E&E
Chapter One
I didn’t have any love for any of the Laws who guarded the Prison. I was locked away without just cause and they were the ones who stood between me and Freedom.
Don’t tell me that some of them were ignorant or “Just doing their jobs”. That wouldn’t be a mitigating factor. That would be an aggravating factor.
Thing was, I had no love for any of the other clients either. I’d have mown down dozens of guards or clients with equal fervor and indifference if it would transport me outside the walls.
If the untermenschen who accosted the Law named Riemann had been working toward their own escape or even pursuing vengeance, then I’d have left them to it.
Their objectives were rape and torture though—and while I didn’t give a rat’s derriere about Riemann, rape—particularly homosexual rape—offended my sensibilities.
I came up behind one. It isn’t as easy to break a man’s neck with a quick Chiropractic style twist as they’re always showing on TV. It can be done though, with the right technique and plenty of “Oomph!”
One down.
The second one was easy too. He had his pants down around his ankles restricting his movement and giving me a great handhold.
I reached between his legs from behind, with my right hand and secured a firm grip on his scrotum. That’s another thing that’s rather demanding—picking a man up over your head, with one hand on his neck and the other on his crotch. I’m uncommonly strong though.
I swung him down so that the full weight of his body and my swing came down right on the top of the head—broken neck number two. A booming kick to the crotch of the third, hard enough to rupture both his testicles and there was only Riemann and me against two demoralized untermenschen.
Riemann had regained his pepper spray and thoroughly soaked one of his clients. I loathe the idea of risking my hand by striking someone’s bony head with my fist—but I’d spent years developing a powerful open-handed slap. It’s much more effective than one might think.
I was busy slapping my last client unconscious when several of Riemann’s fellow gang members came to his rescue. They didn’t cut me any special slack. They come in expecting to do some tenderizing with their riot sticks.
That was okay by me. The Laws were no better than the clients as far as I was concerned. I neither expected nor counted on leniency because I’d been nominally on Riemann’s side during the brief pleasantness.
I stepped inside one Law’s over-handed blow and delivered a powerful poke to both eyes. There is always the possibility of poking out an eye with this maneuver—though it is used to temporarily blind and incapacitate through pain.
Must have been on a roll though, because my poke ruined both the Law’s eyes…
He shouldn’t have been trying to brain me.
I plucked his club from his nerveless fingers. I had about six inches of hardwood club sticking out the thumb side of my hand. I closed with a second guard, grabbing him with my free hand as I did so. I pulled him close while pumping five or six very hard shots into his solar plexus and midsection.
My left forearm blocked a blow another Law aimed at my head. Never mind feeling. I could hear the Radius and Ulna snap. I brought my own club down as hard as I could on the top of his head in retaliation. I got in a mediocre follow-up shot to his temple and then the World went away.
I came to in the prison infirmary. My left arm had a cast on it. My right eye was swollen shut. I had no idea if I still had a right eye or not. The tissue around my left eye was swollen enough to make everything very blurry.
Someone had stomped my right hand into the floor after I was down. A couple fingers were splinted and there was a patchwork of stitches across the back of my hand. I felt bruised and battered all over.
Riemann came to see me a half day after I woke.
“You could be in a lot of trouble,” He said.
I let that lie. I was doing thirty to life. I already had trouble.
“You killed two of the Prisoners. One of the others lost his nuts,” He said.
“Clients.”
“What?”
“Don’t call them prisoners. They were my clients.”
“Well, fortunately you didn’t kill any of your guard ‘clients’.”
“Pity.”
“Don’t feel too bad. Schmitt is blind. Johnson lost his spleen and his gall bladder. He’s never going to be the same. Dixon has some brain damage. He’s going to be more or less palsied for the rest of his life. I’d say that you got your licks in,” Riemann said.
Riemann called the prison Doctor over. He was a real MD and he was doing a very long sentence—maybe life—over some sort of drug trafficking. I never cared enough to find out the details.
“How long until this man is well?” Riemann asked him.
Doc shrugged.
“We generally leave a cast on for six weeks. The splints can probable come off his fingers sooner, but they’ll be one of the last things to fully heal—if they do fully heal,” Doc said.
“Would anabolic steroids or the new super healing drugs speed up his recovery?”
“Probably and definitely, if we could get some.”
“You have steroids. You peddle them to the muscle heads. You have plenty of morphine—you sell that to the other prisoners too.
“This man will not lack for pain medication. He should be blissed out throughout his stay. You will start him on the appropriate dose of steroids at once. If that leaves you short—O well…
“I’ll try to get you some of the new drug and nanites combos within a couple weeks.
“I know that you’re protected. I don’t care. If this man isn’t taken proper care of, I will beat your kidneys into a Christmas pudding.
“Verstehen Sie?”
“You ain’t gonna buy my gratitude Riemann,” I said
“Skew gratitude!” Riemann spat back.
