Ch 08
The echoing snuffling of people just waking up was bouncing softly through the concrete prison around him along with the squeaking distress of bed springs shifting. Wufei stretched quietly in his bed. His bunk mate had yet to wake up, from his near comatose state. In fact after the short wait for him to go to sleep the previous night he had not woken up or even moved much really. At least he didn't snore.
Wufei had barely slept. It was nerve wracking to sleep in the same room as someone you did not know who could step down slide their hands around your throat and suffocate you slowly without much of a struggle. It had taken Wufei months to get comfortable with the Gundam pilots. How long would it take now? Perhaps he did need to get to know this person better; it would make his time in the prison easier to deal with if he could sleep at night. But… he was better off alone wasn't he?
Wufei shut his eyes to rest them. He really hadn't slept that night. This was really not the best start to have when entering into gen-pop again. He had helped to imprison a lot of these men. Even if they did not recognize him.
The faint buzzing sound of the fluorescent lights beginning to illuminate signaled there was ten minutes till the start of their morning. Two weeks and six days.
The bunk above him shifted. And the springs squeaked, Wufei's eyes snapped open. He saw legs dangling down over the edge of the top bunk and with a little push off the guy landed lightly if a little clumsily on the cement floor next to the bunks. He turned around and looked down at Wufei staring up at him. Then cursed "Damn it. I'm sorry. I was hoping not to wake you."
Wufei shrugged and closed his eyes slightly. He was still able to watch him through his lashes, but it was still nice to relax a little longer. "I'm Trent, by the way." He moved to the back of the cell to relieve himself.
Wufei ignored the pleasantries. He still had not decided whether or not to get to know his bunk mate. It could cause a potential bond which was a definite con as far as he was concerned, but it could allow him to sleep at night.
The con outweighed the pro at this point. By a lot.
The bars slid open on the cells. It was morning wake up, an hour until breakfast. Trent wandered out of the cell to do whatever his morning routine was. Wufei kept his eyes closed resting. He did not know what entirely his routine was going to be. In fact all he could think about was his court date, his lack of representation and being the only one he could depend on.
He felt an hour tick by and got up; the cell mates were already leaving the facilities. It was an out of body experience to be wandering in and out of the cells and the cold cement hallways. He was there, but he wasn't focusing at all on his surroundings. He felt no threat eminently and therefore left the rest of the jail mates alone.
Days were spent in the library with law books skimming endless pages that were filled with ancient laws that were somewhat useless considering they were written well before the ESUN was established. All he could concentrate on was putting together a case, which was taxing and stressful. He could feel his anger coiling, he had no outlet.
Nothing to focus on. Exercise outside the cell was out of the question, as was exercise in the cell with Trent.
Plus the warden appeared to be constantly unavailable, a barrier he had not expected since the warden had stated that he was on his side. There were no phone calls allowed to make it possible to contact Quatre, though Wufei had not decided whether or not he actually would have called.
And the endless jabbering attempts at conversation that Trent made were sending needles into his brain. It was like he was on a mission to befriend Wufei, his own personal demon living with him in his cell. He had yet to give in and answer anything with more than one word answers. This morning he made an exception.
"Go away."
Trent seemed to have been extremely startled to have had Wufei actually talk. He did not say anything else before escaping out the cell doors. He had one week left. One week.
Wufei swung his legs over the edge of the bunks steel frame, his feet hitting the floor. He dropped his head into his hands and stayed bent over. The frustration at seeing his chance at freedom slip through his fingers was…
Wufei heard footsteps echoing down the hall towards his cell, so he stood up moving all emotion off his face. A guard stopped in front of his cell, gun was held at the ready, but it seemed non-threatening at the moment. "The warden can see you now."
Wufei did not feel relief wash over him; he was slow to rise and follow out. The guard waited as Wufei put on his pants and shirt before exiting the cell. He was escorted by three armed guards to the warden's office. Instead of having them wait and be stationed outside like their last meeting he kept them just inside the door, behind Wufei. His skin was crawling and the sinking sensation from the last two weeks in his stomach was amplified.
Alan was sitting behind his desk, looking sullen, "I hear you have wanted a meeting with me. I'm sorry I have not been available before now."
"It's about my case." Wufei ground out.
"I assumed as much." He sighed and flipped open a file on his desk. "Your date is a week from now is it not?" Wufei nodded. "I've been looking into this. I have not been able to contact Quatre Winner. He was the one that was going to be providing your defense, true?" Wufei nodded and looked around the office. Books, medals and ornaments on wooden bookshelves.
