Chapter 432 Another Boy
Blue glass, blue transparent ceiling, blue leaves and electric poles passed across the top of the carriage. The boy leaned on the seat and looked at the scenery above his head quietly. The carriage was extremely quiet. There were no other passengers except him.
The train clanged slowly forward. Under the twilight sky, everything seemed to be coated with a light blue. When passing the station halfway, the mechanical broadcast sound in the carriage would briefly break the silence.
[The train has arrived at Songqing Station. Passengers arriving at the station are requested to get off in an orderly manner.]
The door slowly opened, but no one got off the train. There was no one in the station. There were only a few unclear birds standing on the electric poles, making a few calls.
The boy turned his neck and looked at the station outside the window with his empty eyes. It was rusty and the old facilities seemed abandoned. The only display board on the top of the station track was still in good condition. The orange-red dot matrix showed that this was "Songqing Station".
As if thinking of something, the boy lowered his head, fumbled in his pocket for a while, and took out the black personal terminal. The edge of the metal shell was worn very brightly, and there were many small scratches on the side. It seemed that it had been used for a long time.
Turning over the projection screen, the boy's fingertips slid across one line of news, and then stopped.
"Regrettable, the genius boy committed suicide at home"
[On July 12, the East Third District police received a call from the self-discipline unit, and then sent personnel to the scene. They found that the 18-year-old male resident "Ling" who lived in the Songqing Street District died on the pine tree outside his home. According to the scene image, "Ling" fell on the tree branch and died of excessive blood loss. The knife used for suicide and the personal terminal left behind were found next to him.
The personal terminal clearly recorded the process of his suicide. He first sat on the tree for a day, and then in the evening, he listened to a song, then took out the knife, clearly and calmly cut the artery under his armpit, and then fell on the tree with his eyes closed.
According to Ling's classmates and teachers, Ling's grades in various subjects have always been the best in the class. At the age of 16, he advanced to the Withering Sequence 5, breaking the school record. However, Ling was also extremely cold to his classmates and never communicated with others on weekdays. The school arranged for him to see a psychologist, but when the doctor asked him questions, he was particularly clear-minded and calm, and did not show any symptoms of depression. His work and rest were also very regular.
After the incident, the school contacted Ling's only relative, a distant aunt of Ling. According to her, she only met Ling's parents at the wedding 20 years ago, and she has never contacted Ling's family since then.
Before this, this genius boy had obtained the free admission qualification of the Central Star Region's Lapis Lazuli Academy, which was envied by countless people, but his departure also made many people who knew him feel regretful and lost.
Lapis Lazuli Academy is currently ranked 237th in the Federation. It has produced many well-known scholars, doctors, and scientists. This famous school has only 10 enrollment quotas in Shannan Star Region, of which only 1 is free admission.
For this reason, educators in the star region said that the psychological problems of contemporary students can no longer be ignored, and corresponding measures need to be taken to improve them...
————The above is the evening news report of Shannan Star Region-Black Pine Residence Star-Eastern District 3. ]
The boy's eyes were fixed on the screen of the news projection, motionless, like a pale corpse, until a fly hit the glass outside the window, which made his pupils move again.
The train started slowly again, and with the clanging sound of wheels, it slowly left the rusty station behind. The boy also leaned back in his seat again, looking at the blue glass ceiling above his head, and the shadows of branches and telephone poles falling on the glass plate.
The sunset gradually fell, and the blue on the ceiling became deeper and darker, until the last piece of dimness, like a crow's feather, the texture could not be seen clearly.
An hour later, the train stopped at a dim station. The boy stood on the platform with his personal terminal. The light and shadow of the projection screen made his face pale and bloodless.
After that, he put away his personal terminal and walked in the dim and deserted station. Although there was no light, he did not fall or bump into anything. Maybe everything here was too familiar. Just
like that, he walked out of the station and walked along the equally deserted streets. The streets and facilities along the way were extremely old. In many high-rise buildings with more than ten floors, only one or two houses were lit.
Walking into the dark apartment building, he stomped his feet, and then the lights came on. Just like that, he walked up the stairs, and the lights along the way came on one after another, as if to welcome him, making this empty floor look a bit lively. When he
came to the seventh floor, the boy stopped and inserted the key card he carried with him. Then there was a slight sound, and the door opened automatically, and then he walked in.
