by Matt Rogers
‘You can put that gun down now,’ he said. ‘Won’t do you any favours after I leave.’
‘What’s going on?’ King said. ‘Who are you?’
‘You’re interfering with things you don’t want any part of,’ Roman said. ‘Should have stayed out of them while you had the chance.’
With that he turned and left with the policeman. They spoke softly as they went, exchanging information. Clearly the entire thing had been a setup. Roman had never been a prisoner. He’d been inserted into the cell in an attempt to extract information from King. The relentless questions and constant probing had soon become suspicious.
And now he was gone.
King tossed the Zamorana pistol under the cell bars with grim resignation. It skittered away and came to rest on the other side of the hallway. There was no use holding onto it. It would only invite trouble. He couldn’t imagine Tomás being lenient if he discovered King was armed.
He sat back down on the same bench, now alone. His cellmates studied him like he was an exhibition at the zoo. Peering in fascination, puzzled by the complicated chain of events. Their drug-addled minds would struggle to comprehend what had happened. In their eyes, a man had just walked free without repercussion.
King closed his eyes in an attempt to dull a pounding headache that had sprouted to life. He sighed. It seemed trouble was destined to follow him wherever he went. He didn’t know who had him falsely arrested, or why, but he was certainly not who they thought he was.
You’ll never escape it.
Violence and death and chaos.
All he’d ever known, and seemingly all he would continue to know. Especially if Tomás kept his word of transferring him to prison without a trial. He’d heard the horror stories of Venezuelan prisons and began to regret ever stepping foot in the country.
Gang wars. Drugs. Stabbings. Shootings.
The system was a nightmare. If he ended up in its bowels, he doubted he would ever escape. Suddenly it dawned on him that no-one on the planet knew his location.
Ten years of work for Black Force had taken their toll. It was a classified secret project by officials at the very top of the food chain in the United States military. All of it kept off the books. All of it accompanied by handsome financial compensation. All of it death-defying insanity.
King had lost count years ago of the number of times he’d narrowly avoided death. They’d sent him into war-torn wastelands, put him up against ruthless cartels, used him as a one-man hostage extraction team. The memories had blurred together into a relentless barrage of warfare that visited him almost every night.
So he’d retired.
After an eventful stint in the countryside of Australia, he’d travelled slowly through Europe, healing up, enjoying life. Two months later he was in the state of Vargas. He’d seen a pamphlet outside a travel agency and decided to fly here on a whim.
He’d never been to Venezuela.
It meant he’d arrived with zero possessions. In an attempt to escape his past life he’d made himself uncontactable. No phone. No-one had been informed of his location prior to the trip. There wasn’t a soul on the planet who knew where Jason King was.
He should have known better.
The sound of the steel door grating open brought him back to the present. He opened his eyes and saw Tomás stride into view, pausing on the other side of the bars. He made eye contact with King and his features twisted into a grotesque smile. King stared back. His stomach tightened. He knew the worst had yet to come.
By far.
‘We’ve processed you,’ Tomás said.
‘What?’
‘Time for a change of scenery.’
‘I’m getting a trial?’
‘You’ve had your trial. You’re guilty.’
King didn’t respond. With two sentences the policeman had condemned him to a lifetime inside one of Vargas’ hellholes. Just like that. No official processes. Not a shred of diplomacy. Nothing but a quick trip to the nearest prison and a lifetime of suffering.
‘This is beyond illegal,’ he said.
Tomás just laughed. ‘We determine what’s legal and illegal.’
‘So what happens now?’
‘You’re being transferred to El Infierno. You’ve been sentenced to life.’
‘Fuck you.’
‘Oh, I’d be angry too. Nothing you can do about it though.’
Tomás turned on his heel and disappeared from sight. None of the cellmates spoke English but they seemed to notice King’s change in demeanour. A quiet fury. Rage behind his eyes.
Someone would pay for what had happened to him.
CHAPTER 9
They came for him at mid-morning.
The hours between Tomás’ departure and their arrival later that day passed in absolute silence. King didn’t open his mouth the entire time. At one point, one cellmate got a little too curious. The man scurried over to him, wide-eyed, still high on something. He prodded at him with a single finger. King lashed out, throwing a punch but deliberately missing. It scared the man away into the corner.
As he sat he mulled over what options he had. If he managed to get to a phone he could contact old friends from the military who would tear any prison apart to get him out. But he imagined he would not get the chance to. Tomás seemed good at his job, and his job entailed keeping King locked up, for reasons still undetermined.
Four policemen entered the hallway at once, weapons raised, pointing them into the cell. Tomás led the group. He unlocked the cell and beckoned for King to come with them.
‘It’s time,’ he said.
‘What if I don’t move?’
‘We’ll beat you to death.’
King nodded and rose. He knew they wouldn’t be able to touch him, but if he fought back one of them would get a shot off. It was useless to bother trying. He stepped out into the corridor, leaving the filthy cell behind. His cellmates watched him leave with a mixture of confusion and anger. Perhaps they thought he was an ally to the four men standing before him.
He certainly wasn’t.
