Dead Punks

Walking along a dark alley in Quiricada in the early evening of a Saturday in September in the year of the Dragon, I stumbled into a group of young Pinoy Punks. Clad in tattered leather jackets sourced from the nearby Ukay- ukay thrift shops in Bambang and sporting crazy Mohawks, they accosted me for looking them straight in the eyes longer than the usual permitted glance.

“Hey, asshole! What the fuck do you want?” said the leader of the group.

“We better teach the fuck ‘bout the law of the streets!” chorused the other gang members as they dashed like a bunch of Apaches in their ear- splitting rebel yells towards me with unexplained rage on their scowling faces that were obviously aped from watching too many B- movies or just high on rugby or shabu in this case.

“Uh-uh, what do we have here? I didn’t know that there are punks in the Philippines, huh!” I replied in my mocking nasal twang complete with a sarcastic smirk that I could muster for them to see my contempt for their kind.

I looked around and saw countless faces etched with a mixture of fear and indifference from the gathering crowd of on-lookers…

I stepped back slowly and thought about the art of “Bitbit-tse” that is the best form of self- defense in this kind of situation but did not act on it. My inherent Pinoy blood oozing with machismo prevented me from turning the other cheek and running away from a fight even if I am far outnumbered and unarmed.

I took a deep breath in rapid successions and willed myself to relax as the four screaming punks came rushing in. The first dude attacked me with his deadly left hooks and right straights but I stepped aside and parried his blows as I launched a vicious counter-attack that caught him in his glass chin and staggered down to his knees.

The next one came roaring, an Indian straight out of the cowboy movies complete with his fist whirling in the air but a solid right straight to the chest stopped him on his tracks and put him down to the ground gasping for precious oxygen.

Then I caught the two remaining punks with successive roundhouse kicks into their faces and stomachs in their moments of hesitations when they saw what happened to their comrades as they fell one after the other to the muddy ground. My years of training in mixed Martial Arts really helped me in this particular situation.

As they staggered back to regain their bearings, I turned my back and confidently walked away which turned out very costly, a mistake that almost cost me my life that I had regretted to this very day.

I felt the sudden surge of pain at the back of my head followed by the crimson spurt of blood that looked like a miniature fountain followed by blurring of vision as darkness began to set in as a result of a stone that struck me thrown treacherously by one of the punks in his desperate move to get even and regain their honor in the yes of the crowd.

I saw them running towards me; this time armed with fan knives but were stopped on their tracks by the sudden bursts of gunfire from a semi-automatic weapon from a responding lawman just before I lost my consciousness.

I woke up in the hospital bed the next day with policemen telling me to file a frustrated homicide and serious physical injuries against my attackers but I refused.

I stayed in the hospital for another week licking my wounds. I spent the entire time pondering on my near brush with death that all the more strengthened my belief that I am here on this planet with a purpose and that I am invincible!

After being released from the hospital, in a span of two months, I evened up the score when I picked them up one by one in the mean streets of Quiricada, Avenida, Tayuman and Santa Cruz with my trusted and ever reliable Beretta.

The Police as usual was clueless on the dead bodies that turned up in the streets that they immediately put the blame the deaths of the punks to gang wars. One enterprising TV program even had an episode of the 'whole' thing that was quite hilarious--about a Serial Killer in Tondo!

But nobody took them seriously of course what with the Filipino’s notoriety for inherent skepticism on certain things and stuff until it happens to them. Ho-hum.

One thing is sure though, the people in that place can now have a sigh of complete relief from the mischief of the wayward punks that they must have thanked me in their prayers.