THE THOUSAND DOLLAR BREAKOUT: Colt Ryder Uncovers A Deadly Fight Club At San Quentin State Prison . . . Will He Escape With His Life?

by J. T. Brannan

  He danced to one side, then back to the other, feinting and goading me into making a mistake. Ironically, it was the exact reverse of the fight that I’d expected; I’d thought he would be looking to take me down, and my aim was to stay on my feet and take him out with strikes. Now the reality was that he was kicking bits out of me, and my only chance was to get him on the ground, to nullify those dangerous weapons.

  He kicked out fast at my knee, and I pulled it quickly out of the way, knowing how a bad cut to that area would badly damage my capacity to fight effectively.

  He retracted his leg and started another spin; but this time I was waiting for it. The pain in my forehead and arms was intense, the blood in my eyes made it hard to see, but I fought through it, knowing I had to act, and act quickly. Before Garcia’s foot was fully whipped around, while he was still turning, his back to me, balanced on one leg, I was rushing forward, smothering the Brazilian fighter, hitting his supporting leg hard with a low tackle that took him straight down to the floor.

  I collapsed on top of him, using my weight to crush the air out of him. He struggled and squirmed beneath me, but it was clear he wasn’t a ground fighter, didn’t know what to do. But he was strong, and managed to turn to face me before I could take his back and strangle him. I was still on top, but he was facing me now, trying to punch up at me while also attempting to get his legs into a position to kick me.

  A couple of blows made contact with my head, but – hitting from below – gravity and leverage both worked against him, and the shots lacked power. The elbow I hit him with, however, was a good one, and left him dazed.

  Taking my chance, I took my arms away from their controlling position, wanting to go for a front strangle, forearm across his throat; but he’d not been as dazed as I’d thought, and used the opening to push me up a little and get one leg free.

  I saw the danger and fell back quickly, capturing the leg at the ankle and securing an Achilles heel lock on him. He shouted in pain but I ignored him and twisted violently, tearing the tendons and cartilage and turning the shouts into screams. But by going for the lock on one leg, I’d inadvertently freed the other and – despite the pain – he immediately lashed out with it. I kicked it away with the sole of my sneaker, at the same time reaching for the toes of the leg I’d just damaged and pulling out the razor blade that was hidden there. In the next moment, I caught the free leg and whipped the blade along the underside of the knee, severing the tendons and bringing more screams of pain from my opponent.

  But to give him his due, he didn’t give up; he made a grab for the blade out of the toes of the second leg, desperate to cut me, to kill me. He managed to pull it out and tried to cut down at me, but I saw what he was doing through my blood-covered eyes and intercepted the attacking arm, gripping it hard at the wrist; and then with my other hand – the one with the blade – I sliced hard at the underside of that wrist. I dug it in deep, opening up veins and arteries, ripping it through towards the guy’s elbow.

  Blood spurted out of the horrific wound as if from a pressure hose, covering both of us in a vivid arterial spray. It cascaded out and wouldn’t stop, and soon the floor was slick with it as his screams turned to whispered coughs, and I felt his body weakening, going slack and loose.

  In the complicated jumble of intertwined limbs on the floor, it must have been hard for the audience to see what had happened; we were tied up together, blood everywhere, but I knew nobody could tell whose arms were whose, which legs were which. They wouldn’t know that Garcia had been opened up, and was bleeding out; they were silent at last, trying to figure out what had happened.

  But I knew; Garcia was dying, right there on the floor next to me. The hand that held the razor blade eventually went slack and the weapon dropped to the floor, and I finally disengaged myself, still careful of those feet.

  But in the end, I didn’t have to be careful at all; because by the time he’d dropped that blade and made it safe for me to move, his eyes were closed.

  And he was already dead.

  I was backstage now, in the medical area.

  To give Bush his due, he was looking after me; he’d let me have a shower, and the cuts on my forearms and forehead had been stitched up by a doctor; hell, I’d even been given some cold water and some hot coffee.

