Chapter 7: Old Guard vs New Guard

We took positions parallel to each other. Between us lay ten meters of concrete ground. Aside from that the room was empty. There were no crates, barricades, nothing, just the two of us and our weapons. Sliding off my jacket made the weapons I carried visible. In the holster on my left side was my new Desert Eagle, but I only had one clip of ammo so I couldn’t be reckless with that. In the holster to my right was my trusty 9mm. Behind my back were two daggers, one steel, one silver. Malik did not do the same. From the fight earlier I could see that he carried a plethora of weapons. He seemed to like his throwing knives the most so I should be ready to dodge.

“I may have talked tough earlier but I need to be careful. He’s a lot younger than me and his body is probably in better shape. If I let him get too close he’ll use his physical advantage and overwhelm me. I need to make it the 60 seconds so I can tip the scales on him.” I thought to myself as I focused in preparation to fight. As the seconds ticked away before the buzzer sounded time began to slow. My mind started working a mile a minute, trying to analyze every type of attack he might employ. I thought of hi strengths and weaknesses, and how his emotions might change his fighting style. As soon as the buzzer sounded and I was on the clock, my thoughts went away and I gave myself to the fight. My body was getting chills.

Sixty

Rather than start with ranged attacks Malik rushed forward at me trying to close the distance between us and make this a physical fight which would play to his strengths. I drew my 9mm and took aim, looking to make him alter his course, or hesitate. Despite that he continued to press the attack.

Fifty-nine

I fired my first rounds, aiming for his lower legs. He dodged and both hit the ground, tossing sparks to the height of his ankles on the ground behind his heel. His speed was surprising, it almost caught me off guard. Soon enough he had closed the distance and was preparing for a blow, but from where.

Fifty-eight

Planting his left foot and rearing back his right leg he prepared to take a kick at my upper body. His leg launched up high, on a path to collide with my head. The windup giving me time to prepare I ducked his attack and took aim at his planted leg hoping to score an easy shot. Squeezing the trigger the shot rang out but my target was gone. He had lifted his whole body into the air and his left knee now raced towards my chin.

Fifty-seven

With no other options I brought my right arm up, preparing to absorb the blow. His knee crashed onto the lower end of my wrist, causing a jolt of pain to shoot up my arm. But it didn’t matter. I had to respond or he’d have landed the first hit unscathed. Using the right arm he had knocked back for me I brought it crashing towards his torso and landed a powerful back handed hit that sent the airborne Malik falling back.

Fifty-six

Taking advantage of his fall I took aim again firing two more shots from my gun, hitting him in the shoulder and chest. The shots elicited a pained groan from Malik as his body careened into the ground with a thump.

Fifty-five

Wasting no time, Malik twisted his body to avoid a third shot and jumped up back on to his feet. Reaching into his jacket he grabbed a pair of throwing knives, one in each hand, and hurled them in my direction as he made another run at me.

Fifty-four

Managing to avoid the knives I soon found Malik closing the distance once again, now coming at me with clenched fists looking to score body blows in an effort to slow me down. Putting up my guard his fists came down on nothing but my arms, which absorbed the blows. After drawing him in I reared back with my left hand, in which I held my 9mm.

Fifty-three

Bringing the pistol down I crashed it straight into Malik’s forehead, stunning him and forcing him to the ground at my feet. He was not stunned for long though as he grabbed my leg and forced it up, killing my balance and bringing me down to the ground with him.

Fifty-two

Not wanting him to get on top of me I kicked him on the top of his head where my pistol had gotten him, opening up a what must have been a painful gash as he reared back and simply stood himself back up rather than try to hit me while I was down. I followed suit and we stood again just a few meters apart.

Fifty-one

Again I drew my pistol and fired. Malik was forced onto his back foot and jumped back, putting distance between us. Seizing the opportunity I ejected my pistol’s now empty clip and loaded a fresh one.

Fifty

Resorting back to his throwing knives, he maintain his distance and started throwing barrages of four and five at a time. A few cutting my body and many coming close. However the wounds were shallow and healed quickly midaction. In the same amount of time the gash on Malik's head closed up and he was pressing again.

Forty-nine

His next barrage of attacks however were less aggressive. He bobbed and weaved like a boxer, not allowing himself to get two close or two far. We continued back and forth. Landing blows here and there, but nothing decisive or debilitating.

