Kitty did not release my hand after I returned.
She counted my pulse with two fingers against my wrist while the thunder moved farther across the campus.
"Tell me what you saw."
"Nothing."
"You asked how long you were gone. People who see nothing don't ask that."
The dormant fountain stood behind her. Beyond it, the water workers were folding their signs before the wind carried them into the lake.
"It was another fragment," I said.
"Of what?"
"A road."
"Which road?"
"I don't know."
"Were you driving?"
I remembered red metal above my head when it should have been beneath me. I remembered glass against my cheek and distant lights that never arrived.
"Maybe."
Kitty opened the symptom log on her phone.
"Visual disturbance, loss of environmental awareness, approximately six seconds. Possible auditory component."
"Don't write auditory."
Her thumb stopped.
"Why?"
"Because I didn't hear words."
"Did you hear a voice?"
"I don't know."
"That means yes."
She added the line.
I took the phone from her and deleted it.
Kitty stared at the empty field.
"Put it back."
"The physician already delayed my clearance."
"Because this is happening."
"It lasted six seconds."
"Six seconds inside the cage is enough for NS to hit you four times."
"Then I won't disappear inside the cage."
"That isn't a medical plan."
I gave her the phone.
She restored the line and locked the screen.
"You made me responsible for your corner," she said. "You don't get to ask me to become dishonest because the truth is inconvenient."
"I didn't make you responsible. You chose it."
The words sounded wrong as soon as they left me.
Kitty stepped back.
"Yes," she said. "I keep doing that."
She walked toward the dormitory without waiting for me.
Rain began after she reached the covered path.
It fell over the lake, the silent fountain, and every route except the one above her.
The neurological review was scheduled for Friday morning.
By Thursday night, I had rehearsed the truth until it sounded harmless.
I had been tired.
The weather had changed suddenly.
I experienced a brief visual memory without losing posture, consciousness, or orientation.
I remained responsive.
The last sentence was a lie.
Kitty knew because she had said my name twice before I answered.
At 8:10, she sent me the completed corner-observation form.
The six seconds were included.
At 8:12, I called her.
She rejected it.
At 8:14, I called again.
This time, she answered without speaking.
"You know what happens if I submit this," I said.
"The doctor knows what happened."
"My clearance ends."
"Maybe it should."
"You don't mean that."
"I mean it enough to put my name beneath it."
I looked at the signature line.
CORNER OBSERVER: KITTY.
"NS will win without entering the cage."
"Then this is about NS."
"Everything becomes about NS when you want to avoid answering me."
There was a long silence.
Voices moved behind her in the female dormitory corridor. A door opened and closed.
"Submit whichever version lets you live with yourself," Kitty said. "But don't put my name on a lie."
She ended the call.
I removed the attachment from the tournament portal.
For twelve minutes, the submission box remained empty.
Then a new file appeared without my uploading it.
SPONSOR MEDICAL REVIEW FORM: ALTERNATIVE ASSESSMENT AVAILABLE.
Below it was the VT Foundation symbol.
Our Emergency Medicine simulation began with six unconscious mannequins and one working oxygen cylinder.
The Sleeping Man had cut the laboratory supply budget again, so the instructor turned the shortage into a mass-casualty exercise.
"Resources are limited," she said. "You cannot treat everyone first. Triage according to urgency and survivability."
JP raised his hand.
"Can we triage the budget committee?"
"They were declared beyond help last semester."
Even NS laughed at that.
The instructor divided us into two teams.
Our side received NC, Anna, Jihye, JP, Kitty, and me.
The other side received June, Bunny, Cherry, TZ, and NS.
Each mannequin carried a card describing respiratory rate, pulse, mental status, and injuries. We had seven minutes to assign red, yellow, green, or black tags, establish immediate interventions, and justify every decision.
JP reached the first patient before me.
"Respirations thirty-six, weak radial pulse, cannot follow commands," he read. "Red."
"Open the airway first," Kitty said.
JP repositioned the mannequin's head.
The respiratory card changed from zero to twenty-eight.
"Still red," Anna said. "Immediate."
At the next station, NC found an open femoral wound with severe bleeding. I applied direct pressure while Jihye prepared the tourniquet.
"Time," Kitty called.
"Marked."
Across the room, NS directed his team without raising his voice.
June identified tension pneumothorax from absent breath sounds and tracheal deviation. TZ called for decompression. Bunny tagged a walking casualty green while Cherry reassessed the unconscious patient behind them.
They moved like people who trusted the next instruction.
We moved like people determined not to need one.
The final mannequin lay between both teams.
