could take him at any time. Every time he woke up in a blurry haze of panic, he would look for the mural of Luo Binghe in one of the walls for comfort, only to find nothing.

Around four in the morning, he finally got the idea to turn on the tv so that he could be brought back to reality more quickly instead of the confused tossing and turning when he woke up.

He turned it to some news channel, letting the low chatter of politicians fade into the background and suck out some of the silence of the room. Because of this, he slept for a full hour before waking up again, this time for good.

He wasn’t used to letting the sun guide his schedule. Before, Luo Binghe had let him wake up whenever he wanted to; later, whenever the alarm went off is when he would start his day. But if Shen Qingqiu showed any signs of tiredness in that small room, Luo Binghe would always let him take naps.

Now, there would be no time for naps. Shen Qingqiu needed to call someone and figure out how to make this big, empty place somewhere that he could feel safe in. It would never be his home, he thought, but there had to be something he could do to make this apartment feel less hollow.

It felt too much like his abandoned white room in the missile silo. Both of them were places he could call his own, but he could never feel safe. There was a reason he had decided to leave the lonely white prison behind, but he was stuck with this apartment.

Maybe he could buy a snake, like Jello. Maybe then he could feel better.

But could he make the snake happy? Snakes needed love and care, which Shen Qingqiu could happily do, but they needed other things too, like food, heat lamps, a terrarium, and furnishings. Shen Qingqiu was overwhelmed when he tried to think about how much Luo Binghe had done for Jello.

Just how much had Luo Binghe done for Shen Qingqiu?

Shen Qingqiu was a lot more work than a snake, he was sure. But Luo Binghe had treasured him anyway, showering him in attention and giving him everything he asked for.

It was impossible to know how much Luo Binghe had done for him, but Shen Qingqiu would need to figure it out now that he was being forced to do it himself. He would need to wash himself, dress himself, stretch his injured shoulder, feed himself—could he still remember how to cook? Shen Qingqiu couldn’t recall ever even knowing how to cook— and then, at the end of every day, he would need to go to bed alone and miserable, with the inescapable knowledge that he would need to do it all again the next day.

Maybe he could get someone to help. Too many people would be suspicious, because Olympian Shen Qingqiu would never have too many people, but he could probably pay someone to cook for him. Or bring him food, or something.

Did he even have money? He suddenly realized he had no idea what had happened to his own financial situation after he had dropped off the face of the earth. There had to be someone he could talk to about it, like the people who had gotten him his house back, but he didn’t know how he could reach them.

There were only two contacts in his phone: that reporter and Yue Qingyuan.

Shen Qingqiu tried to take up the majority of his day on the tv, but it was impossible to resist the urge to get up and walk around every five minutes. He should go on a walk or something to get the excess energy out, he mused when he found himself standing up for the fifth time in an hour.

Except the thought of going outside and dealing with the heat, the people, and having to put on his whole act just to go out for a short walk was absolutely exhausting. Besides, what if he got lost or kidnapped? Luo Binghe couldn’t protect him anymore, and he was way safer just staying in his apartment.

For the fifth time in that hour, Shen Qingqiu walked over to his front door to unlock and then relock the deadbolt. After another double-check, he walked back over to the couch to settle back in front of the tv.

The moment of peace was just that— a moment.

Yue Qingyuan’s double knock on the door was a massive relief. Shen Qingqiu wasn’t good at keeping track of time normally, but now there was nothing to do but watch the minutes tick by as his tv prattled on about some uninteresting political issue. Yue Qingyuan was punctual down to the minute, and that fact made it a lot easier for Shen Qingqiu to feel at ease while opening the door to let him in.

What makes him feel almost immediately worse, though, is the first thing Yue Qingyuan says.

“Are you ready to go out? Hair brushed, clothes straightened?”

His tone of voice wasn’t demanding or hostile, but Shen Qingqiu’s stomach still sank with guilt. He hadn’t done any of those things. To be fair, he hadn’t known that they were going out, but Yue Qingyuan had still told him he needed to do those things every day, and Shen Qingqiu hadn’t done them.

He hadn’t forgotten, necessarily, just… put it off. He hadn’t wanted to do it in the morning, so he decided he would do it later. Even as the clock ticked closer to Yue Qingyuan’s arrival, Shen Qingqiu’s anxiety only grew, but he still couldn’t get up and do it.

It was impossible to explain to Yue Qingyuan, because even to himself he sounded like he had failed. What an easy, simple task that Yue Qingyuan had ensured was within Shen Qingqiu’s capabilities, and still Shen Qingqiu hadn’t done it.

Shen Qingqiu swallowed hard and, strangely, felt tears prick behind his eyes. Why would he want to cry right now? He wasn’t in pain, wasn’t being told off, he was just being asked a question.

It was like his emotions were out of his control, swinging from content to anxious to guilty to sad, with no discernable pattern or warning. This would all be so much easier to deal with if he was safe in his room, with his snake and Luo Binghe, and not in this white apartment alone with this man he hardly knew.

He was alone now.

Yue Qingyuan shook him out of his thoughts with a gently prodding, “Do you want me to go over it again with you, how to brush your hair?”

As if Shen Qingqiu had forgotten in such a short time. As if Shen Qingqiu were stupid, or a child.

Shen Qingqiu nodded anyway. He did need help, because there was no way he was ever going to do this on his own. Maybe he really had become a child, then. “Please.”

Yue Qingyuan showed him how to brush his hair again, from the tips and then moving up with every brushstroke, then pointed out parts of his collar and buttons that needed straightening. By the end of it, Shen Qingqiu’s hands were shaking. Yue Qingyuan had helped a lot when he listed all the things that Shen Qingqiu had gotten wrong.

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t done a single thing right on his own, and he knew that because nothing he’d done had gotten him any praise. Only his errors were noteworthy enough to comment on.

Yue Qingyuan scrutinized his expression, confused. Shen Qingqiu didn’t hide his expressions anymore, since that was how he usually communicated with Luo Binghe. He had forgotten how to hide them now, and he knew he felt devastated and guilty. Yue Qingyuan would be able to read this open book that Shen Qingqiu had designed for Luo Binghe’s eyes only.

“Have you eaten anything today?” Yue Qingyuan asked. His voice seemed lower by a few registers, which confused Shen Qingqiu more than soothed him. Where would he have gotten food?

There was nothing in his refrigerator, and it wasn’t like someone was going to make food for him. Besides, his stomach had been turning the whole day, and the nausea made it hard to even think about food.

Shen Qingqiu shook his head slowly, as if to convey that he hadn’t, but it didn’t matter to him that much. He had bigger problems to worry about, like people coming through his front door to take him away, or being revealed as vulnerable and submissive to the world who knew his name.

How could he even think about eating? It wasn’t a priority in any case, and hadn’t been since he woke up in that hotel room overlooking Beijing.

Yue Qingyuan didn’t look surprised, but he did look somewhat resigned. “You need to eat. Even if you’re not hungry, you need to eat something every day. This is much more important than the clothes or hair, do you understand?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded yes, he did understand, but this just seemed like another task he had to do.

What was the point of having independence and solitude if he was still following such strict guidelines for his life? Shen Qingqiu was sure that he hadn’t been forced to follow so many rules before, when he was Olympian Shen Qingqiu.

He had done what he wished, gone where he wished, and lived his life with only his own desires to care about. Eating hadn’t been that important to him, so he was sure that he hadn’t eaten that much. It was difficult to remember, because it just wasn’t a big part of that previous life.

“We will pick up food coming back from the store, okay? That way we can eat here in the house. Eventually I want you to eat dinner at a restaurant, but I’ll deliver food until then, if you don’t want to cook.”

The two of them walked out the door and down the hall. Shen Qingqiu didn’t bother to lock the door behind him, since there was nothing valuable in his house anyway. Then they took the elevator down to the ground level to take the subway, which was thankfully close and didn’t require too much walking.

Still, by the time Shen Qingqiu finally sat down on the offered subway seat, his feet ached. The chair was hard and uncomfortable, and maintaining a decent posture was extremely difficult. Only Yue Qingyuan’s whispered reminders kept him from slumping over and letting his shoulders fall.

By the time the subway stopped and Yue Qingyuan beckoned Shen Qingqiu to follow him out of the sliding doors, Shen Qingqiu was already exhausted.

Not sleepy, exactly, but it was so hard to keep moving. The only reason he was able to get up from the seat, besides Yue Qingyuan’s whispered order, was because he knew this would get easier the more he practiced. He would get stronger, and then Olympian Shen Qingqiu would be an easy mask to slip on when he needed it.

With the light at the end of the tunnel encouraging him to take another step, Shen Qingqiu followed Yue Qingyuan off of the train and together they walked to a little corner store that was only a few steps away.

Chapter Text

Yue Qingyuan led him inside, which was good because Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t have noticed it otherwise. It just looked like a sliding glass door set in between two restaurants and a barbershop, all of those part of the same dull gray building with apartment complexes built on top.

It wasn’t cramped inside, though. The ceiling was high enough to see over the tops of the shelves, and while the shop couldn’t go to far out on either side, it extended a good distance back.

Shen Qingqiu was sure he could walk around for a little bit here. The lights weren’t too bright and there weren’t too many people around.

There was so much food here.

Shen Qingqiu had forgotten what kind of variety existed in the world, because Luo Binghe always prepared similar meals for him to eat. Every shelf here had at least four selections of the same food, and then twenty or thirty different foods for one side of each aisle.

Yue Qingyuan retrieved a shopping cart and gestured for Shen Qingqiu to take the lead down the nearest aisle.

“If you want anything, pick it off of the shelf and put it in the cart, okay?”

“Not hungry though.” Shen Qingqiu didn’t think he wanted to eat any of this stuff.

Yue Qingyuan smiled patiently. “It’s not for right now. What do you think you will want to eat later on, when you are hungry?”

Shen Qingqiu shrugged, staring at the selection of cereals and oatmeal. He really didn’t want to eat any of this stuff. Luo Binghe had always known exactly what foods Shen Qingqiu liked and didn’t like, and at what times he would like or not like them.

“Do you ever eat cereal?” Yue Qingyuan asked, and Shen Qingqiu shrugged again. Sometimes Luo Binghe had him eat some for breakfast, but only in the mornings when Luo Binghe was in a hurry because he had to leave. It wasn’t Shen Qingqiu’s favorite, but if Luo Binghe gave it to him, he would eat it and enjoy the sweetness of sugar and milk while Luo Binghe sat across the table with his own bowl.

Luo Binghe wasn’t here though, so he would probably never eat it. “No,” Shen Qingqiu said, and they kept walking.

When it became clear to Yue Qingyuan that Shen Qingqiu was not going to take food from the shelves, the questions started.