Forty-eight

Malik’s speed began to wear on me as I was forced on to my back foot. I found myself almost solely blocking punches and kicks, while he remained on the attack.

Forty-seven

Looking to spice things up in our hand to hand melee I drew my dagger and started to slash and stab at him.

Forty-six

My attacks continued. First I landed a slash across his cheek, any deeper and I might have cut his eye. Second and got a deep stab on his arm, making him jump back. Crimson red blood dripped from his cheek and gushed from his arm.

Forty-five

I tried to close the distance while he was wounded, but his speed was just too much. I began to see that I really was at a disadvantage. While he could close the distance at any moment he wanted; I could not. This was not a winning situation for me, but 15 seconds had passed and I just needed to hold out 45 more.

Forty-four

Malik’s cheek wound was gone and his arm was almost back to full capacity. Drawing his own dagger we started a back and forth knife fight. He made a slash straight for my throat which I bent back to dodge, the grey hairs of my beard being cut by the knife which just grazed the skin of my neck.

Forty-three

Going back to my gun I started taking shots again making him zig zag, bend, and dance a bit more. The more he dodged the more time I gained. A hit on his jacket made one of his throwing knives drop, it making a ping as it hit the ground.

Forty-two

With his senses tuned into everything around him the ping drew his attention and allowed my to land another shot on his arm. But the wound soon closed up again and he was back into fighting condition. I began to see my 9mm just did not have the punching power to cause any lasting damage that might tip the fight. His supernatural healing simply worked too fast.

Forty-one

Holstering my 9mm I switched my knife over to my left hand and drew my new Desert Eagle. The clip held 7 .50 caliber rounds so that gave me seven chances to land a good hit.

Forty

Malik noticing the change of my weapon seemed to pause for a moment as we started to enter a standoff. A few seconds passed as he seemed to reevaluate his strategy. I was more than happy to let him wait. It gave me a moment to catch my breath, which had started to become rather shallow. This was the first serious challenge I had seen in ages and I could feel it. “

I really am starting to feel old and out of shape. But that doesn’t matter now. I just need to run out his clock and win this.” I thought to myself as Malik began to move again

Thirty-two

Malik came at me again, zig-zagging at a high speed to make my aiming difficult. Thinking I knew where he was moving I led him slightly and took my first shot. But he cut in the other direction, making my shot miss.

Thirty-one

As he came close he got in my face and landed a hard hit on my jaw sending my head up. Seeing an opening he pressed forward hoping to knock me on my back, but I managed to sweep his leg and knock him off balance forcing him to one knee and letting me gather as I backpedaled.

Thirty

From his single knee Malik looked up with anger in his eyes. He could see what I was doing. I was not fighting to win I was stalling for time. He knew I was simply trying to hold out until the timer was done and I could use my trump card.

Twenty-seven

Now letting his emotions show, Malik huffed in anger as he broke into a sprint straight at me. He moved so fast that even though he was moving straight I could not line up my shot in time before he delivered a hard punch to my gut followed by a haymaker to my face which sent me crashing to the ground.

Twenty-five

The sudden burst left him tired and he took a second to breathe before coming towards me.

Twenty-four

That second however had been a mistake because as he came on top of me I finally and my shot lined up and I fired.

Twenty-three

Malik quickly twisted his body making an effort to dodge. He managed to avoid a straight shot to the sternum which would have ended the fight, but then the bullet collided with his left shoulder. Knocking him back almost a full meter and rendering his arm useless.

Twenty-two

Making my way onto my feet slowly after taking the hit I felt a hard object floating around on my tongue. Spitting to my left a spray of red surrounded a small white object which hit the ground and bounced with a few ticks.

“That little b*****d knocked one of my damn teeth out! Son of a b***h!” I thought as I looked at my tooth.

Twenty

I marched over slowly to his body trying to ascertain if he had given

Nineteen

Making my way over I was stunned to see him suddenly jump to his feet. Without using either arm, he swung his legs around and used the force to toss himself onto his feet. His arm’s injury was still severe and when he tried to rear the arm back it could only raise halfway. Still, impressive all things considered. R&D should really get a reward for their improvements the the agents supernatural healing. It would have taken me hours to recover from a hit like that even when I was younger.

