Genosha: In the Balance - Ground Rules

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

A group of the ‘terrorists’ are taken to the Citadel prison. They meet the warden, who explains the rules.

Trigger warning: Mention of disturbing content regarding a child.



The stonework of the prison courtyard resembled a castle or fort. Large and imposing, the wings of the prison towered around the courtyard, with only the hint of a blue sky in the center like an open mouth, as if the rest of the building seemed posed to swallow them whole. A few patches of grass lined the courtyard but the rest was pavement. The Magistrates chose the pavement for which to hold orientation for their newest crop of prisoners. They were not afford the luxury of a chair or even to stand, but instead made to remain on their knees.

There was a guard for every prisoner, 12 in all, surrounding the group as a hot wind blew through the courtyard. The sun beat down, relentless and unforgiving. The air was silent. A clock, mounted to the wall, marked the time before the Warden arrived.

Haller knelt in an orange jumpsuit that was too short under a sky that was too blue. All hint of affect had left his face. His eyes happened to be down, and because they were down he could see the line of ants marching past his knees as if from the other end of a telescope. Weaving past in a long, slow line. Ants carrying crumbs. Ants carrying pebbles. Ants carrying the bodies of other ants. Curled into themselves in death. Tiny corpses.

Corpses.

Far, far away he recognized the sensation of something hot and dark gathering in his chest. He shied from it, unwilling to leave the distant, unreal world he knelt in. So David Haller just watched the ants, and let the world pass around him.

Scott stared around the courtyard, trying to locate a weakness in the set up of the prison. Anything rather than focusing on the colossal failure this mission had turned into. The rough concrete rubbed against his knees as he desperately cast his mind around trying to avoid remembering, to avoid the inevitable drift of his thoughts back to that dark place. He had come to rescue the students, not to watch as....he wrenched his thoughts away again circling the edges of despair.

With practiced ease, Korvus sat back onto his feet. Despite the various randomly inflicted bruises, he didn't seem to be uncomfortable in seiza. He looked up to the podium, waiting patiently until the speaker approached. They didn't leave any other option.

The stone beneath his knees felt far less painful than he expected, and the bright sky had some promise of freedom buried high in its vibrant blue. Lex closed his eyes and basked in the glow of the day as he steadied his mind and his heart. He knew that they were likely going to spend a great deal of time locked in cramped quarters and the great blue expanse above him was about the only natural thing he was likely to see for some time. Wait, he thought to himself, the time for action will come soon enough. He purposefully avoided imagining what horrors awaited him before that time arrived.

The heat and the sun weren't doing her headache much good. Amanda knelt quietly, swaying a little as her balance faded in and out, apparently half-conscious. Her eyes however, slitted near-closed, rested on the man approaching the group and those around them. Now was the time for absorbing information, not mouthing off. Besides, her back was still killing her and she'd pissed blood the night before. Definitely no more rifle butts in the back. Still, the pain was good to focus on, better than what had gone on in that room, the sight of... Deliberately she shook her head roughly, waves of pain dispelling the image.

The sun felt good on her skin, a reminder of the world outside. That was important. Behaving was as well. While inside Clarice seethed, outside, she appeared shaken, compliant and....meek. Three words that rarely described her, but she was repeating them over and over again. They killed a child, they would not hesitate to kill her or anyone else. Therefore, behave. Wait. Bide as much time for as many as she could. This was all a mind game and two could play at it. Quietly, she sniffled.

Doug, on the other hand, was being anything but meek. He had to be shoved roughly to his knees, and even then his back remained straight and his head up. His eyes flashed with fire and anger, and there was a growing bump at his temple where he had clearly been butt-stroked by a rifle and knocked out. Manacles behind his back hadn't kept him from lashing out with his feet, shoulders, and head since his capture, and the guard assigned to him was particularly alert, watching 'his' prisoner intently, ready to apply more discouragement as necessary.

Even in the bright orange prison jumpsuit, Marie-Ange knelt easily. Years of Catholic Mass and wooden pews did wonders for one's ability to kneel and ignore uncomfortable hard surfaces. She kept her head bowed, and her arms slack and seemed almost reluctant to make eye contact with anyone, much less the guards. They'd given her a nudge when she had started whispering, but backed off as soon as it became apparent that all she was doing was repeating the Lord's Prayer, and the Hail Mary, accompanied by a few other prayers. The Rosary, complete with twitches of her fingers as though she was counting beads.

A private prison courtyard in the Citadel. Remy had hoped that they might move them; transit opened up any number of possibilities for escape, but instead, they'd stuck them back in the complex, buried in a tomb. He had to give them credit. Fusing a full military base into their executive offices and the main procedural and administrative offices was brilliant, as the banal neatly obfuscated the brutal. They were high enough up that escaping over the high walls still meant a thirty story drop, and even with his powers, Remy would not take that climb lightly.

What concerned him more where the people around him. He supposed it was best that most of his team had been kept together. It gave them shared knowledge and skills to operate, but they had all been pushed to the limit already; the failed plan, Rachel's death, and now prison. Would they hold together? Remy carefully buried a shaft of pain and worry as Ororo's face flashed across his memory. One thing at a time, he told himself, distancing his mind from the hard perch while they waited.

Sarah was lucky she had knees left after the fight in which she was taken, and it seemed the guards hadn't quite forgiven her yet. They shoved her down without waiting for an indication that they needed to do so, and she growled and wrenched herself away from them. "I'm already down, assholes. I don't need your help." She got a sharp kick in the ribs for her trouble.

