2020-04-14 - spike - Trapped again Part fifteen

Author: spike
Title: Trapped again. Part fifteen.
Date: 14 April 2020

Eric placed the bowl in the food station and paused. A grin spread across his face and he examined the bed properly for the first time.

It wasn’t attached to the floor. It was movable, so, he moved it. Only by half an inch but that would be enough.

Holding the bed frame with his chipped hand, he shifted and took a step.

“Pssst! Eric!”

His other self span in the chair and stared at himself in shock. “What the hell are you doing! You’ll set off every alarm back there!”

“Look at my hand.”

He smiled and nodded. “What hand? Clever, so, you’re doing the vanishing hand trick in reverse? Move yourself here but leave it behind?”

“First, how are you handling it?”

He sighed. “I like it, I admit it. Well, a lot of it. I’ll be content to serve however long they force me to, now. Still pissed off I’m going to miss Christmas and that bloody course though.”

“I’ve got over that. Something important cropped up.”

“More important than getting home?”

“Certainly more important than me, yeah. You’ve not met him yet?”

“Who?”

“Remove your tunic, Eric. I’m out of view of the screen, but seeing you in black’ll only spook him.”

Eric removed his tunic and tossed it into the laundry chute.

“Now, look at the screen. Cell, contact cell one dash forty-seven.”

Philip was at the table, drinking a glass of water when he appeared. He jumped at the intrusion.

Eric stared. “Oh, fuck! Y… Your majesty?” he stared at Eric. “What the hell?”

“Stop mocking me! I’ve had enough. Enough! Cell, end communication!”

The screen blanked.

“I got through to him, but he was in a bad way. They believed his claims of royalty were a delusion. Their attempt to cure him resulted in them forcing a false identity onto him. John Smith. Speak to Conrad, tell him to look at the coins in your wallet. The police imaged everything you were carrying. Then tell him to look at the man in cell one dash forty-seven. You’ll have to explain to Philip what’s happening. He’s in a confused state right now and talking to him the next day’s like hitting a reset button. He won’t remember you. Best bet, the thing that got through to him first was a description of his journey here. Then reel off a few names to him. Ask him to name their ranks. Drummond, Asquith, Jennings, Ferguson. You get the idea. Just to clinch it, he met his wife at ladies day at Ascot, something that obviously doesn’t exist here. She won a bet on a horse because her sister’s name was part of it. Sophia’s Secret.”

“But… How? He wasn’t anywhere near the hotel when the bomb went off.”

“I’ve been thinking about that. The world he was in may not be ours. It did reach Edward’s world after all. Hell, it stretched further than that. He could be from any one of them and we weren’t in ours when it went off anyway. I’d stumbled a few steps down the corridor when it did and we know the effect was attenuated the further from ground zero we got in that direction.”

“Bloody good thought. I’ll do it now. Cell, contact doctor Conrad.”

The doctor appeared with a smile. “Unknown. How’s life treating you?”

Eric sighed. “Lonely, sir. As you suggested it might be but that’s not why I called.”

“Oh?”

“Problem, sir. I’ve jus… Well, I say just… He’s still here. He thought it was urgent enough to tell me.”

“You? That other one who appeared in the governor’s office?”

“Yes, sir. He’s using the same trick I pulled in the medical bay but in reverse, sir. His hand stays in his world, the rest of him vanishes.”

“Ingenious. What is this urgent matter?”

“Call up the images of the contents of my wallet, sir. That’s the first thing. Look at the coins, the older ones in particular. He’d been on the throne for over twenty-six years by the time that bomb went off.”

“Very well… Computer. Prisoner 50095223’s wallet contents. Show me the coins… So… That’s what your King Henry looks like.”

Eric chuckled to himself off-screen. “That’s exactly what you said when I suggested it. Older coins, though, sir. At least three years old, sir.”

“That face…”

“Looks familiar?”

“I can’t place him.”

“I can. And he’s here, sir. The treatments they’re forcing on him are reducing him to shell of a man! John Smith, sir. One dash forty-seven. He was telling the truth. He is king… Or rather, was. That’s why I popped over. He deserves better than this. He’s an intelligent man, not this coward called Smith. Tell them to stop! Eric can handle the rest.”

The doctor gulped. “Shit! He was...”

“It wasn’t a delusion. That’s what they’re trying to cure, but can you cure someone of being themselves?”

