Wanderer of the Zerg

Chapter 74: What home feels like

Ellis didn’t know how to comfort the young male.

Despite the old house being torn down and a new one being built,

Fu An and Lans were extremely reluctant to part with the two children they had raised themselves, so they moved their belongings into the farthest corner room on the second floor.

The walls were covered with green floral fluorescent wallpaper, which had been up for ten years. It was said that when the young male first arrived, he was afraid of the dark and couldn’t sleep alone. He had to count the glowing spots to fall asleep after turning off the lights.

The room had two walls lined with bookshelves, filled with stacks of books everywhere.

The window faced the small courtyard’s main gate, where a large patch of flowers was planted beneath the fence—bright and beautiful, with a riot of colors. From the angle of the window, it looked like a small flowerbed made by Xi Tian on the farming planet.

In this room, Xi Tian walked step by step, treading on each floor tile, running his fingers over each item, touching the belongings that had been with his parents.

The air here was breathed by his parents, and the land was walked by them.

The changing seasons here nurtured his parents, witnessed the love between his male and female parent, and saw the moment twenty-four years ago when he was conceived.

Xi Tian collapsed into the only single sofa in the room.

In a whole box, there was an old-model projector and several neatly stacked videotapes. These were the recordings of their daily life from the six years after the male parent joined the family, faithfully captured by the machine.

Before him were their figures, and their voices were in his ears.

He closed his eyes, imagining his female parent sitting on the sofa, his male parent selecting books in front of the bookshelf. His female parent, impatient with his attention being elsewhere, tugged at his clothes until he came over, and then pulled him into an embrace. His male parent, falling into his female parent’s arms, shook his head helplessly and tapped his female parent on the head with the book in his hand.

The missing parental image was finally filled in after twenty-three years.

Tears flowed silently.

Gradually, he covered his face with his hands, his back slowly curving, and his elbows propped up his knees.

The silence turned into quiet sobs and then into the low moans of an injured beast.

What did these tears mean?

For the first time, Xi Tian, who was good at self-analysis, could not answer this question.

He only knew that he was very sad and very troubled.

His male parent, Xi Qisi, and his female parent, Lake, had once come into this world, and then they left early.

They came and went, leaving no trace behind.

Only Xi Tian remained, as proof that his parents had once been in this world.

They loved him but never had the chance to be part of his life and see him grow up.

Death was something Xi Tian, at twenty-three, had never imagined.

In his tears, there was nostalgia, relief, and awe.

Nostalgia for his parents, relief in letting go, and awe of death.

The crying gradually subsided, the tears drying up, and Xi Tian, sitting on the sofa, embraced Ellis, who stood beside him.

His life seemed like a floating reed without roots, drifting aimlessly with the water, with no clear destination.

Ellis was his vine, his chain.

Their lives were tightly intertwined, mutually constrained, and drifting together.

Ellis, Ellis, Ellis.

Xi Tian murmured his partner’s name.

This was the first time he felt how closely they were connected, how intimately their destinies would be entwined for the rest of their lives, inseparably.

“Dear.”

“Xi Tian.”

“Darling.”

Ellis responded with different terms of endearment.

“When we return to our home planet, let’s get married right away, okay?”

Ellis squatted down, gently stroking Xi Tian’s face, “Okay.”

The sounds in the room ceased.

When they emerged again, their emotions had been composed.

Xi Tian began addressing Svet as “Uncle,” and Lans and Fu An as “Grandpa,” and Ellis readily agreed.

The Lance family was very happy to welcome this new family member. They were all smiles and invited them to stay for two more days. Svet was asked to contact the eldest and third siblings to come home, planning to have a family reunion dinner that evening.

Xi Tian and Ellis played their roles as younger members, listening to the elders recount stories from the past years.

They spoke of the amusing stories of Xi Tian’s parents, their love, and how they overcame gender and family pressures to stay together.

“Lans and I, it was quite a challenge for us to be together. Xi Qisi thought we would oppose his relationship with Lake. If we were traditionalists, how could two females possibly be together?

Xi Qisi was unlike Lake. He kept his thoughts and ideas to himself. Despite his youth, he was thoughtful and perceptive, like an adult—a sensitive and keen child,” Fu An said.

“Sensitive and keen? Is that really the nature of my male parent? It sounds like a strange combination,” Xi Tian remarked.

“That’s right. Nothing about his life before the age of fourteen is known except to him.

Saying he was sensitive needs no explanation, but his perceptiveness meant that upon meeting someone, he could instantly see through their identity, status, character, and psychology. Any pretense or deception was useless in his eyes.

If he wanted to make someone uncomfortable, he would surely analyze their weaknesses, apply the right pressure, and suppress them mercilessly,” Lans added.

Xi Tian was stunned, unable to believe his male parent had such a side.

A male child with near-telepathic abilities used this powerful skill to deal with those he disliked?

“Did my female parent also suffer from such treatment by my male parent?” Xi Tian asked.

“The family even dealt with the youngest, Svet, back then. As for Lake, Xi Qisi doted on him so much that he had no time to make things difficult for him!” Lans said.

“Even in the welfare office’s records, his files were completely blank. Unlike the other female children we adopted, whose information was recorded in their files and could be addressed by psychologists if needed.”

“Psychologists? Were there psychologists during the time Grandpa adopted my father?”

“Back then, psychologists were just emerging. It wasn’t as developed as it is now, but they were still somewhat useful.

Thirty or forty years ago, people’s understanding was still quite ignorant. They would lock mentally ill patients in asylums, and electroshock therapy was popular. Rebel children and those who were mentally unstable would calm down and behave after a few shocks.

There was also a procedure called ‘prefrontal leucotomy.’ After the surgery, those disobedient madmen would become docile.”

Lans shook his head. “Later, I realized that the procedure was essentially turning conscious people into idiots. We even had neighbors suggest we have the mischievous Lake undergo that surgery to make him quieter and more obedient. Just thinking about it now is frightening.”

Fu An, who often read and was particularly fond of contemporary history, added, “That era was the beginning of psychology and the nascent stages of cognitive science. There were not as many research findings as today. Back then, whether it was doctors or surgeries, all theories were wrong, and all experiments based on these theories were also flawed. It’s hard to know how many lives were ruined.”

Xi Tian was quite interested in this topic and had an engaging conversation with the two elders.

Ellis, feeling overwhelmed, took the opportunity to quietly slip away behind Svet, and they started chatting about family matters.

This felt more like home.