Cheng Ji asked: "Who?"
"I don't know him." The doctor said, "He's probably an idler from the village. There are thousands of people living in this village, so there are always a few who are running around."
Seeing the doctor's speculation, Cheng Ji didn't think much about it and just said, "Thank you for your hard work."
The doctor went back to his room upstairs to sleep, while Sister Yu brought bedding from home and slept on another bed in the ward. She and Lao Geng took turns to stay up all night, and tonight it was her turn.
Cheng Ji originally wanted to take her place, but she flatly refused: "I am also a doctor, and I can still help if I stay here. If you don't have anything else, just leave. I will take over tomorrow morning."
Cheng Ji couldn't persuade her, so he and Lao Geng went back to the small hotel where they were staying, which was about two kilometers away from the clinic.
After entering the room, the two of them quickly washed up and fell asleep.
I don’t know how long it was, but Cheng Ji was suddenly awakened by a sound. He thought it was Lao Geng snoring, but later he realized in a daze that it was the siren of the fire truck.
The sirens were far away. Cheng Ji listened for a moment, but he couldn't resist the surging sleepiness and fell asleep quickly.
A few hours later, when it was daybreak, Lao Geng's cell phone suddenly vibrated on the bedside table.
Lao Geng would rather cover his ears with a pillow than answer the phone, so Cheng Ji had to answer it for him. Unexpectedly, the caller was Qi Beisong.
"… Why is it you?" Cheng Ji said lazily.
"You haven't gotten up yet?" Qi Beisong asked.
"Hmm..." Cheng Ji rubbed his eyes and asked, "I'm so tired... What's wrong?"
Qi Beisong didn't say a word and went straight to the point: "Is your injured cousin Chen Guangjun staying in a certain clinic?"
"… yes."
“Is such-and-such clinic located in such-and-such a village in the city?”
"yes."
Qi Beisong said: "The village in the city is on fire."
Cheng Ji suddenly threw back the quilt and sat up!
He stammered, "On fire? How?"
"The specific situation is still unclear. I asked Lei Jing to go to the scene." Qi Beisong said, "Remember to charge your phone. I couldn't get through to you no matter what. It took me a lot of effort to find your godfather's phone number. Fortunately, he has a criminal record with the police."
Old Geng, who was in the bed next to him, heard Cheng Ji's sudden loud noise, opened his eyes and asked, "What's the matter?"
Cheng Ji grabbed the phone, his face pale: "Xiaojun's place may be on fire."
Old Geng jumped up with a cry of "Ah!" and shouted, "The fever didn't reach the clinic, did it? I don't think that doctor is reliable. The guy named Zhou has the audacity to say he's good. He must have pulled the wires privately and caused the fever!"
The two got up in a hurry. Lao Geng left first, and Cheng Ji checked out as quickly as possible. After leaving the hotel, he jogged towards the clinic.
Cheng Ji ran fast and came from behind to rush ahead. He had a very bad premonition, and the feeling became stronger the closer he got to his destination.
Finally he ran to the vicinity of the village in the city, only to see thick smoke in the air with a pungent smell. A row of bright red fire trucks were parked on the roadside, and several exhausted firefighters were sitting on the curb, all of them with their equipment half-taken off, their faces covered in stains, and their helmets at their feet. It was obvious that they were in the final stages of their life.
At this time, a passerby sighed: "Isn't there a small clinic here? Why is it so burned?"
Cheng Ji's heart sank immediately.
Old Geng was horrified and rushed to the edge of the cordon in two steps. He saw ruins and scorched earth in front of him!
The population density in this urban village is extremely high, with houses stacked on top of houses and tenants stacked on top of tenants.
Although they are all cement brick and tile houses that are not easy to burn, there are many illegal structures interspersed among them, and there are countless randomly connected circuits. Even the gas pipelines of many residents have been modified at will. Therefore, once they burn, the fire is no less severe than the contiguous wooden structures in Huang Village.
When Cheng Ji and Lao Geng arrived, the fire had already been brought under control. Unfortunately, it was not because of timely rescue, but because all the combustible materials nearby had burned out.
