Katarina takes it and holds it close to her chest as tears press into her eyes. "Thank you. Please come in."
Jarred stands and shakes Velex's hand. "You did what you could."
"It was out of my hands. There was nothing else I could do to prevent this. Katarina, I am so sorry for your loss."
"Everyone I love dies."
Velex sighs and sits down at the table. "You should leave Himmel."
"Why?" Jarred asks.
"While I can bestow military honors to Doss, I can't guarantee that he will have the same from Chancellor Dressler. There's word around Himmel that Doss will be posthumously charged with treason and all his close friends and family will be exiled. You and I both know how great of a man he was, but so many people are influenced by Clark's Blood Force propaganda."
"Clark? Didn't he die?" Katarina asks.
"No. Doss managed to permanently destroy the space cruiser, but there was one survivor. That was Clark. Gabriel saved him."
She looks down at the floor. "Oh."
"Doss is still a hero, Kat." Velex says. "There were so many nanoweapons on board that ship that would have been used on the other IGR planets. Millions of people would have been killed by those if Doss hadn't destroyed them. Tensions between the rebel planet of Verloren and the unified IGR are still on the rise. This isn't anything to play around with. Exile from Himmel usually results in being transported as a prisoner to Strafe, but since Strafe has been for all intents and purposes destroyed, exiles are being sent to Barren Void."
"Barren Void?" Jarred asks. "That doesn't sound very pleasant."
"It's not. If you are arrested and face the harshness of the IGR Military Court, I will do what I can to keep you from facing that fate. Let me put this as simply as I can. In the history of the IGR, the worst criminals have been sent to Barren Void. Out of those two thousand criminals, no one has ever lived more than three months out there. When they are exiled, the prisoners are injected with a tracker so the government can monitor them and ensure that they never go back to their home planets. It's a death sentence, a slow and terrible death sentence."
"Are we really being accused of treason?" Katarina asks as she dries her eyes on her shirt.
"It is a very real possibility. That's why I want you to find any way you can to get off of this planet. The rebels on Verloren should welcome you and Jarred into their forces. I would take you there myself if I could, but taking a ship without permission during this turbulent time will incriminate me as well. I'm sorry, but if there is going to be any chance of making things right, I can't be removed from my position right now."
"It's okay. I understand."
When the three quick authoritative knocks come at the door, Velex knows it's too late. He goes to the door as it slides open and four police officers push past him.
One of them points at Katarina. "Katarina Williams and Jarred Cunningham, you are under arrest for treason and will now be escorted to the airfield for removal from Himmel."
"Removal?" Jarred asks.
"You both are to be exiled to Barren Void for your participation in the plot to overthrow Chancellor Dressler and violate military protocol on Doss's part. He has been stripped of his title and all honors conferred to him. He will from here on be known only as a traitor and a criminal deserving of his coward's death."
"He didn't die a coward's death. He's a hero!" Katarina screams. "He sacrificed himself for everyone!"
"We will take that as a confession of your involvement and continued hatred directed at the IGR."
Velex glares at them. "Do you have to do this now? She just lost her husband."
"Who was a traitor. I'm sorry, Admiral. We are under direct orders from Chancellor Dressler himself. He told us to not let your emotions get in the way or you would be included in these charges because of how close you were with Doss."
"I'm not trying to obstruct justice." Velex says. "I just want to make sure you treat them with respect."
"They're going to your ship, sir. Chancellor Dressler has ordered you to be the one to take them out to Barren Void immediately."
Really? That bastard. "Are any others being exiled?"
"No. Just these two."
* * *
Katarina shivers in the cold of the metal cell as she leans up against Jarred for warmth. The bright white lights do little to warm them. Just two days ago, she was a happy bride looking forward to starting a new life with the man she loved. Now she's a prisoner being sent to her death for something that man did. Is she terrified? Terror is the understatement of the year. Though, that terror does little to eclipse the ever-expanding grief that no amount of time will be able to remedy. Every time she loves someone, that person is taken from her. Maybe she just shouldn't love anymore. If this is how love always ends, then it's not worth it.
"You okay?" Jarred asks.
"Everyone I love dies."
"You've had it rough, girl."
She feels a bit bad for him as well, though. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be bothering you with this when you're having to cope with leaving Jayce behind."
"You've lost way too many people too. I'll make it. At least I know that Jayce is alive. That's what really matters. As long as I can be sure that he's alive and safe, then I can be fine. I have hope. You don't have that luxury. Hope is never guaranteed. It's a wish, a blessing for the chosen few, and a miracle when it actually works. But hope is the only thing keeping me alive right now so I will cling to it and never let it fade. If I lose hope, I lose everything. I may never see my husband again, but I will die happy knowing that he is alive and not suffering anymore. Sure, he probably hates it down there. I get that and I can accept that, but he's breathing and able to think about me. When I stare up at the stars, I picture the lights of Paradise glimmering bright and alive again from Jayce's power. I picture being with him below those neon lights in the garden where we spent so much time together on quiet nights. That's where he proposed to me and it will always hold a special place in my soul. I know I can never go back there . . . to how it was before. I can only hope that one night in this lifetime, Jayce and I will be able to watch the same stars in the night sky while eternity slips away."
