As the numbing darkness that surrounded him began to fade away, Vincent began to stir about. Before even opening his eyes, he could feel that his body was sore, aching, and cold. He felt that he was lying on some sort of hard surface with a bit of a gritty texture.

Opening his eyes, he saw nothing but darkness around him, with some faint shapes in the black. It took his eyes a few seconds to adjust to the almost non-present lighting, but when they did, he saw that he was confined to a small room. Behind him and to his left and right, there was nothing but stone walls. In front of him was the only source of light, which was lit beyond the iron bars that made up the fourth wall. He now understood that he was in a jail cell of sorts—something that he was unfortunately familiar with.

Beyond the iron bars, he saw a guard standing still. As soon as he made eye contact with the guard, they acknowledged Vincent’s presence and walked off.

He then turned around to observe the rest of the room that he was seemingly trapped in. He hated cells. He hated the restriction that cells brought, both physically and mentally. He had never been claustrophobic, but anytime he was in one of these he felt as if he had a severe case. Even so, he still felt the need to check out his surroundings.

The only other thing in the room was something that he didn’t see before: a body. The body was unmoving and laying on its side. He approached it slowly—both because he was being cautious and because his phobia was restricting his movement—and touched it. Thankfully, the body was warm, meaning that it wasn’t a corpse.

Besides the heat coming from it, the first thing that Vincent immediately noticed about the body was the hair and physique. There was no mistaking who it was...it was Eliot.

Quickly, Vincent began to shake and jostle the body in hopes of a response. To his surprise, Eliot began to move on his own. His eyes blinked awake and he stretched his arms and legs. Yawning, he looked in the direction of Vincent and he had a look of confusion to him.

“Vince?” Eliot asked, his voice cracking a bit.

“What’s up, El?” Vincent casually replied, although his voice quivered a bit with worry.

“Where are we? And why does my whole body hurt?”

“It seems we’re in some sort of cell.” He then averted his gaze and mumbled, “Probably because I punched that fuckhead.”

“Punched?” Eliot began to ask. As the question trailed out his mouth, there was a point of recollection that lit up across his face, and then his demeanor grew into one of sadness and concern. “What happened to the girl? Is she alright?”

“Uhhh,” Vincent stumbled trying to remember who Eliot was referring to. “Oh!” Vincent remembered. “I have no idea.”

“Oh…”

Just then, a clinking sound echoed through the cell, originating from the iron bars. Turning around, Vincent saw a demon surrounded by two guards—more specifically, he saw Lucretia.

“I can answer that for you,” she stated.

“What do you want, bitch?” Vincent angrily asked, although there was a noticeable lack of energy coming from it.

Lucretia just stared down at him. “What I want from you,” she began, “is to stop being a nuisance in my casino. I cannot—”

“Well too bad, we’re gonna—” Vincent interrupted before being cut off by Lucretia.

“Quiet,” she said. Although it wasn’t yelled or shouted, the sound of her voice boomed louder than that of a scream. Even the air itself seemed to stop and settle in her presence. “I hate it when vermins try to talk back to me. It’s a waste of my time, and my time is money.”

Vincent looked back at Eliot, who was currently shaking a bit, and then back at Lucretia. He chose to remain silent, clenching his teeth together. His energy and drive that he had before was nowhere near as present as he was used to.

“Now,” Lucretia started, twirling her hair around her finger, “you’re probably wondering where you are. You are currently in a cell within the Collider. ‘What’s the Collider?’ is what your rat-sized brains are thinking now, and I will lay it out as simply as can be.”

She then ran her finger up and down an iron bar. “The Collider is a place where I can send those who have no physical wealth left on their person or people who have disobeyed my rules. When someone has no more wealth in the Setting Sun, they become indebted to me, and so I then own them. For a while, I wondered what to do with these people.” She looked up at the ceiling and smiled. “Recently, I realized that It’s a waste to just kill these people outright. After all, they still have value to spectators. That’s when I thought up the idea of the Collider—a fighting arena where the penniless people that I own can fight for the amusement of paying spectators.”

“We’re just caged animals to you?” Vincent retorted.

