Chapter 45 - Three of A Kind

Who are The Three Ts?

If you were to ask the average person in Starlight City's north side that question, most would answer that it's a group of three hooligans running around town on their motorcycles that get money by doing hired gigs that most would refuse. For their former teacher Aken Amnestor, he'd tell you it's just a group of kids who've been dealt a bad hand in life, dropped out of high school, and are just doing the best that they can. For The Three Ts, they'd call themselves a trio of brothers all from different mothers.

But for Club Azure, if you asked them what The Three Ts were, they'd tell you that it's just a pimple they've been ignoring for a while.

And one that they were planning on popping tonight.

"Nice place you guys have set up for yourself," a person says as they make their way through the crowd of thugs.

"Thanks, it took a while to get going," Tim The First Thug replies cheerfully.

"He wasn't serious," Tom The Second Thug replies.

"Oh," Tim says with a sad look in his eyes.

The Three Ts look to see the person making their way forward through several Club Azure Thugs is a Chinese man with short black hair, a rose tattoo on the right side of their forehead, brown eyes, and black nails. The man is wearing a long sleeved white button up shirt, chalk striped blue pants, and brown loafers.

"We'll be taking this place for ourselves though," The man explains as he lights himself a cigarette, "Our Boss says it's about time we exterminate all the roaches running amok like you."

"Roaches huh?" Tim-Tom says, "Haven't heard my dad call us that one. Seems like he's getting more creative with the insults."

"Why are you even here though?" Tim asks the man.

"I'm Li-Wei Zhang," the man with the rose tattoo explains, "My job is to rally up all of our sellers when Mister Pitt wants us to take care of things for him."

"....just call him your boss," Tim-Tom groans, "I swear it's embarrassing to have that last name."

"It's okay man, my last name's McGee," Tim says trying to cheer Tim-Tom up.

"My surname's Dolby," Tom adds.

"Anyways," Li-Wei says ignoring The Three Ts banter, "Since our boss wants you three gone, I'll be doing just that tonight. After all, I am The Arrow of Club Azure."

Li-Wei explains further, "Like an arrow I'll make sure to shoot down anything in my path."

"Oh really? I have a nickname too, y'know." Tim-Tom replies as he gets into a boxing stance, "It's Starlight City's Brightest Boxer!"

"Dude I told you that name isn't gonna catch on," Tom groans.

"Hearing you say that made me throw up in my mouth a little," Tim adds.

"Oh c'mon!" Tim-Tom yells, "So when that dude has a nickname he's cool & mysterious, but when I have a much cooler nickname I'm just lame and corny!"

"Yes," Tim & Tom reply in unison.

Before Tim-Tom can reply with a witty comeback however, Li-Wei manages to swoop in and get a clean hit on Tim-Tom's face. Li-Wei motions for the other Club Azure gang members to rush Tim & Tom while Li-Wei lunges towards Tim-Tom. However Tim-Tom manages to get an overhand hook landing in Li-Wei's face causing Li-Wei to stop for a bit.

"You know I heard that you three got beaten up by some high schooler," Li-Wei says as he wipes the blood coming from his nose, "I can see why, you hit like a bitch."

"You talking about that kid with the bat?" Tim-Tom asks, "He caught us by surprise, and besides…"

Tim-Tom begins to land several jabs into Li-Wei's stomach from far away as he shouts, "That was just my warm up!"

Up personal with several of the thugs, Tim is weaving through as he tries to put away his pink shades, "these costed a fuck-ton so you better not break them!"

Right as he's about to put them in his pocket though, one of the gang members manages to snatch his shades and snaps them in half.

"Oops, I guess you should have put them away quicke-" the thug says, however he gets interrupted by Tim swarming him and pummeling him with jabs.

"You're all gonna pay," Tim says as he rushes to another thug and does the same song and dance.

"Shit!" one of the thugs says as he gets away from Tim and notices Tom not getting any opponents, "Well guess it's my lucky day, I get to take out the weakest link!"

"Weakest link?" Tom asks before pointing to Tim, "Tim's right there."

"Whatever you're going down!" the thug says as he goes to punch him, however Tom catches his fist.

