The first thing Yao Shen notices about Gao Wu''s room is that it''s very messy, considering he had just arrived in Hengdian.


    "He didn''t have any scenes scheduled on the first day of shooting, which means he arrived yesterday." He waves around at the disorganised state of the room. "Not even you could have done so much damage in such a short time."


    Xin Hulei shoots him a pointed look. "I''d wager I could."


    Yao Shen can''t help the wave of fondness that bubbles up inside him. He likes that Xin Hulei can be competitive even about negative things.


    They start searching through everything, for Gao Wu''s cellphone in particular, but for anything that can give them a clue too.


    "Wear this if you touch something," Xin Hulei says, taking a pair of silicone gloves from his pocket and handing them to Yao Shen.. "I won''t leave any fingerprints, but you will."


    "You don''t have fingerprints?" Yao Shen asks, two parts amused two parts horrified about it.


    "I have them, but they won''t be able to extract any useful information from them."


    Yao Shen doesn''t even want to know. He puts on the silicone gloves and goes back to rummaging through Gao Wu''s stuff. It feels very disrespectful to go through a dead person''s belongings like this, but Yao Shen tells himself it''s for a good cause.


    They''ve been looking for less than five minutes when Xin Hulei finds something. "Look at this."


    He shows Yao Shen a crumpled piece of paper he took out from the trash can where they can read a few scrambled annotations in Gao Wu''s chicken scratch.


    Yao Shen struggles to make sense of the random notes, which seem to be mostly work-related appointments, but then he notices what drew Xin Hulei''s attention.


    [Find a way out from meeting at 20:30 think of excuse or he''ll go after you]


    "Who''s ''he''?" Yao Shen asks, inspecting the rest of the paper for any more useful information. "Could it be the person who killed him...assuming that''s what happened?"


    "Ye Fang found him outside at night, maybe the overgrown garden was their meeting point," Xin Hulei suggests.


    In a way it makes sense; according to Ye Fang it''s a secluded spot only used by the drama''s crew and cast, but it''s not exactly private. Ye Fang heard about the spot from someone who used it regularly, and only minutes after she happened upon Gao Wu''s body, someone else got there too.


    He tells this to Xin Hulei.


    "Maybe that''s exactly why he chose that spot." He underlines the words ''he''ll go after you'' with his finger. "Maybe he thought it would be a safe place to meet "him"."


    Yao Shen grimaces. "Bad gamble."


    They''re still working based on suppositions and guesses, but Yao Shen has a bad feeling about the whole thing. He''s becoming more convinced that Gao Wu''s death wasn''t natural at all.


    "Should we take that with us or leave it here for the police to find?"


    "Leave it, let''s just take his phone if we can find it."


    Yao Shen crumples the piece of paper again inside his fist, in the same way Gao Wu must have done, and throws it in the trash.


    They keep searching but don''t find anything useful. When Yao Shen is about to give up and suggest they stop, his eyes catch on something black and reflective shining from between a pile of discarded clothes on the floor.


    He recognises Gao Wu''s mobile as soon as he sees it.


    "The battery is drained," he tells Xin Hulei trying unsuccessfully to turn it on.


    "We''ll charge it when we get back," Xin Hulei says, pocketing the phone and heading towards the door.


    His hand is already on the doorknob when they hear sounds of approaching voices and footsteps outside.


    Yao Shen holds on to the back of Xin Hulei''s costume and drags him into the open bathroom. He closes the door behind them at the same time that the hotel room''s door opens.


    "Please let us know if there''s anything else you need," a polite male voice says. "The Three Treasures hotel will be happy to aid the investigations in any way we can."


    Both Xin Hulei and Yao Shen go still as the police enter the room.


    For a moment there''s only the sound of shoes across the floor, but then a curt female voice asks, "What do you think we''re looking at here?"


    A man answers her. "We don''t have the coroner''s report yet, but I think it was foul play."


    "Why?"


