First-Class Lawyer

It was 5:20 a.m. in Fa Wang District. The villa hotel that Devore Yves was staying at was strictly guarded.

At this hour, night was transitioning into day; while the moonlight had yet to ebb away, marble white had already permeated the sky on the other side of the wide ranch. 

Behind the villa, a unique starry blue space hovercar was parked on the forest lane. Young Master Joe was holding the car door with one hand whilst his other hand tapped on his earpiece to take a call.

He had been having insomnia lately, tossing and turning through the night. His nerve ends were in a queer state of constant stimulation, though he couldn’t pinpoint the reason as to why that was.

Maybe it was from finally standing on the same front as his father after two decades of going around in circles, maybe it was out of anxiety over Ke Jin’s fluctuating mental health, or maybe it was with every step that they were closed in on the Manson brothers’ feet of clay.

Or maybe, it was the sum of all three. 

He drifted in and out of sleep until three in the morning, then he sat alone at the balcony near Ke Jin’s bedroom for a little over two hours. Eventually, he quietly summoned his hovercar over, planning to go out for a spin to clear his mind.

But he ended up receiving this call right as soon as he opened the car door.

The caller was Gu Yan, but he merely said a sentence “We’ve discovered something relevant to Ke Jin” before passing the comms receiver to Dr. Lin Yuan.

“The cause of Lawyer Ke’s illness has been found.”

It was a plain and simple sentence from Dr Lin, yet it immediately arrested Joe.

“What did you say?” After a long moment, stunned, he asked in a trance.

“I said—” On the other end, Lin Yuan patiently and solemnly repeated his words. “Just now, less than a minute ago, we found what caused Lawyer Ke Jin’s illness.”

Again, Joe fell into bewildered silence. 

After a long time, he asked again, “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not that kind of…” The hand that Joe had on the car door tightened. “Conjecture that has less than fifty percent probability of being true, and would get overturned at the drop of a hat? Frankly, I’ve heard this type of speculation no less than a hundred times, and every time…”

He looked towards the empty void of Ke Jin’s balcony, was quiet for a few seconds, before saying in a low voice, “…and every time it amounted to nothing.” 

“It isn’t a conjecture.” Lin Yuan’s voice had a quality inherent to doctors, gentle but steady, with a convincing sense of surety. “It is a very clear-cut cause.”

All of a sudden, Joe lost his voice.

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“Joe?”  Dr Lin called out in uncertainty.

Joe pinched his nose and rapidly blinked a few times, softly exhaling. “What’s the cause? Tell me.”

Lin Yuan, “We have just found a segment in Ke Jin’s genes that matches the L3-type gene segment.”

“What’s the L3-type gene segment?” 

“Right, so it’s like this.” Lin Yuan briefly explained how he had spliced the gene segment from Yan Suizhi’s DNA and used the analyser to run trajectory predictions that projected the results of the Manson brothers’ research over the years.

“For ease of reference, I have designated the source of the segment from Dean Yan’s DNA as the initial result, type L1. According to the predicted trajectory, the genetic segment in Lawyer Ke’s body would belong to the third stage of research, which is why it is called type L3. The L3-type segment was also present in the DNA of victims of the Elderly Bobblehead case…”

“Victims of the Elderly Bobblehead case? You mean the elderly who had multiple organ failures, receiving a succession of critical danger notices?” Joe’s expression was hideous.

Lin Yuan sighed, wavering for two seconds before responding, “Yes, they actually showed similar symptoms in their medical records. My hypothesis is that this gene segment can cause a person to overreact to some common drug ingredients. It’s like a special type of allergy, where a normally harmless substance is conversely toxic to them. This can trigger a whole host of problems, for example…” 

Though Lin Yuan didn’t finish his words, Joe didn’t need him to.

For example, sudden nervous breakdowns, like Ke Jin and the victims of the Elderly Bobblehead case.

Or even in worse scenarios, hanging between life and death.

A once young lawyer full of mettle, who would have a gentle glow in his eyes when at the defence table, fell to this state simply due to such a sinister and underhanded matter. 

Forever sleeping curled up against the wall; getting triggered even by the slightest change; unable to concentrate, unable to comprehend, unable to speak.

As though an invisible hand had forcibly shut the door to the outside world, leaving him to stand alone in a cramped world without sound.

Maybe each time that his emotions spiralled, he was struggling to ram that door open?

The mere thought of this drove Joe insane. 

For he, as the man standing outside the door, after all this time and in spite of all his efforts, failed to find the lock.

Joe’s fingers gripped the icy car door, lifting from it and hanging down by his side.

He grabbed his hair, turning twice aimlessly on the spot before pounding his fist against the door.

The bulletproof metal struck his bones with a pain so intense that it bored through his veins deep into his heart. 

