Chapter 46: Little Dolphin
Indirect… kiss?
Kiss.
The teeth that were biting the straw paused. Deng Xi looked at the two humans in the film who were sharing a straw. His ears were ringing. In the quiet and dim audio-visual room, he couldn’t hear a single sound, only the “thump, thump” of his own heartbeat.
Faster and faster, more and more intense.
Shouldn’t a kiss be mouth to mouth?
How, how could eating something together also be considered a kiss?
Deng Xi’s whole body was burning hot. A pink blush spread across his cheeks, as if he were drunk. He thought dizzily, humans are so strange.
Then, would the little mute think they were kissing?
The little mute must have known that eating something that the other had eaten, in the human world, meant kissing.
The little mute had refused.
He was the one who had insisted that the little mute drink the milk he had drunk.
Deng Xi’s eyelids instantly became wet. He was so hot he wanted to go and feel the sea breeze to cool down his face.
But they had clearly agreed not to do anything that would be mistaken for being mates by others in the human world.
Deng Xi thought of how he had insisted that the little mute bite his straw, and he couldn’t help but curl his fingertips, clenching the small bottle in his hand.
He belatedly realized that he was still holding the straw that the little mute had held in his mouth. His curled fingertips suddenly felt as if they were holding a hot potato. Deng Xi, as if burned, suddenly loosened his hand.
The moment the small bottle fell, the straw in his mouth was also pulled out by gravity, making a “pop” sound.
At this moment, the prelude of the film had just finished playing, and it fell into a brief black screen. The already dim audio-visual room, after its only light source was cut off, was instantly so dark that he couldn’t see his own five fingers. Without the sound of the film, it also instantly fell into a dead silence.
Making this very small and light sound exceptionally clear.
Almost as loud as Deng Xi’s heartbeat.
The fallen bottle was caught by a single hand. Si Jisheng leaned over and steadily placed it back on the flying chair.
A cold aura approached aggressively in the darkness.
Deng Xi, like a little ostrich, wished he could bury his head in the ground. He held his breath and didn’t dare to move.
The film that Dr. Li had sent over was remarkably effective.
A hint of a smile appeared in Si Jisheng’s eyes. He pulled away, turned, and sat back down. He didn’t ask why the bottle had fallen, nor did he ask why Deng Xi had suddenly become so quiet.
He gave Deng Xi a small space to calm down.
The temperature on his face was slowly cooling down. Deng Xi rubbed his hot face, almost burying it in his palms. His voice was very small and muffled. “I didn’t… didn’t want to kiss Little Mute.”
He didn’t know.
It wasn’t on purpose.
After a long time, Si Jisheng finally replied, “I understand.” His voice was hoarse in the darkness.
The film began to play again.
The audio-visual room also lit up again, no longer the dead silence that had almost drowned Deng Xi in suffocation.
Deng Xi took a deep breath. “I just wanted Little Mute to eat something sweet too.”
The little merman said softly, “I want Little Mute to be happy too.”
Si Jisheng paused for a moment, then turned his head sideways to look at Deng Xi. “Why do you think I’m not happy?”
Deng Xi also shook his head in confusion. “I don’t know.”
Neither of them was watching the film that was playing anymore.
Deng Xi lifted his face from his hands and, turning around, met the little mute who was looking at him. His silver eyes seemed to always be looking at him so quietly.
In Deng Xi’s line of sight, half of the silver-tail’s face was covered in dimness, as if he could never break free from this shadow.
Deng Xi really, really wanted to pull the little mute out of the darkness.
He propped himself up slightly and suddenly asked, “Is Little Mute happy here?”
Si Jisheng nodded slightly and ambiguously uttered two words, “It’s alright.”
Deng Xi: “Then that means you’re not happy.”
Si Jisheng was stunned for a moment and did not argue.
Deng Xi asked again, “Then why don’t you go back to the ocean?”
A long time passed before Si Jisheng finally said, “Because there are things here that I can’t let go of.”
Deng Xi thought for a moment and said, “A long, long time ago, before I met Little Mute, I had a little friend. It was a little dolphin that had just been born.”
“Its mother was killed by another sea creature when it was born, so it was all alone from the moment it was born.”
“The little dolphin had to struggle very hard to survive in the dangerous deep sea on its own. When I met it, it had already learned how to steal edible fish from the sea areas that were encircled by large sea creatures to fill its stomach.”
“It had already learned how to survive on its own in a world without its own kind.”
Deng Xi’s eyelids curved. “Isn’t that amazing?”
Si Jisheng nodded slightly and listened attentively.
Deng Xi’s voice was very soft. “It even helped me push my shell bed before. It was a very kind and friendly little dolphin.” He took a deep breath. “But later, when it was hunting, it was accidentally injured by a sea creature of another species.”
“When I saw it again, because no one had told it how to treat its own wounds, the injured area had already rotted and deteriorated.”