The room was lit by cold fireflies, and only the sound of the boy taking off his shoes could be heard. After changing into slippers, he walked to the bedroom door at the back, paused for a few seconds, knocked on the door, and then pushed it open.
There was a white medical bed in the bedroom, and a middle-aged woman was lying on the bed, covered with a quilt. She was lying on her back with a breathing tube in her mouth. Her chest kept rising and falling with the input of gas from the ventilator. Her face was distorted, and her eyes were half open and half closed. She seemed to be awake, but she seemed to be sleeping and dead.
The medical equipment connected to the ventilator kept inflating the lungs of the middle-aged woman to prolong her life. The dripping sound was clear in the quiet room.
"I'm back."
The boy said so, his voice as calm as dead water. He walked over slowly, looked at the slightly terrifying face of the middle-aged woman, and the breathing tube that kept rising and falling in her chest. His fingers wanted to touch the woman's face, but stopped halfway and slowly retracted.
After watching quietly for a few minutes, he turned his sight to the cold white wall beside him, then took out his personal terminal, pointed at the words on it, and wrote crookedly on the wall with a pen.
[Because the genius who ranked first in the region died after receiving the notice, your son has obtained a vacant quota and can go to the university in the central star field to study. Be happy and look forward to him.]
After writing this, he wanted to add a few more sentences, but the pen slowly stopped in the air, and finally drew a simple period to end it.
After doing this, he set up the self-discipline unit in the room, then exited and returned to his small bedroom, which was full of miscellaneous items, not only leftover lunch boxes, but also abandoned and damaged toys from childhood, as well as damaged and dusty books.
Opening the musty wardrobe beside him, the boy turned out a few barely acceptable clothes from it, and some other yellowed and old clothes were piled up at the bottom of the wardrobe.
After stuffing all the clothes into the washing machine, the boy went to the bathroom to take a shower, then simply put on a bath towel and went to the dark balcony, overlooking the dark streets and alleys below, and then looked up at the distant and ethereal stars above his head.
In this way, he sat quietly for half an hour, and only returned to the room after the washing machine made a beeping sound, hung up the clothes after spinning, and then sat back on the sofa in the room.
He stayed like this until 10 o'clock in the evening, and then went back to the room to sleep. The next day, the boy carrying a suitcase came to the station again. He got on the train and came to the empty carriage, ready to find a seat, but he rarely saw another man and a woman in the carriage.
"Hello, are you classmate Shan? We are journalists in charge of interviews." The woman introduced herself, and behind her was an assistant with photographic equipment in his hands.
In response, the boy looked indifferent and did not answer, but just pulled the luggage and sat on a seat not far away.
"May I ask what do you think after obtaining the free admission qualification?" The female reporter asked tirelessly.
"Or how does classmate Shan study normally?"
"It is said that there are very few fresh graduates who apply for the 'Lapis Lazuli' school this time. Shan has both luck and strength. Have you thought about what industry you will work in in the future?"
The boy did not answer these questions, but just looked at the scene outside the window with a blank look. Seeing that he was still unwilling to cooperate with the interview, the female reporter was also a little discouraged. With the comfort of the assistant beside her, she returned to the seat next to the boy.
Time passed slowly. After the train moved forward for an hour, the female reporter still did not give up and asked again, but the boy still did not turn his head to respond. He just stared blankly out the window, like a cold statue.
"Really..." The female reporter gritted her teeth, but still held back from swearing. She slowly returned to her seat and opened her personal terminal in revenge, ready to find an acquaintance to vent about this unsuccessful interview.
The train continued to move forward, passing one station after another until it reached the end.
It was obviously much more prosperous here, and occasionally you could see a hovercraft flying in the sky.
"Are you going to the central star field today?" Seeing the boy pulling his luggage towards the large landing field in the distance, the female reporter couldn't help asking.
"Yeah." The boy finally answered.
"But there is still a long time before school starts." She thought that most students would leave in mid-to-late August, and it was only mid-July.
The boy did not answer, and the female reporter could not help but chase him and ask.
