Victimized by Richard Thomas

“Victimized”
    Richard Thomas

    (This story was originally published in 2011
    in Murky Depths #15 as a shorter version.)

    © Copyright Richard Thomas, 2011

    It’s the third night in a row and my bloodlust can’t be quenched. There aren’t many women here, I’m one of the few. They don’t have the stomach for it. I do. This advancement in prison control, this thinning of the herd was inevitable. The people won’t stand for anything less. The guilty have an option now at the hands of their victims. There are no laws here, no punishment beyond this place. Fight or die. On some nights, fight and die.
    The warehouse is vast and yet we are on top of each other. Some are sweaty, wiping their foreheads with the back of their hands, taking deep breaths. Others have their arms wrapped around emaciated frames, shivering as if cold. In the center of the room is a patch of canvas, a lone dim bulb descending from the rafters, a sepia tone declaring this time history to be recorded. Risers are scattered around the ring, leading up to concrete walls and dusty windows with spiderweb cracks. Mottled red girders extend across the space.
    The stench is nauseating, men who haven’t bathed in weeks, ripe and rotten. Sweaty socks and rancid feet fill my nostrils. But it is the scent of the man I must beat down in three days, so I inhale deeply, eyes watering. I come to prepare myself, to rid myself of this mark. This idea of victim. This hiding my eyes and looking away. I am here to gain every advantage I can and watch these men become beasts.
    I stand at the top of the metal steps. Months I’ve prepared. Trimming every ounce of fat. Building up muscle where none existed. I fix my gaze on the distance, a place in time where we’ll meet again, and he will not know me then, not as he did before.
    The bell rings, sharp and crisp. A mumble works its way through the crowd as the two men leave their corners. One is tall and gangly, his bony ribs protruding from his chest. He moves slowly, one step at a time, watching his opponent, mouth open, hands clenched. Across from him is a cloud of rage, black lines and insects, a sheet of rain occupying the space. It is pent up frustration. It is a blind, numb animal instinct. Must be family. They always look like that, the family of the victims. Dark eyes focused, arms trembling, his aging frame strong and pale. I guess father. He’s shaved his head as they often do, a ritual shedding of the past. His lumbering gait is a bit off, balance broken from years of remorse, eons of anguish drowned in buckets of amber.
    Voices drift to me. Incest, rape, murder. A sister or daughter? Sex and an accident. A repeated accident. In truth, a plan. Odds are two-to-one in favor of the criminal. He is twenty years younger. Agile and slow, a grin eases across his face. He has faith it will work out. He is wrong.
    The men that surround me are all the same. Variations on a theme. The short, dark toad in front of me holds a fistful of bills in one hand and a notepad in the other. Old school.
    “Bookman,” I say. “Hey, Bookman.”
    He turns around, glances to my left, to my right, finally to my eyes, as they bore into him.
    “What’s up, lady. You want some action?”
    “100 bucks on the old man. The father.”
    “You sure, baby?”
    I swallow my rage and take a deep breath.
    “Just asking...”
    I hand him a bill, and he sucks it into his fist, scrawling his mark and some numbers on the pad. His mouth parts in a toothless grin. He blinks and a twitch invades his left eye.
    “Here you go.”
    He tears off the scrap of paper and hands it to me.
    I look up in time to see the scarecrow advance, a flurry of fast fists to the old man’s head.
    Right, right, left, right.
    He steps back. Forward.
    Jab, jab, cross, uppercut.
    Fists pulled back, he hesitates, full of pride and wonder. A grin sweeps across his face, a bounce in his step, this bag of sticks confident, as the balding hunchback straightens up.
    The old man