The abyss of unconsciousness was my only solace, a fleeting mercy in an eternity of pain. But even that was now denied me. I was wrenched back into existence by a foreign, yet achingly familiar, sensation: power. A trickle of divine energy, warm and golden, was being fed back into my system. I felt bones that had been shattered knit themselves together with impossible speed. Deep gashes and wounds sealed over, leaving smooth, unblemished skin in their wake. The chronic, grinding ache in my feet vanished, replaced by strength. For a few precious seconds, I was whole. I was me.

The sensation was a lie, a drug administered by my jailer. As soon as my body was fully restored to its peak physical condition—a perfect, living statue of sculpted muscle and divine proportion—the connection was severed. The warmth vanished, plunging me back into the cold, profound weakness of a mortal. The nanites reasserted their dominance, leaving me trembling and gasping on the floor, a perfectly restored engine with no fuel.

“A pristine canvas is so much more appealing for the artist, don’t you agree?” the Architect’s voice echoed from a speaker. A compartment in the wall slid open, presenting not my true armor, but a mockery of it. A cheap replica.

The ritual began. My compliance was born of utter exhaustion. I pulled on the stiff, molded pleather boots that mimicked my own, the material chafing my skin where blessed leather once sat. The belt was plastic, its “golden” finish already flaking at the edges. The lasso was a simple nylon rope, dyed gold, cold and dead in my hands. The final insult was the tiara, a flimsy piece of metal with a plastic star that I had to place on my own brow. I looked in the reflection of the polished floor. To the cameras, I was Wonder Woman, vibrant and ready for battle. But I felt like a ghost haunting my own skin, a blasphemous effigy of myself.

The gate ground open. “Tonight’s patron has a particular appreciation for aesthetics,” the Architect announced. “He prefers his art… incised. Allow me to present, for a staggering sum, the mercenary known as Lacerate.”

The figure that emerged was a nightmare of chrome and flesh. He was lean and wiry, his body a patchwork of cybernetic enhancements. His legs were digitigrade, like a raptor’s, allowing for explosive, unnatural speed. But my eyes were drawn to his arms. From knuckles to elbows, his gauntlets were fitted with a series of long, wicked blades that hummed with a low, vibrating energy.

The red lights of the drones blinked to life. Showtime.

Lacerate didn’t charge; he blurred. He was on me before I could even fully register his movement. The first blow wasn’t a punch, but a sweeping arc of his arm. The vibro-blades sang as they sliced through the fake fabric of my bodice and bit into the flesh of my abdomen.

The pain was clean, sharp, and terrifyingly deep. A searing line of fire erupted across my stomach. I staggered back, looking down to see a perfectly straight, crimson line welling with blood, staining the blue of my mock costume. He was already moving again, a whirlwind of silver and red. A slash across my back forced a scream from my lungs. Another across my thigh, deep enough that I felt the muscle itself sever. My leg buckled, sending me to one knee.

He was toying with me, a surgeon of sadism. He wasn’t trying to bludgeon me into unconsciousness like Blockbuster. He was methodically, artistically, carving me apart. Each cut was precise, aimed to cripple and bleed. My beautiful, powerful body, moments ago perfectly healed, was being methodically ruined. The skin of my arms was cross-hatched with bleeding cuts. A deep gash on my shoulder exposed the white of bone beneath.

I was too slow. My weakness was a leaden cloak I couldn’t cast off. I swung a desperate, clumsy punch, and he simply danced away, his cybernetic legs carrying him just out of reach before he darted back in, his blades opening another wound along my ribs.

Just kill me, my mind pleaded, a mantra of silent surrender. Drive one of those blades through my heart. End the performance.

But death was not what the client had paid for. He had paid to dismantle me. He spun, his leg sweeping around in a graceful, deadly kick. The blades on his greaves connected with my side, carving a deep, horizontal furrow from my hip to my armpit. The agony was absolute. My vision swam in a red haze. I collapsed onto my side, my breath coming in ragged, wet sobs. Blood pooled beneath me, warm and slick on the cold white floor.

Lacerate stood over me, his chest heaving slightly, the humming of his blades the only sound besides my own wretched gasps. He admired his handiwork, the masterpiece of ruin he had made of my body. For a final flourish, he pressed the tip of one blade against the smooth, powerful curve of my calf, and slowly, deliberately, carved his initial—a stylized ‘L’—into my flesh.

The pain was secondary to the humiliation. I was no longer a warrior. I was not even a victim. I was a canvas. A piece of meat to be autographed by my destroyer.

He retracted his blades and gave a slight bow toward a hidden camera before turning and striding out of the gate. It slammed shut, leaving me alone. Alone in my fake costume, lying in a puddle of my own real blood, my body a roadmap of excruciating wounds.

The desire for death was still there, a dull ember in the ashes of my soul. But a new, more horrifying realization dawned. The Architect wouldn’t let me die. He would just let the divine energy trickle back in, seal the cuts, mend the muscle, erase the scars, and then dress me in this clown’s costume to be torn apart all over again.

This wasn’t just defeat. This wasn’t an execution. This was my eternity. A cycle of perfect healing and perfect destruction, performed for an audience that had once called me their hero. I laid my head on the floor, the metallic tang of my own blood filling my senses, and for the first time, I did not pray for death. I simply accepted that my hell had no end.