Poison City

“Who is it and what do you want?” Ouyang Turner’s slightly raspy voice came from behind the door.

“This is Gloria Lee, and I’m here to sell coffee.” Gloria responded.

The chain behind the door was taken off, then Sue and Ouyang Turner opened up the door together: “Oh my god, I was so worried! That took you long enough!”

“It’s not even an hour.” Gloria chuckled as she locked the door behind her.

“Yes, but you went out there alone, just to meet some mystery man we didn’t know.” Tae Kuo came out of the kitchen of this temporary apartment, holding a big bowl of soup, some simple soy sauce fried rice and boiled vegetables.

“It’s Detective Marcus Cai from the 17th Precinct, Sue met him before.” Gloria chuckled and sat down with the other three by the coffee table.

“I know, I know. And he’s the ONE copper we can trust.” Tae Kuo grinned: “Have some food - there’s not much around, I had to borrow some from the shops nearby and the neighbors.”

Gloria sighed and looked the Sifu of a coffin home right in his eyes: “You went out?”

“Just for a little bit. Because no one is really looking for me.” Tae Kuo shrugged: “Don’t worry, No one followed me. This entire neighborhood is now deserted, I suspect the people here were all moved or evacuated in a hurry. A lot of them still have leftovers in their fridge. So I just - you know, borrowed a bunch of stuff.”

“Yeah, a coffin home Sifu who knows how to pick locks.” Turner Ouyang shook his head, chuckling: “I’ve seen a lot these few days.”

“So what did you talk about?” Sue began pouring soup for everyone: “This is not a date, then he must have something important to discuss, yeah? What’d he say?”

“He’s got a plan to strike at the ‘core’ of everything. And that ‘core’ was an energy dense location, they believed it is a datacenter” Gloria organized her thoughts before responding to her friend's inquiry: “I - I think I believe him. It fits in with everything we learned so far - the thing with electricity, how it seems to be able to ward off paranormal beings and phenomena, and - why those people tried so hard to cover up the information about the infrastructural project.”

“He wants to ‘strike’ at them? How?” Sue asked.

“Wait wait wait - ” Turner Ouyang was just drowned in his own thoughts, and was slow to ask Gloria his questions: “The datacenter? It’s the ‘core’?”

“He believes it is. Since it is the most energy dense building in the city, by far.” Gloria nodded at the excited young man with an eyebrow raised: “What? What’d you find? Something important?”

“Is - is that datacenter by the water? By - by Lake Aqiu?” Turner Ouyang asked.

“Yes. And?”

“Oh! I think it makes sense now. It makes perfect sense!” Turner Ouyang ran to the small table at the corner of the living room and pulled out a small piece of paper with pencil marks on it from the drawer: “Look! This was something I was working on - sorry it’s just a sketch, but they tried to take it and I had to rip it apart so they don’t know what we’re up to.”

“Okay, what is it?” Gloria fixed her eyes on the sketch, it was the rough shape of Lake Aqiu, with some lines radiating out from the lake, some straighter, some slightly bent. All of which had dots along them. “What are these?”

“Proposed sites for those electric substations and transformers.” Turner Ouyang nodded: “These are their locations. And they are going out from the lake like this. And then - I just realized what you meant by energy density - because these substations and transformers all have this - ” He drew one enclosing line connecting a few dots around the lake, cutting through to the radiating lines from the lake: “Now, if I remember correctly, these substations, they used similar grades of equipments because of their throughput. And then when you go outside of it, you have lower grade equipments.”

“So - the power lines somehow center around the lake.” Sue nodded: “That’s not gonna be normal - but why around the lake?”

“The curse comes from the lake.” Gloria almost smacked herself on the face, it was so simple. She could have thought of it, she SHOULD have thought of it.

“Yes - and - ” Turner Ouyang drew a big circle surrounding everything: “If the electric grid, like you said, was to become some kind of suppression ritual, it comes none simpler and sturdier than a circle, right? And, if things began breaking down - ”

“Wait - so - ” Tae Kuo opened his eyes wide: “You’re saying those missing sages and scholars - ”

Turner Ouyang nodded, his fingers knocked on the sketched lake on that humble piece of paper.

Sue gasped, but then proceeded to ask while scratching her jaw: “But where could that be? This is the lake - ”

“I think I know that answer already - because - this is from a while back, but - ” Turner Ouyang cleared his throat: “There is a tun - ”

Before he could finish, three quick successive knocks on the door exploded in the empty living room.

Gloria hopped to the side of the door, with her Qi fully activated while doing a “shh” gesture. The others in the room immediately hid in the corner, while Tae Kuo ran into the kitchen and took out an old kitchen knife - apparently he did not just “borrow” the food from the neighbors.

“Open up! It’s Luoshan Zi!”