Level Up- The Knockout

by Dan Sugralinov

  Mike shook his head. “No, I wouldn’t,” he admitted.

  “If you want to work out, there’s no one there to stop you. You can run, jump, or do press-ups. You can unscrew your bunk from the floor and use it as a barbell. Just make sure the guard doesn’t see you. However, when it’s old Jimmy’s shift, go right ahead. He’s one of the boys. Speak of the devil, there he is. I need to talk to him about something. And you go ahead with your workout—I can see you’re real eager to get to it.”

  Roman took Hagen’s dinner bag and went to converse with Jim who’d been hiding from the sun under the prison block entrance overhang.

  * * *

  HAGEN WAS INDEED itching for an exhausting workout. He had stopped completely for the duration of the litigation process but now, looking at the inmates sweating it, he reminded himself that he couldn’t afford to stop exercising.

  Demetrious had already given him a few reminders that his stats would drop shortly. However, Hagen’s mental state had made him indifferent to leveling up.

  With some trepidation, Mike stepped onto the racetrack that ran all across the yard’s perimeter and started to jog, feeling even more self-conscious. It seemed as if everyone was staring at him. He sped up a little. It turned out that the other inmates—all those alleged gangsters and rapists—cared as much about Hagen as everybody else in his regular life: namely, not at all.

  So Hagen shifted into his highest gear.

  Running gave him a sense of freedom. It was as if he was returning into his own body which he’d lost touch with in the court room.

  The remnants of the haze left his head. He realized he’d have to spend a long time here. He’d have to get used to the constant clangor of locks, the keys jingling on the guards’ belts, the prison towers, and the bars and wire mesh covering his entire world.

  He was aware of his muscles once again, and felt his strength and stamina returning. He called up his stats after a long while. Both Stamina and Strength blinked warningly. The same was the case with Punch and Short Distance Combo.

  He’d put it to rights soon enough, though.

  “Dem? Are you there? Sorry I shouted at you. How can I get back a lost ability? And how do I fix my mental state?”

  “Dude, the first thing you should do to fix your mental state is stop talking to me as if I was alive. I’m not a human being in the first place. So there’s no point in either telling me off or apologizing afterwards.”

  “OK, then. What’s next?”

  “You have to get back into shape. What affects your psychological condition the most is the loss of your physical parameters.”

  “Got it.”

  Hagen noticed that one of the weightlifting machines was free. He didn’t think twice before he ran off the track and placed himself on the metal seat hot from the sun. The machine was at maximum load, so it took him some effort to operate it, bringing his arms together and then stretching them apart.

  He’d really missed his workouts! Hagen was surprised by how he could have become so dejected he’d forgotten all about his dream. He wouldn’t make it to the UFC without daily progress.

  “¡Pinche idiota!” someone shouted at him. “You fucking bastard!”

  Somebody grabbed Hagen by his collar, dragged him off the seat and threw him onto the ground.

  Hagen jumped to his feet and faced the Latino he’d seen in the bus earlier—one of the pair shouting at each other. Mike recognized him by the tattoos that rose up unto the man’s very chin, resembling a turtleneck sweater.

  Lorenzo “Brix” Reyes

  Level: 13.

  HP: 32,000

  Battles/victories: 211/133.

  Weight: 198 lbs

  Height: 5’ 10”

  Current status: Sureños Familia gang member

  “¡Chinga tu madre!” Lorenzo yelled as he approached Hagen.

  A tight crowd formed around them to hide the two from the corrections officers’ sight. The guards on the towers just watched, puffing on their cigarettes and grinning.

  “I don’t understand,” Hagen replied, hastily trying to remember what little Spanish he’d learned in school. “No... no hablo mucho español.”

  “I’ll teach you some fucking español, ¡cabrón de mierda!”

  Hagen wanted to step back, but bumped into the wall of inmates. They pushed him right at Lorenzo. The other man took a swing.

