Chapter 3

Caleb settled into a comfortable routine with Danny, by simply allowing him to spend all his awake time at the gym.

His workouts attracted the attention of quite a few of the bystanders that often frequented boxing gyms, looking for some little edge in their wagering on fights. Knowing that a boxer was having trouble making weight for an upcoming fight, or that a fighter was nursing an injury, could present a nice opportunity to a bettor.

In Danny's case, he was just moving around the gym, shadow boxing, working on the heavy bag, and jumping rope. It is easy to spot a superbly conditioned athlete, they stand out with their body movements and the ease with which they perform physical tasks.

Being new to the gym, Danny drew a lot of attention. It wasn't so much what he was doing, it was the casual ease he displayed while performing all of his workout routines. Danny had begun to move around smoothly again.

He had been working out for several weeks, when he was approached by one of the matchmakers representing a well known casino. This was a casino with a celebrated boxing history.

Danny was being asked to fill in on one of the under card bouts for a world title fight that was scheduled to take place in another week. Caleb had been adding one or two pounds of body mass each day, until he had attained the weight Danny had requested. He had also restructured the distribution of that weight, so that the waist was smaller, the hips narrower, and the back, shoulders, and biceps muscles increased in mass.

Danny had always possessed strongly built legs, but now, they were more chiseled looking, and the residual internal scarring from an old knee operation had been dealt with, giving the knee greater strength, increasing, by a wide margin, Danny's ability to push off on it.

The knee repair had increased Danny's power with his left hand. Power that he had shown often, as a young boxer, but which had been sorely missed, after the accident that had required the initial corrective surgery.

The casino's matchmaker thought he was going to be taking advantage of Danny, by matching him with a highly rated prospect in the heavyweight division.

He had looked up Danny's record, and knew he didn't belong in the same ring with the young kid they were trying to showcase on the under card.

He thought Danny would present almost the perfect opponent. Danny looked like he'd be formidable competition, but his boxing record indicated his boxing skills had been seriously impaired.

When he weighed Danny, he marveled over his quick weight gain. A month before, he'd fought at one eighty four, and on the scales at the gym, he'd weighed Danny in at two sixteen. Danny would have weighed two twenty, exactly, had it not been for the water weight he'd dropped in that morning's three hour workout, which had taken place right before he was weighed.

Since the fight was to be scheduled for ten rounds, and was the bout right before the main event, the matchmaker's original offer to Danny was only three thousand dollars. This was an insulting offer, especially since he wanted Danny to take the fight on such short notice.

Caleb and Danny knew, from scanning the promoter's thoughts, that the original opponent had been set to receive ten thousand dollars for his participation. This was before he was forced to pull out after suffering a shoulder injury after slipping while training.

"This guy I'd be fighting, isn't he undefeated? I hear he's pretty tough. I think I'll have to take a pass on this one. Three thousand isn't nearly enough to get me to climb in there with him."

"Don't forget, this could be a nice showcase for you Danny. You've never fought in this weight class. Your last fight was a knockout loss against a nobody. You haven't exactly been burning up the circuit as a light heavy."

"That was before I got my hands fixed. Now I can punch, and they don't hurt me at all. I think I can put on a good fight for you, but not for three grand."

"I'll sign you for three, and if you do make a good fight of it, I'll take care of you after. How's that?"

"No, I'll still pass. I'm not sure I'm ready to move up yet. I'm still trying to shake off the differences from all this weight I've been adding. My timing is a little bit off. I feel like I'm getting muscle bound. I need time to find my balance again."

"Look, I'll go to five, because I really want to have a good fight before the title bout, but don't try to hold me up for any more than that." The matchmaker was already getting steamed because, in his mind at least, Danny should have been grateful that someone was willing to take a chance with him.

"Sorry, not interested. Maybe in a month when my hands are completely healed, and I'm used to dragging all this extra weight around." Danny and Caleb knew just how far they could push this guy.

"Danny, this is a mistake. You and me, we could do a lot of good for each other here. You help me out now, and I could help you out later, when you might need a little help. See what I'm saying?" There was a wheedling, whining quality to the man's speech when he pursued things past this second refusal of his offer. He wasn't used to his offers being spurned, not by punch drunk pugs, dead enders, the likes of Danny.