“Because the rotting flesh had already spread into a large area and couldn’t be cut off, it also rotted along with the rotting flesh on its body.”
The little dolphin slowly sank to the bottom of the sea.
A few days later, when Deng Xi went to see it again, it had already become a skeleton that had been gnawed clean by fish.
That was a nightmare that Deng Xi had had for a long, long time.
The little merman’s language was clumsy.
But Si Jisheng understood. He said in a hoarse voice, “It won’t happen. Don’t worry.”
Deng Xi extended his little finger. “Will Little Mute make a pinky promise with me?” This was what Bunny had taught him.
Bunny had said that a pinky promise, once made, could not be broken for a hundred years, otherwise you would be a little dog.
Although Deng Xi thought that there was nothing wrong with being a cute little dog.
Si Jisheng took off his mechanical gloves and hooked Deng Xi’s finger. “Alright.”
The Jiaoren’s fingertips were cool, but the merman’s fingers were warm. Deng Xi curled his fingertips and said seriously, “The one who lies is a little dog.”
Si Jisheng replied in a low voice, “Mmm.”
The two who had made a promise continued to watch the film.
In the interstellar age, same-sex marriage had already been legalized thousands of years ago, and there was an endless stream of film and television works.
Dr. Li had considered that in a primitive society, for the sake of reproduction, animals only had the concept of male and female sex. It was very likely that the merman species was the same. She had specially found a film with a same-sex theme. To take care of the little merman who had just come to the human world, she had even chosen a very youthful school setting.
The two male protagonists, one advanced and the other retreated, and their relationship was extremely obscure.
Deng Xi watched, clueless. “Their relationship as friends is so good.”
Si Jisheng silently pursed his lips and lowered his eyes to cross out the name of this film in his comm file.
Deng Xi had mostly learned some common sense about human society from it, such as the fact that human cubs did not attend class at home. They would go to a thing called a school to listen to lectures.
They would have many recreational activities after class.
They could go out to watch movies together, go shopping, play wildly in the holographic pods, and also scroll through the star network on their comms every day.
And also dates.
Did going out to play with friends count as a date?
Deng Xi secretly memorized it in his heart, feeling that he had learned it.
Deng Xi let out a small yawn in the dimness. He rubbed his sleepy eyes and slowly fell asleep to the background sound of the film. His shallow breathing was caught by the keen silver Jiaoren.
Si Jisheng looked over, then sighed slightly and leaned over to adjust the interval of the water mist sprayed by the flying chair, increasing the speed.
The moisture on his fish tail made the sleeping Deng Xi fall into an even deeper sleep. His brow also relaxed, and the corners of his lips curled up slightly.
At the end of the film, the prelude that they had seen at the beginning was played. The youth seemed to have finally mustered the courage to ask, breaking the ambiguous atmosphere that had always been between the two of them. They shared a long kiss under the twilight sun.
Si Jisheng turned his head sideways and saw Deng Xi, who was still sound asleep.
A perfect miss.
Si Jisheng frowned, resignedly stood up, turned off the screen, left a small lamp by the sofa bed on, and left the quiet audio-visual room.
Waiting outside was the secretary-general, who had come specially after finding out that the audio-visual room was in use. He said in a low voice, “Marshal, your monitoring system issued a warning late last night.”
The secretary-general couldn’t count how many times this had happened this month. The number of times the Marshal’s mental sea had gone berserk had seriously exceeded the limit.
The secretary-general followed behind the Marshal and quickly reported, “The royal family has already sent a letter of inquiry. The Council of Elders and the research institute have also come to ask you if the new species you brought back is of any use to the aliens’ frenzy.”
Si Jisheng’s eyes turned cold, and he said in a cold voice, “Don’t bother with them.” He pondered for a moment. “As for the royal family, just inform them that the military will not be in chaos because of me.”
The Empire had a separation of three powers. If the military and the Council of Elders were on opposite sides, then the royal family was the middle party between the two, dedicated to easing the evenly matched relationship between the military and the Council of Elders.
The royal family treated them equally.
They did not favor either the military or the Council of Elders, but as long as one side overshadowed the other, they would step in and reprimand them.
The secretary-general replied in a low voice, “Yes,” and then asked, “Then your mental sea?”
Si Jisheng stopped in front of the treatment room door. “It will be stabilized soon.”
The secretary-general: “I’ll go and reply to the royal family right now.”
Si Jisheng nodded slightly.
It wasn’t until the secretary-general had left that he stepped into the treatment room and took out the gene-suppressing drug that Dr. Li had placed in the cold storage safe at that time.
Si Jisheng grabbed a handful without looking to see how many there were. Before he drank it, he thought of Deng Xi, who was sound asleep in the audio-visual room, and his movements paused slightly.
A moment later, he still drank all the gene-suppressing drug.
