The fight is a total thrashing. Eugene is a total expert in boxing, while Allen is just a knucklehead who's being mauled around like a punching bag. Whenever he covers his face, Eugene lands a body blow. And when he lowers his guard, his face gets three jabs and a strong right.

Still, Allen never fails to get back up whenever he's punched down, even if the surface of his face covered in blood is higher than the clean, and his bruises can't be counted on both hands. He's tried everything: kicks, fists, elbows, throwing random rubble from the ground, even a piece of rotten wood he used to hit Eugene, which broke on the first use against his arm without even making Zeus blink.

Basically, Eugene is playing around with Allen. Giving him the right distance to fumble attacks, and closing in when seeing an opening; waiting for him to get back up every time he goes down, even if there's no count to end the fight, and there's no rounds. Another final right from Eugene sends Allen tumbling into the ground and against a nearby wall, unconscious, finally, for the first time.

Some people from the ranch assist Allen to make sure he doesn't choke on his own blood. Eugene takes off his gloves assisted again by the guy who did his bandages, and addresses the other kids.

"The three of you claimed to be part of The Fist. That makes you accountable in the same way, and by the same rules you shall be judged."

One of the three starts crying, "We're not with you! YOU are the Fist!"

Eugene is quick to respond: "And yet when you attacked the Foster home, you wrote 'The Fist' in the façade."

"That doesn't mean we're with you!"

"Then it means you wanted to make us responsible for the attack?"

"It was just a prank!"

"A lame excuse for using that name to attack innocent people," I say, and even Eugene turns to me. "Untie one of these idiots for me. I want my just revenge for what they did to my friends and family."

"No," Zeus booms from his spot, making the whole room flinch, me included. "You will not partake in this punishment."

"Why not?! They attacked my family!"

"Because that's a direct order from me!" he shouts back, making the whole roof wobble. "And if you're one of us, you follow my rules. If you're not one of us, then you're one of them."

We'll see if that tongue is so eloquent when I tell him what I found. For now, I let him have this round. But then what I hadn't expected happens: there's a round two: Allen is back to his feet gasping for air.

"It's not over, Sunderland!"

"Oh, you want more," Eugene says calmly. "Ajax, you're on."

I see Allen's eyes morph into panic as Ajax walks past Eugene and into the makeshift arena. Ajax, who's always looking for a fight. It would be interesting to see what he has to bring.

"Are you sure about this, boss?" Ajax says, smiling one of Martin's devilish smiles. "This guy is as good as dead as he stands. And I wasn't planning on going easy on him."

"I trust you know how to control yourself enough," says the officer next to us, who hadn't spoken so far. "We need him beat up, but not necessarily dead."

"D... dead?!" one of the kids that beat up Newt asks stupidly, and I can see his pants going wet. "You can't kill us! This was all Rude's idea! It's his fault!"

"Shut up, Dennis, for fuck's sake," says the one I recognize as Harrison, the one whose finger I almost break.

"Come again?" I say, taking a step closer to Dennis. "You're trying to tell us that this was a plan concocted by someone who isn't even in Maple Heights?"

"It's true, Foster! He'll be back, and he'll have your head in a platter for this!" Harrison replies, somehow still defiant despite the dire situation he's in.

"Sorry to interrupt your threatening monologue, Harrison," says the booming voice of Eugene. "But I don't think you understand that Rude will be in Allen's shoes as soon as he sets foot on Maple Heights again."

Yeah, but this time by my hands.

"Can I start fighting this guy already?" Ajax complains, and both Eugene and I leave the arena.

"Just make sure you don't kill him, Ajax," Eugene says, crossing his arms. I have never seen anyone so muscular in my life this close up. It almost makes me want to shut the fuck up about the marijuana thing to not upset him.

Meanwhile, Ajax runs forward with open arms and lands a vicious flurry of punches on Allen's face, which he tries to block unsuccessfully. "Come on, Allen. I know you're better than this."

"Just have your fun and let me go already..." Allen says, defeated and letting his arms hang down to his sides.

