“Gentlemen, it is better to have died as a small boy than to fumble the football on this one.”

Doug Rollins, Officer Richter and five other people made their way into a small, cramped and very badly overpriced room of The Norwalk Motor Lodge. Outside, a Draconic Smog still lay heavy over Los Angeles, even two days after the major forest fire near The Hollywood Bowl had destroyed several Hollywood Landmarks, including The Pantages Theatre. The fire had been extinguished, but not before it had drawn every major television network in America to the scene of a major cabalistic duel.

The man convening the meeting hailed from Las Vegas. To the uninformed, he was another ne’er-do-well, pissing away a seemingly limitless livelihood by making ill-advised bets on college football games in the casinos of Sin City, Nevada. To people who knew his real role, he was Dre “Poker” Watts, and he handled twenty-one Sleeper Agents in the Southwest Corner of the United States. He called his outfit “Club Black-Jack”.

Dre was a football fanatic, when he wasn’t performing his role in the modern version of cabalistic witch hunting. His lectures to his frightened charges often resembled the bombastic halftime talks that John Madden might have delivered to his scruffed-up roster of Raiders.

“I’ll cut to the chase.” He announced. “You’re here to see me because The Home Team went out and dicked the poodle. You poked the Poodle right there. On the fifty-f—king yard line, Geniuses!”

“Well, I’ve been in contact with The Management. They are not happy with any of us. Nor should they be!” He ranted. “They pay us money, they train us, and they give us the tools to succeed. All they ask from us is to go that extra short distance. All they ask from us is that extra margin that separates the Studs from the F-ck-Knobs.”

“Well, despite what logic would dictate, they decided to give us one more chance. They didn’t even need to ask Lucifuge’s opinion. For us, that was a good, good thing. Now I’ll explain to you what comes next.” He announced.

Watts spent the next two hours outlining an ambitious series of kidnappings. He wanted three people out of circulation permanently, a midget Sterno, a Private I Dipper and an unknown quantity. That unknown quantity went by the sobriquet “Repairman Jack.”

“…and in conclusion.” He wound up. “Gentlemen, it is better to have died as a small boy than to fumble the football on this one.”

“Yeah team!” An agent named Naomi Goodbarrel muttered to herself, as she left the room for her assigned task. She hated Dre Watts, she was sick of being a Sleeper, and she abso-frikkin-lutely hated being referred to as a Gentleman.

Yet she saw no other way to prevent an early prequel to Armmageddon. She wondered what her target, The Dipper known as Lawrence Volker could possibly have been thinking. She wondered what the stupid man would think when she dragged him to The Last Chance Saloon and marched his butt to the 13th Floor.

******************************************

Derrick “Hawk” Chapman wanted nothing to do with anyone for a long time. He was out his ride, a pariah to his relatives and positively livid at a Private Investigator named Lawrence Volker. He knew Volker liked fine liquors and wines. It made him want to piss in Volker’s next snifter of brandy.

Chapman had avoided his curious and concerned relatives by staying in the back of the house and verbally abusing them every time they tried to ask him questions. His car, he told them, had been stolen and the cops, he accused, weren’t exactly busting –ss to get it back for him. That would work for the nonce, but he needed to work it out with Rudy and get Petey back safe and sound.

Little Cora, his second cousin and ten years his minor, asked him. “Did your ride get torched in the fire?”

“What gave you a dumb—ss idea like that?!” He snapped.

“I dunno.” She moped. “Just asking.”

“Ask elsewhere, Dip-sh-t!” He snapped again. He was sick of this entire week of his life.

It thus escaped his attention that a blue Cadillac kept circling his block. One the fifth or sixth pass that morning, the driver left a small package in Chapman’s Uncle’s mailbox. It was a gift that would keep on giving.

*****************************************************

Volker didn’t appreciate his forcible eviction from Raymond Chandler Square. He had grown attached to the grime and grit of the place. It epitomized modern Los Angeles and the majestic slide into entropy that surrounded him. Seeing the other diseased and imperfect people around him; made his own slide into middle-aged mediocrity taste somewhat less bitter. Especially, when he chased it with a Tanguray and Tonic.

