Chapter Six
Every day of isolation gnawed at Roman. He couldn’t see the time of day, and even for the ten minutes of freedom they came to offer when dragging him out for a quick shower, he never saw a window. He couldn’t even be certain it was ten minutes a day. He wanted to believe that. He wanted to hope The Pit held some type of a schedule, a routine, but the longer he spent here with irregular meals in the form of cafeteria scraps, the more it dawned on him how forgotten he’d become.
After what felt infinitely long, a guard came to retrieve him for his ten minutes of freedom. He jolted up, wanting to make use of every ticking second, convinced he might be able to squeeze in a long enough shower for the water to actually run warm. But when the guard pulled him by the hair and shoved a hood over his face, then slapped cuffs over his hands, Roman panicked.
“Where are we going?” Roman asked, slowing his pace only for a baton to hit the back of his calves and force his next steps. “Where are you taking me?”
No one answered. No one cared to acknowledge Roman.
His heart pounded in his chest, ready to burst any second. This was it. This was his march to death. The warden had finally taken his revenge and decided to walk Roman to a silent end.
The hood over his head had eye holes, which perplexed Roman. When he finally reached a well-lit place, Roman could almost make out the setting of a makeshift arena. It wasn’t anything like the arena he was used to, but there was still a balcony and a cheering crowd.
Roman rubbed his raw wrists from the cuffs slapped on far too tightly.
“Ladies and gentlemen, let’s give a big howl for the Lone Wolf!” Warden Sadler announced.
Every rumor Roman had ever heard jigsawed in his thoughts as he took in the loud cheers and long howls of the audience.
The lights were too bright, and the filtered eye holes made it difficult to see much of anything.
The Lone Wolf was the champion of The Pit, or so Roman had heard whispers of. An undefeated feral beast of a man who cannibalized so many people the state prayed he’d disappear from the face of the earth, and so the warden, being benevolent and adventitious, created The Pit and sent inmates to face off against the beastly man. The stakes were high, but the rewards were great.
Roman saw through the smokescreen of lies wrapped around truths. Perhaps the Lone Wolf was a real inmate at one point; perhaps he was even a deranged cannibal. But he wasn’t an undefeated mythical monster of a man. Roman had been given the new title of Lone Wolf, likely replacing the former inmate who died from a fatal injury or in his tiny stone cell from deprivation and isolation.
The warden had won. He’d watched Roman falter and sprung a fate so cruel he’d never crawl his way out again. Roman would wear this mask until he died, nameless and faceless to the authority above. He’d gain no fame, no chance of salvation, no freedom with victories. Roman would be forgotten here in the darkness of The Pit.
When the fight began, no one made an announcement. Roman simply winced at the sharp cut of a blade. A shiv that nearly dug into his forearm. He turned, dodging a second swipe, and nearly fell into the trap of two other men. Here he stood, handcuffed and surrounded by three men, each armed and ready to end his life with an audience cheering for his execution.
“Kill the wolf! Kill the wolf! Kill the wolf!”
How he survived the fight, he didn’t know. It all blurred into a bloody, sticky mess. He had lots of shallow cuts and bruises covering his body, but he panted heavy and feral and victorious for tonight. Roman didn’t know if he’d killed the men he fought or simply injured them beyond recovery. He clenched his fists. He didn’t care.
Everything whirled from then on. Countless hours in his cell. Cheering crowds. Booing crowds. Angry armed inmates. Blood. Rage. Pain. Sleepless nights on cold stone floors. Hunger pangs that stretched on infinitely.
Roman wanted it to end, but he was too afraid to end it himself. Every time they tossed a mask over his head and dragged him to the arena, he prayed this would be the night he willed himself to move a little slower, make a sloppy mistake, barrel headlong into the sharp edge of some blade. But Roman continued fighting and wishing for death because he didn’t know how to surrender. Even having been defeated so much already, Roman couldn’t settle the fire that burned in his chest. He wanted to survive. He wanted to escape. He wanted a second chance, any chance to escape this hell.
Roman’s door opened, and he fully expected to be hauled out for his ten minutes of freedom to stretch and shower, hoping for a chatty guard on shift. Instead, he found himself looking up at the last person in the world he ever wanted to see again.
“Don’t you look like absolute shit?” Ezra knelt to meet Roman’s gaze, then scrunched his nose, obviously realizing Roman smelled about as good as he looked and felt.
“How are you down here?” Roman asked, his voice hoarse since most days he had to rely on his brief shower for a chance at real drinking water.
“My reign as champion has earned me more respect than it ever offered you.” Ezra nodded to the empty hallway, the lack of guards and the obvious control he’d gained over this prison.
