Act II

"Lockdown"

-1-

L3251 jerks her hand away from mine on reflex.

“Do that again bitch and I’ll snap your wrist,” I warn her.

I turn up the heat and slowly bring L3251’s delicate fingers to the heated red tip of the soldering iron.

She is silent at the first touch of the iron but by the time I get to finger number four she breaks. The execution room is filled with her screams and the stench of her burning flesh.

L3251’s scream is primal and arousing. I keep going.

Behind me I hear Haley make a soft sound under his gag.

A sound of empathy.

A sound I had explicitly made contraband here.

As if this girl—this woman-- hadn’t just shredded one the Western Republic’s most wanted serial killer like he was  paper with the tips her fingernails.

When I’d initiated the dogfights between the inmates I knew they’d be vicious. But good entertainment was sparse in Ft. Pride and futility had dulled my senses of common decency.  The fights sated some of the prisoner’s repressed bloodlust, horrified my staff into cooperation and solidified my power over their lives.

The fights were normally lengthy bloody brawls involving broken necks and bashed in skulls. I liked to see who really had it in them to survive.  And while there were no rules, I still wanted a fair fight.

But L3251 was an unusual prisoner.

She was new, one of the few women in Northland and when I locked her in the cell to fight for her life I think most of them men just wanted to see her clothes ripped off. I had a strong  feeling her opponent, U684, planned to get his dick wet before killing her. But before the fight could even really start, thin needles grew from L3251’s nails and within minutes U684 was sliced to pieces. He'd banged on the cell for help, his eyes still looking at me for reprieve as they were plucked from their sockets.

It was the vilest thing I had seen in my life.

L3251 had been in Ft. Pride two months. She went through three weapons screening at Ft. Perch before she was left here and yet no one had noticed the microscopic discs on her nails. I burned the last disc off her nail with the soldering iron and she falls to the floor clutching her smoldering hand.

“That wasn’t a fair fight,” I tell her. “You’ll have to fight U2540 in three days.”

I give her 30 seconds to lick her wounds and then I call a soldier to take her back to her cell.

I look up to where Haley was standing in the corner, his eyes cast down and his body tense. He hated the execution room even when he wasn’t the one strapped down in the chair.

“Did I hear you make a sound earlier ?,” I ask him. “Do you feel bad for that bitch because I may have burned her a little ?”

He makes a short sound around the gag.

I pick up one of the tiny discs I’d just burned off L3251 and rub it, adding pressure. The disc spins and unravels into a long sharp blade.

“Come here,” I tell Haley.

He takes the four steps to cross the room and stands between my knees. With me sitting we are as close to eye level.

I roll up the sleeve of his black shirt to see the dark outlines of the words Republic Liberation Army scrawled  down his forearm. 

I press the tip of the blade lightly it into his arm. He winces as I break the skin with the blade. It happens easier than I would have thought.

“Did that hurt?,” I ask him.

He nods

“Now imagine that pain a thousands times over as you die.  Imagine it lasting for hours before you finally bleed out. That’s what L3251 did. That is why she is here. She’s a murderer and she deserves nothing but cruelty.”

He nods.

They’d been piling up in Ft. Pride.

 The street samurai as they liked to called themselves.

They were cybernetic heavy killers who had casualty lists a mile long. They were worse than the fucking cannibals I  kept permanently restrained and on  feeding tubes.

Gang and cartel activity had only surged under the RLA. Baxter-Finch’s office was too concerned with taking down the Eastern State  and I was left to deal with  the Sprawl’s most disgusting trash.

As I walk out of the execution room and down  death row I get jeers and threats from the inmates, all of whom were days away from being shot and shoved into my furnace. I stop in front of the cell where L3251 had eviscerated her opponent. Most of his skin had been removed to the furnace but the blood and assorted entrails remained in the cell with her.

I usually had Haley clean the cells immediately after a fight but  I’d just put L3251 back in her mess. She sat on the bed amid the congealing blood, crossing her arms and staring back at me defiantly.

 Ft. Pride was changing me, but I was going to survive it.  

I would survive them all.

 

***

 

I tease Haley with the key, running it through my fingers  for a few moments before passing the key over his cheeks and releasing the gag. I pull the gag out and  he immediately drains the bottle of water next to him on the table.

“One of these assholes tried to report me for abusing inmates,” I say under my breath looking around the small mess hall.

Normally Cass didn’t care what I did, but if her boss’s boss got too many complaints from one of my soldiers I’d never hear the end of it.

Ft. Pride was overcrowded and understaffed, I’d had to get creative to keep the inmates in line.