“Will you eat salad?”

“Do you like shrimp? What about other kinds of seafood?”

“What kind of bread do you eat most often?”

“Do you know how to prepare pasta?”

“Will you eat more red meat or white meat in the next few weeks?”

“What about soups? Do you like soups?”

“What is your favorite fruit to eat?”

“Do you like snacking? Chips, fresh produce, sweets, or something else?”

“Are you lactose intolerant or just don’t like cheese?”

“What do you eat in sandwiches?”

The questions did not stop. Shen Qingqiu didn’t have answers to a lot of them, either. There were no choices with his food when he was with Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe already knew everything.

The overwhelming stress of it all was starting to make Shen Qingqiu’s head pound. He didn’t know, okay? He didn’t remember ever trying potatoes. Would fresh strawberries still taste good if he ate them with the stems, because he didn’t know how to take them off? He just wasn’t hungry, and asking him if he was going to want to eat a certain food was like asking a child if it was going to want to eat breakfast foods for dinner sometime next week.

He didn’t know. He was stupid, and useless, and didn’t know the answers.

The unrelenting tide of questions finally stopped for a moment once Yue Qingyuan saw the glint from the yellow overhead lighting reflect off of the tears on Shen Qingqiu’s cheeks.

Yue Qingyuan paused in his inspection of a nectarine, gently putting the small round fruit back in its place on the raised wooden bucket. The store had gotten more crowded, and three or four people were absently milling around the produce section.

“What’s wrong?” Yue Qingyuan asked softly.

And that was it. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t hide a little hitched breath and then he hid his face, sobbing in earnest. He didn’t know what was wrong. He knew what was wrong with him, what he had done wrong, but he didn’t know what he felt like this.

All he knew was that there were people here that were watching him out of the corners of their eyes, and he was in a public, exposed space where there was nowhere to hide his weaknesses under the faintly buzzing yellow lights.

His vision dimmed as his breathing got more and more out of his own control.

They could all see how weak he was now. How easy it would be to hurt him right now.

Shen Qingqiu slid down the nearest shelf, clothes catching on boxes as he went, and slumped to the floor, face still buried in his hands. He couldn’t defend himself.

He was helpless and useless and his stomach ached and his feet hurt so bad—

Someone was trying to talk to him, but he could barely hear it over the roar in his ears and his own loud breathing. He peeked through his fingers but flinched back.

He was so close to Shen Qingqiu, nearly touching his arm. It was as if Shen Qingqiu was somehow tied up and vulnerable; in fact, it was exactly the same because he couldn’t fight back!

He needed Luo Binghe here to save him. To hold him, to protect him, and to take him back to the small, soft place under the ground where no one could get to him. He needed—

“Please,” Shen Qingqiu gasped in between breaths, but it was quiet and barely audible. “Hold me?”

Surely, Luo Binghe was here. Luo Binghe never would have left him alone, Luo Binghe cared about him a lot. Luo Binghe would do anything for him, and now Shen Qingqiu had asked, so Luo Binghe had to come. A moment passed and Shen Qingqiu pressed himself back up against the shelf, wrapping his hands around his body defensively.

Dark spots swam in front of his eyes and the roar in his ears seemed to drown out all other sound.

“Help!” Shen Qingqiu screamed, but he could barely hear it, and it had taken the last of his energy. He slumped over as tears dripped down his neck and onto his frantically heaving chest, but he didn’t let himself dissociate just yet.

Luo Binghe could come, Luo Binghe has to come—

Someone touched Shen Qingqiu’s shoulder. He flinched and scrambled as far back as he could move his hurting body, yelling with as much air as he could get into his spasming lungs. He didn’t want to be hurt again!

Why did so many people want to hurt him? He was helpless and useless, wholly unimportant, but everyone knew his name. He could hear someone calling it into his ear, and he shrunk back from the voices.

But he couldn’t dissociate. He had to stay here, even though he knew exactly what might happen. He needed Luo Binghe! Where was Luo Binghe?

Shen Qingqiu squinted with blurry eyes at the hazy shapes that were gathered in front of him. Someone seemed to be reaching out to him, offering help or comfort, and Shen Qingqiu jerkily reached out in kind.

Comfort was something Luo Binghe did, he knew. But maybe this person wasn’t like Luo Binghe at all.

Maybe they all just wanted Shen Qingqiu to ‘calm down a little.’

Shen Qingqiu froze for a moment, and then he screamed, an ear-shattering, swift noise. These people wanted—! They wanted to violate him!

And just like before, there was nothing he could do but curl up against the shelf and cry.

“Help!” He yelled to Luo Binghe. “Please, please—ah!”

Someone touched his arm and he flinched, yelling as loud as he could and shrinking back. He didn’t want this! Stay away from him!

He screamed and cried until he couldn’t anymore, until his tears stopped flowing so quickly and his voice was well and truly gone. His voice always hurt so much, he thought as he slumped down, all of the tension in his body giving way to exhaustion.

“Take a deep breath,” a voice said softly from a little ways away. It didn’t seem aggressive, and no one was touching him, so it didn’t make Shen Qingqiu tense up again, but black spots swam in front of his vision as he obeyed.

His lungs kept spasming, so he tried again. This time, some more air made it into his chest, and he tried to release it slowly, just like Luo Binghe had showed him.

“Again,” the voice commanded. It was devoid of praise, pride, or appreciation, and Shen Qingqiu’s body trembled before he tried again. He wasn’t doing good enough.

The next breath was a little better, but the Yue Qingyuan stayed silent, so Shen Qingqiu tried again. This time, the spots in front of his eyes didn’t make his world spin, and he put his hands under him to lever himself up to sitting.

He scrubbed at his eyes, which were red and puffy. His whole body was aching from laying scrunched up on the hard linoleum.

Yue Qingyuan… did not look pleased with him.

It took several desperate, scared moments before Shen Qingqiu remembered why that was.

He had screamed. Cried on the floor of a grocery store. Embarrassed himself and Yue Qingyuan in an extremely public area. If there was ever a way to act directly opposite of Olympian Shen Qingqiu, then this was it.

“Sorry,” Shen Qingqiu whispered, but his voice was so wrecked that it didn’t sound much like a word at all. Yue Qingyuan stood up, gesturing for Shen Qingqiu to do the same.

He didn’t even offer a hand. Shen Qingqiu had really messed up that bad, that Yue Qingyuan refused to even touch him?

Shen Qingqiu had failed. Seriously, irreversibly failed. A thick knot of dread and terror sat in the bottom of his stomach like a rock. Yue Qingyuan might give up on him now, leaving him to face the world alone.

Shen Qingqiu just had too much to learn. There was too much skills that he didn’t have, and so many changes in his life that he had to make. Someone besides Luo Binghe would never help him with that, especially for someone as small as Shen Qingqiu. Luo Binghe had told him that so many times, that no one else would do what Luo Binghe had done.

And no one else had, so Luo Binghe was absolutely right. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t ever remember a time when someone genuinely, truly helped him progress on his life path in a meaningful way. Coaches were plentiful and nearly nameless, and his foster parents had used their power and influence over him like a scalpel, digging out his fragile sense of self from the marrow of his bones.

The journey home on the subway was a miserable one, and Shen Qingqiu kept his eyes downcast the entire time. He didn’t want to see Yue Qingyuan’s face when he knew there would just be disappointment there.

When they reached the apartment, Yue Qingyuan helped him put his groceries away, making sure that Shen Qingqiu understood where all the food was located, and what needed to be refrigerated, before leaving.

“Sorry we didn’t have time to pick up dinner. I’ll come tomorrow and bring you something, but I want you to eat something between now and then. Three meals, ideally, but two is fine too if you want to get some rest.”

Shen Qingqiu carefully analyzed his tone without looking at his face, still staring down at the floor.

Once Yue Qingyuan left, Shen Qingqiu did a lap around the house, checking every room, door, and window. He unlocked and relocked the front door several times before deciding that, yes, he should probably check the kitchen cabinets and drapes in all the rooms as well. Intruders could be hiding anywhere, and this apartment was too big.

So many people had seen him break down, had seen how vulnerable he really was. Someone could have followed him home.

Bright, bloody visions flashed behind Shen Qingqiu’s eyelids when he blinked. Shaking and blinking back tears, Shen Qingqiu darted into his bedroom, locked the door, and checked his en-suite bathroom for the third time before climbing into bed.

It should have felt safe. This was where he slept, his final haven every night. But for some reason, it felt cold. His eyes kept darting towards the window, as if massive iron bars would lift at any moment and drag him, naked and bound in chains, onto a golden archway, and for some unknowable reason, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t stop shaking.

Shen Qingqiu got up to check the lock on his bedroom door. His body was too tired to go all the way to the front door, though, and by the time he climbed back into bed, he didn’t feel much safer.

He wished Luo Binghe was here to protect him. Luo Binghe had always made him feel so safe, and anything terrible that ever happened to Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe was always there right after to make everything better.

Maybe… maybe Shen Qingqiu should do something terrible to himself then. That way Luo Binghe would have to come.

Shen Qingqiu shook his head vigorously as his own thoughts. Luo Binghe had been very clear that Shen Qingqiu was never supposed to hurt himself. If Luo Binghe came in to save him while he was hanging from his own ceiling, or on the ledge of a building, Luo Binghe would be so disappointed in him, maybe even disappointed enough to leave right after everything was all right again.

Shen Qingqiu, curled up on his side over his blankets, stared into the blank white wall. Luo Binghe never had any empty walls in his room because they were all full of pictures and drawings and clothing hooks. All of it was proof that someone lived there.

Sitting alone in his white bedroom, half-bathed in diluted moonlight from the drawn curtains, Shen Qingqiu felt like a ghost.

After a few more hours, Shen Qingqiu realized that it would be impossible to go to sleep tonight. Every small noise from outside was making him flinch and prepare for intruders.

He needed to calm down, somehow. Unfortunately, Shen Qingqiu didn’t have any paper here. There were no sharpened sketching pencils in a neat line here, and certainly no heavy painting paper. Even if Shen Qingqiu had everything ready and lined up for him, there was no Luo Binghe to appreciate whatever he’d draw. He had no one to show his artwork to.

Shen Qingqiu stood up with a small rustling sound, inching closer to the wall he had been staring at for the past several hours.

It wasn’t painted. It was wallpapered white. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t remember making that choice when he had decorated his apartment.

Shen Qingqiu picked at the edge of one of the seams with his pinky nail. He used to do that all the time, usually to test the strength of the paint that chipped away when he was making his murals in the white cell, but after several months of doing that it became a nervous habit.

The corner of the paper came up after a little coaxing, which made the corners of Shen Qingqiu’s mouth twitch. It wasn’t quite a smile.

