Death’s New Pet: Love after Life

Suddenly, the floor gives way, tilting ninety degrees. I scramble, desperately reaching for the rocks, but my attempts prove to be futile. With very little time to prepare myself, I’m falling through the air.

Fear swarms through me as I realise this arena is about three hundred metres in circumference and if I fall, I’m going to explode on impact. Frightened, I scramble around for something to grab onto. The vicious wind rushes through my hair and clothes, however, before I can fall any further, the ground connects with my shoulder without warning and forcefully drives me upward. Tilting anticlockwise, I fall again. Just like before, before I can hurl down to my inevitable death, the floor changes again, smashing back into me. A scream of agony rips through me as the ground keeps tilting and changing direction, throwing itself into me. My whole body pounds with bruising but the awful attack from the moving ground is too fast and irregular to figure out. It disorientates me and sends me spinning each time, making it impossible to fight. I’m thrown around like a rag doll two more times before I realise the floor is starting to slow down and not tilt as much. My head pounds and my vision blots in and out.

They are trying to disorientate you. The little voice in the back of my head screams for me to snap out of it but it’s impossible as the nausea rises up in my throat. Just like how Maximo would strap you on the spinning chair and whirl you around for ten minutes to stop your fight.

Everything aches beyond belief. My hearing is nothing but a high-pitched scream from where I hit my head against the stone floor. The familiar feeling never gets easier. I force the bile back down my throat, but it doesn’t go down without a fight.

Abruptly, the floor tilts in the other direction and my legs scramble around to get some contact with a rock to steady myself. Finally, I manage to get to my feet and run up the slope to avoid falling into the other side of the glass dome again.

Much to my relief, the steepness of the slope isn’t as severe, and I can just about fight gravity. The floor does this a couple of more times and I find myself finding a good pattern of charging up to whichever side is the highest and remaining there until it changes again. It keeps me steady and gives me the edge if anything joins me in this arena, but I’m utterly exhausted already.

My plan swiftly goes out of the window as the floor throws itself out of balance again and I fall ungracefully to the lowest side of the tilted ground. The left side of my body smashes against the concrete and I roll a couple of times until I hit the glass. I have a couple of moments to regain my breath and my senses, but I almost wish my hearing never returned because the most awful growl echoes around the dome.

Horrified, I stare up at a huge goblin-looking creature, dribbling green slime and spitting out puddles of saliva at the top of the sloped floor. Its teeth are the size of my arms and sharpened like daggers. The creature slams its jaws open and shut and the sound of the slicing weapons is deafening. It completely takes my breath away.

It charges down the slope towards me. Its face is all muddled up with eyes that have a thin film of green over it, and gill-looking slices in its face around that terrifying jaw. He doesn’t seem to have a nose or ears, but I don’t count either of those senses out without knowing what those gills do. His ridiculously long arms swing by its side, propelling it faster forward up the slope and I don’t doubt if they get me, I’m royally fucked: he could bludgeon me to death with a single swipe! His entire being is faster than ever deemed imaginable, and I don’t have time to plan my escape. Just in time, the floor lurches in the opposite direction, causing the creature to stumble. Luckily, we are both disorientated and I use this to my advantage.

Without thinking, I throw myself down the slope between the monster’s legs, narrowly missing his large arms. I fall fast but manage to twist onto my stomach and scramble to my feet before the awful floor can do much more damage. Thankfully, the monster is disgruntled and confused as it stares around, desperately trying to find me. It gives me time to put some distance between us.

“Three minutes without a weapon is up,” Misery’s voice fills the dome. Relief consumes me as I suddenly spot a dagger in the middle of the arena floor. I risk a glance at the family on the other side, and now I see the sinfully attractive man from earlier with wide, furious eyes. He rises to his feet and glares down at the scene in front of him. I can’t see anyone else, that black mist around him has managed to fully block them all out.

All of the sudden, the roar of the angry beast in front of me pulls my attention back to what’s happening. He still stumbles around about a hundred metres from me, but it’s only fifty from the weapon. I start to charge towards it as the floor finally levels itself out and stops tilting.

Despite that, my whole body still moves as though I’m still rocking back and forth. The nausea rises up and I have to desperately swallow it down to avoid spewing up everywhere and becoming vulnerable. It takes a moment to steady myself, but that’s one moment too many, and now the monster is racing back across the arena. He moves so fucking fast it’s blinding.

I only just about manage to roll out of his way before that large body can connect with me. He continues running until he bangs into the glass on the other side of the dome, creating the loudest thud. To my surprise, the dome doesn’t shatter. With him momentarily distracted, I lurch for the weapon. However, as I grab it, I skid on the loose stones, sending them flying across the arena as I fall on my ass.

Expectedly, the monster’s head snaps in my direction when he hears me. Without hesitation, he charges back over to me again, but curiously enough, he lurches for where I tripped on the stones, not where I ended up. I ready my fighting stance and resist the smile which threatens my lips.

He’s blind.

Testing my theory, I grab a pebble from the floor and throw it as far away from me as I can. It smashes into the glass dome and the Goblin charges after it. Pride settles in as I finally feel back in control of the fight.

As the monster throws himself around in confusion, swinging at nothing, desperately trying to find me, I toss the weapon from one hand to the other, getting familiar with the way the ribbed handle kisses my skin. It shines beautifully under the blaring stage lights, the silver tooth-like dagger sparkling as if it’s made from thousands of diamonds. I run my finger across the blade and something sticky stains my skin. I rub it between my fingers feeling the slimy and oily texture. Then, my heart jumps out of my chest as I frantically wipe my hand on my jumpsuit.

Poison.

Horrified, the blood drains from my body and I stupidly let the weapon fall to my feet. Everything in the arena dulls into a low thud of my heartbeat and my whole body feels as though it’s going to give way. Not from the poison itself, but from my fucking brain which hurls me back into a traumatic memory.

Maximo’s face swarms my mind in all his wicked ugliness. Then that fucking awful cackle stings my head and the pain is unlike no other. Fragments of memories of him tying my naked body down. Him pouring two clear liquids into one another until it created a white foggy poison. Him forcing my lips open and putting a tiny pipette of liquid on my gums. I can taste the disgusting plastic taste of his gloves as he rubs it into my gums to ensure I fully digest the poison. And then the pain — oh fuck, the pain!

My entire body seizes up as though he’s here right now, drugging me. In the distance, I hear the roar of the monster as he hears the thud of the weapon on the ground, giving my position away. His tremendous footsteps shake the ground, and I can smell him getting close, rotten eggs and decaying flesh attack me. But I can’t fucking move. My whole body is frozen still, locked in the curse of post-traumatic stress, and there isn’t one fucking thing I can do about it.