#gongda

Life is like a box of chocolate, Sima Yi read somewhere, you never know what you’re gonna get. Well, walking into Cao Wei headquarters is about the same, except some of the chocolates are actively trying to kill you. The spectacle du jour, as he’s stepping out of the elevator, meeting Xun You who’s rounding a corner with a massive cup of tea in one hand, is little droplets of red scattered like a trail of breadcrumbs along the corridor down to Jia Xu’s office. It’s an alarming sight, since the killing metaphor is not normally so literal, but Xun You takes it in stride, nodding a cheerful good morning and offering Sima Yi his little paper bag of dried fruit. Sima Yi takes a bit of dried persimmon in lieu of courage.

“What,” he says.

Xun You shrugs and navigates his way down the corridor, careful not to get blood on his reasonably priced shoes.

Sima Yi follows. The door to the office is ajar, and he lets Xun You have the first careful peek through before following him in once it is confirmed that whatever butchery has happened is already done. Jia Xu and Guo Jia are in the office, huddled in the far corner. Jia Xu is half-lying against the wall, looking like he’d slid down it very very slowly. He has one hand held to his ribs and the other shoving a wad of paper up his nose, though not for the usual reasons - there’s blood all over both paper and hand. Guo Jia is crouching next to him, peering in like a curious bird.

Sima Yi, being a survivor type, stops in the doorway, but Xun You walks in and joins the peering.

“Did you fight Cao Hong again?” he asks in polite interest.

“Cao Hong couldn’t touch me in a thousand years.” Jia Xu snorts, wincing as it goes through his probably broken nose. “I fought Zhang Wenyuan.”

Xun You’s face darkens, though not nearly as much as Sima Yi thinks it ought to. He’s met Zhang Liao, Zhang Wenyuan, a couple of times, doing the rounds in the office. The guy is about a head shorter than Jia Xu and fifteen times as angry. There’s no word for the way an small, unassuming person can make you snap out of his way just by moving forward, except ones that Sima Yi feels really weird using in the real world. Killing aura, or something equally wuxia. Sima Yi wouldn’t have fought Zhang Liao for all the money in Cao Wei.

It looks like Xun You agrees. “My xiaoshu told you,” he begins very seriously. Jia Xu responds by telling him to fuck off in Chinese, Oirat and Russian. Astonishingly, Guo Jia steps in like some kind of responsible adult.

“Alright, you’ve done your alpha male posturing for day, lao Jia. Let’s go get your face fixed up. I hope it hurts like hell.” He glances back at Xun You, who’s still frowning. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll talk to Wenruo. You go downstairs and do damage control with the boys there.”

“It’s always damage control,” Xun You sighs, but he does turn around and exits the office. Sima Yi, who is fiercely hoping that neither of the older Stooges noticed him, immediately follows.

“Wow,” Xun You mutters as soon as the two of them are out of hearing range of the disaster zone. It’s a rare enough thing to hear him think out loud that Sima Yi pauses in his frantic mental calculation of escape routes in order to listen. “I knew he was going to do it someday, but I didn’t think he’d do it first thing in the morning…”

That does add a certain flair to the affair, Sima Yi has to admit. He glances back over his shoulder before he can stop himself. “Looks like Zhang Liao really kicked his ass. I get why Xun Yu told him to stay away…”

“No.” The younger Xun shakes his head as the elevator slides open before them. Its insides echo with an antiseptically pleasant Western pop cover. “That doesn’t bother us. Wenhe-ge was asking for it.”

The Xuns are so benevolent, Sima Yi thinks sarcastically. “Then why?”

“What xiaoshu said was that you shouldn’t let a sadist fight a masochist.”

Right, it’s going to be one of those days, Sima Yi muses, his head already lightly spinning. He follows Xun You into the elevator and stands next to him for a while as it travels, staring at the closed doors and pretending like he’s supposed to be there and has the slightest idea what he’s doing. Eventually he says, “lao Xun - ”

“Lao Xun is my cousin,” Xun You says, a little bashful. “I told you, please, just Gongda.“ 

"Gongda,” Sima Yi obliges. “Has it ever occurred to you that everyone in this company are completely insane?”

Xun You considers that, calmly contemplative. The elevator drifts down the building with a satisfied hum.

“I don’t think we’re supposed to talk about it,” he remarks after a while, in a tone of very light reproach.  

Sima Yi feels his eyes bulge slightly. “That’s… not making me feel better.”

“Mm.”

“Are you… I mean, you and lao Xun seem like sensible people, I’m not sure how…”

“Oh, xiaoshu has great faith in Cao zongcai.” Xun You shrugs. “I think he feels that it’s appropriate…” his eyebrows bunch up slightly and he trails off, pressing his lips together. Very Xun You of him. So much for insight into the perfect Xun Yu from the person who’s best equipped to give it and isn’t a total psycho like Guo Jia. A part of Sima Yi does have to admit that knowing Xun Yu thinks Cao Wei isn’t on the crash and burn track is very comforting, though there’s still the little question of why the hell. He returns to staring at the elevator doors. The music is very cheerful. The elevator, at least, seems very pleased with its workplace.

It’s a bit of time to ride. He says, “if everyone knew that Jia Xu and Zhang Liao were going to fight eventually, why - ”

“Oh, here we are,” Xun You says brightly, a second before the doors open. He leads the two of them into the social space down the corridor, where there is usually a small gathering of employees around the vending machines. Not today. Today it’s just Zhang Liao, draped in a chair in the corner with a massive ice pack held to the side of his face, Yue Jin to his left and Xu Huang to his right like a pair of honour guards. Probably honouring the ass-whooping he’d handed Jia Xu, Sima Yi thinks with no little solidarity. The whites of Zhang Liao’s eyes are a solid murderous red.

