“Up, up, up.” The summertime melody turned into a revved-up fever pitch, hovering under a pair of shaky arms.

  Roaring his lungs out, Azrael struggled to push the weights. His arms quaked and quivered, but he wasn’t going to give up. He could feel his hands dip. His wrists felt like they were going to snap, but he held on.

  Struggling for breath, he compelled his body to push with every fibre of his being. Hoisting the pair of dumbbells over his chest, the veins on his forehead were on the verge of bursting. Expelling the last of his lungs’ reserves, he pushed with every ounce of strength he could summon, extending his elbows all the way through.

  A victorious hail parted his and Stella’s lips in sync, at the moment of triumph. He nearly dropped the pair of dumbbells with a mighty heave, gasping in disbelief. Wary of Stella reprimanding him, he set the weights on his thighs.

  She held out a fist, her lips arcing a plentiful smile radiating the brilliance of the summer sun.

  Azrael bumped his fist against hers, declaring a boisterous: “HELL YAAAAA!”

  “Now ye can try the big boys,” she said, picking up 36 kg dumbbells in one hand, dangling the pair of weights like feathers.

  The colour drained from the redhead’s face, his eyebrow twitching from how effortlessly she handed him weights that he had no chance of pushing past.

  “Looking back on the last year, I’ve come far. But don’t you think you’re pushing me a little too hard?” Azrael had the weights on his thighs swapped out, his heart sinking.

  “Nonsense.” She scoffed, whacking his back with a pat that nearly tipped him over the bench.

  Biting back a protest, he hauled the weights into position, ready to give the current set his all.

  Staggering out the gym, tipping from side to side, he was closer to a cripple in his present state than the pinnacle of human might Stella embodied. Comparing his and her physique was like night and day, albeit he had managed to adapt to her spartan regime quicker than he had anticipated.

  Returning to his cell, he plopped down on his bed, his muscles turning to lead on impact. Rolling about, he nestled into a comfortable position, his head hanging over the edge, viewing an inverted world through a pair of curious eyes.

  In that moment, he could feel the twitching and soothing over troughs and crests, of spasming muscles, almost meditative in its melody. Amidst his brief solace, a commotion disrupted the peace. Emerging from the shadows, a hooded figure, ethereal in nature, dragged a feeble prisoner with lifeless legs away from the Carnage Room.

  “I wonder where they’re heading to?” Over the past year, he had noticed prisoners vanish, here and there, a part of everyday life within the prison walls.

  He had poked around, tried talking to the others in an effort to gather information about the vanishing prisoners. All he had received were disoriented grunts and nonsensical babbling in response. Stella had been the lone source of any substantial insight, being the only source of meaningful interaction among the prisoners, but even she wasn’t knowledgeable about the disappearances. Shrugging his shoulders, he shelved the thought for another day.

  Apart from the gym, Azrael had spent the rest of his days pouring over the gargantuan collection of books the prison library had held. He had taken an interest in the workings of the human body, studying anatomy in great detail, comparing theory with the hands-on experience he had received cleaning up the ‘Carnage Room.’ The initial three days were the hardest, trying to stomach the brutality of his clean up duty. But a sudden shift in mindset from slave work to learning, keeping his mind occupied in the span of a week. Each time he sighted a newbie enter the ‘Carnage Room,’ he was reminded of his growth in the past year.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  His one lingering fatal flaw was the recurrent nightmares plaguing his slumber, vivid with a decapitated body aligned alongside a head with flowing silver hair. He’d wake up in a pool of cold sweat, panting heavily and clutching his slightly built chest, his heart nearly crawling out his throat. He was reminded religiously of his grim past like a hounding mutt, relentless biting through chunks of flesh, till he was nothing but an eviscerated bag of bones, gnawed clean.

  *

  “The lifestyle here settles down quick, when ye get a routine going.”

  “Yeah. I can’t complain.” Azrael couldn’t think of a time he had found peace, living in his orphanage. An oppressive world, with fiends for brothers. You might think living amongst those without parents would ignite a spark of comradery, but it could just as easily breed resentment. A ground for relentless bullying.

  Currently, he eyed the rows of mindless prisoners, a world filled up with zombies or timid inmates, keeping clear of all, tending to their tasks as diligently as newly birthed fledgelings.

  “Makes ye wanna think what hell we lived through back home.” Stella slid her palms behind her head, leading Azrael to the next set of weights in her regime.

  “Hell? Perhaps one with more commitments than this place. With a bit more to eat than soupy gruel, but people worse off than zombies.”

  Stella tossed him a look over her shoulders. Her face was etched with an expression that wasn’t surprise. But rather a sordid acceptance.

  It was strange to think of his home, of a world that was more demonic in its own right. A world wherein wolves were cloaked in sheepskin, playing at being human.

  “Even then. There are some somethings ye just can’t brush aside. Close stuff. Like family and the sort.”

  “Ah, I have no worries about a family,” scoffed Azrael. “Never had any to begin with. Or whatever I did have, was taken from me. Forever. Leaving me as the only one standing.”

  “It’s freeing to be relieved from yer shackles,” agreed Stella, sliding in the plates over a rusty bar. “To think loss is what teaches ye what ye take for granted in everyday life. And yet, we realise, being here that we want to be free. A lie we tell all, especially ourselves. Ye’d much rather complain of being shackled to people, pretend to fit in amongst a company ye don’t like, than break off from a pack, ye don’t belong with.”

  The redhead clutched his chest. He had enough time to recover from his last exercise. And yet, his heart thundered.

  “Perhaps those that come here, have a similar burden.”

  Stella nodded, her fingers tightening around the bar. In a sharp tug, weights flew off into the air, lighter than a feather.

  And yet we all act different. Lack a shred of comradery, despite toiling through a hell that weigh on us, more cumbersome than manacle and chain. Talking amongst just the pair of us, while the rest shirk away, accepting their situation for what it is than lament for a better world.

  Wiping the sweat off his brow, Azrael assessed his handiwork, turning over a skinned limb in his reach extender. Tracing the frayed muscles from origin to insertion, he matched theory to practice, sliding a finger over the curves and slipping under the tough tissue to feel for the vessels and nerves.

  “What’re ye doing?” asked Stella, who was perpetually sceptical of his examinations, topped up by gooseflesh.

  “I’ve told you a million times now. I’m learning human anatomy.”

  “Huh?” She tilted her head sideways, raising an eyebrow. “Ah whateva.”

  Azrael noticed a night swathe apparition wielding a scythe, hovering towards him. Waving the weapon at him, he picked up a stray kneecap and threw it in the bag. The apparition shook its hooded visage, waiving all concern. What are they? Do they disappear into oblivion or dissipate into smoke? He noticed the ethereal guards of the prison slip in and out of the room, emerging on cue to terminate any inmates –new or old --–who failed to do their chores. “They could be around every moment, shadowing us.”

  “Quit yer yammering and get on with it!” growled Stella, nudging him with her reach extender.

  Azrael shuddered, stuffing the limb into a bag. He picked up his reach extender and continued with his work for the day. Occasionally, he turned over an intact fleshy lump, away from Stella’s wary eyes. Till she yelled again, in his direction.