It became painfully clear to her the moment she stepped from the transport vehicle and entered the IF facility that her time in the free world was about to end. Only her wild dreams of revenge kept her focused and driven as the window of opportunity for her vengeance quickly closed... closed... closed...Kat knew after the first hour of their first evaluation session that she'd be sent to the Charybdis Institute.
She'd never had trouble being objective, and objectiveness toward her own situation was no different. She remained silent during that initial interrogation, her face a perfect mask of indifferent calm while her mind schemed frantically. It was obvious, so very obvious, that the psychiatrists analyzing them had already drawn their own conclusions. It was evident in their questions, the way they framed their inquiries, even in the tone of their voices. Ryan and Zion Jayde were dealt with politely, asked to share the difficulties of the Jayde Center mindset, and although the two were vague in their answers, they were accepted nonetheless. Jax, while given a much different set of questions, was also awarded with some mild form of deference. She received nothing but wary glances and cold stares. Her fate had already been sealed.
And so she didn't bother with the quiet obedience of her companions. It wouldn't make any difference anymore, she knew. Withdrawn coldness became her default demeanor whenever approached or questioned. At first, they tried to draw her out with deliberately infuriating statements, keeping her isolated from the others as she was harassed about anything and everything they thought might provoke her. Nothing was sacred; her relationship with her father, his physical abuse when she was a child, even her bloody bond with Jax. But through it all, Kat merely clenched her jaw, serpentine-gold eyes icy and passive, and she remained silent. Eventually, the psychiatrists learned that getting any sort of emotional response from her was useless, and she was left alone once more.
They might have kept trying if they knew she cried herself to sleep after every session.
Each night, as she was thrown roughly into her private room, the door locked securely to keep her from escaping, she would sit and stare out the window at the stars. Somewhere up there was the Battle School, the spacestation where the final verdict had been made weeks ago. Up there, Hunter Gabriel and Rebecca Solenis still lay in the infirmary, recovering from her violence, and every time that thought passed, Kat smiled to herself through her tears. Let the people stuck there deal with the wounds of her enemies, let them staunch the blood she had drawn. She had more pressing business to attend to, and it had a name. Jax.
She dreamed in red, thoughts of bloody retribution occupying all her concentration during those long nights. The days were endless, and it was excrutiating to sit for hours and listen to the falsely remorseful and guilty confessions of the others. Jax was sorry, oh so sorry for all the violence he'd ever caused. It was that military academy he'd been sent to, all the abuse there, that had twisted him so much as to cause his rage. Ryan and Zion took another approach, but the result was the same. Sad smiles of acceptance flickered on the doctor's faces, and they were forgiven for their grievances.
Only once did a younger, more naive man ask her if she was sorry for what she'd done. It took her a long moment for his question to register. Sorry for what? Jax had abandoned her when she was a child, and all their battles were a product of that. Gabe had tried to kill her first; granted, she had attacked his precious little Sol, but that had been a matter between her and the girl. What was she supposed to have done? Let Gabe beat her to death with the metal pipe he'd stolen? Watch him kill Jax, when that right belonged to her? There was no remorse, no guilt in Kat. Everything she'd ever done had been for a perfectly logical reason, in her mind. The doctor received the first and only word she spoke during that week at the compound. Her answer had been simple. No.
If the evaluation sessions were difficult, their free time together was no better. For some reason beyond her comprehension, Jax and Zion became friends, forming some sort of bond that neither her nor Ryan understood. They would sit for hours, talk animatedly, as if they were lounging in some park under the sun, and not this compound surrounded by barbed wire and guarded towers. Ryan was not one to talk, and Kat ignored the three, preferring to disappear for her free hours into the forest. She would run, enjoying the solitude, a wild sprint down faded winding paths, over fallen logs and through shallow streams. Of course, whenever she began to feel truly free, she'd round a thicket and come upon the towering electrified metal fences. No matter how far she ran, she was trapped, and Kat's psyche would claw desperately to escape this terrifying cage. Dejected, she'd return again to the main buildings, and although the doctors raised eyebrows over her jaunts through the woods, they never said a word. Perhaps they pitied her and allowed the small concession, since the Institute would soon become her home. Perhaps they noticed how she would become passive and obedient after her runs, and thought the adjustment an improvement. Or perhaps they just didn't know anything at all.
The hours of her bounding chases from her own personal hell were spent like her nights, in scheming and plotting. The stakes had changed for the worse, she knew; with Zion perpetually at Jax's side, the risk had increased tenfold. She was torn now, for she knew of Ryan's hate for the traitor Jayde. Zion was Ryan's Jax, and until now she'd respected his own plots of revenge, leaving the boy for Ryan to deal with. And yet, she wasn't willing to let this unexpected alliance destroy all she'd worked for since the day, years ago, when Jax threw her love back into her face and left her to wilt alone in the world. He would die, soon, before she was taken to Charybdis. And Zion would have to die with him.
Her opportunity came late, on their final day at the IF compound. She'd been told of their decision, and all the psychiatrists were rather taken aback at her lack of surprise or response. What had they expected? She'd known from the beginning that she would not be forgiven, that there would be no happy ending for her this time. That they were blind enough to think she hadn't seen this coming lent a tiny spark of resolve. Maybe the doctors at the Institute were so easily fooled. She doubted it, but her manipulative abilities had saved her more than once; they might be able to save her again. But that was for the future to decide. For now, her time was running out.
