by Tom Wood
Victor struck with the hard edge of his shin at the narrow point where the biker’s femur met the fibula, driving those bones inwards and apart, displacing the patella as multiple ligaments stretched until they snapped, one after the other. The leg folded into an L-shape and the biker screeched, hopping on his one good leg for a second before losing balance and falling, clutching in desperation at his ruined knee.
Victor was surrounded at this point. He had expected it but that didn’t make it any easier to leave his back exposed. But he didn’t hesitate. He kept attacking because he still had the initiative, the Nameless still reactive in their shock at the savage violence.
His next target had brought his hands up and was mobile on his feet, shuffling back and forth in a small area, both preparing for Victor’s attack and readying himself for one of his own once the initial shock at what he was witnessing had worn off.
Victor was on him long before that point could be reached, forcing the biker to throw a desperate punch.
The Nameless was a big guy, tall and wide, and he had fast hands, but he didn’t know how to use his size or his speed. He closed too much distance and telegraphed the punch by dropping his shoulder back too low, flaring his elbow too far, looping his fist too wide.
Victor had all the time in the world to step inside the biker’s reach, to hit him in the ribcage with a hooking punch below the left arm that came down in another defensive reaction, opening up his face to Victor’s follow-up palm strike.
Cartilage crushed and bone broke. Blood spattered the biker’s cheeks and flowed over mouth and chin. His nose was flattened.
He stayed standing, however, until Victor hit him under the jaw with an uppercut.
A necessary punch but one that cost Victor, who felt the sting of pain signifying damage to the knuckles of his right hand. Those bones were as hard, as dense, as anyone’s, but they couldn’t compete with the larger, stronger bone of the Nameless’s chin.
That biker sank down to a squat as his knees buckled. Then he collapsed backwards to join the other three on the asphalt. The guy with the L-shaped leg had passed out but the first of the Nameless to have gone down was still conscious in a foetal position, clutching his abdomen.
A quick stamp to the face knocked him out and scattered his teeth across the parking lot.
Four seconds. Four down.
The plan was working, but Victor was in uncharted territory. He had four enemies surrounding him on all sides. There was no way he could take any of them by surprise. They had four of their own crew still and silent on the asphalt to tell them everything they needed to know.
He had to pick the right one to attack first so his back was exposed to the least threat. A short man would be ideal because there was less chance of a punch to the brainstem than with a taller opponent. The problem was Victor couldn’t waste time rotating on the spot to make sure he went for the best target. Any second of time he burned gave the Nameless more opportunities to overwhelm him with their numbers.
He only had an instant to decide so he went for the greatest danger.
That wasn’t the biggest of the four, but the one who had adopted the most threatening fighting stance. That biker was balanced in a half squat, right foot back, torso tilted forward at the waist with his arms out wide. A grappling posture. He was going to bull-rush Victor and try and take him to the ground. Even if that attempt failed, there was a good chance the Nameless would have a handhold and that would be enough to restrict Victor’s mobility.
Against four, he couldn’t allow any such impairment.
With his arms out in front of him, the grappler came for Victor as Victor came for him, dipping to go for Victor’s centre of gravity. It was a hard move to counter because the target’s head was low and his chin a difficult target; with the head leading the body the rest of the guy was out of range.
So Victor adopted the same posture, coming forward with his own arms outstretched, his own head forward, denying the grappler the opportunity to get to his waist or his hips to wrap his arms around. But Victor – taller, faster – could reach his target first. Because the grappler was already low and his torso almost horizontal, Victor went lower, going for the biker’s closest knee.
He wrenched it out from under him.
The biker flipped backwards, his upper body whipping up and then down to follow the leg that Victor pulled closer.
The back of the guy’s head smacked hard on the ground and he went slack with his arms out perpendicular to his body.
Victor released the leg and shot back up to a fighting stance, clearing the guy prostrate on the asphalt because there were still three of the Nameless conscious and dangerous.
Two in front of him.
One behind—
Who punched Victor where the back of his neck met his skull.
The brainstem.
FORTY-SIX
Victor was used to pain. There wasn’t a lot that hadn’t been done to him. He had been stabbed, shot, burned, electrocuted. He had been strangled and knocked out. He had been tortured. He had suffered pain to the point of paralysing agony but he had learned to accept pain for its purpose: a message. A clear and inarguable communication that whatever was causing the message to be sent needed to stop. An instinctual insurance policy that traded temporary suffering in the hope of avoiding long-term consequences. Imperfect, because pain was not always proportionate to the potential consequences and because sometimes the message could not be heeded – the cause of the pain could not be stopped. Victor’s acceptance of pain could not override its unpleasantness but it enabled him to tolerate more of that suffering, to judge it on the consequences separate from the instinctual insurance policy.
The pain he felt in the back of his head was severe but not close to the worst he had endured. It was a dull, pulsing ache reminiscent of a migraine. No great will was required to ignore it, yet Victor knew the consequences were disproportionate to the suffering because those consequences were apparent straight away.
