Free Nathan's Run (1996) by John Gilstrap

splashed with a torrent of blood pumping from the gaping wound, like crimson water from a vampire's drinking fountain. The sound from Ricky's throat was inhuman, half moan and half howl. His breath gurgled in his throat, like the sound of blowing bubbles through a straw.
    Nathan knew right away that removing the knife was a mistake. Instinctively, he put his hands over the wound to try to stop the blood from spurting out, but it was useless; the gore kept pumping relentlessly from Ricky's belly, and now from his mouth as well.
    "Oh, God, I'm sorry, Ricky," Nathan said over and over again, mantralike. In his heart, he knew he had killed him.
    Out of nowhere, Ricky's hand shot up to Nathan's throat and shut off his air supply. For what felt like the hundredth time that night, Nathan locked his hands around Ricky's wrist, trying to make him let go. But, like a mouse caught in an eagle's talon, Nathan was trapped, feeling that his head was going to explode from the pressure. Ricky's eyes showed murder. He was going to die, and he was going to take Nathan with him.
    The knife! It was still on the floor! Nathan ventured a hand away from Ricky's wrist, and found the blade an inch from his knee. This time, it would be no accident. Nathan mustered all the strength he had left to straight-arm the knife into Ricky's chest. He struck over and over again, each impact making a grotesque slurping sound. After the second thrust, Ricky's grip relaxed a little, once again allowing air and blood to flow to Nathan's brain. After the fifth, Ricky let go completely, and with a last rattling breath, he died.
    Nathan panicked. The Crisis Unit looked like a house of horrors. A supervisor was dead, and they were going to blame him. Sure as hell, there would be nothing that he'd be able to say to anyone to make them believe that Ricky had started it.
    Say goodbye to a ten-month release. No sirree, baby, killing a supervisor was about the worst crime there was. They'd throw his young ass in jail until he was twenty-one, if he could get out even then.
    No, staying there and facing the music was not an option. Nathan had to get the hell out of the Juvenile Detention Center. He had to run fast, run hard, and run now. But he'd need keys to get out. Tiptoeing through the river of gore on the floor, Nathan pulled the key ring off Ricky's belt and darted out of the room, locking the door behind him.
    From there it was easy. Every key he needed was right there on the ring. The door at the end of the hallway to the left led him into the area he recognized from his first night as the in-processing area. Nathan briefly considered rummaging through the storage closet for the clothes they had stolen from him eight months before, but he decided that every second spent inside the building was a second closer to getting caught. Moving swiftly and silently, he glided past the one-armed chair with the built-in handcuff, next to the desk where that fat fart Gonzalez asked new arrivals endless questions to which he already knew the answers.
    The final door was the easiest; Nathan picked the right key the first time. He opened it only a crack at first, praying there wouldn't be a cop or a supervisor on the other side. Again, luck was with him. He slipped through the opening, locked the door from the outside, and tossed the keys into the bushes. Ahead of him lay fifty feet of open grass, leading up a tall hill, and beyond that, freedom. He covered the distance in nothing flat.
    Pausing for just a moment at the top of the hill, Nathan looked back at the JDC. Though the elevation changed his perspective, the view was exactly the same as when he had first arrived so long ago. It looked like such a friendly place, constructed of ornamental brick and stone and adorned with pretty flowers and shrubs. Yet, on the inside, the Brookfield Juvenile Detention Center was a garden for hatred. The seeds planted within its walls grew well, nurtured and cultivated by the likes of Ricky and