Hurricane Kretschman.
4th book in Fish Fishbein's "Adventures in La-La Land" series.
Chapter 2
Fish eased the Surveillance Mobile to a stop at the top of his driveway.
And for once, Kenny and Einstein were both ready to go -- decked out in their bail enforcement drag and playing Hackey Sack under the multi-gazillion candlepower glow of the floodlights in his home’s security system.
And, without his having to tell them, their gear was already neatly arranged in two separate stacks.
Two pairs of NHL regulation shin guards, painted black.
Two army surplus Kevlar helmets, same color.
A clear thermoplastic face shield for each helmet.
Plus industrial strength goggles.
Along with two military grade black utility belts with clipped-on pepper spray canisters, rated for use on bears.
A small collection of hefty, double looped zip ties.
And to complete the ensemble, they also included a couple of pairs of black padded gloves, arm and knee pads, black ski masks and oversized aluminum flashlights.
Had the collections been featured on QVC, some pudgy, middle-aged designer would be gushing its praises. Letting the audience know that Bail Enforcement was the new black, and breathlessly reminding viewers that all sizes were still in stock.
And available for six easy, monthly payments.
“So, what do we like, got?” Kenny interrogated the Big Dog while they swapped fist bumps.
Fish chuckled. “You’re gonna love this, guys. We got some crazy-ass Tea Partier in Culver City, who took it on himself to secede from the Union.”
“He means a sovereign individual.” Einstein supplied the subtitles, because Kenny was either lost in the ozone again or zooming some righteous waves the day this was covered in his high school history class. “A person who basically becomes his own independent country.”
“Kewl!”
“And right now,” Fish couldn’t stop chortling. “The independent nation of Hiram Wiedermayer owes the city of L.A about sixteen hundred bucks in unpaid parking tickets, two grand worth of court costs and twenty five large for jumping bail.”
“Whoa, y’mean I could be like, The People’s Republic of Kennyland? Or, what about like, the independent nation of Kenny-vania!” Fish’s third in command giggled at the prospect. “Dudes, that would be like, s-o-o-o freakin’ epic!”
“Ok, Mr. Prime Minister,” Einstein tapped his bud’s shoulder. “Let me ask you a question. You’re now a sovereign individual, right?”
“Fer sure, Brah. I’m like, s-o-o-o totally sovereign!”
“Ok, let’s say your presidential palace catches fire, man. Who you gonna call?”
Kenny shook his head, like his road brother was asking a really, REALLY dumb question.
“Du-uh! Like, we still got a fire department, Brah.”
“We do, Kenny. But you don’t. Remember? You’re not part of this country anymore.”
“Wull—"
“Ok,” Fish broke in. “Listen, I hate to break up the civics lesson here, guys. But we got an FTA to round up. Then we’ve gotta hit the road for Sturgis.”
“Your stuff’s on your bed,” Einstein answered.
“What about me?” Shawna elbowed her way into the conversation. “Don’t I get stuff?”
“Wait a minute,” Fish stopped her in her tracks. “I thought we settled this. You’re staying here.”
Kretschman silently shook her head at Fish and then looked over to Einstein.
“On the bed, next to Fish’s gear. No worries, man. Kenny and I have tons of extras.”
She smiled and walk into the house, stopping at the doorway to give Fish a little peck on the cheek.
“Now it’s settled, SweetPea.”
The Big Dog watched Shawna as she continued through the door and down the hallway to his bedroom. Then he turned to glower at Einstein, who just shrugged.
****
Fish pulled his bedroom door shut, still grumbling at how Shawna managed to override his objections to her coming along.
He stopped at his home office and grabbed a few sheets of paper from the tray in his fax machine. Copies of the court’s paperwork generated by Wiedemayer’s no-show at his hearing, as well as his bail revocation notice and bench warrant.
