Chapter Four: Dark Rumors

"Shit. How'd he know?" Simmons didn't seem to be eating his macaroni. Instead, he was absent-mindingly grinding his spoon against the bowl, squashing the macaroni into unrecognisable mush. "Bastard. Can't take a shit without him hearing about it somehow."

"Sorry," Donut muttered, staring down at his own food. Lunch was edible, though like the cereal he'd been served for breakfast it seemed somewhat lacking in flavour.

"Don't bother apologising, I'm not blaming you for it. Didn't tell him, did you?"

"No."

"Then it isn't your fault. I swear Church has ears planted in the walls, sometimes. But I probably wasn't careful enough when telling you, it's just me fucking up."

Simmons and Donut were the only ones currently at the table. Grif was being held up, as he'd apparently been a smart mouth to Sarge and gotten punched in the stomach for it, something that Simmons assured Donut was a regular occurrence. As for Church, Tucker and Caboose, they were still lining up for their food.

"So, he just goes around blackmailing everyone?" Donut asked, looking over at the three. "How does he keep getting away with it? I thought snitches got, you know..." Donut made a stabbing gesture with his spoon. "Silenced?"

"Well, technically he's not a snitch."

"Right. 'Blackmailer.' It still sounds like snitching to me."

"Yeah, I know. But don't say it out loud. Besides, he doesn't always pass information along to the guards." Simmons continued to mash his food absently, glancing around the room. "Sometimes he does, like if he's got proof of crimes that you weren't ever charged with, or if he knows you're up to something within prison like smuggling or making illegal substances. But a lot of the time, he shares this stuff with other inmates instead.

"For example..." Simmons pointed his spoon at a man with a ridiculous mustache reminiscent of the dastardly villains that would tie damsels to train tracks. "Take Wyoming. Big smuggler, he's the guy to go to if you want anything in this prison. But then someone else starts muscling in on his territory and smuggling stuff in for a cheaper price. Church keeps an ear out, figures out how the guy is getting his stuff. Quietly informs Wyoming. Then Wyoming can do what he wants to put a stop to it. But Church might instead choose to hold the information over the other guy's head. Keeping it a secret in exchange for payment. Money, a discount or first dibs on anything the other guy brings in, more information... whatever he needs."

"And this never gets him attacked?"

"He's a slippery motherfucker. Trust me, there are so many people around here who would love to give Church a good pounding. God knows I would. ...Um, uh... that didn't come out right. Beatings. I meant punching. But if I tried, well... yeah, I don't want him letting some stuff out," Simmons muttered.

"Like what?"

"I'm not telling you." Simmons gestured at Donut with his spoon. "I don't know you well enough to know you won't end up a snitch or blackmailer as well." He went back to mashing his macaroni. "I don't want any more years added to my sentence. Let's just leave it at that."

Before Donut could pester Simmons for more details (because he was curious, and it was not in Donut's nature to leave secrets be) Grif plopped down beside them. Rather than the macaroni, vegetables and juice that Donut and Simmons had been served, Grif had some weird kind of loaf stuck on his plate. It looked a little like the macaroni (it was the same basic colour) but it had been molded into a loaf shape. Grif glared at the plate, and Simmons gave a small chuckle.

"What. Is. That?" Donut asked, gazing at the strange loaf with morbid curiosity.

"The log," Grif muttered bitterly. "Punishment food." Simmons just snickered again. "Shut the fuck up, Simmons."

"Is it poisonous?"

"I'm told no, though the taste would make you think otherwise." Grif prodded it with his spoon moodily. It jiggled ominously. "Has all the nutrition that they're required by law to put in our food, so it's their way of ruining the best part of the day without breaking that law."

"Can... can I try it?" Donut said. "I have to know what it tastes like, it can't be as horrible as you're claiming."

Grif snorted. "Oh, you'll see." He slid the tray towards Donut, who stuck his spoon in and pried away a small glob of it. He stuck it in his mouth and chewed on it for a moment before going slightly green.

"Mmph," he groaned, as Grif and Simmons both burst out laughing. Without any napkins to spit the mouthful into, Donut was forced to swallow it. "Oh my god, that is putrid!"

"Congratulations, Donut, you've past the first step into becoming a true member of this prison," Simmons said, grinning. "If you withstand the log, you can withstand anything." Grif nodded in agreement, though he was still laughing too much to actually speak. It was rather infectious, and Donut smiled despite the fact that it felt like his insides were shriveling up in response to the mouthful of 'log.'

Grif finally regained his calm enough to talk again. "Ah, good times. Good 'tormenting-the-rookie' times. So, what're we talking about? Anything good?"

"Oh, right. The Church thing."

"Ah. Fucker."

"Mmhm." Simmons started gesturing at the walls with his spoon. "Anyway, like I said. Church has ears in the fucking walls. Too many connections. I mean, he's also got Tucker—"

"Graaahfucker," Grif growled under his breath.

"What Grif said. Tucker might act like a fucking idiot... and actually turn into one if there's a set of boobs in the room... but that guy's always had this kinda 'easy to talk to' thing going on... no-one expects the dipshit who talks about boobs a lot to be a con-artist! Anyway, give him time and..."

