Chapter 16

Aire calmly stood, leaning against the wall in the dull training courtyard. She was required to be at close call for in case any of the Domers were injured during some of the tedious exercises.

Also, she had to keep regular and detailed notes on their fitness and performances. Calvert's orders...

Day after day, if she wasn't treating a patient, she found herself watching the unique group of prisoners going about their training.

Her eyes were fixed on the group of Domers jogging around the perimeter of the training area. Or more specifically, the two trainees who were racing each other at break neck speed. They were nearly half a lap in front of the other prisoners.

Marven had ordered them all to do ten laps, but the first to finish could skip the first two rounds of the gruelling obstacle coarse which came directly after the jogging. No rest, no mercy...

She recognised both of the racing Domers, having treated both of them for injuries on multiple occasions. They had proven to be the fittest and most formidable in the Dome.

The one, going by the name Nedes, had a body well toned with strong muscles, though not bulky. He was athletic and fit but unfortunately had a bad habit of being aggressive...he made it very clear that he was the bully amongst the group of Eliminators...

Nedes was running neck and neck with Emeric, who was much leaner than the muscled boy, but not scrawny at all...He too had a body rippling with strong muscles.

However, instead of being prone to aggression, he had a strong competitive streak in him, and took to each challenge that he was presented with and...unfortunately had also become the target of the large bully.

Emeric's wounds had healed as a week passed, and now, in the training square, he was starting to show his true colors.

Aire shook her head with bemusement, as the two Domers were running full pelt with two laps to go. Pushing each other to greater speeds...neither ready to be the first to call quits...It would be nearly impossible to keep up that pace compared to the distance that they still had to cover.

They passed her at breakneck speed, both had a determined grimace on their faces. Aire bit her lip in frustration as Nedes started drawing ahead, first with only a few feet, and gradually the distance grew to a few meters. She had hoped that Emeric would win. Nedes's ego was already large enough...He didn't need the extra pride of winning.

When only one lap remained, Nedes was breathing heavily and his pace was involuntarily starting to slow down. That was when Aire saw the burst of sudden speed from Emeric. He shot by Nedes like an arrow and maintained the breathtaking speed for the remainder of the lap...leaving Nedes far behind in his cloud of dust.

Emeric finished the lap when Nedes and the other trainees reached the halfway point. He was breathing deeply, walking up and down with his hands resting on his head as he tried to calm his heaving. Although the sprint had taken a lot out of him, he had an excited grin on his face.

Nedes had been terrorizing him since the first day after he had run nearly twenty miles and surprised everyone one with his natural athleticism. The larger boy had seen Emeric as a threat to his rising fame and had tried to make Emeric's life a living hell with each opportunity he got.

He nearly succeeded...

Emeric relished each victory he had over Nedes. No matter how small or senseless. The rivalry between them only grew larger with each day when they faced each other off in the training square. He turned when he felt someone's distinctive gaze on him. That sixth sense of his.

He turned and saw Aire by the wall, she gave a slight greeting smile. He nodded a greeting of his own in her direction.

"Alright all of you old drags...fifteen rounds over the obstacle coarse." Marven ordered as the rest of the Domers finished the last lap. Then, with an evident note of irritation he added, "Rogue, you join them after two rounds."

As the Domers set off at a steady jog over the coarse, Emeric settled himself down against the cold stone wall. The coolness refreshed him after his tiering race. He also appreciated the fact that his wound no longer complained when he leaned against the chilled stone.

As his breathing slowed to its normal speed, Emeric watched the other Domers scale a wall with a rope and drop to the ground on the other side. He saw Nedes running at the front, constantly shooting a death glare in Emeric's direction.

"Let's hope you never have to face him in the dome. He might just skin you alive." Aire stated from her position a few feet away from Emeric.

He grunted in amusement, "I'm afraid he's not going to wait that long." Emeric replied in a joking manner, but he realised that there might be more truth in his words than he thought.

A soft chuckle escaped Aire's lungs, "Luckily you can run." Emeric nodded agreement, feeling slightly uncomfortable to be speaking to Aire so freely. In his months as a prisoner, everyone had driven it into him that he was a worthless beast and that he didn't deserve the luxury of being spoken to or being acknowledged as a human.

Aire was the only person in his current state that treated him normally. She spoke to him whenever she got the opportunity, asking him about all kinds of strange theories that people had about Rogues. One, particularly ridiculous had set Emeric laughing out loud for the first time in months.

"Some people say that Rogues hatch from eggs. Is that true?" She had asked quite shyly. Emeric had been unable to hold back to laughter. People could really come up with the strangest things if they set their minds to it.

Replying to Aire's statement about his speed, Emeric answered, "Must be something to do with hatching out of an egg." He smiled when he saw her burry her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking with laughter.

When she finally lowered her hands, her cheeks were bright red with an evident blush, "To be fair, I didn't come up with that theory...I heard someone else ask the question once." She tried defending her cause, but only ended up shaking her head at her feeble attempt.

The amused look on Emeric's face showed that he was simply pulling her leg.

The Domers finished two circuits, and Emeric joined them, running at the front once more. Nedes was on his heals, chasing him down. A predator after his prey...

Emeric ran with light feet and easily leapt over most of the obstacles. The taller ones only required a small hoist with his arms and he sailed clear.

The ropes were child's play for him, being accustomed to climbing after all his days in the Dome, scaling the chain. However, as more rounds went by, Emeric felt the energy being sapped from his muscles.

