Author's note: I'm back with the next chapter of Duos & Deception! Thanks again to Sparda4 for the idea, and also for your expertise in martial arts for this chapter:)
Austin's POV
"Thank you Miami!"
I love performing at concerts, the fans just get me so excited! And it just makes me so much more excited when I know that my friends are backstage cheering for me. This time, I also have Gavin! I'm not sure if he's exactly my friend, but he's cool! And I don't really care that Ally has a hopeless crush on him, I'll just accept my friends for who they are!
I run backstage immediately after my concert, and I see that Ally, Trish, Dez, Jimmy, and Gavin are there waiting for me. Ally, Trish, and Dez run up to give me hugs, and Jimmy just nods appreciatively.
"Great job, Austin!" Gavin exclaims. "You're such a good singer! I see why you're a star!"
"Thanks, Gavin!" I reply.
Jimmy walks off, probably going to do some business thing that he always has to do.
"That performance was awesome, buddy!" Dez exclaims.
"Yeah, you did so well!" Ally adds.
"Eh, you've done better." Trish says.
We all laugh. Trish can be so sarcastic! But it's one of the reasons why she's a great friend, it's hilarious!
"You guys?" Gavin interrupts worriedly.
"Yeah?" I turn to face him.
"I can hear a whole lot of yelling down the hall." he says. "Should I be worried?"
"Nah," I reply, "it happens a lot. It's always harmless."
However, Jimmy rushes back in and objects to this. "Austin, some pretty violent fans are coming along. I think they might be drunk, no one can get them to get out. They're heading this way, but everything's under control. Plus, you have Gavin."
"Are you sure everything's okay?" Ally asks worriedly.
"Don't worry, Ally." Gavin says reassuringly. "I'm here to protect you all, and I'll make sure no harm comes to any of you. Especially you."
Ally smiles sweetly and blushes. Yep, she's definitely lovestruck.
"Where's Austin Moon?" I hear a loud, rumbling voice from down the hall.
"We want Austin Moon!" a larger group of people shouts.
"That's them." Jimmy says. "Gavin, I trust you can handle them?"
He nods, and heads towards the door to wait for the gang to arrive.
"Excuse me, fellows!" I hear another voice outside. I think it's one of Jimmy's business friends. "What are you doing here? This is strictly no access for outsiders!"
I hear a thumping sound, like someone's been knocked down. Before I can say anything, the door is crashed open and this tall man runs in. I see that he doesn't have anyone with him, he's just by himself. The other people with him must have left. The man starts running towards me, but he's stopped by Gavin. Good thing I hired a bodyguard! Gavin immediately knocks the man down, but instead of staying down, the man gets right up.
"I want to get to Austin!" he yells.
Instead of saying anything, Gavin does a flying kick and knocks him down in one blow.
"Was that karate?" I whisper.
"Probably," Trish says.
"It appeared to be Combat Sambo." Dez whispers back. "It is a Russian mixed martial arts technique, used and developed for the military. It is highly unusual that an ordinary American bodyguard would be so highly trained, unless he trained in the Russian army."
I just stare at my red-headed friend. Some people think he's quite stupid, but I know otherwise. He's the smartest person I know, except maybe Ally.
"So why does he know this combat mambo?" I ask, as I watch him repeatedly punch and hit the man that he's already knocked down.
"Not mambo, Sambo." Dez replies. "Maybe when he went to Europe, he also went to Russia? It's possible."
Ally speaks up for the first time since the man barged in. "Don't you guys find it strange that Gavin's beating up the guy that he's already knocked down?"
We watch in silence as Gavin continues to punch the guy, until a security guard comes in and drags the unconscious man away.
"Well, I took care of him." Gavin says, shooting us a smile.
Before we know it, he's out the door for the day, and even though I rushed to the door to say one last word, I couldn't see him down the hallway.
Breaking news! Austin Moon's new bodyguard sends a man to the hospital with critical injuries!
It's the headline of all of the Miami newspapers. Gavin is suddenly more violent than he had appeared to be at first, and no one's happy. I'm disappointed that I hired this excessively violent bodyguard. I've never believed in violence, and I prefer to work out conflicts in other ways. Jimmy's already trying to hire a new bodyguard, and Trish is trying to find Gavin to fire him. At least the one who gets fired so often is doing the firing. Dez is researching that combat mambo thing, to find out more about it. And I haven't seen Ally since last night.