He didn’t need to think about it anymore. Lifting his hand as high as he could reach, Shen Qingqiu started to mark little tallies where he wanted key designs to go, planning the outline of a massive face.

Wallpaper, he soon discovered, was a far harder medium than paint. It took a lot longer to scrape even a little bit off, and the wall underneath was such a similar color that it was hard to tell if Shen Qingqiu had done anything at all. When he finally did manage to get a little bit off, the slightest motion would tear a long strip from the wall, instantly sending a wayward streak through Shen Qingqiu’s meticulous planning.

The task of the little tally marks took up the rest of the night, and then he was blinking in the sunlight of the morning, which cast strange shadows from the light curtains over his mural-wall. It became impossible to tell what he was working on, especially since the wall underneath the paper was nearly the same color, so Shen Qingqiu took a break from his work and went into the living room to check the locks on his front door.

Belatedly, he realized that he hadn’t gone to check locks at all when he was absorbed in his painting. He had felt safe, or at least relaxed, while he was painting the likeness of Luo Binghe as a protecting angel.

Even though Yue Qingyuan had been trying to help him recover this entire time, Shen Qingqiu felt like he had finally done something right. Tearing at his wallpaper just made him feel better, more normal, and it seemed to be way more effective than Yue Qingyuan’s method.

Although they just looked like scratches in the wall, it was a whole lot easier for Shen Qingqiu to get an outfit from the closet and change into it. All Shen Qingqiu had to do was imagine Luo Binghe watching him.

Yue Qingyuan might not care that much, since he was only ever critical when Shen Qingqiu didn’t do something, but Luo Binghe would praise him if he could see.

The scratches on the wall were also a reminder of Luo Binghe’s final command, and Shen Qingqiu was eager to demonstrate that he could ‘remember who he used to be.’ Luo Binghe would be so proud of Shen Qingqiu for not needing him anymore!

After he got dressed and checked the locks on his front door, he walked into the kitchen with a posture as tall and proud as he could make it without pain. His shoulder had been getting worse without the daily, nearly religious physical therapy the Luo Binghe always guided him through. He knew what was happening to himself, but it was hard to see what could be done about it. It wasn’t like he knew how to fix this, and besides, there were greater issues that needed his attention more.

Like eating. Yue Qingyuan hadn’t picked up food last night like he said he was going to. He must have been distracted from Shen Qingqiu’s public breakdown.

Shen Qingqiu’s heart plummeted as the memory surfaced. He had somehow forgotten all about that.

Would Yue Qingyuan still want to see him tonight?

Shen Qingqiu shoved the memory out of his mind with some difficultly. The anxiety was making his stomach roll, and he was supposed to be eating.

In truth, he wasn’t hungry. Hunger, he was sure, was supposed to be a gnawing pain, like when it’s impossible to think of something other than food. Shen Qingqiu certainly wasn’t thinking about food at any point over the last few days, but it had been years since he’d purposely starved himself. Maybe he had gotten the feeling wrong.

For now, his middle had been hurting with cramping pains, and occasionally Shen Qingqiu would feel some bile rise up in the back of the throat. It didn’t seem like the kind of thing that food could fix. Wouldn’t he just throw up?

Shen Qingqiu shut the fridge, then walked over to the couch. He had been standing too long, first to put on clothes, and then to decide if he wanted to eat.

His feet still hurt a lot from the long day yesterday. They had done a lot of walking and had even been carrying stuff for the walk back.

Shen Qingqiu turned on the tv, only to instantly get hit with the feeling of needing to get up and move around. He heaved a short sigh.

Really? He thought he was doing better today.

Shen Qingqiu got up and rechecked the locks on the front door.

Maybe he should put a Binghe mural on one of these walls, too. They were painted instead of wallpapered, so it would no doubt be much easier… but no. Then Yue Qingyuan would see it. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t necessarily put his finger on why he didn’t want Yue Qingyuan to see Luo Binghe’s face on his wall, other than the obvious fact that he wouldn’t be happy that Shen Qingqiu was ripping up his own walls.

It wasn’t a very Olympian Shen Qingqiu thing to do, he knew. It was hard to remember who he was supposed to be when a Luo Binghe was watching him, and that was a bad thing.

Supposedly, a bad thing. Why, then, did it feel so peaceful?

To Yue Qingyuan, it might just look like Shen Qingqiu was tearing up his wallpaper, but the motions made him feel safe. That couldn’t be a bad thing.

Besides, the idea of Yue Qingyuan coming into his bedroom, seeing the shreds of paper covering the floor, and telling Shen Qingqiu that he needed to stop would be unbearable.

Worse still would be if Yue Qingyuan found out who, exactly, Luo Binghe was to him. Shen Qingqiu already knew what Yue Qingyuan would say, and the imagined words pounded into his skull just like the incessant questions in the grocery store.

“You have to stop depending on Luo Binghe.”

“Thinking about Luo Binghe will only make things worse for you, in the long run.”

“Moving on would be the best idea. You can’t replace Luo Binghe, but you need to learn to rely on yourself instead of on other people.”

“Luo Binghe wasn’t a reality, and he certainly wasn’t your life. You have your own life.”

“Luo Binghe hurt you. You’re letting him do that, even now.”

“Luo Binghe never existed.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t know how much truth there was in what he thought Yue Qingyuan would say, but he knew that he never wanted Yue Qingyuan to say Luo Binghe’s name aloud. It was just Shen Qingqiu who had all these visions in his head of Luo Binghe’s gentle expression, his soft hands.

No one else could have this, but it was also only in Shen Qingqiu’s head. Here, sitting alone in a half-familiar apartment with an ache in his shoulder and a permanent feeling of dread lodged deep in his gut, it felt impossible to know for a certainty that Luo Binghe was even real.

Shen Qingqiu went to his bedroom to continue the mural.

After a few more hours of planning and outlining while the sun rose high into the sky and started to set, the mural was starting to look…absolutely awful.

The issue didn’t lie in Shen Qingqiu’s skill level. Given years of practice, he could easily master this with dedication and focus. Sure, he hadn’t focused on anything in a long time, and his willpower had never been so fragile in his entire life, but it could be done.

He had never done a face this large before, and never on a new medium right away like this. He hadn’t practiced, but he needed this done now. Luo Binghe had to come as soon as possible; who cared if his eyebrows were a little crooked or the sides of his face were uneven?

As long as Shen Qingqiu could see those eyes that watched over him, or the gently curling hair that framed his face, nothing else mattered.

There were two knocks on the door and Shen Qingqiu flinched, tearing a long, jagged stripe across Luo Binghe’s half-finished nose. Yue Qingyuan was here, as punctual as he always was, but Shen Qingqiu was overcome with the sudden urge to hide.

It was just Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe in this room, so anyone else trying to come in must be an intruder, even helpful therapists. Shen Qingqiu shook off that thought and dusted off his hands.

There was no white paint under his fingernails, nothing etched into the whorls of his fingerprint, and nothing Luo Binghe could wash away like there were in that white room. Just some traces of sticky residue on his hands that weren’t even visible, though Shen Qingqiu could feel it when he pressed his fingers together.

Shen Qingqiu cast his eyes over the paper mess on the floor of his bedroom and shut the door behind him with a soft click on the way out.

Yue Qingyuan didn’t comment on Shen Qingqiu’s lateness to answer the door.

“You’re in a better mood today,” he observed with a small smile on his face.

Shen Qingqiu nodded happily.

“I brought some dumplings from the dumpling house nearby. I hope you like them.”

Yue Qingyuan set the food out, retrieving plates from the kitchen, and they clinked against the glass coffee table in the middle of the room. Once he was finished, Shen Qingqiu settled back against the couch while Yue Qingyuan sat across from on the comfortable chair.

The smell was overwhelming. Shen Qingqiu grabbed a dumpling with his chopsticks and guided it to his plate clumsily. It had been so long since he had used these, since usually Luo Binghe fed him, and Shen Qingqiu’s hands were trembling from the smell.

It was just like the smell that used to fill Luo Binghe’s room when he made chicken or dumplings.

Shen Qingqiu stared at the crunchy rice and purple cabbage dumpling sitting in the middle of his porcelain plate. “Eat,” Yue Qingyuan encouraged, so Shen Qingqiu did.

The first bite spread overwhelming flavor across his tongue like a blast of oil and salt. Were dumplings always this big? Why did Shen Qingqiu’s jaw hurt trying to chew it?

Shen Qingqiu swallowed his bite with difficulty, then doubled over.

His stomach felt like a hole, all of a sudden. It was so painful! How had he not noticed before?

He had been hungry, then, even though his stomach was protesting the food when he finally ate.

“Is it bad?” Yue Qingyuan asked, worried.

Shen Qingqiu shook his head with a small smile on his face. It was overwhelming, but not bad. He needed more. He slid two more dumplings onto his plate.

The large, heavy dumplings may not have been a good first choice of a meal.

It was clearly painful, with the way Shen Qingqiu’s hands were shaking and he was curled around his middle. His stomach wasn’t accepting the food, too shrunken and neglected to eat something heavy right away. He must have been starving.

Well, Shen Qingqiu was eating now, and that was going to have to be enough. Yue Qingyuan could leave the leftovers in the fridge, which that might take away some of the preparation effort that was making it so difficult to prepare and eat food throughout the day.

When Yue Qingyuan started to put everything away neatly into plastic containers, Shen Qingqiu couldn’t help the little caught sound in his throat. Yue Qingyuan wasn’t going to let him keep eating, but the hole inside of Shen Qingqiu wasn’t filled yet! He needed to eat more.

Or maybe he didn’t, and his stomach was just tricking him like it sometimes did. Yue Qingyuan wasn’t anything like Luo Binghe. Yue Qingyuan didn’t know anything about the workings of Shen Qingqiu’s body or how much he needed to eat to be happy.

“I’m sorry,” Yue Qingyuan apologized when he saw how wounded Shen Qingqiu looked as he was packing the food away. “You’ll throw it all up if you eat any more, I promise. Go slowly. Give it a couple hours to digest, and then have some more. If you had eaten yesterday or this morning, then this wouldn’t happen, so that’s why I told you to eat beforehand.”

Shen Qingqiu still stared down at the carpet petulantly, but he was a little reassured to have an explanation of what was happening. Of course Yue Qingyuan wouldn’t be needlessly cruel, or tell Shen Qingqiu to do things for no reason.

Yue Qingyuan was helping him, Shen Qingqiu reminded himself. Yue Qingyuan knew the fastest way to fit the fractured pieces of Olympian Shen Qingqiu back into place. Of course Shen Qingqiu should have listened to him.

For the rest of Yue Qingyuan’s visit, the two of them focused on Shen Qingqiu’s posture and down-the-nose gaze.

