The Chatapalooza Mystery

by Roger Humes

---

Chap. 1

ChatWorld could be a pretty crazy place, but sometimes it would get as normal as putting on a clean pair of socks. Yes, things could get pretty meat and potatoes until you walked into some place like the Tahiti Lounge and found that Twinkletoes5 had the bumper cars out again.

At least I thought her name was Twinkletoes5. I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that I was in GenChat and that I played piano in the friendly dive where I stood dumbfounded like a shoe salesman with his hat in his hand. I had no clue of who I was.

I faced the crowded dimly lit room as the banter and sway of the chat floated over like the taste of an after dinner mint:

· Ginger&MaryAnn goes "BLEAH".

· DraculaAnn is back

· Cub_Reporter says, "What happened anyway? I was afk and the whole thing had locked up."

· Dawn_tinted says, "hello al"

· Twinkletoes5 revs up her bumper car and waves at al

· Dawn_tinted says, "wb blood"

· Scruggs_Earl enters.

· Ginger&MaryAnn says, "nasty rum,"

· ShelliWinters says, "(Tahiti_theme)is appropriate"

· Dawn_tinted lol@news

· Dawn_tinted beeps

· Roseisaroseisarose says, "hello everyone!"

· ? lights a coffin nail

· ShelliWinters says, "same here cub"

· Spiralzoey says, "Ginger"

· Twinkletoes5 weaves between the tables

· Dawn_tinted winks at al

· Dawn_tinted says, "long time hon"

· ? says, "been elsewhere sweetheart"

· DraculaAnn says, "brb.. potty time"

· Shelli37 says, "ok drac"

· Twinkletoes5 slams her bumper car into the airlock

· HastaLaVista enters.

· Dawn_tinted guessed that

· Spiralgraffe weeps

· ClevelandRox enters.

· Dawn_tinted giggles

· Gilligan943 enters.

· Kaiser_Roll12 yawns...

· Dawn_tinted says, "hello gills"

· Dawn_tinted winks

· Cub_Reporter has to leave pretty soon anyway. Places to go. People to see. Things to do and all that crap.

· ? says, "too many cases, too many dames, you know how it goes"

· Gillsie says, "Hello again!"

· Twinkletoes5 side swipes the bar

· Dawn_tinted yawns

· Ginger&MaryAnn walks over to the bar and orders a shot of JD, green label

· Roseisaroseisarose leaves, heading for The Master Chef.

· Dawn_tinted smiles at cub

· Ginger&MaryAnn boggles at the concept.

· Kaiser_Roll12 wonders if ClevelandRox rocks the mic like a vandal...

· ? say, "one foot in the crapper and the other ahead of the collection agency"

· Kaiser_Roll12 giggles inanely.

· Shelli37 says, "okay hand on lil"

· Ginger&MaryAnn says, "lol @ al"

· Cub_Reporter says, "I have a Texas joke before I go."

· ? orders a mineral water, neat

· Dawn_tinted says, "hey al how come im not one of your dames ???????"

So I gathered from the chat my name was Al and I was a detective, lawyer, or doctor. Well, that and seventy-five cents would get me a cup of joe at the local diner. Still, as I looked around the place I felt like I belonged. The idea depressed me a little.

I sat down at the piano, placed the tip jar on the top, and started playing. My hands felt as comfortable as a rummie at a slot machine. Someone requested Trashy Women, and I complied.

The number who I knew was Twinkletoes5 came swaying up to me. She had one of those bodies that made a man just want to sit down and shake his head, then pull up his zipper.

“Hi, Al,” she said while flashing me grin that made want a new pair of shades, “how’s it going? You been back to the office lately?”

I had know idea what she was talking about but stonewalled with a reply, “No, sweetheart. Been a little too busy.”

“Well, I just wondered if you got that painting in Room 13 done.”

“Didn’t have time.”

“Oh, Al, sometimes I just don’t know what to do with you. When I tell you have got to take care of business, well you just have to grit your teeth and do it, mister.”

She got a look on her face like a kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar holding onto grannie’s money and said, “Say...Al...about our coffee later...I can’t make it. I have other plans. Sorry...”

I felt like someone had just love tapped a sledgehammer to my guts. I didn’t know why what she said bothered me, but for some reason it did.

“That’s okay,” I said as I covered up my nervousness by lighting another coffin nail, “I got some serious reading to do anyway.”

She looked at me questioningly and flashed a tense grin. Without another word, she turned and walked away. The seismic activity from her hips almost knocked me off my bench. She gave me one last glance over her shoulder. Her eyes looked torn between the rock and the frying pan.

Then she stopped at the bar and stood by a tall thin man wearing a black beret and motorcycle jacket. I wouldn’t say he was greasy, but if you had him around you wouldn’t need to buy very much brycreem. After a few minutes they walked out of the Tahiti.

I stubbed out my coffin nail and threw an ashtray at some clown who yelled for Louie Louie. I stretched, then cleared out the tip jar. Searching through my pockets I found a business card for Al_B._Moonlight, Private Detective. Since I had ascertained my name was Al, it had to have been mine.

Twinkletoes5’s actions had bothered me, but I had to line my ducks up in a row before I could them all in one basket. I needed to find out what was going on, and the best place to start seemed to be my office.

I lit up another coffin nail as I headed out the door.
Chap. 2

As I walked into the office, the room seemed as familar and comfortable as an old pair of boxer shorts. It was dimly lit by an overhead light. I entered and closed the door quietly behind me.

I walked over to the desk. Who knows what stories it could tell about happened behind or on top of or under it. I opened the drawers, one by one, searching for clues to my identity. Frankly, I felt about as lost as a tourist in New Zeland without an English-to-Kiki dictionary. Unfortunately, I found nothing in the drawers that gave me a hint of a clue.

Then in the corner of the top right hand drawer the light reflected off a yellowish rectangular object. I reached in and pulled it out. It was a pack of coffin nails. The label read HardDrive. Somehow, I knew that they should be familiar but couldn’t quite put the hammer on the thumb.

I shrugged, tore open the pack, and lit up one of the puppies. Immediately, it felt like someone had put my cardio-vascular system in a belljar and sucked out all of the air. As I staggered from behind the desk my head seemed to occupy the entire room. I wheezed and coughed helplessly, my eyes watering madly. Through my blurred vision my mind caught the glimmer of a woman with solid frame. She seemed to be laughing at me.

Damn, I thought, this is one fine smoke. As I greedily sucked down another drag, my revelry was interupted by the phone ringing. I picked it up and heard a voice that almost brought my memory.

“Hey, Al, this is Louie, what are you doing?” the excited voice boomed into my ear.

“Not much, just checking out some things. Who’s this?”

“What do you mean ‘Who’s this?’ This is Louie. What time should I pick you up for the gig?”

“The gig?”

“Al! How could have forgotten about the gig? Someone is actually going to pay us this time! Remember, we’re playing Chatapalooza. I gave you a poster!”

In an instant of syncronicity, I looked down as he spoke and saw a black poster laying on my desk. It said in red lettering:

CHATAPALOOZA!

The Ultimate

Cyber-Music Experience!!!

featuring

*Reggie Racoon and The Randy Rangers

*Scud Highwire’s Mombatusa

*The Enablers

*The Emissions

*RedOoolala & Derwood

*The Killer Bz

*Apocolypse Dyslexia

*The Cyber Buncha Polka Dudes

*the Sterile Mules

Tuesday at 8:30

10 Base T Pavillion

Sponsored by:

The GenChat Merchants Association

The Totally Oblivious To Society Society

Old Ethernet Brewery

“Yeah, sure, Louie, the festival...How could I forget ha, ha,” I replied, feigning jocularity.

“Good! I swear, Al, if your backside wasn’t attached to your body you wouldn’t be able to use the toiltet! Now don’t lose your electric piano this time! DrShades nearly got a hernia last time carrying the one out of the Tahiti.

“Well, I gotta go check out the recording equipment. Don’t want to miss getting this one on tape.

“Oh yeah, have you heard that Philippe has arrived?”

“Philippe?”

“Yeah, you know, Philippe_RLyeh from The Enablers. He got here at 8:30. Heard he all ready has his songbird lined for for this port. Gotta run, Al. See you in about an hour.”

As I hung up the phone I had the feeling I knew this Louie very well. I also surmised that he had a good portion of my life on tape, but I had more immediate corcerns, like who actually was Al_B._Moonlight and where did I keep my piano? There was a fly in this pickle jar for certain.

There wasn’t much else in the place to check out. Whoever I was, I sure didn’t own own alot. There was a picture of Twinkletoes5 and me on the desk. I picked it and stared at like a man checking his nicks after shaving. It looked like we were at a fair or carnival. Twinkletoes was laughing, her eyes gleaming, holding my arm. I had an expression somewhere between delight and that of a beaver in a trap gnawing his hind leg off.

The photo didn’t tell me much, but staring at it did leave an empty perturbation in my stomach. The woman was a doll. Few could hold an hourglass up to her watch. Any joker who let one like her slip away was a fool.

I lit up another HardDrive. The sensation knocked me back against the wall like a jackhammer into soft mud. It was such moments that which made life worth living.

I switched off the light and stood in total darnkess. All of a sudden, my musings were interupted by a sound of two voice gaily walking down the hall. They stopped in front of my door, their embrace and kiss silhouetted in the frosted pane. One of the shapes wore a beret; the other was a familar lovely form. They finished, and then walked on. The voices stopped when I heard a door slam.

I sat on the edge of the desk and wiped the sweat from my face. I was suddenly very tired and very sad, but there was no time to hold my heart in the hopper. I had to get to the bottom of all of this.

I grabbed a mineral water from the ice box and moved to the door. I stood there for a moment, trying to remember something but my mind was as empty as my pocket after payday. There was a flicker of a face smiling at me from a woman with a body as awesome as the Great Lakes, then a flash of light followed by darkness.

As I closed the door I heard the sound of muffled laughter from down the hall. I took one last long look into the office, like I was saying goodbye. Who knew when I would be back there again?
Chap. 3

I walked outside and stopped to light up another HardDrive. As the force of the first inhalation knocked me back against the lamp post my eyes looked up searching for a certain window. The light was on, but the shade was pulled down.

