Shadowlands: 2. punching bag

I woke up bound by my wrists to the business end of a slave caravan, being dragged across the ground. An unsightly creature like the one that I met when I first arrived walked in front of me. I dangled from a chain that connected a good three hundred prisoners.1

With great difficulty, I pulled myself up, and started walking, stumbling rather, with the rest of them. My back was scraped and bruised pretty badly. I had no idea how long I had been dragging on the ground.2

We approached a gigantic marble building. Spikes of various sizes covered the outer walls of the structure, the walls topped with razorlike protrusions. Shadowy figures in light armor patrolled the catwalks and stood sentry in the towers. They took us one at a time into the building. Those of us who were vaguely human recieved clothes, rags really, but still, warmer than the shredded jeans I had been wearing.3

After giving me clothes, three shadows came up -it really startled me to see shadows move on their own, and not against a surface- walking swiftly. They grabbed me and forced me into a sack. They beat me for what seemed an hour, and threw me into a stone floored room. I struggled with the stitching for a minute and the bag tore open.4

"Hey sunshine," mocked a voice behind me. I turned and saw a bizaar figure leaning against his bars across the hallway. Two more sat playing cards behind him. "You look tasty," I backed away, frightened. He laughed and turned away.5

I spent the night clutching my knees to my chest until exhaustion overpowered fear and I fell asleep.6

I woke the next morning to a metal claw rapping against my cell bars. I trudged with the rest of the Kami spirits to the mess hall.7

After recieving a tray of cooked grass I sat down at an empty seat near a group of crushers -the proper name for those big things I ran into. This apparantly displeased them, or else they just felt like a fight, because the one closest to me shoved me off my chair.8

I got back up, not wanting a fight, and sat down again. He punched me this time, and kicked the chair onto me. He stood over me holding my wooden tray of food. He ate the whole thing, tray and all in one bite, and let out an annoying laugh.9

He turned to his friends and they clicked back and forth, pointing at me. I snapped.10

"Hey fatass!" He turned and got a good view of my foot before it hit his face. I dropped it down bouncing onto my other foot and kicked him in the throat. He collapsed clutching himself. Another of his friends got up and swung. I sidestepped and he hit a priest -Kami that look like nightmarrish abominations of humans. The offended Kami stood up, along with the rest of his table, an assortment of crushers, priests, and more ghostlike figures known as haunts.11

The fight eventually got broken up, after the reserve guards were called in. I got beaten up pretty badly by the shadows for starting the fight, but they must have enjoyed the opportunity to beat people because I was given a tray of real food, instead of the spirit grass.12

I went out into the yard, and avoided everyone. They returned the favor. I watched the different spirits roaming around me. From what I had gathered, there were four types of Kami: priests, haunts, crushers, and creatures.13

Creatures were the simplest, they were embodyments of nature, those spirits that shaman worship. Priests looked like freak humans, all of them warped into wierd charicatures of their former lives. Crushers are the embodyment of hatred, big brutes always ready to smash things. And the haunts, these are what you usually think of ghosts being like, translucent, ethereal, spooky. They're the only ones that come to our plane of existence. Usually it takes them too much effort to come over so they can't do much more than roaming around bumping things and leeching off you until they get ripped out of our world.14

But this is the world of shadows. They run things, all these spirits were captured by them. I hear whispers of 'shades' mixes of spirit and shadow that will one day liberate them and eliminate the shadows. So far though, I'm siding with the skeptics, they don't exist, and if they do, they aren't that strong.15

Now for the last part of my situation. I have been informed by the few who will meet my eyes that I am to become an agent of the shadows. I will be tasked with hunting down and killing powerful Kami avatars, so most of the spirits here want me dead. 16

They won't come clean on why I was brought here, but it has something to do with milking my energy away slowly to strengthen other Kami. They think it can turn them into shades. Apparantly humans from this plane can't provide much lasting affect, so powerful souls are torn from our world into this one.17

But enough of that. After a few weeks, I acquired a cell mate. They threw him in while I was sleeping. He had spent a month in torture for escaping, and then made his way to the floor of my cell.18

He lay there on his side, a dark mist oozing slowly out of his translucent skin. I stepped up to him quietly. I crouched down to check him and he kicked me in the stomach.19

"Get away from me," he snarled, backing against the bars. He saw me fully and looked confused, "You're human? Why are you here mortal?"20

"I've been trying to figure that out for a while now thank you," I responded coldly, massaging my stomach.21

"Sorry I kicked you, I'm Kajos."22

"I'm-" he stopped me.23

"Don't say your real name here, not even once, some of the priests and fairies can use it to control you. You can be Al."24

"Alright, I'm Al," I said.25

"You're from reality. The reason you're here, is because of my kind, one of us haunts did this to you. Now, you'll have a chance at revenge. Nice isn't it?"26

"Revenge?"27

"Oh yes, in the League of Shadows, you'll be killing Kami of all sorts, and before then in the arena for your final initiation." He explained the arena to me, how I would be proving my might and resourcefulness against Kami, ready to keep the League from getting another member. There was no training. Just straight into the fight.