Latent Syndrome

Chapter 2 2. Enter the game

A week later.

The night sky in Los Angeles is filled with light rain like dust. Under the pollution of building exterior glass and neon lights, the puddles on the ground reflect all kinds of turbid colors.

Colin, who was wearing a brown woolen coat, had just come downstairs from the Internet cafe and was smoking a cigarette on the street, preparing to go to the supermarket to buy some food.

Colin, who had become a homeless man, was in an extremely miserable state. He looked unkempt, with stubble all over his face and heavy bags under his eyes. He was in a somewhat haggard state.

In addition to the LDK apartment, he also has a house in the suburbs of Los Angeles, but after experiencing that weird incident, he didn't want to stay at home alone.

I still had enough spare money to repay the loan for a few months. If it didn't work, I sold the LDK apartment at a low price.

At this time, a call came from a woman named Abigail, whom Colin used to meet when he was working in the stock exchange. After long contact, the relationship was somewhat ambiguous, and he also had several overnight stays. , heard that Colin had been fired, so he called to care about the current situation.

But Colin was in a bad mood and had no intention of paying attention to him. He hung up the phone after just a few perfunctory words.

Colin put out his cigarette butt and entered the convenience store, ready to buy some food and wine to satisfy his hunger.

I don’t know why, but I feel hungry very easily recently, I eat a lot more, and my brain is not very clear. After going to the hospital for examination, the doctor couldn’t diagnose anything.

The convenience store has a dazzling array of products, and the rows of display cabinets are like a maze.

[At 13:05 today, an explosion occurred in the Central Business District of Los Angeles. 】

The cashier was watching the news on her phone intently, and the sound was a bit noisy.

While Colin was picking up the wine, a long-haired man in a black leather jacket next to him was bowing and stuffing something into his arms.

Almost subconsciously.

Click!

Colin clamped the long-haired man's wrist, restrained him tightly, and stared at him expressionlessly.

"You put the things back now, and I'll pretend I didn't see anything."

A series of strange encounters made Colin mentally confused. He hoped that the boy would reject him so that he would have a reason to beat him up. Although the boy was not short, about 1.8 meters tall, he was still half a head shorter than himself.

Colin stared down at the thief slightly.

The long-haired man scanned the surrounding area alertly. His eyes were emerald green, like gems, but his gaze was unkind, like a dormant poisonous snake.

After finding that no one was nearby, he approached Colin and whispered: "Sir, I am just getting back what belongs to me."

Colin: "???"

The long-haired man realized that Colin had no intention of letting go, and continued: "Look at the clothes on my body, they are all bought from street stalls. My sister works in a potato chip factory, and she was cut off due to a machine failure. Two fingers, and the damn factory didn’t pay her a penny. In the judicial process, this was explained as an operational error. I don’t have a real job, I just don’t want my family to go hungry.”

The long-haired man's words were so sincere that Colin clicked his tongue and let go of his hand.

"You are really a kind person." The long-haired man lowered his head and laughed, then said, "Did you know that the world is like a scale?"

"What the hell are you talking about."

Colin's eyelids twitched, and he couldn't help but burst out in a bad mood. He was a little depressed that he couldn't beat this person up. This person's tone and attitude were really annoying.

"That's right, sir." The long-haired man put the stolen snacks and beer in plastic bags and said, "If we rank chaos and order from 1 to 10, 1 represents the most chaotic, which is certainly not good. , 10 represents the most orderly, but that is some kind of totalitarianism, so the position of 5 or 6 is the most suitable."

"What do you want to say?"

Colin hissed, a little impatient, he really didn't want to meet a second freak.

"I said, the world is like a scale, isn't it? When a popular standard or norm is at 2 or 3, if you only act in 5 ways, then nothing will change. You can only act in 8 ways. Or act in a 9 way, and add a heavier weight to the scale, so that everything can slowly get back on track. In fact, all opposite things can be substituted into it, such as indifference and virtue, just like you Same thing next, sir."

The long-haired man scratched his ears and then looked at Colin seriously.

"So you want me to pay for you?"

Colin finally understood the implication. It was outrageous that he dared to be the Riddler without money to pay the bills.

