Savage Mate

9. Regrets

Mark

I knew that Trevor acting "nice" had to be a setup. Both me and the girl, from whom I never even got a name, were able to enjoy some more rest time, then they came for her. I decided not to try and think what would happen to her, there wasn't much I could do to help her anyway. Then they gave me some medicine and Trevor started teaching me how to fight with blades. I knew that couldn't be a good thing, there had to be a reason for it, and nothing good would come out of it for me or whomever I was going to fight. 

The next fight they take me to, I face a rather skinny man, who looks mean, but not that strong. At first, I don't get why Trevor hid a knife in my belt, it feels like overkill while dealing with someone like that guy, but soon, I realize that looks can be deceiving, the guy is fast, and strong, and I'm at a clear disadvantage. Worst of all, the guy is enjoying the fight, and I have no doubt he would have no problem killing me. His hits soon find and revive old injuries, and not long after, it becomes hard to breathe, I guess his hits broke my bruised ribs. I'm starting to get angry, and soon I'm trapped by the familiar rage about the injustice of my situation. 

I'm blinded by anger, not caring about the hits he is connecting, only caring about the damage I can deal. He looks startled by the change, and is becoming more cautions, but I'm not allowing him to get a respite, I go after him with all that I have, not caring as his fists connect with my already bruised body. And then, I get what is going on, as he manages to put some distance between us, and starts changing before my eyes.

I just stand there like an i***t as he transforms into a mountain lion, and then he jumps at me. I move to the side and avoid a full on collision, but I can't escape his claws cutting three lines into my side. It burns, and I realize why I was given a knife, it was to even the field. I grab it and held it in front of me, but as the fight keeps going, I realize that this is not going to be an easy fight, it's possible that I have been thrown into a fight to the death without being told about it. The mountain lion is certainly doing his best to kill me. I hate being put in this position, and I lose too long thinking about the consequences of fighting for my life, about the possibility of taking a life, so I find myself on the floor, with an angry mountain lion on top of me, doing its best to tear my face off. It's all I can do to keep his teeth away from me, but there's nothing I can do against his claws, and those are tearing me apart, I can smell my blood and feel it pooling on the floor. I start feeling cold, and I feel my arms losing strength, then I hear John's voice yelling at me to kill the cat, and the image of a different cat comes to mind, and my arms give up.

I was sure I was going to die, so when I wake up in the infirmary, it takes me a moment to understand that I'm alive. I take a deep breath and regret it immediately as pain radiates through my body. I just lie for a while, with nothing to do. My throat is dry and hurts, I know I can't even speak up to try to call for help, so I just wait. It feels like hours before a nurse comes in. She notices I'm awake right away and goes for a glass of water, to which I'm extremely grateful.

"Don't try to move," she warns a little too late, "you have extensive wounds, some even needed stitches, so there's a risk you could open them up, that would delay your recovery. And I think it would also be rather painful. I'll let the boss know you are awake, I'm sure he will be happy to know that."

I don't know if he is referring to John or Trevor, and to be honest, I don't care, they are both bad news, and not someone I would want to deal with. They have never shown any real concern for me, I'm just a tool for them. Sure, Trevor acts nice to me, and he has helped me train and stuff, but it's all for his own gain. If I'm trained, if I'm healthy, if I'm willing to fight, that means more money for him and John. Even his supposedly birthday gift was just to ease me into a sense of security so I wouldn't question what was about to happen, so I would go into the fight feeling happy and content. 

I wonder why I'm still alive, I should be dead, I know what happened in that fight, and there was no way I could have survived that, I was down, and I was at the mountain lion's mercy. And here I am, barely alive, but still breathing. For a moment I wish the cat had finished me, so I could have finally escaped this place and this life that I don't want anymore, but I know I'm not that lucky.

"Good, I see you are awake," Trevor says. "You scared us for a moment there, we thought you were gone."

"Would that had been so bad?" I murmur, and I don't know if he didn't hear, or just choose to ignore it. 

"You have been out for a couple of days, it seems it was worse that we originally thought. We had to take that animal off of you, but we barely made it in time."

"I thought you wanted me dead. Isn't that the whole point of the fights to the death?" I don't care what they think about my tone or my attitude, I almost died and they are angry at me? 

