The alien leather held snug on Yoon’s body, a red tube top bralette on her chest, and torn-up green pants. The visagestes had covered her in alien runes, in a similar fashion as an underhive gang would mark their members, as well as a touch of makeup to look better on what the aliens pass for pict-thieves. They said it was like putting lipstick on a porcine, but welcomed the challenge to make a mon-keigh look presentable if not striking.

  Beauty did not belong on these things' lips, as none but the fly god could design these ghostly, corpse things in his image. The void eyes, glinting black teeth, and pallid skin were just the base, as others had all kinds of horrific and impractical piercings, chemical tubing, and flesh grafting in the name of what passes for style among this misbegotten kind. That’s not even getting to their music, which sounded like a grox both climaxing and being mutilated, played in an obnoxious triplet drum pattern that only the cog-girlies could appreciate.

  When Yoon asked what that forsaken noise was, the xeno brushing her hair called it ‘gorestep’. These xeno—’drukhari’—name everything this way. It can’t just be a neural whip, it’s an ‘agoniser’. It’s not just a grenade launcher, it’s a ‘terrorfex’. It’s not just a spear, it’s an ‘impaler’. It’s not a laser cannon, it's a ‘dark lance’.

  Yoon was already getting the idea, but the xeno loved to drone on about their disgusting toys in excruciating detail. There were also the: shredders, goblets of spite, hell masks, soul-seekers, hell glaives, crucibles of malediction, shadowfields, torture amps, reavers, raiders, ravagers, reapers, rampagers, night shields, masks of the damned, dark scythes, horrorfexes, etcetera, etcetera, and etcetera. Every part of their armorium was made with the intent to squeeze out as much pain and entertainment as possible for a species bored in their assurance that they have already won.

  Even the sapphire acid splinters were the shavings of crystallized neurotoxin that would send a woman writhing in agony if it had reached her flesh. As much as the Emperor would want Yoon to fight to the death, Yoon was in no hurry to throw her life away, especially if it meant getting first-hand experience with the vividly described effects of the drukhari arsenal. Their music was torture enough.

  When they were satisfied with her appearance, they brought out a table of small arms. She was to choose to her liking, confident that she would not turn the weapons on them, or perhaps hoping that she would. Regardless of whatever they may be thinking, Abominatrix clasped her hands and gasped in delight when Yoon picked out two hekates, which proved that she had the heart of a hekatarii. As sickening as praise from her was, the knives felt comfortably familiar in Yoon’s hands, especially when the alternatives were xeno firearms she could hardly tell apart.

  Abominatrix led Yoon on a leash down a dark hall that seemed to stretch out endlessly. After walking in darkness for so long, Yoon was blinded by shimmering light; where there was once a wall, there was now a gateway of suspended, slithering membrane film. The alien pict thief captured her face as her eyes adjusted. Abommy wrapped the leash around her hand to shorten it and pulled Yoon close against her.

  “Hey, all you gals, ghouls, and glams between and beyond!” started Abommy, “It’s ya girl, Abominatrix, and I hope ya’ll are ready for this one. I’m here with the little tigress and, like a true woman of the arena, she felt the blades call out to her. Show ‘em your blades, girl.”

  ‘Little Tigress’ lifted the blades to the pict-thief. The pict-cast screen panned across the audience for their reaction, an auditorium filled with xeno dressed in a parody of fineries, gowns, and garms of garish clashing colors and textures with spikes seemingly glued on at random, some in box seats with opera glasses in hand, steely-eyed and armored guards at their sides. They were all looking up, presumably at Yoon on whatever pict-caster displayed her on the other side.

  “There they are, that’s how you know she’s a wych at heart. But from what I’m hearing, her opponent is cold as ice, just the way Anthrax likes ‘em. Let’s see what he’s got.”

  The pict-caster did a wipe transition to another stream. The crowd drank in the dread written across Yoon’s face as she recognized Anthrax, the armored, winged predator that ragdolled her so lovely the day before. That dread twisted into a sneer as the other mon-keigh contestant came into view. She had mechanical green eyes, a smooth, black, halter brassier, a studded skirt that covered her legs entirely, and two splinter pistols in her hands. Her green eyes were narrowed by lenses that shuttered just short of closing.