“Good morning, lao Zhang,” Xun You says, mild as the dew on the grass.

Zhang Liao stares at him in awkward silence. It’s a curdled moment before Yue Jin supplies, “sorry, Gongda, he can’t talk, we think his jaw is broken.”

“Kicked him in the face,” Xu Huang is muttering, sounding a little dazed. “Who kicks a guy when he’s down like that?”

“We’re just waiting to make sure he’s walking steady before we take him to get looked after.”

“I get the balls, but the face?”

“We weren’t around when trouble started, but knowing Wenhe, well.”

“Yunchang is going to be so pissed…”

At the mention of his boyfriend’s name, Zhang Liao’s head snaps up and he turns that red murder at Xu Huang. He drops the ice pack - under which his jaw is taking on all sorts of fascinating colours and patterns, Sima Yi notes with fixated horror, Jia Xu is an artist is what he is - and flails is hands in urgent, inept signing. Xu Huang pauses in his lurid muttering to look, and passes the message on to the others:

“He’s telling us not to tell Yunchang.”

“What’s not to tell?” Yue Jin scoffs. “Is he gonna say his jaw is wired shut for a diet?”

The rest of Zhang Liao’s face starts going a matching red. Xu Huang conveys another bout of hand-flailing. “He says Yunchang will kill him if he finds out he’s been fighting at work. And that you’re an asshole, Wenqian.”

Yue Jin just sighs the universal mournful sigh of babysitters of grown-ass men everywhere. Sima Yi barely knows him, but feels a bond of shared fate form nonetheless. “What was the fight over, anyway?” he endeavours to ask, in the interest of due process.

Zhang Liao just shrugs. The other two exchange looks, and then look helplessly to Xun You. “Pick a reason,” Yue Jin says with a shrug of his own. “With those two, chances are it’s good enough.”

Zhang Liao looks a little offended, but doesn’t protest this claim, possibly because his jaw is broken. Knowing Jia Xu as he does, Sima Yi is rather forced to concede the point, incidentally reasserting his evaluation of Cao Wei as made up of about forty percent mad geniuses to sixty percent the just plain mad. What a fun career he has to look forward to. He joins everyone else in the room in looking to Xun You for responsible adulthood. Xun You, he realizes, is still holding his big cup of tea as he settles down into a chair next to Zhang Liao. He catches his eye. Older or younger, it’s impossible not to look a Xun in the eye once they get you. Xun You looks so attentive and well meaning with his steaming tea. It is a strange and terrifying gift. 

“Wenyuan,” Xun You says. “I’ll cover for you with lao Guan.”

Zhang Liao looks profoundly relieved. He nods. Just like that, Sima Yi thinks. Defences penetrated and collapsed. Now comes the moving in for the kill.

“I’m just asking that you remember what zongcai said. If you need to let out steam, you’re welcome to do it, just not inside the company. Whatever we are out there, here in Cao Wei we’re us.” He reaches out - god, what a pro - and lays his teacup-warmed hand lightly on Zhang Liao’s shoulder. “Whatever grief the world gives us, it stops right at these doors.”

Yue Jin and Xu Huang are nodding. Sima Yi feels a little like he’d just observed some dark magic ritual. He wonders if there are going to be manly hugs. Since Zhang Liao hasn’t punched Xun You yet, or even tried to shrug that hand off his shoulder, the possibility looms uncomfortably clear. In the end Zhang Liao lets out air in a weird little sad noise and also nods. He holds his hand up and Xu Huang grabs it and helps him to his feet. Some urgent gestures are exchanged. Xu Huang turns to Xun You to interpret. 

“He says thanks, Gongda, and that he started it, so Wenhe shouldn’t get in trouble.”

“That’s for zongcai to decide.” Xun You looks severe. “Lao Jia does have a history, and fighting in the company is a serious matter…”

Zhang Liao waves a hand. Xu Huang looks doubtful, but adds, “he says it’s fine, it was, uh - Wenyuan, are you sure - uh - he says it was therapeutic.”

Sima Yi coughs. Xun You is forced to talk over him extra smoothly. “I… see. I’ll pass that on. Wenhe-ge does have some… special ways of relating to people. It’ll be good not to worry about the two of them in the future.”

Zhang Liao nods reassurance. Xun You and Sima Yi stay just long enough to see that he’s being hauled off for some much-needed medical attention, before heading back upstairs to report. Once they’re back in the elevator, Xun You lets out a long, slightly whistling breath, and crosses his hands behind his back with a beatific smile.

“Completely insane,” Sima Yi says into the happy hum of elevator pop. 

Xun Yu does not attempt to contradict this amply proven truism. He drums his twined fingers against each other - the other Xun would never let telling movement get away from him like that - and stands again in contemplation, watching the floor numbers tick by. “Complicated people,” he says ponderously. “Complicated management.” Then he grins, a grin worthy of Cao Wei. “I love this job.”

“Oh god,” Sima Yi groans before he can help himself. “You’re like a happy Guo Jia.”

He’s not even sure if he’s surprised when Xun You puffs up with pride (to the degree that Xun You is capable of pride) like it’s the best compliment he’d gotten all year. He also tries not to contemplate whether this means that he, Sima Yi, is expected to shape up into a happy Jia Xu. What excellent future prospects, what a professional horizon. “What does your xiaoshu have to say about that?”

“Xiaoshu knows that I always have the best interests of the company in mind,” Xun You answers primly, which Sima Yi takes to mean that he doesn’t think they’re supposed to talk about it. “The important thing,” he adds after a moment, “is that Wenhe-ge was right, Zhang Wenyuan is adjusting.”

That sounds nice. Optimistic, even .Sima Yi swallows slightly. He asks, “Gongda, this, uh, adjustment… does it usually involve getting kicked in the fa-”