******************* ****************** *********
Four weeks later I was moved from the prison hospital to a rather spacious cell in an unused part of the building. It was Spartan but it was a definite step up from the average cell accommodations.
I had a rather weak hand gripper and a nice loose foam rubber ball to exercise my broken fingers. I could do a few partial squeezes on the sponge-rubber ball with my casted hand.
I did a lot of deep knee bends, sit-ups and leg raises and flexed the muscles of my arms—particularly the muscles partially immobilized by the cast—several hundred times per day. It was a form of isometrics or dynamic tension.
I wasn’t at the top of my form yet but I was improving.
“Your arm bones are probably healed already, but we’re going to leave the cast on for the full six weeks, just in case. The new healing nanites speed the body’s recuperation a great deal, but we didn’t get any into you until partway through the third week.
“Anyway, they affect different people to varying degrees,” Riemann told me.
“You’re too good to me,” I said without emotion.
“Zin, you’re a killer,” He began.
“Got that right.”
“You know I hesitated over what I’m going to ask you. Why did you help me?”
“I don’t like to see the strong sticking it to the weak. It’s the way of things—Nature’s Law—but I find it unaesthetic,” I said.
“Don’t be fooled though. I don’t love you. When the day comes that you stand between me and a way out of here, I’ll drop you like a bad habit,” I said.
“But you keep your word, don’t you? You have Honor?” Riemann asked.
“I have Honour,” I replied.
It’s easy to express in writing. I spelled the words for him.
“ ‘Honor’ is what other folks give you. It can be based on Right-Action. It can also be based on deception or other’s misinterpretation of the facts.
“ ‘Honour’ is necessarily genuine. It comes from within and takes no account of what other’s think. I have Honour,” I stated firmly.
I would only say it once. If he chose not to believe, I didn’t care enough about his—or anyone else’s—opinion enough to try even the feeblest attempts at persuasion.
“If I could get you out of here—set you free—would you do me a small favor?
“Actually, I need a really big favor from you,” He said.
“Don’t know. No homo stuff—and I won’t kiss your Bass—or your Catfish either.
“Do you want someone killed?
“I’m not an assassin. I’d have to be convinced that they deserve it,” I said.
“You guys don’t realize it. Y’all eat fairly well in here, even if most of it is sugar, starch, vegetable oil and textured vegetable protein.
“People on the outside though—they’re going hungry more and more often. This drought just won’t let up. There’s rationing, black markets and more and more riots. We’re facing mass insurrection,” Riemann said.
“Don’t look at me. I’m not the Prophet Elijah. I can’t get God to make it rain.
“I know about hungry people. My neighbor threatened to kill and eat my Dog. I told him that if he killed my Dog that I’d kill his whole Damned family.
“I came home and my sister was crying her eyes out. The fat Lopslicker had come into my backyard shot my little Dog and had taken him home to cook,” I said.
“What did you do?”
“I kept my promise.”
“His wife, his two sons and his daughter didn’t kill your Dog,” Riemann objected.
“If you already knew the story, why did you ask? His youngest child was fourteen. The boy shared in the meal and he knew the consequences.
“I left the old man for last. He got to see his whole family precede him into death.”
“Why didn’t you run? Or resist arrest?”
“There were two other Dogs and my sister to consider. Besides, I felt called upon to explain myself—once—without special emphasis or pleading.
“The reprobate judge and the degenerate jury sent me to prison.”
“And your sister?”
“She died about eight months later, resisting the confiscation of her stored food and the murder of her Dogs—our Dogs—by lawfully constituted authority.”
“I have a daughter. She’s fifteen. I have a place that she could be relatively safe with a rather large amount of stored food. I know a couple of the other guards in the same fix.
“We can’t afford to lose these jobs…
“But if I could get you out of here and get you Guns, gear and food—would you be willing to escort our children to my Retreat? I’d want you to stay and protect them—For an equal share of the food?”
“I’ll think on it. Meantime, what weapons can you get me?”
“You’d be surprised. Times are hard. Money is tight. Most weapons are contraband…
“But I’ve read your old blog online and we Laws have our sources. You’ll be surprised how well we’ve managed to accommodate most of your weapon preferences,” Riemann said.
“It’s sounding better all the time. By the way, thank you for the Spam.”
Meat, even commuted meat was a rare thing in the prison. I’d always loved Spam, and Riemann had arranged for me to get a can every day.
“What about the eggs?”
I shook my head once—from side to side.
“Don’t eat eggs—but the trustee brings me a Roast Rat or Song Bird every few days in exchange for letting him eat my eggs.”
“Well this should be a treat,” Riemann said.
He handed me a dozen packages of M&Ms and a small can of Peanuts.
“You do eat candy?”
“O Yeah!”
