Work Text:
Lan Xichen would never refer to it as a problem in light of the results. Instead the… kaleidoscope of events that led to his eventual resignation from the GBC began when a rotting corpse from Lanling rolled in through their receiving bay.
Or, perhaps, somewhat earlier, when CT Luo had reviewed the documentation sent in lieu of the actual body and declared it to be "subpar and lazy, who wrote this? Oh, him. Yeah. I wouldn't trust his findings. He bought his certs from a place in Qishan that's only accredited as an institution because the old clans keep paying through the nose to get their talentless offspring cheap degrees."
"Surely such a thing is not common practice," Lan Xichen replied, aghast. People depended on cultivators: Agents and Technicians. Competence and proper education was of the utmost importance to ensure the wellbeing of those around them.
CT Luo looked as though she wanted to pat his head. Given he stood almost a full foot taller than her, it seemed overly ambitious, but also strangely comforting.
"Tell them that if they insist on providing stupid conclusions based on flawed process to send us the body and we'll look at it ourselves." Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Don't be polite about it or they'll think they can walk all over us."
Lan Xichen had the distinct impression that she had stronger verbiage in mind, but kept it tucked behind her teeth for his sake. She needn't have bothered; Lan Xichen had long enjoyed very warm relations with someone whose language would likely even shock Wei Wuxian.
Still, though he tried to be direct, he could not curb his natural inclinations towards congeniality.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Findings - Bai HaiyuGood morning,
I trust this email finds you well, and you have had a pleasant week since our last communication.
Upon review of the findings you forwarded us—thank you again!—our Cultivation Technicians have determined that there are a number of inconsistencies with the proposed conclusions. While I am confident that your team has done their utmost to accurately assess the situation, our local team has offered to review the evidence firsthand. Please do not take this as a reflection on the quality work done by your team, but rather an offer for collaboration that can benefit us all.
Please reply at your earliest convenience to arrange for next steps, including transportation arrangements for the subject in question.
Best,
Lan Xichen
Senior Cultivation Agent - Gusu Bureau of Cultivation
The body arrived five days later, improperly stored in consideration of the humid summer air.
The results were, to wit, "Fucking juicy!" Wei Wuxian declared, face twisted as he obviously struggled with the smell despite his robust constitution. "Holy hell, how long has this guy been dead?"
"It doesn't matter," CT Luo snapped. "Help me get it on ice before it degrades any further."
"Ice isn't going to help with the rate of cell degradation," Wei Wuxian replied, pushing the gurney ahead of them through the hallway to the morgue. "We need to suspend the decay immediately."
The two of them fell into frantic conversation, passing ideas back and forth through the hallways until they busted through the doors to the morgue.
Generally bodies were stored off-site, with qualified institutions happy to partner with the GBC. The HO morgue remained empty most of the time, in this case a definite advantage as Wei Wuxian and CT Luo charged about the space, the former only narrowly avoiding knocking Lan Xichen over completely. He backed up to stay out of their way. To the best of his knowledge, only CT Luo was dual-certified as a forensic pathologist, though Wei Wuxian seemed eagre to assist in whatever capacity she required.
"We could introduce a freezing array," Wei Wuxian suggested.
"Won't work. As soon as we start preliminary dissection it'll interrupt the lines and we're back at square one." They grabbed the corners of the body bag and, with a brief three count, transferred it to the examination table.
"Okay, okay, okay," Wei Wuxian bounced in place, frantically scratching his nose. "Well how about a modified stasis talisman, then? Affix it to the body in an inconsequential place to prevent incidental interference."
"Could work," CT Luo agreed, rounding the table. Wei Wuxian whipped out a stack of talisman paper and set to work. "No, that line is too wide. If you do that we won't even be able to cut through the breastbone."
"Any thinner and the corpse is going to liquify before we can access the viscera."
"What if we compensate by introducing a coagulating agent?"
Lan Xichen pressed his back up against the wall, removing himself from the path of brilliant chaos flying about the room.
"We could also inscribe complementary sigils on the dissection tools. That way we don't have to worry about interfering with the stasis."
Within the hour, the Wei-Luo Post-Mortem Preservation Method was born, sending Lan Xichen careening unknowingly towards a substantial career change.
Lan Xichen had learned very early on in his life the importance of having a comfortable couch in one’s office. Before his promotion to Senior Cultivation Agent, his lamentably small space had now allowed for such luxury, and he’d spent many nights dozing in a series of procrustean office chairs. When he’d finally moved to his current corner office, the first order of business had been to invest in an appropriately decadent sofa, long enough to allow him to stretch out when he finally conceded to sleep while working those tricky cases which required additional attention.
(Shufu, he knew, hated it. Had barely glanced at it before the unhappy line formed between his eyebrows, the corners of his mouth turning down.
Lan Xichen had tried to get ahead of it: “I’m sure you’ve spent more than one night in the office,” he said. “I remember very clearly sleeping on the couch in A-Die’s office. You must remember that horrible old thing, surely. I wanted to make sure that in the eventuality of me staying overnight that I at least have somewhere comfortable to sleep.”
“You slept in your father’s office when he couldn’t be bothered to bring you home. It was part of why I took custody of you after…” Shufu frowned and shook his head. “I don’t want you to feel that your worth to this organization is dependent on your willingness to overlook your personal wellbeing.”
“I understand, Shufu,” he lied.)
There were still moments, however, when he jolted awake in his chair with aches in his neck and back, and reminded himself that he’d purchased the couch for a reason.
His current case had turned out to be surprisingly demanding. While the initial findings had suggested an open-and-shut matter, the subsequent tests had presented a much different picture, and Lan Xichen had been struggling to figure out how all the pieces fit together, ending with him reconsidering all the witness statements.
He blinked back awake and prepared to dive back in when his phone trilled next to his elbow. He almost considered allowing it to ring through to voicemail, already guilty at having nodded off in front of his laptop. But when the picture of Mingjue faced him from the screen, scowling severely past the unapologetic kitten resting trustingly against his neck, Lan Xichen found himself unable to resist. Just a moment, he promised himself. Just to hear Mingjue’s voice. Surely a minute wouldn’t hurt.
“A-Huan.” A shiver ran down Lan Xichen’s back at the sunshine warmth threading through Mingjue’s voice. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”
“It’s never a bad time when I have the chance to speak with you,” Lan Xichen promised.
Mingjue chuckled. “Liar. What about the time I called you when you were elbow-deep in that yao?”
“Allow me to rephrase, then: regardless of the timing, having a chance to speak with you always makes my day better.”
“You’ll make me swoon,” Mingjue warned him.
“As though you’ve ever done so in your life.”
“You’ve always made me weak-kneed, you know that.”