Including Haley. 

“Who is it ?,” I ask him. “Who reported me ?”

“I don’t know yet, sir,” he says, dragging his fork through his food.

“Don’t lie to me.”

 I had him monitoring all the communications on Ft. Pride for a reason.

“I’m not, sir. I don’t know who did it,” he says and I don’t believe him.

 He’ll pay for lying to me. 

“Fine. Then pick someone I can make an example of. I don’t care who.”

He looks up at me through his lashes and then he scans the mess hall. There were 13 corporals in the mess hall he could choose from, most of whom treated him like shit. But he’s hesitant to pick one for me to single out.

I pick up his gag and his eyes focus on it.

“If you can’t tell me anything I want to hear  I don’t know why you should be allowed to eat--”

“Corporal Chrysler,” Haley says quickly, looking over at the 24-year-old corporal who’d been one of the few soldiers I actually liked. Chrysler obeyed orders without hesitation and knew when to get creative with the inmates.

“You think you’re smart by picking my favorite ? You think I’ll go easy on him ?”

“No, sir,” Haley responds and then looks down. “Corporal Chrysler stole one of your…bottles and replaced it with water.”

I turn and make eye contact with Chrysler across the mess hall, I watch him get uncomfortable under my gaze before turning back to another corporal.

 I’d bribed an airship pilot to bring me contraband when she dropped off the new rotation of soldiers every few weeks. Mostly liquor,  coffee, condoms and lube. It was costing me thousands.

“When did Chrysler steal from me  ?”

“Yesterday morning.”

“If you’re lying to me,” I tell him grabbing his face.

“I’m not, I can show--”

“Stay,” I tell him,  picking up his gag and forcing it back into his mouth before he can protest.

I walk out of the mess hall, to my office and sit at the large tri-screen set up. I deleted the recorded footage from the camera in my quarters everyday before it got sent to the RLA data center.  I have to search through the trash files until I find the clip of Chrysler sneaking into my office while I was overseeing  the death row inmates.

Chrysler goes right to the liquor I kept in a bottom drawer of my desk like he knew it was there. He pours the vodka into his canteen and replaces the contents of the bottle with water--he’s  so careful to keep the liquid in the bottle at the same level.

I extract the clip and transfer it to my Syndicate and walk back to the mess hall. Haley is staring intently at the table and Chrysler seems oblivious to what is about to happen.

I stand behind Chrysler’s table and project the video clip to the entire cafeteria.

The entire hall goes silent, watching the recording of him stealing from me.

I play the video again.

And again.

“Let me make one thing very clear,” I tell the room. “At Ft. Pride I am in charge. Not Headquarters. Not the RLA. Me.”

I walk purposefully to Chrysler, pull him up by his shoulders and cuff his hands behind his back. I walk him out of the mess hall and to the large wooden post that anchored the communication towers.

 It was right under the hottest part of the sun.

“Sir, I--”

“Get on your knees,” I order Chrysler.

He drops to his knees and I shackle Chrysler to the wooden pole. I was only going to leave him there until the next morning, but I decide not tell him that.

 

-----

 -2-

I throwback the rest of whiskey and turn on my pipe before pulling Haley off his knees. I press his naked body prone over my desk. He whines under his gag as I trace a line with my tongue from the dark monogram on the back of his neck, around the large RLA insignia tattooed across the side of his ribcage and down to the other set of initials on his lower back.

He had been fucking determined to get away from this place. Even with the gag in he’d somehow managed to convince my corporals to help him escape twice within the last year. 

Each of his indiscretions earned him another visit to the execution room and DeCartes’ needle.

I pull Haley back from over the desk and drag him behind me, past the tarp that separated my office from my quarters. I undress and press his back flat against the bed, bringing his knees to his chest and force my own knees into the side of his thighs to keep them open for me.

He’s aroused tonight. His arms are folded over his face.  I keep one hand gripping his neck and use my other hand to stroke a sensitive spot of bare skin on his hip. The heat of the pipe in my hand just barely grazes his skin and he closes his eyes against the touch, squeezing them when the heated pipe got too close.

“Look at me,” I tell him and he does. 

I could never shake my insatiable attraction to him, even as he made my life a living fucking hell.

His face somehow always managed to heal itself back into it’s familiar delicate features. But I liked him better with a few cuts and bruises.

I take a long drag from my pipe as two nearly identical single tears fall from each of his eyes.

He fucking deserved to feel bad because this was all his fault.

If Haley had just left Camp Harmony when I told him to the cartel would have never come.

Corp. Strange or  Alan Gray or whoever the hell he was would have never freed those POWs to get to him.

