A/N: There's a reason that Ludwig's crimes aren't elaborated yet. ^^

Chapter 2: Putting Crimes to Faces

When Feliciano returned to his apartment the next morning, he immediately set about brewing a strong espresso and locating some toast for breakfast. Normally, he might have simply fallen fully clothed into his bed and slept until he was too hungry to remain unconscious any longer. Today, he returned restless and riding an adrenaline rush brought by successfully surviving his first night on the job. He could do this – he could exist among the men deemed by society to be too dangerous to be released from their cages.

The miniscule, silver espresso maker steamed gently at the stove, prompting him to snap the burner off. His charges had all taken human lives, despicable in the eyes of decent and honorable individuals, and were all scheduled to be set at the mercy of a lethal electric current. However, he had time to get to know them before that happened. He felt that he owed them at least that. So, retrieving a laptop just a few years too old to be considered "up-to-date", Feliciano set about searching the internet for clues on the men in his partial custody.

Francis Bonnefoy was first, typed into the search engine with honest curiosity. The man had been born in France, then brought to the States when he was ten. Having lived a relatively normal life, everyone had been shocked when he was named as the killer of his lovers. The first time a boyfriend of his had been murdered, it was a "tragic accident" for the young Francis, but the second time had just been suspicious. He had been escorted from the courthouse with a twisted sneer upon his lips and the thrill of victory in his coy, sapphire eyes.

With a shudder, Feliciano pondered his decision to research these men. Already he could feel the sensation of Francis' hands encircling his neck slithering into his subconscious where it could rear up and poison his nightmares to come. Drawing on the severely lacking reserves of courage within him, Feliciano pressed on.

Ivan Braginski, second child and only son of two influential Russian-Americans, had been born in Kansas. At some point in his early adulthood, he had gathered a group of subordinates drawn by his family's wealth, and had systematically tortured and killed each one. Next to the article, one of the pictures of Ivan's victims caught Feliciano's attention and held it, making his heart beat rapidly in his throat. The young man in the photo must have been barely twenty then, smiling cockily at the world as though challenging it to throw at him its worst. It had, however, and he had been horribly mutilated – almost beyond recognition.

It wasn't the smug grin that had captured the night guard's attention, though. It was the vague familiarity of the face. There was something in the dead man's jaw line, his brow ridge or eye shape that seemed faintly reminiscent of someone Feliciano had once met. Shaking himself, he read that Ivan had been tested repeatedly for mental instability before finally being sentenced to death. His family still wrote.

Scrolling away, he returned to the search engine to type in the final name on his mental list.

Kiku Honda was a first generation Japanese immigrant had come to America to get a job in California. Less than two years later, he had butchered his two roommates with a samurai sword that had been hanging on the wall of the shared apartment. Even in the picture of Kiku flanked by his two former companions, his lips were set in a firm line and his eyes glinted with a guarded coldness.

The prisoner's eyes were all the same: frigid and filled with stinging condescending. But not Ludwig. He hadn't so much as looked at Feliciano once that night. Instead, he had hidden himself in a shame so profound that the young man couldn't even begin to understand. Perhaps it was that he felt true remorse for his crime, a sentiment largely lost on the three others around him.

Is that the cost of murder? Feliciano wondered, staring blankly at the compilation of photos he'd formed and the scattered contents of the manila prisoner profile folders that had been spread across the table. Ivan's familiar victim followed him with curiously transparent eyes that set a rosy, optical interior on display. He had died at the hands of killer, but maybe Ludwig's victim – whomever he or she might have been – had died at the hands of a murderer. The difference was that Ludwig had murdered a person, and Ivan had simply killed.

Meanwhile, the murderer was pushing laboriously against the concrete floor, hands slick with perspiration and hot against the body heat-warmed ground. Muscles twitching, he could feel himself becoming tired and mentally assigned himself twenty more pushups than he had completed the day before.

"You seemed quite taken with that new guard," Francis called across the aisle, blowing the powerful blonde a mocking kiss. "Are you going to ask for him as your last meal?"

Ludwig ignored the taunts, but suddenly lost track of his pushup count through the red haze that had risen. Now he'd have to start all over again.

"I would ask for him to be mine," the large Russian piped up with a giggle. "I would love to hear his beautiful screams when I cut into him~"

Nervously, the other inmates glanced at the serene man, wondering if this utterance had been a darkly humored joke or a disturbed statement. Finally, Kiku broke the silence.

"I feel that we could manipulate him to our desires."

"Oh, you too? Ivan grinned. "He seems to be a weak link, da?"

Brushing thoughtfully at his chin, index finger tapping at twitching lips, the Frenchman's mouth contorted into a sneer. "Caution, mes amis, or MonsieurJustice Hero might come after you."

Ludwig threw him a look that could have rivaled that of the Medusa in its lethal intensity as it sizzled through the air and struck the whiskered killer across the face.

"What's going on in here?" The guard jolted awake from the shallow sleep into which he had drifted quite on accident. Frowning sharply and catching the built, blond man's expression, Lovino snapped, "Watch yourself, kraut."

He offered only a curt nod of acknowledgement to the irate warden before setting his hands to the floor again. This time, as he raised and lowered his body to some internal rhythm, Ludwig's mind wandered to the kind man who had introduced himself as Feliciano… who had felt sympathy when hearing that Ludwig was so close to death. Gratitude and a sort of desperate attempt to latch onto whatever humanity he could grasp blossomed in the prisoner's chest, and he vowed, glaring at the back of Francis' turned head, that he would protect Feliciano as best he could from any harm with which the other inmates might present him.