The Light in the Duty Room

He once carried someone out of a fire. He couldn't save them. Six years later, he was transferred back to that building to conduct a fire safety inspection, and discovered that twenty-three minutes were missing from the records of that night.

Zhou Wei spent five years in the national comprehensive fire and rescue service. He once carried someone out of a fire, but couldn't save them. Later, he passed the civil service exam and joined the emergency management office in his subdistrict, conducting fire inspections, filling out transfer forms, and taking flood-control shifts. Twelve ledgers sat on his desk, neatly arranged by month. Everyone thought he planned to keep at it until retirement.

Six years later, as a staff member of the subdistrict emergency management office, he returned to that building. At the very bottom of an archive box, he found the dispatch record from that night: he had been in Fire Engine No. 2. He also found the patrol log from that night: sometime between 23:41 and 00:04, a page had been replaced. The team leader's signature belonged to his mentor.

The twelve ledgers held the most shameful cracks in the city. And the person most determined to plaster them over was the one who had taught him to write his first note.