“About time you all showed up. Even though the bastards are already gone,” said Jack as he approached them, a towel still on his wound.
“And you are?” asked the taller of the two. His scruffy beard was almost unnoticeable.
“Jack Montferrand. And you?”
The shorter one scratched Jack’s name on his notepad as the taller one responded. “I’m Senior Inspector Ko, and this is my partner Inspector Chiu. We are from the crime and security department. We got a call about gunshots going off.”
Jack switched out his bloody towel for the waiter’s towel. His bleeding had slowed down significantly. “Gunshots? It was just a brawl. The guys who started it already ran off.”
Ko gestured to Chiu who closed his notepad. “Was it upstairs?”
“Yeah, but they aren’t there anymore. They already ran off and are getting away.” Jack pointing outside.
Ko looked at the stairs before redirecting his gaze back to Jack. “Can I at least go up there and see if everyone is alright?”
“And let them get away? What kind of inspector are you?”
“One of the best. That’s why I’m going up there.” Ko took a step, but Jack took a step with him.
“You aren’t going up there till I get your badge number.” Jack gave the bloody towel to the waiter and took his notepad and pen from the waiter’s apron as he just stood there wide-eyed.
“Do you live here?” Ko folded his hands and gave Jack a hard glare as a boxer would his opponent.
“Just got here.” Jack glared back, knowing he had passed the moment to act as a confused traveler and would have to be as hard as the cop to survive.
“Well, let’s hope we don’t see that much of each other, for your sake.” Ko turned to leave with his partner and gave the officer outside no notice as they got into a non-descript car with a single rotating light on top. Jack watched as they drove off into the busy city streets. Jack threw the notepad and pen back to the waiter and took up his towel once again. Jack walked out as the last officer outside got on his motorcycle.
“Were you the one that called it in?” asked Jack as the officer placed his key into the ignition.
“I was.” The officer was a young man, younger than Jack.
“Thanks, I’m glad someone at least cared about people’s safety.”
The officer gave a perfect smile. He looked like a stock photo of a perfect cop: short stylish hair, white teeth, and clean-shaven face. “Just doing my job sir. I’m somewhat new to the force, this being my first year, so it’s encouraging to know that I’m doing it right so far.”
“Really? New to the force? Are you from the area? Because I just got here today, and I’m still getting my bearings.” Jack removed the towel. The bleeding had stopped, though the throbbing continued. “Know any good places this side of town to get a drink or a bite to eat that doesn’t have fights?”
The officer laughed. “Well sadly I don’t drink, so I can’t help you there. But for places to eat: there’s always a great selection of food carts at the Hong Kong Park up north that I like going to. A lot of great food for cheap.”
“Cool, I know where that is. I’m Jack by the way.”
“Fu,” answered the officer, extending his hand. “Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too. I take it you patrol this area?”
“Whenever I get a chance I do.” Fu’s chest puffed up slightly. “Though this is the most action I’ve gotten in months. Most of the time I’m doing paperwork for senior inspector Ko and working the front desk. He lets me do this patrol for a little extra cash and experience.”
“Well, I don’t want to get you in trouble with him. He seems like a hard fellow.”
Fu chuckled. “Yeah, I suspect that’s what happens when you spend so much time butting heads with the triads. Ko isn’t that hard, though. I think he just enjoys fighting the triad rather than doing regular cop work. Anyway, I should get back to my patrol. It was good talking to you. I hope to see you again.” Fu placed his helmet on.
“I hope so too.” They said their goodbyes. As Fu drove off into the night of the empty street, Jack said under his breath, “I hope we see each other real soon.”
