From the Chrysalis: a novel

by Karen E. Black

  “Look out!” Dace said.

  Steve wasn’t listening. He shrugged, rolling his eyes at the hostages. “They’ll wear themselves out soon.” Then his eyes bugged out when two hands wrapped around his neck.

  “It’s Bellissimo!” Alf shouted. “Little bastard snuck up the stairs.”

  Steve’s homemade truncheon had rolled to the floor but somehow he kept his balance, perhaps because his assailant was twice his age and half his size. Dace, who had been diverted both by the vibrating door of the hostages’ room and the scene developing in the Dome below, sprang forward just in time.

  “Let go, Bellissimo,” he whispered in the clinging little man’s ear. Bellissimo wasn’t strong, but he had the advantage of being crazy enough to stop at nothing that got in his way. Homemade toothbrush shanks were his speciality. He had already killed two men in the communal shower; a seam-sized shank had been slipped between their ribs at an enemy’s request and nobody had ever been the wiser.

  “Whose side you guys on?” Belissimo yipped, his hold relaxing slightly, although Steve was still coughing, his face turning purple. “I’m just gonna get me one of those mother fuckin’ chicken-shit guards and have me a little fun.”

  “The same kind of fun they have with you, right?” Dace guessed, and as Bellissimo let go of Steve, both men nodded imperceptibly. “Well, see if you can get this, you dirty skinner. I haven’t got all day to explain it to you. There’s no teenyboppers here for you to ream,” Dace said, staring into his opponent’s eyes. “You got that? So keep your hands off our fucking hostages, okay? If you don’t, we’ll all be furniture dust before we know it.”

  Bellissimo ducked under Dace’s right arm. In a reflex motion, Dace’s arm shot out and the little assailant was suddenly flailing, his arms and legs reaching as he fell backwards down the stairs.

  Staring down into the dark abyss, Dace shouted, “Are you okay?”

  There was no response, so they kept squinting down, waiting. Gradually they made out Bellissimo, lying at the foot of the stairs. He was alive, just too ornery to answer.

  “Fuck. Nothing’s gonna kill that little snake,” Steve swore as his assailant struggled to his feet.

  By now there was so much noise coming from the Dome they almost couldn’t hear Bellissimo. There was nothing wrong with Bellissimo’s voice box, though. “You broke something, Debo!” he screeched up at them, rubbing his jaw. “You’re gonna pay for this, you and your little bum boy!”

  Chapter 17

  Only Women Bleed

  Who is the third who walks always beside you?

  When I count, there are only you and I together

  But when I look ahead, up the white road

  There is always another one walking beside you,

  Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded

  I do not know whether a man or a woman

  But who is that on the other side of you?

  *[ Eliot, T.S., The Waste Land, 1922]

  Maitland University, September 6-7, 1971:

  Alternating between the penitentiary and the university, Liza reverted to the girl she had always been, one who’d lived on two continents in two different households, one who had always been torn between two lives. She even amazed herself, she had so much energy. Complete strangers were drawn to her, a girl with wild, unbraided hair who got by on four hours of sleep. She didn’t even need to eat, really. She snacked on chocolate bars instead, and still she glowed. In her heart, she knew she had been born for this. Born to rescue somebody, born to get Dace out. But how?

  The only person she’d confided in was Mel, but he really didn’t have any idea either. And though he hadn’t known her long enough to say so, he was plainly tired of the whole drama. She knew by the glazed look in his eyes that he wanted to pull back, to be the safe, small-town boy he had been before they’d met. For him, it was one thing after another.

  He couldn’t though, just pull back. Because if he did, she might, and he wanted her. Wanted her in the worst way. She knew that. Before she’d come along, he’d had a couple of one night stands, just a couple of rolls in the hay. Liza had tried to diffuse some of his fascination with her by telling him everything about Tony in Dublin, but he didn’t care. If anything, it made him want her more. He prepared for his Science classes during the day and although they were both too young to drink beer at the local pub in the evenings, she hung out with him in his MG late at night, listening to Blood, Sweat and Tears. It was the only place near the residence that was truly private

  “I’m not sure I care for your taste in music, girl,” he said. They’d just been listening to Some Sympathy for the Devil for the third time.

