Yang Rong does not wake up in five seconds – rather, he wakes up in exactly three and a half, his eyes snapping open mid-injection, his body angling forward in reflex. The surroundings inside the vehicle are purely dark, but Yang Rong’s eyes seem to glow a verdant green.
His pupils are dilated slightly, unsettlingly unfocused, yet carrying the intensity of a hawk. It is a purely visceral reaction when the colonel whips his head toward the person in front, startling Shi Luo into pumping the entirety of the syringe.
It is also purely instinctive that Shi Luo immediately grabs Noah and pushes him toward the colonel – as if shrinking all responsibility, the doctor quickly discards the syringe and maneuvers himself several feet backward. Noah, entirely confused, is forced to be substitute, thrown in front of Yang Rong who bears a disconcerting, dark look in his eyes.
Noah hadn’t a chance to recover either before Shi Luo pats him on the back, leans in and whispers, “He isn’t in the right state of mind. He’s always had a trained reflex to wake up from external injury – a stimulus reaction. Pumped full of drugs, he may be confused, aggressive, violent… hard to handle. Sorry, Xie Xing.”
Then Shi Luo decisively walks away to the front compartment of the vehicle, leaving Noah alone with an increasingly alarming Yang Rong – and to make matters worse, the man is now staring at him blankly, unblinkingly. Noah hesitates to reach a hand out. He brushes one hand against an unbandaged portion of his shoulder, curls one finger against his firm bicep and lightly rubs him for attention.
“…Yang Rong?” Noah prompts softly, leaning forward to examine his state. The colonel’s face is slightly tinged amber, flushed pinkish, but his expression is of cold indifference. Frankly speaking, the universes are unaligned when Yang Rong, unfiltered loudmouth, doesn’t speak. With a small frown, Noah taps their foreheads together and murmurs, “Yang Rong, what is—!”
Muscular arms wrap a full circle around his waist, pulling him so suddenly forward his breath hitches. Their heads bonk together painfully – but only Noah seems to register any sort of pain, for Yang Rong fully ignores the impact and begins to slide a hand up his collar, kneading the nape of his neck.
“Kitten,” the man slurs. Yang Rong’s voice is husky in the haze of sleep and when said deeply by his ears, an indescribable craving is dripped down south. “Taking advantage of Rong-ge when he’s asleep, hm…?”
Yang Rong speaks very, very slowly, like his mind is still in the middle of processing the situation, his entire self conked out from drugs. In this position, Noah is half on top of his body, chest-to-chest, pressing down on a hard piece of sedimentary rock. As uncomfortable as it may be, he allows Yang Rong to take advantage, allows those calloused fingers to slide through the gauze on his head, through locks of silver hair, rubbing insistently on his ears.
All the while, the man is still in a strange dream state. The so-called aggressive, violent and hard-to-handle alpha is acting just the opposite.
He murmurs lowly, “Then I’ll forgive you if you…give… give Rong-ge a kiss…” He fondles him some more, and his eyebrows suddenly furrow in surprise – or confusion, whatever it is that’s in that strange head of his. “…Crap… Kitten, for a dream, you are strangely soft to the touch… Perhaps I’ve mastered lucid dreaming…?”
Yang Rong pauses for a second. Then he slides his other hand down the curve of Noah’s ass and gives two experimental squeezes.
“…” Noah is motion-locked.
“…Crap,” Yang Rong murmurs again, giving it another squeeze. “…The quality is excellent.”
“…”
Another squeeze followed by a light pinch, and Yang Rong ponders for a very long time. As though he has reached a conclusion of paramount importance, the colonel nods and resolutely dips his hand down the waistband.
“…Then…I’ll apologize later, kitten, but for now…” Yang Rong gives a low, guttural hum of approval. “My wet dreams are not often so—”
Noah resolutely grabs his collar, hoists him upward and slams him back onto the bed. Yang Rong’s head bounces harshly off the hard pillow – not hard enough to sustain any permanent damage, but definitely enough to hurt.
“—Fuck!” the man exclaims as he braces for impact, only for his shoulder to hit sharply against the metal edge. The collision must’ve paralyzed him straight through, and his latissimus gunshot wound must’ve ripped open, because Yang Rong lets out a loud, uncharacteristic yelp. “What the fuck?!” he shouts as he jolts up in a frenzy. “Where is the enemy—?!”
Noah hovers over him – quite a compromising position still, except his heteroclite eyes are glazed paler than usual. A bit of lethargy mixed with an unknown, brewing emotion. Yang Rong rapidly blinks himself to awareness, though his bandaged hand is still placed not-very-innocuously on a pair of perky buttocks.
