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1.1 Gravity
Gravity is described as the attraction between two objects that have mass or energy. It holds together planets, stars, solar systems and even galaxies.
Nie Huaisang is building an algorithm, which is questionable news to Wei Ying on multiple levels. Firstly, he had no idea that Nie Huaisang knew how to code. Secondly, he's as sure as he can ever be when it comes to Nie Huaisang that whatever he does in his day-to-day life has no requirement for the need to know how to code. Thirdly:
"Um," Wei Ying says to Nie Huaisang, who is sprawled on the couch of his living room cradling his laptop without even taking off his shoes, because he has no respect for Wei Ying or his property. "Why?"
"Because," responds Nie Huaisang loftily, "There is something deeply wrong with Spotify Wrapped not having Nicki Minaj in my top artists, so I'm building my own algorithm to test it. Never trust the system," he adds like he's saying something serious that is not about how much time he spends listening to music and songs.
"Uh-huh." Wei Ying pauses from the kitchen where he's scouring various cabinets trying to find something edible and not-expired enough to consume. "Well, did it work?"
"No," Nie Huaisang says without so much as looking up. "Also, I ate before I came here, so I don't need or want any of your horror food, thank you very much."
"Hey!" protests Wei Ying, affronted.
"You have… not many, but some talents. Maybe. I'm sure. But food is for sure not one of them, and I say this both objectively and subjectively."
Freshman year Wei Ying did have a history of subsisting for months on end on nothing but Flaming Hot Cheetos and contraband hot pot whenever Nie Huaisang decided to fuck dorm room fire regulations all the way to hell, which was frequently. He isn't in the habit of letting his past define his future, though, and neither is he in the habit of letting his friends get away with being little assholes to his face, so he finds the nearest non-lethal object to launch directly at Nie Huaisang's face in his best personal imitation of fastball. A deep-seated satisfaction settles in the pits of his stomach when he's met with an indignant squawk and some retaliatory projectile or other.
—
Wei Ying met Nie Huaisang sometime during the frosh week he doesn't totally recall through the haze of alcohol with complete clarity, which he likes to say is a pretty accurate reflection of their friendship trajectory from that point onwards. Nie Huaisang is as flighty as he is dependable, appearing to spontaneously manifest into situations always completely on his own terms, always when he is needed the most, and always completely and infallibly incomprehensible. Mostly with alcohol and ensuing terrible decisions.
(According to Wen Qing, the circumstances of their meeting had involved some type of boat that may or may not have been stolen, many pitchers of overpriced sangria, two-thirds of a dry cigar, the beach as ground zero for a month-long mono outbreak on campus, and lots of sand in places on the human body where sand should never be found. Wei Ying maintains his adamance that he doesn't need to know the specifics of that, ever.)
—
Somehow, because sometimes Wei Ying suspects he might be some kind of druid, Nie Huaisang ends up snagging a solid six-hour timeslot in library study room bookings for them over the weekend before Wei Ying has four midterms in three days, which is a feat considering the approaching deadlines he knows the entire campus are also neck-deep swamped in, but moreso since Nie Huaisang actually shows up at 11AM sharp on Saturday.
Wei Ying has his own theories that he simply enjoys kicking out the previous occupants of the room, showing his booking confirmation email and a vaguely not-so-apologetic expression, since he doesn't appear to have any notebooks or textbooks or anything even remotely academic on his person. When he points this out, Nie Huaisang just shoots him a mildly disdainful look and a scornful, "Go digital, man, what century are you in?" while pulling out his laptop, whereupon he proceeds to do nothing at all academic, Wei Ying is sure.
His suspicions are confirmed mere minutes later when he stops fidgeting with his rings to peer over at Wei Ying over the back of his laptop vaguely conspiratorially and ask if he wants to take a study break. Wei Ying, who has been mentally weighing the merits of drowning himself in his disgusting bathroom sink and sending a strongly-worded hate email to the IUPAC for their organic compound-naming crimes, seriously, what the fuck is 3-oxoolean-18-en-28-oic acid, after fifteen whole minutes of squinting at his organic chemistry notes, replies with an emphatic "yes."
Nie Huaisang grabs his laptop and slides into the seat next to Wei Ying. For the next hour, Wei Ying and Nie Huaisang are deeply engrossed in a game of Wikipedia Racing to see who can travel the fastest from one designated article to another completely unrelated one using nothing but attached hyperlinks. It's surprisingly fun, and it does actually pretty efficiently distract Wei Ying from the horrifying realities of certain impending academic doom to try and figure out what epistemological links exist between Paris Hilton and moral relativism.
1.2 The weak force
The weak force, also called the weak nuclear interaction, is responsible for particle decay, or the literal change of one type of subatomic particle into another. It is critical for the nuclear fusion reactions that power the sun and produce the energy needed for most life forms here on Earth.
