Hard Rain

there was a shout of approval from
    the crowd. Adonis bounced on his toes again.
    He was quick. Didn't give me a chance to grab the leg.
    I'd have to let him feel that the kicks were working for him, so he'd
    try to land them with a little more authority. The extra couple of
    milliseconds of contact would make the difference.
    He snapped the kick out again. It hit my thigh like a baseball bat and
    shot back to the floor. The crowd shouted again. There was a roaring
    in my ears.
    The impact hurt worse this time. A few more like that and I'd start to
    lose the full use of the leg. I knew he was thinking the same thing.
    I shifted back a half-step and crouched, giving him more of my right
    side as though to protect my forward leg. I watched him in adrenalized
    slow-motion.
    His nostrils were flaring in and out, his eyes drilling into me. He
    shuffled forward, his feet staying close to the floor.
    In my peripheral vision I was aware of his right foot taking the ground
    a little more firmly. His weight began to shift to his forward left.
    His hips cocked for the kick.
    I reined in my urge to act, forcing myself to wait the extra
    half-second I knew I needed.
    The kick started to come off the ground and I shot forward, shortening
    the distance by half. He saw his error and tried to correct, but I was
    already too close. I jammed the kick with my left hip and swept my
    left arm out and around his extended right knee.
    The crowd breathed, "Ahhh."
    He improvised quickly, encircling my left triceps with his right hand
    and thrusting his free hand at my face, the fingers forward, going for
    my eyes. I tightened the grip on his knee and took a drop-step forward
    with my left leg, levering him down toward the floor. He hopped
    backward on his left leg to try to recover his balance and I popped a
    sharp right uppercut into his exposed balls.
    He grunted and tried to pull away. I took a long step forward with my
    right leg, ducking under his left arm and simultaneously releasing his
    knee. I swept behind him, clasped my hands around his waist, dropped
    my hips, and arched sharply backward. Adonis arced over me like the
    last car on a roller coaster, his arms and legs splayed at demented
    angles. His neck and shoulders took the impact and his legs rocketed
    over his head to the floor from the momentum the throw had generated.
    Had I elected to release my grip around his waist, he would have done a
    complete somersault. I maintained the grip instead, and his feet
    flopped back to the floor, putting him on his back. I grabbed his face
    with my left hand and used it to simultaneously shove his head back and
    scramble from behind him. I rose up on my right knee, tensed my hips,
    and smashed down on his exposed throat with my right forearm, getting
    my weight behind the blow. I felt the crunch of systemic breakage the
    thyroid and crico id cartilage, probably the spinous process, as well.
    His hands flew to his throat and his body convulsed.
    I stood up and stepped away from him. The crowd was now silent.
    I saw his neck beginning to swell from a hematoma induced by the
    fractures. His legs kicked and scrabbled and he rolled from side to
    side. His face blued and contorted above his frantic fingers. Nobody
    made any move to help him. Not that they could have. After a few
    seconds his body started to shudder in odd spasms, as though he was
    being shocked. A few seconds after that, the shuddering stopped.
    Someone cried out, "YattaV I won!" and the room reverberated with a
    chorus of cheers. The crowd converged on me. People slapped my back
    and grabbed my hands to shake them. I was uncomfortably aware that one
    of Adonis's friends might use the moment to try to put a knife in me,
    but there was nothing I could do.
    I heard Washio's voice: "Horn, sagatte, sagatte. IkisaseteyareY C'mon
    now, c'mon now, let him breathe! He and a few of the bouncers moved
    close to me and started to push the crowd back.
    Someone handed me a towel and I wiped my face. The crowd eased away. I
    looked around and saw stacks of ten-thousand-yen notes changing
    hands.
    Murakami stepped into the circle. He was smiling.
    iYokuyatta zo," he said. Good job.
    I dropped the towel. "Where's my money?"
    He reached into his breast pocket and took out a thick envelope. He
    opened it so I could see that it was stuffed with ten-thousand-yen
    notes, then closed it and returned it to his pocket.
    "It's yours," he said. "I'll give it to you later." He looked around.
    "Some of