The name on the back of the photograph was like a piece of red-hot iron.
Lin Mo stood in the rain.
His fingers clenched tightly around the photograph.
He even wondered if he had read it wrong.
So he turned it over again.
The front of the photograph.
Ten years ago.
His father stood on the left.
Su Yan's father stood on the right.
Between them was a strange man.
And at the very bottom of the photograph, three words had been written in black ballpoint pen:
Lin Mo.
Not the Lin Mo he was now.
The thirteen-year-old him.
"Impossible."
Lin Mo spoke under his breath.
Rainwater ran down his forehead.
He stood there, completely motionless.
There was no way his ten-year-old self could have appeared in this photograph.
At least, he didn't remember it.
From childhood until now, he had never seen this place.
"Lin Mo!"
Su Yan came running out of the stairwell.
She hadn't brought an umbrella.
Her hair was quickly soaked through by the rain.
"What's wrong?"
Lin Mo didn't answer.
He simply handed her the photograph.
Su Yan took it.
She glanced at it.
The expression vanished from her face in an instant.
"This..."
"You saw it?"
She said nothing.
"The name."
"Yeah."
"It's me."
"Yeah."
"But I was only thirteen back then."
Su Yan looked at the photograph.
"I know."
"Then why did you say it was impossible?"
"I didn't."
"Then what does this mean?"
Su Yan didn't answer.
She only stared at the man in the center of the photograph.
After a long time, she finally said softly:
"I think I've seen him before."
Lin Mo looked up.
"Who?"
"The man in the middle."
"You've seen him?"
"When I was little."
"Where?"
Su Yan closed her eyes.
"My dad's office."
Lin Mo's heart sank.
"When?"
"I don't know."
"Maybe ten years ago."
"Maybe even earlier."
The two of them went back inside.
Lin Mo changed into dry clothes.
Su Yan sat on the couch.
The photograph lay between them.
Neither of them touched it.
"Let's sort out the timeline first."
Lin Mo took out a sheet of paper.
"Ten years ago—2016."
"I was thirteen then."
"What about you?"
"I was twelve."
"My dad knew your dad."
"And this man."
Su Yan nodded.
"The three of them worked on the M Project together."
"The project failed."
"Three people died."
"One person disappeared."
"And the rest was kept secret."
Lin Mo stopped writing.
"But there's a problem."
"What?"
"If the notebook says three people died and one disappeared..."
"Why are there only three people in the photograph?"
Su Yan looked at him.
"What happened to the fourth person?"
"Exactly."
"And the back of this photograph says—"
Lin Mo looked at her.
"The third person didn't die."
Su Yan's expression slowly changed.
"So the 'death' mentioned in the notebook might have been a lie."
"Or..."
Lin Mo said:
"Someone deliberately made everyone believe he was dead."
Silence settled over the room.
Lin Mo picked up the notebook his father had left behind again.
He flipped to the last few pages.
One page contained a strange symbol.
It looked like an upside-down triangle.
Beside it were the words:
"The core data cannot remain at the company."
Below that:
"The child knows."
Lin Mo stared at those three words.
"The child?"
Su Yan leaned closer.
"Which child?"
"I don't know."
"Could it be you?"
"Me?"
"You were thirteen."
"Maybe."
Lin Mo shook his head.
"But if I really knew something, why don't I remember any of it?"
Su Yan looked at him.
"Because you might have forgotten."
"Amnesia again?"
"Not necessarily."
She said:
"Some things aren't forgotten because of amnesia."
"Sometimes our brains choose not to remember them."
Lin Mo didn't answer.
He thought of the hospital.
He thought of those eleven hours.
He thought of how he had kept saying:
"Don't let M find me."
Maybe it wasn't because he was afraid.
Maybe it was because he had really seen something.
One in the morning.
Lin Mo suddenly thought of something.
"My mom."
"What?"
"She should know."
"You're going to ask her?"
"Yeah."
He picked up his phone.
But he didn't call.
"It's too late."
"I'll ask her tomorrow."
Su Yan nodded.
She stood up.
"I'll head home."
"Now?"
"It's already really late."
"I'll walk you."
"You don't have to."
"I will."
They walked to the door.
Su Yan suddenly stopped.
"Lin Mo."
"Yeah?"
"Do you believe me?"
He didn't answer right away.
After a while, he said:
"I do."
"Even if you eventually find out there's something else I haven't told you?"
"I believe you didn't mean to hurt me."
Su Yan lowered her head.
"Thank you."
She turned and left.
