Elite (40 page)

Norma had wanted to be cremated. It was standard procedure for all Elite agents to fill out a form stating what they’d like to have done with their remains in case of death. Daniel was glad. If he had seen her face lying in some coffin, knowing that lifeless image would be the last time he would ever see her again, he would not have enjoyed it. That wasn’t how he wanted to remember her.

When the SUV Daniel had ridden to the funeral in pulled up in front of Elite, Daniel followed Shifty and Charlie out of the vehicle.

“Let’s go get drunk,” Charlie said in a somber tone.

Daniel stopped at the steps leading up to the front door of the complex as his friends and several other agents walked through the doorway. He turned and made his way down the empty sidewalk leading away from the building’s entrance.

He had no desire to drink cocktails and listen to everyone else talk about the “good times” they’d spent with Norma Jean. He wanted to be alone.

Daniel found himself sitting in some dimly lit bar, drinking alone at eight o’clock on a Tuesday night. He hadn’t known where he was going when he started walking, but when he saw the sign for the bar he decided to go inside. After all, the thing most people seemed to prefer doing while grieving was to enjoy a nice strong drink. He figured he’d give it a try.

The truth was that Daniel didn’t feel much like drinking at all. He felt sick to his stomach, and alcohol wasn’t going to help take any of his pain away. Still, he sat all alone at some random hole-in-the-wall bar that was doing all it could to make itself appear more trendy – with blue and green stage lights, a makeshift dance floor and pop music coming from the speakers – nursing a Jack and Coke.

The pretty blonde bartender with dark streaks in her hair, a nose ring, and a tattoo sleeve on her left arm had tried to make friendly conversation with the lonely patron, but Daniel’s short responses made it clear that he held no interest.

Two bar stools over a young woman who seemed to be well acquainted with the bartender was approached by a man wearing black slacks and a pink polo. The man appeared to be in his mid-thirties – his salt and pepper hair made rock solid by the vast amount of hair gel in it.

She was a petite brunette with what appeared to be fake breasts and a fake tan – extremely attractive to any man who was into that type of thing. She looked to only be in her mid-twenties.

Suddenly the man started berating the young woman with questions.

“Where have you been?” He asked her with a raised voice. “You were supposed to be here two hours ago.”

“I got caught up with some stuff,” she responded, as though she did not appreciate the tone of his interrogation.

“What stuff?” he demanded.

“Just some stuff,” she replied vaguely.

“Some stuff?” The man asked confused. He seemed to be growing angrier. “Were you with that punk-ass deejay again?”

“Shut up,” the girl replied, continuing to evade the question. Then she turned back toward the bar and picked up her
cosmo.

“You’re coming with me,” the older man ordered, grabbing her by the arm.

“No!” she shouted, pulling her arm away.

The man reached for the much smaller woman again, and that was Daniel’s cue. He stood up from his stool and approached the quarreling couple.

“Please let her go,” Daniel said with extreme calm in his voice.

“Excuse me?” The man said, releasing the girls arm and stepping forward in an attempt to intimidate Daniel.

“Please keep your hands off the young lady,” Daniel replied, still calm.

At this point Daniel saw a couple of large bouncers approaching from behind the man in the pink polo. Daniel turned his head to the side and out of his peripheral vision could see a smaller bouncer a few paces behind him.

“Do you even know who I am?” The man asked Daniel, as if it mattered. “I own this place punk. This isn’t your business. Why don’t you just take your punk-ass out of here?”

Daniel remained calm on the surface, but inside he was taking control of his body, pumping himself for the physical confrontation which at this point was pretty much guaranteed to go down.

This asshole had picked the wrong day to play tough guy.

“You like to throw the word ‘punk’ around, don’t you?” Daniel asked, referencing the man’s description of both Daniel and the DJ. “To me a punk is any man who would lay hands on a woman against her will, no matter who the fuck he is.”

Any sane human being probably would have been scared shitless while standing a few inches from someone as intimidating as Daniel, but the bar owner was cocky. Of course he probably believed Daniel was insane, talking to him that way while surrounded by a group of large men ready to unleash hell should Daniel make a move.

“Get…the fuck…out,” the bar owner said in a violent half-whisper, moving his face now within an inch of Daniel’s.

Daniel’s muscles were now pumped full of oxygen and adrenaline. He was ready.

“Make me,” Daniel responded in a matching tone.

The bar owner was clearly not an experience fighter, letting out a psychopathic yell as he reared his fist way back, preparing to throw a punch.

Daniel attacked before the owner even started his fist forward, opening his hand and jamming the area between his forefinger and thumb hard into the owner’s throat.

The bar owner grabbed his neck, gasping for air as he dropped to his knees. The two bouncers, each built like an offensive lineman, lunged toward Daniel.

Daniel quickly chose the one on the left and charged him, ramming his shoulder into the man’s lower chest. He put all of his strength into his legs and shoulders as he drove the man into the ground back-first.

Daniel knew that the other bouncer would be right behind him, so he threw a mule kick behind him, contracting his quad muscles as far as they would go. He made contact with the bouncer’s stomach, causing him to fold over.

Daniel had just enough time to look up to see two more bouncers running right for him. One was the man who had been standing behind
him during the initial confrontation with the owner. He had a shorter, stockier build, much like jitters.

The other was coming from the opposite direction, and had a stature similar to that of Titan.

The two attackers got there at the same time, throwing punches simultaneously.

Daniel ducked the giant haymaker thrown by the Titan bouncer, but was unable to get out of the smaller bouncer’s uppercut.