Walking back into the garage, he took a quick look toward where the piles of bounty hunter gear had been stacked, and smiled. At least, Kenny and Einstein managed to load everyone’s Fugitive Apprehension playthings into the Surveillance Mobile’s trunk, without being asked.
He fired up the engine and started backing the Surveillance Mobile down the driveway. They were four good sized, fully equipped grownups, crowded into a faded gold colored, twelve year-old Toyota Camry that was really a more comfortable setting for four jockeys. The damn car was just about invisible in any neighborhood they would ever want to surveil. But that was about the only good thing Fish could say about it.
Fish made a right and headed South on Pacific Coast Highway.
At this hour, they were only about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes from their target address. But, like almost everything else in Fish’s life, this was going to follow anything but a straight line.
First, they had to make a quick stop at a secured, 24-hr vehicle storage lot in the Marina del Rey area, to drop off the Surveillance Mobile and pick up Big Dog Recoveries’ secret weapon.
A tired old airport shuttle bus.
The kind most car rental places and big hotels employ to ferry their customers and guests to and from LAX.
Large enough to provide comfy seating for at least a baker’s dozen bounty hunters and their quarries, it was also fitted with a rust-free assortment of heavyweight stainless steel handgrips, seat frames and luggage racks.
All the better to securely hog tie a formerly fleeing scofflaw to.
Fish’s containment cell on wheels was not only perfect for transporting a larger party of ne’er do wells to the nearest graybar hotel, it also boasted plush-like seats, air conditioning and an in-dash stereo permanently locked onto a heavy metal FM station.
All Metallica, Black Sabbath, Twisted Sister and Slayer -- all the time.
****
As it turned out, the address Fish was looking for was only about a mile from the secured vehicle storage yard where his containment cell on wheels was camped out. According to the paperwork Elias Hope faxed over, Hiram Wiedermayer’s address was on a narrow side street in Culver Village, a collection of identical little post-WWII hovels off Washington Boulevard, just a skoshe East of the old MGM studio lot.
Naturally, all the street names in this part of the galaxy had something to do with the movies MGM produced over the years.
“Keep your eyes open, guys,” Fish glanced up into his rear view mirror. “The street we’re looking for is Boys Town Court. Got it?”
“Wuhh--?”
“Old MGM movie,” Fish answered Kenny’s question before his number three in command had a chance to form the words. “Mickey Rooney, Spencer Tracy and hundreds of happy orphans.”
“Uhh, kewl. I guess.”
Hiram Wiedermayer’s street wasn’t hard to find at all.
All Fish had to do was follow the glow from the dozen or so searchlights that kept the man’s yard brightly illuminated every damn night, from sundown until after dawn.
Along with the din of an endless tape loop of various Tea Party leaders and political candidates, delivering their anti-Obama diatribes over and over again.
At volume levels high enough to drown out a 747.
The Big Dog hung a left into Boys Town Court and immediately stopped. With all the cars already parked along both sides of the street, what was left was too narrow for the ex-shuttle bus to safely get through.
Besides, it was a dead end street.
So if his bail-jumping, one-man nation should decide to fire up his independence buggy and make a run for it, he’d have no way out.
But if the man’s street was easy to identify, chez Wiedermayer was a piece of cake.
To begin with, there were all those searchlights.
Plus the bank of deafening speakers bolted to his roof.
And his was the only house on block with a humongous sign posted in the front yard. Informing any and all that, in sashaying from the sidewalk to the front door, you will have officially left the United States of America, and would now be trespassing within the sovereign borders of the nation of Concordia.
And the use of deadly force was officially authorized.
The three Big-Doggers and their ride-along huddled behind the rear of the containment cell on wheels, slipped into their bail enforcement accessories and held a quick strategy session.
Fish was going to approach the front door with Einstein, while Kenny’s job was to take his paint ball gun -- loaded with balls stuffed with pepper spray powder -- and scoot around to the rear of the house.
Just in case.
“What about me, SweetPea?”