Wei Ying has long-since known that Jiang Yanli is the best of their entire family, which isn't necessarily a hard conclusion to arrive at. He and Jiang Cheng once had a faux-screaming match in full Mandarin at a frat party, just because Wei Ying thought it would be funny to see how poorly the freaked-out trust fund Chads would react and Jiang Cheng had been drunk enough to develop a sense of humour without compromising his natural penchant for screaming at Wei Ying. It had been hilarious, though neither of them are allowed inside the Delta-Kappa-Whatever frat house anymore. Which is Delta-Kappa-Whatever's loss, honestly, but the point is, Jiang Yanli has never gotten banned from Delta-Kappa-Whatever, because Wei Ying firmly believes the higher powers that be created her to be an exact model of the perfect human being.
Jiang Yanli proves this constantly, but it regularly occurs at every Sunday family lunch. It's become something of a ritual for them ever since the second semester he and Jiang Cheng had joined her out here, and Wei Ying makes a point to never miss out on the familiar comforting joys of making Jiang Cheng's blood pressure rise, the company of Jiang Yanli, and the lure of food that is 1) amazing 2) free 3) healthy 4) his jiejie's, and 5) amazing. It's the small pleasures in life.
"Jiejie!" He leans down to give Jiang Yanli a big kiss on the cheek when she opens the door for him, while she laughs and ushers him in. The apartment she had moved into with Jin Zixuan after graduation is light and spacious. Wei Ying is torn, as always, between making jabs at his generational wealth or shitty personality, and preserving his jiejie's peace of mind. Once, in a finals week all-nighter stupor, he and Jiang Cheng had drawn up a comprehensive list of 30 Reasons Why We HATE Jin Zixuan, in full BuzzFeed format. It starts solidly with 1) He sucks, and culminates epically in 30) No man will ever be good enough for jie, ever. It's the perfect list and possibly the one thing he and Jiang Cheng wholeheartedly agree on, but jie gets a tiny little frown on her face that shatters Wei Ying's heart a little, so he has vowed that the list will never exist outside of the notes app on his phone. He did forward it to Nie Huaisang, though, who got a very good cackle out of it.
Still, though. Sometimes he just can't help himself. Especially when he's in a space that is, despite his jie's best efforts with her clearly superior taste in interior design/decor/frankly everything except life partners, such a stark, painful reminder of a—and he shudders, truly, to even think of it—Jin.
Jiang Yanli wipes her hands on her apron before she bends down to check on the oven (oh, whatever's in there smells so good ), and before Wei Ying can open his mouth to further defame Jin Zixuan's character, a series of violent-sounding bangs resound from the door.
"I'll get it!"
Wei Ying opens the door to reveal his little brother, dressed like a dick. "You look like a dick," he informs Jiang Cheng by way of greeting, and ducks out of the way, both to avoid his resulting punch and to let him in.
"I had a meeting for a group project," grumbles Jiang Cheng, toeing off his dress shoes, seriously, Wei Wuxian is wearing his Converse that have holes in them, "and the assholes were already running late, so I couldn't run back to my place and change."
"You wear suits to group project meetings on a weekend? I hate to say it, A-Cheng, but you being a business major may actually be the worst thing that's ever happened to my faith in humanity."
"Yeah, well. Try actually having a conversation with one of those morons."
"Live, laugh, love, A-Cheng, that is the way to be," Wei Ying tells him solemnly. It's years of instinctual honing that gives him the foresight to dodge Jiang Cheng's shove this time, a near-subconscious push and pull.
—
Wei Ying is pretty sure that with how universally he's observed this to be true over the years, he could probably register it as some sort of empirical law of science by now. It could become a solid theory as soon as he figures out an explanation, but he's more than content just to stuff himself with his sister's soup and proclaim with feeling that it is Fundamental Law of the Universe #1 that everyone loves Jiang Yanli's soup, it has magical healing properties, it is the primary source of happiness and hope in his miserable STEM student life. Jiang Cheng, from his side of the table, grunts vaguely in agreement.
Jiang Yanli chides them and laughs like the gentle sound of wind chimes, fondly. "You two. Always my biggest fans."
The first memory Wei Ying has of his jiejie's cooking had been when they were all still in middle school, Madam Yu and Uncle Jiang both stuck late at work again. With the late afternoon sunlight dyeing the kitchen a warm gold, the three of them crowded around the refrigerator to inspect their existing ingredients before dashing to the desktop computer to search for recipes. The group effort it had taken for them to try and defrost the meat in time to satiate their appetites. Since then, gradually, with Jiang Yanli as their guide, it became an after-school ritual of sorts for them to try and experiment with cravings and whatever was in the fridge at any given moment. Some of Wei Ying's fondest memories of high school had consisted of the three of them, peering at the stove, arguing over the optimal consistency for beef stew. He still has a graph backloaded in his drive that they had devised in order to log a mathematical equation for the optimal time required to cook a kimchi pancake in function of the amount of mix and heat level.
