Chapter 789: Light in Darkness of Hell

Trent couldn’t breathe. Jorge’s grip tightened, cutting off air, vision tunneling black at the edges.

"They become

our

slaves," Jorge said. "They clean what we tell them to clean. They give us what we tell them to give us. They bend when we say bend. And if they refuse?"

He released. Trent sucked in air in ragged, wheezing gasps, coughing blood flecks onto the sheet. "If they refuse, we make them wish they’d cooperated. And we take our time doing it."

Jorge climbed back up. Settled in like nothing had happened. "Now clean the toilet," he said. "With your toothbrush."

Trent stared up at the slats. "What?"

"You heard me. Clean the fucking toilet. With your fucking toothbrush. And when you’re done, that’s the toothbrush you use every morning for the rest of your sentence."

Trent’s stomach lurched. "I can’t—"

"You can," Jorge said, calm as death. "Or I’ll hold your head in that toilet with my shit in it and flush until you drown in my precious shit. Your choice."

Trent looked at the toilet—stained, reeking, crusted with years of neglect. Looked at his toothbrush on the sink. Looked at Jorge’s eyes, which promised he wasn’t bluffing and would enjoy every second of making good on the threat. He cleaned the toilet. With his toothbrush. Scrubbed until the bristles turned brown-black, until his hands shook and bile burned the back of his throat.

And the next morning, when he brushed his teeth, he tasted shit, bleach, and the sour tang of his own complete surrender.

The showers were where the real education continued. Trent had learned the rules fast: never shower during peak hours, never shower alone, never shower at all if you could stink through it. But hygiene checks were mandatory.

Guards dragged you in if you tried to skip.

One day days ago he’d gone to shower.

He waited until late—lights dim, block mostly quiet, only a handful of men still under the sprays. He stepped in, back to the wall, head down, soap in hand, moving fast.

The water turned ice-cold. Instantly. Like someone had flipped a valve to punish. Trent yelped, jumped back, skin prickling into gooseflesh. Laughter bounced off the wet tiles—deep, cruel, echoing.

"What’s wrong,

cho-mo?"

a voice called. "Don’t like cold showers?

Those girls

you blackmailed probably didn’t like your dick pics either much less that disgusting shit inside them."

The water stayed frozen. Five minutes. Ten. His lips turned blue. Teeth chattered so hard they hurt. Muscles locked up in painful cramps. Guards stood in the doorway. Watching. One held his phone up, recording the whole thing—Trent shivering, naked, pathetic, trying to cover himself while the cold drilled into his bones.

When the water finally thawed to lukewarm, Trent’s fingers were numb sausages. He fumbled for soap, rushed to wash before— Hands grabbed him from behind. Slammed him face-first into the tile.

Arms wrenched back. Knees forced apart.

Pain exploded—white-hot, violating, everywhere at once. He tried to scream. A palm clamped over his mouth, muffling it into wet grunts.

"This is what you did to those girls," a voice hissed in his ear, low and venomous. "Made

them

feel powerless. Violated. Terrified.

They

begged you to stop. You didn’t. Now

you

get to feel it."

They took turns. Rough. Deliberate. No rush. When they finished, they left him crumpled on the wet floor, bleeding from splits in his scalp and worse places, sobbing into the drain. Guards arrived eventually—ten minutes, maybe twenty, hard to tell through the haze of pain.

They filed the report:

Inmate slipped in shower. Sustained injuries from fall.

Nobody believed it. Nobody cared enough to question it.

Warden Blackwell

visited him in the infirmary three days later. Trent lay bandaged, stitched, doped on whatever painkillers they bothered to give him. Jaw wired. Ribs taped. Body a map of bruises that hadn’t even started to yellow. Blackwell pulled up a chair.

Smiled like they were

old friends

catching up.

"Mr. Holloway," he said pleasantly. "I hear you’re having a

difficult adjustment period.

" Trent tried to speak. Came out as garbled moans through the wires.

Blackwell leaned forward. "Let me make something crystal clear. I received a very generous donation recently.

One hundred thousand dollars

—cash, untraceable—with very specific instructions regarding your care."

He paused, letting it sink in.

"Those instructions were simple:

Make sure he

experiences hell

every single day of his sentence. Make sure he understands what he did to those girls. Make sure he pays for it in ways the courts could never touch."

Trent’s eyes widened, pupils dilating despite the drugs.

"So, here’s what’s going to happen," Blackwell continued, voice soft and almost kind. "You stay in general population. No transfers. No protective custody. No early release. No mercy. Every beating, every humiliation, every violation those men deliver? That’s

justice

. That’s

those girls

getting their revenge through every fist, every boot, every moment of terror and shame you endure. And if you die?"

