gentle collapse

In the early morning, I called Ke Ke and asked her to tell Xie Yu that I had returned.She didn't speak for a long time on the other end, and finally scolded me softly when she was hanging up.

I called Zheng Yi's mother again, but no one answered.I was afraid that something might happen to his house, so I went to knock on his door, but no one answered.Suppressing the uneasiness in my heart, I still ran to the supermarket to unload the goods. After putting the things in order, I only stood for a few minutes, as if my heart was being squeezed by someone, and I couldn't breathe.I took off the work tag and threw it away, ran to the door of Zheng Yi's house, and knocked on the door of his neighbor's house.

"Zheng Yi's mother? You should go out and post a missing person notice, her son is missing..."

"Do you know where she posted a missing person notice?"

The man shook his head: "She's been walking the whole city."

I ran downstairs, ran along the embankment, ran across the street in front of No. [-] Middle School, and started asking the owner of the shop.They all knew about it. Zheng Yi's mother asked about it from one store to another, but it was all a few days ago.Then she must have asked each area one by one, and now she should have asked farther away.I walked along the road, asked at a distance, and finally saw Zheng Yi's mother sitting on the steps in Luoyuan Square. There was a man standing next to her. It was the owner of a snack bar near No. [-] Middle School. The body belongs to Zheng Yi's father.

"Auntie." I walked over, stood in front of them and called them, "Uncle."

"Lin An, you... I called your house a few days ago, and your father said that you are also missing, as long as you come back safely." She stood up and asked me anxiously, "Where is Zheng Yi? Have you seen him?"

"He's at my house now. He's hurt a little. I don't want you to worry...can you stop scolding him when you see him?"

"Don't scold, don't scold, Auntie won't talk about him." She came up and grabbed my arm, "Can I take Auntie to see him now?"

"Auntie, don't worry, let's go back in a car." I looked at the person standing behind, "Uncle, do you want to go together?"

He was a little dazed, and after realizing it, he handed the missing person notice to Zheng Yi's mother: "No, I'm going back to the store to do business, and I'm just here to help. Zheng Yi's mother, Zheng Yi has been found , are you at ease now?" He touched the pocket of his gray clothes with veiny hands, forced ten yuan into me, and then left with his hands behind his back. I don't think there is anything I can do.

I took Zheng Yi's mother home and opened the door to find Xie Yu sitting in the living room.He greeted me, and I opened the bedroom door, let her go in and talk to Zheng Yi, and then came out immediately.The room was quiet, as if there was no one else except Zheng Yi and Xie Yu.

"Zhang Ran left with his suitcase. I asked him what happened. He said he found a job and went to work today." He pointed to the paper on the coffee table, "He left it for you, and you Dad went to the station to do motorcycle business."

I opened the folded paper and looked at it. There were a few simple words written on it, as well as a series of landline numbers.

I looked at the clock hanging on the wall and asked Xie Yu, "Aren't you going to class?"

He took out a watermelon, put it on the coffee table and started to take it again: "Don't worry about it. Here, we can chat while eating watermelon. When my aunt comes out later, let her take some back."

I suddenly thought: "Will the watermelon rot in your trouser pocket?"

"Hmm... no way?" He patted, "It feels fresh all the time, and the melon is still green."

I sat down with a smile, cut the watermelon in half with a knife, and the red flesh appeared. I thought of the scene of the operation, and felt the vague smell of blood lingering in the air.I lost my appetite and asked him about business: "What are you asked to do in the system company?"

"It's nothing serious, routine blood tests and the like? Then I keep asking me the specific time of crossing, even requesting it to be accurate to the minute. How can I remember this? It also includes the location before the crossing, the location after the crossing, and the time of the crossing. The feeling after the test, whether there is a language barrier, the use of modern facilities..." He counted the same thing, "Too many, the questionnaire they took out is very thick, and it took two days to answer the questions .The next few days were some physical fitness tests or something. I found it very strange, because the questions they asked were somewhat similar to those of the Municipal Space-Time Bureau..."

"Will the Municipal Bureau of Time and Space ask so many questions when applying for your identities?"

"It's not so detailed, but when I said that I came over in 2021, they changed the person in charge. The person in charge had a pair of brown eyes on the bridge of his nose and was bloated. I tidied it up in front of me. After sorting it out, I took out about a dozen pages and asked me exactly which month and day I traveled through. I traveled here at the end of April, around the 4th or 27th. After hearing this, he took out his glasses Then the person who registered me came back, gave me a new ID card, gave me a language converter, explained some things, and let me go."

