Chapter 9

Chapter 9

In my past life, one day when I came home from work, I shouted as soon as I stepped through the door:

“Baby? Mommy’s home! Come see what I bought for you!”

It was the first time I had bought him tanghulu. It was made by an elderly couple outside our residential complex, so it was relatively clean and hygienic.

When Xiao Ye was very small and we pushed him out for walks, he would get so excited that he’d wave his hands and feet every time he saw those candied haws.

But we always felt they were unhealthy and never let him have any, so he could only watch longingly every time.

That morning, he had kept crying for me to hold him, but I was running late for work. In my haste, I pushed him away.

It was likely out of guilt that I decided to buy him the tanghulu.

But when I got home, he didn’t rush into my arms and bring me my slippers as he usually did.

I continued to call out:

“Xiao Ye? Chen Zhiye?”

He only turned his head to glance at me before going back to spinning his little pinwheel.

I held the tanghulu out in front of him, but he showed little interest.

At the time, I even called Chen Ming to complain:

“Your son is so petty! Just because I didn’t hug him this morning, he’s been ignoring me all day!”

It wasn’t until the nanny mentioned that Xiao Ye had been spinning that pinwheel constantly lately, to the point where it was almost broken.

I began to subconsciously observe him, calling his name from time to time.

His responses became fewer and fewer. Eventually, he wouldn’t even look at me.

A massive crack appeared in our happy family of three.

Even though Chen Ming and I tried desperately to stitch it back together, as the child grew, his condition acted like a wedge, ruthlessly driving the gap wider and wider.

At first, we looked for a cause, to no avail.

Then we started looking for someone to blame, also to no avail.

No one was at fault. We were simply unlucky enough to have a child with autism.

We tried to face it with optimism, but the moment we saw the child’s abnormal behavior, all our pretenses were stripped away.

During those years, we didn’t even dare to attend class reunions.

We went through many doctors and institutions, but Xiao Ye’s condition didn’t just fail to improve-it actually worsened.

It wasn’t until we met Dr. Xiao that Chen Ming and I were given a glimmer of hope.

Under her intervention, Xiao Ye learned to nod when he wanted something and shake his head when he didn’t.

But he was still so far from the standards of a normal person.

Once, to comfort me, Dr. Xiao said:

“Xiao Ye’s mother, don’t be in such a hurry.

Although current intervention methods are limited, technology is still developing.

Take the concept of brain-computer interfaces today; perhaps in the future, it can be used to treat autism.

Maybe one day, these children will be able to express themselves and converse freely through some technological means.

It sounds like science fiction, but aren’t we living in the future of the past right now?”

At the time, I felt her words were merely the naivety of a young doctor.

But in this life, Dr. Xiao is no longer just a minor attending physician; she truly pursued the path of scientific research.

At just forty years old this year, she is already a core medical expert at Saibo Medical, having achieved both fame and fortune.

So, I got straight to the point:

“Dr. Xiao, what do you think the probability of success for this project is?”

Dr. Xiao was visibly taken aback for a moment.

I explained politely:

“Sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it.

As the lead attorney on this case, I need to understand this project as much as possible.”

But Dr. Xiao shook her head with a smile:

“No, no, Attorney Zhang, your question is a good one.

I was a bit surprised because when CEO Chen first approached me, he asked a similar question.

In fact, he was even more direct back then, asking: Is this thing real, or is it a scam?

He spoke as if anyone had actually implemented brain-computer interface technology before, haha.”

I was slightly stunned, then gave an awkward smile.

Dr. Xiao continued:

“Actually, those of us in research rarely ask such questions, because the essence of scientific research is discovery through exploration.

We are simply moving in the direction we believe to be correct. As for whether we can succeed, that isn’t our primary consideration.

If you must ask if success is possible, my answer is yes, but it will take time.

Currently, we have completed all animal testing, proving the safety of the Lingxi System implantation and successfully capturing the brainwaves of the test subjects.

At the same time, in the first human trial completed just last month, we made significant progress: Subject No. 4 was a person in a vegetative state for ten years. The Lingxi System captured his thoughts and, through voice conversion, allowed him to ‘speak’ again.

However, implantation trials for children with autism are more complex and cannot enter human trials yet.

