Does It Matter

36

 

  Scratch that. He could almost see himself being better off in an abandoned tomb in the middle of nowhere.

The city was loud, and the consistently overcast sky did nothing to help the dark, gritty feeling permeating the air.
He had left the truck parked at a gas station a ways back, when he first entered the city, so that he could walk around and get a grasp for himself. Just in the short walk so far, wandering along the sidewalk with no well formed goal to speak of, he had already received many strange looks from passersby, likely for his dirty clothes and generally unkempt appearance.
He wasn't sure exactly what it was that he was looking for at this point, but he supposed that he would need a goal of some sort. At the moment he had nothing aside from the clothes on his back, everything else having been left at the inn, probably to be pawned off to some other underhanded crooks in the village.
Thinking of it, he thought that it was probably best that he find a payphone, he had some loose change that had been scattered in the truck's glovebox. If he could find a payphone, he could at least call Pangzhi, maybe get him to come pick him up.
It took another 20 minutes of somewhat less aimless wandering before he found one, tucked in the corner beside a run down convenience store.
While waiting for his call to go through, he prepared himself for the lecture he was sure to receive, after his exit and loss of contact over the last week.
Click
"Hello, you've reached the voicemail of Wang's Antiques this line is busy at the moment, please leave a message at the tone. If you believe that you have received this message in error, please hang up, and try your call again."
The operator's smooth, robotic message played like a death toll to his ears.

With a heavy sigh, he left a brief message, and hung up the phone. He opened the door to the booth and walked out with his hands in his pockets, glancing up at the smoggy sky.
Well, since that had failed, he supposed he should at least do something about that trafficking gang, though he didn't know where they were based, and if he reported what had happened to the police, he would end up having to reveal too much.

Perhaps it would be best to just let himself be captured at this point.
After all, being kidnapped to explore tombs and blackmail his uncle's was something familiar, that he had practically grown up with. He knew how to handle such situations by now.
But this last situation was completely unfamiliar, as the people from that village had no connection with his family's business, and would have no qualms with making money however they could. Quite a frightening situation if he allowed himself to dwell on it.

Well, for now, with no money, and no way to contact anyone, he may as well find a map and try to find his way back home, at the least to replenish his supplies and talk to Pangzhi. And to switch to his own car of course.

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Pangzhi sat down with a pleased sigh. Business had been booming lately, he had made six sales just today, in between the nagging of that weird lady and her crew of course. Honestly, she would end up scaring away his customers if she didn't stop.

With a glance outside his window, he could see the back of her ponytail, as she stood just outside his door, waiting for him to open it again.
"Aish, this crazy lady. She should compensate me for the loss she is causing. And for my Bike." He shook his head with a sad sigh, remembering his precious toy. He had just bought it too.
Not much to be done about it now, besides, there were other things to worry about at the moment.
Tianzhen had not answered a single call or voicemail since disappearing. This wasn't too unusual for him, except that this time he had taken that suspicious guy from before. The whole situation was strange to Pangzhi.
Particularly because, after much digging around in secret, he had found that the stranger seemed to be someone hired by Sanxing. Wu Xie was not one to keep risky persons nearby, so Pangzhi could only assume  that he had yet to find out, strange as it seemed, that the man was a spy.

The whole situation was just confusing, and worrying.

He rubbed his brow and turned to his next task, that he had been putting off: the mail, and the phone. He had slowed his voicemails to stack up over the last week while he dealt with all the strange things around him, but it couldn't be put off any longer.
He pulled up a chair and settled in with his notebook and a pencil, ready to listen to the lot.

-----

He was fifteen voicemails in, phone numbers and notes scrawled over the page of his notebook, they were all the same, special orders for jades and collectors looking for specific styles of artifacts. The occasional one from someone looking for Wu Xie. He seemed to make new friends (and enemies) every day.

"To discard this message, press 3, to save, press—" he cut off the message by pressing down on a button. "Message discarded. To play the next message, press 7......New message:

'hey Pangzhi, it's Wu Xie. I lost my phone, so I'm using a payphone, currently in.... xxxx city, headed back soon. I could probably use a hand, if you can find a way out here without alerting anyone. If either of my uncle's contacts you, don't tell them anything. Stay safe, I'll explain the rest later. '

To discard this message, press—"

Pangzhi set the phone down, glancing around. Well that was reassuring. He tried redialing the number that the message had come from, with no luck. The message could have been sent days ago. In any case, there was no way that his friend would have stayed in the area, knowing him.
He supposed his next action would have to be to go try to find him then. It sounded like things had not gone well, given the limited information in the message, and the rushed, yet almost sad tune to his voice.

Given that he had called from a payphone, and that he had felt the need to call Pangzhi in the first place, he assumed that the Zhang guy had probably taken off with his supplies. He supposed he would never get his bike back then.

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Wu Xie did his best to ignore the exhaustion pulling at his limbs as he climbed once more into the drivers seat.
He had managed to acquire a map at the run down gas station beside the phone, where the cashier has stared at him as though he had run in without a head.
Although, staring into the eyes of his reflection in the rearview mirror, he really couldn't blame the kid. His hair was everywhere, and a smudge of dirt ran along his cheekbone, which he now noticed had been bruised a deep purple from smacking into the floor of the truck bed. His eyes spoke clearly of exhaustion, lids falling slow and heavily.
He really couldn't wait to get out of town, so that he could pull over and take a nap. Perhaps it was just paranoia, but he couldn't trust that he wouldn't be immediately caught if he let his guard down now. At the very least he might catch the attention of the police, and this vehicle was very much not his. He could Not afford to go to jail for vehicle theft right now.
With a frustrated growl and a fierce rubbing at his eyes to try to wipe away the sleepiness, he started the vehicle, backing out of his parking space and onto the road.

He would be fine, just one more experience to add to his repertoire.