  “There she is! Sister forced to fight sister to the death. After what surely were years of forging bonds and swearing oaths that these sororitas are so fond of, we will get to savor their anguish of killing each other. Who will be the first to break? What excuses will the winner make? What—”

  “The Emperor truly has no miracles left to spare,” intertupted Whang Youn Dai, “if he does not allow me the mercy of never seeing you again.”

  “Really?” returned Yoon Si-nae, “I for one am thankful I get to kill you myself. I assumed you would feel the same way.”

  “Hardly. Just as waste is collected by garbage men for incineration, it is beneath me to sully my hands with your filthy blood. But if the task falls to me, I will commit to this duty as any other. That you are so eager to slay your fellow woman is evidence enough that you should have been put down long ago.”

  “We are in the middle of the xenos pit. I could ignore the pathetic slights of nyeons like you before, but since we’re going to die here regardless, I’ll take my time to enjoy myself.”

  “It seems the xeno had the correct assessment: you really are one of them. Explains much.”

  “Oh-ho, these xenos will be taking notes the way I’ll carve every bit of scrap out of you.”

  The two mon-keigh scowled at each other through the screens. Abommy clasped her hands together. Anthrax remained unmoved. The audience had their interest piqued; these arena deathmatches were mostly social affairs, but this unexpected dynamic caught their attention.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  “Not exactly what we had in mind,” resumed Abommy, “but we can work with this. Regardless, the sister-on-sister action was only part of the show! Mon-keigh weren’t the only fauna we found on the planet; the beast pens are stocked with some never-before-seen creatures, let's see ‘em now!”

  The pict-casters split into four. Each quadrant depicted cages full of dokkaebi, primarily goblins. The jittery Chams kept probing their cages for escape, no matter how it shocked them. The vicious Gae rammed their horns into the gabion heedless of the harm to themselves. The methodical Go sat away from the walls, plucking out and piling the bone arrows that grew from their back. In a few bigger cages were larger beasts: Oedari, beefy and restless legs wrapped in tinted ropes; Oenun, great eyeballs split open with slobbering mouths; Seobangs, lumpen and misshapen hominids made in mockery of human farmers that even the spirites find it offensive.

  “These sisters will be facing each other while these beasts are in play. They’ll be thrown in all at once, so whoever can master the moshpit will be the victor. Think you can handle that, girls?”

  “Like eating porridge.”

  “Affirmative.”

  “Alright, let’s get ‘em out there. Go get ‘em, tiger!”

  Abommy shoved Yoon into the membrane. Yoon stumbled just short of falling, wiped the feeling of slime off her face, then dodged a hail of sapphire shards that lodged into the wall behind her, where the gateway just was. Whang grunted her frustration at the first volley’s failure; as the arena rapidly filled with dokkaebi, that was the only clean sight line she was going to get.

  Yoon sliced at the Gaes that launched themselves at her, the blades dicing apart meat like air. Even with their limbs severed and tendons slit, the gaes would hurl themselves with all their strength up to the dying breath. As soon as one died, another was tossed into the arena. For the best, since the beasts were the only cover, but this would not end until one sister was dead.

  Go brought out their bone piles of bone arrows and, lacking a bow, threw them like javelins at Whang. They pulled out their spines as they came, then returned to the piles as they generated more. She would counterfire, but the arrows were not all she contended with; chams scurried at her feet trying to trip her up, even using the entrails of their fallen as tripwires, hoisted between two gleeful chams like jump rope. No matter how many she stomped to paste, or how many foamed at the mouth from splinter shards flooding their veins with venom, there were yet more chams. Ceramite power armor and servo-muscle fiber bundles could shrug off bone arrows, but she was not about to test the efficacy of what little alien leather she was given. The only way out of this was to terminate the hive rat.

  Oedari leapt to entangle Yoon between their thighs and calves. Every living limb was a trunk of pure muscle that would wrestle her to the ground, either crushing her with their strength outright or incapacitating her for the hundred other things looking to take her life. Some of them got impatient and turned to squeeze the life out of goblins instead. The beasts fighting each other were the only reason their number did not overwhelm the gladiatrixes. Yoon weaved around the chaos and carved a path through as needed. No matter the madness or grating music, she would clear her mind to focus on getting to the only target that mattered.