It’s all because the passages in the urban village are occupied by illegal buildings. Fire trucks are stuck on the main road and cannot enter. The only fire hydrants that can be found have no water, and the firefighters’ fire-fighting efficiency is greatly limited.
Cheng Ji and Lao Geng tried to go inside through the cordon but were stopped by the auxiliary police on duty at the scene.
Lao Geng was so anxious that he shouted, "My relatives are in there, my nephew is in there! My sister is in there too!"
The auxiliary police officer said: "Then you can make a phone call and ask first, then look around. All the residents in this area have been evacuated."
Lao Geng then remembered to call Sister Yu, but the call went wrong.
Old Geng was so panicked that his legs went weak. He said to the auxiliary police: "My nephew can't be evacuated. He is injured and lying in a certain clinic!"
"Clinic?" the auxiliary police officer said, "Oh, the fire started from there, and it also affected dozens of houses around it!"
When Lao Geng heard this, he sat down on the ground and could not get up again. Cheng Ji supported him and asked anxiously: "Are there any injured people? Where have they been sent?"
The auxiliary police officer looked at them with sympathy in his eyes: "There are injured people, all of whom have been sent to the Sixth People's Hospital's Burns Department, and... there is also a dead person, right there."
He pointed behind him.
Cheng Ji looked straight in the direction of his finger, inside the cordon, on the open ground, under the charred building frame, near the smoldering pile of ashes.
"... I... I'll go and see." Cheng Ji said to Lao Geng, "You wait here..."
Under the guidance of the auxiliary police, he walked towards the open space step by step. When the other party stopped, he still moved forward, walked more than ten steps and squatted down. His throat rolled, and he used trembling hands to uncover the white cloth covering the body.
"… "
The body was completely charred, burned to almost half its normal size, and nothing could be seen.
Even someone as brave as Cheng Ji only dared to take a glance. He had seen injured and dead people with burned bodies in his previous life, but that didn't mean he wouldn't be afraid or have nightmares.
The auxiliary police officer stood far away and asked with fear: "Is he your relative?"
"I... don't know." Cheng Ji said hoarsely.
The auxiliary police officer said: "The person who died so far is this man. I don't know if he was carried out from the clinic, but I heard from the firefighters that he was a man."
Cheng Ji suddenly turned around.
The auxiliary police officer continued: "Several of the injured people sent to the People's Hospital were women."
Cheng Ji jumped up and ran towards Lao Geng quickly!
"Dad!" he yelled, "Hurry to the Sixth People's Hospital's Burns Department, Sister Yu might be there!!"
Lao Geng asked in a tearful voice: "Then, then, that is... Is it Xiaojun?"
"Take care of the living first!" said Cheng Ji.
…
Old Geng was almost carried by Cheng Ji into the gate of the Sixth People's Hospital.
Lao Geng is a man of great loyalty and sentimentality, so he is often confused when faced with sudden blows involving his relatives and friends, but he is more sober when he is injured.
Whenever Cheng Ji met someone in a white coat, he would grab them and ask about the burn department. If someone showed them the way, the two of them would go there. But before they had time to ask, they saw a bunch of people sitting or lying in the corridor of the burn department. They were all sent there from the fire in the urban village.
Lao Geng immediately started looking for Sister Yu in the crowd like crazy, and Cheng Ji was looking for her too!
But no, every one of them is a stranger!
Lao Geng was unwilling to give up and looked again, but Cheng Ji cast his eyes towards the emergency room on the other side of the corridor.
The door of the emergency room opened and closed, and medical staff came in and out, each of them busy and nervous. Lao Geng walked to Cheng Ji, looking terrified, and clung to his shoulders to prevent himself from falling, placing his last hope behind that door.
Cheng Ji mustered up the courage to ask a nurse who had just come out of the emergency room: "Excuse me, is there a person named Zhang Chunyu in there..."
The nurse interrupted hastily: "Several of them are newly brought in. Some are unconscious, and some are not accompanied by family members. I don't know which one you are talking about. I will go in and ask for you later!"
Cheng Ji quickly added Sister Yu's physical characteristics: "She is a 50-year-old lesbian, wearing glasses, and a bit plump!"