Like this was the only way he could dampen his pent-up fury and sadness.

“You—hello? Joe, are you okay? What are you doing?” Lin Yuan was startled by the commotion on the other end. “Calm down first! Hello?”

He fretted from across the line for a long time, babbling to the people next to him. “He’s starting to hit things; what now? I can even hear his bones rattling from across the earpiece. That’s why I told you we should ease him into it!”

The skin across Joe’s knuckles were mangled, and blood swiftly wet his fist. 

He raised his hand again, but before it could descend, a voice carried over from a balcony overhead. “Go on, keep banging; maybe you’ll wake Ke Jin. Hit harder.”

Joe’s fists immediately lost its strength, but still followed inertia, soundlessly pressing against the car door.

The ice-cold metal stung his broken wounds. The pain was exceptionally sharp.

He lifted his head in the direction of the voice to see Eunice in her nightgown, her head turned to the side, speaking to someone, before shouting over at him. “Wait there, don’t move!” 

Soon, Eunice ran out in her slippers, followed by her assistant who had comecame behind her with a first-aid kit in his arms.

“I said to get a spray and a couple of band-aids, why are you making such a big deal out of this?” Eunice lowered her head, combing through the first-aid kid for what she wanted, then grabbing Joe’s hand, shaking the healing spray. “It’s going to  hurt; bear with it.”

With that, she sprayed it on. This medicine worked so well that even a bloody wound like this could be reduced to a scab in half a day—the only downside was that it prickled.

If this were before, Young Master Joe would have wailed theatrically to gain Ke Jin’s attention. But at this moment, he didn’t make a sound; he watched the medicinal spray land on his wounds without even a blink. 

“Did I wake you up?” Joe’s voice was slightly hoarse.

It was strange. Clearly, he hadn’t uttered a thing; he didn’t even roar in distress, and yet his voice was very low and raspy.

In a rare moment of warmth, Eunice carefully pasted a band-aid with both pain-relieving and healing properties onto the wounds on his joints. “No. I was awake before you hit the car. Gu sent me a message.”

Joe, “What did he say?” 

“He said that you’d definitely wish to know about Ke Jin’s situation at the earliest, so he told you at the very first moment. But he also anticipated that you would be in a foul mood, so he requested my help to keep an eye on things.”

Joe nodded.

“Idiots really have a good eye for friends,” Eunice said.

Joe nodded again. 

He was silent for a while, then abruptly spoke. “Sis.”

“Yeah?” responded Eunice.

“I’m fine, go back to sleep.” To accommodate her, Joe had kept his head bowed until the wounds were attended to, then wrapped his jacket around Eunice. “I’m making a trip to Spring Ivy.”

Eunice, “You’ve even called me sis, and you’re telling me that you’re fine?” 

Joe, “It’s quite weird. I thought that when I heard about this sort of thing, I would disregard everything and take a space shuttle right over to charge to the Manson Manor. Acquire some banned substance, injectable drugs or whatnot, pin Miller Manson or Brewer Manson down, strangle them, and inject those drugs into their system. Watch them spasm, struggle, lose their mind, and lose any semblance of humanity. That’s what I thought, yet it’s strange—I actually would reject those thoughts myself, and then convince myself to drive nails into them with statutes and evidence, sending them to their deserved ends.”

Eunice gazed at him, then laughed softly. She pointed at a certain empty balcony with her chin. “This just shows that my idiot brother was so influenced by some lawyers that he has finally picked up something good.”

“Mm.”

“If even you, with your thirty-over years of idiocy, have hope, then why can’t a lawyer with thirty-over years of intellect get better? Isn’t that right?” Eunice paused, and her gaze drifted askance. “Look, even the shrewd and wise Mr Yves has approval written all over his face, so what are you still worried about?” 

Joe followed her gaze, looking over.

At some unknown point in time, his father, Devore Yves, leaned on the balcony with a cup of coffee in hand, his grey-blue eyes pale yet bright.

Joe finally regained his spirit, bouncing back to usual, the always-energetic Young Master Joe.

He sent Eunice back upstairs, then took large strides to Ke Jin’s bedroom. Hiding the injured hand behind him, he gently opened the door. 

Ke Jin was still curled up under his blanket, his back against the wall, quietly asleep, not perceiving a thing.

Joe blinked away the heat that pricked his red-rimmed eyes. Those bright blue eyes curved into a smile, and like thousands of mornings over the years, he said to the person in the bedroom, “Morning.”

And like thousands of mornings past, to no response.

Joe spoke again. “I have to head over to Spring Ivy. Something might really come out of it this time. Are you glad?” 

He paused, then he said, “No matter what, you’ll definitely get better. That day will come, I promise you.”