Animals We've Become/Chaos in the Kitchen

Rusty Cage is the fourteenth episode in Animals We've Become.

Issue
“Scrub harder, puny American boy.”

I knew they were gonna work me like a god damned mule, but I never thought they’d make me do the fucking dishes. Reminds me of when my own mommy made me do the dishes after macrononi mondays, ugh. Pasta just sticks to the plate if left out to dry so I spent hours scraping it off the plates. Wouldn’t even let me play xbox until it was done. I missed out on so many hours of Medal of Honor: Rising Sun co-op with AJ.

What made it was what that Red Army monster was, Vladimir looking over me. “Scrub them good American, I don’t no green scraps on my plate.” Vlad says sternly, looking as dangerous as ever, he still held his sickle while his hammer lays in the middle of the dusty Alcatraz kitchen.

“I’m working on it.” I respond scrubbing harder at the greenish blot sitting in the middle of the plate. “It’s a lot harder than it looks.”

“For you Americans I bet.” Vlad responds laughing, “Jebediah did them last week and it took that puny armyboy two hours to do one dish alone haha.”

It took him that long? Shit, how long is it gonna take me then? I’m a pretty strong guy all things considering but no way I’m as strong as Jebidiah. That dude was built like a fucking tank. If he was a tank, I was a humvee, still tough but built for different jobs.

“Damn, must be pretty funny to watch us work while you do nothing.” I respond. Starting to get annoyed with this Russian dog, I decide to antagonize him a little.

Vladimir grabbed his hammer and smashed several plates next to me. “Just more dishes to be cleaned American. I like watching you puny Americans work, it like watching ants without a home.”

“Well at least we have a home to go back to.” I mutter, still antagonizing him, it wasn’t the best thing to do but I don’t care, this asshole should be insulted.

“Pard-on?” Vlad asks stepping a bit closer to me. Looks like I grazed him.

“I’m saying, at least our country is still around, Mr. Soviet Union.” I respond with a cocky attitude.

“AAAAAAAA” Vlad seemed like he was turning into the Hulk from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He was about to rip his shirt off until he realized he didn’t have a shirt on. He smashed his fist in the surface next to me, making the entire stack of plates fall to the floor and smash in pieces. He breathed out his nose like a bull in anger, standing tall above me like the Empire State Building before it was destroyed. I could even smell his russian musk from this distance. Deplorable.

“Do. Not. Make. Fun. Of. Motherland.” his gritting teeth turned into a grin all of a sudden, before he lifted his fist. A little crater had formed under it. Vlad literally smashed a hole into the kitchen counter.

“Boss not going to be happy with all plates broken. Going to punish puny American. Hee … heee… heee..” he laughed a hardy, creepy laugh as he wandered off leaving me alone for a moment. He was right. Shit. JT Myers is gonna flip when he sees the mess I didn’t even make.

“LEAVE THAT LITTLE BOY ALONE!” Suddenly I heard a booming southern voice from behind me. I turned to see Jebediah Ford charging head first towards us. Like a raging bull, he put himself in between me and Vlad. He pointed an angry finger at the Communist giant. “Let me tell you this, GOAT DICK! If I EVER catch you bullying that boy again… you’re gonna meet my friends Reagan and Bush…” He said, holding up his clenched fists.

Vladamir raised his hammer and sickle, “That is very similar to my hammer and sickle, which I named Lenin and Stalin, respectively. You stole my idea, soldier man.”

“Yeah just like you stole the Georgian’s oil following the Battle of Tskhinvali in two-thousand and eight!” Jeb counters. “And also I didn’t steal your idea… I improved it.”

“I didn’t specifically do that,” Vladimir replies. “Although I will concede that Russia was at fault in that instance, tiny soldier.” It’s like I’m watching the second cold war. This is getting intense, pretty soon the two titans will clash and cause Chaos in the Kitchen, JT won’t be happy about that.

“Gentlemen...Gentlemen....Gentlemen.” JT says entering the room. His snakeskin boots clicking as he walked into the kitchen. “Or should I refer to you two lot as animals instead, because you both clearly lack the intelligence to be gentlemen.”

“You may be right.” Jeb responds. “But I hate bullies.” Jebediah admits. “And Vlad, is the biggest bully of them all. I can’t stand here and see him bullying this kid.”

“I have an IQ of one hundred and seventy” Vladimir states, although JT didn’t seem to acknowledge him.

JT’s eyes narrowed. There was true hatred and fire in his eyes as he looked at the giant Russian soldier. “Vladimir… were you bullying Glenn?”