  Hagen didn’t notice the punch itself: he saw the bright sunshine instead. Then he found himself lying on the hot prison yard tarmac, covering his eyes from the blinding sunlight.

  Damage received: 8,000 (Face Punch)

  His head was ringing. He could barely think straight. Still, he started to rise nonetheless the way he would have in the ring, backing away from Lorenzo’s attack range.

  He leaned back as instinctively, and just in time. A fist whooshed through the air right in front of his nose.

  Hagen instantly punched the opponent’s open side, investing all his pent-up fear and despair from the litigation process in the attack.

  Damage dealt: 14,400 points (Punch)

  The crowd started to buzz in surprise. Apparently, no one had expected Hagen to fight back, let alone demonstrate any technique.

  Lorenzo doubled up for a second, rubbed his side with his hand, and started forward. That was when Mike became aware of the difference between this man and all the fighters he had encountered previously.

  Lorenzo was a trained gangster, not an athlete. Even Liam “the Goliath” had held his side for a while and groaned after a punch like that, but Lorenzo behaved as if he had felt no pain at all. Hagen managed to block the first punch, but then there was another brief flash of sunlight followed by darkness.

  He didn’t pass out. He just lay there with his face on the tarmac of the prison yard. It smelled of petroleum.

  Damage received: 2,000

  The system gave its usual warning about low HP and the necessity to quit the battle immediately.

  That was another difference—no one could quit a prison fight. You could only get as far as the electrified fence.

  You have been defeated by an opponent in a fair fight!

  Total fights/victories: 13/11

  Roman’s voice was like the sound of a referee’s long-awaited gong. “Comrades! Comrades! Look out!”

  The crowd dispersed immediately. Everybody was back doing what they’d been doing before—talking, smoking, or exercising.

  Hagen removed the message informing him of his first defeat and sat down, trying to keep his balance. But his field of vision would get skewed every time, and it felt like the earth and the sky would shift positions any time now.

  Hagen couldn’t see Roman but he heard him whisper urgently into his ear,

  “Whatever you do, don’t say anything about what just happened.”

  Hagen’s vision cleared a little. He saw Jim approach, accompanied by two more guards.

  “So, what’s all this, then?” Jim asked. “Who was it? Don’t piss me off, you bastards. I know who it was, anyway. It was you, Lorenzo. I saw you at the weightlifting machine. Come over here. Over here, I said!”

  Lorenzo stood before Jim with his shoulders squared in a resigned manner, following the protocol of talking to the corrections officers to the letter.

  “Sir, no, sir!” he shouted.

  Jim turned toward Hagen. One of the other guards had already helped him get off the ground.

  “Did this one beat you up?”

  “Ugh... cough...” Hagen tried to speak but spat out blood and some tiny stone that had been in his mouth. It took him a while to realize it was a piece of his tooth.

  Hagen cleared his throat and replied just like the prison officer had instructed him,

  “Sir, no, sir!”

  “So you’re giving me this ‘no sir’ bullshit now, aren’t you? Tell me what really happened! Don’t lie to me, or I’ll make sure you never leave this place in one piece.”

  “I, uh...”

  Hagen looked a
t Lorenzo first. The other man had clenched his fists and looked to the side sullenly. Then he looked at Roman. The Russian was staring at the clouds, smiling innocently.

  “I, uh, fell off the weightlifting machine, sir.”

  Someone at the back of the crowd burst out laughing.

  Jim looked about him menacingly. “Shut up, you swine!”

  Then he turned toward Hagen. “So you’re saying you fell, eh? Is that really how you want to play it? Greenhorn, didn’t I tell you it would be hard on you?”

  “Sir, yes, sir!”

  “So... uh, Mike Hagen, was it? I was wrong. It won’t be hard. It will be unbearable. You’ll fall off weightlifting machines every day. Got it?”

  “Sir... yes, sir!”

  “Now go see the doctor. Off with you, I said!”

  One of the guards grabbed Hagen by the elbow and dragged him toward the prison block.

