Castling (11 page)

*

Tilting to his left, Rook narrowly evaded the strike that punched a hole in the concrete wall he was slouching against. The structure groaned as Lancet’s knuckles drove through it, launching white detritus into the living room beyond.

Opponent off balance,
Rook casually reached up with his spare hand. As sinewy fingers lunged for Lancet’s windpipe, the older man was forced to retreat. Wrenching his arm free in a hail of plaster and pebbles, he hopped back a few feet.

Unwilling to let the interruption go unpunished, Rook pitched his glass across the kitchen.
Lancet managed to save his face a few dozen deep lacerations by dropping a shoulder and rolling from the glassware missile.

The
tumbler shattered, burst into a hundred shards as it collided with the fridge-freezer beyond.

“So we’ve started then!” Rook
scowled in mock irritation, rolling his shoulders before strolling in to engage the seasoned killer.

Lancet
stepped in too, bouncing his back leg off the floor so hard the wood splintered. His foot sped up, curling towards the younger man’s face. It halted eight inches from his chin, breezily slapped down by a well placed hand.

He
tried again, front leg snapping a roundhouse kick into Rook’s thigh, then higher into the ribs. The former was caught by a raised shin, the latter bounced from a lowered guard.

Amused, but unimpressed,
Lancet arched back out of range and spun on his right foot. His left heel whipped around with enough force to break a man’s neck. His opponent merely dipped his smirking head.

Landing, t
he gyros in Lancet’s shoulders were already cranking out a trio of repeating strikes.

The fi
rst was cut down, the ridge of Rook’s palm biting its forearm. The second missed its mark, with the younger combatant rolling his torso aside.

The fi
nal strike buckled as, incredibly, Rook struck it with the point of his elbow. Artificial struts in the framework of Lancet’s hand snapped.

Yelping,
he retracted the wounded limb. Clutching a broken hand, Lancet watched in impotent horror as Rook’s counter, thrown with an insulting apathy, flew forward.

A large fist hammered
Lancet’s solar plexus, rattling the organs within. The blow launched him through the air, across the kitchen and into the folding metal embrace of the standing refrigerator.

The
wizened old killer bounced off the dented fixture, spluttering, eyes wide.

“Orders of magnitude, Sean
” Rook reiterated, marching across the room.

D
ragged up by his shirt collar, Lancet launched a desperate defence, anxious to kill Rook’s momentum. He pushed hard into the arm that was lugging him to his feet, trapping the limb down. Simultaneously, he chopped for the exposed throat.

A hand snaked out,
catching the slice, crumpling the wrist. Lancet was forced to hurl himself into a cartwheel, preventing more prosthetic bone from breaking in Rook’s contorting lock.

Agility unmarred from months in a hole,
the aging fighter sprang. Landing fluidly, he kicked up into his opponent’s unprotected gut.

Contact!

Though Lancet’s roundhouse bounced off floating ribs, Rook’s long, bowed frame seemed no more stooped than usual. Lancet followed with a sweeping motion off his back leg, hoping to topple his opponent.

But Rook simply
stepped over the swiping heel, elbows crashing down.

Lancet
raised his guard, and hoped for the best. Shoulders bruised, they took the brunt of the blows. Another close elbow tore upwards. It forced the guard higher, lest his jaw shatter on its point.

Unseen,
Rook’s uppercutting knuckles bit into his liver, lifting Lancet bodily.

Jesus!

Wheezing, he caught a telltale twitch in Rook’s stance. Lancet instinctively ducked under the winding hook, a clenched fist harmlessly skimming his scalp. Breathing deep, he pressed the unexpected advantage, launching a hook of his own. It veered for the back of an overexposed skull.

But
Rook’s intolerable speed struck again. The lean black and red figure twisted, reversing an elbow back into Lancet’s haymaker.

Fractured f
ingers snapped further. Lancet bellowed.

Stepping back, he whipped out
a lazy jab, praying it might afford him some room to think, to manoeuvre, to breathe.

It did not.

Rook swatted the offending jab and stepped in to hoist his victim by the throat. Lifted aloft, Lancet felt a moment of weightless inertia.

Then he felt the kitchen countertop.

The hunched fighter had pivoted, slamming Lancet’s dangling body through the kitchen’s marble island fixture. It cracked under the plunging weight. Dark polished stone chipped. Cabinets of varnished wood split and tore. Dishwasher tablets, buckets and bin-liners rolled across the floor.

“Alright,”
Lancet wheezed through aching ribs, as Rook stood above him, waiting ominously. Dishevelled, pots clattered about him as he rolled onto his back. Touching a finger to his throat, he pushed a sub-dermal nodule,

“I may have underestimated the ease with which I’ll end you... You just wait for it, though...”

A faint buzzing filled the room.

“Wait for it...”

Rook suddenly reeled, tottering backward as a dose of ultrasonics sundered his equilibrium. Inner-ear greatly distressed, the swaying fighter soon doubled over. The contents of his stomach weren’t long in spilling.

Vomit
splashed against the hardwood floor as Lancet climbed to his feet, snatching up a sizeable chunk of smashed countertop. He waited politely for a gap in Rook’s retching before bouncing the marble slab off his face.

The clatter of metamorphic rock off his temple made
the larger man reel once again. This, in turn, made him vomit once again. Thoroughly entertained, Lancet’s chuckling voice rang out,

“
Honestly Rook, what did you expect? Did you really think I’d leave sole responsibility of safeguarding myself up to a man by the name of ‘Big Phil’?”

