The morning bell clanged inhospitably, bouncing shrilly off cold, brick walls and down the catacomb of corridors like a screaming specter, shattering the dreams of the prison's inmates, many of whom were glad to be woken; Jackson not the least of them.

His sleep had been dark and ruled with claustrophobic dreams. As he lay awake in his bunk, he thought about his survival, determined to do so at any cost, so that he might one day have a chance to drag himself out of the hole that his father had tossed him into; one in which he wanted to bury Bubba in forever, before moving on to obliterate his father. But the latter goal seemed so far beyond his reach and so far away in a precariously balanced future.

Bubba and the prison were what had to occupy his thoughts for today and all the today's that followed, until he was released. He had to deal with them in his present reality. And so he would, even if that meant bending to Bubba’s will he would do it. But Jackson would bide his time patiently until an opportunity came for him to rid himself of Bubba, too.

Patience was something that he was beginning to learn in prison; to extract a worthwhile revenge took patience.

Below his bunk he heard Raquel stir and yawn, which totally wiped away his bitter thoughts.

"Good morning, bunny,” Raquel called up to him, his voice heavy with sleep.

Jackson mumbled lazily by way of reply as he wondered what the day would bring with it. He held no high hopes.

In his own nearby cell, Spider lay in his cot, his sunken eyes feverish with anticipation and tendrils of fear. His nerves were frayed after spending a long, sleepless night imagining, in his mind, over and over again, the Crane bitch in the shower and him ever so gently showering himself, seductively cleansing his skin with the rigged bar of soap. The thought had excited Spider.

There would be blood, pain and cold terror as the blades opened the creamy skin wide; from breast to groin in a thin line of pale pink, suddenly turning red as the flesh split like torn cloth. He could see so clearly the horror in Crane's wide, child-like eyes, as the youth stared incredulously at the wound and then at the bar of soap stained pink with blood, the reverse side of the blades firmly embedded into the palm of his hand.

These imaginings had aroused Spider. He masturbated several times..

He thought of Niko and Blake, and his stomach slumped against his bowel with a dead weight.

They were due to be released from solitary in the next couple of days, and they would come looking for him, and kill him. It would be a horrible death. But he tried to console himself that by then, it wouldn't matter, for he would have accomplished what he'd set out to do - get back at Bubba.

There would be no escape for the big, fat prick, or his twin gorillas, the Delvicchio brothers, and his "pretty child" would be scarred for life. Maybe knowing this would make his impending death easier, Spider thought to himself.

As for Bubba; he, too, had found some difficulty in finding sleep. But this had been a problem familiar to him for many years. A man so feared, powerful and hated learnt not to trust sleep, for it provided one's enemies, and so-called friends, with too many opportunities for betrayal.

His mind had wandered from thoughts about Spider, who he loathed, to Jackson, with whom he was obsessed, and then onto his escape from the prison, which ranked with equal importance beside the boy.

Spider bothered Bubba because the little, bug-like man was not entirely stupid, and not entirely predictable. He was like a sewer rat that had learned how to get by in the hardest and toughest of times, even when trying to compete against others who were stronger and more intelligent. Thus, this creature evolved into an ugly, determined thing with no sense of loyalty to anyone, not even to itself.

But Bubba had arranged it that Spider would soon be leaving the prison in a body bag. The Delvicchio brothers would take care of it later in the day. So Bubba focused his thoughts on the two things that mattered most to him; the escape, and Jackson Crane.

In a couple of weeks' time, the escape would take place and he and the Delvicchio brothers would be free and making their way, separately, out of the country and meeting later on in Asia, where Bubba would set about restoring to its former glory the empire he'd once lead to glory.

He had enough contacts splashed across the world, plus a fortune locked away in secret Swiss bank accounts that A.S.I.O. and Interpol had not known about, to be able to re-establish himself: Bubba was determined to come back; bigger, better and a damn lot meaner.

But what about Jackson Crane?

This was something that he was not sure about, either. Bubba had taken, used and left spent an innumerable and a wide range of people in his life, both inside and outside of prison.

