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He asked for IDs The first tere obviously doctored so badly that Rogers didn’t even bother keeping them He just tossed them back When they tried to pass by him, he put out an arm

“Just to be clear, that was a rejection, guys Try somewhere else, maybe where the bouncer is blind”

A black guy, the biggest of them, said, “Come on, man, on’t drink We just want to dance and score quality time with some fine ladies”

“Sorry, no exceptions”

Another of the group, a slightly suy, stepped up

“I tell you what, Grandpa You let us in and you get to keep your teeth”

Rogers s already You ht want to head back to the dorm and keep your scholarship”

“You must not have heard me, old man”

He took a swing, but Rogers had alreadybut air

“Stop running, Gramps, it’ll only hurt for a second,” said the man

Rogers turned to the other uys to take your buddy out of here before so unfortunate happens”

The hed “You sound like a lawyer, dude,” said the black guy

“I’ like a lawyer”

“How ’bout a doctor, then?” said the

Rogers turned to hi”

“Then you can heal yourself, asshole!”

He swung again, only this tiround and, as he had done with Karl, clenched the rip, he twisted and then jerked doard

Thehis injured arm

“You broke my fuckin’ wrist,” he wailed

Rogers raised a fist to deliver a blow to the head that would have almost certainly killed thelike somebody had set it on fire with an acetylene torch

No Don’t do it Don’t do it!

“Hey, man, come on, back off!”

Rogers stared up at the black guy

“You proved your point, dude, okay?”

Rogers let go of the wrist and took a step back

Instantly, on a sign frouy, two of the other men stepped up to take their shot

Rogers didn’t wait for either of theer one, lifted hiainst the wall The man hit the brick hard and sluers’s belly, he brought a knee up and caught hi with a mouthful of broken teeth

Rogers stepped back and adjusted his hat

“Coh,” he said to the

The other guys helped their injured friends up

The black guy said, “Oh, we’ll be back all right Count on it, you son of a bitch!”

The group stalked off, with several of the their injured buddies The ers and screamed obscenities

The other people in line looked stunned by what they had just witnessed Even the ones ere obviously in the military Some left Most stayed

Within fifteen ers had passed all those twenty-one and older into the bar All the rest were sent on their way After seeing what Rogers could do, no one else gave him any trouble

“Dude’s a damn freak,” one man muttered to his friend as they were turned away