“You’re lucky if I think of you like that,” she responded. “But that being said, this place still follows the same rules and principles as the rest of the casino. Each fighter here has a value, or bond as I call it, attached to them. Every fight you win you earn a bit of money. Winning, in my arena, is fighting until you render the other fighter unable to fight. Whether that's by knocking them out, severely injuring them, or even killing them, it doesn’t matter to me. If you manage to accumulate enough money to equal your bond, you buy your freedom back from me.”

“So I’m paying for my freedom with your own money, just so I can gamble it away?” Vincent scowled.

Lucretia simply smiled a crooked smile. “If that doesn’t suit you,” she continued, “you can have someone from the outside buy you, instead. Although, you wouldn't technically be free, you would just belong to them.”

Vincent just tried to control his breathing and collect his thoughts. All the information he was receiving was almost too much for his mind to keep up with. Rather than thinking deeply about what it all means and why he’s being told, he took the simple route and asked, “Why are you telling this?”

Lucretia chuckled a bit, covering her mouth. “Well, I figured you should know the rules of this place before your first fight.”

“First fight?”

“Oh yes, your first fight is,” she looked down at her diamond-encrusted watch, “tomorrow afternoon, so rest well.” She then leaned in right next to the iron bars, closer to Vincent. He could see the distorted beauty that hid her ugly, evil core more clearly than ever before. “I have high expectations for the both of you.”

Laughing to herself, she and her guards left. The only people left were Eliot and Vincent, who both quietly lingered in the silence. For a while, none of them spoke up and they thought about what just happened and what was going to happen.

Slowly but surely, Vincent began to feel something creep in. It was a chilling sensation—a feeling of unrest and unease. As that feeling sank deeper and deeper within him, panic began to course through his body.

Frantically, he began to look all around the room for something. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, it just had to be something. The sweat that began to form slowly clouded his vision more. Even still, his desperate search around the room continued.

Before he even realized it, his desperation had reached the point where he was clawing at the walls that surrounded him. The walls then began to move towards him, but every time he blinked, they went back to where they were. He couldn’t take it anymore. He was going insane.

“Get me out of here!” he screamed as he punched the wall, over and over.

He never once let up, continuing to beat the wall into submission, even when his knuckles started to bleed. Over and over the crack of bone against stone continued. Something would have to break first, and it wasn’t going to be the wall.

It wasn’t long until he felt someone hug him from behind. Without even looking, still in his daze, Vincent shoved them off of him. He then went back on his rampage. However, this time, the idea to use his powers entered his brain.

In his delirious state, he immediately placed his hand on the wall and tried to summon a void. Nothing appeared. More desperate this time, he tried again. Nothing appeared. Why was nothing going right for him?

Vincent began to grow angrier, confused, and more desperate. He didn’t know what to do, what’s going on with the room, or why his powers weren’t working. He was simply out of his mind, and he began to spiral downwards, losing himself more.

That was, until he felt another presence wrap around him. From out of the dark depths of his own mind, Vincent was pulled back up by a warm embrace. His eyes blinked back to reality, although he was still a bit nauseous, and they landed on Eliot, who had a concerned look on his face.

“I hate this place,” Vincent resigned.

“I know you do, Vince, I get it,” Eliot calmly responded, in control of his emotions, as always. “Are you alright?”

Shaking a bit, Vincent replied, “I don’t know anymore, El, I just don’t.” After a few deep breaths, Vincent was able to look around and see that the room and walls were all normal. “I think the pressure is just gettin’ to me a bit.”

Eliot smiled, gently laughed, and said, “Oh don’t worry about that, there’s no need to get so worked up.”

“What do you mean?” Vincent replied, a bit confused. Even though he wanted to protest, something about Eliot’s voice calmed him down.

“I just mean that I know everything has been happening so fast and that it’s just unbelievable, but I don’t want to see you like that. Just do the best you can, and I know you’ll find a way out. You always do.”

Upon hearing those words, some newfound confidence and motivation began to fill Vincent back up. He began to feel like himself again, so much so, that he stood right up and flexed his muscles with joy.

“You know what?” Vincent began, his energy coming back to him. “You’re right, I got this. There’s no chance in hell I’m gonna lose to this place, or Lucretia. I’ll even promise you this,” he said, looking down at Eliot, “from here on out, I’ll never lose again. That includes even to myself.”