  * * *

  ONCE HAGEN got to the medical room, he had the blood wiped off him, tampons shoved up his nose, and an incident of getting injured due to careless use of sport equipment recorded in his file.

  The doctor was a grey-haired plump character by the name of Mark Borkowski. Hagen had never seen anyone who’d complain so much. As he took care of Hagen, he kept going,

  “So the lot of you are fighting again. What will happen if I quit? I’m the only doctor in this entire goddamn prison. It’s been a year since we’d last had a medical director, and the warden doesn’t want to promote me. Why, you ask?”

  Hagen hadn’t even thought of asking. He was terrified that he’d have to go back to the main block shortly.

  “I’ll tell you why. In that case there’ll be no one to provide medical care to you idiots. The warden doesn’t trust me much,” Borkowski squeezed Hagen’s shoulder. “A boxer, eh? Well, you’ll find yourself in the wooden ring before too long.”

  “The wooden ring?” Hagen broke his reverie. “What’s that?”

  “You’re best off not knowing, kid. Pretend you’re a weakling, not a fighter.”

  The doctor inspected Mike’s mouth, complaining all the while that with the current financing it was impossible to provide proper health care. He touched the broken tooth in Hagen’s upper jaw with his finger.

  “The tooth is done for. I can extract it.”

  “Couldn’t I...”

  “No, you couldn’t! Don’t count on having it replaced or built up. You can splurge on a dentist once you’re out of here.”

  Borkowski escorted Hagen out of the medical room and told the guard to take him back. His last words were,

  “Don’t bring them over here with trifles like that. A squashed nose is no big deal. There are thousands of noses here, and just one of me.”

  The guard escorted Hagen back across several dark corridors, unlocking and locking heavy barred doors. He pushed him into the main hall of the prison block and shut the door behind him.

  Lorenzo and a few other Latinos who had clearly been fellow gang members were sitting at a table in the distance. Hagen tried to keep his hands from shaking as he headed toward the staircase. Roman had already been waiting for him there, holding his lunch bag.

  “Hey, vato,” Lorenzo shouted. “Get your ass over here.”

  Hagen gave Roman a scared look, as if to ask whether he should pay attention. Roman’s eyes bugged out as he hissed,

  “Of course, comrade, come and greet them.”

  Hagen approached the gang. He took a deep breath and relaxed. He’d fight again if he’d have to. Even if he’d get killed in the end. There was nothing else to do, anyway.

  Stat windows started to pop up over the gang members, but Hagen dismissed them without reading. All the members of the Sureños Familia gang were six to ten levels above Hagen. So it would make no sense for him to see their stats.

  The few inmates present in the hall started to gather round, but in a furtive way, so as not to attract the attention of the guards. Everyone wondered what would happen to the new boy who’d managed to throw such a professional punch at Lorenzo’s side.

  Hagen’s leveled breathing did nothing for the tremor in his hands, so he just hid them behind his back.

  There was a large Latino at the center of the group. His head was shaven; he had a funny mustache that resembled two rat tails stuck to his upper lip.

  Felipe “Fino” Peña

  Age: 33

  Level: 27

  HP: 50,000

  Battles/victories: 370/352

  Weight: 222 lbs

  Height: 6’ 1”

  Current status: Sureños Familia gang kingpin

  Fino’s eyes were nearly shut, as if he’d been trying to block out bright sunshine.

  Lorenzo jumped off the table where he had been sitting and also put his hands behind his back.

  “Are you Mike Hagen?” Fino asked. He spoke slowly in a low voice, so it took Mike some effort to make out his words.

  “Yes,” Hagen had to restrain himself from saying, ‘Sir, yes, sir!’

  “Gonzalo the Killa sends his regards. He’d asked us to watch out for you.”

  “We have no business watching out for every piece of white ass that this puto Gonzalo fancies,” Lorenzo butted in.

  Fino turned his head to face Lorenzo. “Zip it, Brix. Don’t interrupt me.”

