by Kieran Song
Garret had no response, so instead he showed Dog a few more exercises.
And then one night, unexpectedly, he was brought to the pits again to fight. His opponent was three years older and had already survived four fights. He was taller and physically more imposing than Dog, but it made no difference.
Dog snapped his neck in thirty seconds and the crowd loved him for it.
After the match, Dog sat by the entranceway to the pit and closed his eyes and breathed. His heart was still racing and his thoughts were frantic. He was drowning in images of blood and the boy’s screams. He couldn’t forget the look on the boy’s face just before he killed him. The boy was begging for mercy as tears and snot dribbled down his chin. It was inhumane. Dog didn’t want to do it, but what other choice did he have in the matter? It was either eat the bullets from the guns pointed at him, or kill his opponent. It wasn’t a difficult decision for Dog.
When he saw Allegra, he was still shaking heavily, though not because of the fight itself. The boy had begged Dog. Absolutely begged for mercy and he had ignored him.
Allegra rested the black medical bag on the ground and Dog looked at the yellow smiling moon. It calmed him.
She washed his face and poured water over his head and Dog felt cleansed from the horrors of the pit for a brief moment.
“Ryker was impressed with your win again today,” Allegra said. “You kill them so fast.”
Dog looked at her with shame. “The first time I killed someone in the pit, I hesitated and we both suffered. If I end the fights sooner, then maybe they won’t suffer as much.”
He didn’t know whether Allegra understood, or even agreed to what he said, but after a brief moment of silence, she nodded.
“Come, let’s go see Jacob,” she said.
*
Dog noticed an extra bounce in Jacob’s step when he greeted him this time.
“This is for you,” Jacob said as he handed Dog a folded piece of paper.
“What is it?” he asked.
Jacob winked. “Open it.”
Inside was a picture of a yellow smiling moon, drawn with intricate detail. It was shaded and coloured with brilliant yellow and grey gradients to give the drawing a rich texture. Dog couldn’t remember the last time he received a gift from anyone.
He looked at Jacob with a curious eye and was at a loss for words.
“No need to thank me,” Jacob said. “I thought you might like it. It really didn’t take that long to draw, just a circle and some colouring.”
Dog held the paper in his hands delicately as if it were a fragile flower, threatening to wilt and crumble in his blood stained hands.
“So what tattoo do you want this time?” Jacob asked.
“My name,” he replied.
“Surely you have another name besides Dog,” Jacob said.
“If I had one, I forgot it long ago. Dog is fine.”
“There’s no dignity in that name,” Jacob protested.
“I’ll give it dignity,” Dog said. Finally Jacob gave in and wrote the name across the base of his neck in large, stylish letters.
“No mirror?” Allegra asked when the tattoo was done.
“No mirror.” He held the drawing in his hand like a sacred artifact and left the room, returning with the guards back to his cell.
He placed Jacob’s drawing underneath the straw where he slept. At least once per day, he took the picture out and stared at it as if it were the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
Chapter Eleven.
With Tiberius retired, Ryker needed an Arena champion and decided that a tournament was the perfect way to find a new one. The Arena had been doing well as of late, which allowed Ryker to find and purchase more slaves. His dungeons were almost at full capacity, and he decided that he had the inventory to spare to hold such a tournament.
Sixteen boys were enlisted into this tournament and over the course of two days, only one would survive.
When Ryker finished the tournament bracket and the fighting lists, he circulated it internally amongst the guards and slaves.
Allegra was heartbroken when she saw the names on the list. Many of the boys in the tournament were ones she had fought so hard to pry away from death’s grasp. And in just two days, fifteen of them were doomed to return to its bitter embrace.
She took special note of where Dog was placed. He was seeded tenth overall and was up against a boy from the south with a permanent scowl on his face, nicknamed Cannibal.
Cannibal already had six fights under his belt and was an angry boy as gritty as asphalt and he got his nickname on the account that he tore the neck out of his opponent with his teeth during his second fight. Cannibal certainly had the experience and size advantages over Dog. She wondered if this was to be his last fight and it saddened her to think so.
The idea of the tournament had proved to be popular. Every seat in the arena was filled and even standing room space was scarce. The guards had to start turning back spectators at the door as they struggled to find a way inside.
“I’m a genius,” Ryker said as he gingerly sipped his whiskey. He sat on his throne and took in the electrifying atmosphere while Tiberius stood at his side.
“Who do you think will win Ty?” Ryker asked. Tiberius shrugged his massive shoulders.
“Does anybody ever really win here?” Tiberius replied.
Ryker laughed. “You’re a depressing man Ty.”
And YOU’RE a piece of shit, Allegra thought. She regretted not smashing the decanter into Ryker’s head when she had the chance.
The voice through the speakers announced the start of the matches, and the violence and blood began.
Allegra stood in the corner of Ryker’s pavilion for what seemed like hours, doing her best to block out the sights and sounds of the fights. For the most part, the higher seeded fighters won their matches, despite a few close calls. It was the experience that allowed the veterans to prevail, leaving their opponent’s corpse for clean up on the sand.
Dog was the only exception.
