living like bandits, running like fugitives

Maxwell wakes up. there is a strange noise. he looks at the familiar ceiling of the room in which he has been staying for the last four days.

Maxwell stands up on his underwear. he looks at Alice who is on the bed next to his. she is tied up with a belt. she has tape on her mouth. she opens her eyes. she looks at him with anger. she is cursing him and demanding an explanation.

Max puts on clothes. he takes the tape off her face. he endures all the screaming and all the cursing from that young demon.

"kid shut the fuck up. as it is we both are wanted. I risk my neck for your ungrateful ass."

yields Maxwell furiously.

"don't ask for gratitude to the girl you have left orphan. you took my dad's life. you took my freedom. but you are not taking my future, nor my mind. I belong to myself."

said Alice in protest.

"I am risking my life for you. I am risking my fucking opportunity to get revenge for you."

screams Maxwell feeling frustration.

Max unties Alice. she slaps him, not once, but multiple times. Maxwell holds her hands. he whispers something in her ears.

Max gets out of his room. he is follow by Alice. she tried to run away before, but it was a worthless attempt to find freedom.

after the massacre on the royal palace, Logan Cromwell has most of his men patrolling the heart of what is the Martyrium Kingdom. their task is to kill anyone who is loyal or part of the royal family.

is because there is no escape from Logan Cromwell and his power that Alice has accepted to be at the mercy of Maxwell Altham, the assassin who murdered her father. also another reason why she haven't left his side is, because even when he treats her with disrespect. he cares for her well being.

Max enters inside of a restaurant with Alice. there are two assassins that work for Logan. before they even notice, Max takes a gun out and he shots at both of them.

"those were my last bullets. the following bastard won't be as easy to take down."

said Max with a nervous laughter.

"do you really needed to kill them when he came here to eat? or talk like a hobo man."

said Alice feeling displeasure.

Max sits on a table on the middle. Alice sits with him. she keeps complaining. a waitress gives him the menu. Max offers to pay for the two guys he killed. the waitress tells him that there is no need to pay. she can just take the money from the dead bodies and 'clean' later.

Max laughs with satisfaction. he orders food for him and for Alice. she has never eaten food that isn't made by professional chefs. when the food is done. she looks at it on the table. her face shows dissatisfaction.

Max doesn't care and he starts eating. he smiles and laughs. the joy from eating is such that he orders more food.

Alice keeps looking at her plate. she doesn't want to even touch it. she feels disgust. she asks if there is anything. Max yields and he tells her to eat it.

"I will have you decapitated twice. I swear my older brother is going to avenge my pride. he will force you to live the rest of your life like a slave. I will make sure of that."

yields Alice.

she is so angry. Max is just ignoring her childish threats as he keeps eating. once he is done eating he pays for his food. the waitress asks him for help with 'something.' he understood well what she meant. he follows her to the bathroom.

for almost two hours there are wild screams and loud noises coming from the bathroom. Alice blushes as she thinks of what Max may be doing in there. she tries to not picture him on the act, but she can't avoid letting her imagination connecting the dots.

Max comes out of the bathroom pulling up his zipper. he is shirtless. Alice yields at him and she even slaps him. she is so furious to think that the man who is protecting her behaves like an animal on heat.

the waitress comes out of the bathroom. she asks if his bride is angry. Maxwell explains that Alice isn't his bride, she is his prisoner.

Max doesn't even know how old is Alice. on his eyes she is just a possessed rag doll. he asks about her age. Alice tells him that she is going to be seventeen soon.

Max leaves the restaurant. Alice is running behind him. Max looks at the bright sky. he yawns as he gets on top of a horse, which belongs to the guys he killed. Max helps Alice to get on top of the horse.

they leave towards the place in which he has been hiding. he rides for about one hour without been spotted by Logan's henchmen.

on the way Max looks at the establishments and residents of this world. he smiles feeling the fresh air of freedom. he feels like he can live the rest of his life like this. this is what he wanted from the beginning, true freedom.

Max puts his hands on his pockets and he feels the crowned ring. he takes it out. Alice is surprise, sad, and happy, all at the same time as she knows what that ring represents.

Max puts the ring on his middle finger. Alice is shock. she feels horror to see the ring on the hands of a vulgar murderer. she looks at him. his ignorance towards the power that ring holds, gives her some sort of tranquility. there is time to do something about it.