“Look Shawna, I already told you. I don’t want you getting mixed up in this.” He pulled his black ski mask down over his face, hiding everything but his eyes and his mouth. “You want to do something? Keep an eye on the bus. I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“Dammit, Fish,” she hissed at him. “I’m better trained, better equipped and probably more experienced with this kind of thing than you are.”
Just as Fish was getting set to fire back, he felt a tap on his shoulder.
He quickly spun around to discover a tiny, sweet-looking, elderly African American woman. With a cardigan sweater draped over her shoulders, a pair of reading glasses hanging from a chain around her neck, and a warm smile.
“What you boys doin’ out here in the middle of the night? You here to do something about him?” She gestured towards Concordia’s presidential palace.
“Yes, Ma’am,” Fish nodded. “Can you tell us anything about him?”
She looked over at the house, then back to Fish.
“Just look at that place,” she shook her head and tsk-ed. “It just ain’t right. Look at them lights. Look at them speakers and that sign. You know what I think?”
“About Mr. Wiedermayer? What’s that, Ma’am?”
The elderly woman leaned in and whispered, “I think that muthuhfugguh crazy.”
Then she laughed and continued on her way.
Fish looked to Kenny and nodded.
“Ok, you got thirty seconds to hit the back yard and find a spot with a clear shot at anybody coming out the back door. Got it?”
Kenny nodded. “Fer sure.”
“Thirty seconds, Kenny.”
“I like, got it, Brah.”
The Big Dog stared at his watch, waiting for the second hand to race around to where Mickey’s minute hand usually indicated noon.
He silently pulled the front gate open.
“Ok,” he whispered. “Go!”
Kenny took off at a quiet canter, then disappeared around the side of the house.
Fish looked at Einstein.
“You’re with me,” he whispered. “This clown’s probably harmless, but I don’t want anybody taking any
chances. Get out your pepper spray. If Wiedermayer does anything weird, threatening or stupid -- if he even sneezes, you spray him down. Got it?”
Physics boy nodded.
As the two silently headed for the front door, Einstein pulled his pepper spray canister off his utility belt, shook it a few times and released the safety.
They each took up a position at the outside edge on either side of the front door. A safety precaution in case their no-show sovereign individual felt like pumping a couple of rounds through the middle of the door before opening it.
Fish checked his watch. Kenny should be in place by now.
He nodded to Einstein, who was standing right next to the doorbell button.
Einstein pushed the button and the two could hear an old fashioned doorbell buzzer going off, somewhere in the rear of the house.
No answer.
Half a minute later, Fish gave another nod and Einstein pushed the doorbell button a second time.
Still no answer.
“I got an idea,” Fish whispered to his second in command. “Keep pushing it ‘till I tell you to stop. Push it a ton.”
Einstein shrugged and followed his boss’ orders, hitting the doorbell button so many times even Fish was getting annoyed.
“HAMMER-VIBER! GET YOUR SCRAWNY, CHICKEN-SHIT ASS OUT HERE!” Fish was doing a pretty fair impression of a pissed off, loud and obnoxious drunk.
“YOU HEARD ME, HAMMER WIPER! YOU AND ME…IN YOUR FRONT YARD…MANO TO MANO. NOW, YOU LITTLE SON OF A BITCH!”
The Big Dog pounded on the door a few times with his fist.
“GET THE FRUCK OUT HERE, HAMMER DINGER! I’M GONNA KICK YOUR FUGGIN’ AZZ!”
Fish pounded on the door a few more times.
“OPEN THIS GOT-DAM DOOR NOW, HAMMER HEAD! BEFORE I KICK IT IN!”
“You’ve got the wrong person,” the strident, irritated voice filtered through the heavy oak door. “My name is Wiedermayer. Hiram Wiedermayer. Now, go away!”