I sighed, turned my back to the building, and walked down the street. It was time to put the torch out to pasture. I had more important things to figure out. After all, she was only a dame, and in this crummy little cyburg dolls were a dime a baker’s dozen. If I told myself that enough times maybe I would start believing it.

My mind proceeded to do cartwheels and jumping jacks. I remembered feeling this bad once before. I was walking down the hall, it was late. I heard the creak of a rocking chair, and the voice of my mother. She was making me angry. I think I had a knife in my hand...wait...it was just another damn flake memory...

*****

When ChatWorld was originated there were several unforseen effects. One major consequence was the creation of cyber-beings, entities who were a cohesion of the thoughts and emotions that flaked off the chatters. Most people couldn’t tell a flake, as these individuals were called, from a hole in garden hose. We could usually pass for chatters if we desired to do so.

I said we because I knew that I was a flake. The scene that had just flashed through my mind was one of my flake memories. It had come from someone else. Most times flakes don’t notice the recollections until they are almost over. You get used to it like a corn in a tight pair shoes. It’s just a part of life in ChatWorld.

*****

I had about an hour until Louie would pick me up. I needed information but had no idea where to go. Most detectives worth the salt on their boiled eggs had sources. I probably did too, but, of course, I had no idea where. So I wandered aimlessly, my feet moving like a stream of urine in a tornado.

Suddenly, my mind began to clear like erasing a sheet on a magic slate. The dominoes were starting to fall into place. I was starting to remember who I was. As I ambled by a dark alley I took a big soothing swig off my bottle of mineral water. It was refeshing as cool breeze after you get out of the shower and haven’t put on your underwear.

I guess that I should have been paying more attention, then I wouldn’t have been caught off guard like a diarrhea victim with his pants down. Two large shadowy shapes appeared and drug me back into the alley. I struggled, but they were as strong as gorillas in a china closet.

A beautiful face appeared in front of me. I recognized it. The lips were luscious behind their sinster sneer. The hazel eyes made me just want to take off my clothes and go for swim in the soft pools behind their hard glint.

“You!” I gasped as I strove in vain against the steely grips that pinned me to the wall.

“Yes, Moonlight, it’s me,” she taunted in a voice that I wanted wrapped around me some place below my belt. “I assumed you would be starting to get your memory back about now. Sorry, sweetie, but it’s a little too soon for that. I need some more time.”

I felt a pin prick in my arm and noticed her step back with a syringe in her hand. I wanted to make some comment about her mother’s ancestry but my tongue felt as about as supple as an old shoe. Everything started to spin in slow notion. The colors grew intense, and the dim light flickered like prism before my eyes. My body started to feel numb. Behind her I thought I saw a slender boy with deep blue eyes hiding behind a trash can.

As I started to fade into blackness, the thugs dropped me into the trash. Behind slitted eyes I felt their footsteps walk away and tasted the wickedness of her laughter as it swayed out of sight. Then I was out like an administrative assistant with access to his boss’s expense account.

*****

I started to slowly come back around. My head felt like someone had stepped on it with golf shoes. My mind was as empty as a school boy’s thoughts during his SATs. I had a slight recognition of something happening to me, a face laughing evilly at me, but that was about it. Then I felt a hand groping in my jacket pocket for my wallet.

“Sorry, buster,” I snarled as my fingers tightened around a slim forearm, “but the gravy train stops here.”

“Hey, mister, let go, a flake’s gotta eat ya know,” a frightened high pitched voice trembled.

I opened my eyes and saw a boy about fourteen. He was short, thin, had long blonde hair, and was wearing a ragged set of clothes. Great, I thought, another cyber-waif. I was about to cuff him on his way when we made eye contact. His orbs were a deep blue, the kind where you’d like to go sit on hot summer’s day. They reminded me of someone behind a certain windowshade in a particular building.

I relaxed my grip and sat up slowly, motioned for him to sit down. He hestitated, shrugged, and complied. I lit up a coffin nail and delighted in the pickaxe sensation as the smoke ran down my lungs.

“So what’s your name, kid?” I asked between puffs.

“Little_Jewels.”

“Well, Jewels, why are you on the street?”

“No place else to go. When Bates was in charge he cut the funding to all of the cyber-children’s homes. It’s never been restored. We kid flakes sort of fell through the cracks.”

“So how do you get by?”

“Through the kindness of strangers.”

“Thief, huh?”

“Well, I don’t have any other options. It’s either that or clean the pickles of fat old male chatters.”

“See what you mean. Say, I’m working on a case and could use some help. You interested?”

“Do wild pontiffs defecate in the shubbery?”

I wondered just how far that line had gotten around ChatWorld by now. I sighed, stretched, and stood up. My head felt a little wobbly and my knees responded like unbent paper clips. Little_Jewels slowly reached over and took hold of my arm. I steadied myself.

“Frankly, kid,” I said as I brushed the trash off my clothes, “I trust you about as far as I could throw a tractor. I assume you feel the same about me, but believe me I’m a straight shooter...no not that kind!

“I’ll fill you in on what I’m doing. If you’re interested I’ll pay you two cyber-georges a day plus expenses. Okay?”

“Sure, Mister...”

“Moonlight, Al_B._Moolight,” I said as I read the name off the business card I found in my coat pocket. “Now let’s go.”

We walked out of the alley, turned right, and headed into the night.
Chap. 4

The wind had started to pick up and wrapped about us like a puppy’s tail around a lampshade. It was a cool breeze. I raised the collar on my coat and watched the sparks and ashes fly off my coffin nail. I looked at Little_Jewels. He was shivering under his t-shirt, so I took off my coat and handed it to him.

“W-w-where w-w-e goin’, Al?” he chattered like a drug crazed chipmunk as he gratefully accepted my jacket.

“I thought we’d stop by the Tahiti and nose around a little. There’s something else we need to do, but I can’t remember what it is,” I replied between the delicious raspy drags on my coffin nail.

“You don’t remember much, Al. Are you a hootch hound?”

“I don’t think so. At least I’m not one now. Something’s happened to me, and I’m not sure what it is. Kind of like someone took one brick out of my library, you know. I get flashes and glimpses. They’re not flake memories, I know they’re real, but I can’t quite get my finger on the pulse.”

“You’re flake, too? Wow! How did you make it?”

“It wasn’t easy, kid. Started out poor, dirt poor, so poor I couldn’t afford to pay attention. But I went to school, studied hard. And now look at me. It got me where I am today.”

“But you look terrible.”

“Thanks. Now shutup, kid.”

We were at the Tahiti. As I opened the door the friendly sound of chat grabbed us by the rancheros and pulled us into the room:

· AhabTArab says, "Can you at least type up my accident report Blarney?"

· SnowBored says, "Blarney, just wonder if anyone would believe that..."

· SyddleBurne doesn't really catre today

· Blarney_Stoan says, "if anyone would believe what ...that the world is gonna end??"

· SnowBored says, "I don't but met some people who DO believe in end of world..."

· Twinkletoes5 leans against the bar and smiles at Philippe

· SnowBored says, "They said "THE END" is on year of 2000....."

· 8675309 pounces on syddle and tickles him until he turns red

· SnowBored says, "only less than 3 years left to see..."

· The_Boss slides naked across his desk

· AhabTArab sneaks another hug and smooch from Blarney

· 8675309 puts a towel on boss

· AvalonMan says, "ewww...that's not what we wanna see, Boss..."

· SexySunset . o O ( if the END is 2000..then my mortgage company can kiss my butt for the last 6 months of 1999!!!!!!! )

· Blarney_Stoan grins and returns the smooch and huggle

· 8675309 pouts because syddle is ignoring me now

· Blarney_Stoan says, "LOLOLOL@sunset"

· Chinacat is back ..freshly showered and smelling like a daisy!!!!

· Philippe_RLyeh whispers in Twink’s ear

· Twinkletoes5 blushes

· Blarney_Stoan huggles jack

· SnowBored . o O ( wonder if I smell clean or dirty.. )

· Blarney_Stoan . o O (hhhmmmm a lil cologne, deodorant...and onions for lunch)

· Lenonoleum smells Snow....phewwww..it smell clean

· SexySunset gets dizzy watching that little flower go round and round and round.....

· SnowBored . o O ( sheesh better run off to brush his teeth and whole thing )

· Blarney_Stoan hands Snow a breath mint

· Chinacat sits at the sickie table with ahab

· Blarney_Stoan sniffs ahab

· SexySunset shoots her flower!!!!!!(357mag)

I wasn’t sure why we had come here, except that the place felt like home for the holidays to me. We slipped into a table in the back that some people vacated when they saw me enter.

A rather attractive waitress with a platform as significant as Mt. Rushmore came up to us. I ordered a mineral water, and Little_Jewels ordered an Old Ethernet. She laughed and said she’d bring two mineral waters.

Then I heard a voice behind me laugh and say, “Well, Al. Getting them a little younger aren’t you? And I see you’ve switched circuits too.”

I turned and viewed a body that knocked my rancheros up into my throat. She had more curves than a crooked politician. I caught sight of the face. Parts of my body had been there before, I just knew it. And those eyes...there was something about those hazel eyes.

“What’s the matter, Al, got your tongue caught in the trapdoor again?” she asked through lips that I knew had brought better men than me to their knees.

“No, sorry,” I said while torching up another coffin nail, “you just reminded me of someone, only her eyes were as cold as a woman who finds her husband in bed with her mother.”

She broke eye contact and stammered, “O-o-h I-I-I see. Well, I have to go...take care of some business. Ta ta for now, Al.”

As I watched her hips oscillate across the room I heard Jewels exclaim, “Wow! She owns this place! You know Daybreak12?”

“Who hasn’t?”

“What does that mean?”

“No idea, kid. Yes, I do know her from somewhere...but there is something else...just can’t quite grasp it...”

The waitress was slow getting our drinks so I walked to the bar to clear my head. As I jostled my way into the crowd I dumped against someone. He pushed back, so I returned the pushed with an elbow to his kidney.

“Pardone, I did not see you,” his voice slimed like a the bottom of the frying basket at a greasy spoon.

