Farsworn
(Previously: “A Proper End”)
Justin Farsworn, one of Langrun’s newest fighters, has been stabbed just twice so far in his career: once in his left calf, giving him a slight limp, and the second time—this very moment—underneath his hairy navel, just an inch or two above the belt. It isn’t strange, he knows, for gladiators to endure gut wounds; before he signed away his life, became the chattel of the stable, he had witnessed many battles to the death, for they were all but unknown in his world and Justin found them to be fascinating. Lost in time—or was it space?—poor Justin had been cast adrift, snatched up by some weird spell and then deposited upon this distant shore. He wore strange clothes and spoke in rhythms queer; when asked from whence he hailed, he said, “America”—a land unknown to any whom he met—and so had come to be called “Farsworn.”
As the steel slips inside his waist, the pain erupts—that sudden, icy pinprick, which will soon begin to burn like fire—and he sees his wife’s face: Deena, whom he misses dearly, mother of his son. It’s been three years and he’s almost forgotten her—her voice, those honeyed words which woke him every day before work—Morning, baby—and her lips upon his mouth, the heavy softness of her breasts. The way she’d moan, when he would penetrate her. Suddenly he hears it... then he realizes, shuddering, that what he hears is coming from his own mouth as he struggles to contain the agony of being belly-stabbed! Oh, Jason, Justin thinks—his son, who must be nearly seven and so big by now. But no—he’ll never see his son again. He pushes it aside, the thought of him, and looks now in the other fighter’s dark and terrifying eyes.
“And now I gut you, novice,” says the burly veteran, a man called Gortun. Gortun’s got a broad and very hairy chest; his stomach bulges slightly, and is pocked with scars, suggesting that his foe has felt before the very pain he’s feeling now. He never dreamed he’d be a gladiator; as a young man, in the years before he met his Deena and got married, settled down, he used to watch those gladiator shows on TV—watch them take a trident to the midriff, double over, bright blood splashing stark against the sand... and sometimes, afterwards, he stand before the bathroom mirror, lift his shirt up, rub his naked gut with one hand—low, between his crotch and belly button—and imagine what those men must’ve endured. This wasn’t Rome—far from it—but he knew now how they felt, those doomed men, taking steel in their stomachs...
“Arghk...”
He looks down; blood spills out from where the blade dips into him, and dribbles down his leather harness, reddening his loincloth. Gortun smiles wide...
He’s gonna twist the blade inside me now, thinks Justin, rip me fuckin’ open... but I can’t die yet—I won’t!
The stocky gladiator reaches forward, grips the back of Justin’s neck—an almost tender gesture, though the fighter knows it means defeat. And as the brute draws closer, Justin stabs him in his furry stomach, pushing through the fat until he feels it pierce the belly meat, then slip into the soft and yielding innards underneath. Old Gortun bears his teeth; his eyes grow wide. But he’s enjoying this, knows Justin—even as I gore his guts, he’s gettin’ off!
“So, this is how it ends,” growls Gortun—“veteran and novice, gutting one another in the gruesome final act!”
“You wish,” spits Justin, face flushed, sweaty as he wrestles with the pain. “One man is gonna spill his guts today, and I assure you, it ain’t me!” But even as he says the words, he feels Gortun’s blade defeat the muscles of his stomach—which, until this point, he’s tried so hard to flex as tightly as he could, imagining they might keep even steel out. He fails, of course... and now he shivers, wincing as the sword’s tip prods his vulnerable bowels.
The crowd of many hundreds goes mad; it is common to see men eviscerated in the sand—it happens every day—but two men gutting one another at the very same time is a rarer thing, a special sight. The fans lean forward in their seats, stand up and cheer. They can’t quite see what’s happening; both fighters loudly groan now, bodies pressed together, bare legs tangled, grappling for domination. Finally there comes that gory image, unmistakable—the fruits of battle: bright, slick, pinkish-purple organs drop and dangle heavily between the men’s knees, proof of combat worth... but whose? Perhaps both?
“Looks like,” Justin pants, “this is it...”
“Indeed,” grunts Gortun. “All men—p-perish...”
“No escapin’ it...”
Blood spurts from Gortun’s lips and dribbles down his chin, reddening the thick pelt of his chest. His eyes cross, and he leans his weight on Justin; pulling back, the winning fighter watches Gortun fall upon his knees, the stinking pile of his small intestine heaped upon the hot sand.
Justin looks down, clutches at his crimson belly; he’s evaded disembowelment, but the threat of it is ever-present in the ring. He’s heard of fearsome desert warriors, the Southern Men called Bahar’sool, who yearn to die eviscerated. Some men seek to spill their guts, it seems... but Justin’s happy to have kept his, for the time being at least. Lifting his head, he glimpses Gortun again, and happens to see that the loser has tugged down his loincloth, exposing his fat, stiffened prick; as he watches, the dying man masturbates, jerking himself until hot, creamy semen erupts from the tip. Although Justin wouldn’t admit it, his own dick is throbbing with want, as well... but want of what? To die? To have his belly butchered like an animal’s? Those days he watched the gladiator shows, he’d get a hard-on, but could never understand the reason why...
Maybe, he thinks, one day, I finally will.
(Next: “The Boy Gladiator”)