June 16, 1976, around 6:00 p.m.
When I went down to the kitchen, the cook bowed his head.
"Would you like to take it yourself again today?"
He was asking me so naturally now that it seemed he had already adjusted to my change in behavior.
"Yes."
I glanced over the meal.
It seemed a little better than earlier, at least.
It was still a patient’s meal, but for now, there was nothing to be done about that.
Pushing the cart down the hall, I suddenly stopped in front of a door marked pantry.
It was where the servants came and went during their breaks.
Usually I just passed it by, but today the door was slightly open.
When I peeked inside, I saw a small tin box beside the coffee pot on the shelf.
I went in and opened it, and there were a few cookies inside.
They were round, flat butter cookies, the sort that used to come in the same kind of tin that held sewing supplies at my grandmother’s house.
Beside it were a few sugar cubes kept for coffee and a small bag of caramel candies.
So they had things like this too.
Come to think of it, it made sense.
No matter how heartless Umbrella was, they were still people in the end. Without something sweet, they probably wouldn’t have been able to endure this brutal life in Antarctica.
Even madness needed a minimum level of comfort to keep running.
I looked around briefly.
There was no one in the hall.
"Well, a few won’t hurt."
I slipped a few cookies and caramel candies onto a small plate and set it on the cart.
I felt a little bad about making the children eat nothing but patient food, so I figured I should at least give them something sweet to hold.
It was the moment I turned the cart around.
"Master?"
It was Herman.
He was standing in front of the pantry with a coffee cup in hand, looking at me.
And then his gaze naturally drifted to the plate on the cart.
"Ah, shit. I’m screwed."
For a moment, silence fell.
I looked back at him, keeping my hand on the cart handle as if nothing were wrong.
"I’ll be busy all night today, so I was taking some to have with tea later."
I tossed out the excuse and pushed the cart away.
Herman only watched my retreating back without saying a word.
As I walked down the hall, I quietly steadied my breathing inside.
There was nothing strange about the director taking snacks for a sugar boost during night work.
I had come up with a decent excuse, but I still couldn’t shake the unease.
I didn’t know how much Herman reported, but there was no need to get nitpicked over something this trivial.
Still, I felt like I’d need to be more careful from now on, even when no one was around.
When I knocked on Alfred’s door, he answered right away.
When I opened it, Alfred was seated at his desk, writing something with great concentration.
As soon as he saw me come in, he hurriedly closed the notebook.
He shut it very quickly. He must not have wanted to be caught.
"I brought dinner."
"Thank you."
Alfred still looked intimidated whenever he saw me, but unlike before, he was stuttering less.
As I set out the meal, I also slipped the plate I had put on the cart onto the table.
Alfred’s eyes widened.
"What is that?"
"A snack. If you only eat your meal, your mouth will get bored. Eat it after dinner."
Alfred looked at the plate, then gave a small nod.
"Yes."
Then he turned his gaze back to the food.
He didn’t seem especially pleased or displeased.
Well, he’d know once he tried it.
I sat down in the chair across from him.
"What were you writing earlier?"
Alfred stiffened slightly.
"...My diary."
"I see."
I didn’t pry any further into his private life.
Alfred didn’t explain more either.
A brief silence passed, and Alfred silently spooned up his soup.
"Have you thought about today’s question?"
Alfred paused with his spoon and nodded.
"...I’m thinking about it."
"In what direction?"
"I still don’t know what the most important relationship is."
Alfred took another spoonful of soup and continued carefully.
"But...could it be family?"
"Why do you think that?"
"Just because. I think it would be very lonely without family."
Lonely...
I let the word turn over in my mind for a moment.
It was simple, but coming from this child, it sounded heavy.
"Why does that make it the most important relationship?"
Alfred thought for a moment, then tilted his head.
"Hmm... I don’t know. It just feels that way."
"Feelings are a good starting point too. Think about it some more."
Alfred nodded.
He seemed disappointed that he still hadn’t found the answer, but he didn’t force it.
He really was the opposite of Alexia, someone who moved by emotion before logic.
But considering that last night he had gotten closer to the answer than Alexia did, there was something sharp about his instincts.
And those instincts were pointing in a bad direction.
He would surely be a normal child if someone just gave him a little guidance, but maybe the reason he became so warped in the game was that no one around him ever pointed him in the right direction...
By the time the meal was nearly over, Alfred carefully reached toward the plate.
He picked up a biscuit and took a bite.
A brief silence.
"...It’s good."
It was a quiet murmur.
It seemed to have slipped out before he realized it.
Alfred must have noticed what he said, because his ears turned slightly red.
What kid that age doesn’t like sweets?
I pretended not to notice and stood up.
"Eat well."
"Yes."
Just as I was about to close the door, Alfred called out softly.
"Father."
"Yes?"
"You’ll come again later, right?"
This child still needed to confirm it.
"Of course. I’ll stop by once more before you go to sleep, so wait for me."
Alfred gave a small nod.
His expression looked a little brighter than before.
I quietly closed the door.
I wondered what was written in that diary.
The thought flickered through my mind as I stepped back into the hall, then vanished.
Whatever it was, it was his alone.
With that, I turned and headed to Alexia’s room.
Alexia’s room was as it always was.
When I knocked, she answered at once, and when I opened the door, she was seated at her desk, writing something in a notebook.