The whole time, Yue Qingyuan only asked two questions.

“Does this feel at all familiar?”

“Does this hurt?”

The answer to both was no. Shen Qingqiu was starting to realize that he had tricked himself before. Ever since coming back to Chaoyang, he had never once gotten his previous posture or gaze even close to what it had been.

Luckily, Yue Qingyuan was patient. He kept his hands and body far from Shen Qingqiu to respect his personal space, no matter how much easier it would have been to just guide him in the right direction with his hands. He backed off in his instruction when Shen Qingqiu flinched, encouraged him when he got tired, and corrected him gently when he got something wrong.

He just never seemed to have any praise for Shen Qingqiu, and Shen Qingqiu lost energy and the will to continue after a little while.

Ah, what kind of Olympian would be fine acting pathetic enough to ask for some praise? Shen Qingqiu decided not to say anything. He would just need to work harder to earn it.

But not today. Shen Qingqiu flopped down on the couch when Yue Qingyuan declared that practice was done for the day, and Yue Qingyuan sat back down on his usual spot in the comfortable chair across from him.

Shen Qingqiu was so tired.

“It looks like an old injury, but you should definitely do physical therapy for that shoulder,” Yue Qingyuan said. He probably assumed it was a fencing injury, in which case, it would be a couple years old. Shen Qingqiu just smiled tiredly at him. His body ached like he just had a good workout.

He could do his best to recreate what Luo Binghe always did for him, but it would be better if someone could come help him. A physical therapist would be the fastest way to heal his shoulder, but there was no way Shen Qingqiu could invite someone else into his house.

It would just be another person who knew how vulnerable he was, and another person who could use the knowledge to tear him apart.

They talked for a little more, with Yue Qingyuan mostly holding the conversation and Shen Qingqiu listening, and then Yue Qingyuan left Shen Qingqiu be for the night.

This time, Shen Qingqiu didn’t even try to go to sleep. It would be impossible just like last night without Luo Binghe watching over him, so that had to take priority.

He was starting to realize that the wallpaper’s color wasn’t the best for this project, and sometimes it was only possible to tell that there was a difference between the paper and the wall underneath because the wallpaper scraps hung down and cast a shadow.

He really should fix his strategy.

Treating this project as if he were working with chipping paint was going… not great, so something had to change. What if he made the face out of shadows from the carefully placed half-torn wallpaper?

That could work…

 Shen Qingqiu scratched and tore at the wall until the early hours of the morning.

The thin drapes let the morning sunlight through on the dawn of another day, and Shen Qingqiu wondered how many days it had been away from Luo Binghe. Had it been longer than a week? That was the longest Luo Binghe had ever really left him by himself, before.

Luo Binghe would always give him breakfast in the mornings, then lunch in the afternoon, then dinner before bed. It wasn’t like Shen Qingqiu ever needed to eat that much, but it was nice.

Luo Binghe was also so careful to never let Shen Qingqiu feel uncomfortable or insecure about eating. Luo Binghe cared about him, and that was what it meant to eat breakfast every morning and dinner every night. It was to show Shen Qingqiu that he knew everything about him, and cared a lot anyways.

Shen Qingqiu shut the fridge with a mouth that tasted like sawdust. He had eaten last night, so he didn’t need to now. Yue Qingyuan hadn’t explicitly told him to eat breakfast, anyway.

It was fine.

Shen Qingqiu sat down on the couch again, eager to test his progress with his ability to relax and not get up from the couch to check his locks. To his surprise, he seemed to be doing worse today.

He would zone out for a long time, staring at some spot on the carpet, but then his body would jolt with some irrational fear and he would leap up from the couch and anxiously walk around.

Luo Binghe wouldn’t let this happen. Luo Binghe was barely here, barely seen in the traces of lines between the misshapen scratches on Shen Qingqiu’s bedroom wall. That wasn’t enough to protect him.

It was probably just a bad day, or maybe it had been a bad night. Luo Binghe had never seemed so far away, and Shen Qingqiu hadn’t really been making progress trying to improve his self-sufficiency.

Any work he had done with Yue Qingyuan to forget about Luo Binghe taking care of him and live his own life, had been undone by the hours he poured into completing the wallpaper-mural. He had thought that if he finished that, then he wouldn’t need to rely on himself, but he had been wrong. Luo Binghe had returned Shen Qingqiu’s life to him, and there was no way that Shen Qingqiu could give it back again.

Luo Binghe wasn’t here, and while Shen Qingqiu was now able to get dressed and brush his hair in the mornings, he still wasn’t even close to how he was and it was hard to want to improve.

He didn’t want to wrestle with the tangles, eyes watering in pain. Dressing was hard, especially in uncomfortable clothes with many buttons. Stretching an old injury…

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t tried that yet, although he knew he had to. Yue Qingyuan had told him to do it today, and the last time he didn’t do something Yue Qingyuan told him to, his stomach hurt and he nearly threw up after dinner.

He had already been starting to feel the ache in his shoulder, more now that he was working on murals again for hours at a time. That was how his shoulder got displaced the first time, and it was going to happen again unless he did something about it. Plus, he did not want a physical therapist in his house.

Chapter Text

Keeping the tv going for the background noise, Shen Qingqiu stood in the middle of his living room. Since the glass coffee table in the middle of the room was way too heavy for him to move, Shen Qingqiu stood off to the side, near the window.

This way, he supposed, he would have a wall to stabilize himself on if he started to fall, and he was far enough away from anything fragile that nothing should get damaged.

What was the first thing Luo Binghe always had him do? Besides ice and hot packs, because Shen Qingqiu could do those at the end.

Shen Qingqiu started with shoulder rotations. Ten repetitions of arm circles going forward, ten repetitions backwards, and then repeat all that a few times. Luo Binghe would always count out loud, so there was no mystery about when they were done, so Shen Qingqiu did that too.

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t remember if they usually repeated it three or four times, so he just stopped at two. His shoulders were really starting to get sore, sorer than he ever remembered them being. He did a few more motion exercises to warm up, but he stopped after a little while.

Maybe he wasn’t doing them right. Were they supposed to hurt this much? Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to do it without help.

Stretches should be easier, because he only needed to hold one position for a count of ten. Shen Qingqiu put his palm high on the wall and pressed his chest as close as his injured shoulder would allow.

One, two, three, four…

Luo Binghe would never count aloud for these, because he would always be observing Shen Qingqiu’s little reactions in case a stretch went too far and injured him more. Shen Qingqiu didn’t speak often, so Luo Binghe could always read his body language like an open book, and doing his stretches was no exception.

Shen Qingqiu let his arm fall, wincing at the sudden change of position. Luo Binghe would always massage it when it felt like this, and it would never really make it hurt less, but it made him feel better about it.

He sighed and inched the same hand up the wall to do the stretch for another ten seconds. This time he didn’t go quite as high so that it was easier to handle.

…five, six, seven, eight…

A familiar voice pricked his ear and his head whipped around towards his tv, stretch forgotten. The pain of the sudden position change as his hand dropped didn’t matter so much, either.

Luo Binghe was on his tv screen. Luo Binghe was here, in his room.

Luo Binghe?

Shen Qingqiu couldn’t even bring himself to whisper the name, but his eyes went wide and he scrambled to get closer before going completely still.

He was here! He hadn’t been a dream. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been imagining those thousands of little moments. His heart hadn’t been built on a lie or some comfort-seeking hallucination. Luo Binghe was real, and he was his, and that overwhelming relief that the mythical Luo Binghe was still in this changed world of Shen Qingqiu’s threatened to consume him.

Was Luo Binghe okay? His voice didn’t sound anything like Luo Binghe’s normal gentle tones.

It was some kind of sports competition interview, Shen Qingqiu realized after a few seconds. His voice was distant, professional, and cold.

He—

Shen Qingqiu felt tears prick at the backs of his eyes.

Luo Binghe had left him, but now he was here, he was back. But he didn’t want Shen Qingqiu.

Luo Binghe had left him. Shen Qingqiu wasn’t wanted anymore. He had done something, he didn’t know what, but he wasn’t good enough, and now Luo Binghe wouldn’t let him into his room.

He hadn’t done what Yue Qingyuan had said, he hadn’t done what Luo Binghe had told him to do, so of course he didn’t deserve Luo Binghe here, comforting him. He was terrible at remembering who he was.

Everything was so much harder without Luo Binghe, but did Luo Binghe even remember him?

Luo Binghe was cold. He looked down his nose at the interviewer with shut-off eyes, answering questions with the lowest number of words he could use.

“Sorry,” Shen Qingqiu whispered, falling to his knees. If Shen Qingqiu wanted forgiveness, Luo Binghe would give it to him, right? Even if Shen Qingqiu himself wasn’t good enough?

Luo Binghe’s eyes would go warm and soft, any minute now, as his cold demeanor melts at the sight of Shen Qingqiu’s helplessness. “Of course I can help you,” he would murmur.

Tears welled up in the corners of Shen Qingqiu’s eyes. Luo Binghe didn’t want him. He wasn’t good enough, and he never would be.

Without Luo Binghe, he would be stuck like this forever. He would never be able to fix himself. He wasn’t good enough to obey Yue Qingyuan and he wasn’t good enough to be like that, like the cold martial god on the screen.

A sinking, hollow pit opened wide in his gut. Luo Binghe was never coming back for him.

Still, he couldn’t tear his eyes from the screen long after the interview with Luo Binghe was over and the next fencing tournament began. Luo Binghe didn’t show up on the screen though. Why wasn’t Luo Binghe here? Didn’t he miss Shen Qingqiu?

Didn’t he feel like his heart was being torn out of his chest, like he would never feel happiness again?

Shen Qingqiu’s head hurt from the tension in his face as he sobbed. Luo Binghe, Luo Binghe.

He just needed a hug, was that so hard? Would that be the biggest burden?

Even though Shen Qingqiu just wanted to curl up and sob into the carpet, he knew he would just be proving the point. He really would be useless.

But he could take care of himself! Really, he was good at it, even! Got dressed this morning by himself and everything!

He tried standing up to prove it, but his vision swam and he couldn’t get himself to focus on anything other than the screen, so he crawled towards the remote and switched it off before using the glass coffee table to pull himself to his feet.

Miserably, he pulled his arm across his chest, adding a bounce to the motion to go even farther.

He knew instantly he had done it wrong. Pain lanced up his arm and he screamed, nearly collapsing again with the force of the pain. Wrong, wrong, wrong, this is why he needed Luo Binghe.

Everything hurt and only Luo Binghe could make it better. Shen Qingqiu’s uninjured hand flew up to the shoulder, fluttering over the damaged tissue and trying to figure out what went wrong.

