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Chapter 4: The Morgue
Death was impartial.
Whether you were an ember, heralded as the hope of a new world, or just an ordinary soldier, the violent genetic mutations took no prisoners. This fortress, guarded so fiercely, was no different from the humblest shack occupied by a destitute farmer. This wasn’t the apocalypse people imagined—wealth, power, weapons, training—none of it could stave off death’s arrival.
After reporting Pan Shuai’s death, Old Liu returned with only a stretcher. The person who handed it over explained there weren’t enough hands, so Li Xingyuan and Old Liu would have to carry Pan Shuai’s body themselves to the designated area for the dead.
Li Xingyuan positioned himself at the front, his back to Pan Shuai’s corpse. He couldn’t bear to look at that face, which had become so alien. Old Liu likely felt the same, though he said nothing. His lips were pressed tightly together, like two plates welded shut by grief.
Li Xingyuan didn’t know the way, but he didn’t need to. Earlier, he’d noticed the thick plumes of black smoke rising into the sky. Several olive-green tents stood in a row before the smoke—likely the temporary morgue. The air reeked of kerosene mixed with the acrid stench of charred protein, a smell rarely encountered even in crematoriums. It was the unmistakable odor of mass incineration, where bodies were burned in rapid succession.
As they approached, Li Xingyuan realized the tents weren’t originally olive-green but military green. Now they appeared nearly black, soaked and slick with oil, as if drenched in it. The metal frames glistened with a greasy, dark yellow sheen, droplets threatening to fall and strike anyone below.
He felt nauseous, but his stomach was empty except for a bloating gas that rose through his throat, bypassing his mouth to surge into his brain, leaving him more exhausted and disoriented than before.
Under normal circumstances, the military might have borrowed refrigerators from nearby hospitals or funeral homes to store the bodies before transporting them back to their hometowns. But such resources were unavailable now. There weren’t even enough hands to dig graves, so immediate cremation was the only option.
They had just placed Pan Shuai’s body on a small cart when another group arrived, carrying what could barely be called a body.
The flesh had burst outward from the center in a grotesque explosion, mixing skull fragments, yellowish-white nerves, dark red blood, and coagulated black organs. It looked as though everything had been stirred together yet hadn’t fully merged, leaving each part still vaguely distinguishable. It—it couldn’t really be called “he” or “she”—was fresh, likely dead only recently. The flesh still twitched faintly, as if the motor neurons connected to the muscles hadn’t completely died. Black blood dripped steadily from severed muscle fibers lying exposed on the stretcher.
The people delivering the remains showed no signs of sorrow, only numbness. They exchanged a few brief words, signed a document handed to them by a doctor in a white coat, and hurried away.
“What’s going on?” Journalistic instinct compelled Li Xingyuan to ask, but he regretted it immediately. He didn’t want to know.
“It’s another ember who died inside the hibernation pod,” a masked doctor in a white coat replied curtly, barely glancing at Pan Shuai before focusing on the grotesque mass of flesh. As he touched its surface with gloved fingers, Li Xingyuan noticed the flesh twitch slightly, oozing black pus from ruptured areas.
“Just death?” Li Xingyuan persisted. “Ordinary corpses don’t turn into… this.”
The doctor shot him an impatient glance but, seeing Li Xingyuan’s civilian attire, perhaps mistook him for one of the embers awaiting hibernation. With forced patience, he explained: “Every fifteen minutes, the hibernation pods automatically refresh the nutrient solution and monitor the embers’ vital signs.”
“He must have died shortly after a routine check,” the doctor continued in a detached tone. “Genetic mutations occurred, cancer cells proliferated rapidly, causing death. Normally, without nutrients, the cancer cells would die quickly too. But—this is just speculation—the nutrient solution meant for the patient also fed those mutated cancer cells.”
The doctor adjusted his glasses with his gloved hand, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “When the next check detected no vital signs, soldiers removed the body from the pod and brought it here for cremation alongside others. The vacated pod can then be used for backup embers—if we can still contact them to come.”
Li Xingyuan stared at the twitching mass of flesh. Its spasms grew weaker; deprived of nutrients, this monstrous clump of cancer cells wouldn’t survive long.
“If the embers can succumb to illness even in hibernation,” he murmured, “can they truly make it to the future?”
The doctor glanced at him but said nothing.
Li Xingyuan didn’t expect an answer. He lowered his gaze to Pan Shuai’s aged, collapsed face, the swollen eyeball protruding grotesquely, staring back at him.
For a fleeting moment, he thought he heard Pan Shuai’s voice again, blunt and carefree: “You’re right. I won’t suffer anymore.”
The dead no longer suffered, but what about the living? How much more suffering lay ahead for humanity?
“Let’s go,” the doctor said, handing Li Xingyuan a document. “Write his name. If possible, include his home address. If all this ends, we’ll send his ashes to his family.”
Li Xingyuan accepted the stack of papers. It wasn’t a formal document, just plain A4 sheets covered densely with names written in black ink.
He took a deep breath and wrote Pan Shuai’s name. Then, pen hesitating mid-air, he looked up at Old Liu.
“Old Liu, do you know where Pan Shuai was from?”
From Old Liu’s steel-like lips came an address—a place far to the north, distant from here. Yet Old Liu remembered it clearly, down to the exact door number.
Li Xingyuan nodded and added the address.
The doctor reviewed the paper briefly, nodded, and wheeled Pan Shuai’s body into the tent.
Li Xingyuan didn’t smoke, but at that moment, he wanted to try it—to see if it might ease the bitterness gnawing at his heart. He pulled out the crumpled pack of Zhonghua cigarettes from his pocket, pinched it in his hand, and extracted one, offering it to Old Liu.
Old Liu shook his head. Li Xingyuan placed the crooked cigarette between his own lips but didn’t light it. He bit down on the filter as though chewing something he held a blood feud with.
The two crouched at the entrance of the morgue, watching people come and go, delivering more bodies.
After a long silence, Li Xingyuan removed the unlit cigarette from his mouth, crumpled it back into the pack, and stuffed it into his pocket.
“Old Liu, take me home.”
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