Noble Warrior (18 page)

But it was too late. Pharmy snatched McCutcheon's leg and pulled him to the ground.

Squirm away. Get to your feet. Do not stay on the floor with him.

The weight of Pharmy, however, proved too much for M.D. to move. The gigantic man, understanding his advantage, used his leverage to roll his big belly onto McCutcheon's face, and before
M.D. could slither away the man smothered his foe with flab. M.D. turned his head to the side, struggling to breathe, and Pharmy bounced his balloonish gut up, then down, purposefully using his
stomach's immense girth to slam McCutcheon's head into the floor.

M.D. shot a laser beam strike at the big man's ribs, but he couldn't get much leverage on the punch to create any meaningful impact, and Pharmy used his weight once again to slam
McCutcheon downward.

Another tremendous boom echoed off the walls and M.D. lost his wind. The beast prepared for a third, a fourth, and then a fifth up-and-down collapse.

“Should we stop it?” one of the guards asked. “You know, keep your boy fresh for some of the big money wars we talked about?”

Krewls popped a sunflower seed into his mouth and considered the question. “Gimme five hundred bucks on the hero.”

“Against Pharmy and the troll?” the guard replied. “I thought the plan was save the kid to fight bigger fish?”

“'Round here,” Krewls replied, “people gotta save themselves.”

“Fuck it, I'll take that action.”

“Me, too,” another guard said.

Krewls pulled out a wad of bills from his pocket. “I've always been a sucker for the underdog anyway,” he said. “Plus, with the stakes this high, well...I'm
bettin' this kid's gonna get resourceful.”

“You got it, sir.”

The guards worked out their bets.

“I really wish we had some chairs, boys,” Krewls said looking around. “'Cuz I got a feeling this one here will be worth a seat.”

M
.D. had fought large and heavy opponents in his life but never anyone this gargantuan. From such a weakened, vulnerable position, he knew his only
play would be to go for the vitals—eyes, throat, or groin—but Pharmy already had M.D.'s arms pinned to his sides, and the fat of his gigantic stomach prevented McCutcheon from
being able to either strike or squirm away.

Even breathing was a battle.

Pharmy, using his weight smartly, continued to attack M.D.'s head with big booming falls. Both of the fighters knew it was only a matter of time before M.D. suffered one too many slams and
concussed. McCutcheon fought as best he could, wriggling to his right each time Pharmy hoisted himself upward, but still found himself unable to slide away before yet another colossal detonation of
flesh smashed down onto his skull. M.D. took heaps of abuse, unsustainable abuse, with each new crash reaping even greater consequence for his opponent. Giving away nearly a foot in height and two
hundred pounds of weight in a ground war, offered McCutcheon almost no odds for success.

“Ooh,” a guard said to Krewls after yet another belly flop smashed into McCutcheon's face. “That's gotta hurt.”

“And smell, too,” another officer added. “I mean, when's the last time any of you have seen the big fella shower?”

A couple of laughs escaped their lips as they watched Pharmy continue to smother and pound M.D. Though he struggled with all his might, McCutcheon could not get to any of Pharmy's
vitals.

So he decided to let Pharmy's vitals come to him.

The huge beast set himself up for another immense collapse, but this time, instead of spinning to his right, M.D. broke the pattern, wriggled to his left and bent his leg at the knee.

Pharmy, with irreversible momentum, slammed down with another huge explosion, but instead of slamming into McCutcheon's face, he jammed his own testicles into the top of McCutcheon's
knee.

Upon seeing the impact each of the guards instinctively grabbed their groins and averted their eyes. Pharmy's eyes rolled to the back of his head and he flopped over breathless and
immobilized. McCutcheon staggered to his feet and shook the cobwebs from his head, but before he could drop-kick Pharmy in the face, Goblin jumped onto his back and bit him for a second time in the
same shoulder from which he'd already taken a huge chunk.

M.D. screamed in pain and his blood began to boil. Something about being bit snapped M.D., turned him from conscious fighter into primal animal, and a moment later, seething with rage,
McCutcheon reached around his back, reversed the position on the dwarf, and grabbed the evil dwarf by the sides of his head.

Then twisted.

A crack echoed off the walls. Goblin's eyes bulged wide, then froze, open and hollow. McCutcheon, shirtless, sweating, blood running down the front of his rippled torso, released his grip
and the dwarf fell to the floor.

Lifeless.

M.D. took a step backward, sucked some wind in order to get his body the oxygen for which it starved, and readied himself for the next phase of Pharmy's fury. He expected unprecedented
wrath from the beast, a level of ferocity the likes of which he'd never yet seen in an opponent. Collecting his wits he resolved to stay on the outside, on his feet, too, with a plan to dance
and strike. Speed and quickness would be the path to victory. When the opportunity appeared, he'd go for the eyes or throat. Maybe even fishhook Pharmy's mouth or jam a finger three
inches deep into his ear hole. Rules were gone. Ethics were out. Survival was all that mattered.

