Breakfall

Joseph had been taking Judo at “The School” for three months now, and the building still amazed him. It stood three stories high and took up a quarter of a block. The outside seemed due for a paintjob, which it should; the building was built in the late twenties. In a city that was losing historical monuments left and right, the building stood out like a sore thumb.
Although there was a spacious front entrance, practitioners were required to use a back door. A thick, wooden door with grooves of age led to a flight of matching wooden stairs. As Joseph walked up them, a bulky red gym bag in his hand, they creaked and gave just a little. Even though it felt as if they would give, Joseph knew better; not one oak board had given, even for all those little bodies tramping over them.
These steep, mountain-like stairs led up to a small hallway, which then led into an office. One had to walk through this area in order to get to the spacious center. Here, in the very middle, firm mats were set up in a rectangular fashion. Joseph bowed into the training area, walking across to a small locker room.
It was five minutes until class started. Joseph was late today; he generally liked to get here early. Other students were already dressed, warming up by themselves. Joseph shrugged out of his work shirt and pants (he came here directly from his realty job), and put on his light clothe pants and jacket. The jacket was made of a very heavy canvas material; this was needed for the heavy pulling and lifting of each other they did.
As Joseph walked out, barefoot and tying his white belt around his waist, everyone was lining up. On the left were the older, higher ranking students. The ranks decreased from there, going down to the much younger, new students. He took his place in the lineup.
“Seiza,’ said the instructor, a small graying man.
Everyone in the line, even the two black belts flanking the teacher, stood at attention. The new students looked to the regulars for what to do, and copied them. Their feet were together, hands at their sides.
“Kieskei-ray.”
Almost in unison, the long row of Judo students bent at the waist, bowing to the teacher. Then they began warming up.
At this point, Joseph was barely out of breath. When he had first started Judo, the warm-ups themselves were a workout. First they’d run for what seemed to be miles, in a matter of different movements. Then they’d do other standing warm-ups, designed for Judo specifically. Joseph saw that many of the new members were panting and huffing. He had barely broken a sweat.
“We’re going to do break falls now,” said one of the black belts, a buff guy named Smith. “New members in one line, other in the next line.”
Everyone scattered, reorganizing in two separate lines like a flock of birds. Joseph stood in the back of this line, made up of about eight individuals. The black belt who had organized them was talking to the new members. He showed them how to do a zempo gaiken, which was a forward roll.
“When you land, make sure to slap the mat. That way you can release the built up energy.”
They looked at each other questioningly. To a newcomer, that sounded like a whole lot of bull. Joseph new from experience, however, that it was very true. He tried taking a fall without it, and boy oh boy was he sore the next day.
As the new students began to clumsily learn how to accomplish this feat, Joseph moved up in line. Only one person stood in front of him, a green belt whose name Joseph couldn’t recall. He stepped up to the edge of the map, took a couple of steps forward and rolled head over heels. The green belt landed with a booming, firm slap. Joseph stepped up to the edge of the mat.
He knew it was best to take some steps forward, about three. As he was taking a right-handed fall, Joseph started with his right foot forward. Right, left then finally right again. His hands and arms came up in a circular fashion, right arm held high. With a little hope, Joseph rolled himself over his head. He landed with a soft thud, muted by a loud meeting of his hand and the mat. In a clean, strait motion, Joseph brought himself back to his feet. Generally, it took months for a person to perfect this fall. Yet Joseph had almost mastered it in the short time he'd been there. He was a quick learner.
The green belt in front of him was just getting up. Joseph hadn’t heard or seen his break fall; he’d already been halfway through his own fall. The mat in front of him was wide open. From his point of view, the green and red rectangular sections seemed like he was looking at some brick floor for a giant.
Looking back at the whole incident, Joseph figured he had done everything right; and in fact he had. Almost.
Joseph took two steps forward, first left then right. And once again his arms came up, as if he were hugging a large rubber ball. A little hop, and he was over. What happened to him was something that even happened to expert Judo practitioners; he overstepped, getting himself caught off balance. The faces of his fellow students seemed to stand out as he rolled over, just before hitting the mat.
The second Joseph’s hand slapped that hard, grooved wooden floor, an odd feeling overtook him. The closest thing one could say to describe it would be like when you go to take one more step on a flight of stairs, but it’s not there. A sense of disembodiment. It felt like his body was being lifted up, up, up. Everything got very bright for a second; then it slowly faded into a blaring sepia overtone.
Joseph (or his subconscious mind, if you will) stood towards the back of the room. Except this wasn’t the beat up, wide-open gymnasium he was just in a second ago. From one wall to the other, children sat in creaky wooden chairs. The little girls were in ‘20’s style dresses, while the little boys were in starched suits. As with most large groups of children, there was much squirming, like a large organism. Despite the dark overtones, Joseph could tell warm summer sun was spilling in from the ceiling – high plate glass windows stretched on the two side walls. A stern looking woman stood on the small stage at the front of the room.
