Rating: R
Summary: Keller's going to make sure him and Beecher reunite, no matter what.
Time: Season 5
Disclaimer: None of the characters in this story belong to me, this is all fiction, thank you very much.
Warning: This story is not for someone who doesn't like slash, or violence. In which this story has. This story has been stemmed from the show "Oz", which is rated TV-MA, mature audiences only, as most of the fiction about Oz. There is cussing, violence, relations between two men, murder, etc. The list really does go on. Now after reading this, do you still want to read the story? If so, go ahead, but remember ... I warned you.
Update - Keller and O'Reily talk. Beecher and Said talk about Guenzel and other things. O'Reily kills Howell. Shillenger, Beecher and Said lie to Sister Pete about Guenzel in their group session and she is angered. Guenzel dies. Mikey Miller arrives in Oz.
***
A Plan Of Action
***
Tim McManus rubbed his eyes angrily, making the skin around his eyes go to a bright red from their usual white color. How many times could he look at the body? He couldn't stop. He dealed with death everyday but staring at Claire Howell's smashed and bloodied body, sent him a chill up his spine. It wasn't like he loved her or anything, hell he hardly liked her, but god no one really deserved to die this cruelly, it was just a horrible way to die. But whoever did it, obviously knew what they were doing, because all the CO's told him that there were no fingers prints anywhere. Yes, this whole thing disturbed McManus, a dead CO on his hands, this was not good at all. He watched the paramedics put Claire's sickingly prone body into a black body bag, McManus turned away in disgust. He felt his earlier food start to want to come up as he heard the distinct sound of the body bag zip up. McManus gripped the wall for support as he felt a wave of nasuea come over him, he felt like he was either going to vomit or pass out. He slid down the wall and sat down on the floor, his knees crushing against his chest. He gripped onto his head as he began to massage his temples, hoping it would somehow make him feel better in any way, it didn't. The smell of death was everywhere.
"Are you okay Tim?" The warden of Oz, Leo Glynn, said, bending over as he continued to stare at his friend.
"God, no." McManus said, still massaging his temples. "Did you see it?" McManus asked, finally looking up at his friend. "It's fucking horrible. I didn't even like her, but fuck." McManus grunted, banging the back of his head against the concrete wall slightly. "I've seen death before, but damn it, her body ... just the way it looks, her eyes. God those eyes. Wide open. When everything else is broken and bloodied and covered, her wide eyes are the one thing that stands out. She knew what was going to happen."
Glynn pulled McManus up and steadied him. "Let's not think about this Tim."
"How can we not? How can *I* not think about it? When that look in her eyes is just branded in my memory. How shitty is that? To know you're going to die a horrible death like that? It's fucked up, and whoever did it is fucked up." McManus hissed out.
"Let's get us some coffee, believe me, we need it." Glynn said, he cast a look at the body bag sadly.
"Yeah, we definitely do." McManus said, looking at the same thing, before they both walked away from the body bag.
***
Sister Pete sat at her perfectly polished wooden desk, her hands gripping onto the case file, which she knew was just yesterday's news. She released the grasp onto the yellow colored file and ran her fingers across the name etched across the front of the file in big, messy letters in black permenant ink that read: Adam Guenzel. Her heart ached, she looked at the picture of him, his mug shot when he first arrived in Oz, and his continued to ache. He looked so young, he was so young, and now he was just another member of the Oz R.I.P. as some of the inmates here called it. She had wanted to help him, but before she could even try, he had ended up dead. And the questioning part of her couldn't help but point the blame at one of the three men in her group session class yesterday. Tobias Beecher, Kareem Said and Vern Shillenger. She had told them she would find out what happened no matter what, and then suddenly out of the blue Guenzel ended up dead. She felt the urge to scream at those three men the next she saw them, she didn't care if she was screaming at the innocent one, even if all three of them were innocent, she just wanted to scream at them, she wanted to grab them by the shoulders and scream at them. Especially Tobias Beecher. She wanted to give him a slap upside the head, to make him see what he didn't try to stop. She wanted to hurt him. God, she was so mad. She hadn't felt this mad since she found out that she was just a ploy in Chris Keller's plan to get Toby back a few years ago. Yes, this was how mad she was right now. He was just so young and had so much to do with his life, a life he no longer had, she wanted someone to see that. A part of her wondered if somehow she could have prevented it. But how? Damn it, she was so angry, so resentful.
Damn you Tobias, Sister Pete thought to herself. She knew deep down that something had happened, more than Toby had let on, and that made her even more angry. First he had asked to be transferred to the mail room and then he just ended up not even caring about what happens to Guenzel anymore? It was as if, he was concentrated on something else. Someone else. And now this got her to the very edge of her anger. Chris Keller. That was who Toby had been thinking about instead the welfare and safely of Adam Guenzel. In the big run to Toby, Chris had been more important, and now a young man was dead because of it.
