I was lucky. One of the microscopic supernova explosions sparked just inside his hand. It looked as if someone had set off a firecracker underneath his skin and the gun fell into the gaping hole in the ECC. We rolled up staring each other down. Johnny shook his bloody hand and snarled at me.
"That's gotta' hurt, Johnny," I taunted him. Then I saw motion out of the corner of my left eye. Johnny made a dash for the motion and I followed.
Tabitha had been playing 'possum. She bear crawled as fast as I had ever seen her move for the first gun that Johnny had dropped. Unfortunately, she didn't make it. Johnny stomped on her hand with his left foot and kicked her hard in the chest with his right. Tabitha's ribs were bruised already and were probably broken now from Johnny's kick. I was on top of Johnny before he could kick at her twice. He would pay for that!
He turned to me as he swept the gun away from Tabitha with his right foot and turned the momentum of the sweeping motion into a left-leg spinning side kick. I blocked the kick with my stomach. Had I been wearing a mouthpiece I could have spat it on him. I heaved out twice as I backed up, blocking at his follow-up punches. He got me good on the side of the head with one of them and I saw stars for a second.
"Turtle up!" Bob would have yelled at me. Therefore, I did. If you are ever being attacked too quickly to defend against, cover up as best you can and take it. Try to get inside to cut off the full force of the attack. Bruce Lee was always fond of saying that there are three regions of fighting. One is within a few inches where you're grappling with your opponent. The second is at kicking and boxing range from your opponent. Everybody trains for these two distances. The third distance is in between one and two where most people don't know how to attack. This is why Bruce Lee developed the famous Six-Inch Punch.
I realized that I had to get inside region three if I was going to survive. So, I turtled up and crowded him. This cut off his kicks. He countered by throwing hook punches to my ribs and head. I bobbed and weaved, and ducked and covered until I could catch my breath. The spin sidekick to the stomach had taken some of my wind. With all of the astronaut training over the past six months, I hadn't done as many abdominal exercises as I usually do, so my stomach wasn't as hard as it should have been.
Most fights don't last long because they are typically -antisymmetric—the better fighter usually whups the lesser one quickly—but Johnny and I were very evenly matched, except that I had already had a pretty rough day. I was getting tired and something had to give. So, I shoved Johnny back and pushed him harder by following with a thrust front kick, stomping him in the bladder thus pushing him as far away from me as I could manage. His knees buckled for an instant but I needed to recover for that instant and couldn't continue to press.
"This has been fun, Doc," he said, as he wiped blood from his nose with his sleeve. He held up his wrist. "Will one of you guys get over here and shoot this bastard for me!" he yelled into it.
"What's the matter, Johnny? Can't beat an old man by yourself?" I taunted him while trying not to give away that I was very tired.
Johnny moved around to keep himself between the handgun and Tabitha who was trying to stand, obviously in serious pain. I saw a flicker of motion through the trees at the edge of the clearing and knew I didn't have much time before Johnny's backup would be drawing a bead on me. I circled counterclockwise toward Tabitha, trying to keep Johnny between me and his crew.
"Enough of this!" I screamed at Johnny as I rushed him with a left leg jump bicycle roundhouse kick that caught Johnny square on the jaw turning his head.
"You are going down, Johnny fucking Cache!" I was enraged. Left leg outer crescent kick, right leg round house, spin left outer crescent kick, right leg tornado roundhouse kick, backfist, reverse punch, "Kia!" I yelled.
Johnny dodged and parried, and slipped and blocked. He was on the defensive. I had to keep pressing while the adrenaline was flowing because I knew that when I came down from this rush I would be physically wasted.
I had to use the adrenaline. I had to get angry! He blew up the Shuttle and killed all those people! Our friends! He shot Tabitha! I blocked every punch Johnny attempted and I managed to slip by each kick.
Forget that "Luke never succumb to the Dark Side crap," if someone is trying to kill you, get angry, get pissed, get evil. Do whatever you have to do in order to stay alive. You can get philosophical about it afterwards, if you survive that is. The Dark Side was coursing through me like water through a sieve. Son of a bitch, HE WAS GOING DOWN!
I followed an uppercut with a jab. Johnny ducked the jab so I turned it over into a hook punch and caught him right on the jaw. His eyes rolled white for a split second, which was all I needed. I jumped and switched feet in the air bringing my back leg into a roundhouse kick that landed in his left ribcage solid enough to break bricks. He heaved. I heard a crack! Then I heard several whizzing sounds whip past me followed by cracks. I realized the cracks were from a rifle.
Johnny punched at me with his right, so I slipped left and caught his wrist with my right hand and pushed through his elbow with my left palm heel. His elbow snapped into two pieces like a stick. Skin, pulled muscles, and torn cartilage were all that held his ulna and radius forearm bones to his upper arm bone. Johnny let out a scream.
Then a searing hot pain ripped through my right shoulder. I had been shot. I grabbed Johnny by the hair and pulled his body to mine, his back to my chest. Bullets slammed into Johnny forcing us to the ground. One of the bullets pierced his neck and entered my chest just below and to the left of my right nipple and we fell to the ground, Johnny twitching slightly and bleeding profusely on top of me.
I could hear return fire and some scrambling around me, but the firefight lasted only a few seconds. I wheezed and coughed a few times as if I had to clear my throat of mucous drainage from a bad sinus infection. I turned my head toward the probe and could see the pulses of light getting much more frequent and the screeching sound was so high it was almost inaudible and the flashes of light were ranging in color from white hot to near blue. It was actually quite beautiful, in a deadly kind of way.
We had to get out of there soon I knew, but at the moment nothing mattered. I was simply observing everything around me. I was dazed. Seconds passed and a helicopter shadowed the sun briefly. I could see sparks flying from the tail and the fixed wing portion of it. As each shot was fired I could hear Tabitha cursing violently. Then Johnny rolled off me to my left.
Tabitha's silhouette was above me. She helped me up. It was all I could do to rise to my feet. I coughed several violent coughs. I covered my mouth and when I looked back down at my hand it was covered with blood. Johnny jerked twice and rolled over. Tabitha reacted instantly and emptied the rest of the clip into his head.
"That's for Ray." She pulled the trigger. "That's for Terrence." She fired the weapon again. "And that's for Tracy and Malcom you piece of shit!" She fired the last four rounds into his face, or what was left of it. She screamed curses at him and then kicked him in the side and then screamed at him again. Then she turned her attention to me as she nonchalantly tossed the empty pistol to the ground.
Tabitha unzipped my flight suit and pulled it down to my waist. I was still dazed, nearly catatonic, and my chest was a wet blood-soaked deep red. Tabitha looked at both my chest and my back, then she unzipped her flight suit.