  “It suits my mood,” she replied. “I’m so frustrated. I wish there was something I could do. It’s driving me crazy, sitting here, waiting for some official to feed the reporters their stupid lines.” The Maitland Spectator had interviewed all the family members of the hostages then reported that days might pass before anybody discovered the “full extent of the horror” behind the penitentiary walls.

  “Hmm. Maybe it’s not such a good idea to keep carrying that plaque. You don’t want to draw too much heat.”

  “But I have to do something!”

  “Well, you can’t crawl inside the Pen,” Mel reasoned. “Your cousin sounds like a tough dude. He can take care of himself. He’ll be all right.” The high-rise student residence loomed over them in loco parentis, doing a poor job. Many of its windows were still aglow at nearly 4:00 a.m.

  Liza and Mel were sharing a joint. Neither of them had ever smoked pot before, but he was a small-town boy who had come well equipped to a big town university, albeit through his mother’s efforts. Apparently he had enough quarters to wash eight months worth of jeans and underwear, and sufficient condoms to equip his entire dormitory floor. His mother, he’d told her, was determined that an early marriage would not snuff out a promising medical career, as it had for his older brother.

  “You have to suck it into your lungs and hold it there,” he advised, apparently pleased to be teaching her something she didn’t already know. Maybe, he thought, he could teach her how to drive a car, too.

  “I feel shivery!”

  “It’s working,” he promised. His arms wrapped around her in the front seat and he held the sweet smelling cigarette to her lips while his other hand slipped to her breast. “But you gotta relax.”

  “I can’t,” she said, staring out the window. They were less than two hundred yards from their student residence. A stream flowed to the left, lazy at this time of year, belying its reputation for claiming several young lives every spring.

  “Yes, you can,” he insisted. His hand slipped lower and slid over her hip bone. These days Liza was thin almost to the point of emaciation. Her hip bones jutted from her sides and sharp angles planed her face. “You gotta eat,” he kept saying.

  After losing several pounds she could ill-afford to lose, she probably should have lost his interest, except he was inexplicably and thoroughly intrigued. He had never met anyone like her before, and her jailbird cousin, well, he was in prison! Of course she was concerned about him. She was a woman, or almost one, after all. His mother, who read Betty Friedan and was prone to saying, Only women bleed, wore her own heart on her sleeve. He was still a little hard-pressed to understand why Liza was even slightly interested in this convict, who was probably disfigured with tattoos and stupider than Curly, Larry and Moe combined. But that was a woman for you, and he liked her that way.

  In the mood for some softer music, Mel yanked Blood, Sweat and Tears from his tape deck with his free hand. The car radio blared.

  “One man is confirmed dead and another is close to dying after the worst riot in Maitland Penitentiary history,” the announcer said, practically salivating. “The bodies of Robin Blake, 42, and Jake Jacko, 37, both convicted child-killers, were discovered early this morning. No details have been released, although there are unconfirmed reports that both men were tortured. The guard hostage
s, who many had feared dead, have all been released unharmed. All prison staff and inmates are now accounted for.”

  Liza sat up so abruptly that Mel’s arms fell to his sides. He looked momentarily bereft.

  “He’s alive,” she said, her voice soft with awe.

  “Yeah, well, sure. I told you he’d be all right.”

  “But if he took the guards hostages …”

  “He’s dead meat. Put yourself in their shoes.”

  Her face fell and her chin began to wobble. A tear trickled from the corner of one eye. “But why would he take them? He was getting out in a couple of months! Anyway, the hostages are alive, aren’t they?”

  “But at least two guys are dead. Well, they’re perverts, so I’m not sure how much that matters,” Mel said hastily, taking a final draw on his stubby roach.

  “Some comfort you are!”

