Dagger

Breath

                Blood. Amber, spreading, dark blood on the floor. Sensei lies face-first on the concrete floor in front of me. My head is getting dizzy, I want––no––need to puke. Jon just ripped a bullet through Sensei from a kilometer away using a handgun, when its effective range is supposed to be only two hundred meters.

                The abandoned wharf is filled with Jon’s laughter, “f*****g geezer, shouldn’t have gotten in my way. Well, it’s not like I was going to kill him after I kill you anyway, Ray. Hey, that rhymed! Cool!” I can’t get a fix as to where Jon is, but all I know is that he’s getting closer.

                Dammit, if I’d only practice harder, spent more time in training, I…

                “You’d have died anyway, false-one,” Jon taunts, a rhythmic series of metal hitting metal follows his every word. He’s reloading.

                I hate it when he reads minds, I say to myself. Sensei needed medical services immediately, but I needed to take care of Jon first.

                Every action begins and ends with the breath, Sensei’s words echo in my mind.

                He’s right, I need to calm myself down. If Jon wanted me dead, he’d have done so. He wanted something from me, and I need to use that to my leverage. Because running away from a guy with the most perfect accuracy in the world isn’t going to do crap when he’s holding a g*n.

                “Yes, that’s it false-one,” Jon says, “Go back to your breathing. By all the gods, I will make sure that in their eyes, they will see that I am more superior to you in every way, so bring your best shot. Although you never really got to weapons training yet, haven’t you?”

                “That’s right, Jon!” I shout in response, “How are the gods going to acknowledge you if you shoot down an unarmed man. You think this makes you better than Sensei after you gunned down an old man who was only trying to protect me?”

                I hear footsteps getting louder by the second.

 Jon’s here.

He’s about a hundred meters away. My mind’s eye has finally awakened, Sensei!.

A g*n c***s. f**k, he’s going to shoot.

                “You bet I am,” Jon whisper, as if he’s just standing in front of me.

                I open my eyes and see in horror as I see Jon half-n***d with a Glock pointed at my head a few feet away from me. A flash of light erupts from the barrel of his g*n, a loud c***k bursts through the air.

                Dammit, it’s no use. I can’t beat him. He can read my mind. He can hit any kind of shot in the world. He––

                For a brief moment, I realize I’m not dead yet. In front of me, the bullet moves through the air with the speed of a snail.

                I did it! In my moment of desperation, I finally reached Nirvana’s first gate, Sahasrara. My brain is running a thousand times faster than an average human.

All I need to do now is force my muscles to move at the same speed. It takes a lot out of me, but I raise my hand and swat the bullet away from me.

                “What the f**k?” Jon looks at his g*n, confused. My hand is sore, and I’m panting like a dog, finally back in normal time speed.

Sahasrara takes this much energy!? I’m dead if––

                Jon empties his clip-on me, and I quickly swat every bullet away with my left hand, leaving it bruised and incapacitated.

                “You fucking­­––“

                I don’t let him finish and start raining punches on him at superspeed. Most of them land, but some are blocked. Jon is still my senior when it comes to fighting, especially in superspeed.

We exchange blows until I can no longer lift a finger, our bodies b****y and bruised. Jon smirks at me, “Is that it? Too bad.” Jon grabs something from his back pocket. f**k, it’s a fresh clip.

Exhausted, I enter Sahasrara for the last time, trying to grab Jon’s g*n, but I’ve done the calculations, I won’t make it in time to grab the g*n. Jon leaves me with no other choice.

I reach for the swiss-army knife Sarah gave me earlier. For good luck, she said. Now, it’s for my life. All I need is stab him, but I’m still a foot away, and his barrel is already on my forehead.

Fuck it! I lunge the knife towards his solar plexus. I’m taking you down with me.

Bang.

The next thing I realize, a warm wrinkly hand is grabbing my wrist with a ridiculously strong grip. Another wrinkly hand is also holding Jon’s wrist, pointing the g*n above and away from me.

“Sensei!” I shout in relief towards my conscious master. Sensei stood between Jon and I. A scar now stands where the bullet entered his body.

“f*****g geezer,” Jon cringes.

“Enough, we shall settle the matter later. They are watching,” Sensei warns, his eyes surveying the rooftops around us. I squint at the nothingness until I see silhouettes of men with rifles occupying the rooftops and pointing their guns at us.

Several red lasers point their way to each and every one of our heads.

“Alright, false-one. A truce” says Jon as he stares angrily at our unknown assailants.

What the hell did I get myself into this time?