seconds. everything on the bus happened in a space of about twenty seconds max.
later, i replayed the assault in my head and broke down my reactions as follows:first, i became completely detached from the situation. i went in to absolute denial. i thought for an instant that maybe if i closed my eyes he would go away. i would open them again and he would be sitting calmly in his seat, not lumbering towards me screaming and flailing. maybe he would not be there at all. i seem to have already hallucinated twice today. maybe he was just part of an ongoing trend. maybe if i breathe deeply and concentrate, i can disbelieve him away.
that didn't work. he was real enough to give me a swollen left ear and turn both of my forearms in to one big contusion.
the denial part of my response-to-crisis lasted maybe a half second. the next half second was spent having a deep existential conversation with the universe-something along the lines of "why me? am i not a good person? did i screw up in a previous life?"
a half second later and the universe had yet to reply, but the part of my brain given to self preservation was saying a lot. i raised my arms in front of my face to take the first salvo of punches. the pain in my arms turned to numbness with amazing speed. then he wasn't punching anymore but instead was trying to pry apart my upraised arms, probably trying to get to my throat or my eyes.
i was trapped in a bus seat designed for one small person, not two large guys. i got both of my feet off of the floor and up to the seat. i used my legs to launch me sideways into the seat behind mine. i ended up crumpled into a sort of fetal shape with my legs in the air and my head on the seat and in no better of a position to fight, but at least he is not right over me.
when a wave person goes mayhem, they lose all of their higher brain functions and become creatures of pure rage. they have the psychotic energy and overwhelming desire to kill, but, fortunately for the rest of us, the effect does not increase their coordination or reaction time. the wave stands there, unable to comprehend how i could be in front of him one instant and gone the next. an attacker with just a little more awareness would simply slide over and continue his attack, but this is beyond him-for now. i need to get out of the seat and in to the aisle, where i will at least have a little more room to maneuver.
luck seems to be with me, as the driver is now on his feet shouting profanity laced threats. the still detached part of my brain hopes that he remembered to stop the bus. the more present part of my brain moves me in to the aisle. just as i have my feet under me and am beginning to stand, the wave whips around and throws a fist like a stone at my head, i duck, but my left ear takes the blow full on. i see stars....
and like that i go blank. if the stress of everyday life can send me in to a fugue state, just how long did i think i could fight without going blank?
that should have been the end. blanked out and helpless, the wave should have pounded my skull in or crushed my larynx or driven rib bones in to my heart and lungs.
but it wasn't my day (to die). when i blank, usually that's it. lights out. this was different. this episode had.... substance.
i was in a darkness that wasn't true darkness, but something more like an energy without room for light. there was a voice.
"what's shaking there, bobby?"
the darkness parts like frost being wiped from a car window. the mayhem wave is standing over me, screaming, but at the same time he is not there. he is at the other end of a long tunnel.
the voice again : "oh dear. can't have that now, can we?"
i wake up, not knowing if i have been out ten seconds or ten days. at the other end of the otherwise empty capmetro bus, the wave is clubbing the driver to the floor with one brutal punch after another. the driver has maybe two seconds before something irreversible happens to him. i stand there on rubber legs, trying to shake traces of the blank effect from my head. i know i should be saving the drivers life, but i don't know the how of this. hear the rear door slide open behind me, and this almost makes me laugh. how drunk or stoned would someone have to be to board a bus not noticing a murder in progress?
"excuse me please." someone crowds past me in the narrow aisle and i register a glimpse of short blond hair and wire rimmed glasses and realize that it has to be the snotty college kid who had been studying me like a bug under a microscope.
the wave is standing with his legs parted slightly for balance. he doesn't notice the kid standing behind him until the kid launches a kick between mayhem boys' legs with such brutality that i swear it can be felt standing almost ten feet away. my hands move reflexively to cover my own privates.
any man not wearing a titanium jock strap would have been permanently disabled by a kick like that. the wave is still on his feet, though. before he can turn all the way around, the kid slides his right arm behind his neck and and curls his left arm in front of the neck. the kid is seriously outweighed by the wave, but using this choke hold he has the wave on his knees and then on the ground, out cold, maybe dead for all i can tell. u. t. must be offering courses in submission fighting 101.
college boy looks at the two limp bodies at his feet, not even bothering to check the drivers' pulse. he walks up to me and grabs my i.d badge hanging from my throat. he begins reading my name and vital information out loud, like he is relaying information to an unseen partner. i realize that his glasses probably double as a bluetooth.
i wonder if he is an undercover agent or just a teenage martial arts freak. he glares at me, and with a snarl in his voice, says:
" great. first anger, then violence. your damn lucky you only fought a defensive battle. they ought to send you back to the ..."
"let me guess" i interrupt "back to the chalkboard?"
he laughs. "you wish."
he sighs, his shoulders sag. he looks at the bodies.
"fulton, you have had a long day. get your sorry ass home before the cops get here."
to be continued.
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