“I’ll see to it. Don’t worry.”

“Thanks. Now, what did you mean, Eric? Lonely? The blacks aren’t that bad. Getting on quite well with ‘em. Even made friends with a couple of greys.”

“They tried to get me banged up in eight! Fuck the lot of ‘em!”

Eric sighed. “It’s a tradition, me! Every single one of them had the same!”

“How are they still here, then?”

“Simple. How am I still here? I passed the test. I their eyes, anyone so cowardly or stupid they’d condemn themselves to eight just because a complete stranger told them to punch someone… They deserve it. Even the old git, Howard passed that test and he was sent down in ninety-five! They’ve been doing it at least that long. As I said, a tradition, like the line crossing Diah went through. When they ordered me to punch him in the head, I threatened to stand on the table and yell all blacks are powerless.” Eric chuckled. “Scared the shit out of them, but gained their respect.”

“And the greys? None of them’ll even look at me!”

“I was hoping you might’ve had the same idea I had. Doc, could you ask the governor to edit the arrest video, cut it in half and broadcast the arrest speech onward and interrogation? It’ll show the greys he’s not scary. Just fucked over. And Eric…”

“Yeah?”

“Let your training out in the gym. I’m the trainer’s assistant in there now, when I’m not getting visitors, learning the flute or working on clearing up the workshops in preparation for the woodwork lessons.”

“Flute?”

“If there’s still a place, sign up. It’ll help fill your time. And read up on the game Gravia. The blacks all play it and it looks good. Get on with them, Eric. And tell them about your anger management techniques when you’re in the gym, where they can use it. You’ll have a lot of friends in no time.”

He sagged into the chair and sighed. “How can things be so different? It’s only been a couple of days.”

“Simple. You didn’t get the idea to show all the prisoners your arrest. You might need to come up with a story for the blacks though. I came up with inventing a drone scanner coupled with killing a bloke who caused the death of my dad. Got them on my side quick enough. You also got turned off the blacks cos of that punch to the head threat. You know they can’t touch you and threats to friends and family are meaningless.”

“And the flute?”

“I looked it up on my first night here, saw there was a space and thought, what the hell? Even if I am still learning in twenty years, it’ll pass the time. No way out once you’ve signed up though. Well, only one, and that’s your release, but trust me, you’re already ahead of the rest of the class. Most of them are thick as pig shit. Spoiled rotten on the out by access to computers that do their remembering for them. None of them even knew what a minim was and probably won’t be able to name it three lessons in.”

“Thanks, me. I was getting a bit itchy, not having anyone to talk to. What’s with the bruise though. Don’t tell me someone”

“Attacked me? Yes, but god, was it worth it?”

“Who?”

“Medeline. Take it you’ve not met her yet, then?”

“I’ve been saving that one up for when I get really bored. Something to look forward to. Why was it worth it?”

Eric chuckled. “She was grey seven.”

“Was?”

“What happens when we get violent? Grey sevens have a similar threat hanging over them… Demotion to black, which, she now is. The punch didn’t even hurt, even if it did leave a bruise. When you’ve been in the ring against Edward, I doubt any punch would.”

“How did you get her to react like that?”

“I contacted her first on here. Let slip I had a mission but she’d never know when or how… She thought I was here to take her down. Got a bit of a self control issue, so when she saw me in person in the gym and wearing black, she realised I couldn’t touch her. When I said I don’t need to touch you to make you suffer… Wham. Well funny.”

Eric grinned. “Thanks, me. Keep me updated?”

“I will… Well, I will as long as you’re only an arms reach away. Beyond that, not until I’m out.”

“God… I hope I’m not here that long!”

“Never know. That’s why I’m filling my time. Oh, and take the doctor’s advice. Apart from short term words like tomorrow, morning and afternoon, forget time. I have and I’ve given up on any idea of getting out before February. Best way to deal with it. Doesn’t matter how long we’re in after that. Just enjoy it while it lasts. One day at a time.”

Eric nodded.

“Good. Best be off. The music teacher had a cracking idea. Something you might like too. Something we’ve never done with wood. Instruments. Making them, that is. Got some reading to do.”

Eric drifted back to find a face staring out of the screen. A muttered “shit”, he dropped to the floor, crawled onto the bed and relaxed.

“Unknown!”

