“Pick up your feet,” Sensei Dan said on the second day. He sat on one of the saw horses in their make shift dojo. “Your cardio is awful. How is it so bad when you walk everywhere?”

  “I don’t run!” Owen huffed. Dan had him running the abandoned halls of the Gold Glow while he watched. Owen was drenched head to toe in sweat and he was beyond parched. He wanted just a sip of the water he brought to the dojo but Dan said water was a reward.

  The dojo is where legends are born. Those were Dan’s words. Owen didn’t feel like a legend. Running, jumping, punching. They were all activities outside of Owen’s realm. He hadn’t done any real physical activity since his days at the Care Facility when the most fun he could have revolved around an old slaughter ball and mismatched teams. Even then he wasn’t anyone’s first pick

  “You’re going to run across twelve lanes of traffic in a few days. You’re already doing better today than you were yesterday.” Owen agreed. He impressed himself by being able to run for ten minutes before he wanted to pass out. “We start with a mile a day, soon enough you’ll be running ten a day up with buckets of water across your shoulders.”

  “Really?” Owen didn’t like the prospect, but going along with Dan resulted in less pain than fighting him.

  “If I can find enough stairs. Stop running. Get some water.” Owen sprinted for the water and chugged it. “Don’t be overly dramatic. It was just a mile and a half.”

  “I thought you said a mile!”

  “You were doing so good!” Dan flashed him a big cheesy smile. “That’s enough running for today. Let’s move onto something a little more fun. We ran through basic strikes yesterday. You’re not ready for kicks yet. What to do?” Dan tapped his chin, and then without warning threw a jab at Owen’s head.

  “Stop doing that!” Owen said. He barely dodged the punch.

  “You’re getting quicker. Those warrior instincts are starting to come alive.”

  “No. I’m just worried you’re going to punch me when I don’t expect it.”

  “So always expect it!” Dan shouted as he attacked again. His strike was telegraphed, but it was still whip quick. Owen blocked it with his forearms, simulated pain radiating through his nerves. “A Hardknuckle practitioner is always ready for a fight. Don’t let me hit you. Every hit I land is ten pushups. Ready?” Owen swallowed and shook his head. “Alright, let’s go!”

  Sensei Dan attacked, his fists zipping close to Owen’s head. No hesitation, no warning, no pattern. Owen knew how to survive. He’d been in fights in the care facility. He didn’t win any, but he knew how to protect his head and Dan only counted clean hits.

  “Stop running!” Dan darted around Owen and socked him in the liver. His legs almost gave out. “Dodge, stay in the fight. You give an enemy your back, he’ll take it. Swivel on those toes!” Dan’s fists were a blur. “If you can’t dodge, you need to stop it.” He backed off for a moment. “Watch me.” He head-butted the air. “Use your head to intercept my punch.”

  “Isn’t that the opposite of what I want to do?” Owen didn’t know much about fighting, but getting hit seemed counter-intuitive.

  “Nope.” Dan threw a punch and left his arm extended. “Power is strength plus speed. A punch’s true power is only unleashed when the arm is fully extended. Think of it like me snapping a whip. If you intercept the punch to prevent it from reaching full power you’ll severely dampen the blow and put yourself in position to retaliate. Try it!” Dan popped Owen in the forehead.

  “Fuck!” Owen shouted. He stumbled away, hands on his head. “This isn’t how you teach someone!”

  “Owen, I warned you when you put on the CTD. This system isn’t built for beginners. You agreed to the terms and conditions. I’m training you as gently as I can. I need you to have some faith in your sensei. Face me!” Owen reluctantly faced his unwanted sensei. “Get into your fighting stance and get ready. Headbutt my punch.”

  The first hit hurt. Bad. Heat radiated through Owen’s skull. Hs instincts screamed run. His vision blurred. Simulated or not it felt real and his body reacted to every hit Dan dished out. He punched and Owen threw a head butt. It was weird. It didn’t hurt as much as the first time. Barely stung. He figured it out. His timing was off, but as counterintuitive as it seemed, catching the punch with his head stopped it dead in its tracks.

  “There we go,” Dan said smiling. “Feel that? No. That’s ‘cause you’re doing it right! Avoid getting hit when you can, but the reality is you can’t avoid everything. There are no glass jaws in Hardknuckle. Knowing how to take a punch is just as important as knowing how to throw one.” Dan patted Owen on the shoulder. “You’ll get there. Knock out two hundred straight punches on the bag and we’ll call it.”

  Owen scoffed, but obeyed. He threw punches at the punching bag he made from a canvas rucksack bought at the night market. He stuffed it full of the cheapest cloth filler and a trashcan full of sawdust left over by the mall workers. Sensei Dan watched silently while Owen counted punches in his head. His bare knuckles burned and his wrist ached, but he got it done. He used a hose taped over a faucet in a maintenance closet as a shower. Mercifully Dan wasn’t around when Owen showered.

  “Can I have pizza?” Owen asked Sensei Dan when he was dressed in clean clothes. Dan didn’t want him eating anything that would be a detriment to their training and wouldn’t let him eat anything frozen.