He'd have to defeat this foe by any means necessary. Nobility in warfare had just become a luxury he could no longer afford.

Head shots, head shots, head shots
were the only thoughts that ran through his mind.

Pharmy climbed to his feet, but in a move that surprised everyone, did not storm forward. M.D. raised his fists and waited for the rage, but noticed that the look of violence and anger had
disappeared from Pharmy's face. Instead, the giant softly limped to his fallen cell mate, dropped to his knees, and tenderly tried to arouse Goblin from his sleep.

“Brutha, Wake. Brutha, wake now. Wake.”

Pharmy poked at Goblin with his thick index finger, but the midget lay motionless on the floor, entirely unresponsive.

“Brutha, wake now. Wake.”

Like a puppy trying to lick its mommy's nose after she'd just been run over by a car, the human beast hunched over the only person on the planet that he'd ever loved.

Or who loved him back.

“Wake please, Brutha. Wake.”

McCutcheon's heart fell into his stomach.
What have I done?

Mends eyes blinked open and slowly he sat up.

“You oughtta check those locks a little better next time, crusader,” Krewls said to Mends as he prepared to walk away. “Me and my first lieutenant will each mention it in our
incident report how the two inmates must have jimmied the thing during your hallway patrol. And the midget slipping on the wet floor, well...we really oughtta get that leak in the ceiling fixed,
too.”

“Brutha? Brutha?” Pharmy said, confused by Goblin's unresponsiveness.

“Here's your cash,” one of the guards said to Krewls as he handed him a stack of neatly arranged bills.

“Yep, really oughtta fix that leak,” another of the guards said to Mends.

Krewls took a deep sniff of the green paper. “Ah, I love the smell of money on a Tuesday night.”

T
he guards threw a weary and worn McCutcheon back inside his cell, and as the door locked behind him the words of Colonel Stanzer echoed through
M.D.'s head:
You've been spared so far, but at some point every last one of us who does this kind of work gets bloody with stains that don't wash off.

Stanzer always wanted to turn me into a killer, McCutcheon thought. He always wanted me to taste blood, to bury my naïveté, to slay my dragon.

Well, fuck him. Fuck him for ever dragging me into this.

Fixer wetted a washcloth and reached out his hand. “Here, try...”

M.D. snared his cell mate's throat. “Do not touch me, old man. And do not say a goddamn word, either. I don't want to talk. Especially about your penis.”

Fixer lowered his arm, M.D. released his grip and then hopped into his bunk. He wanted to rest, sleep, vanish, disappear. But of course, he couldn't. Only one thought raced through his
head.
What have I just done?

A
t six the next morning a bell cried out, signaling the start of a new day. Fixer, as usual, remained in his cell, choosing not to go to the
cafeteria for breakfast. M.D. stayed, too. There was nothing out there for him anymore. Nothing at all. So he went back to sleep for another three hours. When he woke, he saw the old man smiling
and stirring a cup of tea.

“Oh, the hummingbirds are flapping today.”

“Fuck the hummingbirds,” M.D. said rolling back over.

Even before all the oatmeal had been plated in the cafeteria, word spread throughout the entire prison about how McCutcheon defeated Pharmy, snapped the neck of Goblin, and saved a guard. It
made for great breakfast time conversation. It also created an incredibly large problem for M.D. Taking the side of a screw over a fellow inmate carried a price.

The penalty of death.

When McCutcheon saved Mends he signed his own death certificate, because in the world of prison it was always the convicts versus guards. Anyone who violated this law of life behind bars
required swift and immediate payback. In a culture with no values, rules were still rules. Us against them. Always. Saving a guard was worse than snitching.

“Good still flickers in your heart,” Fixer said admiringly. “Prison extinguishes that in most men.”

“There's no good in here, only darkness. I was a fool to come.”

“You didn't choose to come. It was your destiny.”

“My destiny?” McCutcheon still felt numb about the idea he'd taken someone's life. “That's what I'm afraid of.”

“You're a special one, kid. All my years I ain't never seen nothing like it. Got me so inspired, I feel forty years younger. Only thing is,” Fixer said as the sound of
boots stomping up the hallway grew louder. “I think the games for you have just begun.”

Five guards stormed to the front of their cell.

“And perhaps for me as well.”

The cage door flew open and a black-booted officer slapped the tea from Fixer's hand, sending the cup of hot liquid rocketing against the wall.

“Toss this place. Now!”

After roughhousing M.D. and Fixer out of the cell, the guards, following Krewls's orders, began attacking every personal item in the small domain. Bit by bit they threw all of
Fixer's things onto the floor. M.D., of course, owned nothing.

“Contraband!”

They smashed his cooking ladle.

“Contraband!”

They smashed his collection of spices.

“Contraband! Contraband! Contraband!”

Each and every item Fixer owned got tossed onto the floor and mashed into fragments by the heel of hard, black, steel-toed boots. From the cache of fresh fruit to the chocolate chip cookies,
from the plates to the cups to the spoons. They even destroyed his beloved stinger.