He groaned and sat up. “What… Oh. Sorry, must’ve nodded off. It was a big day for me, getting a visitor and a punch in the mush.” He chuckled and moved over to the chair. “How can I help?”

“You were sleeping?”

“I’ve done my revision. I identified where I’d gone wrong in the last test. I don’t have anything to worry about. You’re one of the ten percenters, aren’t you?”

His head sagged and he nodded. “I lost dessert and telop choices over this!”

“If you don’t improve you’ll even lose the class itself, you realise that?”

His eyes brightened. “You think I can”

Eric held up his hand. “Don’t fail deliberately. You know what he said. Next time, it’s not loss of individual privileges, it’s demerits and the minimum number of them is five. Five weeks without anything. You can guarantee the moment you get the self-improvement one back, it’ll be back in there to start it all over again. He said there’s no way out.”

He stared at Eric in horror.

“Look… Why is it so hard for you? Is it the same as Greuder? Daydreaming the class away? Letting everything wash over you without any of it sticking?”

He nodded.

“And have you read the book?”

“I’ve tried, but it’s just so bloody boring!”

“Well grit your teeth and read it again. And again. And again until it sticks!”

“I just don’t see the point! Why bother with all this musical notation stuff, we’re meant to be learning the bloody flute!”

Eric sighed. “Cell, can you bring up the score of Beethoven’s fourth symphony? First movement?”

The screen split. Eric studied it and nodded. “Send it to the other end of this connection.” He looked the prisoner in the eye. “Now, look at that! The very top staff of that page is flute. It’ll be the same throughout, flute at the top.”

“But...” He leaned in to study it. “But there’s nothing there! It’s just rests!”

“How long?”

“Errr…” Eric began to see the cogs turning. “It’s… It’s a semibreve rest?”

“Finally, something sunk in. But look at the rest of the page. All the other instruments have something to do. Are you starting to understand now? Every instrument in an orchestra has to be in perfect synchronisation. That’s what sheet music does! The flutes aren’t needed just yet, so they wait. They wait for the entire page, while the clarinet and others do all the work. Think the violins do most of it in classical. Cell, next page.”

The page changed and there, the second bar of it. Flute. Eric pointed. “See? They wait, but it’s not that long. They play the next few bars and then wait again.”

His eyes widened. “Oh shit…. That looks complicated!”

“That’s why you need to learn how to study.”

“But… How can you play more than one note at once?”

“No idea. It’ll be interesting to find out. I don’t think you can. That line isn’t just for one flute player, y’know. It’s for a few in the woodwind section. I imagine they decide amongst themselves who plays what note. We’ll probably get individual sheet music until we’re good enough. I wouldn’t worry. Something that complicated’s a long way off. It is for an orchestra and we won’t be playing in one of them for the first few grades. When we are, you might actually have learned to enjoy it. I intend to. How long was your sentence?”

“Five.”

“I won’t ask how much longer, I know you’ve got no idea. You might be in that orchestra by then. Might even be a good one. Might even get a little fame out of it.” Eric chuckled. “You could even apply to be in one outside. I think they pay well.”

His eyes widened even further, in horror. He shook his head.

“You’ve been doing this now for four lessons. It’s new, I understand, but everything’s difficult at the start. Were you always one to give up on anything you didn’t get straight away? Do you think anyone in the world ever accomplished anything with that attitude?”

“That’s why I’m in here.”

“Well, it’s time to break the cycle. Learn to learn. Read those two chapters, then read them again and again. Don’t allow yourself to drift. Concentrate on it. The best way to get something is through repetition. Understanding can come later. And when you do understand, everything suddenly becomes a hell of a lot easier. You just have to get over that first bump in the road.”

“Thanks… I think. How can you be so good at picking this stuff up?”

“Upbringing probably. My parents understood the need for a little self-control, self-discipline and focus in their lives. They spent a lot of it living in the Canadian wilderness following Grizzly bears. I wasn’t allowed access to a computer until I was seven, and that was only because the school insisted. My mum and dad didn’t want me to see one until I was ten.”

“Shitting blood, why!”

“Because they’d seen the damage they can do. Look at yourself. Your reliance on computers to do every single little thing for you… It’s rendered you helpless. Dump you in a place with zero technology and you’d be dead in a day. I could survive that indefinitely.”

“Zero tech?”