Its card described a young fighter found beside an arena cage after repeated head trauma. He opened his eyes to pain, spoke incomprehensible words, and withdrew one arm while the other remained still.
"Glasgow Coma Scale?" the instructor asked.
"Eight," June said.
"Seven," I answered at the same time.
NS looked at the card.
"Eyes two, verbal two, motor four. Eight."
"The left arm isn't withdrawing."
"The best motor response counts," June said.
"Correct," the instructor replied. "GCS eight. Prepare airway support and urgent transfer."
JP lay his red tag on the mannequin's chest.
"Nobody is allowed to make eye contact with me right now."
The instructor checked our treatment sheet.
"Why?"
"My friends have recently developed a hobby of imagining my intracranial pressure."
"Then give them fewer reasons."
The bell ended the exercise.
NS's team finished with one fewer error.
We lost because of my answer.
It should not have mattered.
It did.
When the instructor announced the score, I removed my gloves too quickly and struck the injured wrist against the table.
Pain entered like electricity.
NS saw my face change.
"Still two out of ten?" he asked.
Kitty looked at me from the supply station.
I hated that he knew what number she had asked beside the lake.
"Still none of your business."
"It becomes my business if you enter the cage unable to defend the side I'm striking."
"Concern looks strange on you."
"It isn't concern. I don't want VT explaining afterward that I beat an injured man."
"Then don't let him explain anything for you."
NS stepped closer.
"Submit the neurological report."
"Who told you?"
"Nobody. Your clearance status changed on the fighter portal."
"You monitor me now?"
"The card changes if an opponent becomes ineligible."
June approached from behind him.
"NS."
He ignored her.
"If you aren't cleared by the original physician, I won't accept a replacement assessment from VT."
"You don't choose my doctor."
"No. But I choose whether I enter the cage."
For one second, I heard the person who used to sit beside me in the VIP room, before every conversation became a contest.
Then KM's voice reached us from the laboratory door.
"If King Slayer withdraws, I'll fight twice."
His four Engineering friends laughed behind him.
KM looked at my brace, then at JP.
"One warm-up and one main event."
JP walked past me.
"You should worry about reaching your own fifth round."
KM noticed the number written across JP's wrist tape.
His eyes remained there a fraction too long.
"Four," he said. "That's optimistic."
JP covered the tape with his sleeve.
"It is my emergency contact number."
"Good. Tell them to sit close."
KM left before Mr. Kim arrived for afternoon training.
JP did not make another joke until we reached the gym.
Mr. Kim made JP spend an entire session losing.
NC pressed him into the fence.
He escaped.
I crowded him with the body shield.
He escaped late.
A heavier senior volunteer trapped his hips, landed controlled body strikes, and forced him to protect his head while Mr. Kim counted aloud.
"One. Two. Three. Move."
JP moved.
The senior caught him again.
"One. Two. Three. Move."
By the fifth drill, JP's legs had slowed.
By the seventh, his guard opened whenever he tried to circle.
By the ninth, he remained against the fence after the count reached three.
Mr. Kim stopped the drill.
"Why didn't you move?"
JP swallowed air.
"I was waiting for a dramatic opening."
"You were tired."
"That too."
"KM will recognize it before you do. Fatigue makes honest men out of fighters. It reveals every weakness pride concealed."
JP looked at the four boxes in his notebook.
"How tired will I be after three rounds?"
"More tired than you have ever been."
"And after four?"
Mr. Kim studied him.
"Why is four more important than winning?"
JP wiped his face with the bottom of his shirt.
"It isn't."
"Then stop training toward a number. Train toward the next correct decision."
JP nodded.
The drill resumed.
This time, Mr. Kim allowed the senior to increase pressure.
JP escaped the first trap.
He failed the second.
He escaped the third by dropping to one knee, turning beneath the senior's arm, and crawling away before standing again.
It looked ugly.
It worked.
He lifted one finger toward me.
"History remembers the moon landing."
"The moon landing didn't crawl under a body shield."
"You weren't there."
The laughter cost him enough breath to lose the next drill.
Still, he stood again.
JP's mother called while we were changing beside the equipment lockers.
He looked at the name and carried the phone toward the only wall without a sponsor camera.
His little sister answered instead.
Her face filled the screen from too close.
"Why is your eye purple?"
JP touched the bruise beneath it.
"Advanced medical education."
"Did a patient hit you?"
"The patient was a body shield. We had a disagreement."
His mother appeared behind her and took the phone.
"What happened to your face?"
"Sports practical. Controlled contact. Very safe."
I watched him turn slightly so the camera could not see the larger bruise along his ribs.
