The Youthnage Experience 9: Karl's Competition
by BBMSN
I hurried down to the lobby and had them bring around the Hummer wagon that Jack used yesterday. Then I waited for Karl. It didn't take long. I heard a hush fall over the busy lobby, and people parting way as he walked toward me. Occasionally, there was a gasp, but mostly there was just awed silence. Karl walked through the lobby with a cocky arrogance, totally ignoring all on-lookers, but also completely aware of the stir he was creating. He was wearing khaki camouflage pants, and black leather army boots. He had on a heavy-duty weightbelt that was cinched to its last notches around his waist, which seemed to have narrowed and tightened even more since the last time I saw him, highlighting the vast spread of his lats and shoulders. The tight black tank top he had on did little to hide his powerhouse barrel-chested upper torso. He was a god, making his way through a sea of stunned mortals. He came up to me, grabbed me by the neck and said "Let's go." He meant business.
We went out to the car, and I got into the driver's seat. Karl opened the passenger side door, ripping it off its hinges. He looked at it, surprised. "They don't make em like they used to," he said. Then he crumpled the door in his bare hands, as if it were made of cheap aluminum foil, then deposited it into the trash can at the curb with a crash. He came back to the car and looked at it for a second, then said, "I feel like having the top down." The fact that the Hummer wasn't a convertible didn't stop him. He put his right hand where the roof met the windshield and dug in. The metal gave like warm putty. Once he got a grip, he peeled the top back. Then he switched his grip and began to roll the metal back, like he was opening a can of sardines, using his finger strength as the key. He rolled it up to the back of the car, then came back up front. The front windshield was now wobbling, with no top to support it, so Karl grabbed it with one hand, ripped it out, and put it in the backseat.
"It's hot out here," he said, and began to pull off his tank top. His body fat appeared to have dropped to zero. His entire upper body rippled with strength. His obliques looked like thick steel bridge cables, supporting his monstrous upper torso as it narrowed down to his tight rockhard waist.
He got into the car, and the Hummer's springs groaned, the car leaning toward him. "Drive out to the highway and head south," he ordered. I took off into the street. As I did, I looked into my side mirror and saw Jack and Sam coming out of the hotel. Jack noticed the crumpled car door in the trash can, and Sam looked up in time to see us driving off.
Karl leaned his seat back and laid back. He uncinched the weightbelt and reached into his army pants, pulling out his hard-on. "Whack me off," he said to me, looking up into the sky.
"Whack yourself off, I'm driving." I looked around to see who had said that, then realized my lips had been moving. Karl reached over calmly, and cupped my jaw in his beefy musclehand.
"If I ever have to repeat myself with you, I will beat you to a pulp," he said slowly."And if you don't whack me off now, I will crush your jawbone like an eggshell." He squeezed just hard enough to make my teeth start to ache. I reached over and took his cock in my hand. Oddly enough, I was harder than I'd ever been in my life. I worked Karl like I would have worked myself, and he groaned with approval. The back of my hand rubbed against his stomach, his silvery hair bristled against my skin like heavy steel wool. As I entered the highway and merged with traffic, I heard a woman scream "Oh my god!" as she caught a sight of us. I swerved to avoid hitting another car, so Karl took my hand off him and put it on the wheel. "Drive," he said, "Get off at exit 10." Then he engulfed his meat with his own massive hand, and went at it with a frenzy that would have bent steel. It didn't take long for him to unload, his spray exploading into the wind. The cars behind us must have thought an entire flock of seagulls had just had the crap scared out of them.
I got off at exit 10, and followed the ramp down. Karl told me where to go after that, and soon we were pulling into the parking lot of an old high school. The parking lot was half-filled with Dodge Rams, various other big pick-ups, Trans Ams, El Caminos, black SUV's and an assortment of army vehicles. There were also a few flat-bed trucks.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"There's an extreme power invitational here today. A private club of men into showing off their overdeveloped strength.They come from all over the country: state troopers, correction's officers, marines, ex-cons, bikers, anyone who's strong enough to qualify. They scout men from powerlifting events and strongmen competitions, then get together once every two years."
"How'd you know about it?"
"I came across it on the internet about a month ago.Once I found out where it was, I decided nothing could keep me from going up against them."
"How you gonna get in?" I asked.
"Let's see them stop me," said Karl, getting out of the car. I got out and looked out of the parking lot to see if Jack and Sam had followed us. When I turned, I bumped right into Karl.