I wouldn’t haven’t been locked in that godforsaken basement for two weeks starving half to death and scared shitless.

And the RLA wouldn’t have sent me to Ft. Pride as punishment. A place I would likely be for the rest of my life because of him.

I tighten my grip on Haley’s neck until he starts choking, I fuck him harder, imagining what it would feel like to finally crush his delicate neck between my fingers. Without warning his entire body goes still and taught, his eyes roll back into his head and his body suddenly grips mine violently.

His fists the cheap bedsheet and  a single moan comes from underneath his gag. I loosen my grip on his neck.

“Everything is wasted on the fucking young,” I spit at him, watching his body continue to convulse beneath me.

Close to two years at Ft. Pride had aged my body in ways that didn’t seem to touch him. I had to find new ways to keep an erection, my hair had started to thin and gray, there was a permanent redness and bags under my eyes. Cass was always commenting on my how tired I looked.

Fucking Cassia Winthrop.

If I ever got the chance I was going to kill her too. It wasn’t just that she enforced my sentence, it was how happy she was about it.

Haley’s eyes roll away from mine and his body flushes pink. Despite his best efforts  part of him liked being fucked by me. I press my forehead to his, he makes a strained sound at the pressure.

“Did I say you could come?” I ask, tracing the end the pipe near the thin skin behind his ear.     

He looks at me confused and unsure of what I want.

 I mold my lips around his gag and suck, feeling the warm metal against my teeth and the pull of the mechanism that tightened the gag when it thought it was being taken off. 

 I take the key out of my back pocket and unlock the gag, pulling it from his lips and tossing it aside. He’s panting and takes in a big gulp of air as the gag comes off.

I drag my middle finger down his chest, through the evidence of his orgasm that  lay against his stomach.

“Open,” I tell him, bringing my middle finger to his lips.

His mouth twitches as he presses his lips together.

“Open,” I repeat.

He turns his head away from me and I pull it back, pulling on his hair to try and make him scream so he’d open his mouth.

“It’s funny, Haley.  On that video footage, Chrysler knew exactly where my liquor was…as if someone told him….I don’t know how you managed to tell him or why you did it but I don’t care.”

I tap my other hand against the sensitive spot of skin on his hip and start slowly thrusting into his body.

He starts tearing up again. His eyes are so shiny with tears and I can almost see my reflection in them.

And then I see nothing.

There’s a soft buzz and then the entire room goes pitch black.

“Maxwell ?,” Haley says quietly.  I know he’s still underneath me, but it’s so dark I can’t even see him.

“Shut up,” I tell him trying to parse out what was happening in my head.

Ft. Pride doesn't get dark. The entire camp was  constantly lit with high power lights, that blocked the stars and left a constant orange glow over everything.

Almost immediately my syndicate pings with a communication from the night shift at the watchtower.

“Sir,” the corporal says over the syndicate. “This is the watchtower. The power is out--”

“No, shit,” I snap at the corporal. “The back up should be on shortly. It’s probably headquarters fucking around.”

The fuses connecting Ft. Pride to the power grid had a tendency to go out  but they usually turned themselves right back on. The main circuit switch for Ft. Pride’s power supply was remotely located in Cassia’s office at Headquarters. A staffer could have accidentally turned it off.

It made no sense to keep the switch thousands of miles away, but it was another way for Headquarters to keep me on a leash. They could get rid of my running water, air conditioning and power with the flick of a switch.

I turn on the small light on my syndicate. The pin light is so minimal I can only see dark shadows in Haley’s face, he seems unsettled by the darkness. I bring his head up until out lips meet. I kiss and bite until the bruises on his lips match the ones of his neck and I finally get my release.

“Why are the lights still out--,” he starts when I pull out several minutes later.

“What ?  Are you afraid of the dark ?,” I snap.

I use the light on my Syndicate to find my way to the shower and curse when I realize the water isn’t running with the power off.

I dampen a towel with water from a water bottle and use it to wipe the sweat from my body before calling back into the watchtower.

“Did someone check the damn fuses or call Headquarters ?,” I ask and don’t get a response. “Hello ? Watchtower?”

I turn to Haley, shining the light on him. He’s lying on his side in my bed, his knees bent into his chest and  his head resting on his arms.

“Go to the storage shed and get those emergency drone lights,” I order him throwing the damp towel at him.

“Yes, sir,” he nods, wiping himself off.

Haley was a fucking pain in my ass, but he was more competent than the corporals I was forced to deal with. He’d been at Ft. Pride longer than any of them, I never had to explain anything to him. His usefulness was the only thing keeping me from putting a bullet in his head some nights.