He moved what little he still owned into a cramped first floor office on Santa Monica. It was Near Saint Andrews Street and looked out on cheap, run-down apartment buildings that often housed transvestites that were too low-budget for West Hollywood. Next door to his new residence and office was a back office Hollywood outfit called RATZ. They edited soundtracks and scores for Paramount.

There was one person there that didn’t seem quite right to him. The guy spent way too much time paying attention to Volker as the newly-arrived Private Investigator moved in to a new storefront. Volker just figured he was bored, and like many young Hollywood hopefuls, lazy and demoralized from way too many dead end part time gigs in the back lot. But something about that guy triggered Volker’s street nerves. People that weren’t right just always seemed to kind of smell like it.

He’d have to hook back up with Repairman and Ground Zero. There was too much left unaccounted for back in the woods. Volker was smart enough to know that the details you swept under the rug often came back to bite you the hardest. He also didn’t quite know how he was going to handle Derrick Chapman when the “Hawk” came to pay him a visit about the SUV and the money for the job. Volker had no answer to that one and he didn’t want to be on the wrong side of Hawk Chapman in a gunfight.

*****************************************

Cora Chapman always liked getting the mail. It was a part of her day. It was her way to help Uncle Johnnie, who had lost a leg in an industrial accident. She always got Uncle Johnny his mail, because he always smiled and called her “his favorite little girl in the whole world.” Cora jumped up and down and grinned when the mailman slowly made his appointed rounds.

She ran across the small yard in maybe four or five steps. She stopped on a dime at the edge of the street and looked both ways. She then skipped to the mailbox and through it open. There were five or six letters a bunch of junk advertisements and a small box in a plain, brown wrapper. It was addressed, quite simply, “to Hawk.”

She knocked on his door with trepidation. She didn’t know why Cousin Hawk was yelling at her, she just didn’t want to get hit with it again.

“What?” He asked in a truculent tone.

“You got a package, Cousin Hawk.” She answered as politely as she knew how.

“Just leave it and get the Hell lost.” He snapped at her again.

Cora ran to Uncle Johnny crying. She didn’t understand why Haw was in such a foul mood. She also didn’t understand how much worse her cousin’s life was about to get.

*******************************************

Officer Richter had learned a great deal from the small spiral notebook that Volker believed lay incinerated in the ashes of his old office. He also counted his blessings that the entire building he’s illegally broken and entered had now vanished as a piece of useable evidence against his police procedures.

Ceballos felt similarly. “Man, that fire hurt people.” Ne noted. “But it sure saved our sorry –sses! Don’t never do that again, Richter. I won’t cover you next time.”

“We shouldn’t have to now.” Richter answered. “I’ve got all the help I need.”

The duplicate Expedition key had been palmed out of the LAPD evidence room on Vine. Richter was compromising himself again; even having to hide it from his partner Ernesto Ceballos. It worried him. He couldn’t serve both masters at once. For now, he was convinced Dre Watts was the more important task master.

A stoolie named Gary Tompkins had delivered his little package to Hawk Chapman. It contained the Expedition key and a cryptic note that read.

“Wanna know more, Sh-t-Bird? Get on The Green Line. Head to Norwalk Station. Get in the Blue Caddy. You’re dead if you don’t get there by 3PM today.”

Ceballos asked Richter. “Are we still working that Simpson Murder? I’d like to go make like a Police Officer and pursue something useful today.”

Richter rounded on Ceballos. “You got a collar on that one yet?” He asked. “Simpson may have been trash, but he lived in our precinct, and that makes him our trash. We’re paid to solve this case.”

“We meet an old stoolie of mine today in Norwalk.” He continued in a calmer voice. “He knows where Volker’s main goon went to ground.”