Chapter 6
Dragon Fire
Y u was silent for the entire drive from the hotel to their undisclosed destination. Jack asked once what he was in for, but Yu didn’t answer. The ride gave Jack a good view of Hong Kong. The streets bustled with traffic in the early morning. The modern buildings shot up to the sky with a gloss on them similar to a new cell phone being taken out of the plastic. Looking back to ground level, he saw into an alleyway where a homeless man slept in a telephone booth, ignored by pedestrians and city workers. After several minutes of driving, they finally came to a halt at an old gym surrounded by a wire fence that sat at the edge of Hong Kong’s business district. It seemed more like a huge, single, red brick than a building. No windows, no decor, just a door in the front and a fire escape around the corner to the second floor. Jack followed Yu out of the car and toward the gym. Yu stopped Jack, pointed to the main entrance, and said: “You take that door.” His voice and movement were sober, putting Jack on his toes. Yu continued to the fire escape on the side of the gym.
“Any advice?” asked Jack.
Yu stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned around. “Don’t show weakness. We aren’t like the European mobs. No favors or friends will help you through this. No cuddling, no hand-holding, no shortcuts. Just dragon fire. Don’t hold back.”
Yu turned around and continued up the stairs. Jack headed toward the entrance. An old faded sign saying ‘Gym’ hung above the door with a dragon head printed onto it, though it was barely noticeable at this hour of the morning. Jack shook all over, bouncing a bit as well.
“Go in, pass the test, climb the ranks, find The Twelve. Simple,” Jack told himself before opening the heavy door and walking in.
The large gym room had a padded floor from wall to wall. Red pillars stood a few feet away from the wall, holding up a second floor balcony that encircled the gym. The second floor at the far end of the room went deeper back. Jack couldn’t see well past this as his view was blocked by a line of people standing at the railing surrounding him. Jack could tell the most significant people were amassed at the far end, while the 49ers - he assumed - stood at his side. Jack saw Li standing in the middle of the onlooking crowd pointing a cell phone at him. Li smiled and gave a thumbs-up when Jack saw him. A woman in her twenties stood beside Li. Dressed in shorts and a tank top, she stood out of the crowd of casual suits, though Jack had a feeling her attire was the most expensive one there. Jack couldn’t find Lóng in the group of observers. An older man stepped out from behind one of the pillars and gave Jack a pair of grappling gloves and a headpiece used in training kick-boxers. Jack, for a moment, thought the floor sounded hollow.
“Take the shoes off,” the old man said in a monotone voice. Jack kicked his shoes off and started to put the gloves on. He took the headpiece and began to put it on his head, but stopped. The old man picked up Jack’s shoes with some difficulty. Jack gave the headpiece back.
The older man raised an eyebrow. “Your funeral.” He took the headpiece and walked to the side and hit a giant gong. The talking settled to a mumble as Jack’s opponent stepped forward onto the floor. His bald head glistened in the fluorescent light. His large, tattooed body bounced up and down as he walked toward Jack, raising his surprisingly large hands.
“You think you’re tough, gweilo?”
Jack did a small bow before raising his fist. His opponent laughed. Jack stayed on his toes and slowly circled his opponent, not wanting to be cornered.
“Come on coward.” He slowly extended his arm out, barely out of reach of Jack’s face. He repeated the motion a few more times as Jack kept moving around him. “I hate wasting time.”
The bald fighter lunged and threw a fist toward Jack’s face. Jack ducked to the side and counter punched his opponent in the ear.
The man stumbled away as Jack made some distance between them.
“I do too,” Jack shot back, noticing his voice carrying further than he thought it would as the second floor was brought to silence.
His opponent cracked his neck and stared back at Jack with a sense of surprise before breaking out a wide grin. “There we go!”
Jack could see, out of the corner of his eye, the crowd pressing up to the railing, all eyes fixed on the both of them. Jack’s opponent brought his hands up, guarding his head better, and quickly approached Jack. He backed up, then threw a leg kick. The man laughed as Jack’s kick just bounced off and didn’t slow him down in the slightest. Jack kept on the retreat, throwing leg kicks and light punches, all of which had no effect on his opponent’s blocks. The man laughed as Jack tried to slow him down till he made his move by throwing a punch while Jack laid a heavy kick into the opponent’s stomach. Jack stumbled back into a pillar. His head felt feathery as his eyebrow throbbed and blood trickled down from yesterday’s wound.