I go to Sonic Boom, but she's not there. I look at the new instruments that are in stock, and then I hear my name.
"Austin!"
I would recognize that voice anywhere. It's Ally!
"Hey, Ally!" I run up to her.
"Have you seen the news?" she asks.
"Yeah, of course! I'm kind of disappointed, honestly. Trish is trying to fire him. I hope you're okay with it." I say, knowing that she's probably heartbroken.
"I can't believe him!" she exclaimed, more angry than disappointed. "I can't believe I ever had a crush on him! I hate people who like violence, there are better ways of solving things, for crying out loud!"
I'm taken aback from her strong words. My usually meek friend who's shy and has stage fright has completely just transformed into this spiteful girl, and I'm impressed!
Suddenly, Trish runs in.
"I found Gavin! He's in this martial arts training place. But I can't get to him, there's tons of security and I'm pretty sure everyone there does his Combat Sambo thing!" she exclaims.
"Let's go there and give him a piece of our minds." Ally says, heading towards the door.
"Okay, I'll text Dez to meet us there!" I suggest.
I pull out my phone, and to my surprise, Dez has already texted me.
Hey Austin I got into Gavin's training place and I'm watching him you better come and see this
"Dez says he's already in there and watching Gavin train!" I tell my friends. "Let's go!"
It only takes a couple of minutes to walk to Gavin's training place, because it's actually in the Miami Mall, just on the other side! I can't believe I've never seen it, but I guess I really only go to the places on Sonic Boom's side of the mall.
"What do you kids want?" a security guard says, as we walk towards the front desk.
"Well, we're looking for Gavin Young." I say.
"Or Dez Wade," Ally adds.
"Gavin Young is busy and he doesn't want visitors." the man behind the front desk offers. "And I don't know who this Dez Wade character is."
I pull out my phone to text Dez.
How did you get in?
I get an immediate reply.
I climbed through an air duct!
?
Yeah there's one right at the front desk!
And no one saw you?
No I don't think so
"Dez crawled through that air duct," I whisper to Ally, pointing at the air duct right at the desk.
"How did he do that?" she whispers back.
"Oh, we actually just got a message from Gavin!" the front desk man says. "He says that if Austin Moon and his friends are looking for him, they can go find him in room 250."
"That's us! Austin Moon and friends!" Ally exclaims.
"Photo ID!" the security guard shouts.
I fumble in my wallet but I find my driver's license, and they let us in.
We run for room 250 to find Gavin and Dez. When we arrive there, we see Gavin hitting this wooden statue thing, and Dez is watching attentively.
"What the-" Trish exclaims, but fortunately Gavin doesn't hear.
As Gavin is too busy hitting the statue thing and he's too occupied with the thumping sounds of every blow, Dez decides to fill us in on what he's doing.
"Wing Chun," he explains, "is a Chinese martial art that specializes in close-range combat. Strange that he is so skilled in it, although he never mentioned being in Asia."
"Well, his accent seems a bit Japanese to me." I suggest.
"What's the wooden statue thing?" Trish asks.
"That's called Mu ren zhuang," Dez explains. "In Cantonese it is called Muk yan jong. It's a wooden dummy that is used to practice Wing Chun."
"It's suspicious how Gavin's already shown that he knows two completely different types of martial arts from two places that he's never been." I say.
"It's also suspicious how Dez knows so much about this stuff!" Trish whisper-yells. "Where did you learn all of this?"
"It's called paying attention in class!" he defends himself. "Do you guys never pay attention?"
"We never learned about martial arts!" Ally says, confused.
"You mean you guys never took international martial arts history?" Dez asks, shocked.
We all slowly shake our heads.
Before Dez can say anything about our bad taste in school courses, Gavin notices us.
"Hey guys!" he exclaims. "What are you doing here?"
"Well, we were just here to talk to you." I say. "About last night."
"What about last night?" he asks.
"Gavin, you're not supposed to attack fans, you're just supposed to keep them away!" Ally exclaims, obviously disappointed.
