The second day of training was worse for Jericho. He trained with his group and this time he did not have to deal with any of the other groups. His brain fog was gone, at least for the most part, but now he felt the full effects of training for ten hours a day for two days straight. His body ached excessively, and every movement caused him to cringe.

After training, he sat in the room ready to heal himself when Zeta spoke.

“If you’re going to heal, then do it in the field house,” Zeta said. “I’ll kick your ass if you do it here. Trust me, that’s better than a guard doing it instead and taking their frustration out on you.”

Jericho thought about refusing but he changed his mind at the last second. His mind was primed and tapped into the visceral plane, but he pulled back and was now out the door.

“I’ll walk with you,” Zeta said.

“If you want,” he said. “I’m not even sure if I have enough energy to heal myself. I might be wasting my time going there.”

“If that’s the case, then we’ll do more stretches.”

“I’d rather lay on the hard ground,” he said. “It’s such a bullshit rule. Why can’t I just heal myself for a few seconds in the room? How the hell would I even use my healing powers to escape? It’s fucking useless.”

“It’s not a useless power,” she said.

“I don’t need your reassurance.” The words escaped from Jericho’s mouth like venom. “I know it’s not useless. Stop telling me what I already know.”

“I was only trying to be nice. Why are you such a dick?”

“What? Am I supposed to be happy being imprisoned? I’ve been beat up during my first two days, not to mention I made an embarrassment of myself by vomiting.”

“I get that, but you don’t have to take it out on me.”

“Aren’t you a hypocrite with how you act with Isaac?”

“Me and Isaac are cool with each other. He knows I’m not serious. You’re just being mean.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Jericho said. He knew what he said was wrong, but he did not take back his words.

“We’re in the same situation, asshole.”

Zeta stopped walking with Jericho and turned in the other direction. She did not bother to say goodbye and Jericho did the same.

He arrived at the field house, took one step inside past the entrance, and tried to heal himself. He attempted to reach the visceral plane again, but he was blocked this time. He was mentally unable to tap into his powers.

“Fuck!” He paced to his right and punched the wall, but even though the wall was padded, his fist was angled improperly. He pulled his hand back in and shook it violently to alleviate the pain. He then clenched his fist but recoiled immediately when his fingers burst with more pain. “Fuck!”

There were others around, but he did not care. He did not care about anyone. He hated it here and he was justified doing so. These people were not his friends. They were prisoners just like him, only here because they were kidnapped, only here because of circumstance.

“Hey! You mind shutting the fuck up?”

Jericho looked over and he noticed the tall boy from group C approaching him. He only assumed he was from group C since he did not recognize him from Bobbi’s group.

“What the fuck do you want?” Jericho said when the boy was within distance.

The boy punched Jericho in the face.

Jericho pushed him back instinctively.

“Kenny. Just leave him alone,” The other boy from group C said.

“No!” Kenny barked at the other boy. “We need to teach this kid a lesson, so he understands the rules. This behavior should have been corrected when Meacham knocked some sense into him.”

“Just leave it, man. He’s already going through enough. He’ll know soon. He’ll learn. Think about your first week here.”

“Why are you talking so much? Are you disobeying me, Roman?”

“No.”

“Punch him then.”

Roman advanced, his fist flew at Jericho without hesitation. Jericho caught the fist, allowed it to slide past, and retaliated with a strike of his own. The hit struck cleanly, but Jericho’s hand reversed backward, and his fist flew to his own face. He stumbled backward; his face burned from his own knuckles.

Kenny laughed while Roman rubbed his face indicating he was still hurt by the punch.

While Jericho was still down, Kenny threw another punch at him.

“M’s coming,” Roman said. “Knock it off.”

Kenny smirked at Jericho, and he flew backward back to his original spot across the gym. A second later Roman did the same and it was as if they never bothered to punch and strike him across the face.

Jericho felt his cheek. Kenny must have been the ping-pong guy that Isaac referred to, the one that deflected the four-hundred-pound tire back to Jericho from across the gym. He must have used his power just now to fly back. Even though Jericho hated the guy, he thought Kenny’s usage of his power was commendable. He was able to deflect objects but deflecting his own and another person’s body most likely took skill. No wonder he was here.

Jericho was also curious about Roman, but the person they were worried about finally entered the field house. It was Meacham, and Jericho turned away and did his best to avoid interaction. He stared at a wall as he did arm stretches. From the corner of his eye, he watched as Meacham passed by. He thought he was in the clear, but he noticed a head pivot from Meacham, then an entire body pivot. He swore under his breath.

“Are you utilizing your time well, or wasting it?” Meacham said with gum in his mouth. He chewed on the piece of gum with every word, and after he finished asking the question he continued to chew.

“I finished training already. I only came back here to practice my healing.”

Meacham nodded. “Practice. Uh-huh. I got it.”

“Oliver!” Kenny yelled from across the field house. “Are we training or what?”

“Shut it! I’m doing something!”

Kenny grimaced momentarily then went back to whatever he was doing. He looked as if he was unbothered by the dismissive shout. He bent over and his eyes pierced at Jericho. Meacham liked Kenny as a student, the first name basis indicated that. Jericho would have to follow Isaac’s advice and avoid this ass-kissing natural talent.

“Come with me,” Meacham said.

Jericho followed along. Anything was better than having to walk back to his roommate he told off. He cringed when he realized where he was going. He was back to the four tires. Meacham pointed to the one that almost killed Jericho.

“You will move it.”

This again? Jericho thought.

