He shifted his weight to the balls of his feet, lowered his center of gravity by two inches.
Brought his hands up, not in fists, but open palms forward.
A Krav Maga ready stance, so subtle it looked like he was just standing there.
Brody reached him first.
The big man came in fast, faster than most people expected from someone his size.
He loaded a right hook, classic boxer’s punch, full rotation, maximum power.
The kind of swing that ended bar fights in one shot.
But Caleb had seen it before it started.
The tell was in Brody’s right shoulder.
It dipped just a fraction, just enough, a half second before his fist began its arc.
To anyone watching, the punch was sudden.
To Caleb, it was a letter he’d already read.
He slipped left. The hook passed his jaw by less than an inch.
He felt the air move across his cheek, and then he answered.
One elbow strike. Muay Thai. Short range. Driven from the hip, not the arm.
It connected with the hinge of Brody’s jaw, the exact point where the mandible meets the temporal bone.
The impact traveled through Brody’s skull like a shockwave through water.
Brody’s legs disconnected from his brain.
He went down face first into the concrete.
Didn’t break his fall.
Didn’t try.
He was unconscious before he started falling.
Three seconds.
The yard went silent.
Then Trent came.
He was faster than Brody, smarter too.
He didn’t charge. He closed the distance with short, quick steps, keeping his body tight, his center of gravity low.
His right hand came out of his pocket holding six inches of sharpened plastic.
Caleb saw the blade. Saw the grip, overhand stabbing angle. Saw the trajectory.
Krav Maga. Weapon disarm. Sequence seven of 12.
Trent thrust forward.
Caleb sidestepped, caught Trent’s wrist with both hands, and rotated it outward, hard and fast.
Trent’s fingers opened involuntarily.
The blade hit the concrete with a sound like a pencil snapping.
Caleb kept the rotation going.
Trent’s elbow locked. His shoulder followed.
One more degree of rotation and the joint would separate.
Caleb held it right at the edge, enough to control, not enough to damage, then shoved Trent forward.
He stumbled three steps and hit the fence.
Five seconds total.
Two down. One left.
Slade.
The big man was already moving.
He’d pushed off the weight bench and was crossing the yard at a dead run.
Not strategic. Not technical. Just raw fury.
Three hundred pounds of it barreling forward like a freight train with a grudge.
He was counting on mass, on momentum, on the simple physics of a large object hitting a smaller one.