His vision blurred.
Sounds muted.
The ground seesawed beneath his feet.
He found himself stumbling forward with increasingly widening steps as he sought to fight the swaying and tilting parking lot.
He vomited.
One of the Nameless yelled something, although the words were thin and distant. He didn’t know if they were directed at him or the other two.
He glimpsed movement in the blur of colours and shapes before his eyes.
He tried to correct his footing, yet he couldn’t synchronise his feet. He tried to bring his arms up to protect his head but they were too heavy.
He knew he had been hit again because air rushed out of his mouth. He knew it was a punch to the ribcage because he folded to one side.
Victor swivelled in an attempt to see the attacker, to defend himself from the follow-up, but he lost his footing. He would have fallen had he not stumbled into another of the Nameless.
The one who had punched him in the brainstem, he guessed. He couldn’t know for sure, such was his disorientation.
The biker grabbed Victor from behind, wrapping a thick arm around his neck in an amateur chokehold. Amateur because he didn’t pull Victor’s head against his chest and didn’t brace the other arm against the back of Victor’s skull to increase the pressure, but effective nonetheless because the Nameless was strong and Victor too slow to counter the choke.
He felt the pressure in his skull from the trapped blood that couldn’t escape through pinched veins. He tried to turn into the choke to put the thick muscles of his neck in the way and gain their protection, but it was far too late for that. He should have done so immediately, the instant he felt the arm wrapping around him.
With the pressure in his skull came pain: an intense, pulsating sensation that made his eyes water. He knew his brain was being starved of oxygen, knew unconsciousness was coming in just moments. He was already weak.
‘You’re done,’ he heard the Nameless hiss
at him.
For a second, he believed it.
Until he realised he had heard the words, understood them clearly and recognised the tone and the implication.
The effects of the punch to the brainstem were diminishing.
He was weak from oxygen deprivation only.
Fight, he willed himself.
Victor threw elbows at the biker’s torso, but he had lost too much strength to make them effective and encourage his attacker to release him. Each strike further diminished his oxygen reserves and further weakened him.
The pain increased as the disorientation from the punch to the brainstem decreased.
But he had mere seconds remaining until he had no capacity to fight or even resist.
His left hand was closest to the biker’s torso, so it was that palm Victor pushed flat on his enemy’s ribs. Those fingers he used to find the bottom of the Nameless’s ribcage. Those fingertips he pushed against the soft flesh there protected by only a T-shirt, hooking them beneath the lowermost, floating rib that attaches only to the spine, not the sternum.
With the last of his strength, Victor wrenched back with his hand and tore that rib free.
The Nameless shrieked.
Victor dropped straight down to his knees as he was released from the chokehold, coughing and gasping, ropes of saliva and vomit hanging from his lips, his chin.
The biker with the detached rib was pale and clutching his side. His eyes were wide and desperate, every breath a hissing agony he couldn’t endure. He stumbled a few steps before collapsing to the ground with his back against the wheel of a parked truck. He shook and trembled.
‘WHAT ARE YOU DOING?’ Castel yelled at the two Nameless who were still capable of acting but were not. ‘It’s over. End him.’
They were hesitant because six of their guys had faced Victor already and five were unconscious and the one who was not sat shock-still, white, shaking, unable to speak, with a look of horror on his face that could not be rationalised.
But their enemy was on his knees and they were as scared of Castel as they were of Victor.
With a glance of encouragement between them, they approached. Neither straight on. One came from Victor’s left, the other from his right. They came, but neither rushed.
Victor blinked the moisture from his eyes, grateful for their trepidation, which gave him an extra second to re-saturate his blood with precious oxygen and his senses an extra second to reconfigure after the shock to the brainstem.
The one to his left was in range by the time Victor rose to one knee.
That Nameless swung a punch at Victor’s face, the arm angling downwards, aiming for Victor’s cheek with a quick hooking shot.
A knock-out blow if it landed.
Victor caught that punch in his right fist – ball in mitt – and squeezed hard enough to shift and creak bones throughout the attacking hand and for the biker to cry out before Victor wrenched the arm closer and used the edge of his left palm at the elbow to lock the limb and twist the Nameless off balance.
Holding the man immobile, Victor stood.
He broke the arm at the elbow, snapping off a chunk of the humerus as he forced the lower arm the wrong way against the joint.
The Nameless wailed.
Then Victor broke the arm at the shoulder too, rotating the limb backwards until the ball ran out of socket and the bone had no choice but to give way.
The Nameless wailed louder.
Victor released him and he fell forward, writhing and crying for a moment until the pain became too much and he went silent.
One biker left.
Who ran.
He rushed back to his chopper, almost knocking it over in his desperation to get on and speed out of the parking lot, leaving only Castel and Victor standing under the moonlight.
Castel didn’t back away. He didn’t try and run. Misplaced bravery, or pride maybe.
He said, ‘That was … unexpected.’
FORTY-SEVEN
Castel waited. He was frowning, confused and surprised by the events he had witnessed and blinking hard and fast as if he had somehow imagined it.
