Alexi kept his eyes down as he ground his feet into the wall to dry them. His head was freshly shaved and his body had been wiped dry of sweat. Some guys slathered on a layer of oil so they were hard to get ahold of, but Alexi wanted the opposite. I would have swam in Johnsons and Johnsons before coming out if I was given the opportunity.
Like Fedorov, Alexi’s brow eclipsed his eyes. His wide mouth stayed closed. The Bull of St. Petersburg, with those ears like horns, swollen and curling and hard. He didn’t lap the ring or shadowbox. He didn’t look at me, not yet. He wasn’t interested in intimidation. He kept his eyes fixed on the ground.
It all supported my theory: Alexi was keeping a secret. I was betting everything on it.
The announcer started in on Alexi. It took a while to introduce him. We were opposites, in terms of notable accomplishments. Alexi didn’t acknowledge any of it, which wasn’t out of modesty, if I was right. When the announcer disappeared through the door, Alexi finally took his eyes off the mat. He watched me like I was a teller at the bank about to mouth next in line.
Alexi didn’t respond when the bell went off. His hands didn’t come up until I moved off the wall. There was no change in his stance from his past fights: orthodox with a wide base. He kept his hands at the midpoint between his shoulders and hips, the perfect height to throw hooks and uppercuts.
I came forward standing tall, closing the distance with my hands high. It had to look bonkers, going right at Alexi, but it was vital to completely adhere to my strategy. If I doubted myself, if I deviated in any way, I might as well have walked up to Alexi, given him a hug, and let nature take its course.
I threw a jab from way too far out. Only a guy with an eye patch would have judged he was in range, but it read like fear, so it worked. In all his previous fights, Alexi had seized the opportunity. A more cautious fighter might not have jumped at the bait so early, but Alexi needed the contest over as soon as possible.
I didn’t wait for Alexi’s overhead right, the thunder punch of the gods, the chosen blow of power hitters around the world. I started moving on the assumption it was coming. If Alexi decided to go to the body instead, I was done.
I stepped through, changing levels as I went, like I was ducking under a half door. Alexi’s forearm skimmed the top of my head. I knew the punch was coming—I had drawn it out purposely—and still he almost got me.
We ended up facing away from each other. I torqued hard, bringing my shoulder and hip around together. The first blow was as clean as I was going to get, so I put everything I had into it. It was only a matter of time before Alexi figured out I’d figured him out.
Ideally it would have been an elbow, but I had ended up farther away than I’d intended. If my legs possessed veto power, they’d have kept on running up the wall and into the stands. I used the heel of my hand instead, keeping my arm loose, letting my body motion provide all the power. I connected exactly where I was aiming, dead on Alexi’s crusted right ear.
It was a waste to hit someone on the ear. If you had the angle, you wanted the temple. On any other opponent it would have been squandering a giant opportunity. But no one had ever hurt Alexi Mirovich when he had his feet under him and I had no illusions I was any different.
I didn’t wait around to observe the results of my attack. I was already circling toward Alexi’s back in an attempt to force him to turn. He cut the angle instead, stepping through to keep an orthodox stance. I squared up and we were back where we started when this all began.
There wasn’t enough space for a punch, but there was enough for a slap. I sent it in a tight arc, cupping my hand on impact, my hip and shoulder snapping, making the blow a concussion, not a push.
I whacked him square on the other ear. The spectators had to be baffled. Ken Allen had just slapped the baddest man on the planet upside the head. Twice.
He had balls, they would one day recall. They probably ended up wherever the rest of him landed.
I circled with a wide dip as the blur of a left hook sped through the spot my head previously occupied. I glanced down at Alexi’s feet and caught him shuffling to stabilize. My heart soared. That miniscule movement proved my theory.
Alexi hesitated. The fast way to get to me meant changing stances. The long way around meant rotating his head 180. Neither option was good for a guy with his condition.
He probably got sick as a kid. Out in the Russian wilderness, where the mantra of medical care was If he dies, he dies. Most likely an infection from rolling. It was impossible to wrestle your entire life and not catch one bug or another.
