"Really protect yourselves?" Michael felt a chill of anticipation mixed with fear. "Are you talking about fighting?" "I'm talking about survival, about making sure nobody ever puts their hands on you again without consequences. That night, David cleared space in the garage and hung the heavy bag he'd retrieved from storage.
The twins watched as their father transformed the mundane workshop into something that looked more like a training facility. "Your mother doesn't need to know about this yet," David said as he tested the bag's stability. This stays between us until we see how things play out at the dojo." "What exactly are you going to teach us?" Marcus asked.
David's smile was sharp with promise. "Everything I learned in eight years of military combat training. Everything they don't teach in pretty dojos with pretty rules." "Is that legal?" Michael asked.
"Self-defense is always legal." And after what I saw tonight, what's been done to you boys, anything you do to protect yourselves will be justified." The twins exchanged a look that carried volumes of silent communication. Their father was offering them something the dojo never had. Real power, real protection, real respect.
When do we start? Marcus asked. right now," David replied, pulling on a pair of focus mitts. "Because tomorrow night we find out if Mitchell keeps his word, and if he doesn't." He let the sentence hang unfinished, but the implication was clear. The time for talking was almost over.
The time for action was beginning. The garage felt different at 10:00 that night, transformed from a mundane workspace into something that hummed with purpose and possibility. David had moved his truck outside and rearranged tools and equipment to create an open training area. The heavy bag hung from a reinforced beam, swaying slightly in the cool evening air. "First lesson," David said, wrapping his hands with cloth strips.
"Everything you've learned at that dojo is designed to make you predictable. Traditional stances, traditional combinations, traditional responses. In a real fight, predictable gets you hurt." Marcus and Michael stood side by side, still wearing their school clothes, unsure of what to expect from their father's version of martial arts instruction. "Dad, we're not trying to hurt anyone," Michael said carefully.
"We just want them to leave us alone." David's laugh was humorless. "Son, they've been hurting you for two months. This isn't about starting fights. It's about ending them quickly when they start with you."
He demonstrated a basic stance that looked nothing like what they'd learned at the dojo. Lower, more mobile, hands positioned for striking rather than blocking. "In the army, we didn't have time for fancy forms or elaborate techniques. We learned to neutralize threats efficiently and move on. That's what I'm going to teach you."
For the next hour, David ran them through drills that emphasized speed, aggression, and targeting vulnerable areas. No ritualized sparring, no pulled punches, no concern for tournament rules. "Hit the solar plexus, the throat, the knees," he instructed, holding focus mitts for Marcus to strike. Don't worry about looking pretty. "Don't worry about looking pretty.