Freedom is won, not given.

- Writings of the Sol Empress, Words of Faith

[Gabriel]

Gabriel's eyes fluttered open, but struggled to focus. He laid on his side on some sort of cot, a rolled blanket under his head. Blurry shapes moved nearby, while shuffling sounds and scattered murmurs reached his ears.

Someone looked down at him. "Ah, finally you wake. Welcome to the Ring."

A full black beard speckled with gray sprouted from the man's weathered brown face, but no hair covered his bare scalp. Within brown eyes were both the depth of a long life and the warmth of a home hearth.

Gabriel blinked his eyes while lifting his head. "What is the Ring?"

"Freedom or death. Although to some, they be the same thing. Win four matches and you get to leave. If not, you never leave."

What? Gabriel gazed at the surrounding as he sat up. "I shouldn't be here."

Perhaps two dozen men occupied the large cell. Rows of cots lined a curved block stone wall with a few small barred windows. Thick dark metal bars spanned the other side, separating the cell from a hallway where a disinterested guard in a green and red uniform slumped in a chair. A menacing shock rod hung from his belt. But strangely, the door in the bars gaped open, as if the guard had no fear of the prisoners leaving. The haze of fine dust that hung in the air had a musty smell of sweat and blood.

Most of the men had brown skin, like the man who greeted Gabriel, but there were some with lighter skin tones as well. Everyone in the cell wore the same simple black tunic shirts and pants. Also, everyone had a thick black band with a blinking green light around their necks. Gabriel reached to his neck to find he had one, too. Probably some sort of monitoring device.

"No one should be here, yet here we be. I am Augar. What be your name, friend?" the man said, extending a right hand.

"Gabriel," he responded, extending his right hand in turn.

Augar smiled as he grasped Gabriel's wrist in some sort of greeting custom. After a moment, Gabriel responded in kind. Augar smiled. "It would seem you be an outsider, Gabriel. That explains why you be here."

"I am not from this world. My ship crashed outside of Oran and then some goons stunned me before I could ask for help." Gabriel wrinkled his forehead. "Am I in the city?"

"You be in the worse part of Oran." Augar pointed to a small lump on his upper right arm. "You have not the tribe implant. There be a bounty for those like yourselves. The Khan have little tolerance for trespassers."

"And what brings you here to this luxury resort?"

Laughing, Augar showed his white teeth. "My sin be a voice too loud for the Khan. They have little tolerance for dissent either."

"Listen," Gabriel whispered, leaning in. "I came here with my sister, Hope. Have you heard of her? Could she be here?"

Augar shook his head. "This, I do not know. Usually, the women be taken to the manor as indents, indentured servants." He pointed toward a young woman entering the cell, pushing a cart. "That girl, Sura, be such. She might know of your sister."

Walking barefoot, Sura wore only a simple short dress made from the same black fabric as the male prisoners, and the same blinking band circled her neck. Thick shoulder-length dark hair fell across the sides of her head. She had a lithe figure and an attractive face, but her amber eyes, joyless and dulled of life, cast a shadow on Gabriel's heart.

From a large metal pot on the cart, she doled out ladles of a thick soup with a piece of dark bread into gray bowls held by each a prisoner. Looking down below his cot, Gabriel noticed he had his own bowl and cup.

Sura yelped as a tall muscular prisoner with a scar across his dark face and malice in his eyes swatted her arse. She communicated her displeasure with a scornful expression, muttering a curse. In response, he grabbed her by the arms and pinned her against the back stone wall, pressing himself against her. "Little bird, won't you sing a sweet song with me?" She cringed as he stroked her cheek with a calloused hand.

Batting his hand away, fire erupted her eyes. "I am not your bird. Let me go, kalb!"

The other men in the cell backed away. The guard seated in the hallway looked up, then stood and walked away. Gabriel stepped closer, his heart quickening. This man has power here.

Sura pushed back against him, but he did not budge. Baring cracked teeth, he shoved her back against the wall, drawing a grunt from her mouth. Sura raised her knee between his legs, but he turned before it made contact. She whimpered as his large hand encircled her throat and squeezed.

"Stupid bitch!" Enraged, the man raised his other hand to strike her.

But Gabriel grabbed his wrist.