.....RVM45
Chapter One
I didn’t have any love for any of the Laws who guarded the Prison. I was locked away without just cause and they were the ones who stood between me and Freedom.
Don’t tell me that some of them were ignorant or “Just doing their jobs”. That wouldn’t be a mitigating factor. That would be an aggravating factor.
Thing was, I had no love for any of the other clients either. I’d have mown down dozens of guards or clients with equal fervor and indifference if it would transport me outside the walls.
If the untermenschen who accosted the Law named Riemann had been working toward their own escape or even pursuing vengeance, then I’d have left them to it.
Their objectives were rape and torture though—and while I didn’t give a rat’s derriere about Riemann, rape—particularly homosexual rape—offended my sensibilities.
I came up behind one. It isn’t as easy to break a man’s neck with a quick Chiropractic style twist as they’re always showing on TV. It can be done though, with the right technique and plenty of “Oomph!”
One down.
The second one was easy too. He had his pants down around his ankles restricting his movement and giving me a great handhold.
I reached between his legs from behind, with my right hand and secured a firm grip on his scrotum. That’s another thing that’s rather demanding—picking a man up over your head, with one hand on his neck and the other on his crotch. I’m uncommonly strong though.
I swung him down so that the full weight of his body and my swing came down right on the top of the head—broken neck number two. A booming kick to the crotch of the third, hard enough to rupture both his testicles and there was only Riemann and me against two demoralized untermenschen.
Riemann had regained his pepper spray and thoroughly soaked one of his clients. I loathe the idea of risking my hand by striking someone’s bony head with my fist—but I’d spent years developing a powerful open-handed slap. It’s much more effective than one might think.
I was busy slapping my last client unconscious when several of Riemann’s fellow gang members came to his rescue. They didn’t cut me any special slack. They come in expecting to do some tenderizing with their riot sticks.
That was okay by me. The Laws were no better than the clients as far as I was concerned. I neither expected nor counted on leniency because I’d been nominally on Riemann’s side during the brief pleasantness.
I stepped inside one Law’s over-handed blow and delivered a powerful poke to both eyes. There is always the possibility of poking out an eye with this maneuver—though it is used to temporarily blind and incapacitate through pain.
Must have been on a roll though, because my poke ruined both the Law’s eyes…
He shouldn’t have been trying to brain me.
I plucked his club from his nerveless fingers. I had about six inches of hardwood club sticking out the thumb side of my hand. I closed with a second guard, grabbing him with my free hand as I did so. I pulled him close while pumping five or six very hard shots into his solar plexus and midsection.
My left forearm blocked a blow another Law aimed at my head. Never mind feeling. I could hear the Radius and Ulna snap. I brought my own club down as hard as I could on the top of his head in retaliation. I got in a mediocre follow-up shot to his temple and then the World went away.
I came to in the prison infirmary. My left arm had a cast on it. My right eye was swollen shut. I had no idea if I still had a right eye or not. The tissue around my left eye was swollen enough to make everything very blurry.
Someone had stomped my right hand into the floor after I was down. A couple fingers were splinted and there was a patchwork of stitches across the back of my hand. I felt bruised and battered all over.
Riemann came to see me a half day after I woke.
“You could be in a lot of trouble,” He said.
I let that lie. I was doing thirty to life. I already had trouble.
“You killed two of the Prisoners. One of the others lost his nuts,” He said.
“Clients.”
“What?”
“Don’t call them prisoners. They were my clients.”
“Well, fortunately you didn’t kill any of your guard ‘clients’.”
“Pity.”
“Don’t feel too bad. Schmitt is blind. Johnson lost his spleen and his gall bladder. He’s never going to be the same. Dixon has some brain damage. He’s going to be more or less palsied for the rest of his life. I’d say that you got your licks in,” Riemann said.
Riemann called the prison Doctor over. He was a real MD and he was doing a very long sentence—maybe life—over some sort of drug trafficking. I never cared enough to find out the details.
“How long until this man is well?” Riemann asked him.
Doc shrugged.
“We generally leave a cast on for six weeks. The splints can probable come off his fingers sooner, but they’ll be one of the last things to fully heal—if they do fully heal,” Doc said.
“Would anabolic steroids or the new super healing drugs speed up his recovery?”
“Probably and definitely, if we could get some.”
“You have steroids. You peddle them to the muscle heads. You have plenty of morphine—you sell that to the other prisoners too.
“This man will not lack for pain medication. He should be blissed out throughout his stay. You will start him on the appropriate dose of steroids at once. If that leaves you short—O well…
“I’ll try to get you some of the new drug and nanites combos within a couple weeks.
“I know that you’re protected. I don’t care. If this man isn’t taken proper care of, I will beat your kidneys into a Christmas pudding.
“Verstehen Sie?”
“You ain’t gonna buy my gratitude Riemann,” I said
“Skew gratitude!” Riemann spat back.