“NO, I AIN’ GOIN’ AWAY…WEIMERRUNNER!” Fish pounded on the door one more time. “YOU GAVE MY WIFE THE FREAKIN’ CLAP, YOU SUMMABITCH! SHE DANCES DOWN AT THE STRAWBERRY HIPPO! NAME’S CIMMANIN!”
“Look, I’ve never even heard of the Strawberry Hippo, friend. And I don’t know any dancer named, uh…what was that name?”
“CIMMANON! HER NAME’S CIMMANON, YOU SON OF A BITCH! SHE TOOK YOU INTO THE VIP ROOM. AND YOU GAVE HER A DOSE, ASSHOLE! NOW, CIMMONIN’S GOT THE CLAP…IN HER GOT-DAMN THROAT!”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Really.” Wiedermayer’s voice came back through the locked door. “But I don’t know who you’re talking about. Or what you’re talking about.”
“SO, NOW I GOT THE CLAP, WIMMERWINDER! AND SO DOES MY GIRLFRIEND, VICKIE! NOW, GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE SO WE CAN SETTLE THIS LIKE GENNELMONS!”
“Ok, fine!” Wiedermayer’s voice filtered through the door one more time. “But once I prove I’m not who you think I am, I want you to go away.”
“WIMMERWINDER! GET YOUR SCRAWNY ASS OUT HERE!”
Wiedermayer unlocked the door and pulled it open.
“Hello Hiram,” Fish held up a copy of his bench warrant and stuck his booted foot in the door before the startled Tea Partier had a chance to slam it shut. “Looks like you’ve got a little unfinished business with the city of Los Angeles.”
Hiram backed away from the door.
“What is this? What are you doing?!”
“I don’t know what it’s called in your neck of the woods,” Fish pushed the door open and walked into the house. “But back in the good old U.S. of A., we call it taking your keister downtown.”
Concordia’s one and only citizen spun around and started beating feet down the hallway, headed for the back door.
“But you can’t do that! You got to show me a warrant! That’s the law!”
“I already did, man. And you’re right, it is the law -- in the U.S.” Fish let out a loud guffaw. “But check it out, Wiedermayer. We’re not in the United States. We’re in – what the hell do you call this place? Concordia?”
Wiedermayer yanked the back door open and leaned out into the night.
“Help!” he started screaming. “Help! Murder! Unlawful arrest! Somebody call 911!”
A paintball stuffed with pepper spray powder suddenly burst against the doorframe.
“HELP!”
A second one caught him in the belt buckle.
“HELP! POLICE!”
He took off running for the side of the house, desperate to get to the driveway.
“HELP ME! KIDNAP! SOMEBODY CALL 911!”
Another paintball splattered against the backyard gate.
Then Wiedermayer tried a small change in tactics -- reaching out to his neighbors in a language they were probably more familiar and comfortable with.
The same ones he, his political party and Donald Trump wanted to forcibly evict, by the millions, from the land of the free.
“AYUDA! Help!”
No response from the potential deportees living all around the border between the United States and Concordia.
“AYUDAME! For Chrissake, help me!”
He yanked the wooden gate open. “SOMEBODY CALL THE POLICIA!”
Then he ran through.
And straight into Deputy Shawna’s outstretched forearm.
Which caught the man in his Adam’s Apple and toppled him to the driveway.
Shawna was on him before he finished surrendering to gravity, rolled him over onto his stomach and slapped a pair of the oversized zip ties around his wrists, behind his back.
Meanwhile, Hiram Wiedermayer, former US citizen and now sovereign individual and Premier for Life of the nation, Concordia, continued yelling non-stop at the top of his lungs.
“YOU CAN’T DO THIS! I’VE GOT RIGHTS! THIS IS ILLEGAL SEARCH AND SEIZURE! I WANT MY LAWYER! HELP! MURDER! KIDNAP!”
Fish appeared just as the deputy fished something out of her jacket pocket, a bright red foam rubber ball, a little larger than the ones kids used to play jacks with.
