No More

The searing pain went through my head as it hit the bottom step. I knew what was coming, so I covered my head and tucked my body into a fetal position. My stepfather came closer. "Shouldn't have talked back you stupid girl." He rasped. I sat there, taking the beating, wondering if it would ever stop. He kicked and punched for what felt like forever. When he finally walked back towards the empty beer bottles, I made a vow to myself, I would never take another Bering from him again without fighting. I stay true to that promise to this very day, just not in the way I'd imagined.

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Beautiful, strong, determined, smart. All things you use to describe Elizabeth Marie Tate. Most people would think she had the perfect life. Not rich but not poor, an adoring parent, everything she could need or want.

Well, that's what it looked like from the outside. Inside, it wasn't all that great. Pretty house, but barely enough money to pay the bills, and all the money they had was because of Liz, a stepfather turned abusive when her mother died, and she only had what was necessary for her stepfather not to get discovered.

No one knows. She has no one to turn to, and things with her stepfather are getting worse. She can't tell the cops, because her stepfather has connections to gangs that could get her killed in a heartbeat.

What happens when she tries to learn how to fight back? She ventures out on a limb, goes to a street fight, and does the stupidest thing one can do. She confronts a fighter.

The best fighter to be exact. No one knows his real name but everyone knows he's lethal. Turns out, that 'he', is a she. Somehow Liz makes it out of their confrontation alive and with a new trainer.

She knows she will die if she doesn't defend herself, and she knows it's true, but the least she can do is go down with a fight.