“Tell the ones I made up. Bring me back to my childhood.” Cheng Xin did not hesitate at all. Even she was surprised at how quickly she had caught on to Tianming’s plan.
“All right. Then let’s not talk about anything else. Just the stories. Your stories.” Tianming spread his hands and looked up, clearly addressing those monitoring the conversation. His meaning was clear:
And so, Tianming began to tell the story. His voice was deep and soothing, as though he was chanting an ancient song. Cheng Xin tried hard to memorize, but she was gradually absorbed by the story. Much time passed as Tianming spun his fairy tale. He told three stories, all connected to each other: “The New Royal Painter,” “The Glutton’s Sea,” and “Prince Deep Water.” After he finished the last story, the sophon put up a countdown, indicating that they had only one minute left.
The moment of parting was at hand.
Cheng Xin awakened from the dream of the fairy tales. Something struck her heart hard, and it was almost unbearable. She said, “The universe is grand, but life is grander. We’re certain to meet again.” Only when she was done did she realize she had almost repeated Sophon’s farewell.
“Then let’s pick a spot to meet, somewhere other than the Earth, somewhere in the Milky Way.”
“How about at the star you gave me? Our star.” Cheng Xin didn’t even need to think.
“All right. At our star!”
As they gazed at each other across the light-years, the countdown reached zero, and the image disappeared, returning to the snow of white noise. Then the unfolded sophon turned purely reflective again.
The green light went off. Now none of the lights were on. Cheng Xin understood that she was now on the precipice of death. On a ship in the First Trisolaran Fleet several light-years away, the conversation between her and Tianming was being replayed and examined. The red light of death could go on at any moment, and there would be no warning yellow light.
Against the unfolded spherical surface of the sophon, Cheng Xin saw the reflection of her own dinghy and herself. The half of her dinghy facing the sophon was completely transparent, like an intricate locket dangling from a necklace, and she herself was a picture placed in the locket. She was dressed in a snow-white lightweight space suit, and she appeared pure, youthful, beautiful. She was surprised by her own eyes: clear, placid, showing nothing of the surging waves inside her. She felt comforted as she imagined this lovely locket hanging on Tianming’s heart.
After an unknown amount of time had passed, the sophon disappeared. The red light did not come on. The space outside looked the same as before: The blue Earth appeared again in the distance, and behind it the Sun. They were witness to all.
She felt hypergravity again. The dinghy’s thruster was accelerating, and she was going home.
During the few hours of the return voyage, Cheng Xin adjusted the dinghy’s hull so that it was completely solid. She sealed herself in and turned herself into a memorization machine. Again and again, she repeated Tianming’s words and his stories. The acceleration stopped; the dinghy coasted; the thruster turned around; the dinghy decelerated—she didn’t notice any of it. Finally, after a series of tremors, the door opened, and the terminal station port’s light spilled in.
Two of the officials who had accompanied her to the station met her. Their faces were impassive. After a simple greeting, they brought Cheng Xin across the port to a sealed door.
“Dr. Cheng, you need to rest. Don’t dwell on the past. We never held much hope that you’d get anything of use,” the PDC official said. And then he gestured for Cheng Xin to enter the sealed door that had just opened.
Cheng Xin had thought this was the exit to the port, but she found herself in an extremely small room. All the walls were made of some dark metal. After the door closed behind her, she couldn’t even see the seams. This was not a place of rest. It was simply furnished, with a small desk and a chair. On top of the desk was a microphone. Microphones were rarely seen in this age, and only used for high-fidelity recording. The air in the room had an acrid smell, almost sulfuric, and her skin felt itchy—the air was clearly heavy with static electricity.
The room was filled with people: All the members of the special team were here. As soon as the two officials who had received her entered, their expressions changed. They now looked as anxious and concerned as the rest.
“This is a blind zone for the sophons,” someone said to Cheng Xin. Only then did she realize that humans had finally achieved the technology to shield themselves from the ever-present listeners, though it was only possible within extremely confined spaces like this one.
