Fight or Fall (4 page)

It’s been said that everyone’s lives are pre-determined. From the moment of conception, your life’s plan had already been mapped out.

It’s called destiny, fate.

Well, I say fuck that.

I thought my destiny was to be a swimmer. An Olympian. A world-class athlete. I didn’t just say that because I was making shit up. I had four World gold medals to back it up, eight World silver medals, and twenty eight swimming trophies and medals collected since I was ten. Take me out to the pool and I’ll show you how a butterfly stroke is supposed to be done, how a breaststroke is completed by a master, and how to fucking win swim competitions.

That pre-determined shit? That destiny thing? It’s for those idealistic idiots who thought that the world was made up of the seven colors of the rainbow, that everyone in the world was nice and soft-hearted; that shit basically didn’t stink. Or that your own family, your blood, could never betray you.

Whatever destiny I thought of, whatever dreams I had since I was eight until now, it all went down the drain. Never to be seen again. My swimming medals? Gone. My swimming records? All taken down. My sponsors? Done. It’s been six months since it happened. Six months of not talking to her. Six months of avoiding her calls and her e-mails. Six months of distancing myself from the only person in the world who could make me commit such a heinous act.

After the scandal that caused tsunami waves in the swimming world, hundreds of reporters and media personnel wanted to ask me why. I hung up on all the phone calls, declined all the media invitations, and said no to all types of news exclusives.

I might be a man without honor, as she called me, but I still would not lie. If I were to answer their questions, “Why did you do it?” “What caused you to do it?” “Do you regret doing it?” I knew what my answer would be every single time – I thought I was doing it for her. My sister – my only remaining family member, my own blood – the girl, the woman, the person whom I was tied to since she was only a beating pulse in my mother’s womb. Yes, I thought I was doing it for her. Instead, she now saw me as half the man that I was, not the beloved brother she grew up loving and looking up to. I wish I could take it back. But there are no take-backs, no redo’s, no do-overs.

Which is why I am in this situation now.

Could this guy be any more stupid?

Fuck. That
hurt
.

Maybe he’s not that stupid.

The punch to my left side felt like it tore my left kidney open. This goddamned beast who looked like he soaked himself in oil and suntan lotion managed to sneak a punch to my side while I was busy trying to figure out his next move. I’d thrown his body on the floor twice, the last time sounded like he broke his back, and body slammed him into the wall, but he was still standing.

The mysterious announcer whose voice was the only thing I heard in this glass cube introduced this hulking motherfucker earlier as Igor “the Russian” Goric. I hadn’t seen the other fighters. We were kept away from each other most of the time since we were all signed three months ago. I overheard from one of the trainers when I was walking into the gym a month ago that there was a total of sixteen fighters. Some of their identities were a mystery to me. I just knew one thing – we were all disgraced, fallen athletes in each of our respected sports.

Training sessions have been scheduled individually. I don’t know if any one of them had a coach. I didn’t. They, the
company
, offered to hire a coach for me, but I adamantly refused. I didn’t need anyone telling me how to work out, how to fight, how to stand on my own two feet after being punched relentlessly. Fighting was not a sport. Fighting was about survival. Of the fittest. Of the strongest. Of the man who’s the most determined not to be maimed, or die.

Igor rushed towards me, dancing, tapping his feet like a Tango King. What was this guy’s deal? One minute he was punching me, next minute he was bouncing on his legs like a contestant on that fucking dancing show. Seriously? Does this guy think he can toy with me? He looks like he’s setting himself up for success – the way his brows are relaxed now when earlier it was forming a unibrow after I clocked him on his left ear, causing the skin to break and spill blood; the unclenching of his fists wrapped in the white nylon/cotton elastic material smeared with some of my blood; and the shadow of a smirk forming on his arrogant face.

This fucker was going down.

When he lunged at me again, I swung my body to the left, leaving his punch in the air, the space my head just occupied a second ago. I raised my fists up, punching, drilling on the target, moving my whole body, putting all that weight into the punch to his gut. I heard him suck in a breath while I threw another punch to his left shoulder. This time I used my torso as much as possible to spin the punch out from my shoulders. My swimming coaches had told me that my greatest assets were my shoulders. In swimming, my shoulder muscles enabled me to swim efficiently and minimize my strokes. Now I was using those same muscles to deliver the blows that threw Igor’s head from one side to the other, almost 180 degrees in rotation. He spewed out blood, but unless he pressed on the big, red button on his side of the cube, then this fight was not over. He grunted something in Russian. Probably calling out my name in admiration.

Stepping forward, I extended my left fist all the way, lifting my left shoulder to stab him with a jab on his right jaw then quickly following it with a right cross to the left side of his cheek. Igor was no longer smiling; instead he looked like he was barely making it through the night. Earlier he looked like he was suiting up for victory, and now he was cloaking in his failure.

The temperature in the cube was now rising. One of the main components of the cube, which all the fighters have been briefed about, was that the temperature would rise and fall at random. How hot and how cold it would get was determined by a computer. It was supposed to calculate the extremes in temperature that us, the fighters inside, could tolerate without our bodies disintegrating and breaking apart.

