Crashing (Serial)

[Dingley]

Oh my god! What'll happen to Michael?? Another fantastic installment AP thanks! As to your questions, hmmm I dunno, I like it all! The C-note half is more exciting I suppose but I think it needs the other bit too. Sorry that is not much help is it?!

[scofield72]

I preferred the Sara half cos I want to know what the answer was that Michael wanted to tell her but I loved it all. And to be honest I have enjoyed all of it, I think it's all been really good, but I really enjoy the Michael/T-bag/C-note thing thats going on. I just hope Michael gets C-note first!!! I can't wait to find out what happens next!! lol

[Audio Pineapple]

scofield72 said:

I preferred the Sara half cos I want to know what the answer was that Michael wanted to tell her but I loved it all.

Tweeeeeeener!

And thanks guys! #happy#

[Audio Pineapple]

Good Crimety - just did a count of all chapters and this is over 10,600 words long! I think that's the longest fanfic I've ever written, even against my Lost ones lol!

Chapter Twelve

‘Just be looking the other way man; that’s all you have to do.’ C-Note’s words echoed around Sucre’s head as he stood up from his knelt position on the ground, the fight between C-Note and T-Bag ended. He’d been in prison long enough to know what was going to happen even if the inmates around him weren’t whispering tales of riots to each other.

C-Note had retreated back to his side of the yard, leaving behind the two bodies that were littering the floor and Sucre found himself shuddering to look at them. Distracting his eyes he made his way to the phone, thankful that it was finally free to use.

Tapping his free hand on the phone with nerves he dialled the familiar number, feeling the butterflies entering his stomach when he heard her answer.

“Hello?”

“Maricruz…”

“Fernando.” He heard the hesitation in her voice, heard her sigh and suddenly he didn’t know what to say, the speech about how he loved her, how he needed her and how he was going to make sure he was a brilliant father fell to pieces in his head, leaving him only able to repeat himself.

“Maricruz…”

“Why are you calling me?”

“You said that you were frightened. I would never hurt you.”

“The people you were with, the people they said almost made it out.”

“I don’t have anything to do with them!”

“There were murderers Fernando, how do I know they weren’t coming after me?”

Sucre stopped tapping with his free hand, leaning it on his forehead, “they weren’t baby, I’d never let them.” His speech suddenly began to filter back to him and he felt himself getting choked up, “I love you.”

“Well that’s nice to know cuz; I love you to.”

“Hector?” Suddenly being accosted with his cousin’s voice Sucre felt his pulse begin to race and the anger begin to flare up again. He’d been with her, he’d been with Maricruz.”

“She doesn’t want to be talking to you Fernando.”

“You don’t have a right to tell me what to do. That’s my baby she’s having!”

“Not as far as everyone else is concerned.”

“Wha… what do you mean?”

“It’s my baby, that’s what we’re telling people. It’s easier than her family thinking it is half the kind of scum that knocks over liquor stores.” There was a glee in his voice that left Sucre unable to respond before the dial-tone kicked in a few seconds later. He abandoned the phone, not bothering to put it back on the receiver.

It was all over, all of it. Hector had won and it was all Michael’s fault. Sucre felt his knees begin to go weak as he made his decision. Michael had to pay and he was going to take C-Note’s offer.

*****

“You coping kid?” Greg blinked, clearing his mind from the memories to realise that he was once again sitting on Anderson’s bunk, in his cell, in the prison and he couldn’t keep the disappointment from showing on his face, hearing Anderson giggle, “back off into never-never land?” Greg nodded, trying to hide the disappointment.

“Is he dead?”

“Yeah, he’s dead.”

Greg looked away again, unable to stop his mind flashing back to what had happened only moments before. He’d been sitting right next to the victim and he could still feel C-Note’s hand brushing against his arm during the selection process.

“Do you think they’re going to kill me?”

“It’s a race riot; they’ll kill whoever they can get their hands on but you shouldn’t worry too much, they prefer the big dogs. One of me is worth at least five of your kind.”

Greg felt the hurt sting that he was being referred to as ‘a kind,’ having hoped that, after two weeks he would have become distinguishable as his own person. “Does that mean they don’t want me?”

