Colorful years

The moonlight at three in the morning, cold and fluid like liquid mercury, seeped silently into Zhang Chao's studio apartment through the tightly closed window. The digital clock on the wall emitted a pale blue light, coldly displaying 2023/05/02, as if time itself had become indifferent and mechanical in this small space.

Zhang Chao lay on his back on the bed, his fingertips hovering above the phone screen, trembling slightly. The message he had just typed flickered uncertainly in the input box, like a star about to fall into a black hole:

"We compress love into a quantum state and store it in the folds of spacetime. When the wave function collapses at some future observation moment, it will still be alive."

These few words encapsulate the love between him and Xiao Hong that transcends reality; every word reflects his deep appreciation and bewilderment about this relationship.

On the other side of the city, Xiao Hong sat by a sun-drenched window, her latte already cold. Sunlight streamed through the blinds, casting barcode-like shadows on her phone screen—cold and mechanical.

When she read the words "quantum state love," the latte art at the bottom of the cup suddenly disintegrated into countless pixels, scattering across the surface of the coffee, just like that snowy night three years ago when Zhang Chao turned around at the entrance of the Civil Affairs Bureau, the ice crystals fluttering from his coat shimmering in the air with a final, resolute air.

“You always…” Xiao Hong’s voice trembled slightly, tinged with grievance and helplessness. The moment she slowly pressed the call button, a driverless delivery vehicle outside the shop window braked sharply, and the lidar on its roof swept across her pupils.

The sudden light stung her eyes and reminded her of the computer Zhang Chao used for his creative work. Were they also observing the decay cycle of some love particle at that moment?

Time slipped by unnoticed. At 03:17 AM, Xiao Hong unconsciously shifted her body on the silk sheets, creating serpentine folds. The smart home system, misinterpreting her as awake, automatically started playing the morning stock market report.

The mechanical and merciless voice echoed in the silent room, and dreams and reality overlapped in a cold sweat. Xiao Hong's eyes were glazed over. In her dream, the scales of the green snake were clearly the jade necklace Zhang Chao had given her, a necklace that would emit bioluminescence in the dark. But now, in her dream, it appeared grotesque and unfamiliar.

Her phone suddenly vibrated, the holographic alarm clock mechanically chiming the time. The message notification, like a scalpel slicing through the film of a nightmare, read: "Suggestion to activate the Love Freeze Agreement? Y/N." Xiao Hong's heart skipped a beat. Looking at the cold notification, she felt as if she could see the end of their love.

At this moment, Zhang Chao was in a high-rise building in Tianting Jiangjing Garden, looking at the city lights through the glass curtain wall. The glass curtain wall reflected the drone's aerial photography lights, and the red, green, and blue lights intertwined, just like his complicated mood at this moment.

When Zhang Chao's figure appeared on the downstairs monitoring screen, the access control system suddenly reported an error, and the LCD panel displayed rainbow-colored garbled characters, like a beautiful yet chaotic rainbow.

Xiao Hong ran barefoot down the corridor, the motion-sensor lights turning on one after another, like quantum particles being observed collapsing one by one, each step filled with urgency and anticipation.

They met in front of the fingerprint lock. Zhang Chao's trench coat carried the noise of the city night wind, the scent of the night; Xiao Hong's bathrobe hem was still stained with the sticky fluid of dreams, unrealistic fantasies.

When the distance between two bodies is less than 1 nanometer, all protocols and cryogenic plans decohere into background radiation like smoke. Zhang Chao gently stroked Xiao Hong's cheek, feeling her warmth; the real touch instantly dispelled his unease.

“Look…” Zhang Chao pointed to the elevator monitor screen that had suddenly turned blue, with strange characters and static flashing on the screen. “Even the AI ​​chose not to record this quantum tunneling moment.” Xiao Hong bit the third button of his shirt, tasting the rusty flavor of the miniature robot.

The button was heating up; it was the temperature monitoring chip implanted in Zhang Chao operating at overclock, just like how he could always find the optimal solution in the equation of love, and how he could stand firmly by her side no matter how great the difficulties.

Suddenly, the Big Dipper birthmark on the back of Zhang Chao's neck began to glow, its blinding light illuminating everything around them. Xiao Hong was horrified to discover that her smart bracelet was displaying the date 1839—a time-space coordinate left by her great-grandfather. Their embracing bodies instantly quantized, reassembling themselves on the Humen beach during the Daoguang era.

The wind at Humen carried the salty smell of the sea and the stench of gunpowder, brushing against their figures. Zhang Chao and Xiao Hong stood on the beach, gazing at the opium chests being destroyed, their hearts filled with mixed emotions. "This time..." Zhang Chao grasped Xiao Hong's trembling hand, pointing to the opium chests being destroyed, "We're looking for more than just the communicator, there's also..." He lifted Xiao Hong's wrist; the bracelet displayed a new mission: engrave "Zhang Chao? Xiao Hong 2077" on the bottom of the chest.

The waves crashed against their quantum-state bodies, each surge solidifying their probability of existence. They embraced tightly, steadfastly holding onto each other amidst the raging winds and crashing waves.

As the sun rises, golden sunlight shines upon them, and the love between the two time periods finally resonates perfectly. Their figures gradually become clear on the beach, as if they have merged with this land and become eternal.

However, this is a story that will happen much later.

Let's get back to reality and see what exactly happened between Zhang Chao and Xiao Hong on May 2, 2006.