Another Choice

Chapter 4-Duty or Feelings?

Tal Tal ordered his men to investigate Haneul's family background. He'll find the reason why she keeping her persistency to go on, even after all that torturing already tearing apart her body.

Haneul felt extremely weak and it was just the first day of her torture. The sun went down or she thought so because suddenly the soldiers stopped and they left her cell. Her head was pounding from the constant beating and her arms felt like it was on fire. She was burned with the iron stick several times, even the material of her dress was burned into her skin.

But it was finally over for a while!

She exactly knew that everything will start over again when the morning arrives, but until then, she still had hours to rest or sleep, maybe. She had to be strong...she wanted to. Betraying the rebels will only mean one thing, her brother's death. She won't bear to make her brother die just to make her survive.

Haneul never wanted to be with her brother more than ever. She imagined the happy past once she had before the plaque killed both her parent. However, her imagination didn't seem to work. Her mind started to fill with panic and the pain was almost too much for her to take. Tears wanted to escape her eyes, but she held them, knowing that her tears won't help and it will only make her seems weak in front of her enemy. But, the pain and sadness were suffocating her from deep inside. Haneul felt like she will never see her brother again and not just him, but even seeing the sun seemed impossible. The thought of sying in a dark cell made her felt even more lost.

She wanted to escape somehow and rescue her brother from the rebels. She wanted to hug him again and she wanted to have the power to protect him. Even her heart was aching from the darkness that slowly invaded her mind.

She looked up at the dark ceiling, "Really? This is how I'm going to die?" she asked herself and the tiredness knocked her out finally, pushing the small girl into a short and light sleep.

The next morning

Soon after the sun rises up, Tal Tal and the two torturers went to continue what they started with Haneul. The wrong and heavy feeling in his chest just went stronger with every passing minute and with every step they took towards her cell.

He didn't want to do it again. Tal Tal just wanted to let her go and protect her from the days after, but even he, himself couldn't understand, why. Why Haneul was so important to him from the beginning? Why was he so eager to find her alive, after she jumped down from the cliff?

He couldn't understand it, but somehow Haneul reminded him to Mei Li, to his sister, who was killed seven years ago. She was like her, proud, strong, definite on the surface, but deep inside just a little girl.

It was horrible to hurt someone like her, even if he, himself didn't have to raise his hand on Haneul.

Sudden;y, one of Tal Tal's men approach him and said, "Sir, I've found the girl's background. It looks like that both of her parents already died when plague attack her village. But, it seems that she still has a younger brother. Her brother is being kept in the rebel's general mansion. Tal Tal nodded and he started to guess that it might be her little brother that kept her enduring all the torture. But, her brother supposes to be saved if he is kept in the general's mansion. Tal Tal was confused and he tried to find another reason why she kept doing this, while walked towards Haneul's cell.

As they opened the door of the cell, they found her still asleep, still tied to the chair she was sitting from the previous day.

"Why didn't you untie her for the night?" Tal Tal asked, clearly with anger.

"Untie her? A spy? We never do it to a spy, Sir!" answered one of the torturers.

"But, she is a young girl! Learn to show mercy!"