  The crowd hadn’t known exactly what to make of me, couldn’t decide whether to cheer for me or jeer at me, but I hadn’t cared; I’d just wanted to get out of there, get that damned blood off me.

  If the crowd didn’t know how to feel, then neither did I. I’d just killed a man, for the spectacle – and the financial interests – of others. What did that make me?

  But, I told myself, it wasn’t me who’d brought the razor blades to the fight, it was Garcia.

  So, I decided that I did know how to deal with it.

  Garcia had brought it on himself.

  Fuck him.

  But the presence of weapons was disturbing. Did Bush know about it, or had Garcia hidden them and fooled everyone? Even if he hadn’t known about it, he didn’t stop the fight when it became obvious what Garcia was using. But then again, this wasn’t the UFC. It was prison rules, and that meant you could do whatever the fuck you wanted.

  I heard the next fight as the doctor patched me up, could hear the impact of blows and the grunts of pain from inside the chamber, along with the cheers and catcalls from the galleries.

  I wondered who was fighting; decided it didn’t really matter.

  Whoever they put in front of me, I’d beat.

  Even Deke Jasper? a little voice asked, inside my head.

  But I knew I would just have to cross that bridge when I came to it.

  Chapter Four

  The second round was the semi-finals, the last four people, and I was paired with Johnny Tsang, a Triad gang member from LA. According to Bush, this guy had knocked his first opponent out within thirty seconds. Old school kung fu hustle tempered by street experience within the LA gang scene was a combination I didn’t like the sound of. But what was I going to do? Giving up wasn’t even on the agenda.

  The crowd was hushed for this one, and I had a feeling that the bets would be spread more evenly this time; Tsang had scored a clean, early knockout, establishing him as a quality fighter, while I’d used a man’s own razorblade to sever my opponent’s arteries and make him bleed to death, which established me as . . . I wasn’t exactly sure, but it was clear to everyone that I wasn’t a pushover, at least.

  We edged around the small room, watching each other carefully, assessing each other’s movements, postures, strengths and potential weaknesses.

  Tsang wasn’t a particularly big guy, but the way he moved, you could see there was immense power there; what he lacked in weight, I knew he would have it in technique, and I found myself wondering about the best way to beat him. I’d still not seen an opening I could capitalize on, and I just had to make sure I didn’t provide an opening for him – because he’d take it in a heartbeat.

  And then I did what I’d just decided not to do – dropped my guard, just for a moment. Sure enough, the attack came, strong and fast; a savage overhand right, looking to hit me with the tip of his extended thumb, maybe in the throat.

  But the opening had been intentional, and I covered his attack with one hand while I launched a counter with my other, a brutal shovel hook to the exposed liver.

  Only Tsang – like a master chess player – had known what I was up to, and arched his body out of the way at the same time as he smashed a hard side kick into my midriff; it blasted me across the room, and knocked all the air out of my lungs.

  I hoped nothing was damaged inside me, but I couldn’t be sure.

  Damn that kid’s reactions; he must have been twenty years younger than me, and it showed. I was fast for my age, but my age was pretty old.

  Damn it, I was going to have to fall back on experience instead, and hope that would be good enough.

  I moved carefully around the room, more cautious now than
ever. I knew what he was capable of, and it didn’t make me feel good.

  Tsang was emboldened by his successful attack, and pressed forward, trying to capitalize on it. He threw a left palm-heel strike – like an open-handed jab – and followed up with a right. I moved easily to the side, but he then came in with a round kick that I only narrowly avoided, and I could see that he was hemming me in, trying to push me into a corner. Once there, it would limit my lateral movement, and I would have a lot more difficulty in avoiding his ferocious attacks.

  I used my boxing footwork to get me out of there, but he turned before I could hit him with anything useful.