Ajax lands a lightning quick kick to Allen's knee, making him stumble and fall forward, barely able to maintain himself on all fours. Then he stomps Allen's head with his working boot and grinds it against the dirty and bloody floor despite the howls of pain of his opponent. Ajax is nothing like the super correct and proper fighter Eugene is: he's a war machine. He grabs Allen's feet next, performing an ankle lock that resounds over the crying and screaming from Allen, who's not going to be able to walk on that leg for a while. Not satisfied with this, he also performs a knee bar, and this time the sound makes Dennis barf all over himself. The torture continues with a calf lock on the same leg, making sure it's not going to be functional in years to come.

"Ajax, that's enough," Eugene finally concedes a little bit of mercy on Allen, who otherwise would end up curled and broken all over like a noodle.

"Aww, man, just when I was starting to have fun..." he says, getting back up as ordered.

"We've done our part of the deal," Eugene says to the big officer, who nods and smiles.

"I don't know what you're talking about." The scrawny officer cuffs Allen unnecessarily and helps him to his only working foot, and the two of them drag him out of the factory leaving all of us to decide what's going to happen to the losers who attacked Newt and my house.

It's Eugene, of course who takes the lead.

"You have seen first-hand how The Fist deals with delinquents like the three of you. And since you mentioned that our good old friend Rudolph Riggs was involved, he's also accountable for this."

"You can't touch us, we're underage. If we go with our parents to the police—

"Harrison. The police was literally here with us watching the whole thing happen," Ralph says in almost a monotone. "And your father knows most of us. He knows exactly why he shouldn't meddle in our affairs."

"You may think you're top dog, but you're nothing but a little bitch," Harrison still says to me, baring his teeth.

Eugene stands in front of me. "You may have to tell that to the police, because the Foster and Newton family pressed charges and they can very well send you to prison. And I can make sure that happens. For even more years than you think."

"Prison? We're underage!"

"Juvenile prison until you're eighteen and then a regular prison with all the inmates you can imagine you may find there."

"You can't be serious."

"Oh, but I am, Mr. Harrison. Didn't the police stop you today on your way to school?"

"They did, but—

"But nothing. You reap what you sow."

"Wait, are they really going to jail?" I ask stupidly, unaware that this was an option.

"Most likely they will be on probation, but the next offense will not be kind on their souls."

"Especially because they'll probably not be underage anymore by that time and then they'll have to go through me, first," Ajax smiles.

Dennis starts crying. "I don't want to go to jail!"

"Then you should have known that attacking a fellow schoolmate and destroying property was not the way to go," Eugene explains patiently. "Remains to be seen if you had anything to do with the attack at Mr. Foster's father. If you had, you wouldn't even be considered for probation."

"That's easy to tell," I say, pulling out my phone and dialing Newt's phone number. The phone rings in Harrison's backpack. "He's been the one making the calls before something happened."

"I'm sorry about your phone, Mr. Newton," Eugene says, and Newt shakes his head smiling. "But that may be considered evidence now." Then he turns to the handcuffed kids. "I hope your parents know a good lawyer."

Saying that, the two officers enter the room again and take them away between Harrison's threats of killing us and Dennis' cries against going to jail. The third kid remains silent, as he has been since the beginning.

"How come I wasn't invited to this?" I ask Eugene.

"Well, you're supposed to be in Preston as we speak," he replies immediately. "Care to explain to me why's that not the case?"

"I told my parents they can't force me to go to school, and I'm hell-bent on proving my point."

"Wow, very mature."

"So not the point I'm trying to make," I say. "I want to be back to Maple Heights High where my friends are."

"Not a damn thing we can do about it if your parents decided against it, John," Eugene says to me patting my shoulder. "And trust me, it wasn't for lack of trying."

"My mother can be very stubborn when she gets to it."

"And I can understand her frustration about it. And yours, too," he says. Yet, I can't condone that you abandon school like this. "So you will be banned from going to the ranch if you don't go to school. And trust me on this, I have contacts in your current school."

"What?!"

"You heard me right. You can't use the ranch as an excuse to skip classes."

"To be fair with you, Mr. Sunderland, I don't know if I want to go to your ranch anymore," I say, going straight to the point that led me here in the first place.

"Oh? And why would that be?"