At some point, Nick looks down at his hands and sees that they're covered in blood.
He holds them out to AJ, who laughs and says, "That's, like, symbolism or something." Nick rubs his hands on his pants.
They're entrenched behind a pile of overturned benches and desks. AJ's already confessed, with an unrepentant grin, that the riot is officially out of his hands. "There are some real fucking nuts out there. Didn't see them coming." He fishes a cigarette from the pack in his breast pocket and lights it. "At least we can smoke inside now."
"How long do you think they'll keep it going?" Nick asks, because the chaos hasn't died down at all in hours. In fact, it seems to be escalating. He wonders if every man has a berserk in him. He doesn't remember all the details of killing, but he has blood on his hands and there's a dead man next to him. Nick even knows his ID number, if not his name. Mr 698F-909-G21 worked in the cafeteria. Now he lies on his back in the corridor, half-buried under a pile of scorched towels.
"Til they fuckin' drop," AJ says. He nods at Mr 698F-909-G21. "Classic. Nothing really beats the old blunt instrument, huh?"
"I guess not," Nick says and looks away from the slickly red-white mess of blood and brains and bits of skull. It's been a while since he really really needed to kill anyone. He must have wanted to now, if he put that much energy into it, but he can't remember. There's a fuzzy patch there somewhere; between turning away from Justin, leaving him pale and blinking stupidly at the top of the basement stairs, and right now, sitting calmly on the floor between AJ and this dead man whose name Nick can't remember because he never remembers names.
He rubs his hands on his pants again, leaving maroon stains on the grey cotton. Symbolism or something.
This whole thing makes him wonder. He knows bits and pieces. None of it makes sense to him, though. All this, all this blood and fire and chaos for a pretty piece of flesh who should be glad to go with Genotech, because they would pamper him until he dies fat and happy and peaceful.
A new sound cuts through the layered clamor of voices and weapons.
"Fuck, those are fucking Genotech patrols!" AJ yells through the noise, over the metallic whine of the electric guns.
Nick can even smell them now; there's a special ozone reek to those guns. Genotech patrols are licensed to kill, and Genotech weapons are distinctly harder to battle with nightsticks than, say, other nightsticks. AJ's already scrambling to his feet and waving at Nick.
He's not sure who makes the decision, but he has a creeping suspicion that it's he, that he suddenly veers to the left and down the stairs instead of continuing ahead to the relative safety of the cellblock. It can't really have been AJ, even though AJ seems to have things invested in this riot, in the cause for this riot. It must have been me, he thinks, even though he can't remember actively deciding, but here he is, anyway, running down the stairs, and AJ's right on his heels. The ozone stench seems to follow them down, as if they've already been fried by Genotech bullets. As if it's their own smell now.
The closet door gapes wide open like the slack jaws of some disappointed beast. Nick skids to a stop and wonders why he has to steel himself to look in. There have been so many corpses already. The whole place is drenched in blood by now, or it seems to be. Almost as if the blood smell is a counterpoint to every other smell; the metallic-meaty baseline for everything else in here.
It's empty. He turns to AJ. His head hurts a little from the smoke and the heavy air, the reek of the Genotech guns.
AJ pats him on the shoulder and looks past him into the closet. There's a brief pause in the shooting and screaming and banging: a sixty microsecond vigil, Nick thinks, and then it starts up again, louder even, if that's possible, and AJ's rooting around in the piles of mops and rags at the back of the closet, and then he's pulling Justin from his hiding place.
"Fuck me," Nick says out loud, but he can't even hear it himself. It sounds like the whole building is coming down, as if they're bringing in tanks.
Justin shakes his head mutely and the dingy-grey mop he was wearing in the fashion of a wig falls off his head. It occurs to Nick that of all places in this fucking prison, this is the dumbest, least safe spot for him to be.
AJ is yelling something at him, angry face, and he notices that Justin is struggling like a fish on a hook in AJ's grip. He struggles in Nick's grip, too, when Nick puts his hands on him, but only for a little while. Then he looks up into Nick's face with eyes that show too much white, but he's trusting, trusting. Nick keeps his hands - still soiled with Mr 698F-909-G21's drying blood - on Justin's shoulders, pats a little, like he'd pat his dog back when he had a dog.
That dog would have had a heart attack on the spot in here, because there was no creature more afraid of loud noises than old Trotsky. Justin shivers a little under his hands, too, like Trot used to when the going got rough.
"They'll find us!" AJ hollers. "We gotta head down!"
Nick gives him a two thumbs up, even though he has no idea how to 'head down' from here. AJ's never seen fit to share his big secret, and Nick hasn't been particularly curious. AJ's got a mouth the size of all of Cellblock 3.
It seems to be designed by an idiot savant on bad 'shrooms, but the trapdoor/slide contraption under the laundromat works. Justin's tight-faced and determined and slides down without hesitating a beat, even though it's a four foot fall at least at the end, and Nick hears his muffled cry before he lets himself go.
The sounds of the oncoming tide of patrols and rioteers are muted by the trapdoor, and Nick actually hears Justin mutter curses under his breath.
"Can you walk?" he asks and pokes Justin in the shoulder, "hey, can you walk?"
"I think it's. I broke it again," Justin gasps, "fucking HELL."
That's a no, then, so Nick lets him lean on him, throws his arm around his shoulder and supports his lean frame, strangely heavy now that he's hopping pathetically on one leg.
He hears it first, he thinks, but he feels Justin jerk and knows it's loud enough for all of them.
"Fuck," AJ says next to him. "You hear that? Fuckin' dogs."
Nick spots the hole in the tunnel wall seconds before AJ pushes them down the dark, half-hidden subsidiary.
He blinks to adjust to the darkness and when he can see, he's looking down the barrel of a gun. The dogs suddenly seem very far away.
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