Igor was now squirming, his hands wrapped tightly around his waist and he could barely stand up on the giant-sized “Troudeau Enterprises” octagon-shaped logo in the middle of the gleaming white floors. If I was him, I would just stay down. The increasing temperature would weigh him down heavily. When there is a temperature gradient, heat transfers by conduction, meaning all his energy reserves would be depleted, and he would be unable to cool down on his own, thus creating more fucked-up scenarios for him. Yes, in my other life, I’m a mechanical engineer. Was a mechanical engineer, I should say. After the scandal, no respectable company wanted to hire me. My old boss, who used to be my number one fan, did not fire me directly, but while the animosity and disgust at my actions towards the country’s golden boy in swimming might not have been enough for me to quit my job, I resigned because I felt useless and not needed anymore.

Scanning my present surroundings, I saw how the sterile, pristine white floors and the one-way mirrors added to the mystique, the uniqueness of this fighting cage, technically a cube. As if the whiteness of the surroundings would add purity, innocence to the brutality and harsh fury unleashed inside of it. No rules. The last man standing wins. Each of the corners of this enclosed fighting arena was a mirror to the savage nature that humans would pay to watch other people get hurt, beat up, or maybe even killed.

I took my time approaching him. He was still lurching on the floor, sweating bullets tinged with crimson. He tried to pick himself off the floor, tried to stand up, leaning heavily on his right side. He weakly raised his left hand to his chest, an act of defiance, clenching his fists, ready to attack again. He was not giving up. I wouldn’t either.

The name of the game was three million dollars.

As the revolving air around us became warmer, I leaned closer to him, almost crouching on him. “Time to wave the white flag. Punch in your surrender. Don’t wanna have to hurt you while you can still walk.”

I had no clue if he spoke English. His eyes darkened with rage, his chest heaved up, discovering yet another burst of energy. He looked like he hadn’t gotten the memo yet – I would be sending him straight to his mother country. Right. About. Now.

I stepped back four steps to allow him to gain some shred of dignity. I stood on my ground, shifting my left and right foot, slowly bouncing on them to prepare myself. As he roared his body towards me, while screaming, “Nyet!”, sounding incredibly like
net
, I slid to the floor swiftly, and when he was inches from me, grasped both of his legs, gripping the backs of his knees which caused him to fall, displacing his already weakened balance and knocking him down to the floor. The room now felt like a fucking hundred and ten degrees, as he lay grasping for control underneath me. I used the blade of my forearm against his throat and pushed straight back.

Nyet, motherfucker? I think Mother Russia is going to welcome you back with open arms if you can breathe through my chokehold on you.

He sputtered, blood leaking from the right side of his face due to the greeting my assaulting punches gave him earlier. I felt his body flail, slowly giving up. His eyes struggling to stay open. Lack of oxygen in his lungs and the extreme heat inside this cube was not a pretty combination.

I waited for it.

One…two…three…four.

The whole room flashed green, announcing the winner. Igor was now in a dead faint. He was alive. I just sent him to sleep for a while.

I stood up, fixing my blue kick-boxing shorts, wiping the sweat that trickled from my forehead with my bloodied hands.

Fourteen more to go.

Some men fight for fame or glory.

Some for honor.

I had fame and glory.

I had honor. And lost it.

Those weren’t reasons enough for me.

My only reason for fighting is to live.

For her.

For them.

Always for
them
.

Turning the shower to the coldest temperature, I pressed a hand on the lower left side of my stomach. The pain radiated to the back. Shit.

This one was going to bruise. I stayed for a few minutes after the medics checked Igor. He was somewhat gaining consciousness somewhat by the time he was wheeled out on a stretcher. Did I feel sorry for hitting him as hard as I did? No fucking way. He was going to pound me to death if it went the other way. The proof was right here, resting against my hand. He was aiming for my ribs, but somehow I deflected it. The hit he gave me could have punctured a lung if I had not been alert and on the defensive mode.

The cold water helped alleviate the soreness I was feeling. Cold temperature changed the blood flow from my skin to the vital organs, reduced the lactic acid build-up, and increased oxygen all throughout the body. Even if I was worlds away from swimming, I still remember every single thing that my former coach, Chuck Trevails, had taught me.

Chuck had been with me through thick and thin. One of the most difficult things I had to do was face him after I had framed Kieran for opiates. I saw the disappointment in Chuck’s eyes. Initially he hadn’t believed it when the FINA officials told him that I was the culprit, the mastermind of Kieran’s disqualification. But when I confirmed it with him, when I said, “Yeah, I mixed poppy seeds in Brynn’s pancake mixes so that Kieran would turn hot for opiates,” Chuck’s eyes filled with repulsion…then sadness. He was only fifty five years old, but he looked like he had aged twenty years after my admission. He was like a father figure to me. Even after the disgrace I put him through, he still went with me to talk to the FINA and IOC and petition as to when I could come back. The ban was indefinite, pending reviews and decisions from the other officials. But Chuck, he still believed in me, still trusted that there was something good inside of me. Before I left that night to catch the flight to the U.S., knowing full well I couldn’t stay in Shanghai anymore, he had called me and in a weary voice said, “Son, find yourself. You’re a good one. Maybe you’re lost right now. Whatever you’re going through, I’ll be here. I’ll be just a phone call away.” Those words gutted me. Gutted me to the core of my fucking heart. Even then, he was nice to me. I don’t know if I could believe him – that I was a good person,
still
. He was right about one thing, though, I was lost. And I don’t know where and when I’d find myself again.