s usual we came early. Having greeted Sensei, the guys ran to the changing rooms, while I unwillingly dragged
myself behind everyone with my head hung low. And suddenly very close to me I heard the voice of Sensei: “You’ve mastered yourself, well done!”
It was so unexpected that I even got embarrassed, surprisingly looking into his eyes. He was carefully looking at me, and his eyes shone with endless kindness and sympathy. And as usual, without giving me time to collect myself, he added, “Well, it’s time for you to go change.”
Meanwhile another group of people came up and greeted him. They started to tell him about their problems.
“There you are!” A thought flashed across my mind. “Is it possible that he knew about all my thoughts, doubts, and torments?! Then if he knew, maybe that’s normal, maybe that’s the way it should be? And if he said well done, it means that not all is lost yet.” Nevertheless, the words of Sensei affected me like an elixir of youth given to an old woman. I rushed to the changing room, having forgotten that very recently I hobbled all broken and tired through this life.
“Where are you rushing to?” Tatyana asked puzzled, looking at my wild speed of putting on my kimono. “I can’t believe my eyes, just recently you were dying, and now you are rushing headlong into the sports hall.”
“Ah, Tatyana,” I smiled. “Andrew was right when he said that we shouldn’t worry too much.”
Looking at the surprised expression on her face, I added, “I’m in a hurry to live, so that ‘I won’t later regret the senseless years of my life…’”
Tatyana laughed, and I ran into the sports hall full of overflowing energy and joined the other guys who were warming up. To tell the truth, I myself didn’t expect such activity from my almost dying body. Where did it come from?
Five minutes before the beginning, Eugene, who was warming up next to Stas, looked in through the door and shone in the rays of his blinding Hollywood smile.
“What good luck! I see a familiar face.” Eugene moved his hands apart.
A sturdy built guy, not too tall, with a strong-willed face and military bearing, entered the sports hall. The amazed exclamation of Eugene made others look around. Sensei and the senior guys came up to the newcomer:
“Hi, Volodya!”
“Welcome back!”
“We’re glad to see you!”
When the delighted participants calmed down a little, Sensei asked, “So, how was your trip to the south? Did you warm your bones thoroughly at the resort?”
“Aha, I have even burnt myself. I wouldn’t wish such a trip on anyone. As they say, if you have nothing to worry about, your command will help you with it.”
“What’s going on down there?” Eugene asked.
“What, don’t you watch television, country boy?” Stas said with a smile.
“What? What? What is a “tilivision”? You should know that news is spread in our village only through rumors. And if somebody doesn’t understand it, one fist punch in the ear, and the heads of brothers get clear. That’s it!”
The guys laughed. Eugene transformed into the role of priest and addressed Volodya, “Confess, my son, confess in detail, about your overseas sufferings and about the sorrowful deeds of hell. Relieve your soul!”
“Well, Eugene! Even the grave probably won’t change you,” remarked Volodya, laughing with everybody. He added more seriously, “What can I say, people are getting mad there, they can’t share even a piece of earth… They ruined such a resort!”
“They know well how to make a tempest in a teacup,” Victor agreed. “They learn it from birth.”
“Yes,” Eugene drawled, “they couldn’t avoid the bloody front, unfortunately. I suppose you also chattered your teeth with fear?”
“We are used to it, holy father. It’s not my first time,” Volodya comically mimicked him.
“All right, guys, we’ll have enough time to talk.” Sensei stopped this funny exchange of impressions. “Go change. It’s already time to start the training.”
The warm-up went by at an active tempo with moderate exercise stress. I noticed that Volodya, despite being a stocky guy, moved softly and easily, like a snow leopard. When the main crowd finished repeating the basics, Volodya and the “speedy” guys started emotionally discussing something with Sensei. Having finished our exercises, we also hurried to join them, trying to grasp the subject of the conversation.
“Was it possible to undertake something over there?” Volodya argued hotly. “We had to work mostly at night, in complete darkness, and often in cellars. There you can’t light a flashlight or even a cigarette or you would instantly get a lead bullet. So many of our guys died because of that!The only thing you try to do under such circumstances is to fire back at every sound in the darkness.”
“But you are supposed to have special equipment for night vision,” said Stas.
“Aha, they only show that in movies. But in reality, maybe they have it in anti-terrorist units… but where can we get it from?”
“Why do you need special equipment?” Sensei asked, shrugging his shoulders. “The human is a lot more perfect than any piece of iron.”
Volodya reflected and remained silent for a little while before adding, “Well, I think I tried it all. I tried to narrow my eyes, so my vision would adapt faster. We tried to train in the darkness in order to improve the perception of sounds. But all in vain. Still, in most cases we were caught by surprise despite the fact that we seemed to be ready.”
“Vision and hearing here are absolutely irrelevant,” ascertained Sensei. “Humans have a completely different level of perception, thanks to which you can control your surrounding space at a desirable distance around you.”
Volodya briskly glanced at Sensei and said, “Sensei, show me.” He placed his palm against his heart and added with a smile, “My soul missed your examples so much.”