I looked up and saw a tall thin angular man. He was wearing a black beret, wrap around mirror sunglasses, and a motorcycle jacket. Behind him I caught a glimpse of the most beautiful woman I had ever seen jump the modem into this sorry little cyburg. I felt like I knew her, had spent a lot of time with her. And looking at them together I got a sinking feeling in my craw that I had blown something with her.

“Oh, Al,” she said with a guilty tinge to her voice as her deep blue eyes started to drown me in their pools of angst, “we didn’t see you come in. This is my...friend...Philippe. Philippe this is my tenant...Al...”

Three of us felt about as comfortable as people in a crowded elevator trying to figure out who had the onions for breakfast. I picked up the drinks, nodded to them, and started to back out through the throng.

“Oh say, my friend,” Phillipe said as he put his arm around her like she was his piece of luggage, “are you the Al_B._Moonlight from the Killer-Bz?”

“I guess so, guy.”

“Wonderful, I so look forward to hearing you tonight. Perhaps Twinkletoes and I can sit on the stage and listen.”

“And perhaps pigs can fly,” I muttered half under my breath.

“Pardone, my friend?”

“Nothing. Yeah, guess, I’ll see you there.”

“Yes, we’ll see you there, Al,” Twinkletoes said with an edge of guilt in her voice. “And, Al, I’m sorry, I didn’t plan this.”

“Yeah, that’s the way the eggroll flakes, sweetheart. See you later.”

I turned and bulled my way through the crowd. My heart was racing like an Indy speed car. I didn’t know what had just happened, but it made me feel as low as snake’s belly in wagon rut.

Sitting down at the table, I caught sight of Daybreak. She was fine looking woman, one of those frames you could write home to grandpa about. We locked eyes for a second. Her gaze was distraught, pensive, like she was about to let the beans out the cat’s bag. Then she disappeared into the crowd.

“Well, Al, what should we do?” Little_Jewels asked.

I sipped my mineral water and lit up another HardDrive. It was like a mule had kicked me in the lungs. At least that made me feel a little better.

I sat down my drink and said, “Finish up, we’re going to make like leaves and book. I’ve had about enough of this sleazy little dive.”

We finished our drinks in silence, placed a modest tip on the table, and left.
Chap. 5

We wandered aimlessly pell mell around GenChat, followng where our bootheels would be going. Frankly, I was at my wit’s end up the rope. A few things were starting to come back: the number of my lotto ticket, what was the special on Thursday at the Totally Oblivious To Society Society Soup Kitchen. However, most of my mind was still as blank as a boy at the chalkboard trying to spell onomatopoeia.

Finally, Little_Jewels broke the silence and asked, “Say, Al, do you have any idea where we are going?”

“Sorry, kid, but I’m up on the roof with no branch to climb out on.”

“I thought so. You sure you’re not a gin snooter or something?”

“No, kid, I think those days are behind me.”

“Say, Al, I have something to tell you. I hope you won’t mind, but I need to level with you.”

“Shoot, kid.”

“Al...I’m gay...”

“That’s okay, kid,” I said as I lit up another HardDrive and felt the enticing smoke go off in my sinuses like a cherry bomb, “I’ve been here a long time. You hang around chat long enough you see everything, usually twice, from pimple faced pud pullers to middle aged housewives stuffed in leather like sausages to granny gangs on Harleys.

“I figure you shake the shaft where you want it to go, and if you don’t hurt anyone what’s the point of getting upset. Besides, I like you, kid. You remind me of someone.”

“Thanks, Al, I feel better now,” he said as he tried to take hold of my hand.

I stepped back and said, “Sorry, kid, I may be understanding but I prefer my lovers to not be able to count to twenty-one on their digits.”

All of a sudden I stopped like a pig smacked in the snout with a nine iron. In front of me was a sign that jogged my memory like a runner with a rock in his shoe. The door read 518. I had been there before, I was sure of it.

I opened the door and was assaulted by the clamor of mayhem and a waft of burnt hemp. The room was lit by a lava lamp and several people were running back and forth from a typewriter to a microphone like Keystone Cops on amphetamines. A red bearded man sat at the typewriter and pounded like a testosterone crazed monkey. As fast as he finished a sheet, someone pulled it from the typewriter, ran to the microphone, and read it in a loud funny voice. Then they would all fall down laughing.

As I looked at the decor of the room, I felt some inkling of recognition. Save for the lava lamp the place was bedecked in a psuedo-Twenties Paris style. The room did need a good sweeping and the rugs shaken out. At least they could have gotten rid of the peanut shells and Old Ethernet bottles on the floor. I knew more about housekeeping than they did about beans.

Then the pieces fell in place like one of those nudie jig saw puzzles. This was the home of VOIC, the Voice Of Infernal Chat, the underground FM station in GenChat. I had been here before and was well acquainted the group, who was known simply as The Crew.

“Al! Long time, no see!” a fetching voice caught my attention. “Hey, everyone, it’s Al!”

She wore a Twenties bopper dress and had legs the way I liked them: long, lean, and going all the way up to her waist. The outfit was so short there was little room for imagination or for her to bend over. Her name was RosettaStone.

Everything started to come rushing back like a midnight run to the can. The sight of her curves squeezed more memories out of me than grapefruit juice out of a walnut. As I lit up another HardDrive and wheezed my way through the smoke my mind rushed back to us on a boat with some desperate characters...then a storm...she asked if I could whistle...wait, damn, that wasn’t my memory..but as I eyed that gorgeous frame of hers I wished that it was.

“Hi, sweetheart. I saw the sign so thought I’d stop by,” I mumbled between puffs.

“Always room for you here, Al, you know that,” said while leaning her enticing hips toward me. “Just wish we had more occasions for you to drop in, you know...”

“Hey, it’s Al!” a voice as harsh as gravel pit unfortunately interupted us, “Say, who’s the bed wetter with you?”

“His name is Little_Jewels,” I replied to DJ_Castbroader, the erstwhile leader of the group, “go easy on him, he’s a good kid.”

“Never knew you to care much about kids, Moonlight,” he continued as he straightened the tie on his rather sweat stained unkempt pin stripe suit.

“It’s different with him, Castbroader. He works for me.”

Mark_the_Narc surfaced from his typewriter to ask, “Hey, Al, what brings you here? Slumming it or what?”

“Looking for some info, Mark. Figured you guys might be able to help out.”

“There you have it,” he said as returned to typing like a demon with the runs.

I sensed a hormonally desperate squeeze on my arm. I turned to gaze into Rosetta’s soft brown orbs. They had a look someplace between Bambi and Lizzie Borden. I was always had a soft spot for Rosetta. She was a good kid. Grew up hard on the streets, about as hard as I felt when I looked at her.

“Al,” she whispered in that voice that had driven many a man straight up the wall to the other side of his pants, “something’s wrong. I know you, and I know when there is a dog pile in the woodhouse.”

I looked at her shoes and agreed.

“I can’t remember who I am,” I replied close to those tantalizing lips.

“Oh, Al, what happened?”

“I told you I can’t remember, doll. For as bright as you are sometimes you’re one ace short of a royal flush.”

“Well, we do have someone who maybe can help...”

“Do you mean?”

“Yes.”

“Is he here?”

“Do untamed popes defecate in the shubbery?”

I was beginning to think that the various forms of that line had gone around the merry-go-round once too often. I tore my eyes away from her tightly stacked body to follow the point of her finger across the room. There sat perhaps the eeriest member of this strange coterie, Enrico_Bizarro.

No one knew where Enrico came from. No one knew if he was a chatter or a flake. He said little and revealed even less. His tight lipped style was somewhat odd for radio, but he had become emensely popular with his on air mimes of Twenties torch songs.

“But I thought he was in Tangiers or Nepal or Queens or someplace like that,” I continued.

“He was, but now he is back,” Rosetta replied as she leaned her pleasing form seductively against me.

Rosetta beckoned Enrico. He rose, straightend his emaculate sharksin suit and wrap around mirror shades. He strode to us on a step so light you almost thought he was floating on marshmallows. She quickly explained my dilema to him.

Enrico bade me to sit down. He removed his sunglasses and locked gazes with me. I had met some pretty tough customers in this cyburg but quickly decided I would never want to bandy bullets with this one.

My mind began to drift. Colors flashed, tasted like sound; noises drifted just past the reach of my fingertips. The room began to swirl, and I felt like I was spinning down some psychic slide of angst in a second rate detective story. Then, I hit botton and floated along on a sea of archetypical thoughts.

When I opened my eyes Enrico had returned to his seat. It was like a tarp had been rasied at the carnival and the rides for open for business. My mind was coming back around. I remembered what it meant to be Al_B._Moonlight. I wasn’t sure if I liked the idea.

“Well, Al, did it help?” Rosetta asked as she leaned seductively close.

“Yes, sweetheart, and I’ve got to be to my office by 8:30 so Louie can pick me up for the gig.”

“All in good time, my good boy, all in good time. I don’t know what it is about you Moonlight. You’re slime, uncaring, unfaithful, self-centered, and need a bath. But I’ve been waiting for a long time to get my hands on you.”

With that she pulled me into a nearby bedroom, slammed the door, and yelled,

“/Secure Room On.”

I surmised that I might be a little late for my ride with Louie. I had another rendezvous at the moment.
Chap. 6

I quietly crept out of the room like a church mouse on secanol. At the door I turned and stared back at the sleeping Rosetta. Her long brown hair covered her breasts in a not unpleasant manner. One long leg was draped over the quilt, and she had an expression of total contentment.

I felt pretty good myself, though a little sore. The woman moved as fast as a ginsu knife commerical. She had the strength of a small ox on steriods and could have taught a blender a few moves. I was as stiff as a Fuller Brushman confronting a naked housewife.

I lit up another HardDrive as I walked to the door. The sensation was like someone had placed a cement block on my chest and then stepped on it. I gasped stone-blind for air and weakly leaned against the wall through the tumult of tears. They were right; the first aftwerwards was always the best.

“Hey, Moonlight,” Castbroader’s quarry like voice thundered into my throbbing ears, “don’t forget your package, No deposit, no return.”

He pointed to Little_Jewels who has asleep on the couch. The poor kid looked exhausted. I hated to wake him. Who knew how long it had been since he had slept anywhere besides a cardboard hilton. However, I also recognized that the last thing he needed was to get up alone in the midst of this pack of raving lunatics.