The nurse silently pulled the mask down to her nose, and after several seconds she said, "There is only one female patient in her 50s in the emergency room. When she was brought in..."
The spring door of the emergency room was suddenly pushed open from the inside, and a stretcher came out with a person lying on it.
All the noise in the hospital disappeared from Cheng Ji's ears. His whole body was cold. He and Lao Geng were staring at the man as if frozen in time. The glaring white on the man's face filled their entire field of vision.
Lao Geng stepped back, sat down, and fell to the ground crying.
Cheng Ji was dragged to his knees by him, but he didn't think of crying yet. He only felt light and dark interweaving in front of his eyes and a rumbling sound in his ears, as if hundreds of bombers were circling and dropping bombs that could shake the earth and sky at him.
Lao Geng's heart-wrenching cries echoed in the corridor, but Cheng Ji stared blankly at the ceiling above the corridor, at the dizzying lights.
He hasn't come back to reality yet because reality is too unreal.
He vaguely remembered that this was once a novel. It turned out that life was the same everywhere, filled with countless deaths.
I don’t know how long it took, maybe more than ten seconds, maybe more than ten minutes, someone picked him up from behind, patted the dust off his knees and said, "I'm late."
Cheng Ji turned his head and saw the sharp lines of Qi Beisong's cheeks and chin. Looking up, his brows were wrinkled into the shape of the Chinese character "川".
Cheng Ji unconsciously stretched out his finger and pressed on the "chuan", trying to smooth it out.
He rarely took the initiative to be intimate with others outside, which surprised Qi Beisong. But after he came to his senses, he felt heartbroken.
The more abnormal Cheng Ji behaves, the harder the blow hits him, and he has to use unnecessary little movements to hide his feelings.
Qi Beisong grabbed his hand, looked deep into his eyes, and asked, "Are you going to cry?"
Cheng Ji shook his head. It’s not that he wasn’t sad, he just didn’t accept it.
Before Ms. Cheng passed away, he said goodbye to her for almost a long month, and less than ten hours ago, Sister Yu was still complaining about this and that like every old woman, with a sharp tongue but a soft heart, wanting to know everything and ask questions about everything. Now she is dead!
Slept and burned to death!!
Tears rolled down Lao Geng's cheeks. He opened his mouth and cried helplessly, "Sister Yu! My Sister Yu! What's going on? Oh, God!"
Cheng Ji's eyes were dry, and he leaned against Qi Beisong, his back stiff and motionless, asking the heavens the same question over and over again: Why? Why?!
The nurse wanted to push the gurney away, but Lao Geng held her back and said, "Let me see her! Let me take a look at my sister Yu!"
The nurse patiently explained: "It's not good to stay in the corridor for too long. It will affect the work of doctors and nurses, and other patients will also have complaints. Family members should go to the morgue together."
"Oh my God!" Old Geng got up from the ground and clung to the cart, crying, "Oh my God, why don't you have eyes? She is only fifty years old!"
“…” the nurse said, “Wait, fifty years old?”
A hoarse voice shouted from the side: "Geng Chunbiao! You x! Why are you crying so sadly?!"
Lao Geng cried and wiped his tears: "Sister Yu! My Sister Yu! My... huh???"
He turned his head and saw Zhang Chunyu lying on another gurney, cursing. Although his face was black, his clothes were torn, and his hair was singed, he was still alive and well! !
“Hmm???” Lao Geng turned to the nurse.
The nurse lifted the white cloth from the face of the deceased: "This is the old lady who just passed away in the emergency room. She was 97 years old. It is a happy funeral that she died of natural causes."
"Hmm?" Lao Geng turned to the nurse again, "What did you say just now, 'When she was brought in...'"
The nurse said: "Zhang Chunyu had severe burns when he was brought here!"
Old Geng fell to the ground with a thud!
"..." Cheng Ji also fell backwards and was quickly held by Qi Beisong.
Sister Yu was still cursing: "Geng Chunbiao! Cheng Ji! You two xxxes didn't even look carefully before you started crying. Who the hell are you crying for?!"