“…” Yang Rong speaks very slowly. “I am not dreaming, am I?”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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“…” Noah, in a half-befuddled state, responds softly, “…It is fine.”
“…?”
Yang Rong seems partially shocked by the response. He seems even more shocked when Noah doesn’t make an attempt to climb off his body – instead, the younger man almost seems to snuggle into his hold, turning himself comfortably on top, planting his cheek pliantly onto the crook of his neck. Aggressive one moment and pliant the next – Noah’s behavior is all sorts of contradictory.
“…Noah, what’s wrong?” Yang Rong asks unsurely. “Are you hurt? Rong-ge will take a look…”
“Mm…” Noah shakes his head, nuzzling himself deeper into the embrace. “Nothing. I only want to hold onto you, Yang Rong…” Then upon a mild pause, he corrects, “Rong-ge.”
“…” Yang Rong seems to be in a state of analeptic shock. Ten long seconds of silence are followed by unsteady breaths and strangled noises, his body slightly shaking in tandem. “…?”
Ten more seconds pass before the colonel speaks again.
“Fuck,” Yang Rong concludes plainly. “I’m not dreaming. I’m already dead.”
Noah ignores him and opts to close both eyes instead. He wraps an arm around Yang Rong’s torso and lies obediently on top. When settled comfortably, Noah rubs his nose more insistently against the crook of Yang Rong’s neck, beckoning for attention.
“Rong-ge,” he sounds out a little quieter than usual, hinting unspoken need. Warm breaths graze across the colonel’s sweat gland. A pair of rosed lips dip tower to touch on firm skin. Noah mouths at the junction of his nape, tugging the skin gently in between his lips.
Yang Rong clears his throat.
“If I have to get shot three more times to hear you say that again, consider me dead,” the man says righteously. “But Noah, this isn’t right. Aren’t you taking advantage of Rong-ge? Isn’t there a double standard? Rong-ge can’t touch you but you’re allowed to harass—fuck, little kitten, please don’t move like that—”
“Mm.”
It is uncertain whether the hum is an affirmative or negative. Noah is more persistently tugging at the skin now, teething at the gland, lightly scraping his molars across it. Saliva is traced downward. Yang Rong’s neck is heated up in shades of pink and his pulse, heard through Noah’s damaged ear, is speeded up erratically.
Compelled by a sudden urge, Noah bites him – not deep enough to break through skin, but enough to leave a temporary pink mark. And Noah is quite intent on making the mark permanent, licking and biting harshly, sinking his canine teeth near the point of puncture. He’s about to go further until Yang Rong moves him gently away.
They’re face-to-face now – Noah staring dazedly and Yang Rong staring with a flustered, half-calculating expression. The colonel cups the side of Noah’s cheek and playfully squeezes once. Testingly.
Yang Rong asks slowly, “Marking me?”
“Mn.”
A straightforward hum that has Yang Rong raising an eyebrow in pleasant surprise. Always quick with advances, the man shamelessly hooks a finger on Noah’s jaw, lightly scratching him as he would to a soft animal.
“How bold, little kitten,” he says with a teasing undertone. “You may need to bite harder for it to last more than an hour.”
“Mn.”
“’Mn’?” Yang Rong quotes him, purposefully mischievous. The gears are turning visibly inside the colonel’s head, his green eyes lightening up in the way that indicate no proper intention. He leans forward and when their lips are no less than an inch away from touching, Yang Rong murmurs, “Sexual harassment with one account of aggravated assault… Noah, you’re aware your actions may land you in confines…?”
“Mn.”
“Mn. More specifically…” Yang Rong is obviously having too much fun with this, tapping their noses together, sliding a hand on the back of Noah’s neck. His body language oozes all flirtation, and Yang Rong is never one to hold back. He whispers lowly, “It may land you into the confines of my bed—”
Before he finishes, a large pill bottle comes hurling at him at the speed of light, slapping him painfully on the side of his abdomen, effectively knocking his breath away mid-sentence.
