#qinyang

The world is a bit hazy when Jiang Yang opens his eyes the first time: it's blurry, bright, and painful, so he immediately shuts them off and brings his right hand to his head—or he attempts to - his arm refuses to move, immobilised from shoulder to wrist, wrapped tightly in bandages. He tries to move his other arm, but it is stuck as well, serving as a cradle to—

"You're awake."

This time even the pain doesn't stop him: Jiang Yang quickly blinks the fog out of his eyes, just to see Luo Qingeng sitting nearby in what looks to be an uncomfortable chair—against the backdrop of sterile-white walls—next to a hospital bed that Jiang Yang himself is occupying - and he's not the only person in it: in his left arm, cuddled against his chest, lies little Fusheng, lulled into peaceful slumber by the pacifier in his mouth and the sound of Jiang Yang's heartbeat underneath his ear. On instinct, Jiang Yang curls the arm around his body a little more securely.

Luo Qingeng doesn't look happy when Jiang Yang finally meets his eyes.

"What happened?" Jiang Yang asks, and when Qingeng tilts his head in a clearly unimpressed 'I should be the one asking this question', he sighs and tries again: "Why are you two here?"

"You never showed up last night."

To help put Fusheng to sleep - the boy wouldn't doze off otherwise no matter how many alternate methods they've tried; at first, Jiang Yang thought it was all Luo Qingeng's ploy to attempt to make his life more miserable, to pay off the debt of even thinking about giving the baby away when they first met, but Fusheng was only an infant, incapable of scheming and ignoring his needs—and, at one point, he must have decided that having Jiang Yang close was a crucial one to feel safe enough to rest.

Still, a hospital is not a good place for such a small baby, not when he doesn't have to be here. Jiang Yang is about to say so, but the sharp look shot his way stops the words right on his tongue.

"A'Yang—" Qingeng leans in closer in his chair. "—we waited all night. Sheng'er wouldn't calm down - and when I called your number, it turned out he had a good hunch not to."

The latest  witness's testimony in the case of the murder of Fusheng's mother led him and Zhu Wei out of the office at around the same time he should have been heading to Mei Gao Mei—it uncovered tracks they would have never found otherwise: a fake license plate, abandoned tools, buried half-burnt, blood-stained clothes, a torn paper receipt in the jacket's inner pocket, a transaction leading to a small store just outside of the city, a security recording of a man wearing that very same jacket...

Last night. A small apartment in a dilapidated building. The man - the victim's last partner. A chase up the fire staircase and over the rooftop. A broken metal pipe swung against Jiang Yang, knocking him off his feet, then a boot stomping on his arm when he tried to reach for anything to use as a weapon. Police sirens. Zhu Wei seizing the man but not in time to stop the hit to Jiang Yang's head.

Then, darkness.

Now, Luo Qingeng's cold, displeased anger.

...No. Not anger. Worry.

Despite the cutting ice of it, something warm and delicate unfurls in Jiang Yang's chest. "I'm alright," he says, even if all it does is raise Luo Qingeng's eyebrow.

"You're in the hospital."

"In one piece."

"Your arm is broken." Before Jiang Yang can counter that one, Qingeng adds, "And your skull is cracked." That explains the throbbing in his head. "And you twisted your ankle. Should I keep going?"

It's not proper to laugh, but the ridiculousness of the situation makes him want to - the few times Jiang Yang worried one of them would end up in a hospital, it was Luo Qingeng who was stuck in bed, getting lectured on not getting into shady business now that he was taking care of Fusheng. Jiang Yang is a simple procurator: out of the two of them, he's not the one more likely to use fists to fight his way through a problem.

"We wouldn't have known," Luo Qingeng says then, and any trace of amusement evaporates immediately. He's not looking at Jiang Yang anymore but at Fusheng, covered with the soft fox blanket that's normally neatly folded on the couch in his flat. "Nobody thought to inform me. I called your phone three times before your... colleague picked up."

Zhu Wei—who is famously not a Luo Qingeng fan, but who has a weakness for the man's adopted son—who, at this very moment, is also hovering just outside the door to the room. When Jiang Yang meets his eye over Luo Qingeng's shoulder, the man breathes out, gives him a single meaningful nod and leaves just when Qingeng turns his head to look, too.

'It's over,' the gesture means, and the last trace of tension bleeds out of Jiang Yang's body: the man they found last night must be in arrest right now.

"I'll tell them to contact you first if anything—"

"—happens again?" Qingeng finishes for him and sits back again, taking the warmth with him. "It shouldn't have happened in the first place. You're barely conscious on your feet most days, what were you thinking getting into something like this?"

"We caught the murderer of Fusheng's mother."

A pause. Then, a huff - unimpressed, exasperated, exhausted. "Was it worth it?" he asks.

"You know it was." That's the only correct answer. Jiang Yang looks down at Fusheng's peaceful face and gently, gently brushes his thumb over the boy's arm. "You'd do anything for his safety, too."

"I'd do anything to keep him safe," Luo Qingeng corrects, and his tone seems softer now. "I wouldn't be able to do that if I were gone. If you foolishly died, you wouldn't, either."

'But I didn't,' Jiang Yang doesn't say - because they're both aware of that now; because they had no way of knowing mere hours ago. Because, as sharp as Luo Qingeng's words are, he's not wrong.

"He can't fall asleep without you," Qingeng reminds him, sounding the most resigned Jiang Yang has ever heard him.

Jiang Yang looks at him then—looks close despite the painful lights and the pounding headache—and sees: the dishevelled hair, the wrinkled shirt, the dark shadows under his eyes. Luo Fusheng isn't the only one who has lost sleep this night, and he's not the only one who would be forced to live with absence where Jiang Yang once was.

The weeks—months—full of shared moments together, big and small, settle in his chest like lead, near-suffocating but welcome.

"Qingeng," he says quietly and waits, waits several long seconds until the man looks at him again. "I'm sorry for making you worry."

Luo Qingeng presses his lips together. "If you think that's the only—"

"I won't do this again," he adds, voice heavy with the same gravity present in his eyes and reflected in Qingeng's. "You have my word."

They watch each other in silence, daring the other one to break first, to waver, to get back on anything they've shared until now, but neither does—the air is tense with expectations and promise, with invisible strings tying them tighter and tighter into something that should be terrifying but isn't: a web of willingness to bear consequences, of cooperation, and dedication, and responsibility.

At last, Luo Qingeng nods and leans in again—and this time, he doesn't stop until he presses his lips against Jiang Yang's.

"I'll keep you accountable," he whispers, not unlike a threat.

Jiang Yang smiles in relief and does his best to kiss him again.

Her name is Qinyang (Yang for short) and they are an Orange Mage🍊 She is a very compassionate, fierce, and protective person🧡 she also wears hearing aids due to moderate hearing loss caused by listening to music too loudly and playing the drums without ear protection 🎧

Their weapon is an Orange Shield that can grow in size and be thrown like a boomerang✨

Her companion is a tortoise named Lucky! He's very soft spoken, patient, and insightful🐢 However, he's also very slow (which Yang isn't always fond of, but she still loves and cherishes him!)