“Yes,” Vladimir said proudly.

JT approached the giant man and with the force of a champion boxer, punched Vladimir right in the central cheek. “I will not have any FUCKING BULLIES in my squadron, sir! I’ll have you know that I was bullied by my sister growing up… It’s a wound that never heals…” Suddenly, he began to pace back and forth with his hands behind his back. “We are not animals. We are not monsters. We are men. Men who treat each other with respect. If we do not respect each other then we are no different that the damned undead.”

“I am sorry, General.” Vladimir bowed his head in shame.

“That is good to hear, colonel.. You are forgiven.” JT grins, “This man may be our prisoner, but he’s still a human being. We may beat and belittle him but toying with him like a bully is not our way. Vlad as punishment I order you to do ten laps around the courtyard.”

“Very well comrade.” Vlad responds. As the giant ran out of the kitchen with both his large weapons I sighed a breath of relief.

“Thanks...I guess.” I mutter.

“Guess harder,” JT smirked.

“He’s a monster.” I mutter under my breath.

“They don’t call him The Monster of Magadan for nothing.” Jebidiah grunted. “JT told me he did some bad things in Magadan. Somethings that can’t be said out loud.”

“We’ve all been animals, Sargeant.” JT replied. “Now, finish these dishes. Glenn, walk with me.”

“Dish duty?! Again?!” Jeb sighed.He kicked a tin can across the floor with his hands buried deep in his green army camo cargo short pockets. “Aww nuts!”

JT Myers wanted to talk to me? Shit, this ain’t gonna be good. Three days into Alcatraz and I’ve already been called upon by the warden, fucking hell.

“You see Glenn.” JT Myers says as we passed the hallways of Alcatraz passing through several prisoner cells. “You and Sonnie both serve a purpose here while your other friends are merely a fly in my ointment. So while you and Sonnie are both currently safe, if you were to say…”

JT then bangs his Five-Seven handgun against the cold metallic rusty bars of the cell next to us causing the man inside to snap in anger.

“Anger the other prisoners…” JT continued, “Your friends will pay the price. Perhaps that woman will lose a breast, that boiled piglet you call a friend will lose his tongue or maybe even your former cop friend will lose his legs.”

I can’t believe it, JT’s using my own friends...no my fucking family against me. Using them as hostages. This is crazy, like something out of a movie, but no it was real. If I want to keep my family safe, AJ, Amber, Mark, Trace, Donnie, Stephanie, Jeremy, Katie and especially Frank as we needed him to escape this purgatorial hell. We were gonna need each other if we’re gonna get outta here.

I looked back at the angered prisoner, he was large, large enough to take on Vlad or Jeb. The guy looked to be former military, probably some soldier that refused to take orders from JT Myers. The man had dog tags that I can barely make out, I think it says “Dutch.”

“Let me outta here JT! You know I was telling the truth! I know what I saw!” Dutch shouted as he rattled the cells.

JT pointed his five-seven handgun into the cell, “Quiet…” he said. “I still have plans for you but you’re walking on very thin ice.”

Before Dutch could respond, JT took me by the shoulder and moved me along the hallways.

“I’ll play your games for now.” I respond coldly, “But what have you done with Donnie?”

“Donnie is alive...for now. But he has been harmed, to what extent is up to him.” JT responds. “You better be careful, though sir. Otherwise you may end up like this poor soul.”

He gestured towards a nearby cell, where bald man with an eyepatch was chained to the wall. There were more chains than I had ever seen in my life… I had only ever seen one man covered in so many… but… it was impossible…

“Are they…?”

“You recognise them?” John Tassoni smirked. “They once belonged to my baby brother in law, Brent. This man here insulted him and my brother, so Brent wrapped him in unbreakable chains and left him in the heart of the prison. The man has no gone so insane that he doesn’t even know his own name.” He held the bars with something like sorrow in his eyes. “Now we only know him as Chain…”

“LET ME OUT,” Chain screamed. “GET ME OUT OF THESE FUCKING CHAINS, VULTURE VAG!”

“No,” JT responds.

We moved on, passed a pitch black cell. It was so dark inside I could only barely make out the man inside. “Who’s he?” I asked.

“Him? Glenn… Out of all the lost souls here… He may be the most dangerous. If you could wish one wish on the whole of your life… Wish that you’d never have to meet him on the other side of those bars.”

I looked into the cell again. I could faintly see the man’s white, round face. He was short and pudgy with a giant wide grin. “Come on now John, gotta bone to pick with me?”