The doctors gave them an entire day of freedom. Ryan, Zion, and Jax would return to BattleSchool tomorrow, taken to the shuttle and shot back into the vast void of space, the same oblivion she cried into every night. She would be sent to Charybdis. With this in mind, they were left relatively unmonitored for the day, allowed to wander around the compound. Kat chose the forest, convincing Jax and Zion to accompany her on a final walk through the woods. Jax she had asked the night before, alone, had crawled into his lap and cried some falsely hurt tears, telling him of the imagined horrors Zion had done to her. His outrage had overridden whatever wariness he'd held around her during the week, and together they resolved to destroy the Jayde boy. Zion had been easier to convince; Jax merely asked him to come, and as friends, he agreed and followed quietly.
Neither boy expected this day to be their last. Neither knew of the knife Kat had concealed within her uniform as she traipsed cheerfully through the trees with them at her sides.
Eventually they reached a thicket she'd chosen beforehand, a small clearing completely surrounded by trees, completely obscured from view. No one would be witness to the murders that were about to take place, and no one would find the graves she dug with her own bare hands.
It started simply enough. Unsuspecting Zion walked straight into their trap, and before he knew it, Jax jumped him from behind, holding the boy helpless as Kat smiled up at him and slit his throat with one swift slash. He fell to the ground, and Jax stood slowly, slightly in front of her as he stared down at the dead Jayde. He knew nothing of Zion's innocence, had killed his only friend in blind obedience to her false confession, had sacrificed Zion for another chance to gain her love. Stupid, stupid Jax.
"We did it, Kitten... Zion's dead, he won't ever hurt you again." He didn't even bother turning around, oblivious to the sudden fire that lit in her yellow-green eyes, unaware of the knife that flashed in her hands as she advanced toward him. With a smirk, Kat purred, caught up in this moment of her revenge. So many years, and she wanted to enjoy every bloody second.
"And neither will you, J-Bear." Jax started to move, but she placed the sharp point of her blade against his back, and he stopped, breathing suddenly becoming rapid. "Don't turn around. Just stay there and think nice things about me, neh?"
"What are you doing, Kat?! Kat, don't do it... Kitten, I love you, what are you..." Raising herself on her toes, she gripped the handle in both hands and shoved her entire weight against the blade. It slid underneath his shoulder blade, between his ribs, and with a gasp Jax crumpled to the ground, still struggling under her knife with surprising strength. Kat twisted it slightly, reveling in the betrayed pain on his features, and giggled. "I love you too, darling. Shhh, don't struggle, you'll just lose blood faster." He kicked out at her weakly, but she moved aside and rolled him into his side, watching with fascination as a trickle of blood began to leak from the corner of his mouth. "Tsk tsk, what did I tell you? Shhh..."
"Katera...." Kat kneeled beside Jax then, leaving the blade in his back as she tilted her head slightly and smiled at him, coppery curls straying into her cold eyes as his own fluttered shut. Reaching out, she pulled the golden ring she'd given from from his thumb, holding it up to watch the light twinkle from its surface. "I'll keep your ring to remember you by, Jax, right next to my locket, always, just for you."
Her heart burned in broken triumph as he struggled to open his eyes one last time, the love and sadness inside causing her to bite her lip as he whispered her name as a final gasp. "Kat..."
With the sun shining brightly overhead, the birds singing gayly in the towering trees of this quiet forest, Kat cried bitter tears of completed vengeance and lost love as Jax drew his last breath and died silently at her side. What have I done?
Long minutes passed, and gradually her crying ceased, eyes drying once again as survival instinct overrode whatever pain she felt. Burying her fingers in the soft loam of the earth, Kat dug frantically with her two bare hands, shoulders shaking with the effort. One, two hours passed as she scooped the dirt away, finally managing to scrape two shallow pits in the ground. Not noticing the sweat that ran into her face, stinging, she leaned down to give Jax one final kiss upon his bloodied lips before rolling his body into the hole. Zion's move took longer as she ripped the Jayde patch from the shoulder of his uniform before tipping him into his own pit. It was another half hour before the dirt was replaced, and shaking weakly, Kat stood and laughed over the fresh graves of her two companions.
Then brushing the dirt from her uniform, she stalked to the nearby stream, washing the evidence from her hands, cleaning her face of its blood and sweat. Fresh once again, her soul sparkling with triumphant vengeance, Kat cast one final glance at Jax's grave before skipping her way through the trees, back toward the main compound, the weight of his ring bouncing against her chest as it hung from her necklace, the pressure of Zion's patch as it sat securely hidden in her breastpocket. She had finally done it. She had finally killed Jax.
Of course, hours later when the day drew to a close, she was questioned and interrogated when Jax and Zion failed to return from their excursion. Victory kept her face straight, a mask of cold indifference as she lied flatly that they'd gone on their walk and come back. After that, she'd seen them sneak away into the woods again, and that was the last time she saw either of them.
A manhunt began, MP's streaming through the woods as they scoured the brush and the trees for the two runaways. Their graves were never discovered, concealed beneath her carefully constructed blind. Every inch of the fence was examined, searched for any signs or clues, but none was ever found. To everyone's best estimate, Jax and Zion had somehow, amazingly, managed to escape from that which was inescapable. No one bothered to give her a lie detector test, no one bothered to look under her fingernails to see the telltale traces of blood and dirt she hadn't been able to erase. That night, amidst the sounds of shouting IF officials and barking dogs, the compound lights flashing brightly through her window, Kat slept soundly for the first time in years. No nightmares, no remorse or guilt, no tears. She slept with a clear conscious and unhaunted dreams, and the stars shone down upon her face as she smiled in her sleep.
The next morning, they dragged her away, wrists cuffed behind her as she was driven under guard to her new home, the Charybdis Institute. As the armored vehicle pulled from the compound's driveway, Kat looked back through the rearview mirror and smiled a secret smile to herself. Jax's ring dangled against her throat, and with a twinkle in her serpentine pupils, she settled back into the seat and closed her eyes, preparing herself now for what the future might hold for her.
Goodbye, my Jax, my love. Someday, we'll meet again...
