Welcome to Nine Stories, Season Two. This is a private writing project. As before, I will personally invite Fanfou friends to take part. Requirements: a short story of 1,000 to 1,500 words, containing the sentence “So we went to get the blankets” (from Assassin Mission). No restrictions on genre. Please submit within two days after the New Year holiday ends, publish it on your blog, and announce it through Fanfou. Together we are creating a mysterious plan.

(Common shot one: as far as the eye can see there is a hillside grown thick with immortal grass. At the very top of the slope stands a house, a pure white sealed cube without a door. The cube is mirrored in the blue sky, and the blue sky is naked of everything. The camera moves forward and upward, brushing past the upper edge of the house, so that one may see this: in the farthest distance the blue sky joins with the sea behind the hillside, while on one side of the slope, that is, behind the house, the hillside does not continue, and instead blue seawater meets the vertical face of the mountain. Looking left and right from the front of the house, the hillside stretches evenly on without mishap. Xisai and Lian, below the camera, walk along the slope toward the house.)

Xisai: The house is right there.

Lian: Is Tihu inside?

Xisai: He is. He told me. Ah, no, I should say he was at least. As for now, maybe.

Lian: Why are we looking for him? Do we really have to?

Xisai: Of course. He might be inside, so we’re going to check.

Lian: What did he say to you?

Xisai: He said that when you’re the only person left in the whole world, that’s despair.

Lian: Mm.

Xisai: I said great, then. Eat what you want, wear what you want, everything’s up to you.

Lian: And then?

Xisai: He said I was too naive.

(Lian smiles a little and looks up at the house on the crest of the hill.)

Lian: Aren’t you naive?

Xisai: Extremely. Absolutely. I think it’s exactly like that. You still expect there to be lots of living people around to admire and flatter you?

Lian: Stop talking nonsense.

Xisai: Tihu said not to talk as if all the people in the world had died. He said: suppose I lock you in a room right now for a year with no one to communicate with, no one to talk to. Try that.

Lian: Then you really ought to try it.

Xisai: If there’s nobody else in the world but me, can’t I just go wherever I want? He said there’d be tigers, wolves, jackals outside, plus zombies made from dead people. It’s not as cheap as I imagine.

Lian: Really?

Xisai: I said if that’s the case, then I’d still rather stay inside the room and feel despair. But Tihu went on describing how every day, right on time, you’d pull down the iron grilles on all the doors and windows from the inside, and in the middle of the night you’d enjoy the pounding on the doors and the howls of the zombies. That would feel wonderful.

(They draw near the house. Until now Xisai has not paid attention to it, concentrating only on his narration.)

Xisai: Hear that? There’s a sound coming from inside the house.

Lian: What sound? Tihu?

Xisai: Probably. Once we’re close enough we’ll hear it clearly.

(They arrive at the house. It has no doors or windows. It is an absolute cube.)

Xisai: He’s in there. He’s talking.

Lian: Yes. Does he know we’re outside?

Xisai: I don’t know whether he can, but he’s talking. Listen.

Lian: So we went to get the blankets?

(Xisai nods and presses his ear closer against the cube to listen.)

Xisai: Tihu, we’re outside. Can you hear us? Who went to get the blankets?

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: Can he hear us?

Xisai: Tihu, who did you go with to get the blankets?

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Xisai: Can you hear us talking?! Who took what blankets? Where did you go to get them?

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: He can’t hear our voices.

(As Lian says this, he steps forward and knocks on the house. Xisai says to Lian:)

Xisai: Shall we have a look at those wolves, jackals, and zombies he was talking about?

Lian: Let’s have a look.

(Common shot two: from below the hillside, from the place where they had just climbed up, there appear some wild beasts, just like in every description, and many zombies too, just like in every description. They move toward the house and make sounds, just like in every description.)

Lian: What’s this?

Xisai: Tihu’s world of despair. Inside, no one communicates with him. Outside, there just happen to be terrifying nonhumans.

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: What is he doing?

Xisai: I don’t know. But I think the house he’s in and these objects before us are quite interesting. The house is minimalist, while those brightly colored moving objects are maximalist.

Lian: Don’t keep talking about “isms”! Do you even understand them? They’re useless things.

Xisai: I don’t understand them, but by chance I can throw these useless things onto this house and these objects. They match nicely.

Lian: And what use is that? Foolish.

(The beasts and zombies draw close to the house. Some in front have already arrived; the others gradually pass Xisai and Lian, surround the house, and carry out whatever it is they are able to do, just like in every description. Tihu’s voice comes again from inside the house, only now with more tension in it.)

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: Is there nothing else?

Xisai: I don’t know. There probably is. For example…

(As he speaks, Xisai crouches down to observe the immortal grass underfoot. Where the zombies have trampled it, it grows all the more luxuriantly, while in the places where the beasts’ saliva and droppings fall, bright flowers have even sprung up, unlike every description. Tihu’s voice grows more urgent.)

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets. So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: Is he tense because of these things coming up the slope?

Xisai: I don’t know. If he can’t sense us, how can he know about them? They pound and howl, but don’t we knock and speak too? Who knows.

Lian: Tihu is still someone easily swayed by his surroundings.

(Xisai smiles a little. Lian stands on the cliff beside the house and watches the sky gradually darken, while the colors of sea and sky change, unlike every description. Tihu’s voice can be heard all the while.)

Tihu: So we went to get the blankets.

Lian: Let’s go.

Xisai: We go to get the blankets.

Lian: For whom?

Xisai: For science and fantasy.

(Xisai and Lian walk past the beasts and zombies still advancing upward.)

Xisai: Before we leave, we needn’t straighten the bent stalks of grass, nor try to wipe away the traces of our coming.

Lian: Now you know everything too?

(Night falls completely. The hillside, the immortal grass, the flowers, the house, the beasts, and the zombies all remain bright. Blue butterfly flowers brandish their blades and stab at the night breeze.)

Tihu: So you went to get the blankets.

[Nine Stories, Season Two] Sequence links:

quills: "Purity"

Rose Cat: "Untitled"

Jiashu: "Little Wood Splinter"

casa: "Tihu's Empty Room"

tihu: "Shahtoosh"

Mile: "A City Without Snow"