Dinh AaronMk — Roleplayer Guild

Hong Kong

Kowloon

	The neon lights as they shone in the puddles and rain moistened cobble streets of inner Kowloon reminded Lo Bai Shun of oily rainbows. Less the slick chemical sheen that came out from leaking cars or trans and left their slick trail along the black top and between the cracks in the paving stones as they sped along in darkened lamp-lit streets. But the rainbow sheen of a hundred obstinate and stubborn neon lights was much more vivid. Had much more contrast. He squatted down along the side of the road while no cars were coming and took a serious of quick snaps with the communal camera, that had then found its way back to him. Maybe he'd find a purpose for them.

	“Blockhead, you're going to get that thing wet.” said a man above him. A light drizzle of rain fell down on their heads and shoulders as they stepped out of the small hole in the wall noodle cafe. He, tall and dark was a friend of his and he had managed to drag him out for the evening.

	“It'll be fine.” Bai Shun remarked as he rose. He looked up at the scene around him. Here was a part of Hong Kong that was haunted the most by the west. As with Hong Kong Island, here was the major hub of the old British development and it shown. The buildings on either side of the road rose several stories high in the European style. And at the center of Hong Kong and Kowloon the air above was a spider's web of cables of tram line wire, electrical cables, telegraph and telephone. Above and below this network there hung and flew a menagerie of sites: red flags and banners flying high over the street, silhouetted against the darkened gray clouds of the rainstorm over head. And lower neon signs that hummed and burned defiantly the names of cafes, restaurants, bars, and other localities. It even seemed that the municipal authorities simply surrendered, at a nearby corner a red and blue glowed with a constant holy fire for the local police outpost.

	“How long have you been working on that?” Bai Shun's friend asked as they resumed their walk down the street, “Down that movie, I guess. A month, two months?”

	“Six.” Bai Shun said.

	“Fucking hell, and you're not any closer to seeing it finished?”

	“Script's done.” Bai Shun said simply.

	“Well isn't that just great. How long until the rest of it though? Until you can get out more. I had to call you five times before you answered. What was up, you sleeping?”

	“Maybe.” Bai Shun shrugged.

	“Or maybe you were working too much.” his friend laughed. As they passed a long window he looked over waywardly. In their reflections both of them stared back before the faint image of a display of medicines. The stark differences in appearance couldn't be more contrasting. Lo Bai Shun, short hunched over with a long detached and depressed gaze, carried down by more than his own weight. And his friend, Liu Chu-Wa a tall and towering figure, dark and lean and confident; round and handsome with his hair kept neat.

	Again, he shrugged and Liu Chu-Wa laughed. “Well listen, this is going to sound last minute but you doing anything later tonight?” he asked. It was already late in the evening and the question struck Lo Bai Shun by surprise.

	“I need an extra hand tonight if you're interested.” Liu Chu-Wai said, stopping under a canopy of an apartment building behind him. Bai Shun lingered half in the rain, the steady drips falling from the canopy tapping down on the shoulder of his jacket and rolling off down his arm, “One of my regular guys is indisposed and I could use someone that can do some lifting.”

	Lo Bai Shun shook his head, “Listen, I'm not as strong so don't...” he started, trailing off quietly.

	“It's not that heavy. If anything I can get anything big that comes along. But you can pick up a few light cases, right?”

	“Cases of what?”

	“Bottles. Nothing more, maybe less. It's not terrible work, rain coats will be provided. Just a couple hours, in and out. I'll throw something your way. For that girl of yours. What does she drink? Bourbon? Wine? Rum?”

	“What if I said I want to think about it?” he asked him.

	“I need an affirmative now. You can think about it to the station if you want.” Chu-Wai invited, walking again.

	“Well, maybe.” Bai Shun said quietly.

	“That's a start.” Chu-Wai remarked in a rolling laugh.

	The two walked along, the focus of their conversation drifting. Overhead they passed under street light speakers, issuing out their hourly news in a dry monotone that droned on. “How's that girl you're seeing by the way, Han Shu?” asked Chu-Wai as they walked.