Eighteen

With his arm half limp, Malik’s punch went went forward with little force making it easy for me to slide inside the length of his arm and deliver a stab to the gut with my dagger and a pistol whip to the face

Seventeen

Now snapping out of his rage filled trance Malik started to pedal and leap back. Trying to give himself an opportunity to heal.

Sixteen

Sheathing my knife and redrawing my 9mm I started taking shots at him, looking to cause some damage and stall him more.

Fifteen

But even while injured he retained an impressive amount of speed and agility. None of my 9mm bullets hit home, forcing me to discharge the second clip and load my last one.

Fourteen

Looking back up at Malik I could see him rotating his left arm, just waiting for it to become usable again, and with each passing second it healed further

Thirteen.

Firing again with my 9mm I managed to hit a few grazing shots but no hits of actual value. His speed was just too much as he zig-zagged again and again, avoiding bullets, until my clip ran empty.

Twelve

With an empty gun likely being of little use I holstered it and again drew my silver dagger form behind my back and began to backpedal to get away from Malik.

Eleven

With his arm able to make a full rotation again, Malik bounded forward trying to close the now nearly twenty-five meters between us.

Ten

Closer and closer he drew. Trying to delay him again I began firing away with the last five rounds in my desert eagle. Rather than zig-zagging he simply jumped and ducked to avoid my bullets, with surprising success.

Nine

I continued to fire as Malik drew closer and closer

Eight

I fired the last of the rounds in my Desert Eagle and with no time to hoster, simply threw the gun to the ground and braced for a fight.

Seven

Malik finally closed the distance unleashing a fast barrage of attacks at me. The attacks moved so quickly his arms and legs became a blur that I struggled to dodge

Six

The flurry continued as my armor began to show chinks. A punch to the gut got through and one of his kicks landed on my side, striking my ribs hard and likely breaking two or three of them.

Five

His speed became too much as I was overwhelmed, and with my guard proving useless the punishment rained down.

Four

Desperate to break out of my backpedal I gambled with a sudden punch to the jaw. This attack landed on his chin as he hit back with an uppercut of his own. Simultaneously we were knocked back.

Three

Knowing the time was short I prepared to use my trump card, drawing the silver dagger from behind my back

Two

Malik broke out of his daze and ran toward me. At the same time I ripped the sleeve off of my left arm, revealing a detailed tattoo that covered from the middle of my upper arm, to my shoulder.

One

I used the silver blade to slice my right hand staining the knife and covering my hand in warm, red blood. Malik now right in front of me went for a kick at my exposed ribs, but now it was too late

Zero

The buzzer sounded as I brought my bloody right hand up to the tattoo, which absorbed the blood and began to glow with a blinding, bright, white light. Suddenly the world around me turned into slow motion. Malik’s leg which had been approaching me at serious speed now looked like it was barely moving. That was not all however, as while time had seemed to slow down, I still moved at normal speed. This was my trump card.

Reaching out and grabbing Malik by his ankle, I crushed it in my hand like it were a small stick before whipping Malik over my shoulder. I whipped Malik’s body into the ground, creating a large shockwave around me. The shear force from his body hitting the ground dug him in and created a crater that was as deep as I was tall. I had literally put him six feet under, deeper even. With the fight over the effect from he tattoo began to where off and time seemed to return to a normal pace. Behind me I heard the door open, followed by steps and a slow clap that came about once every three seconds.

“Well well well, I must admit I had my doubts there for a moment Benjamin, but it seems you remain quite the formidable fighter.” She told me in positive voice “It’s good to know you still have it.”

“You should know better than to doubt me. So you think this should put to rest any worries the higher-ups have about my ability to fight.” I said exasperatedly

“Well I don’t think I will look forward to telling them about Malik but I’m sure it should get them off your back, at least to some extent.

“G...Good.” I said walking towards Alice

Suddenly a bad feeling began to hit me. Where I had seen one Alice I now saw three, and all three were blurry.

Suddenly my left leg lost all strength and fell out from under me, placing me down on one knee.

Then my throat began to seize up as I coughed uncontrollably until a warm liquid filled my mouth, which I immediately spat out. Looking down I saw red all over the ground around me as my hearing began to get bombarded with a high pitched buzz over which I could barely hear anything.

“Benjamin! Benjamin! Benjamin…” Alice yelled at me. However the sharp buzzing made it increasingly harder and harder to hear. Then the rest of body went limp, crashing straight onto the cold, hard concrete. Then, the world faded to black.