Lan Xichen did in fact know that. Or, rather, he knew it now. There had been a lamentable period of time where he’d believed Mingjue the single person in the world immune to his smile, and had spent a rather distressing month and a half trying to win him over. Sixteen, and suddenly full of self-doubt with which he’d had minimal experience, the situation had been unnecessarily harrowing.
To his ongoing regret, they never managed to spend as much time together as he wanted. Even after Mingjue had left his role with Qinghe’s Cultivation Agency they rarely got more than a few stolen days together throughout the year. He promised himself he could be content with that little, so long as he could still have Mingjue in his life.
“Are you at the office?”
“Mn. A particularly challenging case, I’m afraid. What first seemed to be an accidental poisoning came back with a troubling toxicology report, and I’m finding myself beginning the investigation over again essentially from scratch.” The fact that the blood composition samples had been nearly completely degraded by the—pettiness? Incompetence? Both?—of the Lanling Cultivation Office certainly held up the investigation.
“In that case I’m even more honoured you picked up.”
Another nagging tug of guilt bit into his chest, and Lan Xichen found himself physically rubbing his breast as though it might assuage the feeling. For the life of him, he couldn’t tell if the guilt came from avoiding his work, or Mingjue feeling that the simple act of answering a phone call constituted a kindness on his part.
“Tell me about your day,” Lan Xichen said.
“If you’d like, but all I’m going to do is complain about Qing-jie’s horrible new girlfriend.”
“Oh?”
Mingjue never needed much prompting to launch into a rant. Lan Xichen smiled; he craved the sound of Mingjue’s voice, and enjoyed losing himself in the familiarity of it. “No respect for a doctor’s schedule. Qing-jie is on track to be one of the most respected surgeons in all of Qinghe, and this brat threw an actual temper tantrum when she had to cancel a dinner date to act as an attending physician…”
Mingjue had, initially, detested the doctor who’d saved his life simply because she’d been in the lamentable position of informing him that the severe damage to his meridians would prevent him from continuing on as a cultivator. They’d found their way to parity, eventually, though it had been an uphill battle; Mingjue felt too angry to see reason, and the doctor from all accounts ‘brilliant but unwilling to put up with any shit,’ according to Nie Huaisang as he delivered the surgery post-mortem. Lan Xichen had never met her in person, but from all accounts owed her for Mingjue’s life and ongoing recovery.
He had arrived in Qinghe after the surgery, tearing himself away from an active case for the first time in his entire career. Wangji had stepped in, thankfully, and Shufu had been both supportive and understanding. He’d remained longer than he’d initially intended, and when he returned some of the shine had worn off his position as Senior Cultivation Agent, no matter how prestigious he'd found the role once he'd been promoted. He’d wanted to spend more time with Mingjue, assisting in his recovery. While both Nie brothers sent regular updates with regards to his progress, it did not compare to being there in person. Two years on, and he still hadn’t managed to recapture the Panglossian view of his chosen career.
Conversation dwindled until they merely passed the sound of soft breaths back and forth. Lan Xichen imagined Mingjue at home, in bed, and ached to be in his arms.
“Go home, Xichen,” Mingjue finally ordered.
“I shouldn’t,” Lan Xichen said, looking at the case printouts in front of him.
“You won’t solve it overnight. Get some real sleep and tackle it again tomorrow.” He would know: prior to his forced retirement, Mingjue had spent more than one night awake to work on a case.
“Very well. Will you stay on the line with me until I get home?”
“Of course. Always.”
Lan Xichen turned off his desk lamp, and gathered his things for the drive back to Cloud Recesses. He'd be arriving narrowly before curfew, but it would be worth the unimpressed glare of the sentries to sleep in his own bed.
“CTs Luo and Wei are going to be unavailable for the next two weeks,” Lan Qiren announced at the staff meeting the following morning.
The attendees, exclusively the Bureau’s contingent of Cultivation Agents, all exchanged rather boggled looks at the words. Wangji, Lan Xichen noted with mild interest, looked unsurprised. Lan Xichen had no doubt Wei Wuxian had shared the plans in advance; they’d been officially together for almost three months now, and Lan Xichen had happily watched his brother fall awkwardly and incandescently in love.
“They will be travelling to our satellite offices to demonstrate the method they have developed for the preservation of corpses. While I appreciate this may place some strain on our resources, I have approved additional hours for the Tech Assistants, and both CT Luo and Wei will make themselves available for video consultations if required.”
Without Su She to provide unnecessary commentary, the meeting wrapped up more quickly than usual.
Lan Xichen and Wangji met outside the boardroom. “This must be a very trying time for you,” Lan Xichen offered, trying and failing not to sound both amused and smug at once.
He needn’t have bothered trying. From the excruciatingly dry look Wangji levelled at him, his brother saw right through it. “Wei Ying and Mianmian deserve to have their achievements recognized by their peers.”
Mianmian, Lan Xichen thought with glee. He’d long worried over his brother’s lack of friends, Nie Huaisang exempted, and knowing he had begun to branch out brought him no small measure of comfort.
“I have volunteered to watch A-Yuan, with Shufu’s assistance,” Wangji continued. Lan Xichen blinked at the news. He knew they were involved, but hadn't quite appreciated that it extended to lengthy periods of childcare. Then again, Wangji had never done anything by halves. “Wei Ying and I agreed that it would cause less upset to his education.”
While Lan Xichen could not imagine a two week absence would overly upset the education of a seven-year-old, he nonetheless nodded. Absently, however. Surely Shufu couldn’t reasonably commit much time to such a venture? “I cannot say what my schedule will look like, but please do consider me as an option as well.”
“Thank you,” Wangji said, inclining his head.
Concern for his uncle’s time lingered, though Lan Xichen tried not to let it distract him. Wangji would surely respect that Shufu had insurmountable responsibilities preventing him from being a full time caregiver to a young child.
The first time he found A-Yuan in Shufu’s office, he thought little of it. Wangji had been called upon to verify the findings of one of their junior Agents, and Lan Xichen himself had only just returned from a case of his own. A-Yuan looked satisfied, seated on the floor, plucking at the strings of a guqin with all the dexterity capable with somewhat chubby fingers.
The boy spotted Lan Xichen lingering in the doorway and hopped up to present himself with a frankly adorable little bow. Helplessly charmed, Lan Xichen returned it, and rose to A-Yuan’s immense grin. It enveloped his face, showing off rows of helplessly mismatched baby and half-dropped adult teeth.
“Thank you for keeping Director Lan company,” Lan Xichen said.
A-Yuan nodded, his features quickly morphing into a mimicry of Wangji’s general solemnity. “It is my pleasure, Lan-shushu.”