*****************************************

Rodney Easton looked the role of Hollywood Two-Star Flunky. He dressed in black and wore thick retro glasses. He was thin to near-emaciation and wore a hair style that was supposed to look cool, but bordered on mop-headed instead. He was well-coached in looking like The Avatar of The Non-Entity.

Easton had drawn the assignment of finding and shadowing Lawrence Volker. It was his job to pinpoint the little SOB for Naomi Goodbarrel and Officer Richter. He had already used the help of a “sniffer” from The Home Office in England to track Volker down. Now, he just needed to watch and wait.

He had no legitimate business with the crew over at “RATZ”, but then again, as long as he did nothing stupid or crazy, he was free to hang around near the premises. SO he hung out with his cellphone and his sweaty black outfit which he despised. He waited for Volker to move so he could call Doug Rollins and keep the team informed.

*********************************************

Norwalk, California had suffered a fate similar to nearly every nice, small Southern California town that gets assimilated by The Borg of The Angels. The streets of strip malls had decayed and attracted less and less savory tenants. Some were now abandoned and boarded up, as crowds of poorly dressed and non affluent people waited for busses across the street from them. At one, mused Officer Ceballos, Norwalk might have been a nice place to live. Back in the day, as they say.

Now, it was where Ceballos and Richter would take down “Hawk” Chapman and try to break him on The Simpson Murder. “So why do we want Chapman?” Ceballos asked.

“He knows Volker.” Answered Richter. “We use Volker to get the perp.”

“What if Volker doesn’t rat The Repairman? We don’t have anything on this creep that’s legal.” Ceballos pointed out.

“I’ll betcha he doesn’t know that.” Richter replied. “As far as Chapman and Volker know, this notebook doesn’t exist. Hawk’s gonna think I’m the secret agent of God when I drop this on him.”

“He’ll sure think your something….” Ceballos mused.

“A lotta guys do.” Richter answered.

It was now about 2:15 and the two officers and Tomkins had been there a good hour. Tomkins was the perfect Stoolie. He kept his mouth shut and took his money like a good boy. Richter could have put Tomkins in San Quentin for looking at him the wrong way. He had dirt on his drug deals and his hooker running. Richter also needed dirt on other people more. Tomkins obliged, and it kept the heat off of him.

He looked up from the Sports Section of The LA Times. He saw a tall, lean black man approaching the car. He had the package in his hands that Tompkins had delivered earlier. “That’s your boy, Richter.” Tompkins said without emotion.

“Take his –ss!” Richter shouted. He then dismounted the Cadillac with his .38 drawn.

“On the ground, Chapman.” He ordered. He showed Hawk his badge.

Chapman was stunned. He thought of no other action but to do as he was told. He wondered how the police could have known he was short one beautifully done up Ford Expedition. As Ceballos put the handcuffs on, Chapman realized he was in a world of really bad trouble.

***************************************************

Three hours later, Rollins sat in a Carrows and ate a chicken salad. He’d had much worse lunches while hauling freight as a trucker. His beeper broke his relaxation and flashed the number of Officer Richter. He’d put Richter on a really short lease and Dre Watts had done the same to him. Rollins got up to walk to his rig and use his phone. He hoped for the best of good news.
“The Crow has a new nest.” Richter said to Rollins. “He hasn’t told his little birdies yet.”

“Have you heard from The Den Mother?” Rollins asked. He meant had Easton called Richter about Volker with any new news.

“Just what I told you, Sir. He’s gone to ground in one of the scummiest parts of Lower Hollywood. Santa Monica and Saint Andrews.”

“Like seeks like. It’s not like he has anywhere else to go.”

“What time are you off shift?”

“6:30.”

“Blow out the candles at 11:30.”

“We haven’t even done a Recon yet.” Richter protested. “Is this smart?”

“You’ll have a busy evening. Naomi is one of our best. Meet her at Sunset and Ivar. Over near all the ATMs.”

“Ok, what do we do when we take him down?”

“You’re going to Vegas, Baby.”

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