Cataclysm

1.8

I woke up slowly, feeling groggy and drugged, laying on something stiff. I could taste blood - and a lot of it.

"Hey, you awake?"

I groaned in response and tried to sit up. Rough but gentle hands helped me lean against the wall, and then my blurry vision cleared and Eoin came into focus. He was smiling, but the bruised side of his face made him look like some villain from a movie.

"Not bad for your first fight," he said. "That other guy fights like a professional."

"Where am I?" I mumbled, looking around. There were other beds, covered in multicolored blankets, and counters covered in medical supplies. I rubbed my nose and felt blood start to gush.

"Don't -" Eoin started, then finished with a sigh. "- touch that. It took me forever to stop your bleeding. I bet if I let you just bleed and bleed, you'd die. Imagine that. Dying from a bloody nose."

"Comforting," I muttered, holding my hand up to my nose and feeling the blood pool in my palm. I glanced to the side and saw a rather large pile of bloody tissues.

Eoin noticed my look and handed me a clean one. "Yeah, it's not fun to try and keep an unconscious person from drowning in their own nose bleed."

"Sorry?"

"It's not your fault, don't worry." Eoin sat down next to me and leaned against the wall. "Man, Leo was brutal - against his own friend. I guess he really did fight in the games." He turned to look at me. "I thought escape from that place was impossible. How'd you do it?"

I remembered what Varien had told me. He thought they let us go. Now that I actually started thinking about it, I was starting to believe him. "I think ... I think they let us go."

I don't know what I was expecting, but what he said was definitely not it. "Yeah," he said slowly. "I think they did."

"Have you been there?" I asked hesitantly. "Is that why you're blacklisted?"

"No," he said, leaning his elbows on his knees and staring at the floor. I sensed his sudden mood change and didn't say anything, and didn't expect him to continue, but instead, he surprised me and spoke again. "I was a soldier in the wars in Europe."

"Then how'd you end up over here?" I asked softly.

He chuckled a little. "I did the least honorable thing a soldier can do. I ran away. Defected, in a way. But the armies over there - they all threw honor out the window years ago. It's pathetic, really. Puts the real heroes to shame." He paused, rubbing his arm uncomfortably, and sighed. "I couldn't take it - I couldn't do those things to those people anymore. Those innocent civilians we lined up and shot, the cities we stormed simply to get attention, the chemical warfare and poisonous gasses, the psychological torture ..." He sighed again, massaging his temples with his thumbs. "I guess a guy like me can't handle it. Someone with a conscious can't do things like that, not without a good cause. Not without a purpose."

"Then why'd you join?" My voice sounded stuffy as I smashed the tissue against my nose. I was afraid of the answer, or how he'd react to the question, and instantly regretted it.

"I didn't. I was drafted." Eoin leaned back again, lacing his fingers behind his head. "I should've run away right then and there, but I thought there was honor there. Thought there was something worth fighting for." He glanced at me again. "So. What are you doing here? British, right? You run from the draft, too?"

I shook my head and winced as a headache exploded through my eyes. "My parents - my mum moved us over here when I was fourteen, to avoid it, I think, before she knew it would happen."