“Not that lucky, a dead white guy is still a dead white guy, regardless of stature.”

“Any chance I can just hide out and not fight?” It felt like his only option, the only way he could think that he’d make it out alive.

“No chance in hell.”

He stood up, laying a hand onto Anderson’s side and kissing him softly, “no chance at all Sammy?”

“Tempting,” Anderson laughed, stepping backwards and removing Greg’s hand, “and you are certainly getting better at working out how to get things around here but T-Bag’s the only one who can dismiss people from fighting. I like you kid, but if you don’t fight you are entirely indispensable.”

*****

Lying on his back with his eyes closed, trying to drown out the sounds of the inmates milling around with his favourite hip-hop song Tweener felt lost to the world. He was feeling more secure by the day that his secret was safe; he barely conversing with the escapees and they all seemed more interested in each other.

No matter how much he tried to tell himself he wasn’t afraid however, he knew that it wasn’t the truth. Watching T-Bag’s attack on Michael and now C-Note’s attack on T-Bag’s clan had shaken him to the core, knowing that he could end up on the receiving side of their rages.

The good news was that he did have a new cellmate; Bellick and Pope had come through for him, his fellow occupant old and senile, barely capable of dragging himself out of bed in the morning, and apparently straight. Even with everything that had happened; Lincoln dying, Michael being raped, it all felt worth it when he could actually sleep through the night without waking up to find somebody on top of him.

“Morning Sweetpea.”

Tweener’s eyes shot open, the voices suddenly becoming crystal clear as the music died out. “Leave me alone.”

“Now is that any way to treat an old friend?”

The tone of T-Bag’s voice made Tweener feel sick to his stomach, he’d already been in prison long enough to recognise when his least-favourite inmate was playing mind games. “I’d hardly consider us friends.”

T-Bag sat down by Tweener’s feet, immediately causing Tweener to sit up, drawing his knees to his chest and looping his arms around, holding them in position, shielding himself.

“Well we need to have a talk about your treachery.”

“Oh god,” Tweener was barely aware that he’d breathed the words, everything felt frozen into place, the voices outside diminished to whispers behind the white noise that suddenly filled his mind. T-Bag knew and the riot would be the perfect place to kill someone. He couldn’t help the same words repeating over in his head; iIt was all over… it was all over… it was…

“Now you’ve been hanging around with those darkies before and despite how horrible it is to see one of my own going over to their side this is your chance to redeem yourself for your past mistakes.”

The white noise faded and Tweener wondered if he would have collapsed with relief if he hadn’t been sitting; T-Bag didn’t know about Bellick, he wasn’t talking about it, which hopefully meant that he was able to stay alive a little longer.

“How am I supposed to redeem myself then?”

“Fight; on our side, on the right side.”

Tweener nodded a bit too emphatically and he stopped when he noticed T-Bag cock his head; obviously confused about the sudden change of heart. “Good, it’s nice to have you on my team.”

[Audio Pineapple]

Chapter 13

He wasn’t sure where the animosity had come from but as the guards opened the doors to let him back into the cell block of the prison Michael felt almost suffocated by it. He made his own way back to his cell, glad that he could sense less eyes following him than had been before he left, hoping that his attack was now officially yesterday’s news.

Approaching his room he was surprised to see Sucre standing outside, doing a typically Sucre attempt to look nonchalant which made him look nothing short of terrified.

“What’s wrong?”

Sucre’s eyes shot from viewing the bustling population below to looking directly at him, instantaneously forming an intense eye contact that made Michael worry. He hadn’t seen Sucre look so angry since the first time he had suggested they try to escape.

“What’s wrong?” Met with a steely silence once again Michael tried to break the eye contact, moving a few half-steps closer, “Sucre?”

“I’m…” Sucre coughed as his voice cracked, finally looking away; “I’m sorry Papi.”

“Sorry for what?” Sucre shook his head, wandering away into the masses, leaving Michael to just call after him; “sorry for what?”