"What are we going to do now?" Katarina asks.
"We will find a way to survive."
"No one has ever survived in Barren Void."
Jarred holds his arms around her. "Then we'll be the first."
The heavy metal door slides open and Velex steps inside carrying bundles of white fabric in his arms. He steps up to the cell and unlocks it before joining them. "I'm so sorry about this."
"So you actually followed their orders to bring us out here?" Jarred asks.
"I told you that I can't risk giving up this chance. I will remember you two and never let your story die. You will be martyrs for the cause of the rebel force. Your deaths will serve as inspiration and I can only pray that it will spark more revolutions within the IGR. You will never be forgotten."
"Thank you, Velex." Katarina says.
"Call me Axel." He takes Katarina in his arms and embraces her. "Doss loved you, Kat. He died for you and I know he never thought this would come about from his actions."
"I know."
"Remove your shoes, jewelry, weapons, belts, and everything else. Put your belongings on the bench. And yes, I mean all your weapons, Jarred."
With shaking hands that she attempts to hide from Velex, Katarina begins to remove her earrings and shoes. Her heart is racing in her chest, but she does all she can to remain calm. She watches her owner remove his belt and toss his combat knife, smoke grenades, and a handful of ammo on the metal bench.
Velex removes Katarina's clip from her hair and there is a loud click as her slave collar drops to the floor. "How does that feel?"
Honestly, it feels terrible. "Bad. I want to wear it."
"You can't. You can't take anything with you." Velex tosses both of them some white coarse shirts and pants, so thin that they are nearly transparent. "Get
changed. These are the clothes given to exiles. I wish with all of my being that I didn't have to do this."
Katarina slips off her shirt and starts to pull on the white shirt when Velex stops her.
"Is there wire in that bra?"
She blushes and tries to cover herself. She wasn't aware that he was watching her. Why does he want to know that? "Yes."
"Take it off. You can't take anything metal with you."
"Really? What will I wear?"
"I don't have anything else for you." Velex says. "I'm sorry. You have those pants and that shirt, just like Jarred."
Both of the men watch her as she unhooks her bra and slips it off. Exposed now and feeling more vulnerable than she has in so long, she takes a deep breath and pulls on the thin see-through tunic. It's even thinner than she had first thought. She defensively covers her chest with her arms.
Velex gathers their clothes and tosses them out into the hallway. "I'm really sorry. Truly, I am. If we were still on Himmel, I would personally go buy you another bra."
"It's fine."
Velex turns to Jarred and holds out his hand. "I need all of your weapons."
"I've given you all of my weapons."
"I'm not stupid. I've been doing this for so much longer than you've even been alive. I can see all the signs. Give me the razorblades and the microgrenade tape."
Jarred sighs and glares at him as he reaches into his mouth and pulls out two razorblades and a strip of black tape. "Fine."
"Thank you. I'm trusting you that you aren't hiding weapons anywhere else in your body. I don't feel like doing a cavity search."
"That's it."
Velex nods his head. "Good. Katarina, forgive me for this. I need your wedding ring."
She clutches the ring close to her heart. No. She can't let him take the ring Doss gave her. "Please, don't."
"I can't give you any special treatment. Believe me, I don't want to do this, but I have to."
Despite her accomplishment of staying strong until this point, Katarina begins to cry at this point. This is too much, forced to give up the ring her late husband gave her at their wedding not even a week ago. She bites her lip as she slides it off of her finger and places it in Velex's hand.
"I'll keep this safe and when I clear Doss's name and I am able to have a funeral for him, I will bury this with the remains we were able to recover from his space fighter. That way you two will be buried together even though you will die millions of miles apart."
So now they are already planning her funeral. This really is a death sentence that she can't get out of now. Even Jarred, the silver-tongued suave guy who could talk himself out of prison eight times, is now forced to face this definitive fate. Katarina looks over at her partner in crime whose demeanor is stone cold and unfeeling. No emotions or signs of anxiousness show on his face. How can he be so calm?
Velex pulls out something from his back pocket and holds it up. "While I have to take your ring, I don't want you to die without something of Doss's with you." He slips the white rosary over her head. "You know how much this meant to him. Keep it safe and pray that it will do the same for you. It was the only thing we were able to recover in one piece. Maybe there's something special about it. If it could survive an explosion of that magnitude, then perhaps it can keep you safe."
She hides it under her shirt. "Thank you."
"It will be our little secret. You can keep it hidden on the ship better than you could your ring. Oh, I almost forgot." He turns to Jarred and holds out his hand. "Your necklace."
Jarred shakes his head. "Don't."
"It's a bullet, Jarred. It will go off in the metal detector."
This is the first time Jarred has shown any emotion since being arrested. His voice cracks as he backs into the corner. "Take anything else. I don't care. I'll give up my own hands to keep this necklace."
"I know how much it means to you-"
"No, you don't!" Jarred screams at him. "It is the last thing I have connecting me to my husband who I may never see again. It's all I have left. Please. Don't take this from me."
