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started and two rows could be seen. Each race had a look-out from a bunk somewhere down that line to look for opportunities to speak to inmates from the buildings or to see when the Gooners were on their way or a myriad of other reasons. I saw Blockhead’s giant head immediately. We joked with him in the past that he had a Jack in The Box bobble head. We loved him at over 50 years old and from the High Desert area in the Inland Empire, California. He was another drug addict raised in the desert and California’s prisons but he had a conscience with honor and dignity. I studied his scrunched up face and knew he was having problems in the gym as a leader for the White race. He came to the door immediately.
     
     
    Trigger already had a Mexican leader, a young gang banger from Artesia L.A at the other opening to the double doors ten feet away. I heard Trigger talking to him in Spanish. Damon and I huddled up with Blockhead in a small circle and Blockhead spoke first. “The Chicans are trying to bully us. They are changing which shower we can use and making up all kinds of other rules in here.”
     
     
    All I said in the huddle is, “We are about to take flight on em so when you hear the alarm either get your money or be ready for them to attack.” After those words left my lips I broke a foot away from our huddle to lighten the situation and started having regular, loud enough conversation for the guards in the tower and on the floor at a podium twenty feet away to hear. “We are coming off lockdown. I guess its time to play on the workout bars.” A minute of filler conversation later Torrez said, “That’s enough. Let’s get you back in your building.”
     
     
    We walked the track back almost full circle and I started studying our tower. Two guards were standing their watching the escort. One had a block gun. No big. I was leading the way and thoughts crept into my mind that I was being obvious. The reason I wanted to be in front was my first thought was that I would get un-handcuffed first. Then I realized it wasn’t a guarantee. Whoever was the closest to the Gooners would get un-cuffed first. I slowed down and let Trigger and Psycho catch up to me and Damon. I huddled closer to Torrez to start some pseudo conversation. We got to the gate and waited for it to open. While waiting at the gate to the Sally-port, the vestibule opened.
     
     
    Torrez and three other Gooners didn’t offer any freedom from the handcuffs after the gate opened and I wondered if we would make it back to our cell in cuffs. Torrez scooted in front of us and stopped at the Sally-port and pulled out his keys. I was caught off guard and didn’t get in position first. Neither did Damon. Trigger got his cuffs off and I looked at his scarred thick knuckles while Psycho got un-cuffed next, then Damon, then me.
     
     
    Trigger and Pyscho started talking to Torrez and that gave me room to get into the vestibule. There weren’t any guards inside the building. They were all in the tower, watching, waiting and wondering. I made it half way through the vestibule with Damon right behind me and stopped and looked back. I walked back as if I wanted to talk to Torrez right when Torrez shooed Trigger away so I turned with him on my rear right behind me and started walking again. I heard the vestibule we just walked through start closing and looked up at the tower through the glass. The guards were watching us. I slowed so Trigger would walk into me and he slowed and didn’t bump me. I forced myself to look like I had been pushed and jerked my body forward, then planted and turned and lunged fast and hard. I punched a backpedaling Trigger and felt Damon fill up the rest of the narrow width of the corridor. Trigger and Pyscho regrouped with a barrage of ineffective punches.
     
     
    I heard the tower hit the alarm button and everything other than the fight left my mind. My punches were beating Trigger’s and I felt and saw his face bouncing backward