Skin (16 page)

Cato laughed
which only seemed to enrage the fury dwarf more. He came at me
again. I waited until he was nearly on top of me and then skipped,
jumping just high enough to cover his head, and plucked his club
from his little gnarled fists. I landed lightly and in the same
move, brought the club down on the dwarf’s head, and knocked him
clean unconscious.

When the riot
of the crowd had settled, the Guardians brought Cato and I into our
positions to face off against each other.

“
I won’t
hold back if you won’t, Priest.” Cato said. I nodded in agreement.
The Guardians bellowed and in the same instance, Cato’s fist landed
right in the centre of my nose. He wasn’t holding back
alright.

I had
seen Cato fight often and knew the man well. A
fighter
’s moves over time came to reflect their
personality, just like my mother said, and I had seen it myself in
the months in the ring. Cato was different though, even as a
spectator I never knew what he was about to serve up and it went
doubly so facing him as an opponent.

He started
with basic thug moves, hooks and jabs. I easily ducked most of
them, landing a few lucky blows. I didn’t pull a leap on him,
wanting to get a sense of what it was like to fight him on his own
level. We sparred, trading blow for blow and the audience was
getting bored.

“
You’re
not only there to fight, to win as an athlete,” my mother had
spoken during one of her many diatribes. “It’s an entertainment, a
performance, so I give them a good show.”

I wasn’t
about to kiss him as I’d done that night with Imogen, but I had
some new tricks ready to show off.
If Cato was such an
adaptive fighter, let him adapt to this.

I sprung
to the left and then quickly back again, back and forth so he
couldn
’t land a punch. As frustration registered on
his brow, I landed dead in the centre and returned the clean blow
to the nose he’d dealt me on his first swing. Before he could
regain himself, I leaped, flying over his head. I flipped mid-air.
It was incredible to feel myself move like that. And just with the
power of a few new muscle strands in my legs. The rest of my body
soon caught up with the momentum of what that new possibility could
deliver and it was ready to shine.

I botched the
landing, falling hard on my back. It was enough time for Cato to
land on me, pinning me by the neck. Up close, he was smiling,
having as much fun as I was.

“
Hate to
break it to you, priest,” he said. “But you’re gonna lose your
first fight.”

Maybe if
I hadn
’t focused so much on the show, the theatrics of
it all, Cato might not have been right. I flailed underneath him,
my new legs offering no use against his weight and the expert
angles he held my shoulders in. I was useless, trapped like a
rat.

The
Guardian
s announced my defeat and Cato let me up,
pulling me to my feet and embracing me in a brotherly hug. I
returned the embrace, smiling with him as we bowed to the
audience.

Two things
were on my mind at that point. The first, I was not going to lose
again with these legs and the second, the next Natural I fought in
this arena would be Darius.

Sveta
was asleep by the time I got home. After my defeat under Cato,
I
’d gone out running—steering well clear of the
wharves this time, but not without the certainty that I couldn’t
best whatever I’d come up against now that I knew what my body was
capable of.

Cato’s victory
had been luck. I was distracted by this new power. I could leap, I
could fly. It took my mind off the game and into the show; I'd
distracted myself with my own cockiness. If I hadn’t had made that
stupid flip, Cato would’ve been down. Like I was going to down
Darius as soon as I had the chance.

Mariosa
lifted an eye to let me know she was still watching, not trusting
me, even when she slept at the foot of the bed. Quiello was napping
on my pillow with his tiny snore. He didn
’t wake up,
just burrowed into me, his fur his natural peaceful gold, as I
carried gently him out of the room into the atrium and set him in
the little tree top nest he’d claimed as his own bed.

I
slipped into bed. Sveta stirred. She was gorgeous, her hair spread
over the pillow. Awake, she was stunning, like a lightning bolt
that took me head to toe anytime I looked at her. When she slept,
she was still amazing, but it was a different beauty entirely, one
that hit my heart in a way I
’d never had with any
other woman before. I missed her.

Her eyes
flickered open. Electricity.

“
Are you
watching me sleep?” she whispered, her voice croaky in sleep.
“That’s not not disconcerting.”

“
I love
you,” I said. The words just came, unbidden, unexpected,
unplanned.

Sveta
smiled again and closed her eyes. I wasn
’t really
surprised that she didn’t say it back. I nuzzled into her neck,
kissing her ears gently.

“
Not
tonight,” she said. She rolled into me and curled into my
chest.

I stroked her
hair and the nape of her neck where the snake skin had firmed into
a soft leather as it had healed.

“
Tell me
about your fight,” she said sleepily.

“
I
lost,” I said. It felt like a confession.

“
And
your legs?”

I told
her how I had jumped, explained the theatrical flip on my last leap
and how it had cost me the game.
“You would have seen
it yourself if you’d been there.” I said, unashamed but still a
little surprised at my sulky accusation.

“
I was
working,” she said. “I’ve got a lot to research at the
moment.”

“
And
that’s why you’re always reading magazines and surfing the net?
Because you’re researching? What are you searching for?”

“
It’s a
personal matter.” She still had her eyes closed but I could tell
from the stiffness across her shoulders and the shallowness of her
breath that she was properly awake now. I took a deep
breath.

“
I want
another implant,” I said.

I
’d decided when I was out running. When I had
woken up in Omega, learnt that I was Animus, I’d been horrified. I
thought I had lost my own body and that meant losing myself.
Through recovery and tonight’s fight, I knew I was wrong. I had
never felt more a part of my body than ever before. These legs had
unleashed a new part of me and I wanted to see what else I was
capable of.

Sveta
rolled away from me and sat up, propped against the bank of pillows
behind us.
“Pardon?”

