Chapter 18

“I know I suggested the idea but I even think this is a crazy.”

“I have to agree with her.”

I also thought it was out there but given the timeframe there wasn’t much room for another one. The longer this went the worst it could get. The plan was simple in a complicated way. We knew where everyone was so Jessica convinced us the best way to get Jason out was to draw him out using her as the bait. Jason was big on challenges, Jessica felt he would challenge me. It sounded crazy but it fell into the going after the head of the snake and hope it’s enough to stop them all idea.

“I am open for any suggestions.” I replied back to them.

“I said it was crazy, but I didn’t say I wasn’t going through with it. Plus chances are we’re going to be winging it.”

“Ain’t that the truth.”

I opened the assistant principal door for Jessica to go in. “We’ll come in and get you once we’re done.”

“If all goes well.”

“Thanks Jace.”

Jessica put her arms around my neck kissing me gently on the cheek. “Be careful.”

I gave her a small reassuring smile closing the door and locking it from the outside.

“You think she will be safe in there?” Jace asked

“No one’s there so hopefully.”

“You ready? Not that it matters…”

“No time like the present. Let’s go do this.”

We moved, we didn’t have to run and we took the time to get there preparing ourselves mentally. There was an eerie silence in the school, like a storm was approaching and we were given a dose of bliss before it hit. I continued to steady my nervous but the closer we got to the gym the more I was able to make out two figures standing waiting for our approach. One small figure and something short of a building.

“Well this is interesting.”

We made our way around and looked at Charli and the big guy we saw earlier at the east wing commanding everyone.

“Well I must say, I am not surprised to see you here.” Charli said. “I honestly don’t see what she sees in you.”

The big guy leaned over and whispered in her ear. Given under any other circumstance she was an attractive woman but far much older than I was and her attitude was a big turn off. It was either my face or the joke the big guy told her because she was laughing.

“I wouldn’t have made the effort to come out and warn you, but it worked in our favor.”

“You guys haven’t succeeded yet by my account.” I replied back.

It was evident based on the expression of her face she didn’t like the answer. “It’s only a matter of time, so why don’t you kids tell me where she is and I promise, you won’t die by my buddy here.”

“I don’t know if you noticed but there isn’t that many of you left. Now if you tell me where Jason is I rather just deal with the leader and challenge him straight on.”

“Just because you beat up a few lackeys,” She looked over at the big guy, “Huge waste of time and money if you ask me. Don’t think you stand a chance against us.”

The big guy nodded.

Charli continued, “It’s unfortunate though, the boss would have enjoyed toying with this one, but I guess the honor gets to go to us. Tiny get ready.”

Tiny? That was an understatement. He started pounding his fist together.

“Something tells me they are challenging us to a fight. Go figure the plan kind of worked,” Jace said. It surely appeared that way. They had us, there was nothing more for them to do except take us out but here they were, dropping their guns as they got ready.

I was tired, we didn’t fight a lot but the emotional stress behind this whole thing was taking its toll on me, but there weren’t many of them left. Everyone I cared about was in that gym, Jessica was in danger and these two were standing in my way.

Jace didn’t need to acknowledge my stance on the situation. “Nothing like going after Ego’s” I confirmed. “Which do you want?”

“I honestly don’t know how I feel about hitting a girl.”

“I’m sure she doesn’t have any reserve feelings on hitting us.” They were doing light stretches. Tiny swung his shoulders and Charli loosened her legs. “Keep it tight, look for openings, it looks like two different fighting styles and they’re fresh.”

“It’s cute watching you strategize against us but we have somewhere to be so please whenever you’re ready.”

