Guysmiley's blog

It wasn’t a typical night at the gym, not really too many working out. Maybe it had to do with school or football starting up again. Whatever the reason, I didn’t really mind pretty much having the place to myself. I was working biceps and triceps, plus some chest and had just moved into the third set of hammer fist bicep curls using 50 pound dumbbells. I had picked up the weights and was moving backwards, intending to do them seated, when someone bumped me from behind, almost knocking me over.

“Watch out, old man,” a voice said from behind me. I had kept myself from falling and glanced up in the mirror. A well-muscled Asian man had sat down on the very bench I was heading for. Odd thing was, his hands were empty of weights of any kind. I placed my weights back in the rack before turning toward him.

“Really, you couldn’t choose another bench to sit on? You had to choose this one?” He starred at me coldly for several seconds before standing up. I stood at 5’7” and a firm 170 pounds. As he came up, I could see he was close to 6 foot and probably 250-275 pounds of solid muscle, a definite body builder type. He moved forward into my space.

“You want to do something about it, old man,” he said with a slight English tone that offset his Asian tongue. Frankly, I was getting a little tired of his slight to my age. Now while I was a tender 63 years old, many thought I acted like a twenty year old. It is always hard to determine the age of most Asians, but I’m going to guess he was in his late 30’s to early 40’s. His muscles bristled as he stood there in front of me.

“I’m not looking for trouble,” I replied, bringing my hands up in front of me in a slight defensive posture. At least, that is what it would look like to anybody observing us, that I was showing a “I don’t want to fight,” posture. In reality, I had moved closer to my fighting stance, not wanting to be caught off guard. He glowered at me for a moment more, leaning his mass in toward me.

“Is there a problem here,” a third voice cut into the heated air between us like a knife? I glanced over with a slight turn of my head, not wanting to take my eyes completely off the body builder. It was the desk man, an athletic young man named Wade, a nice kid, but more of a ladies man than a fighter. He never even saw the punch coming. The muscled man’s fist caught him square on the knock out line and Wade went down like a sack of potatoes, his head landing hard on the matted floor. He wasn’t moving anytime soon.

By the time the muscled man turned his attention back in my direction, I was gone, taking advantage of the distraction to make my exit, stage left. I was grabbing my stuff out of my locker, shoving it in my gym bag, not even thinking of changing, just intent of getting out while the getting was good. Then I heard it, the swish of the large door leading into the gym proper as it opened. The handle crashed into the wall, smashing the tile behind. He definitely wasn’t trying to be quiet. I stopped dead in my tracks, almost afraid to breath.

“Where are you, old man?” I glanced toward the mirrors over the sinks. I couldn’t see him yet, which meant he couldn’t see me either. By the time he reached the end of the lockers and looked down my aisle, I was no longer there. But my gym bag was. “You have nowhere to go, old man. Come on out and let’s get this over with.”

I rushed to the emergency exit only to find it chained closed. My mind was reeling. Had he done that or was it just something I’d never noticed because I’d never needed it. I could hear his bulk moving throughout the room, his fists banging on the lockers. At least he was making himself easy to track. But I needed space; I knew I didn’t want to be trapped in the small quarters that the locker room offered. I figured if I could get back out into the main gym, I would at least have a chance for escape.

I’m not sure what it was that told me to duck, but I did so, just in time to avoid being smashed by one of the locker benches he held in his grip. The bench was in full swing, like a baseball bat, and it slammed against the lockers with such force that it snapped. I hoped he felt the repercussions up into his arms. Not that it would stop him, but it might slow him. He dropped the remaining piece and threw a wild right hook toward my head. I ducked under it, changed my level, and slammed my own left hook into his side, intent on connecting with his liver. My blow was spot on and the resounding grunt told me I’d found my intended target. The blow dropped him to one knee and I scuttled past him, heading for the door. I hoped the pain would last long enough to give me time to get out of the place.

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I glanced back at the weight area, disappointed to see Wade still lying on the floor. I got to the front door only to find it locked. I checked the lock for the keys but they weren’t there. I was quickly searching the desk area when I heard the roaring voice coming from the locker room.

“I’m coming for you, old man.” I had to find a secure place to hide. As the door from the locker room swung open, I ducked behind the counter, pretty sure he hadn’t seen me. I was digging through the desk drawers, looking for anything that might double as a weapon. My own knife was still in my bag in the locker room. All I could come up with was a stapler and to my surprise, a kubaton. They weren’t much, but they were something. Staying low, I moved to the opposite side of the front desk area, trying to put space between him and myself. “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

I heard some rattling and raised myself up to see what he was doing. He had picked up a bar bell and was stripping the weights off it. As the last weight fell to the ground, he brought the bar up, holding it in two hands across his chest, like a spear. His spear against my stapler and kubaton, not exactly fair odds. He passed by my hiding place. Lucky for me, he didn’t look down but just walked past. I jumped up, my feet leaving the ground, slammed the stapler against his ear and hit the top part, driving a staple through the fleshy part of his ear. He bellowed in surprise, but it wasn’t enough to stop him, as the spear in his hand came swinging around in a forward slash. I barely managed to avoid the tip of the bar, but I also knew what was coming next. As the backslash started toward me, I was already on the move, my arms in a classic general defense posture, my body moving forward. My arms wrapped the bar at the same time my shoulder slammed into him. Even with his massive bulk, this drove him back. Wrapping the bar with both hands, I had to use other weapons on him. A knee to his groin, an elbow to the back of his neck as he bent over, another knee to his face, a side head butt as he came back up, a side kick to his left knee. Then I had the spear in my hands. He bellowed again and charged. I slammed the tip of the bar as hard as I could into his gut, brought it up under his chin, swung it from the side, catching his head, then a repeat from the opposite direction. Holding it tight, I brought it straight up into his groin. His knees buckled and he sank down to them. Still wielding the bar, I moved behind him and brought it up under his chin, choking him. His meaty hands grabbed the bar on both sides and he started trying to push it away from his throat. I knew I didn’t have long before his obvious strength would beat my precarious hold. I put a knee to his back and pulled back harder but I could tell it wasn’t being effective. That’s when I got an idea. I suddenly let go of the bar and his arms shot forward. My right arm snaked down his chest and back up around his throat, my elbow crook closing on the Adams apple portion of his throat. My left hand came up and my right grabbed that bicep and the hand went behind his head. I dropped back, pulling him into my guard, locking in my hooks. I tightened the rear naked choke, giving it everything I had. He didn’t even have time to let the bar go, freeing up his own hands, before the lack of blood shut his systems down and he went slack in my arms. I kept the hold on for several more seconds to make sure he was out. Finally I let go, rolling him to one side. As I was getting up, Wade came over, one hand to his bruised jaw.

“What happened,” he queried, seeing the unconscious mountain of muscle on the floor.

“I have no idea, but you got something we can tie him up with before we call the police?” Wade stepped behind the desk and came back out with some zip-ties. Between the two of us, we had him hog-tied in a manner of moments, including using the bar bell to help hold his arms. He started coming to just after we finished and Wade was on the phone.
I leaned in close so only he could hear. “Chose more carefully what old man you pick on next time, punk.”

He was glaring at me as I walked away.

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