  “Well, c’mon. If this Dace guy hadn’t been there in the first place … What did he do anyway?” he asked again.

  “I can’t say. It’s not my story to tell. Not to you, anyway. Oh, I’m sorry. I don’t mean it like that. Dace, it’s just, well, he’s difficult to explain.”

  “Liza, what are you doing scrunched up over there and halfway out the door?”

  “You don’t know what he’s like.”

  “Look, I’m sure your cousin is a swell guy, and it’s really great that he’s all right. Maybe when he gets out we can get together and have a beer or something.”

  “A beer?” Liza was laughing now as well as crying, although she didn’t have the slightest clue why. The idea of Dace and Mel having a beer together was instantly hilarious, though. She could almost picture it: Dace’s reddish head, Mel’s curly one, both bent over a little wooden pub table. What would they talk about? Not her! What did men talk about when they were out together, anyway? Sports? Politics? She had never seen Tony interact with other men, and her father rarely. He and she had both been loners and when she left home, her brothers had been too young for any real talking.

  “That’s very magnanimous of you,” she allowed, then relaxed a bit as her relief that the riot was over slowly seeped through her veins.

  “We start classes Monday. You’ve gotta start thinking about yourself, girl. My guess is they won’t let outsiders into the Pen for a long time, anyway. You must’ve lost five pounds since I met you last week. Look how baggy your pants are.” He tugged demonstratively on her jeans, looking at her through the dilated pupils of his hazel eyes.

  “Oh, Mel, I’m sorry, but I can’t stay,” Liza murmured, starting to feel slightly nauseated even before the effects of the marijuana had worn off. Dace was alive, but something was wrong. She could feel it in her bones. And now the penitentiary was going to be shut tight. How many weeks until she heard from him again? How long before he confirmed the role he had played? Great God in heaven, what was happening to him right now?

  Chapter 18

  After Hell Broke Loose

  Riot Ends at Maitland Penitentiary

  1 dead, 11 injured. One prisoner was found dead and 11 others injured, apparently at the hands of their fellow inmates, as more than 500 inmates ended their rebellion at Maitland Penitentiary. The convicts capitulated after the federal government refused to bargain with them. All six hostages were released unharmed. A spokesman for the Solicitor-General said he didn’t know the reason for the last minute violence, but some of the injured are believed to be informers and child molesters.

  *[ Maitland Spectator, Sep 10, 1971, p.1.]

  Maitland Supermax, September 1971:

  “Get the fuck up,” the voice said.

  At first he thought it was the broken bell ringing, but it was just his ears. A plastic glass rolled into the black void under his cot, clipped the cinder block wall and stopped. He’d put the empty glass down on the floor when he’d first arrived, so thirsty he could have drank the toilet water. For some reason he was afraid to open his eyes, so when he did, it was just a crack. Fuck. What did they want with him anyway?

  The sudden sense of déjà vu was almost too much to bear, not that these guys resembled Loony Tunes or his henchmen in the least. For one thing, they were dressed in full riot gear: black leather clothes and helmets with shiny visors. For another, they all had guns. Machine guns, in fact. Yep, this was a goon squad, the real McCoy.

  What the hell? he thought, frowning with the irritability of the sleep-deprived. The riot was over and his, no the hostages were safe. People had shaken his hand. Was that before or after they had run the gauntlet? Forget it. No point in thinking about that now.

  “Go away,” he said, covering his face with a pillow. He had never been so tired, not even when he was a teenager and the heat was up his ass.

  “Get the fuck up, Debrex,” a helmet growled again, the overhead light bouncing off his visor. A second helmet booted the bottom of Dace’s cot, happy to help. Groaning, Dace slid to his bare feet just as one leg of his bed collapsed.

  “And if I don’t want to?” he hedged, eyeing the open cell door. Yeah, right, as if he could just go. There were six of them and one of him. He had no idea of the building’s layout. He had been bussed here about ten hours earlier and had been sleeping ever since.

  “Get moving,” the lead guy said again, motioning everybody into the hall.