Lan Xichen managed not to coo, though he struggled against it to the point of nearly straining a muscle in his jaw. When Wangji had been this age, Lan Xichen had been fourteen and discovering the joys and pitfalls of young love, his school, his intense interest in pursuing the xiao. He hadn’t ever deliberately neglected his brother, but memories of him being this small had dimmed with time and fought with various others for a place in his mind.
“Wangji is slated to return shortly before bedtime. If you’d like to join us, A-Yuan and I will be going in search of dinner once I’ve finished here.”
Lan Xichen hoped Shufu wasn’t planning to put off any necessary work in order to babysit. While his uncle’s dedication was commendable, Lan Xichen couldn’t help but worry it might place him in an awkward position down the road.
“I could take A-Yuan, if you have other duties you need to attend to,” Lan Xichen offered. Having just wrapped up a case, and with nothing too urgent in his pending workload, he could spare an evening.
“Thank you, but it is not necessary.”
Lan Xichen smiled. He would have to trust in his uncle’s ability to manage his workload. “Then I would be delighted to join you.”
The second time it occurred, about a week into what Wei Wuxian and CT Luo had fondly referred to as their “roadtrip” across Gusu, Lan Xichen caught up with Shufu in the labs.
In the absence of their full time Cultivation Technicians, their assistants and support teams were doing their utmost to keep up with the demands of head office. They were all competent, but highly specialized, and obviously missing the broader expertise of their missing superiors. Shufu was conducting his weekly compliance checks, a measure introduced nearly half a year ago when outdated warding talismans had resulted in Wei Wuxian’s first workplace injury.
(Not his last, much to Wangji’s ongoing consternation; Wei Wuxian was not a man cheerfully dedicated to his own safety when results were on the line).
A-Yuan trailed behind him, holding his own clipboard and very seriously recording checkmarks whenever Shufu made his own notes. Shufu’s eyes danced with silent mirth, though he somehow managed to keep himself from smiling whenever A-Yuan carefully ticked the boxes before him.
“Director Lan, A-Yuan,” he nodded in greeting. “I wasn’t expecting to see you down here.”
“Wangji has been held up in a deposition,” Shufu said, answering the unasked question. “And as the daycare hours are over for the day, A-Yuan has agreed to assist me with reviewing the on-site inspections.”
“We have found no anomalies,” A-Yuan reported.
“Excellent.” Lan Xichen glanced at the file folder in his hand. “If you’d like, I can take over for the time being.”
“We still have five labs to check,” A-Yuan told him before Shufu could answer.
Lan Xichen chuckled. “I shall leave you to it, then.”
At least Shufu was getting his work done. Though, judging from the obvious panic on the face of their blood splatter expert, more than one person wished he wasn’t.
And then, yet again two days later, Lan Xichen walked into Shufu’s office to see A-Yuan colouring on the floor. He delivered an update on the Lanling case, quick and perfunctory, distracted by the presence of the young child and mindful to keep the details as vague as possible.
Shufu understood immediately. “A-Yuan, if you ask Lan Ruiyu nicely, she will print you off another page.”
A-Yuan jumped to his feet. “Thank you, Da-ye.”
“Mn. Please close the door behind you. We’ll be just a moment.”
Once A-Yuan had gone, Lan Xichen delivered his updates.
“I will admit that I am becoming slightly frustrated with the Cultivation Agent who initially worked on the case,” Lan Xichen said. “He seems uninterested in maintaining any semblance of professionalism, and has been creating unnecessary roadblocks.”
“Likely because he does not care to have his own findings questioned. Let me know if he continues to cause you problems and I will intervene.”
Lan Xichen nodded. “And…” He paused. “Did you need me to take A-Yuan?”
Shufu’s eyebrow twitched upwards. “This is the third time you’ve asked. You do recall I managed to keep you and Wangji alive.”
“Of course. I meant no offense.”
“I didn’t believe you did,” Shufu assured him.
When Lan Xichen exited the office, he found A-Yuan hovering over Lan Ruiyu’s shoulder, carefully considering two different options of line art to colour in.
He brightened when he spotted Lan Xichen. “Which one would you like, Lan-shushu?” he asked.
“Me?”
A-Yuan nodded enthusiastically.
“Ah. I will admit to a mild preference for the dragon, if it suits you.”
Lan Ruiyu obligingly printed the page, and A-Yuan darted back into Shufu’s office to work on it.
He called Mingjue that evening, gaze fixed on the very colourful picture of a dragon now tacked to his refrigerator.
"I am worried about Shufu."
"Oh?" Mingjue, like Wangji, had perfected the art of the single syllable response, though his often seemed encouraging instead of forbidding. He never doubted Mingjue was listening to him.
"Wangji has become involved with a gentleman—"
This, apparently, merited a full reply: "Does A-Sang know? Because I am incapable of lying to him, and he'll read this all over my face in an instant."
Neither of them mentioned that Mingjue had very successfully hidden the truth of sabre cultivation from Nie Huaisang for nearly twenty years, yielding the information only when he eventually ended up in hospital at the brink of qi deviation.
"It's a relatively new development. Officially, at least. Wangji refuses to acknowledge that he was mooning for the better part of three months."
"How could you tell? I'm not trying to insult your brother, but I can't imagine him being terribly obvious about it."
"The same way you can always tell when A-Sang is up to something. The idiosyncrasies of being an elder brother, I suppose." They shared a genuine chuckle. "The man in question has a young child, and several times now I have discovered Shufu watching over the boy while his father is unavailable."
Mingjue waited in silence. Then, "Oh, is that the entire story?"
"Of course. Shufu's role is very demanding, and I'm worried this will place undue strain on him."
"Did he not essentially raise you and Wangji?"
"He was not in the Director role at the time. Mingjue, I… I appreciate the severe demands for his time. And I worry."
His father had worked over a hundred hours a week for his entire career, or so Lan Xichen recalled. He’d arranged for special childcare arrangements for himself and Wangji, prior to Shufu taking over, which regularly saw them under the rotating supervision of a number of disinterested professional nannies during their waking hours. How could Shufu be dedicating his time elsewhere? Lan Xichen feared he’d end up working into the small hours of the morning to compensate.
“Well, from everything I know about your uncle, no one could get him to do anything he wasn’t already interested in doing.” True enough. “Do you think Wangji’s boyfriend is taking advantage?”
“Far from it. Shufu seems to like him.” Shockingly, and against everything Lan Xichen knew of his character. Both their characters. However Wei Wuxian had managed to ingratiate himself, Lan Qiren regarded him with an exasperated fondness bordering on affection.
“Then you probably don’t need to worry.”
Lan Xichen hummed noncommittally, still unconvinced.
“SCA Lan?”
