Futile Devices Scans

The brass key slid into the keyhole and turned once. Only after ramming the door hard did the latch finally spring open.

Zhou Ruo An pushed the door open. The lights were off inside; only the standby light of the television glowed—a single red dot piercing through the darkness, eerily unsettling.

After switching on the light, Zhou Ruo An set the takeout bag casually on the coffee table. He walked a few steps and pushed open the door to a bedroom—empty.

The next moment, he heard the old lock turn again, followed by another heavy slam against the door panel.

Because of long neglect and disrepair, the hinges creaked unevenly—this time the sound was particularly grating. A young man stepped inside, his movements accompanied by that teeth-grinding noise. He wore a cap and a mask, wrapped up tightly so that only his eyes were visible.

“You went out?” Zhou Ruo An’s voice carried a hint of surprise.

The young man wore a down jacket, yet still looked thin as a narrow strip. One of his legs was lame, his steps dragging and weak.

As he passed Zhou Ruo An, he didn’t spare him even a glance. Limping, he made his way to his room and pushed open the old wooden door.

Zhou Ruo An seemed long accustomed to this attitude. Sitting on the sofa, he idly flicked a coin. Just as the door was about to close, he spoke. “I brought you a late-night snack.”

The young man didn’t stand on ceremony. Dragging his leg, he came back and picked up the takeout bag. Zhou Ruo An’s gaze followed instinctively, landing on the hand mottled with white patches—there were large abrasions across it.

The coin, tossed high into the air, was caught in his palm. He looked away and clicked his tongue. “Zhang Jin, are you trying to die even faster?”

The hand gripping the takeout bag tightened slowly. The next moment, the young man yanked off his cap and pulled down his mask, revealing a face covered in bruises and wounds of varying severity.

Zhou Ruo An was startled—not out of shock, and certainly not pity. When Lin Yi beat people until they were a bloody mess, he could sit nearby slurping instant noodles without changing expression. The injuries on Zhang Jin’s face were like a light drizzle in March—barely enough to dampen clothes, hardly worth mentioning.

It was just that the already gaunt face, mottled with white patches, now crisscrossed with cuts, bloodshot marks, and bruises, mixed with its uneven base color—altogether, it was unpleasant to look at.

Zhou Ruo An fished out a pack of cigarettes from the coffee table, pulled one out, and held it between his fingers. Looking up at Zhang Jin, he asked, “With that wreck of a body, didn’t you at least scam some money after getting beaten?”

He placed the cigarette between his lips and drawled, “Ah… right, I forgot—you’re a ‘model citizen’. You look down on underhanded tricks like mine.”

Zhang Jin stood rigidly straight, his lowered gaze carrying a vicious, almost deranged edge. “How much would it cost to have Lin Yi beat them back for me?”

Zhou Ruo An leaned back into the sofa, smiling. “Lin Yi doesn’t come cheap. But if you tell me why you got beaten, I might be able to get you a discount.”

“I… I went to find someone to sleep with. They don’t take clients like me. They said if they did it with me, my vitiligo would infect them. They also said I have cancer, that if I died halfway through, they’d get into trouble.”

Zhou Ruo An wasn’t much of a smoker—he only lit up when he was particularly pleased or displeased. Now he lit the cigarette, laughter dancing in his eyes. “They’re not wrong. With that body of yours, one round might really kill you.”

Zhang Jin took a step forward, his face—like that of a vengeful ghost—looming close to Zhou Ruo An. “I’m fucking twenty-two, about to die, and I’ve never even tasted a woman. If that’s how it ends, I won’t die in peace!”

Zhou Ruo An slowly wiped the smile from his face and handed the cigarette to Zhang Jin. “Even if they didn’t take you as a client, they didn’t have to beat you, did they?”

Zhang Jin stuffed the cigarette into his mouth with trembling hands. The wound at the corner of his lips split open again, and the pain made his brows knit together. “I refused to leave, so the thugs at their place beat me.”

Zhou Ruo An let out a sigh and raised his payment QR code. “Lin Yi charges high fees for doing the dirty work—he usually collects debts for big bosses. For something this minor, just give two thousand.”

Zhang Jin choked on a puff of smoke and coughed violently, as if the world were collapsing around him. Afraid he might cough himself to death right there, Zhou Ruo An quickly amended, “Then make it eighteen hundred.”

“I don’t have any money!”

Zhang Jin’s voice now sounded like a bellows on the verge of breaking. Zhou Ruo An dug at his ear, his expression turning into a smile again. “The old man may have taken both of us in, but he always favored you. Before he died, he transferred the scrap collection station to your name. I heard you sold it a few days ago—for eighty thousand.”