  “I think you’ve earned a slice,” Dan said. He held up a big finger. “Just one though.”

  The mall at five in the afternoon was packed with teenagers getting out of school and gang members that never went. Owen didn’t see a single peace keeper in the mall which meant the mall wouldn’t sponsor any peace keepers to keep the peace. Brawls between gangs were commonplace, everyone else just had to stay out of the way.

  Owen sat in an old booth with cracked cushions at PIZZA PRINCE, which boasted fifty percent all natural ingredients from GREEN VALLEY FARMS. Owen wasn’t sure he believed the faded banner hanging over the entrance, but the pizza didn’t need flavor spray and he was fairly certain the employees washed their hands more than once a day.

  “I used to do ribs after a day of training,” Dan said. He sat across from Owen, looking comical in the small booth. “A whole rack of them slathered in Mama July’s sweet and spicy honey sauce. Those were the days. I swear she could’ve gone nationwide with that sauce. This your favorite spot?”

  “I think so,” Owen said. “I used to come here with Mandy. We never had enough credits to pay for a whole slice so we’d split one.”

  “Was she your girlfriend?”

  “No.” Owen shook his head. He really wanted her to be though. “We just grew up together. Then she was gone. I came here sometimes hoping I’d see her. Never saw her though.”

  “That’s tough.” Dan looked over his shoulder. “Hey, check those guys out.”

  If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  Owen turned just a little bit and saw four members of the Red Demons sitting around a small table, a half eaten box of pizza between them. A laughing devil’s face glared at Owen from the back of a red vest. Then he made the mistake of looking one of them in the eyes.

  “Ah shit,” Owen said. He knew what came next when the Red Demon smiled and sauntered over. He licked his lips, his split tongue twisted in separate directions and the skull tattooed across his face crinkled when he laughed.

  “I know you?” the demon asked, still smiling. He clasped his hands in front of his silver belt buckle. “I gotta know you if you’re lookin’ at me like that.”

  “I wasn’t looking,” Owen said. “I just—,”

  “Just what?” The demon interrupted him. “You think I’m cute?” He looked at his fellow demons. “He thinks I’m cute boys. You wanna take me out on a date? I think we’d make a cute couple. We can hold hands and take us a little stroll through the paint park. Huh? We can have us a nice little relationship and find an affordable apartment somewhere and get us an application for adoption to raise us a nice little family.” The demon wiped a greasy hand on Owen’s shoulder. “Where you gonna take me? I like eatin’ good.”

  “I didn’t mean to look at you.”

  “Now you’re hurtin’ my feelins’.” The demon nodded. “Hurt em’ bad. If you don’t think I’m cute you gotta have another reason for lookin’ at me and my boys. Get up.” The demon waited. “Get up!”

  “You going to let him talk to you like that?” Sensei Dan asked. He crossed his arms and tilted his head. “I wouldn’t let him talk to me like that.”

  “Shut the fuck up,” Owen hissed at Dan.

  “The fuck did you say?” The demon asked with a dumbfounded look on his face. He stretched out Owen’s collar as he dragged him out of the booth. “Say it again! I couldn’t hear you down there.”

  “Look, I’m sorry.” Owen glanced at the pizza shop employees. They weren’t going to help him. No one was. He managed to steer clear of gangs for most of his life and now he was going to get knifed for looking a demon in the eyes. “I didn’t mean to look at you.” Owen didn’t know the right words to say. He didn’t know if there were right words. His legs trembled and if he hadn’t pissed already he’d do it right there.

  “That’s disrespectful as shit. Look at me and tell me to shut the fuck up. This is my place.” The red demon pointed at the employees watching the unfolding confrontation. “I own those two. This whole hall belongs to the Red Demons. You sit there it’s because I let you sit there. You eat, it’s because I say you eat.” He grabbed what was left of Owen’s slice and smashed it against his mouth. “Eat, bitch!”

  “Punch him in the face, Owen!” Sensei Dan said.

  “I’m not going to fight anyone!” Owen shouted back. The demons would kill him. They weren’t known for taking it easy on citizens and they had him outnumbered. His only option was to take it like he’d done his whole life and hope they left him breathing at the end.

  “Yes you are,” Dan said. Suddenly he was behind Owen, one of his big hands on the back of Owen’s head. In an instant he shoved Owen’s head right into the demon’s nose. Crack! Broken cartilage. Blood. A sudden scream. The song of a shattered nose on an asshole’s face.

  “You motherfucker!” The demon flung Owen across a table. A plastic cup dug into his back and he tumbled across the floor. The rest of the demons were up and Owen felt an ass kicking coming at high speed.

  He tried to run. A demon tripped him and he tumbled into a family of four before they could run. The parents dragged their screaming kids away as Owen took a kick to the gut. Pizza came up. He should’ve used the flavor spray. Flavor spray tasted the same coming in and going out.

  “Smash his face,” skull face said as he wiped blood off his mouth. “I don’t want his mama to recognize him.”

  “Get up, Owen,” Sensei Dan said. “This isn’t what we’re training for. You can take these guys.” There were four of them. Four men that had more experience with violence than Owen could dream of.