I gently nudged him. He sat up and sleepily rubbed his face. Then he looked at me and smiled. Instantly, our gazes met. I was carried away by the placid blue expression of his eyes, the kind of look where you could put your feet up and have a nice refreshing iced tea. I knew who he was now, and I vowed that despite the mistakes I had made before in my life, nothing was going to harm this kid. I owed her that much.

“Come on kid, we got some business to take care of,” I said quietly.

He nodded. We started to walk toward the door. I stopped and looked back. The Crew was still involved in its mayhem. Rosetta had awakened, showered, dressed, and rejoined her cohorts.

They were scheming up their coverage of the GenChat Holiday Parade, which was interesting because such things can be whatever you wish on radio or in chat. The combination could get lethal. I wasn’t sure if I should admire them or be frightened, very frightened.

As I closed the door I heard Rosetta say into the microphone, “And now it’s time for It’s 8:30, The News...”

*****

By the time we got back to my office, more and more was falling into place like a bowl of Jell-O setting in the breezeway. Everything was pretty much in place up until about 8:30 yesterday. Beyond that the pieces flaked like dandruff on a black shirt.

I spied a figure walking toward me. She had one of those bodies that made a joe want to lay down and hope that she gave you cpr. My eyes ran approvingly along her form: the long blonde hair under the ten gallon hat, the fringed cowboy shirt filled out in just right places, and the skin tight jeans covering those thighs that had obviously broken many a bronco. Her name was SadieMoo, and she was my client.

“Moonlight, where have you been?” she asked breathlessly.

I was distracted as I watched the front of her shirt when she attempted to catch her breath. I lit up another coffin nail while I sorted out my thoughts from my lusts. She was definitely was a luscious ginger snap.

“Sorry, doll, but I got bushwacked, ambushed, sideswiped, sent up the stream without a bloody oar. I just got my feet back under my pants now.”

“Oh, Al. I’m sorry. I thought you were flaking off...Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t mean flaking, I meant...”

“That’s okay, sweetheart. I never pay such things never no mind, especially from a pretty face.”

“Then you haven’t found out anything about Sorry_Wrongnumber?”

Sorry_Wrongnumber was Sadie’s boyfriend. He was a telephone man or an electrician or something like that. All I knew for sure was that he worked with wires. He had been hired to help set up Chatapalooza. He checked in at 8:30 two days ago, but he disappeared like a bad check artist with the winning lottery ticket.

Sadie employed my services for fifty cyber-bucks plus expenses. I had started to nose around when I ran into my present plight like a blind man walking into a wall during a thunderstorm. My memory had returned to the point when she hired me, but it was still chasing the foghorns in the harbor for the rest of the story.

Then I saw a familar car turn the corner. It was a sporty little green number, just the right kind for a long Sunday afternoon drive in GenChat. Twink sat behind the wheel. My spirits started to rise, and I was ready to wave until I noticed Philippe plastered all over her. I didn’t think she even saw me when they cruised past. I also had no idea how she could drive so well with his tongue in her mouth.

I felt like someone had starting digging a new pit in my stomach with a forty dollar shovel. I was about to go into a really deep funk when I noticed Little_Jewels had placed his hand on my shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Al,” he said in a quiet voice, “she’ll be back. You know that you are who she cares about...”

I knew that he had never met Twink. They obviously didn’t travel in the same circles, but when I stared at his face I realized that Little_Jewels knew more about her in ways than I ever would. Still, to be on the safe side I checked to make sure my wallet was still in my pocket.

My introspections were interupted by the sound of a very loud engine racing up to the curb. I looked up to see a robin egg blue station wagon gun to a stop, throwing the passenger on the right side up against the wind shield. The passenger was DrShades, the drive was Louie_Linguini. The car contained the Killer Bz’s equipment and members, except for Rose who always rode with her whatever date she had that week.

“Al!” Louie boomed in his agitated jovial voice. “Hawl it in! We’re going to be late!”

“Tuck you shirt in your pants, Louie. I’m coming,” I replied while torching up another coffin nail. “Can my friends come along? Little_Jewels is working for me, and SadieMoo is my client. You know Sadie don’t you?”

“Who hasn’t? Sure, climb on in! Oh, Al, I need to check out my recording equipment! You drive!”

“Uh, Louie...I don’t know how to drive...”

“Al! Anybody can drive! You just give it gas and point it where you want it to go! Now get behind the wheel!”

I decided it would be easier to comply than argue. I got in on the driver’s side and waited for Louie to start the beast for me. As I slipped it into gear and jerked out onto the street I thought that it was going be an interesting trip to the pavillion.
Chap. 7

Louie had given me a bottle of mineral water that sloshed all over when I lurched out of the parking spot. Some of it spilled on Sadie’s shirt and adhered the cloth to her fine frame so I wasn’t complaining.

There were four of us in the front seat packed like carp in a sardine can. Sadie had her lovely form molded up against me which wasn’t bad except occasionally when I tried to downshift I winced. Next to her was Little_Jewels, lost deep in whatever thoughts floated behind those placid eyes. Then there was DrShades who was the fly in the oil can. The man was a hot guitarist but unfortunately he sweated like he played and bathed less often.

Louie was in the backseat with Rasta_Kahn. While Louie tested his recording equipment the enigmatic musician next to him was seething because our drummer, Obwan, had called him his “American Friend”. Obwan had also attempted to lift Rasta’s watch, which explained why the greasy little man was nursing a sore lip while sitting in the back with the equipment.

I screamed through a red light with the left turn signal on. Looking back in the rear view mirror at the four car collision behind us I thought about what a snap driving really was. As I turned right too sharp and took out a mail box my mind drifted back to how I joined the Killer Bz.

*****

I had first seen them playing an Open Mike at a little dive called The Grain Factory. The act before them had been duo of singing nurses doing old hootenany tunes. They stopped singing to turn the pages in the songbook. Then the Killer Bz hit the stage like a rabid dog in a hurricane. They knocked my socks to someplace next Thursday.

The best musician was the lead guitarist, Rasta_Kahn. A tall spidery man about as wide as a toothpick, he had the kind of fingers deprived housewives dream about touching their unmentionable parts. However, he also had a knack to pull such experiments as doing the guitar solo to Stairway To Heaven on bassoon.

DrShades played rhythm guitar. He was as steady as a henpecked husband after thirty years of marriage and his voice was as strong as he smelled. If the band had a soul, which was hotly debated among several GenChat churches and former girlfriends of the band members, it was this squat little man behind the wayfarers.

Louie_Linguini was a chatter from New Jersey. He played bass, kept us in line, wiped our noses when we needed it, and was always good for a tenspot. I guess he could have passed for our manager, as if we needed one with as few gigs as we got.

Obwan was a slimy little no account who followed Rasta into chat one day. He had the kind of hands you expected to see wrapped around drumsticks or in someone else’s pocket. We tried to get rid of him but finally gave up and made him part of the band.

Then there was The_Rose__. What could say about Rose that wasn’t written somewhere on a restroom wall? She had the voice to match her significant platform and the desire to break every heart she stepped on. She liked to wear outfits that bordered between lewd and lascivious. Every band needed a front, and she had the merchandise for the role.

And of course, there was me, Moonlight, Al_B._Moonlight. I was the piano player, but you knew that.

*****

I marveled at just how fast pedestrians could move when you gunned a thundering piece of iron through a crosswalk. I gazed in the rear view mirror and noticed Louie was starting to look nervous, but I figured he was worried about us being late. So I floored it and sped off down the street.

As I slammed on the brakes and skidded between a semi and ambulance at an intersection my thoughts began to take a walk down memory lane again, sort of like one of those flashbacks you would see in a Grade B detective movie.

Chatapalooza was the brainchild of the new owners of ChatWorld. They been touched by the support and desire for a decent place to walk the dog on a Saturday morning that the residents had shown. So they hatched a plan to throw the first cyber-music festival. Some of the biggest names from both sides of the modem had been signed. Somehow we had slipped in like a hot dog between two slices of salami. If all went right this could be our big break.

But not all was right, and I knew it. Someone was up to something bigger than the bulge in my pants when Sadie sprawled over me during a sharp turn. God, that woman could have made the dead want to sit up and play yautzee.

My memory was returning like a prodigal sheep, but not fast enough to suit me. I had a good handle on the kettle up until yesterday. Then there were flashes, glimpses of a laughing face, a cold set of hazel eyes, a burning sensation in my arm. Yet when I rolled the dice I was getting boxcars when I needed snake eyes.

My mind wandered like a senile old gomer at a false teeth convention. Those eyes, I had seen those eyes before, I knew those eyes well. It just wouldn’t come. I might as well be trying to get a salary advance out of Daybreak.

I slammed on the brakes, throwing everyone around in the car. I barely heard Louie mumble “geez Al” and Sadie whisper her AlternateChat pin number in my ear. Daybreak, that was it! If I was right then I was on the correct street to the zip code of the address of the solution. I might even have had an idea about what happened to Sorry_Wrongnumber.

“Louie,” I asked as I slammed the gas to floor and sped through a scattering flock of nuns, “did you bring your laptop?”

“Sure, Al. I never go to chat without it.”

“Good. I need to use it when we get to the gig.”

With that I stopped the car in front of Ten Base T Pavillion by running into a lamp post. I had forgotten how to use the brakes. The radiator spewed like prostate victim at three in the morning, but the body of the car looked intact.

I flipped to the keys to the attendant and said, “Valet parking please.”

Then I grabbed the laptop and headed for the dressing room with Little_Jewels and Sadie hot on my heels. We had no time to waste.
Chap. 8

Ten Base T Pavillion was located just west of GenChat Control, right before you hit the link to the other sections of ChatWorld. It was an imposing structure with Orwellian arches over its Frank Lloyd Wright entryways and windows. The joint was teaming with the throngs that flowed in for the concert. The air was filled with excitement, music, and the mysterious odor of scorched rope.

We slipped around the side of the building like eels on butter. A large guard with a sloping forehead stopped us to check our credentials. He told us that the door was locked and that we would have to go through the front. No amount of arguing or greasing his palm would let us past him. We had to carry our equipment via the main enterance.