He Yuchen traveled here in 2020, and Xie Yu came in 2021. The concentration of time is a bit strange.Why is the Municipal Space-Time Bureau so sensitive to 2021?I thought for a while, and knocked on the bedroom door: "Didn't disturb you?"

Zheng Yi straightened up on the bed and shouted to me: "Lin An, my mother's words are as fierce and fast as firing cannonballs. I'm going to be overwhelmed. Come and save me."

I held the door frame and didn't intend to go in: "Auntie is concerned about you, do you know if you listen carefully? Zheng Yi, I want to ask you, do you know how many years ago your backpack came back?"

"1994."

In 1994... the time went away again.I sat back on the sofa again and asked Xie Yu: "Have you ever contacted someone who read those materials completely at the Municipal Bureau of Time and Space?"

Xie Yu shook his head.

"Then in your previous organization, are there any people who have traveled back after 2021?"

"It doesn't seem to be there. The ones I'm familiar with are all from a few years ago." Xie Yu said, "I came this time to see how you and Zheng Yi are doing. After I went out that day, I went back to the system company in the afternoon. , Zheng Yi happened to be picked up by you. Keke told me that I asked for leave after you called her, and wanted to continue to help you find clues. It seems that you have found a breakthrough point?"

This is not a breaking point, at best it is a strange place worthy of attention.

And I know a person who traveled back from a long time ago, Chen Wei.

The college entrance examination is over, the family has fallen, left Los Angeles, joined the underworld, and finally committed suicide.Counting from 2019, the third year of high school, Chen Wei has experienced so many things, he must have traveled back after 2021.And in order to avoid the time traveler's regulations restricting his future, he has been concealing the fact of time travel, and has not registered with the Municipal Bureau of Time and Space, and has not changed his ID card.And Xiao Xiaoyan, who works in a system company, voluntarily married Chen's father who was ten years older than her...

Chen Weicai was my breakthrough point.

I told Xie Yu my opinion, and he nodded in agreement: "I also doubted the year before, but there are no people in our organization who have traveled from a long time ago. Those people don't participate in the parade, nor are they angry. It’s very different from us. I tried to chat with them, but I always felt like there was a gap, and they didn’t disclose any information to us.”

I temporarily put the matter of going to Chen Wei on the schedule, and felt a little more at ease.So I chatted with Xie Yu: "After you traveled, you found that the time was only a few years away. You must want to go home, right? But we don't allow time travelers to go out here, and ordinary people have to be restricted. They still have to apply. It’s almost time to apply for a visa.”

"Go home? How do I go back..." Xie Yu smiled wryly, "This place and the place where I live should be parallel spaces, right?"

"how do you know?"

"I don't have the city of Luocheng in my time and space, but I know Luoyang. In fact, I certainly don't know all the cities in our country, but you say that this belongs to Sichuan Province. I am originally from Sichuan. I know very well that there is no one in Sichuan. The city is called Los Angeles."

"How is it possible...Chengdu, Panzhihua, Ganzi Aba, all of them? Luocheng is in the south of Chongqing Province." I watched him and listed them one by one: "Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou... do you have that time and space? ?”

"It's all the same, everything is the same, but I really haven't heard of Los Angeles, at least not in Sichuan Province." He shook his head seriously, his voice earnest, "Have you ever been to these cities you mentioned?"

No, I have lived in this city since I was born and have never left here.

"And..." Xie Yu said with some hesitation, "In the time and space I live in, no traversal machine has been invented yet. When did you invent it?"

I can't answer, I should have seen the specific year in the book, but I forgot, anyway... It's been a long time.

I turned over the note that Zhang Ran left for me, and wrote on it with a black pen:

1. All employees in the system company use a strange language.

2. The system company does not provide time-traveling services to the citizens of Los Angeles. Zheng Yi and I both had our stomachs cut open when we served as service providers. Even Xiao Xiaoyan has that scar on his body, but Xie Yu does not.

3. He Yuchen firmly believes that he has traveled through a book, but the background of the book does not exist through time travel.

4. Many people in Xie Yu and his organization are from before 2021, and the time and space they live in has not invented the time travel machine, and they think that there is no such city as Los Angeles.

5. Not many people have left here.

I can't make sense of these things, but their vague connection is almost obvious.

I don't care, I don't care if this world is a book, one of countless parallel spaces, or something else.It doesn't matter if this is a time-space-distorted junkyard in the universe.I have long since ceased to have a great sense of curiosity and fear of the world. I exist, and there is a reason for my existence.But if I have to uproot all the secrets to possibly get my brother back, that's all I can do.