Chapter 504: Mind Games
Laz’s day was quite boring after the time in the yard. He did regular rounds with Vera, hearing all about how things worked, how they worked and what to do in the even of this happening or that happening.
It was honestly one of the most boring day’s Laz had remembered having in a long time, something he was actually thankful for. He was too used to crazy on a day to day basis or being constantly on the run or the move when he wasn’t actually running from something. So the fact that he was able to just take it slow was rather relaxing to him in many ways.
The strangest part was that by lunchtime, he wasn’t being harassed by the inmates anymore. In fact, more often than not they would just put their heads down when he walked by and many of them actually went in the other direction.
Even Vera noticed this and pointed it out.
"What did you do? Smack a bitch when I went to the bathroom or something?" Vera asked as the prisoners were giving them a much wider berth than ever.
"I don’t know. To be honest I haven’t even spoken to any of them, much less had to engage in any way," Laz responded, just as confused.
"Well, maybe it’s cause their scared or something? But I mean, considering how they were in the yard, I would have expected that to go on for several days before they finally backed off. But instead, it was like someone instilled the wraith of god in them. Not that it’s a bad thing, but it don’t make no sense."
"Agreed."
And that was all that they said about that since it wasn’t like any of the women in the prison were going to tell them why.
As they ate lunch, Laz chatted more with Vera and several of the other guards who seemed interested in the new guy.
"Must be hard for you ladies sometimes, consider these women used to be super strong killers?" Laz asked, noticing the women around him weren’t exactly super buff. They weren’t weak, but none of them seemed like the body builder types either.
"To be honest, things changed after shit went south a few months ago. We used to be dependent on the guys to do normal drag outs and handle fights. But after that event when we were forced to have everything on the up and up, they changed the way we handled things. Got some new toys that would put a full size elephant down with a little zap and they are a bit more liberal with the tranq darts and such now. Basically if we need to drag a girl out for inspection and she doesn’t want to comply, we gas her room first to knock her out before going in. So a lot less hands on," Vera responded.
"So anyone I need to watch out for specifically?" Laz asked, curious.
"Well, the cult like I told you earlier is the biggest problem and the only group we don’t understand," Vera responded before one of the other’s sitting with them spoke up, a tanned skinned, brown haired but grizzled woman who looked to be in her fifties.
"And that one bitch. Got to be careful of her. Whatever happens, don’t let her find you by yourself," the woman grunted before returning to her meal.
"EH?" Laz turned to Vera. He noticed that she was quite a bit more talkative and approachable than the others so if he needed something explained, the was the best one for the job.
"Ah. Yeah. I forgot about her cause she’s been quiet ever since. Ok. There is this one girl you need to watch out for, a girl by the name of Mercy," Vera corrected herself.
"She some kind of large badass or something? I never feared them before and I doubt I’m old enough to start doing so now," Laz said, making a joke.
"Nah. No. It ain’t that. She’s.... different...." Vera said, as thought struggling on how to word her response.
"She’s small like a kid with a sweet smile. But that’s just the mask she wears. She ain’t big. She ain’t imposing, but bad things happen to people around her. And they don’t remember shit afterword," the grizzled woman spoke up again interrupting her meal.
"This girl right here was a victim once so it’s hard for her to talk about. But I wasn’t cause I believed those stories the older guards told. So now I’ll tell you what they told me. Stay the fuck away from that girl unless you have to. She don’t cause no shit if you do yourself right and follow the rules. But cross her and she guns for you. I know those fuckers up in their ivory tower be saying they can’t be using their power with them chokers on, but I’ll tell you right here, right now. Don’t go believing you’re safe cause of that. Stick to your pair and make sure you keep your eyes out," the grizzled woman said before picking up her tray and throwing away the rest of her meal. She then left without looking back.
Laz turned to look over to Vera who, for the first time today, looked both a little shy and a little skittish. It wasn’t something he had seen before.
Laz kind of wanted to know, but he wasn’t going to ask. If she want to tell him, she would. Until then he would just keep the woman’s advice and not go looking for trouble, not that he was here for that anyway.