“OK… No electronics then. A knife, cooking pan, water bottle, fire lighter, snare, catapult and a few stones… That’s all I’d need.”

“What’s a snare?”

“A loop of wire. Place it over the hole in the ground where something lives, it catches it.” Eric grinned and stared him in the face. “So you can eat it. There’s nothing like a good rabbit stew.”

“You… You eat flesh?”

“And God does it taste good.”

“But… It’s illegal to keep animals for food.”

“Rabbits… wild rabbits. Not domesticated ones. And before you say that’s disgusting, they eat valuable crops. Farmers are grateful when someone offers to rid them of a few rabbits. They’re a pest, but a very yummy one. The point is, I have a good attention span because I didn’t rely on the computer to do everything. I don’t need one. You need to get over that dependency and the best way to do that… Read.”

“I suppose I’d better get on with it.”

“Before you do, just listen. Cell, play Beethoven’s fourth, first movement.”

Whether there were any differences between it and the fifth from his world, Eric had no idea. All the bits he was familiar with were the same, but that wasn’t much.

It came to an end.

“Now.” Eric smiled. “Tell me you don’t want to learn how to do that.”

The grey smiled and took a deep breath. “Repeat, repeat and repeat some more. I’ll try my best. Cell, end comms.”
* * *
All twelve of them awaited him in the gym the next morning.

He sighed. “OK. We’re not all here but I suppose I should activate.”

Col looked down the line and shrugged. “Not all…?”

“We’ve got a newbie… Fresh from wearing grey seven, remember. Well… The guard said she’d be promoted yesterday.” Eric smirked. “Let’s all give her a round of applause. Somehow I doubt the punch in the head threat’ll work with her when she’s free to join us on the floor considering that’s what got her the black in the first place.”

“Ahh, shit. Best part of getting a new one. Seeing how they react.” Col shrugged. “Oh well, we could always get one of the greys to give her a chocolate bar or something. As a commiseration. I’m so sorry…”

“Interesting… For her, I wholly approve.”

Howard glanced at the door. ”As for activation, wait.”

“Why?”

“Prison regs. It’s why we can’t get going straight off without an instructor present. The gym needs supervision. If she doesn’t turn up soon, you might need to go out and look for her, or at least get a guard to drag her here.”

Eric sighed. “OK. I’ll give her a couple more minutes. I think I can estimate that amount of time quite easily. If she’s not here by then, I’ll check to see if she’s loitering by the tables. Doubt she’s still in her cell. I always get kicked out during inspection and the guard doing it should’ve ordered her down here.”

“If the guard knows where she’s meant to be, maybe. The cell would’ve told her otherwise.”

Eric nodded and started to count in his head… sixty… one-twenty… When he got to three hundred he sighed. “Right. I’ll check the floor. Wait here.”

Back down the corridor, into the communal area… It only took a glance to spot her. She sat at a table in the middle and god, she stuck out like a sore thumb. All the greys gave her a wide berth leaving that familiar halo of empty tables around her.

He marched up to her. “Gym. Now!”

“Or what? You can’t touch me.”

“Oh… I thought I told you already, I don’t need to bloody well touch you.” He studied the other tables, smiled, and marched to the other end of the room.

“Cerol… Got a favour.”

“Go on.”

Eric pointed. “She’s refusing to go to the gym. Drag her there. Trust me, she can’t hurt you. She’s already suffered the harshest punishment a grey seven can suffer after punching me in the face. She’s black now. One more infraction like that and she knows what’ll happen.”

“Why can’t you do it?”

“I don’t know if it’s the same here as back home, but… She’s a woman. You’re a woman. If I dragged her kicking and screaming to the gym she could accuse me of all manner of things. Men do not hit women… Well, the ones who do are cowards and utter scum. You look strong enough to handle ‘er. No hitting though.”

“I got a warning for that knee to the groin…”

“I’ll explain to the instructor when he arrives. I think he’s reasonable enough to let that slide. He’ll stand up for you.”

“What’s her story? Why did she hit you?”

Eric grinned. “She’s a retro. I’ve met her before and let’s just say, she and I did not get on… She tried to force me at gunpoint to work for her. It didn’t end well for her. In fact, what she did that day led to her arrest and she blames me.”

“In that case…” Cerol stood with a grin. “Let’s do this. I bloody loath retros.”

They both made their way back to Medeline.