"Looking for somebody, pumpkin?" he said. "Remember what I did to them last time. Next time will only be worse." He worked his big arm between my legs, then lifted me off the ground. He flexed his biceps, and I could feel the thick muscle bunching up, pushing into my groin, and lifting me higher. "Feel that, boy? That's pure power. Unstoppable man strength. And later on, you're gonna feel the full force of it. But right now, we're gonna show some boys what real strength is." He lowered me down to the ground, and headed for the building. I followed along behind.
We went up to the side entrance of the old school, which appeared to be abandoned. Some of the windows were boarded up, and the entrance we were at had a huge chain and padlock around the door bar. Karl cupped the big padlock in his hand. I expected him to snap it, but instead, he let it drop. Then he ripped the door right off its hinges, just like he had done to the car door, only with considerable more force.
We walked into the hallway. The building smelled musty and stale, but still like a school. We could hear voices down the way. Deep, loud voices, mixed with hearty laughs, and then an occasional CLANG of heavy iron. We headed toward the noise, and soon found our way to the gymnasium. It was full of activity. There were men everywhere. Big men. Big beefy hairy hulks, most of them buzzcut and tattooed. They walked around in various stages of undress. Some of them were stuffing themselves into Inzer powerlifting suits. Some had wrist wraps dangling from their huge arms. Their calloused hands were white with lifting talc. There were piles of weights and equipment all around. None of the dumbbells were under 150lbs. None of the plates were under 100. Lifting equipment and racks filled the gym, which was thick with the smell of male power.
Karl's eyes were glazed over. He was practically drooling. It was like he had found his home planet.
A big bear of a man with a clipboard came up to us. He had on a heavy flannel shirt, which didn't keep the thick shock of brown hair from sprouting out at the top.
"Who the fuck are you two," he snapped. Karl grabbed him by his chest hair and slammed him against the cinder block wall.
"I'm this year's winner," said Karl, pinning the big bear to the wall with his thumb.
"The hell you are," grunted the bear. Karl shifted his hand to the man's throat, and began to slide him up the wall. The guy looked like he weighed around 300lbs, and got bug-eyed as Karl lifted him without even straining.
"What's the problem over here?" said a man from behind me. I turned and saw a guy about my size, dressed in casual clothing.
"Nothing, Mr.Doogan," choked the big bear man. "This guy says he wants to compete."
"Well, then, let him, Slammer. Looks like he qualifies," said Mr. Doogan, who introduced himself as the sponsor of this entire event. Karl let Slammer slide back down.
"I'm Tom Vargas," I said, shaking his hand.
"I know who you are," said Mr. Doogan. "I was at your conference yesterday afternoon. That's some product you've got there," he said, eyeing Karl. "Slammer, you take Karl and show him around,"he said, "Let's go up into the stands, Tom. They're about to start."
Mr.Doogan and I talked about the event, which he had started about ten years earlier, after inheriting a good chunk of family money. Although he was not a big man, he had always had a passion for powerlifting and tests of strength. He set this contest up to see how far genetically gifted strongmen could take their gifts. He paid all the expenses for this weekend, and flew everyone in. He also helped many of them with expenses throughout the year. He kept the club limited to twenty. At the end of this year's competition, the bottom five would be dropped, allowing his scouts to find five new men to replace them by the next event. Mr. Doogan felt that, although harsh, this allowed new blood into the group, and stimulating competition and focus during the two years off. It seemed to be effective. The men on the gym floor were monsters. They were warming up with weights that most men would never even max out at. Not many of them were as freakishly shredded up as Karl. They looked more like the guys on ESPN's Strongest Man show. Only more so. Bigger guts. Bigger squatbutts. Bigger BACKS. Damn, did these guys have backs!
"OK, Tom, it's starting," said Mr.Doogan."I think you're going to enjoy this."
"Call me Daniel," said Mr.Doogan, as we sat in the bleachers. Then he explained the sequence of events. First, each competitor got three tries for a max weight in one of four lifts : bench press, deadlift, squat, or legpress. Daniel had included the legpress because these men had such tremendous strength in their legs, and he loved seeing them move massive tonnage. The winner in each lift then moved up to the "talent" portion of the competition, where each man got to exhibit his power in a show of strength of his choosing. The two most impressive displays would advance to the next level, Daniel being the sole judge of these proceedings. The two winning strongmen would then battle it out for winner in an ultimate fighting style match-up.
