Allice in Mysterious Land (ON HOLD)

30: Conflicted

"So there are kidnapped kids all over Dogson?"

Mr. Orion tumbles to Roy's chair, not daring to lean back, as if afraid the chair might collapse soon. His eyes are brimmed with sorrow, or maybe the burden of the secrecy he must carry all this time. "I've heard of the plan. But I'm not involved."

"But still, you knew." As Roy's tone rises, he marches forward with his sickle still in hand. Lin-Irene rushes to snatch it away, but one look at his hatred-burned eyes stops her. "Their lives could be saved, Dad. My Lowlife friends and their child might be alive by now..."

"Don't call them your friends. You barely know them."

"I'm prouder to ever have them as friends, rather than sticking with people like Jorge and Beatrix Kamal."

As if sensing the sparking tension between the two, Lin-Irene steps back, approaching my mattress with a roll of her eyes.

Driven by my instinct, I grab my backpack with the safe of Mantis shrimps inside, hugging it above my lap. Yet, my action makes her chuckle.

"You're still afraid I'll take them back, aren't you?"

"You're their caretaker." I need to raise my voice to survive amidst Roy and Mr. Orion's argument. "You'll do anything to get them back."

A sinister smile curls up on her lips as she leans on the wall while avoiding Miro's dirt-speckled mattress. "I would. But now, I'm not sure."

I search for a hint of betrayal in her voice—a quivering voice or anything—but there's none. I hug the backpack tighter, still full of anticipation. Someone's drastic change rarely means something good, either by their behavior or their more-relaxed tone of speech.

Moreover, when it's someone who has locked up Auntie Morgan in prison and hurt Sandra with her weapon.

"After I got into the hospital, I realized that I was just a pawn." She chuckles bitterly, biting her cheeks' insides afterward. "I wanted to get my shrimps back because they're my pets. And I wanted to get Jorge's attention so he would help me achieve my goals. He once needed me to handle OCZ's dirty schemes as well, after all."

"Goals?" I raise my voice again at the evolving cries in the father and son's exchange.

"Yes. Higher ranks in society. I need to get there to not lose the competition between"—she counts with her fingers—"one million people in Dogson."

"Does that involve me?" I tilt my head, trying to make brief eye contact. There are glimmers in her charcoal eyes that are impossible to look away from, once one stares at them too long. "Am I also a competition for you?"

To my surprise, she giggles with a hand covering her mouth. "You are, in lots of things. Getting Jorge's attention seems to be what you do best—"

"You could've saved lots of people, Dad," Roy emphasizes his words with an accusing finger.

"Are you asking me to betray my best friend for people I've never known before?" Mr. Orion jerks up from the chair with his hands gesturing above his head. "I don't know who they are; I don't even know their names."

Yet, the concern in his eyes betrays his words.

"Correction: people you've never known before, yet whose safety depends on their Chief of Police. Though he has been acting like himself instead of how his title wishes him to."

Lin-Irene groans, cupping her face. "This is why I don't want to be around them at the same time."

My muscles relax a bit. The atmosphere is still oozing with unbottled rage, yet as I sit next to Lin-Irene, who treats this as nothing, my anxiety melts slowly into nothingness.