But through extracranial sensing, we are already able to roughly capture the stronger conscious thoughts of affected children.

I believe that in the future…”

I couldn’t help but interrupt her.

“Can the Lingxi System really turn children with autism into normal people?”

The moment the words left my mouth, I regretted them.

However, Dr. Xiao didn’t seem to find my urgent tone strange.

She paused for a moment, then laughed heartily.

“Haha, Attorney Zhang, the purpose of the Lingxi System has never been to turn autistic children into ‘normal’ people!”

I was stunned and looked at her in confusion.

Dr. Xiao took a sip of water and asked me a question in return.

“Attorney Zhang, how does the law define a ‘normal’ person?”

I answered without thinking, “At the very least, they must possess full capacity for civil conduct.”

She continued, “And how does the law define this ‘full capacity for civil conduct’?”

I wasn’t sure where she was going with this, so I answered casually, “The simplest criteria is that they must be at least eighteen years old.”

In a gentle yet swift rebuttal, Dr. Xiao asked, “Then by your logic, are all children not ‘normal’ people?”

I froze, my mind momentarily failing to keep up with the logic.

Dr. Xiao’s tone became much more serious.

“In your legal system, even death row inmates have independent legal rights, yet children alone lack an independent legal status.”

In the past, I had been a top-tier debater. No matter how tricky the question, I could dismantle it instantly.

But when the topic of the debate became children-and the Xiao Ye who once existed-I couldn’t say a single word.

Dr. Xiao continued to share her professional insights.

“Humans have been studying autism since the 1940s.

“At first, people defined the condition as being ‘simple-minded,’ which later evolved into Autism Spectrum Disorder.

“Today, we have a newer perspective:

“Perhaps it isn’t a disease at all.

“Extensive research shows that the consciousness of autistic children is complete; it’s just that their sensory nerves are misaligned, leaving them unable to express themselves in our way.

“In other words, they have their own way of expressing themselves-it’s just on a higher dimension than ours.

“And precisely because we cannot understand them, they resort to those ‘abnormal’ behaviors when they try to make us understand.

“Attorney Zhang, I don’t know if you’ve ever considered this:

“In this vast world, all things in nature have their own language.

“But because we so-called ‘normal humans’ are too arrogant, we are always obsessed with making others learn our language, much like training a dog.

“It’s the same with children. We demand they grow up to be just like us, yet we expect them to achieve more than we ever did.

“This is the greatest injustice.

“Returning to the issue of autism, I believe that autism is not a disease that must be cured.

“It is another natural state of the human brain.

“What the Lingxi System aims to do is not to treat or correct, but to translate.

“Through electrode embedding, we have summarized the brainwave patterns of primates and collected massive amounts of data on the words and deeds of autistic children. Based on this, we use algorithms to compile an ‘Autism Dictionary.’

“In the end, it’s not the children who need this technology-it’s us.

“We are the ones who need to understand our children.”

I suddenly remembered that in my previous life, every time Xiao Ye went to class, Dr. Xiao would always make inexplicable gestures or strange sounds.

It turned out she was mimicking him, trying to get the child’s attention.

The reason Dr. Xiao’s intervention methods were so effective perhaps wasn’t because she had some secret trick, but because she respected the children enough.

Her familiar voice pulled my thoughts back to reality.

“Of course, I know that in reality, parents of autistic children experience pain beyond the imagination of ordinary people, and they have already done their best.

“But since the pain is known and certain, we need all the more to break through inherent concepts and view the problem from a higher dimension.

“Only then can that pain be seen through and transcended.

“Attorney Zhang, imagine this:

“If you were the family member of an autistic child, besides wanting the child to become ‘normal’…

“Wouldn’t you also want to know what your child truly wants to express beneath those strange words and behaviors?”

I let the question pass with a smile, not answering her hypothetical.

When the conversation ended, I asked Dr. Xiao for a lollipop-peach flavored.

In my previous life, every time Xiao Ye finished a lesson, he would receive a piece of candy as a reward.

He would always pick the peach-flavored one from a large tray of assorted candies.

I had always thought it was just one of his repetitive behaviors.

After all, in my eyes, he didn’t understand anything.

But at this moment, a thought suddenly occurred to me:

What if he just really liked peach flavor?