Another
focused burst of ultrasonics brought Rook, dizzy and nauseated, onto one knee. Another swinging hunk of dark rock crunched against his exposed back, prompting a splutter of bile and string of imaginative profanities from Rook’s lips.

“
Seriously! ‘
Big Phil
.’ And I was under the impression you had a
brain
in there...”

Eyebrow split, cheek a healthy puce and mouth
dribbling a cocktail of blood and vomit, Rook shrugged off the goading. Inclining his head, sweat running down his sharp features, he exuded the same cold, confidence.

So Lancet
broke his face.

The stone’s edge butted his
nose with an audible crunch. Rook fell. Slumped against adjacent drawers, nasal wheezing accompanied his every breath while rivulets of red gushed from his nose.

“Don’t fret,” Lancet teased, cocking his artificially powerful arms for a final swing
, “give me a minute and I’ll take a look for myself.”

The countertop swung
diagonally down. It was met halfway by the bony knuckles of Rook’s desperate swing. The marble crunched, knocked from Lancet’s hands. Spinning off, it hit the floor with a dull thud.

Irate,
Lancet attacked. Ultrasonics blaring, he backhanded his stubborn opponent in the teeth. Rook’s head turned, blood whipping across the walls. Leading with the knuckle of his middle finger, the follow-up strike thrust for the exposed mastoid.

But Ro
ok stopped the mid-knuckle, forearm catching forearm. Meanwhile, the bent fingers of his half-fist shot into Lancet’s squealing larynx.

This can’t be good...
the old killer thought as bent digits passed, unhindered, up under his chin.

With the satisfying
crack of smashed electronics, the debilitating ultrasound ceased.

Rook
recovered instantaneously. Spinning his torso, he kicked a heel out for his target’s face. Gagging at the damage to his windpipe, Lancet backpedalled as the boot scraped his cheek.

Clad in black
, shoulders rounded like a gorilla, Rook advanced, his amusement evident in the cold smirk hung on his face. Lancet battled to keep his composure. Outfought at every turn, Rook’s prodigious skill and unflappable confidence seemed unassailable.

Lancet
decided his sole recourse was to out-think his opponent.

Shouldn’t be too hard,
he surmised, just managing to hold off a barrage of roundhouse kicks to his thigh, ribs and neck,
I’ve got my party tricks. And the advantage of not having been clobbered in the brainpan thrice in the last sixty seconds!

Lancet
threw a jab.

It was caught.

He followed with an arcing fist.

The ridge of Rook’s hand cut
it down at the wrist.

Bouncing off the dead
ened arm, Rook’s chop sliced diagonally.

Lancet
lent back, pulling his neck clear.

Rook followed up with a straight cross.

Lancet
’s open palm parried it away as he countered with an uppercut.

It
found his opponent’s solar plexus.

Which was good.

It had n
o effect.

Which was bad.

He tried to follow
with a sneaky foot to the groin but Rook was quicker; his boot finding the underside of Lancet’s knee.

Jarred,
he landed awkwardly, unable to prevent Rook’s second foot from clouting the inside of his thigh. He wailed, tripping, his stance kicked wide. His attacker stepped in calmly, elbows swinging like hammers. Despite the numbness in both arms, the fractured fingers, the damaged wrist, Lancet covered his head, his guard fending off the pounding strikes.

It quickly became
clear his
outthinking
strategy needed some better ideas.

Like Divine Intervention.

Praying for the best rather than planning his attack, Lancet managed to snatch the back of the bigger man’s neck. He pulled with every ounce of his technologically enhanced strength.

Rook’s head
shot down. Lancet’s knee drove up. A broken nose bore the brunt.

Lancet
reckoned the resulting moan of displeasure was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard. Greedy, he repeated the tactic, driving his knee up and Rook’s head down.

The second attempt was
markedly less successful.

Rook plunged his elbow into the rising knee.

Lancet
screamed. 

His other
swept in and pounded the ribcage.

D
eflated, Lancet stopped screaming.

Straightening, Rook acquired
for himself two fistfuls of expensive Italian shirt and rammed his forehead unto the bridge of Lancet’s nose.

Even as tears welled in
his opponent’s eyes, Rook was winching him up. He shoved the dazed man bodily into the nearest supporting wall, half demolishing it with the effort.

“
Ok, I was wrong,” Lancet choked, braced against an unstable wall, held aloft by crushing arms, “there’s definitely a brain in there. Only it’s made of granite.”

Taking the bait, Rook smiled,
conceding “It’s a relatively common misco-AH!”

Lancet
had used the last of his strength to trap Rook’s right arm rigid. He then struck hard, below the elbow. The joint hyper-extended. Rook dropped his arms immediately, cradling the injured limb against his side.

Lancet finally
had a point to focus on, an injury to exploit. He just had to stay alive long enough to make with the exploiting.

Rook
made plain his disapproval by punting his target’s torso so hard, it converted the half demolished wall into a thoroughly demolished wall.

Lancet
landed amid a mound of debris, plaster and gristle. Winded, he rolled over a shoulder and onto his back. Rook was advancing again. He had expected to see fury in the man’s face. Irritation at the very least.

But Rook’s grin had grown wider.

He’s actually thriving on this.

Cool terror
trickled down Lancet’s spine. He’d fought worse. Surely, there had been stronger, deadlier, crueller foes over the years. But their rage had ever given him the edge.

Rook was smart, skilled and smiling.
Lancet had no idea what to do with that last one...

“So, how much are they offering for me, these days?” He stalled, retreating into a deep stance, “Just out of professional curio-ah“