The rest of the day went without a hitch. Laz had scanned almost the entire area top to bottom during his rounds again and again, improving his ability to read such detailed information in a moments notice. He was able to discover weapons stashed away in prisoner’s bunks although he didn’t expose them, caught some activity in the kitchen and swore to never try the meat loaf, even though the food they had was different from the the prisoners ate. He even caught some of the women getting it on with each other in camera blind spots, attesting to just how much the prisoners were paying attention to security.
The thing he watched the most though was the group of the cult members, although he only did so at a distance. He wasn’t sure how much the collars interfered with something like spiritual sense, but if one of the women had that ability, they would have noticed close observation right away. Instead, he just watched them go about their business.
There were two things that stood out. One, the number of people wearing those masks in the entire facility was much larger than he thought. Considering each block had around a hundred prisoners, almost twenty percent of each block had cult members. The other surprising thing was that they would met in their groups and talk, but sometimes they would just be listening while nodding, even though no one was moving their mouths.
’It’s almost like someone is talking to them through telepathy?’ It wasn’t surprising since Laz could do it, but it required a pretty powerful spiritual sense. Especially because the person who was communicating with them would do so to all five groups at once.
Laz was leaning against the fence in the yard during B blocks time, Vera having been called away by their boss.
As he stood there and looked out over the crowd, he noticed a movement coming from his side, but sensing the person moving towards him, Laz didn’t bother stopping her.
Her hair was buzzed on the sides like a fade with the top being long enough to pull into two pig tails which was how she currently had it styled. The hair itself was a light blonde while her face looked no older than a child’s. As for the body behind the orange jump suit, it was hard to tell there were any curves there, adding to the image of her youth. If Laz hadn’t known there was another facility for girls under the age of sixteen, he would had thought she was maybe twelve or thirteen at most.
"Hi mister guard. You’re looking pretty lonely here all by yourself. Would you mind if I joined you?" She said, her voice an almost sickly sweet that made one think about candy and rainbows.
Laz had to admit that he was amused, but not in the way another man would be. Instead, he could feel the tendrils of energy coming off from her, so faint that they were almost invisible even to him.
For only a moment, Laz wondered if her collar wasn’t working, but then figured out that the amount of energy she was using was so little, the collar itself wouldn’t detect it. After all, every women here had some slight energy coming off of them, the difference was that she could control it while for them, it was no different than a few hairs falling out.
Of course those tendrils of energy were wrapping around his arm and sneaking up, looking for purchase inside his body. Had he not noticed them, they would have taken him without him ever knowing what had happened. Or at least they would have been a danger to someone other than him. Laz could feel that even if they came in, they wouldn’t be able to cause him harm, even if he didn’t burn them away with the black flame.
"I’m working," Laz said, giving a reply that was neither offensive nor defensive. After all, he wasn’t suppose to be chatting away with the prisoners.
"That’s ok. I just need somewhere to sit. My feet are tired after all and there is no other free spot besides the grass."
Laz didn’t respond, instead looking around as though keeping a focused.
"I’m sorry, I know I must be bothering you. See, I don’t have any friends and although I just got here, I was hoping I could make at least one," the mysterious girl said, almost like she was a scared new kid.
Laz had to contain his laugh.
"Maybe... Maybe you can be my friend? And maybe my big brother? Some of these old hags are super mean and I don’t want everyone talking about me. I’m scare of them big brother..." The girl looked almost in tears as she finished saying what she said. It looked like she would run into his arms the moment he said yes not that he would be that stupid.
Laz had to admit, if he hadn’t known this was an act from the beginning, he would have probably fallen for her trick if only because of how pitiful she looked.
The tendrils had almost gotten inside Laz’s nose when he took a step forward away from the fence and startled her so much she lost control.
"I’m sorry, I must get back to work," Laz said before walking away, quick to hide his smile.
’She must be going nuts right now,’ Laz thought to himself as he kept walking.
Behind him, the happy face youth’s smile quickly turned into a frown.
’You’re not getting away you bastard. I will drag you through hell if I have to," Mercy said, with more than just malice in her voice.