“I was planning to use that money to buy myself a burial plot, and burn some paper offerings for myself—cars, horses, a house. My life’s been worthless while alive; at least in death I should enjoy some comfort.”

Zhou Ruo An gave a soft “Mm.” “Make a few paper beauties too—same difference when you get there.”

“Zhou Ruo An!”

“Alright, alright.” Zhou Ruo An raised both hands in mock surrender. “Fifteen hundred, not a cent less. Lin Yi beating someone—you’ll be satisfied.”

“Fine.” Zhang Jin took out his phone and scanned the code. “When the time comes, record a video and send it to me.”

After transferring the money, Zhang Jin grabbed the takeout bag and dragged his leg back toward his room. Watching his frail, skeletal back, Zhou Ruo An suddenly spoke up: “You really don’t plan to acknowledge your ancestry and go back to being a young master? Even if your illness can’t be cured, at least you could live better while you’re still alive.”

“Even though that mother of yours who abandoned her own son is despicable, hasn’t she been trying to get you to return to the Zhou family lately?”

The man, now little more than skin and bones, paused at the door and slowly turned back. His brows were knotted with hatred. “A sickly, dying illegitimate child—go back just to be despised and humiliated? Or turned into a joke for their amusement? And in the end, be buried in some corner of the Zhou family ancestral graveyard, unable to rest even in death?”

He raised a hand, staring at the white patches on it. “As if being born with this disease wasn’t enough, now I’ve got a terminal illness. The sins they committed have all fallen on me. I wish they would all just die—and you’re still telling me to go back and be some young master?”

“Young master?” Zhang Jin tugged at his mottled, discolored face, neither smiling nor angry. “In this lifetime, I’ll never change my surname back to Zhou.”

Zhou Ruo An fell silent for a moment. Then he propped his legs up on the coffee table, picked up the remote control, and turned on the television. “Then why not give that opportunity to me? My surname just happens to be Zhou, same as your bastard of a father. Come to think of it, I might actually look more like his son than you, the real young master who took your mother’s surname.”

Zhang Jin’s body could no longer endure the strain. Lowering his head, he turned and slowly closed the door. From the narrow crack, his weak voice slipped out: “Zhou Ruo An, you’re really boring.”

Lin Yi was in the middle of collecting a debt, a compulsive gambler kneeling at his feet.

“Please, don’t do this in front of the child—please let him go into the room.”

In the corner of the room stood a boy, about seven or eight years old, wearing cartoon pajamas.

Lin Yi glanced at him once before looking away. Clamping the cigarette between his lips, he freed a hand and picked up an ashtray, tapping it lightly against the man’s face. “Good father—when you borrowed money to gamble, did you ever think about him?”

The force of the ashtray wasn’t strong, yet the man shrank back in terror, clutching his head tightly.

The child began to cry, his thin, frail body pressing desperately into the corner of the wall.

Leaning against the table, one leg braced on the ground, Lin Yi took a drag of his cigarette. Then he straightened and walked toward the boy. The man clung to his leg like a dog, but was immediately pinned down by the others.

“When you grow up, will you gamble too?” Lin Yi crouched in front of the boy, cigarette between his teeth, and asked.

“Answer me!”

“No… I won’t gamble.”

“Won’t…”

It was unclear whether the answer satisfied Lin Yi. He remained crouched in that corner, watching as the compulsive gambler repeatedly kowtowed and begged for mercy. Thick clouds of smoke gathered and dispersed again and again. Through his sobs, the child thought he heard a low, indistinct murmur, blurred within the rising smoke:

“I used to think I wouldn’t walk his path either.”

Only when the phone in his pocket rang did Lin Yi look away and answer. “Speak.”

The voice on the other end was blunt and rude. “Come back and help me beat someone.”

Lin Yi gave a soft “Mm” and hung up. He removed the cigarette, then unhurriedly lifted the boy’s pajama shirt. Amid terrified screams, he pressed the cigarette butt against Ultraman’s eye.

Lifting his gaze, he said, “Remember this—there are no guardians in this world.”

He stood and walked toward the door. “Have him sign the mortgage contract. I’ve got something else to do—I’m leaving.”

Zhou Ruo An crouched by the roadside, watching Lin Yi beat someone. Holding up his phone to record, he frowned slightly when he saw the tall man in the frame throw another punch. “Stick to the fifteen-hundred fee—you’ve gone over the limit.”

Lin Yi kicked the man aside and turned, walking straight toward Zhou Ruo An’s camera. Backlit, his features were indistinct, the lingering violence around him not yet dissipated—giving him a dangerous edge.

