Page 45 of Captured By the Scaled Outlaw
Chapter 17
My hand freezes. Icicles pump frigid blood through my veins as my vision doubles.
I snap my head to meet Lowell’s intense, grief-filled eyes. “Wait, w-what?” I stutter.
“Why are you acting like you didn’t know? You were integral to the project that leveled my entire species,” Lowell says, monotone, as though he’s reading a grocery list.
Hands cling to my beating chest. I’m filled with panicked heat. “No! I didn’t… I wasn’t….”
Lowell stares, nearly comatose. “The documents regarding the project have been scrubbed from existence, so I’ve always been unsure what your true level of involvement was. But damn, your signature was oneverything.”
“I didn’t—”
He cuts me off. I don’t dare talk over him. “I’m not looking for you to convince me of your innocence, so don’t try. It didn’t go well for the original director, and won’t for you, either.”
I swallow, my throat dry and cracked. “Wait, what? Did you—”
“Kill him? Yeah,” Lowell says, the corners of his mouth burrowing into his cheeks.
The old director didn’t flee Nilsan, after all. The Board of Ethics searched for him for months.
Pressure drills into my temples with a ferocity that feels like my head will explode. Memories deluge my thoughts: sitting in the Nilsan board room, signing construction papers I barely understood, many sleepless nights after rigorous testing of soil only to end up with undefined results, verbal warnings from the previous director to “hurry the hell up,” faked numbers after I didn’t finish analyzing the samples taken over the entire swamp within the deadline…
My greatest shame is finally back to haunt me.
My indifference.
My negligence.
My naïveté.
The project destroyed lives. And I helped to do it.
But why is this the first time I’ve heard about this?
“The Department of Land Conservation is nonviolent, non-military. We don’tkillanyone. You must be confusing me with someone else,” I plead, pressing my lips tightly together.
Lowell becomes increasingly annoyed with each word I speak, the wrath he’d once looked at me with returning in a snap. “How could you not know? Nilsan strategically poisoned the swamp foryears.” His cheeks pinch with a grimace. “My appearance is obvious from theWANTEDposters, so why did you never question that you haven’t seen another Lizardfolk like me? I’m the only survivor of the incident, so not a single other Lizardfolk shares my species.”
In truth, I’ve only wondered about it for a short moment. From Grandma’s journal, I surmised that hundreds of Lizardfolk species lived all around the continent even if I have never seen them for myself.
“I assumed you weren’t from around here. Lizardfolk appearances are usually based on the terrain of their species’ region. And Nilsan attracts many tourists,” I reply.
Lowell spits, a dubious look drawing his brows together. “Don’t try to play stupid.”
I wipe my face with the palm of my hand, aghast. “I’m not trying to trick you, Lowell. This just doesn’t make any sense. Why would your species matter to Nilsan so much? More than any other, enough to exterminate them?” My frustration grows as I speak, guilt eating away at my tongue. “Why? Why would someone like you matter so much?” I shout.
A silence falls between us, sand whipping against the tent’s flimsy flaps. The air is tense but not laced with aggression. I immediately regret my outburst.
Lowell’s appearance melts from anger to blasé, his hands resting atop one another. He seems intrigued. “To put it plainly, my species is larger, stronger, and more aggressive than any other Lizardfolk.”
I draw back, tightening my shoulders up to my jaw. “That seems like a poor reason to kill off a species, even for Nilsan,”
“Exactly, because it’s not the complete reason. But that’s the only reasoning you’ll find if you dig deep enough,” he explains. “Nilsan spent years covering up decades of information documenting the Misya Swamp Lizardfolk. Particularly because we were the only race or species to retaliate against Nilsan’s expansion andwin. Your project wasn’t the first time they tried to build across the swamp, but their previous failures made it possible to build across deemed ‘barren’ land,” he snorts, “ormanufacturedbarren land.”
I can’t decide if I believe any of this. I knew beforehand that the Misya Swamp Project was the second attempt at construction, but I was never told why. Nilsan didn’t make broadcasting their failures a habit, especially not to the public. They couldn’t risk losing loyalty.
Despite the pit in my stomach, I keep pressing. “Nilsan would have sent the military, not the Department of Land Conservation with some convoluted plan.”
