Jack Reacher 01 - Killing Floor

I didn’t hurry him. I could wait. I had all weekend. He had the rest of his life.
    “Well, yes indeed.” He grinned. He had no teeth. “Well, yes indeed.”
    I looked over at him.
    “Well, yes what, Granddad?” I grinned back.
    He was cackling away. This was going to take a while.
    “Yes indeed,” he said. Now he had the chuckling under control. “I’ve been in this joint since God’s dog was a puppy, yes sir. Since Adam was a young boy. But here’s something I ain’t never seen. No sir, not in all those years.”
    “What ain’t you never seen, old man?” I asked him.
    “Well,” he said, “I been here all these years, and I ain’t never seen anybody in that cell wearing clothes like yours, man.”
    “You don’t like my clothes?” I said. Surprised.
    “I didn’t say that, no sir, I didn’t say I don’t like your clothes,” he said. “I like your clothes just fine. A very fine set of clothes, yes sir, yes indeed, very fine.”
    “So what’s the story?” I asked.
    The old guy was cackling away to himself.
    “The quality of the clothes ain’t the issue,” he said. “No sir, that ain’t the issue at all. It’s the fact you’re wearing them, man, like not wearing the orange uniform. I never saw that before, and like I say, man, I been here since the earth cooled, since the dinosaurs said enough is enough. Now I seen everything, I really have, yes sir.”
    “But guys on the holding floor don’t wear the uniform,” I said.
    “Yes indeed, that sure is true,” the old man said. “That’s a fact, for sure.”
    “The guards said so,” I confirmed.
    “They would say so,” he agreed. “Because that’s the rules, and the guards, they know the rules, yes sir, they know them because they make them.”
    “So what’s the issue, old man?” I said.
    “Well, like I say, you’re not wearing the orange suit,” he said.
    We were going around in circles here.
    “But I don’t have to wear it,” I said.
    He was amazed. The sharp bird eyes locked in on me.
    “You don’t?” he said. “Why’s that, man? Tell me.”
    “Because we don’t wear it on the holding floor,” I said. “You just agreed with that, right?”
    There was a silence. He and I got the message simultaneously.
    “You think this is the holding floor?” he asked me.
    “Isn’t this the holding floor?” I asked him at the same time.
    The old guy paused a beat. Lifted his broom and crabbed back out of sight. Quickly as he could. Shouting incredulously as he went.
    “This ain’t the holding floor, man,” he whooped. “Holding floor is the top floor. Floor six. This here is floor three. You’re on floor three, man. This is lifers, man. This is categorized dangerous people, man. This ain’t even general population. This is the worst, man. Yes, indeed, you boys are in the wrong place. You boys are in trouble, yes indeed. You gonna get visitors. They gonna check you boys out. Oh man, I’m out of here.”

    EVALUATE. LONG EXPERIENCE HAD TAUGHT ME TO EVALUATE and assess. When the unexpected gets dumped on you, don’t waste time. Don’t figure out how or why it happened. Don’t recriminate. Don’t figure out whose fault it is. Don’t work out how to avoid the same mistake next time. All of that you do later. If you survive. First of all you evaluate. Analyze the situation. Identify the downside. Assess the upside. Plan accordingly. Do all that and you give yourself a better chance of getting through to the other stuff later.
    We were not in the holding pens on the sixth floor. Not where unconvicted prisoners should be. We were among dangerous lifers on the third. There was no upside. The downside was extensive. We were new boys on a convict floor. We would not survive without status. We had no status. We would be challenged. We would be made to embrace our position at the absolute bottom of the pecking order. We faced an unpleasant weekend. Potentially a lethal one.
    I remembered an army guy, a deserter. Young guy, not a bad recruit, went AWOL because he got some nut religion. Got into trouble in Washington, demonstrating. Ended up thrown in jail, among bad guys like on this floor. Died on his first night. Anally raped. An estimated fifty times. And at the autopsy they found a pint of semen in his stomach. A new boy with no status. Right at the bottom of the pecking order. Available to all those above him.
    Assess. I could call on some heavy training. And experience. Not intended for prison life, but it would