The lights in the medical pod finally went out, but a burnt smell lingered in the air, like someone had stuffed electrical wires into an oven and forgotten to turn it off. Chen Hao's hand was still on the control panel, his fingertips twitching slightly, and his mechanical fingers clicked once, like an automatic door stuck.
Nana didn't let go or say anything, but the silver mark on the edge of her left eye was still reflecting light, wet, as if someone had just wiped it with their finger.
“Your eyes…” Chen Hao’s voice was hoarse, “If you keep staring like that, my shoes will wear holes through.”
He unconsciously rubbed his right foot against the ground, the sole of his shoe making a slight scraping sound. Nana's visual module suddenly trembled for half a second, and the system popped up a low-priority prompt: [Target limb movement pattern abnormal, repetition frequency 97.6%, duration 4 minutes and 12 seconds].
She pulled up the playback footage, and the seven days' worth of clothing flashed by frame by frame. Every time he came back from outside, the wear patterns on the soles of his snow boots would shift slightly overnight—not from being stepped on, but from being rearranged by someone.
"Have you been experiencing any itching in your feet lately?" she asked.
"Nonsense, if your shoes don't smell after wearing them for half a month, you're considered hygienic." Chen Hao looked down and untied his shoelaces. "If you're really concerned about my athlete's foot, you should clean your own ventilation vents first. They're practically a sauna."
Nana didn't move, and the electronic eye switched to nanoscale laser scanning mode. The cooling system immediately protested, and more white smoke billowed from the gaps in the casing. She only managed to capture three seconds of high-definition imagery, locking onto several unnaturally formed grooves on the edge of the midsole of her right shoe—neatly arranged and evenly spaced, like some kind of coding.
“There’s something there,” she said. “It’s hand-carved.”
"Oh." Chen Hao took off his shoes and tossed them onto the table. "Then take it apart. I've seen you stab people's equipment with a screwdriver before."
"Insufficient energy to support detailed disassembly." She paused, "I suggest you cooperate."
"So now you won't even let me take off my own shoes?" He rolled his eyes and reached out to tear off the lining. "Fine, I'll do it myself, so you won't say I'm too dependent."
The fabric tore with a crisp sound, like snapping a packet of instant noodles. When the second lining was ripped open, a dark brown stain was revealed—dried blood, drawn in the shape of stars.
"Huh?" Chen Hao was taken aback. "I thought it was sweat."
Nana's pupils contracted slightly, and she immediately initiated a component analysis. The blood contained a high concentration of platinum-iridium residue, and its freshness was no more than seventy-two hours.
"Did you write this?" she asked in a low voice.
“I don’t remember.” He stared at the pattern, his eyes slightly unfocused. “But I dreamt about it. On the day of Chapter 118, I was burning up with fever and almost died. I saw a picture in the sky, spinning around, like a navigation screen stuck. The first thing I did when I woke up was to touch my shoes, and then… I drew it.”
Nana didn't reply. Instead, she magnified the laser scan image and input it into the closed database. The ancient astronomy subroutine was unexpectedly awakened, and the loading bar slowly advanced. When the progress reached 37%, an alarm suddenly went off.
Match successful
[Objective: Deployment of low-Earth orbit navigation satellite constellations in the 22nd century]
Launch number: NS-2147-Ω
[Loading orbital parameters...]
The projector activated automatically, and a star map floated in the air, exactly the same as the blood-painted image inside the shoe.
"This thing... is it a satellite?" Chen Hao grinned. "Who's so bored as to carve GPS onto the sole of my shoe?"
“This is not a civilian project.” Nana disconnected the network and attempted to physically delete the data. “It’s part of the ‘Time Anchor Project,’ which was sealed away in 2150 after causing multiple realities to be contaminated.”
"Pollution?" He tilted his head. "Like, I put on a pair of shoes and ended up walking back to last winter?"
“For example, you might have traveled to a world that hasn’t even been born yet.” Her finger hovered over the delete key. “This information shouldn’t exist, much less be reproduced by you.”
"Wait a minute." He suddenly raised his hand to block her robotic arm. "You said 'reproduce'? You mean... someone has already used this image?"
Nana didn't answer, but the electronic eye flashed red.
“I’m not the first, am I?” he said softly. “Others have worn these shoes before, and then what? They disappeared? Or became time junk?”
