This story was written by my friend Kevin and is narratively a sequel to Alek’s original story. It’s the third installment in the Short Story series and only uses words from my Short Story 2, counting multiplicity.

Lin waited at the top of the mountain. He had never known Zhou to break a promise before, but Zhou always arrived belatedly from slowly eating his favorite food: fancy instant noodles in burned round boxes. Lin decided to idly do math problems on the mountain for a month to give Zhou time to come. If Zhou didn’t show up by then, Lin would make a plan to go to Hu’s house some night to find Zhou’s dead body in a video-game.

Lin was in flashcard review gear when Zhou screamed behind him. Lin scrambled and turned around: Zhou ran reluctantly as a cop attempted to shoot him but missed by a little margin. Lin threw a flashcard and the officer crumpled. Lin remembered to say a muffled sorry to the cop and then sped towards Zhou.

Zhou chuckled anxiously, “Lin–or as I like to call you, IN–you’re crazy for taking down that cop!”

“I would say he’s gladly settled into a nap, he can probably recover in a year or 3 days,” Lin laughed. “Being crazy is the key to success in life. Now, we gotta go down this mountain on (7-5) large flashcards!”

“Yes, IN! Winter is a great time for slowly falling on snow over a distance!” Zhou pulled on the flashcard gear and meticulously started to not ascent the mountain. A short time later, they were surprised by a wind that dumped lots of snow from the mountain top, covering the head of Lin but luckily only thinly coating Zhou.

“Zhou, I can’t see, and the arms of Lin are literally shocked!” Lin called. “Am I terminal?”

“No IN, you’re too young for persistent sleep! We must go quickly–I’m looking back at the Large Snow Boss–so I’ll make a road for you!” It was grueling work, but Zhou spent time painstakingly checking the ground and frequently signaled the next road to Lin with his important flashcard voice.

Finally, they reached the base of the mountain safely. Zhou found his room nearby and walked Lin away from the blizzard.

“Wu- hu, that was exciting!” Lin called happily. “I can see again too! Sorry for freaking out up there, Zhou.”

“I enjoyed that, the rescue was a peaceful process,” Zhou whispered with a tired noise. He sat down at a desk and handed Lin a shoebox. “Want to play flashcard Sorry?”

And from that day onwards Zhou was a little bit better at achieving the items on his cards.