Electric Barracuda (12 page)

“And I’d love to hear more about this dangerous hombre you’re risking your life to catch . . . Have you met the Litter?”

Babes snuggled tight on both sides of the agent.

“Well,” said Lowe. “Serge has this website.”

The Doberman led him up the trailer’s steps. “Let’s log on and take a look . . .”

Chapter Six

Cyberspace

S
erge’s Blog. Star Date: Wow!

Yo out there. It’s actually me, Coleman. Serge just crashed after staying awake for three days. I’m usually the one that’s passed out, but I took some bad acid, so I’ll be wide open for a bit, just carrying on with my job, all the little chores that go un-thanked. Serge complains I don’t do chores, but I’ve just spent who knows how long lying flat on the ground, keeping the carpet in place, because it was starting to dome up in the middle, and it goes without saying you can’t let it get to the ceiling . . . By bad acid, I don’t mean the regular bad, where you’re on a mega-freak-out trip like you’re both suffocating and having a massive heart attack at the same time and swear to God you’re going to die any second. The dying part doesn’t make it bad, because if you’re a party warrior, you go: Yes! It’s kicking in! . . . What makes it bad is you do
really
stupid stuff, like if you go to the mall, and everything’s normal—just weeping and banging your head on a post because they don’t have a Hickory Farms, and a second later you’re covered in cold cream and dragging an inflatable woman, and everyone yells “pervert,” but I only bought the thing so I could drive in car-pool lanes . . . Good acid’s totally different. Took some killer windowpane last year, and first got pissed because it wasn’t working and I thought I’d been ripped off, and I’m playing with my zipper, up and down and up and down, hearing sounds of individual prongs locking and unlocking in musical scales like a xylophone, and the mechanism starts blowing my mind and I think: Hey, a lot of planning went into this motherfucker. So I took off my pants to get a closer look, zipping up and down in front of my face. Even more impressive! LSD’s like that, always giving you a new perspective, especially when the pants are over your head, and you’re looking
out
through the zipper: up, down, up, down, each time giving me a peek through the crotch to the tune of “Jungle Boogie.” And you know how sometimes you just get this paranoid feeling on excellent drugs that someone’s watching you? It was like that this time, except multiplied by a hundred, probably because I was in a restaurant. Suddenly all these people began screaming, and I thought maybe some customer had gone berserk, and I crawled under the table. Then suddenly the table went straight up in the air! I’m thinking, holy fuck, what kind crazy McDonald’s is this? Turns out some employees had lifted the table and grabbed me and then I was on the sidewalk in my underwear and some pants hit me in the face, and I went back to the motel and kept working the zipper, wondering about the person who invented it, and I finally nod to myself: Yeah, now this guy really had his shit wired tight—he could see the big picture. And I hid under the bed and played with the zipper for the next six hours until the trip wore off. Now,
that’s
good acid . . . But this stuff I just took is stale or diluted, so you only get a little high and stay up all night. Which makes it bad
acid
, but great
speed
. The last time I got some I went back for more at five
A.M.
, but the guy refused to hook me up because his wife was yelling crazy in the background: “Does that goddamn idiot know what time it is?” and Serge is shouting from the driveway for me to hurry, and I get back in the car, and Serge says I shouldn’t have come at this ungodly hour because the wife sounded like she was on ten periods and I wouldn’t be welcome anymore, but I said, no, they’re drug dealers—they understand the chemical equation. He said, what equation? I said, they sold me speed; I woke them up . . . Oh, when I said Serge was zonked from exhaustion, I wasn’t kidding. He had a mondo-huge day! We’re driving who-knows-where, and he’s totally obsessed with his new Fugitive Tour crap, and we pass this field and see all these old tents and people in gray and blue uniforms loading muskets, and Serge makes a wild U-turn and races across a dirt parking lot. I ask what’s going on? He says, “A military re-enactment! I’ve always wanted to be in a military re-enactment!” I said, “What about the Fugitive Tour?” He said, “What?,” and jumps out and sprints to the command tent, offering to enlist: “Are you doing the battle of Santa Rosa or St. John’s Bluff? Maybe Fort Brooke. Please tell me it’s Fort Brooke! You’re probably wondering which side I’m on—the side of history!” He sees a campfire that’s gone out and an old charred pot on a log. “Is that coffee? I don’t