  They dragged Owen to his feet. Skull face wound up for a punch. Owen’s head moved and the punch slipped by. But he didn’t do the moving.

  “This is the only time I bail you out, Owen,” Sensei Dan said. “Just relax. Let me do the work.” He grabbed Owen’s wrists and worked him like a puppet. Owen had no control. It was like being in a dream. He broke free of the demons’ grip, his fists snapping against temples and jaws with nasty pops. The demons stumbled away.

  “How did you do that?” Owen asked. He’d never moved with so much precision in his life.

  “Be quiet,” Sensei Dan said. “Let me show you what Hardknuckle can do.”

  Sensei Dan didn’t wait for the devils. He dragged Owen forward, the CTD’s programming forcing his body to move against his will like he was a passenger in his own life. First a solid punch to a nose, followed by a swift ball breaking kick to a demon’s groin. A scream echoed across the pizza shop. Owen didn’t have an ounce of control. Dan’s grip on his wrists was unbreakable and before he could think about resisting Dan shifted him in another direction.

  The demons attacked, throwing wild haymakers at Owen’s head. Dan slipped them, moving Owen’s body in ways he didn’t know it could move. The demons couldn’t touch him with Dan manipulating his limbs. He dodged. Blocked. Attacked. His untrained muscles screamed as they stretched. Years of stagnation came back to haunt him all at once. A demon’s fist cracked against Owen’s skull. His knuckles broke and Sensei Dan howled with laughter.

  “Intercept the punch!” Sensei Dan shouted. “Retaliate.” He threw a three piece combo at Skull Face. Ribs, face, ribs again. Each strike drove the demon a step back. “Scuttle.” He slid Owen around the demon. “Front kick!” Dan grabbed Owen by the ankle and made him kick the demon in the spine. He smashed through a row of chairs and stopped at a wall.

  Owen didn’t have faith. He wasn’t a believer. He thought it was bullshit trapped in his skull by a faulty tech. He thought Sensei Dan was a product. The CTD was a torture device that got him fired and beaten by a ghost.

  Sensei Dan was a product of the pre-collapse world. A gimmick. Owen didn’t believe he could teach him anything valuable. Hardknuckle was the bane of his existence. Dan showed him it was real. Sensei Hardknuckle was at the controls, but Owen’s body did the damage. One by one the demons went down under bone breaking hits. They screamed and shouted, blood and spit leaking from busted mouths. Bruises were already forming across their faces and Owen knew they were afraid. He’d seen the same look in the mirror more than he cared to admit.

  Owen didn’t feel the pain in his knuckles or the soreness in his muscles anymore. He only felt the exhilaration of the fight slithering in his veins.

  Skull Face stood up and pulled a knife from his belt. He smiled wide with his trump card pulled. Owen swallowed. Knives were the biggest danger in city seven, even beating out industrial accidents as of last year.

  “He wants to play grown up games,” Sensei Dan said with a laugh. “Those get grown up prizes.” The demon moved in, knife raised with deadly intent. Dan shifted Owen a step back, spun him, and kicked. “Spinning back kick!” Dan shouted as Owen’s heel audibly cracked Skull Face’s jaw. The knife clattered against linoleum and it was over. “Hope he likes smoothies.” Dan lowered Owen’s leg as Skull Face smacked the floor, his jaw misshapen as he laid in a pool of his own spit and blood. “Let’s get out of here, my disciple.”

  “Sorry about this,” Owen said to the PIZZA PRINCE employees as he staggered out of the restaurant. “Holy shit.” He was still shaking. His knuckles bled, his heart thundered. “You took them all down.” He kept looking over his shoulder, but the demons were too busted up to follow him.

  “A master is still a master even if he isn’t using the best brush.” Dan adjusted his gi.

  “That was amazing.” Owen took a deep breath. He saw the world with new eyes and it wasn’t just because they were partially swollen. Something in his mind permanently shifted as a result of that fight. He didn’t know he was capable of half of what Dan pulled off, but the proof was in his red knuckles. “You’re the real deal.”

  “I know.” Dan didn’t look back.

  “Teach me.”

  “What are you talking about?” Dan stopped and looked at Owen, his eyebrow raised. “I am teaching you.”

  “No,” Owen said. “You’ve been forcing me to learn. I didn’t care about it before. But that was different. That was real. I did that.”

  “Sort of,” Sensei Dan said. “I won that fight.” Dan tapped Owen’s chest with a meaty finger. “Are you serious? Are you ready to train Hardknuckle Style in earnest? Will you obey my commands and trust that I am leading you down the right path?”

  “Yes,” Owen said. He nodded, his body shaking as the adrenaline wore off

  “Yes, what?”

  “Yes, Sensei?”

  “Was that a question?”

  “Yes, Sensei!” Owen said with conviction. He didn’t care about the citizens shuffling around him. They might’ve thought he was insane for talking to nothing, but that didn’t matter anymore. He knew Hardknuckle was real. Dan controlled him briefly, but everything Sensei Hardknuckle did, Owen’s body was capable of doing. He decided to throw himself into Dan’s training. He didn’t need to be afraid of the world anymore. Not when he had Sensei Dan Hardknuckle on his side.