Their tradition had fallen off temporarily when Jiang Yanli had first moved away for college, but in the comfort of his jiejie's kitchen, their accumulated family recipe collection continues to grow. The radiator hums, natural light streams brightly through the big windows in the dining room, and Wei Ying is warm. "Yes, jiejie," he choruses in unison with Jiang Cheng.
1.3 The electromagnetic force
The electromagnetic force acts between charged particles. Opposite charges attract one another, while like charges repel. The greater the charge, the greater the force. The electromagnetic force is responsible for some of the most commonly experienced phenomena: friction, elasticity, the normal force and the force holding solids together in a given shape.
It's Wen Qing who suggests that they go to a board game cafe over the weekend to celebrate the end of midterms, and Wei Ying almost gets a black eye for subsequently trying to ask Siri for ways to check if someone is currently being possessed by a nefarious demon.
"I just think it would be a fun bonding activity to build camaraderie, dickface," she snarls at Wei Ying, who feels like she is not currently doing a very good job of building or maintaining camaraderie. Wen Qing is in health sciences, though, which just makes Wei Ying think that she definitely knows the most efficient and painful ways to kill someone, so he doesn't push her buttons too much. Wei Ying is smart, and he probably has a lot to offer the world in the near-to-distant future, so would Wen Qing the Great please have compassion on him, just this once? Please?
When she finally frees Wei Ying from her headlock, Wei Ying is fake-coughing and whining with all the dramatic ability that his middle school theatre productions and his general fondness for melodrama have instilled in him. It works on Wen Ning, who frantically pours him a glass of water in such haste that it mostly gets all over himself, but when Wei Ying sneaks a glance at his sister she's just busy rolling her eyes. And sneaking a glance at Mianmian, who is also rolling her eyes from her side of the table and confirming her presence at the alleged fun bonding activity. He looks back at Wen Qing, whose face is doing something that looks very strange to Wei Ying, like she might be happy, or content with life in general. Huh.
(A day or two later, Wei Ying is eating his self-brought food (read: a Thermos full of hot water, and a pack of Shin ramen) illegally in the overpriced campus café and staring down the barista who hates him for reasons unknown when he brings it up to Nie Huaisang.
"Dude," Nie Huaisang says sagely. "If you aren't picking up on their kinesics, their vocalics and paralanguage, the haptics or proxemics…"
Wei Ying is horrified. "What the fuck did you just say to me?")
—
They meet at the cafe Wen Qing had texted to the group chat. Wei Ying is bitching to and getting mostly ignored by her, about how cold he is, how tired he is, how much broker he's going to be after the overpriced grilled cheese sandwiches he won't be able to hold himself back from ordering. In mostly that order.
"Your bitch ass is lactose intolerant," says Wen Qing stonily. Her stoniness is even worse today than it usually is, so Wei Ying cranks up the whining to a twelve. "Stop being an idiot."
He's just about moved the topic of bitching onto his shitty microbiology TA who docked him by an eighth of a point on his lab—which, for real, though, three entire digits after the decimal point? How would that even translate as a solid component of his grade—when the door swings open, letting in a draft of cold wind, Mianmian, and. Holy shit, Adonis in a peacoat, maybe?
Wei Ying is, generally speaking, very deeply grounded in his conviction that the illusion of conventional male attractiveness is nothing more than a mirage of nice hair and being tall, but wow, never mind. He's decided to scrap that hypothesis as absolute and complete horseshit. And Wei Ying doesn't normally enjoy being proved wrong at all, but he is immensely enjoying the sight of this man's perfectly sculpted jawline and the molten gold (?!??!!!??!!?) of his eyes, thank you very much. Holy fuck, what.
"What the fuck," he hisses under his breath at Wen Ning, who just blinks at him in confusion. He doesn't even have the mental capacity to lightly mock Wen Qing for the way she uncharacteristically enthusiastically waves Mianmian over.
"Hi!" she says breezily when she gets to their booth. "I brought a friend, if that's okay?"
"Hello," greets Adonis. Fuck, his voice. Wei Ying wants to die. He extends a hand towards Wei Ying—to dap him up, maybe? Offer his hand in marriage, hopefully? "My name is Lan Zhan." Fuck, he's expecting a handshake. Who under the age of twenty-five is shaking hands in a casual setting? They are, apparently.
"Hi," says Wei Ying, and wills his brain-to-mouth filter to function for once in his adult life. "I'm Wei Ying." Lan Zhan's hands are big and warm and Wei Ying is so hyper-aware of his touch that he registers every individual callous on his fingers and also, like, how soft his palm is? A man who is gorgeous and also uses moisturizer? Wei Ying is against the idea of swooning on principle, but he might be swooning.