Lan Xichen looked up, surprised to hear the title tripping from Wei Wuxian’s lips from where the man lingered in his doorway. Their recent return had been heralded as a triumph for forensic cultivation, the Wei-Luo Post-Mortem Preservation Method now a standardized practice among the GBC satellite branches. There had been talk of publishing papers, though the two of them continued working on cobbling together the appropriate documentation. Wei Wuxian took a very different approach to academic excellence than his counterpart, apparently.
“Surely we’re beyond that these days.” His brow creased. “Unless this is a formal matter?” CT Luo, as far as he knew, had taken charge of his active case. He didn’t think it necessitated additional resources, unless he’d made some particularly egregious errors in his initial assessment.
“No, no, no,” Wei Wuxian insisted. He sauntered into the room and placed a generously sized coffee from the café down the street in front of Lan Xichen before splaying out on Lan Xichen’s couch. “I came to say thank you for helping out with my radish the past couple of weeks. You’re definitely in the running for his second-favourite Lan.”
“The first presumably being Wangji,” Lan Xichen chuckled. He hadn’t done much, truth be told. Only suggested he was available if the strain became too much for Wangji and Shufu. They had not deemed it necessary to take him up on the offer.
“Nah. Lan Zhan’s got five years of birthdays to catch up on before he can try and wrestle the title from Lan-laoshi.” Wei Wuxian scratched his nose. “Though he’s already getting pretty close. You know, I almost had A-Yuan convinced to play the dizi before we moved to Gusu. And suddenly it’s all guqin all the time. I think our neighbours are going to kill us.” Wei Wuxian tilted his head back and forth thoughtfully. “He’s pretty good, though. Way more patient than I ever was, but then again I doubt that’s a surprise to anyone.”
“You've been misled regarding the extent of my assistance,” Lan Xichen offered, "Though I would have been happy to lend whatever help I could. A-Yuan is a lovely young man, and a credit to his father.”
Wei Wuxian’s face dropped into something akin to horror, but Lan Xichen only had a moment to worry before he half-collapsed on the couch and howled (albeit at a workplace-appropriate volume, indicating fairly impressive self-control of which Lan Xichen hadn’t thought him capable), “Why are you all so earnest? Don’t you know what you Lans do to my poor heart?”
Lan Xichen grinned down at his paperwork, providing what privacy he could, given the fit occurring on his couch.
“This is really comfy,” Wei Wuxian said after the theatrics passed, stroking the soft leather with an impressed moue.
“It’s important to have a comfortable couch in one’s office, if the space can be spared,” Lan Xichen said.
“For the dreaded overnights,” Wei Wuxian nodded. “My, ah, one of the people who raised me felt the same way. I think it eventually just became an excuse, though.”
“An excuse?”
“Yeah. To miss all the important family shit. Eventually you end up falling so far behind that it just becomes easier to skip it, instead of showing up and realizing you don’t know how to talk to anyone anymore. And, added bonus, it gets you a real leg up in your career. Especially if you’re aiming to become a department head, or whatever.” He suddenly laughed and waved awkwardly, backpedalling with impressive speed. “Sorry, it’s not that. I don’t mean you. Obviously.”
“Obviously,” Lan Xichen repeated faintly. Was that what he was doing? Had he fallen so far behind as to need the excuse to stop himself from engaging again? He didn’t want to think so, but how long had it been since he’d committed real time to anything outside of work?
“I’ll get out of your hair,” Wei Wuxian said, hopping to his feet.
“Did…” The other man paused at Low Xichen’s low tone. “Did your guardian ever manage to break the habit?”
Wei Wuxian’s lips thinned into a tight line, and though he chuckled there was no humour in it. “If he did, I wasn’t there for it.”
Either entirely oblivious or keenly aware of the mental upheaval he’d created, Wei Wuxian mercifully left, closing the door behind him.
Lan Xichen sat unseeing for a long time. He couldn’t believe his father had relied on what Wei Wuxian had suggested, simply because he’d never seen fit to bother excusing his behaviour. But Lan Xichen himself? Since his promotion, hadn’t it become easier to rely on the staid convenience of insisting work came first in order to avoid the extreme discomfort of catching up with his friends after so long? None of them begrudged him for it. No one questioned him.
Not even Mingjue.
With a shaking hand, he picked up his phone, and placed a call with barely a glance at the screen.
“Have I missed too much?” he blurted out immediately after Mingjue picked up.
A moment of silence followed before, “Hold on.” Some scattered whispers. Lan Xichen realized far too late that he’d called in the middle of the afternoon, and Mingjue was doubtless busy with his other commitments.
Silence finally fell, giving Mingjue the opportunity to respond. “What is this about?”
“If I’d been there, I might have seen the signs of your qi deviation earlier—”
“Xichen, A-Huan, my heart, stop.” Lan Xichen quieted. “You wouldn’t have known because I didn’t want anyone to know. I didn’t want to worry about it, and I didn’t want you and A-Sang to worry about it either. I thought I had it under control. I did have it under control, right up until I ended up on that joint case with LCO. If you’d known, I wouldn’t have been able to stand it.” He took a measured breath. “I knew it was happening. It happened to my father, and my grandfather. Everyone who has ever practiced traditional Nie cultivation suffers the same fate. It’s part of why my family has always invested so much into medical research. Advances put it barely even on par with heart disease these days. I don’t know why it hit me as hard as it did, and I am sorry that I hid it from you.
“It was never your fault.”
Lan Xichen nodded against the phone screen.
“What brought this on?” Mingjue asked, surprisingly gentle.
“I…” What could he say? He stared at the couch across from him. “I’m tired, Mingjue.”
“Then go home,” he urged. “Take the afternoon off. Call me when you wake up and I’ll tell you again if I need to.”
“Thank you.” Lan Xichen straightened in his chair. “I’m quite alright, now.”
“If you don’t go home and put your ass to bed, I will tell A-Sang to call Wangji.”
He laughed. “Well. It’s not the same as you being here and putting my ass to bed, but I suppose in your absence I’ll have to make do.”
Mingjue huffed and hung up. They’d fallen out of the habit of saying goodbye. Perhaps because the fear of Mingjue dying still gripped him in the quiet hours, when he found himself alone with his thoughts, and memories of saying goodbye one night and waking up to the trilling sound of his phone only an hour later when Nie Huaisang called him from the hospital. ‘Goodbye’ these days felt too much like inviting trouble.
He gathered his things and made his way to the door.
Several surprised looks passed his way as he left the building. Mid-afternoon on a Wednesday, and he was packing up to go home? More than once, he had to fight the urge to turn on his heel and head back to his office.
The feeling intensified when he spotted Shufu on his way out, coming back in through the doors from an off-site appointment earlier that morning.
“Xichen,” he said with a concerned frown. “Is everything all right?”