On the outside, his sex life had involved women only. But inside he had settled for men, preferring younger guys. It was a case of 'making do', he supposed, and was quite acceptable. He'd never had a problem with fucking some boy. He'd always particularly enjoyed fucking those with a gentle nature and boyish body scarcely touched by life, with eyes alight with innocence.

The sad thing about that was, as far as Bubba could see, there weren't as many about as there had once been, and those that came in like that usually didn't stay that way for long. They either changed, or killed themselves, or ended up getting carted off to a nut house.

Sometimes they had tried to fight Bubba off, and he had to kill them, or put them in the hospital or prison infirmary ...But those that survived became tough and ugly vermin, like most of the other men in the prison, and Bubba lost all interest as they grew hard with cynicism. Jackson was different.

Bubba knew that he was yet to really touch that part of the youth that made him so unique; that mystery that lurked behind the grey, cloudy eyes which sometimes shone with a haunting power. They could be pensive, impenetrable or pained, and sometimes blazed with a deep and fury. But they always contained a special air of awareness, as if Jackson Crane knew something no one else ever could; some essential, mythical truth, and this knowledge somehow set him apart from all others.

Bubba had never considered himself a fag or a homosexual. But when it came to Jackson, he found that there was a grey area of 'maybe'. But Bubba would’ve kill anyone who'd dare call rum a poofter!

There was a spirit in the youth that Bubba longed to possess -it wasn't just a physical need for the boy. It was a need to have a taste of that strength and power in him that filled Bubba with longing that made him need Jackson. By having him, possessing and fucking him, Bubba felt he could share in the boy's special freedom.

Like scruffy farmyard animals, the prisoners were herded into the shower block. There they disrobed and amongst a lot of chatter and occasional horse play, set about getting ready for another day within the bluestone walls of Pentoville Prison.

"How's your face feel today?" Raquel asked, standing under the jet stream of a shower nozzle, talking to Jackson who stood at the shower next to rum.

Jackson shrugged. "It's fine. Hardly hurts at all," he said shortly, a bar of soap in his hands, which he wetted and lathered up.

Spider showered in a distant corner, constantly checking over his shoulder, looking at Jackson, and sometimes even taking a glance at Bubba, waiting expectantly for something to happen; his body growing rigid with the mounting tension within him.

Spider's own body, like Jackson's, stood as a sore testament to Bubba’s power and cruelty. His ribs and kidney areas were red and spotted with bruises. The jets of warm water helped to alleviate some of the pain as he stood there, moving slowly under the shower, watching Jackson, waiting for his deadly trap to be sprung, waiting for the boy's blood to soak the shower block floor. He felt a stirring in his groin upon the thought.

Raquel washed shampoo from his long, auburn hair. Trails of foam ran down his neck, down his chest and over the mounds of his drug induced breasts, down across the flat of his stomach and into the net of dark hair, and the subsequent region of his true sex.

Jackson's mind drifted beyond the confines of the prison and its walls and fences of electrified wire. His mind was continually churning over schemes and more schemes of how he could get back at Lloyd Crane. But he was dissatisfied with everything that his mind was able to concoct.

Scenario after scenario led to bitter disappointment, and he began to wonder if these mental exercises were not a complete waste of time as he absently ran the soap down the length of his body, from neck to waist, being only dully aware of Raquel, the other inmates, and the prison. That hypnotised state dispersed when his eye picked up a flash of red on the off-white tiles of the shower floor.

He watched it, dumbstruck, as it gurgled down the drain, followed by more thick gouts of blood that seemed to be appearing at a staggering rate.

The scream; a horrible, tortured wail that seemed to be coming from inside Jackson's head, threatening to crack it wide open. But when he looked to one side, he saw that it was Raquel, standing under the shower, blood gushing from a long, deep lesion that ran from his collar bone, down over one ridiculous breast to just above his navel.

It took Jackson a moment to realise why Raquel's left breast looked ridiculous; it was almost entirely severed.

It was happening so slowly; like a run down, battery operated doll, Raquel fell back, slumping against the tiled wall, spattering it with blood, and then slid gradually to the floor, eyes white and wide, mouth agape in a hoarse scream, losing consciousness, surrounded by a spreading sea of blood.

Shocked into speechlessness, Jackson stared down at his friend and saw a bloodied bar of soap stuck in Raquel's grip.