“Shut up and do what you do best, Alice,” Fabiola said. “Kill.”
Why does everyone think it’s an honor to be talented at killing? If I turn out to have been the greatest gunslinger in Wonderland, I don’t think I will feel proud about it. The idea of killing people you have never met before because they’re wearing a different uniform baffles me.
But I have to defend myself.
“Why a pawn?” I shout back at Fabiola. We’re still advancing, though most of the rest of our white army is dead now. However, Fabiola’s strategy has worked so far. I have to admit; she is one fierce warrior. She even stabs her victims one more time after killing them, just to make sure.
“What pawn?” she says.
“Why did Lewis make me a pawn?” I slice another head off. “Why the weakest of the kingdom?”
“Pawns aren’t the weakest,” Fabiola says. “They’re only underestimated.”
“How so? I feel like a brainless killing machine you shoved onto the battlefield and, with my skills, I am only trained to do what you tell me.”
“There is a wisdom behind that.”
“What kind of wisdom, Fabiola? Please stop lying to me.”
“Even though I don’t want you to find Carroll’s Knight, I was hoping you’d figure out the wisdom of being a pawn on your own.”
“That’s lame, White Queen. I might as well die before I have enough time to figure out anything.”
“Behind you,” Fabiola, in an amazing and unbelievable maneuver, moves to my side and stabs a black pawn who was about to kill me.
“Thanks,” I say, frozen in place.
“Don’t ever thank your soldier friends in war,” she grunts.
“Why?”
She chops off the head of a black bishop who was about to finish me. “That’s why, Alice.”
I get the message and advance with fierce anger toward an approaching black pawn, slashing left and right, using my None Fu skills and jumping in midair. Their heads roll off the chessboard, which is nothing but a red bloodbath now.
“Where is Margaret and the Queen?” I ask Fabiola.
“Don’t bother looking for them. High governmental people are cowards. They’re hiding somewhere,” Fabiola says.
“Then how are we going to win?” I ask. “Aren’t we supposed to kill them all, or are you still worried the Chessmaster will find Carroll’s Knight if we win?”
“I’m worried, but we have no choice or both of us will die,” Fabiola stands against my back again. “But winning doesn’t mean having to kill them all.”
“Then how are we going to win?”
“By you being a pawn?”
“What are you saying?”
“Search inside you, Alice. You must know the answer.”
Instantly, I remember The Pillar being fed up with Hollywood movies. When Fabiola tells me this, I wonder the same. Why wouldn’t she just tell me what to do to win? Why does she have to say things like ‘search inside me’? So clichéd.
But then, in the middle of my fried brain and torn muscles, killing left and right, an idea presents itself.
It’s something I had heard earlier. I believe it was The Pillar who had pointed at it.
“I know what I have to do,” I shout, advancing forward. “I’m a pawn. And if a pawn reaches the other side of the chessboard, they can exchange their piece for a king or queen or a stronger warrior.”
“That’s the Alice I’ve been looking for,” Fabiola chirps.
“You mean the Alice The Pillar believes in,” I say.
She pouts, but then let’s it go. “Look, I designed this board to hide what’s left of Carroll’s chess pieces. You don’t need to exchange pieces. All you have to do, as a pawn, is to make it to the other side and we win.”
Even though I’m ready, I realize how much harder it is to advance then to fight in the same place. How am I going to kill all of them and reach the other side?
“Don’t worry,” Fabiola says. “I will help you reach the other side.”
“How so?”
Immediately, she shouts from the top of her lungs, insulting the Queen of Hearts.
“Don’t provoke me, Fabiola,” I hear the Queen’s voice shout back. I can’t see her, probably because of how short she is. “I will not die in this war, because I’m too short, no chopping sword will find my head,” she mocks Fabiola. “But I won’t stand for you making fun of me! You know who I am, and what I could have done to you in all these years. You’re only alive because I let you.”
“Then show me you can kill me,” Fabiola shouts.
“What are you doing?” I yell back at her. “She’ll send the whole army to kill you.”
“That’s the point exactly.” Fabiola smiles feebly, her eyes exposing her plan to me.
I get it. She is gathering the black army all around her so I can reach the other side of the chessboard.