An Illegal Burial

The silence was a shroud, heavier than the dust that clung to my skin. Melissa. Her name echoed in the hollow spaces of my chest, a phantom limb I’d forever reach for. The Reaping Song, her voice, a defiant melody against the suffocating weight of our chains, now stilled. Stilled by the ArchGovernor’s decree, by the very hands that had raised her to the gallows. And by mine. The memory of my hands, clumsy and trembling, pulling her legs, was a poison that would never leave my veins.

They’d dragged me away, a husk of a man, leaving her swaying in the Martian breeze, a macabre pendulum against the crimson sky. The punishment was swift, brutal, and final. For them. For me, it was just the beginning of a different kind of hell. They locked me in a cell, the cold metal a stark contrast to the burning rage that consumed me. Rage, grief, and a sickening sense of betrayal. Betrayal of her, of myself, of every whispered promise I’d made in the dark.

Hours bled into days. The gnawing hunger was a dull ache compared to the gnawing in my soul. The guards, their faces impassive, brought me water and nutrient paste, their eyes sliding over me as if I were just another piece of equipment to be maintained. They expected me to break, to wither, to become the compliant slave they’d always known. They didn't understand. Melissa hadn't just died; she had ignited something. And that spark, however small, was now a smoldering ember within me.