“In your cells cons!” The guard’s voice rang out loud above the stifled chatter and Michael found himself frozen as the fight erupted around him. It wasn’t any ordinary fight and it took him a few moments to realise why before the memories came flooding back. He couldn’t stop himself leaning over the railing to see the attacks, mainly contained on the ground floor. As he watched he saw a black inmate fall to the floor, instantly set upon by a pack of white convicts. From his distance it looked as though they ripped the body apart but he wasn’t sure if that was just because of the amount of blood left spilt across the floor.

He turned away from the spectacle, his brain finally kicking into gear and trying to work out where he could hide. It wasn’t until he saw a man barrelling towards him, causing a large gash across his forearm that he decided hiding wasn’t an option.

Rushing into the cell he hoisted the mattress up, fumbling around until he found the blade he had hidden there. He’d almost forgotten that Abruzzi had given it to him but he had never felt happier to receive a gift than he was right then. Feeling confined already by the walls of his cage he stumbled back out into the fray, already becoming woozy from the loss of blood.

-*-

There were almost too many things to focus on at once, so many miniature fights happening around him that Sucre was finding it hard to watch the door to his cell, even though he was standing less than five feet away from it. He was waiting for Michael but he wasn’t sure why. Every inch of him was screaming for him to turn and run, turn and hide but if he was going to be the cause of Michael’s death he wanted to be there to witness it; he didn’t want Michael to have to die alone.

He’d thought it was over when Matthews had ran towards Michael, weapon aimed at his head but Michael’s quick reflexes had saved him, his arm flying up to take the brunt of the damage.

And now Michael was trapped, his eyes wild with fear as he ducked the various blows that arrived in his direction, lashing out at anyone who got close enough to hurt him but making sure that he only scared people, never actually striking them.

It was just too nice; Michael was being too nice and Sucre couldn’t stand it. He wanted him to be fighting properly, attacking people with wild abandon but instead he looked like little more than a child, cowering and whimpering.

He saw C-Note stalking down the tier, deep scratches down one side of his face, gleaming blade in hand and he saw that Michael was not watching this new attacker, looking past C-Note to a fight.

It only took a split second for Sucre to make his decision; he had to warn Michael, grab him and drag him to safety, he was too nice to die like this. He laid a hand onto Michael’s shoulder, not remembering that he was standing behind him and he didn’t have time to react before Michael spun around, blade thrust forwards in an attempt to protect himself against what he could have only considered to be an unknown assailant.

Sucre felt himself fall onto his back, pain rippling through his body as he glanced down to see the tip of the blade sticking out of his gut, the majority of it firmly imbedded into his stomach. A moment later he heard the crashing of the tear gas canisters, heard the screams and cries of inmates turn into coughs as they ran back to their cells for cover.

He tried to get up, deciding against it when it only made the pain worse and when he saw the smoke from the canisters he couldn’t decide whether it was really from the objects or whether the smoke was in his own head, clouding his eyes from the inside out.

Closing his eyes to try and block it out he expected himself to see Maricruz but he couldn’t, he could only see Hector with a child in a park near where they had grown up; a young girl who had Maricruz’s eyes and his own nose and ears. He managed to emit a chocked sob, reaching out to the imaginary image, trying to stop Hector playing with his daughter but he couldn’t. The picture was getting further and further away and no matter how far he stretched his arm he couldn’t quite make it.

The vision filling his thoughts he didn’t even notice when more blood began to spill from the sides of his wound or that his breath was slowing. All that mattered was saving his daughter, was making sure he could be a father. All he ever wanted felt just out of reach and it remained out of reach as he took his final breathes.

[Dingley]

Oh no! poor Sucre! That is so sad.

love your writing again AP, you capture each person's emotions so well. And the writing of the riot was great!

[scofield72]

oh no, Sucre can't die, I feel sad now!!!
anyway, great job, can't wait till sunday!!! lol

[Audio Pineapple]

*sniffle* poor Sucre - I didn't want him to die (so why I wrote it I've no idea lol.) It's quite a coincidence that it happens right after Haywire really dies - I've had this chapter planned for weeks

[soulonfire]

ooh ive missed lots of this!

Very sad ending though =(

[Audio Pineapple]

Thanks peanut

Well I got a bit carried away with myself this morning so it's actually 2-3 chapters long but I couldn't find a cut-off point so carry it onto Wednesday so it's just a very long post today lol!