Usually, it wasn’t a big deal, but Alexi never got the chance to recover. He was put through the wringer every single day of his childhood. Alexi’s father had slapped his ears enough to warp them before the kid’s voice changed. And it only got worse as he got older.
I was leading left and Alexi right, our stances opposite. His expression hadn’t changed but he had to be wondering if I knew or if it was all a big coincidence. I shifted outside Alexi’s lead shoulder, throwing a left at an upward angle, halfway between a hook and an uppercut. It was neither.
It was a slap.
Maybe my hand was cupped just right or maybe it connected at the perfect angle. Whatever it was, my slap cracked off the side of Alexi’s head like a starter pistol. The sound echoed through the silent arena. The whole place was holding its breath.
It was all there in the footage. The two times Alexi had been hurt, he was standing up and turning in the same motion, which was a no-no for a guy with his ailment. He covered it well. His whole game revolved around disguising it. The minimal movement. The hooks to anchor you in front of him. The utter lack of kicks. If Alexi went to the mat, he stayed there. Standing up while short on oxygen was a big trigger for his condition.
It was a good thing I had my hands up because Alexi’s counter hook came for my chin. It thudded off my forearm, and there I was, in hugging range. Another heartbeat here and I was done. I launched myself into the air, turning my shoulder over as I struck, like I was trying to hurl a baseball into the clouds. My hand smacked Alexi upside the ear as I spun away.
Alexi trained remotely and privately, with a small team of guys who had to know. He did all his cardio on his ass. He didn’t drive a car. Then there was his lack of reaction to the announcer, to the bell.
Among other afflictions, Alexi Mirovich was stone deaf.
I used my momentum to fuel an aerial, measuring the distance to avoid collision with a wall. The tumbling routine landed me a solid ten feet away. Alexi closed in, taking the opportunity to shift back to orthodox. He squinted, his jaw tight.
He knew I knew his secret:
The Bull of St. Petersburg had labyrinthitis.
16
For your normal, everyday person labyrinthitis isn’t a big deal. Whenever your balance vanishes, you can take a seat and wait it out. Turn down the lights, reduce your stress or fatigue, and in time your vision will return to normal. You won’t want to puke, and you’ll be able to stand up.
But Alexi was currently trapped under blaring lights, trying to catch an annoying pest who kept smacking him in his ringing ears.
Namely, me.
If I had any chance in hell, it was through triggering Alexi’s vertigo. To accomplish that, I had to get the fluid in his ear rolling around all inflamed. So here I was, playing tag for mortal stakes. Was it wrong of me, taking advantage of Alexi’s affliction? I probably felt as guilty as Paris did, trembling in the bushes with an arrow for Achilles.
We were back where each of us had entered the pit. Neither of us had a mark on them, but now Alexi knew what I was up to. The two minutes our bout had lasted felt like ten. My strategy was a high-cardio one. If I ran out of gas before triggering an episode I was toast.
Alexi went back to basics, shuffling in to close the gap and waiting for me to lead. If I didn’t throw anything meriting a counter, all the better. He’d tie me up and haul me down. If that happened, I wasn’t getting back up.
I darted into range then bounded away as Alexi threw a lead hook, high and tight. He’d adjusted his punch, turning his elbow over and ducking his head into his shoulder to guard his ears. It left his body open but Alexi had bigger problems.
I lunged in, again faking from too far out. Alexi read I was going low and launched an uppercut on course to end me. It missed because I went extra low, hitting the mat to pick his ankle. It was a garbage takedown, easy to stuff, but you had to pull your leg out, and Alexi wasn’t about to hop around on one foot.
Alexi did the only thing he could and sprawled out flat. I scrambled away like Daffy Duck before he could squash me into the mat. It was a huge waste of energy on my part. All these attacks were. None of them had any effectiveness. No fighter in his right mind would have done any of this.
But now Alexi had to get up.
He put both hands on the mat as he looked toward me. I was too far away to take advantage of him being down and I also wasn’t foolish enough to try. You didn’t charge a bull. He got both feet under himself and squatted up slowly, extending his fingers to keep four-point contact for as long as possible, a man trying to stand on thin ice.