“I…” He wasn’t sick. Not even under the weather, really. Suddenly he wondered if he should have listened to Mingjue at all. What sort of man left in the middle of the workday to go home and nap? “I thought I should take the afternoon.”
Strangely, Shufu merely nodded. He even appeared understanding. “Return refreshed tomorrow.”
“I will.”
They said their goodbyes, and Lan Xichen made his way to the carpark.
The nap did him some good, he admitted privately, and he returned to work the next day feeling somewhat better about the state of the world.
And then the same case once again came crashing down on his ears, throwing what had begun as a new resolve to try avoiding sleeping on his couch to utter oblivion.
TO: [email protected]
FROM: [email protected]
CC: [email protected]
BCC: [email protected], [email protected]
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Red: Findings - Bai Haiyu
Attachments: Bai.H_Toxicology_WEID239.pdf, Bai.H_Autopsy_LUOQD151.pdfGood afternoon,
Please note I have cc’d in Lan Qiren, Director of the Gusu Bureau of Cultivation.
I’m sorry, but I don’t believe your below response to be appropriate in consideration to the subject matter at hand. As you know, our own toxicology reports indicated that COD was complications due to exposure to necrotic blood, suggesting a walking corpse was somehow involved and must have been in the immediate vicinity, considering the rapid onset of the condition and concentration in the bloodstream. Given your team’s lack of findings with regards to the presence of any walking dead, it suggests post-mortem displacement, which is supported by the livor mortis.
Please take some time to review the attachments. I still welcome your collaboration in this case, but will include additional parties if you feel unable to support further investigation.
Best,
Lan Xichen
Senior Cultivation Agent - Gusu Bureau of Cultivation
“Lan-shushu.”
Lan Xichen blinked up from his laptop, surprised to see A-Yuan hovering in the doorway. Wangji waited in the hallway, not quite hovering, and nodded encouragingly when A-Yuan looked back at him.
“What a pleasant surprise,” Lan Xichen said honestly.
Straightening himself to his full, preciously small height, A-Yuan marched forward and placed an envelope on Lan Xichen’s desk. The boy rocked back on his heels, trying not to look too hopeful as Lan Xichen slid his finger under the fold and gently pried it open.
"You are invited," he read aloud. The invitation was printed on good cardstock, dozens of clipart musical notes and instruments dancing across the page. "To a night of music at Gusu Primary." He looked at A-Yuan in surprise. "All families welcome."
"I'm playing the guqin. Zhan-gege has been helping me prepare. I even have a solo!"
"…" Lan Xichen looked at the invitation, at a complete loss as to what he could say.
Quiet stretched out long and uncomfortable between them until, merciful creature he'd become, Wangji stepped into his office. "A-Yuan, you know the way to da-ye's office, correct?" A-Yuan nodded, though a small frown had tugged down the corner of his mouth. "Why don't you take his invitation upstairs. I will come right away."
A-Yuan nodded. As he passed Wangji in the doorway he ducked in close, lower lip trembling. "I don't think he liked it."
"I'm sure he did," Wangji assured him.
A-Yuan nodded, though the slump of his shoulders suggested deep disbelief, and he made his way back to the elevators.
Wangji took A-Yuan's place across Lan Xichen's desk. "Do you remember my first recital?"
Lan Xichen gave the question proper consideration. There had been many over the years, especially once Wangji's obvious talents had been buoyed by an older child's dedication to practice. He would have been quite young, probably A-Yuan's age, when he first performed.
"My memories of it are looking out into the crowd and seeing you and Shufu. And I recall very vividly seeing the two of you at nearly each one, prior to your enrollment in the academy."
"Of course we wanted to support you, Wangji."
"It meant quite a lot to me, though I know I have not always been demonstrative." Lan Xichen couldn't help an amused huff, which Wangji accepted with the tiniest smile. "It would mean quite a bit to A-Yuan, as well."
The amusement fled. "I have so much work, Wangji—"
"Shufu will be coming along with Wei Ying and I. We plan to go for dinner afterwards. All of us would like for you to join us."
"How is Shufu coming? He must be so far behind already, having helped with A-Yuan so much these past weeks. He… I should see if there's anything I can take off his plate."
Wangji's gaze turned troubled. "I promise you that Wei Ying and I were very careful not to burden him."
"But now can he have so much time?" Lan Xichen demanded.
"Xiongzhang, what is this about?" Wangji sounded confused. Perhaps even lost. Lan Xichen's stomach dropped. Of course he would have been too young to recall their father's work habits prior to them moving in with Shufu. The long, agonizing hours left at the mercy of uncaring assistants and secretaries. To Wangji, only six when their mother had died, such things must have been a bare whisper of memory before being replaced with the much warmer, more attentive home Shufu created for them.
“You were too young to recall, but when father took over the Directorship of the GBC, he was constantly working long hours. I’m afraid that Shufu will do the same if we ask too much of him outside of work.”
“Do you honestly believe that if our father had truly wanted to be at home with us, anything could have stopped him?” The question pulled Lan Xichen up short. “That if Shufu had taken over from him in a professional capacity when we were children, he would have fallen into the same habits? Right now, Shufu has time to occasionally assist Wei Ying with A-Yuan. He regularly takes lunch with both you and I. He has a weekly weiqi game with one of his friends, and frequently guest lectures at UGusu in his free time. These are things he manages while maintaining a standard of excellence which far surpasses the former Director Lan’s.” His lips pursed. "If our father had wanted to be involved in our lives, he would have made the time."
Lan Xichen wondered if it would be more unfilial to defend their father or to allow the words to go undisputed. Indecision muted him until Wangji stood.
“I have always valued your presence in my life,” his younger brother told him. Lan Xichen barely managed to meet his steady gaze. “And I know that Wei Ying and A-Yuan would value you as well, if given the chance.” He paused for a moment’s deliberation. “You deserve to be valued.”
Stricken, Lan Xichen watched mute as Wangji showed himself from the office to go in search of A-Yuan.
He sat staring at the invitation long past when he should have been getting back to work. Finally he pushed back from his desk and took the stairs up to see Shufu. He half-expected to find it empty, everyone fled for the day, but a light remained on in Lan Qiren’s office, the door ajar as though his uncle had been waiting just for him.
He knocked, of course. But unlike his father, he never doubted that his uncle would invite him in.
“Come.”
He took a deep breath and walked into an office that he’d never slept in (save once, the night Shufu officially demanded, and was granted without a token argument, custody of himself and Wangji), and found Shufu sitting behind his desk, waiting. For him?
“SCA Lan,” Shufu said.
“Shufu.” Lan Xichen gasped. He’d never called Lan Qiren Shufu while in the office before. It felt as though he was somehow taking advantage of his uncle’s position. But how could he do otherwise?