"Don't fight me over this." Velex insists. "I'm already being extremely lenient with you two. I'm supposed to do a full body search of every exiled criminal which I am forgoing. I'm also not going to inject you with trackers because I don't want to know when you die. As soon as you step off of this ship, you will be declared deceased."
Jarred slips the necklace over his head and holds the bullet to his lips. "I haven't taken this off since our wedding day. It is the single most important thing I have."
"I understand. Now please give it to me. Don't make me have to bring someone else in here who will treat you two like animals. They'll whip you and humiliate you before sending you out there. At least with me, you won't be bleeding beforehand. The last two female criminals who were exiled when I was away on a mission were brutally raped in front of their husbands before being sent out into Barren Void. Don't make Katarina have to go through that. The other officers are heartless when it comes down to this punishment. They will take that necklace from you and throw it away. I swear to you that if I can find a way to get back down to Paradise, I will give it to Jayce and let him know that you loved him. Let me do this for you."
He drops the necklace into Velex's hands. "Tell Jayce I said Je t'aime."
"I'll do just that."
* * *
As they step out into the blowing snow and the far-stretching darkness, Katarina holds onto Jarred's arm and shivers in her thin white tunic and pants given to the exiles. The ice bites into her skin that quickly turns red and cold. All she can see in all directions around them is darkness, fog, and a blizzard of snow being whipped around them on the forceful winds. She turns back to see the ship leaving and Velex quickly bows to them before turning his back on Barren Void.
Jarred abruptly pulls her along into the piles of snow. "Come on. We have to get going."
"Where are we going?"
"I don't know, but we have to keep moving or we will freeze to death out here. These clothes don't provide any protection in these conditions."
"There's nothing here, Jarred." Katarina says, already exhausted as her feet begin to go numb.
"There has to be something somewhere."
"This is just where they stored all the scraps from creating the other planets. That's why this weather simulator is so messed up. It was the rejected prototype."
"Don't worry about it." Jarred snaps. "If there are scraps of things that should have worked, then maybe we can find them and make them work."
"That's insane."
"It's better than lying down in the snow and dying. We can't let them win. We're stronger and smarter than that."
She's losing her patience with him. There's no part of her that wishes to die with this arrogant man calling the shots out here. "This is pointless. There is no winning anymore. It's over, Jarred. No matter how strong or brave you are, it's over. It's a death sentence."
"Are you dead yet?" Jarred asks.
"No."
"Then it's not a death sentence." He shouts at her and grabs her shoulder, digging his fingers roughly into her skin. "Stop crying. You don't get to cry. We have to rely on each other for strength, not weakness. I don't have any empathy for weakness, especially when I know how strong you can be. So man up and grow a pair. We're going to soldier through this, keep our wits about us, and find a way to survive. Is that clear?"
Katarina grits her teeth as best as she can through her shivering.
"Answer me, 43. That's an order."
She bites her tongue to keep from saying something she knows she will regret and possibly be punished for. Instead, she closes her eyes. "Yes, sir."
"Good." He pushes her forward into the darkness. "Now get walking."
Katarina takes a few struggling steps in the knee-deep snow before tripping and falling face first to the ground. She can't do it. She can't keep going like this with Jarred screaming at her like she's some kind of anima
l or a slave. But then it hits her hard. She is a slave. She belongs to him. Being bought and sold by those around her, her allegiance lying with the person who holds the key to her slave collar, taking whatever punishments they decide to deal out for infractions whether justified or not, Katarina has no say in her life anymore. Now she is crying uncontrollably face down in the snow that is quickly piling in around her. Maybe it's better to die and not have people controlling every aspect of her life. This could be the one thing that she gets the final say in.
"Get your ass up and get walking. I don't have time to babysit you, bitch."
"Fuck you, Jarred!" Katarina screams through her tears as the wind whips through her hair. "I don't have to take this abuse anymore. We're both going to die out here so let me die in peace. You've done nothing but hurt me verbally for weeks. I've been trying my hardest to please you and serve you like a good android should, but all I get in return is hatred and more orders. I'm sorry if I'm not trained the way you want me to be. I'm sorry that I'm not a perfect little robot. I'm sorry that I can't bend you over the bed and dominate you like Jayce does. You're trying to drive me to the point where I'll want to defend myself in that manner because that's all you're used to with Jayce. I'm not Jayce! I will never be Jayce, no matter how much you want me to take his place. I'm not going to push back like that. I don't want to fight you for control. I just want to fight for my right to not be treated like trash."
Jarred stops where his is and stares down at her. "Is that how you really feel?"
"Just go die as far away from me as you can." She loses all control she had over her emotions as she collapses in the snow and weeps.
A few minutes pass in the silent darkness before heavy feet crunch in the snow. Jarred kneels down in front of her and picks her up in his muscular arms. "I'm sorry."
She buries her face in his chest, thankful for what little shelter his broad shoulders provide from the blowing snow. She may be extremely angry at him right now, but she was reaching her limit of cold.
Paradise Awakened Trilogy Page 43