Alexi didn’t want to switch feet, but orthodox was where he felt most stable. I waited until he resumed his measured shuffle to dart in again and kicked out at his front calf with my lead leg. All speed, not going for damage, instead trying to upset his base. He had a choice: get kicked or lift his leg.
He chose to get kicked.
I circled, keeping my distance, faking in and out, occasionally kicking at his lead calf. It didn’t always work but it never got me in trouble. The technique was too quick, too noncommittal. My piddly little kicks were too low to grab, too far away to counter with a punch.
My fourth kick was a good one. Alexi’s front foot slid into line with his rear, putting him on a tightrope. He dropped his hands to balance and I slapped him upside the ear. I faked another low kick and he bought it, so I slapped him again.
Alexi didn’t know what to do. There were no rounds, no coaches. His father had always been there to advise him. The son of a bitch who caused his condition in the first place was his sole confidant.
It was always the father. All mine ever gave me was the dual American-British citizenship that was required to play Jove Brand. Guys who spent their lives fighting didn’t do it because they had mommy issues.
Alexi needed to get his hands on me and he needed it bad. It made him desperate. He stalked me down, winging wide punches, looking to either drop or hug me.
I dove into rolling leg scissors. The stupid, showy rolling leg scissors. It was the kind of move an eight-year-old tried. The rare times they worked, you ended up on your back and your opponent on his stomach. Nine times out of ten he would beat you to top position in the resulting scramble.
Except I didn’t try to scramble. I popped up immediately and ran away, leaving Alexi on his knees and elbows. I’d employed another technique useless in the overwhelming majority of scenarios. What was the point of a high-risk takedown that did no damage and conferred no advantage?
Alexi got up again, slow and methodical. His mouth was pursed. To the crowd, it looked like he was patiently annoyed. The pressure the guy must have been feeling. If his condition went public his career was over. He’d managed to conceal it, fighting as rarely as possible for the biggest purses and getting it done quick. Sure, this tournament was underground, but the odds makers were watching. And the gangsters. And the blackmailers.
And he was here as voluntarily as I was. Best-case scenario: participating would get him an early release. Worse case was the choice between fighting or dying. Russian prisons were as dangerous as American ones, except you had fewer rights and no one asked questions when you disappeared forever.
I felt it then: fighter’s sympathy. It happened when you’d studied your opponent, profiled him, lived in his head. Being a fighter, you already identified with the guy across from you. No one else understood the training, the stress, the dieting, the sacrifice. How you traded your health for a livelihood. There was no respect, no deeper mutual understanding than there was between two guys trying to take each other out.
Alexi set his stance. I waited until his eyes were on me to nod my head a fraction. To those watching above, I was tucking my chin. There were three ways out. The first: I picked him apart, humiliated him, exposed him. Eventually he wouldn’t be able to stand without ever taking a solid hit. The second: he tapped out and raised a million questions. Foremost among them: did Alexi Mirovich throw fights?
The third: Alexi took a fall. A hard one.
Alexi blinked, once and slowly. With his head tilted down and his hands up, no one saw it but me. I came forward. He had to work with me for us to pull this off. We had to trust each other. If he was double-crossing, I wouldn’t know about it until I woke up.
I shot for a takedown and Alexi dropped to stuff it. When he did, I came off the mat with a flying knee. It caught him square on the jaw. I felt his head snap back as our bodies collided.
Alexi went down face-first with me on top of him. I pushed off him as I stood, hands ready, but he didn’t move. For a horrifying second I thought I broke his neck. As I bent close to check his breath, my body blocking his face, Alexi winked at me.
I did my best to look like a guy who couldn’t believe his luck, stumbling back, eyes wide in surprise. It would go down as a fluke, the luckiest punch in the history of combat sports. Maybe a month from now it would be revealed Alexi had a 106-degree fever and a preexisting concussion.
The rumor would take years to spread, if it ever did. Only the elite would ever know what happened.