Luo Binghe would massage him. Luo Binghe would make it better with a hug and a nap. Luo Binghe didn’t want him in his bed, Luo Binghe didn’t want him in his room, Luo Binghe had kicked him out of his life.

Shen Qingqiu squinted through the haze of tears and reached for the phone on his end table.

“H-Help?” He asked breathlessly. Yue Qingyuan always answered quickly, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t give him time to ask if something was wrong. “Pl-ple—” Shen Qingqiu broke down crying into the microphone with uncontrollable hitching breaths, cradling his shoulder as best as he could with only one hand.

Luo Binghe wasn’t here, but Shen Qingqiu needed the reassurance that someone was. He needed to know that someone in this vicious world cared about him. Time seemed to pass slowly until Yue Qingyuan arrived with his familiar two knocks on the front door.

While waiting for him to come, Shen Qingqiu had unlocked the door and waited with baited breath. He didn’t care about intruders anymore, not when his shoulder was already so broken and Luo Binghe didn’t want him anymore. There were bigger things he had to worry about than silly things like locks.

If Yue Qingyuan couldn’t get in, then Shen Qingqiu would be truly alone. Yue Qingyuan shut the door behind him quietly and knelt down to be eye-level with Shen Qingqiu, who was curled up in a ball against the side of the couch.

“What do you want me to help you with?” Yue Qingyuan asked softly. Shen Qingqiu had called for a reason, after all. If he just didn’t want to be alone, then Yue Qingyuan would sit there with him for however long he wanted.

Shen Qingqiu hesitated for a moment. While he was waiting for Yue Qingyuan to get there, he thought about this question. He was going to ask Yue Qingyuan for a hug.

But such a monumental thing wasn’t so easy, now that Yue Qingyuan was right in front of him.

Shen Qingqiu was such a broken little thing, a discarded shell of a man that nobody wanted. How could he possibly ask Yue Qingyuan to put his arms around his repulsive, sticklike body?

If he hadn’t deserved love from Luo Binghe, the one person who had been willing to provide everything for him, there was no way he was going to get affection from Yue Qingyuan. It was clear enough in the lack of praise, and how Yue Qingyuan never told him ‘good job’ or came near enough to touch him.

Shen Qingqiu gathered all of his courage anyway and swallowed hard. He cleared his throat and willed his crying to stop, because he was only going to be able to say this once and he didn’t want to be misheard. “I want a hug, please. If—if you can.”

Instead of clearing, Yue Qingyuan’s face got more confused and he tilted his head as if he hadn’t heard quite right. “I haven’t been coming too close to you because you flinch every time. You always back away when I’m nearby, and tense up when I reach out. Are you sure you want that?”

So Yue Qingyuan hated the idea of hugging him, then. That was a rejection, plain and simple. Shen Qingqiu was too easily startled for Yue Qingyuan to want to hug. Too injured and uneasy.

“N—no, I can, if you want,” Yue Qingyuan backtracked quickly at the look on Shen Qingqiu’s face. “Of course I can give you a hug, I just wasn’t sure that…never mind. If you think it will make you feel better and not worse, then of course I can. Come here?” Yue Qingyuan held his arms out, inching closer on his knees.

Shen Qingqiu sniffled and scooted forward too, wrapping his arms around Yue Qingyuan just like how he used to do with Luo Binghe. And, responding exactly in kind, Yue Qingyuan’s arms came up to hold him the same way.

Shen Qingqiu shuddered, the déjà vu hitting him like a sledgehammer. The clothes were wrong, the temperature of the air and the lighting were wrong, but the comfort in the way Yue Qingyuan held him, like he was afraid of breaking something, was incredibly familiar.

“Thank you,” Shen Qingqiu whispered in his ear, as he closed his own eyes. Like this, he could almost pretend Luo Binghe was right there. It was as if Luo Binghe wanted him back, cared about him, and wasn’t like that cold imposter on his tv screen.

Any moment now, Jello would need to be fed and Luo Binghe was there to hold his hand while they heated up the mice. Since Shen Qingqiu was so agitated, Luo Binghe would kiss him to help him realize that he was safe.

Sometimes hugs just weren’t enough to calm Shen Qingqiu down all the way, or didn’t fully convince him that everything was alright. The barely-there brush of their lips against each other’s was like renewing a vow of protection and care. Of course it meant the world between Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu.

…This wasn’t Luo Binghe that Shen Qingqiu just kissed. Shen Qingqiu jolted backwards, separating their faces, but he was still too weak to immediately break out of the hug. Hopefully Yue Qingyuan wouldn’t push him away, it was really just a mistake! Shen Qingqiu would be more careful next time! That is, if Yue Qingyuan still let him have hugs after this.

“I…” Yue Qingyuan couldn’t seem to look at Shen Qingqiu’s face, staring down at the ground with a light blush high on his cheekbones. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to be together in that way, I’m sorry. I may have had a crush on you when we were young, but—”

The rest of Yue Qingyuan’s words were drowned by a tidal wave in Shen Qingqiu’s ears as he froze in shock. Yue Qingyuan was one of them.

Yue Qingyuan was a man who desired other men. A man who wanted Shen Qingqiu.

All this time, he had been worried about an intruder in his house coming in to hurt him, and he hadn’t even considered that he had been inviting in the worst kind of intruder that existed. Shen Qingqiu fell completely still as his eyes started to unfocus.

“…after all, I am a doctor and you are my patient, so it—”

“Oh,” Shen Qingqiu said, the sound barely audible, and the flood of words flowing out of Yue Qingyuan’s mouth cut off. “You…you want to rape me?” He rasped dazedly.

Yue Qingyuan went very still. “What. What are you talking about? I’m not—absolutely not! No!” His face was as white as a sheet, and he quickly pushed Shen Qingqiu away from the cradle of his body.

Shen Qingqiu could do nothing but lay on the floor, staring wide-eyed up at the ceiling. There was nothing he could do to stop it. Nothing he could say would convince Yue Qingyuan to leave.

Maybe this is why Yue Qingyuan would never praise him. Because he would only praise Shen Qingqiu if—if he was using his body. Or to ‘calm him down a little.’ Shen Qingqiu’s body shook with silent tears. He had been in so much danger, and he hadn’t even known about it.

His mind was starting to become detached from his body, he could feel it. Soon Yue Qingyuan could do whatever he wanted and Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be there for it. Maybe he would stay there forever, since Luo Binghe wasn’t here to bring his broken pieces back together again.

Yue Qingyuan knew, now, that Shen Qingqiu relaxed with praise and touch. He had everything he needed to do something unspeakable, and Shen Qingqiu would never be safe from him again.

“Out,” Shen Qingqiu whispered, a final plea before he himself left. There was no way Yue Qingyuan would listen to him, but it made him feel better that at least he had put up a little bit of a fight.

He couldn’t defend himself, but at least he could still… ask for safety?

Nothing could be heard over the roar in his ears, so Shen Qingqiu let his eyes unfocus as he drifted listlessly.

*_*

Shen Qingqiu came back to reality with a throbbing pain in his skull. Why did his head hurt so bad?

His face felt itchy and wet, like he had been crying for hours, but he didn’t remember that. Shen Qingqiu scrubbed at his face with a yawn. He was exhausted. He hadn’t slept in a few nights, he remembered, but it was hard to place exactly why.

He stumbled to his bedroom, only getting there quickly because his feet seemed to know the way. He tucked himself into bed, wrapping his face around his comforter so that he could breathe, but his ears and neck were covered and safe.

He closed his eyes, but sleep never came. His thoughts felt slow and sticky, and something distinctly unpleasant lurked in the back there, making his heart race with stressed anticipation. As much as he tried to ignore it, it wouldn’t let itself be ignored, just like the throbbing pain in his head.

For the entire night, he tossed and turned, unable to find a comfortable position to lay that didn’t aggravate his head and totally unable to find unconsciousness.

Where was Luo Binghe? Didn’t he care that Shen Qingqiu was suffering like this?

Shen Qingqiu, of course, knew that Luo Binghe wasn’t actually there. That Luo Binghe didn’t actually care about him. But it felt better to ask himself the stupid questions than to face the reality of the fact that he wasn’t good enough to be wanted.

Yue Qingyuan… Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to think about Yue Qingyuan. Neither him nor Luo Binghe was in his life anymore, and that meant loneliness. Shen Qingqiu couldn’t think his own future.

He would be alone, suffering pointlessly until he died. It should be soon, he decided, when the sky started to lighten to signify the morning. If he was going to live like this, every day afraid and every night alone, then it would be better to die quickly.

Shen Qingqiu got out of bed that morning thinking that it would have been better if he hadn’t gotten into bed at all. Instead of the reassurance of safety and comfort, the darkness seemed to invite unwanted thoughts.

The daylight couldn’t burn them all completely away, though, and by the time Shen Qingqiu got dressed, brushed his hair, and sat down in front of the tv, the directionless anxiety that warned him of unknown dangers now sat alongside a strange kind of deep-set numbness. Maybe this was what betrayal felt like.

Whatever it was, it was difficult to breathe through, like it was sitting on Shen Qingqiu’s lungs, and without really thinking about it, Shen Qingqiu had retrieved his phone from the glass coffee table.

There were still only two contacts. Shen Qingqiu scrolled nervously, as if more could suddenly appear, but of course nothing happened.

Left with little alternative, Shen Qingqiu called the reporter. ‘Li Yu’ was her contact title, so it must have been her name. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t even realized that he hadn’t asked.

She knew that he had been away for a long time, though. She knew a lot about him, it seemed, and that was a good thing because then she couldn’t get offended if he misstepped.

The only problem was that she really, really wanted to know what had happened to Shen Qingqiu while he was gone, and Shen Qingqiu had no intention of telling her. Luo Binghe was his safe little secret, and no one else could have him.

It was fine.

Li Yu picked up on the third ring.

“Hello? Who is this?” She sounded tired, and Shen Qingqiu realized that it was still fairly early in the morning. Ah, he had probably woken her.

“Sorry for waking you,” Shen Qingqiu said. His voice still hadn’t returned to normal, gravelly and painful, but hopefully it sounded tired too. That way it would seem like he had also woken up with this phone call, and he wouldn’t be blamed for calling… no, that didn’t make any sense…

There was some shuffling on the other end, and Li Yu’s voice seemed to brighten. “It’s you! Can I come over right now? I just woke up, but I should be able to be there in fifteen, if that’s okay?”

Shen Qingqiu managed a noise of affirmation before he could think too much about it. She couldn’t possibly have bad intentions with him, he was sure.

She was a woman, and women that came over to his house, in his limited experience, just wanted to make him happy. Besides, women had been allowed over to his apartment before, he was pretty sure.