“—Fuck?!” Yang Rong yelps out as the bottle slaps his bandaged skin. He curls agonizingly to the side, but his shoulder blades strain with the movement, sending another ripple of pain down his gunshot wound. The exclamations are no less loud. At the very least, he does grab Noah, turns the younger man underneath him and rasps out with the seriousness of a dying soldier, “Fuck… Little kitten—your Rong-ge is—has something to tell you before he—”
“Please,” comes the stern voice of a certain doctor. Shi Luo is watching from a few meters away, his lips pursed and his eyebrows twitching in no positive regard. He holds a notepad and a pen on one hand, indicating he’d just finished with some more important matters. “No osculating nor copulating on my bed – a hospital bed, if you may have forgotten your current situation. If you wish to die, by all means take it outside. Xie Xing, get off his body. You will aggravate his wounds, and the buffoon has little self-control.”
Noah is pressed close to the colonel’s side. As though the words snapped him out of certain daze, he moves away and puts more distance between them.
“…Oh,” he murmurs. “I’m sorry, Yang Rong.”
Uncharacteristically softly, Noah brushes his lips on the colonel’s forehead. He then climbs off to sit on the bedside. Yang Rong stares in a strange trance. Then the man clears his throat, lets out a soft cough and reaches forward to tug Noah’s sleeve.
“…Kitten, I’m in pain,” he says. “Come and give Rong-ge another kiss.”
Shi Luo throws something else at him – the notepad, which hits him squarely on the forehead.
“It seems you are well enough to talk nonsense,” Shi Luo says. “Then we may cut the unnecessary chatter and discuss official business. Read what I’ve written.”
Yang Rong clicks his tongue, pries the notepad off his face and hoists himself up to a sitting position. The hospital bed creaks underneath him, and it is with much difficulty that Yang Rong remains upright. Every small movement strains his body, his muscles bulging from exertion. Beside him, Noah is staring intently at the bandages wrapped around his entire torso. The reopened wounds are damp and pinkish. Some spots that peek out are coated by a flimsy layer of carapace, sporadically appearing and disappearing with no control.
Yang Rong flips through the notepad, skims through the contents, and says with no visible emotions shown on his face, “The summit meeting? The topics don’t exactly interest me. What is all this scribbling about magnetic fields, solar interference, system upgrades… architectural designs of… doomsday shelters? As though we aren’t already on the brink. And this specie evolution… I’ve told you I’m not particularly well-versed in boring, scientific things.”
“Section eight.” Shi Luo gestures for him to flip the page. “On the topic of human-hybrids. We’d be discussing the possibilities of successful morphs, the genetic correlation between vertebrates and humans… among other anatomical adaptions. If the Nexus provides budget for blind human experimentation, evolution will very well take its course.”
“…Shi Luo,” Yang Rong speaks slowly, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Say it in words I understand. Are you mocking me?”
“…What I mean is there will be interesting conversations to be had,” Shi Luo says with a sigh. “And naturally… you, Colonel Yang, are asked to attend.”
“Very bold of them to ask me to attend. I’ve been fired.”
“You quit,” Shi Luo tells him matter-of-factly. “It isn’t easy to remove yourself entirely from the system, Yang Rong. Not when you’ve been a pawn under it for your entire life. They would find you no matter what.”
“So you imply I should attend the summit meeting and listen to old folk speak about things that do not matter to me… Then remain as they give a verdict of whether to imprison me or kill me.”
“They won’t kill you.” Shi Luo ponders for a bit before saying, “You should thank me, Yang Rong, for I’ve made ninety-eight calls and signed twenty-six documents in the last three days you were unconscious. I’ve been granted permission to oversee your case, so you’d more than likely land on my operating table instead of being sent off elsewhere…. Well, in fact, I’ve already confirmed your presence at the meeting, so it is impossible to opt out regardless.”
“…” Yang Rong blinks once. “…I should thank you?”
“You should thank me.”
Shi Luo leans against a cabinet. His coat is now taken off, probably placed in the front section of the vehicle, the area blocked by another set of curtains. The doctor assumes the air of professionalism – his hair is now neatly brushed back, his shirt changed to an unwrinkled one, his tie perfectly knotted. On his wrist is a pristine wristwatch.
He’s a stark contrast to Yang Rong who is half-battered and nearly mummified in gauze. The doctor is also a contrast to the still-befuddled Noah who is sitting listlessly on the side of the bed, planting himself onto Yang Rong for reasons unknown.
The doctor gestures to them both and says, “If you don’t show up, there’d be a more drastic manhunt. Not just for you, but for Xie Xing as well. They’re convinced you hold relations with him, Yang Rong, so you’d have to quell their interests. Make an excuse, either confirm or deny his whereabouts, fake his death—anything to get them off his case.”
“Then it’d be easier to silence them altogether,” Yang Rong says, disconcertingly straightforward. “Zero witnesses.”
