There is significant violence in this story so if that's not your thing you may want to pass on this tale.
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Arnold VanVleet was a gentle soul as a child. However, two things happened between his eighth and ninth birthdays to change that forever. His father was murdered, and a few months after that two boys three years older than he was beat him severely just for the "fun" of it, landing him in the hospital for three days, an expense that his widowed mother could ill afford. It was only the devotion of his mother and older sister that got him through the ordeal, and then an unexpected encounter with the owner of a dojo gave him a different outlook on life.
From the time that he was nine until he was nineteen he spent all of his free time taking martial arts courses, or working out to increase his strength, stamina, and quickness for practicing martial arts. He never participated in soccer, basketball, chess club, or any other activities that a normal child in a suburban environment would -- instead he had devotion to his studies, his mother and sister, and becoming an instrument of justice.
By the time that Arnold was fifteen he was six feet one inch tall, about 185 pounds, of flexible titanium. It was then that he visited his first lesson on justice -- to the now eighteen year old thugs who had beaten him when he was eight years old. He confronted the thugs -- now both about his size -- in a park at dusk on a cool May night. The thugs were there to smoke weed and shoot some hoops -- Arnold was there to administer justice.
"Heh, do you two stupid ugly assholes remember me?" Arnold challenged as he approached the miscreants from the shadows while they were shooting a basketball at the park's court.
"Who are you calling an asshole, dip shit?" one of the miscreants toughly responded.
"I'll answer my question for you, assholes. You sent me to the hospital when I was eight and you were eleven. I've come to return the favor."
Arnold wanted the thugs to make the first move so he baited them some more until finally one took a swing at him. Two minutes later the thugs were unrecognizable since their faces were piles of goo as they lay unconscious on the hardcourt. Arnold calmly walked away.
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Despite the fact that Arnold was a fighting machine at least since he was fourteen years old he was kind and considerate to all normal humans, especially women. Although no one would say that he had movie star looks, because of his demeanor and the fact that he was a good listener essentially every female that he came into extended contact with loved him, even if not romantically.
It also quickly became known that no male could ever mistreat a female in his presence or if he became knowledgeable about it. This first became widely known when Arnold was sixteen and he personally witnessed Jim Allison, the biggest kid in the High School Arnold attended, and a tackle on the football team, slap his "girlfriend" just outside the front entrance of the school.
Arnold approached Allison and said "Only dickless wimps and cowards hit women, Allison -- so which one are you, a dickless wimp or a dickless coward?"
"I'll show you who's dickless," Allison yelled as he charged Arnold.
Arnold's first kick was to Allison's left knee, causing him to grunt and stumble. Arnold's next kick was to the side of Allison's head. That was it; "fight" over; Allison an unconscious drooling blob laying on the pavement.
Then Arnold walked up to the slapped "girlfriend." "Are you all right?" he asked inspecting the large red welt on her left cheek.
"Yes -- thank you," the bewildered girl replied, moving her eyes between Arnold's concerned face and the insert body on the pavement.
"If you're OK, maybe you could make a call to get the paramedics to take Allison to the hospital. I have someplace to be and don't have a cell phone. Would you mind?" Arnold said/asked.
"No I don't mind -- I'll call now."
Arnold turned and saw three of Allison's teammates clustered around him with confused expressions on their faces. Arnold spoke to them in a non-confrontational voice. "When Allison gets out of the hospital be sure to tell him that no male hits any female in this school without answering to me."
The guys he addressed simply nodded their heads.
Allison was on the injured list for the rest of the football season; until Arnold graduated High School there were no more reports of males hitting females.
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By the time that he was nineteen Arnold was six feet four inches tall and 230 pounds, still of flexible titanium. By taking a heavy course load and going two summers Arnold already had an associate's degree in criminology from the local community college. Then, despite his mother's apprehension, he enlisted in the Navy with the promise by his recruiter that he could become a Navy cop -- a member of the Shore Patrol, aka Master at Arms.
Basic training was much less strenuous for Arnold than his normal workout regime, and he was both the physical and academic star of his class. That gave him the right to pick what branch of the Navy he wanted to serve in, so he achieved his goal of becoming a "Master at Arms." In the nine week Master at Arms course Arnold was again the physical and academic star -- in fact after a week he was designated as the instructor for the self-defense courses taught to recruits since having him take self-defense courses would have been a joke as he quickly established the very first day of that training when he dispatched (without significantly hurting them) every single other recruit first singly, then in pairs, then in trios.
Arnold's first post was a prestigious and important one -- San Diego. He was assigned a senior female partner, 28 year old Master Chief Petty Officer Alicia Connor. They immediately hit it off both professionally and personally; for Arnold it was love at first sight.
