Imagine a night, like any other night. The cool air, perhaps a light breeze, with only the sights and sounds of the city for company. A solitary figure walks alone along an apparently empty street. Until, out of the shadows, another figure appears and the unthinkable happens. An assault is about to occur to another innocent, peaceful person seeking only to get where they're going.

In another story - in another time and place, this situation could have a very different ending. But, this is not just any night. It's not just any place with any characters. At least, not as far as the attacker is concerned.

No, tonight should be just any other night. The criminal assailant, skilled at what he does from the experience gained from countless other nights, assumes that his victim will comply like all the rest. If they resist, as others have tried, they will simply be beaten or worse as compliance is necessary. In fact, in this attacker's mind, it's demanded!

But, unbeknownst to this subhuman, bent on taken what he wants rather than working for it with respect and honor like the rest of us, his world is about to change - his illusions about his own superiority or ability to be in charge of these situations, crushed.

Imagine, as the assailant is doing, how the poor, lonely victim, surprised by the sudden appearance of this unknown stranger, is overtaken be fear and a sense of panic and bewilderment. Imagine how they must feel as their heart sinks - their breathing changes - their heart begins to race and pound ferociously in their chest.

Can you imagine what being in a situation like that must feel like? Can you?

The assailant can. Because he's planned for it. He knows how little attention people in general give to the world around them, to say nothing of the attention they give to their own safety and self-defense until it's too late.

So, he steps from the darkness and confronts his victim. He watches the rather bland, but calm, look of a person doing what they always do, change into the startled, confused, and contorted shape that he's looking for. He senses his own elation and rise in confidence as he sees the signs that tell him that his ploy, like so many times before, is working.

But then, just as he takes hold of his would-be victim - just as he's spitting the commands for money and the threat of punishment for not complying, he senses a strange feeling unlike any he's ever felt before. At least not in this situation.

Suddenly there is a crushing, almost burning-like pain focused in his grabbing hand and radiating up his arm. He feels his knees unconsciously bend as they somehow lose the strength necessary to stand. Though he tries, his body seems to be completely out of his own control.

Across from him but intimately connected through responding actions, the defender's face changes from its initial look of surprise at the change in circumstance to look of contempt and intense commitment. As she digs a small, metal bar, no bigger than a marker into the small bones on the back of her assailant's hand, she watches his legs give out.

That's all the confirmation she needs to tell her that the technique she learned so many months ago in a self-defense class was working perfectly. As they assailant struggled to regain control of his own body, the defender suddenly changes tactics and slams the blunt end of her small, almost hidden weapon into her attacker's temple, sending his head back and to the side.

Recognizing a new target open up as his head moves in response to the bone-jarring strike she just delivered, she drops the weapon, known as a Kubotan, or self-defense keychain, down into his shoulder, just behind the attacker's collar bone. Hooking the tiny weapon behind the clavicle, she pulls toward herself, grinding the metal implement into the thin and highly sensitive bone.

The assailant, once weak in the knees from the initial attack to his hand, is now reeling in pain and dazed from the powerful shot to the side of his head. The overwhelm caused by the combination of attacks and the resultant short circuiting of his nervous system causes him to drop to his knees before his assumed victim. Now firmly in control of the situation and standing over her damaged and confused would-be assailant, the defender, with a final look that says, "how dare you even think that you could do this to me!", delivers another bone-crushing strike to her attacker's face with a well-place knee before running off into the night and back into her life.

Imagine, seeing a lone, solitary figure, sprawled out on a dark street. The now motionless figure, a man who once had the misguided notion that everyone else in the world was a victim from which he could take what he wanted without respect or concern, lies unconscious and still.

Sounds like a commercial, doesn't it? Except it's a scene that has been played out more than a few times involving a small, simple, and easy to learn and use weapon known as a Kubotan, or simply a self-defense keychain. A powerful little weapon that can turn even someone with little to no formal self-defense training into any attacker's worst nightmare.

This simple story shows how the lives of two people, would-be attacker and victim, experienced firsthand the power and effectiveness of this inconspicuous little weapon. And the results changed both of their lives forever.