Volume One, Chapter Forty-Two: Proceed with Caution

What he wanted most was to call his family in Bincheng, to hear the tender, childish voice of his four-year-old son. But he didn’t dare—Lu Lin could trace the call and discover his greatest vulnerability.

He had a superior, a leader who was both mentor and friend, to whom he longed to turn for advice on how things had come to this. He knew his evidence was still insufficient to judge who had killed Old Dao Bo, or who had betrayed the cabin.

Yet the mission he was carrying out forbade him from seeking outside help.

He had four colleagues—there used to be five. They had faced life and death together, always advancing and retreating as one. Now Wolf was dead. One among the four was a traitor. He could hardly trust his own judgment and needed more evidence.

After all, lives were at stake.

He had survived in the primeval forest against all odds, starving and half-naked, and finally escaped with his life. He desperately wanted to talk to someone. In truth, he wished for someone to simply listen, to offer him some comfort, but now he didn’t even know whom to turn to.

A wave of bitterness swept over him.

He realized he no longer had friends, no family, no colleagues or superiors. Everywhere he looked, there were only enemies and adversaries.

Then he thought—he could call Water Snake, the man who seemed to know everything. If there was anyone the Flying Squirrel could still trust, it was the intelligence gatherer Water Snake.

But Flying Squirrel wasn’t seeking solace from him; he wanted to know what Lu Lin’s weakness was.

Sitting on Lu Lin’s leather sofa, he smoked two “Ashima” cigarettes from the large desk, sifting through all the information Water Snake had provided about Lu Lin at Yadu. He realized there was no need to call; those scattered pieces of information were gradually forming clear data in the mind of an intelligence analyst.

On the small tea table beside the sofa stood a bottle of foreign liquor. He noticed a stapler on the table, opened it, and saw it was loaded with staples. Taking the stapler, he walked to a full-length mirror and saw his lower back; the wound, soaked earlier in water, had split open again, blood seeping into his waistband. He took two swigs of Martell, then, holding the stapler in his right hand, pressed it against his knife wound and drove the staples in.

Each staple made him grimace in pain, and by the end, his grimace turned into silent hopping. He finished off the rest of the Martell, gasping from the cold burn, longing to shout out the open window, but he dared not.

He opened the door. Lu Lin was waiting outside, handing him a set of striped pajamas. Flying Squirrel took the clothes and changed in the office; it was clear they had belonged to Lu Lin. He tossed his own shredded “clothes” onto the carpet at the doorway, then urgently demanded Lu Lin take him out for a meal.

Lu Lin led him downstairs. There was a “Nationalities Restaurant” there, just in time for lunch.

Entering the restaurant, Flying Squirrel, famished, deliberately slowed his steps at the entrance, his eyes scanning every corner of the dining room. Then he strode ahead of Lu Lin, unceremoniously choosing a table in the deepest corner, sitting with his back to the wall, facing the door.

Lu Lin, noticing the blood seeping through the pajamas at Flying Squirrel’s waist, asked, “Are you hurt?”

Without turning, Flying Squirrel replied, “Occupational injury.”

Lu Lin ordered a few stir-fried dishes. As they waited for the food, he noticed Flying Squirrel’s legs restlessly fidgeting under the table. He said, “Your behavior is nothing like a policeman’s. If anything, you look more like a criminal.”

Flying Squirrel didn’t answer, but a look of curiosity and inquiry appeared on his face.

Lu Lin continued, “I graduated from the police academy. The way you came in, observing every corner and every person—no academy trains its cadets like that. Police are the embodiment of justice; only criminals are so guarded.”

Flying Squirrel sneered softly, “That’s because you’ve always been a soldier. You’ve never worked undercover, never been a thief.”

A waitress brought over beer, and Lu Lin saw Flying Squirrel’s eyes light up.

Snatching the beer, opening it, Lu Lin handed it to him and asked, “Is there really a difference?”

“A big one,” Flying Squirrel replied, taking a long swig before leaning forward. “A woman who meant everything to me just died in front of me, a brother was killed not long ago and we can’t even find his body. Do you have experiences like that? I’ve come here, to your jurisdiction, because of them, and endured all kinds of hardship for it. Our jobs are completely different. I don’t need you to teach me how to do my job. Right now, I just need your help.”

The dishes arrived one after another, but Lu Lin had no appetite.

His appetite had long since been ruined by his shrewish wife at home. The fat owner brought over the local specialty, red-braised clay pot chicken, a bowl of dried pickled vegetables with red bean and minced pork soup, and a wooden bucket of rice.

Lu Lin could only watch this mysterious man wolf down the food.

At the table, Flying Squirrel said nothing. He was truly starving. For southerners, a day without rice was as if they hadn’t eaten at all. He devoured the entire bucket of rice and the dishes, then asked Lu Lin for a cigarette and drank four bottles of Lancangjiang beer.

Lu Lin watched as he downed each bottle in a single gulp, finishing all four in less than ten minutes.

Flying Squirrel changed into the new clothes Julie had bought for him and was taken to the Yadu Golden Shield Hotel, an establishment run by the local Public Security Bureau. It served not only the public but also hosted officers from across the country who came for exchanges or investigations.

In the early 1990s, the grim security situation was a nightmare for many ordinary people.

No one could have imagined then that one day the entire country would be covered by omnipresent surveillance cameras—especially in a small city on the southwestern border, where theft, robbery, and even murder often happened in broad daylight.

In big cities, unscrupulous bosses were everywhere. Migrant workers often couldn’t get paid, street vendors were chased away by city inspectors, and the chaos caused by understaffed city management led many criminals from other places to gather in the city, forming various gangs.

So-called “motorcycle gangs” were a product of the times—two people to a bike, one driving, the one on the back snatching purses. The targets were random: women with shoulder bags going to or from work, men on bicycles carrying handbags, even arms wearing watches sticking out of car windows at traffic lights for a smoke.

Going to the bank to collect wages or withdraw cash was dangerous work. Accountants and cashiers were nervous wrecks, and bosses had to arrange special cars for pickups and drop-offs.

The market economy had already replaced most of the planned economy, and many state-owned enterprises had been privatized as joint-stock companies, creating a new class of overnight millionaires.

Even in border places like Saro, or remote, impoverished towns like Yadu, the abundance of natural resources attracted countless eager outside investors.