The crowd went crazy, the announcers went wild, and Millie strained to hear their commentary, her hand in mine, her other hand resting on Henry.
“Tag took him down,” I yelled downward, giving her the play-by-play I knew she needed, but my eyes stayed locked on Tag’s back as he struggled to grind his way past Shotgun’s guard.
“Ground and pound!” Henry shrieked.
But the round ended, and Tag was forced to let Shotgun up. Tag stood easily and walked to his empty corner, but he didn’t sit on the stool that was placed there for him, nor did he lean against the ropes, giving the crowd his back. Instead, he grabbed a towel, shot his mouth with water, spit it out again, took another drink and found Millie in the crowd. He stood, fingers clinging to the cage that surrounded the octagon, and he didn’t look at me or anyone else. He kept his eyes on her long enough that the announcers were turning their heads, trying to see who or what held his attention.
“I’ve got this, Millie!” he roared suddenly. “I got this! I got this, baby!”
“Did you hear him, Millie?” I yelled down at her, my eyes never leaving Tag as his eyes stayed planted on Millie’s face. She nodded vigorously. “He wants you to know he’s okay.”
Everyone was staring at her now, and the announcers were wide-eyed and openly speculative as the buzzer sounded and Tag turned away.
It continued on that way through the next four rounds. When the buzzer sounded, Tag would find his corner, find Millie, and reassure her, always in the same way. “I got this, Millie. I got this.”
And the crowd started to believe him. They started to chant for him, a chant that began with Henry.
“Tag Team! Tag Team! Tag Team!” he’d yelled continually, and before too long, the people around us picked up the chant, and it spread through the crowd in pockets and in power, until Shotgun caught Tag on the forehead again, staggering him, causing him to go down on one knee only to surge up and catch Shotgun beneath the chin, knocking his head back with a whip-lash inducing crack.
Shotgun crumpled.
For half a second there was a collective intake of breath, a shared, stunned heartbeat that silenced the crowd before pandemonium broke out and the referee practically slid to Shotgun’s inert form, frantically waving his arms over his head, indicating the fight was over. Tag had won.
“It’s over!” I screamed. “He did it!”
“Tag!” Henry howled in wild delight. “Tag!”
But Millie just stood, shaking, her eyes dry, her palms drenched. Or maybe that was my hand. We clutched each other, and Henry hung on too, the three of us caught up in the surge and swell that raged around us. The crowd was hollering, people clapping, jumping up and down, jostling us, patting us on the back, congratulating us. Everyone had watched as Tag zeroed in on Millie throughout the fight, and they were zeroing in on her now.
Tag approached his corner again, this time with his hands raised above his head. But as he found Millie once more, his eyes narrowing on her face, his right leg buckled and his hands came down, relinquishing celebration for something to hold onto. He swayed wildly, the crowd gasped, and I lunged forward, letting go of Millie’s hand, my arms out-stretched as if I could catch him.
His fingers tangled in the netting, his eyes rolled, and his body jerked, collapsing into a shuddering heap on the octagon floor. And he continued to convulse.
I was up and over the cage wall before anyone could stop me.
The crowd grew silent beyond the octagon, and strangely enough, no one challenged me. I knelt beside him, trying to hold onto him, not knowing what to do, and the referee was immediately at my side, as well as someone from Shotgun’s corner.
“He’s seizing!” the referee said sharply, and someone shoved a mouth guard back between Tag’s teeth to keep him from biting his tongue. I slid my arm beneath his head to prevent it from knocking against the floor.
Shotgun was sitting up blearily, and the medical personnel who had come immediately to his aid abandoned him for the new emergency. From the corner of my eye I thought I saw Molly. Blond hair, blue eyes, silently waiting. And I bit back a curse and slammed down my walls, refusing to acknowledge her.
THE TELEVISION IN the emergency waiting room was tuned into a local station, and Millie, Henry and I sat in numb silence, listening to a Vegas reporter sharing the news of the day. Axel, Mikey, Cory, Andy and Paulo were there too, looking as grim and gutted as I felt, and they raised their eyes to the screen when Tag’s name was mentioned. The reporter stood outside of the MGM, where people were still streaming in and out of the venue, her hand clutching a fuzzy blue microphone, her expression both serious and exultant, telling us what we already knew about Tag’s fight and none of the stuff we wanted to know.
It was fight night at the MGM this evening, the main event one many had been waiting a long time to see, but it was an undercard fight featuring a last-minute fill-in that has been the subject among fight fans here tonight. David Taggert was called up only three days ago to fill the slot vacated by Jordan Jones. Jones had been scheduled to fight long-time UFC favorite and former Light Heavyweight champion, Terry Shaw, when he sustained an injury that left him unable to fight.
David Taggert, after a stunning upset in April against Bruno Santos, was called in to take his place. Fight fans definitely got their money’s worth when Taggert and Shaw went a full four rounds before Taggert knocked Shaw out cold. However, that’s not where the story ends. The controversy is over an apparent seizure Taggert had after the fight ended. Shaw was out cold. The fight was over. The referee raised Taggert’s hand, Tag Taggert turned toward the crowd, raised his hands, took a few steps, and collapsed.