***
Said stood in the gym as he watched Toby punch the punching bag; Said sighed and let himself travel into his thoughts. Adam Guenzel was dead. By now, it had traveled all over Oz, although Said had gotten the news from Toby. Although Said hadn't really known Guenzel, the news of his death was hitting him hard as well. He had lied. He had lied in the group session because of one little fact. To protect his friend. Did he feel remorseful about protecting Toby in a way? No. But he did feel remorseful for refusing to help Guenzel, when Toby had asked him to?Yes. Maybe if he did, this whole situation would have been able to be avoided. But it was no use in thinking about that now, was there? Adam Guenzel was dead, and nothing was going to bring him back. Said wanted that to be it, he wanted to be able to drop the whole subject, but how could he? A young man was dead. And he hadn't helped. So yes, in a way he did feel responsible. He felt as if he was a part of this whole charade. Another person was lost. Another lost soul. Was it even about Allah anymore? Maybe not. It was just about another person dying before having a real chance to find themselves. There was nothing you could do, Said kept telling himself, but as much as he said it, he couldn't believe a word of it.
Said looked up once more, and frowned when he saw Toby pounding the punching bag with no coordination, but the way his punches landed, it sure looked like he was hurting himself. "Tobias ... " Said said, pushing himself up, he walked to Toby and grabbed his arm to stop the awful assualt on the inanimate object and on Toby's hands. Speaking of, as Said looked down at the sweaty hands, he saw the cuts on his knuckles, and frowned as the blood mixed with the sweat. "Hurting yourself can not bring back Adam, come on, we should get you to the medics." Said said, smiling slightly for his friend.
"He's dead, he's fucking dead." Toby said, his eyes cold. "Shillenger did it."
"We all know this." Said said, as they slowly walked to the hospital ward of Oz.
"And I'm responsible. Adam was my responsibility, I told myself I would try to protect him, and I didn't do that." Toby said sadly.
"No one did that." Said said quietly.
***
"What happened?" Doctor Gloria Nathan asked as she looked own at the badly cut hands of Tobias Beecher. Her eyes softened at how deep the cuts were, perfectly deep enough to cause real pain, deep enough to make them take a long time to heal. Gloria turned her back to Toby and Said for a moment to get the neccessities to fix Toby's hands up, as she awaited a reply.
"I guess I hit the punching bag too hard." Toby said, wincing as Gloria began "fixing" up his hands, although it didn't feel like she was fixing them up, actually it felt like she was killing him. "Fuck!" Toby cursed. "Sorry." He apologized sympathetically.
"It's okay, I guess we're all allowed to cuss during pain." Gloria said with a smile. "Maybe you ought to be more careful when you work out. The cuts on your hands are deep, like you kept punching the punching bag after the initial opening of the wounds."
"My head was in a different place." Toby said, waiting impatiently for Gloria to hurry up and finish with his hands.
Said just stood in the background watching, not saying a word.
"Well, like I said, be more careful." Gloria commented. "Okay, you're done, you're free to go." Gloria said, still smiling.
"Yeah, thanks." Toby said, jumping off of the hospital bed, he looked down at his white bandaged hands and grimaced as him and Said left the hospital ward. Toby's hands felt like they were on fire, but for the moment it was worth it. For Guenzel, it was.
***
McManus sat at his desk as he stared at the file case of Adam Guenzel, he shook his head as he opened his filing cabinet and put it in with all the other deceased inmates of Oz. Lost another one, McManus thought to himself, with a self-depricating tone to his thoughts. He lost someone everyday in this place, it was nothing new, nothing he could prevent. But damn it hurt. It hurt, because everytime one of them died, he lost a little more of his vision, of the dream he had for Oz in the beginning.
***
Toby slowly walked into the mail room, he then slowly made his way over to where all the mail was, but then his eyes froze when he saw, no felt, Vern's presence in the room. Toby had to remind himself not to clinch his fists, he really wanted to beat the holy living shit out of Vern after what he did to Guenzel, did Vern hold no compassion? Toby had to snort at that, of course not.
"What's wrong sweet pea, you sad about our poor loss?" Vern said, cocking his head to the side.
"You bastard." Toby said, staring at Vern head on. "You god damn bastard." And suddenly everything seemed to blur into Toby's mind, as he pummeled Vern down to the ground. He didn't care about the pain in his hands, he just wanted Vern to pay for the death of Guenzel, he wanted Vern to feel some pain. They rolled around a bit, sharing punches, but then the loud voices of ... no not guards, but McManus and Glynn entered Toby's ears, and he then felt himself being pulled off of Vern and held back.
"Calm it down you two!" McManus screamed, holding Toby back.
"Take a fucking walk." Glynn said to either Toby or Vern.
"I will." Toby said, pushing McManus way from him. "I have mail to deliever." Toby snapped, he grabbed the mail cart and wheeled it out of the room, His anger was rising. Not just at Vern, but at the whole damn situation. Fuck. Another person's death that will be carried on his shoulders, this wasn't really what Toby wanted. He already had Andy Shillenger, Hank Shillenger, and his own damn son's death on his shoulders, and now Adam Guenzel was on that list too, this was just dandy, yep candy and roses.