Chapter 14

It was a haggard cough and T-Bag felt his upper lip curl in disdain as he saw droplets of blood fall onto his hand from it. He’d been down this road before, packed among a line of inmates, the injured from the riot who were still capable of walking their way to the sick wing, five guards all armed to the teeth walking alongside them to make sure that the attacks didn’t flare up again.

He coughed again, his body doubling over as he unconsciously used his injured wrist to grab hold of his stomach in an attempt to remain upright. He stopped walking for a moment feeling his breath shudder as he tried to compose himself, growling as the inmate behind him deliberately kept walking, sending him crashing to the floor.

“Get up con!” Delightful images of hurting Bellick for his joyous exclamation flitted through his mind but he wasn’t either stupid or angry enough to go through with it now, especially with Bellick’s hand firmed attached to the gun. Instead, T-Bag straightened himself and fell back into step, unable to stop himself from crying out in pain when Matthews shoved him into the inmate in front; or, more specifically, shoved the wrist that T-Bag was pretty sure was broken into the inmate in front.

He spun around to see Matthews laughing, eyes sparkling despite the fact that he was badly limping.

“Leave it con!” T-Bag obeyed Bellick again, resuming his pace until they reached the sick wing. The inmates instantaneously spread out, each race taking up his own little corner of the room and T-Bag toyed with the idea of retaliating against Matthews but decided against it. The guards were just outside and they would relish the right to run in, guns blazing if Tancredi gave the signal that anything was wrong.

He walked across to his segment of the room, keeping close to the wall as he surveyed the various injuries around him. A few broken bones, some pretty severe beatings and some stabbings that hadn’t been quite deep enough caught his eye, the usual casualties but he found himself unsure what was happening when he saw the inmate Tancredi was talking to, sitting himself near them so that he could overhear.

“Michael? Michael can you hear me?”

Tancredi was nice, much nicer than the usual prison doctor’s ended up being and T-Bag had always felt privileged that she dealt with him with barely masked disdain rather than outright disgust but this was different; with Michael her voice was soft and worried.

She was tearing a roll of bandages and that was when T-Bag saw the blood that was seeping down Michael’s arm. Tancredi took hold of his arm, more gentle than T-Bag was used to seeing her and she began to wrap it up, Michael loosely trying to jerk his arm away.

“Michael?” She grabbed her light, shining it into his eyes and letting out a sigh of relief when he blinked, “Michael you’re in the sick bay. Can you remember what happened? Can you tell me where you are?”

“Sara?” He looked around as though he was just realising where he was, “what happened?”

“There was a riot, your arm got hurt and you’ve lost a lot of blood. Do you remember any other injuries Michael? Hitting your head maybe?” She tied the remainder of the bandage, “that’ll hold the blood for now; I can’t do your stitches yet.”

“His stomach,” Sara glowered at T-Bag’s intrusion into the conversation but he just gestured to Michael’s shirt, damp with blood.

“It isn’t his; I’ve already checked and there aren’t any wounds there.” She turned Michael’s arm over again, rechecking it before turning back to T-Bag, “you okay without me for now?”

“Fine and dandy Doc,” she crossed the room to tend to a more severe bleeding wound and T-Bag edged himself closer to Michael, laying Michael’s head on his shoulder and almost feeling guilty when Michael began to shiver at the touch. “Who’d you hurt?” He kept his voice quiet, not wanting to make the coming conversation public but there was only one reason Michael could have so much blood on him without having been attacked and that was if he attacked someone himself and from the shaking and the distanced gaze he wasn’t coping with it very well.

“Sucre,” T-Bag was surprised at the answer, glancing around the room to see if he could locate him, “he died and it’s all my fault.”

“It’s gonna be okay.” Michael’s tears began to fall as the shock began to wear off and T-Bag looped his good arm around his waist, pulling him closer.

“Please don’t.”

“Please don’t what?”

“Not now, please,” T-Bag looked at him confused, unsure what he was talking about when and Michael raised his head from the shoulder to look back, his voice barely loud enough to be considered a whisper, “please don’t rape me now. Just wait a little bit longer, please.”

