Free Nocturnal by Scott Sigler

get your ass kicked. Wow, I look totally scared.”
    “Gimme,” Alex said.
    Rex blinked away tears. He could see again. Oscar Woody was the one on his chest. Oscar’s curly-poofy black hair stuck out from beneath a white baseball cap with a gold-lined, crimson
BC
on the front. Above Oscar, standing there looking down — Alex Panos.
    Alex, with his movie-star blond hair and his big strong body, a body that Rex would
never
have. Alex held an unfolded page from a sketch pad. He looked up. His eyes narrowed. He turned the drawing around, so Rex could see it.
    Rex’s drawings were getting pretty good — no mistaking that Alex was the boy in the drawing, the boy getting his arm cut off with a chain saw held by a muscled version of Rex Deprovdechuk.
    Alex smiled. “So you think you can kill me, faggot?”
    Rex shook his head, the back of his head grinding against dirt, twigs and dried leaves.
    Jay peeked over Alex’s shoulder. Sixteen years old and Jay already had a goatee, although it was as thin and red as the hair on his head. “Seriously, Alex, that’s a good drawing! Looks just like you!”
    “Jay,” Alex said, “shut the fuck up.”
    Jay’s shoulders drooped. He seemed to suddenly shrink from a five-foot-ten stud to a five-foot-six weakling. “Sorry, Alex. I didn’t mean nothing.”
    Alex’s eyes never left Rex. Alex crumpled the paper, then tossed it aside.
    “Boys,” he said, “hold his arm.”
    Rex tried to scramble up, but Oscar was too heavy.
    “Stay still, pussy,” Oscar said.
    Someone grabbed Rex’s right wrist and yanked it hard, painfully stretching his arm. Rex looked at this attacker — blue-eyed Issac Moses, his strong hands locked on Rex’s little forearm.
    “Jay,” Alex said, “go grab those two chunks of wood, I want to try something.”
    Rex finally managed a few words. “I … won’t draw … anymore.”
    “It’s too late for that,” Alex said. He looked to his right. “Yeah, those are the ones. Put a chunk under his elbow, and the other one under his wrist.”
    Rex felt something hard shoved under his elbow, raising it a few inches off the leaf-scattered dirt. He watched Jay slide a piece of wood under his wrist, then looked up at the surprised face of Issac Moses, who had yet to release his hold on Rex’s arm. Issac’s mouth was always turned down, and his nose seemed too small for his face.
    “Oh man, don’t do this,” Issac said. “That’s going to hurt him bad.”
    Alex’s smile faded. He looked hard at Issac.
    “Shut up and keep holding him,” Alex said. “If you don’t, you’re next.”
    Issac’s mouth opened, perhaps to say something, then he closed it and looked down.
    Alex took a step forward. His feet straddled Rex’s elevated arm. Alex looked like a towering god, blond hair hanging down, a few locks gleaming from the beams of late-afternoon sun filtering through the tree’s shade.
    “I have to teach you a lesson, Rex. I have to teach you about pain.”
    The tears flowed. Rex couldn’t help it. “You guys hurt me all the time!”
    Alex’s smile widened. “Oh, them was just love taps, faggot. You probably even liked it. Now? Now you get to learn about
real
pain.”
    Alex weighed over two hundred pounds. He was bigger than most of the teachers. He raised his leg knee-high, letting his military boot hover above the center of Rex’s forearm. Alex smiled, then stamped down hard. Rex heard a muffled
crunch
sound, then had the odd sensation of feelinghis forearm grind into the dirt while his wrist and elbow were still elevated a good two inches off the ground.
    Then came the pain.
    He looked before he cried out. His arm made a shallow V, an extra joint between his wrist and elbow. Oscar got off of Rex’s chest. He stood there, black curls puffed out from under his hat. Oscar was part of the circle that surrounded Rex, the circle that blocked out what little sun filtered through the overhanging tree, the circle that cast the wounded boy in complete