As Daniel explained the contest, I watched the gym floor. Everywhere I looked was a breathtaking specimen of macho grit and determination. Even the assistants, who were loading up the bars with 100lb plates, were heavily muscled gorillas, and they looked like no match for any of the contestants, some of whom were doing mock-wrestling over in the corner, grunting and sweating as they used their own powerful bodies to warm up. Two of them would lock up, grapple around a bit, then break up, pat each other's butts, and strut off, shirts soaked through with sweat, like two rhinos at play. But when Slammer walked out to announce the beginning of the contest, all the men drew apart, brows furrowing hard, as they began to focus on the duty at hand.
All the lifts would be going on simultaneously to save time, and Daniel did not have to judge this part of the contest. The assistants, along with Slammer, kept track of who lifted what. I saw Karl over by the legpress machine. He was leaning against the wall, his massive arms folded, as the other men warmed up. Karl clearly needed no warming up, and had no intention of doing so.
They loaded up the bars on the legpress. There were two levels of bars on each side of the machine.
"How much is on there?" I asked Daniel.
"They start at 2800, and move up from there," he said. I suppressed the urge to rub my hand across my crotch like it was asking me to do.
Six men competed on the legpress, including Karl, who was going last. Each man got the 2800, some with more effort than others. Then Karl got on. He slowly pushed up on the weight, and undid the locks. He lowered the weight down, then pressed it up with ease. Thing is, he was only using one leg. And he started doing reps. Up and down the sled went, Karl smirking, his hands behind his head. I heard him growl out "Yeahhh," until Slammer came running over, whistle blowing. He started reprimanding Karl, who locked the sled back into position, and stood up. Slammer yelled something at him, and Karl said "Then put some weight on the goddam thing."
"Holy smokes," said Daniel. Slammer came over and asked him what to do. Daniel told him to load the thing up, which they did. They managed to fully load the legpress machine with 4000lbs, the most it would hold.
"Shit," said Karl, "pussy weight. Have some of these apes climb up there too."
Slammer looked over, and Daniel nodded. They got four of the 350lb men to climb up on the legpress. That brought the weight to 5400lbs. Karl got back on. And began to press. He used both legs this time, and he pressed the sled up and down, rep after rep, fast enought that the four big men had to hold on tight. All other action on the gym floor had stopped. Everyone stared at Karl, many of them slack-jawed. Karl continued to press out rep after rep, lowering his knees to his ears with every rep. When he reached 100, he stopped. He climbed out of the press, and stood. He took off his weight belt and lowered his pants, exposing his huge thighs. They were purple with pump, and blown up like balloons. In the cool damp air of the gymnasium, steam rose off his quads like a fog.
Daniel stared in awe. He said, "What the hell is in that formula?"
"I don't know," I answered slowly. Karl looked over at me, winked, then tapped the tip of his nose with his muscle tongue.
"You have to get it for me," said Daniel.
"Get what?" I asked him, while watching Karl, who, by flexing his massive calves, had snapped the heavy laces of his army boots, and kicked them off. Then he ripped out of his pants and tank top, so that he was standing in only his Unico boxer briefs. He put back on his weightbelt, which he cinched another notch tighter. My god, what a sight he was. Pumped up freak superhuman. Far stronger than any other man here, and he knew it now too.
Daniel shook my shoulder. "You get me that formula, I'll make it very worth your while." I didn't know if I could do that, even if I wanted to. The Youthnage can hadn't had anything written on it, and for all I knew, only Dr.Abrams had access to that information. But Daniel shook with excitement. He looked like the type that always got what he wanted, because he could keep throwing money at it till he did.
Karl began to make his way over to us. As he got closer, I could see the veins snaking all across his huge legs, feeding his massive muscle. Then Slammer stepped between us and Karl, blocking his way. Slammer was a big thick bear of a man. His nickname came not from being in and out of prison all of his life, which he had been, but from his time as a bouncer, when he used to take men out of the club he worked at, and slam them on the cement sidewalk until the fight was out of them. The fight was usually out of them after the second slam, but Slammer liked to count to ten.
Karl looked at Slammer with an expression that said "you gotta be fucking kidding me." He wrapped his big arms around Slammer, and lifted him in a bearhug, trapping his arms at his side. Slammer had never been lifted by anyone, and began to struggle, slowly at first, but then, when Karl's grip didn't even budge, more frantically.
"Can't get out, can ya, pussy?" sneered Karl.
"You put me down now, or I'll fucking kill you," grunted Slammer.
