Counterpunch

by Aleksandr Voinov

  “Curtis, take him to the cage,” Les said.

  Not being allowed anywhere near the media had its advantages. Brooklyn assumed people were going crazy over the fight, but none of that reached him, locked away in the gym for those four and a half months. And every now and then, nights spent in the cage.

  They didn’t beat him anymore, not while he was training, but still he took what happened there deep into his heart. A constant supply of murderous hatred against Curtis, who fucked him with the tonfa—and then pushed a metal frame into his mouth, keeping his teeth apart to fuck his throat with his dick.

  Curtis, the coward, didn’t give him any chance to lash out, didn’t even allow him the choice to bite—and get punished for that. The first time had broken him. But the second time put him back together. And after that, Curtis couldn’t touch him. The worst had happened. Now casual brutality was just icing on the cake.

  He’d go out there and throw the fight. Thorne at least wouldn’t rape him or sell his arse anymore. Even if that meant being the whipping boy, even if that meant using all his strength to keep Thorne fit. Rose had been too proud, but Rose wasn’t a slave.

  He missed the Cubans, but he knew he was on his own. All he had to do now was face the freeman world champion and play tomato can.

  Cash touched him on the shoulder.

  Brooklyn nodded and stepped off the exercise bike, stretched out, and tapped his gloves together. “Let’s go.”

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Like a man about to get hit a lot.” Brooklyn huffed.

  Cash laughed. “Man, good to see some of the old Brook again.” He patted his arm, but Brooklyn didn’t comment. He wasn’t sure himself what the “old Brook” was. Or who.

  He stepped into the hall and the flashing lights, blinked against the cheering people waving Union and St. George’s flags—worse than a royal wedding. People screamed and shouted, and he made out the occasional word. His name.

  Near the ring, twenty or thirty women and a few men shouted, “Free Brooklyn Marshall,” at the top of their lungs, repeating the slogan over and over. He was glad Cash was guiding him. He was blind with tears. Hardly the entrance of the bad boy, the killer, and he bit his lips to guard his face. Something about crowds scared him, yet still transferred so much energy on him he felt like he was about to burst. Like he couldn’t possibly contain it all.

  He focused on his fight song—“One on One”—and kissed his gloves, briefly, a gesture for those in the hall that supported him, despite everything they’d read or thought they knew about him.

  He climbed into the ring, and Cash, poor old Cash, who struggled so hard with his bad hip to follow him inside, took his robe off. Les was already in his corner, alongside various hangers-on. Brooklyn ignored them.

  Then a big electric guitar riff ripped through the hall, and Dragan Thorne’s trademark air sirens howled. The part of the audience that had been booing Brooklyn now jumped to their feet and cheered their hero. The sirens blared out, and a thick rapper voice sang, “Fight like a man, or die like a slave.”

  Brooklyn listened to the first verse—while the music was always the same, Thorne actually paid that rapper to write new lyrics for every one of his fights.

  In its own way, a stroke of genius. Like being dissed by the entire hall while Thorne marched into the ring, now even larger than life.

  When the robe came off, Brook stared at a mass of glistening muscle. Three inches taller than him, Thorne had weighed in at just fifteen pounds heavier—the man was cut to the basics, which was always an impressive display.

  Unlike Odysseus, he wasn’t a man Brooklyn’d like to go to the pub with, at least not this version of him. In the hotel, he’d been likeable and relaxed, but out here, he radiated a presence, and while it appeared menacing to Brooklyn, he could at the same time see how it must look to men who didn’t have to go mano a mano with him. Reassuring. Solid as a tank.

  For a moment, Brooklyn doubted he could do it. He had a visceral reaction to the idea of hitting another man outside sparring. While demolishing Thorne would be like taking down a concrete pillar with his bare hands, he couldn’t shake the image of Odysseus lying on the ground, something dark running out of his ear. He didn’t want to hit a man that hard again.

  But he wasn’t really here to win.

  Take just one fall in your career. I know it’s not easy, but you can make it look good. Hell, we can go the full twelve rounds if you want to, but you need to go down.

  And that suited him just fine. This way, he didn’t risk killing anybody but himself in this fight.