“Geez, Al,” Louie grumbled as he hefted an amp, “if you could ever be on time stuff like this wouldn’t happen.”

“Sorry, Louie, I tried to make up the time while driving,” I replied as I picked up a mike case and walked to the door.

“I know, don’t remind me.”

I wandered through the front door and was immediately set upon by the various groups and organizations pilfering the crowd for donations. Chief amongst them was one of the sponsors of the concert, The Totally Oblivious To Society Society. It was an odd cultwho would gladly accept your family savings in return for an orange robe and a new chat identity.

I could hear the strains of the opening act, the Sterile Mules, as I elbowed my way through the multitude. The beggars tended to back off after I showed them the bulge in my coat pocket. It was actually a pack of HardDrives and spare pair of socks, but it served its purpose.

As for the Sterile Mules, they were cranking into Brain Damage which meant it could be early or late in their set. They had been a one hit wonder who rode the first Punk Wave on that song. With thinning hair and growing stomachs peeking out from under their torn t-shirts the Mules were making a comeback milking the same tune like a cow with a dry udder.

All of a sudden Daybreak appeared in front of me. Her voluptuous form was clad in a black miniskirt that showed off one of the best set of gams in GenChat. She also wore a white satin blouse that plunged to where my hormonal interest was perked. However, her face sported an expression of pure disgust.

“Moonlight, I could just spit!” she grumbled as she pointed her lovely finger behind me.

I turned to take in a view that about sent my rancheros flying out my ears right beside my lunch. The body that stumbled drunkenly into my sight was one of those solid packages with enough curves to keep a geometry student busy until after finals. It was JetteBabe. She was wearing the same outfit as Daybreak.

“Well, at least some people’s taste in clothes has improved,” she slurred through bourbon laced breath.

JetteBabe could be considered as permanent fixture as a urinal in GenChat. She had a dynamite body and one those mouths that could tie knots in cherry stems or blister paint off a hull. She was usually drunk, bordering some place between lucid and surly. She was one tough customer who had twisted my shorts in a few directions. I trusted her about as far as I could throw a horse.

“Gee, Jette,” Daybreak snarled, “I didn’t know they made cheap knockoffs of the good stuff. Say, Moonlight, when do you play?”

“About 8:30, sweetheart,” I said as I lit up a HardDrive and felt the smoke grace my lungs like a pneumatic drill. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here. I figured you’d be busy elsewhere.”

“Whatever do ever mean, and please, I am not your sweetheart,” she said feigning wide eyed innoscence.

“Sure, doll, I just figured you had other plans. You know, perhaps some needle work or something,” I said as I stared deeply into her hazel eyes.

“Uh...why...Al...”

“I don’t know what you mean about knockoffs, unless you’re talking about knockups and then that would be you!” Jette spittled in Daybreak’s direction.

“Please, dear, don’t make me make you regret the words I’d make you eat,” Daybreak replied.

“Listen, sister,” Jette roared as she staggered her pleasing form against me, “I’ve left better women than you gumming toast for a week! You just say the word, and we’ll have this out once and for all!”

I choked down the phrase “cat fight” and slipped out from between them. I looked back and watched them stand squared off like a sheep dog and a bulldozer. I wouldn’t lay odds against either one of them, and I had a sneaky feeling that it wasn’t the last I’d see of them tonight.

*****

We finally got backstage to our dressing room. It was actually a restroom that had the fixtures torn out of it and a worn sofa put in it. The place was about as dank as a pair of gym socks after a good workout. I put down the mike case and watched the rest of the band lumber in under the tonnage of the equipment.

From the across the hall I heard a laugh that tore out my heart and ran it through a food mill. I peered into the swank of The Enablers’s dressing room. Since they were one of the headline acts no expense had been spared. Behind the jacuzzi and racketball court was a well stocked bar. There was a cyber-blade track around the outside edge.

Then I caught sight of Twink and Philippe arm in arm staggering around the room. I had never seen her appear happier or more at ease. She turned to the door, and our gazes met. She looked away uncomfortably and whispered something to Philippe. He looked at me, nodded, and closed the door. I felt like a boy scout with his fingers caught in the scoutmaster’s trunks.

Strains of sound floated from the stage. The crowd yelled for an encore, and the Mules returned for a high amp version of Louie Louie. The Killer Bz where checking out our refreshments, a gallon jug of warm Thunderweb. I decided what the hell did it matter now and grabbed a cup to join them.

All of a sudden I felt a hand gently touch my arm. I turned to look into the blue eyes of Little_Jewels. They held a serenity that told me of what had been and still could be, if I had the moxie to know the difference. I put down the cup. Why make things worse than they all ready were?

It would be awhile until our set. I decided it was time to put my nose to the ground and see what perked through the filter. I told Little_Jewels and Sadie to wait with the band. Obwan was attempting to sell them Rasta’s watch.

As I started down the hall, I heard Twink’s laugh from behind the closed door. It was like a bad dream where I kept waking up to find myself in another bad dream.

The idea of the Thunderweb seemed pretty good at the moment, but I shrugged it off like sand on a duck’s back. I had walked that road too many times trying to hitch a ride on the oblivion express. One would be too many and two not nearly enough.
Chap. 9

I pulled out my handkerchief and wiped the sweat off my face. Backstage was as warm as a gerbil in heat. I wished that I had brought my spare shirt or at least had taken a shower at 518.

The Mules had just finished their set and were carrying each other off the stage. Wheezing past me, limping with sagging instruments in hand, I watched the great hope of yet another generation stumble along the corridor. There was nothing more pathetic than a group of aging old punks.

Behind me, I felt a set of eyes bore into the back of my skull and raise the hackles, whatever they were, on my neck. I reached my right hand in my pants pocket and wrapped it around the roll of quarters I always carried to play the slots. Whirling, I grabbed my pursuer by the collar and was about to acquaint the individual with a knuckle corollary. I stopped like a BMW at a traffic light. The person was Little_Jewels.

“I thought I told you to stay in the dressing room, you little twerp!” I hissed like a python on cheap whiskey.

“Sorry, Al,” he replied from behind those serene blue eyes, “that Obwan character was giving the creeps. He kept staring at SadieMoo and talking to someone on a cell phone about the white slave trade.”

“I didn’t know Obwan had a cell phone.”

“I think it’s Louie’s.”

Little_Jewel’s eyes unglazed. He suddenly looked like a fourteen year old flake lost backstage at a major concert in some tawdry mystery story. He slumped to the floor and held his head like someone with a three day hangover. I knew the feeling well.

He shook his head, looked up at me, and said, “I don’t know what’s going on, Al. I’m usually not like this. Ever since I met you I haven’t been myself. It’s like I keep seeing the world through someone else’s eyes, like they want me to tell you something.”

I lit up a HardDrive and helped the kid to his feet while the smoke carved another notch on my gravestone.

“That’s okay, kid,” I said quietly. “We’ll work this out. I’ve got some ideas, but I’m not ready to let the cards out of the hat yet. Right now, just stay behind me and keep your nose clean.”

“Sure, Al,” he said as he blew his nose on my one good kerchief.

The next band was setting up on stage, The Cyber Buncha Polka Dudes. I had seen them play in the Tahiti and a few others places around GenChat. They had given birth to a polka/surf rock fusion that was about as annoying as a bee in your shorts. I wished that I had remembered my ear plugs.

I peered out from behind the curtain and surveyed the crowd. The joint was packed like a well stocked humidor. Then I spied Daybreak and JetteBabe in the v.i.p. box. Daybreak was there because she was one of the leading merchants in GenChat. As for Jette I had no idea except it might have been easier to let her in there than to try to stop her.

Outside of the bruise on her cheek and the shiner on her left eye Jette looked her usual jovial cantankerous besotted self. Daybreak looked pretty banged up too, and her blouse was torn down to the point where it perked my interest a little harder. Then I gazed at her face. It looked different.

The lines were as stern as a keel on a frigate. Her eyes were hard, obessessed. I didn’t like the scene one bit. Someone had cut the cheese, and the elevator door was still shut. She kept looking at her program and then at her watch. I went to check mine, but it was gone. Damn that Obwan, I thought.

The Cybers were about to launch into their first number, and I wanted to be as far away from the stage as possible. I figured it was about time for a chat with Daybreak, but first I needed to stop back in the dressing room and pick up the laptop.

As we headed down the hall I could feel The Cybers’s opening medley of Little Old Lady From Pasadena/Beer Barrel Polka/Eve Of Destruction smack me like a punch drunk pug in the stomach. I would have had a better time with a bottle of sloe gin and a ride on the tilt-a-whirl. I looked up to see Twink and Philippe come out of The Enablers’s dressing room.

Philippe was wearing his usual beret, leather jacket, and sunglasses. He had on a pair of burnt orange flares and a lime green disco shirt with parrots. He wore enough gold chains to choke an elephant. It was easy to see why his nickname was The Frog Prince.

Twink looked stunning. She wore a black miniskirt with a white satin blouse that plunged to somewhere near infinity. I hoped for their sakes Daybreak and Jette didn’t see her. She was Shakespeare while they were just a couple of potboilers gathering dust on the shelf.

They brushed by me like I was yesterday’s funny papers and stock quotations. It was going to be a long concert.

When we got to our dressing room, the boys had finished off the Thunderweb and were starting on Rasta’s aftershave. Rose had arrived, accompanied by her latest, DonJuanTwo3. My heart went out for the poor joe. I just hoped that he had a reliable virus program when he went into a private room with her.

I tried to find the laptop, but it was missing. Then I noticed Obwan sitting in the corner counting a large wad of cyber-simolas. I grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pinned him to the wall.

“Look you greasy little spoon,” I snarled into his terror stricken face, “I don’t know what you did to the laptop, I don’t care. I just want it back.”

“Ah, but, my good American friend, Obwan has no idea what you do mean” he quavered as he attempted to weazle his way out.

“Number one, I don’t believe you; number two, even if I did believe you I wouldn’t believe you; number three, I don’t care if I believe you or not; number four, if I don’t see that laptop in five minutes you will be sucking dogfood out of a straw for the next six months; number five, I am not, and neither is anyone else here, ever been your damn American friend! Did I make myself clear?”

