**LITTLE RAYAN'S POV**
I woke up to find myself in a pitch black room from the rough texture under me I knew that I was on top of a sleeping mat, the darkness in this room was enough to make me doubt that I was conscious. After a few minutes inside this place my eyes slightly got used to to the darkness, I could slightly see the outlines of my hands and a bit of my body, I lightly touched the aching spot on my collarbone only to touch a slightly rough fabric covering it.
"That cripple really treated me,"I thought to myself.
I placed my palms on the mat I was sleeping on, since I still didn't have enough strength to stand up and pushed myself up, I suddenly hit my head on the ceiling and a loud gong sound echoed inside. I stretched my arm upwards and I ended up touching a cold hard metallic ceiling, I did the same with the walls only to touch the same thing. My heart started pounding as my feet grew cold, memories of the day my family was slaughtered sprung up in my mind.
The memories was so vivid that you'd think it happened yesterday. I always suspected it but ever since that day, I had an immense fear for enclosed spaces. I started banging at the small what I could assume to be my cage as hard as I could.
"let me out of hear!"
"let me out!"
"you fucking asshole let me out!"
I kept yelling in anger and fear, it didn't help in any way I was still stuck. After a while both my hands started to ache, my ribs and throat burned from the prolonged yells. The coldness had now spread all over my body and I felt a strange nausea as my pleas reached deaf ears, that is assuming if anyone was here.
"please let me out," my yells had now turned into a whimper.
"please I don't wanna be in here, let me out."
"shut the fuck up!" I heard someone yell but the sound of the voice wasn't of an adult it was that of a child not much older than me.
"hey, we were all like that when we first arrived," someone else chimed in but the voice was of a girl.
"so who picked you up?" the girl asked, "Riven, Oliver or.... Lance?"
"wait Lance," I said as I recognized the name.
"pfft hahaha, this runt couldn't outrun that cripple," the other kid said. "just how slow are you."
"well you try running when you have a fucking arrow through your back!" I shouted in anger.
After I yelled that, the two got quiet and I hadn't realized before but talking to them helped in occupying my mind. I had temporarily forgotten about my surroundings, the fear was still there but slightly reduced and now with the silence it came back tenfolds.
"hmm, I don't know what you did to get an arrow but if it's true then you'll fit in here just fine." the girl said, "get some sleep you'll need it."
"yeah," the other one said.
Yeah right get some sleep, how can I fucking sleep when my heart feels like it's about to burst out of my chest but also what else could I do, I lied down and closed my eyes hoping the out of sight out of mind thing would actually work but it didn't, I still knew where I was. I tried thinking of happy things but my mind thought otherwise, this was the first of the many horribles nights that were to come.
I didn't even get a wink of sleep, it was dark in here so I could only assume that it was night time as the cage grew colder and colder till it stopped. I heard the sound of footsteps and keys as it got closer and closer, at first I thought it was the cripple but I could hear two feet so I ruled him out, the next thing I heard was the sound of a lock being opened and the sound of a metal door scraping the floor. This happened thirteen more times before my cage was opened.
As the door swung open, I hurriedly got out but the second my eyes were exposed to the light I quickly shut them as the burning pain hurt. I opened my eyes slowly to allow them to get used to the light and when it finally did, I realized I wasn't alone in this, in this room there were a total of fifteen children including of different ages and gender, there was a total of eight boys and seven girls, behind everyone of us was a small cube shaped cage almost the size of dog houses.
I noticed something about the kids here they all had bruises and cuts, some had a cut on their lips others had a bit of dried blood on their nose and others had black eyes but the one thing they all had in common was the bruises on their knuckle and also their ragged clothes. I was the odd one out, I was shirtless and I had a round bandage surrounding my upper body.
The kids stretched themselves a bit, none of the kids seem to mind me except for two of the oldest here. The two approached me one girl who looked at least twelve years of age and a boy who looked to be the same age as the girl.
"hmm you weren't bullshitting when you said you were shot," the boy said, I recognized his voice.
The boy, had messy blonde hair, he had a small cut right below his right eye, he had a round nose, pink lips, he had a medium build and also he had deep black eyes. The girl on the other hand had hazel eyes which were slanted, she had a cut on her sharp nose and also a cut on her upper lip, she had long black hair that was even more messy than the boy's and she had a small build.