******************* ****************** *********
Four weeks later I was moved from the prison hospital to a rather spacious cell in an unused part of the building. It was Spartan but it was a definite step up from the average cell accommodations.
I had a rather weak hand gripper and a nice loose foam rubber ball to exercise my broken fingers. I could do a few partial squeezes on the sponge-rubber ball with my casted hand.
I did a lot of deep knee bends, sit-ups and leg raises and flexed the muscles of my arms—particularly the muscles partially immobilized by the cast—several hundred times per day. It was a form of isometrics or dynamic tension.
I wasn’t at the top of my form yet but I was improving.
“Your arm bones are probably healed already, but we’re going to leave the cast on for the full six weeks, just in case. The new healing nanites speed the body’s recuperation a great deal, but we didn’t get any into you until partway through the third week.
“Anyway, they affect different people to varying degrees,” Riemann told me.
“You’re too good to me,” I said without emotion.
“Zin, you’re a killer,” He began.
“Got that right.”
“You know I hesitated over what I’m going to ask you. Why did you help me?”
“I don’t like to see the strong sticking it to the weak. It’s the way of things—Nature’s Law—but I find it unaesthetic,” I said.
“Don’t be fooled though. I don’t love you. When the day comes that you stand between me and a way out of here, I’ll drop you like a bad habit,” I said.
“But you keep your word, don’t you? You have Honor?” Riemann asked.
“I have Honour,” I replied.
It’s easy to express in writing. I spelled the words for him.
“ ‘Honor’ is what other folks give you. It can be based on Right-Action. It can also be based on deception or other’s misinterpretation of the facts.
“ ‘Honour’ is necessarily genuine. It comes from within and takes no account of what other’s think. I have Honour,” I stated firmly.
I would only say it once. If he chose not to believe, I didn’t care enough about his—or anyone else’s—opinion enough to try even the feeblest attempts at persuasion.
“If I could get you out of here—set you free—would you do me a small favor?
“Actually, I need a really big favor from you,” He said.
“Don’t know. No homo stuff—and I won’t kiss your Bass—or your Catfish either.
“Do you want someone killed?
“I’m not an assassin. I’d have to be convinced that they deserve it,” I said.
“You guys don’t realize it. Y’all eat fairly well in here, even if most of it is sugar, starch, vegetable oil and textured vegetable protein.
“People on the outside though—they’re going hungry more and more often. This drought just won’t let up. There’s rationing, black markets and more and more riots. We’re facing mass insurrection,” Riemann said.
“Don’t look at me. I’m not the Prophet Elijah. I can’t get God to make it rain.
“I know about hungry people. My neighbor threatened to kill and eat my Dog. I told him that if he killed my Dog that I’d kill his whole Damned family.
“I came home and my sister was crying her eyes out. The fat Lopslicker had come into my backyard shot my little Dog and had taken him home to cook,” I said.
“What did you do?”
“I kept my promise.”
“His wife, his two sons and his daughter didn’t kill your Dog,” Riemann objected.
“If you already knew the story, why did you ask? His youngest child was fourteen. The boy shared in the meal and he knew the consequences.
“I left the old man for last. He got to see his whole family precede him into death.”
“Why didn’t you run? Or resist arrest?”
“There were two other Dogs and my sister to consider. Besides, I felt called upon to explain myself—once—without special emphasis or pleading.
“The reprobate judge and the degenerate jury sent me to prison.”
“And your sister?”
“She died about eight months later, resisting the confiscation of her stored food and the murder of her Dogs—our Dogs—by lawfully constituted authority.”
“I have a daughter. She’s fifteen. I have a place that she could be relatively safe with a rather large amount of stored food. I know a couple of the other guards in the same fix.
“We can’t afford to lose these jobs…
“But if I could get you out of here and get you Guns, gear and food—would you be willing to escort our children to my Retreat? I’d want you to stay and protect them—For an equal share of the food?”
“I’ll think on it. Meantime, what weapons can you get me?”
“You’d be surprised. Times are hard. Money is tight. Most weapons are contraband…
“But I’ve read your old blog online and we Laws have our sources. You’ll be surprised how well we’ve managed to accommodate most of your weapon preferences,” Riemann said.
“It’s sounding better all the time. By the way, thank you for the Spam.”
Meat, even commuted meat was a rare thing in the prison. I’d always loved Spam, and Riemann had arranged for me to get a can every day.
“What about the eggs?”
I shook my head once—from side to side.
“Don’t eat eggs—but the trustee brings me a Roast Rat or Song Bird every few days in exchange for letting him eat my eggs.”
“Well this should be a treat,” Riemann said.
He handed me a dozen packages of M&Ms and a small can of Peanuts.
“You do eat candy?”
“O Yeah!”
.....RVM45
; Mark I--Okay; Mark III 
}
I am all caught up now.
