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The teenage boy is panting like a rabid animal, wheezing as he coughs from the excessive exertion. Something clatters and splats on the stage floor, and his footsteps storm our way.
My hand is sweaty and shaking in Dessin’s grasp, but he never lets go. Never tears his eyes from mine.
The boy snatches me by my long hair, yanking my head back until I’m looking up at his glistening face, sweat dripping down his nose. With labored breathing, he screams something in my face, spitting as he over accentuates certain letters.
“Wait,” Dessin breathes.
But the fist knocks straight into my bottom lip, then again into my cheekbone. I taste the bitter iron flavor.
Dessin thrashes against his restraints, firing off a string of profanities at the boy.
But my ears are ringing. My vision blurs. My head is slammed against the post, banging my brain around in my skull. I dangle from my chains in a delirious, throbbing heap.
The boy rears his arm back again, balling his fist, from which I’m guessing his goal is to knock me unconscious. He jerks forward, throwing his weight into his punch.
Dessin catches his fist, and the stadium falls quiet.
His knuckles turn white, gripping the boy’s hand with a volcanic rage rising to the surface. Unsurprisingly, Dessin has managed to break free of his shackles. The notorious Patient Thirteen. The dangerous escape artist. And he is as agile as a mountain cat as he twists the boy’s wrist backward, making a loud snap. The boy screams, falling to his knees.
“I’d like to watch her break your bones herself. But I’m not that selfless,” Dessin growls in the boy’s exhausted face.
But his sense of balance is tampered with too quickly. Dessin sways before hitting the floor, eyes glazing over as he stares up at the ceiling. Panic floods my lungs, stabbing me in the heart.
The boy uses his other hand to beat Dessin. Pounding his face with one clenched fist. Attacking a defenseless man into a bloody pulp. My bloodshot stare darts to our friends waiting on the sidelines. Warrose is about to lunge, hands gripping the edge of the stage. I shake my head at him.
The teenage soldier moves back to me, smearing blood across my face, then spitting in my eyes, degrading me in front of his superiors.
And I know this won’t end until I lean into the void. This won’t stop until I discover that one weakness. I’m hit once more, knocking me into that pit of nothingness until I see it. I witness the source of what cripples the boy. Of what forces him to freeze, to solidify into a paralyzing state of panic.
There. I see it.
Through my throbbing face, swollen bottom lip, and blood coated mouth, I laugh.
It bubbles out of me, like seeing him in attack mode is the funniest damn thing in the world. And I sell it like my life depends on it. My laugh becomes a wild cackle, and the boy is stunned upright. His balled-up hand pauses over my face.
I grin through bloody teeth.
“Suck. My. Dick.”
The crowd erupts in laughter and disapproving booing. They throw their drinks and food at the boy, yelling words that sound like there isn’t anything more offensive in their language.
Humiliation. When his victim laughs through pain.
That’s the weakness.
And he can’t move past it. Unable to process why his methods of violence are having the opposite effect.
Sentinels drag the stunned boy away as he has failed this test. And as they undo my shackles, I race to Dessin’s side on the floor. He grabs my hand, letting me help him to his feet. And we’re both struggling to remain conscious. Our backs are dripping long trails of blood. Our nerves morph into poisoned daggers, piercing every inch of muscle. And though our shoulders droop forward, our chins remain high.
And something strange happens.
A prisoner, an old woman with weather-worn skin and cloudy eyes, drops down to one knee, placing a fist over her heart.
Slowly, another drops down, then another, and another. Our friends are the only ones still standing aside from the audience of soldiers. I hold on to Dessin, who looks just as confused as I feel. We search the staggered sea of kneeling men and women, old and young, all wearing the same expression. Respect. Hope. Allegiance.
The Ringmaster bursts through the silence in outrage, ending the Fun House Night with a red face and waving arms.
We don’t see it right away. Not until she screams. Two sentinels drag the mother back to the stage and knock her to her knees. She looks up at us with a grimy face and missing teeth. Confused. Scared.