Yue Qingyuan was the only exception to the rule as far back as Shen Qingqiu’s memory could stretch, and he had turned out to be bad. No more exceptions were allowed.

Li Yu hung up, probably because she had to get ready to come over, and Shen Qingqiu slowly set his phone down on the table. Hopefully he wouldn’t regret what he’d done. It was hard to trust his decision making. It seemed like everything he did after leaving the safety of Luo Binghe’s room just made his own life worse.

Shen Qingqiu rethought his decision several times through the next fifteen minutes. He checked the locks on the front door after every lap around the living room, in case Yue Qingyuan decided to come back while he was least expecting it, and made sure all the windows were shut tightly so no one could see inside.

Li Yu knocked on the door, calling out at the same time. “Shen Qingqiu! I’m here!”

Shen Qingqiu wondered if she did that because she knew how much safer it made him feel for him to hear her voice before opening the door, or if she shouted because that’s the kind of person she was. In any case, Shen Qingqiu didn’t feel apprehensive as he unlocked the door.

“Hi.” She smiled warmly at him as she stepped inside. “It’s good to see you. How are you feeling?”

Words stopped in Shen Qingqiu’s throat. Luo Binghe never asked that question because he could read it off of Shen Qingqiu’s face, and Yue Qingyuan seemed to know that Shen Qingqiu couldn’t really tell him so he didn’t ask.

Li Yu, though. She wouldn’t judge him if he told her the truth, and besides, he was getting really tired of people not knowing. “Just…lonely,” Shen Qingqiu answered truthfully.

That way, he realized belatedly, he had also told her the reason why he had invited her over.

She tilted her head, and motioned towards the couch. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Li Yu just wanted information, he knew. She wanted to know what had happened to him over the last four years, and Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to explain everything to her. But he did really, really want to ‘talk about it.’

So he followed her over to the couch and sat down next to her.

Yue Qingyuan never sat down next to Shen Qingqiu, trying to maintain professional distance or something, but she scooted closer. Maybe she saw how cold he was, or how he was hugging his arms.

He should really… stop doing that. It wasn’t at all like how the Olympian Shen Qingqiu would act.

But it was hard. Li Yu seemed to soften at his cracks in the façade. Every time he showed he was vulnerable, like in that hospital room when he asked if there was anyone who would contact him, she had helped him.

Well, couldn’t she help him now?

“He left me alone. Even though I really didn’t want him to. He doesn’t want me anymore,” Shen Qingqiu tried to explain. All the thoughts that had run through his head a million times that night tried to get past his lips, but it didn’t make much sense.

Still, Li Yu’s brows creased in concern. “Were you and him, like… I mean, is this heartbreak? Why you’re like this?” Shen Qingqiu shrugged listlessly.

“He told me that after a year, I would have to get sent back home. I made him promise that, and then the year was over really quickly and I didn’t want to go—” Shen Qingqiu flinched away from Li Yu’s outstretched hand, placed comfortingly on his forearm.

Li Yu was smiling, a little. “It sounds like he didn’t abandon you, I think. He probably didn’t want you to go either, but since he promised, he had to make you leave. That means that you can go back to him! This is good news!”

“No,” Shen Qingqiu shook his head. “I can’t go back.” He didn’t even know where Luo Binghe was.

He didn’t even know if his Luo Binghe was the same person as the one on tv, the icy, professional fencer that Shen Qingqiu was trying to be. Maybe Luo Binghe only existed in that hidden missile silo. In any case, he wasn’t ever able to go back.

But she was right. Luo Binghe hadn’t abandoned him. The only reason Luo Binghe wasn’t with him now was because Shen Qingqiu didn’t let him. Shen Qingqiu pushed him away, and he would spend the rest of his life regretting that decision.

He would never see his Luo Binghe ever again.

The thought hit him like a battering ram, startling a sob out of him. “Do you want a hug?” Li Yu asked hesitantly, reaching out an awkward hand.

This was so unlike the aloof, untouchable fencer that she had researched so heavily and poured hours into. If the world knew what she knew now, nothing good would happen. Nothing that comes from this visit could be on the record, and certainly not reported on.

Shen Qingqiu did want a hug. Luo Binghe wasn’t here, but this woman would never hurt him, and he wanted the invasive horror of Yue Qingyuan’s presence gone. He never wanted to remember him again. He crawled forward onto the couch and curled up in her arms, crying as silently as possible.

This wasn’t helping him at all.

This wasn’t the three-time Olympian medalist that didn’t need help from anyone and never cried. He was failing at remembering who he was. With a little difficultly, he extracted himself from her arms and wiped his face on his sleeve. Maybe Li Yu could help him in a different way.

Maybe she could help him forget about Luo Binghe.

“Do you want to see what he looks like?” Shen Qingqiu asked, voice trembling a little.

Li Yu nodded slowly. “If you’ll let me. If you don’t want to, don’t force yourself, and don’t feel obligated or anything. I’m here for you.”

Shen Qingqiu carefully got up, making sure not to trip on the path around the couch, and showed her to the bedroom. Surely if she sees Luo Binghe, she’ll know how to help Shen Qingqiu get better.

Yue Qingyuan wasn’t allowed to see the mural because he would make Shen Qingqiu stop working on it. But Li Yu wouldn’t just make him stop. Li Yu would help him just by knowing what was wrong, maybe.

That’s what had just happened. Shen Qingqiu told Li Yu about his loneliness, and just by her knowing, Shen Qingqiu had felt better.

He let the door swing open to his bedroom, hand twitching towards the wall.

Li Yu didn’t look sympathetic, though. She didn’t look sad or comforting or hopeful. She just looked confused.

“Did you do this? Why did you destroy the wall?” She asked in a whisper, reaching up to put one of the shreds of paper back in its place.

But didn’t she see that the shred made a shadow that looked like Luo Binghe’s nose? That shred of paper was important to the mural, so it didn’t make sense why she would try to put it flat to the bare wall. She wasn’t looking at him, and Shen Qingqiu fidgeted uncomfortably.

Maybe she just didn’t like it?

“This is him,” he explained. This was Luo Binghe. Sure, the shape of a human face could be hard to see, but couldn’t see sense the kind eyes on her? Couldn’t she feel the way the texture of the wall mimicked soft skin?

She shut her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, she was looking at Shen Qingqiu’s face, and she seemed very sad. “This is what rejected you? This wall?”

Shen Qingqiu nodded, a bit uneasy at the way her tone had changed so suddenly. He didn’t get what was so hard for her to understand. Why didn’t she seem sympathetic anymore?

He was sure he had done something wrong, but he didn’t know what. He wanted to ask for a hug again, but she probably wouldn’t like that after his failure. Greater than the desire for a hug was his fear of being rejected.

She glanced down at Shen Qingqiu’s hands, rusty colored with dried blood, nails cracked through to the beds and jagged from healing improperly.

“I’m sorry,” Li Yu said, and her voice still sounded so sad. “I need to call some people. If you want, I’ll be right back.”

She didn’t wait for his response before leaving his bedroom, and Shen Qingqiu could hear the front door click shut behind her. He was left reeling, alone with Luo Binghe and very confused.

He decided he wouldn’t let anyone else see this wall. Li Yu seeing it might have been a mistake, he wasn’t sure yet, but the ominous feeling in his chest seemed to tell him that he should never have let her even in the house.

Directionless anxiety seemed to be his new constant companion. It was clear Li Yu was greatly affected by the mural on his wall, but Shen Qingqiu wasn’t sure how, and he wasn’t sure if Li Yu was going to use the knowledge for something bad.

He…trusted her, he thought. She wouldn’t betray that trust, especially not so quickly, right?

Li Yu finished making her calls, and Shen Qingqiu shut the bedroom door behind him as he walked into the living room to meet her.

She took his hands into her hands, and Shen Qingqiu just stared at her. The touch didn’t seem like it was meant to cage him. It was comforting. Why did it feel so strange, then? Where was this uneasiness coming from?

“I called some people that can help you. I promise they’re going to come here to help you, and you can talk with them in a safe space. They’ll help you get better, do you understand?” She asked quietly. Shen Qingqiu didn’t understand, but he nodded anyway.

People trying to help him was a good thing. But it was impossible to know if he could trust them.

Eventually, there was nothing more Li Yu could say to him, and Shen Qingqiu was a little shaken up by the encounter, so she left with a quiet goodbye and a small smile. Since Shen Qingqiu had nothing better to do, he turned on the tv again. Hopefully Luo Binghe would show up again, and maybe this time he would look sad. Like he missed Shen Qingqiu, his treasure.

It was hard to calm down enough to sit and watch boring tv, though, so Shen Qingqiu paced around the house instead, occasionally glancing at the screen. Around now would be the time that Yue Qingyuan would arrive, if he were ever welcome back.

Two knocks sounded at the door, the sound echoing through the silent apartment and sending a thrill of adrenaline through Shen Qingqiu’s veins. He backed up slowly, hiding in the corner of the living room. The door was still locked, he reassured himself. He had checked it, unlocking and relocking it, at least a dozen times in the last ten minutes. It was all going to be okay.

The two knocks didn’t sound again, so Shen Qingqiu got up on shaky legs to check through the peephole. There was no one there.

Shen Qingqiu checked the lock again.

He would wait for another half an hour, and then take a look outside. Yue Qingyuan could be hiding in wait for his opportunity.

When he finally opened the door, he found a little package sitting outside. It was already scary to be partially in the hallway, so Shen Qingqiu grabbed the box and darted back inside, locking the door as he went.

It was food.

It smelled absolutely delicious, and Shen Qingqiu didn’t even retrieve a spoon before scarfing down the light soup. There wasn’t much of it in one package, and once Shen Qingqiu was finished, Yue Qingyuan’s voice seemed to echo in his ears.

Right. He couldn’t eat too much, or else he would just throw up and feel worse.

Shen Qingqiu saved the rest of the packages of soup in the refrigerator along with the dumplings, hoping that he would remember to eat it in the morning tomorrow.

He had gotten lucky today with food randomly appearing in front of his door, but he might not later. He needed to remember to eat.

Maybe the people that Li Yu had mentioned would help him with that.

*_*

Over the next few days, people kept knocking on his door. Men, women, older people, teenagers, everyone, and they all had the sole purpose of getting inside.

Very quickly, the stream of people seemed to realize that only women were ever let into the house, and never the ones with cold eyes. They all wanted to talk to him and these strangers all wanted him to respond with his closest secrets.

Soon his voice started to close up because of all the talking. All the small stuff that was trying to get him to open up, to get him comfortable talking, it just hurt him. These people didn’t seem to want him to be happy, these people just wanted him to talk, no matter how much it hurt.