They handcuffed him again and marched him back the way he had come the previous day.
‘How do you get away with this?’ King said.
Tomás shoved a hand in his back. ‘Don’t talk.’
‘I’ll talk if I want to.’
The butt of the man’s rifle struck him in the abdomen, sending a flare of pain up his torso. It hurt, but he didn’t let it show. He stayed upright. Masked the burning sensation in his ribs. Stared at Tomás with bemusement.
‘That was cute,’ he said.
It angered Tomás. The man had put a considerable amount of force into the swing in an attempt to send a message. Any other victim would have crumbled.
King made it look like the blow hadn’t bothered him in the slightest.
Tomás wrapped a hand around the back of his collar and quickened his pace. They exited the police station almost exactly twenty-four hours after entering it. The congregation of officers led him to the same van that had brought him from Diamanté. They threw him in the back. A pair of them followed him in and the other two entered the driver’s compartment. Tomás drove.
As they tore away from the station, King considered Roman’s involvement. The man had been working for whoever was responsible for his arrest, that much was certain. Perhaps it had something to do with the three thugs he’d beat down in the alley. Perhaps he had messed with the wrong people. A gang with inside connections in the law enforcement system, throwing him in prison to send a message — that they were not to be fucked with.
But that made no sense. Such an elaborate procedure would be far more time-consuming than a simple bullet to the back of the head. If these people had such a widespread reach, it would not have been difficult to kill him. No, they wanted information. Roman had been loaded to the gills with questions, determined to try and snatch an answer out of him before he wised up to the man’s true identity.
An answer he did not h
ave.
There was more to this. He was sure of it. But as the van rattled and shook, bouncing over potholed roads towards prison, King figured he may never find out what that may be.
They screeched to a halt after a twenty-minute journey. The doors opened and King stepped down onto dusty earth, an officer’s hand wrapped around each arm to ensure he didn’t make a break for it. They had parked in an empty lot without another car in sight. Tomás rounded the van’s side and came face-to-face with King. He was smiling.
‘Welcome to your new home,’ he said, gesturing at the massive structure before them.
From their position it was impossible to tell how large the prison truly was. King stared up at an enormous rectangular building, made of a haphazard amalgamation of brick and metal. Guard towers were positioned along the length of the structure, towering over everything else, complete with glass windows running the entire diameter. Reinforced, he assumed. Bulletproof. The top of the building had been coated seemingly at random with hordes of barbed wire. Bars ran along the windows facing out onto the street they stood on.
‘This is it?’ King said.
Tomás laughed. ‘This is one side. It’s a square, my friend. The prison’s in the middle.’
The sheer size of the place dawned on King. This long building acted as one wall of the prison, clearly guarded around the clock. From here, it seemed impenetrable.
King guessed he would not be breaking out anytime soon.
One of the battered steel doors on the ground floor opened and a prison guard stepped out onto open ground. He was tall and wiry, dressed in an official-looking uniform. His wide eyes flicked over the group and came to rest on King.
‘There he is!’ he cried. His English seemed good, despite a thick Spanish accent. ‘The American pig!’
King noticed the holster at his waist contained a pistol. He looked like he knew how to use it.
‘I’m Rico,’ the man said, approaching Tomás with an outstretched hand. ‘I’ll be looking after this guy for his stay here.’
Tomás clasped his hand and exchanged a look with Rico. ‘He’s all yours.’
‘How long will you be looking after me for?’ King said.
Rico turned. ‘The rest of your life, gringo. Which I’d say won’t be long. They don’t like foreigners in here.’
‘I’m sure they’ll like me.’
Rico cocked his head. ‘Tough guy, huh? You haven’t seen a prison like this before.’
‘I’ll manage.’
‘No you won’t.’ The man turned to Tomás. ‘I’ll take it from here.’
The policeman nodded and signalled for his men to return to the van. As he walked off, he took a final glance at King.
‘Hope they make life hell for you, American,’ he said.
‘You’d better hope I die in here,’ King said.
‘And why’s that?’
‘You know why.’
He shut his mouth and refused to elaborate. Inside he seethed with rage, yet he did not let it show. Tomás scowled and climbed back into the van. Ten seconds later its wheels spun and it peeled away from the prison. In a cloud of dust it crawled back down the narrow entrance path and exited onto a cracked asphalt road.
King stood in the dusty parking lot and watched, his hands cuffed firmly behind his back. He felt Rico’s eyes on him.
‘Don’t bother running,’ Rico said. ‘There’s three guns trained on you as we speak.’
King turned and looked at the guard. His yellow teeth had curled into a smile. It was clear he got a sick satisfaction by introducing newcomers to the prison. He probably revelled in watching them break under the conditions.
King would not break.
That much he knew.
‘You’re in on this?’ he said.
‘In on what?’
‘I had no trial. I was arrested yesterday for something I didn’t do.’
Rico laughed, a cruel cackle. ‘You think you’re special? You wouldn’t be the first, and you won’t be the last.’
‘Didn’t think you were all this corrupt.’
‘Well — I’m a free man, and you’re in prison. So who wins?’
