The chamber shook with the weight of the fight, every blow Lin traded with the clone echoing off the steel and stone walls like thunder. Dust rained from the ceiling, tiny pebbles scattering across the cracked floor as the monstrous imitation of him lunged forward, its movements jerky, but frighteningly fast.
The clone's face — a twisted mirror of Lin's — contorted with something caught between rage and despair. Its eyes glowed faintly in the gloom, feral and wrong, yet every so often a flicker of recognition would cross its features, as if the thing remembered who it was supposed to be.
Lin's breathing was ragged, sweat dripping into his eyes. His ribs burned where the clone's fist had connected earlier, and his left arm ached from blocking one of its heavy strikes. Still, he refused to back down.