He shrugged, casual as discussing the weather. "Some men don’t survive prison. It happens. Nobody will ask questions. Nobody will care."

Blackwell stood. Adjusted his tie. "Welcome to hell, Mr. Holloway. You’ve got years left to enjoy it." He walked to the door. Paused with his hand on the frame.

"And remember—

those girls

are still out there. Living. Healing. Laughing. While you rot. Every time you bleed, every time you break, think of

them

. That’s the soundtrack you get to live with for the rest of your life."

Jorge made Trent his property. That’s what inmates did to child predators in Cell Block D—they didn’t just beat them; they

owned

them.

Turned them into servants, slaves, living fuck-toys, walking reminders of what happened when you preyed on teenage girls. Trent became Jorge’s personal bitch within days.

He cleaned Jorge’s side of the cell every morning—scrubbed the floor on hands and knees with a rag that smelled like piss and bleach. Made Jorge’s bunk so tight you could bounce a quarter off it. Shined Jorge’s boots with his own spit, tongue dragging across the leather while Jorge watched from the top bunk, smirking.

Every command echoed the same twisted irony: this is what you made those girls do. Made them perform.

Made them beg.

Made them strip their dignity for your sick pleasure. Now Trent got to feel it—every degrading second, every forced smile, every time his body betrayed him by obeying just to avoid another beating. The karma wasn’t subtle. It was biblical. Absolute. And there was no safe word, no timeout, no escape.

Weeks blurred into months. Time lost all meaning inside those walls—days bled into weeks, weeks into months, until Trent couldn’t remember what season it was outside. He stopped being Trent Holloway.

Became the

cho-mo

.

A target. A lesson inmates pointed at when new fish arrived: "See that broken motherfucker? That’s what happens when you touch kids."

His nose never set right—crooked, constantly stuffed, whistling when he breathed. His ribs ached every time he moved, a dull fire that flared when he coughed or laughed. Survived on whatever commissary he could beg or steal back when he had any. Went days without food when Jorge decided he didn’t deserve it.

Stopped showering unless guards forced him—too many memories of cold water and hands pinning him down.

Stopped talking. Stopped looking anyone in the eye. Stopped existing as anything more than a breathing body taking up space on the bottom bunk.

And somewhere out there, beyond the razor wire and concrete,

Peter Carter

was living like a king. Rich. Powerful. Surrounded by beautiful women who worshipped him, who begged for his touch, who glowed after he fucked them senseless.

While Trent paid the price for hurting someone Peter loved.

Every. Single. Fucking. Day.

The infirmary again. Another beating. Another "slip and fall." Trent didn’t even remember the trigger this time—maybe he looked at someone wrong, maybe he breathed too loud, maybe Jorge just felt like reminding him who owned him. He lay on the thin vinyl mattress, bandaged, stitched, doped on whatever weak painkillers they bothered to give, staring at the water-stained ceiling and wishing his heart would just quit. One quiet stop. One last breath. Gone.

Footsteps approached down the corridor. Trent didn’t turn his head. Didn’t care. Probably another guard coming to tell him rec time was over, back to the block, back to Jorge’s boots and toothbrush humiliations.

But the footsteps stopped beside his bed. "Trent Holloway."

A woman’s voice. Soft. Unfamiliar.

He turned his head slowly—pain lancing through his neck and jaw—eyes focusing through the haze of medication. A female corrections officer stood there. Late twenties. Dark hair pulled into a severe bun. Sharp features, sharper eyes. No disgust on her face. No hatred. Something else. Something that looked dangerously like

interest

.

She glanced toward the door. Checked the hallway. Leaned down close enough that he could smell her shampoo—something clean and floral that didn’t belong in this place.

"I’m an enemy of the Carters," she whispered, voice so low it barely carried. Trent’s cracked ribs squeezed around his lungs. Breath caught. "I know what Peter Carter did to you," she continued. "I know why you’re really here. And I know he paid good money—

six figures

—to make sure you’d suffer every single day of your sentence. No protection. No mercy. Just pain."

Trent stared at her. Couldn’t speak. Couldn’t process. Heart hammering against broken bone. The officer’s eyes locked onto his—intense, burning, alive in a way nothing in this prison had been for years.

"Tell me, Trent Holloway—" she whispered, leaning even closer, lips almost brushing his ear, "

do you want revenge?

"

His pulse roared in his ears. "Because if you do," she breathed, "

I can get you out of here.

"