  He turned back toward Hagen and continued. “We are no nannies, don’t get me wrong. But Gonzalo is a brother, and you’ve also proved that you ain’t no snitch. So chill. But watch it.”

  “Hey, who are you to speak for everyone?”

  The voice came from behind Mike’s back. He jolted and swung round. Who could it be this time?

  A huge man stood there in front of a group of black guys. He was naked to the waist, muscled and covered in sweat, looking as if he’d just left the shower.

  Blake “Ford” Ali

  Age: 29

  Level: 24

  HP: 45,000

  Battles/victories: 300/278

  Weight: 242 lbs

  Height: 6’ 4”

  Current status: Pirus Brothers gang kingpin

  Fino replied, without even looking at Blake,

  “I’m telling you. You have nothing to fear. You’re under our protection.”

  “Then watch out for your bitch real well, or someone might strangle her in a dark corner,” said a cocksure Blake.

  Hagen was standing in between the two gangs and felt their mutual hatred almost physically. “I am nobody’s bitch,” he replied. “And I don’t need anyone’s protection. I know how to take care of myself.”

  “It’s too late. We have...”

  “Hey, what’s the commotion? Disperse at once!”

  The guards started to shove the groups of Latinos and blacks in opposite directions, yelling at them and pushing them with their truncheons, making sure that the members of the opposing gangs ended up in different corners of the hall.

  Lorenzo managed to shout out to Hagen,

  “Hey, cabron, we’re not done yet. See you in the wooden ring!”

  A blinking window popped up at once.

  Revenge

  Defeat the opponent you had previously lost to.

  Hagen didn’t wait for one of the guards to poke him in the head with a truncheon and retreated toward the stairway where Roman had stood. As he scrambled to safety, he bumped into the steel shoulder of a white guy with a shaved head and Celtic tattoos on his neck.

  He gave Mike a shove with an elbow. “Look where you’re going!”

  “Sorry,” Hagen replied without even bothering to see who it was.

  * * *

  HE CAUGHT his breath as he reached Roman whom he’d already considered a friend. The Russian gave Mike his paper bag back and led him upstairs to the second floor.

  “You’re really something, comrade. Are you completely out of your mind?”

  “Why, what’s the matter?” Hagen asked, alarmed.

  “You don’t get anything at all, do you?”

  “I d-don’t have a
ny idea!”

  “Look, there are two main gangs here—the Sureños and the Pirus. The former is Latino, and the latter is black. These gangs are constantly feuding.”

  “Why is that?”

  Roman looked so surprised he even stopped for a moment. “Are you kidding me? There doesn’t have to be a reason. The only consideration, if you wish, is to prove who’s the block’s top dog and whose balls ring the loudest.”

  Hagen and Roman stopped at the railing staring at the main hall below. The guards had stopped pushing the inmates away from each other but stayed in the hall, watching.

  “Comrade, why the hell did you have to go to that weightlifting machine? Everything is divided between the Latinos and the blacks here. The same concerns the TVs in the recreation room. Don’t even dream of changing the channel if the blacks or the Latinos are watching something. You might come to on Doctor Brokowski’s operating table with a shiv between your ribs—or at the Pearly Gates, at that.”

  “So the weightlifting machines are out of bounds?”

  “Everything is out of bounds. The Latinos and the blacks own everything here.”

  “What about the whites?” Hagen asked, out of turn once again.

  “The whites own everything else outside the prison walls. But in here we’re nothing. I sense some karmic justice in it. Don’t you, comrade?”

  Hagen pulled the tampons with dried-up blood on them out of his nose. There were no garbage pails on the floor, so he had to place them in the bag.

  “There’s a third gang,” Roman continued. “Or, rather, a pack. White supremacists. They call themselves Wild Boys. They’re really a pitiful bunch of bodybuilders—the blacks and the Latinos leave them alone because the Wild Boys stick together and anyone who gets into a fight will them gets punished by the guards. The whites are in cahoots with the top prison brass. Actually, it would do you good to hang out of them, being white and all. Easier to get stuff sent to you from the outside.