Roman scoffed. He’d become a champion again. His own new type of champion, one without respect or reward, but a feral edge for violence that made the anger he held for Ezra all the more palpable.
“Geez, you really do look rough, man.” Ezra eyed Roman’s dirty clothes, then scratched at his own face stubble to indicate the unkempt beard Roman had.
Roman merely glowered, incapable of mustering much else.
“You’re not the only one who’s been struggling these past three months.” Ezra pulled out a Polaroid picture and tossed it onto the floor of the cell.
Three months. Christ, had it already been three months of solitary? Worse. Had it only been three months of solitary? Roman didn’t know which reality was worse. Time lost itself here, and he started to believe he’d never find it again. He looked at the photo, not sure what to expect, but had a sickly expression when he saw Levi alone in some candid cafeteria shot.
His expression had turned ghostly, his face filled with fear as his eyes seemed to look in every direction. Even with one single photo, Roman could see the fear etched in Levi’s expression, the paranoia, the exhaustion.
Roman was lost and alone in here, but his best friend was lost and alone out there. When he rejected the offer and refused the wager, he suspected Levi might end up as collateral damage, but he hoped… But hope was foolish, and Roman knew nothing ever came from it.
“Come to gloat?”
“Come to help,” Ezra replied. “I’d like to make you an offer one more time.”
“Make Levi the offer.” Roman tossed the picture at him. “He’s not a bottom, from what he claims, but you’ve got a better shot with him than me.”
Roman wanted to be strong, wanted to prove he’d made the right decision, but most of all, he hoped Ezra didn’t simply shrug and walk away. Roman wasn’t ready to close the door on this deal, even if he knew he should.
“Even if I wanted to be Levi’s friend, he still doesn’t wanna be mine.” Ezra picked up the picture and turned it to face Roman. “Some deluded loyalty to you. The guy’s survival instincts are seriously lacking. With your stubborn behavior, life has been hard on Levi. I imagine it could get a lot easier if the world knew he was in my good graces.”
“Tell him to let me go, to be your friend,” Roman said. “Hell, bring him here, and I’ll tell him.”
“Even if I could swing that, I don’t want his friendship.” Ezra stared Roman down, stared through him, stared deep inside his soul. “I want yours. I want you.”
Roman stayed quiet.
“Uphold our original deal, and I’ll do the same,” Ezra explained. “I’ll keep everyone off Levi. I’ll keep everyone off you.”
“Except for you,” Roman said with a bit more snark than he thought he had left in him. “You’d very much be on me, inside me, controlling me every which way, right?”
“That was the wager, wasn’t it?” Ezra asked, no mocking tone in his voice, but it still stung Roman’s ears. “This is the last time I will offer my friendship. My clout is powerful, and it affords me favors, but even I only have so much sway.”
“Just win a few more matches.” Roman sarcastically punched a fist in the air. “The bigger the champion, the more loyalty you earn. Trust me on that.”
Ezra gave Roman a dark look. “When this door closes, you’re on your own.”
“I’m used to it.”
“The next time they open your cell, it’ll either be to lead you to my cell or back to The Pit, where you’ll huff and puff and fight until you fall down. Forever.”
It was a definitive statement, not one of speculation. Ezra had the warden’s ear and favor, and he likely understood the old bastard had grown tired of Roman clawing at victories and fighting to live one more pathetic day.
Roman almost considered accepting that harsh fate. Dying didn’t seem like the absolute worst thing. He considered it a quiet ignoble death and far better than living longer only to suffer. He no longer had anyone in his corner, in his life…but then he considered the single friend he had. A true friend, not some facade of play pretend that Ezra painted.
“Levi would have a chance?” he asked more to himself than seeking further clarification from Ezra.
Roman’s cowardice had already cost Levi and put him in danger. At least with this ultimatum, at least by upholding his deal, he might make some of it right. And if Roman were fortunate—which he truly believed he never would be again—he might even salvage some vestiges of his own life.
“All right,” Roman forced himself to speak, every word scrapping against his tongue with an unyielding desire to continue fighting, continue resisting. But he was so tired. “I’ll be your friend. I’ll keep my end of the wager. I’ll fuck you.”
“To be clear, you won’t be doing the fucking,” Ezra said with a smirk. “You’re okay with this arrangement? Absolutely certain?”
“Yep,” Roman conceded.
“Perfect.” Ezra’s cadence was kind, his smile friendly, but even so, the wicked glint in his green eyes unnerved Roman. It was enough to make him want to crawl back into his solitary cell and hide. “I love to take care of my friends.”