"Aw, Ally, I was just trying to protect you guys!" he replies.
"By beating up another person? You know he's in the hospital!" Trish shouts.
Soon Ally, Trish, and I are yelling to him, and he's trying to defend himself. I guess we're all disappointed and more than a little angry. Then Dez speaks up.
"Gavin, we are very disappointed in you." he says quietly, but professionally. "You were never meant to harm another being in order to protect Austin, your job was to merely control the situation."
We all look at him in surprise. Dez can be crazy sometimes, but he can also be the most professional out of all of us.
"Dez is right." Ally agrees. "And even though you disappointed us last night, I think we're willing to give you a second chance. But only if you agree to be assertive and not aggressive."
Gavin nods. "I'll try my best."
"Well, I think that's all we had to say, you can keep training if you want." I say.
Everyone nods, and we walk out of the room as Gavin resumes his Wing Chun training.
"We should probably keep a close eye on him." Trish says once we leave the training center.
"Yeah, we don't want him to hurt any other fans." I reply. "I can't have that kind of publicity!"
Ally rolls her eyes. "Don't worry about publicity, Austin. Everyone loves you, they just might not love Gavin."
As we pass through the food court, we see Jimmy, and he immediately runs up to us.
"Austin, we need to talk to Gavin! He's too dangerous, you can't have him as a bodyguard!" he exclaims.
"Relax, Jimmy." I reply. "We already talked to him, we told him that he can't just attack people. We gave him a second chance to prove himself."
"A second chance? No, Austin, he's too dangerous!" he replies.
"Jimmy, it's okay. We have security guards, too, and we know that if anything goes wrong with Gavin, they can help out. Austin's not in danger." Ally reassures him.
"Fine, but just one more chance. And we're going to look into his past, too. Just to make sure." Jimmy finally says.
We all nod, and then we head back to Sonic Boom.
"Gavin Young..." Dez murmurs as he looks at his computer.
"What are you doing?" I ask.
We were supposed to help Ally run the store, but Dez and Trish decided to take a break and sit at the grand piano.
"We're looking into Gavin, to see if he's really who he says he is." Trish replies.
"Oh, look! This says Gavin Young, seventeen years old, worked at Walt Disney World in Orlando! I love Disney World!" Dez exclaims.
"Well, so far so good!" I say.
"It says that he also worked at some other theme parks in Orlando for a few months, and he was a very good security guard." he continues.
"What about the stuff that he said about working in Europe?" Trish asks.
"This website is called Florida employees. Do you really think it'll talk about Europe?" Dez sighs.
Even though Trish and Dez are working together to find out stuff about Gavin, they always argue! It's kind of their thing. It's really funny, actually!
"Guys, what are you doing?" Ally calls.
"Looking up stuff about Gavin!" Dez replies. "Wanna see? There are some pretty good pictures of him! I know you have a crush on him!"
She laughs. "Not anymore. I don't like guys who are aggressive. Violence doesn't solve anything! Plus, I only had a crush on him because he's good-looking. But he's not really my type. He's not a musician, he's a bodyguard! And he's always trying to be super flirty around me. It's annoying, not charming!"
Well, I'm not aggressive, I'm a musician, and I'm definitely not super flirty! And I'm single, too! Now, how can I give Ally hints without being flirty?
"And who needs to know two types of martial arts, anyways?" she interrupts my thoughts.
"Actually, three." Trish offers. "This website says he's a national kickboxing champion!"
"Seriously? When did he have time in his career to do that, anyways?" I say.
"That's strange." Dez suddenly says.
"What's strange?" I ask.
"It says here that Gavin was part of the Swiss Guard a couple of years ago. But didn't he say that he was too young and too tall for last year?"
"Maybe it's a false website," Trish suggests.
"Yeah, there are a lot of those online." Ally agrees.
"Okay, probably!" Dez says, moving on to the next website.
But even as he does that, I get an uncomfortable feeling. It doesn't make sense, and it makes me suspicious.
Author's note: That's it for now! It'll probably be a while until the next chapter but who knows, maybe I'll write it quickly and update.
I hope you like it so far! Feedback is appreciated:)