Free Breakfall by Kate Pavelle

crazy. They’ll break something.”
     
     
    A SBJORN FELT Don’s devastating muay thai kick catch his ribs before he could withdraw the punch that marked Don’s jaw. An exchange of fast blows followed, none hard enough to cause much damage.
    They circled some more, pacing themselves, their breathing now heavier.
    Don launched a kick and Asbjorn moved out of it, blocking.
    Calm brown eyes looked down at Asbjorn. Tiger’s grin was lazy as always. “You’ve put on some inches, kid.”
    No longer centered on Don, he launched a rear kick with his heel and spun, connecting with Don’s knee.
    “Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. Don’t hurry so much, Asbjorn.”
    Don moved with a hook to Asbjorn’s jaw, hoping for a knockout, but Asbjorn caught it on the forehead in an attempt to duck.
    “If you must block with your head, take it on the hard part.”
    His broken skin began to bleed into his eye, the red rivulets running down his cheek.
    “If you touch that blindfold again, that’s fifty more push-ups.”
    “Don’t panic.”
    “Breathe.”
    His tongue snaked out to taste his own blood and he heard his own cold, hollow laugh.
    “Never fight angry.”
    One-eyed, he moved in, catching a hook on his ear and not caring, leaning in to hit the older man with short, stiff uppercuts.
    “I’ll be here when you come back, Asbjorn.”
     
     
    T HIS WAS unlike the other fights. Sean looked around. The silent crowd focused on the violent altercation—no, the duel — with rapt attention, but nobody moved in to stop it. The gangbanger kids, now clustered around Adrian, looked at their older mentor with questioning eyes, but he shook his head disconsolately.
    Don’s knee crooked funny.
    Asbjorn obviously couldn’t see anymore. One eye was covered in blood and the other was swelling shut from a well-placed cross.
    Don’s uppercut doubled Asbjorn over.
    Asbjorn gasped for air and forced himself up—up and forward—driving his forehead into Don’s nose.
    Silent and ghostlike, a third fighter appeared in the circle. He wore sagging pants and a checkered shirt. A blue paisley bandanna wrapped around his shoulder-length dreads. He wielded a push broom.
    “Stop it. Stop it right now!” He broke the silence with a voice that was pitched high with tension.
    “Get out, Troy!” Dud yelled.
    Don stumbled forward, blood pouring out his broken nose, his fists finding their way home to Asbjorn’s ribs.
    Asbjorn grabbed the man’s shoulders and gathered himself for another head butt when the black kid hooked Asbjorn’s knee with the push broom, immediately rebounding the hard handle end off Asbjorn’s head.
    Sean watched Asbjorn’s knee buckle under his own weight and the well-placed maneuver. His face turned the other way, right into the path of the flying staff.
    Asbjorn crumpled on the concrete floor.
    Before realizing what he was doing, Sean was in the thick of it too, his body between the armed man and the fallen one. Troy was in midswing, not done with Asbjorn quite yet, when Sean barred his way.
    His training took over as he timed the swing, moved inside, and smothered the trajectory of the improvised weapon before it gained maximum velocity. Sean twisted Troy’s wrist into a painful lock, elbowing him in the face for good measure as he went down.
    He stood there, holding the broom. He barely registered the flood of bodies surging toward him.
    Asbjorn.
    He dropped the tool, stumbled forward, and fell to his knees by a head covered in red, reaching for the motionless hand. A sense of dread filled him. To his horror, he felt the prickle of unwelcome tears threatening to force their way into his eyes, clouding both his vision and his judgment.
    “Sean. Sean. Sean.”
    He heard somebody say his name over and over as though through a thick veil. Only when slender arms wrapped around his shoulders and soft hands touched his bare arms did the words penetrate the specter of red and blonde before him, and he lifted his head in