  Whang moved toward the Gos since dodging away got her nowhere. The Gos had the self-preservation to retreat, yet a cowardice that left their piles to be crushed. The Chams stole some bones but lacked the dexterity to wield them. Oenun flocks darted forth like a descending school of flying piranha. A holofield had kept them from escaping the arena, so the irritated eyeballs came chomping and slathering for flesh. The practically limitless ammunition and rapid rate of fire of the splinter pistol made dispersing them easy, but every moment distracted by a witchbeast was a moment when Yoon got closer.

  Seobangs, slow and clumsy as they were, used farming implements as polearms: scythes, hoes, rakes, cultivators, all together formed a staunch line of spears that made Yoon’s little daggers feel silly. Luckily, some idiots left piles of bone arrows lying around, and the seobangs lacked the shields for a proper phalanx. It took a couple of flurries, but their ranks were felled and thinned enough to get by, their broken formation scrambling apart in her wake.

  Whang shot at Yoon, forcing the rat to pick up seobangs as a meat shield. The splinter shards were meant to be injected into meat, so they didn’t pierce all the way through, but it slowed and blinded her enough. Whang retreated past a pack of oedari. If Yoon wants to get close, she’ll have to tangle with them.

  Yoon tossed the seobangs and some goblins into the oedari as bait. While the commotion of entangled limbs blocked Whang’s shots, Yoon was accustomed to brawls. She navigated the mosh pit the same way she did the rest of the arena, a predator slinking through the foliage towards a lamb all too aware of her presence. Still, there would be one moment where the space between is clear of obstruction, and that is when the duel is decided.

  Whang batted aside a goblin tossed at her. That left one free hand aimed at the rat barreling forth. She would be on Whang in an instant. A hail of splinters nailed across raised forearms. Their acid-flayed skin and their venom pulsated dark blue across veins. The rat roared its agony but did not slow even as its arms were shredded, crashing into Whang with its shoulder, sending them both into the dirt.

  The pain was like lava taking the place of her blood. Yoon’s bones broke, rendering her forearms naught but bleeding, flailing appendages that could no longer hold the knives, instead letting them fall beside Whang. But she has worked with pain and broken bones before, whether on the operating table or under the abbess’s whips. She brought up a heel to stamp on one of Whang’s wrists, hard enough to release one pistol from Whang’s grasp, and flailed a broken arm to bash the other pistol, sending it clattering out of reach.

  Whang punched Yoon in the nose, feeling cartilage squelch and blood spurt across her knuckles, not enough to get the she-beast off, but enough to daze. Whang felt for, and found, the knife near her free hand. Yoon’s open maw descended and bit around the meat of one of Whang’s augmetic eyes. Whang stabbed into Yoon’s side, the blade sliding through flesh with ease, only limited by its length reaching Whang’s clenched hand. Whang felt hot breath spread across her face as the rat grunted, but her teeth only dug in.

  Yoon tugged, tearing flesh, and Whang felt her inner wiring and servos be pulled against her organs, forcing out a scream Whang did not know she was capable of. Yoon kept tuffing again and again. Whang’s feet kicked at the ground as she mustered the strength to pull the blade out and stab again, this time between the ribs. Yet this only emboldened the rat, whose eyes rolled with blood craze and whose teeth dug into metal and tugged with greater ferocity.

  When the first metal bent to cracking, Whang dropped the knife as the agony akin to her skull breaking sapped her motor control. A crack spread into a fracture that wracked Whang’s body with pain, only made greater as her augmetic eye was ripped from her head, trailed by entrails of viscera and cogitation wires. Yoon continued her mauling, the other eye coming out with less resistance now that the shell’s integrity was compromised.

  Yoon spat out the metal and meat to survey her work: Whang's face looked like the horangi after a chainsword was pulled through its eyes. All that was missing was to pull her limb out, but the wound in Yoon’s liver and lung did not afford the time for luxury. These xenos have the means to patch them up; it was merely a matter of who dies first.

  Yoon pushed herself up with her legs. One last look at the gurgling mess beneath her, she stomped Whang’s throat in with the last of her strength. She made sure to keep her eyes open long enough to see the gurgling stop and passed out, satisfied with even death.