Perhaps she sensed me coming in, because she stopped moving the pen for a moment without lifting her head.
Then she finished by writing one last short line, set the pen down, and only then turned to look at me.
She didn’t say much, but there was a look in her tired eyes that said, Oh, you’re here.
By now I was naturally setting out her meal, and I also placed the plate I had left on the cart onto the table.
Alexia looked down at the plate.
"...What is this?"
"A snack. Eat it after your meal."
Alexia said nothing as she started to shift her seat, then paused.
It looked like she had been about to close the notebook, but perhaps she noticed that I had already glanced at it, because she left it as it was.
I casually let my gaze drift toward the notebook.
Just like when she had been trying to find the answer to yesterday’s question, today too there were arrows and question marks scattered between the densely packed lines of writing.
She had clearly been trying to find the answer earlier around lunchtime too, but seeing her still clinging to the notebook and writing furiously, today’s question must have been a pretty difficult one for Alexia as well.
Honestly, I hadn’t expected her to take it this seriously.
It was just a kind of solution I’d made to improve my relationship with the children, but she was pouring all her energy into this one question as if solving a difficult problem.
Whatever it was, that obsessive tendency to dig into something until she reached the end was laid bare in the notebook.
"Still looking for the answer?"
Alexia lifted her spoon and answered briefly.
"Yes."
"Where are you stuck?"
"I’m not really stuck. I was just organizing two arguments that kept conflicting."
"What two?"
"That the relationship with oneself is the starting point, and that the relationship between choice and its consequences is the starting point. Neither seems wrong."
So she was still 고민ating between the two answers we had talked about this morning.
"Do those two really only conflict with each other?"
Alexia’s eyebrows rose slightly.
"What do you mean?"
"Exactly what I said. Think about it."
Alexia set down her spoon for a moment and turned her gaze to the notebook.
Her brow furrowed slightly, as if she were trying to recall something else.
A brief silence passed.
Then Alexia slowly opened her mouth.
"...Are you saying that understanding oneself ultimately means understanding the choices one has made?"
I said nothing.
I had only given her a small hint, yet she had started finding the link on her own.
That was very much like her.
"I’ll tell you the answer later, so eat first."
At my response, Alexia let out a short huff through her nose, as if she had caught the thread.
It was hard to tell whether she was dissatisfied or satisfied.
Then, with a look that seemed a little more relaxed than before, she picked up her spoon and began eating.
Apparently, just having one thread to hold onto was enough for her.
After a brief silence, Alexia took another spoonful of soup and spoke quietly.
"Dr. Ross came to see us today."
"Yes."
"He came to check whether our health matched what was written in the records, right?"
"That’s right."
Alexia looked down at her soup bowl for a moment.
"I thought so."
She slowly set down her spoon and looked at me.
"Why did you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Protect us, even going so far as to alter the records."
It was a direct question.
So this child really didn’t know how to beat around the bush. She was just going to ask it outright.
I looked at her for a moment.
"Do you find that strange?"
"Not strange so much as... I don’t understand it."
Alexia lowered her gaze to the table.
"At first I didn’t know what your kindness toward us was meant to achieve. But now I think it’s even harder to understand that it has no purpose."
She couldn’t believe that someone would look after her without a reason.
I spoke slowly.
"Is it really that strange for something to have no purpose?"
"Yes. Every action has a reason."
"Then what do you think my reason is for protecting you?"
Alexia thought for a moment.
"I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking."
What should I say?
I couldn’t exactly tell her the truth—that I was scrambling to avoid dying at their hands. And if I lied, I wasn’t confident I could fool this sharp-eyed child.
"Why must there be a reason?"
Alexia’s eyebrows rose slightly.
"No one protects someone else without a reason."
"There are."
"Who?"
I paused briefly, then gave a short answer.
"Parents."
At that one word, Alexia said nothing.
The answer—that parents protect someone without reason—was, for Alexia, not a matter of logic but of emotion, and she was still clumsy in that territory.
Another silence passed.
Alexia carefully set down the spoon she was holding.
Then, very quietly, almost like a murmur to herself, she said, "...Parents aren’t always like that."
What that answer meant was clear.
Ah, this child was talking about herself now.
Alexander had not been that kind of parent to her.
No, had he even had any awareness of being a parent in the first place? To Alexander, these children were nothing more than tools for restoring the family’s glory...
I looked at her for a moment.
A proud child with an empty core, and because of that, a child who found it hard to understand or empathize with others.
On the outside, she was nothing but an elegant chrysalis, and I was the one who had to fill the hollow inside.
"Yes, not always."
Alexia looked up.
"But that doesn’t change what they should be."
After hearing that, Alexia lowered her gaze again and said nothing more in rebuttal.
Then she simply picked up her utensils again and continued eating in silence.
By the time the meal was nearly over, Alexia glanced at the plate, then casually picked up a cookie and took a bite.
After that, she just chewed without saying anything.
But after a moment, she quietly took another one.
I stood up.
"Eat well. I’ll come by again later."
"Yes."
Just as I was about to close the door.
"Father."
Alexia spoke without taking her eyes off the plate.
"...Thank you."
It was the first time I had ever heard her say that.
I looked at her for a moment, then quietly closed the door and said, "Yes, you’re welcome."
It was the moment the barrier between Alexia and me began to break down for the first time.
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