[ilikeoldchangke]

Jeff could hear his wife hammering and kicking the panels when he shut the rear door. The whole vehicle was shaking when he went to the window and grabbed Billy by his shirt.

Jeff: Billy, look at me in the eye and tell me you will bring her to the Castle immediately.

Billy: I will.

Jeff: I'll see you at the Castle. You hear me? You better be there.

Billy: Don't fucking die out there.

With Jane screaming in the back and threatening to decapitate him, Billy pulled out onto the road and sped off. Jeff was already sprinting back towards Johari’s position. Something told him that the new arrival was not to be taken lightly.

*

The tension between the Johari and the Teacher was palpable. With a sudden burst of movement, they clashed. Johari launched the first strike, his keris stabbing through the air like a striking viper. The Teacher countered with a lightning-fast kick and a follow-up swipe of his twin blades. The krabi whizzing dangerously close to Johari's body, missing his skin by mere millimetres. With the wide swing of his injured arm, a splash of blood was sent onto Johari's face, but he remained unfazed. His silat movements were a mesmerising display of balance and precision, his kris darting in and out, but always just inches from the Teacher's flesh.

The Teacher’s Muay Thai kicks were a blur, his krabi blades a deadly extension of his limbs, always threatening, but unable to strike Johari down. Sweat poured from their brows as they continued to spar, their breaths coming in quick, shallow gasps.

The intensity of the fight was like a storm in an arena, the thunder rolling with each strike and lightning flashing when steel sparked against steal. The Math Teacher usually managed to strike down his opponents in less than a minute. Most of the other Teachers were not his match. But Johari was a lot faster than them and he had a better control of his balance too, countering his strikes and hits with quick weight shifts and strikes. The Math Teacher had never fought anyone like him.

Johari tried to control his breathing. He parried the strikes accordingly, waiting for an opening. He needed to find an opportunity to strike. The Teacher was fast but aggressive in his offence. When executing some of his combos, he had come close to landing a fatal cut. Johari knew that no one could keep up such a tempo for an extended period of time. The Teacher was bound to make a mistake soon.

And as the seconds ticked by, it became evident that the Teacher's impatience was getting the better of him. His strikes grew wilder and less precise, and his impatience hindered him in landing a decisive blow.
Meanwhile, Johari remained calm and composed, his experience shining through. He parried the Teacher’s attacks with ease, his keris always close enough to keep his opponent at bay. Until, from behind him, Johari heard the roar of a motorcycle engine. His focus drifted off the Teacher for an instant, and that instant was all it took for the Teacher to move in for his strike.
Moments before the rider sent his bike flying towards Johari, Jeff threw his body against the rider, sending both of them rolling and tumbling into shrubs and disturbed cow grass. Out of control, the bike flipped and hurdled it way towards Johari and the Teacher.


The Teacher saw the approaching rider, but he would not be distracted. He had seen an opening in that fraction of a second when Johari let down his guard. And that was all he needed. A quick step forward, his left blade down to push the leading keris out wide, his right blade across and within Johari’s guard, and then, its edge would meet Johari’s neck. But all plans, no matter how well-laid, could fail from unexpected factors. On instinct, the Teacher dropped his blades and tucked himself into a sideways roll, just narrowly avoiding the motorcycle as it barrelled past him.

His opponent too had rolled out of the way, losing one of his weapons in the process.
With the distraction past, the two men quickly regained their footing and the melee began again.

*

The Science Teacher was assigned to a different district. He was not supposed to be here, but he could not help it - not when he knew the Math Teacher was in danger. They were a couple - Math and Science always went together. Seeing that his other half was not responding to his calls, he abandoned his students and went over immediately.

After rolling away from Jeff and regaining his feet, the Science Teacher took in the situation. Upon seeing the detonator in his partner's mouth, and considering that their odds were about even, he began drawing the fight away from the explosives and towards the coffeeshop and shophouses behind them. The two Teachers backed their way and retreated into the coffeeshop, closely followed by Jeff and Johari. Less than 50 metres away from then, the coffeeshop had cleared out the moment the sound of gunfire rocked the neighbourhood. It was a peculiar sight to see all the lights on and steam still rising from the boiling soups and food laid out for customers that would not return.

A sloppy kick to Science Teacher’s chest resulted in Jeff getting his foot grabbed and being swept to the ground. He landed hard, but before the Science Teacher could do more damage, Johari deflected a kick with his shin and send a desperate stab that had the Math Teacher scurrying back. The Science Teacher saw his opening and knocked Johari off balance with a right hook, but Jeff recovered and barrel-charged into him, lifting him off the ground and onto a table of half-finished drinks. Everything happened so fast that the men had no time to register pain. Their punches and kicks became a blur. Jeff faced off with the Science Teacher by the drinks stall, while somehow, Johari and Math Teacher were engaged in their own duel up in front of a noodle shop.

The Science Teacher swept a row of coffee mugs half-filled with teaspoons of condensed milk at Jeff, while Jeff grabbed a half-filled tea brewer to meet those flying mugs. Jeff went in for a body kick, but was blocked by the Science Teacher, who, with his bigger frame, lifted and threw him against a POS machine. Jeff bounced back and kicked a rectangular tin of coffee powder towards the Science Teacher, before grabbing two classic porcelain mugs by the ear handles and smashed them on his head. Disorientated, the Science Teacher threw a hard left hook, and despite blocking it with his arm and elbow, Jeff slammed into the cigarette cabinet, displacing the dark packets of tobacco.