Cannibal had tried to strike first but he missed badly with the clunky sledgehammer. It was a weapon far too heavy for him to wield. Dog was quick to retaliate and in less than ten seconds the fight was over with Dog’s pitchfork protruding from Cannibal’s lifeless body.
Ryker was on his feet cheering. “It will be Dog,” he had already decided. “Dog will win this whole thing.”
The second round of matches started immediately following the first, despite Allegra’s protests.
“Let me patch them up first at least,” she begged. Ryker beat her senseless right there. She felt every agonizing boot to her spine while she laid in a heap on the ground, defenseless. It wasn’t until Tiberius interjected that Ryker stopped.
“You’ll miss the start of the second matches,” Tiberius said as he gently coaxed Ryker back to his seat, allowing Allegra to drag herself back to her feet.
Her body ached and she felt sharp jolting pains in her hip muscles. She went to the sink at the rear of Ryker’s balcony room and spat out the blood from the back of her throat while wondering if there was any internal bleeding. Allegra stared at the mirror and cursed the girl looking back at her.
“Useless,” she said. “Useless.”
The second round of matches provided many unexpected results. Vitaly Kirelenko, also called the Bear, succumbed to his wounds from his first match and dropped dead in the sand four minutes into his fight. His opponent, a sheep-faced boy nicknamed Stink watched in silence as the blood flowed from Kirelenko’s body.
Dog faced off against a short and thin boy named Pain who bore more scars on his body than victory tattoos. Pain’s main weapon was his speed, which he used to his advantage during the first fight. The slower opponent Pain had faced ended up with four deadly puncture wounds in his stomach, neck, armpit, and knee while Pain remained untouched.
Once the match started, Pain tried using the same tactic on Dog but was caught off guard by Dog’s equal sp
eed. Dog dodged Pain’s whirlwind attack and using his opponent’s momentum against him, Dog hurled Pain headfirst into the concrete walls. The match was over in eight seconds. Dog stood victorious before the backdrop of Pain’s splattered brains.
The other two victors were a hefty boy named Crush, who used his immense weight to his advantage, and a Middle Eastern boy nicknamed Prophet.
Thus the first night of the tournament ended. Eight boys were dead and two of the survivors had serious injuries.
Allegra and Maria were tasked to mend their wounds.
“They better not die,” Ryker threatened. “I need them for tomorrow, otherwise I’m sending the two of you to fight in their place.”
Crush’s wounds were easier to manage and he would survive. Stink was a different story. His fever was running at high temperatures and they were having trouble bringing it down. The infection had casted the long shadow of death over him.
“He can’t fight tomorrow,” Maria said. “Look at him.”
It was true. Stink was dehydrated and sweating profusely from the fever. He looked half awake and half in a dream.
“What do we do?” Maria asked. “He will die if we send him out like this.”
Allegra looked at Stink who stared back at her with glossy eyes. He spoke, but not to her; ghosts perhaps.
“Wait for me,” Stink whispered. “I’m still here.”
Allegra found herself crying and she wiped away the tears streaming down her cheeks. She ran her hand through Stink’s thin black hair, oily from the sweat, as he continued to look through her and into a world of fevered dreams.
“Don’t leave me behind again,” he said. “I’m sorry. I’ll be good. Just don’t leave me.”
“What do we do?” Maria asked again.
Allegra shook her head and clenched the wet cloth in her hand tightly. She felt the anger boil inside her. She wanted to save Stink from the fights tomorrow, but the truth of the matter was there was nothing she could do. Stink was too weak to fight and she was too weak to protect him from Ryker’s bloodlust.
“This boy was dead the moment he was kidnapped and brought here,” Allegra said with a heavy heart. “We keep him alive and whether or not he survives the fight is up to God.”
“What kind of God allows this to happen?” Maria spat. Allegra had no answer for her.
Chapter Twelve.
That night, two ghosts came to visit Dog. Both Cannibal and Pain were on their knees, heads bowed as if worshipping Dog like some false god.
“Leave me alone,” Dog said. The two remained unmoved. Blood flowed from Pain’s head like syrup from a cracked tree trunk while Cannibal bled from three symmetrical punctures in the chest.
“I’m sorry for what happened,” Dog said. “I had no choice.”
They looked at him with sorrowful eyes that read like words on a page.
But you had a choice, they said.
“You killed people as well,” Dog said. “Don’t judge me.”
You’re better than us, the ghosts echoed. You can be different.
Dog turned away from them as he lay on the straw bed.
“I’m nothing,” Dog whispered to himself. “I’m just another animal in a cage.”
He fell asleep with his back turned to the apparitions, who watched and haunted him throughout the night.
Chapter Thirteen.
Ryker warmed up the crowd with a couple of preliminary matches before the grand conclusion of his tournament. Despite the gory happenings in the pit, Ryker seemed to have maintained a healthy appetite as he gorged on slices of sausages and cheese that Allegra brought to him. He ate them greedily with the point of his pocket knife.
Watching Ryker eat like a starving warthog made her stomach feel queasy and she choked down the bile that rose to the back of her throat.
The preliminary fights were over fairly quickly and on came the championship matches which drove the crowd into a real frenzy.