The ball was attached to a pair of elastic cords, which she fastened together behind Wiedermayer’s head while he continued yelling at the top of his lungs.
“You have the right to remain silent, dirtbag!”
Concordia’s Premier for Life took this as his cue to clamp his mouth shut tight.
Shawna pinched his nostrils together, cutting off the flow of air into his lungs. When Wiedermayer finally ope ned his yap to gulp down a breath, she stuffed the gag ball into his mouth and tightened the cords.
“For Chrissakes, use it!”
The Big Dog fired off a loud guffaw.
“So, when did law enforcement start buying their toys from the Adam and Eve catalog?”
“Not all our toys, SweetPea,” she chuckled and reached into her back pocket. Then she pulled out a pair of Barbie pink handcuffs that were partially wrapped in black velvet.
“Just the good stuff.”
“Shawna,” Fish chuckled a second time. “You have the right to remain kinky as hell.”
****
Fish pulled back into his driveway a few minutes shy of nine thirty.
Rush hour was still raging all over southern California and as far as everyone in the Surveillance Mobile was concerned, they had already put in one Hell of a long day.
Rounding up the entire population of Concordia and then wrangling him over to the LAPD’s Venice Boulevard facility took all of forty five minutes.
Plus another four and a half hours for the forces of good to get Premier for Life Wiedermayer fingerprinted and booked, shoot front and sides of his mug and involuntarily spray him down for the fleas, lice and other six-legged what-have-you’s that occasionally hitch rides on some of L.A. county’s ne’er do wells.
Add to that the hour it took to get the LAPD’s body receipt for Fish to hand over to Elias Hope.
Then tack on another hour to return the airport shuttle bus turned containment cell on wheels to the storage yard and pile back into the Surveillance Mobile.
Which finally put all four back on the road, headed for Big Dog Recoveries’ world headquarters in Malibu, at a little after seven in the morning.
Smack in the middle of one of L.A.’s world-famous, time zone-clogging rush hours.
And just in time for the heavy metal FM station to which the Surveillance Mobile’s radio was tuned, to launch into a fifteen year-old, recorded interview with P-FREELY, the all-but forgotten lead singer of a nineties era hair and headbanger group called BUNZ ‘N GUTTER.
Like hundreds of other wanna-be bands that gigged up and down the Sunset Strip at the time, they were charmingly short on talent. But long on sex, drugs, wearing women’s fashions and attitude.
In fact, all that separated BUNZ ‘N GUTTER from everyone else was P-FREELY.
And his reputation for drunkenly urinating on the stage at every performance the band ever played.
Along with a voice one rock critic described as sounding like, “a cat caught in a Cuisinart.”
Fish turned onto his street in the North Malibu Barrio and took a quick right into his driveway.
Then stomped on his brakes.
“What the Hell?”
A humongous RV was blocking the upper section of his driveway.
A factory stock recreational vehicle that had to be at least forty feet from front to rear.
With no cutesy bumper stickers advertising where its owner had been. Or which middle school their kid was an honor student at.
No garish, mutli-hued combination of swirling, metallic painted stripes trying to give the impression that the vehicle was a custom job.
Not even any signage affixed anywhere on the bus, advertising the owner’s business, so they could write the whole thing off their taxes.
Just a simple vanity license plate that read, “MRBAIL”.
Fish walked up to the door behind the RV’s passenger seat and pounded hard.
“Hey, Elias.”
No answer.
Then he moved toward the rear of the unit, pounding on the outside wall as he went.
“Here, Elias,” Fish whistled a few times, like he was paging his dog. “Here, boy!”
Still no answer from inside the RV.
He returned to the garage, where Einstein, Kenny and Shawna were watching the proceedings with expressions of wonder, polite disinterest or amusement on their faces. Depending on where you looked.
“Dude, like, what’s goin’ on with like, your bud?”
Fish just shrugged. “You got me, Kenny.”
Einstein chuckled. “According to Newton, a body at rest will stay that way until it’s acted on by an outside force.”
