Alexander Smith - Lockdown

In the worst dreams, though, I was inside a glass prison, on the surface. Through the walls I could see my house, my family going about their life without me. I shouted to them and banged on the glass, but there was a gas mask right in front of me, preventing them from hearing. And I saw the blacksuits approaching my front door, the gas mask freaks closing in on the back of the house, the dogs leaping through the windows, spraying my mom and dad with glass. I tried to smash the walls of my prison but they wouldn't even crack, the wheezer in front of me blocking my every move, and I could do nothing but watch as they met the same fate as Toby, their blood pooling over the kitchen floor as their killers retreated.

It was only at the end of the dream that I realized the figure before me, on the other side of the glass, wasn't a gas mask at all. It was my reflection.

AFTER EACH DREAM I'd wake up screaming, sweat pouring from me and my heart in overdrive. Each time it took me ages to drift off again and each time the same thing happened-nightmares that tried to eat me alive.

By the time the lights came on, serenaded in by a short blast from the siren, I felt like I'd been lying on that bed for a thousand years, tormented by every demon possible. My sheet was drenched and my head was pounding, and when I swung my legs over the bunk, every limb was shaking like a leaf. It took only one glance through the bars at the prison beyond to send me stumble-running across the cell to the toilet, throwing up my guts into the dull metal pan. Nothing came out apart from a thin trail of bile, but it made me feel better-like I'd purged myself of some of the thoughts from the previous night.

The sound of my retching had woken Donovan, and by the time I'd pulled my head from the toilet he was sitting up in bed watching me with a sympathetic smile.

"Takes a while for the nightmares to leave," he said. "But they do. Trust me-that toilet and me were best friends for the first few days I was here."

I laughed, despite myself. Wiping my mouth with my sleeve, I realized that puking wasn't the only thing I needed the toilet for. I glanced at Donovan sheepishly.

"Um, do you mind…?"

He raised an eyebrow, then cottoned on to what I meant, his head disappearing as he lay back down.

"Sorry, Alex," he said as I went about my business. "That's the other thing you never really get used to. Pooping in public."

"Well, it would be a lot easier to relax if you'd keep quiet for a second," I scolded. The bed creaked as he laughed, but fortunately he didn't say another word until he heard the flush.

"My turn," he said, jumping from the bunk.

"All yours."

Doing my best to ignore the noises behind me, I stared through the bars at the cells directly opposite. Inmates were climbing from their bunks, all pasty faces and crumpled uniforms. Judging by some of their expressions, I wasn't the only one who'd had nightmares.

My eyes fell on one cell, on the next level below. It was pretty far away, and sat at a strange angle, but I thought I could make out Montgomery curled up on the stone next to the bars. I saw a pair of legs on the upper bunk, which no doubt belonged to chief Skull Kevin. From the looks of things, the bottom bunk was stripped bare. I wondered if poor Montgomery had spent the whole night on the floor.

"So, you ready for some hard labor?" asked Donovan, flushing the toilet. He had an apologetic look on his face and was wafting the air with both hands. "That mush plays havoc downstairs, you know?"

"You're not kidding," I replied, holding my nose and wishing-not for the last time during my stay in Furnace-that we had separate bathrooms. "Anyway, what do you mean, 'hard labor'?"

He grinned as he pulled on his shoes, then offered the same infuriating reply I'd already heard so many times.

"You'll find out soon enough."

TEN MINUTES OR SO after the lights had come back on the siren cut through my head a second time and the cell doors rattled open. With a series of whoops and cheers the inmates on every level crashed along the platforms and down the stairs, filling the prison with the sound of thunder.

"When you're locked up in here for life, you learn to welcome the little freedoms," explained Donovan as we made our way from our cell. His face was once again a mask of defiance, challenging anyone to mess with him, but his tone was light enough. "Getting out of our cells every morning feels a little bit like we're breaking free, if you know what I mean."

I didn't. Not then. But I soon came to understand. Part of you soon forgets about the outside world. There is just lockdown and out there, and out there-in the yard, in the trough room, at hard labor-feels a hell of a lot freer than a two-meter-square cell.

As we made our way down to the yard Donovan explained about the jobs. Mornings were spent working. Slopwork was in the kitchen. Greaseup meant cleaning duties, which sometimes included the Stink, or mopping the toilets. Bleaching was in the laundry. According to the duty roster-displayed in crisp white letters on the giant screen above the elevator-Donovan and I were chippers for the day.

"It's the hardest of hard labors," he said as we followed the crowd through to the trough room. We picked up a couple of bowls of mush from the canteen and found an empty bench-close enough to the scene of yesterday's incident that I could make out a weird rust-colored stain on the floor. I focused on my breakfast to try to take my mind off the fight. It was a pile of sawdust-colored paste that looked identical to yesterday's dinner.

"The same thing?" I asked, feeling my stomach grumble. I wasn't sure if it was because I was hungry, or because my gut was warning me not to go near the dish.

"Yeah," Donovan replied, lifting a heap of paste up with his spoon and eyeing it suspiciously. "Exactly the same. They make it in batches, each lasts a few days. You have it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner."

"Great," I muttered. I knew I was going to have to eat something sooner or later, so I scraped a thin layer off the top of my breakfast and touched my tongue to it. I was expecting the flavor of vomit, or crap, or something equally nasty, but to my surprise I couldn't taste anything. Taking a deep breath, I closed my mouth around the spoon and felt the runny mixture drop onto my tongue. For a second I gagged, but then I managed to control the reflex and noticed that the goo was completely flavorless, except for the pleasant tang of salt.

"The texture is the worst part," Donovan explained, scooping the last dollop from his bowl. "Just think of it as salty porridge and it isn't too bad."

I remembered how my dad always put about a kilo of salt in his porridge-as opposed to honey or sugar or jam like sane people-and the thought made me feel better. My appetite took over and I wolfed down the paste with a passion, almost sucking the plastic from the spoon in my eagerness. The gunk was lukewarm, but it settled in my stomach and radiated a pleasant, comforting heat.

The morning's third short siren blast saw everybody making their way out of the trough room back into the yard, where the crowd gradually split into a number of groups. I followed Donovan to the other side of the huge space toward a cavernous fissure in the rock guarded by a blacksuit and his shotgun. I felt my legs go weak at the sight of him, but the sheer density of the people around me held me up as we stomped past.

The short tunnel ahead led us to a room filled to bursting with mining equipment-picks, shovels, wheelbarrows, and dozens of hard hats that clung to the walls like yellow fungus. Around the outside of the room were three more cracks: gaping black mouths in the rock. Two were open but a third, in the center, was sealed off with enormous wooden planks bolted into the rock.