Fear Her Wrath II: Crucible of Glass

Chapter 4

"I still don't understand why they let the girlfriend in to see Psychosis," said one receptionist to the other as they checked me in at the lobby of Merceron Prison.

"Must have connections with someone," his friend replied, then looked over at me. "Do you have connections with someone?"

I shrugged. It had been hard enough just to get visiting rights to the juvie center in Brand Hill. Now that Simon was transferred to Merceron—pending his trial as an adult for Psychosis's crimes—I should have been the last person allowed to make a social visit. It took nearly two weeks of string-pulling by Ellie G and Terrence Rashad to get someone who wasn't an immediate family member past the front desk, and if the prison administration wasn't already thoroughly corrupted by the Montagnese family, I could never have gotten through. Obviously, I was playing into their hands. The Montagnese-controlled local media had been making the most of Simon—a freak without mafia connections born and raised in the Fen—and his girlfriend who still stood by him despite the overwhelming evidence of his crimes. Keeping us demoralized was key to the New Imperium's hold on this city, and this gave them the perfect opportunity to shift the blame for the poverty and violence in the Fen back to our side of the river.

But here I was—a blank check to visit Simon whenever I wanted, as long as everything we said was recorded. I tried not to visit too often. It wasn't just bad publicity for Simon that made me hesistant.

I rarely left Merceron feeling better than when I came in.

"Alright, come this way," said the receptionist, pointing me towards a uniformed guard standing by a locked metal door. "He'll take you to see the freak."

Merceron Prison, officially "Merceron Correctional Facility," had an ugly reputation. Built over a hundred years ago by Judge Amos Merceron in Egyptian Revival style, its 200 cells were overcrowded within a year of opening. From there, it expanded in a haphazard fashion—sprouting new cell blocks every decade or so until it sprawled over the western shore of Fenley Island like a poisonous creeping vine. Since the closure of Darrow Street Jail, it was the only place of adult detention in the Fen. Its current official capacity was 1600, and it mainly housed the people who couldn't afford a lawyer or didn't have the political connections to get them out on bail. The older wings were the worst—just lines of bare stone cells with three or four prisoners each, spending 23 hours a day in a space smaller than my bedroom. Beginning in the 1970s, the city built more comfortable cells so Montagnese soldiers and associates could wait out shorter sentences without mixing with the general population. These half-empty cells were the ones I passed as I followed the guard to the maximum security wing, where Simon was being held. I kept facing straight ahead, avoiding the hostile gaze and sneering remarks of the prisoners as we approached the large iron door that divided the worst of the worst from the ordinary criminals. The guard flashed his badge.

"He's ready for you," said the armed man at the door.

If you're wondering why the maximum security wing of the worst prison in the state allowed visitors, this was where the costumed freaks were kept. Some of them—the ones in the pay of the Montagnese family—lived in moderately spacious and comfortable cells, with plenty of natural light and a TV and bookshelf in the corner.

The rogue freaks—and that included Simon—got the bare minimum.

He was already waiting for me in the small visiting room just inside the maximum security wing. There were three stations, each allowing communication through a two-way speaker embedded in an inch of bulletproof glass. The partitions allowed a small amount of privacy, but anything we said would be overheard both by the guards and by any other freaks who happened to be seeing visitors. Today, however, we were alone.