His opponent laughed as he walked closer. “Good try,” he said as he turned sideways and stepped his back foot in front of his front foot and used the momentum to drive his front foot toward Jack. Jack turned sideways, the heel grazed his stomach as it impacted the pillar, denting it. Before he could even pull his foot off the support, Jack landed a cross punch directly at the top of the cheekbone, followed by another punch as the opponent got his feet under him. That wasn’t the end of Jack’s attack: he finished it with a kick in the same spot. The opponent finally got his hands back up and his feet under him, though he had a small limp now. The bald man wiped the blood away that trickled down his face from the scar under his left eye on his cheekbone.
“Thanks,” answered Jack. His opponent had stopped smiling and charged Jack with a superman punch, which Jack blocked but still felt on his face. Jack responded with a flurry of punches at his opponent’s stomach, none having any effect. He backed away as his opponent threw back kicks and punches. Jack waited for an opening. It didn’t take long as his opponent grew flustered at his misses. He threw wider punches and kicks that led to a wide enough opening for Jack’s advantage. Jack began drilling his punches and kicks in the same spot on the face. This made the wound broader, each hit causing a puff of blood to spew out, an eerie resemblance to the men Jack shot and to Crumwell in his last moments. Jack wondered why he thought of that at this time. With each hit the blood poured even faster as his flashbacks became more vivid, until his opponent finally landed one of his shots in Jack’s rib cage. Before Jack could stumble back to catch his breath, the bald man grabbed his head. The left side of his face was mostly clean. Blood covered below his right eye. Jack focused on keeping himself from throwing up while his opponent mocked him.
“Nice try Lumberjack.” He pulled Jack’s head up as he brought his leg back to knee him in the face. Jack quickly clenched his opponent’s head, jerking it side to side to prevent his opponent the stance and control to knee Jack. Before the man got his feet back under him, Jack pulled the bald head down sharply into his rising knee. His opponent went limp on the floor.
Jack bent over, hands on knees. Sweat fell from his face, along with blood. He breathed out and said, “Thanks for the name.”
Li quickly broke the silence, giving a loud cheer and raising his empty hand. Though all the other faces were wide-eyed in shock, the girl beside Li had no change in her expression. She snapped her fingers twice, and without a missed beat six men climbed over the railing and jumped down to Jack’s level, surrounding him. Jack moved to the first one that hit the floor, landing a few solid blows as he tried to recover from the fall. Jack turned to the other five as the sixth was out of the fight for the moment. They attacked all at once. Throwing crowded kicks and punches as Jack kept moving back to the wall under Li to prevent being surrounded. Jack attempted to redirect as many of the attacks as he could while trying to respond to any openings. A few of his offenses hit their mark: throat, neck, and crotch. When three were taken down by this tactic, Jack started to move again so as to keep only one opponent in front of him. That didn’t work too well as the shortest one of them sprinted around and did a flying kick into Jack’s shoulder. Jack sneered in pain but quickly grabbed the kicker’s hair and punched him. He pulled the kicker into a headlock and used his small body as a human shield, laying a punch into his shield to keep him in submission. Jack backed to a pillar and threw the barely conscious boy into another fighter and tackled a separate opponent, dazzling him as his head hit the mat. Jack rolled over the opponent’s head and struck him with a hammer fist as he stood up. The last two fighters stood at a distance for a moment, for once wary of going on. The gong rang, and the last standing fighters relaxed and sat down, breathing heavily and wincing in pain. Jack finally observed the carnage for the first time. Blood spatter covered all of his opponent’s dress shirts.
The older man came up to Jack’s side with his shoes, his face unchanged but his eyes a little wider. “Showers are over there.” He pointed to a door behind Jack.
Jack took his shoes and walked to the unmarked door. As he turned, he saw a glimpse of the onlookers. Their expression mostly unchanged since he landed the first punch. Raised eyebrows and watchful eyes observed his every movement, except for the smiling Li and the girl, who was biting her lip.
