In a mist-like space filled with an air of mystery and enigma, Ai found herself floating on top of what seemed like white clouds. Streaks of golden light pierced through them as Ai looked left and right in confusion.
Where is this place?
She crumpled her dress near her chest in her fist, feeling a sense of bad foreboding enveloping within her.
"Jun...Jun where are you?"
Afraid of being left alone in the vast, endless space of the unknown, she desperately searched for Jun. She held a strong feeling of wanting to be by his side.
She anxiously looked around and wondered to herself.
Is this what Jin saw when he suffered that high fever...
She remembered him calling it a strange and cloudy sort of a place.
She didn't know where she was heading, but as she walked on for a seemingly endless amount of time, she began to hear the sound of somebody weeping.
Who is crying...?
It wasn't one, but two people she could distinctly hear crying their hearts out in grief. The clouds gently fluttered away, revealing the scene of her parents before her.
Mom! Dad!
She ran towards them and called out. "Mom. Dad."
? But Zhou Yichen and Xie Nuying didn't raise their heads to look up neither did they show any reaction. Ai took a look at herself and saw that she looked transparent. It was as if her soul was present at the moment and not her physical body. But more than that, she was shocked upon witnessing what was happening before her.
She saw herself lying in a hospital bed, her eyes shut and not a sound of her breath disturbed the silent air. Right beside the bed, Xie Nuying and Zhou Yichen stood in horror, watching their daughter's dead body lying in front of their eyes.
"This...cannot be real..." Xie Nuying tremblingly held Ai's hand that felt cold and rigid, the sensation piercing her mother's heart like a knife.
"Ai...wake up my dear..." Her fingers quivered as she squeezed her palm. Her voice choked, unable to face the dreaded reality.
"Ai, your Mom and Dad are here. Everything will be fine now. Don't worry, w-we will take good care of you now...We won't let you get hurt anymore, okay?"
The more Xie Nuying spoke, the more her expression rapidly turned whiter and whiter because the deafening silence left after her words brought forth a doom in her heart.
Xie Nuying gently combed her fingers through Ai's hair, doing everything she could to bring any reaction from Ai no matter how tiny it might be.
"Yichen! W-why are you not saying anything?" She shook his arm, bringing him near Ai, "Say something, will you? You always keep chattering so much day in and day out but why are you keeping quiet now!?" The always poise and level-headed Xie Nuying yelled at him for the first time.
Zhou Yichen said nothing. His eyes were simply fixed at his dead daughter's body. They had rushed to Beijing as soon as they heard of Ai's accident but never did he imagine that what they would be greeting was not a sight of their recovering daughter but the news of her death.
He watched her face long and hard to detect any tiny trace of a movement if any but the more time passed, the more his heart sank.
Ai was dead. The apple of his eyes was lying motionless on a hospital bed.
Xie Nuying paled and broke down, weakly hitting on his chest. "Look...Ai will de-definitely respond if you speak something. Even though we lived together, I always knew that she was a daddy's daughter and princess. I have often felt jealous of your relationship. S-So if it's you, she won't stay still like this anymore...So will you please for God's sake talk to Ai?"
It was a voice begging her husband to do something as if that was the last resort left.
"...I wish I could, Nuying," he quietly said.
She looked at him, bewildered. "W-what do you mean?"
Zhou Yichen blankly looked at his wife, his usual joyful gaze devoid of any life. "Our Ai has left us, Nuying."
Silence.
"N-nonsense. Do you think this is the time to fool around? Where has she left us? Can't you see she is right in front of us here?"
Zhou Yichen held her shoulders, his own palms quivering coldly. "Nuying please...I beg you. Don't...Don't make me say it again...and again. I cannot bear this anymore than you can. Our Ai won't wake up anymore..."
Xie Nuying blinked. "I am telling you Yichen, I am not liking this behavior of yours. How is it possible that Ai won't wake up anymore? She is just hurt and resting! I-I know I am not supposed to disturb her rest, but I just want to h-hear her voice...just once. That's the only thing I am asking. Am I asking for too much as her mother?"
Zhou Yichen felt his heart shattering with her hope. Her refusal to accept the reality only tore him apart further.
"So please tell her-"
"Ai is dead, Nuying!"
*SLAP*
Xie Nuying slapped him across his cheek, her wet eyes flaming with fury. "Zhou Yichen, you bastard! How dare you talk about our daughter like that!?"
He felt the sting of the slap on his cheek, but the pain was nothing compared to losing his daughter and seeing the woman he loved grieving over this doom. He could hardly blame her for lashing out.
She trembled. "Oh I g-get it now. Is it that you don't consider Ai as your daughter anymore because we got separated? You finally showed your true colors! Well then fine! She is only my daughter from now on, not ours! Since you don't seem to care about her, get the hell out of here right now!"
Her shaking arm pointed at the door, signaling him to leave.
Zhou Yichen stared at her silently for several long seconds and gently pulled her into his embrace.
"Don't touch me, Yichen! I will never forgive anybody who speaks nonsense about my Ai! Even if he is her own father!"
Zhou Yichen shut his eyes, tears sliding down his cheeks. "I am...I am sorry Nuying. I am really..." his voice broke, "sorry that I cannot say anything else despite my heart resisting so damn hard. But what I can assure you is that..."
His brown eyes glinted with such coldness that threatened to bring the Arctic in Bejing.
"Even if I have to go to hell, I will drag the person out whoever is responsible for my daughter's death by hook or by crook."