Lin Mo stood in the doorway watching her.
Only after her figure disappeared into the stairwell did he close the door.
Two in the morning.
Lin Mo returned to the study.
He opened the computer again.
He scanned the photograph from ten years ago.
He enlarged it.
Sharpened it.
Adjusted the brightness.
The background of the photograph gradually came into focus.
Details slowly emerged from places that had originally been impossible to see.
The background was an office.
A painting hung on the wall.
There was a folder on the desk.
And an old-fashioned computer.
Lin Mo enlarged the desktop.
There were several words on the folder.
"M-Project"
His breath caught.
He enlarged it further.
There was a date below it.
2016 / 06 / 03
Lin Mo froze.
June 3 again.
Ten years ago.
Three years ago.
Both on the same day.
This couldn't be a coincidence.
He kept looking.
There was a sheet of paper in the lower-left corner of the photograph.
It seemed to have a string of numbers written on it.
Lin Mo studied it carefully.
17-04-23
He frowned.
"What is this?"
Suddenly, his phone vibrated.
A message.
From Su Yan.
"Are you asleep?"
Lin Mo replied:
"Not yet."
A few seconds later:
"I just remembered something."
"What?"
"Ten years ago, on June 3, my dad took me somewhere."
Lin Mo sat bolt upright.
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"I only remember..."
"He kept telling me not to open my eyes that day."
Lin Mo stared at his phone.
"Did you see anything?"
"No."
"But I remember a voice."
"Whose?"
Su Yan didn't reply for a long time.
Finally:
"A boy's."
"About our age."
Lin Mo frowned.
"What did he say?"
"He said..."
The messages stopped there.
A few minutes later, another sentence appeared:
"If you ever forget me, don't trust your parents."
Lin Mo's hand stopped.
"A boy?"
"Yeah."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure."
"Do you remember his name?"
Su Yan replied:
"Lin Mo."
Lin Mo froze completely.
He stared at that name.
For a long time, he couldn't move.
"Impossible."
He spoke under his breath.
But the photograph.
The notebook.
Su Yan's memories.
They all pointed to the same answer.
Ten years ago, there may really have been a Lin Mo.
And that person...
might not have been him.
Three in the morning.
Lin Mo suddenly had an idea.
He opened the old family photographs.
He began searching for pictures of himself from before he turned thirteen.
One.
Two.
Three.
He found a photograph from when he was ten.
In it, he stood between his parents.
Perfectly ordinary.
The next one.
Eleven years old.
His birthday.
The next one.
Twelve.
Graduation.
The next one.
Thirteen.
Summer.
Lin Mo stopped.
The date the photograph was taken:
June 5, 2016.
In the photograph, he stood beside his father.
But something was strange—
There was a scar on his left wrist.
Lin Mo stared at it.
He had absolutely no memory of it.
Even stranger,
his father's hand rested on his shoulder,
as if deliberately covering something.
Lin Mo enlarged the photograph.
Near his father's wrist, a tiny symbol was visible.
An upside-down triangle.
Exactly the same as the one in the M Project documents.
A chill ran down Lin Mo's spine.
He immediately opened another photograph.
June 7, 2016.
He was sitting in a car.
The wound on his wrist had already been bandaged.
His mother sat beside him.
But his father was nowhere to be seen.
Lin Mo looked at the photograph.
Suddenly, a wave of pain hit his head.
A blurry image flashed through his mind.
A black car door.
The sound of rain.
His father's voice.
"Don't tell Mom."
Another voice.
"Does he really remember?"
Then a girl crying.
"I don't want to forget."
Lin Mo's eyes flew open.
His forehead was covered in sweat.
He began to gasp for breath.
It wasn't a dream.
It was a memory.
Extremely blurry,
but definitely there.
He picked up a sheet of paper.
He began writing down everything he could remember.
A black car.
Rain.
Dad.
A girl.
A boy.
And—
A door.
Written on the door:
B17.
Lin Mo stared at the paper.
B17.
The numbers in the photograph just now:
17-04-23.
Could the two be connected?
He opened a map.
He began searching for places that might have existed ten years ago.
The company where his father had once worked.
Su Yan's father's office.
The hospital.
Warehouses.
Everywhere he could think of.
Finally,
he found an industrial district that had gone out of business.
One of the old buildings had a basement marked:
B17.
Lin Mo's heart began to race.
Six in the morning.
Su Yan arrived.
"What did you find?"
Lin Mo showed her the photograph.
"This."
Su Yan stared at it.
"Your hand?"