"I have contacted a public defender for you." Wufei met Alan's eyes after that. "He has decided that there is no actual time to put a case together for you. He is going to talk to the judge to attempt to get the trial date postponed until you can put together a case."
Wufei nodded. He doubted there would be time; he had gotten through only two of the volumes in the library out of the thirty seven that were there. It was logical.
Didn't mean he wasn't pissed off about it.
"When will it be?"
"There is no date set yet, Wufei. I'll let you know as soon as I hear something." He looked mildly regretful. Almost as if it was his fault. "You can go to the cafeteria now."
Wufei nodded and left, guards flanking him swiftly. He didn't bother grabbing a tray, just sat at a table by himself.
No one approached him or sat next to him like they had been doing all week. He sat stewing.
He was not going to be getting out in a week. It was very doubtful he would be getting out at all in the next month… and it could take longer than that. He knew that better than anyone out there. The courts were backed up with war criminals and profiteers from the just the recent war or incident as they called it. The likely-hood of giving someone who was already in jail a trial before they finished several trials where true criminals were out walking the streets was a ridiculous notion. It just did not happen normally.
Wufei felt his chest tighten. And his spine strained under the stress he had been through vertebrae by vertebrae. He felt like he was going to break again and he didn't like it. No one came near him today or sat at his table. But he felt the eyes of one person on him, Trent.
The yard was alive with the usual banging and abusing of the weight racks and the arguments of prisoners from all the cell blocks. Wufei watched the on goings without much interest. He already analyzed most of where the alliances were though the development of him as one of the head members recently was an interesting one. No one bothered him as he sat at the far edges of the yard. Only two guards could see him at any given point and that was if they looked away from the main pack and actually stared down the wall they were on.
Wufei looked at the walls. They would be easy enough to scale with the brick pattern; the problem would be time
and what to do once you were at the top ridge of the yard. It was at a central location in the prison so the other housing barracks were surrounding as was the larger much more ominous wall beyond that enclosed the prison. Then there would also be the other guards to deal with. It wasn't like he hadn't dispatched people in hand to hand combat, but they had the authority to kill if deemed necessary.
Wufei frowned at his thoughts. They were not useful to him at this time. He did not need escape fantasies to add to his list of issues. The meeting with the warden had been discouraging at best. Six days. Then he was positive that there would be nothing for him, but to rot within the prison walls. Alone.
He looked up and saw Trent coming towards him from across and to the left side of the yard. There was no mistaking it he was actually coming over to talk to Wufei...but he was coming from the area of the yard that belonged to the Clealis group. Which was strange since Marcus Clealis was in a different cell block then their own.
Marcus Clealis, happened to be one of the head suppliers to the White Fang faction. He was the ring leader of war profiteers that had been trying to conquer space's gun running market. Wufei had a hand in his arrest. Marcus had watched him since the day that Wufei entered the prison.
Trent walked right over to Wufei and stood leaning against the wall two feet away from him. He then decided to sit and collapsed down gracelessly next to Wufei. The kid was harmless. Wufei internally scoffed at calling Trent a kid. He was sixteen and in the highest level security prison possible next to this twenty some year old errand boy as far as he could tell.
What was he doing in a high security prison anyhow? Trent inched a little closer to him, but stopped about a foot away, when he realized that Wufei was tensing slightly. "You know it's not that bad once you get used to it. Being in here."
Wufei rolled his eyes and put out "Says the man who was raped repeatedly at night by his cell mate."
Trent tensed and shook his head. "Do you always have to be so spiny?" He glanced over at Wufei.
"Do you have to be so annoying?" Wufei growled out. Then he stopped. It reminded him too much of an exchange he and Duo had once. A long time ago. It was best to be forgotten. He wasn't supposed to be forming bonds. He was supposed to be focusing on how to get out. What he would do after...He had no idea.
The pressure was crushing him again. This wasn't what he had planned for. He was supposed to be ensuring peace by helping the Preventers against those who would try to squander it. But no, instead he was locked away by his friends and the very organization he had been trying to support.
Wufei got up again and wandered towards the gate to the yard. There was less than two minutes to go for yard time.
He could tell. "I'm just trying to help you out!" Trent yelled after him.
Wufei ignored the pesky cell mate. He wouldn't know how to help if someone gave him an instruction manual.
Three days later Wufei's skin was the only thing holding him together and he was itching to crawl out of it. There was no relief that he could see coming to him in the next few days. His public defender had met with him once, he seemed to know what he was doing so competent, but he was not a man who instilled confidence. He was meek and quiet and seemed to have succumbed to the idea that Wufei would not be seeing outside the walls of the prison any time soon.
