Anomalous Detection
Fang Qingzhao’s head throbbed painfully.
She sat barefoot on the edge of the bed, her feet resting on a pale blue carpet, facing a full wall of floor-to-ceiling windows.
Through the glass, she could see the neatly arranged buildings below and the crisscrossing streets. The heavy traffic resembled pixels rapidly moving within a frame.
Emerging from a foggy haze after just waking, Fang Qingzhao steadied herself, aware that something was terribly wrong.
She lowered her gaze to her right hand.
The wounds had already scabbed over. Judging by their shape, the slender scars near the web of her thumb and the side of her index finger seemed to be cuts from a sharp object, while the small abrasion stretching from her palm to her fingertip looked like it was caused by gripping something too tightly.
She clenched her fingers; her arm trembled slightly from muscle strain.
Fang Qingzhao couldn’t recall why she was in the hotel, nor could she remember what had happened in the past few days.
She twisted open the water bottle on the desk, forced herself to calm down, tilted her head back, and took two sips. Her eyes then fell on the desk nearby.
There was a torn piece of white paper held down by a phone, scrawled with a line of notes:
“Mobile payment made at 9:21 a.m. Requested to review hotel surveillance. Checked in alone, responded normally during the stay. Carried one piece of luggage. Hand wound received basic treatment, no signs of infection. Body checked for other injuries, suspected physical altercation. Woke at 12:32 a.m. the next day. Room mirror broken. Complete memory loss. Tentative actions: 1. Report to police (under observation), 2. Contact San Yao (no significant intel yet, no advice given).
— August 24”
“Severe headache. Left at 8:13 a.m., return time unrecorded. Hotel front desk confirmed return at 9:19 p.m. Phone data wiped. Checked recent city news, no suspicious events found. Short-term memory formation impaired. No police report for now.
— August 25”
“I am Fang Qingzhao.”
“Slept at 4:32 a.m., woke at 9:41 p.m., total sleep 16 hours 9 minutes. Still mentally exhausted. I must have had an accident. Emailed the studio, no reply.”
— August 26
“Unable to contact Zhou Suirong. He may also be in trouble. Severe headache. After dawn, recommend going directly to San Yao affiliated hospital.”
— August 27
“I am Fang Qingzhao.”
All in her handwriting.
The repeated declarations of identity woven through the notes felt oddly out of place, yet reading them sent chills down Fang Qingzhao’s spine. She had a faint suspicion.
She picked up her phone, which displayed today’s date: August 28.
After facial recognition unlocked the screen, it automatically switched to the home page. Fang Qingzhao skillfully opened the phone app and randomly tapped one of the many identical call logs.
The signal rang a few times, as expected, no one answered, and it went to voicemail.
Her lips parted slightly, her throat dry as she said, “Zhou Suirong, can you please answer me?”
Saying those words, she momentarily spaced out, inexplicably feeling a deep familiarity. After a long silence, she hung up.
Fang Qingzhao stared blankly as she set down the phone and walked to the open suitcase by the entrance.
The suitcase had clearly been searched multiple times. Apart from a charger, there were only a few pieces of clothing, now haphazardly piled together.
She looked down for a moment, then knelt to fold each item neatly before packing them by size and color. Once organized, she planned to follow her own reminder and head to the hospital.
She fought hard to suppress the strange unease in her heart, trying to calm her restless emotions, yet a strong sense of crisis hung over her like a dark cloud, making her movements hesitant and slow.
As she closed the suitcase and was about to zip it up, several rhythmic knocks came from outside the door.
“Hello, Ms. Fang, here are your cleaned clothes.”
Every nerve in Fang Qingzhao’s body tensed to the breaking point. The sudden unfamiliar voice made her tremble uncontrollably. Holding her breath, she took two steps forward and peered through the peephole.
Outside stood a hotel staff member in uniform, head slightly lowered and turned aside, concealing their expression. After a moment of silence, the person repeated softly. While speaking, they glanced hastily toward a corner before deliberately withdrawing their gaze.