Before the Science Teacher could get in another kick, Jeff drove his heel down on the incoming leg, rushing in and landing a quick jab and a right hook. The Science Teacher fell to his right and onto a row of hanging coffee socks. Grabbing the first thing he could reach, he swung a fire extinguisher at Jeff's face, missing him by mere inches. He cursed and threw the extinguisher at Jeff, who, although catching it with both hands, could not regain his balance before the Science Teacher kicked him over the service counter.

Jeff slid and landed against a cleaning trolley. Ignoring the pain, he got up and threw a chair at the Science Teacher who was scrambling over the service counter. The plastic chair merely bounced off him as he broke into a charge. Jeff avoided him and redirected the momentum of his charge into a table of used utensils. The table toppled and utensils clattered all over the floor while the Science Teacher rolled to a stop. He got to his feet and lifted a large round tabletop, then, using it as a shield, he charged towards Jeff.

Jeff executed a forward kick, his foot meeting the tabletop at its centre, but unlike the movies where a single foot could tear through solid tabletops, Jeff only managed to slow down the charge. The large piece of wood forced him stumbling back against the drinks stall, where he hopped across the service counter moments before the panel slammed against the stall and knocking canned drinks all over the floor.


*


Johari was disarmed by the Math Teacher and both men were fighting with their bare fists. The Math teacher had Johari in a clinch and began kneeing him aggressively. But Johari put up a mean defence. He fought himself free after placing a few good jabs to the Math Teacher’s ribs and digging his thumb into the open wound on the Math Teacher’s forearm. The Math Teacher grunted in pain and almost dropped the trigger in his mouth. They separated from each other, Johari diving for his dropped keris, while the Math Teacher pulled out a belt knife.


The Math Teacher's eyes widened in surprise when he found himself at a disadvantage. He realised the wound on his arm had split open during the fight, the angry raw flesh now a gaping wound with crimson blood flowing out. He had lost most mobility in that arm. Johari seized the opportunity, his retrieved keris moving with even greater precision than before. With a swift and calculated strike, he knocked the blade from the Math Teacher's hand and sent it clattering to the ground. He stepped back, his keris poised at the Math Teacher's throat. His purpose was not to strike a pose for the camera - it was meant to distract. The next thing the Math Teacher felt was a dinner knife stabbing into his cheek from left to right, trapping the pressure trigger in his mouth. Blood flowed freely, but the Math Teacher stood there seemingly immune to pain.

Before Johari could end him with a keris to the throat, the Science Teacher slammed a foot into him, sending Johari against the glass display of the economical bee hoon stall. Jeff ran in with a low kick, causing the Science Teacher to stumble into his colleague. By then, the Math Teacher had pulled the knife out from his cheek. He removed the trigger from his mouth and held it up in the air. Johari was about to attack again when Jeff rammed into him, pushing him onto the ground just as the Math Teacher released the trigger.

The explosion rocked the neighbourhood, sending shrapnel in all directions. Bamboo poles with clothes drying on them snapped into pieces and the windows of surrounding HDB blocks shattered en masse. Aquarium tanks at a nearby pet shop were shattered by the shockwave and the fishes flopped about on their bellies on the concrete floor. The shrapnel tore out large chunks of tree bark, some pieces as big as a wall fan, from the 50-year-old raintrees. Crowns of matured trees in the area were given an early trim too. Cars, shopfronts, and even ATM machines were pulverised by the explosion. Lights, fans, and wall tiles in the coffeeshop were smashed into chips of sharp stone that rained down on Jeff and Johari while they hugged the ground. A fire hydrant was cut down in half, while the damaged watermains sent spouts of water into the air. When the smoke died down, there was a crater on the ground the size of a car.

Jeff pushed himself off the ground, covered by debris and food scraps. He looked at where the two Teachers were standing earlier, and they were no longer there.

Jeff: Johari... Johari!

Johari: Am I dead?

Jeff: Not yet… You, okay?

Johari: I think so... How about you?

Jeff: I think I pulled a muscle somewhere, but other than that, I'm fine.

Johari took a look behind Jeff and added,

Johari: Not for long...

Jeff: Huh?

Jane charged into their midst, the mangled metal of one side of the handcuff still dangling from her wrist. Before Jeff could react, Jane slapped him across the cheek, swept out his legs from under him and putting him in a chokehold. Jeff didn't even have time to draw in a breath before his arms flailed wildly as Jane's legs wrapped around his body.

Johari climbed up from the ground and, as he looked at Jeff, on the verge of being choked to death by his wife, he didn't envy him one bit, but a part of him wished Maisura was there with him. Jeff was waving desperately to him for help, but Johari was not about to cross Jane.

Jane: I said I'll fucking kill you...! I mean it…!

Johari: Go to sleep, Hibiki...

That was the last thing Jeff heard before everything went dark and his body went limp. As soon as he was out, Jane let go and checked Jeff for a pulse.

Johari: He won't go that easily.

Jane: I know. I won't let him.

*