In a brightly lit room, a man lay asleep on a recliner leather couch. His eyes stirred and fluttered open, revealing a pair of sharp, deep red irises. He raised his head to scan his surroundings.
The metallic floor and walls reflected the intense white glare from the lights. A row of massive tubes filled with unknown, luminous blue liquid lined the left and right sides of the room, creating an empty space in the middle with only a single, wide steel table at the center.
Inside the tubes—excluding 3 empty ones—were naked bodies of all genders and ages. Clean and pristine.
They resembled more of a doll than a corpse.
At the very front of the room, placed on a higher platform, was the largest tube of them all, yet the body inside was thinner, smaller than the rest. They curled in a fetal position, covering half of their face. It was difficult to discern their gender.
Long white hair scattered around them like streams of milk as if they were constantly sinking. Their pale, sickly complexion showed faint cracks across their body, resembling that of a porcelain.
The man stared at them for a long while, transfixed. It was the most beautiful being his eyes had ever landed upon.
So fragile. So…precious.
Remembering something, he snapped out of his trance and looked away, ashamed and angry at himself.
What was he thinking? He already had his one and only precious person. Was his heart always this fickle?
No, he couldn't even remember having a heart in the first place. Then, was it because of this human body?
His eyes caught the mirror across the room, reflecting his lean figure, sculpted with fine lines of his muscles. He sported a mid-length black hair that was just enough to be tied up into a small bun and had an angular face with sharp jaws and a tall nose. A pair of willow-leaf eyes pierced back at him and thick, sword-like eyebrows arched over them, giving him a mixture of exotic and oriental features.
Almost like a combination of his 2 past personas, Vesper and Ji Zhixuan.
"You're awake."
The man turned towards the voice and saw a bespectacled man entering the room, closing the steel door behind him. He didn't recognize his voice and face, yet something about his presence drew him towards him.
This…
"What?" Xing He placed the suitcase on the table and smiled. "Can't recognize me?"
The man widened his eyes. He could recognize that smile anywhere.
ˆXing He sighed and took off his glasses. "How disappointing. I took all that effort just for my lover to not recog–mmp!"
His words were blocked by a powerful kiss. He let out an amused chuckle as they took a brief respite and clung his arms around his lover's neck before continuing their reunion.
Their tongues intertwined in yearning. They took each other's breath, melding into the heat of their body, and fell deeper into an unreachable depth of their love. The deeper they fell, their craving for one another only increased.
The man pushed Xing He down to the table, separating their swollen lips and breaking their kiss. Seeing his flushed face, constrained with desire, Xing He let out a small laugh. "Seems like you have no problem with this face?"
"I was thrown off for a moment, but in the end, it's you." The man caressed his lover's new face, seeing the soul beyond it. "Are you alright?"
Xing He raised his eyebrows and broke into a smile. He cupped his lover's cheek in reassurance. "I'm fine. Everything went smoothly. You want to hear about it?"
"Mn."
Xing He propped himself up and spread his arms. "First of all, welcome back to reality. This here is my…well, you can say it's my personalized salon."
"Salon?"
"Your body, my current body, and my previous body are all from here."
The man looked down on his body. It didn't feel any different from a regular human body.
"It is a real human body." Xing He could guess what he was thinking. "There are many women who carry unwanted fetuses in this world and those who want to abort them can donate them to us instead. We harvest them through special means and develop them into empty shells. They're mostly used to produce cyborgs. My situation is a special case."
"That one is also…?" The man turned his head towards the white-haired person.
Xing He followed his line of sight. "That one is my real body."
"You're…cracking."
"Yeah. My body is very fragile because of my neural strength. I've never used it anymore since my employment here and probably never will. It needs to be preserved though since I still need my brain, so I can't just discard it."
"Is it fine to leave it like that?"
"I put myself inside there because I was cracking. Although it prevents further deterioration, it can't fix the already established one." Xing He stared at himself for a moment and returned his attention to his lover. "Speaking of which, you need a name. We need to settle your identity as soon as possible, so you can go out."
"We can use the name you gave me. Huo Yan." The man didn't find the need to think of another one. His lover gave him that name, enough of a reason to use it, and he liked the nickname he used to call him.
