Gothic Warrior and the Dark Man
by Billy Wong
Gothic Warrior and the Dark Man Copyright © 2012 Billy Wong
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission of the Author. Your support of author’s rights is appreciated.
All characters in this compilation are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
If you would like to be notified of new releases and special deals, please sign up for my mailing list and receive my book The Golden Dawn (#1 in Chronicles of the Floating Continent series) for FREE!
https://my.sendinblue.com/users/subscribe/js_id/2rsmo/id/2
Lincoln sipped the ice water mixed with the last of his double of Kentucky whiskey, his sullen gaze wandering over the shelves of liquor behind the bar as he pondered whether to cut his losses. His friend Jase had recommended this joint as a place to find dates, but Lincoln should've bothered asking if there would be a mature crowd. These kids weren't interesting to him. All they wanted to do was dance and laugh and not hold a real conversation. Maybe he should stop destroying his liver and go.
He vaguely heard movement to his right and glanced over. A curvaceous girl dressed in "goth" style sat down a few feet from him. She was white, but he had no prejudice about color. Her round pretty face might have appealed to him on a better day, but tonight he dismissed her. She wasn't anything special. She'd probably enjoy chattering more with some shallow teenage boy than a grown ass man like himself.
I'm a drunk asshole, he thought as he turned back to his inspection of the liquor shelves. I shouldn't judge her. Who says I'm really better than her or anyone here? I'm thinking like a fucking dick. I should go home and go the fuck to bed.
But goddamn it I need another drink.
"Hey bartender," he slurred, shuffling to the right towards the chubby old fellow, "gimme another double."
"Aren't you here alone? I wouldn't advise having another drink if you have to drive home."
"I don't fucking care, I want a double!"
The bartender looked down. "Sorry, son, but the law's the law. Can't afford another lawsuit."
"Fine!" Lincoln spun away from him angrily. "Fucking pu-" His arm hit something hard and small, which moved, and he heard the ding and splash of glass and liquid hitting the hardwood floor.
"You spilled my martini you asshole!" a female voice said.
Lincoln turned to face the curvaceous goth girl and fumbled in his pocket. "Sorry man." He fished out a bill and offered it to her. "Here's five dollars."
She scowled. "That's a single."
He fished out another bill, a ten. "Fine. Here's fifteen dollars."
"I don't want your money you moron."
Silence filled the bar; it even seemed like someone had turned off the music. "Yeah what do you want then?"
The girl seemed to consider, then smirked. "I want you... to lick my drink off the floor, like a dog."
"Aw no you don't bitch!"
She chuckled. "I know you have pride. Most men do. But I'm warning you, you better do what I say or else..."
"Or else what bitch?" He leaned forward, putting them eye to eye. "You gonna call the cops, or tell your pussy friends to try and take me out?"
The girl seemed bemused. "Are you sure you won't do as you're told?"
"No bitch." He glanced around to see how many of the boys looked ready for a fight. A few bigger kids had edged closer to him, but he wasn't intimidated. "Bring it."
"I would, but you're looking the wrong way."
Lincoln turned back to the girl, and she decked him. The punch lifted him off his feet and spun him to the ground, knocking over a stool in the process. He tasted the salty tang of blood, and an immense pain in his mouth told him she had broken a fucking tooth.
He grabbed the leg of another stool to help him lurch to his feet and stomped towards the stupid bitch. Normally he wouldn't hurt a woman, but this slut had broke his tooth and he was going to teach her the important lesson not to pick a fight with a man.
Before he could reach her, several thick hands grabbed him. The big boys he'd spotted before threw him down, punched, kicked, and stomped him. Cheap ass little shits, trying to look tough but couldn't fight one on one...
"Stop!" the girl cried. "What the hell are you guys doing?" She motioned with her arms for everyone to clear some space. "He's mine."
His attackers moved back, and Lincoln staggered up. "Really? You're brave, but dumb."
"No..." She raised her fists, clad in black fingerless gloves. "I am a Gothic warrior," she said dramatically, "and these are my battle gloves."
He rolled his eyes, then spat out some blood. "Well, since your friends just beat the crap out of me, maybe you should give me some free shots to even it out."
Grinning, she stuck out her chin. "Sure."
Though a voice in the back of his alcohol heavy head warned him not to do it, Lincoln laid into her with a huge right hook. She didn't fall, so he plowed her with a left hook. When that didn't drop her, he nailed her with another right.
"Enough," she said, and gave him a hook back. The room erupted in cheers. "Is all you throw hooks?" She stung him with a straight punch, then knocked him against the bar with a high kick. Dazed, he shook his head. "Not impressed!"
As she approached, he kicked her in the stomach. "I can do more than hook." He tried to follow up with a jumping elbow, but she blocked it.
"Maybe so," she said, holding his arm at bay like he didn't have over sixty pounds on her, "but I will defeat you, dark man."