Apparently, Lan Zhan knows Mianmian through some undergraduate society or other. Apparently, they work biweekly with a horde of incompetent morons. Apparently, Lan Zhan is brilliant at helping Mianmian compose cleverly-worded passive aggressive emails that leave their asshole recipients 50% dumber just by reading them. Apparently, Lan Zhan's bangs cascade to frame his face delicately when he looks down. Apparently, Wei Ying wants to climb him like a tall, gorgeous, perfect tree.
"Oh," says Wen Qing, a few mostly peaceful rounds of Jenga that only involve a minimal amount of screeching later. Wei Ying has discovered Lan Zhan to be very good at Jenga, and the tiny furrow of his brows when he's concentrating to be very cute. He looks up over his shoulder to see Wen Ning returning from the stacks of games at the storefront with an armful of—Wei Ying squints—Avalon. "Oh, no."
"What?" Wen Ning asks defensively, which is to say not at all defensive by any and all non-Wen Ning standards. Mianmian, who is also apparently privy to the hidden terrors of Arthurian-themed deduction and bluffing board games, snorts and leans back in her chair. "Oh, this'll be good ," she says, and rubs her palms together in a cartoonishly villainous way.
"What?" Wen Ning says defensively again, slightly squeakier this time.
"Nothing, nothing," Mianmian says, gleeful in a way that kind of makes Wei Ying a tiny bit fearful for his life. "I'm deeply obsessed with this game and how fully capable of destroying friendships it is, that's all."
Wen Ning sets the game down in the middle of the table and Wei Ying makes for the instructions first, then throws them down immediately afterward when he decides he can't read and pesters Mianmian into explaining instead. It's essentially just like Mafia or Werewolf, except Wei Ying has already gotten to make fun of the concept of Mordred once, so he already considers it a personal win.
"Whatever happens in this game," he says seriously to Lan Zhan, "please do not let it get between our status as new best friends." Wen Qing rolls her eyes, but Wei Ying is resolutely not looking at anyone except Lan Zhan.
Because Lan Zhan is perfect and takes to Wei Ying's bullshit with a nonchalant ease that rarely anyone ever does, he nods solemnly and even makes to cross his heart. Everything about Lan Zhan seems to be doing it for Wei Ying in a way that would almost make him suspicious if he wasn't so emotionally horny about it. As well as maybe real horny, he doesn't want to examine that particular vein of thought right now.
Wen Ning passes around each of the cards that indicates their roles, and Wei Ying peeks at his own, trying his best to poker-face his disappointment away when it reads Loyal Servant of Arthur. Seriously, he never gets to have any real fun and commit fraud and/or treason in any of these.
The first round of quests passes smoothly with Lan Zhan, and Wen Ning having been chosen by Wen Qing as the representatives. The second round has the leadership position passed down to Mianmian, who hesitates when she has to pick three.
"I'm going to put myself, just because I'm sure I'm not a spy," she says slowly, "and then probably Lan Zhan, I think. And for the rest of you, um…" She narrows her eyes at the rest of the table, as if she'll be able to X-ray vision the truth out of the bunch. Before Wei Ying can even open his mouth to offer his humble opinion, she holds a hand up. "No, I don't wanna hear it."
Rude. Wei Ying points an accusatory finger at her. "Mianmian, you'd better not be being mean to me right now. I am lactose intolerant and I process caffeine like shit and I'm about to consume so much iced coffee, please treat me with respect. Or maybe pity, I feel like respect might be asking too much of you. Or neither, it doesn't matter, but I can swear that I am not evil, and I will not let you sully my honour."
"You are lactose intolerant?" Lan Zhan frowns. Wei Ying flaps his hand around in a vague motion that he hopes translates as Whatever, sometimes we all have to compromise our entire gastrointestinal system for the thrill of it, c'est la vie.
Wen Qing rolls her eyes at Wei Ying. "No, I agree with Mianmian," she says, because she is mean and Wei Ying means nothing to her, apparently. "We aren't actually far enough in this game to go off of anything solid, so I'll say we go with instincts for now. Wei Ying is way overexplaining himself here, it's suspicious for sure."
"Rude!" he declares. "We have been through so much together, we got through frosh together, and you treat me like this. Lan Zhan would never betray me like this, would you?"
Lan Zhan is currently in the middle of—dumping Wei Ying's iced latte into his own tea? "I would not," he agrees, the perfect image of someone who didn't just dump Wei Ying's iced latte into his own tea. When Wei Ying just gapes at him in confusion, he offers a tiny shrug. "You said that you were due to feel discomfort from the dairy. I will finish it for you, so that you may order something else more suitable."
God, he is so weird. And also kind of unexpectedly gross, Wei Ying does not think this is at all the best way in the world to make matcha latte. He hadn't even managed to get a single sip in yet since it arrived, Wei Ying has no idea why is everyone so hellbent on not letting him self-destruct from food-related ailments for fun.