“Ah. Xichen, then.” He maintained perfect posture in his seat, back straight and shoulders forward, but the skin around his eyes relaxed. “Wangji suggested you might come see me.”
Lan Xichen took the seat across from his uncle and looked at him. Really looked. He lacked the telltale strain of exhaustion in the corners of his eyes, and his mouth remained unpinched and relaxed. At no point did he turn his attention to his open laptop, and eventually both the screen and the second monitor beside it dimmed to the lockscreen. He made no effort to stop it from doing so. Lan Xichen had his undivided attention.
“Why?” he finally asked. He expected his voice to come out at a shout, but it barely trickled out at a whisper.
Lan Qiren considered the question a moment, probably reading far more into it than Lan Xichen had intended. “Shortly after your father signed custody over to me, I promised myself I would not speak ill of him in front of you.” Lan Xichen took a steadying breath."I will not break that vow, now. You deserve what pleasant memories you have of him—"
"What pleasant memories?" Lan Xichen interrupted, to his uncle's obvious shock. Lan Xichen never interrupted anyone, let alone the man before him. Even as a child, he had done his best to be polite and biddable and out of the way. As a young man, he had flourished under the attention of his peers, but kept the first two habits. He was well-liked. He was outgoing. He was everything he thought his father had wanted from him.
And it hadn't been enough.
"My memories of my father are of him telling me to smile”. ("A-Huan, your mother is going to be disappointed to see a sad face. What is there to cry about? I told you that you would have to entertain yourself until she came home."). "Or to help A-Niang with chores around the house while she carried Wangji. I think back to pleasant memories and all I can remember is her and you."
Shufu's face softened, quite like Wangji's, actually. The subtlest parting of lips that only suggested a crack in his neutrality.
"Why didn't he love us?"
Shufu couldn't have looked worse if Lan Xichen had stabbed him. The softness collapsed like a dying star, leaving Shufu looking ancient and crestfallen.
"He loved you. Only, your father considered love an impediment instead of a strength. Xichen," Shufu paused, "A-Huan." Lan Xichen's heart tapped a quick double beat. "I am sorry that you believe that what he did was acceptable."
"I don't understand your meaning." Shufu's gaze hardened and Lan Xichen hurried to continue. "This ignorant nephew apologizes."
"No, A-Huan. There is no need for an apology. Not for this. Not from you. Your father made the conscious decision to prioritize his work, his hobbies, and his political ambitions instead of his wife and children."
Lan Xichen could not prevent his face from contorting itself out of his usual smile. He tried to reign himself in. To keep his expression under control but it would not cooperate. "Shufu," he began helplessly, flying apart at the seams. Lan Xichen wanted to scrape his hands through his hair, as he had done throughout his childhood. He took a few deep breaths and scanned the room until his gaze finally landed on Shufu's own copy of A-Yuan's invitation. A square piece of white cardstock, about thirteen centimetres across. A purple trumpet. A blue guqin. A yellow rattle drum. Fifteen instruments in all. Comic Sans script, which probably made Wangji cringe, though he would have artfully hidden the reaction. He slowly returned his focus to his breathing. Every trick Shufu had helped him with in those horrible days after their father had given them up in favour of his own pursuits. This certainly wasn't the first time he'd struggled with a potential panic attack thinking about how his father didn't love him, though it had been some time since the last one.
Finally calm enough to meet Lan Qiren’s eyes once more, Lan Xichen turned his gaze upwards.
"You know, Wangji was ten when he told me he wanted to be a cultivator. He had found a box of photographs which included several of your mother in her uniform—" Back when the GBC had strict guidelines for its agents, all white robes and traditional decoration, "—and he insisted that it was a life he wanted."
"Wangji has always known his own mind," Lan Xichen nodded. He knew the photo of which Shufu spoke. Wangji had it framed and kept it in the front room of his home. And yet Lan Xichen couldn't help thinking there to be another particularly influential person in their lives who Wangji greatly admired, who had likely influenced his decision in ways their mother's memory could not.
"But you had no interest. Until you reached seventeen, you seemed set on pursuing music. I had already begun researching some of the best conservatories on your behalf. It came as a shock when you told me you'd enrolled in the academy."
(“I want you to seriously consider pursuing a career in cultivation. Myself, your mother and your uncle have all been successful in this endeavour, and Wangji has already suggested he plans to pursue it as a career as well. While I admire your interest in music, and your obvious talent for it, you must admit that it would be more appropriate to keep it as a hobby and find more prestigious uses of your time.”)
"You don't think I should have?"
"You are an excellent agent, A-Huan. The Bureau has benefited greatly from your contributions. I only wish I was certain that it was what you truly wanted. You must allow yourself to prioritize what you care about," Shufu said, gruff in the same manner he had been when Lan Xichen had been a child, seeking reassurance. "If such a thing is your work. If such a thing is your family. If such a thing is music. My priorities have always been split between my duties to my family, and my role in the Bureau. I find these things to be fulfilling, personally and professionally. But I can also appreciate that they need not be the entirety of my focus. You are allowed to take time away to spend as you see fit.”
“What would I do?”
“A-Huan, you possess one of the most brilliant minds I know. Do whatever pleases you, and trust that no one who cares for you will let you fail.”
Lan Xichen did not cry. He was nearly forty, and little seemed more mortifying than the prospect of crying in the workplace. And yet he felt his low lip begin to wobble and he had to take in a few deep breaths through a clenched jaw to fight off what would surely be an unseemly display.
The clock crept towards midnight. Downstairs and around the corner his couch waited for him.
"I think I should go home," Lan Xichen whispered.
"Come. I will drive us both." Shufu stood. He paused at Lan Xichen's side and placed a hand on his shoulder, an anchor to stop Lan Xichen from floating up and away.
"Thank you, Shufu."
Lan Xichen had enjoyed a vibrant social life prior to joining the Gusu Bureau of Cultivation. Even during his academy days, he’d managed to balance his education and personal obligations and before assuming the title of Senior Cultivation Agent, he’d managed at least to keep some semblance of balance between his work and personal life. These days, he managed to tear himself away for a weekly dinner with Shufu and Wangji (recently extended to include Wei Wuxian and A-Yuan, much to the pleasure of everyone) and little else. What friends he had kept in touch predominantly through email and varied group chats, the contents of which ran leaner with every passing year.
More than once, he wondered if he hadn’t over-internalized the message his father had conveyed at the time of his appointment as a Cultivation Agent.
(“Everyone will look at you as a product of nepotism. You must prove them wrong. I will not have either of us questioned with regards to our qualifications.”)
As with everything his father ever told him, the consequences were only implied. Lan Xichen could remember his mother and Shufu always being forthright in discussing expectations and potential results of failure. His father doubtless imagined that Lan Xichen’s imagination capable of conjuring up far worse than anything he might invent himself.
