First Posted: 3 April 1997
"Yeah? Why don't we dance his bones?" suggests Thousand Watts.
I stare at them both for a few seconds, thinkin' of Jimbe. I rub my hand across the right side of my head, where the hair has grown back in. Then finger the scar under the long hair on the left side.
"Chill, tools," I command. "That was the Dog. You don't be mammyjamming messing with him. He's prime life buck. 16 point rack, you grok?"
"Fuck me, mammyjammer!" Playback mutters looking after the dark figure turnin' the corner at th' end of the street. "Wha'd the grinder want wi' you, Whipcord?"
Whirling around I hardball Playback across the side of the face with the back of my hand. "Don't ever call me that, tadpole!" i snarl at him as he lay on the ground beneath my feet. "Not no more! I'm the Alpha! I'm the leader!"
Thousand Watts slides forward a pace. Moves his hands out away from his body. Huh. Good. Respect. Like showing his throat. "Yeah, yeah, ok, Alpha. Playback jus' forgot is all. Ok? No harm meant? Right Playback?"
"Yeah, yeah, sure Alpha. Kowtow, man, kowtow. Jus' forgot. You th' leader."
Yeah, i'm the leader. After a while i started thinking about what the Dog told me. Hey. I read good enough. Make th' system work for me for a change. Yeah! An' what a mirth seeing those old bitty-bop librarians freakin' over me in their crib, touching pre-video. Reading about wolves and packs.
"So ok," i say to Playback who also's got his arms out. "So don't forget next time."
"Yeah, ok, man. I won't. But, hey, what'd the Dog want?"
"Just some names, pack-boy. And places." What he's gonna do wi' them I can't grok at all. I think back to Jimbe again. Blood in the surf. Thinkin' about it that way, I don't want to know why Dog wanted the info. I'm better off not being around the Dog.
"Right!" i command the Pack, heading them down the street the opposite way the Dog left. "Time to cull the herd and jack some scorecards!"