We both fell into ready position. This was going to be a different fight it was evident they were no strangers to combat compared to the others we have fought. I controlled my breathing and took everything in…alright this was going to happen. Jace shot forward first and I was right behind him. They didn’t wait for us, they closed the other half and we all met in the middle. They were fast, Tiny totally surprised me. The idea was to take him out first but the planned quickly changed, man he fast for his size and it felt like I was hitting a rock. I slipped through a couple of attacks and saw an opening but a foot found my hip from behind. It was a good solid kick and I felt every part of her leg. I sucked in my elbow catching her and rolled into it. She fell with me but we both were up, she jumped at me with a barrage of kicks. She was fast and strong in her own right, I was blocking frantically trying to keep myself from getting hit. Given any other time I would have admired her technique but I was too busy trying to stop her from hitting me. She drew me in with a number of fakes connecting with others. I took another hit to grab her leg. I went to elbow it but she was able to quickly counter rolling away.

I quickly glanced at Jace and he was holding his own but I knew I needed to hurry and get over there. I turned back to Charli and she was on the offensive again. She was in the air I barely had enough time to get under her leg. At the same time Tiny was lunging at me. My position left me exposed, I don’t know how I did it but I popped up in the air kicking Tiny as he flew past me.

“That was my bad, I got him.” Jace said hot on his heels.

Charli was back on me, her leg meeting my shin. The pain on her face appeared as it met. I knew it hurt her because I was feeling it too. Jace and Tiny were close and the fight crossed between the four of us. It was really something, it was as if we were in tangents with each other, we ended up switching off multiple times between each other. Every time I thought there was an opening it was closed by the other person. I blocked an incoming punch aimed at Jace as he countered and Charli did the same for Tiny, the pace was fast and we continued to help each other out as the fight continued. It should have appeared as a blur but it wasn’t. I grabbed Jace and slid him into a sweep, the teamwork exercises really paid off because he didn’t hesitate at all. My nervousness was still there but I found myself much more focused and calm. I was hit occasionally but the rush and adrenaline kept me going.

The fight split again and I was back with Charli. She didn’t have that smug look on her face she started out with. Her whole demeanor had changed, she was a lot more focused and I felt as if I had a huge bulls eye on my head because she was really going after it. She wasn’t as fast as before but she was more vicious with them. I heard a loud crash like glass was breaking, it distracted me enough for Charli to land another hit. She was coming in with another but I punched her leg as it came in giving me enough time to see Tiny walking through a broken window into an office where Jace was picking himself off the ground. I reacted to it but Charli hit me on the side of my head. My ears rang but I couldn’t process the pain because more kicks were coming. I was pissed off for letting myself get distracted and also for getting suckered kicked. I caught her foot but I didn’t give her any time to counter. I shot my leg out kicking her in the chest knocking her a few feet into a concrete wall. She was stunned and quickly slumped to the floor. She wasn’t getting up for a while.

I jumped through the window seeing Jace outside a doorway where the hallway of the gym entranced was but I didn’t see Tiny. I ran towards him as I got to the doorway a leg came across the door, I slid underneath and could feel the power as it connected with the door. That kick would have taken my head off. I stopped next to Jace helping him up.

“I’m good.”

I nodded and we focused out attention back to Tiny. He was looking around and then back, he was looking for Charli and saw her outside against the wall. Seeing her slumped against the wall shot him to a different level of anger. He came at us strong. I jumped at him but he managed to catch me and Jace at the same time swinging us around into a set of doors before throwing us onto the ground. 

“What was that?” I heard Jace curse as I was slapping the floor in frustration. Did we just let this guy throw us?

“Jace, stay in close, keep it tight…” before I was able to finish I realized were in the gym and in front of my many students and faculty. They were noticeable scared and confused at our sudden presence. I tried scanning for my team or Emmalin but I wasn’t able to single out one person, I did notice the four acolytes holding automatic rifles at us.

Tiny came through the door staring us down. He looked tired but it was hard to tell by the way he was standing tall. Two of the acolytes were making their way towards us yelling at us to get down, their guns were right at our heads, but Tiny held his hand up motioning them to lower their weapons. I was fuming at our situation but before the guns were lowered I took out the acolyte before he had a chance to know what happened. I heard another thud and saw Jace shared the same idea. There was surprise among the crowd and even some cheers as we started dismantling their rifles. Tiny stood there with a slight grin on his face that I was looking forward to knocking right off.