His legs were screaming from the exertion and his lungs were burning. Each breath felt like a dagger to his throat, but he refused to give up his position in the lead.

Nedes had fallen slightly behind, the two laps he had done prior to Emeric joining had taken their toll on the bigger juvenile.

Emeric finished another round over the coarse and briskly jogged back to the beginning. Sweat freely ran down his bare back as the midday son bore down on him, urging him on.

He began his last circuit with tired limbs that dragged him down with each step. The obstacles he had leapt over earlier suddenly seemed much taller as he was forced to climb over each one.

When he reached one that was nearly three meters tall, a structure built out of horizontally stacked wooden poles, he didn't realise that Nedes had caught up with him. As Emeric began to drop down to the ground on the opposite end, Nedes grabbed his ankle, throwing Emeric off of balance.

He fell off on the other side with a shout of surprise. Instead of dropping silently to his feet, Emeric fell with his back to the ground.

Before he was able to right himself, he hit the ground with an impact so hard it drove all the air from his lungs in one painful exhale. He didn't move as his lungs desperately drew air in. His whole body was aching from the fall as well as the hours of gruelling exercise. He lay still, his vision fading as black spots drifted in and out of focus.

A dull aching pain was thundering away in his scull, not aiding Emeric in his state.

He vaguely registered the other Domers clambering over the obstacle and passing him. None of them even shooting him as much as a glance.

A few minutes passed and he risked pushing himself into a sitting position. A throbbing pain had claimed his head and he grimly realised that he had hit it against the hard cobblestone ground on impact.

He rested his head in his hands as he willed the pain to leave him. He wasn't sure how much time passed as he sat immobile. He didn't register that Aire had walked up to him and was on her knees next to him. She placed a hand on his shoulder, "Emeric?" She said cautiously. He slowly lifted his head, blinking past the black dots that invaded his vision.

"Are you alright?" She hesitantly asked. Emeric got a sheepish grin on his face, "Well...He didn't skin me alive, so I guess so."

Aire gave him a light shove on his shoulder, "Don't scare me like that." She reprimanded. Emeric didn't reply as he hesitantly got to his feet. He swayed slightly when another immense headache took him, but then he turned to the remainder of the coarse.

"What do you think you're doing." Aire demanded, grabbing his shoulder. Emeric lightly pushed her hand away, "If I don't finish, Marven will make me run the whole thing again.

Aire knew that Emeric was right, so she didn't try and stop him again. "Just take it slowly." She called after him as he started hauling himself up the long rope.

*****

Finally, after seven harsh hours of exercise, the group of Domers were led to the mess hall, where all the Eliminators got their midday meal after training. They were all bone weary and exhausted after everything the morning had demanded of them.

As they stood in line, waiting for their meals, Emeric found himself distastefully glaring at Nedes. His head and back were still throbbing, a constant reminder of what the bully had done.

The bigger boy also had his angered eyes fixed on the young Rogue.

They stood in silence, but Nedes got a sadistic smile on his face, catching Emeric's eye once more. He drew his thumb over his throat, the gesture all too clear in its meaning.

Emeric felt an unwanted shudder crawl up his spine. He knew all too well that Nedes was capable of going through with his serious threat anytime and anywhere if the opportunity presented itself.

Emeric, however, made sure that he appeared completely unaffected by the prospect. He simply turned away to face the front once more. On either side of him, there was a two meter gap as the other Domers refused to get close to him, as if he carried some vile disease like a true animal.

Emeric's attention was brought back when he reached the front of the row and was handed a bowl of food by a kitchen hand, who gazed up at him dismissingly. Emeric took the bowl from the man and walked away, not wanting to suffer the man's scrutinising gaze longer than was necessary.

He made his way to the furthest corner of the mess hall, preparing to sit on the ground. Over the past week he had learned the hard way the he wasn't welcome to sit with the others by the tables and benches provided. He had tried, but had been elbowed away and spat on...not a pleasant experience, and one that he was going to try hard to avoid in the future.

As he sank down against the wall with a soft sigh, he gazed at his food...if it could be called that...What he had been provided to eat had more the looks of some rotten, squishy substance that one could expect to find in a bog. It was an off grey color and had a gooey jiggle to it each time Emeric move the bowl.

He dug his wooden spoon into it, picking a rather large amount out. He rotated the spoon above his bowl and watched the goo fall back to his bowl with a resounding smack.

He looked down at it distastefully, knowing that it was going to be tasteless and unappetizing. He recalled hearing some of the other Domers joking about it, calling it 'snot slop'...A good description.

The thought took the remainder of Emeric's appetite away as he set the bowl, untouched, to one side...Deciding to rather wait for his evening meal which usually contained dried bread and a meagre amount of meat...

Just the afternoon training left, baths afterwards (which would have been pleasant had the water not been ice cold) and then he was off for the evening, only to have the same tedious day repeated each morning he woke up.

The only relief he got from the sapping routine was if he got sent to the dome, and that he had found out would only happen twice a month...

Emeric lifted his gaze as he felt eyes on him once more...Nedes was watching him again...A threatening smirk plastered over his face. He repeated his previous threat, dragging his thumb over his neck. Emeric kept his gaze defiantly. He was tempted to give Nedes a figure...A very specific figure, but he refrained from provoking the bully even more.

Instead he dwelled in the comfort, knowing that bullies usually picked on those that they envied...Nedes wasn't sure who he was or who he wanted to be...he had been thrown into the same world of uncertainties that Emeric found himself...In the same hell hole...And that simple thought made Nedes's taunts all the more bearable.