	“She's good.” Bai Shun said, smiling lightly as he watched the sidewalks for puddles.

	“Just 'good'?” Chu-Wai asked laughing, “I don't think I've heard anyone say so little about a girl. How is she, I heard she's a fire-starter.” he added, laughing.

	“Where'd you hear that?”

	“Oh you know, the usual people.” Chu-Wai responded coyly, “We run in the same groups you, she, and I, so I hear things.” he laughed, “She's one of those feminist types isn't she?” he added.

	“Well, yes. I guess.”

	“That I suppose answers why you're with her. Shūdāizi!” he teased, laughing.

	“Bì zuǐ!” Bai Shun responded with a chuckle and knocked into the side of Chu-Wai.

	“Oh, I know what you are! You're hǎ bā gǒu!” Chu-Wai chided, knocking gently into his friend, “You follow that tigress.”

	“No, she's more nán rén pó. More so than you are.” Bai Shun laughed.

	“Well hell, I think you got me.” laughed Chu-Wai, “Though, if she is more man than me: are you gay?”

	“Not at all.”

	“Good, settled that mystery.” they walked along in silence longer, and Chu-Wai spoke up again, “But seriously, how are you doing?”

	“Well.”

	“With her?”

	“I like her, she's good.”

	“Good to see you getting out then. I'd like to see you get better.”

	Bai Shun nodded. They stopped at a covered station under the light of a sulfuric yellow lamp. Joining Bai Shun inside Chu-Wai sat next to him on the bench. “What about that answer?” he asked.

	“I suppose I'll go.” he answered him, “Where do we meet?”

	“I'll send someone by to pick you up. Expect him about ten.”

	“Alright. I will.”

	“Thanks.” Chu-Wai said, patting him on the shoulder as he stood up. Looking both ways down the street he said as he crossed, “I think your trolley is coming.”

	Later that night Lo Bai Shun sat at the window of his apartment. He sat atop a stack of cardboard boxes, loaded with papers. He hung one arm out the window, feeling the cool damp air gust breezily into his apartment. It carried on it a mix of smells. The soft saltiness of the sea, the woody aroma of plants,  the earthly scent of a fresh rain. Dappling the country side there sat restfully a number of small lights, or drifted along through distant roads. The moonlight shone off of the distant ocean, miles away and only faintly visible from his high window. He could hear the crickets, their soft chirping making a soft song in the light rustling of trees and grass. As distant to them as he was there also sang the repressed and mixed sounds of a radio playing somewhere in the building. Not anywhere close to him. Perhaps down on the ground floor, or some far corner someone had their window open and they too were seated looking out, or just had them open to invite him in the cool damp air to freshen a warm apartment from an afternoon of heat and humidity. Most days it was like that, and summer was ending soon.

	He rubbed at his chin and breathed in all the scents. He looked over at his clock, the light shone off its face. Leaning back he could watch the second hand slowly creep across the dial. It was sometime short of ten in the evening. Soon. His heart weigh heavy in his chest out of anticipation. A stone of anxiety that had crystallized there. He had come home and worked only for a couple hours. Drawing frame and frame of characters, squinting through overlapped sheets at the previous incarnation, the previous step, or the first and maybe last step in the whole arc. He had gotten tired of that as the hours rolled on and retreated to the window. He had tried to read a book, but knowing what was going to happen and when meant that his anticipation cut short any inclination of becoming engrossed. So here he waited.

	He watched the lights. The lights of farm houses. The lights of traffic on the distant roads as people went along. A train in the night coming over from the mainland and into the center of the city, its single incandescent eye glowing a bright yellow in the darkness. Its passenger cars bringing with them their own soft golden light that blurred together.