  At the sound of the bell, Brooklyn let Les push the gum shield between his teeth, tapped his gloves together, and began to circle Thorne.

  He took a leaf out of Odysseus’s book. He had replayed their fight a million times in his head, and the grisly conclusion twice as many times. By nature, he was more the attacking type, but if he wanted to last against Thorne, he’d have to keep his strength together, be more tactical than he’d ever been.

  He kept his guard up, and the first round saw very little in terms of punches. A few jabs, as if they both still had to find their distance, and Thorne changed his stance a few times, as if trying to work out whether to take Brooklyn on as a southpaw fighting southpaw or as an orthodox fighter. For all his brutal looks, Thorne had a keen tactical mind. Flexible too. There were plenty of boxers who did one thing well and kept doing it over and over, whether it yielded results or not.

  Dragan Thorne wasn’t one of them.

  The round ended with Thorne getting in two good hits to Brooklyn’s shoulder, but he danced away gingerly when the bell sounded. A rare moment of grace for the big guy.

  Brooklyn sat down in the corner, spat out the gum shield, and took a sip of water. Les didn’t talk to him, didn’t give him any kind of advice. To his coach, he was just a body. Just meat. A slave of no consequence. Despite the title, despite the fact he’d made it this far.

  Fuck him.

  Brooklyn glared at Les. “Went to the bookies and bet on fucking Thorne, didn’t you?”

  Les shoved the gum shield so hard between his teeth that it slipped past and almost into his throat. “Fuck you, Brook.”

  Shit if that didn’t make him want to win. Clearly, Les didn’t give a toss whether he left the ring at all. The hate and bitterness sat so deeply between them now, he couldn’t begin to imagine he’d not only liked Les at some point, but also wanted desperately to fuck him. Be fucked, even. Looking into his trainer’s contemptuous face, he knew he’d rather get fucked again by Curtis. Or his tonfa.

  He jumped to his feet so fast his shoulder connected solidly with Les’s, almost spinning him around. Take that, wanker.

  Round two, and he was changing tack. So did Thorne. Less guarded, more offensive, they both got a number of excellent shots in. They hurt. Thorne was massively strong, committing that power into a combination that left Brooklyn breathless and hurting in the corner. Hard to remember to break out of that by going lower in the knees, like ducking under a tornado. But he broke free and made it through the round, even though his ribs and sides were on fire.

  But it didn’t hurt enough to give up.

  Take just one fall in your career.

  He owed it to himself and his pride—how far he’d come—to at least pretend he’d put up a fight. This was nothing. Thorne wore his opponents down before knocking them out, and Brooklyn wasn’t nearly there yet. In his long career of pain, this wasn’t the worst beating he’d got by far. Odysseus had given him much worse. His legs were still there, for one. A little pain only spurred him on.

  And fuck Thorne, too.

  Round three, and Thorne turned into something from a horror movie. There was just no escaping, no respite—the hulking bastard kept coming, kept punching, almost chased him round the ring. Not a moment of rest. He was already pressing for the coup de grâce and looked intent on delivering it soon.

  Sweat streamed from them both, spraying every ti
me a glove thudded into naked flesh. It was pure instinct that landed the hook to Thorne’s temple just as the man was lashing out again. Perfectly timed counterattack.

  Brooklyn managed to get a few gulping breaths in when Thorne relented and staggered backwards with a look of surprise on his face.

  The bell bought them both more time. Brooklyn hurt in too many places to count, but he’d be damned if he showed any of it. He gulped down the water, caught a movement to the side of him, outside the ring.

  Nathaniel.

  Nathaniel Bishop-Edwards.

  Looking pale and worried and like he might be sick.

  He fucked you. He used you. He owns you.

  Of course, as your owner, he has a subscription, dumbarse. Likely comes with the deal Cash worked out—six first-row tickets for the “management.”

  Nathaniel met his gaze, and he looked like he was about to jump to his feet and try to reach him, agitated like Brooklyn had never seen him before.

  The bell. He took the gum shield and stood, his body aching all over.

  Thorne approached like an invading army.