He stopped being able to talk really at all, and that just seemed to frustrate the unceasing tide of people. Still, every night, there would be two knocks on the door and dinner sitting outside when Shen Qingqiu got up the courage to answer.

There was only one woman who Shen Qingqiu ever really talked to.

She looked so much like Li Yu that Shen Qingqiu didn’t think twice about letting her inside. It was only a belated second later that he realized it wasn’t the same woman.

But she was already inside the house, so it was easier to pretend rather than be nervous about the stranger.

“Hello,” Shen Qingqiu said to this Li Yu hesitantly. His voice had become quieter than the last time he had talked to her, but hopefully she didn’t mind.

She greeted him with a small but genuine smile in return. “Thank you for letting me in.”

They talked for a while, Li Yu asking simple questions and Shen Qingqiu answering. She talked mostly, since Shen Qingqiu was starting to get tired, and Shen Qingqiu was grateful that he was allowed to tuck himself into her side.

Without realizing why, Shen Qingqiu started crying. Maybe it was the familiarity of being in the arms of someone who cared about him. It was an incredible feeling; even though he was crying, it felt really good to be there and not have anything expected of him.

“Why are you so afraid of strangers? Why don’t you trust men?” She asked. Muted sounds of the city traffic floated through the thick glass window, but the tv was off, so otherwise the room was darkened with thick curtains and quiet.

Shen Qingqiu took a moment to answer, but Li Yu was willing to wait. “When—when I was gone.” They both knew he was talking about his four-year absence. She nodded. “There was—a—a man… not safe.” Not Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu continued, tears drying up as he tried to find the words. “I was sleeping. But he woke me up. Touched me…” He was having trouble finding the words. How was it possible to describe the horror of the moment, the physical pain and sickness at such a terrifying invasion of everything Shen Qingqiu was?

His breath was starting to stutter, and he knew he was going to start crying again. It was okay though, because Li Yu was understanding and sweet, and crying like this didn’t feel bad like it normally did. This kind of crying wasn’t anxious or numb. There was no fear in it, just the scabbed-over pain of old memories. “H-hurt. Tore through my body. Not—not cuddling. Not gentle. Rip—ripped—”

She ran her hands through his long hair, just like Luo Binghe did, silent but encouraging. “I’m so sorry that happened to you. What happened next? After the man left?”

Shen Qingqiu let out a shuddering breath, bringing his hands close to his chest. He wished he had something to hold to comfort him. He missed Jello. “Then another. Then… another. Another.”

Her hand paused in his hair. “That sounds like it was very scary. How many men were there in total?”

Shen Qingqiu remembered, about three or four weeks before he was put back into Chaoyang, Luo Binghe and him talked about it again. They were sitting in the bedroom together, and Shen Qingqiu woken up a while before the alarm went off.

In the early hours of the morning, with nothing else to do and no desire to get out of bed, Shen Qingqiu was left with his thoughts. Usually he tried to avoid thinking about when those men had broken into his room, but this time he decided that he was done with being afraid of those memories.

Luo Binghe hugged him and snuggled him all the time, even kissed him, and there was never pain there. Luo Binghe cared about him so, so much, and he was nothing like those men were.

It was during those early-morning hours that Shen Qingqiu asked a soft, nearly silent question aloud into the darkness. “Was it more than one?”

Luo Binghe was awake too. If he wasn’t, then Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t have bothered asking the question. He sighed, a sound that was nothing more than the smallest puff of air. “You’re safe here. Everyone that hurt you is dead, but…yes. There were more than one.”

Shen Qingqiu didn’t even need to ask the same question that Li Yu had. Luo Binghe could read his face through the silence and only hesitated a moment before answering.

“Nine.”

Li Yu could only whisper now with a voice weighed down by horror. “I believe you. That should never have happened. I am so sorry you had to go through that.”

That night, when Li Yu left, Shen Qingqiu stayed for a few extra minutes next to the door. Li Yu hadn’t left, and she was talking to someone else. Maybe telling someone else how to comfort Shen Qingqiu?

It was a man, he realized instantly, and wilted a little. He would never let a man comfort him if it wasn’t Luo Binghe. Li Yu couldn’t possibly have anything worthwhile to say to the stranger outside his door.

“If we just had more time, give it a few years, then he would show significant progress. I’ve gotten him to open up to me just today, isn’t that effective enough?” Li Yu pleaded.

The man responded with a resounding negative noise. “We need him to be fit for public appearances sooner than next week. We don’t need someone he can open up to, we need someone who can fix whatever’s broken in his head. There’s just no time for your approach. I’m sorry, but we just can’t hire you. I don’t care about your clinic’s financial problems.”

Li Yu sighed. “He doesn’t want to get better, that’s the problem. He just wants comfort right now, and he’s still hung up on whatever’s happened during those four years. If you could just let me find out what it was—”

“No. I’m sorry. You can’t change anything fast enough to matter. The world knows Shen Qingqiu is alive now and your methods won’t be enough for him to be able show his face. You don’t get to contact him anymore. Liu Yihan, you’re dismissed.”

Chapter Text

The stream of people tapered over the next few days, but it took Shen Qingqiu longer than that to figure out why. Have they finally realized that Shen Qingqiu didn’t want people to keep coming over?

It finally hit him when he was pacing around the house with his tv on.

Usually, it was nothing unusual to hear his own name on the tv. People liked to talk about him, but Shen Qingqiu didn’t care too much. His name didn’t mean much too him anyway. Luo Binghe had only ever used his name once, and that was in the command to remember who you are, Shen Qingqiu. He had never needed to respond to it, because the people who used it weren’t people that Shen Qingqiu wanted to see.

It usually didn’t mean much.

But this time, Luo Binghe had also been mentioned. Shen Qingqiu’s ears were pricked every single time Luo Binghe’s name was mentioned. Several times he had seen him onscreen, and every time he would tell himself to turn the tv off, but he never did.

“—Luo Binghe may be the hegemon of the fencing world right now, but you have to remember that Shen Qingqiu paved the way for him.”

It was some talk show, and the man behind the desk was tall, sarcastic, and incredibly fake. Shen Qingqiu thought about just dismissing it to continue to check behind the curtains for intruders.

“Well, you know, Shen Qingqiu left in disgrace. Not a lot of us think about him anymore, not after his four-year scandal. We’re lucky we found out about it at all, really.” The guy sitting on the couch next to the host was even more tall and fake, from the way his white-white teeth flashed when he spoke to his carefully-arranged lounging posture.

The host laughed. “Well that’s just allegedly. We don’t know if Luo Binghe knows about his predecessors’… troubling proclivities with other men.”

“’Troubling proclivities.’ Well said,” The man on the couch drawled. “If you could count nine in a row as just—aiyah, that doesn’t even cover it.  Shen ‘Jiu’ was—for four years— doing stuff like that, and we don’t even know the half of it! That man’s a lost cause. He hasn’t made a public appearance yet, because he’d be arrested or just couldn’t face the shame!”

Shen Qingqiu blinked. Then he sat down on the couch, stupefied, as the two men on the tv continued to blather on.

He had been… sold out? Li Yu had told other people, important people, about Shen Qingqiu’s four secret years. He thought that she wouldn’t do that.

He thought she cared about him, not about selling his face to people who would break it.

Those people that had stopped showing up hadn’t decided that he was better off on his own, then. Those people had given up.

Shen Qingqiu felt his stomach sink. Luo Binghe might think that Shen Qingqiu would take comfort in other men like that. Luo Binghe used to know him inside and out, but now the only things Luo Binghe could know about him were through the news.

On the tv in the background, they kept calling him Shen Jiu. As if that was all he was worth, like his body’s only use was to be ripped by man after man. Luo Binghe was seeing this, maybe even believing it.

What if Luo Binghe thought that Shen Qingqiu didn’t need him anymore?

Shen ‘Jiu’ hugged his body. So many people knew now.

So many people knew that he was vulnerable. That he could be raped. They thought he would enjoy being ripped apart, even.

The thought was unbearable. Shen ‘Jiu’ peeked outside his window, half-expecting there to be a crowd of people outside trying to get in. There was no one.

But there could be some people that snuck in already. The locks—Shen ‘Jiu’ had never trusted the locks. It was never safe here. His breaths came in quick pants, his vision swimming as he tucked himself into the corner of the room.

He was so vulnerable.

Stress had made him lose weight that he couldn’t afford to lose, and he wasn’t eating the dinners that were outside his door anymore. He hadn’t yet slept through the night in his cold, exposed bed, and every time he would hear something outside his window he would jump and cringe into a corner to hide.

Exhausted, afraid, and completely alone, Shen ‘Jiu’ was nearly crying nonstop.

Once he was able to breathe again, he stood up on shaky legs, blinking the dark spots out of his vision.

“Hello?” he yelled, voice scratchy. “Ple—please don’t hurt me. I’m not—please!”

There was no one there to answer, but there was also no one there to shush him and hug him until he calmed down. This was a dangerous place.

“I know I’m not good enough for you!” Shen ‘Jiu’ yelled at the wall. The mural was peeling and faded, the soft texture of skin more like unforgiving concrete, and Shen ‘Jiu’ couldn’t remember where Luo Binghe’s eyes were supposed to be. Shen ‘Jiu’ spent the night tearing up the wall searching for where Luo Binghe might have gone. “Where did you go?!”

“I’m not going to be hurt again!” Even his own shouts seemed insignificant in the vastness of the apartment. Like they were being swallowed up by the tall white walls.

“Please help me! Anyone! I—I can be held! I’ll even like it, I promise!” Shen ‘Jiu’ tried to lure out the intruders, but he held a knife. As soon as the people in the shadows came out, Shen ‘Jiu’ would attack. They just needed to show themselves. He wasn’t vulnerable!

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry! Please come back!” But Luo Binghe was gone, and no amount of yelling would bring Shen ‘Jiu’ back to the underground missile silo.

“I can’t do this! I can’t do this alone! I can’t do this! Help me…”

“Where are you? I can see you! You can’t hide from me!”

“Why do you want my blood? I can show you my blood just fine! Why—why do you—”

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. So sorry. I’m really sorry. So sorry.”

Had months passed? It was hard to know.

The scars up and down his arms had faded from bleeding wounds to scabs to white streaks on his skin, but he kept cutting more across them with the knife so it was hard to see the first few cuts.

No. He wouldn’t do that. Luo Binghe told him not to hurt himself! He would never…

Luo Binghe was gone. Luo Binghe gave up on him. No—the world gave up on him. Shen ‘Jiu’ gave up on Luo Binghe?