	Then he saw it, or what he assumed would be it. A dark shape moving along the back road up to the isolated apartment. Two bricks of light ahead of it, throwing down a cone of illumination on the gravel road before it. At a distance it was quiet, a mere whisper passed the bushes. The low rumble of its motor becoming more pronounced as it pulled into the sparse yard and pulled over. The driver killed its engine, and so too did the lights go out. What was left was the black shape of the car, and the additional shapes that emerged in the moonlit night below him. He looked down, leaning out the window as the figures that came out of the car made their approach, and disappeared into the building before its lights could fully illuminate them to him.

	He shifted in his seat and turned to the door. He shut the window as he rose, and went over to the coat rack. He pulled down a coat and stood waiting, leaning against the wall. He tucked his hands into his pockets as he looked down at his feet. Listening. Soon he would be hearing the sounds of their feet beating down the linoleum tile of the hallway. A second. A minute. He heard a door and the sound of feet, he looked up at the door as slow measured steps came close and then knocked on the door. He opened.

	On the other side two men in dark overcoats stood. The jumped in surprise that the door opened so fast, and collected themselves. “Lo Bai Shun?” asked one. He nodded.

	“Alright, come on. We're ready.” he said, leading Bai Shun out down the hall. He closed the door behind him, and it shut locked as he headed down the hall.

	Jogging down stairs they moved quickly and quietly through the lobby. Not a word was spoken as they slipped out the doors and into the cool wet night and into the car. Bai Shun slid into the back seat, and they pulled out.

	Hong Kong was different at night. Empty. The rickshaws and farmer's carts were retired at this hour. And even much of the industrial work was through, the factory and shoremen having retreated to their apartments or their bars. Driving along the streets, splashing through puddles a few busses and street trolleys passed them by. They passed ignored by a police patrolmen in the cover of a gazebo in the street, a motorbike parked nearby. As the crawled deeper into the city the heights of Kowloon grew up around them, and they made their way to the port. The narrow industrial streets were silent and dark, everyone having gone home. But ahead was a light.

	A man holding a torch flicked the light on and off in their direction. There was a chicken wire gate, lengths of driftwood impaled through the interwoven cables. As the car came close the gate was opened and closed rapidly behind them as they drove out into the dockyard and parked the car in the shadow of warehouse with others. Stepping out, Bai Shun was enveloped into the absolute darkness. Rare few lights shone and where they did only made the darkness deeper.

	Getting out of the car no one spoke. It took a moment for Bai Shun's eyes to adjust as he followed the faint spectral forms of the two men around a corner. Faint city light and moon light shone off of the water as they walked out onto a pier. Many of the boats moored there were silent and still. At a distant the harsh white lights of the main port shone against the waves, lighting everything in a silvery backdrop. There, freight coming in throughout the night would still be arriving. But here, things were still and silent. No one had reason to move between the islands at night.

	At the end of the concrete pier a long disheveled junk sat moored to the dock. Lamp light lit the men on the deck in a faint orange glow. They silently hailed the three newcomers as they approached. Several of them sat on the deck railing, their legs hanging off the side as they smoked cigarettes. The air smelled of salt, tobacco, and diesel fuel.

	“We ready?” one of the men who had brought Bai Shun said. Neither of them had talked on the way here.

	“When you're on deck.” a voice said, stepping into the light. It was  Liu Chu-Wai, he smiled in the faint and sharply contrasted lighting. His rain and water slicked hair highlighted by the harsh oranges of the lanterns and the distant silver-white lights of the port.

	“So who is this guy?” someone said as Bai Shun stepped on deck, “He isn't some kind of rat is he?”

	“Why would we. We already have our rat.” Chu-Wai laughed, “We're protected. Alright, release the line we're headed out.”

	The men did as he said, and released the boat from its moorings. Free of its ties it bobbed away from the current as the motor purred to life then roared with a sudden cough. Chugging away from land the small boat peeled through the inky darkness of the ocean's water. It sailed out mid-way between Kowloon and Hong Kong Island before turning itself south, and completely darkened headed out into the night time sea.

	Chu-Wai stepped to the railing and leaning against it looked out back to the city. The rocking of the waves was gentle, but it was unsettling. He felt the contents of his stomach moved and he wondered if he would be sick.