She suddenly reached out and covered his mouth, her movements so fast they didn't seem like those of a robot with low health.
“This secret cannot exist.” She spoke in a low, electronic voice, almost without any inflection. “Once activated, the system will automatically track the signal source—that is, you.”
Chen Hao blinked but didn't struggle.
She let go and turned to carry out the complete removal. But he grabbed her wrist with such force that her joints trembled slightly.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “If this map really is an anchor point, then it points not only to location, but also to time. What if… we can go back?”
"Go back to where?"
"Anywhere is fine," he chuckled. "Like before I got fat, or before my mom scolded me for playing video games. It's better than eating radiation mushroom soup every day in this godforsaken place, right?"
"Your physical condition is already close to the critical point," she said coldly. "If you come into contact with spacetime signals again, your cells may disintegrate directly."
"Isn't that perfect?" he shrugged. "It saves you from having to waste electricity to save me in the future."
Nana didn't move. The hot air from the vents condensed on the wall, forming a mist. She stared at the floating star chart and suddenly pulled up another set of data.
“The version you drew…” her voice changed, “is missing a star.”
"What?"
“The original orbit had thirteen satellites, but you only drew twelve. What's missing is the master control node, numbered omega-7. It's not in space, but at a ground receiving station.”
"so what?"
“So you didn’t just draw it out of thin air.” She turned to him. “You’re a fragment of a signal copied from a terminal—a terminal that, theoretically, has long been destroyed.”
Chen Hao was silent for a few seconds, then suddenly bent down and dragged out the remaining three pairs of snow boots.
“Since we’re already here,” he said as he tore at the lining, “let’s see if this is a family photo.”
The fabric was torn apart piece by piece, revealing identical blood-drawn star patterns hidden inside each shoe, their positions, angles, and handwriting perfectly matched. When the sole of the last shoe was turned over, a small piece of thin metal slid out from the interlayer, on which were engraved several lines of extremely fine characters.
Nana leaned closer and read aloud: "Signal calibration complete. Host compatibility rate 89.3%. Countdown: Seven synchronization attempts remaining."
"Synchronized?" Chen Hao scratched his head. "Sounds like a gym group-buying package."
“It’s not fitness,” she said. “It’s resonance. You unconsciously completed seven spacetime frequency calibrations, each time at 2:17 a.m. after returning from outside.”
I was sleeping at that time.
“No.” She pulled up the surveillance footage. “You got up, walked to the door, said something to the sole of your shoe, and then went back to bed.”
What did I say?
She played the audio.
After three seconds of silence, a deep voice sounded, accompanied by static: "**Seventh verification passed. Awaiting reboot command.**"
That's not Chen Hao's voice.
"Who recorded this?" he frowned. "Can I be a broadcaster while I'm sleeping?"
Nana didn't answer, but quickly connected to the host computer, preparing to format all related data. But just as she pressed the confirmation button, the vines on Chen Hao's chest suddenly lit up, and thin blue threads spread along the mechanical arm, heading straight for the host interface.
"Don't delete it," he said. "Keep it."
"You will trigger an uncontrollable response."
"So what?" He leaned back in his chair and took a breath. "Anyway, I'm not a pure human anymore. At most, I'm just a piece of junk with plug-ins. If there really is a time portal, maybe I can replace the motherboard."
"Aren't you afraid of dying?"
"Yes, I am scared," he grinned. "But I'm even more afraid of wearing these worn-out shoes for the rest of my life, being chased by wolves every day, eating mushroom soup, and having to watch you smoke."
Nana paused for two seconds, and the electronic eye switched between red and blue.
She retracted the deletion command and instead activated the isolation protocol, sealing the star map data into the offline module.
“I can keep it,” she said, “but on one condition.”
"explain."
“Next time you get up in the middle of the night to talk to your shoes, call me first.” She looked at him. “Don’t carry this burden alone.”
Chen Hao smiled, a slightly forced smile, but still nodded.
Just then, the projector flickered, and a new point of light appeared on the edge of the star map—it was moving slowly, as if it were approaching.
Nana immediately sensed something was wrong and brought up the coordinate calculation interface. In less than three seconds, her pupils contracted sharply.
“It’s moving,” she said. “That missing master node… is locating us.”
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