Overhead lamps turned the asphalt almost white.

Trucks and cars reflected the light in sharp angles. A few travelers stopped to watch from the sidewalk. Brett threw Curtis onto the ground near the curb. “Get up,” he said. Curtis stood slowly. Brushed the gravel off his palms. Blood hadn’t come yet. Just redness.

Just heat. “I said get up faster.” Brett kicked dirt at him. “Or do truck drivers move as slow as they think?” Curtis stood. Straight. Steady. He looked at Brett the way a man looks at weather.

Something that was happening. Something that would pass.

Brett’s students formed a circle around them. Eight young men, all trained fighters, all watching their master with admiration. Someone propped a phone against a truck tire to film. The live stream now had over 3,000 viewers. Brett cracked his neck, rolled his shoulders, dropped into a fighting stance.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” he said. “I’m going to hit you. And you’re going to fall. And everyone watching this stream is going to see what happens when a nobody walks into the wrong rest stop.”

He threw a front kick. It caught Curtis in the ribs. Curtis doubled over but stayed on his feet. Brett followed with a spinning back fist. Curtis ducked it. The fist whistled over his head. Brett paused. Surprised.

“Lucky,” he muttered. He attacked again. A combination jab, cross, low kick. Curtis blocked the jab, slipped the cross, and checked the kick with his shin. Clean. Textbook. The kind of defense that takes years to learn. Brett stepped back. For the first time all night, his smile flickered. “Where’d you learn that?” he asked. Curtis didn’t answer.

Brett came harder. Elbow strike, knee to the body. Curtis absorbed the knee, grunted, and shifted his weight. Brett threw a roundhouse kick aimed at Curtis’s head. Curtis caught the leg midair. Just caught it. Held it there for a full second. Then he let it go and stepped back. He didn’t attack. He didn’t counter.

He just stood there breathing evenly, watching Brett with those impossibly calm eyes. The crowd had grown. Twenty, thirty people now. Some had come out of the rest stop to watch. Others had pulled their cars over on the highway ramp.

The live stream had crossed 10,000 viewers. Brett’s face was red. Not from exhaustion, from embarrassment.