A Bullet Through A Flock Of Doves

Two - Will They Give Me The Chair?

It was called Red Onion State Prison, which made Gerard simultaneously amused and disgusted. Red onions were excellent for making people cry, but he despised the taste of them. He told this to the escort, who he decided to name Shades, and he was glad to see him shudder.

He knew he should probably be afraid, at least a little. Red Onion was Virginia's one and only supermax prison- a prison that was the most secure, most effective, a prison for the worst of the worst. He was vaguely curious as to who else he would meet there.

He was pushed through doors and into an air conditioned room which could hardly pass as a room. He was taken aside and into another room, where a man with angry eyes read him his rights and told him he would have appeals to use before they were exhausted and he was put to death.

Gerard politely asked him how long that would take.

The man explained (still with angry eyes) that the capital punishment process could take years. "But, in your case," he said mockingly, "those FBI agents are pretty persistent. At this rate, I'd say chair in a month or two. Until then, you're in death row."

He couldn't help but smile. Good. That gave him plenty of time.

The angry eyed man took him to another room, where a tall woman with a long pair of orange pants (ugh, why orange, the colour just looked so bad) along with a white shirt and an orange jacket. She didn't leave the room, so Gerard ruefully changed in front of her. Not that it mattered, she was a woman, after all. Very much not his type. And besides- he managed to hide the cross around his neck from her, tucking it under the collar and hiding the chain with the ends of his hair.

Then he was taken away again, and put in handcuffs- although these handcuffs were more like padded hand socks, supposedly to better prevent escape. He was annoyed by them but decided not to voice it. All of this was just such an inconvenience.

And then, after a maze of hallways, they emerged into a gigantic space, roughly octagonal in shape, with a domed roof with dim lights and large metal beams. Hundreds of cells lined the walls, and if he squinted, he could just make out their occupants, spots of orange against the overall gray. Echoes of noise filled his ears, made louder by the metal surfaces all around.

He opened his mouth to ask if this was where they parted ways, when he found himself being shoved (rather rudely) towards another door.

This led to yet another hallway, equally gray and dreary. Gerard was quite put off from the lack of colour here. Even a spot of red would bring some variation, a puddle of blood would do quite nicely...

There was a sound of grinding gears, and he looked up to see that a grille was being raised in front of them, leading to a more closed off, private, quiet (thank God) part of the prison. He was led inside.

There were much less cells, maybe twenty or thirty at the very most. They were bland, gray, with barred grates for the fronts and no visible windows. Through the almost opaque fronts, he could see people peering at him as he walked past, eyes sparkling dark in the shadows. Dim lights lit the area. It even smelled of death, despair- silly people who had slipped up, made a mistake, and were about to pay the ultimate price.

The people appeared to have a cell to themselves. Gerard was glad for that. He didn't think he could bear an inmate without possibly finding a way to kill him and then ending up in even more trouble.

He was pushed into a cell near the end, with a bunk bed and a toilet and a sink and a shower and a small shelf, along with a barred window, high off the ground. There was nobody else inside of it, and he exhaled in relief. Still, the bunk bed was a little silly if only one person would be living here.