Page 25 of Beast Unburdened

Grinning I shook him a little, “I’m counting on it.” But in my hearts, I knew a back-to-back fight was going to test me to my limits. I was just as likely to get seriously hurt, die or come out the victor. I did know that I had never, in all three of my years as a gladiator for Drameil, had as much to fight for as I had now.

When the shuttle door opened I showed nothing of my turmoil, hiding what I felt behind my beastly facade as always. As I’d always made sure to be too wild, too uncontrollable, Drameil had taken to putting a lead to my nose ring. As I slapped the lead into Luka’s hand he visibly swallowed, struggling to hide his distaste but then his mask slid into place as well.

Luka led the way with a disinterested look on his face, leading me on that damned lead like he was walking a pet and not a very well-liked one at that. The other three gladiators walked at our heels, apparently kept in check by virtue of their pain collars.

We were ushered into the bowels of the stadium, through the back doors and unvarnished, of despair-smelling tunnels that housed the fighting stock for now. While Luka spoke with one of the fight’s organizers to check where we would be housed for the afternoon I spent a moment looking around. Checking out the competition waiting in small cubicles in this narrow corridor.

I’d been on Xio several times before, not that that meant I knew much of the planet of course as all I’d seen was the inside of a transport and the arena. But I knew the layout here, down below and I knew how things would go from here on out, what to expect. That at least settled my nerves.

They dropped me off first, unlike the other three who’d just sit on a bench in an open cubicle. They stuck me in one of the cages usually reserved for the non-sentient beasts they also pitted out on the sands. Like the Ferai beast still locked in our old cellblock with only the stinking Thonklad for company.

I paced the cell back and forth in three steps, walking in a groove that many feet had followed before me. I focused on the fight ahead, on the first three opponents I knew I’d face. In my head I recounted their statistics over and over again, making sure I remembered their strengths and weaknesses.

Xio’s primary arena, the Dome, was not as large as many of the arenas I had fought in. It was meant for the very elite only so tickets went at a premium. Each of the fighters pitted on its sands was a prime fighter, having had far more wins than losses under their belt. Generally, fighters of the prime class won more than seventy percent of all their matches, and once that number started dropping they were sent in for deathmatches, like Sunder.

Knowing this, I knew the stands would be filled only with the richest and most privileged. I’d fought many prime fights as I’d never been defeated at all. The fact that these organizers were now allowed to pit me in two back-to-back fights, three against one, probably had everyone salivating.

All these rich assholes would want to be the ones to personally witness the Beast’s first defeat. Fierce, whose hearing was the best out of all of us, had whispered to me that the betting odds on my second fight were 39 to 1 that I’d win. I fervently hoped Abigail didn’t hear about this.

The other three all went out on the sands, one after the other returning victorious. While Luka paced in front of my cell or watched from the handler’s bench near the entrance to the sands. I couldn’t tell the male to settle down and calm before he betrayed us to the organizer watching him with interest. The Beast wasn’t supposed to be able to talk at all.

As the headliner for this night of fights, I was the last one to get out there obviously but when the announcer started prepping the audience for my first fight it felt like forever and then some had passed. I wanted to get this over with, there was only so much warming up of my muscles I could do to prepare for this fight inside this tiny cell.

When I stepped out on the sands everything felt so damn familiar for a moment I could hardly remember that I fought a free male this time. I was fighting so that Abigail and the others, so that I myself, could live our lives as free people. That was a worthy cause.

Luka unsnapped the chain from my nose ring and whispered at me, “You can do this. Try to keep your back to the sinking sun, I noticed it’s particularly bright this sunset.” That was good advice that I hadn’t expected from the Doc. Keeping my back to that sun would ensure my opponents had that bright light straight in their face, blinding them.

Barefoot I walked across the warm sand, reaching the middle and raising my arms high in the sky so I could roar for the audience. It whipped them up in a frenzy, they were screaming my name, applauding. Ironic that they cheered me on when each of them had bet that I’d lose my second fight tonight. Of course these fights weren’t meant to the death but it was not uncommon for one or two causalities to fall on such an evening regardless.

