Skull of the Zipa PREVIEW CHAPTERS by Chuck Chitwood (best book club books for discussion .txt) 📕

Rule One: Stay on my feet. I dropped into a squatting position to one knee and resist the force bearing down on me.

Rule Two: Attack, don’t hesitate. I thrust my right arm skyward breaking his grip. The swift move wedged his hand off my mouth. I could have tried to run away but then I remembered Ami saying, you should have attacked me instead of trying to scramble out of here. Don’t run away immediately. Incapacitate your attacker so they can’t run after you. My left foot made a crunching sound against his kneecap. At the same time, my right elbow crashed against his jaw rapidly as I spun around. The attacker was stunned for a split second by the swift barrage of violence.

Uncle Ami always told me Counter-attack rapidly and frequently. Don’t give your opponent time to think. I swept at his wounded knee again with my right leg as I turned to face my attacker, but he took a step back. I think he was trying to make sense out of the fact that a little girl who should’ve been easy to overpower had overpowered him.

He reached behind and pulled out a black knife, sharp on one side and jagged on the other. He came at me and I used my weapon; my bag. I let the strap of my bag fall from my shoulder and it caught on his arm. I spun around and flipped the bag around with me. His arm was suddenly tangled up in the strap. I yanked as hard as I could and the knife went flying out of his reach.

My attacker glanced towards his knife. I knew he couldn’t decide if he should attack me or if he should go for the knife. His slight hesitation tipped the scales my favor. I sent a flurry of violent knees between his legs and into his stomach. He doubled over in pain and tried to grab me, but I grabbed him instead and locked his arm under shoulder. As he bent over, I sent my knee to his nose and heard the popping and cracking of cartilage.

The attacker muttered something in Hebrew, but I couldn’t understand him. I didn’t know if he was cursing me or begging me to stop. He was disoriented, I could’ve run away. Only he could have run after me.

I grabbed a five-pound weight from a weight rack right near me. He didn’t have time to prepare himself for the impact of the weight against his head. He fell to the ground.

I waited with the dumbbell poised to strike again just in case he wasn’t really out cold. He was. I ripped the mask off his head. When I realized who had attacked Ami and me I was stunned. It was the cute guy from the sail boat rental place. Why would he hurt Uncle Ami? Then from somewhere behind me, I heard someone clapping.

“Excellent.” I turned to see Ami. “You have passed the test.”

I glanced at the poor, unconscious college boy on the ground lying on the mat with a trickle of blood running from his nose. Then I turned back to Ami. I couldn’t believe this was some stupid lesson.

“Hadassah he’s okay. That was only a five pounder. Probably gave him a mild concussion. That’s all. You did very well.”

I pushed him away. “You scared the snot out of me. I thought you were dead.”

“And yet, you didn’t lose focus. Well, done.”

I grabbed my once perfectly good fifty-dollar gym bag that was now useless because it had been sliced open. I took a drink of water. “What would have happened if… oh, I don’t know… he killed me? Or if I had killed him.” Outrage washed over me.

“Ehud would not have hurt you. He is one of my top students. You know, he is in the army. He only works across the street on his days off. And I was watching. I would have stopped you if I thought you were really going to hurt him.”

“How nice of you, Uncle Ami.”

Thankfully, Ehud sat up and shook off my attack. He was wobbly but he didn’t seem mad. In fact, he congratulated me on a good fight and excused himself to clean up.

“So do I get a black belt now?” I grinned knowing how Ami hated the comparison to traditional martial arts.

“Hadassah, this isn’t a little martial arts studio where six years olds get trophies for fighting the air. This is real self-defense. Krav Maga is not pretty or noble like jujitsu that has a lot of artistic body movement. This is down and dirty street fighting using whatever you can and you passed a big test – a superior, stronger opponent. My little myrtle, you get to live. That is your black belt.”

“Still, there should be belts.” I turned away and smiled.

“A belt is for holding up your pants and the holster for a Desert Eagle 10 millimeter pistol.”

“Oh, Ami, don’t get so upset. I don’t understand you. You’re so sweet but so violent. What gives?”

“America makes you soft. You think life is nothing but going to the mall or to a coffee shop. Sadly, peace does not beget peace. Defeating evil begets peace.”

“But Ami, I keep telling you no one is going to attack me, especially like Ehud did, at my school. When you fight, you get expelled. It’s called zero tolerance.”

