“You made your point perfectly clear. Nothing has changed.”

“Do you require time to prepare?”

But Jason was already in the cold place, the killing place. He raised his hands, and watched X circle, looking for the feint, the feint within the feint. Hands. Feet. The flick of an eye. Sometimes the feints were words designed to distract or disarm. It was a favorite strategy.

Unsettle the mind; destroy the balance.

Destroy the balance; obliterate the man.

But Jason was prepared for that, his shadow on the wall as they circled, X’s feet a whisper on the stone, his hands up as Jason made the first move, a flurry of blows and kicks, a feint of his own before drawing first blood with a jab so fast and sharp it split skin like the rind of a melon.

X showed no sign of pain or surprise, the only change a single blink as blood dripped into an eye. “I understand your father came to visit you. Strange that he never did so before.”

Jason said nothing.

Circling.

“Has he changed, do you suppose? Or does he sense some change in you, some reason for hope where none existed when last you were here?”

“Are we fighting or talking?”

“In the past, we’ve done both.”

X’s words were like a shrug, but what followed was the most perfect display of controlled violence that Jason had ever seen, an explosion of movement and contact that left him staggered and stunned. X drew blood twice, then backed away, looking displeased.

“Again,” he said; and came for Jason with the same relentless speed. This time Jason did better, blocking a string of blows before landing four good jabs and a punch to the ribs brutal enough to drop most any man alive. X just grunted, and came again, hard strikes to the face, a kick that numbed Jason’s leg from the hip down. He took a single step, and the leg folded.

“Enough!” X turned away, angry. “Did I imagine the man you were two months ago? Have I misremembered, somehow?” Jason spit blood, and X looked down his nose. “This is pitiful. Stand up.”

Jason straightened slowly, but X came fast, knocking him down twice more, then spitting once, and showing his back to underscore the contempt. After that, his attacks were clinical, strategic, perfectly executed. But the more strikes he landed, the more frustrated he became, lashing out harder and faster until he’d backed Jason into a corner, words grating from his throat with every blow.

Never … been … so … disappointed …

But Jason was in the corner for a reason, absorbing the blows until X hit him a final time, still flush with disgust. “Stand up, for God’s sake.”