Day Three

[Strazio Rockwell]

The explosion shook the entire mountain and rattled me to the core. The subsequent shockwave was enough to send me tumbling down the side of the mountain. Instinctively my legs stretched out and tried to slow my descent, but one of them was caught by a tree root. The root twisted my ankle and sent me onto my ass. For a moment I could only hear the ringing in my ears from the explosion. Dirt clods pelted my chest and face as debris rained down the mountainside my whole body was numb and unresponsive. The weight of the abyss kept me numbed and pinned to the ground.

He’s dead. The Rock is dead. The Rock N’ Rock Connection is dead.

“No...” I sputtered and turned over onto my stomach. My senses were slowly coming back and I pushed myself onto my knees. “No! No! No!” I punched the dirt with every exclamation “no! No! No!” The cuts on my hand stung from the dirt, but I kept punching through the pain. It almost stunned me to realize it, but in the past day and a half I had come to think of that big goliath as a friend. A venemous and wicked thought snaked its way into my head everyone I care about dies or gets hurt because I’m too weak to save them. My fingers dug their way into the dirt and grasped a moist clump of earth. A familiar bubbling boiling rage burned in my chest. It was a coping mechanism of sorts. Without this rage, without this pain I would have no purpose and it was because of this that I raged against the world.

Impotently I yelled, I yelled for everything I had lost. I yelled not just for what I had lost in the Abyss, but for everyone that I was too weak to protect. “I’ll fucking kill you you bastard!” I bellowed my empty threat at the Rock’s murderer. I hoped that the entire island would hear me. My hand ripped up another chunk of earth and in a fit I threw it down the mountainside. I wanted to tear the island apart and swallow every piece. I wanted to take the abyss and cram it down my throat. This pain in my chest, this fucking hatred I was going to unleash it upon this forsaken island. Every tree would be uprooted and mashed to splinters, every animal would be gutted, and every player would be slaughtered; even if I had to do it with my bare hands.

My anger started to quiet itself and slowly I stood and put weight on my sprained ankle, the pain forced a wicked smile across my face. Purposefully I unclasped the champion belt around my waist and held it into the air. This wasn’t over yet, not by a long shot. I dropped the belt and looked towards the sky and addressed my fallen friend.

“Don’t worry champ, I’ve got this.”

Every step hurt, every breath was pained, and every action sent bolts of hurt down my shattered arm. The pain gave me razor sharp focus, without this pain I would be nothing. Three days on this unforgiving rock had given me more than enough fuel for my anger. Today I was going to find someone and rip their goddamned heart out. My good hand gripped the 2x4 so hard that my nails cracked and the wood sent splinters into my flesh.

I continued my climb up the mountain, towards Blair Village. Still holding onto the cinders of rage I couldn’t stay for too long. A simple glance in every house was enough for me to move one. There was no time to rest. No, there was only time to hunt and to kill. There would be no more playing games and there would be no more losing.