Tabitha stumbled as her bad knee gave way. A guard steadied her with an impersonal hand. "On your knees," he said roughly. She could only stare at him with numbness around her heart. Even the pain that shot up her leg as her knees hit the ground didn't melt the ice around it.

Terry had hit her knees hard, muscles and joints stiffened up into unsteadiness. The guard accompanying her kept her from falling over by jerking her shoulder back and up, but otherwise seemed uninclined to make contact. She knelt, focused on pulling breath in and out, and let her gaze drift from one face to another, jaw tightening on familiar ones, noting details where she could on the unfamiliar ones.

An older uniformed man approached them from the guard station. unlike the others, he wasn't armed. Not even a sidearm. He adjusted his glasses as he reached the front of the area on which they were knelt. With a sigh, he waved over one of the Magistrates.

"Who ordered this?"

"Minister Moreau said that-"

"Let me be clear, Sargeant. Once a prisoner comes through those doors, the only orders which apply come either from me or to me. Understood?"

"Yes Warden Commander."

"Good." He turned back to them. "Please, feel free to sit. The row of penitents doesn't suit you."

He waited as they relaxed slightly and folded his hands behind his back. His accent was very British, private school and educated. "My name is Warden Commander Wiitcombe. I am in charge of your incarceration. Before we go any further, I'd like to stress the fact that this facility is housed in the midst of a military base, as part of the Citadel complex. Not only does it make escape attempts extremely unlikely to succeed, but it puts any escaped prisoner in the midst of thousands of well armed troops who will have shoot to kill orders. If your escape attempt fails, my office will be required to liaison with Minister Moreau's office in order to determine the response. I assure you, you will not like it."

There was a pause as his gaze tracked from eye to eye. "I have been instructed that you will be questioned. I would also strongly advise you to cooperate and provide what information you have. Minister Moreau has arranged for certain... specialists to be on hand for those who prove reluctant to speak." There was an edge of distaste in Wittcombe's voice; an obvious unhappiness with the Minister's methods. "If you provide the information that is requested of you, obey the guards, and pass your time here quietly, I can promise you that you will be treated humanely. If you do not, your treatment will be decided on by higher authorities. Do we have an understanding?"

Still kneeling, Amanda raised reddened eyes to the man speaking. "So if we play nice, we avoid being tortured and shoved into that fucking machine that turns us into robots or worse. Have I got it straight?" she said bitterly.

"I think so," Clarice agreed. Quiet and demure was not her normal MO, but she was trying here. Trying not to make this worse. To bide her time. "Behaving can't hurt us," she pointed out. Actually, it could, but she wasn't going to say that.

"Playing nice and talking means that I have no orders to do anything further than question you. I suppose that if other Brotherhood forces attack us again, that could change. However, as of right now, you are prisoners of the Genoshan penal system, which means that you get to enjoy certain rights and protections." His voice was quite frank, oddly refreshing after the threats and hostility. "Quite a few of my guards were killed or injuried in your attempted escape. To the others, they were colleagues, friends... you get the picture. Some of them would like any excuse to hurt you. I've made it clear that my men will follow proper protocols regarding the prisoners. However, if you step out of line, many of them are eager for an excuse. I assume you understand me?"

"We understand," Scott replied coldly as he looked over at Wittcombe. "And these include the right not to be physically abused or have to see a little girl strapped into a machine and killed?" he continued in a calm, quite voice trying his best to bottle up the anger he felt inside where it couldn't get anyone else hurt. "I don't suppose it would do any good to point out, once again, that we are not members of the brotherhood. Don't worry, we'll behave," he said casting a significant glance around the courtyard at the other prisoners; the unspoken addendum 'for now' went unsaid except in his head.

"I do not suppose our rights include a formal reading of the charges or a trial by a jury of our peers? Perhaps televised if we care for it to be?" Korvus didn't shift on his knees, his question genuine and curious. He suspected a televised trial could potentially catch Lilandra's attention. It would be another option for them, as much as he didn't care for the Imperial Guard.

"That is up to my superiors. However, you may not be so eager. As members of a well documented mutant terrorist organization, you are culpable for a wide range of charges. Add to that the deaths of dozens of law enforcement officers, and I'd suspect that all of you would be looking at the death sentence." He got up, dusting off his hands. "Cooperate, and there are options in terms of how to deal with you. Resist, attempt to escape, or hold out for a public trial, and you'll find yourself facing execution, I promise you."

Sarah rolled her eyes. This was all a matter of etiquette, so they could look in the cameras later and say with an honest face that the mutant "terrorists" were given a chance to cooperate before shit hit the fan. The Genoshan's hadn't just been lucky, they had been prepared. And you didn't follow up an elaborate trap like that by treating your prisoners "humanely". Her voice was low and hollow when she spoke, and suggested she wasn't entirely sincere. "I'll be sure to be on my best behavior then. Maybe I'll get a cookie."

"Your choice. I won't allow prisoners to be abused for no reason, but I also won't shed a tear if you get yourselves shot playing hero or tough guy." He gave them a nod and waved for the guard. "Get them back to their cells, and draw up a roster for questioning. Moreau wants it started immediately, and I don't have a good reason to disagree." He said, before leaving the room. Around them, guards pulled them to their feet, and dragged them back into the cell block and the days ahead.