  “At your service,” Dace said, mentally adding fucking space cadets as he followed them to a staircase at the end of the corridor. Not that he had an option. Two guards brought up the rear, their black jacks aimed at his kidneys.

  “You guys showing me the way to the breakfast room or what?” he inquired blandly.

  “Or what,” the spokesman said, then snorted. When they reached the landing halfway down the staircase, a pair of grey mechanic’s coveralls smacked him in the face. His eyes watered.

  “Crybaby,” the spokesman goaded him. “Not such a big man now, are you?”

  Chicken shits. Mother fucking … He looked down, half-expecting all the obscenities in his head to spill out onto the floor.

  “You want me to put this on,” he guessed. He stood on the landing of a staircase so new, he probably could have gotten high on the smell of fresh paint if he’d tried.

  “You supposed to have a high I.Q., ain’t ya? I’ll bet you think you’re pretty smart, don’tcha?” the guy speculated. Dace doffed his pants and ripped the shirt over his head so fast that several brass buttons popped off and rolled downstairs.

  A considerate bunch, they waited until he got the overalls halfway on before they started hammering him. The first blow to his head almost knocked him down. Blood dripped into his eyes as he crashed into the wall.

  “It’s just a head wound,” one of them said helpfully. “Those suckers always bleed a lot.”

  And, “This is for our buddies,” the rest of them grunted, until he was curled up on the landing with his arms raised to protect his face.

  But when they hauled him up, dragged him downstairs to the next landing and started beating him again, he’d had enough. Jesus fucking Christ. He hadn’t gone through a goddamn riot just to lie down and die. He got in several well-placed kicks before they’d even realized what was going on.

  A wake-up bell clanged somewhere. One bull was doubled over, protecting his genitals when his buddies lost interest, yanked Dace by the straps of his overalls and tossed him like a bag of garbage through the first open door.

  “We’ll be back,” they promised in unison, scattering like the cockroaches they were.

  Dace examined his new surroundings, starting at the bottom of the room. At first he couldn’t see much, especially with both his eyes swelling shut. Judging from the pain, some ribs had just been cracked, but a careful inspection of his skull revealed that his brain was still intact. That was all that mattered. Saliva drooled from his busted mouth onto the clean cement floor, but he didn’t pay any attention until a molar followed, square, almost perfect in the low light. He tried to plug it back into his mouth, but his fingers didn’t work.

 
This cell was like all the ones he’d occupied before, except there were no bars, just an electronically locked door with a slot big enough to accept a tray. There was also a sink and a concrete slab bed. It took a while to figure out where the toilet was, then he saw the hole in the floor.

  The bed looked good. Craftily, he calculated how long it would take to crawl to the plywood mattress. His mind had slowed, so the calculation took a long time, but the crawling took longer still.

  He also had trouble retrieving words. Sega … ciga … until the words segregation and disassociation came to mind. New names, old places. Also known as Solitary or the Hole. At first he startled at the slightest noise, then his eyes rolled back into his head, not caring anymore.

  Late afternoon light filtered through the slot in the door where he would get his meals. If they fed him. And his mail. If they let him. His mail, his Liza letters. His … his … he drifted into dreams.

  He lay on a bosomy, floral couch, its cushions warm and soft. A dark-haired girl pulled a down comforter over his chest, drawing it closer to his stubble-covered chin, but before it reached his face, his teeth exploded into his brain.

  They shouldn’t have. He was going to live forever. He was a young man. There was still time to make things right.

  Chapter 19

  Cold Storage

  Prisoners Turn on Their Own Kind

  Battered convicts told how hundreds of prisoners screamed for blood as the last night of the riot turned into a torture session. The victims were fellow prisoners, stool pigeons and sexual offenders. They were tied in chairs around a radiator. Three teams of five men took turns beating them for hours. The beatings ended when the soldiers arrived, but it was too late for one man. The dead man was found under a mattress. *[Maitland Spectator, September 10, 1971, p.4]

  Maitland Supermax, sometime in September 1971: