A knock on the door wakes Ara from her rest. She continues to close her eyes because she is not planning to answer the door nor talking to any human being at the moment.
"Mutiara!" someone calls out her name. It was a man's voice.
"What is it that you people want from me?" she answered without even bother getting off her bed.
"I am being ordered to bring you breakfast. If you are going to continue being this rude, maybe I should chug this away and you can starve to death," he answered.
'What a terrible person,' cursed Ara.
She drags her whole body up and forces herself to come to the door. She opens with oen powerful swing to show the guard that she is not afraid and that she is very angry. It is the same guard as the one pushing her around the day before.
He has a box of meal in his hands. Without saying a word, he hands it over to Ara and pushes her back into her room then locking her inside.
'Great! Now I am a prisoner of some rebellion parties which my ex-bestfriend is a part of."
"Just so you know! I never signed up for this! Call Guntur of Rama! Tell him to talk to me face to face like a real man!" yelled Ara.
The guard does not respond. Ara is certain that he heared her but decided not to answer. Footsteps moving away from her room echoes in the hallway, leaving only silence to accompany Ara.
"Guntur you stupid idiot! If you want to commit suicide, you should have done so alone! Why are you dragging me and the prince here for no reason!" Frustrated, Ara throws her meal on the table and crumples to the floor.
After calming down, she stands up and sits down on her study to eat the meal. Regardless of how upset she is, she needs food to have her stamina back. She needs her strength if she is to get out of this place at all.
The meal is terrible looking and does not seem to be edible at all. Ara forces the dark-colored porridge into her mouth and almost gagged in the process. She needs to be in full control to keep the food down. Each spoon is an uphill battle with herself.
'What is this porridge even made of? It honestly looks like poop...Ugh! I am gonna be sick!'
She keeps on gagging and keeps on trying until her hands become cold and her whole body shakes. Finally, Ara gives up and relaxes her body on the backside of the cold metal chair. She managed to finish roughly three quarter of the food.
"I gotta say. I am proud of myself. This looks like it has been made of trash! Who eats this piece of junk?" said Ara to herself.
Being prisoned, Ara decides to do something to make sure that she does not go insane on the first day. She cleans her meal box and toss it to the dedicated waste bin. She then picks her old maid uniform which brought warmness into her eyes again.
Chuckling, she said,"I never thought that there will come a day when I miss Garuda so much. I miss Bunga and the two princes. I miss my routine and how free I was."
Her fingers go through the details of the dark colored uniform she used to hate. Her fingers stumble upon something cold on the fabric. She looks down to see that cold item and it was that sapphire brooch.
"And i miss Bunga and Madam Bintang.."
As if she was struck by a lightning, Ara comes to a realization.
"Oh my lord! Madam Bintang! The brooch!"
Her shoulder slumps as she pieces the puzzle together in her mind.
"It all makes sense now. Madam Bintang giving me this brooch which is similar to Guntur's. It could be a mark. A mark of the Neo Renegades. That is why Guntur and his crew came to get me that night. They thought I was one of them."
Ara takes the brooch off her shirt, feeling extremely disturbed that all of this time she has been wearing that brooch proudly, thinking that she has the favor of the head maid. The brooch fell to the floor with a small clinking noise as it tumbles a few time times on the floor before settling under the desk.
"All this time Madam Bintang has set me up for this. She used me as a puppet."