Sensei smiled ironically, waving his hand as a sign of agreement, “All right, kamikaze, come on…”
Volodya and the guys developed a whole plan for how to disorient Sensei. Meanwhile the crowd got excited about the unusual demonstration. Someone brought a thick scarf to blindfold Sensei’s eyes, checking its light impermeability. Others discussed how to create more noise and vibration in the air. Our company observed that process with interest, standing next to Stas.
“Who is this Volodya?” Andrew asked.
“Volodya? He is a friend of Sensei’s. One of his old disciples,” Stas replied.
“And how long has he been training with Sensei?” “Well, I’ve already been training for five years. When I met Sensei, Volodya had just come back from the army. Actually, he had trained with him even before the army.”
“He is a serious man, athletic,” remarked Andrew. “Well, I would think so. Volodya is a master of sambo, served in the marines and in the intelligence service. And after that, in the Ministry for Internal Affairs.”
“Where does he work now?” I asked.
“Right now, he trains a newly created special force,” Stas explained. He added, “A fine fellow indeed!” Our entire group, under the supervision of Volodya, sat on the sides of the sports hall, forming a circle. Sensei walked into the center. Volodya blindfolded his eyes with a scarf, thoroughly closing every possible chink. After this preparation, he disappeared into the crowd. Meanwhile Sensei took an odd stance. He looked like a tired pilgrim who took a rest for a while leaning over an imaginary staff.
“Wow!” Eugene exclaimed with admiration, rubbing his hands in anticipation of something special. “Shortly we’ll see something very interesting.”
“That’s for sure,” confirmed Stas, carefully looking at Sensei.
“What kind of a stance is that?” Andrew inquired. “If I understood correctly, this is from the style of the ‘Old Lama’,” Stas answered quietly.
“I have never heard of such a style before.”
“Hmm, and probably you’ll never hear of it. It is an ancient, dead style. As Sensei says, it was forgotten even before the birth of Christ. Today there is left only a poor remnant of this school. In China it is known as the style of the ‘Dragon’.”
“Not bad for a poor remnant,” Andrew was astonished. “As far as I know, the style of the ‘Dragon’ is the most powerful style, as it absorbed the wisdom and power of all of the martial arts schools…”
Looking once again at Sensei he added, “How do you know about this ancient style?”
“I had an opportunity to learn about it two years ago. Some tourists came to us. So Sensei, as a polite host, regaled them with the style of the ‘Old Lama’. That was quite a show, I tell you, we couldn’t tear ourselves away from it!”
After such an advertisement, we stared at Sensei in order not to miss something thrilling. Meanwhile, Volodya gave the signal, and our entire crowd started to make an unimaginable noise, chaotically clapping our hands and stamping our feet.
Making use of this cover, Volodya started to come near Sensei, going around him clockwise. His movements were soft and light. He stepped like a panther before the jump, getting closer and closer to the enemy. When Volodya neared Sensei’s right side, with a quick, light under-step, he started to execute a strike of mavashi-geri in the head. Practically simultaneously, Sensei moved his right leg behind and, rotating his right hand into an arch, slightly touched Volodya’s face with the edge of his palm. Sensei just touched him, like a light feather, and didn’t hit like I expected him to. Judging by what we had seen, it wasn’t an accident or a miss. All movements were executed by Sensei with ease, smoothly and with special accuracy. Volodya reacted to this light touch as if he had been hit by a cannon-ball. His legs sharply flung up, and he was catapulted backward, crashing down with force against the floor. Everybody in the sports hall was completely silent. Volodya moved, sitting up on the floor. People exhaled and buzzed, like a beehive, discussing what had just happened.
“How did he manage to fall down?” Kostya asked Andrew with curiosity, but he shrugged his shoulders.
“Maybe he just lost his balance. He was standing on one foot. Probably so, because it seemed like the strike was very light. And you can’t even call it a strike.”
Sensei, shedding the scarf, asked Volodya, “Are you alive, masochist?”
“Alive,” Volodya drawled, holding his right eye. “I don’t understand, where did I make a mistake?”
“Your mistake is that you tried to get me from what you thought was my most unprotected side, in other words, from the most vulnerable point.”
“Of course!”
“That’s why you got into trouble! If you had attacked me from the front, you would’ve had more of a chance than attacking from behind or the right side. Had you attacked from behind left, you would’ve been hurt even more.”
“But why?”
“Because you think like a human, possessing vision and hearing. How many times did I tell you, you must take into consideration your opponent’s way of thinking. Since I see and hear nothing, you could logically assume that my mind is controlling the worst protected places a lot better and stronger.”
“And how about the front?”
“In front of me, there is weaker control because the body is already prepared for attack. A human, without natural perception, is more physically ready for the fight in front of him and spiritually from behind, and that’s a lot more dangerous. It means that the more vulnerable the side of the opponent seems to be, the more it is protected and, correspondingly, the counterattack can be more unpredictable.”
“And what if I had had a gun?”