The nurse educated Sister Yu: "Your back and both lower limbs have 30% burns combined. You will definitely need skin grafting. Doesn't it hurt? If it hurts, can you save some energy?"
Sister Yu said that I was cursing because I was in pain, so I had to divert my attention. Who else could I curse except these two idiots
Cheng Ji's tears fell.
Sister Yu scolded: "Are you still crying?"
Cheng Ji roared: "Zhang Chunyu! I was about to collapse just now!!"
Qi Beisong held him in his arms and coaxed him: "Baby, baby..."
Sister Yu endured the severe pain and said, "This... They want to send me to the ward. I saw that the doctor who treated Xiaojun has already left. He also has severe burns, but it's okay. But we really don't have time to save Xiaojun..."
The tears that Lao Geng had just held back burst out again. He lay on the side of Sister Yu's gurney, feeling extremely sad.
Sister Yu's eyes were red too: "Xiaojun just got a little better today. I had discussed with the doctor that we should fight this battle at all costs. One more day is one more day..."
Cheng Ji was slightly shocked when he heard this and said, "Today..."
"What's wrong?" Qi Beisong asked in his ear.
Cheng Ji murmured: "It's not such a coincidence... It can't be such a coincidence..."
He used to be a policeman. He was trained. He didn't believe in coincidence, but only in deliberate planning!
"Sister Yu, do you and the doctor know how the clinic caught fire?"
Sister Yu said: "I don't know. The fire started at around 3 or 4 in the morning, and we were both asleep. He dozed off in the isolation room, and I slept on the bed outside. We were both very peaceful."
"Did it catch fire suddenly?"
Sister Yu tried to recall: "Anyway, I was half asleep and suddenly felt hot. When I opened my eyes, there was a sea of fire all around me! I banged on the glass desperately to wake him up. We tried to lift Xiaojun off the bed, but there was a loud bang and I passed out... I don't remember much of what happened afterwards. It might be the doctor who saved me."
Cheng Ji frowned and said: "There are no coincidences in the world, and there is a logical chain behind all coincidences!"
Lao Geng asked, "What do you mean? Is someone trying to harm Sister Yu?"
"Yes, whoever has a grudge against Sister Yu is a suspect!"
"But Sister Yu has no... no enemies!"
Cheng Ji looked at him and said, "She didn't, but Xiaojun did. If someone wants to silence Xiaojun, it will implicate her and the doctor!"
Lao Geng's eyes opened wide, as if he had been struck by a thunderbolt!
Cheng Ji was about to rush out of the hospital building, but Qi Beisong quickly picked him up by the waist!
"Don't act impulsively without evidence!" Qi Beisong growled.
He said to the nurse who was pushing the bed, "Hurry up! Send Sister Yu to the ward first! We'll be there later!"
Cheng Ji tried desperately to pry his hands apart: "Let me go! I'm going to ask Mao Xiaowei if he wants to kill me to silence me!"
"no!"
"Let go! I'll break your thumb if I really do that!"
"Break it!"
“Let go!!”
Qi Beisong ignored his struggle and forcibly pulled him to a quieter stairwell, then pressed his shoulders and pushed him against the wall: "Calm down and listen to me!"
Cheng Ji stared at him and finally lowered his eyes.
"… you say."
"Don't panic." Qi Beisong asked word by word.
"Um… "
Qi Beisong said, "I'll send someone to find out whether this was a coincidence or a premeditated plot. Can you just follow me and not do anything else?"
“…” Cheng Ji said, “Okay.”
It was inevitable that they heard Lao Geng and Sister Yu lamenting about Chen Guangjun in the corridor.
Although Chen Guangjun was seriously injured, he still had a chance to survive lying in the clinic, but now all hope disappeared. How pitiful.
After listening for a moment, Cheng Ji took the opportunity to hug Qi Beisong's arm, hugging him so tightly that his whole body was shaking slightly.
"What's wrong?" Qi Beisong asked with his head down.
Cheng Ji was scared.
"..." He said in a muffled voice, "Just now... I thought I would never see Sister Yu again."
Qi Beisong kissed him lightly on the top of his head: "Be good, baby, I'm here, I'll go check."