Chapter Three: The White Platform

Officials called her twenty-hour absence a dissociative wandering episode. She remembered nothing but the white platform, yet in the hospital she drew a map of Linlan. White lines joined seventy-two camera-dense intersections into the shape of an open eye. Zhao remained on the other side. So did Xu's sister. At 2:17 a.m., with three hours left on Cen's timer, Lin returned to his apartment. He meant to dismantle the broken phone, but his computer turned itself on. Cen was gone from his feed. There was no timer. There was only a photograph he knew well: a tired man with a creased collar, the portrait Qiongjing had used in his public dismissal notice three years ago. Name: Lin Mo. Perhaps you should look at him.