Wufei was stressed out and not sleeping or functioning correctly. The solid plan would be to accept what was happening and try set up a defense for future unknown trial dates, but Wufei did not want to face the potential acceptance. If he accepted the issue then that was it. There was no fight left to fight. His drive would shut down quickly and he would waste away in the prison blocks…
That he was unwilling to do.
"You decide to start talking to me yet?" Trent spoke up. He was lying on the top bunk as usual it was close to lights out. Wufei had been ignoring his usual antics stoically without making any commentary. He hadn't even bothered to answer back most of the time.
"Wufei…?" Apparently Trent was not getting the hint. "Wufeeeeeei" He droned out.
It worked once before; why not unleash the wild side a little. "What?" Wufei hissed out. "What could you possibly want that is so important as to need to talk to me? You never needed to talk to me before I was your cellmate, why the hell would you need to confide in me now?"
Trent rolled onto his side and leaned over the edge of the top bunk to look at Wufei, "It's nothing really I just thought…you know that…"
"That what? We could be best friends forever and ever? In case you haven't noticed I have been trying to get out of here since the minute I entered this place. I do not need friends. I need to focus on this Friday to see when I can possibly get a chance to rejoin normal society. I'm not here to hang out. So what Trent, what do you want?" Wufei sent the hardest glare he could muster at the face hovering above him.
Trent rolled over and was silent for the rest of the evening.
Wufei's presence was not required at the trial. News came out to him at breakfast and he sat silently after being called to the warden's office among the inmates not bothering to eat. They were sitting around him though, accepting his need for space, not trying to antagonize at all.
The noise and the hustle of the cafeteria was not comforting at all, it just was. Moving into yard time, Wufei strolled to his usual spot in the grass and sat with his back against the wall. He slipped off his shoes and placed his feet in the grass, before leaning his head back and staring at the blue sky beyond the wall.
Trent wandered over and sat next to him not saying anything for once. He just sat there and took in Wufei's silence and responded in kind. He made no attempt to converse at all actually and that was slightly comforting and familiar. Very Trowa or Heero like. Wufei frowned at his thoughts. They were useless now, his old friends and his new observations.
When yard time ended, Wufei accepted the hand that Trent presented to help him up. He moved off to his work period in the library after another silent lunch with no food. He hadn't wanted it that morning and he hadn't wanted it at lunch. In the library he did not know what to do. The law books held no interest to him and the rest of the library held no interest either. It was hollow and useless.
Wufei returned to his cell and sat against the wall facing his bed for the entirety of the last remaining period in the day. He did not move to lie down and try to sleep, just waited for the final lineup before lights out. It came soon enough and he and Trent stood out on the hallway then walked into their cells ready to go to bed for the night.
Wufei stood facing the bed and couldn't move towards it. Trent paused, noticing his lack of movement. "…you okay?"
He shook his head and made no move to head towards the bed. He was a sixteen year old ex-terrorist who was afraid to go to bed.
What a cosmic fucking joke.
Trent came and leaned on the wall next to him. Wufei started talking quietly, "I didn't get out today. They postponed the trial."
"Well that's good at least. The rest of us are stuck in here a lot longer then you will be. We're already sentenced. When is the next trial date?"
"I don't know." Wufei whispered. "The courts claim to be too full at the moment so it is postponed until a 'proper date can be established'."
Trent frowned next to him, "That can't be legal. How are they allowed to do that? That means they can hold you…"
"Indefinitely." Wufei exhaled his worst fear. The laws did not seem to apply here. They had deemed him a threat. The trial would have been very public filled with press covered in the ESUN's best courts. People would want to know what was happening to one of the rebels that lead the world to its current peace.
They were trying to hide him away. Seal him from all existence. He had no friends that would protest for him, He had no family that would wonder where he had gone to. He would simply disappear and be condoned to the cell block he found himself in for the rest of his life.
So he couldn't get into bed.
If he lay down for the night that would be the end of Wufei Chang. He would have no fight left in him. There would be no reason to continue. Eventually the jail inmates would start organizing against him, once they realized who he was. There were a lot of gun runners and war profiteers that had been placed in jail by him over the short stint he worked outside as a Preventer. So he couldn't do it. He couldn't lie down and sleep for the night. He was afraid to.
He was afraid for the first time.
Next to him Trent scooted closer and saw that he didn't respond. So he brought his arms up around Wufei in a loose hug and slowly pressured him to the ground. As the lights went out they didn't move from that spot, sitting against the wall on the cold cement floor with Trent holding Wufei in a loose hug and Wufei staring into space.
TBC