The world— Luo Binghe gave Shen ‘Jiu’ the world. Or…

He wasn’t safe here! Shen ‘Jiu’ jolted, his entire body tensing up and making his head pound as he jerked up and glanced around quickly. People were everywhere here. He should move, or else they’ll get him, but there is no safe place for him. Luo Binghe…

Yes, that was right. Luo Binghe is the safe place. Luo Binghe is gone. Shen ‘Jiu’s been left alone with the shadows and terrifyingly unsafe.

Shen ‘Jiu’s breathing constricted in panic again. It was happening every few minutes, but every time it happened, it was as scary as if it was the first time. The way the looming, shapeless anxiety seemed to take over his entire body was unexpected every time, leaving him twitchy and anxious waiting for the next one when he finally came out of it.

It seemed like his heart never had the chance to slow down. Every time his eyes closed was another opportunity for anxiety to consume him, so he couldn’t sleep. No one visited, and time didn’t matter anymore.

If he couldn’t sleep, didn’t eat, and received no company, what use was time to him? His eyes hurt always, light made him flinch back always, no matter if it was sunlight struggling through the dark curtains over the wall-to-ceiling windows or the eye-piercing fluorescents in his kitchen ceiling that warded away the shadow-people lurking in the corners.

His bedroom wasn’t safe anymore, not that it ever had been, although it was so much worse now. Luo Binghe wasn’t there anymore, although sometimes Shen ‘Jiu’ thought he could see him in the bloodstains on the exposed wall. But then Shen ‘Jiu’ would rush to it and try tear it apart again in search of the glimmer of hope, and new bloodstains from his broken nails would cover the old ones, and Luo Binghe would be gone.

No one was here for him. There was no one who cared about him, no one who checked up on him, as if Shen ‘Jiu’ had become completely worthless to everyone who knew him. There were no more knocks on the door.

Shen ‘Jiu’ waited—all he could do with his dragging, seemingly infinite time was wait—but there were no knocks on the door.

It didn’t really matter if he lived or died.

He felt half-dead already, with the way his body was so light and floaty all the time. His head felt full of air and shadows, while his limbs were like lead weights. He was so incredibly weak, and he was acutely aware of this like a distant but incessant alarm going off nonstop in the back of his head.

Sometimes the only way he knew he was still alive was by the blood, which flowed out of his body as sluggishly as if he were almost a corpse.

Maybe all of his blood would leave him soon and he would float away like an empty balloon.

And maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, if Shen ‘Jiu’ just… stopped existing. If all of his blood was gone, and the last remnants of himself with it. He hadn’t been himself since he left Luo Binghe’s room, so there would be nothing lost, really.

Shen ‘Jiu’ had lost everything already when he was crammed into this apartment and forced to survive, alone and scared.

His vision dimmed.

Anytime now and all of this would stop, and he wouldn’t need to wait anymore. Luo Binghe wasn’t coming back, and Shen ‘Jiu’ was so tired of waiting. He was tired of flinching at every noise, tired of the tide of hope and fear that flooded him when a pot fell off of the counter or a flicker of shadow caught the corner of his vision.

Shen ‘Jiu’ was so incredibly tired.

He held onto his own arms, but they were cold. Shen ‘Jiu’ gasped for air.

Shen ‘Jiu’ was hiding, tucked into the corner behind his bed, with his blankets thrown over his head that hid his entire body from view. Hopefully the blankets pooled on the floor would catch most of the blood flowing from his arms, and he would be completely hidden.

No one would ever know he was gone. Shen ‘Jiu’ smiled stiffly. He was finally going to be gone, and he wouldn’t need to be afraid anymore. After all this fear and uncertainty, it would be a relief to know that finally that there was nothing that could hurt him.

Luo Binghe…

Shen ‘Jiu’ had always needed Luo Binghe. Even now. Where was Luo Binghe?

The knife fell out of Shen ‘Jiu’s hands as he shuddered. He was so cold. It was blissfully dark under the blanket, and it felt very good to hold his aching head in his hands and know that this would all stop.

The shadows in the corners of his eyes stopped moving too, like they knew what was happening. They had lost, and Shen ‘Jiu’ had won! They couldn’t get to him now…

Luo Binghe couldn’t get to him now. Luo Binghe!

Shen ‘Jiu’s chest seized in terror. Luo Binghe couldn’t get to him! Shen ‘Jiu’ threw off the blanket with shaking hands. He couldn’t stand up! How was he going to look for Luo Binghe?

He tried to yell, but his voice was gone and his chopped-up breathing wasn’t letting him anyway. Instead he whined as loud as he could over the ringing in his ears, holding up his bleeding arms for Luo Binghe to fix.

Luo Binghe could fix this! Please, please fix this! Luo Binghe!

Luo Binghe appeared in his swimming vision, smiling softly. He must have come out of the wall, which Shen ‘Jiu’ had been digging at. His efforts had paid off! Luo Binghe looked so proud of him, and Shen ‘Jiu’ tried to reach his arms up even higher.

 He gathered up Shen ‘Jiu’s hands and pressing something soft into the deep gashes there. It hurt more than he expected it to, but compared to the sheer relief at seeing Luo Binghe again, the pain was easy to ignore.

Shen ‘Jiu’ tried to stand, and Luo Binghe helped him by holding his arms even higher. Luo Binghe was talking to him, maybe, but it was hard to hear and hard to see. Shen ‘Jiu’s legs suddenly got very weak and everything went completely dark.

*_*

When he woke up, he was in a hospital. Machines were beeping at him and it was too bright and too loud, but he felt calmer. He didn’t feel safe, but it didn’t seem to matter so much. His head lolled to the side, away from the brightness of the window, and it took a moment for his eyes to focus, but Luo Binghe was sitting there, smiling softly at him.

Those eyes.

Shen ‘Jiu’ made a little aborted motion towards him. He wasn’t close enough, why was he so far away?

Luo Binghe was supposed to be touching him. Holding his hands.

Shen ‘Jiu’s stomach hurt. His head hurt, too. Maybe he should just go to sleep, but it was nice to see Luo Binghe’s face and Shen ‘Jiu’ didn’t want to leave.

Shen ‘Jiu’ tried to tell Luo Binghe all that, but it all came out of his mouth in a garbled mess, and Luo Binghe shushed him.

“Don’t talk, okay?” Luo Binghe asked, but that sounded pretty unclear too. Was Luo Binghe okay?

Shen ‘Jiu’ tilted his head to the side like a bird, the hair tickling the back of his neck. He wanted to ask that question, but Luo Binghe said to be quiet, so he just asked with his face.

But then, if he was trying his best to be quiet, then why were the machines so loud? Beeping and beeping and beeping…

The next few hours were a messy blur for Shen ‘Jiu’. Luo Binghe helped him sign some papers and showed him stuff on the computer, and took a picture of him. “To help you disappear without people looking for you,” Luo Binghe explained, and Shen ‘Jiu’ didn’t understand, but he didn’t need to. He knew it was important. “This way, you can come back home with me, and you never need to go back again.”

Then Shen ‘Jiu’ was helped into a car, and him and Luo Binghe were allowed to be together in the backseat. Even though he was so tired, he didn’t want to leave Luo Binghe. He didn’t want to be away from Luo Binghe ever again.

Without realizing why, Shen ‘Jiu’ started crying.

Luo Binghe noticed immediately and shifted Shen ‘Jiu’ into his arms. “You’ll never be alone again.”

It had been so scary, such a long and exhausting lonely month. Shen ‘Jiu’ cried and cried without stopping, as if he could leave it all behind if all of his tears soaked into Luo Binghe’s soft sweater. It spilled out of him like a flood, and it felt like he was telling Luo Binghe everything.

Everything terrible that Shen ‘Jiu’ had done, every time he didn’t listen to Luo Binghe’s instruction, every time he knew he wasn’t good enough even though Luo Binghe had told him otherwise. Luo Binghe never stopped talking to him, soothing and patting his back. The car was dark and warm, and the chill in his bones disappeared as he cried.

By the time the car finally stopped, his head ached from all of the crying and his eyes refused to stay open even though Luo Binghe was trying to help him drink from some water bottles. Luo Binghe was there, and he was safe, protected from everything that had just happened.

Luo Binghe kept his promises. Shen Qingqiu would never be alone again.

When he woke up, Luo Binghe would be there, washing his bloody body, watching him sketch his little drawings that he always proudly displayed stuck to the door with magnets, and helping him feed Jello with a hand careful not to let Shen Qingqiu get burned with the hot water.

Luo Binghe would tell him every day that he only cared about Shen Qingqiu, that nothing could ever make him leave, and that he was completely safe in this underground room. Luo Binghe would always be there to protect him, even from damaged thoughts in Shen Qingqiu’s own head, or injuries that Shen Qingqiu himself had made.

There would be no traitorous, terrifying strangers to haunt his nightmares, no knocks on the door, and Luo Binghe would be there for him every time anything scary happened. Luo Binghe knew him, through and through, inside and out, and would never let him feel something like fear when he didn’t need to. There would be no terror that couldn’t be calmed.

He would never have to leave that room that made up his whole universe, the soft bed in the middle and the quiet bathroom beyond the door. Shen Qingqiu could sleep in the quietly humming dimness, only an arm’s reach away from the only person who really mattered.

Everything he ever remembered wanting was there, in that room, but for now, he just wanted to go to sleep in Luo Binghe’s arms.

******************************

Extra (In this chapter…) -  His PR team really, really wants him to die, and that’s why he was left alone for so long. His disgrace hurt powerful people — sponsors, coaches, teams, and executives — and the stock prices of companies that had previously been connected to Shen Qingqiu were plummeting. Since he couldn’t appear in public to defend himself, death was the only way his reputation could recover. Afterward, well-spoken people could tell a new version of his story, and guilt over his death would make the public believe it.

Li Yu is writing article after positive article advocating for Shen Qingqiu’s innocence, but she doesn’t want to visit him because and she’s afraid she’ll be hurt if he lashes out at her, because she’s only ever heard horror stories about mentally ill people. Since she’s just a low-level local reporter, she… isn’t actually doing very much to help.

Liu Yihan, the false ‘Li Yu’ that sold out Shen Qingqiu, only did that because her little clinic was failing, and the money she received saved her clinic. She was also hoping, by selling the information, that people might be a little more sympathetic to Shen Qingqiu’s cause and advocate for actual mental help, but the media changed her story a lot and she did way more harm than good.

Yue Qingyuan’s doing his best to keep Shen Qingqiu fed and healthy, but there truly is nothing he can do when Shen Qingqiu blacks out and dissociates every time he sees Yue Qingyuan’s face. Yue Qingyuan doesn’t even really know what’s wrong in the first place, since Shen Qingqiu never told him.

The Olympian Shen Qingqiu had truly been friendless, so there was no one else that wanted to visit him who also knew where he lived.

His only option for survival was Luo Binghe.