No doubt he was hoping he had.
Victor approached with slow steps, the dull waves of pain and disorientation emanating from the back of his skull threatening to trip him up every time he lifted one foot from the ground.
The Nameless he had kicked in the abdomen was whimpering and shivering on the cold asphalt as he regained consciousness. Victor had to step around him.
Castel waited.
He had time to flee like the eighth biker had done, yet he remained in place. He did not lead from the front, but he did not retreat either.
A leader.
‘I guess you’re going to make me suffer,’ Castel said as Victor stopped before him. ‘That’s okay. I can take pain. I’ve suffered before. But you can’t just replace me. You don’t know how to work the routes. You don’t have the charm for this. My buyers are loyal to me. They’ll wait. You might think you’re in charge, but I’ll heal. I’ll return. Good as new. Better. I’m not even human. I’m an idea. You can’t defeat an idea.’
‘I’m getting bored of repeating myself.’ Victor spat to rid his mouth of the taste of vomit. ‘Your business is the last thing I’m interested in.’
Castel, small eyes growing smaller, listened.
‘I’m only looking for Joshua and his mother.’
Castel’s eyes then widened. ‘For real?’
Victor nodded.
‘That’s not a play?’
Victor shook his head. ‘If you tell me where they are, I won’t hurt you. But if you don’t tell me, if you make me hurt you, then I won’t stop until you beg for death. Do you believe me?’
Castel glanced around the parking lot. ‘I believe you.’
‘Well?’
‘I don’t know where they are. I never knew. I only ever saw them one time when she was with Abe way back.’
‘Then why didn’t you tell me that before?’
Castel said, ‘Because I needed to know what you were really doing here. I didn’t believe you.’
‘Then I’ve maimed almost your entire crew for absolutely no reason.’
Castel’s mouth hung open for a moment until he said, ‘Sounds kinda dumb when you put it like that.’
‘Could McAllan have anything to do with Michelle’s and Joshua’s disappearance?’
‘Bobby’s a paper gangster. Even if he had cause to harm them, he hasn’t got the stomach for anything real. But he’s connected. He knows a lot of bad people.’
Victor considered this. ‘Did Abe ever say why they moved out here from Vancouver?’
Castel thought. ‘I don’t know. Maybe something about a husband. A real piece of work.’
‘Compared to Abe?’
Castel shrugged. He didn’t know anything further.
Victor gestured to the seven brutalised Nameless behind him. ‘When people ask—’
‘I’ll think of something,’ Castel said.
‘That’s what I wanted to hear.’
Castel asked, ‘Are you going to hurt me now?’
‘Do I need to?’
‘I’m sorry about what I said before on the phone, about the mom and her boy. I was angry you hurt my guy. It was wrong what I said. I shouldn’t have done that. My niece has learning disabilities. I love that little angel to death.’
‘Are you still angry with me?’
Castel was quick to shake his head.
‘Then I think we can call it quits.’
The bar entrance flew open. Big Pete came rushing out with his hockey stick held high and ready, reacting to the noise and the screams of mere moments beforehand. He looked at Castel and Victor and then at the many prostrate bikers scattered across his parking lot.
‘What the … ?’
‘They fell,’ Castel explained.
FORTY-EIGHT
Victor was glad to have an excuse to drive into town. He wanted to create a little sep
aration between himself and the Nameless before ambulances arrived and Linette’s colleagues became involved. Big Pete had been quick to call it in.
None of the bikers would say what had really happened. A combination of Castel’s promise and their own pride would see to that. Any humiliating story they told was better than the truth.
Big Pete was another matter, but as he had not actually witnessed the fight, there was little he could tell investigators.
Victor found Linette in a booth by the window. It was pretty much the worst seating option in the entire establishment – in full view of the street outside and anyone passing; near to the entrance and facing away from it – but Victor slid into the seat opposite without commenting on her poor choice.
Did anyone else think like this? he wondered.
Linette glanced up from her coffee. ‘That’s a pensive look if ever I’ve seen one.’
‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.’
‘You make it sound like that’s an uncommon occurrence.’
‘This time is different,’ he said. ‘This time I’m thinking about myself.’
She frowned, unsure, and didn’t press the issue. Instead, she reached for a laminated menu.
‘I suppose you don’t eat food like this,’ she said. ‘But that’s too bad for you. Luckily, I’m always hungry.’ She took a fistful of her midriff. ‘If you can call it luck.’
‘What kind of food do you think I eat?’
‘I don’t know. You’re all muscle and skin so I’m thinking protein shakes and kale. Maybe a slice of watermelon on special occasions.’
‘Hardly,’ Victor said, taking a menu himself in his left hand.
The right stung, now the pain in his head had diminished. He could still clench his fist and flex his fingers, so he knew nothing was broken. Swelling and bruises would come later.
She didn’t notice he used his left hand to give the right a rest and shot him an approving look. ‘You surprise me.’
‘I’m beginning to surprise myself too.’