Eric leaned in, again with his hands clasped behind his back. He growled in her ear. “One last chance. Gym, now!”

“Oh shit on you, you idiot! I’ve already been punished worse than you can imagine!”

“Worse than I can imagine!? What the fuck do you think I’m wearing! I know what the worst punishment is and now you face it too. Now up!”

“Make me!”

“OK. You asked for it, now you get it.” He stepped to the wall and watched with amusement as Cerol grabbed her under the armpits and hauled her to her feet.

“What the shit are you doing!”

“What does it look like? I’m doing him a favour and you’re going to the gym. He’s already told me you can’t touch me cos of the punishment you’ve already received so… Try it on, please. I want to see what happens if you do.”

Grabbing Medeline by her collar, Cerol lifted her until she was on her tiptoes and walked towards the gym.

“But you’re nothing but a shitty grey five! You wouldn’t dare!”

“Oh, I dare. I’m not scared of a bloody retro like you.”

Cerol frogmarched Medeline towards the gym. There was a yell from across the room and a guard ran over. “What the hell are you doing, Baxter?”

Eric stepped forward. “I asked her to help, sir. This one refused to follow my orders, sir.”

“Your orders? How can you”

“Sir, the physical training instructor made me his assistant. My job is to get all the blacks in the gym to start their workout before he arrives. She refused to go, so I recruited a friend to help out.”

The guard stepped forward and glared. He leaned in, staring Medeline down. “Is this true?”

“No!”

“Is this the time for the blacks to be in the gym?”

“No! She just grabbed me!”

“Well, I know for a fact, that it is.” He looked at Eric with amusement. “I commend you on your creativity in solving the problem. Please, continue. I’ll observe, just in case this one does lash out again. You know what happens then.”

Eric chuckled. “Thank you, sir.” He walked alongside Medeline as they continued. “God, I knew you were an idiot but this really confirms it. You’ve already lost everything and now you’re going to lose even more. For what, exactly?”

“What do you mean, more? I’ve already…”

“When I tell the instructor, what do you think’s going to happen? Hmm? You’ve got no privileges cos of your demotion to bloody black and now? I sense demerits on the horizon. And why? Pigheadedness! That’s why? The first thing you bloody learn here is to do as you’re fucking well told.”

“I refuse to obey a bloody computer!”

“Well, it looks like you’ll never earn another privilege again, then, doesn’t it? You’ll spend every hour apart from gym in that cell for the rest of your life. You’ll never see the outside again wearing black. There’s no way to go back to being grey from this. Do you really want to suffer for the rest of your life just for the principle of the thing? You respond with yes, sir, even to computers. You do exactly what you’re told no matter who or what tells you to do it! Every black knows that! Or do you want to live off noodles for the next fifty years? Nothing to drink but water? Nothing on the screens to choose from? Bored out of your skull until the day… you… die...”

Her gaze shot to him in horror.

“I assume you had the same induction we had? Never feel a breeze, smell a flower, pet a dog. Hope it’ll be for a very, very long time?”

“So?”

“So you know what being black means. You follow every single instruction that induction told you to do apart from the things that’ve been updated. The cell tells you to do something, you do it. As you have no privileges for it to take away, it will issue demerits. It’s the only punishment it has left apart from you know what! Keep resisting and it might even do that to you.”

“It… It can’t!”

“Why can’t it? You think we matter? When you were a seven, you still had an opportunity for release. Might’ve been thirty years from now but you still had a chance to see the sky again. Now, you never will. You don’t matter anymore. None of us do. Rehabilitation’s off the cards for you, it’s just punishment now.”

They reached the gym and Cerol halted, put her foot on Medeline’s backside and kicked her into it.

Eric giggled. “Thanks, Cerol. How’s the revision going, by the way?”

“I’ve got it. Don’t worry about me. It’s the rest of them who’re probably quivering in their slippers.”

“I’ll see you in class.” Eric stepped inside and swiped the panel. “Close, lock and activate.”

The moment door slid shut the rest of the blacks did just as Eric had suggested.

A round of applause.

Howard looked at her with disgust. “Well done you shitting coward! You’re one of us now and don’t even think we’ll welcome you into the fold! The number of friends I’ve lost to your kind… Retro scum like you don’t deserve any friends, so, here, you won’t get any. Not one of us, apart from Eric when he’s ordering you about in here, will ever speak to you. The greys will avoid you like the plague, we’ll make sure of that by sitting near you. You’re alone for the rest of your shitty miserable life! So get used to it.”

