Jet nodded and made to retreat, and then brought a stiffened hand down in a brutal strike against the woman’s forearm. She dropped the spoon with a howl and swung a meaty fist at Jet’s head, which Jet easily avoided before kicking her in the chest. Jet’s effort was rewarded with a snap as several ribs broke, and then the woman’s friends rushed her, swinging and howling like animals. The circled prisoners screamed warnings and encouragement, the fight a welcome diversion from the tedious routine of incarceration.
Jet parried the first blow, allowing it to glance along her shoulder, and met it with a knee to the abdomen. The second woman’s breath escaped with a woof and her eyes bugged out, and then she was falling, Jet’s chop to the back of the neck dropping her like a bag of rocks. The woman with the shank made a feeble grab for Jet and got a kick to the face for her trouble. Blood sprayed from her ruined nose, and then Jet turned to the third prisoner as the gathering whooped and hollered catcalls.
“Well? You want some? Might as well make it a three for one,” Jet said, waiting.
An inmate near the door yelled out, “Take her, bitch.” Several of the rest nodded and whistled.
The third woman’s eyes roved over Jet and then moved to just past Jet’s shoulder in an amateurish bluff, signaling that she was about to try something – a kick, judging by how she’d shifted her weight to her left leg, Jet reasoned.
Jet played along and pretended to turn, and then caught the woman’s leg in midair and flipped her back with all her might, swiveling and pivot-kicking immediately afterward to finish the maneuver. The woman flew backward through the air and smacked against the hard floor with a sickening thud, and Jet recognized the sound of more bones breaking, likely in her right arm, which had absorbed most of the force of the impact.
A cheer went up at the sight of the downed assailants, and Yulia was stepping toward Jet when a shout greeted them from the open cell door and four guards entered, brandishing truncheons.
“Everybody back,” the first one yelled, pointing her club at Jet. “Except you.”
The crowd obeyed as the guards neared Jet. The attackers moaned from the floor and the lead guard’s eyes narrowed as she took Jet’s measure.
“I was defending myself,” Jet said, hands hanging unthreateningly by her side.
“Who else was fighting?” the guard snapped.
Jet’s eyes flitted at Yulia and then back to the guard. “It wasn’t a fight. They came at me from behind. I defended myself from being stabbed with that,” she said, pointing at the shank. “These three lost.”
The guard looked to Yulia suspiciously and back to Jet. “Fighting’s against the rules.”
“I told you. I wasn’t fighting.”
“Why did they attack you?”
“I don’t know. I just got here.”
The guard looked confused. Nobody was talking, and Jet was sure that the code of all prisons, where the guards were the enemies and you didn’t volunteer anything, would hold, at least until pressure was applied. The guard took another look at the three fallen inmates and made her decision.
“Take her to solitary,” the guard ordered, “until we can figure this out.”
Jet was going to protest, but the guards looked like they wanted to use their truncheons, and she didn’t want to give them an excuse.
“Back up and hold out your hands, palms up. Nice and slow,” another guard ordered. Jet complied, and for the second time in one day, steel handcuffs braceleted her wrists. Two of the guards escorted her out of the cell as three more arrived at a run, but Jet wasn’t interested any longer. She’d only been in the prison for a few hours and she’d already attracted attention of the exact kind she’d wanted to avoid, and now would be stuck in solitary – for how long, she didn’t know.
The solitary block turned out to be on the men’s side of the prison. The doors were flat steel plates instead of bars, and the wing reeked of sweat and urine. The female guards watched as two male counterparts pushed Jet into a cell and bolted the door behind her, and then the light in the cell shut off, plunging her into complete darkness. Jet could barely make out their voices through the thick panel.
“Who is she?” a male voice asked.
“New arrival. Fighting. We want to keep her here until we figure out what happened.”
“How long? We’re tight on space.”
“Probably overnight.”
“I’ll call if we need the cell.”
“All right. Back to work for us.”
Footsteps echoed away, and Jet was about to move from the door when she heard more.
“She’s a looker, isn’t she?”
“That she is. Be perfect for our thing.”
“We have to be careful. Find out more about her first. If she’s just here for trial…”
“I’ll ask. But these days all these bitches want to make some money. You know that.”
“I don’t think we say anything till we know more.”