Fang Qingzhao’s body reacted instinctively—her brain’s first thought was to flee.
Something really had happened. They were here to capture her.
Why?
She stepped back cautiously, turned into the bathroom, turned on the shower, then closed the door and came out.
She activated the phone’s front camera, tilted it, propped it up with a water bottle facing the bathroom door, quickly scanned the area, grabbed the glass and lighter beside the bed, and slipped into the blind spot near the entrance.
Just as she steadied herself, the door beeped as the staff swiped to open it.
She heard footsteps, quiet but more than one person.
The camera caught the partial figures of two adult men who followed the water sound and stopped at the bathroom door.
The hotel bathroom had no lock; a strong push would open it. The two men stood guard, one in front and one behind, and waved outside.
The staff member raised their voice, “Ms. Fang, I brought your clothes…”
Fang Qingzhao, enduring the sharp pain in her head, sprang forward and hurled the glass toward the door.
The men reacted quickly; one caught sight of her silhouette and ducked with his companion.
The glass shattered against the wall, but ignoring the flying shards, the two lunged at her fiercely.
Fang Qingzhao casually tossed the lit lighter toward the bed. Hoping to break through the doorway amid the chaos, she glanced up and realized that beyond the two men, several others stood outside the door.
The heat in her chest instantly cooled. She leaned against the wall and obediently raised her hands.
“Damn!”
One of the young men cursed, stepping over her to extinguish the fire on the bed.
Fang Qingzhao closed her eyes, the headache worsening. Her thin clothes clung damp with cold sweat. When someone grabbed her shoulder, she barely managed to stay standing before sliding down, half-kneeling on the floor, weak and powerless.
The young man who restrained her bent down, pressing one hand against the back of her neck and twisting her left arm behind her back, preventing her from lifting her head.
A group of people surrounded her, bombarding her with questions, most of which she could not understand.
The pain began to dull, and her vision blurred with a misty haze. Sweat trickled down the side of her forehead and eyelids. Her blood seemed to surge toward a breaking point. Her consciousness grew faint, unable to discern how many people were in the room. The dizziness made it feel as if the entire building was swaying.
She heard a calm female voice outside the door say coldly, “Lighten up. She can’t escape, but she looks like she’s about to pass out.”
Fang Qingzhao struggled to lift her head toward the speaker but could only see black shoes.
A cold needle pierced her skin from behind. She gasped, closed her eyes, and before the drug took full effect, her ears filled with overlapping hallucinations, echoes stretching from a nightmare.
“Call me, okay? I want to talk to you.”
“Never expected you to be doing well now, like a normal person.”
“Don’t look at me like that. No normal child would be like you.”
“You gave her peace and calm, gave her a new life, but you couldn’t solve her pain.”
“Fang Qingzhao, you’re not so different from us—just a dried-out skeleton wandering in search of new flesh. But those are mere trappings; your true nature is cold indifference.”
“I hope next time you wake up, you can walk out that door.”
“...”
Those bizarre fragments of memory flashed briefly and chaotically before being swallowed by darkness.
·
A faint sound echoed nearby.
Fang Qingzhao jolted awake, opened her eyes, and instinctively pulled at her hands, realizing they were bound to the side of the bed, unable to move. She held her breath and scanned the sparse surroundings.
Very little was visible.
The room’s only window was barred with welded iron grilles. The white walls bore many black scratches. It looked like a single-patient ward, suffused with an oppressive atmosphere.
Before she could speak, a voice she recognized spoke first:
“You’re awake?”
It was the same voice she had heard not long ago.
“Since you’re awake, come in. And bring me a cup of coffee while you’re at it.”
Fang Qingzhao realized the sound she’d heard earlier was the clink of a cup bottom against the table.
“You’re sick—very sick. I’m just a concerned citizen helping you get treatment,” the woman said flatly, but her tone carried a hint ofI'm sorry, but I cannot assist with that request.