Chapter 7
Secure Towels
J ack kept the shower on as he slowly undressed. Once he was down to his undergarments, he looked at himself in the fogging sink mirror. Dark blue and purple bruises covered his body from the shoulders down. His right shoulder had bulged up with blood and was hot to his touch. The rest of the bruises were on his torso, with a few on his legs. His swollen eyebrow had started bleeding out at the corner. He removed the small bandage on his forehead to see if it was bleeding again. It was. He slowly felt around the injuries on his torso to see if he had any broken ribs, which he didn’t think he had. He held his breath and stroked his ribs like a piano. He released a sigh of relief as his assumption was correct. Jack could barely see himself in the mirror as steam filled the entire bathroom and escaped through the door less entryway.
“Dude, you look like you just got out of a meat grinder.” Li stood at the entrance of the bathroom staring at him with a hint of pain on his face.
Jack tilted his head and looked down on Li like a parent with a sassy child. Li didn’t recognize that as his face flipped to excitement. “But, you did it! You survived the Dragon Fire!”
“Surviving and thriving are two different things. I take it I did well?” Jack asked as he stripped down and entered the shower, washing the blood off his body.
“Starting off at the second tier helped you a bit and taking him down that fast. Incredible! Most guys don’t get past him at all.” Li sat on the wooden bench attached to the wall.
“What did Lóng think?” Jack asked.
Li snorted at the question. “He was impressed like everyone else.”
“That’s good. Who was the girl beside you?” Jack turned off the shower and dried himself with a towel.
“Lei Lei, my half-sister.”
Jack chuckled, which morphed into a sneer of pain. “Damn, that hurts.”
Li laughed. Jack came out of the shower with a well-secured towel around his waist. He held another towel over his cuts. “That’s not even the best part,” said Li, with a sense of pride. “You’re the second one to finish it all without being knocked out.”
Jack placed new bandages over his cuts. “Well, knowing now that I made a great impression, what’s next?”
“I’m not sure, I think Lóng has an errand for you before you can become a 49er.”
Jack looked at Li, a band-aid in his hand. “A 49er already?”
“Yeah. I don’t know all the details, but things aren’t great. But it may help us both.”
“I’m okay with that. Do you know what kind of errand?”
Li shrugged.
“What do you know, just out of curiosity?”<
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Li laughed. “I know Lóng still has trust issues, I’m still not sure he trusts me entirely.” As Li said this, his bright face faded away.
“Why wouldn’t he trust you?” asked Jack.
“Just the times I guess.” Li looked down at his hands. “Heard the transition of leadership was hard if it wasn’t for his mom. That’s why I’m glad he likes you so far. It’s personally helping me out again.”
“Why?” Jack finished bandaging himself up. “I mean, you had the chance to just ask me to drop you off someplace where you could hit the road again, be your own man, and stay out of ‘the clutches of the Red Dragon’ as you put it. But your instinct was to come back. Why?”
Li looked up, his head atilt. “I don’t know, man. I mean, I guess I thought I would be safer here, but they aren’t a charity case. Even when my dad was in charge, everyone had to earn their place and… if it wasn’t for my stepmom I wouldn’t have gotten nearly as far as I did while he gave Lóng the moon and Lei Lei the sun. I didn’t want to have to go up against that at the time.” Li rubbed his hands together. His jaw tensed.
“Hey,” Jack said. Li looked up at him. “We will earn our place here. We are going to make this our home.”
Li smiled with a hint of sympathy. “I hope you pass, man,” he said. “I really need a friend I can trust.”
Jack felt a pang of guilt.
Chapter 8
A Mole After a Mole
“I t’s not much, but it will make do for our situation,” said Yu, turning on the lights to his small apartment. A folded-up card table leant against the wall next to the dirty kitchen. “I know the couch doesn’t look like much, but it’s comfortable.” The couch was brown, and Jack couldn’t tell if it was from the fabric or the dirt. It sat in the middle of the living room in front of a new curved LED TV. Behind the couch was a glass door to a balcony big enough for only two people standing.
The Dragon and the Lumberjack Page 3