Chapter Text
The body can’t remember pain.
Dream had always thought that was bullshit, but it was the only reason he hadn’t tapped out when that left hook had caught him off guard. Lights popped in his vision but he kept himself upright.
He swung out, taped knuckles hitting satisfyingly against the side of his opponent’s head, snapping it to the side. He lunged forwards, jabbing out over and over, pushing him back against the ropes. He took a fist to the ribs but barely felt it, pushing the advantage.
He had him up against the ropes, got a good swing in at his eye, watched his opponent’s head snap back, braid fishtailing with the force of it. The opponent ducked down out of the way, getting a good swing at Dream as he did. He stumbled to the side but spun, watching the boxer retreat back a few steps.
Dream pushed on, swinging, catching fists to the side of his head, feeling sweat or maybe blood trickle down his face into his eyes, but before long had his enemy up against the ropes again, ready to get the knockout, ready to-
Techno held up both his taped hands in an ‘X’. Tapping out.
Dream had won.
He shook the sweat from his hair, wandered over to the edge of the ring and spat blood onto the ground. The warehouse was long-since abandoned, and would stay that way ‘til Friday.
Then Friday would come and there’d be all kinds of people, dozens of voices echoing around the space. Fistfulls of change, weeks wages on the line, bookies shouldering their way through the crowd to yell out numbers. Men tired from jostling for work at the docks or standing in breadlines. Men who’d lost everything in trenches in Europe.
Men in suits, watching from the back. He tried not to think about it.
He heard Techno wince from the other end of the ring. Dream looked up, still panting for breath. Techno looked awful. He almost felt bad about the black eye he’d given him, the one Techno was gingerly poking at.
“Broken?” he managed. Techno shook his head.
“I’ll live.”
Dream nodded, and rested his forehead against the ropes. Breathe in, breathe out. Ignore the ache in your side. The body can’t remember pain.
“That was good,” Techno said, still keeping his distance, still recovering on the ropes “You gotta remember to-”
“Feint, yeah, yeah,” Dream said. He’d heard it a thousand times before. Techno acted like he wasn’t familiar with the process of winning a fight. That wasn’t what they were supposed to be practicing, anyway.
“I was going to say keep your right guard up, but sure, that too,” he replied. “You drop it whenever you get ready to swing from that side.”
Dream nodded, pushing himself upright. He turned back to Techno, who gave a little snort. “You look awful.”
Dream scrunched up his nose. “Whose fault is that?”
“You’re the one who said not to pull my punches,” Techno shot back, but there wasn’t any heat to it. He dryly pointed to the black eye, and yeah, that was fair.
“You alright?” he asked. Dream stretched experimentally, felt around in his mouth for any new gaps. It hurt, every movement hurt like hell, but the body can’t remember pain, so he sucked it up. Nothing broken. He nodded.
“‘S a shame, really,” Techno said after a while, and started to unwrap his knuckles. Dream made a questioning noise.
“That you’ll be going down in the third round. The shape you’re in, you’d probably win.”
He made a non committal hum, stared vacantly at his wrapped knuckles.
Techno paused his unwrapping, and slowly looked up at him. “Dream.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re going down in the third round.”
“Sure,” he agreed easily, and met Techno’s gaze. “If he beats me.”
He remembered the look on Techno’s face when the suited men had walked up to them after that fight, all those months ago. The way they’d been ushered into a car that was bigger than the apartment he shared with five other people. The crippling fear they’d been caught by the law, then the crippling fear when they learned they hadn’t. The introduction to a man named Schlatt. The offer of a partnership. The roll of dollar bills for every fight he won.
The ache in his shattered fingers after the first fight he lost.
The body can’t remember pain.
He remembered the look on his face, last week, when they’d told Dream that when that Foolish fucker got in the ring with him, he had to go down in the third round.
“Don’t be stupid,” Techno said, his voice low and careful.
“They won’t hurt you,” Dream said, and started roughly unwrapping his knuckles, “you don’t have anything to do with it.”
“Dream.”
“I can’t tell you what my plan is,” he said, and did his best not to think of the train ticket to Nowheresville Illinois he had burning a hole in his wallet.
He’d sent George and Sapnap ahead, they said they’d found somewhere nobody’d come looking. He’d told Skeppy and Bad to find somewhere else to stay, he hadn’t heard from them in months other than a blank postcard from Vermont. It had made great kindling.
The apartment was empty, except for the rats, and Schaltt could do whatever he wanted to them.
That did leave Techno, but he’d manage. The old Jewish couple that ran the Deli liked him well enough. Maybe enough to pay him to haul boxes.
“Dream,” he said, and crossed the ring to put a still partly-wrapped hand on his shoulder. Dream turned to look at him. He put a hand over Techno’s, nodded once. I’ve got this, he thought, just trust me.
Techno’s mouth quirked up into a grim half-smile. “Make sure you keep your right guard up,” he said.
One more fight. One more bout of scraped knuckles and broken noses.
What did it matter? The body can’t remember pain.