Prologue
Raymund was scared.
He had been at home with his family eating a dinner which happened to be one of the best he had cooked in years. His wife, Koni, had made dinner last night, so this night was his turn.
That was the deal they worked out quite a while ago. Another plan which had proven successful. Their whole marriage had been based on plans and working out decisions together, and they found that it was a very efficient and happy way to make a relationship work.
And as much as their family always thought ahead, this one time was different.
They had not planned to take a walk through the lush hawaiian jungles after dinner, but decided in a spontaneous whim to do so. The walk was relaxing. Raymund and Koni strolling side by side, hand in hand.
Heading into a very dense part of the jungle, the pair came across a group of people. Raymund thought this was out of the ordinary, but many tourists had been visiting the island lately and the younger crowd tended to be unusual. They would be the kind of people to stand in a group in the middle of a jungle.
As Raymund and his wife walked by, he noticed that the group of men seemed to be in fact two groups. One being dressed very casual, in shorts, sandals, and button up shirts. The other group was dressed in either all black or greens that blended in with the surrounding flora. The groups were facing each other, with six or seven men on either side, and with four men in the middle. One man dressed in the dark decor of the men behind him on his side, one dressed in a suit, and the other two dressed casual like the group behind them.
The four men in the middle were standing very close and speaking barely above a whisper. The two business-like men were handing wrapped packages to the casually dressed pair, and in turn handed the business-like men a suitcase.
A hand off, Raymund thought, in the middle of the jungle? Things were starting to become more than unusual. Raymund had never even heard of things like this going on in the dense thickets of Hawaii. Weren’t hand off’s usually associated with drugs? Tourists were going much to far these days! Raymund decided he wasn’t going to just stand around and do nothing. He noticed his arrogance was coming back to the surface, but he ignored it. He decided that enough was enough.
Raymund let go of Koni’s hand, and before she could say a word, started off towards the group.
But then he noticed something that struck fear into his heart. These men we armed. They had firearms with them and were holding them at their sides, ready to be used when needed. This situation had become much more grave than Raymund first thought. He stopped himself before he went any further, with the intention of turning around and briskly walking back home.
But then two men turned his way.
Raymund’s heart skipped a beat and he stopped dead in his tracks. Sweat instantly started to run down his forehead. His instincts were to pop his knuckles, which he always did when he became nervous or agitated, but his fear dominated his bad habits.
One man looked his way. . . And then turned around to continue supervising the trade. But the other’s eyes searched in the couple’s direction, looking for any activity. It must’ve been darker than Raymund had thought, because the men didn’t seem to have noticed him. He was hoping Koni was staying as quiet and as still as he was, but then again, she was sometimes even more curious than he. Raymund wanted to get back to where Koni was standing so they could figure out what to do, but he knew he couldn’t just turn around and stroll toward her. He decided he was going to try and inch his way back as slowly and as stealthily as he possibly could.
He took a deep breath. Inhale. Exhale. Then he almost imperceptibly took a step back.
No reaction from the man still staring in his direction.
Another step.
Nothing.
One more step.
Crack!
Raymund heard Koni make a small noise and he felt as if he had a heart attack right there on the spot. He quickly looked down to see that he had stepped on a branch, which had broken in two instantly. He looked back up at the men. The one that had been watching them started to slowly walk forward, and a few other men looked at him and seemed to be asking what he was doing.
Then the man stopped, raised his rifle, and fired one round in the pair’s direction.
Raymund instantly dropped to the ground and heard his wife do the same. He hadn’t been shot, but he knew he had shown the men their position, and he heard them starting to shout. He got on his hands and knees, and then looked up to see the large group of men surrounding him and his wife.
Raymund didn’t know what to do. He wanted to speak, but he wasn’t sure if the men spoke Hawaiian, or even English for that matter. Besides, that would probably just irritate them anyway, so he stayed silent. Not speaking at all and staying alive was much better than trying to make peace and being shot.
Then the man in the suit walked through the small crowd of men and knelt in front of Raymund.
“Excuse us, sir, but can we help you in some way shape or form?”
Raymund looked down to the ground and stayed silent.
The man’s tone changed from calm to fierce. “I’m waiting for an answer, old man, what do you think you are doing here?!”
“. . . My-my wife and I were just taking a walk along one of our favorite paths. We didn’t expect-”
“Didn’t expect what? What did you see?”
“I, we. . . we didn’t see anything.”
“Nothing at all?”
Raymund always knew he was a bad liar.