“You taking a break or something?” Jace yelled at him.

Tiny expression quickly changed as he charged at us once again.

“Here we go. Take him down like a tree.”

I rarely acknowledge my fighting abilities at school and even though I was known for them, not many people have had the opportunity to see me fight, but today everyone was going to see how I fight, today everyone was going to see a full demonstration of my abilities, today they were going to know why I was known as Gabriel the great.

We met Tiny head on with kicks and punches. For as long as this fight was going Tiny was still moving fast blocking and throwing his own techniques as well but we were connecting, there was no worry of another person jumping in the fight so our full focus was on him.

Tiny continued to press forward on the offensive, but even on the defensive side I started seeing much more openings. I went after his legs, every time there was a block or slip I snapped a kick towards his leg. Tiny started catching on because he was reacting more to it letting Jace go after his head. Tiny grabbed Jace’s leg as he was about to connect with his fourth head shot, tossing Jace off to the side. I shot in with a punch but he batted it away wrapping his huge hands around my neck lifting me right off my feet. My air was quickly cut off as is fingers were digging deeper into my neck. No, it wasn’t going to end like this, to be this close. I gripped his wrist, using whatever leverage I could to get my legs up to kick him wherever I could, hip, stomach, armpit, chest, neck and face. He finally let go and I was sucking in all the air I could as I hit the ground. I caught a glimpse of an acolyte and hadn’t realized how much we had traveled across the gym. His attention was turned, I swept him and before he landed Jace came out of the sky with an elbow in tow. It was quick and over, I picked up the gun after it was done looking at Tiny recovering. He was looking right at me, anger written all over his face. I handed the gun back to Jace who started taking it apart.

On the other side of the gym there was some commotion taking my attention temporarily away from Tiny. I saw Kyra, Donovan, Alec, and Felicia taking out the last acolyte. Donovan and Alec were holding him down subdued. Kyra turned giving me a thumbs up. What were they thinking but that had to wait. It was just Tiny left and the realization was starting to set in as his leverage in the room was gone. He clenched his fist and started yelling. This was it, he was going to go the hardest he could, but I knew this was going to expose him the most. This was our chance to end this now.

Tiny came at us again but I directed him towards the middle of the floor. He was going for the knockout punch, swinging wildly. Jace and I worked together, we directed the attacks and countered with each other. I tried to contain my excitement as his openings were more obvious as I hit them as hard as I could. The look of desperation was coming across his face, he was getting angrier and angrier but we kept hitting him.

My energy was starting to run low and figured Jace wasn’t far behind. “We need to finish this.” At that point Jace slipped under a heavy right haymaker. I flew in driving my elbow into his chest twisting my body for the other elbow to strike him in the face. This knocked him back a couple of feet as he whipped his head back in pain. Jace followed right after with a drop kick from behind causing him to stumble forward. For a brief moment in time, everything was silent. It was Tiny and I in the gym alone, my vision tunneled onto him, I felt all my energy, anger and frustration center onto myself. I was already in the air thrusting all my power into my hips lining my knee at his head. My knee connected and I heard a weird cracking noise coming from Tiny. My leg kicked back from the hit as Tinys body continued to make its way underneath me. I didn’t expect the impact and landed awkwardly barely catching my balance.

I didn’t need to look, I knew the fight was over. I looked at Jace and he had a shocked look on his face. “Dude that was a pretty nasty hit.”

“It hurt more than I care to admit right now.” I could feel the burning sensation in my knee.

There was a slight hesitation from everyone on the gym before they got up clapping and cheering at realizing they were not in any immediate danger. I looked around as the gang came to us with others behind them thanking us. I scanned until I found her, she was safe with a smile on her face. My fears quickly going away until Jace reminded me of one crucial information.

“There’s still one left...”