Feng Jiao Xue snapped out of her dazed as she tried to stop herself from remembering. It's over now and she doesn't need to dig up what is already in the past. A past that is better off buried deep within her consciousness.
"Xue-Chan?" Lou Xi asked, trying to bring her back from her daydream worriedly.
"Sorry, I am fine, just fine. It's a little bit... no, it is so hard to believe that we finally achieved the freedom we dreamed of" She replied with a warm smile.
Lou Xi looked at her expression and his soft gaze matched the pure, small smile that forms in his.
"Silly~" He pinched her nose lightly with a fond and loving gaze, like an indulgent big brother towards his beloved little sister. Full of love, full of affection and unreserved pampering.
As he gazed down at Feng Jiao Xue, Lou Xi couldn't help but feel surreal. Finally... finally his sister is free from endless darkness. They can pull themselves out of the quagmire they grew up in.
Lou Xi couldn't help imagining the future ahead of them. Perhaps he could take Feng Jiao Xue to concerts like normal teens do. What do normal big brothers do for their little sisters? He wonders and silently worries butt as he thought more of that, he couldn't help but chuckle.
"What's so funny?" Feng Jiao Xue asked curiously at the sound. Lou Xi may always have a mild smile but his laughter are few and in between after all.
Lou Xi gazed down at Feng Jiao Xue with a teasing smile. "Just remembering the times when you where half awake and run straight to the wall" He replied in jest making Feng Jiao Xue roll his eyes at him.
"That was one time. Let it go. It wasn't even that funny" She huffed as she playfully punched his shoulder.
Lou Xi just laughed louder. 'Worrying about being a good normal big brother... he would take that any day than worrying if the weapons he made... were enough to bring his sister back the next day'
However, such a sweet dream was short-lived.
"Crash!!!" The glass wall shatters, a physical manifestation of what is to come to their world.
Lou Xi's eyes widened as he twirled them around in a flash, protecting Feng Jiao Xue and for a moment, time froze before the single bullet became a rain of metal.
Feng Jiao Xue had already reached for her own gun, having reacted immediately and turned the couch around to be used as a cover.
"Are you alright? What the hell were you thinking?!" She asked the other worriedly checking him over injuries before cursing and tearing her skirt and using it to bandage his shoulder to temporarily stop the bleeding.
She had reacted fast enough but Lou Xi's protective nature acted first.
His first thought wasn't to fight back but to protect her while she had already moved to cover and attack before she was pulled by him and the bullet had grazed his shoulder deeply as his action had momentarily taken seconds of delay before they fully took cover.
"I'll be fine. How did they find this place?! We have set up a contract! The Organization can't do anything to us anymore!" Lou Xi furiously said, gritting his teeth.
She pushed her gun to him, ripping the couch's cover with swift movement. She took another gun meant for longer range hidden inside the couch but could not see the enemies due to the lack of light.
However, her eyes narrowed at the onslaught of bullets.
It took a few moments but still managed to calculate some areas by pinpointing which direction the bullets were coming from.
"We gave them too much faith. Stay here, Lou Xi" She firmly told the other before firing back, disabling the other to respond.
When that no longer works, she rolled over and hid behind a pillar occasionally firing to where she knew the others were hidden in the trees. It may not be one hundred percent accurate, but she had confidence in her marksmanship.
True to her thoughts, most of her bullets landed on their target despite the random position. Their enemy was wise enough to not get close knowing that she can take their life like a reaper if they appear close enough to her.
Lou Xi, despite being more adept at supporting her as a doctor, supplier, spy and tech guy, was no amateur either.
He calculated the trajectories faster than Feng Jiao Xue allowing him to have more accurate shots.
"Clack, clack!" The gun sounded, barrels empty. Feng Jiao Xue threw her gun away in frustration.
"Darn it!" She cursed when she ran out of bullets.
Her eyes meet Lou Xi who shook his head at her near one of the hidden exit. All passages has been blocked.
Their enemy infiltrated and trapped them already. It was clear that this assassination have long been planned and slowly acted upon.
Feng Jiao Xue face darkened further and instantly rolls on the floor to a pillar, Lou Xi kicking a table from the opposite wall that slides beside her to give her cover as he continues to shoot. Feng Jiao Xue didn't pause as she immediately went running towards the closest painting and took out one of Lou Xi's most prized gun creation.
Tearing the painting down and taking the gun, she loaded the weapon and Feng Jiao Xue did not waste a single second before firing back again, this time more fiercely.
Lou Xi takes shots one at a time, not a bullet wasted while Feng Jiao Xue aggressively rains bullets upon the general direction of the infiltrators.
The bullets were as fast as light, taking down the hidden enemies one after the other. Even the branches could not hinder the silver flashes and each bullet fired, was sure to bloom a flower of blood on its target.
One by one, the bullets stopped but she did not relax and went bravely to the shattered floor to ceiling glass window overlooking the forest. Making sure that she is covered.
Like the grim reaper standing tall illuminated by the moon, she shot every suspicious movement, be it the movement from the wind, the twitch from an animal or the fleeing enemy, she did not care but as she shot what she supposed as the last enemy, she heard clicks all around the room this time before she could react, she was falling down.
She looked wide eyed as Lou Xi smiled sadly, hands reached out, at the final attempt to save her life. Feng Jiao Xue's eyes widened in shock and disbelief. Her mind not registering what she was seeing as Lou Xi's figure slowly turner smaller and smaller in her view, her body feeling weightless as she fastly plummeted to the softened ground before Lou Xi was engulfed by blazing fire after a loud bang.
"Lou Xi!!!" Feng Jiao Xue called out, her voice filled with pain and distress. She couldn't hear anything else but her heart breaking into pieces. Not the sound of the burning cracks of the flames as their home was ablaze, nor the loud 'thud!' of her body as the explosion threw her away midair and hit the tree instead of the soft grass below.
She struggled to keep her eyes open only to see their safe haven, engulfed in flames. Staring in disbelief unable to comprehend how they finally managed to crawl up to their heaven only to crash and burn in a matter of a single moment.
"No!!!! NoNoNoNo! No!!! Lou Xi!!!!" She screamed in utter fear and disbelief.
They believed that if they managed to make great contributions just like those before them, the organization would keep their word and allow them to live a normal life.
She never thought, they never would have thought that this was how they, and probably the others who left had ended.
How foolish, how ridiculous.
She felt her wounds sting on her face as bitter tears fell from her eyes.
They never should have hoped. They never should have dreamed.
"Lou Xi... I'm... Sorry... Brother" She tried to say before her vision started to fade with black spots but before they could fully darken, she saw in a haze, a blurry figure approaching before she felt weightless and fully blacked out.