Wei Ying pouts, "Lan Zhan! I'm broke, you know, that was all the money I had planned on spending today."
"Hmm," Lan Zhan says, "I will pay for whatever else you would like from the menu, if it turns out you are telling the truth about your identity."
"Deal!" Wei Ying exclaims. "Mianmian, you heard the man, put me on the team."
Mianmian still seems conflicted, but complies. The three of them on the quest team each submit their cards, Wei Ying still lightly bummed that as a Loyal Servant of Arthur he can't fail the mission just for the fun of it, but the prospect of getting a drink from a hot guy is incentive enough for him to behave.
The mission fails with one Fail card in the midst. The table erupts with accusations.
Wei Ying: "What the fuck?"
Mianmian: "HA!"
Wen Ning: "Um."
Wen Qing: "I knew it!"
Lan Zhan: "Hmm."
Fingers are pointed, mostly Mianmian and Wen Qing's at Wei Ying. Lan Zhan doesn't say anything, but there is something in his eyebrow quirk that doesn't quite sit right with Wei Ying.
"It wasn't me!" cries Wei Ying. "I swear it wasn't me, you think I would intentionally fail the mission and miss out on free food?"
Wen Qing only scoffs at him, because she is mean. "Do you hear this man? He's so focused on arguing that he didn't fail the mission this time, but that doesn't mean he still can't be a spy. Be careful here, guys."
"Why do you hate me?" wails Wei Ying. "You guys are so suspicious of me in these games, and every single time I'm always just, like, there."
Wen Ning pats his hand gently. "It's never anything personal," he tries to mediate, and at least he's got the decency to squirm and look a little bit apologetic about it, "but currently you do have the most cause for suspicion."
"Fine," declares Wei Ying, "persecute me, see if I care when the agents of evil win. The truth will absolve me, or whatever Castro said."
"History," corrects Lan Zhan. He takes a sip from his tea-latte concoction, maybe specifically to mock the turn of the fates and all his friends against Wei Ying.
"Yeah, that. Whatever."
The third round fails again with Wen Qing and Wen Ning picked for the mission by Wen Ning himself.
"Be quiet," snaps Mianmian before Wei Ying can even speak. "If one more mission fails, we lose."
"None of my business since you've already clearly decided on me being evil," sniffs Wei Ying haughtily. "You can start deciding amongst yourselves how you'll escape Avalon when Evil Mordred takes over or whatever."
Wen Qing scowls at him. "I wish killing people was an option in this game so I could take more concrete direct action against you."
"If I am not mistaken," Lan Zhan jumps in as the voice of reason, "the first failed quest consisted of Wei Ying, Luo Qingyang, and myself. The second consisted of Wen Ning and Wen Qing. All five players have been involved with no overlap, which renders all of us equally suspicious."
"So we're back to square zero," grumbles Wei Ying. "I have decided to trust none of you. I'm posting new friend applications directly after this."
"On what, Tinder? You're just going to get a whole bunch of unsolicited dick pics," retorts Mianmian.
Wen Qing shrugs. "I say fuck it, honestly, if we all have an equal chance of being evil."
"Wrong!" yells Wei Ying. "There were three people on our mission and only two people on yours, which means you have an almost 20% higher chance of being evil!"
"Wen Ning, too," muses Mianmian.
"Wrong again, I don't think Wen Ning has done anything wrong before in his entire life, ever. It has to be Wen Qing."
"Fuck you," spits Wen Qing, and then the accusations start all over again, each argument more self-righteous and ridiculous than the last. Wen Ning tries to pick three random people for the mission in a desperate effort at conflict resolution, but it gets vetoed almost unanimously.
"We must be diligent," supplies Lan Zhan. "The rules indicate that if we veto five teams in consecutive turns, it results in an automatic win for Mordred."
The turn to propose a team falls on Wei Ying. He assigns himself first, obviously. Then Wen Ning, because he told Wen Ning to stare directly into his eyes and say that he's innocent, and if it ever turned out that Wen Ning's earnest eyes were capable of deceit like that, he might have to walk directly into a large body of water and never look back.
"How many people on this mission? Three?"
Lan Zhan nods after double-checking with the rules.
"Well, this one's easy," says Wei Ying. "Mianmian and Wen Qing were automatically suspicious of me from the get-go without anything concrete to back their suspicions up, so they must be doing it to hide something. Lan Zhan, this one's on you." Over protests from both Wen Qing and Mianmian, he hands the mission card to Lan Zhan.
"Well, let's put it to a vote, shall we?" says Wei Ying. "Wow, this is fun. See what happens when you antagonize me for no reason, girls?"
Both of them vote against the team, obviously, but it's three against two. The mission is a go.
All three of them submit their cards. The mission fails. Once again, the table erupts:
Wei Ying: "What the fuck ?"
Mianmian: "HA!"
Wen Ning: "Um."