He nodded yes as I threw him out the door. He bounced off the wall, rolled over once, and took off like a turkey on Thanksgiving Eve.

I was about to inform Louie when I felt something cold on the back of my head. I turned around to find myself staring down the wrong end of a rather large bore gun.

“Good evenink, my name is Ivan_BenThinkanov, and my employer hask asked me to have a chat with you, Mr. Moonlight,” a voice slurred in an accent as thick as a porterhouse steak.

Meanwhile, The Cybers had started into their closing number, Louie Louie.
Chap. 10

The big goon had caught me with my pants down like the farmer and his daughter in the outhouse when the high school football team tipped it over. I needed to stall for time. Luckily, that was one of my strong suits.

“Mind, if I smoke?” I asked as I lit up a coffin nail.

“It isk your choice, but do not you know it isk unhealthy for you?” he replied.

I guess what happened next was my fault. Frankly, it was no big deal that he had a gun trained on me. It was one of my occupational hazards. I had long ago quit counting how many times I had a .44 or a pair of 38s stuck in my face. If anything it got the adrenaline flowing. Unfortunately, it also made me mouthy.

“Gee, Ivan,” I hacked between puffs, “you got a gun pointed up my right nostril and still you worry about my health. I am touched...”

The next thing I knew I was laying on the floor watching the stars and tweety birds fly around my head. My temples throbbed beyond all hope of a cyberprofin cure, and my neck felt as stiff as a white man in a line dance.

“Now maybe you vill learnk to keep your fly buttoned, you smartinski,” he snarled as he brandished his rod like a candy cane at a hooker’s convention.

“Yeah, what ever, Ivan. You do seem to be the touchy sort. No, please, not again. I’ll be good. So who did you say you’re working for?” I bantered as I drug my feet for time.

“I didn’tk. I try to keep a tight lip close to my pocket. My employer vould be very angry ifk I spiltk the potatoes.”

“The beans, Ivan, it’s ‘the beans’. Okay, now don’t hit my again. I said I’ll try to be good. So what brings you to ChatWorld?”

“Employment, of course. I vas wivd the Komputer Get Banned agency in old country, but vhen governmentk go down toilet, so do my job. I tried InternetPol, but the benefit package vas wery lousy. Thenk my new employer offered me present position.”

“Pays well, huh?”

He shrugged and answered, “Good hours, good money, dental plan is vonderful.”

I was starting to draw him in, but I knew the man was a professional. He could snap out of it any minute. I needed a diversion like mama needed a new set of panythose. Luckily, I was about to get two for the price of one.

First, Sadie came back into the room to show off her outfit for the concert, a black miniskirt and pleasingly revealing white satin blouse. Ivan’s eyes were glued to her like a turnip to flypaper. Second, the next band, Apocholypse Dyslexia slammed into fourth gear on their opening number.

Lead by their drummer/vocalist Larry __, Dyslexia showed a remarkable combination of musicianship and socially challenged behavior. They immediately launched into selections from Larry__’s rock opera Guns ‘n Roses: The Early Years.

Between the dissonance of Dyslexia’s opening F#MinorSus7 chord and the site of Sadie’s platform nearly hanging loose in the wind Ivan momentarily wavered. That was all of the space I needed. I wrapped my hand around my roll of quarters and layed a sucker punch on his jaw. He went down like a cherry bomb in a crapper.

I grabbed the gun and poked it like Uncle Elmo’s finger up his nose. I then told Little_Jewels to get the rope out that I knew Sadie kept in her bag for trips to private rooms. We trussed Ivan up like a pig on a spit and sat him up on the sofa.

“Okay, buster, it’s my turn to play the doctor and maybe I should just take your temperature with this gat, and I don’t mean orally,” I growled as I leaned heavily against Sadie.

“You do not scare me, Moonlight. I have beenk trained by the best. There is no vay you cank make me talk.”

He did have a point, but then how could he know I kept an ace up my boot. That card had just crawled its greasy little self back into the room, meekly carrying the laptop.

“Obwan, my...man...glad you could make it back,” I said as the cowering little wretch handed me the laptop. “Ivan here was just saying how he was looking for a new friend. You know, someone to share adventures with, to take home and let sleep on his couch with his wife, yada yada.”

Obwan immediately brightened up like a new dog with an old trick. He plopped down next to Ivan, checked out his watch, pocketed his rings, and thumbed through his wallet. He then offered the terror strickened man a nibble off of his goat droppings curd.

“Okay, Moonlight, I vill tellk you vhat I know, just get this animal avay fromk me!” he pleaded.

“Agreed, Ivan. First, where were you going to take me?”

“Vhy for a quiet peaceful ride ink the country.”

“Yeah, a one way ticket on the trolley to nowhere. I figured as much. Okay, then, who do you work for?”

“I-I-I do not know. She vas always hiddenk in the shadows, but her voice vas like ice on my troikas.”

“Fair enough, I guess. That does confirm some suspicions, though. Okay, so what’s the dope, the buzz, the plan, the blueprint for the ticket to this operation?”

“A-a-all I cank tell you is that vhen she done this lousy little GenChat vill be hers.”

“Nothing else?” I said as I started handing Obwan his credit cards.

“V-v-v-vell, there were some vials. I didk see them. That is all I know, I svear on the grave of my fallen comrades.”

“Okay then. Obwan, he’s yours,” I said as I stepped back.

“B-b-b-ut you promised!”

“Frankly, Ivan, I don’t cotton to being whacked up side the head by someone who smells like beets. Maybe a few months with this oily little spot will help you see things in a different light. You’re doomed, Ivan. You’d have an easier time getting rid of a case of jock rot with sandpaper than you will ditching him.”

About then I remembered there were other people in the room. Rasta was lost in his own little world totally oblivious to what had transpired. Rose and her date were so locked up in each other lips you could have set off a bomb and they would have missed it. As for DrShades, who knew what went on behind those sunglasses? Louie, on the other hand, was sweating bullets and looked like he had creamed several new colors into his shorts.

Meanwhile, Sadie inclined against my leg and purred, “Oh, Al, that was so scary. How can I ever repay you?”

“We’ll work it out in trade later, sister. Right now, I’ve got to get a band ready for a gig. It’s almost 8:30 and time for us to go on.”

In fact, Dyslexia was just ending their set with a thundering metal version of Louie Louie. We needed to get up front post haste like a pony in the third heat.

As we walked out the door, I pulled the songlist out of Louie’s hand and scanned it like an insurance policy. The closing number lept off the page and slapped me in the eyes like a lollipop in the kisser.

“Say, Louie,” I said as I lit up a HardDrive and collapsed in a pathetic rheumy mess against the wall, “do you think we should change our closing song?”

“Forget it Al!” he screamed like a water buffalo with the hives. “We’ve been practicing it for a week! Our version is the best! Why should we change? Why don’t they change? No one appreciates what I do for this band! What if I quit, huh? What would you do if I just up and walked off and quit? I got other offers you know...”

He ranted on, but I shut him off like a bad movie on cable. I had other cuds to chew at the moment. First, there was the gig. Then, I had to finish unraveling this mystery. Otherwise, we could all be hip deep in gators of trouble with no net to beat them off like a stick.
Chap. 11

Things were hopping when we got to the stage. The promoters were there and twisted up like a used tissue. It seemed that two bands had canceled. One story was a little pathetic, the other a little strange. I wasn’t sure which one was which.

One groups was The Emissions. They were an odd trio, built around the songs of their lead singer, Kid Shelley. He had spent several years in Oslo in the Betty Fiord Clinic but had been as clean as baby’s blanket since. However, he fell off the merry-go-round and was found in their dressing room in the midst of an ether and Robitusan binge. It was a shame. I really wanted to hear their live versions of Elvis Is Dead and Big Stinky.

The second band to book like a dictionary was Scud Highwire’s Mombatusa. Scud played umbera, African thumb piano. I had heard a lot of joes plunk the prongs, some even electrified, but he was the only one to use a phase shifter and a whammy bar. Mombatusa had second billing at the concert, but Scud refused to play on a stage that had not been disinfected. It seemed that he didn’t want to be polluted by the aura of meat eaters.

My stomach was rumbling like a buttern churn by the time we reached the stage. I had been playing live for years but usually in some ditchwater joint like the Tahiti. There were probably ten thousand chatters and flakes in the pavillion. I was as nervous as a priest at a beauty contest.

Then I noticed Twink and the Frog Prince sitting on the edge of the stage. They were lip locked like a couple of lampreys. I doubt if you could have gotten a tongue depressor between them. My stomach slipped to my knees, and my heart felt like it was riding the roller coaster of unrequited love.

I gritted my teeth and chinched up my pride. Al_B._Moonlight wasn’t going to let that get him down. I would just channel the pain, play a great set, and then go home like nothing had happened. Yeah, I thought, and clydesdales can fly, too.

We hit the stage like a complusive obessive possessed. I had heard us play good before, but nothing like that night. We were as hot as the back side of a bikini on the beach and as tight as a biker’s delight. The crowd roared as we ripped into our groove.

Rasta had recovered from us taking away his new piccolo and was twisting sounds out of his Telecaster that no one knew were there. DrShades was as solid as your intestines after a triple cheese pizza and a glass of buttermilk. Louie had dropped his bass so low that every woman in the place was squirming in delight. Even Obwan was keeping time to the beat.

And then there was Rose. Clad in a green sequined minidress that was so short and so tight that none of the school kids would need to check out the illustrations in the sex eduaction books, she was vamping the chat pheremones in the arena to record levels.

She ripped into A Little Help From My Friends with a wail and a strut. Prancing like a pony with the runs she perked the interest of every man in the house and the envy of every woman. The band was as firm as slowly drying concrete behind her, which was a good place to watch her bend over and dance.

Rose slammed into our cover of If I Can’t Sell It, I’m Gonna Set On It. She had every man in the house digging in his pocket for loose change. We were as tight as a dipsomaniac on red port. Even DrShades was showing the trace of a smile.

Rasta surprised everyone by stepping to the mike for the next number. He sang about as frequently as he talked, which was about as often as a Republican gives spare change to a panhandler.

“This for someone who couldn’t make it here tonight,” he said as he broke into Elvis Is Dead.