***
"Damn, ain't he the tempermental thing?" Vern asked, air brushing off his clothes and picking up the fallen pieces of mail. He shot a grin at McManus and Glynn, in which he knew that was driving them insane, that was why he did, he shot one more grin for the hell of it. His head felt like it was going to explode, Damn, Toby really had learned to throw a few punches since five years ago.
Glynn sighed and left the mail room with McManus on his heels.
***
"We have to do something about this." McManus said, entering his office after Glynn, McManus slammed the door behind him. McManus rounded to his desk and stood behind it. "You, as I know, that this whole Beecher/Vern fight, is not the least of our problems here. Claire's death is a big item here. We all may have not liked her, but like you said once, she IS a human being, or was, and she used to work here, which inclines me to actually give a shit when she gets killed." McManus roared.
"Don't turn Sherlock Holmes on me here." Glynn said, rubbing his forehead. "Tim, we'll do a memorial to her, pay our respects and that's the end of the case. We're not some sly and sleek dectective guys off of Homicide: Life on the streets."
"I know we aren't, but can't we do something?" McManus asked.
"Unfortunately not, people die Tim, it happens." Glynn pointed out sadly. "We still have a prison to run, with alive people."
***
Mikey stood in the long and very loud line of the rest of the inmates of ... Oz, as he over-heard it was called, some sort of nickname for the real name: Oswald Penitary System. All of these men, as they loudly chatted about anything and everything, were waiting for the same thing he was, lunch. Prison lunch. Yeah, this was just fucking great. Mikey ran a hand over his face, as he slowly made it to the front of the line, he watched as a prisoner, a very good looking young man, with spiky hair, and a four leaf clover tattoo splashed the food on his plate and motioned for him to move along, which he did. After Mikey got his food, he picked a bare table and sat down and began to eat his food, as he let his thoughts run wild inside of his head, the most private place to be. No one had access to get there, no one in the whole damn world, not even himself sometimes. Mikey looked around the prison and kept himself content on making sure he found a way out of this shit hole. He wasn't fit for prison, he would die in here. Sure he was tough as nails, he just didn't like being around all these people. They all seemed to have their own groups, their own friends, their own religions, their own ... boyfriends and/or prags, there were the drag queens, the Italians, the Latinos, the Irish, the Aryans, the Blacks, (two sorts of blacks too ... Muslims and the gangsters) there were the Bikers, the list went on. He felt out of place. And god damn it, Mikey hated it when he was out of place. And plus he was set up, he didn't deserve to be here, he would get out.
And that would be on his word, if not, he would find a popular guy around here to leech off of.
***
"Mail." Toby said to Peterson, who usually just nodded and approved him, instead came closer to him. "What?" Toby asked.
"What happened to your hands?" Peterson asked, a little curiously.
"Got in a fight." Toby answered.
"Ah, well go on ahead Beecher." Peterson said, smiling friendly. "And get better!"
"Thanks, I will." Toby said, wheeling the cart into the rest of the way into solitary. Carl Peterson was actually one of those nice guys, who got a really screwed up job and was bored all the time and would chat with you on anything. He made all the other CO's look like the devil, compared how friendly and chatty he was. Toby shook his head at the thought and gave a few of the prisoners in their cells their mail, answering the question over and over about what happened to his hands. He then finally made it to Chris's cell. This actually brought a smile to his face, and he was actually here to deliever real mail. Toby grabbed the magazine and rolled it up in his hand and batted it against the bars of the cell lightly, making sure he didn't mess up the magazine, but got Chris's attention.
"Hmm?" Chris asked, looking up, he smiled startled, when he saw Toby. "Hey!" Chris rolled out of the cell bed, landing on his feet, he then walked over all the way to his side of the cell and graciously took the magazine, he glanced at he magazine and threw it on his bed, he then turned back at Toby, and frowned, finally seeing the white ace bandage all over both of his hands.
"It's nothing." Toby answered, before Chris could ask ...
"What happened to your hands?" Chris asked, anyways.
"I hit the punching bag too hard, my knuckles got a little injured up, I'm fine though. How are you?" Toby asked.
"Bored." Chris answered, busily staring at the bandage on Toby's hands, he recogonized the coloring of it, the way it was swirled around the usual un-markable hands of Toby's, he recogonized everything he could, before taking Toby's left hand first gently. Chris then started to un-do the bandaging, which managed to get a squeak out of Toby, but Toby didn't say a word. Chris finally got the bandaging off and stared at the now beginning to heal cuts. Chris stared down at them as if they were a piece of art, he then began doing the same thing to the right hand of Toby's. Once Toby's hands were both unbandaged and branded into his memory, Chris looked into Toby's eyes, which held a soft look in them. "I love you." Chris said, his bottom lip twitching into a grin.
Toby let out a shuddering sigh, hearing those words again. "I love you too."
And
in the background, a not-so-suprised Catherine McClain watched them in
silence, as she held an envelope.