CELLS A2 AND A3

Holly felt his hands around her shoulders after she turned on the shower. It was difficult not to succumb to his warmth.

"We can't..."

"I just want to talk," he said, but his hands remained in place. In fact, they were gripping her shoulders harder.

She wanted to say that it was okay that he wanted more than just talk, that she in fact wanted it too, and wanted nothing more than for them to be together without worrying about their cellmates. But what she said was, "Get out." She shivered violently as his hands moved toward her chest. "They saw you come in here, Tristan. They'll know."

"I've given up on trying to…" He was close to her ear. "There's nothing more I can do."

"Then, you've given up on me," she said, sad.

He let go of her. "I haven't given up on you."

"Our water tastes like it's mixed with bleach. We're barely given enough to eat. The toilet is making weird noises. It's freezing." She showed her teeth to the wall. "We're done."

"I tried…"

"You did."

"I really tried, hon. I wanted more than anything to escape, to rescue everyone. But… there's nothing we can do. Nothing. He has us. Dead to rights, he has us. He has every angle covered."

"And what's this, then?" She hadn't moved away from him, could still feel him hips pressing against her. "You've given up on being a saint?"

"What is it you expect me to do?" He was whispering again, making her shiver worse from his hot breath.

Holly closed her eyes. "Your work isn't done. Neither is mine. But, heheh, no worries. I am prepared for this." She turned to him, her gray focusing under the water, her hair falling out and clogging the floor drain. "Listen… I can't hear them anymore. They've stopped working.

Tristan eyed the window to their left.

"It won't be long now."

Tristan tried to hug her but she slipped away and exited. He watched her scamper off, cold water trailing behind her. Her legs looked too weak to carry herself.

He didn't know how long he stood there before he heard a familiar voice coming from the barred bathroom window. "What's with all the dead fruit outside?"

"Never mind." He broke himself out of the trance's grasp. "You have something for me?"

Robert reached an arm through the bars and dropped the tool without a word. Tristan caught it with both hands, leaning to compensate for the weight.

"What the hell is it?" Tristan asked, examining the tool closely.

"Sorry. It looked rare enough that I thought it would… you know… I realize it's no gun."

"No…" It looked like some hardcore super wrench, able to twist anything off of its screw. Heavy, weighted by the thick crescent at its end. The glimmering silver would have looked precious in a place like Knothole, but in the cells, it looked like everything else. "Where did you get it?"

"I found it. In a factory." He watched Tristan examine the device. "I apologize. It's probably useless to you. Honestly, I was hoping it would buy me some more time. To find you a gun."

He had been expecting Robert to bail out on him, to never see him again. But this mysterious stranger had actually done something.

Something practically useless. "Robert… you're our last hope. You know that, right?"

Those big blue eyes only stared back at him.

"You can still save a lot of us. If you hurry."

Robert's reply was a short nod.

"As for this, it's fine. I wouldn't know what to do with a gun, anyway." But he probably would have shot himself with it.

Robert nodded again, this time a farewell, his head disappearing from view.

Tristan felt like he was walking into daylight for the first time in a long time. His eyes squinted shut when he reemerged into A3, his skin tingling with a wave of warmth and his thinning hair standing up on end. It was the heat of the cameras, Snively or Robotnik or whoever staring down on him.

Tristan thought back to Shirk trying to knock them down, using the ball. He wondered if he could hit it on the first try.

He brought his arm back and let it fly. There must have been an amazing connection to his muscles, his arm made for the sole purpose of hitting the camera dead-on, right through its lense. The casing broke apart and Tristan watched it fall all the way down, and it hit the ground with the sound of shattering plastic. A shit-heap on the floor, and at the top, there was no sign of something ever being suspended up there.

His cellmates heard the crash and had gathered around the camera. It had smashed apart too easily… the impact had sounded hollow.

At their feet, a small piece of white paper was poking out of the wreckage. Durango pulled it out carefully and held it away from his face, hands shaking. The others didn't have to lean in to read the large black letters.

NICE TRY