Luckily the song was an easy rock progression in G. We slipped in behind him like a snake in a hotdog bun.

· Rasta_Kahn sings The year was 1963/he was as big as he could be/his hit records and his movies/he seemed as big as eternity

· Rasta_Kahn sings Elvis is dead/and you know that is that/Elvis is dead and he died....while taking a crap, crap, crap, taking a crap

· Rasta_Kahn sings Oh how you loved his songs/they made you feel like you belonged/you can’t believe that he’s really gone/or that he’s been dead for this long

· Rasta_Kahn sings Maybe you should get a life/talk to your kids, spend some time with your wife/he ate too much and he got too high/it’s not like the man was christ

· Rasta_Kahn sings Elvis is dead/and you know that is that/Elvis is dead and he died....while taking a crap, crap, crap, taking a crap

We blew the roof off the place with that one. Rose thundered into Won’t Get Fooled Again. swinging her hips like a California earthquake. We cranked up the amps and started shattering all of the glassware in the pavillion.

After the song, Rose wandered off stage to rest her pipes and to get a tongue massage from DonJuanTwo3. That meant it was my turn for my number upfront. I left the piano, picked up a mike, and ambled to the main spotlight.

“Sometimes, we do something wrong and spend alot of time kicking our hinnies over it,” I croaked as I squinted under the harsh light looking for her. “Luckily, I’m not that way, but I have a song for someone special out there.”

Rasta capoed his guitar up to the sixth fret and whined out a sound like a mandolin with a broken heart. The boys joined him one by one laying out a bittersweet yet raunchy groove as I moved in time to the music in a slow sardonic dance. I cued them to hold silent for a long beat. I stared at the floor allowing the dramatic intensity to build. I took a deep a breath, lept straight into the air, and hit the floor signaling the band to start again.

I locked eyes with Twink as my voice started to throw Reason To Believe in pleading daggers in her direction. She stood transfixed in my stare as I was in hers. All else darkened and faded away as I poured out my soul to her, said in music what I never had the rancheros to say to her in real chat.

When the song ended the place erupted into an estatic din. Twink wiped her eyes and slipped her arms out from under a puzzled Philippe. I slunk dripping back to my piano. I was as spent as a cat in heat at the dog pound. I lit up a coffin nail, took a long swig off my bottle of mineral water, and looked at Twink. For the first time in days I smiled.

Rose returned mumbling something about being upstaged. We settled back down into our groove as she entreated To Love Somebody to the crowd. She would have had a lot of takers after her performance.

I cringed as we broke into our reggae version of Louie Louie for the closing number, but the crowd didn’t seem to mind. We had them so whipped up that Rose could have read from the telephone book and they would have cheered.

At the end we locked arms and bowed together. It was nice and could have been better if Rose hadn’t been trying to get her hand in the back of my pants.

When we came off stage I looked for Twink, but Philippe and she were gone. It was probably for the best. I had work to do.

The next act was the Goober Peaz, an acoustic four piece band from Alabama. I figured their blue grass rendition of Inner-gawda-dah-vidala. would last the entire set. That would give me long enough for my chat with Daybreak.
Chap. 12

As I walked down the hall to the dressing room, the Peaz broke into the harmony on their opening song. It hit my ears like a muffin on a cheese grater. If they ever got head colds they probably wouldn’t be able to sing.

I had left the laptop and figured I’d better pick it up before Obwan got back. When I entered the dressing room, the sticky fingered little wretch was already there, but, fortunately, he was busy frisking down his new friend, Ivan, for more valuables.

I took time to sit down, enjoy a mineral water, and rest my dogs for a minute. I figured I’d need the energy for what I had to do. Then I picked up the computer and crept out like a gravedigger in his stocking feet.

Little_Jewels was waiting outside the door for me. His eyes had returned to that look of serene tranquility. He was an odd little character. Sometimes I wondered if he was a few fries short of a happy meal. I liked the kid though.

“Where we off to now, Al?” he asked.

“Sorry, kid, where I’m going is a oneway ticket and the caboose is already full,” I replied as I lit up a HardDrive and felt my lungs shudder at the noxious pleasure.

“Al, you can’t go without me.”

“Why not?”

“...I don’t know...I’ve never felt like this before...but I can see through some different people’s eyes, and I know, just know, you will need me there...”

“Fine, kid, let’s go,” I replied wondering if he really was a few feathers short of a whole duck.

We walked back down the hall and stopped to catch the end of the Peaz’s set. They were having a great time, but the crowd had a “what is this crap?” look on their faces. You could have heard a steel girder fall in the place. The band finished with a blue grass version of Louie Louie.

The next act was RedOoolala and Derwood. Red had been the go-go dancer for the Killer Bz, but she had now launched her own career. Derwood was her boyfriend. She let him in the act because he was always on stage with her anyway. She wore tight fitting minidresses, and he wore a dog chain and a bib.

Neither one of them could sing to get out of bucket. The trick to their act was that they did short sets. By the time the audience got done marveling at Red’s astonishing legs, they were done. They figured it had worked for Sonny and Cher. They started out their set with I Got You Babe. I just hoped to god that they didn’t finish with their calypso version of Louie Louie.

Little_Jewels and I turned before we reached the stage and headed for the v.i.p. box. Normally, I would have had as much chance to get in someplace like that as hotdog salesman obtaining enterance into a vegan convention. However, I was a performer, and they let us get away with anything short of sodomy.

When we entered the box Jette sauntered up to me. She had been taking advantage of the wet bar and snack buffet. She had an Old Ethernet in her hand and food crumbs smeared on her blouse.

“What’s ya doin’, Al?” she asked in breath reminiscent of an old shoe. “Ya come by to sample the goodies? Here, let me slip out of this outfit.”

“Jette, I don’t have time for this. You’re two shots past second base, and, frankly, you couldn't pour water out of a boot with the instructions on the heel,” I snarled as I pushed her back into her seat.

She passed out like a ticket taker at the late call window.

Daybreak swayed her way up to me. Something about herstill smelled like old gym clothes out in the rain. Where she usually carried herself with a sneering contempt of superiority, she now looked just down right mean like a bulldog at a motorcycle race. Her stare could have burnt the hairs off the backend of a linebacker.

“Hi, sweetheart, how’s tricks?” I asked as I reached for another HardDrive.

She gave me an evil leer and smacked me up side the face with her purse. I think she had a brick in it. I went down like a hooker after a ten dollar bill.

“Well, Moonlight,” she cackled as she eyed the laptop and me, “I see you got your memory back and have an idea of what is going on here. Pity for you that you figured it out too late.”

The cool floor felt good on my aching head, but I surmised that I had to sit up and chew the fat with music. She had the drop on me like a union suit open in the winter wind. I had been chasing this broad for days, and she kept putting her token in the slot before I did mine.

“Yeah, Daybreak...or whoever you are now...I toted it up and pegged down the odds,” I said rubbing the back of my neck.

“Moonlight, you are one strange odd man.”

“Thanks, I think. So may I ask what this identity is and how it came about?”

“Sure, why not? I’ve got a loaded set of .45s pointed at you so don’t move.”

I stared at her chest and bit back the obvious comment. I sat up to listen like a young scholar at his first lecture.

“Daybreak was bored one day,” she continued, “so she created a new chat identity. Little did she realize that it would become the dominant one, that it would only let her out of the bag when it was good and ready.”

“So who are you?” I asked.

“Oh, my name is Nightshade. Where Daybreak was a good business woman with a somewhat twisted sense of morality, I am about as Machevelian as union steward handing out passes to the bathroom.

“I created my own financial empire in here and was well on my way to controlling ChatWorld until I encountered Gil Bates.”

“So he was a rival who blocked you?”

“No! He was the most wonderful creature I have ever met! Our passions meshed perfectly! He was my my lover! He taught me finance, and I taught him just what a well greased set of thighs could do.”

“And that brings us to...”

“Together we planned to raze this hole of a chat secton and put in the first cyber-mall! But no, you couldn’t let that be, could you Moonlight?! I lost a bundle on that project, and I lost my lover when Bates jumped the modem! Out there he won’t even return my calls!”

“And so you...”

“I want revenge you cheddar head! You got uncomfortably close when you came nosing around for that Sorry_Wrongnumber lunkhead. He had found out the skinny and was about to go to the cops. Well, he won’t do that now.”

“You mean you erased his disk?”

“Not yet, but soon it will be, as will you all. You see I’ve hidden a virus, a very potent virus here at the concert. When The Enablers break into their off harmony chorus on Louie Louie the sound will trigger an alarm, the alarm will then trigger a computer program that will dump the virus into the main chat system. All of ChatWorld will be wiped out!

“My only regret, Moonlight, is that you won’t feel that agonizing death. I can’t afford to allow you to live.”

“So you’re going to shoot me in front of ten thousand people.”

“Duh, Moonlight, hello, it’s a rock concert. The only ones looking at us are Jette, and she’s about three sheets past the salad bar when coming out of a stupor, and that kid, and he goes after you. He gives me the creeps, like he knows what I’m thinking. Farewell, you slimy little twerp!”

I closed my eyes as her finger tightened on the trigger. All of a sudden Little_Jewels jumped in front of her and attempted to wrestle the guns out of her hand. One went off like a sailor cussing a blue streak. The kid slumped to floor.

I was all over Nightshade like mustard on rye. A quick cuff of my right hand, and she went out like a light switch. I had never hit a woman before, but in her case it felt pretty good.

Jette was sobbered by the shot. She ran to the kid and cradled him in her arms, using a piece of her skirt to stop the flow of blood. There was a look of true tenderness and concern in her eyes. Sometimes, she could amaze me.

I paged the medics and then turned to the laptop. I was no computer scientist. but I had to do some quick configuring or we were going to all be leftover soup.
Chap. 13

The Enablers had just hit the stage. Like the Goober Peaz, they were doing an acoustic set, but, unlike the corn pone quartet, their music was more accessible to the GenChat public. They were also about as hot as the backend of a grill on the Fourth of July. They busted right into The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

I didn’t catch much of it. I was too busy. I had managed to access Nightshade’s identity profile. Getting in was easy, tracing were she hid the virus was something else. She had more blind alleys behind passwords set up than sidestreets in San Francisco. It would take time to unravel it, but unfortunately time was not on my side.