“Here we go,” Ryker said as he bit into the end of a greasy sausage, the juices bursting from it and running down his lips and chin.
Dog was up against Crush in the first fight, and like his previous matches, this one ended in a matter of seconds. Armed with an axe, Crush swung it around wildly and he missed — badly.
Dog was quick to spot an opening and countered with a knife to Crush’s heart. The boy fell to the ground like a heavy sack of flour while Dog watched him helplessly.
Ryker’s cheers were as loud as the others in the Arena.
“That little bastard,” the Goblin laughed. “He’s something special.”
Perhaps no fight she had ever seen was more heartbreaking than the one between Stink and Prophet, which followed immediately after. The gates opened and Stink wandered into the pit listlessly. He was still running a high fever and he could barely stand. Stink reached out into the empty space before him, grasping for the phantoms that the fever had created.
“Don’t leave me,” he cried out.
The Prophet watched the boy and bit his lip. Stink continued to saunter around the pit, hands outstretched as if reaching for some type of salvation. And then suddenly, Stink woke from whatever place the fever had taken him too and he realized where he was.
When Stink saw the Prophet standing there, ready to fight, he dropped to his knees and buried his face into his hands.
“I don’t want to be here anymore,” Stink said.
“Where do you want to be?” Prophet asked as he walked over to Stink and knelt down beside him.
“Will you kill me?” Stink shuddered as the tears took hold of him. Prophet shook his head.
“We’ll leave this place together,” he said as he embraced Stink in his arms. “I’m not going to fight anymore. It’s not His will.”
Allegra wanted to join the boys and hold them, tell them that everything was all right. She wanted to shield them from Ryker’s wrath or join them in death. But like all other times, she was frozen in her place. All she could do was pray that their fates were swift and painless.
Ryker glared at the two boys with disgust and spat as the crowd erupted in a chorus of profanities over the match results.
“If they won’t fight, then they die,” Ryker shouted. He made a gun gesture with his thumb and index finger towards the guards at the south gate, and they understood. Their weapons were drawn as they entered into the pit.
Allegra turned away as she knew what was to come. The sound of gunfire erupted and the crowd cheered in reaction to their deaths.
“Monsters,” she whispered.
“It’s over,” Ryker said as he stood at the edge of the balcony and addressed the audience. “There is no room for compassion in my Arena. Compassion is weakness and weakness is death.”
The crowd roared in acknowledgement.
“I give you your new champion, Dog!” Ryker proclaimed.
The guards brought Dog back to the Arena by gunpoint and ordered him to wave to the crowd like some sort of circus freak.
Dog did as he was told and the audience gave him a standing ovation. The chants of “Dog! Dog! Dog!” were ceremonious and Ryker smiled at their reactions as he realized the dollar value his new champion potentially brought in.
And then Allegra noticed something. Despite being at the center of the glory and praise of being a champion, Dog’s attention was focused somewhere else. His eyes were fixated on the two boys gunned down in cold blood. They were still holding each other in their final embrace.
His heart is still there, Allegra thought. He still has his humanity. Please don’t take that away from him.
BOOK THREE: CHAMPION
Interlude:
From the Journal of Edmund Glaber:
December 8, 2007,
I can’t take it anymore. Everyday is another step down that winding staircase leading me to hell.
As long as I’ve known him, Ryker has always been sadistic and violence was his drug. During our time at Red Gate, he managed to orchestrate his own little combat arena
where he paid prison inmates to fight each other while profiting on the bets. Somehow, he even got the prison guards (those corrupted pieces of shit) to buy into it. Ryker had a way of looking into the darkest regions of your soul, the places where even you didn’t want to visit, and dig out your taboo desires and wave it in front of you with promises of making it a reality. You just had to pay for it.
Once outside of Red Gate, Ryker had created a full scale Arena where he could watch fights whenever he pleased. When I had asked him “why use children?” he shrugged and replied, “Because children are weak.”
Tonight, I witnessed a whole new level of sadism by Ryker. Before tossing three fourteen-year-olds into the pit, he had them lightly cut on the palms of their hands, their backs, and chest. They were superficial cuts, which wouldn’t prove threatening in anyway, and I was confused to as what Ryker was doing.
He smiled at me and said, “Just watch.”
A fourth entered into the Arena and I guessed him to be seventeen or eighteen. At first I thought Ryker was having the three younger ones fight the teen, but what was puzzling was that there were no weapons on the ground, and the older one had the same cuts as the kids. It was only when I heard the announcement that I understood what Ryker had done.
“Tonight, we have a special stipulation match. In one corner, we have Zombie, who has the unfortunate luck of being infected with HIV. In the other corner, we have three human pieces of meat. How long can they last before Zombie infects them too? Or can the meat find a way to stop Zombie without being infected?”
“Ryker, what did you do?” I had asked him.
“I was growing bored of the usual fights,” Ryker replied. “I thought this would make things more interesting.
“I can’t believe I’m seeing this.”
“Quit whining, and enjoy the show. I told Zombie that I have the cure for his HIV, which is a total lie, and if he could infect the other three, I’d give him the cure.”