[center][h3]Nick Waller[/h3]
[sub]November 29th- ???[/sub]
[hr]
[/center]

When Vincent made his run for it, hell broke loose. Not quite all hell, because the rest of it was obviously right in front of them, waiting to reveal itself, but some hell definitely broke loose. The guard captain was furious, enough to toss his baton at the escaping fugitive, even landing a glancing blow on the man. 

Furious enough to punish the rest of the group. Now, some snarky folks might like to pipe up about collective punishment being a war crime, but this wasn't a war, they weren't combatants under the protections of the Geneva Conventions, and he was still pretty sure this was some sort of Alphabet Agency Private Prison they were being shuffled off to, one where their rights would be ignored at best, and specifically violated at worst. Nick kept his mouth shut, only letting out a gasp as he was grabbed, and his body [i]violently[/i] protested against his mind. 

He needed to get away. They would hurt him. He knew they would hurt him, they just said it, but worse, [i]he knew they would hurt him.[/i] It would be that horrible summer night all those years ago all over again. He knew what happened in prisons, he read about Abu Ghraib, and he couldn't do it again. 

The fight went out of him when it sunk in just how utterly [b]fucked[/b] he was. He'd pulled a bit, but a jab to the back while he was inwardly collapsing, again, had stopped his involuntary attempt at escape. As he pulled his captors' arms down a bit, they tugged him back up, and one of the bastards smashed their baton against his calves, causing the muscles to cramp up from the impact. They pulled up just a bit, forcing Nick's knees to bend and his legs under him, before giving a shove that resulted in him stumbling a few steps before falling. 

"Get up." One ordered darkly, and Nick nodded shakily, putting his hands in front of him and pushing, muscles burning and crying out against being used so soon after being hit. Gritting his teeth and baring it, like he did so many other things, Nick stumbled forward, used to managing through a cramp thanks to his usual runs. 

The next few minutes were a bit of a blur as he pushed past the pain and the worry and the anxiety, only paying enough attention to his surroundings to not accidentally leave the group and get attacked again. The inside of the prison was, simply put, existentially terrifying. If these people didn't want them to see the light of day again, they wouldn't, simple as. Their very hope of continued existence relied on the whims of these madmen. He refused to even contemplate the impossible machinery siphoning money from the inmates, again harkening back to his psychotic break theory. They could be getting tortured with gas, injected with all sorts of horrible drugs, you name it, and Nick wouldn't know. He couldn't tell you what was real right now and what wasn't. He vaguely recognized one or two of his fellow students, and had probably seen the faculty members here and there, but nobody stuck out in his mind as real except the two he'd had the misfortune of bumping into in the cafeteria, and that was hardly a reassurance. Meeting two people you'd already met earlier while having a psychotic break? Excellent evidence of sanity, indeed!

Trying to focus on his immediate surroundings again, Nick furrowed his brow at the sight of the judge, who looked suspiciously like their University's President. What that meant, Nick couldn't guess. If anything, it lead credence to the nightmare mirror world isekai theory as much as it did the psychotic break, but more so the former, somehow. Pondwater likely wouldn't let the University Police brutalize his students for the crime of gathering at a dock, right? 

No, he had to focus. Their judge was asking about them. Who they were, how the got here, what they were doing? Nick automatically prepared the simple response he knew by heart, give your name, invoke the 5th, shut the fuck up, but he was beat to the punch by some of the others readily volunteering evidence on their behalf. 

Part of Nick wanted to scream, but part of him was impressed at their composure. Sure, the man who represented himself had a fool for an attorney, but they seemed to be handling the insanity better than he was if they could think of something other than a polite "fuck you". 

To Nick's surprise, as well, it actually worked! This evil mirror Pondwater believed them, and even said that it made sense! Which made no sense! He went on about some social darwinist theory (was that the right phrase? Nick always got those propaganda talking points confused) about winners and losers and life being a zero-sum game of success (which was bullshit in its own right, it didn't [i]have to be[/i]), before declaring that they were here to be tried, judged, and evaluated. There was just one problem. 

"Wait, of our own free will? I certainly don't recall [i]choosing[/i] to come here, or to submitting myself to this bullshit alpha male crap you've convinced yourself runs the world." Nick just couldn't keep his mouth shut, could he? The world did not carefully sort people into failures and successes, winners and losers to be granted boons and banes accordingly. It fucked everybody as much as it good get away with, people fucked each other as much as they could get away with, and whoever got away with the most ended up on top. "And I [i]refuse[/i] to let somebody else's terms of failure or success define me! I haven't gotten this far by relying on the praise or the support of others! I fought tooth and fucking nail to get to where I am! So don't [i]lecture[/i] me about worthiness!" 

Nick's face was warped into a snarl, his breath coming evenly but heavy, and his eyes betrayed the maelstrom of emotion swirling in his gut, the anger at being lectured by another idiotic authority figure who'd moralized the world into some arbitrator of their idea of fairness having taken control. It was like being lectured by his father all over again, the hypocritical bastard!