He felt his stomach churn when he realised that that was what Michael had been expecting to happen to him from the physical contact, “don’t worry; I don’t want to hurt you. I just want to help you.” He laid Michael’s head back onto his shoulder wondering if he should stop before Michael developed even more of a personality to him but he didn’t feel capable of pulling away.

He hadn’t blamed himself for anything that had occurred in the prison in a long while; if he ordered somebody to be beaten or killed it didn’t matter because they had done something against him first and if his urges got the better of him it didn’t matter because a man had to find release somehow and they were all convicts as well. Nobody was innocent so it didn’t matter.

But Michael hadn’t deserved it; he had felt guilty before he had ever hurt him and now it felt as though a tonne of bricks had crashed onto his head. In a matter of days Michael had lost his brother, lost his homosexual virginity and now lost the only inmate who’d stuck by him after the escape failed. He didn’t blame himself for the first occurrence, or for the last but he wanted to find some way of making up for the second, even if all he could do was help to comfort him for a while.

“I didn’t mean to do it. He snuck up behind me and I…”

Michael’s voice trailed off and T-Bag did the only thing he could think of, not knowing anything to say he began making shushing noises, trying to calm him down. He watched Tancredi out of the corner of his eye and he knew that she hadn’t seen anything yet, still immersed with caring for the other inmates.

“I miss Lincoln.”

T-Bag felt his stomach clench as Michael moved closer to him, nuzzling his head from the shoulder to the neck and T-Bag took the hint, tightening his loose hold around Michael’s waist. He had to admit that it felt nice for Michael to be handing over emotional control but he tried to push the thoughts away. He was here to help, not to help himself. “I know.”

“I miss Sucre.”

“I know.”

“I miss LJ.”

“I don’t even know who that is.”

“Lincoln Burrows Junior, my nephew. He’s fifteen now.”

“Well you’ll see him in the future; he won’t even be too old by the time you get out.” Michael shook his head, forcing T-Bag to bite down on his lip so not to groan at the feel of Michael’s smooth skin rubbing against his own.

“The government weren’t happy that Lincoln was trying to escape legally; he had a lawyer on the outside that was coming up with a solution to get him out but he didn’t stop. So they went round to LJ’s house and they killed his mom, and her guy and they were supposed to kill him but he escaped,” Michael sighed, “he wouldn’t even have had to escape if I hadn’t convinced the lawyer to work for Lincoln and now they’ve caught him and they’re going to ,” Michael sighed, “he wouldn’t even have had to escape if I hadn’t convinced the lawyer to work for Lincoln and now they’ve caught him and they’re going to charge him with his mom’s and her guy’s murder and it’s all my fault.”

“It’s not,” he wasn’t entirely sure what to make of the story Michael had just relayed but he believed that it was true, Michael looked to fragile to be able to lie right now. He tightened his grip the slightest bit more and he suddenly realised the memory that Michael had been reminding him of ever since he’d nuzzled him. Susan.

He’d turned up at the house having stolen the head of a sunflower out of the neighbour’s garden and been informed by a disinterested Zack that she was upstairs in her room. He’d made his way up the stairs to find her curled up on her bed, tears silently streaming down her face and he’d gone into automatic mode, dropping the forgotten flower on the floor and sitting next to her, pulling her body against his and holding her there until she was able to stop crying enough to tell him that she’d been fired from her job. She’d seemed heartbroken but he could still remember how his chest has swelled with pride when she finally smiled again, ruffling his hair and getting off the bed to giggle at the sunflower.

“I guess one sunflower and the love of your life is all you need to brighten your day.”

“Huh?”

He brought himself back out of his gaze realising that he’d uttered Susan’s words out loud; “nothing, you were just reminding me about a girlfriend.”

“Maytag?”

“No,” he let the ‘girlfriend’ quip slide, pleased that Michael seemed to be distracting himself from the death and the gore by working on working out his new puzzle.

“Seth?”

“No.”

“Greg?”

“He’s Anderson’s girlfriend and it’s not him. You can stop guessing, you’re never gonna get it. Her name was Susan.”

“Oh; a real woman.”

