Justice System: I Litigate for the Whole City

Chapter 182 : Don't Come Any Closer

The iron door flew open under her shove, slammed into the wall stop, bounced back, then swung out crooked again.

Beyond the door was the rooftop. A ring of parapet walls with the plaster peeling off, two concrete piers, a bent-neck iron vent cap. Two puddles from last night's rain on the floor, a film of dust floating on the surface. The east section of wall had collapsed at one corner, exposing half a length of rebar, with a scrap of plastic cord still tied to the end.

Lin Qi stood in front of that gap.

The hem of her white coat lifted in the wind, slapping against her calves again and again. Soft-soled hospital shoes on her feet, a sweater underneath the coat. Her back to the door, one hand braced on the low wall beside the broken edge, the other clutching something, a cord wrapped twice around her wrist.

From the iron door to the gap, two puddles lay in between, and a fallen clothes-drying pole. She'd counted: sixteen steps. Before coming up, she'd said one thing to Ma Jianjun: watch the clock, if I'm not down in ten minutes, call 120, give this address, say the old outpatient building roof.

She'd taken seven or eight steps.

"Don't come any closer."

The voice wasn't loud, half of it sheared away by the wind, yet every word came through clear.

Shen Zhixia stopped. She didn't step forward, didn't step back.

[Thud. A person has to be willing to come back on their own.]

Sixteen steps. She wanted to walk over. But if she crossed those remaining few steps, in Lin Qi's eyes it wouldn't look like rescue—it would look like a shove. She pressed her hands against her trouser seams, held her ground, lowered her bag slowly to her feet. The bottom of the bag was streaked with dust from the iron stairwell; it landed with a soft sound.

"Go back," Lin Qi said. "This building's filthy. Every step kicks up dust."

"I'm not going."

"You don't go, I don't go either."

"Come down with me. Eat something first," Shen Zhixia said. "Everything else can wait."

"Wait," Lin Qi said. "I've already been waiting."

Wind poured through the gap, ruffling the two puddles into fine rings. Shen Zhixia ran her words through her mouth first—"come down," "don't move"—recited them, then swallowed them.

"Lin Qi." She spoke slowly. "You told me something yesterday: this thing, you may carry it your whole life. If you can't carry it, you carry it anyway. But you don't carry it to your death."

"That was then."

"I remember what you said. You have to remember it too."

Lin Qi didn't turn around. The hand braced on the wall had gone white from the wind; the cord on her wrist was cutting a red line into the skin.

"Four floors," she said. "Below is a pile of concrete pipes. I came up at six-something. I've been standing here four hours."

A chill ran down Shen Zhixia's back.

"I'm not making conversation," Lin Qi said. "I mean it: I can't go down."

"Then you don't have to go down," Shen Zhixia said. "Turn around."

Lin Qi didn't move.

"Turn around, I'll talk to you," Shen Zhixia said. "You don't have to answer. Just nod. That page of supplementary explanation—why didn't you go hand it in this morning?"

"What's the point."

"There is a point." Shen Zhixia said. "If you're gone today, not one character on those three pages is yours. But it's about you. That's what it says. Those eight characters you never signed—once you're gone, they're yours. No one will deny them for you, and no one will accept them for you. If you're alive, standing at that window, then someone has to settle the account with you."

Lin Qi's shoulder moved. The hand on the wall tightened, nails scraping the wall surface, a small flake falling off.

"You said you trust paper."

"I trust paper."

"What's there to trust about paper? Paper is written by other people."

"Paper is written by other people, but the words need someone standing there to claim them." Shen Zhixia said. "While you're here, I have someone to bring with me. If you're not, I win this case and still come out missing one person."

"You haven't even won your own case."

"No."

"Then what are you using to talk me down?"

"That I haven't let go yet." Shen Zhixia said.

The wind rattled the vent cap, sheet metal scraping sheet metal. The first puddle was just past her toes. She didn't step in it.

"Peng Nianman has been home barely twenty days," she said. "When he grows up, he'll ask his father one thing: what really happened to my mother that night. Right now, there's exactly one person left who can answer that. If you go down, you're the one with the answer. If you stay up here, that question stays forever as the hospital's one line."

Lin Qi still didn't turn. But the hand holding the object dropped, hanging at her side. The chest of her white coat was bare; her badge wasn't on it.

"I'm scared."

It came out very soft. As if the word itself startled her, the hand braced on the wall started shaking.

"I'm scared to go back to the hospital. I'm scared of that window. I'm scared that when I see people in white coats, they'll take back what they said. I'm scared of that paper with my name on it—written and written until it becomes true." She said, "That paper from the twenty-fourth, I didn't hand it in this morning. I stood on the walkway outside the commission for half an hour. I couldn't even make myself walk toward the window."

"Then I'll take you," Shen Zhixia said. "There's still time this morning. Come down with me now, eat something, then go hand it in. I'll call and cancel the police report, and I'll have the missing person post taken down. The things you're scared of, one at a time. First one first."

"Shen Zhixia."

"Yeah."

"That night..."

Shen Zhixia didn't move.