JT shivered. “Come, Glenn. Let’s move on.”

They moved to the next cell. A deep gravelly voice called out from the darkness inside. “Hello, chief.”

“Who is this?” Glenn asked.

“We don’t know,” JT said. “Vlad brought him here last week. Says his name is David King, but I’m not so sure.”

David King leaned forward into the light. He had a round face full of zits. “Heh, pizza face” Glenn said with a hardy laugh.

“Boy you hurt me,” David King replied with hurt in his tone. “Not cool mate, not cool.” Suddenly, he turned to JT. “Yo, JT, my guy. You gucci, dude?”

“I fucking hate this guy,” JT sighed.

“Ok wow dude.” David pouted. “Could you at least give me my camera back?”

“No”

“Damn, fuck you, filthy crust.”

JT facepalmed. “Okay, moving on.”

The final cell contained an African American, the darkest man I’ve ever seen stood before me in the cell. His eyes blackened and bloodied as if he had been beaten without mercy.

“See this Glenn, this’ll happen to you if you don’t comply to our demands.” JT says.

“Who’s this?” I ask, waiting for the introduction.

“Name’s Paul Bowick but he likes to be referred to as Paulie. Not that I give a damn.” JT mutters as he hucks a large ball of flem at the man, hitting him in the face. The chunky green slimeball ran down his face but Paulie didn’t react as if it wasn’t there. They had broken him.

“See Glenn, you will be broken here. Your spirit broken, your body beaten and your soul destroyed. If you are to die here your spirit will remain behind these cells just as the hundreds of other prisoners that have died here. Your soul will occupy your cell forever no matter what you do. You see Glenn.” JT grabs me by my shirt collar and brings me only centimeters from his face. “You’re in our world now. We’re the Ghosts. Fighting for our right to live. Soldiers, kill their enemies...but Ghosts, we haunt them.”

And with that JT drags me from the cell hallway and brings me over to my group’s main cell block, cell block 716.

JT throws me to the blood stained concrete floor of the New Alcatraz prison system. “You’re done for the day boy.”

As he walks away I step up. “You won’t break me!”

JT stops, “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t.”

As he walks off my family exits the prison cells behind me.

“G-g-g-glenn are you alright?” AJ mutters as he approaches me. I notice then he’d replaced his crutches with two broken cell bars, more than likely due to Lucas or someone harassing him, probably broke his beloved crutches.

“I’m fine buddy, don’t worry about me.” I respond.

“We’ll get outta this one right?”

“Look at me AJ.” I put my hands on his shoulders, “Remember when Jason and...Grayson.” I shutter at the name, remembering our former friend.

“No!” Mark says. We turn. “His name was Ethan, I don’t care what that voice in his head said. Ethan was our friend, he was the one I gave this badge to. Not that deplorable dangerous deviant.”

“You’re right.” Amber says wrapping her slender, soft arms around Mark’s chest which had his shirt ripped open giving me a good look at his muscles. “Ethan was our friend, not Grayson.”

“You’re right.” I smile. For the first time that day, I felt good. Mark has that about him, always making the worst situation into the best situation. “When Jason and Ethan trapped us in the girl’s locker room and we had to escape before they came back. What did I say then.”

“Th-th-that when we’re together any-anything is possible.” AJ smiled.

“Exactly.” I returned the smirk. “We’ll escape this hellhole and rescue Donnie and somehow get back to New York before you know it. All of us, every single one of us.”

“You got that right Glenn.” Sonnie smirked putting his hand on my shoulder. “Soldiers want to go home, families are always home. Afterall, home is where the heart is.”

“You alright man?” Trace asks looking around. “Those bastards made me clean the toilets.”

“Toilet duty huh?” Sonnie asks grabbing Trace gently on the shoulder. “I got that shit back in boot camp. My hands were stinky for a year haha. Tough job, I can see why they chose you for the job.”

“Why’s that?” Trace asks.

“Because you’re so strong.” Sonnie smiles.

“Hey, I’m strong too!” I yelled. I can’t fucking believe this shit. Seriously, I’ve had to face off with the Moscow Monster all morning and nobody says a thing - Trace cleans a toilet and everybody loses their minds. Absolute bullshit.

Sonnie ruffled my hair. “Heh, I know son.”

“Save that strength, my friend. You’re gonna need it.” I looked around but couldn’t see who spoke but whoever was speaking had a handsome, British voice. Suddenly, Jeremy jumped down, as if from nowhere. He landed right in front of me. “Hello there.”

