The Beginning

Chapter 4: The Fifth Time Cycle (III)

Li Shiqing is no exception to the rule that any ordinary person has a certain reverence for the police profession.

When she was a child, she was constantly scolded by adults with the words "If you do something bad, the police will arrest you", and she never did anything wrong like running a red light or littering.

So when the two police officers said to her, "Ms. Li, there has been a traffic accident and we would like you to assist us in our investigation," Li Shiqing was dumbfounded.

"Traffic accident?"

Li Shiqing, baffled and shocked, said, "Could I have been hit by a car for my concussion?"

The two officers looked at each other, and when they looked at her again, their expressions were a little helpless.

"Don't be too nervous little girl, we're just here to find out what's going on and we know from your doctor that you've suffered a blow to the head, but the consequences of this traffic accident are very serious and we'd still like you to try and remember."

The older of the two, the police officer, was quite kind and spoke slowly.

"At 1.45pm this afternoon, a 45 bus hit a tanker truck head-on at the River Road entrance to the river crossing bridge, causing a violent explosion and leaving no survivors in either vehicle involved."

His voice was low and hoarse, "The explosion also caused a chain of car accidents, which, along with the explosives splattered everywhere, resulted in a number of casualties in the surrounding area, and I'm sure you just saw the injured patients brought in at the emergency room."

The more Li Shiqing listened, the more astonished she was, and she was unable to speak for half a day.

When those injured were brought in, there was talk of a bus hitting the tanker, but at the time the patients' families were just whispering and she was listening in the clouds.

Now that she had heard the definitive answer, and had heard that more people's had not even survived, she was inexplicably more upset.

As the older officer recounted the incident to Li Shiqing, she could feel the other officer's eyes keeping a close watch on her expression.

It was the first time she had ever been stared at by a police officer like that, and she was a little flustered and more than a little aggrieved.

"But what does that have to do with me?"

She wasn't a prisoner, why did she need to stare at her like that?

"Because you and one other passenger were the only two survivors on this bus."

As he spoke, his expression also began to turn serious.

"To investigate the cause of the accident, we looked at the CCTV footage along the route. It was discovered that just before the accident, the bus pulled over temporarily and you got off the bus with another male passenger."

She got out of the car with another person?

"I got on that bus?"

Li Shiqing drew in a breath of cold air, "But I don't remember anything! I can't remember anything!"

"We saw on the CCTV that you darted away as soon as you got out of the car. Just under five minutes after you got out of the car, that car crashed, hitting the tanker truck in the opposite direction."

The older officer was nicer to her, but there was no denying that as he recounted the case, his expression was stony as if he had seen the two cars explode in front of him.

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Maybe he really did see the blast site with his own eyes, more than once ......

In the surveillance footage.

"You did get in that car earlier and you did get out of the car early, and those are recorded on surveillance."

The younger officer was probably more impatient, "Think about it again, can you remember anything? Why did you get out of the car early and run away as fast as you could as soon as you got out? Did you know the man who got out of the car with you?"

Hearing that she might be one of the only two people involved, Li Shiqing did her best to think back, even if her head was particularly uncomfortable right now, because after all, lives were at stake.

"I can only recall until I went out at noon ......"

She swore I really tried hard to recall, but a recent memory was really blank.

"...... I remember getting up late and having a random bowl of noodles down the street before getting ready to go shopping in Jiangbei District."

The two officers looked at each other again, exchanging glances about something she couldn't know.

Normally, Li Shiqing hates this feeling of rejection: "I'm right in front of you but you won't understand what we're thinking", but now, in addition to a deep sense of panic, she feels more sorry.

With such a big event happening, the doctors at the hospital, the families of the patients in the emergency room, the police officers who were out on the road investigating, everyone was running around and working on the event.

And she, who was obviously one of the parties involved and probably knew a lot of hidden secrets that no one knew, had gotten herself concussed at such a crucial time and was left here to meditate without a clue.

They asked Li Shiqing questions such as "what were you going to buy" and "did you often take that route", as if to stimulate her memory with these details.

But she could remember every detail of this morning, but she had forgotten the memory of "getting on a bus".

Their questioning did not include Li Shiqing's name, age or schooling, and it was assumed that they had already found out through the civil registry system or some other means that she was an "ordinary" female student.

The two experienced officers questioned Li Shiqing repeatedly for a long time and she did her best to co-operate, during which Li Shiqing dry-heaved several times during her answers due to excessive stress and headaches, but she did answer seriously, but the results were obviously not very satisfactory.

"I thought there was a survivor? Why don't you go to him and ask?"

Feeling that it was a waste of time to ask further questions, Li Shiqing rubbed his aching temples and asked, "Maybe he knows more about the situation than I do."

"We found him near the crash site after you got out of the car ......"

The young officer had an even odder expression, "He's temporarily deaf because of the explosion at the scene, and it's difficult to communicate. But he made it clear that you were the one who dragged him out of the car."

"Oh my God, what have I done."

Li Shiqing wiped her face in distress and felt the urge to wail.

Not to mention that the police uncles were coming for her, even she herself felt that she must know something inside after hearing what the two officers had said about what had happened.

Did she spot something wrong with the driver in the car and wisely chose to make a scene and get out?

No. If she had noticed something wrong with the driver, shouldn't she have chosen to call the police first?

The more she thought about it, the more she got a headache, and Li Shiqing covered her head and sucked in her breath in pain.

