The Yaoguai: Part One (complete)

As a photographer, Sun Bao worked an odd variety of jobs to make ends meet. He’d worked at a chain photography studio, trying to get families together to capture the ‘perfect moment’ for a christmas card. He had done crime scene photography, witnessing things gristly, heartbreaking, and with enough dead bodies to turn him off meat all together. Wildlife photography had been fine, save for the fact he was allergic to bees, and one outing landed him in the emergency room.

In any case, Sun Bao had always known his fate would be found in the lens of a camera. So, on a chilly evening during a charity event to save historic works of art, he was tasked with taking candid photos of the festivities for the charity’s website. While he meandered around, trying to remain unseen by the crowd, he spotted a girl through the lens of his camera.

She was beautiful and quite tall, with long hair styled so it was sleek and shiny. Her eyes turned, locking on the lens right as Sun took the picture. For a moment there was stillness between them, like two deer caught in headlights. She smiled, then he smiled.

“You weren’t supposed to look!” he teased.

“I certainly hope you won’t be using that.” She touched her soft cheek, and Sun could see the red paint on her nails. “I’ve never been one for cameras.”

“I find that hard to believe.” Sun was instantly smitten. “I could send you a copy for approval, if you’d like?”

The woman smirked. “Very sneaky, Mr. Photographer. You’d best give me your card. I think it’ll be better if I find you.”

Sun handed her his business card, but he wouldn’t know her name until some time had passed. He received an email with an inquiry for a job to take pictures at a wedding. After accepting the job, Sun was asked to come by the venue so he could take engagement photos for the invitations.

Usually, these things took place at a church, a garden, or some other location with beautiful scenery. Sun ended up at an old hotel that appeared to be crumbling from the outside. The old grotesques and gargoyles lining the walls were faded beyond recognition, and there was no sign of paint on the walls. 

The doors nearly screamed on their hinges as they were opened. But rather than a ghost or demon shambling out, it was her; the beautiful girl from the charity. She waved as Sun approached, a joyous smile on her face. “They’re not here yet,” she said of the couple-to-be. “So why not come in and scout some places?”

Sun smiled, forgetting how creepy and dilapidated the place appeared. “So it isn’t your wedding?”

“Goodness, no,” she chuckled. She extended her hand. “I’m Mari Qiangwei. It’s my brother, James, who is getting married.”

Sun couldn’t stop smiling as he followed Mari’s tall, beautiful pear-shaped figure. She showed him around the old hotel, which must have been grand in its heyday. Now it looked like the sort of place you’d go to die rather than have a wedding.

“My family has owned this place for generations,” Mari said. “This is the Wild Rose. The ballroom is just over here. It’s where the main ceremony will be taking place.”

The once-vivid red carpets were now stained and browning. The embellished wallpaper was peeling away from the walls, and the ghosts of odors past wafted by on their merry way. The ballroom wasn’t as grand as Sam had pictured, either. It was quite narrow, and the marble floor had seen better days. 

“Our parents are giving my brother this place as a wedding present,” Mari said.

Sun was taking a few shots to check the lighting, and how the dingy room photographed in general. “What does he plan to do with it?” To Sun, it felt like a cruel joke. He would rather receive a crisp five-dollar bill than this crumbling nightmare. 

“He’ll do what our family has done for generations - run it.” Mari watched Sun with a keen eye before approaching him. “It’s not operational right now. But James’ fiance is quite wealthy and wants to invest in something with him. They can’t have children, so...” She stopped herself, as if realizing this was something too intimate to share with a strange photographer.

“Will you be helping them?” Sun asked out of curiosity. “I mean, with the hotel and all.”

Mari looked at him, her soft eyes darting over his face before she gave him a soft smile. “I’m hoping to do some traveling before I come back here.”

“Where would you want to go?”

Mari scrunched up her face in thought. “Anywhere really,” she answered with a shrug. “Where would you want to go?” 

Sun had traveled to many places, but there had always been one he wanted to visit just to see where it would lead him. “Probably China,” he answered. “I’ve never been, and I would like to find my family there.”

Mari’s brow knit together. “What do you mean?”

Sun sighed and gave a soft smile out to hide his own uncertainty. “You don’t wanna hear my sob story. You’ve got your own plate, I have mine.”

Mari stepped closer to him. “How about we talk over dinner?”

Sun looked at her with surprise. Mari’s cheeks were flushed and she was fidgeting in place. “After this shoot is done. How about you and I go have dinner somewhere and talk about our plates?”