"Yes, but we expect our humans to win, not those animals," he says as if it's obvious. "We gave you that knife for a reason, you didn't use it like I taught you! What's the point of doing all that if you are not going to put any effort?"

"I never wanted to fight, you know? I only fight back because is either beat them or getting beaten."

"Well, in this case it was kill or be killed, and you almost lost. Your father was really angry," I almost deny John being my father, then I thought, what's the point? I'm tired of reminding them that he is just the man who married my mother, but no one cares, they keep thinking we are somehow related. "Once you get better, your training regime will be increased, we can't let you lose another fight like that. The whole point is to prove that we are better than those animals, and to win the bets, none of that will happen if you throw the fights."

"Shifters are faster and stronger," I point out.

"You didn't have a problem when you fought that wolf a few months back."

"That was an animal, an animals act on instincts," not to mention it's easier to kill an animal than a person, "a shifter has intelligence behind his movements."

"Then you have to get smarter. You are our best fighter right now, and we can't lose you. We won't lose you."

Trevor leaves, and I feel kind of depressed at the thought that this is going to be my life forever. I have nothing to look forward to. I fall into a fitful sleep, and when I wake up again, it's John who is in my room.

"It was about time. The doctors say you need time to rest, but some things can't wait. I need you to come with me," he orders.

"He can't walk, he could open the wounds..." the nurse starts explaining.

"I don't care, I need him to come with me, make it happen!"

The nurse brings a wheelchair and helps me into it. It hurts a lot, but pain is nothing new to me. She takes me deeper into the complex and after a while I realize we are going to the basement, the place John saves for the worst of his deeds. Soon the smell clues me to our destination, and soon we arrive at a room filled with cages. There's where John keeps the animals he use for his animal fighting, a side is covered with cages with dogs, the other has some more exotic animals. He has some exclusively animal fights, but the animals he deems more vicious, he pairs with some of his human fighters. 

One of the cages doesn't have an animal, it has a human, one I recognize as the shifter from my last fight. He notices when we walk in, with John not far behind.

"You promised you were going to forgive my debt if I won the fight, and I did!" he says as soon as he notices John.

"Well, your debt is forgiven, but you were never supposed to walk out of that fight alive, and you were not supposed to defeat my rising star. All the bets were in your favor, and by winning, you made me lose a lot of money. But don't worry, you won't have to pay anything back to me, I will set things back to where they are supposed to be." John makes a signal to one of his men, and two of them come closer. I notice one of them carries a long knife, the other what looks like a cattle prod. "Now, I need you to pay attention to what's going to happen," he tells me, and I know it's not going to be a pretty sight.

"Shift," one of John's thugs demand of the shifter, and when the shift doesn't happen, he uses the cattle prod. I wince at the shifter's scream, and feel sick at the smell of burning flesh. 

"Open your eyes!" John yells, and I realize I had closed my eyes, not wanting to see what's coming next. I feel his hand on my shoulder, squeezing painfully. "You need to see what happens when things don't go according to my plans. Maybe that way you will be more willing to do your part."

I watch in horror as the mountain lion does his best to avoid the knife that's cutting at him, but even in his animal form, there's not much space in the cage for him to move, and John's thug is fast, stabbing him and moving out of the way before the shifter can retaliate. Little by little the man is damaging the shifter, until there's a pool of blood under him, and his movements are way too slow.

"This is what happens when rules are not followed. Last time you weren't there to watch it, but something like this happened to that cat you let escape," he says and I feel sick all over again. That poor Kitty. "You could have avoided this too, save him some pain, if only you had fought like you were supposed to. If you had used that knife we gave you, you could have ended his misery fast, but because of you, he will die slowly and painfully," I hate that he is turning the blame on me, but damn, it's working. "That's enough boys," he calls off the thugs, "I don't think he will recover from that, and if he does, then we can try again later."

John walks out, leaving me alone with the dying mountain lion. I can see his chest rising, but the movement is not as fast as before, and as time goes by, the movement slows even more, until it stops. I didn't get to know him, and he did try to kill me, but still I mourn his death, because of how unfair it was. He didn't need to die, and even if part of me knows that I'm only a pawn in John's sick empire, his words affected me, and I can't help but feel responsible for his death.

I try to roll the wheelchair away, but I don't have the strength for that, so I have no other option but wait at that place, alone, with the animals and the dead shifter, until someone comes for me.