Wow! Thank you SO much to everyone who reviewed/followed/favorited this story, or heck even read it at all! I'm still building up my confidence writing in a new fandom and trying to get the characters down, so every bit counts. Extra thanks to Sam, Guest, lorcheto, Zimdan19, Guest, and allen3smith for your encouraging reviews!

Well, for this chapter, I apologize for the copious amounts of hurt with NO comfort for now. Basically this is an AU from episode 2, but I did put it some of the actual dialogue (since I'm a canon-compliant kind of girl..for the most part). This one is more Mike-centric but there will be lots of Harvey, Donna, Rachel, and the gang in the next chapter!

Enjoy?

Fictional

Towards the end of his second week in Danbury, Mike was doing everything he possibly could to avoid another run-in with Frank, but found it literally impossible.

Frank was out for blood.

It didn't help that after Harvey had come to see him, Frank had somehow been able to get under the lawyer's skin as he left the prison, and whatever was said between them had only made Gallo set his sights on him even more.

Mike knew that Harvey had been in touch with Cahill and was doing everything he possibly could to get either him or Gallo transferred somewhere else, but he had a sinking feeling it would be too little, too late. He just had to try and survive until that happened.

Mike figured his best strategy would be to stay within sights of the guards and the cameras at all times, so that Frank wouldn't have an opportunity to catch him in a place where he'd be an easy target.

Unfortunately, that ended up being his biggest mistake. Mike knew that Frank had a few of the guards on his side, but he hadn't realized just how much pull he had within the prison.

"Hey, hey, I know you don't trust me, but look who's headed this way," his real roommate, Kevin Miller, had frantically tried to warn him in the common room, but Mike knew better than to trust anyone now. Kevin had attempted to make amends with him for switching with Frank the first night, how he really didn't have a choice in the matter, but Mike wasn't ready to listen, and he wasn't going to listen now in case Kevin was trying to set him up. He blew him off, adding a final "leave me alone," to which Kevin nodded in defeat, quickly moving away as Frank and his goons approached Mike.

As Gallo threatened him, his men surrounding him in a threatening stance, Mike motioned with his head to the guards behind him, feeling some sense of security that nothing would happen within their vicinity. Instead, a feeling of ice cold dread crept down his spine at the knowing smirk that crossed Frank's face at that.

"You mean the guards that let me into your cell?"

Mike threw down his book and wheeled around, realizing that the guards once behind him were now conveniently gone, and the entire common area had cleared out, just as Kevin had warned him. He was now alone and completely surrounded by Frank and his men.

He should have listened.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait!" Mike started, trying to control the rising panic in his voice, "so that's it? You're going to let these guys kill me?

Frank chuckled hollowly at that. "Who said anything about killing you? We're just going to hurt you a little...or a lot."

Mike swiftly jumped up from his seat, racking his brain for a way to stall for more time. He went for the quickest defense he could think of, calling Frank's leadership abilities into question and daring the hardened criminal to take him on on his own. Frank paused, studying him, and for a brief moment Mike thought that he would actually just take him on one-on-one, and then maybe he might stand a chance.

"Ok, tough guy."

But when Frank reached behind him and pulled out the long, sharp, handmade shiv, and his men grabbed his arms and roughly pulled him back, Mike knew it was all over.

He was a dead man.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could hear Harvey's voice echoing "When there's a gun to your head, there's 146 other things..."

Mike knew he couldn't give up without a fight. He had to try, for Rachel, for Harvey, for Donna, hell even for Louis, for everyone he cared about, to try and make it out of this alive.

As Frank came furiously towards him, wielding the weapon in his hand, Mike did the only thing he could think of, and kicked out with both legs as the other thugs held tightly to his arms, striking Frank's hand with a sickening crunch and sending the shiv sliding across the floor.

Mike couldn't help but let out a triumph "ha!" as Gallo howled in pain, only to realize he was far from danger as one of Frank's goons sent a solid fist flying into his stomach, causing him to double over as the breath was knocked out of his lungs.

"You're going to pay for that, Ross," Frank growled out at him, clutching his injured hand to his chest. Eyes flashing furiously, he marched over and picked up the dropped shank with his remaining good hand, striding back over to Mike purposely. He continued struggling to break free, looking up as Gallo approached him once again, more cautiously than before.