He laughed, “yeah, a real woman. She was my soul mate. This reminded me of her when she’d lost her job. Hardly the same as losing her Sucre but you’re about as upset as she was.”

“Jokes aren’t going to help much,” he nuzzled his head again, leaning his body against T-Bag’s and T-Bag wondered if Michael realised what he was doing. He certainly didn’t realise the effect that he was having on him and how it was become more difficult by the second not to make a move on him. He coughed, glaring at the blood that re-emerged, he would have assumed that it had stopped by now.

“Like her daughter as well.”

“Huh?”

“You’re like Susan’s daughter when kids at school would make fun of her and she’d look for comfort and say that jokes wouldn’t make the situation go away.” He left the remainder of the sentence off, about how the first thing that had “reminded me of her was Michael not realising that he was turning me on, just like she hadn’t.”

“You do realise that you said that out loud don’t you?”

“Shit.” He felt Michael pulling away from him and kept a lose hold on him, “I never did anything.”

“Sure.”

“Honest and don’t think that I didn’t think about it,” he couldn’t help losing himself in the memories again as a smile spread across his face, “there was this one time when she was sitting on my knee, wearing one of those little knee-length summer dresses. And she was holding herself tightly against me while she cried, and her dress slowly rid up her leg until I could see her panties and…” he trailed off when he felt Michael pulling away again, desperately trying to separate himself. He pulled Michael closer again, whispering to him, “and the moment that she felt better and went off to play with her doll collection I ran into the bathroom and masturbated to high heaven but I never touched her. Or him.”

“Him?”

“Her son, real attitude problem and wasn’t that fond of me, always fantasised about punishing him, making him learn a lesson for back chatting but I didn’t. Never even gave them inappropriate hugs, not that Susan believed me. She saw me on America’s Most Wanted in the kitchen apparently, we sat down for dinner and the next thing I knew there was a veritable swat team’s worth of police barging the door down and dragging me off.

“You promise you didn’t hurt them?”

“Not emotionally, not mentally and certainly not physically. Susan meant too much to me to risk it.”

He felt his stomach tighten again as Michael laid back against him; “I’m quite good at telling when people are lying you know, I don’t think you’re lying.”

“I’m not; I hadn’t even touched any kids since I met her, let alone hers.”

Michael smiled, nuzzling him again, “so you’re not just an insatiable beast then?”

“Well yeah, but I can control myself if I need to.” He stopped talking as he watched Tancredi walk over to them with her needle and thread as she sighed.

“Get off him Bagwell.”

“I don’t mind,” he tried not to feel happy about Michael’s admission but he couldn’t. Tancredi on the other hand didn’t look happy, gently pulling Michael away as she began to uncover his bandage.

T-Bag laid his head back against the wall, watching them, studying how the corners of Tancredi’s mouth were twitching upwards and how Michael’s eyes were becoming more lifelike by the second.

He coughed again, expecting it to stop as soon as it had started but he felt his body attempt to curl up as the coughs intensified.

“Oh god,” he could barely hear Michael’s voice beyond the roaring that was filling his ears as the blood began to spill, spreading out where it was coughed, across his trousers and the floor.

“Bagwell?” He felt Tancredi try to move his head back, “Bagwell?” He ignored her and the rising fear in her voice, “Theodore?”

He tried to laugh as he thought about how he was only called Theodore once in a blue moon; only resulting on losing more blood as he lost consciousness.

[Dingley]

Finished! It was long but very good (I know I always say this!). Funny how you showed how sensitive and caring T-Bag was and they showed that last night! But what is going to happen to T-Bag now! Can't wait for more...

[scofield72]

It was long but it was fab, I can't wait to find out what happens next!!

[Audio Pineapple]

First I kill Sucre when Haywire dies and now I end up writing sensative T-Bag when he turns up Maybe I should write LJ in and see if he comes back

And thanks - wasn't too sure how this chapter would go down because it was a lot softer than recent ones.

[Audio Pineapple]

scofield72 said:

It was long but it was fab, I can't wait to find out what happens next!!

posted at the same time lol - thanks!

[scofield72]

I think it was mad showing T-bag's sensitive side especially with Michael anyway, someone who never usually gets that close to T-bag. Like I said, Fantastic!!!!