“
I said
I want another Animus implant.”

“
Absolutely not. Is that why you just told me you loved
me?”

I
didn
’t think it was, but at this point I was getting
angry enough to suspect that it might have been true.

“
You
can’t deny me this, Sveta. It’s my body.”

“
Not if
you become Animus it won’t be. There are things at work here, Rev
that you simply do not understand, things you aren’t even aware of.
You only want another implant because you lost to Cato. It’s your
vanity speaking, not your heart or mind.”

“
It’s my
body,” I repeated, almost yelling. “And I’ll modify it as I
choose.”

“
Forget
for the moment you have no means of paying for this without my
help,” she said. It was a stinging blow that cut straight to the
quick, but I ignored it. I was already in defensive
mode.

“
You do
not need any more implants. Your legs were a medical necessity. The
power has just gone to your head.”

“
And
what about Imogen? Or Johnny? I’m sure all of those trimmings were
just medical necessity. And you?"

“
I have
told you the story of my blindness,” she said, her eyes flashing
dangerously, her snake scales shimmered like magic.

“
It’s
not your eyes I was talking about.”

“
You
know nothing,” she said, venom dripped from her words.

I had likely
crossed a line, but I didn’t care. I just kept on throwing words
out underneath my anger. “I wear glasses, my shoulder goes out
randomly at the slightest change in wind direction. My body is
weakening. How is that not cause enough for a new implant. I’m not
asking for wings.”

“
Then
why don’t you go and get yourself some mechanical implants,” she
said.

“
No way
in all hell am I becoming a Mech,” I said.

“
What’s
the difference? For someone like you, I mean. What is the
difference if, as you’ve told me so many times, the Animus is so
unnaturally human?”

“
I said
I was wrong about the Animus and the Natural stuff, I’m living,
walking, leaping proof of my own admission I was wrong.”

“
Do you
know what drew me to you in the first place, Alistair?”

I stopped, my
next line of argument fell right out of existence. Alistair. No one
had used my real name since my mother had died. It was her last
word.

“
No,” I
said. My voice was quiet and I felt small.

“
Your
dedication. Your devotion to your vessel. It was what marked you.
And your performance in the ring, your work with sanctuary, it has
only confirmed my prediction that you, Alistair, are
special.”

Damn
right I was special. I wasn
’t Alistair anymore. I
wasn’t even Rev. I was Priest and I was only just getting to know
what that meant and it wouldn’t be Sveta or anyone else who could
stop me taking Priest as far as he needed to go.

“
Where’s
Sveta?” Cato said. I was lubing up the treadmills and hadn’t seen
him come in. I didn’t want to talk to him, didn’t want to see him
after last night.

“
I don’t
know where she is,” I lied. She was still upstairs, still in bed.
“Why do you need her?”

“
Just a
curiosity, pal. No need to get your tail in a twist, I’m not after
your lady.”

Tail? Was that
a dig at me being an Animus now? I went back to the treadmill
belts, but Cato lingered.

“
You’re
up against the new kid tonight then? Nervous?”

“
New
kid? I'm meant to be fighting Darius.”

Cato
shrugged. That
’s not what the rotation says. Have you
met him yet? He’s big. Not Darius big, but he’s cut and mean.
Reminds me a bit of you actually, physically speaking.”

I didn't
know
anyone new joined Sanctuary. When had Sveta set
this up between all that time moping alone and doing nothing,
snarling at me? Why hadn’t she said anything? Weren’t we meant to
be partners of a kind?

“
Erik,
his name is,” Cato said. “He’s a nice enough guy, a bit reserved,
but again, that’s just like you, Rev. It’s like Sveta’s brought you
in new all over again. You don’t have a brother do you?”

I
didn
’t have a brother.

Cato set
himself down on the preacher rack and started to lift, the dopey
smile that stayed permanently on his too nice face never faltering
between reps.
Cato was not by any means a sensitive
guy. He was a typical meat head, all brawn, no brains, completely
unaware of people on anything but a superficial level. If he’d seen
a similarity between this Erik and me, it would have to be blindly
obvious. Sveta was replacing me.

I
’d been pissed to find out I wasn’t on with
Darius tonight, but now I couldn’t wait to see this new kid in the
cross and turn him into mince.

My second
fight as an Animus saw the Guardians dressed like science fiction
robots.

Usually as I
waited on stage it was with the nervous anticipation of what manner
of beasties was about to be unleashed. This night I stood, bouncing
on my legs waiting to see what my human opponent was.

The crowd
clapped enthusiastically as the second stage lifted and Erik
stepped onto the cross for his debut appearance.

Cato was
right. Even I could see the similarities to myself in this man.
Same height, same shape. He even had a short buzzed hair like mine.
He had a dark, ridiculous goatee. He was younger than me, but I was
stronger in all the ways that mattered.

“
I’ve
heard a lot about you,” he said as we clasped hands in the usual
start. “You’re kind of a legend,”

“
Legends
are what happens after the event, kid. I said. I will be a legend.
For now though, I’m still a cold hard fact of life that’s about to
hand you your ass.”

We bumped
fists and took our places on the arms of the cross. The cage
lowered between us. Even with the stage length between us I could
see the nervous energy radiating off the kid. If it had been
another man, I might have felt sorry for the guy.

I
don
’t know what to call it. It was man shaped, as tall
as me, nothing imposing when it came to size and muscle. It wore
ragged brown pants but other than that it was bare, grey coarse
skin. It had a round face with a thin slit of a mouth that
stretched outward to reveal a mouthful of glittering points like
diamonds. Its fingers and toes were webbed like it might have just
been plucked out of the harbour. There wasn’t a hair on
it.