Wen Qing: "I knew it!"
Lan Zhan: "Hmm."
"What the fuck," says Wei Ying again emphatically. "Well, game over, I guess, but—" he flips his card over, "—it wasn't me, you assholes, rot in hell, this is completely on you."
"Hmm," says Lan Zhan. "I would disagree." Then, to Wei Ying's horror, he slowly flips over his own identity card. It reads, clear as day in weird gothic font: Minion of Mordred. Wen Qing is the other mole, but Wei Ying will deal with that particular betrayal and throwing-Wei-Ying-under-the-bus later.
"Wow," says Mianmian, a kind of awed look on her face. Wei Ying thinks that he can relate. "I kind of just thought you were incapable of lying."
"I never once said I was not a mole," replies Lan Zhan, just a hint smugly. "I was never asked directly, so I did not have to lie."
Just then, Wei Ying comes to a realization. "Hey, what the fuck, you propositioned me with a drink knowing full well I was innocent and that you would be able to pin that suspicion on me." Holy shit, there are levels to this. "You really think you can trust someone, and then they throw you directly into the throes of board game persecution, huh."
"It was not an honourable move," agrees Lan Zhan, "but it is the objective of the game." He pauses briefly, then continues, more quietly, "However, since I did make a proposition in ill faith, if you'd like, I would like a chance to make it up to you, sometime in the future."
The cold tap water Wei Ying had asked the server for earlier promptly goes down the wrong windpipe. Wen Ning has to whoop him on the back multiple times.
—
Later that night, he receives a string of texts from Wen Qing. The first is a selfie of probably-Wen Qing with he-thinks-Mianmian, very blurry and possibly intentionally so. Wei Ying gets the message nonetheless and sends !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! back to her in response. The second reads, btw i had her give ur # to lan zhan so i reserve the right to cash in favours from u for the rest of the foreseeable ever.
He types out WHAT THE FUCK , and repeats the action of copy-all-paste-copy-all-paste until he has an exponentially formed, terrorizing, repeating WHAT THE FUCK wall of text that crashes his shitty phone for a solid five hours. It's okay, though, because when it finally turns back on again, there is a message from an unfamiliar number his phone suggests as Maybe: Lan Zhan.
1.4 The strong force
The strong nuclear force, also called the strong nuclear interaction, is the strongest of the four fundamental forces of nature; a force which can hold a nucleus together against the enormous forces of repulsion of the protons.
Wei Ying doesn't do movies. The only movies in his hypothetical mental catalogue of things that exist in the Wei Ying's Brain Cinematic Universe are cartoon movies intended for a target audience at least a dozen years younger than him, stupid blockbusters with stupidly high budgets and stupidly high ticket prices to match that his friends sometimes drag him to, and stupid arthouse movies that Nie Huaisang forces him to watch when he feels like talking shit about stupid blockbusters. So Wei Ying does not suggest going to the movies.
Lan Zhan suggests dinner, because he's cute and gentlemanly like that. Wei Ying says yes.
"Fuck," is what he also says to Jiang Yanli when he calls her in a panic after his Thursday lab. "What am I supposed to do, I don't think I've eaten out in months." He pauses. "Maybe just McDonalds at 3AM when I'm drunk, but that's it."
Jiang Yanli laughs lightly, her voice a bit tinny over the phone, because Wei Ying is still in the biology building, which is possibly a portal to hell or the worst place on Earth, if portals to hell and worst places on Earth also sold begrudgingly good Banh Mi sandwiches. "A-Ying, why are you calling me? You're asking me to tell you how to eat and digest food?" She sounds amused, in that Jiang Yanli-specific way of making fun of Wei Ying that doesn't make him feel wronged in the slightest.
"You haven't seen this guy, jiejie," groans Wei Ying. He pushes open the double doors, greeted by the shape of his own breath in the cold air.
"Hmm," she says, "well, I don't know what to tell you except the generic be-yourself-and-I'm-sure-he'll-love-you big sister talk, but be yourself and I'm sure he'll love you?"
Wei Ying sighs. "I don't know why I'm even asking you. Straight guys have it so easy that the bar for them is not even on the floor anymore but, like, six feet under," he complains. Explains why the Jin Zixuans of the world get to date the Jiang Yanlis, he thinks half-vindictively to himself.
—
"Tell me something weird about yourself with no context," Wei Ying says to Lan Zhan over dinner. Lan Zhan had let Wei Ying pick the restaurant, so Wei Ying had gone with the Asian fusion restaurant across the street from the main library, because it was cute enough that it was a frequent Instagram-tagged location on campus, but inexpensive enough for Wei Ying to justify it to his conscience. He knows that he should be against the premise of bastardizing perfectly fine cuisine for the broader consumption of white people on which Asian fusion as a subcategory of food are founded, but, well. It's not his fault they bastardized it well.