A man wearing a black outfit and a mask covering his entire face walked in with a basket in his hand, he walked over to every person here and handed them a full loaf of bread, an idea came into to mind, when the man approaches me, I could hit him first and hard and make a run for it.
"don't even think about it, it's not worth it," the girl said as she noticed me staring at the masked man.
"the few idiots who tried what you are thinking... Well let's say they dont think much after that," the boy said.
I wanted to pounce on the man when he reached me but, the look on their faces made me stop, so I just took my share and started eating, I thought I was eating fast but when I was done so we're everyone else. The reason I ate fast was due to a habit I learned when I was a street urchin.
"now everyone report to the main grounds now!" the masked man ordered.
"follow the crowd if you don't want trouble," the older boy said to me.
I did as I was told and followed where everyone was going, as soon as we walked out of the room, I saw a long hallway leading to the exit it took us all two minutes to get out and we were now standing in what I think was called an arena. The ground was filled with sand and around us was a wall of seats. At the highest podium in front of us, I saw three men standing there I recognized Lance and anger boiled inside me when I saw him, our eyes met and he grinned at me before waving.
I wanted to spit on the ground in disgust but I held myself back, in front of us a black door was opened, a masked man wearing the exact same clothes as the one behind and fifteen more children ranging from seven to eleven years came out of there. Now that I think about it I must have been the youngest here.
"I'll announce the rules this time because Lance here brought a new recruit for us," the man who was standing in the middle said.
"the rules are simple, the last ten standing among you will be allowed a second meal today the unlucky one well be prepared to sleep hungry." he said and he sat down on his chair. Lance and the other man sat down with him.
"begin!" the three men announced in unison.
Like soldiers in a battlefield everyone on the opposite side charged at each other. A gruesome brawl without any rules begun, I just stood there shocked at what was happening. In my daze and the bandage surrounding me I had become an easy target for the battle crazed 'recruits' here five of them ambushed me as I tried to hold them off one of them had the ingenious idea of shoving his finger in the wound on my collarbone I screamed out in pain.
Blood started showing on the bandage and the wound started to hurt again. A roundhouse kick landed squarely on my chin sending me down on the ground, the kick made my head spin. The moment my body touched the ground, the masked man who had brought us here walked over to me and applied a white paint on my forehead.
So did the other masked man on anyone who had already been knocked down. The fight ended with the two older kids and some others standing the rest of us were on the floor, moans and groans filled the arena, the ground was filled with blood and some had even lost their tooth.
Well guess I would be missing a meal today, I said to myself bitterly.
"what the fuck was that!" Mr Lance shouted standing right next to me.
I didn't even notice when he had gotten off the podium and marched over here but that was his mistake, he was the one who brought me here so he should pay for it. I jumped up from the ground with my fist aimed at his face, the moment my fist was close to landing on his cheek he dodged it, I threw another one just as fast but he moved out of the way, every attack I threw at him was pointless it was like he knew where I was going to attack even before I did.
"where was this fucking vigor ten minutes ago?" he asked his tone still casual.
I threw a punch and this time he dodged it by stepping forward, making me move past him while in this position he used this split second to hit me with his walking stick at the back of my head. I fell down on the ground chest first, there was something I had forgotten to mention about Mr Lance's walking stick, at the end he always held on, it had a large round knob that was pretty sturdy, he had pulled up his walking stick from the ground and used it as a cane, he beat the ever loving shit out of me with that round knob thing.
The sounds my body made when the walking stick connected to my body will always be imprinted in my mind, it wasn't as painful as the arrow but still it hurt. He kept swinging it back and forth not caring where it landed, I would hit my gut, head and back. In an effort to protect myself I held my arms around my head protectively as tears started dropping from my eyes due to the pain.
"it hurts doesn't it? Remember this pain well, when you lose tomorrow, the day after or even a week you'll experience it again, for as long as you lose this is what will happen," he said as he kept hitting me.
"do you understand!?"
I quickly nodded my head at him, in hope of it ending but it didn't, I don't know when he had started hitting me but what I do know was that when he stopped the sun was already starting to set. The blonde kid and the girl were the ones who came for me, My legs and arms were sore from the beating, I was even contemplating sleeping on the ground guess I should be thankful for them.