Lost children of war

Punch, kick, sidestep, punch, punch.

She didn't even remember her opponents name. It didn't matter. The names, the faces. They were never the same. No one faced her twice. They knew better. She didn't pay any attention to her opponent. She didn't need to. He was weak. Unworthy. Couldn't make her pay attention. Couldn't make it real.

Block, block, sidestep, breathe out, breathe in, punch.

Everything was a blur. Nothing seemed real. Hadn't seemed real since the war ended. And she was left here. A soldier without a fight. Without a purpose. Without a life. She didn't live. Merely existed. Filling up the empty void with fight after fight. All of them meaningless. All of them merely blurry patches of memories were she buried herself in the movements. Just being without conscious thought.

Kick, sidestep, kick, kick, punch.

It was freedom. No worries. There wasn't a society here that she needed to blend into. A society with all these rules and manners that she didn't remember. Expecting her to go back to the person she could no longer recall being. The person that died when she became the killer her family shaped her into. A family that no longer existed. A family she failed to save. She was alone here. Adrift. Lost. And no one here to show her the way.

Breathe out, punch, breathe in, block, punch.

It was over. She looked at the man on the floor. He was out cold. He would live. She walked over to ring master and collected her pay. Walking over to the bar she ordered a bottle of vodka and took a long tug. Seemed to be the only other thing that could wipe the tension out of her. The only other thing that still grounded her to the earth that she no longer understood.

She had once been someone hadn't she? A girl with hopes and dreams and ambitions. Who had that been girl? A scholar? An artist? What had that girls name been? She frowned as the half forgotten memories washed in front of her minds eye. Tao? No that had been her families name. Her clan. Xaren. Yes. Tao Xaren. Her parents had wanted a strong boy and had been rather disappointed with the soft girl that her mother had given birth too. They had hoped that with a hard name she would at least become a tough woman. A warrior that would make her family proud.

That hadn't been who she was though. She had proven to be skillfull in the martial arts but back then her passion had lain with books. Instead of joining the others on the training fields she had squirreled herself away in the library. Using words, once written by men that were now long dead to hone her own. What had that been like. She remembered that she had felt a rush whenever she wrote something. She tried to recapture the feeling but it evaded her.

She had not felt anything in a long while. Nothing but the rhythm of battle, or the burn of the vodka down her throat. This was hell. No.. Not hell. It was even worse. This was Limbo. Not being able to move forward. Not being able to turn around and head back. She remembered the thrill of battle. Knowing that she was out manned and outgunned and still she had gone at it with everything she had and had come out the victor. Cut down enemy after enemy. Watching corpse after corpse fall to the ground and she had moved on without care. She had been invincible then. Untouchable. She wanted it back.

It wasn't fair dammit. She had sacrificed everything she was when her family had sent her off to fight alone. Set aside everything she was too become who she needed to be. And with each life she had spilled that thing had settled in a little bit deeper until she could no longer tell where it stopped and she began. And now it would no longer leave her be.

The memories would not leave her. They haunted her. Made it impossible to sleep. She never wanted to go through something like that again and she wanted it back. To go back to that place where everything was clear and blurry and she knew what she had to do and not where to begin. Where she had fought her enemies and wondered who those enemies were and if the corpses that were lying scattered around her, feeding the earth with their life's blood were amongst them. When those few others had been there to watch her back and stand by her and she had stood by them as well. Where they would have sacrificed each other if it was necessary and fallen in bed together after wards cause they needed to know someone else was there and they were still alive.

She shot back another shot of vodka. She never should have lived. She didn't belong amongst these people in their era of peace. She didn't know what peace was anymore. Some days she looked at the blade in her hands and wondered if she should finish herself after all, but she couldn't. She wasn't a human being anymore. She was a living weapon. And weapons don't switch themselves off. No... they stayed where they were layed down until someone came by to pick them up again.

And so here she was. Passing the time with these meaningless fights and bottles of vodka hoping that if she lost herself enough in either one then maybe this new world would stop spinning around her and start making sense again and she would no longer feel so stuck, outdated, lost, obsolete, redundant. She felt as if there was nothing left of her these days. Stripped, used up. She felt so old and weary. Was she really only seventeen years old? She wanted to go to sleep and not wake up. She wanted... She still wanted things. It seemed that there was still something left after all. She smiled a tired smile and downed another glass.