Work Text:
Li Tianchen, trapped adrift in time and without his sister, meets a dead man.
It’s not so unusual.
Cheng Weimin is familiar from two different perspectives and as if tracing back two references to their origin point, years later and in retrospect. There’s something in his face—agonized and sincere at the wrong moment, too-empathetic and too bleeding-heart—that can resemble Cheng Xiaoshi. Something about the the twinge of recognition from his silhouette and the way he extends a hand as offering: trustworthy on the same level he isn’t, aware of what the skin contact can mean and still unflinching at the thought of seeing Li Tianchen’s eyes glowing red back at him in a mirror; all Liu Xiao in the way he performs the gesture. Or, vice versa, it makes Liu Xiao look like an mimicry turned sideways, not quite identical nor quite trying to be, but: adjacent, Li Tianchen recognizes with a strange taste in his mouth.
Li Tianchen is used to living in lateral angles to power; offered a seat at the table and still expected to perform, to bend his head and obey and be shaped, even through the guise of equal balances.
There’s a part of him that wants desperately to be changed underneath someone else’s hand, that makes himself a tool in someone’s hand: the same part of him that hears Liu Xiao say, beasts only hunt when they’re hungry, and feels a shifting within himself (Li Tianxi holding on with his hands covering her eyes, seeing more through the gaps in his fingers than she voices). Teeth-and-fur to weapon-and-cloth. Armed with the arrows Qian Jin puts in his hands; armed with the arrows Liu Xiao puts in his hands; armed with—
Cheng Weimin is different, in one respect.
In another, Li Tianchen watches Cheng Weimin in a country that speaks a tongue Li Tianchen is not fluent in and in a school he’s heard the name of only on Liu Xiao’s tongue, placed in a time that doesn’t belong to him unless he steals it like a spark from a god, and tests how lightly he needs to tread.
Li Tianxi’s blood stains his palms, black underneath light. Invisible unless you know it’s there. Li Tianchen had always known Qian Jin was capable of firing the bullet. Li Tianchen wonders if the younger version of Liu Xiao is sitting somewhere in this building, hands crossed politely on a desk listening to a teacher’s instructions in the months away from ash and wreckage; if this child version of Liu Xiao would look at him the same way his older self would, eyes unreadable at the same time he promises honesty, tilt his head like a bird and smile, offering paths to follow. If he would think without saying that Li Tianxi is disposable, but still hand him a map to what he wants. Its lines true and perilous. Here be dragons like an offering.
Cheng Weimin says, almost-kind, a steady assurance in the words: “We’ll make sure you get home.”
Li Tianchen—distracted, inspecting his hands in-between the direct and hollow glances at Cheng Weimin—laughs. It comes out wretched. Cursed.
Li Tianxi dies on the ground of a tunnel, words unfamiliar and clumsy on her tongue, wetness on her cheeks. Li Tianchen steals a fire he isn't meant to. Cheng Xiaoshi, in another time, is a child waiting for his father to return to him, his abilities intact and unawakened; Cheng Weimin, in another time, makes a promise he doesn't know how to keep.
Benny_Alt Wed 24 Sep 2025 11:09PM UTC
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lanternglass Thu 25 Sep 2025 06:41AM UTC
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Moondal Thu 25 Sep 2025 12:43AM UTC
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lanternglass Thu 25 Sep 2025 06:41AM UTC
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jan Thu 25 Sep 2025 01:57PM UTC
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