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墨書 Inktalez
Chapter 10: The Climax of Tragedy
The emergency lights cast a blue shadow on my retina as I counted the droplets of blood forming on Zhou Yi's eyelashes. When the thirty-ninth drop fell, the mechanical sound of the ICU automatic door sliding open coincided with the sharp crack of Lin Yichen's leather shoes shattering a glass vial. The green waves of the Fetal Heart Monitor suddenly spasmed as if an invisible hand had gripped its throat, reminding me of the bulging veins on his temple when he tore up the paternity test, each vein twisted and threatening to break through his skin.
"Blood pressure 40/20!" The nurse lifted the blood-stained combat uniform, and at that moment, dark red pus flowed down from an old centipede-shaped scar on his waist as the sutures burst open. His right ring finger suddenly spasmed, pulling at the tear in his Tactical Gloves, revealing a half-finished tattoo that glimmered indigo under the cold fluorescent light—inside Mother’s diary, that blood-soaked Embryo Laboratory number was inscribed in the same Gothic font.
Lin Yichen's silver-gray tie brushed against my earlobe, the metallic edge scraping my skin painfully. The scent of incense mixed with disinfectant invaded my nostrils. "The ambulance arrived just in time," he said, his thumb pressing against the scabbed bite mark on my lower lip, shards of glass embedded in his palm piercing my wound. "Just like that car twenty years ago."
The ventilator suddenly emitted a sharp alarm. I bit down hard on the crescent-shaped scar on his thumb, and as the taste of rust spread between my teeth, that black obsidian cufflink pressed against my molar—the word "voluntary" from the Consent Form in the delivery room was now burning at the base of my tongue.
"Penetrating injury causing delayed cardiac tamponade." The attending physician's glasses reflected the death warning on the medical record folder. The scalpel protruding from his white coat pocket glinted coldly, its handle carved with serpentine patterns resembling the dagger Zhou Yi had once used to shield me.
A Lollipop rolled out from a dark pocket of Zhou Yi's tactical pants and landed by Lin Yichen's feet. The colorful reflections from the cellophane danced across the tiles like a waltz, while the sound of rust falling from the vent onto the candy wrapper overlapped with his hoarse command to "open your mouth" from years ago in that attic.
"A β wave characteristic of pregnancy response has appeared." The nurse's trembling fingertips cast a quivering shadow on the monitor screen. The undulating curve reminded me of the vanished fetal heartbeat trace on the ultrasound machine. When Zhou Yi's left hand suddenly fell limp, the sound of the prenatal report being swept up by a gust pierced through my eardrum, its edges slicing through the air with a shrillness that matched the current alarm from the Fetal Heart Monitor.
Lin Yichen's grip on my wrist was almost crushing my bones. "This Inferior Alpha pheromone," he said, rubbing his nose against my ear gland, the scent wrapped in cedar piercing through my pores. "Is it enough to drive you mad?" The silver tie clasp suddenly burned against my palm; its gear-like edges were unmistakably parts from Mother's pocket watch she clutched when she fell.
"Your study's safe, third drawer," I shouted as I grabbed a bloodied Cotton Swab and thrust it toward his throat, cotton exploding into snow against his oxygen mask. The scattered embryonic Experimental Records floated before me, yellowed pages with Mother's handwriting interlaced with Lin Yichen's annotations.
With a crackle of knuckles, Lin Yichen crushed the notebook with such force that fragments of embryonic photos splintered into a web. He suddenly gripped my neck and pressed me against the Observation Window; in the glass reflection, Zhou Yi's chest wound was swallowing all light, dark red whirlpools revealing fragments of fetal membrane tissue from that night I miscarried.
At that moment when the surgical light exploded, I held a shard of glass against his carotid artery. The broken glass reflected twelve overlapping surveillance feeds, each showing Su Ya delicately handling an embryo culture bottle, her nail polish shifting from pastel pink to bloodstains on the delivery bed.
"He is nothing but a guard dog!" Lin Yichen's roar shook the emergency medicine shelf. The morphine solution twisted on the ground like the rain stains from the day Mother committed suicide. The sensation of platinum edges cutting into the skin was identical to when Zhou Yi last marked me, except that his canine teeth pierced the glands, releasing pheromones with a metallic tang, unlike the decayed pine scent that now filled my nostrils.
Zhou Yi's pupils dilated to their fullest extent. The green light of the Fetal Heart Monitor swept over the mud caked on his combat boots, and the dried ochre clumps crumbled away—just like the dust that rose when Mother's urn shattered beneath that crooked Sophora tree on the hillside behind the Lin Family Old Residence. In the darkness, a cold liquid dripped onto my lips, the unique metallic sweetness of the laboratory culturing solution mingling with the taste of sedatives, bursting into fragmented bubbles on my tongue.
(End of Chapter)
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