"My uncle does not believe in the use of microwaves," says Lan Zhan, without missing a beat. Then he pauses, as if weighing the ridiculousness of that statement, then offers as a form of elaboration, "Radiation," as if that's any better.
"No, that's great!" exclaims Wei Ying. God. He is so weird and cute. Wei Ying likes him so much. "Wow, though, like most of what I eat is microwaved, I can't imagine. By this I mean I love to microwave boxed mac & cheese."
"You are lactose intolerant."
"Yup!" says Wei Ying, taking another sip from his milk tea.
Lan Zhan narrows his eyes, then reaches into his pockets and pulls out a tiny box of over-the-counter lactaid pills to slide it over to where Wei Ying is seated across from him. "My treat," he says cheekily. Who would've thought that that perfect statue face was capable of cheek. "Now we are even."
"Even for what?" Wei Ying says dumbly. "I have never bought you lactaid."
"I was dishonest, that afternoon over Avalon," says Lan Zhan. "I said that I would make it up to you."
Wei Ying must have it really bad already, because he genuinely finds this sweet and kind of hilarious. "Wow, and they seriously dare to say chivalry's dead," he says, graciously swallowing the pill. "Lan Zhan, my saviour in shining white parka."
Lan Zhan's eartips, just barely sticking out of his neatly parted hair, flush a pretty shade of red as he ducks his head and returns to his food. Wei Ying grins. God, he's so cute.
Wei Ying likes Lan Zhan a lot. He's weirdly polite and formal, but in a way that comes across as genuinely charming rather than pretentious. He seems content to mostly let Wei Ying ramble about anything, but he's attentive and takes Wei Ying just seriously enough to still be responsive to his jokes. When he does respond, there's a careful but prominent undercurrent of dry, sophisticated humour beneath everything he says that Wei Ying just finds delightful. Plus, Wei Ying would like to repeat once again, on the record, he is gorgeous, and Wei Ying is not so above superficiality that he will not admit to it. Lan Zhan is possibly the perfect human specimen, and Wei Ying is just going to have to live with that until he gets him onto a horizontal surface. Vertical works too, fuck, Wei Ying thinks that he'd very much enjoy that as well.
When Wei Ying reaches to signal their server for the bill, Lan Zhan stops him. "I took care of it already," he says, seeming weirdly bashful about it.
"What?" says Wei Ying, affronted. "But you said we were already even. You pulled a going-to-the-washroom-and-settling-the-bill on the first date? Lan Zhan, wow."
"I did say that," says Lan Zhan in his low, smooth voice. "This is unrelated."
"Why, then?"
Lan Zhan shrugs. "To treat Wei Ying."
—
Hours later, Wei Ying sits straight up in bed and stares at Lan Zhan's figure under the blankets.
"Lan Zhan," he whispers, "Lan Zhan, are you awake." He is, barely, but he cracks open a bleary eye to look at Wei Ying.
"Mmphf...?"
"Did you tip the server?"
"What?" mumbles Lan Zhan into the pillow. "Yes."
"How much?"
"Thirty percent," responds Lan Zhan sleepily, dragging Wei Ying back down to the bed. "Oh, wow, okay," says Wei Ying, relieved, and lets himself be tugged back in.
"Hey, Lan Zhan," he says again into the darkness, a few moments later, "Lan Zhan, are you still awake."
"Hmmphf."
"Do you wanna be my boyfriend.”
Lan Zhan shifts them until he is cradling Wei Ying in a position where he can kiss the back of his neck, and gives another affirmative half-asleep grunt.
1.5 Unifying nature
The outstanding question of the four fundamental forces is whether they're actually manifestations of just a single great force of the universe.
Chinese New Year, because it falls inconveniently on a Thursday night when none of them are able to make the trip home, culminates in a hasty gathering in Mianmian's living room instead.
"Well, you know, Chinese New Year's is very different without, like, a whole cohort of extended family that I barely even remember existing," she's saying as she leads them into the kitchen where the Wen siblings have already started on preparations. "It's almost like, how the hell am I supposed to know how I even look anymore without all the aunties coming up to me every few seconds to give very specific updates about how much weight I've gained or lost and how many more dumplings I shouldn't or should get dumped on my plate to make up for that?"
There are dumplings, because they are a group of filial young adults who truly commit themselves to the illusion of tradition. The wrappers are store-bought instead of made from scratch, because the illusion of tradition really is just an illusion sometimes, and so terribly frozen shut that Wei Ying has to be tasked with trying to get them to be melt by shoving them into the microwave in 10-second increments and hope for the best. The filling is vegetarian in order to accommodate Lan Zhan, but the only imitation meat they'd managed to find so last-minute are vegetarian burger patties that Jiang Yanli tried her very best to pound back into minced form.