“If you had had a gun, we would have greater use for you tomorrow.”
“What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I’ve just said. We would have eaten pies from your fresh meat.”
Volodya smiled in reply to Sensei’s black humor.
“Well, no need to, I will better bring pies to you myself…”
When Volodya took his hand away from his face, we were taken aback a little. A big bruise has swollen under his eye. The skin around his eye became dark blue and was covered with blisters, as if after a burn. Girls from our group began to bustle about and brought Volodya a towel, which they had wet in cold water. But even this compress didn’t help him. Nevertheless, it seemed that Volodya worried least of all about his eye. He stood up, shook his clothes off, and merrily joked with Sensei, while we were commanded to exercise our techniques.
After the training, almost at the very end of the additional training, we again heard something interesting.
“Sensei, is there such a technique to control the surrounding space that can be taught in a simpler form, so that it could be understood and practiced by the guys of my sub-unit?” asked Volodya.
The Teacher thought for a little while and replied, “Yes, there is such a technique, although you will need a partner for it. Best of all is to practice it sitting in the lotus pose. You should do the following: on the level of your head suspend a soft tennis ball on a rope, so that during its swinging or pushing by a partner the trajectory of its flight would coincide with the location of your head. Your objective is simply to learn to dodge it without using your common organs of control in the surrounding space, and to rely more on intuition. You should perceive the ball in its spiritual interpretation. Try to feel the object approaching the back of your head and, guided by your internal intuition, move your head before it hits you. The most important thing is to train your mind, and again we got back to our subject,” smiled Sensei. “Speaking frankly, you should bring your mind to a complete calmness so that it reminds you of the mirror-like surface of a lake. And in that full silence of your consciousness, the approaching object, in our case the ball, will be like a pebble thrown into that glassy surface, causing ripples, or like a boat, call it as you wish. But it will be cleaving your space. All the rest that is located farther, such as people standing in the circle, will be like trees or people on the shore, whatever you prefer. And you are the center of that lake. You should learn to feel any vibration on your surface, any penetration in your space. Finally you will learn to feel the approaching alien object and all that’s happening around.”
Andrew, who stood with us next to Sensei, asked, “Can we also train in this way?”
“If you have such a desire, certainly, train yourselves,” answered Sensei.
“And in this case, what kind of a perception will it be?” Volodya asked.
“Almost the same as the one during this demonstration. The most important thing is to come out with your consciousness over the boundaries of your body.”
“And how is that?” Andrew didn’t grasp the idea.
“Well, I’ll give you this simple example. Any human, when he sits down, relaxes, and tries to calm his thoughts, will start to feel that his consciousness is widening and comes far out over the boundaries of his body. Consciousness becomes three-dimensional. It covers enormous spaces. In this case, you simply limit it with a certain place. In the example that I showed you, it was the sports hall. Although, if you train hard enough, you will be able to feel what is going on at the other end of your district. Actually, it’s not that difficult.”
“In other words, the most important thing in the exercise with the ball is to achieve a complete calmness of the mind, like in the example with the lake?” Andrew asked again.
“Absolutely correct, and make an effort so that not a single thought could enter that space.”
“That’s hard.”
“Hard, but possible.”
“Stas said that the style of the ‘Old Lama’ is very ancient. Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“Does history record the names of those who mastered it?” asked Kostya.
Sensei smiled, thinking about something and answered, “You might know only Buddha. And, of course, his first followers.”
“Buddha?” said Kostya, surprised. “But I thought that he had a different kind of philosophy, the philosophy of good. Why did he need to fight?”
“Even good people may need to fight,” Sensei answered calmly. “But to master that art doesn’t always mean to attack someone. For them it was sort of a stage in spiritual development.”
Thus our additional training ended, and again we became witnesses to the valuable knowledge and abilities of Sensei. Our delight was endless. Having changed, we awaited the others near the sports hall. When the crowd came out to the street, Eugene glanced at Volodya and exclaimed with horror, “My god! Oho… What a shiner you have, beautiful.” At these words, everybody turned their attention to Volodya. His eye was completely swollen, turning into a big, black spot.
“Don’t worry,” Eugene tried to cheer him up, puffing up his chest, and declaring, “Bruises make men more attractive!”
Volodya replied with a smile, “And how about you, don’t you want to become more attractive?” Everybody burst out in laughter.
“Of course he wants to. And I’ll be like a witness in that joke,” Stas was developing the situation. “When he was asked, ‘Did you see how one man hit another on the head?’ he replied, ‘I don’t know if I saw, but I heard a sound, as if somebody hit something empty’.” Victor added, “And I will be a second witness. If I am asked why I didn’t come to help the victim during the fight, I will answer with a clean conscience, ‘How could I know who the victim was when they were fighting with each other so hard?!’”
Another wave of laughter rolled through our crowd. “Come on, guys,” Eugene mimicked everyone. “Your jokes are good only for soldiers in barracks. Did you see, Sensei, I hardly said a word, and they have already fabricated a case!”