“I understand. But you must also understand that not all battles are physical. It takes mental agility to be victorious in a physical battle. Trust in who you are and who God made you to be. Look at any evil regime, they all look alike, dress alike, and parrot the same language. Think of the Hitler Youth or… or at the Stormtroopers in Star Wars. They are all clones. It takes mental strength to be yourself and to not doubt your Creator in moments of crisis. A disciplined body leads to a disciplined mind.”

Ami helped me to my feet. And then Ehud, who’d been listening, walked over to officially introduce himself. Then the weirdest thing happened. He asked me out. I just kicked his butt and he asked me out on a date. How bizarre. After he left, Ami assured me that he was a good guy and usually unbeatable.

“He admires your strength.” Then as an after-thought, Ami added. “All good men admire a woman’s strength. Only bad or insecure men fear a woman’s strength.”

“Really? In America, the girls I’m around like to play dumb and giggle a lot.”

“You mother faced the same thing in college. Do you know what she told me when she flew home for the school’s winter break?”

“What?” I asked trying to picture my mom as an eighteen-year-old college student.

“She said she met a guy who spent a lot of time in the library and he was the only guy who wasn’t afraid of her. Other guys would look at her but kept their distance. However, your father came up to her and started asking questions about Israel.”

As we practiced some more moves, Uncle Ami told me the story. “In truth, your father wasn’t even hitting on her. Apparently, someone told him she was from Israel and he wanted to talk to her about her country. After a while, her friends left, but they stayed and talked. When the library closed, they went to a coffee shop and talked for hours. After that, they bumped into each other several times a week in the library and would sit together.”

Ami chuckled. “It wasn’t romantic like in the movies. They became good friends first which is the key to a successful relationship.” He rubbed his chin. “But your mother says he was romantic. He even sneaked into the astronomy building one night and had a romantic dinner set up for her on the roof under the stars. They danced under the stars until a security guard came to check the building. Your father hadn’t planned on that. They could’ve gotten in a lot of trouble but your mother helped him scale down the outside of the building using the drainage spout. And then she said they took off running. I don’t think your father had ever been quite that adventurous before. Your mother said he changed that evening. He realized he loved your mother and he loved the thought of blending his studies with adventure.”

“So that’s why he decided to go into archaeology? Because of my mom?”

“Exactly.”

“Ouch.” I blink a few times as I wake from having been knocked unconscious after my fall. I have no idea how long I’ve been out. It could have been five minutes, it could have been twenty.

I glance up at the cliff where I fell. It wasn’t as huge a drop as it felt when I was falling. It might have been fifteen to twenty feet. And luckily, I landed in some soft, cushy, soup-like sand. All in all, I’m pretty lucky.

If it hadn’t been for the sand, I might be dead. But as it is, I don’t think I broke anything. In fact, I don’t think I even sprained anything which is a good thing. Unfortunately, the springy sand pit is quicksand. And that is a bad thing. Seriously? This is like a bad adventure movie where the good guy gets stuck in quicksand.

Only in the movies, whatever the good guy is ‘stuck’ in… it’s definitely not what quick sand actually looks like. This mushy muck is sticky and dark brown. Quite frankly, it reminds me of brownie mix my mom used to make and then she let me lick the bowl.

But this isn’t brownie mix and I’m sinking. It’s a good thing I didn’t thrash around before I blacked out or I’d probably be dead. I guess I landed sort of feet first so I’d only sunk up to my waist. I tried to lift my legs like I was walking against waves at the beach. But instead of rising up, it felt like the sand was trying to swallow me. Dumb move.

“Stay still, Haddie. It’s just like in movies. I hope.” I lift my arms and slowly start moving forward when I notice an oily smell. I reach down and pick up some of the black sand working it between my fingers. It’s soft and oily. I read about this stuff in science class years ago. Oil sand. The jungle equivalent of the La Brea Tar Pits.

“Well, Haddie, on the one hand, I probably won’t drown. At least not quickly. It’ll probably be a slow painful death that I will get to savor.” I look up into the thick foliage just to the side and see what I’m fairly certain is a python. “Then again, on the other hand, I’m stuck out in the open and I might look tasty to Mr. Snake. In which case, I’ll just have the life slow squeezed out of me.”

I’m totally spent. I’m hungry. I’m sore. And my hands hurt to make a fist. Worst of all I can see what I