“What?” Meacham said. “Don’t think you can?”

“I can’t.”

“You see,” Meacham said as he transitioned further into the disappointed father character. “This is what’s wrong with young kids these days. They don’t try. They meet any minor inconvenience and suddenly they want to give up. Oh, I don’t want to fight in the war. Boohoo. Buddy, let me say. I’ve seen my fair share of war and it’s nothing compared to what you kids are going through.”

Jericho wanted to make a snide comment about how he probably had not been in war for decades and that war had changed in multitudes, but he felt an enthusiastic “For sure” was an appropriate response.

“Are you tired? How much more exercise and healing can you do?”

“I think I’m all tapped out,” Jericho said.

Meacham removed his hat then put it back on. “Tapped out? It’s only been two days. Are these the type of people they’re bringing to me to train? Your teacher is Watkins. I doubt he’s putting you through much. He’s too much of a pussy to get anything done.”

Hearing the word pussy from a man that was nearing his grandfather’s age made Jericho shiver. Impulses scratched at his back, and the uncomfortableness only increased.

Meacham continued to rant about Jericho’s teacher. “Watkins is an idiot. He probably doesn’t even care about you right now because of the last kid. He must be thinking why put in the effort? He doesn’t care about anything but a paycheck, but me, I like to see progress.”

Jericho watched as group C left the training area, most likely to go eat. Jericho’s stomach grumbled. Adding hunger to feeling like garbage only made his mental worse.

“Then, let’s get you to the point that you can. Let’s start by doing push-ups—“

“What?”

“—and I want you to do them until failure.”

Jericho obeyed and dropped to the floor. No amount of tiredness or desperation would prevent him from doing the push-ups. Getting his ass kicked again would only humiliate him further. He was in position, faced against the ground with his arms straight making a right angle with the floor. That was one. Then it was two.

“Two?” Meacham said. He paced across the field house then came back to Jericho. Jericho attempted another push-up, but he could barely bend his arms. “Come on. Not even three? Two? Is that it?”

“I trained today. I’m sore.”

“Heal yourself then.”

“I’m too tired to do that too. I might also have a mental block.”

“Mental block?” Meacham scoffed at the idea. “Just get over it. It’s so easy. Why are you complicating things? Come on, try healing yourself again.”

Jericho closed his eyes to focus but also to block out Meacham’s face. His thoughts were wandering, and he wondered if he simply needed to block everything else out from the world. The energy was there, Jericho could feel it, but it wormed away from his grasps like a faucet running water down his hands. He reached out again, this time with better luck, and the metaphorical water stuck to his hands cohesively as if he were made from the water itself. He motioned the water, feeling at its movements, the way it slid away, how it kept to his fingers. It took no distinct shape, but it held together, and he was sure he grasped it.

He opened his eyes and his vision adjusted to the light. The world around him was the same, but also anew. He reached for his shoulder, entered the visceral plane, and began to heal. He worked down from his shoulder, focusing primarily on the deltoids. He continued to his chest and stomach and finished with the other arm. For good measure, he did a quick heal over his lower body, and when he was finished, he felt the best he had been in days.

“That’s what I like to see,” Meacham said. “Let’s see some push-ups now.”

Jericho did seventy consecutive push-ups and only stopped to follow Isaac’s advice of slow, consistent growth.

“Heal yourself again,” Meacham said. Jericho did as instructed, and Meacham asked another question. “Have you been healing yourself during your training with Watkins?”

“Not really, no. I always focused on improving my powers through healing alone, and never thought about applying it to my exercise regime.”

“You’re shitting me, right? It’s such an obvious thing to do. I seriously can’t believe it took you this long to realize you should be healing as you strengthen your body. You didn’t even think about doing that before we took you in?”

“Oh, I’m joking,” Jericho said. “It’s just a joke. Only an idiot wouldn’t think about doing that.”

He was not joking. He healed himself from time to time, to alleviate some feelings of soreness, but never considered exercising his body until death, healing himself, then repeating the process.

“You got me good! Only a stupid fuck wouldn’t be able to think about that, right?” Meacham said as he transitioned the conversation. “From now on, I want you to continue this. Anytime you’re in this field house, whether it be a training day, after-hours, or on your rest days, I want you to train your healing. Not only do I want you to improve your physical body, but I want you to grow that power of yours. Oh, you should also toughen up your mind since it’s terrible.”

“Thank you,” Jericho said. The gratitude seemed appropriate, although he was still mad that he was punched.

“In no time, you should be ready to fight with Kenny. He’s been getting a bit too cocky lately and it’s been pissing me off. It’s not so easy out there in the real world and I want him to know that. I don’t know why but everyone raves about you as if you’re the next best thing. I’d like to see if that’s true. Keep it between us, but Kenny should be leaving soon. He’s practically ready to move up the ranks so he can work for us in the real world, but I’m thinking about keeping him here for a while longer.”

“How long has he been here?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Meacham said. “Tell you what, if you’re able to defeat Kenny when the time comes I’ll let you move up and get out of here. I’ll vouch for you. Otherwise, Kenny will take that spot as planned. Sound like a good idea?”

With a dry throat, Jericho said, “Yes.”

“Good. I’ll let you get back to staring at that wall while doing stretches.”

Jericho dropped to the floor and started doing push-ups again. His body moved up and down next to the four-hundred-pound tire. He eyed it fiercely between sets and when he was running low in his healing reserves. One thing consistently stayed on his mind while he moved on from push-ups to other exercises. He was determined to move the tire.