Chapter 4-3
1150 Words
Each afternoon the old cook and the little boy would ride out together. They were seen all the time, chatting and laughing, going for a seemingly harmless ride.
But deep inside the forest, hidden by calloused trees and unyielding rocks, the old man would take the boy through a series of devastating arts and acts.
The boy learnt things he could never have learnt anywhere, and even if he could have found such a place, he would never have had such a dedicated teacher.
Chris was taught how to break and assemble guns of all sorts, how to wear a holster and a gun, how to draw and fire, how to fight like an animal.
Months passed, and years rolled by, and the boy grew…and above all else, he continued to learn the deadliest forms of fighting and surviving from the mysterious Uncle Chad.
Of course, the boy never told anyone what he was learning; even his mother did not know. Chris never wore a gun in public, just like Uncle Chad had warned him not to. He never helped much on the ranch. Many of the cowboys and his own siblings believed he was a sissy.
His father had nothing but utter contempt for ‘that oaf of a boy you spawned like a woman’, his favourite sentence whenever he was speaking to his wife about their last son, Chris Bawa.
No one knew that the handsome, fleshy boy they all saw, who had a keen dislike for ranch work, was indeed a boy skilled in the most savage arts of unarmed combat.
They didn’t know that he was equally proficient with fighting with a knife or a cudgel, and also with a variety of other weapons.
When it came to guns, unknown even to himself, he had developed into a terrible monster. No one even suspected it, not even his own mother.
But Little Rock found out eventually.
The town found out in a really terrible way the day three killers came to Little Rock and touched the eye of the huge boy.
***
Chris Bawa loved his countless trips to the forest with Uncle Chad.
He never got tired of it.
It did not matter whether the day’s schedule included a gruelling mountain-climbing drill, or following the trail of some Indians, or reading tracks like a book and setting deadly traps with just little materials littering the forest floor.
It didn’t matter if it was a punishing moment of running or doing energy-sapping exercises.
Sometimes he was driven to the very end of his endurance; most times he had to engage in physical punishment when Uncle Chad attacked him with virtually any weapon he could lay hands on.
Uncle Chad could take hefty branches, spiked branches or rough rocks to attack Chris Bawa as he took the boy through the drills of unarmed combat.
“Every part of your body is a weapon, laddie,” Uncle Chad would say grimly. “Your teeth, your fingers, your joints, and your knuckles. Also, your body is covered with so many frail places, weak areas you have to harden.”
He would poke Chris in various areas of his body.
“There are some areas you can’t harden, and thus you should learn how to protect them, make damn sure you never expose them to your enemies. You should also know how to immobilize a man completely and quickly.”
He would suddenly strike Chris in a sensitive vein, causing the boy to double up on the floor of the forest with pain.
“Sensitive arteries, veins and pressure spots are exposed all over the human body. Sometimes you will meet that one guy who is faster, bigger and stronger than you. In such a situation you must know where to s***h, hit or jab to reduce him to a helpless bundle of instant pain.”
The little Bawa was an ardent student.
He learnt everything at a rate that shocked his strange mentor, but Uncle Chad never let this show.
“Your fingers and your brains are your greatest assets, laddie,” Uncle Chad always said. “You should be able to outthink your enemy, and sometimes you must think like him. Your fingers should always be supple and fluid, able to claw out your gun with the fluidity of a romantic river, and able to bunch up and punch like a castrated mad bull. Protect your fingers, laddie, and you will live long.”
Perhaps the young boy’s greatest excitement came from the gun-play sessions. Uncle Chad taught him how to keep his holster low, like a professional gunman.
They worked first on accuracy.
That had not been overly difficult because, like all other disciplines, the boy seemed to be a natural with drawing out a gun and aiming. Soon he was hitting stationary objects over various distances dead centre.
The strange old man then took Chris through hitting moving objects whilst he was stationary.
When the boy became unbelievably capable, his mentor took him deeper into the woods one afternoon, his face sombre.
“Now we come to the most important aspect of gunplay, my boy,” he had said quietly. “That has to do with your ability to draw and aim your gun like a damn spirit, laddie.”
His eyes took on a brooding gaze all of a sudden as if he were remembering something unpleasant.
He sighed and turned to the young Chris.
“A lot of things count in gunplay, and you must seize all the advantages you get, whilst minimizing your vulnerability as much as possible. For example, standing with the sun at your back is always preferable, since a ray of sunlight hitting your eyes wrong in a split second can send you to your grave.”
He held Chris by the shoulders gently.
“You must always be as sharp as possible. That is when rest becomes a weapon. If you’re going to engage an enemy in gunplay get plenty of rest beforehand if you can.”
“Sleep?” Chris asked with raised eyebrows. “Why sleep?”
“Not sleep, you oaf, rest!” the man said. “A tired body means a sluggish mind, which can count for a second of indecision, which can make all the difference between life and death. When you’re tired, rest before a gunfight, if you can. Rest is a weapon. Right laddie, now go back ten paces, and draw that gun, you big bag of lazy bones!”
The very first time the boy felt a strange exhilaration as he faced his mentor, his fingers poised over his gun butt.
“We draw on the count of three, laddie,” Uncle Chad said. “One, two, three…draw, you tortoise!”
- Writer
