“Don’t overcommit to the swipe, rookie!” grunted Breno, a battle-worn veteran of the school. He sidestepped Marcus’s haphazard swing and snatched his wrist. Off balance, Marcus was sent stumbling beside Breno before receiving an unforgiving blow from the butt of the practice sword. His legs felt light and his head heavy, and before he could react, the world came rushing towards him. It slammed into him hard, splitting the coarse skin on his brow.<br/><br/>“I will survive the games. I will get stronger. I will live!” Marcus shouted within as he blindly reached for his opponent’s ankles. The blood from his brow trickled into his left eye, and a sea of red overlaid itself on his blurry vision. He grasped something solid and squeezed it, trying to dig his nails in, holding on in desperation. A kick to the ribs rolled Marcus onto his back and another blow to the torso forced blood up his throat. “I will live,” Marcus whispered in a raspy voice.<br/><br/>“You’re the weakest piece of shit to ever come to this school. Shit, you may even die in training. The dominus won’t be happy if he doesn’t get a return on his investment.” Marcus’s heart sank. Towering above him, eclipsing the sun stood the dominus, brandishing his whip.<br/>“Don’t . . .” Marcus pleaded, his arms weakly upstretched in defense.<br/>“I give orders around here, bastard!” The whip cracked down and Marcus froze up. In a state of sheer agony and terror, Marcus lay on his back, his eyes squeezed shut and his world a swirling blackness of pain. His fingers came to work themselves into a patch of grass. Peculiar. The training grounds were barren. And the hilt of his practice sword remained within his grasp. Fortunate. And he opened his eyes and the stark blue sky was replaced with gray. The scent of the forest danced through the air, and above him stood a man, far weaker than the dominus, but far more imposing.<br/><br/>“Get up, rat!” Another blow to his side rolled him back onto his face.<br/><br/>“There’s so much grass here,” thought Marcus to himself. “It’s so nice.” The whip came crashing down on his back. He felt nothing. Peculiar.<br/><br/>“Get the fuck up!”<br/><br/>“Alright.” Marcus tightened his grip on the scythe and calmly gazed upon the taskmaster. In one eye he was the same, gruesome creature Marcus always had the displeasure of looking upon. In the other, he was bathed in blood, the blood from his brow. Marcus liked the image of the latter better. The whip snapped against him again. Marcus smiled, letting some of the blood from his brow run into his mouth. Without a word he embedded the scythe into the taskmaster’s eye, and watched in amusement as the man’s body convulsed in pain, the pathetic creature bleating for help. Still, the images in his eyes didn’t match up. Marcus set out to fix that. He tackled the man and threw all his weight into driving the scythe deeper. The blood flowed faster and the voice groaned softer. The fragile bone cracked and the scythe sank deep, scraping its way down as gray matter worked its way out onto the boy’s hands. Marcus remained transfixed on the broken man, now both eyes sending the same message. Peculiar.<br/><br/>“Marcus, what have you done?” He looked up into the face of Breno and back down at the corpse of the doctore, his face bashed in by the practice sword. His arms slumped and tears fell on the remnants of a face.<br/><br/>“Not . . . again . . .” Weeping, his hand grew slack and the practice sword tumbled away.<br/><br/>His eyes blurry from tears, Marcus slowly awoke to the familiar cage and the familiar staleness. He touched his eyebrow. Still smooth. He sighed and fell back asleep.<br/>