    The man chuckles, but there''s no real humour in it. "Let''s just say that I think this production crew didn''t make the right offerings during their opening ceremony."


    The woman hums. "That''s true, there''s been talk about a lot of weird stuff happening ever since they started filming back in the spring. Things were quiet for a while during most of the summer and the beginning of fall, but now they''re back and this happens?"


    "Right, the timing is off. And his medical records confirm that he had no chronic illnesses or known congenital defects." He sucks on a breath. "We need to wait for the autopsy, but I don''t think sudden death is going to be in it."


    "Yeah, well, this place is a mess. I''ll start with the bedroom, you can take the living room," the woman says as her footsteps move away from the bathroom in which Yao Shen and Xin Hulei are hiding, heads pressed to the door.


    "I''ll take a look in the bathroom first, you''ll find all kinds of interesting things there."


    Yao Shen only has the time to look behind him and shoot Xin Hulei a panicked look, before Xin Hulei takes his hand, and vanishes both of them out of there.


    "Fuck that was close," Yao Shen says, as soon as they''re back in his trailer.


    Xin Hulei merely hums. "But now we know that those investigators will definitely want to talk with us, and soon."


    ---


    The rest of the day passes by slowly. The filming pace is no less frantic, but Yao Shen''s mind is miles away.


    Moreover, there''s an odd vibe on set now that the shock of Gao Wu''s death has settled in.


    During a break between scenes Yao Shen overhears two crew members talking. "I listen to a True Crime podcast, and they say that 9 times out of 10, the killer is always someone close to the victim."


    "But Gao laoshi didn''t have any family, so, who..."


    "Don''t you remember? He and "that" person were very close for a while there..."


    The two of them glance around, but when their eyes land on Yao Shen they quickly move away, talking loudly about something else.


    Yao Shen tries to put the whole thing out of hid mind, but he''s disconcerted by the idea that his coworkers would believe him a suspect in Gao Wu''s death.


    The worst part is that he can''t even fault that logic. There are plenty of witnesses of him spending time with Gao Wu on set while he was trying to ignore his burgeoning attraction to Xin Hulei, and even photos online of that ill-fated date.


    The question is, how long will it take for the police to arrive at the same conclusions?


    ---


    The first thing Yao Shen does when they arrive in Xin Hulei''s apartment is charge Gao Wu''s  phone, using the first free socket he finds. He sits up on the counter looking down as the screen lights up, while Xin Hulei leans against the counter opposite his, with his arms crossed in front of his chest.


    "What do you think his password is?" Yao Shen asks Xin Hulei when, as expected, the fingerprint reader doesn''t recognise his digitals.


    Xin Hulei takes the phone from him and scans his own thumbprint, unlocking the phone with a melodious click.


    Yao Shen shakes his head in rueful amusement. Demon king privileges; unexpectedly handy, even in the 21st century.


    A cursory look through Gao Wu''s text messages doesn''t reveal anything useful.


    "It''s just back and forth between him and his manager. He''s telling her he won''t get to Hengdian on time." Yao Shen pauses. "All my scenes with him where crossed off in the callsheet, so that''s our timeline."


    Xin Hulei nods. "He arrived in Hengdian sometime yesterday, most likely in the afternoon."


    "That just makes it even more odd that his room would be in such a state," Yao Shen says. "He must have spent only a few hours there before going out, and uh, meeting his end."


    "Maybe we weren''t the first ones in the room," Xin Hulei says, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the kitchen counter. "Or maybe he was looking for something."


    Yao Shen leaves the text messaging app, and goes check WeChat instead.


    There are very few conversation threads in Gao Wu''s profile. Just four. Ye Fang, Ye Fang''s chatgroup, Yao Shen -- still nicknamed ''cute gege'' -- and Jia Hao.


    Yao Shen is most surprised to see the conversation with Jia Hao on top of the list.


    "Jia Hao texted him on the day he died," Yao Shen says.


    He opens the conversation and reads Gao Wu''s last words.