"do you know? I use to be a man of peace and unable to even defend my own self. now look at me, I can't solve a single struggle without using violence. I had become a beast of violence. I can't avoid who I am, now."

said Max on a sorrowful tone of voice.

"it will take long to arrive at our refuge. so I was thinking if you are going to tell me, what turn you into such a fuck up man?"

asks Alice with a sweet voice.

Max wanted to slap her. no, slapping her wasn't enough. he wanted to slap the living shit out of her until she either dies or passes out. he looks at her with a grin showing that he is annoyed by her comment.

"you sweet little twisted angel. I don't like your disrespect towards me."

said Max with a force smile.

Alice laughs. then she starts to hit him on the back. she grabs him from the hair, as she is pulling him, she tells him that a dog has to learn some manners before he even has an owner. then she slaps him really hard.

Maxwell wanted to murder her. he was telling to himself to control his impulses. he needs to learn to control his anger. he starts to breath it, and breath out until he feels more tranquil. he tells her to behave if she doesn't want to be punish.

"you are such a rabid dog, I can't believe something so disturbing like you was able to kill papa. I will make sure that you get some torture therapy to fix that personality of yours. if you properly behave, maybe my brother won't circumcise you."

said Alice with an angelic tone of voice.

"you are the devil. and I think I fuck it up by letting you live."

said Max feeling regret.

on the way Max decide to open up, just a little bit. he told her about how his best friend betrayed him. he told her about how his fiancee betrayed him. he told her parts of what it was like to be on jail. she could feel the pain on his voice as he kept talking about his pain. she could see it, the sorrow, the pain, the horror.

there was a tear falling from his eyes. what pained him the most was the feeling, the feeling of been betrayed by his lover. it was still a fresh memory on his heart and mind.

Max has long brown hair and a long beard. his face seems to be rough. it was hard for Alice to notice before, but now she can see it. she can see how handsome he actually is. she can't believe that there could be a woman capable of emotionally hurting such a beautiful looking man. she pictures how he may had looked on the past.

"what kind of woman betrays a face like that? is even your friend better looking?"

said Alice sounding completely surprise.

"no, it wasn't about the beauty or the personality, maybe it wasn't even for the money. it was probably, for the pleasure of hurting someone else."

said Maxwell with teary eyes.

for a moment Alice felt strange. no one has ever cried for her. what kind of macho man cries for a woman? she couldn't avoid, but to feel jealousy of the woman, whoever she was. who was able to made this man made of stone, cry for her.

Max notice the tears and he dries his face and eyes with his t-shirt. he promised to himself on prison to never, ever again. to never cry for anyone. to not cry for a woman specially. he needs to get over his own feelings. or otherwise revenge would be almost impossible.

"forget what you saw. she is dead to me, one day I will cut off the head of my sorrows."

said Max with a force smile.

"you pretended to be this big bad wolf, but in reality. you are just a big softy, aren't you?"

said Alice smiling.

Alice erases her smile as she reminds herself that this roughly-handsome-macho-man-with-emotions is the one who murder her father on cold blood. he might be her type, she may feel slightly attracted to his face and body, but she hates him.

Maxwell feels better now that he talked with the kid. he thinks that maybe one day, he may find true love and peace. all he wants is to let the past behind.

"is there anything else?"

"pardon? what do you mean?"

"I mean, like if there is anything else. anything you want to do, after you take your revenge. you can't live without having a proper goal or dream to fulfill on the future."

"maybe for you that is not living, but for me. after vengeance nothing else comes."

Alice is unsure about hating or feeling pity, for a man with no future. a man living on revenge alone. a man without anything else to live for.

Alice is afraid of the idea of turning into him. she can't become something as pathetic as him. maybe the words 'to forgive' do exist for this main reason.

Maxwell looks at the sky and the sun. he feeling of freedom is so new to him. even after escaping from prison, he never felt truly free. not until he ran away with the princess. now the future doesn't matter.

Max tells to himself, that neither love nor hate matters anymore. he wants to appreciate and to feel the beauty of the world. the beauty the world has to offer.

"I am no longer prisoner of other humans nor of myself. I am truly free to be."

yields Max aloud.

Alice wants to know about the world she knows as Eartho and she asks. she was afraid of been ignored by Max, but he starts to tell her all that he remembers about his world. everything that he knew, before jail.

"is there anything that you miss from your world?"

Alice asks out of curiosity.

"no, I am better in this world."

answered Max with honesty.

Max felt that this world was more of a home, more than Earth will ever be.