“Excuse me…where is Celine?” I asked immediately.
“Oh…I don’t know but she seemed to have left…” the teacher replied with a stunned expression.
“She…left?” I asked, unable to suppress my shock.
Although Reiner did come to this conclusion already, it just felt more real now that I was hearing confirmation from someone else.
“Yes…we couldn’t find her this morning…so…” the teacher replied before trialing off.
I looked at Reiner with a troubled look before turning to see the confused children who were standing around us. We better leave before we start freaking out the kids and making them panic about this.
“Where are the other teachers? Apart from Celine, who else is missing?” I asked in a hurry.
The situation seemed much worst that I had anticipated. I was aware that Celine must have known that we were on to her and have successful exposed her wrong doings because it wasn’t that hard or complicated; however, I never counted on her vanishing into thin air the day after like this. A part of me was worried and scared for the wellbeing of the children and the continuous operation of the orphanage; however, a bigger part of me was flat out angry.
How can she be so irresponsible and just leave the children like this?
“I’m not sure but the whole management team seems to be missing. We, as in us teachers, we couldn’t find any of them or get in touch with them. We’re trying our best to work as normal…like having our classes and stuff for now,” the teacher explained with a sad smile.
I could tell and appreciate that the teacher was trying her best to stay calm and hold everything together as best as she could; however, I could sense her anxiety.
“Let’s go find the other teachers and talk to them,” Reiner suggested as he tugged on my hand.
“Do you know where the other teachers are?” I asked her.
“The ones that are not teaching right now should be together in the teacher’s office. They’re still figuring out what to do. Normally, we don’t manage anything about the place, we just teach so we don’t know how to run the place…” the teacher informed us truthfully.
“Ok. That’s good enough. We’ll find a way to deal with this somehow. Thank you very much,” I quickly thanked her before turning to leave.
Our next destination was clear. I walked along the hallway that led to the teacher’s office with Reiner in silence as my mind worked hard on figuring out our next move. What should we do now?
“Celine and her team really ran off because they figured out that we caught on to them…” I muttered as if talking to myself.
“I’m not all that surprised. They probably don’t know that the punishment will just be worse for them if they run away,” Reiner replied coldly.
“Really? What do you mean by that?” I asked as I stopped in my tracks.
“Just like I said it. Being caught for fraud against King of all people is already very severe. Protocols are in place for these types of offenses, and they’re not laid out to be so kind,” Reiner stated emotionlessly.
“They ran away because they fear punishment then…” I surmised regretfully.
Why did things have to turn out this way? What’s going to happen to Celine and her team now? More importantly, what’s going to happen to this place and the children?
My temples started to throb in pain and so did the muscles in my neck. Stress was really eating me up alive. I better figure something out soon or I’m going to go mad about all this.
“Those that run off don’t expect themselves to be caught,” Reiner said lightly, and it was clear that he believed otherwise.
Celine and her team will definitely be caught…and then…
“What will happen to them if they’re caught?” I asked, although I wasn’t sure if I truly wanted to know.
“You mean, when they’re caught. Something bad will happen for sure but I’ll rather not go into details for your sake. It would suck for me too if I had to comfort you at night when you have your nightmares,” Reiner teased with a small laugh.
I gulped without wanting to imagine the punishment that awaited them. Despite Reiner’s teasing tone, I knew that what he said was serious.
“Let’s focus on learning what is going on with the teachers. Then we probably have to report this news to King. Hopefully, he can send someone to help out right away,” I suggested before sighing.
“It will be fine. Don’t worry. The teachers are here, and I guess so are the operational staff, if they keep on doing what they normally do, this place can probably run for a couple of days without any big issues,” Reiner stated his view before smiling at me.
“I guess so…I hope so…” I replied in a small voice.
When we arrived at the teacher’s office, many teachers were gathered there. They seemed more relieved than shocked when Reiner and I suddenly walked in. For a moment, it felt like we were saviors or heroes that have arrived to bring an end to the bad days.
“Let me take this…” Reiner whispered to me before he turned to address the teachers.
I just nodded at him as I decided to leave things in his capable hands for now. The teachers looked up at Reiner with hope shimmering in their eyes and it made me pray that Reiner would have a way to curb their fear and panic.
“My name is Knight. I’m King’s son and a senior manager of the company. We are aware now that Celine and the entire management team of his orphanage has gone missing. I can understand that everyone is worried and because of that I would like to make a couple of announcements to address this issue,” Reiner began explaining calmly.
The teachers nodded their heads as they waited eagerly for his next words. Frankly, it was amazing how trustworthy and dependable Reiner appeared. It wasn’t like he didn’t seem dependable most of the time, but I still found myself admiring him as he continued to address the distressed teachers.
–To be continued…