"Why don't you stay at home for a while, such as spending more time with your family? You may not be able to come back for many years in the future."
The boy's footsteps finally stopped.
"I don't know." After saying that, he continued to move forward, drowned in the crowd, and disappeared.
Yes, he didn't know why he stayed, and he didn't know why he was so heartless. Maybe he was also afraid of something, afraid of waking up again and again at night, hearing the cold ticking sound next door, and afraid of the mother who could never be awakened.
There were countless times when he felt that he was living in an unreal world. He had an illusion that this world was actually just the town he was in, and everything outside on TV and in the news was fake, and he would always be trapped in this place. No matter how he wanted to leave, there would always be some kind of accident that would interrupt him and make him unable to escape, and he could only be confined to this town forever.
Reason told him that this idea was wrong and impossible. After all, it was impossible for a single town to build so much history, news, daily necessities, and artifacts. However, his thoughts were like shadows in the dark, always popping up when he was relaxed and careless, and came to him, making him feel a creepy fear.
He tried to keep himself calm, and his thoughts were as still as cold stones, because once they turned, these strange and terrifying thoughts would not be able to help but pop up.
He didn't know why the strange genius 'Ling' chose to die, but he knew that in fact, there was only a thin line between his and 'Ling's endings. If 'Ling' hadn't died, he might have been lying on the tree branch in the sunset.
Because without 'Ling''s quota, he couldn't afford any tuition fees to go to other star fields to study at university, and he would be forced to continue to face the ticking sound in the bedroom next door that night. This long-term despair and pressure had slowly eroded everything in his world, turning it pale and cold.
With the help of the staff at the take-off and landing platform, Shan went through various procedures step by step, and finally boarded the gray old aircraft.
Sitting in the window seat, as the mechanical prompt sound fell, the safety arm descended, fixed Shan's body, and then the bottom of the aircraft gradually sprayed blue airflow, slowly rising.
A burst of thrust came from under his body and back, watching the small town below slowly overlooking the whole situation, and then gradually getting smaller, so that his body finally lost weight slightly, and intense emotions surged in his heart.
There seemed to be a warm liquid flowing down his eyes, making him choke a little, and he wanted to cough. His fingers tightly grasped the handrail, and his face flushed.
[Hello, is there anything wrong?]
A semicircular magnetic self-discipline unit observed the boy and stopped to ask.
He blinked hard, holding back tears, and then shook his head to indicate that he was not.
After stopping for a few seconds, the self-discipline unit checked that the boy was not seriously injured, then turned around and left, and continued to patrol the cabin, and he finally couldn't help choking and crying.
The world outside the window gradually separated from the surface of the planet. The stars in the distance were particularly eye-catching in the dark universe. Everything was so magnificent and grand. The vast scenery of the starry sky tore apart the pale fear in his past mind and told him that there was such a vast and endless world. The conjecture that had tortured him countless times finally disappeared.
Half an hour later, the boy, whose emotions gradually calmed down, continued to stare at the vast starry sky and scenery outside the window in a daze until the aircraft gradually arrived at the space port outside the planet. He slowly came back to his senses. It
was just half an hour, but it seemed like a lifetime ago.
He opened his hands, clenched them again, and then walked out with his suitcase.
While waiting in line, he recalled an afternoon many years ago, when his parents took him to the playground. He had a lot of fun. There were many children in the playground. There were fresh green grass leaves, and the sweet smell of popcorn seemed to be still remembered.
It has been a long time since he felt so peaceful. He could calmly recall the past instead of being afraid to stop thinking about the good things.
The more desperate he was, the more he dared not think about the good memories. He was afraid that he could not bear such a gap, so he tried to be a little pessimistic, and then kept chewing on the pale and repetitive daily life.
After sitting on the starship heading to the central star field, the boy slowly closed his eyes.
Although there are still some shadows and melancholy, at least at this moment, he can slowly feel some hope rising slowly in the corner of the sky.
Blue glass, blue ceiling, blue branches and shadows of trees, in that twilight evening, he seemed to dream of another self lying on the tree branch, counting the stars in the night sky, and then closing his eyes.
A bit of stream of consciousness, but there is no need to think too much 0 0/
(End of this chapter)
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