Haley dresses quickly and heads for the door. I don’t bother gagging him since most of the corporals are asleep

He takes barely a step outside when the lights come back on, and I hear my shower start running.

I’m only under the water a second when I hear Haley scream and the door to my quarters slams shut. Haley races into my shower, grabbing my arm.  

I shake off his grip and push him away. He never touched me.

“What--”

“Somethings not right...” Haley mumbles. “Something’s wrong--”

“Is this another one of your tricks--”

I stop talking as a soft knock sounds at my door. The knock  continues in an even rhythm and I glare at Haley who looks scared shitless. I pull on my undershirt, fatigue pants and gun holster on before opening the door.

At first I don’t see anyone at the door.

And then I look down.

Corporal Chrysler’s decapitated head was at my feet, pushed by the wind to gently knock against my door.

It had been severed crudely from his body, which I could still see handcuffed to the communications tower post in the distance.

Beyond Chrysler’s body I could see a few more bodies. The uniformed bodies of my corporals who watched the doors of Northland Penitentiary and beyond that--

“Fuck,” I whisper.

My worst fears are confirmed when I see a corporal running towards my door, his weapon is missing and he’s bleeding severely from his stomach.

“Sgt. Maxwell, sir !,” the soldier wheezes. “Sir, t-th-the power went out and when it came back on…the..the.. cells…they…opened. The prisoners are out! They’re killing…all the guards…I  ran and…got…out….oh, god I can’t believe I’m still alive--”

“Not for long,” I tell him as black blood seeps out of his wound.

I slam the door on the bleeding soldier and walk back into my quarters, the corporal knocking loudly on the door and begging for help.

I put on my full uniform for the first time since I’d been here—including the bullet proof vest.  I stash two flasks in each pocket and take out my  non-RLA issued automatic firearms.

I pull Haley by the collar of his shirt and roughly stroke his cheek with the gun.

“Did you have anything to do with this ?,” I bark.

This didn’t seem like Haley. Whatever was going on was far too gruesome and deadly than anything he would do, but he’d gotten desperate to escape and I hardly knew what to believe anymore.

“No, sir,” Haley says. “How would I--”

“Listen to me,” I say, dragging the gun down his back. “If you’re lying to me, if I find out you had anything to do with this I will fuck you with this gun until you bleed to death, do you understand ?”

“Yes, sir,” he says. “I’m not lying--”

“Let’s go, then.” I say holstering the guns. “Stay close.”

We step out of my quarters. Haley walks behind my like a shadow, his arms graze my back with each step. We step over the corporal who had told me what was happening. I’d planned to give the corporal one of my flasks so he could have one last drink but he’s already dead.

The figures of the escaping inmates, most darting across the base to the vehicle sheds, are visible in the distance. A mass  of them are congregated near the soldier barracks.

They were likely looking for me. The fact that they didn’t know I had a separate quarters  from the soldiers was probably the only thing that gave me time to escape.

The prisoners in Northland Penn had never seen Ft. Pride. They were always brought into their cells blind folded and there were no windows in the entire penitentiary.

I start to walk quicker.

“Where are we going, sir ?,” Haley asks. 

I ignore him, making my way to the penitentiary as fast as I could.

If the prisoners  were looking for me, I had to hide. Which meant going to be the one place they’d never go back to.

The penitentiary.

-3-

I get the doors of the penitentiary open and the smell of blood is overwhelming. There were six guards on duty at night, which meant at least six bodies were rotting away somewhere in the building

A few inmates lay dead in the halls; either trampled or killed in an act of revenge.

“What are we doing in here ?,” Haley asks.

“Hiding,” I tell him.

My blood boils as we walk  down the halls, past empty cell after empty cell after empty cell. Even the unstable prisoners had been let out—those men hadn’t been in society in years.

“I don’t understand,” Haley says as we past our third hall of open cells.  “How could this--"

“I don’t fucking know,” I snap, the enormity of it suddenly hitting me.

I was a dead man walking.

If the prisoners didn’t kill me, Headquarters surely would.

This wasn’t an escape of a few first time offenders. These were 97 of the Republics worst killers, almost half of them serial rapists, 5 of them compulsive serial killers and 8 of them alleged cannibals.

And now they were all free and likely armed.

Except two.

As I turn the corner towards the death row  cells I catch a glimpse of Forge DeCartes still in his cell. And he’s not alone.

Sitting in his cell is L3251, the woman whose fingernails I’d burned off. The door of the cell is open like all the others but they remain inside, sitting together, side by side, like they were waiting for me.

