I don't piss myself out of choice, not even out of fear, but out of shock. And shame follows like a shadow, a heartbeat. Two. Three.
Then laughter. A whole damn quarter of the stadium erupts in cruel amusement. At me. This body collapses to the ground, hands slapping against cold, sticky stone. Pathetic.
The creature leaps ten meters, at least, but it doesn't come for me—it goes for Frank. He's twenty meters ahead now. The lion-thing stretches out its tongue, landing with a crash so loud I feel it in my spine. Feeling my insides vibrate, I crawl back like a worm, slipping, scraping.
Why does this feel familiar?
There's something wrong with this body, or maybe with me. The fear is mine, no doubt. Real and raw. But it doesn't feel like it belongs to me. I can't explain it. I just know this body reacts on instinct, and that instinct is always retreat. Always fear. I feel it all, every damn ounce of it, and it disgusts me.
I'm pathetic. Helpless, a bystander in someone's skin.
Frank dodges the creature's slash—barely. He shouts something back, but I'm too far away to hear. The crowd has gone silent, except for the scattered whistles. The screams. Their laughter's gone, replaced by morbid fascination. They're entertained.
One man versus a monster. One human against something not human.
Tears blur my vision. They fall without permission over my naked body.
"I can't do anything," I whisper, voice cracking under the weight.
"I'm too weak!" I try to scream, but it comes out broken, merely a whisper, even to myself.
Blood smears across my limbs as I crawl over pools of it. Not my blood—someone else's. Or maybe multiple people. I stumble against a wall, cold and slick. I don't know how long it's been. Seconds? Minutes?
Frank is still fighting.
When my eyes find him again, it's right as the beast swats him aside like a toy. He flies meters, his body flailing. The lion-thing doesn't wait—it searches for new prey immediately.
The colosseum stretches far, hundreds of meters, maybe more. I can't measure properly, my head is too foggy and numb to concentrate.
Then it charges into the masses. No hesitation, and my kind starts to scream, to scatter, try to flee—but they're too slow. The creature tears through two, then four, then another three. Limbs rip, and blood sprays. Chaos consumes everything.
I glance back at Frank. He's far right now, maybe fifty meters away. He's stirring, and that barely.
The screams won't stop, and it's not the noise that gets me. It's that final scream. The one someone makes right before dying. That's what gets under the skin, that last cry of knowing it's over. That's the sound of horror.
I move, crawl, and stumble toward Frank.
Behind me, the massacre continues, but I don't look back. I can't.
When I reach him, I finally see what the others were doing. Around the edge of the mob, some of the survivors have taken down a smaller version of the beast. A cub, maybe, and they're not mourning. They're not scared.
Tearing at its flesh, its fur, its teeth. Like scavengers. Some claw for pieces of ear, others for bone or tongue. It's grotesque, but it's what they've become, what they need to do to survive in this place.
A thunderous crack echoes across the colosseum, and I don't flinch, afterall, I'm numb.
I just kneel beside Frank.
His body is wrecked—bruises blooming like ink under his skin. But what hits me hardest is the bite mark on his side. Not deep, but bad enough. Blood spills freely, dripping like a broken faucet.
He shakes his head. "I'll make it, boy." Then he coughs, hard and wet. Pain etched into every twitch. My hands curl into fists.
"I told you," He growls, cutting me off, "I'll make it. Just be quiet for God's sake."
His voice isn't warm, not comforting anymore. It's sharp and commanding. The voice of someone who must survive—who has no space left for pleasantries.
This body lowers his head, and still, I can't help but think how pathetic all of this is.
But what could he have done? What could I have done?
Nothing. Still... pathetic.
Suddenly, a trumpet-like sound erupts—sharp, metallic, as if the sky itself is cracking. The cheers in the crowd twist into boos, a wave of contempt crashing over the colosseum. The heavy doors—closed for what felt like minutes, maybe longer—now creak open.