“Jeremy Agner, you are a bold one,” Sonnie said.

“Meatloaf, my man.” Jeremy said, putting a hand on Sonnie’s shoulder. “We’ll need you for the upcoming battle, lunchbox - so keeps your spirits up.” He turned to Trace, his black shirt waving behind him in the wind like he was the protagonist of one of those steamy romance novels my mom used to read to me. “Trace, I hear you lost your father in nine twelve?”

Trace wiped away a tear. “Yes… sir.”

“Channel that anger, my friend. Remember who you are, but remember who these people are too. They killed the man who killed your Daddy, but that doesn’t make them any more deserving of mercy. When angels fall from heaven, they become devils. Never let go of your anger. Temper it. Nurture it. Forge a blade sharp as a whip and cold as death itself, and when the time is right… bring your hellish fury down upon all those who deserve it. Remember that.”

Trace stood tall and nodded. “I will!”

“Now… Richardson…” He turned to me and put an arm around my shoulder, leading me out of the blood soaked room. “Mate, I’ve got a very special job for you.”

“What’s shakin’ bacon,” I say trying to sound cool. The confused look Jeremy gave me confirmed that I fucking blew it, though.

He led me into a secluded room on the other side of the prison. There Katie stood, leaning against the wall. “Hey,” she said seductively.

My eyes widened at the sight of her. She had long flowing dark brown hair that moved gracefully as she moved her head, bobbing like calm waves in an sea breeze. Sweat glistened on the top of her bosom like morning dew on grass. I had to have her, I would have her at some point. My eyes trailed down her body, a glorious body at that, it rivaled Amber’s she had curves in all the right places, her soft butt looked wanting for some grabbing, but he couldn’t make his move just yet, I had to bide his time.

“Yo,” I said.

She stuck her tongue out at me. Damn, she was fine… and she knew it. “How’re doing, sugar?”

“Pretty good,” I smiled. “You?”

“Shut the hell up, Glenn,” Jeremy sneered. What the fuck, Jeremy? Must’ve been able to tell that I was about to make my move. “We’ve got work to do, young chap. Show him, babygirl.”

“Of course, officer.” She said with a wink, strutting over towards a large scroll hung up on the wall. She pulled a cord and the roll unraveled, revealing I giant map of the prison.

“Damn bro,” I said, my eyes widening. “How the…”

“We’ve been here since day one,” Jeremy replied, leaning an elbow on my shoulder. I could smell his sweet aftershave. “This is a years work. A whole year fighting against that bloody maniac, John Tassoni.”

“We’re gonna fuck him up!” Katie cheered.

“Damn right, princess” Jeremy replied as the two clapped up. They really were a true couple. Proper love birds. Back in grade school, their relationship was the kind a boy and girl would get bullied for. Katie and Jeremy sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G! Fucking hate that shit. Jason used to say that about me and AJ all the time because I kissed him on the forehead once! And that was because of a dare!

“So, what’s the plan?” I ask, intelligently.

“The plan?” Jeremy replied, grinning. He pointed to a picture of a girl at the edge of the map.

My eyes got big at the sight of her, big like a Chinese cartoon characters eyes. She was even sexier than Katie and Amber COMBINED. She had a perfect Aryan face with nice rounded cheekbones she was both cute and hot and I couldn’t believe. Her body was slender as a fox, elegant like a swan. Katie and Amber were gone from my mind now, there was only her. I had found the one thing I never thought I would find… true love.

“Damn, she’s beautiful,” I said.

“That, my friend. Is Julia Tassoni Myers. JT’s baby girl.” Jeremy had a devilish grin on his face as his pushed his custom ray-ban glasses up to the bridge of his nose. “Ain’t too many people the old bastard cares about more than her. That’s where you come in, old bean.”

“What do you want from me?”

“We don’t know why, but Myers has taken an interest in you,” Katie said. Her expression was almost as sly as her boyfriend’s. “We were watching while he showed the prisoners to you. He needs you around.”

“Which is why we need you to get close to her,” Jeremy continued, putting his arm around Katie. “You’re the only one he’ll let close… the only one she’ll let close. Sweet talk her, seduce her, bend her to your whims. And when we have her under our control… that’s when we’ll strike.

I grinned. Hell yeah, I could do this. Time to put that ol’ Richardson charm to the test. But now… now there was only one question that needed to be answered. “But what are we gonna do with the fucking General?”

Jeremy chuckled, “We’re gonna hang him.”

Trivia

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