"Is it worth it, Gallo?" Mike tried breathlessly, still trying to buy more time. "Even if you do this to me, you'll just end up with more time on your sentence, and we both know that what you really want is to get out of here. Why risk it?"

"Well, smart guy, I owe Harvey Specter A LOT, and this seems like a good way to settle the score," Frank replied, casually twirling the shiv in his other hand. "And I'll tell ya what kid, I'm not going to hurt you after all."

Mike looked back at him skeptically. There was no way Gallo was just going to let him go, not after all this. He was going to send a message to Harvey, one way or another.

"No," Frank looked at him again, a murderous look in his eyes, "I'm going to kill you."

Mike's eyes widened, and he fought as hard as he possibly could to break free from the two huge men still holding him. "No, no, Frank, wait!"

In desperation, Mike jerked his head forwards into the nose of one of the prisoners holding him captive, causing a sickening crunch as he broke his nose. The man barely stumbled back, but his grip on his arm slackened just a little. Mike wheeled, trying to pull his arm free and fight back in any way he possibly could, but it was too late. Gallo was already there, and Mike was outnumbered, and he had nowhere to go.

Without any hesitation, Frank jammed the shiv forward...directly into his stomach.

White-hot, blinding pain, like Mike had never experienced before, exploded throughout his entire body, and his vision went fuzzy as Frank violently twisted the sharpened blade in even deeper.

"Since you like your movie quotes so much," Frank whispered viciously in his ear, "then tell Harvey Specter that Frank Gallo sends his regards." Then he roughly pulled out the blade, causing Mike to slump forwards against the weight of the men holding him, no longer able to stand on his own.

With that, he stabbed Mike in the abdomen again, and Mike was unable to bite back the cry of pain this time. Blood was already pouring out of his wounds at an alarming rate, covering the front of his prison blues in a sickening shade of red and starting to pool at the floor by his feet.

Satisfied that Mike wasn't going to be able to walk away, Frank nodded shortly at his men then, and they carelessly let him go. Unable to support his own weight anymore, he crumpled in a heap on the floor with a dull thud, desperately still holding onto consciousness by sheer will.

"C'mon boys, let's get out of here," he distantly heard Gallo order his men, their footsteps quickly retreating as they cleared the room and left him for dead.

"So this is how I'm going to die," Mike's remaining consciousness told him, and his damn eidetic memory began unwillingly filling in the facts about blood loss and abdomen wounds and how little time he had left.

"No...not like this," he weakly shook his head, not quite ready to give up, although he already knew with utmost certainty that he was mortally wounded as his rapid-fire mind began calculating his odds of survival. But despite all that knowledge, he wasn't ready to quit without one last fight.

Summoning every ounce of will and determination he had left, Mike pushed himself up onto his shaking elbows, vaguely horrified that he was slipping in a pool of his own blood on the floor.

Unable to stifle another cry of anguish, he pulled himself across the floor a few inches, eyeing the doors in the back of the room through his narrowing tunnel vision. He just had to make it to those doors and try to call for help...

He pulled himself a few more inches, and then just a few more, desperately trying to reach the doors. But his body wasn't cooperating anymore, was already shutting down on him, and just a few feet from the door, he collapsed face down on the cold concrete, dark streaks of red following him in a trail across the floor.

The faces of everyone he cared about, everyone he had gone to prison for in order to protect, flashed before his eyes. Rachel. Harvey. Donna. Louis. Jessica.

Rachel would be beyond devastated, and he desperately hoped she would survive this, and Harvey...he would never forgive himself for this, no matter what he had promised Mike. This would destroy him.

Somehow through the haze, he heard someone calling his name in the distance, and was vaguely aware that someone was pulling him upwards now, tapping the side of his face and urgently talking to him, but it felt as if it was from the end of a long, dark tunnel, and he was moving rapidly to the other side.

"Mike! Look at me man, come on!" the voice of his cell mate, Kevin Miller, briefly registered in his mind, and he realized that Kevin was there with him now, yelling at him to hold on. "Mike, stay awake, I'm going to get help, ok? Damn it I told you to leave..."

Mike tried to respond, tried to force the words to come out, to tell Kevin his final words to Rachel, to Harvey...but he just couldn't hold on anymore.

The world faded away, and Mike briefly wondered why he wasn't more afraid now, and his last thoughts were that he hoped everyone he was leaving behind would be ok.

And then everything was black.

TBC