I train my gun on them and DeCartes smiles wickedly.

“What the fuck is going on?” I demand.

“Big man’s mad because his blow job probably got interrupted,” DeCartes says to L3251 who gives him a small smile.  

“You don’t talk to her,” I tell him. “What the fuck did you two do ?”

“Nothing,” DeCartes shrugs. “The lights just went out, the cell doors opened and it was… fucking mayhem.”

I take out my other gun so I can keep a bullet trained on each of them.

“Then why the hell are you two still up here ? Especially you.”

I focus on L3251.

She was scheduled to be executed tomorrow. If anyone should have tried to leave it would have been her.

“Belle and I are old friends--,” DeCartes starts.

“I didn’t ask you,” I snap at him.

“I don't lie with dogs. You said I would get a stay of execution if I won a fight fairly,” she says and I hate how confident her voice is. “I was going to win that fight. I still plan to.”

“And you ?,” I ask DeCartes.

He smirks.

“Didn’t like the odd out there,” he quips. “Besides I’ve got a good deal here.”

He did have quite the advantages.

 I’d given him real food, the occasional liquor bottle and an air conditioned cell for his tattooing services. In another life I would have shared a few nights with him. I could tell he got off on sadism as much as I was starting to. I’d been using Haley as a pawn with him, just out of his reach, to keep DeCartes interested.

I sigh and pull up the emergency facility override menu on my syndicate.

“There is an emergency lockdown protocol program for the penitentiary,” I tell them. “Once I initiate it  the doors will lock down and no one can come in or get out until my boss at Headquarters sends someone with a physical key--”

“We having a slumber party ?,” DeCartes scoffs and smiles.

“We’re not doing anything. I’m keeping myself safe from those lunatics until Headquarters sends back up. I’m saving myself-- you all just happen to be in here.”

I didn’t like the idea of being locked inside the penitentiary with three delinquents but I had no choice.

“What about the other soldiers ?,” Haley asks as I start initiating the emergency lockdown protocols.

“So it speaks,” DeCartes says, used to only seeing Haley with the gag.

“They’re probably already dead,” I say. “It’s not worth it to look for them.”

When a confirmation for emergency lockdown appears I click yes and give my thumbprint. The screen reminds me that the penitentiary will be locked  from the inside until the physical key is installed into the keypad outside the penitentiary doors.

I confirm again and a 60 second countdown begins

“How long do you think will it take headquarters to come and get us out ?,” Haley asks, his voice trembling.

I look at the time.

10:23 PM

The lockdown will initiate an SOS to Headquarters, but I imagine Cass won’t notice the SOS until she’s back at work, then it will take some time  to get the backup ready and flown out here.

“12-14 hours.” 

The moment the lockdown countdown hits 30 seconds, Haley turns his back to me.

And he runs.

On instinct I go after him, but he’s quicker than I remember and my knee had been acting up without it’s regular maintenance by a doctor.

“Where the hell are you going ?,” I demand, chasing him down the death row hall.                                                                             

He goes to  the front door of the penitentiary, and pauses, facing the door. The voice in my ear continues to countdown to the lockdown.

“10”

 

“9”

 

“Get back here ! ” I order him and he shakes his head, his hand hovering near the penitentiary doors.

 

“8”

 

“7”

 

“If you step out that door you won’t be able to get back in here, those prisoners will eat you alive.” I remind him. “How many times do I have to tell you ? You can’t escape, Haley. Even if you do get out of Ft. Pride, Headquarters will hunt you down and bring you back. You know too much too.”

“6”

“5”

He turns to looks at me, his expression is pained and I beacon him to step away from the door. He stares at me like a spoiled child ready to burn himself on a hot flame instead of doing as he's told.

“4”

“3”

“GET AWAY FROM THE DOOR, HALEY!”

“2”

“Haley!,” I shout as he swings open the penitentiary door and runs outside.

“1”

I don’t dare chase after him. A loud buzz sounds within the penitentiary walls.

“Northland Penitentiary is now in lockdown. All inmates and staff are confined inside the penitentiary. Doors will not open until senior administrative staff arrives on premise.

----

A/N

So originally when I envisioned writing more HaleyMaxwell I knew I wanted to write a prison break at Ft. Pride. In original drafts the story was just Maxwell "bounty hunting" Belle but then I realized  I needed to write why Haley was wearing a gag and then I had this image of him being among the prisoners alone and that's how this serial came about.

Also, TempestCast exists in an alternate timeline where when Haley opens the door to the penitentiary Rocket Olsen is somehow standing on the other side and they run off together.