Most of the dumplings look pretty pathetic. Jiang Cheng tends to get ambitious and pile on way too much filling, so he's typically responsible for the ones that burst in the pot. Wei Ying's attempts at folding pleats are abysmal at best, and after the first batch he gives up completely and just focuses on securing the edges. The kitchen is a mess of flour and smeared filling, but Wei Ying takes out his phone to snap a bunch of photos for his annual WeChat Moments update anyway.
There is also hot pot, because it is simply the most all-encompassing way to host a large group of people while respecting everyone's tastes and preferences. Also, zero technical skill is required beyond keeping an eye on the things you want to eat so no one else takes it. "Judging by the sheer amount of people who were also buying sesame sauce and fighting over the same three cuts of lamb, everyone else is also doing the exact same thing," snorts Wen Qing.
For good reason, thinks Wei Ying gleefully. He'd made sure to arrive early at Jiang Yanli's before they all left for Mianmian's together, specifically so that they could make her signature spicy broth to bring to Mianmian's, because he can trust no one except his beloved sister. When he took a picture of it and texted it to Lan Zhan with a chili pepper emoji along with the kiss mark emoji, Lan Zhan had immediately texted back … followed by nothing but a lone :/ face. He is such a fast learner, Wei Ying is so proud of him.
It's a point of heated contention of an extended debate Lan Zhan and Wei Ying had been having with each other continuously for weeks since the night of the fusion restaurant. Wei Ying, of course, maintains that there's nothing that can't be fixed with a little dried hot pepper. Lan Zhan, because his taste in food is boring and lame, disagrees.
On one occasion, Wei Ying had said, "You know, I've had this argument plenty of times with white people, too, Lan Zhan. One time I had to explain to someone the concept of mala, Lan Zhan, mala. I said it's a specific type of numb-spicy, and she goes, but doesn't all spicy food make your mouth go numb? I was like, no, are you fucking kidding me, there's levels to this shit. And she did not understand it at all, don't tell me you'd stoop to their level? Do you also think ketchup is spicy, too?"
"In general, I do not find ketchup to be a necessary or… palatable condiment."
"You're avoiding the question. Oh my God, Lan Zhan, do you think ketchup is spicy?"
"I do not. I also do not believe spiciness to be the end-all, be-all indicator of taste," Lan Zhan said stiffly. There's always a little stubborn clench to his jaw and a slight tick in his eyebrows when he gets like this that Wei Ying loves.
"And what do you think it should be, then, Lan-gege?" Wei Ying challenged.
Lan Zhan, as haughty as Wei Ying had ever seen him, had said that seasoning is a complex art of food chemistry that involves the perfect marriage of flavours. "Overpowering of the flavour profile with one single saturated taste speaks to a lack of sophistication and taste. For, as you say, white people food, that flavour happens to be blandness. In terms of raw ranking, the standards to surpass that are very low. However, spiciness is still one lone flavour." Wei Ying could barely hear him speak over the sound of his own cackles.
"Oh, Lan Zhan," he'd said, wiping away a tear. "You really do crack me up."
Now, however, his preference works perfectly for him as he announces the Jiang family monopoly on the spicy side of the dual-side hot pot divider.
"I feel," declares Nie Huaisang, "that it is distinctly undemocratic and borderline nepotistic for there to be a whole side reserved for you three at the expense of the majority."
"Not like anyone's stopping you from trying, though," retorts Jiang Cheng, fishing up a piece of lotus root to go with his sliced beef.
Nie Huaisang grimaces. "No way, I'm way too fucking sober for that right now."
A few more hours into the night, the majority of them are significantly less sober thanks to Nie Huaisang's supply of booze that mainly consists of cheap boxed Don Simon wine and grocery store champagne. Wen Qing had scowled at him when he'd lugged it in on a school night, Nie Huaisang, are you trying to fucking kill us, and Nie Huaisang had countered with, in Wei Ying's opinion, a pretty convincing case that they should have had this week off anyway, because tradition and filial piety. Or something.
When he and Lan Zhan finally bid goodbye to their friends for the night, he's pleasantly wine drunk and his face feels flushed for more reasons than one. At night, Lan Zhan is quietly luminescent the same way the moon is, high in the sky; it's reflected in his eyes, the muted way the light touches him, bounces off, softly, to encase everything that he touches, including Wei Ying. He closes his eyes and lets out a tiny happy sigh, lets Lan Zhan plant a kiss on his temple and lets the pull of his arms guide him home.
Further reading
Nave, R. Fundamental Forces, hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/Forces/funfor.html.
OpenStax. “Extended Topic: The Four Basic Forces—An Introduction.” Dynamics: Force and Newton’s Laws of Motion, Lumen, courses.lumenlearning.com/physics/chapter/4-8-extended-topic-the-four-basic-forces-an-introduction/.
Rehm, Jeremy. “The Four Fundamental Forces of Nature.” Space.com, Space, 1 Oct. 2019, space.com/four-fundamental-forces.html.