"You said this year would be calmer," his mother replied.
"It is calmer. Last year we touched dead bodies. This year, the bodies touch us back."
She did not laugh.
"Come home this Sunday. Your sister keeps asking when you will visit."
JP looked toward the training calendar on the wall.
The tournament conditioning session occupied the entire weekend.
"I have revision," he said. "After the assessment, I promise."
His little sister pushed beneath their mother's arm.
"What does four mean?"
JP looked at the tape around his wrist.
"Four exams."
"You only have four?"
"Please don't say only."
"Will you get first place?"
He smiled at her.
"I only need to stay until the fourth one."
His mother asked what he meant.
"Nothing. JP language."
He changed the subject before she could ask again. They discussed dinner, his sister's drawing competition, and the kitchen light that had begun flickering during the power rationing.
Before ending the call, his mother made him promise to sleep.
JP promised.
After the screen went dark, he remained beside the wall.
"You should tell them," I said.
"After the fight."
"That answer is becoming popular."
"My mother worries when I catch a cold. If I tell her I volunteered to be locked in a cage with KM, she will arrive with the police before Round One."
"That might be the smartest corner strategy available."
JP removed the tape marked 4 and folded it into his notebook instead of throwing it away.
"After the fight," he repeated.
The water distribution trucks failed to reach Campus 2 that evening.
Traffic workers had blocked the western road with idle buses, and the remaining purified-water drivers refused to cross their line. Students carried empty bottles from building to building while the dormitory administration limited every floor to two working taps.
The VT training center had no shortage.
Cold bottles filled an entire refrigerator beneath the sponsor logo.
Jihye photographed it.
"Don't post that yet," Anna said.
"Why?"
"Because the students outside will break the windows."
"Maybe they should."
JP opened one bottle, drank half, and stopped when he saw a maintenance worker watching from the corridor.
He handed the rest to him.
"I wasn't thirsty," JP said.
The worker looked at JP's soaked training shirt.
"Of course."
He accepted it anyway.
Near the opposite cage, June timed NS's rounds while Bunny and Cherry held the pads between combinations. TZ recorded each strike and recovery interval.
NS had completed five rounds without slowing.
JP had completed three minutes against a padded shield and nearly vomited into a bucket.
He watched NS drink from a fresh bottle.
"Do you think pride can improve cardiovascular endurance?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"That's unfortunate. I have an excellent supply."
Kitty entered the gym carrying my neurological form.
She did not hand it to me.
She gave it to Mr. Kim.
He read the description of the six missing seconds.
"Training ends for XH," he said.
Every conversation near us stopped.
"I am doing footwork," I replied.
"Training ends."
"The sponsor offered another assessment."
"VT is not replacing your physician."
"Then there may be no fight."
Mr. Kim folded the form.
"There may be no funeral either. I can live with one of those outcomes."
KM's crew laughed from outside the fence.
Heat climbed into my face.
NS removed his gloves.
"Enough," he said.
The laughter stopped.
KM leaned against the cage door.
"Defending him already?"
"I am defending the card," NS replied. "If XH is removed, none of you become King Slayer by default."
KM smiled.
"Still confident he'll make it?"
NS looked at me.
"He'll make it."
The answer did not sound like kindness.
It sounded like a claim.
I hated how much I needed it.
VT received the neurological report eleven minutes after Mr. Kim opened it.
The location data placed XH inside the training center. The physician's notes identified recurrent visual disturbance, missing time, emotional stress, bereavement, and incomplete neurological clearance.
The tournament medical director recommended removing him from the card.
VT read the recommendation once.
"Replace the medical director," he said.
PL stood across the office with her tablet held against her chest.
"That will attract attention."
"Then promote the replacement as an independent safety review."
"He experienced another episode."
"Six seconds."
"Six seconds is not nothing."
VT opened the projected revenue report. Ticket sales for KING VERSUS KING SLAYER accounted for seventy-two percent of the event's advance income.
"Nothing is whatever cannot survive accounting," he said.
PL looked at the signature field beneath the report.
"What do you want the new physician to conclude?"
VT returned to the training feed.
XH stood outside the cage while NS resumed pad work inside it. Between them, Kitty held the neurological form and June held the round timer.
"I want seventy-two hours of monitoring," VT said. "No recorded episode means conditional clearance."
"And if the monitor records one?"
"Then we will learn whether six seconds can be misplaced twice."
PL did not move.
VT faced her.
"You wanted a place inside my system. This is what the inside looks like."
He approved the alternative assessment.
At that exact moment, the eastern half of Campus 2 went dark in an unannounced ration cut.
The VT training center remained illuminated.