The light was bright and it hurts his eyes, so he was squinting. The air was dirty and it coated his throat almost instantly as he bent over coughing. The salty air of the ocean was replaced with smell of mold, sweat, and blood. He gagged for a moment.
The noise of screaming was deafening, it was a cheering sound, but with the disturbing twist of obvious blood lust in the voice of the crowd. His eyes had not yet adjusted to the new lighting, so he couldn’t see where the sound was coming from, but he could tell he was in the center of the screaming.
He was trying to remember where he was. The last thing he remembered was writing in the sand, on the beach. He realized he was still dreaming and as he came to that realization, he felt the sudden urge to spin around.
Coming directly at him was another man, holding a knife. His eyes finally started to adjust and he could see the crowds sitting all around him screaming and cheering, and it became obvious to him that the two were in a fighting ring, and the crowd wanted him dead.
His thoughts quickly went to the woman he had been with on the beach. He hadn’t known her, but it felt right to be with her, like he was supposed to be in love with her. He had spent weeks meeting her nightly, sometimes talking about random topics, sometimes passionately kissing. Tonight, though, not only had she not shown up, but his dream had suddenly shifted to this nightmarish scene.
Like the woman from the beach, he didn’t know this man, but for reasons he couldn’t understand, he hated him, and knew that he had to kill him. It was then that he noticed that he also had a knife in his hand.
He let out a scream as he rushed the man.
He held his knife backwards in his hand so the blade rested on his forearm, he dodged to the left to avoid the clumsy attack of his opponent, and without turning to look at him, spun the knife and drove it deep into his back.
The crowd cheered. He took small comfort in the fact that they didn’t specifically want him dead, either of them would suffice for the crowd. For a moment, he regained his senses and felt like he needed to drop the knife and run, but as soon as that clarity came, it went, and the lust for violence, and the desire to kill this stranger came back with a force that he couldn’t control.
The other man had stumbled and fell to his knees, but after a second started to climb back to his feet. He didn’t wait for his opponent to get all the way standing, he rushed over and leapt at the man and tackled him. He pulled the knife out of the man’s back and rolled him over. He saw the fear in his eyes, but beyond that he could see the same hate he felt. Did this man really hate him, or was he being driven to fight as well?
He tried to force pity out of himself, tried to show this man mercy, tried to stop hurting him. It was no use, it was as if his body was making decisions for him, and ignoring his brain shouting “STOP!”
He sat on the man’s stomach and starting driving his fists into his face over and over, and blood began to spatter on his clothes and arms. The man went limp. He stopped beating him and looked into the crowd. They were on the verge of a frenzy. Screams and cheers and the seemingly endless chanting.
“Kill him, Kill him, Kill him, Kill him”.
So, following the urgings of their cheers he drove the knife into his throat, killing him.
He woke up with a start. He was shaking, and crying. He had no blood on him, but he still could feel the man dying under him, he could still hear the gurgling as his last breathe mingled with the blood in his throat.
“What the hell just happened?”
