She hadn’t left him. Whirling, jabbing her Sai, leaping and kicking, she was a lethal whirlwind of blows and strikes and death. Inches from his prone body she did what had to be done. That’s what she always did. He rolled over from his back onto his side, curled his body inward and ripped off his right boot. One glance at the red stain blossoming out across the fabric of his sock from the big toe of his foot told him that it was all over. The nail had been bitten through. He watched the blood spread, detachedly noting to himself how like a poppy it looked with his toe at the centre of the blood flower. Why is she still here? Glancing across at his left hand, he noticed that an injury he’d taken there was bleeding freely also. Trying to stand, he braced himself with the palm of his right hand pressed into the mud and blood, but found that his legs weren’t listening and crumpled back to the ground. He tried twice more to stand before she kneed him in the shoulder, knocking him back to a curled position.