Karl simply tightened his hold. And every time Slammer exhaled, Karl tightened even more, so that there was no way for Slammer to breath back in. I stood up to try and stop Karl, but Daniel pulled me back. Karl began to bounce the big man in his arms, shaking what fight he had left right out of him. Slammer was making guttural, frightened gasping sounds. Two of Slammer's friends came to his aid, trying to pry Karl's arms open. Karl swatted them away like flies, one at a time, backhanding them across the gym floor, then reapplied his crushing hold. The rest of the men continued to watch on. None of them cared for Slammer enough to risk getting bitchslapped for him.
I heard a thudded pop, as one of Slammer's ribs gave to the mounting pressure. Slammer's nose began to bleed, and I heard another pop. I had to stop Karl. Someone had to stop him. I stood up.
"Put the man down, asshole," came a voice from the other side of the gym. It was Jack.
Karl dropped Slammer, who crumpled onto the floor, and crawled away, wounded. "Son of a bitch," said Karl. "I'd know that pussy voice anywhere."
Actually, I might not have recognized Jack's voice, as it had deepened substantially since this morning. I looked at him in amazement. If someone had told me this was Jack's bigger, stronger brother, I would have believed them. He had morphed up bigger than ever.
"Time for Karl to say bye-bye," said Jack, stepping into the middle of the gym floor, and stripping of his shirt.
"Shit," said Daniel, "that looks like Jack Calhoun's bigger, stronger brother."
The men from the competition formed a wide circle enclosing Jack and Karl. This was something they all wanted to see. I wasn't sure I did. And where the hell was Sam?
Karl and Jack glared at each other across the gym floor, surrounded by the men of the extreme strength competition.
"You gotta be the dumbest fuck on the planet," Karl said to him, "stepping up against me again. Remember how I popped your arms outta their sockets last time? This time, I'm gonna show you what my full strength can do."
"That right, grandpa?" said Jack. "Maybe you outta up your blood pressure medicine first, before you pop a rhoid."
Karl scowled at Jack and took a step toward him, but then turned and walked over to the bench that was loaded for the bench press lift....loaded with 1200lbs. Karl grabbed the middle of the bar with one hand, and lifted it off the rack. Then he curled it up, slow, and lowered it back down. Then he curled it up again, only this time he stopped mid-rep and held it steady.
"Look at this arm, punk," said Karl. "This is the arm that's gonna pummel you into the ground. Then I'm gonna pick you up and pummel you down again. And then again. Until I'm tired. And I don't get tired."
Daniel sat next to me, shaking with excitement so badly that he clung onto the bleacher seat with his hands.
Karl lowered the bar slowly to his side, then suddenly hurled it upward, launching it toward the ceiling. The 1200lbs of iron shot up like a cannonball and smashed through the ceiling into the open air, only to smash back through and land with a thundering crash on the gym floor just next to Karl, splintering the wooden flooring into bits and embedding itself 12 inches into the concrete slab underneath. The entire building quaked from the impact. Karl never blinked, but continued to stare down Jack.
"Now it's your turn," Karl growled, and began to advance toward Jack. Karl roared toward Jack like a freight train. He plowed into Jack at full speed, lifting Jack right off his feet. Karl muscled Jack backward, through the circle of strongmen, and right into the wall, hitting the cinder block with such momentum that they crashed right through, into the parking lot outside.
The guys from the contest clammered through the hole to get outside. Daniel led me to a side door that opened out onto the parking lot. Jack and Karl rolled around the asphalt, like a massive alpha male tumbleweed. Finally, they rolled up against a two foot retaining wall at the edge of the parking lot. Karl straddled Jack, using his superstrong thighs to pin Jack down, and held Jack's chest down with his thick brawny forearm. Then Karl raised up his other arm, and brought his big fist down toward Jack's face. Jack dodged the blow at the last second, and Karl's fist slammed into the asphalt paving, smashing it like peanut brittle. Jack managed to slam a kidney punch into Karl's back. Enraged, Karl shifted Jack into a sitting position against the retaining wall. Then Karl reared back his thick knee, and rammed it up toward Jack's face. Again, Jack dodged it at the last second, and Karl's knee smashed into the concrete wall, cracking it like a glass windshield. Karl roared with anger, so loudly that some of the men covered their ears. Karl extended his leg fully backward, and brought it up again with lightning speed. This time he made contact. I heard the sickening crunch of Jack's nose bones.