He turned and made his way to his first exercise. The others nodded and did the same.

Eric returned his attention to Medeline. “From now on, you report to the gym immediately after the guard dismisses you when he inspects your cell. You are nothing! And when you’re in here you bloody well do what I say until the instructor relieves me! Now get onto that fucking treadmill. Five kilometres. Go!”

She looked around in a panic, tears building in her eyes as the implications of her situation began to sink in. Defeated, she half-walked, half-slouched across the room to the target on the wall and started a half-hearted jog. Eric rubbed his hands together with a grin and followed.
* * *
Exercises completed, Eric jogged over to the instructor.

He didn’t look happy.

“Problems, sir?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. I’ve reviewed their performance and they started almost as late as when I’m here normally. They’d only been at it for ten min… A short amount of time when I arrived. Why?”

“I knew I was behind schedule, sir. That’s why I didn’t tell you at the start, sir. I wanted to get mine completed. We waited until everyone was here for a while, and I was the last of the regulars in after inspection, sir. She didn’t arrive.” He nodded at Medeline. “Just as well I knew she’d be joining us or she would’ve been locked out when you got here, sir. Col told me there has to be an instructor in the gym, so to avoid activation until she was present.”

“I see. And where was she?”

“Sitting in the communal area, sir. I went out to check, ordered her into the gym, she refused, so I called on a friend from flute class to help. Hauled her bodily into the gym. Then I locked and activated, sir.”

“You called on… But the greys are terrified of you lot.”

“I’ve given them the we’re not all monsters speech. Explained that we’re held to a much higher standard of behaviour, that our punishments are a hell of a lot more severe and as Medeline had only just suffered the most severe punishment yet, demotion to black, she wouldn’t dare lash out again. Added to that, I introduced Cerol to the blacks yesterday. She’s the one who kneed Grueder in the groin. As far as they’re concerned, she’s an honorary black after doing that, sir.”

“That’s very quick. Very good. I think that deserves a reward, don’t you? A grey helping a black. More, manhandling”

“Womanhandling, sir.”

He chuckled. “Good point. Womanhandling another black into the place she should be. Who is this prisoner?”

“I don’t know her number, sir. Cerol Baxter’s her name though, sir. If you cross-reference with members of flute one, that’s her. Just in case there’s more than one of them in the prison.”

He nodded and ushered Eric to the room he’d entered the first time to collect the tablet. A swipe of the hand, they entered. It was a small office. None of the usual things an office might contain such as filing cabinets or in trays, though. Just a small fridge, a desk and a chair.

The instructor placed his hand on the panel on the desk. “Computer, access the file of Cerol Baxter, prisoner number unknown, but she’s taking cell block three’s flute grade one.”

Her picture sprang up in mid-air along with various statistics. A swipe of the hand and her prison accounts replaced it. The instructor nodded. “I like that one. She shows she’s trying. Already earned a few from me.”

“She said herself, sir. She thought the flute class would be hard but she likes a challenge, sir. She’s the only other one who took it seriously at first, until the threats began.”

“Computer, update to this file. As this prisoner’s only two privileges short of the full set, grant them.”

The screen updated and two new privs appeared at the end of the list. Dessert and extended visitation rights.

Eric nodded at the last one. “How long does extended extend to, sir?”

“We have a few apartments here, Unknown. A chance for families to get together, for a little legal intercourse, in more ways than one, if you know what I mean. I believe they spend the weekend together. The families see it as a vacation, usually. The prisoner sees it as one of the best things that can happen to them. It’s the only chance they ever get to imbibe alcohol, too.”

“Damn… Why did you have to mention booze? I like a pint of ale once in a while,” Eric sighed. ”and I didn’t see that privilege on mine, not that there’s anyone I could call on to”

“That one, blacks don’t get. Would you want to spend the entire weekend in those restraints?”

“Oh, god, that’d be hell. Good point though.”

“You’d better be off or you’ll be late again. That delay held everyone back. Come on. I’ll give her what’s coming to her when you’re gone.”

“Damn. Wanted to see that too.”

“Well you don’t get everything you want.” The instructor swiped the door again and headed back to the gym exit, Eric following. Another swipe and Eric made his way back to his cell.