"That night, the pharmacy sent the drug up. One ampoule." She said "one ampoule" slowly and precisely. "I watched her open the box. Watched her snap the ampoule. After I signed, I went down. The patient was in bad shape, so I went down to check on her."

"Then."

"Then I came back, and there was a person standing next to the treatment cart." She said, "Not from pharmacy. Not from our department. He was standing there looking at the empty ampoule. I glanced at him; he didn't look up. I figured he was from another department, borrowing something."

Shen Zhixia's hands clenched inside her sleeves. She didn't ask a single question—not what he wore, not how old, not when he left, not how long he stood there.

[Thud. Don't lose this sentence here.]

"Come down," she said. "Write this down. This is worth more than a batch number."

Lin Qi turned around. Her face was pale from the wind, her lips cracked at the corners, her eyes swollen. But that dead-ash look in them had scattered a little.

She lifted her foot.

Before the foot could settle, the knee buckled. Her whole body slid down the low wall, the hand clawing at the plaster grabbed air, and her shoulder tipped out toward the gap.

Shen Zhixia lunged without thinking. She didn't count those remaining steps. One hand swept over Lin Qi's back and grabbed the back collar of the white coat; the other seized her forearm and hauled her inward, against her own chest.

They both crashed onto the rooftop slab. Gray water from the puddle splashed up, smearing half her face. The back of her head cracked against the concrete, and her vision flashed white.

Lin Qi collapsed across her arm, crying.

Not that kind of crying. It came up from underneath the chest, a sound held in for months, one wave after another, torn apart by the wind, then joined again. She gripped Shen Zhixia's sleeve, nails digging into the fabric, talking while she cried—nothing intelligible—only "6:20" surfacing over and over from the sobs. At last she forced out one whole sentence: "I didn't want to die... I just stood here, and I couldn't cross either way." Then the crying choked her breath off again.

He Xiufen's judgment that morning had been only half right.

Shen Zhixia didn't try to talk her down. She pushed herself up with one hand and pressed Lin Qi's head against her shoulder, the other hand stroking down her back, over and over.

Her own hand had been scraped raw, beads of blood welling up. She ignored it.

Shouting from below. Ma Jianjun poked half his body up from the stairwell, face flushed red: "Little Shen! The ambulance is in the yard! I called when the ten minutes hit!"

She freed one hand and shouted down: "She's alive! Tell them to wait!"

Only after getting those words out did her own eyes sting.

She pulled out her phone and dialed the number—110. Gave the address, calling it "that four-story old building about a hundred meters south of Chengbei Hospital's back gate, rooftop." The voice on the other end asked how the person was. She said the person was here, alive, able to speak, and an ambulance was already downstairs. The voice told her to stay in place and wait.

Hung up. One arm still around Lin Qi, she redialed He Xiufen with the other.

"She's on the roof of the old building. Alive. Crying."

Silence on the line for two seconds.

"Good," He Xiufen said. "If she needs medical care, don't let her go into the ER alone. I'll make calls on my end."

After a while longer, two stretcher bearers came up from the stairwell, backs soaked through. The woman in front carried a soft stretcher, a reflective vest over her white coat.

The moment Lin Qi saw the white coat, she shrank behind Shen Zhixia.

"Don't let the hospital people touch me."

"Which service are you with?" Shen Zhixia asked.

"Municipal Emergency Center, taking her to Chengbei." The woman answered.

"Chengbei Hospital?"

"Closest."

Shen Zhixia looked down at Lin Qi. She was still gripping that dirty sleeve, knuckles white.

"This ambulance isn't from their department," she said. "I'm coming with you. I won't let go of your hand."

As the stretcher was being wrapped and lifted toward the iron door, she glanced back. In one of the two puddles on the slab, something was reflecting light.

She walked over and fished it out of the water. Plastic shell, cord broken at one end, white background with black characters: Chengbei Hospital, Obstetrics, Lin Qi. She wiped it on her sleeve, flipped it over, tucked it into her pocket, fastened the button, and caught up with the stretcher in a few strides.

Four people carried her down. The iron stairs creaked turn after turn, the window pasted with old newspaper passing by frame after frame.

The ambulance was parked in the open ground below, rear doors open. She climbed in and took Lin Qi's hand between both of hers. That hand was ice-cold, fingertips purple.

The vehicle moved. She freed one hand to type: Director He, we're in the ambulance, heading to Chengbei. The reply came fast: the ER records—go get them as soon as we arrive, don't wait. She replied: Got it. The other side asked: What about her mother? She typed three characters: Wait for her to wake.

She sent Tang Guo another message: found her, take down the post. Tang Guo replied with three exclamation marks, then: I'll keep watching on my end.

The ambulance crossed a speed bump, jolting. Lin Qi's eyes were half open, lids drooping, then lifting again. That hand never loosened.

"The drug wasn't my call."

Seven characters. Wind through the window crack. The siren stretched long.

Shen Zhixia freed her other hand and typed the sentence into her phone, character by character: The drug wasn't my call.

Not one character wrong.

She stared at those seven characters on the screen for a while. Didn't delete them.

The ambulance rounded a corner, the siren pulling into a single long line. She didn't let go.