Only when he drew so close that his face no longer fit within the screen did Lin Yi ask the person holding the phone, “Am I handsome?”

Zhou Ruo An pressed the stop button and looked up at Lin Yi from within the shadows. The man’s bone structure was exceptionally sharp—prominent brow ridge, high-bridged nose, and a jawline carved as if by knife and axe—giving him an inherently cold, severe air.

Both Lin Yi and Zhou Ruo An had faces that women liked, but because Zhou Ruo An appeared more refined and easygoing, he tended to be favored a little more.

Zhou Ruo An was fair-skinned, to the point that the bluish veins beneath his skin were faintly visible. Now, with the cold wind reddening his ears, his voice tightened slightly. “Handsome as hell, Brother Lin. From now on, Bai Ban and I will follow you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Squatting beside Zhou Ruo An, Bai Ban was engrossed in a pornographic novel, reading with voracious focus. Even through his padded pants, the bulge in his crotch was obvious. His attempt at flattering Lin Yi felt perfunctory at best.

Bai Ban had only a primary school education and didn’t recognize many characters. He shoved the book in front of Zhou Ruo An. “What do these two characters read as?”

Both Zhou Ruo An and Lin Yi had only graduated from middle school. Lin Yi’s father had died in a gang fight when he was seven—rumor had it that his body had been stabbed five or six times. His mother had died even earlier than that short-lived father, to the point that Lin Yi couldn’t even find a single photograph of her now.

Relying on policy, Lin Yi had scraped through nine years of compulsory education, then became a lackey, drifting through gang circles. Because of his ruthlessness and lack of emotion, he had earned a modest reputation in certain shady, unseen fields.

Nowadays, when acquaintances ran into him, they would either keep their distance or put on a show of deference—but once he left, they would spit and curse, “Like father, like son—rats’ offspring know how to dig holes. Who knows how many knives he’ll end up with stuck in him.”

Zhou Ruo An, on the other hand, had been a good student. But Old Man Ding, who had taken him in, only supported him through middle school. On the surface, it was due to lack of means, but in truth, he had already seen that Zhou Ruo An was crooked at heart, destined for the wrong path.

As Old Man Ding would say in his Sichuan dialect: “This kid… is no good.”

Even so, Zhou Ruo An had self-studied the high school curriculum and even read a few law books, managing to stand out slightly among the three of them in this “cultural lowland.”

Now, looking at the pornographic novel Bai Ban held out to him, Zhou Ruo An replied, “Defilement. Making a woman’s body full of defilement.”

“What does that mean?”

The three of them squatted in a row along the wall. Lin Yi pulled out a pack of cigarettes, offering one to Zhou Ruo An. When Zhou Ruo An waved it off, Lin Yi put it in his own mouth. As if making idle conversation, he asked as well, “What does it mean?”

Zhou Ruo An took out the phone he had just put away. “Since you’re both so eager to learn, let’s look up the exact meaning.”

Bai Ban’s crotch had been uncomfortable the whole time. He grabbed himself through the fabric and stood up. “I’m going to take a piss—Brother Zhou, wait till I get back before you look it up.”

Amid the shuffling footsteps, the webpage had already loaded. Bai Ban was Lin Yi’s dog—when trouble came, he would bare his teeth at anyone, even Zhou Ruo An. There was no way Zhou Ruo An would wait for him. Narrowing his eyes, he drew out his words deliberately as he read:

“Defilement is a Chinese term, pronounced wū huì. First, it refers to something dirty or unclean; second, it describes a person of low or humble status; third, as a verb, it means to soil or taint; fourth, it refers to obscenity or violation.”

He clicked his tongue and pointed at the phone. “Lin Yi, this word describes the two of us.”

Lin Yi had already smoked half a cigarette. The warmth of his breath and the curling smoke blurred his gaze, obscuring most of his expression. He seemed to cast a sidelong glance at Zhou Ruo An’s phone. “What does the fourth meaning refer to?”

Zhou Ruo An chuckled. “That one… probably describes our future. Just like in Bai Ban’s book.”

Lin Yi laughed as well. Resting his arm on his knee, he flicked ash from his cigarette. As the smoke drifted away, his gaze became clearer, heavy as it settled on Zhou Ruo An. “Our shared future—or separate ones?”

“Fuck, Lin Yi, I just realized you’re seriously boring.” Zhou Ruo An stood up and kicked the man who had a cigarette in his mouth. “Let’s go—to the funeral goods shop.”

“Where are we going?” Lin Yi followed behind.

Walking ahead, Zhou Ruo An only tilted his head slightly, smiling as he said, “To buy Zhang Jin a set of burial clothes.”

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