Klay bolted from his bedsheets into a small corridor and then to the small staircase leading to the kitchen, and there she was...
His mother, the same one who had passed away due to cancer so many years ago, was the same one he could not muster to take care of.
Inexplicably to even himself his tears grew tumultuously in size as he hugged her from behind with all his might, wetting her white and green striped dress she was wearing under the apron as she made breakfast.
This is a new one now...
I never thought I'd see my big boy crying like this before.
Her words made him lose his composure further as a few more tears descended from his eye sockets. He tried to stop them but such action was away from his control.
This lasted for a long minute until his big 31 self finally regained composure and sat down on his kitchen table after setting a table for two.
He could not be paused for longer as he had much to accomplish on just this day, he looked at his calendar and remembered that this exact day was when the big famous mixed martial arts of the city had their tryout to join them. January 26th, 2015. The great UK Top Team was looking for prospects to train and elevate.
What a coincidence eh? The same day he returns to the past is the same day when his MMA journey "began". This fact just fueled his belief that some higher entity arranged for this to happen. Maybe so, but all he knew was that it was a sign to dedicate this lifetime again to the practice of martial arts.
And so, after a very brief breakfast, he rushed outside, he couldn't muster looking at his mother's face again otherwise tears would begin pouring yet again.
As Klay rushed to the bus station to get to the gym he received a call. It was Reece, his best friend, his only friend. He was the only man he could truly rely on be it here, in the past, or in the future. He answered.
Wassup man! You ready for it?
Sure thing. - responded Klay
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Alright bro I'll see you at the door, I wanna kick some arse man! - Reece fired back.
Reece is always excited when it's about this matter man. He's probably the only bloke who is almost as into MMA as Klay, really explains why they remained close even after so many years, even after Reece quit his career to go do modelling. Blonde hair, blue eyes, pretty face... I guess after building up his physique it was the natural course of action.
After a longish bus ride, Klay had finally arrived at the place he spent most time at, this gym where he would call home for most of his life. Quite literally though, as there was a long period where this man would sleep there to focus on this game, almost 3 years!
He looked at the big sign with some sort of nostalgia, he was finally back there again, maybe this time around he could finally get into the gym's amateur course on his first go. In his last lifetime, it took almost two more years of trials to get in at 18. This is one of the most renowned MMA gyms in the world, and many legends have trained here in preparation for world title fights.
He had come a tad bit early though, almost 1 hour ahead of time. He waited and waited until prospect after prospect arrived. There were people of many sizes, from heavyweights looking to turn their lives around to kids like him looking to become great. From his perspective, it looked like around 60 people of all ages and sizes had arrived just to be able to join this opportunity.
And in the nick of time, Reece had also arrived, almost a second too late as the gym owner was ready to welcome the guys in.
Hello, lady and gentlemen, my name is Samuel! But you guys can call me Coach, Coach Sam or Sam if you manage to get in and Sammy if you climb professionally under our gym!
Today we will divide you guys into 3 groups among our training rooms, we will be doing some warming up together, a little strength and conditioning training and then, oh and then... The SPARRING!
I know that's what you guys are excited for, ain't that right? Well since this is to join our amateur training division there should be no reason to conduct drills or anything of the sort. Equipment for sparring will be provided to you as mentioned, you may go into the lockers to change now, that is all.
Klay and Randolph and everybody else following that speech went packing into the lockers, as bulky men of all types were changing it quickly turned into a stench house. As Randolph blabbed his mouth over old news of the time Klay was attempting to size up the guys at the gym. It looked like almost all of them were bigger than him, including Randolph. Most of them were older than him and had more training done.
Of course, Klay wasn't demoralised by this, he was only concerned with the absolute hell of conditioning he was going to be placed under. This old body of his had not experienced one day of hard training in his entire life, he had done some push-ups and pull-ups, but nothing compares to the type of endurance required to even participate in this training.
In his past lifetime, he had barely even made it through this conditioning, when sparring came around he could barely even stand up, and he only lasted around 2 minutes in the sparring.
And so Klay had a mission, to make as little effort as possible during the strength and conditioning training so that his frail body could even last the sparring. The only issue is that there were multiple trainers placed throughout the rooms, so he had to figure out a way to hide that he wasn't doing much work, to avoid being punished and placed under further stress.
*Whistle*
And so the training began.
In a line, he and many other boys had begun performing exercises to warm up and stretch, always following the coach assigned to them, which was not Samuel, but another one of his assistants. This resembled a warm-up that many wrestlers conduct, consisting of running around in a circle and following a coach's routine.
After countless laps around the enclosed matted space, they would proceed with other exercises for strength and conditioning. Klay like the little sneaky man that he is would always aim to do as little movement as possible, causing him to receive some warning calls from the trainers.
Fortunately, such calls were not enough to kick him out and he proceeded to the sparring training, where they evaluated the real skills of the athletes aiming to join the gym. Klay smirked with sweat-drenched hair, he knew he was ready to take anyone here on.