  He threw another attack, a whipping front kick that drew my hands down, before he clocked me in the head with the left palm-heel, then the right. I saw stars, but after the first blow hit me, my body responded instinctively, reaching out for the right. I wasn’t fast enough to catch it before it hit me – it caught the stitches in my forehead, re-opening the cut – but I managed to grab it on the way out, and I pulled on the wrist and drove my other arm up under his armpit, turning my body with a sudden twisting action, pulling him onto my back and shoulder before dropping my weight down and forwards, throwing Tsang heavily with the judo shoulder throw known as ippon seio nage.

  Tsang’s back and neck struck the hard, tiled floor and I heard a collective gasp of appreciation from the audience at the move.

  He fell in front of me, head toward me, and I immediately dropped my knee down onto his unprotected face, feeling the man’s nose get crushed underneath it.

  He grabbed at my leg with both hands and held onto it for dear life in panic; or so I thought. But in the next moment he was rolling and pivoting, turning his legs to me and securing them around my own thigh; and then his arms went into the same Achilles heel lock that I’d used on Garcia, his body leaning rapidly backward.

  I saw what he was doing though and leaned forward into it, punching hard into his kneecap as I went. It made him pause briefly, and I used the distraction to twist out to the side, breaking the hold. I pulled my leg out fully and sent my heel straight back into his face, connecting with his jaw.

  He was disoriented at last, and I scrambled toward him, pulling him to his feet as I ripped my knee up into his groin. He grunted, and while he dealt with the pain of the blow, I pulled his head down and ran with it into the hardened glass of the press viewing gallery window.

  His skull bounced off the window, but it wasn’t enough; he was a tough little bastard and managed to wrestle out of my grip and keep me at bay with a sharp little back kick that got me right in the hip.

  He spun to face me then and let rip with a thrusting front kick that I narrowly avoided, catching his incoming leg at the same time and – grabbing hold under his armpit – I managed to lift Tsang high up into the air, running with him back toward the window, holding his body horizontal to the ground.

  When his back hit the hard glass, the entire window frame seemed to shake, and the crowd roared its approval. We bounced off with the impact, and I used the momentum to turn him over into a body slam, smashing him down onto the tiled floor.

  I scrambled to my knees, ready to drop some elbows into his face, but there was no need; running him into the glass must have weakened him so much that he couldn’t keep his head up when I’d slammed him into the floor. His skull must have hit the ground first, taking the full force of the slam.

  He was out for the count, and wouldn’t be getting up for some time.

  The crowd roared its approval, and I was once more taken back to those fights in the cement-walled parking lot back in Tar Heel. The crowd had cheered for me there, too.

  But unlike some, it left me cold; I didn’t need the adulation, I didn’t crave the attention. I’d fought back then for some extra money, and I was fighting now for survival.

  Those people in the crowd were a sick set of bastards, who cared if they approved of me or not, if they liked me or not? They were betting money on the lives of real human beings.

  I’d love it if I could get some of them inside this chamber, so they could experience the real thing.

  They’d soon change their minds about the excitement and thrill of the fight game, I was pretty damn sure of that.

  But I’d done what I came to do, and another opponent was down.

  I’d made it.

  Grand final, here I come.

  Chapter Five

  I was sitting in the medical area, getting my forehead re-stitched, when I heard the commotion. There was shouting and yelling, followed by the clanging of metal, and I saw several riot officers running through to the holding cells at the rear of the complex.

  “Trouble?” I asked one of the guys as he raced past.

  “Yeah,” he said as he ran. “For you. It’s the guy you’re gonna be fighting next.”

  The next moment, a body was wheeled into the medical ward on a stretcher, Bush following the two guards who pushed it. “Bob,” he said to the doctor, “do what you can for this one, but I think he’s a goner.”

  I looked at the man on the stretcher, and agreed with Bush’s assessment – the guy was a real mess, beaten to a literal pulp, and there was so much blood covering him that it was hard to tell what and where his actual wounds were. He didn’t seem to be breathing either, and I didn’t fancy the doctor’s chances.

  “Get your ass back out there, Delaney,” Bush told me. “We can’t hold that fucking freak-show in the holding cells for long, and I want you out there first.”

