I thought he was dead. I thought, at the first flash of him, they’d taken him from me.
I’d expected to lose him today. I promised him that I’d kill him. But the thought that anyone else could touch him, that they could steal even a minute of the short time we have left together…
“Come out, you coward!” I shout.
The sound echoes off the rocks, around the stadium, fed back to me by the enormous speakers that pick up my every breath.
But the sound, I know, will seep into Jason like poison.
‘Coward.’ Always so desperate to be the winner of this awful game. But not for freedom. He enjoys it. He likes the attention. He likes the respect of the new men. He likes hurting people.
It makes me feel sick to think of what Robin must have been dealing with. All those bruises I never saw him get. All those times he never told me what happened.
Maybe this is why. Maybe he knew I couldn’t stop myself.
Then I’m glad. I’m glad Robin was smart enough to hold out until I could do this legitimately. Until I knew just enough to give this bastard the sort of death he deserves.
There’s a movement off to my left. Had he let me walk another meter or two, I never would have seen him. Had he not been so desperate to prove he’s the more formidable of us, he might have waited, tricked me. But he’s so eager to show he’s no coward that he lunges too early.
I turn, swing the crystal, smash it into his cheek. The crack is audible, visceral, the vibration of shattering bone running through my hand.
It feels amazing.
He falls, my boot comes down on his neck, and I could end it. Right now. This could be the shortest match in Deathball history.
But that would be far too easy.
Instead, I raise both arms in the air, beckoning to the audience, asking them to decide his fate.
Fascinating how people who have never so much as spoken a word to a man can call for his death behind a mask of anonymity. Lost in the crowd, just going along with it, they don’t care who he is, where he came from, whether he’s good or evil. They’re so distant from it. Yet they hold his life in their hands.
But they’re not ready. For all the people who yell at me to split his skull in half, the rest want my freedom. They want to see me do this properly. And shouts of ‘Deathball’ win out.
Their enthusiasm reaches deafening when I kick him in the stomach and continue my search.
Sun God vs. the Lord of Darkness. It’s an interesting theme for a match between Robin and myself. Maybe I’m not the only one who looks at him that way—who sees all the warmth and life in his eyes and his smile.
Or maybe… maybe he was supposed to win this. Put the Lord of Darkness down in the ground where he belongs.
He would have made a magnificent hero today, resplendent in those shining wings.
Now they’re filthy, covered in red sand. Broken.
I mount one of the larger boulders, and I’ve climbed almost all the way to the top when the voice comes over the speaker.
“It appears we have our first weapon drop of the day, only this comes from…” The pause is long enough to turn my face toward the speaker. “An anonymous sponsor!”
There’s a communal gasp while I breach the summit of the enormous rock and wait. The weapon flies in from a distance, from outside the arena, and I expect it to fall at my feet, truly I do. I’m the one they want to win. The people, they’re screaming my name even now.
I scan the stands, looking for a sign from one of my usual sponsors, all of them here today to watch my performance. But they all seem confused.
Whatever it is, it’s big. It must have cost a lot.
And it falls from the sky, well short of my rock, close to the place I last saw Jason.
The bastards.
They’ve given him the upper hand already.