It was the first of many dates with Mari. Sun told her how he was adopted. Mari revealed her family was struggling and relying heavily on her brother’s marriage. There was also a lot riding on Mari to find a rich and successful husband, a pressure she didn’t quite appreciate. 

“My family has some very strange traditions,” Mari told him. “My brother and I are practically all that’s left, aside from my mom and uncle.” She always seemed nervous when discussing her family. Sun had noticed, when introducing her to his family, that she seemed to attach more to them. He had barely met her family, aside from her brother, whom he had to do business with.

“My family has always hosted these strange dinners. My mother makes it a point to invite as many people as possible, but right now, things are so hard.”

“What’s going on?” Sun asked, out of concern. “Tell me. Maybe I can help?”

Mari struggled to tell the story. She wanted to share her odd family’s quirks and passions, but for so long, she had felt they were something that should never be revealed. “It’s the hotel. If we can get it fixed, I feel like my mom will be able to relax a little. It’s been our family’s means of living for so long. I don’t think she knows much else besides her roses.”

Sun kissed Mari and she smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ll help you as much as I can. Perhaps one night we can host one of those dinners for your mother.”

“No!” An expression Sun had never seen before came over Mari. She looked possessed, almost on fire. As she settled and realized how her voice had changed, she shook her head. “My mother is very particular. She would not appreciate help that way. I’m warning you now, stay away from those dinners - even if she invites you.” She shuddered. “They’re very strange.”

Sun was a bit unnerved, and rather than have any sort of confrontation, he decided it was best to listen to Mari and agree. But already, his curiosity was piqued. 

Between then and the wedding, Mari and Sun were building a relationship, and were falling in love. Already, they had been intimate, and Mari had been staying with Sun often, especially as the wedding drew nearer. 

When the wedding day arrived, it was a bleak affair. Most of the attendees were smiling, but the atmosphere of the Wild Rose made everything feel like some sort of experimental play. Some of the faces in the crowd appeared ghastly and gaunt. Of Mari’s family, there was only her mother and uncle. Both stood at the very back of the ballroom, wearing black clothing that seemed better fit for a funeral than a wedding. The groom barely smiled at all, which Sun tried to reason as nerves. 

“Why does this feel like a death more than a beginning?” Sun whispered to Mari as they were going to the reception. Mari seemed like the only bright spot to him. She had been crying through the wedding, although that was nothing Sun hadn’t seen before.

After the wedding, Mari revealed to Sun that she had purchased them tickets to China. They would go for a vacation, while also trying to hunt down Sun’s birth family. Sun was overjoyed that Mari made the effort to do this for him. They would document their entire trip, detailing every moment as well as the search for Sun’s origins.

The search took them to shady places, and some felt extremely dangerous. But even when Sun was losing hope, Mari was ever enthusiastic. And the blog they were keeping about the trip was slowly growing in popularity. Each day, there were more and more visitors on their page. Mari’s highly detailed accounts, coupled with Sun’s photographs, were getting attention from some very high places. The investigation led them to lots of dead ends, but eventually the popularity of their blog helped them gain leads.

But soon, Sun came to the realization that what was most important on this trip hadn’t been finding where he came from. Through it all, what stuck out the most to him was everything Mari had done, and was willing to do to help him.

Sun proposed to Mari, and she accepted. 

Once they returned home, Mari moved in with Sun right away, despite some evident reluctance from her family. Mari kept updating the blog and answering questions from their followers. Then she came to Sun with remarkable news. A publisher wanted to turn their trip into a book!

Sun and Mari worked hard to update and edit the upcoming book. Once published, they went on tour to promote it. The book grew in popularity, and was optioned for a movie. Overnight, Sun and Mari had become a massive success. They were offered several more book deals, including one about the history of the Qiangwei family. It was at this suggestion that Mari shut down. She refused, and even started to get angry. In order to calm her down, Sun suggested they do a book about their upcoming wedding, and how the Qiangwei family was going to expand. Sun was going to take Mari’s name.

In the midst of all this, Mari’s brother, James, and his wife were having problems. Remodeling the Wild Rose was taking a toll on them, but James’ wife seemed to be going through something of her own. Mari often got calls from James in absolute hysterics. Throughout them she could hear his wife in the background, screaming and wailing. 

While Sun and Mari were helping to write the script for the movie based on their book, Mari got a call that brought her to tears. James’ wife had died. They immediately went home to help with the funeral, and to take care of James and the family. Sun and Mari decided to cancel their wedding, and instead get married at the courthouse. Despite all this, Sun was happy. He didn’t care about the wedding. He just wanted to remain with Mari as long as he could.

