Before she could react, the man was back and they led Yao towards the wall at a brisk pace. He followed without protest, awkward and stiff.
Her years of petty theft told her to wait and watch. See how the suits got inside. Follow when it was safe.
But that was her brother.
With a howl, Jin leapt from the shadows and barreled into the nearest man. She rammed her head into his gut and he staggered back, gasping for breath. In his moment of disorientation, Jin swept her leg behind the other man's, knocking his feet out from under him. He crashed to the ground.
"Yao, run!" she shouted.
She turned her attention back to the first man, who had recovered his wind and lunged forward, fists swinging. Jin ducked and dodged close enough to smell his cologne, then slammed her heel down on the top of his foot. He staggered away with a grunt.
Jin turned back, but Yao hadn't so much as turned his head. "Yao?" She grabbed his hand and yanked. If they could get outside the fence the way she'd come in, the men were too big to follow. They'd have a head start while the others wrestled with the locks on the gate.
Yao remained immobile, as stiff as a statue, but his eyes followed her with a pleading stare. Just like Liu had described Auntie Bai Wei.
Jin slapped him, hard. Smarting pain bloomed in her hand, but Yao didn't move. His eyes went wide, looking past her left shoulder.
She spun in time to see the second man's fist just before it crashed into the side of her head. The world went black.
Jin's eyes blinked open in a dimly-lit cell. Her head throbbed where the man in the suit had clobbered her. A sick sensation hung in the back of her throat. She swallowed back the nausea.
Where was Yao?
A quick glance told her she was alone, with nothing save the rickety cot on which she lay and a toilet in the far corner. The back wall was bare cinder-blocks. A sharp chill emanated through it into the cell. Iron bars formed the other three walls. Another row of cells lay on the far side of a central hallway. The only light came from a bare bulb glowing over the hall.
The cells to either side of her were empty, but across the way, a dark figure hugged the shadows. Jin swung her feet to the floor and sat up. Dizziness swept over her in waves. She probed the lump on the back of her head. Her fingers came away bloody, but from what she could tell, her skull was in one piece, only the scalp split. Jin wiped her hand on her jeans.
She lurched upright and stumbled forward, catching herself on the bars of the door. Clinging there, she closed her eyes and waited for the world to stop spinning.
When she was fairly certain she wouldn't collapse if she let go, she straightened and dug in the breast pocket of her jacket for her lock picking tools. When her fingers closed around them, she let out a relieved breath. The men in suits must not have worried too much about her-or else they had something much bigger to think about-if they hadn't taken the time to search her. The pick wasn't well-hidden.
With deft motions, she set to work.
The figure across the hall inched forward, crouched low, until it was pressed up against the bars. "Shouldn't do that." The voice was high and light. A woman. "They won't like it."
Using the tension wrench to turn the cylinder gently counter-clockwise, Jin felt the pick catch one tumbler after another. When the last tumbler fell into place, she turned the cylinder further counter-clockwise. The bolt slid back with a welcome thunk.
Moving smoothly, less dizzy with each passing breath, Jin pushed the door open.
It creaked, as if it hadn't been oiled in decades. She paused and waited, not breathing. When nobody came to investigate, she slipped out of the cell, crossed the hall, and knelt in front of her fellow prisoner. "Did you see who brought me? Was there a boy with them?"
The figure giggled. "Boy, boy, plays with toys!"
Jin plunged a hand between the bars and grabbed the stranger's plain black T-shirt, yanking the woman forward until the bars dented her skin. Jin pressed her own face close enough she could feel the other's breath on her skin. "Did you see?"
The woman shied away, breaking free of Jin's grasp. "Never see anything." She slid back on all fours. "Not safe to see."
Jin rose and backed away. The stranger was crazy. Maybe she was a spirit host. Maybe whatever rode her had shattered her mind. Further talk wouldn't bring her any closer to finding Yao. Or Auntie Bai Wei, a small voice reminded her.
Jin pushed the thought away. If she found Bai Wei, she would try to help her, but Yao came first. Her hand slid into her pocket, and when she found the jade lion still resting there, she nearly sobbed. She pulled it free and cradled it in front of her lips. Help me find Yao, she begged silently. Help me find my brother.
She swung the lion first to her left, then to her right, where it flared with heat. With catlike steps she padded down the hallway's length to the closed door at its end. She pulled it open. The woman she'd left behind began to wail, throwing herself against the bars. "Take me with you! Don't leave me!"
Jin shut the door behind her, muffling the woman's cries. Her heart thudded against her ribs. The figurine's warmth centered her, and she followed its lead into a maze of winding corridors.
As she crept through the bowels of the prison, Jin became aware of a low, steady thrum, like the building had its own beating heart. She felt it reverberating in her chest, only barely able to pick it up at the lower spectrum of her hearing. Her hand tightened around the jade lion.
She passed cellblocks full of prisoners, mostly sleeping, some pacing their cells from end to end like caged beasts, others chained to the walls. Most ignored her, although a few hid like rats when she approached, and other reached through the bars, begging her to release them.
Time and again, she shook her head and walked on. What good could it do to undo the cages? With a contingent of prisoners tromping at her heels, or running loose through the prison, it would not be long before someone, or something, noticed. Besides, she still had no idea how to get into the building, never mind out.
So she left the wretched souls behind and blocked out the sobs of the few who begged her to set them free. She held the lion in her left hand, its amber glow hidden in her palm, and the lock pick in her right, ready to use as a weapon if she were forced to fight.
More than once, the lion led her through doors into stairwells leading down, deep below ground level. The lower she climbed, the stronger the skeletal building's throbbing pulse, until she felt her teeth rattling against each other as her feet touched the floor.
The stairwell led past several doors with small rectangular windows. Jin glanced through when she passed. Wide rooms, lit by blue-tinged fluorescents, stretched as far as she could see. The tubes illuminated stacks of electronics, humming with energy.
She'd seen illustrations like this in the textbooks Auntie Bai Wei gathered for Yao. Some deep tech that Jin couldn't hope to comprehend. What it was doing on this side of the river was a mystery, but one she wasn't interested in solving. All she wanted was to find her brother.
Two more floors, then the lion gave a sharp surge of heat. Jin glanced through the window. This floor was dark. No light, save what shone in through the stairwell window.
So be it. Cautiously, Jin pulled open the door. It opened without a sound. She slipped into the darkness.
The jade lion led her into the black, beyond the arc of the stairwell's glow. Unable to see so much as her hand in front of her face, Jin opened her fingers, allowing the figurine's amber radiance to light the way.
Heavy metal doors without windows lined the hallway on either side. Was Yao in this place? What sort of terror must he be enduring? Jin increased her pace.