EPThttp://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/461933-fiction-american-bromide-ch-13
Orange men on an orange yard - sodium lamps off a spread of snow and a single file of jumpsuits. The mass clinking of interlaced steel shackles marked slow progress, a two-count rhythm to an eighty-eight beat dirge. Freddie and George had peeled off to their respective wings, while Carl went to the kitchen for the pre-dinner shift. The firebug shuffled ahead of Bobby.
"Some speech, huh?"
"Yeah." Bobby had slept through it.
"That nigga got a way with words." Through the mutual chain linking their ankles, Bobby felt Rufus' step speed up to half beat faster than the rest of the line.
"You thinking about what you'll do when you get out?"
Rufus grinned, a big easy one. "Yeah, I was thinking of doing work for the man."
"The senator?"
The line shuffled into B Wing's cinderblock and concrete entryway. The passage was so narrow two men could barely fit abreast, and straight as an arrow until it widened into a bare vestibule flanked by a glass-walled, one-man guard station. Flourescent green replaced the wash of sodium orange that had illuminated their walk through the yard, and the temperature warmed twenty degrees. Bobby began to sweat.
"Yeah, him. He doin' good for the good folk, and he know what he doin'."
Then the line stopped. Rufus nearly ran into the inmate ahead of him. "What's goin' on, man?"
"I dunno... heard one o' the screws talkin' smack about the speech guy, then one of us told him to shut it..."
Bobby strained his ears for echoes.
"...you givin' me lip, son?" Then a pinging thwack. It was Big Al.
A Darth Vader voice. "...man, fuck you, you pasty-assed - " another thwack.
Big Al, quietly: "Oh, this is gonna be fun." Hoots spread down the line, Big Al turned to them, beat his baton against the hallway. Bobby caught a glimpse - face flaring red, neck veined purple. He felt yellow bile rising from his stomach.
"All of you - shut your fuckin' throats or this'll shut it for ya." Big Al turned his back. Bobby heard a few sniggers from behind him, tensed, but Big Al was already focused back on James Earl Jones in a jumpsuit. Thwack. "You like that, ya uppity motherfucker?" Whack. "On the ground." Thwack. "I said on your knees, bitch!" Two whacks. Squealing laughter. "Yeah, all you niggers are the same, so big and tough but one good hamstring and you're on the floor." Then a string of blows, this time higher in pitch.
Rufus muttered something. Bobby nudged him. "What, man?"
"He be breakin' bones now, sweet jeezus."
More blows. "Had enough yet?" Bam bam bam, flesh against concrete, then the dull thud of a boot. "Yeah, that's right, you're jus' a nigger and you'll always be one." Then Big Al hocked and spat. "Lil' bitch, gettin' blood all over my shoes." Big Al flipped a tit on his guard uniform, spoke into a walkie-talkie strapped to his chest. "Ronnie, got a non-compliant... yeah, he's still breathin'... get out of that station of yours and help me drag this piece of shit out of my cellblock. Tell Nurse Williams to go easy on the morphine - I want him to feel every inch of those stitches."
Bobby thought back to chow line whispers from a month ago. "New guard - poor kid picked up enough running yards in high school for a scholarship to Notre Dame, but enlisted because he wanted to go kill Ay-rabs like Pat Tillman - shipped out in '04, his truck got hit in Fallujah - have you seen his legs yet? They're plastic, man..."
Bobby saw Ronnie limp out of the guard station, an off-beat drummer to the orange line's slowing dirge. Big Al saw him, waved a finger, then turned to the inmates. "What y'all faggots starin' at for? Get a move on!" But only the front few did. Big Al's voice went up to a falsetto. "Y'all deaf?" The fat guard advanced down the left of the line, swinging his baton at a shoulder here, a head there. The line began to move at an even slower dirge. "Faster, you sons of bitches... freezin' cold out here..."
Behind Big Al, Ronnie unlocked the beaten inmate's ankle cuffs, then began dragging the man by the armpits like a sack of potatoes. One of the man's prison shoes slipped off, joining a six-foot smear of blood on the ground. Ronnie missed a step, fell down, looked at his fat partner, but Big Al did not notice. Shrugging, Ronnie picked himself up, laminated ankles bouncing the flourescent lamps like a pair of well-shined shoes. Then he unlocked the beaten man's handcuffs and drew one of his arms across a shoulder.
Rufus gave Bobby a look of surprise as Ronnie drew the other man up and the two stumbled towards the infirmary. "Damn, he can still walk?"
"Yeah, the little faggot was probably faking it."
Big Al had found his way to Bobby and Rufus. The fat guard then prodded Rufus around with his baton and kept it at a friendly angle to the firebug's throat. "Gettin' out soon, huh? Better not get uppity or it's back to the big house you go." Then, without warning, Big Al smacked Rufus across the head, so hard the lanky arsonist staggered against the wall. "Yeah, you complain about that and I get cozy with your parole officer. Next thing you know, you're back in here, and I'll tell everyone you're a snitch."
Then Big Al turned his fat moon face to Bobby and opened his lips, which began moving in slow motion. The words refused to register. Bobby's eyes hardened into little chips of ice, and he lowered into a slight crouch, then launched himself forward, his forehead smashing into a pockmarked nose. Bobby's world tumbled over; he saw the lights, the cinderblock walls, then Big Al's flailing arms hitting the concrete at an awkward angle.
They rolled on the ground. "What the - hey, help, he's assaulting me, HELP -" Bobby felt Big Al's hands inching down towards his waist, reaching for a taser, so he buried his face in the fat man's shoulder and sank in a dozen teeth. Something vaguely human screamed a high opera falsetto in his ear, then went silent as a prison boot stamped on its face. Bobby went close to deaf, felt misaimed stomps and kicks on his back, barely made out indistinct shouts down the line. "Yeah, kill that cracka', kill that cracka', kill 'em..."
Then as his hearing returned: different shouts, heavy blows, a metal jangle, a deep voice. "I got keys. I GOT KEYS! Everyone stand still, Santa's back and he takin' off some cuffs." Clinks and clanks down the line. Bobby felt hands at his ankles and wrists. Then the bite of the cuffs was gone and he was free.