Their success brought them a lot of job opportunities and income. They were often kept away on business, but Mari made time to visit her family back home. Everything was going smoothly, so much so that Sun and Mari had begun planning on having a baby.

“One last trip home,” Mari said. “Then we will get serious about having a baby.”

“I don’t understand why your family has never come to visit us once,” Sun sighed. “What about when the baby comes? We can’t take it back and forth on a plane so much.”

“We’ll figure it out.” Mari said vaguely. “You know how they are.”

No, he didn’t. Sun had barely spoken to his in-laws. They didn’t like him at all when he and Mari first started dating, and through all their successes, they had only been in contact with Mari. They had reacted with stern and condescending aloofness to the idea of their nuptials. 

After Mari departed, Sun worked on turning the empty office into a nursery for the baby. He cleaned everything out, and was in the process of painting the walls when his phone rang. He thought it was Mari, but when he answered, it was her mother on the other end.

“Sun,” she said in a clipped, serious tone. “I have some bad news.”

Her next words caused Sun to drop the full bucket of paint on the ground, and fall on his knees into the puddle. Mari was dead. There had been an accident, and Mari’s neck was broken. Sun could barely register the words, but his grief was instant and all-consuming. 

James came to pick up Sun and take him to the funeral. By that point, Sun had locked himself away, not taking anything in except for Mari’s coffin. He saw nothing else, and heard nothing throughout the funeral. He had to be led around by James or his mother-in-law, Fei. They refused the calls of his parents and sister, who were trying to talk to Sun and take him home. But Fei insisted he was home, and well-taken care of.

“Mari would want him here,” Sun heard Fei tell them in a saccharine tone. “I’m sure Sun will feel better being around the things and places Mari loved.”

For a while, Sun barely ate or slept. He stopped bathing as well. His grief had sunk him into a depression in which nothing mattered, and nothing came through. James and Fei took Sun to a hospital to recover. He stayed there for months.

Placed on medication and given regular therapy, Sun was given a camera to take pictures around the hospital. He was able to see the world again through a lens, but without the camera, it was hard to take anything in. Even as he got better, the camera became his safety blanket. As long as he had it, he felt safe to return home, or at least into the care of James and Fei.

“You’re a Qiangwei now,” Fei said. “You will stay with us. It’s what Mari would have wanted, and don’t you want to make her spirit happy?”

Sun was frozen by Fei’s words. “Yes, of course,” he answered listlessly. 

Sun was taken back to the Wild Rose, which he noticed looked different now than before. Looking through his camera, the place looked completely opposite from what he remembered. Before, it has been an old, decaying building sagging under its own weight. Now it looked new. It was painted red, and the statues had distinct faces where before they had been worn away. Inside the carpets were clean and vivid red, the embellished wallpaper clung tightly to the walls, and no seams could be seen. The air smelled of disinfectant and luxurious perfumes. 

Sun was given a room on the family floor where James and Fei lived, with Fei’s brother, Bo. There was also a supposed cousin, who refused to leave their room. Fei or Bo delivered meals to their door, as well as whatever supplies they sent for.

Sun spent most of his time in his room or wandering the grounds.  He was never sure whether the hotel had guests or not. He wasn’t even sure if he had seen an employee beyond the few Qiangweis that lived there. All he knew, he saw through his camera lens. He would take pictures, sending them to Mari’s email address. He would write her long letters, expressing his love, his guilt, and his continuing dreams for them that could no longer be. 

One afternoon, Sun was outside taking photographs of the countless rose bushes around the hotel. Fei tended to them religiously, and got angry if anyone plucked even one blossom. There were signs all around warning to not touch the roses, to not stand too close to them, and not even to water them without permission. Sun hated these roses. Daily he dreamed of ripping them from the ground and starting a bonfire with their remains. He took pictures of them, printing them out and tearing them up before burning them in the trash can on the veranda.

He had been arguing with Fei lately. She was insistent that she take over his finances. Sun had let his sister handle them while he was in the hospital. Fei argued that because Sun was a Qiangwei now, a Qiangwei should take care of him. Sun hadn’t even seen his sister since he came to the Wild Rose. Fei thought it best he had no visitors until he was ‘completely better’, something Sun argued might never happen.

“You are so selfish. Mari would want me to take care of you!” Fei didn’t seem to blink at the mention of her child. In fact, it didn’t seem like she wanted to mourn at all. She used Mari for everything against Sun, and it usually worked. Sun would kowtow to her commands, but on the inside, his anger was festering. 