care if it’s cold. Wait here!” And he chugs half the pot, brown stuff streaming down his neck, and runs back with the thing still in his hand and salutes. “Reporting for duty! Coffee wins wars! Fourscore and seven! Rockets’ red glare! Bombs bursting! Bang a gong, get it on!” Before they can say anything, there’s a bunch of loud explosions and puffs of smoke from cannons. Serge clapped his hands like patty-cake: “The battle’s begun! I’ll help you win! Watch this!” Then he dashes onto the field and grabs a rifle from the side of a dead soldier (I think the guy was just faking), and charges from the rear to join the advancing front line of the blue army—“What’s wrong with you guys? Show some patriotism! Start yelling!” And he breaks right through the line, still sprinting, waving back at them and shouting, “Follow me! On to fucking victory!” And he ends up all alone in the middle of the field between the two armies, still charging. I guess they were filming some kind of authentic documentary, and Serge is wearing a tropical shirt and sneakers and a wristwatch. So then everyone
does
start yelling, and Serge reaches the line of gray soldiers and clubs one over the head with the stock of his rifle. Man, did that guy go down fast. And this other soldier is like, “What the fuck are you doing?” Serge says, “Preserving the Union!” And then he clubs
him
. Other dudes tried to take the rifle away, but Serge is swinging it like a baseball bat. Now the blue army is really running, and Serge looks over his shoulder: “See how it’s done?” But two of the
blue
guys grab him, and Serge says, “What are you doing? I’m on your side! You’re going to blow the battle!” But they’re just yelling “Asshole!” and “Dick-wad!” So Serge head-butts one and punches the other in the Adam’s apple and takes off. I think they canceled the battle because all the blue and gray guys are now running together after Serge. Except Serge is pretty fast, and these dudes are wearing all this heavy, hot clothing. Serge zigzags back and forth across the field, doing loops all over the place. Some of the guys start to faint, and I decide to wait in the car with the beer, and finally I see Serge racing over the top of a hill with a rifle and about a hundred guys behind him. He picked up an American flag from somewhere and jumps in the driver’s seat. They’re just about to the car, when Serge guns the engine and takes off right at them. Never seen people scatter so fast. I suggest we get out of there, but Serge says that would be desertion and speeds back onto the battlefield, more guys diving out of the way, Serge waving the flag out the window at the documentary crew: “The tide has turned in favor of the Republic!” And he finally reaches the enemy camp and runs over all their tents and backpacks and lawn chairs and shit and says, “Now
this
is a military re-enactment!” And we take a gravel road back to the highway and he tells me the only thing to do after the Civil War is to drive to the airport so he can experience “time shock.” We’re riding the escalators over and over at Orlando International, and Serge is telling everyone about metal stress and the failure rate of different planes and that he thinks pilots secretly have parachutes, and he sees this one guy and almost craps with glee, and I ask, “What is it?” He says that he’s been searching airports his whole life, but never actually thought he’d find one, and I say, “One what?” He says, “A Hare Krishna.” I say, “I’ve seen millions in airports.” He points and says, “But this one has luggage. He’s actually traveling. It could be my finest irony masterpiece!” He runs over to this tourist brochure rack, and then up to the bald dude in a robe, and Serge hands him the pamphlets and asks him for money. The guy gives a dirty look and walks away, but Serge keeps pestering for donations and forcing brochures on him. They’re both walking faster and faster until the old guy’s in an all-out sprint, and Serge snatches at his robe just before he ducks through security. I tell Serge that I think the guy’s upset, and Serge says, “Of all people he should understand: It’s karma.” Then Serge bought a guitar at Best Buy. Not his original plan, but he was playing Guitar Hero and the song was by the Who, and these kids start laughing, and Serge says, “What’s your problem? My high score will fry the program,” and one kid says, “You won’t even make the top fifty.” And Serge says: “The top fifty never saw Townshend in person,” and then he smashes the guitar to bits and the store people ask him to get out his wallet. Then we’re driving back to this motel, and I think coffee gives you a letdown, because Serge is frowning, and I ask him what’s the matter, and he’s sitting there with a Civil War rifle, toy-guitar pieces, and shreds of a Hare Krishna robe and says, “Every day it’s the same shit.”

