Mistaken Identity Chapter I A
So here it is, Chapter One. I posted it before and it got very very very confusing and scrambled. So here I am posting it again. Hopefully it wil be readable this time. I'll probably mess it up, I'm good like that.
Here's hoping the story is worth the headache!
Chapter I
The Distraction
See Prologue for Disclaimer and Spoiler information
The vinyl seats were held together with duct-tape, had broken springs and were sticky to the touch. The air conditioner only stirred the hot, stale air, and did absolutely nothing for the smell. The windows were barred shut for safety. Frank Jacobs kept his complaints to himself, though. Not that his silence encouraged any of the twenty teenagers from moaning, groaning and cursing. He wasn’t surprised, it wasn’t like he was taking a group of Eagle Scouts on a camping trip. His boys he would eat Scouts for dinner and have room leftover for dessert. This wasn’t a pleasure trip by any stretch of the imagination.
Frank had been working in juvenile corrections and parole for going on fifteen years. It wasn’t a job that got easier with time and experience. The kids got younger, more violent and more jaded, and there were more of them every year. The boys with him today were in danger of becoming beyond his help. Gangs, drugs, death: life was hard on the street. He knew he wasn't going to get through to all of them, or even most of them. If he could get through to one, though, the trip would be more than worth it. Ely State Prison wasn't a place most people went voluntarily, but he went four times a year. Every trip he took the boys that were on the brink of going too far. This was his last-ditch effort to save them.
Ritchie Inman, his right hand man, was trying to keep the peace and the driver ignored them completely. They were almost there, Frank checked his watch and his clipboard one more time.
They’d brought twenty kids with them on this trip. The youngest of them was thirteen and the oldest had just turned seventeen. Not a single on of them had to shave, but their rapsheets already rivaled their adult counterparts. He had white, black, Korean, Mexican, Salvadoran, and Chinese boys with difrint gang aligances with plenty to prove. It was a powder keg just waiting for a spark.
A sudden hush fell over the bus when they reached the prison gates. High walls topped with razor wire, guard towers with spot lights and guards armed with semi machine guns made everything suddenly more real. Ely State wasn't juvie and it wasn't county lockup, it was the real hardcore deal. The Prison was a massive square compound whose nucleus was cut in two by the central buildings. The sparse green patches of inmate tended grass stood out sharply against the dirt and dust of the natural desert. The prison looked neither kind nor welcoming; it was an oddity in the bleak and unforgiving landscape that lay only nine miles away from the town it took its name from.
Most of the boys were from the Las Vegas or Carson City metro-areas and were far more used to glittering lights and endless stretches of housing projects. It was the first in a series of shocks that they would have to deal with. The bus rolled through the “business” gates and Frank got ready for the long, grueling day ahead. These boys weren't visitors, and they weren't going to be treated like it. They were about to be stripped, searched, booked and given prison uniforms and identification. They would be given the same treatment and consideration as any other man in the prison. If that wasn't enough, which it usually wasn't, there were some men who were going to lay out exactly what was waiting for them. Those who thought their “boys” on the inside would take up for them were about to get a rude awakening. They all thought they would be sitting safe and sound in a big room listening to lectures and watching videos. They couldn’t be any more off base. This wasn’t going to be a spectator sport. Their parents, guardians or the state when applicable had agreed that this was their last and best hope.
The bus screeched to a halt at the Ely Prisoner Transfer Center at 10:04 am the teenage thugs, bad boys and gangbangers found that they weren’t in Vegas anymore.
The administrative wing, as the hallway of offices and meeting rooms was called, could have been located anywhere: a warehouse, a low-rent office building, or even the back-hallways and service areas of a hotel. The bars on the windows and thick steel doors were more then enough of a reminder that the offices were apart of a prison. The walls were utilarian gray and the floors were poured concrete covered by a cheap carpet. It was a somewhat overwhelming experience, especially for a job interview.
“Well, Mister Doakes, you have an excellent resume.” Ellen Powers, Assistant Warden, smiled at the man sitting on the other side of her desk. “And a wonderful letter of recommendation. Any corporation would be thrilled to have you. So you've worked at Tangiers, Circus Circus and Mandalay Bay, and now you're applying here.”
The forty-something man sighed, “I have a gambling problem, Ms. Powers. He wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead, “A very serious one, and quite frankly I almost lost my wife and daughters because of it. I need this job.” He licked his lips, “And I am willing to do whatever you need me to.”
A small part of that was, a very small part, was true. Oliver had a gambling problem, a wife and two daughters and a very big problem. He didn't need the low-level accounting job at the prison, though. The job he was already working was going to set everything right again. Then he would just stay away from temptation. No more high-stakes poker games until the crack of dawn, no more high-rollers blackjack or craps marathons. He was getting out of the grave he’d dug and he would be done once and for all.
He licked his lips again, and would swear he could hear his thundering heartbeat echo in the small room. “Despite my little problem, I have a very solid work ethic.”
A small smile crossed Powers' face, “Well, Oliver, we're all about second chances here.”
This was his second, or was it his third, chance and he couldn't mess it up. It was all business, his business, to keep his family together. He had to do this, he didn't have a choice.
Oliver's smile was wane and his handshake was a little on the clammy side. “I'm sorry, Ellen.”
She dropped his hand, “I beg your pardon?”
He looked at the clock mounted on the wall behind her desk. His family could never, ever, know about this. Heather would never forgive him and his daughters, well he had no idea what he would say to them.
“I'm really sorry about this.”
He sank his hand into his blazer pocket and tried to think of something else. The plastic box was heavy in his hand, but he brought it out quickly.
Ellen saw the taser, and recognized it immediately as several guards carried similar devices, coming at her. Training that she had hoped she’d never need kicked in and she kicked her legs and sent her chair rolling back and away from the taser. She threw up her arm to deflect it. The self-defense lessons were useless, she'd never learned how to avoid an electric shock. She took the hit to the right side of her chest and it instantly paralyzed her. The pain was overpowering it was like being stabbed with fiery needle. Her muscles jerked and jolted and her stomach lurched. It felt like she was going to throw up, cry and scream all at the same time. She couldn’t do anything, though, it hurt too much.
Oliver lowered her to the carpeted floor. “You don't understand, but I'm really sorry.”
The woman blinked up at him, confused and in pain. He could see the muscle in her cheek and neck twitch under her skin. Though she looked nothing like any of his three girls, he couldn't help but think of his wife and children.
“You'll be safe here, I promise.”
Oliver offered a weak smile to the woman's now closed eyelids. He felt like he was going to vomit. Oliver, Ollie to his friends, wasn't a violent man by nature, he reminded himself for the fifteenth time. He hadn't even spanked Tracy or Mina when they were little.
He didn't have a choice.
He sat down in Ellen's chair and it squeaked in protest. It knew what he had done to it's usual sitter. His nervous laughter at that thought echoed in the small office. He sounded a little crazy.
Oliver opened his portfolio folder back up and slid the thin USB memory stick out of it's little pocket. He almost dropped it because his hands were shaking uncontrollably. Ellen's computer sat on the desk, humming away. She had a cute kitten screen-saver, he hit the mouse to make it go away. The desktop picture, Ellen with a young man in a cap and gown, was no better. He licked his lips again and made himself focus. The cords running out of the back of the tower hooked it to the prison's main server. He plugged the USB into the easy-access slot and watched the computer recognize the device, then opened the file. Windows made everything ridiculously easy.
He looked at his watch, it had been a gift from his wife, and licked his lips again. It was almost time.