“That’s what I thought. Alright boys, we’ve got two more contestants! Round ‘em up!”
Raymund didn’t see the man walk up to his right, but he felt the sharp blow against his head as his body plummeted to the ground. His vision was hazy and his ears were ringing, but he vaguely remembered hearing the man in the suit apologizing to someone about an inconvenience. The next thing he knew, some sort of cloth or bag was thrown over his head and his sight was completely gone.
Then a few moments later, he completely lost consciousness.
~ ~ ~
Raymund was scared.
He had been kidnapped by what seemed to be a gang of sorts. They had appeared violent, and seeing as he had not heard his Koni make any sort of noise during the struggle, he was scared as to if she was ok or not. He had no idea where he was because he had been both unconscious and blindfolded for who knows how long. And to top it all off, his head never hurt as much as it did right now.
Raymund was scared, and who wouldn’t be?
He was told to stand up, and when he did, he almost fell over from disorientation. He was then escorted down what felt like a downward slope and was led across something wooden. He only knew that by how the boards creaked under his feet. He assumed he was on a sort of boat or dock, as he could hear water lapping up against a hard surface.
He was stopped, and something started to feel around his body. He heard information about himself being reported back to another person.
“. . . Tall. Thin. . . Weak arms, but his legs seem to be in good shape. . . .”
A pause.
“. . . Yes, and the woman seems to be the same. Both have virtually no upper body strength, but they could probably run a marathon.”
Then his vision came back to him in a blinding sensation that made his head throb even worse. It took him a moment to get used to the sunlight, but he was grateful that his sense of sight had been granted back to him. He looked over to see Koni, beaten and bleeding from the mouth, staring back at him. It was a glare that was fixed onto her face, one that he hadn’t seen in quite a long time. Did she think this was his fault?
“If you both could look in my direction, thank you.”
Another man in a suit, different than the man who captured them, stood in front of them with his hands behind his back. He was shadowed by two guards, both armed.
“Welcome to the Island. It has other names, but none that you need to worry about. It seems as though you two were caught spying on a little. . . endeavor of ours, yes?”
Keeping quiet kept them both alive before, maybe it would work again.
“No answer. Which, of course, is perfectly reasonable. You were forced against your will to an unfamiliar place. It would only make sense that you would want to learn more about your surroundings before you venture any further. Allow me to do you a favor and tell you what you obviously want to know: why are you here? You are here because you stuck your nose into our business. Curiosity is a very dangerous thing, which you are about to experience the hard way. Why? Because you are a troublemaker!”
The man signaled to whoever was holding him, and his captor hit him in the stomach, causing him to bend over. The man then grabbed Raymund’s head and thrust him back, past a proper standing position, into a stance that made him almost bend backward. Then the man got very close to Raymund’s face, still in his grip, and spat “And we have a way to deal with troublemakers like you.”
The man hit Raymund across the face his his other hand, turned around, and walked back to his earlier position. “You are going to be entered into a sort of competition. An Olympics of sorts, if you will. You will be put into an arena with many other troublemakers just like yourself and pitted against some of the most frightening men you will ever meet in your life. If you perform well against them, you just might survive to see another day.”
Raymund was furious. Who was this man to make him do something against his will? He could no longer hold his tongue. He could feel his very sanity tearing with each passing moment.
“And if we refuse?” Raymund spat at the man.
The man in the suit turned around. “You won’t refuse.”
“How do you know? As long as I have something left to live for, I will never give in to the likes of you.”
The man stared at Raymund for a few moments, then turned to the guard on his left and said “How many more contestants did you say we needed?”
“One, sir.”
“Right. We don’t need the woman.”
Raymund felt rather than saw the two guards behind him and Koni back away. His eyes were fixed with loathing on the man in the suit. Then the guard behind the suited man pulled out a pistol, took aim, and fired the gun.
The bullet went straight through Koni’s forehead, and as her lifeless body fell sideways off the dock and into the water, Raymund crumpled to the ground.
If he hadn’t spoken. If he had just kept quiet and didn’t say a word, he would still have his Koni by his side.
“There.” the man said, “Now you have nothing left to live for.” The man knelt down to Raymund’s level.
“Welcome to the Pain Trials.”
Then he stood up and walked away. The guards that were behind him and his wife grabbed hold of Raymund and dragged him deeper into the jungle. And as Raymund wept for his lost wife and his own stupidity, he lost the will to live, and allowed the men to carry him to what would soon be his certain death.
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