"You want to know something about us?" Tom says as he begins to squeeze tighter on the thug's fist, "Tim's good at swarming people and getting up close and personal while Tim-Tom likes to hang back and go for longer range attacks. But me?"

The thug begins to wince in pain as he hears the bones in his hand start to bend and snap like twigs as Tom continues, "My style of fighting is simple."

Tom uses his open hand to punch the thug in the gut, knocking him out instantly. Tom lets go of the thug's now entirely broken hand. Tom finishes his sentence by saying, "I usually just punch someone once or twice and they're down for the count. Because physically speaking, I'm the strongest of us three."

As Li-Wei Zhang looks around him he starts to question why The Three Ts are still standing. Timothy McGee, a man who everyone saw as the weakest link in the group, is managing to completely overtake any opponent he comes across. Thomas Dolby, a man that nobody paid attention to, is knocking out Club Azure's members in just two hits. And lastly, Tim-Tom Pitt, someone he was told didn't have much besides his leadership, is actually holding his own against himself.

For a second, Li-Wei thought to himself that maybe just maybe The Three Ts would actually win this fight.

But that was before he remembered one thing.

One thing that gave Club Azure the edge against The Three Ts.

And that was numbers.

Sure Tim could rush gang member after gang member, but he still tires out quickly. Tom may be strong, but he's slow too and easy to counter. And as for Tim-Tom, he may be good when at a distance, but get close enough and he loses his edge.

"You want to know why I'm really called The Arrow of Club Azure?" Li-Wei asks as he suddenly lunges towards Tim-Tom and begins to beat him repeatedly, "It's because when I attack someone, I always move forward until the job is done."

Tim-Tom tries to move back to gain more distance, however when he does so, he realizes he is touching the wall and cornered himself in. Li-Wei delivers a liver kick into Tim-Tom sending him down for the count. As Li-Wei wipes the blood from his face, he looks around and sees that the other members of Club Azure have also finally defeated the other two members of The Three Ts.

"Finally, it's over," Li-Wei sighs as he lights himself another cigarette before telling his underlings, "bring them to the car, the boss will take care of 'em."

The group begins to grab the unconscious bodies of The Three Ts however they're stopped by a car honking its horn. Everyone stops and looks to see an orange jeep pull up outside of the auto-shop and two people get out of the car.

"This is the place that Amnestor recommended? It looks like a shithole," One of them says.

"Hey, he said we'd be getting a discount if we go here," the other says before saying, "Excuse me, we're here to get an oil change."

The man who asked is the biology teacher at Starlight High, Sam Penningberg. And next to him is his teaching assistant, Ray Ramirez. Sam is wearing a more casual tie than he does at school while Ray has his long black hair down and is wearing a blue hoodie, gray shorts, and black flip flops.

"Uh Sammy," Ray says as he points down to all the thugs, "I think they were in the middle of something."

Several of the gang members circle around Ray & Sam while Li-Wei stands completely still.

"Hey you two should mind your own business!" one of the thugs says, "I don't like beating up the elderly!"

"The elderly?!" Ray says as he begins to grow enraged.

One of the gang members looks at Li-Wei only to see him completely stunned.

"Are you okay man?" The thug says.

"When I was in high school," Li-Wei begins to say, "there was a teenager who defeated every single opponent who ever faced him. Those who fought him said he had the strength of a gorilla, the ferociousness of a tiger, the swiftness of an eagle, and a tongue that stung like the venom of a snake. Most thought he was just an urban legend because everyone called him 'Beastman'."

Li-Wei points towards Ray Ramirez, "Yet that animal is standing right there!"

"Oh, someone recognizes me?" Ray chuckles, "I thought if I grew out my hair and didn't show off my tattoos people wouldn't figure it out."

"You are wearing shorts," Sam adds.

"Oh yeah," Ray says as he looks down at his tattoo covered legs. 

"Bullshit that's true!" A gang member says as he goes to swing at Ray.

However Ray gives the gangster an uppercut sending the dude flying with several teeth falling out from that singular hit.

"With all this grading I have to do and dealing with high schoolers I really have been needing to blow off some steam," Ray begins to say as he rolls up his sleeves, "So let's have some fun!"

See You Next Chapter!~