Joseph opened his mouth to talk, scream, make any noise at all in this suddenly deaf world. Yet his vocal chords seemed to refuse to work; in fact he found his mouth wasn’t open at all. His arms and legs met a similar obstacle. They seemed to be cast of heavy lead. Whatever this daft experience was, he had to remain stiff, silent and seemingly unseen.
For the first time, Joseph found he was hearing voices in his mind. Yet they weren’t all clear sentences; sometimes it was just quiet noises, or even pictures. A little girls voice seemed to be rambling on about a trip she had taken to New York this past summer. Pictures of flowers, teddy bears and even one of a full bladder flashed before his eyes. All noises took on an echo. Joseph found he could move his eyes. He looked across the back of the countless children’s heads; even though he could see their mouths, he knew everyone of them was silent.
Over all of this chatter was a growing sense of fear and destruction. Joseph’s seemingly unconscious mind couldn’t quite place what it was, despite the fact his mind was searching for the answer. The feeling was like one sometimes gets when they feel they are being watched. Like the ice melting off a quaint and peaceful lake, Joseph came to the realization of what this was. Pictures of valves with their needles in the red flashed before his subconscious. Furnaces that were overheated and bloated to the point of combustion.
Wait, thought Joseph to himself. Isn’t it summer?
That it was – in his world, at least. Slowly the picture and voices in front of him started to become fuzzy. It looked like a camera, which was slowly, painfully going out of focus before him, at the same location yet a different season, the picture suddenly changed. Boys and girls were seated around round tables, chatting merrily and eating. Once again, stern looking women walked in between these rows.
The feeling of dread, doom and sorrow returned to him. It hit so hard that if Joseph had been able to move, he’d been knocked right over. An explosion, more felt than anything else, rocked this hallucination. Images of fire, of burning wood and flesh flashed before his eyes. He could almost smell the burning hair. Joseph’s inner being wept.
Like sudden acceleration in a fast car, Joseph was brought back to his own material world. He was lying half on and half off the matt, his whole body shaking. The instructors and students alike gathered around him. The head instructor was bent over him, yet even thought Joseph saw his lips move, no sound came. Joseph’s ears rang like he was in the middle of a big explosion, or half in and half out of that strange world.
“Joseph – hang tight – help is on the way –“ one of them was saying.
He shook his head. There was almost the feeling of fresh blood dripping from his still ringing ears; yet he know if he had the energy to lift a hand, there would be none. Every muscle in his body was on fire. His head felt heavy and pressurized. Despite protests from those closest to him, he lifted his head up a bit. Curious, he lifted his hand as well.
Expecting to see some remnant of what had just taken place, he was slightly disappointed. His normal hand just shown back at him. The next day, Joseph would find his hand black and blue, with noticeable grooves from the impressions of the floorboards. He lowered his head and hand, letting his eyes slowly close shut. Once again drifting in and out of consciousness, Joseph was dimly aware that the crowd had parted; the sound and vibrations of a cart could be felt through the ground.
Two paramedics lowered the cot, skillfully lifting him up and putting him on it with a grunt. While one took his pulse, the other gave him a once over. Joseph was only dimly aware of this. Soon after they wheeled him back the way they had come, putting up the wheels on the cot and carrying him over the steps.
While they were carrying him down those steep steps, one slipped. He didn’t necessarily fall; the whole time the paramedic was in control. Yet he lurched to the side, which allowed Joseph’s arm to fall free. It brushed up against the wooden railing next to the stairs. And everything happened all over again.
There was a bright light, like the pure light of the sun. This time, instead of a sepia overtone, everything was grayscale. This time he got the feeling that his body hadn’t made this trip, unlike his last vision.
The lot that had once been this old school was now practically barren. Men in hard hats were hard at work, some nailing boards while others were cutting wooden planks with old-fashioned circular saws. A couple exchanged some sort of joke, and both laughed heartily.
Last time, it felt the vision had lasted hours. This one was noticeably shorter; it only lasted a matter of minutes. Joseph nearly screamed; with every second of this newest vision, the pressure in his head doubled.
Joseph awoke screaming, in a fast moving ambulance. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest, hard. The two paramedics were staring down at him in shock; they had no clue what to do. Joseph wasn’t able to talk at the moment, and there were no obvious ailments to take care of.
Joseph would only spend a night at the hospital. Once he was away from that strange place, he felt almost instantly better. Various doctors studied over his case puzzlingly, looking for some abnormality. But he seemed to just have had a strange case of epilepsy. At least, that’s what they told him.