Miami

Just south of the river near Brickell.

Seven o’clock.

Roy the Pawn King, Tommy Junior and Coltrane sat at the bar listening to live, three-chord Chicago blues. Dim red light.

“I still can’t believe he did this to us,” said Roy.

“Believe it,” said Tommy.

“Didn’t Capone used to come here?” asked Coltrane.

“Practically a fixture,” said Tommy.

Through the doors of Tobacco Road came a pair of bikers in head scarves.

Skid Marks grabbed a stool. “Dad, why’d you want to see us?”

“It’s about our attorney,” said Tommy.

“That button-down asshole,” said Bacon Strips. “What about him?”

Tommy gave them the nine yards.

“Son of a—” said Skid Marks.

“We need your help,” said Roy.

Bacon Strips leaped off his stool. “Don’t worry. We’ll take care of him.”

“Sit back down,” said Tommy.

They knew when not to argue. And had respect.

“We don’t want revenge,” said Roy. “We want our money.”

“We want revenge, too,” said Tommy.

“So you have a plan to get it back?”

“Oh, have we got a plan!” said Coltrane. “But it has to be delicate. Brad sewed this up legally, and the money’s offshore. If we just beat the tar out of him, it’s gone for good. That’s why we’re bringing in someone who knows how to fix such things.”

“And can be trusted,” said Tommy.

“What do you want us to do?” asked Skid Marks.

A harmonica howled from the stage. Roy pulled two envelopes from his jacket. “Brad’s not taking our calls, so you need to personally deliver these to his secretary.”

The bikers looked at a pair of letters. One was already sealed in an envelope marked Confidential. They read the other.

“I’m confused,” said Skid Marks.

“Roy’s idea,” said Tommy. “That letter you just read instructs our attorney to equally distribute all proceeds among the families’ surviving relatives. Brad’s to deliver the sealed letter to our authorized agent. ”

“Proceeds from what?”

“The map mentioned in the open letter.”

“Is the map in the sealed envelope?” asked Bacon Strips.

“No,” said Tommy. “No map exists.”

“Then what’s in it?”

“Brad will find out when he opens it.”

“But it’s marked Confidential.”

“That’s why he’ll open it.”

“Now I’m really confused,” said Skid Marks.

“Greed is his weakness,” said Tommy. “You should have seen him drooling back in that hospital room when we reminisced about the old moonshine days and Capone’s place.”

“Only one problem,” said Bacon Strips. “I don’t see how Brad will be able to deliver the sealed letter.”

“He won’t deliver it.”

“I’m lost again,” said Skid Marks.

“After he reads it, he’ll track down our friend so he can steal the map and recover the treasure for himself.”

“The map that doesn’t exist?”

“Exactly.”

“But how will he find our friend?”

“With your help. You’ll secretly meet the friend and bait the trail for our lawyer. Here’re extra copies of the letters for yourself.”

“What’s the rest of the plan?” asked Bacon Strips.

“Don’t have it,” said Roy.

“Don’t need it,” added Tommy. “That’s our friend’s specialty. Once you meet, he’ll take it from there.”

“I understand now,” said Skid Marks, tucking the envelopes in his leather vest and jumping off the stool again. “So where do we find this so-called authorized agent of yours?”

“That . . . gets a little complicated,” said Tommy. “You better sit back down.”

Part II