That Ken Allen beat the best guy in the world.
The crowd was dead silent, except the Japanese golf clappers, who tapped appreciation. I went back and pretended to check on Alexi to hide my over-the-top mugging. Medical got there in under ten seconds. I stumbled off toward my unscrewed door.
No one was waiting to greet me. I went for the showers. I was under the water when the shaking started, my body crashing from the immense chemical dump. I propped a forearm on the wall to keep steady, switching arms to soap up.
I toweled off with the oil-stained rag and got dressed. I was no prima donna, but deodorant would have been nice. Even more, I was missing my harness. The weight of it was like a security blanket. Jove Brand, armed to the teeth, didn’t falter in the face of danger. Ken Allen sporting an empty holster quaked.
A handler was waiting in the hallway. In a sign of respect, he kept his distance while gesturing toward the helicopter pad. I stopped outside the nightclub, where I got a lot of tight smiles and a few attaboys. I had cost most of this joint a lot of money, but I’d be damned if I was getting on the helicopter until I knew Diana was safe.
Eventually Fedorov had to come to me. The other alternative was having his goons usher me off at gunpoint, which wouldn’t look too good in front of the patrons. Still, it took him an hour to give up. An hour in which hundreds of people saw me alive and well. It didn’t engender much confidence. When he came, Anatoly was with him. So was Nat, rolling an aluminum case behind her.
“Four hundred sixty-five thousand and three hundred American dollars,” Fedorov said. “Plus five hundred thousand for tournament champion.”
“No belt?” I asked. The case was lighter than I thought it would be. Eighty pounds, maybe.
Fedorov gave a single closed-mouth chuckle, more acknowledgment than amusement. “The Calabria girl is on her way home, with my men in a follow car to ensure she arrives safely.”
I was usually good at spotting a performance but Fedorov was a brick wall. Why had he invited Nat along? To reassure me? If she was just another employee, she should have looked more concerned about being outed.
“Let us speak more at the dacha,” Fedorov said with a gesture.
I took a shot in the dark. “Is your daughter coming with us?”
Fedorov’s coal eyes glittered as he shook his head i
n what I interpreted as disbelief. I took my spot on the helicopter next to the fire extinguisher, making room for Nat, but she stayed behind. This time Fedorov squeezed in next to Anatoly. We all put on our headsets as the rotors fired up.
Maybe my case was light because it was a bomb. I flipped the latches and paused a beat, figuring if it was, Fedorov would stop us from blowing up. There was a lot of money inside but no plastique.
“How do you like traveling like this?” Fedorov asked.
“Beats hanging off the skids.” I clicked the case shut and held it in both hands, ready to block gunfire.
Fedorov rocked in amusement. “Ah yes. That was an impressive stunt in Near Death, going from motorcycle to helicopter. How many takes?”
“Three. One to get the jump right then a second to realize how much momentum I was bringing with me. You know, we came up with it on the spot.”
“Da?”
“Yeah. Kit rented the helicopter for two days to get the aerial shots but wrapped up early. He decided to put the extra time to use, so we improvised some scenes. I almost killed my costar with that flying kick from the helicopter to the rooftop. In addition to narrowly avoiding decapitating myself on the rotors and falling thirteen stories.”
“Fascinating,” Fedorov said. “They should have you record an audio commentary.”
“Maybe if I don’t get locked up for two murders.”
“Relocation is an option. Your skills are wasted here, coddling make-believe warriors. Come work for me. Not only in front of the camera, but also behind. You could name your price.”
It wasn’t a tempting offer, not even for a second. “Are your casino chips valid in Russian stores?”
Fedorov sighed, his eyes fading into shadow. I wasn’t in love with disappointing him but I also didn’t look as good in a mankini as I used to.
“I tried, Anatoly,” Fedorov said, turning to his silent mountain of an audience. “I try to scare him but he is fearless. I try to tempt him but he does not fall. I try to beat him but he prevails. I try to buy him and he is not for sale. You are a fanatic, Ken Allen.”
Jove Brand is Near Death Page 21