"Yeah."
"Were you hurt when you were little?"
"I don't remember."
"Your dad knew."
"My mom knew too."
"But neither of them told me."
Su Yan said nothing.
Lin Mo showed her the information about B17 as well.
"I want to go there."
"Now?"
"Yeah."
"It's too dangerous."
"I know."
"And you're still going?"
"Because I feel like the answer is there."
Su Yan fell silent.
Finally, she picked up her coat.
"I'm coming with you."
Nine in the morning.
The two of them arrived at the industrial district.
It had been abandoned for many years.
The main gate was rusted.
The walls were crumbling.
There was almost no one around.
Lin Mo held his phone and followed the old information to B17.
It was an iron door.
The number was still on it.
B17.
He reached out and touched the door.
His fingertips met a layer of dust.
"This is it."
Su Yan looked around.
"Let's go in."
The door wasn't locked.
He gave it a gentle push.
It let out a shrill squeal.
The basement was very dark.
The two of them turned on their phone flashlights.
They walked farther inside.
Old documents covered the walls.
The tables and chairs were coated in dust.
At the very back was a room.
A label was stuck to the door:
M-01
Lin Mo stood in front of the door.
His heart pounded violently.
"Is this the place from the recording?"
"Maybe."
He slowly pushed the door open.
The room was empty.
There was only a table.
An old tape recorder sat on it.
And a cardboard box.
Lin Mo walked over.
Written on the box was:
Lin Mo.
Su Yan drew in a sharp breath.
"Open it."
Lin Mo lifted the lid.
There were no documents inside.
Only a stack of photographs.
The first.
Thirteen-year-old Lin Mo.
The second.
Him again.
The third.
Still him.
Every photograph showed him from a different angle.
At school.
At home.
On the street.
With Su Yan.
There were even photographs of him sleeping.
Lin Mo's hands began to shake.
"She started photographing me when I was thirteen."
Su Yan said nothing.
At the very bottom was one more photograph.
Lin Mo picked it up.
It showed a room.
A hospital bed.
A boy lay on it.
His face was captured clearly.
Lin Mo looked at that face.
His entire body went rigid.
It wasn't anyone else.
It was his thirteen-year-old self.
But written on the back of the photograph were the words:
"First failure."
The next photograph showed another hospital bed.
The boy was still Lin Mo.
On the back:
"Second time."
The next one:
"Third time."
Lin Mo's breathing grew faster and faster.
"What failed?"
Su Yan shook her head.
"I don't know."
Suddenly, a sound came from the back of the room.
Click.
They both turned at the same time.
The old tape recorder in the corner
had turned on by itself.
It wasn't plugged in,
but it began to play.
Static.
Then a little boy's voice came through.
Young and childish,
but incredibly clear.
"You finally came."
Lin Mo froze completely.
That voice—
it was his.
His thirteen-year-old voice.
The recording continued.
"If you're hearing this right now,"
"it means I didn't succeed."
"It also means they're still lying to you."
Su Yan grabbed Lin Mo's hand.
The little boy in the recording paused.
Then he said:
"Lin Mo, if it's the present-day you who's hearing this..."
"Don't trust Dad."
"Don't trust Mom."
"And don't trust Su Yan either."
Su Yan's face instantly went white.
At the very end, the little boy said:
"Because the real M..."
The voice suddenly cut off.
The entire basement fell silent again.
Lin Mo stared at the tape recorder.
"Who is the real M?"
There was no answer.
Just then, footsteps suddenly sounded outside the basement.
One.
Two.
Three.
Someone was slowly approaching.
Su Yan turned her head.
"Someone's here."
Lin Mo immediately switched off the flashlight.
The two of them hid behind the door.
The footsteps drew closer and closer.
A shadow appeared in the doorway.
It stopped.
A hand slowly reached for the doorknob.
Lin Mo held his breath.
The door was pushed open.
A man walked in.
Lin Mo saw the side of his face through the crack in the door.
The next second, his whole body went rigid.
Because he knew that man.
It was Takahashi.
But what frightened him even more was that Takahashi was holding a photograph.
In the photograph
was thirteen-year-old Lin Mo.
Takahashi looked at it and said under his breath:
"Just as I thought."
"He found it after all."
Then he raised his head
and looked toward the place where Lin Mo was hiding.
The corners of his mouth slowly curved into a smile.
"Come out."
"I know you're in there."
Lin Mo's heart jolted violently.
Takahashi continued:
"What we couldn't finish ten years ago..."
"It's time to end it today."