Grif poked moodily at the log on his plate. "Fucker," he muttered bitterly. "One minute, he's bonding with you over laziness and a mutual love of pornography, and then suddenly Church is blackmailing you with the fact that your sister is doing a whole bunch of weird drugs and that it would just take one urine test to get her arrested."

"My advice is to start carrying around a porno magazine to distract him with," Simmons said. "Boobs are Tucker's krytonite."

"Okay." Donut started prodding his food around, more focused on the conversation than actually eating. "So, this works on everyone? Just threatening them with blackmail?"

"Not everyone. Some people just don't have anything they can be blackmailed with. Maybe they don't have anything that they haven't already been charged for, or maybe they're just too batshit crazy to care what Church tells anyone. But they still can't touch him because he's also got Caboose. Would you want to attack him with Caboose standing there?"

Donut shivered. "Definitely not."

"Exactly. And on top of everything else, he's got this thing with Tex. Don't know exactly what's going on there, but having a connection to the guards... well, there's perks to that. She can help him get things and I'm pretty sure she warns him whenever someone that he might want to talk to is coming into the prison. He probably knew you were being brought here long before you actually got here."

Donut was still pushing his food around on his plate. Again, he was starting to feel too nervous to eat. "Is she allowed to do that?"

"No. But they wouldn't fire her. Tex is too good a guard. Probably the best." Simmons drummed his fingers against the table for a moment before eying Donut. "You didn't make Church angry, did you?"

"Um. A little. I might have said the snitch thing out loud," Donut admitted. Simmons groaned. "Why? Is he one of the, erm... easily offended stabby types?"

"Mm. No, you're probably okay, for now. Honestly, Church is easy to make mad, there'd be no-one left if he stabbed everyone who pissed him off. But..." Simmons pulled a face and shook his head. "Suspicious incidents do tend to crop up that guy."

"Suspicious—"

Donut was interrupted by Simmons raising a hand to shush him, still watching the cafeteria line and waiting to see if Church was about to come over. While Simmons confirmed that Church was still occupied, Grif took the chance to steal his macaroni.

"Eh? Hey! Grif, give me back my food!"

"Licked it."

"Fuck!"

Grif sniggered and stuck a spoonful of the half-crushed macaroni in his mouth. "Tastes like victory. Anyway... pretty much, whenever people annoy Church too much... they tend to die. Like Phil and Joannes."

"I think his name was Jones," Simmons said.

"No, it was definitely Joannes."

"What happened to them?"

"Well, Phil was a guard that really had it in for Church," Simmons said, while starting on the remainders of his lunch. "Most of the guards don't really care one way or another, but Phil really hated him. Maybe one of Church's activities on the outside affected his family or something, he never did stop bitching about being a single parent.

"So, one day there was some kind of fight between them and Church landed in the infirmary for a week. The very next day, there was a riot in the cafeteria. Phil was killed while trying to get everyone to calm down. Couldn't find any proof of what happened precisely... but his head had been like a grape. Very few prisoners are strong enough to do that. Caboose being one of the few. I don't know if he actually did it, or if it was on Church's orders or not, but I wouldn't put it past them. And if we tried asking Caboose, he'd probably insist the man 'fell and crushed his head at the same time.'"

Donut winced. "And Joannes? Or Jones, or whatever his name is..."

"Jones was a con-artist as well. More importantly, he wasn't willing to go along with Church's bullshit. When Church attempted to blackmail him, Jones just tried blackmailing him right back. There was quite a war between those two, and Jones actually managed to get the upper hand on occasion. But not long afterwards... they just found him dead in his cell. Hung himself."

"But that's... that's suicide, right? Not murder..."

"Maybe. But, well..." Simmons sighed. "Tucker had been talking to him a lot recently. He probably could talk someone into suicide if he tried. We're in prison, after all. There isn't much happy stuff in our heads to begin with. Maybe Tucker, or Church even, talked him into it. Or maybe he was just tired of prison life. But it was just too convenient..."

Simmons clammed up immediately as Church, Tucker and Caboose finally headed towards them. Church grunted in recognition of the three as he sat down, Tucker grinned and winked at Donut as he passed by, and Caboose greeted him with a cheerful 'Muffin Man!' Now that the topic of the conversation was sitting at the table, Simmons returned to arguing with Grif, this time about the various incidents that had occurred between Grif and Sarge, usually ending with a punch in the gut.

They all seemed so at ease. While Donut was trying not to shake or start fiddling with his food or betray any signs of nervousness. It took everything he had not to freak out just looking at Caboose (' his head had been like a grape') building a little tower with his macaroni, or Tucker ('could talk someone into suicide if he tried') making jokes about boobs, while Church ('whenever people annoy Church too much... they tend to die') steadily ignored him.

Even Grif and Simmons, Donut was a little suspicious of now... sure, aside from the swearing and bickering they were nice, but what had they done to land themselves in prison? Why were they hanging around Church if he was such a blackmailing douche bag? And despite talking to the two of them the most, Donut knew even less about them than about the others, and the unknown was in some ways scarier.

Then again, the unknown wasn't that bad... Donut had definitely been less afraid before Simmons had explained things to him. He kind of wished he hadn't been told anything.