Seeing her like this, the two officers were probably too embarrassed to ask further questions and could only end the questioning reluctantly.

"Hey, get some rest, the doctor said you'll get your memory back any day now, I'll have Officer Jiang stay in the hospital, anytime ...... ah, sorry, I'm going out to take a call."

The older officer pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket and as soon as he saw the incoming message on the screen he looked solemn and went out to answer the call.

Li Shiqing was lying on the bed, looking at the young Officer Jiang, and the atmosphere was a little awkward.

" Classmate Li Shiqing, we sincerely hope you can remember more information because there are no other survivors except you and another passenger, and no one knows what had happened on that bus. You were not able to see the scene, it was so tragic ......"

His eyes were a little wet.

"We need to give an explanation to the community and to the families of the deceased."

"I understand. I'll try to think of something, and as soon as I think of something, I'll tell you guys."

Li Shiqing agrees solemnly, without any hint of excuses.

Officer Jiang's expression, which had been serious and stony, finally eased up a little and he even smiled at her.

The older officer had been on the phone for a while and when he entered Li Shiqing's ward, his whole demeanour changed and he looked at her as if he had a sword in his sheath, even when he looked at her with a knife in his eyes.

"What's happening?"

Li Shiqing's heart sank as she sensed the change in his attitude towards her.

"They found it ......"

He went over to Officer Jiang and, without avoiding her, whispered in Officer Jiang's ear, so softly that I couldn't hear anything except the first few words.

However, Officer Jiang, who had just smiled at me, turned pale after hearing what my colleague had whispered, and looked at her with a look that could only be described as "frosty".

"Mr. Officer, is something going on?"

In Li Shiqing's short life of twenty years, no one had ever looked at her with such eyes.

Even though it was only a glance, she still felt her scalp tingle and her body fill with shortness of breath.

"I'm sorry, student Li Shiqing, but you cannot leave this room or receive visits from anyone until you recall what happened on the bus."

The older officer said coldly, "We now suspect you of being a suspect in a mega-case."

"I... I'm a suspect?"

Li Shiqing points at herself, jaws dropping as she repeats.

Why did she understand every word he said, but together she didn't understand any of them?

The time that followed was a nightmare for a patient.

The two officers, who had suddenly changed their attitude, stopped saying "get some rest" and even her request to "call my family" was denied.

The two sturdy men who had carried her into the ward earlier were guarding the door straight away. Li Shiqing had thought they were hospital orderlies, but now it seemed they were plainclothes police officers, and even the female nurse who had come to help her use the toilet had to be questioned by them when she entered the room.

However, it was Li Shiqing who was questioned the most.

"Think again, did you know in advance that the car would be in trouble?"

"What is your relationship to the male passenger who got off the bus with you? Do you know him?"

"Did someone coerce the driver? Or did you ever find out anything?"

"What did you get on this bus for? What do you want to buy when you go to Jiangbei? Why don't you choose to shop online?"

"Why did you run as soon as you got out of the car?"

Not to mention her inability to remember anything and her concussion symptoms, even if she had nothing wrong with her, being bombarded with such a barrage of tired questioning would most likely drive her crazy.

No matter how much she explained "I really can't remember anything", they continued to question her relentlessly, and she even threw up a few times in the middle of the conversation, but they only asked someone to come in and change the sheets for Li Shiqing.

Apart from the exhaustion and shock, what chilled Li Shiqing even more was the attitude they displayed.

In their eyes, she looked like some kind of vicious bad guy, and this little single ward was suddenly turned into a cold and unforgiving questioning room, and it was an ordinary college girl like me they were treating so harshly.

The diagnosis of "concussion" and "retrograde amnesia" given by the doctors seemed to them at the moment to be an illusion that she was faking, and even her bewildered shaking of her head in the face of repeated questioning was probably taken by them as an uncooperative "resistance".

They say that things like memory loss can be faked.

But what could she say in her defence?

She really doesn't know anything!

Li Shiqing, an ordinary schoolgirl, was terrified by this attitude, she cried and lost control of herself, and at the height of her headache she even cried out in anguish.

"I don't know! I really can't remember! I don't know why I got off!"

But no matter how much Li Shiqing cried and shouted, it did not help because they would not stop asking the questions she could recite.

Exhaustion and fright made her lose track of how much time had passed.

In the time between questioning, Li Shiqing's mind was also in turmoil.

Sometimes she wondered if her disappearance would make her family anxious. Sometimes she worried that the police locking her up would give the teachers at school a bad impression of her and perhaps be misunderstood in the future.

The thought of it made her almost immediately frustrated again.

Will there really be a future for her after being caught up in this strange affair?

For a moment, Li Shiqing thought she might as well just die. If she hadn't thought of her family and friends, she might have chosen to "die to show her will".

The sky outside the window went from bright to dim and difficult, and from dim to bright again - it was the officer who had turned on the lights in the ward.

After the long questioning, both Li Shiqing and the officers were tired.

The officers had lost their initial serious and stoic appearance, even the older one, whose eyes were slightly bloodshot, had gone out once midway and returned with a strong smell of smoke.

" Li Shiqing, have you remembered anything? Why did you get out of the car at that time?"

Officer Jiang's eyes locked on hers and he asked again.

This most mentioned issue was the last straw that broke the camel's back, and Li Shiqing's already tense nerves could not hold out any longer.

"I don't know anything!"

With a cry of exhaustion, Li Shiqing passed out as she had hoped.