Rico led him into the building. The interior was a maze of dilapidated corridors, outfitted with a state-of-the-art security system. Cameras monitored their progress from every corner. The conditions were horrid. King passed under damp ceilings dripping water onto the floor. Lights flickered and half the paint had peeled off the walls. But the reinforcements that mattered were sound. All the doors were made of steel, and required a keycard to open. They passed several soldiers dressed in Venezuelan military gear, all brandishing high-powered assault rifles.
Then Rico pushed open a final door and bright sunlight flooded King’s vision once again.
They stepped out into the prison grounds.
The centre of El Infierno was an enormous space, at least the size of a football field. From here he could see the multi-storey building curving around the perimeter of the prison like a giant outline, boxing them in. The guard towers dotting the walls had undisturbed views over the grounds, complete with turrets ready to fire at a moment’s notice. King wondered how often they were used.
The prison had a sickening atmosphere. He felt the tension in the air as soon as he stepped onto the dusty earth. He heard sounds similar to the holding cells at the police station, but tenfold in volume. Rabid screaming far in the distance. Vicious arguments in Spanish. The general air of testosterone, like a thousand men vying for dominance. Without even laying eyes on another prisoner King could tell he had entered a brutal world.
‘What are the rules here?’ he said.
‘What rules?’ Rico said. ‘You do whatever the fuck you want. So does everyone else. As long as no-one touches the guards, it’s not our business what you get up to.’
‘What about food?’ King said. ‘Water?’
‘I’m not here to hold your hand,’ Rico said. ‘Work it out yourself.’
They headed down a narrow dusty path between concrete buildings, all indiscriminate and bare of any kind of decorative touch. Utilitarian structures, nothing more.
‘These are the private cells,’ Rico explained. ‘But don’t worry about those. You’ll never see them.’
‘Where am I going?’
‘The pavilion.’
King didn’t like the sound of that. Rico refused to elaborate, and he didn’t prod any further. The Venezuelan sun beat down on the back of his neck. He found himself sweating for the hundredth time that day. He hadn’t changed clothes since he’d been arrested. He probably smelt disgusting, but it was hard to tell when surrounded by so much filth.
Hopelessness began to plague him. Until now he’d held onto the possibility of escape. Now it seemed futile. El Infierno was an enormous complex, protected by millions of dollars worth of security features. He didn’t fancy his chances of walking free, either.
They rounded a corner and King saw the pavilion.
It was a cage the size of a large warehouse with a concrete roof and walls that were nothing but reinforced steel mesh. Mud caked the floor inside. It was packed with men in tattered clothing, all lean and wide-eyed and animalistic. There were no uniforms. The pavilion seemed to contain a functioning society, shut away from the civilised world and left to their own devices.
From a brief glance, the building appeared immensely overcrowded. King listened to the yelling and hollering and grunting from inside and gulped back his apprehension.
It seemed they were throwing him into a madhouse.
‘This is where you’ll spend the rest of your life,’ Rico said, leering. ‘Like it?’
King said nothing. Just clenched his fists and rode out the unbridled spite coursing through him in waves. Whoever had put him here would pay for it. He would use all his skills to ensure he stayed alive. And then he would find a way out, and he would slaughter whoever had done this.
They’d chosen to throw him in here.
He would m
ake them regret it.
The determination kept him charged, kept the energy rippling through his muscles. As they approached one of the entrances, King saw dozens of men notice him at once. They stopped what they were doing and gripped the mesh, staring out at the newcomer. But this wasn’t just any newcomer.
This was a foreigner. Easy prey.
King didn’t know what to expect as Rico barked a command in Spanish, ordering the prisoners away from the entrance. Many of them fell back, making it safe to open the door. The guard slotted a keycard into the side of the gate. He entered a code, then withdrew a bundle of keys from his uniform pocket and slotted one into the lock on the gate. An elaborate system that would ensure no man managed to break free.
The door buzzed, and swung inward.
‘I have a few questions for you later,’ Rico said. ‘But I’ll let you get acclimatised first.’
The guard didn’t keep the door open for long. He shoved a hand into King’s back, pushing with surprising strength. King stumbled forward, through the gate, into the pavilion. The door grated shut behind him. He heard another buzz, this one indicating it was locked. Then Rico turned and walked away from the cage. Probably back to one of the guard towers.
King found himself facing off against at least a hundred prisoners. The floor all around them was littered with discarded syringes and homemade pipes; a sanitary nightmare. The inside of the pavilion was permeated by the sickening stench of body odour. He imagined general hygiene wasn’t a priority in this place.
At the moment, he was priority number one.
Every man in the compound was interested in the tall, well-built Westerner who had just entered their territory.
They all wondered if he would put up a good fight.
CHAPTER 10
King let the adrenalin rush hit him. He’d need it.
Every ounce of his reaction speed would be required to fend off an attack. If a cluster of them decided to jump him at once, then all the combat prowess in the world would be rendered useless. There was a point where resistance became futile. With this many hostile eyes on him, he knew it would only take the slightest hint of mob mentality for dozens of the thugs to join in and collectively beat him to death.