章 4: Tonsillectomy (Part 1)
Zhang Colony
Ah. As Mei-Lin suspected, there was a large ruckus. Blame started to fall between the family lines. Instead of being beside her, it was as she predicted. Her future husband now condemned her. It was only his associates that held him back from casting a stronger judgment since she was pregnant. Several slurs were shouted at her. How dare she as the next in line betray her future husband. How dare she kill an innocent man.
It was not her though. This, no one believed.
She was held, now sentenced. The prison area was simple and her food would be just with some concerned additions added inside for her benefit. However? Once the child was born, it would be taken away, and she would face the true extent of her punishment. Mei-Lin sat in silence. Used somehow against her will, conception unexplained, and now on a controversial death row, after nine months.
She spent another week inside her tormented situation until an outsider came to aid her. Mei-Lin watched her through the old-fashioned bars that were becoming her home. She knew of this woman, however her stature was now lower. She held her head up high and did not bend as she came in. Dressed like she were attending some casual Earth meeting on TV, she strolled in.
"Mei-Lin Wang. My name is Relena Dorlain." She came closer. "I am trying to remove you from this situation. The Earth and the Colonies have been working for more peaceful means to disastrous situations. However-"
"The Zhang clan is an outside colony to your usual," Mei-Lin interrupted her. "They will not bend on their beliefs."
"This is true, however, religion and politics must associate with the Earth and Colonies in all forms. No one is putting you on a death sentence for becoming pregnant before you were wed," Relena insisted. "However, the body found in your home has made that harder. It has taken time to make progress within your colony on these issues, but it's almost done."
Almost done? "Can you free me?" she asked. "Can you prove foul play?"
"I need details. What do you remember? I need trust and honesty," Relena Dorlain demanded. "No matter how cruel it may sound to your colony."
"It does not sound cruel. It sounds absurd." Mei-Lin moved from her bars. "I went in for a surgery. I looked for proof, but no one would give me it. I tried to tell my husband-to-be. Neither of us had been excited about the marriage. I planned on telling him the day I saw him then. Our marriage day. That is when I woke up with the dead man in my room."
"Is that the honest truth?" Relena Dorlain asked her. "You don't know the man who was murdered in your room? We have looked into this excuse and there are no records of you being at a doctor, or any recordings of what happened in that room."
"I have an appointment card." That made no difference to anyone though. It was just a piece of paper that showed she would be there to see the doctor. Not that she had been there, and that was quite small next to the insurmountable charge of killing a man.
"We do have that in our possession." She heard the sigh of the Dorlain woman. "As times have advanced, this has happened on more than one occasion. The opposition to marriage through different means of control," Relena Dorlain pointed out. "The identity of the man in your room. He was another interested in you?"
Ah. She was trying to make Mei-Lin confess about the father. That she killed the child's father. "I have done nothing wrong. I did nothing against my former husband's will, nor do I know the man who was lying in there dead. He was not another lover. If he was another option for marriage, my family would know those details. Not I."
"I have managed to work with other colonies over the years, as had the person before in my position," Relena confirmed. "One of many duties, but an important one, that I will not relent upon. Often." She paused. "A written confession of the events, fully disclosed, containing all legal and illegal events, with an official departure that removes them from the colony has been accepted so far."
Admit she was at fault and be banished from her colony. Admit she was unfaithful with the man that was dead, and that she tried to kill him to hide the secret on her wedding day. "I would write what you ask, if I could, but I have nothing more to say." There was nothing else to give.
"Mei-Lin Wang, I do not think you understand the position you are in." Now, the Dorlain woman was surely getting upset. She moved closer, her posture rigid. "The Earth and the colonies together are working to save your life in a colony that often runs in its own sense of justice. You need to be honest. Without honesty? Without a fully disclosed written confession?" Troubled. Relena Dorlain looked beside her, then straight at her. "I cannot stop them all. Without a confession, what I can do is limited for you. Please. Who is it that you loved and where is he?"
"It's confession or death." Mei-Lin moved as close to the bars as she could. "Do I save myself by saying I slept with another, killed him to try and hide that secret? If so, this child would be shunned. If I stay true to myself, have the child, and accept death gracefully? Their life would be better. Honor or life."
Relena's eyes . . . changed. The hard stance of Relena Dorlain softened toward her. "I would try to keep you from execution, but you are right. You would live the rest of your life behind bars." The eyes of Relena bore into Mei-Lin like she was searching for something. There was nothing though. "But? If there really is no one else, you don't know that man in your room, and you have been telling the truth?" She realized it now and backed away. "Mei-Lin. I?" She paced slightly. "No one believes this. I didn't believe it either, everyone has confessed that nothing has happened. Your doctors, his assistants, everyone." She moved back to the bars. "I will do everything I can to try and save you. I will pull all my power towards this case personally. At the very least, pull you from the colony to a place of safety for your condition. I am so sorry." Mei-Lin watched her walk off.
There was silence once again in her area. Honor or death. That was her decision.
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