It seemed that the long-haired man had packed up the stolen items, but it was nothing, just two cans of beer and a few bags of snacks.

"Yes." The long-haired man laughed dryly, "I am indeed ashamed of my behavior just now."

"Hold."

Colin felt that with this man's eloquence, not being a stockbroker would be a waste of money, second only to being a pyramid scheme leader.

Colin bought a bottle of liquor and a portion of cooked food, which he could heat directly in the store later. He paid the bill at the counter, and also paid it to the long-haired man. The total was just over eighty yuan.

Just when Colin paid the money, thinking that the long-haired man would thank him.

"My name is Di Wei. This is a very important name. You will see it frequently in newspapers in the future."

I saw an orange high-end convertible car parked at the intersection outside the convenience store. Di Biao held the car door and flipped quickly into the driver's seat while holding the packaging bag. Sitting on the passenger seat was a woman wearing a blue deep V dress. A sexy Eastern European girl with a tall and graceful figure who is in her best years. Any man who sees her will be ignited with desire.

"My good sister, please thank the gentleman who paid for us."

Di Wei put his arm around the girl's waist and pointed at Colin.

The girl blew a charming kiss to Colin, and Di Biao stepped on the accelerator and drove away in the supercar.

There was a black line on Colin's forehead. He bit open the cap of the liquor bottle with his teeth, took a big gulp and wiped his mouth.

What the hell is going on every day.

At this time, a message came from the mobile phone. It was a police officer from the Los Angeles Police Department.

Because Colin was the neighbor of the female corpse and there were suspicious potholes in the wall, he was asked to go to the police station three days ago to take notes. Some routine inquiries did not consider him a suspect.

Colin told everything truthfully and explained everything he had experienced.

The police officer in charge of the transcript shuddered just listening to Colin's story. What's more, those who witnessed it marveled at Colin's nerve or courage. If it were him, it would probably leave a lifelong psychological shadow.

Colin didn't take it seriously. This kind of thing would naturally make people very uncomfortable, and he hadn't recovered yet, but to say it was a shadow of life would be a bit too exaggerated.

When Colin saw the message on his cell phone, he was puzzled. He thought he had said everything he needed to say, and there should be nothing else going on, but now he was told to go to the police station immediately.

The time was chosen wrong. It was almost nine o'clock, so late at night.

But in order to support public security work, Colin still chose to call the police station.

Twenty minutes later.

At a little after nine o'clock, Colin met the police officer who had taken notes on him that day at the door of the police station.

"Agent Grey, this is the key figure in that case, Colin."

The police officer introduced Colin and said to Colin: "This is the senior detective sent by the peak to deal with this incident. Ms. Gray, she has some questions to ask you. You guys can talk about it. I still have work to do. "

After saying that, the police officer left. There was no sound at the quiet police station door, leaving only the two of them and some street lamps that gave off a pale light.

The first time Colin saw this woman, he realized that she was a very dangerous person.

Her back was straight, and her height of about 1.7 meters looked very tall.

He was wearing an extremely ordinary white jacket and straight pants, but his boots were military tactical boots, and he was carrying a silver metallic suitcase.

The most surprising thing was that her face seemed to be blind in one eye, completely wrapped in black cloth from one side of her forehead to her left eye. There was a hideous scar under the other ear, which was distorted and spread to her neck and even lower.

Although he tried to cover it up with the tattoos of thorns and vines, it was still exposed. It was hard to imagine what kind of injury it was, probably half of his neck was chopped off.

With neat, shoulder-length black hair, the only remaining eye was dark brown, and his eyebrows were extremely cold, which made Colin feel like he was being scrutinized. Even though he was similar in age, he felt that he was not of the same age group.

"I'm sorry to bother you so late, Mr. Colin. You don't have any plans for tomorrow, right?"

Although the words were very polite, Gray's attitude was not polite at all and was extremely cold. It was a normal and harmonious conversation, but she was forced to make it extremely serious.

"I am now homeless."

Colin took out a cigarette from the cigarette case, lit it, and took a puff.

Gray's face was expressionless and she had no reaction at all to Colin's behavior.

"Very well, find a place to sit down and talk in detail. What I am going to say next will exceed your cognition range."