Then I lucked out. I found a directory labeled Last Week’s Wash. I almost passed by it, but then I remembered that once Daybreak had referred to me as her overdue laundry. I launched it and, bingo, the cows had come home.

I slipped through a hastily constructed firewall and found a directory called 3 Sites. I couldn’t get any further though. I was drydocked on the lawn. Yet, I did have some clues. Two of the files hadn’t been accessed in over two weeks. The third, Shiney Thing, had been opened today at 8:30. God only knew what that meant, but it at least gave me a shot in the dark.

Next I backed out until I came to the identity profile list. I highlighted Nightshade and punched delete. Daybreak’s face immediately started to soften into the snotty cantankerous visage that I almost adored. However, I didn’t have time to go into the cache and flush it. I had to hope there wasn’t enough of Nightshade left to rebuild herself.

I checked on Little_Jewels. He was resting his head comfortably in Jette’s lap as she gently stroked his hair. He smiled at me and nodded. I tousled his hair and took off like a bolt out of the blue for the stage.

I wanted to find Twink and warn her to get out while she could, but to my surprise she was nowhere to be seen. Meanwhile, The Enablers had launched into Philippe’s big number out front, I Will Survive. I could still see why they called him The Frog Prince.

I stood stumped like a one legged man. It would have been easier if the lights hadn’t been flashing in my eyes. Then it hit me like a brick in the back of the head. I looked out over the audience to the shining disco globe in the middle of the ceiling. Eureka, the ship had come in, and there were visas for all the passengers.

I scouted around and saw that there was a ladder from the back of the stage that rose to a scaffolding that ran under the ball. It would be an easy climb.

When I was nearly to the ladder, I heard the thundering sound of feet like hooves behind me. I was tackled to the floor. I managed to break free and roll away from my pursuers. It was Ivan, who had escaped from Obwan, and one of his grizzly comrades, who was big enough to call Ivan “Tiny”.

Luckily, I found that when they are that big they usually aren’t very fast and are about one fruit loop shy of a full bowl. As I dodged his lumbering punch I wrapped my hand around the roll of quarters in my pocket and came up hard into the soft skin under his chin. I followed with a chop to the windpipe, and he went down like mom when dad came home from sea.

All of sudden Ivan threw a punch at me. I managed to block it with my right arm but the force knocked the roll of quarters from my hand. I decided to give it all I had and slammed my numb fist into his face. He didn’t even blink. In fact, he laughed. Then he slammed me to the floor with a savage right hook.

As I rolled he placed a loving toe tap into my ribs. I felt my breath run away in a paper bag. He laughed at me and threw a garbage can in my direction. I managed to roll out of the way, but the can clipped me in the back. It looked like curtains at the afternoon matinee for me.

When I was about to give up hope and throw in the towel to take a shower, I noticed a gleam out of the corner of my eye. I quickly grab the container and threw it on the floor in front of the advancing goon. The floor was covered with marbles. Ivan slipped and fell.

I was on him like a nymphomaniac at a Quaker meeting. I rolled him over and laid several rabbit punches to both kidneys. As his body stiffened in shock I slammed his head over and over in the floor to the point of redundancy.

I dropped him, pocketed my roll of quarters, and headed up the ladder. Time was running out. The Enablers had finished their Blue Suede Shoes/Turkey in the Straw/Layla medley. The crowd was yelling for an encore which meant that it was about time for them to launch into Louie Louie.

I reached the scaffold and crawled along trying not to look down. I didn’t particularly care for heights...I had been with a beautiful woman once...we were pursued by an evil man...he had confronted us on Mt. Rushmore...damn, it was not a good time for a flake memory.

I reached the ball. Above it was a small black box. I pried off the cover. Inside was a vial, a timer, a microcimputer, and several wires. I wasn’t a rocket scientist, but I knew enough circuitry to know it was either the blue wire or the red wire. The question was which.

The band was slowly grooving through Louie Louie, nearing the end of the first verse. I had to decide. One wire would end the threat, the other would turn us into cyber-pablum. I closed my eyes. Little_Jewel’s face appeared. He was pointing at the blue wire.

As the band hit the first note on the chorus I pulled the wire. Then The Enablers went into their cat in heat fingers on a chalkboard style harmony. Nothing happened. I opened my eyes to see I had pulled the red wire. Well, I thought, the kid can’t always be right.

I laid back on the scaffold and pulled out my last coffin nail. I lit up and inhaled a new lease on life.
Chap. 14

I stumbled a sweating mess back up to the stage. The Enablers had just finished their set and were packing up their equipment. The crowd was chanting for more, but they were as spent as spinster’s wallet on lotto night.

Then I noticed Twink and Philippe standing off stage. I figured that it time for me to put descretion before the better part of valor and slink off with my tail between my legs, when I notice they didn’t seem to be getting along very well. The Frog Prince stood impassively with his arms folded, and Twink was on the verge of tears. I bummed a coffin nail from one of the roadies and sauntered over.

Twink came running up to me, drying tears from her eyes. I stood quietly and waited for her to speak.

“Oh, Al,” her voice quavered, “I’m sorry I ran you through that ringer. I don’t know what came over me. I just get so lonely sometimes, sitting in that office, not knowing if you’re dead or in bed with some hussy or both...”

“I know, Twink,” I interjected, “I’m slime, a low life, an ingrate...”

“Don’t you interupt, mister, You just let me finish this.”

The last time I had seen her this angry was when I soaked my skivvies in the dishwater. I decided that I better stand hat in hand and hear her out.

She continued, “I’m a woman, too Al, if you haven’t noticed. I have needs. And then Philippe showed up, and he was so nice and so much fun, and I thought why not, it’s my turn to have a good time.

“But I-I-I- couldn’t do it, Al. I don’t love him. I can’t do it unless I love the man. So he called me a ....a frigid floozie.”

Twink started sobbing again. For me that was about as far I could let the kettle boil. I had been drugged, beaten, humiliated, seen a good kid shot, and nearly lost the only person I truly cared about in this crazy little cyburg. Even Al_B._Moonlight had his limits.

I marched over to Philippe and tapped him on the shoulder. He didn’t respond so I tapped a little harder with my fist.

“Listen, mister,” I growled through clenched teeth, “ you take at a look at what you’ve done. In case you don’t know it, that dame is a lady, a real lady, something you don’t see often in your line of work. Well, you hurt her feelings.”

He looked perplexed and replied, “So, my friend? She was just my bird for this roost, but she turned out to be an iced squab. What is the deal that is big about all that?”

“Why you lousy...I swear you have an intellect rivaled only by garden tools...if I wasn’t a gentleman...”

I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see Twink standing behind me.

“Al_B._Moonlight,” she said, “I have two things to say to you.”

“Sure, Twink, what is it?”

“Number one, when I tell you have got to take care of business, well you just have to grit your teeth and do it, mister.”

“Okay...what’s the second.”

“You are no gentleman.”

I turned back to the grinning Phillipe. He was a head taller than me, but I had sawed off bigger trees than him. I wrapped my hand around my roll of quarters and laid a Sunday punch on his kisser. He went down like a club footed duck.

I threw a businees card on him and said, “Here’s my lawyer. Sue me if you want, but you know you can’t get blood out of a rock.”

I turned back to Twink, smiled, and say, “Now shall we catch the last set and then go for a malted? I heard that the Racoons’s steel guitar elad on Louie Louie is killer.”

“Oh, Al, I was hoping you would ask!” she beamed.

I slipped my arm around her waist, and we walked away paying the cursing in French behind us never no mind. It was time to watch the show.

*****

The next morning I got back to the office about 8:30. I had just been to the hospital to see Little_Jewels. He was a tough little turkey and was going to pull through. I also took along Father_Mike who had found a place for the kid in his Young Flakes Home. I promised to stop by the visit him when I was in the neighborhood.

I also got the skinny on Sorry_Wrongnumber. When Daybreak got home she heard a noise from her hall closet. She found the poor joe trussed up and gagged in there. Daybreak shrugged, entered, and closed the door. Four hours later a disheveled Sorry_Wrongnumber limped home.

After he left Daybreak called Jette to tell her the dirt, which was like posting up signs all over GenChat. Sorry_Wrongnumber returned to his residence to find cold eggs and his suitcase on the lawn for breakfast.

Twink had just finished the breakfast dishes. While she dried them I put away the cot where she had slept, and then folded up my sofa bed. She looked up at me and smiled.

There was something about that smile today, like her face was saying “room for rent”. I wasn’t sure, but I figured that it was time to put away the cards and play the game by her rules.

I walked up to her and wrapped my arms around her delightful frame. She molded to me like pudding in a bowl. I gazed deep into those eyes of hers where I saw some of the flakes that become Little_Jewels. My soul went for a swin in those orbs, and my face leaned forward with my lips hanging a tantalizing breath away from hers...

I kissed a alot dames in ChatWorld and was kissed by a lot of them, but never had it been anything like Twink. If this was heaven, then shoot me and bury me in the back 40. I felt the world swirl away in a magic sound of color. Her lips were as soft and tasty as a trip to the Dairy Freeze. I thought my heart was going to explode and my head rocket off to oblivion.

“You know, Twink, I was a fool not to do this sooner, a real meathead,” I whispered.

“Oh, Al, I waited so long for that,” she whispered back as her lips brushed against mine, “but I have to go.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry, Al. Our timing never seems to work out. It’s just that I spend so much time in here taking care of you that my business is in shambles out there.”

“How long will you be gone?”

“I don’t know Al. I’m sorry. Maybe it’s best if I go now.”

With that she picked up her suitcase, put my heart in her wallet, and walked to the door. She turned and looked back at me like a kid who had to give up his candycane to go to the dentist.

“You mad, Al?” she asked holding back the sobs.

“Sweetheart, I don’t think I could ever be mad to you.”

With that she blew me a kiss and walked out. I stood a long time staring at the closed door. Women, I thought, can’t live with them and without them the place turns into a sty.

I got out a mineral water. I sat down at my desk, opened it, and turned on the radio. I heard Rosetta doing an add for Nuisance Perfume. I thought about going over to 518 for a visit.

But I changed my mind. I didn’t feel like going anywhere.