Sea Hare

Wen Yiqian stood at the window with the business card in his hand and let his expression do what it wanted.

He understood what getting involved would mean. Fox alone was enough to demonstrate the organization’s reach — and Fox was a recruiter, not an operator. The people Mask actually deployed were different in kind. Making someone disappear quietly was not a difficult problem for them. It was a routine one.

But the alternative was carrying this around inside his chest for however long it took him to stop caring, and he could already tell that wasn’t going to happen quickly.

Even without provoking them, he thought, my situation is hardly peaceful. One more set of lunatics. What’s the difference.

He said it to himself with the tone of a man making a joke, but his eyes had settled into something that didn’t waver, even if his hand around the card had not.

He had spent most of his life finding reasons not to act. He recognized the feeling of having run out of those reasons.

He looked down at his legs, which were also, faintly, trembling.

“I’m not scared,” he told them. “It’s just the rheumatism.”

He changed into a dark hoodie, went downstairs, and found the phone booth near the bus stop.

The number connected faster than he’d expected.

A woman’s voice — lazy, slightly blurred with sleep. “Hello?”

Wen Yiqian went still for a half-second. He had prepared himself for gatekeepers, verification, some kind of screening process. He had not prepared for the direct line to go directly to Fox.

“It’s me,” he said.

“Wen Yiqian.” She was more awake now, and the interest in her voice was immediate. “Have you decided to join us?”

“Stop. You killed An Zhi.”

A pause. “I don’t kill people. I don’t enjoy it.” Another pause, thoughtful. “I plan. Someone else does the cleanup.” Her voice shifted into something that wasn’t quite regret. “Little sister An Zhi is dead? What a waste. She was quite endearing. I was almost fond of her myself. He really has no sense of appreciation.”

“Who is he.”

“You want to avenge her?” Fox’s tone held something that might have been amusement. “You’re more affected than I expected.”

“It’s not about her specifically,” Wen Yiqian said. “It’s that the injustice is unbearable.”

“Mm.” She seemed to accept this. “The one who handles cleanup for me is called Sea Hare. You’ve probably already met him.”

“When?”

“He’s exceptional at disguise.” Her voice was slow and deliberate. “And he has a particular fondness for dressing as a woman.” A brief pause. “He’s quite convincing, actually.”

Wen Yiqian stopped.

He turned and looked at the bus stop.

The girl on the bus. Chestnut hair. White-framed glasses. The bag moved aside, the seat offered. The smile when he got off.

The image assembled itself behind his eyes and he felt it go through him like a current.

He had known something was wrong. He had felt it without being able to name it — some quality that didn’t fit, some note just slightly off. And then he’d noticed the Adam’s apple and his mind had gone sideways into embarrassment and amusement and he hadn’t looked any further.

Now, with his head clear, he looked.

The build. The posture. The particular way the figure had held itself, even in a dress, even in a wig.

That was Little Bai.

The one who had walked out of the bank encirclement without leaving a trace. The one who had occupied a corner of every scene and left no impression. He had slipped through because slipping through was what he did — it was the skill, the whole skill, applied in both directions. Invisible when he needed to be invisible. Perfectly present when he needed to blend in.

And last night he had taken Bus 101.

Bus 101, which went directly to An Zhi’s neighborhood.

He had sat across from Wen Yiqian for the entire ride. He had moved his bag and offered a seat. He had smiled when Wen Yiqian got off.

And then he had gone to kill An Zhi.

He wanted me to recognize him. The certainty of it was cold and precise. He offered the seat. He made himself available. He was sure I would see through it — and when I didn’t, that smile wasn’t politeness. That was contempt.

I sat three rows back and noticed nothing. An Zhi died because I noticed nothing.

Wen Yiqian’s breathing had changed without him deciding to change it.

He hated the man who had killed her. That was simple and immediate and clean.

What he felt toward himself was less clean and considerably harder to sit inside.

All those clues. The wrongness he had registered and then dismissed. The seat offered with perfect confidence that Wen Yiqian would catch what was being communicated.

He hadn’t caught anything. He had made a small joke to himself about his own virtue and gone home to eat instant noodles.

“Is it really necessary to be this angry?” Fox’s voice came through the receiver, following his audible breathing. “She was just a woman.”

The phrase landed and something in Wen Yiqian’s face changed.

“Just a woman.”

“A person,” he said. “A living person.”

He pressed his free hand over his face and dragged it slowly downward.

What was left when the movement stopped was not quite any of the things that had been there before.

He laughed. It was not a comfortable sound.

Fox’s voice, when it came again, had shed its laziness entirely. “If you’re thinking of going after Sea Hare — I should warn you. Kill a Mask operative and the retaliation will be comprehensive. There is no version of that where you survive.”

“Undoubtedly,” Wen Yiqian said. He said it like he was repeating a word in a language he found faintly ridiculous.

“I’m not being theatrical. Mask is not something one person can fight.” She paused. “However. If you were a member — you could settle things with Sea Hare however you chose. Members are permitted to act against each other.”

“Even against you?”

A silence. “If you had the ability.”

“Then I’ll join,” Wen Yiqian said.

Whatever was moving behind his eyes had stopped being containable.

“From this point on, I’m a member of Mask.”

(End of Chapter)