"I'd do it for ten, as a favor to you. We both know what's probably going to happen. I think I can stay with your boy, and hold my own, for six or seven rounds at least, but if I'm wrong, I want to get something for all the pain and trouble being wrong is going to get me."

Caleb and Danny waited as the promoter ran down his other options. He could always fly someone in, from out of town, but that would probably end up costing him more in the end, after paying out the purse, and for the fighter's and handlers round trip flights. It would cost a bunch, not to mention having to put the fighter and his handlers up, as a full comp, at the hotel, for a few nights.

This pug standing right in front of him looked so perfect. He didn't want to take any chances with his fighter. Danny hadn't knocked anyone out in four years, plus he was a natural light heavy trying to move up. What kind of punch could he possibly have?

"I'll pay you eight, and you better not lay down the first time he hits you. For eight, I expect you to really try."

"Twelve now, because I don't like it that you tried to feed me to your lion, on the cheap."

"I'll pay you the ten, but only because I'm going to enjoy seeing my guy turn you into sausage. I won't forget you holding me up like this either. I've got influence around here, and people will call me to ask what I think of you. After this fight, you better head back to Los Angeles, if you ever expect to get any new fights. This will finish you in Vegas."

The next day, Danny stopped off at the Casino, to sign the contract, and to let their own doctor look him over. Later, he had to submit to another physical examination, this time by the doctor hired by the state athletic commission, to give everyone some assurance that Danny would be cleared to go on the day of the fight.

"Why do you persist in engaging in this barbaric exercise, human? I don't have so much excess energy that I can continue to waste it on repairing the damage you will be receiving."

"This is what I do, I'm a fighter. As good as I'm feeling, who says this guy will even lay a glove on me? I might take him out right away. I had eight or nine first round wins, back when I was winning all the time."

"You are not planning on making your usual fight? Are you not concerned that people will notice the marked increase in your abilities? Do you not worry that people will wonder at this new found skill? Can we afford for them to know that you have been repaired and enhanced?"

"A win now would be considered as only a lucky fluke. Later on, after I start winning regular again, that's what people will be expecting from me. Nobody will think nothing about it, until after I've strung a few solid wins together. After I do that, then we'll need to be a little more careful about how I look in the ring. We can't start looking too good, or people will start ducking us again."

"Why do you not challenge this champion you wish to topple? It seems to me that one fight is infinitely preferable to many."

"Fine with me. You set it up, and I'll fight him. I don't know how you're going to manage doing that, but I'm all for it, if you can."

"Which one of these men is your champion?" Caleb was looking all around the gym.

"None of them. You think a world champion would hang out in a dump like this? There's four different champions right now, and I think they all live over in Russia, or someplace around there. This is America, we don't have any heavyweight champions here, not right now. You don't just walk in off the street, and challenge any of the top fighters. You have to earn your shot at them."

"Your thoughts tell me that you believe the process could take five or more years?"

"About that. Right now, it's going to be harder than it would be if I was some kid starting off fresh. I've got a lot of previous losses I'm going to need to live down. I need to do something flashy. Enough to make people look at me in a different light, to forget about how many losses I've had. That's why we can afford to take this kid out quick. Nobody will be expecting anything. They'll just think I got lucky, caught him on an off night, or that he came in cold, not ready to fight."

As the night of the fight drew closer, Danny had Caleb cease with his all night poker playing. Feeling the need for some favorable pre-fight publicity, Danny was offered a small suite at the Casino that was promoting the boxing matches.

In return for the free rooms, Danny agreed to make himself available for any members of the press, or any other media that wanted to meet and talk with him.

Except for a single question, asked at the weigh in, by a Los Angeles based reporter, Danny wasn't invited to be interviewed before the fight.

"Danny, after tomorrow's fight, will you be announcing your retirement?"

"If I should lose tomorrow, I'll have to really consider it." The media people who were familiar with Danny's fight history, over the past six or seven years, greeted his statement with a small chorus of muttered remarks. With the exception of Danny, no one in the room thought he stood even the slimmest of chances in his match.