  Of course, Thorne knew he’d go down. That was the deal. It was easy to muster a confident swagger if your main concern was looking good on camera.

  Brooklyn stood his ground, more defiance than real fighting spirit, but things got ugly when Thorne hit him hard in the face. He staggered back, and only the ropes held him upright.

  The ref was between them immediately, and Brooklyn wondered, dazed, what kind of courage it took to slide between two heavyweights when you were a guy older than sixty, all of five foot five and potbellied. And then to push them apart with all the confidence of Moses parting the Red Sea.

  Thorne snarled at him through the gum shield, flashing red plastic that looked like a mouthful of blood and mirrored the red blooming from his split eyebrow. It was a small cut at the outer edge of the bone ridge over the left eye, but of course it bled like a motherfucker, streaming down Thorne’s sweating face.

  Brooklyn couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen Thorne bleed, but the picture shocked him. Thorne looked genuinely angry now, blue eyes flashing at him.

  No help. No respite. The fight resumed, and Brooklyn practically walked into two terrible punches that almost sent him down again. Jesus fuck, Thorne was strong. Brooklyn felt the strength drain from him, but most importantly, from his legs. Everything was in his legs. The ability to punch hard, the ability to take punches. He felt like one of those weird Japanese fighting game characters whose “life” bar at the top of the screen depleted with every hit they took.

  Flashing lights, up and down seemed to want to switch around, and through the confusion, it was terribly difficult to remember why he was here, and why he kept walking into more pain. It didn’t really seem worth it, especially as he’d promised to go down, anyway. Surely it was time now?

  The bell saved him again. He found his corner, hurt and confused, closed his eyes and let them touch him and give him water. All he did was breathe, trying to find his strength somehow. But he felt like he’d been run over by a truck. Already. What round was this?

  “Well, this won’t be a Thrilla in Manila,” Cash said. “He won’t last much longer.”

  “Yeah, it’s gonna be over next round,” Les said. “He’s shaken Thorne’s confidence, that’s all.”

  “Want to throw in the towel?” Cash asked. “We can probably get a rematch.”

  Les made a noncommittal sound. “Might be a good way out for Brook. People are going to write that Odysseus broke his heart. I think they’re right.” Then, louder, with a punch against Brooklyn’s biceps, “Get up and fight, Brook!”

  Brook stood at the bell. God, his legs were weak. Thorne was a lot stronger than him. Round six. Halfway there. But halfway where? He had no clue.

  Thorne was relentless. He kept pushing, and Brooklyn knew a couple more good hits would finish him.

  Then don’t get hit, Santos would say.

  Brooklyn smiled at the memory and almost unconsciously ducked under a cross that seemed powerful enough to break his jaw, had it connected.

  He went down low and punched Thorne in the liver with everything he had left, once, twice.

  The crowd roared, as if it had been waiting for him to attack.

  Thorne, enraged, came at him again, slapping his guard away with yet another blistering cross to open him up for the knockout. Not unlike how Rose had fought, and Brooklyn’s muscles remembered the best response. Uppercut to the wide-open jaw.

  Thorne went down, rolling eyes and all.

  Brooklyn stood, stunned, stepped back while Thorne struggled to get up again. The ref began counting. God, was this really happening?

  Seeing Thorne’s uncoordinated scrabbling gave him something like satisfaction, tempered with the sense that that could have been him. He could be down, being counted. Last round, he’d been so very close to this. And suddenly the pride was back. He didn’t have to throw the fight.

  Every man has a price.

  I don’t, Brooklyn thought. You can’t buy me. You can’t break my heart. He glanced over at Les, who looked flabbergasted, and Cash, who, despite his bad hip, was beginning the oddest, most touching little victory dance Brooklyn had ever seen.

  Even if this meant Thorne wouldn’t buy him, even if the rest of his life was in ruins, even if he now truly was a slave and headed for nothing more than being used up like a fucking racehorse, even if everybody hated him but Cash and a few thousand strangers out there in the hall, this was the one thing nobody could take from him.

  This was his fight, his victory. He’d be the slave who made Thorne bleed and knocked him flat on his arse in round six.