Then my first three competitors entered the arena and the fight was on.

*

Abigail

When I returned to the bridge I found Tori awkwardly perched on one of the jump seats at the back wall of the bridge. As far away from Kitan as possible and Kitan was just as awkwardly sitting in the pilot’s chair, the tension between them thick enough to cut.

Eyeing the two I said, “What?” My eyebrow raised in inquiry I pinned each of them with a stare. Kitan rolled one shoulder, dipping his head with the pointed fox-like snout, and refused to meet my eyes. Tori however met my stare but her face turned completely scarlet.

“Come on, spill it you two,” I asked, hoping this would provide me with a distraction so I wouldn’t think of Ziame risking himself. Eventually, Tori whispered, “The baby kicked, I let Kitan feel it...” And now they were both feeling awkward, how interesting. I wasn’t sure if there was attraction brewing between the two or if this was just them being awkward over the tender moment.

Either way, it wasn’t a distraction at all. I just rolled my eyes and sat down in the captain’s chair, my leg jittery with nerves. Kitan gave me a sideways look and then very carefully said, “Shall I put the match up on the viewscreen? They won’t have started yet. Probably another hour or two before Ziame is up.”

I shrugged trying to act nonchalant, “Put it up when it starts I guess.” Then I eyed Tori again, “Do you know who fed the beast and the prisoners today?” She hesitated a moment, “I went with Sunder. His cage really needs to be cleaned but we don’t know how to go about it… They normally would knock him out with the pain collar but we think that’s cruel.”

“Shit yeah, that’s really cruel indeed. Maybe Luka can sedate it?” I offered. Then another thought crossed my mind, “In zoos don’t they usually have the ability to isolate an animal in one part of their cage? Maybe when we sedate it we can make a sliding door between two cells? So for next time, we can just lure it to one side with food?”

“That is a great idea female,” Kitan said, “We should do that. I know Jakar is handy enough with some tools, he can probably make such a thing.” “But then we really should find a safe planet to leave that poor animal on, keeping it on the ship is no way to live,” I added. Wondering if I needed to make sure the males understood that or if they’d like to keep the dangerous animal as a pet or something. I couldn’t imagine Ziame wanting to but he had told me this animal was normally kept as a pet, not that I could see how.

“Of course,” Kitan said, “He has lost his bonded, there is no way to safely keep it now.” He agreed with me with a solemn nod and then eyed Tori who was still perched in her jump seat. She looked awkward still and now ventured to softly ask, “What about Sunder? Is his mission going alright?”

We had worried that Sunder might be recognized in one of the bars when he tried to procure us a navigator and found us a lead on a replacement transponder so we could change our ship’s identity. He’d been advertised for today’s fights as one of the main contenders, as his fight had been the only deathmatch on the docket he’d drawn a crowd. Except now it was canceled and replaced with Ziame’s impossible twofer. But Kitan couldn’t do it himself, he needed to be here to fly the ship and was still too hurt to go out, so Sunder it was.

I eyed the fox-like male for a second, wondering if Tori’s concern for Sunder bothered him in any way. The male was trying to scratch beneath the cast on his arm with one of his claws and was clearly frustrated it wasn’t working. There was no apparent interest in Tori’s question except when he casually mentioned he could send the Tarkan male a message.

Tori nodded anxiously, she was nibbling on her lower lip and I realized maybe I was wrong about her being interested in Kitan. Maybe she was interested in Sunder, she had been spending an awful lot of time with him. Then I shook my head, don’t be stupid, of course this could just purely be friendship, it wasn’t like Tori was in a good place to look for a boyfriend.

In many ways, I reminded myself, I wasn’t either. I had after all just been abducted and thrown into this crazy world, I could hardly trust my own feelings now could I? I thought of Ziame risking his life today and felt cold fear clench my belly and crawl up my throat. I remembered only too well how it felt to lie curled up in his arms each night, I wanted him back safe and sound, I wanted him at my side.