Happy with his official weight coming in at two twenty, right on the button, Danny waited around to pose for some pre-fight photos with his opponent. The kid was tall and rangy, with a big wing span. Danny thought it might be a three or four inch advantage for the kid. They were close to each other in weight, with Danny having a one pound advantage.

Caleb was reading the opponent's thoughts, allowing Danny to listen in as well. There was no hint in the boy's mind that there was even the possibility that he could lose. In fact, he was already planning on attending several post fight parties with his new girlfriend. He loved Las Vegas. Loved it like Danny had, and like several hundred other young, still rising, boxers who had come before him. The kid was enjoying the new world that was opening itself up to him. His fists were making his future, and he was determined to make it last for just as long as he could.

Danny saw a lot of his younger self in the kid's seemingly endless belief in himself. He had the confidence that came from never having any reason for doubting his future. Danny felt certain that he was going to untrack the kid's future with the upcoming fight. There was a small, wistful, part of himself that wished he didn't have to do it. He knew how devastating that first loss could be.

The night of the fight proved somewhat anticlimactic. Danny was as tense and high strung as he had ever been before a big fight. He remembered the feeling. It came because he knew that he was going to win. It had been awhile since he went into a fight having the jitters and being on edge.

Caleb didn't understand, couldn't understand what this fight meant to Danny. This was what he lived for. He'd never gotten tired of feeling the energy, the electricity, the sense of anticipation, that went through any crowd gathered in an auditorium, waiting for a big fight.

Even though the main bout was only a world's light welterweight title fight, the mood was festive, and the fight was well attended by famous people from the boxing world.

When he finally was called out of the waiting room for his fight, Danny was loose and sweating. He felt an unaccustomed strength and power coursing through his body.

Caleb, wanting to take no chances at all, had infused Danny's body with highly efficient energy receptors. Every nerve and synapse was functioning at or near its peak performance capability. For the duration of his time in the ring, Danny would be operating as never before.

The fight started off with a quick left jab, immediately followed by a straight right hand, both from the kid.

Danny blocked the jab, slipped the right hand, then fluidly countered the right with a perfectly timed left hand of his own.

That punch, landing perfectly on the kid's jaw, effectively ended the fight, putting the kid down to the canvas for an early eight count.

When he got up, he was still groggy, confused from the impact of the punch he hadn't even seen coming.

Danny moved right in when the ref signaled it was okay, landing a three punch combination, putting the previously undefeated contender away for the count. The whole fight lasted less than a minute, and the crowd was stunned into silence at the sudden, totally unexpected, ending of the fight.

After the fight, Danny was interviewed while standing in the ring. In this interview, conducted by one of the pay per view ring commentators, Danny was able to watch the knockdown, and, later, the knock out, several times on the monitor the crew placed in the ring for the commentator's use in the post fight interviews.

Part of the reason for the interview had been to allow a few extra minutes of delay, enough for the main event fighters to get ready to make their appearances. No one had anticipated such a quick ending to the bout.

"Danny, I must admit, most of us, gathered here at ringside, we didn't expect such an easy time of it for you." It was obvious, from the commentator's thoughts, that he had believed the fight would end with Danny, himself, being counted out by the ref.

He had his notes prepared for the anticipated post fight interview, but it was notes readied for an interview with the kid that was trying, with great difficulty, to make his disoriented way down from the ring. His legs were still quite unsteady, and he was shaking his head in answer to all of his trainer's questioning.

"I think he wasn't expecting too much from me. Maybe he saw some tapes of my last few fights, I don't know. I came in here feeling very good. My hands felt good for the first time in years."

"You had a hand injury?"

"Both hands. For several years now. A friend loaned me some money, so I was able to get them repaired. They don't hurt anymore."

"Where do you go from here Danny?"

"Back in the gym to train some more. I felt good with the extra weight tonight. I was afraid it would make me slow, but, I caught him when he missed me, and that slowed him enough so I could catch him again, later. We'll see if anyone else calls, wanting me to fight their unbeaten fighters now."