Chapter One: Our Only Family Left Is Brother

"Waaah, waaah..."
"Sob... Brother, what's wrong? Please wake up..."
"Sob... Uncle, Auntie... Please, please save my brother, I'm begging you... I'll get down on my knees for you..."

Summer, Yangjiang Province, Yang City, Qili Street, Wuyi Road.

A thin little girl with sallow hair knelt on the ground, her eyes brimming with tears, helpless and desperate as she pleaded with the crowd that had gathered to watch.

On the ground beside her, a similarly gaunt young man lay silently, one hand clutching his chest.

Next to him, a two-year-old girl was also kneeling, her cries ringing out again and again, fat tears splashing onto the man's haggard face.

Despair hung in the air. As she looked at the indifferent, whispering, pointing onlookers, hope drained away from the little girl with every passing moment.

Each time her sallow forehead touched the ground, a clear, crisp sound echoed, mingled with her tears. Her reddened, swollen brow was as raw and fractured as her breaking heart.

"Hey! Do you people have no humanity? Is watching a spectacle so entertaining? Is it really that hard to call emergency services? Get out of the way!"

Just as the girl bowed her head to the ground again, an angry voice rang out. A beautiful, refined young woman shoved the crowd aside and strode forward.

"Little one, don't cry, get up. I'll call an ambulance," she said gently.

"Sob... thank you... thank you, big sister. My brother... my brother, he..."

"There, there, don't cry. Your brother will be alright, I promise. Believe me," the young woman assured her, voice trembling with emotion as she looked at the little girl's swollen forehead and those desperate, pleading eyes.

"Out! All of you!"

After the call, the young woman glared at the crowd, her voice harsh with anger.

...

"Waaaah..."

The ambulance wailed toward the hospital, but inside, all was eerily quiet.

"Doctor, he..."

After a moment, the young woman looked at the little girl, hope glimmering in her tear-filled eyes as she clutched the man's large hand. Nearby, the two-year-old wept silently, small body pressed against her brother. The young woman's heart felt tight as she softly asked,

"Well..."

The emergency doctor sighed heavily. "Preliminary diagnosis: cardiac arrest from extreme exhaustion. So... it's too late."

The doctor's words had barely left his mouth when the silent little girl jerked her head up, biting her lip hard as she choked out,

"Doctor, my brother... he'll wake up, won't he? Please, save him. I'll get on my knees for you."

She knelt again, tears falling soundlessly, each drop landing with a crisp tap that struck the young woman and the doctor like a heavy hammer.

Faced with the girl's hopeful, beseeching gaze, the doctor couldn't say the final words. He couldn't bring himself to tell her the truth.

With trembling hands, he gently lifted the little girl, holding her in his arms, his eyes silently pleading with the young woman.

He was a father too.

"Please, try again. Give them a little more time," the young woman murmured, her voice weak and sorrowful.

The doctor sighed deeply. "Are you their..."

"A stranger."

The young woman picked up the two-year-old, patting her frail little body, and shook her head. "Contact their family first."

"Little sister, what's your name?" she asked softly, reaching out to draw the girl from the doctor's arms.

Choking back tears, the little girl replied, "Sister, my name is Yang Qiu. This is my little sister, Yang Dong. My brother is Yang Qing. I have two more sisters, Yang Chun and Yang Xia—they're at school."

"Yang Qiu, little Qiu," the young woman said, wiping away her tears with affection. "Where are your parents?"

"Papa... Mama..."

"We don't have parents—just Grandma and our brother."

"Brother says we're all orphans, but we're lucky because we met Grandma."

"But, Grandma left us on a snowy day. Brother said she went far, far away and won't come back, but she'll watch over us from the sky."

"Now we only have Brother."

Her choked voice echoed through the ambulance. The young woman was stunned, lost for words.

The doctor, hands shaking, silently pulled out a pack of cigarettes, took one, and held it between his lips, inhaling deeply though he didn't light it.

Beside him, the young nurse pressed a hand to her mouth, biting down hard to keep from sobbing aloud.

Grandma is gone, now we only have Brother...

That phrase pierced the hearts of all three like a knife.

So they were all orphans. And he was their only hope.

Now that hope was fading—did they have anything left?

Silent, helpless despair...

At that moment, all three gazed at the little girl and the man lying quietly. Their hearts felt as though a boulder was bearing down on them, suffocating and oppressive.

"Sister, you said Brother will be alright, didn't you? He'll wake up, won't he?"

The little girl's thin hands clung tightly to the young woman's pale, delicate fingers, her voice full of hope.

The young woman was silent. How could she answer? She couldn't, and didn't have the heart to.

At last, tears slid silently from her eyes, falling onto the girl's small, sallow face.

Startled, the little girl looked up, dazed, at the weeping young woman.

After a long moment, as if understanding something, she gently released the young woman's hand, then knelt heavily before her silent brother, her small hands caressing his face as her clear cries broke out once more:

"Brother, are you leaving too? Big Sister is crying—just like the day Grandma left. Your tears are falling on Qiu's face too."

"Sob... Brother, where are you going? Don't you want Qiu anymore? You promised you would send Qiu to school too, that you'd get me a backpack even prettier than Big Sister's and Second Sister's."

"Brother, please, don't go. I'm begging you, wake up, Brother..."

"You promised Grandma you'd take care of us, that you'd watch over Qiu and Dong as we grew up happy. Please wake up..."

"Sob... Brother, are you going to find Grandma? Then take Qiu with you, please. I miss Grandma so much..."

"Waaah... brother..."

"Sob... Brother, wake up. We're all alone now... sob..."

...

"Waaaah..."

At last, amidst suffocating silence, the ambulance reached the hospital. The young woman carried the two-year-old, who had cried herself to sleep; the young nurse carried the fainted little girl.

Another stretch of silence followed.

"Sigh."

"I'll arrange a private ward for him for now," the doctor said as he stepped down from the ambulance, glancing at Yang Qing's still body. "Then we'll figure out what to do. He has two more sisters, right? Call the police and bring them here for a last farewell."

"Thank you," the young woman replied. "Sorry for all the trouble. Will she be alright?"

The doctor gently stroked the little girl in the nurse's arms, his voice tender. "She'll be fine—just fainted from grief and malnutrition. She's too frail, but an IV drip will help."

"Thank you."

...

Thanks to the kind doctor's efforts, Yang Qing was placed in a modest private ward, while the young woman hurried about paying fees and handling paperwork.

Half an hour later, after paying nearly five thousand yuan, she dragged her weary body into a children's ward. There, she saw the two little girls lying quietly in bed, cheeks still streaked with tears, and found herself weeping in silence once more.

They still had two sisters at school, but how could she tell them that their only support in this world was gone as well?

Again and again, she lit up her phone screen, then let it go dark...

At last, when she lit it up once more, she sighed and typed 110, ready to call the police—when suddenly, a terrified scream exploded through the quiet:

"Holy shit! He's... he's come back to life! Help! Somebody help!"