He’d had the sense that some of the tenured CAs had wanted him to fail. Either because he entered the GBC as the first of the wave of a new generation of agents or out of some deep-seated dislike of his father. It made him want to succeed to spite them. And in that drive for success, it appeared that he’d allowed himself to lose sight of certain unhappy realities as a result. He had nearly six years' worth of banked vacation time. And he qualified for two of the quinquennial sabbaticals offered to longstanding GBC employees. All together, he might have taken a full year off.
And yet that suddenly didn’t seem like enough.
He woke before his alarm that morning and laid in bed even after it sounded. He waited through his usual departure time of 6:10am, rose late, ate a leisurely breakfast, worked on a few crosswords and didn’t walk through the HQ front doors until 10:07am.
When he called up to Lan Ruiyu to make an appointment, he found himself pleasantly surprised and also somewhat terrified when Shufu offered to see him immediately. It was one thing to have made a serious life-altering decision, and another entirely to see it through.
All the same, he made his way to Lan Qiren’s office, fervently hoping that he wasn’t about to lose his remaining family.
Shufu waved him into a free seat, but Lan Xichen found himself reluctant to take it.
“I’ve come to let you know that I plan to resign,” Lan Xichen said. Shufu seemed unsurprised. Perhaps a bit relieved? Lan Xichen couldn’t tell if he truly saw such a thing written across his uncle’s face, or if he merely wanted to. “Effective immediately.”
To this, Shufu finally frowned. “Xichen, no.” Lan Xichen’s heart stuttered, even as his uncle pressed on. “Lan Ruiyu forwarded me the records of your accumulated leave time. You currently have access to almost thirteen months of time off, and there will be severe tax implications if paid out in a single lump sum.” Lan Xichen’s breath stuttered. “I will be maintaining your status as a full-time employee of the Bureau for seven months, at which time you can choose to either take the payout or continue until your date of return, at which point we can process the termination.”
“Shufu—”
“Xichen,” Shufu replied evenly. “I will not lie. After our conversation, I hoped you would take the opportunity to make a change. And while this one is more extreme than I anticipated, I am very glad you’ve taken what I said to heart.”
“You’re not disappointed?”
“I will never be disappointed in you. If anything, I am disappointed in myself for not seeing the problem before it came to a head in such a way.” He leaned across his desk. “You have always and will always make me proud.”
His father had never once said he was proud. Lan Xichen assumed him to be, when he’d entered the academy, when he’d graduated with top honours, when he’d joined the Bureau, when he’d been promoted to Senior Cultivation Agent. He told himself he saw pride in his father’s eyes, when the man could be bothered to look up from his phone. Now, when he thought of it, he could only recall Shufu’s eyes transposed over his father’s face.
“What are your plans? If you have any?” Shufu questioned, leaning back in his seat.
“Music,” Lan Xichen blurted. A spontaneous response, but one that made deep and profound sense to him. “I want to remember how to use a xiao for fun.”
“Excellent. Will you be remaining in Gusu?”
An affirmative sat on the tip of Lan Xichen’s tongue, and dissolved as quickly as frost in sunlight.
“Xichen. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you. How was the kid’s concert?”
“Excellent. A-Yuan proved a very talented young musician.” Lan Xichen rallied his nerves. "I need you to collect me at the train station."
Nie Mingjue made a sound not unlike a laugh, but soaked in disbelief. "What, are you actually taking vacation time?"
"No," Lan Xichen chuckled. "Not so much taking vacation time as. Well. I've resigned from the GBC." Silence met his announcement. "I realized that I was professionally satisfied, but unhappy. After a long talk with Shufu, I decided that things needed to change."
"Xichen," Nie Mingjue choked out. "I. Yes. Of course I'll pick you up. When does your train get in?"
"Ah. I am already at the terminal."
"What."
Uncertainty welled nauseously in his stomach. This had been a terrible idea, obviously. How stupid, to believe that Nie Mingjue might welcome an uninvited upset to his life. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—"
"No!" Nie Mingjue snapped. "No. Xichen. Don't. I'm just surprised. I'm coming to get you. Right now. Wait for me."
"You've waited for me this long," Lan Xichen replied. "I can wait a bit longer."
"I'll be there."
Nie Mingjue hung up without a goodbye, and the familiarity made Lan Xichen smile. He rolled his suitcase to the front of the station and took a seat outside, breathing in the arid Qinghe air, battling down his lingering anxiety with promise he'd heard in Nie Mingjue's words.
He'd texted Wangji, Shufu, and an unsurprisingly enthusiastic Wei Wuxian about his safe arrival, the latter responding with several adorable pictures of Wangji working with A-Yuan on his guqin fingering. He also made his way through several threads on a forum dedicated to theories in non-cultivation musical theory before Nie Mingjue arrived. He skidded to a halt in front of the terminal doors like a man possessed, still dressed in his sleep pants and hair flying wild about his head. Even his moustache seemed askew. Lan Xichen couldn't believe he'd lived for twenty years being in love with this man without enthusiastically throwing himself into their relationship wholeheartedly.
The moment Nie Mingjue spotted him, his face softened, and Lan Xichen's heart lurched hard in his chest. This late at night, only a few travel-weary bodies dotted the terminal, and no one stood between them.
A voice that sounded suspiciously like Wei Wuxian silently laughed at him. Do a running leap into his arms, Xichen-ge.
But for all he considered it, he was still a Lan at heart, and instead he stood and rolled his suitcase across the distance between them.
Mingjue stared at him in awe. “You quit your job and immediately came to Qinghe?”
“No. I made sure to attend A-Yuan’s concert first.”
Mingjue choked on a laugh. “Priorities, then.”
“About that. Priorities. I’ve realized that priorities aren’t always about duty. Or what you feel you should be doing. I didn’t realize that they can be about what you want. What I want. I love you,” Lan Xichen told him. “I’ve loved you for the better part of twenty years, and I want to be with you for the next twenty. If you’ll have me.”
Mingjue stared at him in shock, and then pulled out his phone. Lan Xichen’s stomach dropped, clear memories of his father dismissing similarly important words by checking his email, and he forced himself to remember that Mingjue was not like that. Could never be like that. He waited patiently, until Mingjue held up his phone to show off his browsing history.
“Real estate in Gusu?” Lan Xichen whispered.
“My OT is almost done,” Mingjue told him. “To the point where Qing-jie is at least willing to let me out of her sight, anyway, since she won’t trust anyone else with my recovery. I wasn’t sure if it was what you wanted. If I could offer enough to pull you away from your work.”
“You are enough,” Lan Xichen promised. “No matter where you are.”
