<center>http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y19...gyllenhaal.jpg
Uncle Sam taught him to shoot
Maybe a little too well
Finger on the trigger, loaded bullet
How could you take his life away?
What made you think you had the right?
How could you be so full of hate?
To take away somebody's life
And when I heard you let him die
And made the world all wonder why
I scratched your name on the side of a bullet. </center>
(lyrics by nickelback.)
There was nothing all that special about the maximum security prison on Osiris. The inmates followed their own rules of degradation and violence to establish a pecking order that would ensure their survival for the length of the sentence, the guards were corrupt and could be bought easily, the food was terrible (biotin and other supplements with seasonings to make them taste like the food from Earth That Was), etc.
The men with smaller sentences lounged in the yard and played their games of prison politics like a collection of kings presiding over a living chessboard. They taunted the newcomers with whispered threats and vile jeers, watching to see who would break when - and exchanging money when it finally happened. The more high profile prisoners were kept in isolation: tiny cells with no windows, no lights, no communication at all with the outside world. Not even the guards would speak with them when they came to drop off or collect trays.
It was a cruel life -- but criminals deserved it didn't they?
Every now and then there would be the sound of screaming on the cell block, another prisoner would have lost his tenuous hold on his sanity when faced with endless silence and the absence of light. And then the news would trickle through the prison, for prisoners were the worst kinds of gossips.
"Did you hear? Ole' Johnson off'd himself today --"
"I hear O'Malley's crackin'. How much longer do you give 'im?"
And so on and so forth.
For six long years, Jackson sat in silence, crouched in the corner of his dark little hole and stared into the darkness around him with unseeing eyes. For six years, he waited and he listened, keeping track of the days by the constant flow of food coming in and out of his cell (of which he only ate a little - just enough to keep him alive). Slowly but surely, a plan began to form in the back of his mind. Every step was analyzed, with no rush because he had all the time in the world.
And then one day, he put the plan into action.
"--Mister Warden, sir!"
"What is it?"
"There's been an escape."
<font color="#FFFFFF" size="1">[ January 02, 2006 01:27 PM: Message edited by: drift away ]</font>