“Silence who? The Nexus? The entire human population?” Shi Luo gives him a pointed look. “It is not easy to fully erase someone’s existence – the only way is to hide them in the slums forever. You may choose to hide Xie Xing for the rest of his life… and that method, General Xie has already tried.”
Noah shifts slightly but doesn’t say anything. He only continues to wordlessly hug Yang Rong. Entirely pliant like a soft animal, but entirely deadpan like he’s in a separate realm of time and space. Yang Rong, confused but very much welcoming the embrace, ruffles his Noah’s hair. No response comes from the younger man, and Yang Rong begins to shamelessly play with his ears as well.
“Alright,” Yang Rong says distractedly, with no regard to the doctor in front. He pulls on Noah’s ears (elicits a low, inaudible whine), and with his one braincell entirely discarded, Yang Rong says, “I’ll sit in on the meeting… By the way, Shi Luo, does Noah have a tail?”
“…” Shi Luo exhales very deeply, takes off his glasses and massages his nose bridge. The doctor answers ten seconds later, “He doesn’t at the current stage. It is possible if the radiation becomes more active in his body. There have been cases of humans with congenital vestigial tails, so the possibility isn’t very far off.”
Yang Rong hums in appreciation. “The possibility is there.”
Shi Luo only closes his eyes, sighs for the nth time, and tries to resume back to topic. Albeit with great difficulty. “…An entire unit has been killed. Many of them, clean shots to their heads, no signs of infection. The military has managed to recover the corpses before they’re preyed on. Black boxes, all broken. Suspicions have risen. Do you know the events that have transpired?”
“I can recall mildly,” Yang Rong says. “I was only conscious enough to pick out bits and pieces, however.”
“At the scene of struggle were three vehicles, only two of them theirs.” Shi Luo’s lips purse. “One of them happened to be a vehicle stolen by Colonel Yang. There are various speculations. One of them suggests that the colonel had killed the soldiers and escaped by foot – not very feasible nor logical to leave the vehicle at the scene of crime. Another speculation – Unit 99 sent a distress signal in their last moments. The person called to the scene was General Xie. Do you understand where I am getting at?”
Yang Rong pauses in his actions. “Hm.”
“…Well, I won’t say anymore.” Shi Luo raises his left hand, glances at his watch and says, “The rest you may hear in the meeting. It will be in fifty-three minutes.”
At that, Yang Rong raises his head in confusion. “What?”
“Fifty-three minutes,” the doctor repeats. “Put on a shirt, Yang Rong, lest you prefer to walk in half-dressed.”
I feel like I want someone to shoot Shi Luo and at the same time dont shoot him because yes, he’s a jerk but he is also the only doctor (besides the old lady) to treat Noah… also i’m bothered by him constantly calling him by his dead name.
If i could only save one of these alphas at this exact point in time, i’d save YR….. jr… lol
thanks for the chapter <3
LMAO I didn’t notice the jr … I did a double take 🤣
At the start it looked so much like Shi Luo was resurrecting a dead and Noah was the sacrifice…
🍆
Please please omg they’re so cute and YR thinks he already dead when Noah actually let him do anything 😂😂😭
Awwwwe cuddly cuties ☺
Don’t worry Yang Rong you’re not dead. Though you might end up that way if Shi Luo keeps chucking things at you for shamelessly flirting in front of him.
Thanks for the chapter!
That Shi Luo sure isn’t anyone to trust. Thanks for the new chapter!!!!
Lf ifar bea j rlut bo gfilfo, jcv jujlc, nfgs ribkis gfagjmar tlr tjcvr ogbw Rbjt’r ybvs – tf wjs tjnf ilcufgfv ja bcf qblca.
Rong ge, ily
❤thankx for the chapter!
LOL Shi Luo just yeeted Noah to YR without hesitation. I can’t blame him, and I also find it absolutely funny, but even so lol.
OMG HAHAHAHAHA, YR you have the worst habits when awakening, and I’m dying of laughter. But you’ll be dying from Noah’s fist, I’d say. This, omg it’s so funny what the hek. But hey, he’s taking every opportunity possible, and Noah is fairly obedient today sooo…. shoot your shot? Although he was blocked by Shi Luo hahahaha
Normally when getting scared there’s a possibility of peeing a little in fear. In Shi Luo’s case, it’s squirting the contents of a syringe 😂
Finally some fluff 🥰but also a bit of blood ofc
Autocorrect typo?
“as if shrinking all responsibility” –should probably be *shirking [all responsibility]
YR waking up to Noah’s presence was hilarious 😂 😂 😂