Xing He was flattered. Unfortunately, he had to reject the idea. "Though I appreciate the gesture, we shouldn't use any name we used in Zhou Yi's neural space. There's a risk he'll remember."
The man thought for a second. "How about…Qing Xinyuan? Or is one character name the standard?"
"No, not really. It's just the trend in our generation." Xing He thought the name was fine. Still, he was curious. "Why that name specifically?"
Qing Xinyuan leaned into Xing He's ear and whispered with a smile, "It means 'to fall in love with Yuan'."
Xing He's eyes opened a tad wider and he turned his face away with a begrudging blush. He really should train his resistance towards his lover's attacks. If his boss or colleague saw him react this embarrassingly to this kind of cheap flirtation, they would shame him as long as he lived.
And with his neural ability, he would live longer than enough.
"…Idiot. Surname doesn't count and your intonation has a completely different meaning."
"Exactly. So only the two of us know." Qing Xinyuan kissed the color on Xing He's cheeks. "Furthermore, I'll always remember you every time someone calls my name and you'll always remember me every time you hear it. I would say it's a win-win situation."
"You really learned how to speak, huh?"
"I learned from the best."
Xing He huffed in a show of annoyance, but the upward tilt of his lips thoroughly exposed him. He was 100% certain nobody else in this world had a lover who specifically named themselves for them. On one hand, he couldn't help but feel embarrassed, but on the other hand, he also felt proud.
This was his one and only lover. Nobody—nothing could ever surpass him.
Ding!
His communicator rang from a notification income. He tapped on it to see a message from Gao Lang, thanking him for earlier favor and asking him to inform him when the cremation date for Shen Yuan's body had been decided.
Seeing the name Shen Yuan on the screen, Qing Xinyuan narrowed his eyes. "Who is that?"
"Zhou Yi's subordinate. He was the person who assigned me the mission to kill you." Xing He typed his reply as he explained, "To cut things off without any loose ends, I terminated my previous body which was equal to normal human death for the body. Except for my colleagues in this department, nobody knows about my real neural ability, so they think I'm really dead."
"Will Zhou Yi suspect anything?"
"He won't. Many people witnessed Shen Yuan's death and his corpse is in the morgue. Even if Zhou Yi doesn't believe that he's dead, they'll only think he's in denial."
Another message came in, this time from Xing He's boss.
"I have to go. My boss called me in to report." Xing He sighed and slid down to his feet. "My plan is to recruit you to this department as my handler so you can stay here. I've been using this identity to play as my own handler for a long time, so I technically have none. Knowing my boss, he won't have any problem with it as long as you perform well."
"What if he finds out what I am?"
"He probably already knows."
"Probably?"
"His neural ability is clairvoyance of some sort. You never know when he's watching." Xing He shrugged. "But if you prefer to lay low, then I can think of something else."
Qing Xinyuan shook his head. "I'll follow your arrangement. I was just worried that you'd get into trouble because of me."
"Don't worry. Most of the time, I am the trouble," Xing He reassured with a laugh. He was about to leave when he stopped and looked back to Qing Xinyuan. "When the time comes when your…former fellow species return to this planet and the queen calls for you, are you certain you can resist it?"
"Our queen never leaves our home planet to mate, give birth, and keep herself from harm's way. Our hivemind connects beyond time and space, but I've not felt that link since I woke up. Much less receiving the queen's command." Qing Xinyuan pressed a kiss on Xing He's forehead. "I have my own queen now and I won't leave him for the world. I'll fight for humankind if that's what you wish for."
"Why would I make myself jealous? You only need to fight for me." Xing He smiled in satisfaction and returned the kiss to Qing Xinyuan's lips. "If we don't get assigned any job in the near future, let's renew our marriage vows."
Qing Xinyuan caught Xing He by his waist and reeled him close. He teased his ear with a sweet whisper, his words tinged with mischief. "If it's only the vow, I can recite it to you here and now. Anytime. Eternally."
Xing He's ear flamed red and he could only endure the onslaught as Qing Xinyuan whispered his solemn vows in a tender, lulling voice. His lips tickled his skin and his hand deftly slipped under the back of his shirt.
He knew if he let this be, he would be late for his report, but he couldn't care less. Why should he push his lover away when they both wanted this?
Work could wait.
He had an alien to love.
-- THE END --