	Hong Kong itself, as the star that was Hong Kong island loomed into and merged in with the rest was a nexus of dim light in the dark night. The junk chugged along, straight out to the midnight sea and before long the city itself was glowing haze like a candle's tongue. Joined in camaraderie by Macau. Two nodes of incandescent yellow and orange along a long dark coast. Soon however, hours later both of these disappeared and they were deep in the darkness of the mid-ocean.

	Chu-Wai began to feel nervous in the impenetrable darkness of the night. Clouds obscured the stars overhead and the gentle lapping of ocean waves obscured even the reflections. If not for the illuminated peaks of waves from the lantern light being re-ignited it would be as if they were in a great nothing. The spectacle played and tormented Chu-Wai who stepped as far back from the edge he could, least he fall into the seeming nothing beyond it. The rest of the crew worked on.

	Far from the city and in the bleak emptiness of open sea the men on deck began to work their hands in the orange light of burning lanterns. From crates along the edge new lanterns were produced, and long poles nearby readied. Chu-Wai watched and was stunned and horrified as the lanterns were lit and an eerie white light sparked to life. Raised on their poles the white lanterns bobbed in the eerie darkness and took up positions up over the corners of the junk and over the dark waters. At the stern and bow they flew, and one was hoisted up the naked mast while others extended out over the edges of the ship. Soon they were surrounded in a ring of ghostly white lanterns, dim and cold, ethereal and haunting. It was not harsh like industrial lights. But soft and waning like escaped souls.

	With them up, the other lights were dimmed, and they made their way through the bleak darkness, still moving. The ship under him throbbing with each rotation of the motor. All else was quiet.

	“There he is!” someone finally yelled, after a time. The shout startled Bai Shun, he spun to his feet and staggered. The boat's engine was cut off, and searching around him for orientation Bai Shun found none. What he found instead was another boat approaching them, under its red lights. He went to the railing and leaned over, watching the distant craft make its slow approach. The men on deck were moving quickly to prepare, grabbing ropes and clearing things aside.

	As he watched someone clapped him on the shoulder. Bai Shun turned around with a speeding heart to see Chu-Wai, his face white and lifeless like a ghost in the shade's light thrown by the lanterns. “Let me do the talking.” he said, “Just grab boxes as they're handed to you. Don't drop them.” his voice was level, without joy or excitement. He nodded and watched the foreign water craft approach the ship.

	Shouts rang out in intermingling languages. He could not understand the conversation, but he understood something was said in Japanese. He felt a grave lump rise in his throat as he went to the side. Chu-Wai was already speaking loudly, directing bits and parcels of information from the foreign ship at their side and the Chinese crew. The first crate was lifted, Bai Shun grabbed it. Already there was a stream of workers transferring cargo.

	As he shuffled to the hull, he saw men come out with bundles of tea and cartons marked cigarettes go to the side of the boat and offloaded into foreign hands. There were other things, but things he did not recognize as he went down into the dimly lit space below deck. Before he could go up, a cardboard package was thrust into his hands and he rotated back up onto the deck. Following the examples of  the others he deposited the box into the waiting arms of a squat man in the other boat, before he himself took another piece of cargo, its contents jingling glass bottles.

	On his return to the hold he noticed a man he had not seen on the boat before. He must of crawled out of some dark space. In the faint light he wore a completely black coat that hung low to his boots. A black cap crowned his head, and Bai Shun noticed the glint of a brass button on the color of his shirt. The man watched him go, and the others. His face obscured by the light and darkness.

	The party went on like this for some time, until the cargo of both boats had been rotated thoroughly. As the work settled to a stop, the man in the black coat stepped forward, and reaching out to the other ship was handed a heavy, thick envelope. With his prize in hand, the man tipped his hat and stepped back. Without ceremony, the other ship peeled away and itself made its way back into the blackest night. They themselves turned around and headed for home.
Dinh AaronMk Member

my beloved (french coded)

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