A still silence filled the cell. Sura's eyes widened. Even the man's mouth gaped, apparently surprised that anyone would oppose him.

With eyes narrowed, Gabriel spoke with a level voice. "She said, let go."

The man wrest his hand away from Gabriel's grip and shoved Sura aside. He growled, "Do you know who I am?" Turning, he flexed ample arm muscles and sneered, standing half a head taller than Gabriel.

"Someone not burdened with abundant wit?"

"Huh?" Scrunching his forehead for a moment, the man then bared his teeth and seethed. "I'll teach you somethin'."

Taking a deep breath, Gabriel shifted his stance. So much for making new friends.

The man launched a roundhouse swing. Gabriel blocked with a left hand and jabbed with his right, connecting a fist to the man's chin. But he hardly reacted to the strike. Another blocked swing from the angry man resulted in a palm thrust to his nose and an elbow to his jaw. Stepping back to wipe away a trickle of crimson from his nose, the man hissed through clenched teeth. He charged and wrapped Gabriel in a grapple hold.

Lifted from his feet, a throw sent Gabriel crashing down to the hard floor, upending two cots. The ring of onlookers moved aside. Stunned, Gabriel could not resist being picked up again and hurled against the wall with a thud. Staggering as he stood, Gabriel grimaced at the pain radiating from his ribs.

The man jumped behind Gabriel and wrapped an arm around his neck and squeezed, grunting as he initiated a rear chokehold. Calling on aikido-based moves that Eshe taught him, Gabriel dropped his chin inside of the arm hold to relieve pressure on his neck. Grabbing the man's elbow and wrist, he spun and dropped, throwing the man over a shoulder, slamming him against the floor with an involuntary grunt. Still maintaining the arm grips, Gabriel rolled the man onto his face and placed a knee on his back, then pulled the man's arm up and over his back, hyper-flexing both the wrist and shoulder joints. The man cried out in pain.

"I think you owe the lady an apology." Gabriel said, tightening the hold. "Don't you think?"

Sura stood across the cell, her eyes wide, with a hand to her mouth. Gabriel winked at her.

"Go to hell!" the man spat, his cheek pressed hard against the floor. "I will--" He cried out again as Gabriel leaned in, increasing the pressure.

"I think you should reconsider," Gabriel said calmly. "I would hate to rip any ligaments."

The man never got the chance to respond, nor Gabriel to make good on his threat. A red light appeared on their neck monitoring bands, followed by searing shocks. Gabriel's eyes rolled back in his head as his body collapsed to the floor, shaking in violent convulsion. He had time for one irreverent thought before passing out. Oh crap, not again.

Sometime later, Gabriel's eyes fluttered open, again laying on a cot, and the swirling shadows in his mind lifted away. This time, someone else looked down at him. A pleasant face belonging to Sura.

"Why did you do that for me?" she asked. "You could have been killed."

Gabriel gazed around at familiar surroundings, the same except for missing the man he fought. "Well, I must still be alive. No afterlife would not look like this." Then he grinned as his eyes turned up to Sura. "Although, I think I see an angel."

Sura furrowed her brow. "You did not answer my question."

"Because you are worth the risk."

She dropped her head. "I am just an indent. It would be best if you forgot about me."

"That is no longer possible." He sat up and pointed at her neck. "So how did you earn that fashionable necklace?"

"Debt to the wrong people," Sura replied. "I borrowed a lot of money to pay medical costs for my son and could not pay it back, a high crime on this world."

"Where is your son now?"

Her lower lip trembled, and a longing shown from her eyes. "I left him at a shelter and I haven't seen him for so long. With this damned collar on, I can't leave."

Firming his jaw, Gabriel said. "When I get out of here. I will come back for you."

"Don't!" She shook her head while shedding a tear. "Don't give me false hope. That is cruelty."

Gabriel took up her hands and paraphrased a passage from the Writings. "Hope is only cruel if destiny is predetermined. If not, it is a light in dark times."

"I wish I could believe that." Sura lifted wet eyes. "Why are you here?"

"Trespassing, apparently." He shrugged. "Crash landed in a starship outside of the city. I came with my sister, but I do not know what happened to her. Would you be able to find out? She is about your height with long dark hair."

"I will try. What is her name?"

"Hope."