A fire lit inside Lincoln's heart and filled him with the strength of rage. "What the fuck you racist bitch?!" he roared with a fury that made her eyes go wide. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but before she could he blasted her in the nose with a punch that sent her back. He followed with a thundering overhand right, then a left uppercut. Her legs buckled, but he didn't let her fall all the way down. As she toppled forward he caught her neck in an underarm choke and cranked on it, dangling her in his hold.
She recovered and clasped her arms around his waist, lifted him into the air and drove the small of his back into the edge of the bar. Lincoln yelled in pain, then managed an "Oh hell no," while she spun him around and hurled him onto a table. One of the table's legs snapped, and he slid awkwardly to the ground.
"Somebody better pay for that!" the barkeep said.
"Sure, whatever," the girl replied. "Here's a hundred dollars."
Although his back was screaming as if impaled with lances of fire, Lincoln forced himself to scramble to his feet. As the girl tried to close her purse, he grabbed her by the hair, pulled her head down, and kneed her repeatedly in the jaw. She collapsed to her back, tried groggily to raise her head. Lincoln dove after her and landed a falling, crushing elbow to her face. He stood, leaving her spread eagled beneath him. A hush fell over the bar.
He should have stopped there, he really should. But her words of a "dark man" fueled his venom. He leapt into the air and delivered another higher, more devastating elbow.
The girl moaned and rolled away from him, covering her face. Lincoln couldn't help feeling a twinge of sympathy for her, bigot or not. She had picked the wrong fight and gotten hurt, bad. The humiliation and shame for such a proud person would not leave her soon.
Then she rolled to a crouch to stare at him, and he realized there was still fight left in her. What the fucking hell? He had finished bigger men than himself with blows like tha
t.
"That was pretty good, pretty good. I won't hold back anymore."
Lincoln groaned. "You're bluffing."
"We'll see."
They charged one another and collided like bulls, punching blood and spit out of each other's faces again and again. She isn't trying to dodge, Lincoln thought as time slowed down. Maybe I should just throw hooks. Maybe I can outlast her. Her neck is skinnier than mine.
As if reading his mind, she stepped back and hit him with a roundhouse kick to the liver. He hugged his middle and fell back, tried to roll through. Lincoln came slowly, agonizingly to his knees only to eat her running knee in the mouth. His spine slammed against the floor and he felt his broken tooth leave his gums and, horrifically, slide down his throat. He sat up and saw the girl backing up for another knee.
If it wasn't for the support behind him, he would've never got up in time. But he put his back against it and levered himself up. She ran at him, left her feet for a flying knee. With every ounce of energy he could muster he jumped to intercept her with a punch. His fist met her chin, and her own momentum fed the impact. She went limp in midair. They both fell to the ground, her flat on her back, him kneeling over her.
"You lose," he said weakly, and mounted her supine body. From there, he punched her face repeatedly. She seemed unconscious, her arms flopping limply, but he wasn't convinced of her defeat.
Sure enough, she recovered, yet even though he predicted it he was too slow to avoid her counter. She caught his right arm following a punch and bent it backwards, threatening to tear the tendons. Lincoln tried to fight the hold, but couldn't overcome her leverage. He screamed in pain, drooling blood onto her stupid goth shirt, wanting to break her stupid goth face—well, more than he already had.
"You give up?" she asked. Her face was a gory, swollen mess, yet she sounded calm.
"Never!" Lincoln barked, his arm shaking.
"I'm gonna break your arm..."
"Never!"
"Snap it in half..."
Lincoln leaned back as if trying to escape, pulling the girl up slightly off the floor. She smirked, knowing he couldn't break her grip like that. But he didn't mean to. He snapped forward, smashing a headbutt into her nose that drove the back of her head against solid wood. She sighed, released the hold and laid there. Lincoln waited. She... still laid there, blood running from her nose.
"Yeah now what, huh?" he said, tears in his eyes, cradling his arm. "Gothic warrior got knocked out!"
She reached up and gouged his eye.
"Ow, shit!" He scooted back trying to clutch his eye with his injured arm, but couldn't lift it high enough so he used his other hand. "What the fuck bitch?"
"Why do you think I keep my nails long? It's not to look pretty..." Still on her back, she motioned with her fingers for him to come at her and flexed her left leg as if preparing to do something.
With one eye shut, Lincoln stumbled towards her. He saw her leg move again and sidestepped to the left at the last moment—only for her right foot to rocket up instead and collide with his chin. The world turned sideways, and it didn't even hurt when his head bounced off the floor. He stared directly forward for several seconds, not sure where he was or what he should be looking for. Then the girl's face popped into his field of vision. She was up, and he... wasn't. He tried to move his arms, his legs, but couldn't get his limbs to work. She could have done anything to him at that moment. She could have killed him, or stripped him naked, or made him eat her shit.
Instead she smiled. "That was fun. Good night dark man." She turned, and was gone.
It took several minutes before Lincoln could even sit up. He expected to be laughed at, but when he looked everyone in the bar gazed back at him with... respect? Everything felt so surreal to him, he couldn't understand it. What the fuck had just happened?
When he could finally stand, Lincoln dragged himself to his car and fled home to rest.