  The ref raised his hands and then took Brooklyn’s. Brooklyn glanced back at Thorne’s trainer and crew who rushed to his aid, and he was glad that Thorne battled to get back on his feet, eyes glazed, but then the roar from the crowd washed everything else away.

  His legs were shaking, he had to be grinning like a fool as he turned in the ring, arms raised. Somebody’d had the dramatic sense to drape a British flag over his shoulders.

  The chorus started small, in one corner—those thirty or so women and a couple guys—but it rapidly propagated across the hall. “Free Brooklyn Marshall! Free Brooklyn Marshall!”

  Brooklyn hoped they thought it was sweat running down his face.

  Cash saved him, helping him out of the gloves and into the robe and getting him past the ropes, where a crush of people waited to slap his shoulder and embrace him. He didn’t know most of them, but just the respect and adoration from those strangers lifted him up and made him float.

  He eventually managed to get back to the changing rooms, where he sat, suddenly boneless, unable to lift his arms.

  Cash took his hands and unwound the bandages, saying absolutely nothing. After the roar from the crowd, the cavernous and Spartan changing room was solace. “Want some music?”

  “No, I’m just thinking.”

  “Thinking what?” Cash gathered the bandages, moved them from one big hand to the other and finally put them down.

  “Thorne wanted me to throw the fight.”

  “Really? Wow.” Cash stared at him. “And you didn’t?”

  “No. Seems I didn’t.” Brooklyn gave a small laugh. Hell knew where that had come from. Hysteria? Exhaustion. “He was going to buy me, make sure I was taken care of. Now he won’t. I’m fucked.”

  Cash patted his shoulder. “There are other buyers, Brook. Don’t you worry. You’re big news now. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

  Brooklyn glanced up and saw nothing but understanding in Cash’s eyes. “They’ll still do it. Maybe not today. But they will.”

  “I can try and help convince people . . .” But Cash looked dubious himself. “Ah, damn, Brook. Why do you always get the short end of the stick?” Clumsily, Cash leaned down and embraced him.

  “It’s okay. I have to shower.” And damn if his legs weren’t shaking on the way. When he’d
finished and got dressed, he came back out, sore hands shoved into the depths of his hoodie. The doctor was already waiting to give him a quick checkup, all business as usual, and told him, “You’ll live,” before packing his stuff and rushing out. He held the door open for Cash who just entered, pushing his mobile back into his pocket, looking a bit grey. “Seems you have an appointment.”

  Brooklyn groaned. “Seriously? I don’t think I can—”

  “Not like that.” Cash waited for him to gather up his bag, and outside, two big guards waited to escort them farther down into the bowels of the building, where a big car was waiting in the car park.

  A Jag. Brooklyn climbed into the backseat and was relieved when Cash joined him. Plenty of space for the guards, one of which was the driver.

  Yet another expensive hotel, but this time, Cash signed him in at reception and handed him a key. “Looks like you’re supposed to relax. Porn channel included. Knock yourself out.”

  Brooklyn huffed. “I just want to sleep.”

  “Then sleep.” Cash was about to turn away.

  “Cash?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Home? You know, I appreciate the offer, but me and the wife are back together and . . .”

  Brooklyn laughed. “No. I mean. Guards? Overseer? All this, you know, slave thing?”

  “Just don’t run away this time, okay?”

  Okay? What the hell?

  “It’s not like you could go anywhere without a thousand fans wanting you to sign their boobs.” Cash grinned. “Have a rest. Or, hang on.” He reached into his suit jacket and handed him a card. “Call me when you need me, okay?”

  Strangely, that didn’t trigger any flight reflexes. Cash trusted him to go up to his room and sleep. Maybe that was his reward, before they dragged him back to the gym tomorrow morning, to, no doubt, get his arse kicked—again.

  “Okay, thanks.”

  Very strange to go up to a hotel room without anybody waiting for him. It was a two-bedroom suite, and Brooklyn did nothing for a few minutes but take in the brown-and-cream interior. Nothing he could ever have afforded when he’d still been free and employed and had wanted only to have a regular life, unlike what his parents had had.