  “He did this?” I said, pointing at the body on the stretcher.

  “You’re damn right he did,” Bush said, then winked at me. “But you better not let me down now, I’ve got a lot of money riding on you tonight.”

  I guessed that meant that Bush and Michaels weren’t running a scam together. If they both wanted somebody else to win, maybe they weren’t in this together. “Nice to know you have faith in me,” I said.

  “I guess somebody has to. Now get out there. And good luck.”

  “What’s his name?” I asked.

  “Why?” Bush shot back, eyes narrowed. “Somebody been talking to you?”

  I shrugged. “Just interested.”

  “Well, names don’t matter out there. And don’t you be listening to Trent Michaels, or whoever else has got to you, you just get out there and try to survive, you understand me?”

  “Yes, boss,” I said.

  “Good. Now get.” He pointed to the door, and as I stood, two armed guards rolled up next to me to escort me back into the chamber.

  Bush took one last look at the body on the stretcher, shook his head, and made his way back to the viewing gallery.

  “You got a message from a friend,” one of the guards whispered to me as we made our way to the arena. “It says, ‘Don’t forget our agreement, gump’.”

  Damn, why did everyone want to give me advice?

  Just follow your own advice, Colt, I told myself.

  Stay alive.

  I’d only been stood in the chamber for half a minute or so, when a collective gasp went through the audience, audible even through the viewing windows, and I could see why.

  My opponent had arrived, wrestled through the door into the injection chamber by four men in riot gear. He was struggling against his bonds like a wild animal, and they forced him to the ground, zapped him with a taser, and – as his body convulsed with the electric shock – they quickly took the cuffs and chains off and hightailed it out of the chamber as quickly as they could.

  Even from his prone position, I could see that this was a true mountain of a man – about six feet eight, and close to four-hundred-pounds of muscle and hard fat, tattoos and hair covering most of his pale skin while a thick, heavy beard covered his face and came halfway down his gargantuan chest. There was an unruly mop of scraggly brown hair on the top of his scarred head, and his eyes had no discernable color; they were empty, devoid not just of pigment, but of emotion. The guy looked like he could bench-press an elephant; but more w
orryingly, he also looked like he could rip the elephant’s throat out with his teeth if it made him angry.

  And right now, he looked very angry.

  Was this the infamous Deke Jasper?

  It pissed me off that I still didn’t know. But would knowing make any difference to what I did, to how I fought?

  I still didn’t know.

  In the audience, I saw a scramble of frenetic activity as everyone started placing urgent, last-minute bets – and I was pretty sure that none of them would be for me. I hoped nobody spilled their champagne in the commotion.

  There was no waiting for the announcements to be made, no build-up; but Mountain didn’t need instructions. As soon as he recovered from the taser and remembered where he was, he pulled himself to his knees and exploded toward me like a rampaging rhino.

  I couldn’t move out of the way in time, such was his explosive power – not that there was much room to move inside this chamber anyway – and he caught me hard, driving me back into the main viewing window.

  There was a loud bang as my body hit the glass, and I could hear the audience cheering wildly. But the glass held, and I found myself thankful for small mercies.

  He kept hold of me, his strength enormous, and rammed me back into the window again; and then he dropped his forehead hard toward my face, and I just managed to move my head in time, taking the headbutt in the shoulder instead. It still hurt, but I would have been KO’d for sure if it had hit the intended target.

  Luckily, he’d left my arms free when he grabbed me, cinching his grip around my trunk; and although I was sure my ribs would soon be splintered into my internal organs, at least there was something I could do to stop him.

  My hands curled up into cups, and I slammed both of them around his ears, the pressure from the air pockets I’d created blasting through his head and threatening to blow out his eardrums.

  But it didn’t stop him, and he rammed me into the viewing window once again, snarling with rage. The breath was knocked right out of me, and then a searing pain ripped through me as I felt his teeth sink into the side of my neck.