Decision Time

Clay:

//I was a small child again. My body frail, the older man towering over me. Something about his face, his voice, made my entire body shiver. He had bright green eyes, but they were cold like ice. He was always looking down on me. Like I wasn't human.

I remember how dark the shed was with its dreary wooden walls. The planks were jagged and old, moulded with age as if the structure would collapse at any moment. There was always that smell of old damp wood. The air was thick, I could feel it slither down my throat with each jagged breath. It was hard to inhale. I could feel metal digging into my wrists and ankles. I could hear the clanking of chains ring in my ears with every movement. I couldn't feel my arms as they always hung above my head as I slept. My entire body stung, though the pain was numb by now.

I couldn't stop shaking. I felt cold. Tired, like lifting a finger would drain me of all my remaining energy. My mouth was so dry that I felt my tongue cracking, my throat ripping itself to shreds when I attempted to speak. The emptiness in my stomach turning to pain. Master had a wooden sword raised above me. The number of welts on my body, the blood pooling in my mouth moistening my tongue enough to manage a few words. It became too much to bear, all the pain in my body flooding back at once with each strike.

"Please stop… It hurts…!" I pleaded.

Yet despite my pleas, he still brought the wooden sword down on me again. First my shoulder, I tried to cry out, but no sound came from my mouth. He hit my chest and all my breath drained from my body. Then my stomach, I almost threw up but there was nothing left to come up. He hit me over and over again until I was coughing up blood. 

"If you want the pain to stop, then all you have to do is…"

My heart pounded as the sight of blood filled my vision. All over my hands. All over the floor, the walls. Surrounding the bleak cabin were dead bodies. Those I recognized, and some I had forgotten. Nonetheless, their blood was on my hands. That cold feeling returned, excruciating pain turning back into numbness.

"Win!"

Those words triggered something inside of me. I couldn't describe the feeling that came over me. I felt this bloodlust. Overwhelming anger taking hold. I had to win. To make the pain stop. To be worth something. To eat. To survive.

Winning was the most important thing.

I broke out of my bindings with sheer force and grabbed the swords I had dropped on the ground. In front of me was no longer my master but my next opponent. He was blurred. I couldn't tell his figure or his stature. But it didn't matter, whoever was in front of me never mattered as long as I was stronger than them.

The way he moved was refined, but it was too calculated. Every move was overanalyzed, every move he did was balanced. Predictable.

With two unrefined moves, he was down. A drizzle of blood falling from his lips and sliding down his chin. As he lay lifeless on the floor, I could hear the eruption of the crowd in my ear. The announcer's voice ringing throughout the stadium.

Alright, folks! Decision time!

I stared down at my unconscious opponent.

Does the loser live… OR DIE!?

The crowd erupted in a chant, loud enough to drown out any other noise. "DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!"

The decision is made…

I raised my blade, my heart pounding in my chest. I wanted to kill him. I wanted to see his blood paint the entire arena red.

"DO IT."//

That's when I went to slash him. My eyes focused on his neck, his head was about to roll. Until my entire body was squeezed, so I couldn't move.

The warmth of whatever was gripping onto me consumed my figure. It thawed my body from the cold, but as I heated up, the pain began to return. Out of pure instinct, I thrashed to throw whatever was grabbing onto me away, but no matter how much I thrashed they just wouldn't let go.

//The crowd was unrelenting. Their cries and yells getting louder the more I was being held down.

"KILL HIM! KILL HIM! DO IT! KILL HIM!"//

"Let go!" I shouted, trying to thrash again. As I continued to fight, the grip only tightened. The pain was becoming unbearable, my body lighting on fire.

//The voices of the crowd were so loud my head was about to explode. I had to kill him, I had to kill my opponent before Master…//

"Clay! That's enough!"

//The voice was so faint, drowned out by the crowd. I could barely hear it. But something about its tone was familiar.//

"You've proven your strength."

That was Lynne's voice.

Somehow the stadium in front of me vanished. The crowd's voices fading into the background. Suddenly I remembered where I was. I was inside of a dojo, the school Swordsman Academy. Those arms wrapped around me were Lynne's. He was trembling.

The pain from my chest erupted, making my legs weak and my vision blur. "Oh… Lynne…?" I grumbled, slowly coming to my senses. The crowd's voices were gone, and I felt like myself again. I remembered that now, I was free.

I was…

"Eyvind!" One of the boys yelled from the crowd. I recognized him from earlier with his spiky orange hair, I was pretty sure they called him Simon. He grabbed the other boy from the ground. "I've got you. Let's get you to the medic."

Lynne loosened his grip on me, but when I almost fell over, he wrapped my arm around his shoulder. "Come on, let's get out of here."

The pain made me feel lightheaded… or maybe it was the blood draining from my body. At least I wasn't cold.

"Did… I win…?" I asked. I could barely remember what happened moments ago, I could barely talk.

Lynne gave me a gentle smile.

"Yeah. You did."