I'd seen enough. I ran over to the back of one of the pickup's and found a crowbar. I grabbed it, and ran over to Karl. I reared back, and clocked him in the back of the head with the crowbar. Then I stepped back.
Karl turned his head slowly. He released Jack, and stood up, facing me. I was frozen in my tracks. I could see that Jack's nose was bloody, but he looked ok otherwise, and was conscious. Karl reached out and grabbed the crowbar from my hands. He placed it vertically into the deep ridge running down the middle of his thickly muscled abs. Then he let go, and the crowbar stayed. With the crowbar wedged between his powerful stomach muscles, he began to crunch down and flex. With each twist of his abs, the crowbar bent. And twisted. And bent more. Then he bent forward, and flexed into a most-muscular crab shot. Every superhuman muscle fiber on his upper body fired at the same time, exploding into a mind-numbing display of rippling strength. The crowbar was flattened. Karl stood up straight, and let the crushed iron bar clang to the ground. He stepped toward me.
"Leave him alone, old man."
We both turned toward the voice at the edge of the parking lot. It was Sam. He was leaning against the back of a black pick-up. Around his feet were twelve empty cans of Youthnage. He strode over to us, cocky as a rooster. He got nose to nose with Karl.
"Get out of my face, boy," warned Karl.
"Make me," said Sam.
Karl slammed his palms against Sam's solid shoulders. Sam didn't budge, but he slammed Karl back, and Karl took a step back. The two men circled each other slowly. Suddenly, Sam charged, hitting Karl in the gut with his shoulder. He pushed Karl back into the side of an SUV, pinning him. Karl raised his arms up, meshed his fingers together, and slammed Sam with a hammer blow to the middle of his back. Sam was unfazed. He pushed Karl harder into the side of the truck. Sam's feet dug divots into the asphalt as he ground in. Karl struggled, but couldn't get free. He slammed Sam's back again, to no effect. The SUV began to slide sideways, the tires skidding and screeching as they inched along. Sam pushed and pushed, until the truck banged up against the pick-up next to it. He pushed harder, and both trucks began to slide. The tires jutted and protested against the sideways movement. Sam pushed until the two trucks banged up against a flat-bed truck. The pick-up began to buckle as Sam ground his shoulder into Karl's thick torso. Karl grabbed Sam's ears and pulled his head back, then headed butted the younger man as hard as he could, but Sam's thick Slavic skull took the blow easily. He scoffed at Karl's vain attempt, and pushed harder, crumpling the pick-up like an accordion.
Jack came up by my side, watching. His nose had stopped bleeding, but looked an unhealthy purple. Otherwise, he looked no worse for the wear of being shoved through a cinder block wall, and smashed in the face by a battering ram knee.
"I'll be a son of a bitch," he said, marvelling at the way Sam was handling Karl. But suddenly, the door frame of the SUV buckled, and Karl used the momentum to throw Sam off-balance. He flipped them both around, and slammed Sam into a bearhug, the same hold he had used on Slammer so effectively earlier. He lifted Sam into the air and began to squeeze.
"Shit," I said, as Karl began to tighten his grip around Sam, and to bear down with his freaky strong arms of steel. Sam looked at him and said, "That all you got?" and flexed his arms up into a double bi display of unbounded power. Karl squeezed harder and harder, ten times harder than the squeeze that had busted Slammer's ribs like eggshell. Sam just chuckled. His granite lats wouldn't allow the bearhug to crush the fight out of him like Slammer's had. In fact, he liked it. He leaned into Karl's ear and whispered, "Harder". Karl, turned on by the boy's resilience, crushed him tighter against him, but also started rubbing Sam's body up and down against his own. Sam put his hands on Karl's traps, and began massaging the older man's bullmuscle with his powerful superboy grip strength. Karl moaned, and they began to grind into each other.
"I think they're falling in love," said Jack. And he appeared to be right. They continued to grind into each other, but no longer as a battle to the end, but as a grope out session, two massively strong alpha males going muscle to muscle.
Daniel pulled up to Jack and I in his Bentley. "Listen to me, Tom," he said. "You two help me get that formula, and you'll never have to work again. I could create a race of supermen with that stuff. Get in."
Jack and I looked at each other. Sam and Karl had become more entangled, and completely involved in exploring each others strength. Some of the other strongmen had paired up and were doing the same thing. We shrugged, and got into Daniel's car, and headed back to the hotel to find Dr.Abrams.