That afternoon, as he wandered through the garden and entertained more fantasies of destroying Fei’s precious roses, he reached out to pluck one. Instantly a wasp appeared and stung his hand. Sun panicked. He had to get back to the hotel for his epipen. His hand was already starting to swell, and it was becoming hard to breathe. He was trying his hardest to reach the hotel when he passed the well house. The ground opened under him, wood splintered, and he went tumbling through the dark air. 

He landed with a horrible thud. He still couldn’t breathe, and he was in agony from the fall. Sun wondered if he was going to die there as he gazed up at the sunlight above him. He rolled his head to the side, gasping what might be his final breaths. There was a scattering of dead roses all around him. Some were dried and turning to dust, others were rotting, and some were new, maybe even seconds old. His vision was growing dim and blurry, but he could see something in the shadows. There were shelves, full of round objects. 

As Sun was beginning to lose consciousness, someone stood over him. Someone with a red silk robe with long white hair that draped down their chest. They reached down and placed a palm over Sun’s swollen throat. “I will save you,” they said, in a voice like a hollow wind. “But you will serve me.”

Sun’s lashes fluttered. As his vision swam, he saw a vision of a headless woman standing behind the first figure. The headless woman came up to him and knelt by his side, stroking his face and slapping away the hand of the other. “You get away from him!” she cried. She turned back to Sun, cupping his swelling face in her hand. “Oh, my poor Sun. what has happened to you?”

“He’s dying, of course. Good thing he isn’t like you. He might have a chance.”

The headless ghost turned towards the other again. “I remained to protect him!”

“And you’ve done such a wonderful job at it.” the other snarled sarcastically. “Now, it’s my turn.”

“No, no. Please, no. You can’t! Don’t touch him! Don’t!”

The headless woman was pushed aside as the white-haired figure placed their hand on Sun’s throat again. Their long fingers curled around it, then moved up to caress his jaw. They tugged open his lips, and a white mist spilled out, pooling along the ground. The headless woman quickly shooed the mist away, making it dissipate from Sun’s body. The swelling in his face subsided and he took in a long, ragged breath. 

“He’s breathing!” the headless woman gasped excitedly, clutching her hands where her mouth would be. 

The white-haired figure grabbed Sun up. “I’ll take him to the surface. Now that the door has been broken, I can finally see outside.”

The headless woman took hold of them. “No! It is my job to keep you down here! I am your shackles!”

The white-haired figure turned to laugh in her face. “You can do that. You can keep me down here, but then you keep him here as well.”

The headless woman’s grip began to loosen.

“He will see what lies down here come morning.”

The headless woman let go of him, and the white-haired figure’s laugh vibrated through the empty chamber. “He will still be mine,” they said. “You cannot change that.” 

“I’ll pull you back each time you attempt to reach him!” she growled. “You will not find freedom!”

The white-haired figure chuckled. “You can try.”

Sun awoke to the taste of ash on his tongue and the smell of decay in the air. As he rose, he found himself lying in the garden. It was early morning. The sky was painted pink and purple and the moon was slowly sinking, paling in the sun. He sat up, dusting himself off before checking his hand, where the wasp stung him. His fingers were still swollen, but he had somehow survived the night.

He entered the hotel to find James standing behind the front desk. James was pale and thin, with dark circles around his eyes. His sleek black hair and face looked immobile, but when he saw Sun, he unfroze in surprise.

“Where were you?” James rushed out from behind the desk to approach him. “We’ve been looking for hours!”

Sun furrowed his brow. “I was in the garden. Did you not see me?” He kept his hand down, not wanting James to see it. 

“I looked there myself,” James insisted. “I saw nothing in the garden last night!”

Sun just shook his head and went upstairs to his room. Once he was inside and had locked the door behind him, he looked at his camera. He scanned the pictures, seeing the ones of the roses he took before he passed out. After those were several files of nothing but black. He went through each one, counting them. There were at least fifteen. But then he started seeing something in them. It was faint, but it looked like there was a face in the blackness. With each passing file, it became a little more vivid. 

“Do you see me, Sun?” The voice whispered in his ear like a trickle of cold water. It sent shivers through him as it flowed down his back. The chill crept into his bones, and he remained frozen as the face on the camera became much more vivid. It was skeletal, with pincers. Golden eyes began to glow, and Sun dropped his camera.

A long, spindly hand picked up the camera and handed it back to Sun. 

“You dropped this.”