The smaller bouncer’s fist hit him right in the chest, but Daniel reacted quick enough to grab onto his arm. He reached up and grabbed the back of the man’s head, focused on the strength of his upper body, and slammed the bouncer’s head down onto one of the high top tables standing next to him.

Daniel had never had to divide so much of his focus between what was
happening both inside and outside of his body. He couldn’t think about anything other than responding to each move that the bouncers came at him with.

Slamming the shorter bouncer’s head on the table caused Daniel to lose focus on the Titan bouncer, and as he turned to face him he was greeted by a powerful black fist smashing into the side of his face.

The ferocity of the impact sent Daniel backward, falling over himself.

The Titan bouncer followed up by jumping on Daniel’s back and slamming him to the ground face first. The other three bouncers regained their composure and jumped on top, forming a thousand-pound dog pile.

Daniel’s ears were ringing as he gathered himself on the bottom of the pile. His face was burning after taking the hit from the herculean bouncer, and he thought he might have a broken cheekbone. He could already feel it starting to swell, so he focused on keeping his blood vessels in the area from expanding to prevent the swelling until the fight was over – which for all intents and purposes, it seemed to be.

Daniel thought about turning off the pain, but saw no point. He had felt so much emotional pain over the last few days that the physical pain was a welcome change.

“Beat the shit outta him!” He heard the bar owner yell. Apparently he had regained his ability to speak.

Daniel smiled and began to focus, remembering the last stage of the obstacle course.

He let his conscious mind flow into the rear of his brain, commanding it to release all the adrenaline and testosterone humanly possible – and then some. He absorbed enormous amounts of oxygen into his blood stream and pumped his heart as fast as it would go. He began to lose himself in the back of his brain and it felt good. Nothing had made him felt good since Norma’s death.

He opened his eyes – he was going to win this fight.

There were random body parts all over the place. Fists and feet were ramming into the sides of Daniel’s body but he hadn’t even noticed. He could feel the bodies of the four bouncers moving around on top of him, keeping him pinned helplessly to the ground.

Or so they thought.

Daniel managed to get his palms flat on the floor on either side of his chest and began to push upward. He didn’t budge. The feat seemed impossible. They were just too heavy.

But not for Daniel.

Daniel closed his eyes and focused, sending everything he had to his arms and chest and contracted his muscles further and further until
he finally starting pushing the pile upward. His heart was now beating out of his chest. It wouldn’t be able to handle the intensity much longer.

He heard the other people in the bar gasp and they noticed the pile starting to move upward.

The bouncers furiously jabbed at his sides and the back of his head, but he was too occupied within his own mind to feel or notice.

He moved his legs forward, bringing each knee to his chest and shifted his focus from his upper body to his mid and lower body. He commanded his quads and abs to contact further than they ever had before and thrust himself backward at an upward angle.

He felt the bouncers groan in shock as they fell from the now vertical pile. Only the Titan bouncer was able to hang on by wrapping his arm around Daniel’s neck. Daniel continued his backward motion, picking up speed before slamming the bouncer’s lower back into the bar.

Daniel heard the bouncer’s spine crack as he let go of Daniel and collapsed on the floor.

The other three security guards were now charging back after the disruptive patron, ready to rip his head off, but now showing a slight amount of fear in their eyes.

Daniel used his arms to prop himself up on the bar as he lifted his legs and thrust both feet forward into the chest of one of the big bouncers who was first to arrive.

The three-hundred pound man stumbled backwards almost ten feet, clutching his chest, before falling to the floor.

The other two reached Daniel at the same time and both decided to just try and grab Daniel this time and wrestle him back down to the floor.

Daniel had other ideas.

He was immovable as they grabbed and clawed at him, trying to pull him away from the bar. Daniel first pulled his right arm free from the shorter bouncer and used it to throw a quick jab. He was so amped up at this point that he no longer had to think about how strong he wanted his punch to be. His muscles were now locked on superhuman mode.

He made contact with the side of the short bouncer’s face, the one quick jab proving enough to knock him back a few steps.

He then turned his body and put everything he had into a big right hook directed at the other larger bouncer. The bouncer let go of Daniel and tried to block it, but was only quick enough to get his fingertips on Daniel’s arm which did little to nothing to slow it down. Daniel made contact with the bouncer’s nose, sending him to the ground unconscious, just as he had done to Jitters.

He then turned to finish off the shorter bouncer, who at this point was the last man standing. Daniel simply rotated his body and threw a left hook at the man who was now standing upright after recovering from Daniel’s jab. Daniel’s left fist found its target, delivering a knockout blow.

As Daniel stood above his fallen foes, he felt a pain in his chest. The pain was not caused from battle wounds, but from too much stress on his heart during the battle.

He winced as he sent signals through his neural pathways, easing his heartbeat and slowly bringing himself down from his pump.

Then he remembered one final piece of business he needed to attend to.

He turned toward the bar owner, who looked on in horror at his men scattered around the floor of the bar. Then he looked up at Daniel, a new sense of terror in his eyes.

“Please keep your hands off the lady,” Daniel said in the same cool voice he had used when the whole encounter started.

The bar owner didn’t say a word, only nodded in terrified comprehension.

Daniel took the back allies back to Elite from the bar as to avoid the police whom he knew must have been called at some point during the bar fight.

The momentary pleasure he had felt from taking down the bouncers at the bar had now faded as he realized that he had gained absolutely nothing from it. He stood up for a young woman – yes, but she had put herself in that situation, and it probably hadn’t warranted critically injuring four men to get her out of it.