They folded into one another’s arms, laughing as their heads bonked together. They’d have to find ways to move with one another; everything until now had been furtive and driven by the want for more time.
“Come on. Let’s go home,” Mingjue whispered against his temple, pressing a kiss to the fine hairs.
The drive through the Unclean Realm to Mingjue’s building passed quickly, despite the silence pressing excited and demanding between them. He rested his hand over Mingjue’s on the gear stick, tightening every time a flash of doubt crept into his mind. Mingjue knew. He always knew. And every time he lifted his hand, Lan Xichen’s with it, to press a kiss to his knuckles.
He lived in a modern building; all glass and steel and yet built to honour the distinguished history of the Unclean Realm. Mingjue tugged him into the apartment, across a threshold Lan Xichen had only crossed a handful of times in the past few years. His home would be significantly more spartan, if not for Nie Huaisang. His brother's influence lurked in every corner: delicate artwork, throw pillows and artful splashes of colour he knew Mingjue would never have picked for himself. If Lan Xichen looked in the fridge, he imagined that alongside the cheapest beer would be bottles of incredibly expensive wine, untouched until the rightful owner showed up for a drink.
Before Mingjue's hospitalization, his apartment had been a crash pad and nothing more. Everything important to him either stayed with Nie Huaisang in their childhood home, got tucked into storage, or carried along with him during his time as a cultivator. Seeing the homier touches now drove home the substantial changes he had made to his life, and gave Lan Xichen hope that there might be a way for them to make room for one displaced amateur xiao player and his single suitcase.
"Do you want…" Mingjue trailed off when he turned, and saw the look on Lan Xichen's face.
"Yes," Lan Xichen agreed, cheeks heating under Mingjue’s regard. "I want."
They tumbled into the bedroom together. Their first time had been desperate and furtive, driven by teenaged frustration and hormones. Since then, they'd found their groove with one another. Mingjue knew exactly how to coax Lan Xichen's body to liquid obedience, the places to touch to drive him out of his mind and make him beg.
(Sometimes, on very rare occasions, Mingjue wanted to be the one begging. It happened less frequently now he had escaped the violent thrall of sabre cultivation, and Lan Xichen realized with a happy start that they'd have time now to explore the possibilities at their leisure.)
Mingjue obviously had no desire to draw it out. He took them both roughly in hand, calloused fingers wrapped around heated skin and driving them both to wonderful heights of distraction. Lan Xichen came with a gasp when Mingjue kissed him, gentle and sweet in contrast to the rough strokes of his fingers. No one else ever saw this side of him the way Lan Xichen did. And, he realized with a satisfied hum, he would make sure no one ever would.
"Let me keep this," he begged the universe.
Mingjue chuckled against his clavicle. "I was just thinking the same thing."
Lan Xichen kissed the crown of his head.
Da-ge had obviously slept in. They hadn't had plans, exactly, but generally when his brother told him that he'd be by "bright and early" to " help you with all this museum shit, A-Sang, no, don't try to explain it to me again, as long as you like it I don’t care," Nie Huaisang tended to interpret that as, "have your lazy ass out of bed and ready to go by nine at the latest or there will be hell to pay."
He'd set eight alarms, and dragged himself out of bed after snoozing the last one three times. He showered. He dressed. He went to the stand around the corner from his townhouse which didn't have anything espresso-based on the menu because da-ge only ever drank black coffee and claimed they made the best in the Unclean Realm. (They did not, da-ge only liked it for the nostalgia of the experience, hearkening back to when their father took him for his first cup an epoch ago, presumably because he never realized da-ge would immediately start working towards using it to replace all the blood in his veins). And when da-ge hadn't been waiting impatiently outside his door, Nie Huaisang had braved shitty weekend transit to haul his ass halfway across town, sternly telling himself not to worry. Worry never got anyone anywhere unless carefully feigned and conveyed at the exact right pitch. Also, a certain bitchy acquaintance of his suggested in the secret coded language of bitches everywhere that excessive worry gave people wrinkles, and Nie Huaisang felt way too young to deal with that shit).
Nie Huaisang used his spare key to let himself into his brother's apartment, yawning wide enough to crack his jaw, and unable to cover his mouth with two extremely large coffees balanced in his hands. One had spilt on his sleeve. There was a coffee stain on his cream linen and wool twill blazer and his cleaner was going to murder him. Why did life have to be like this?
"Da-ge," he called, drawing out the syllable as obnoxiously as possible. If he had to suffer, so did his brother.
His suffering intensified when he nearly killed himself tripping over an unfamiliar suitcase lying forgotten in the front hallway. The coffee did not go flying, but only because of Nie Huaisang's incredible and well-concealed dexterity.
"Da-ge! Whose is this?" He kicked it around until he caught sight of the tags. Gusu? "Is Xichen-ge here? Were we expecting him? Did you forget to tell me?"
"It was spur of the moment," the man in question replied, exiting the back hallway which led to his brother's room. His trousers were wrinkled. He'd slid on one of da-ge's horrible old crew neck shirts, which hung around him like an off shoulder ball gown. He looked happier than Nie Huaisang could ever remember seeing him.
"You never do anything spur of the moment!"
"I also resigned from the GBC."
Nie Huaisang took a sip of disgusting coffee. It had not changed into a decent macchiato. So. Apparently not dreaming.
Nie Huaisang shoved the two take away cups into Lan Xichen's hands and whipped out his phone.
Nie Huaisang
IS YOUR BROTHER HERE TO STAY???
I WAS NOT CONSULTED????????
As your BEST FRIEND you are CONTRACTUALLY OBLIGATED to WARN ME ABOUT THESE THINGS
Queen Bitch
My brother is my best friend.
Yes. He intends to stay in Qinghe for the foreseeable future.
You were offered in trade, but I declined the honour.
Nie Huaisang was going to take the train to Gusu and dump a cup of bleach and a red sock in with all Lan Wangji's white laundry.
Nie Huaisang
Afraid I would dethrone you as biggest bitch in Gusu?
Queen Bitch
As incumbent, it is a position I take very seriously.
Tell my brother good morning. And also that I am transplanting his gentians to my own garden.
"What the fuck," Nie Huaisang whispered at his phone screen. He looked up in time to see Lan Xichen take a sip of coffee and grimace. "You're actually moving here?"
Lan Xichen suddenly seemed unsure, which made da-ge's arrival perfectly timed. He lifted one of the cups from Lan Xichen's hands and swallowed down most of it in a few disgusting mouthfuls.
"He is."
Lan Xichen beamed, the expression putting every other innumerable smile Nie Huaisang had seen on his face to shame.
"I am."
They leveled one another with gazes too hideously sentimental for words. Nie Huaisang was going to need so much therapy.