“Wull, maybe we should like, get ahold of that Newton dude, Dude. See if maybe he could like, do us a solid here.”
The Big Dog looked at Kenny and shook his head, chuckling.
“Not likely, Kenny.”
“Wull, how come?”
“Because, man,” Einstein waded in. “Dude’s been dead for almost three hundred years.”
“Whoa. Bummer.”
Deputy Shawna reached over and gently touched Fish’s arm.
“SweetPea, you mind if I give it a try?”
Fish shrugged and then chuckled. “Hey, knock yourself out, Shawna. Mi amigo es tu amigo.”
“Aww, thanks, Sweetie,” she kissed him on the cheek.
Then she rooted around in one of her saddle bags, pulled out a small bullhorn and aimed it at the RV.
“YOU, IN THE RV! THIS IS THE POLICE!”
If any of Fish’s neighbors had plans that included sleeping in that morning, the volume and clarity produced by Deputy Kretschman’s little bullhorn made quick work of them.
“SHUT OFF YOUR ENGINE AND TOSS THE KEYS OUT THE DRIVER’S SIDE WINDOW!”
No answer forthcame from inside the huge RV.
“SHOW ME YOUR HANDS, DRIVER!” Shawna looked away from the bullhorn for a moment to smile at Fish. Then she went back to the business at hand. “I SAID, SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!!”
A small, frosted white plastic hatch suddenly popped up on the roof of the RV.
“That you, Fish?”
Fish chuckled and politely took the bullhorn from Deputy Shawna. Then he raised it up in front of his mouth.
“That’s affirmative, driver. NOW, SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!”
“I CAN’T! Not right now!”
“WHY NOT, DRIVER?”
“I—I just can’t, is all.”
“DRIVER, DO I HAVE TO SEND IN THE DOGS?”
“Goddammit, Fish! ‘Cause I’m in the crapper and I’m trying to take a dump!”
“ALL RIGHT DRIVER,” The Big Dog was having way too much fun with this. “THEN, WHAT IF YOU JUST SHOWED ME ONE HAND?”
“Jesus Christ, Fish! You got my body receipt?”
“THAT’S A ROGER. THE JOB ISN’T FINISHED UNTIL THE PAPERWORK’S ALL DONE!”
Fish looked over to Shawna and winked. Which she answered with a quick peck on his kisser.
“TELL YOU WHAT, DRIVER. HOW ABOUT YOU JUST SHOW ME THREE FINGERS? C’MON, TRES LITTLE DIGITS. CAN YOU MANAGE THAT?”
“How about this, Fish?” Elias’ hand slowly pushed up through the vented opening.
It was tightly closed in a fist.
Except for the extended middle finger.
“THAT WORKS FINE, DRIVER. YOU MAY GO ON ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS.”
Fish eased the Surveillance Mobile to a stop at the top of his driveway.
And for once, Kenny and Einstein were both ready to go -- decked out in their bail enforcement drag and playing Hackey Sack under the multi-gazillion candlepower glow of the floodlights in his home’s security system.
And, without his having to tell them, their gear was already neatly arranged in two separate stacks.
Two pairs of NHL regulation shin guards, painted black.
Two army surplus Kevlar helmets, same color.
A clear thermoplastic face shield for each helmet.
Plus industrial strength goggles.
Along with two military grade black utility belts with clipped-on pepper spray canisters, rated for use on bears.
A small collection of hefty, double looped zip ties.
And to complete the ensemble, they also included a couple of pairs of black padded gloves, arm and knee pads, black ski masks and oversized aluminum flashlights.
Had the collections been featured on QVC, some pudgy, middle-aged designer would be gushing its praises. Letting the audience know that Bail Enforcement was the new black, and breathlessly reminding viewers that all sizes were still in stock.
And available for six easy, monthly payments.
“So, what do we like, got?” Kenny interrogated the Big Dog while they swapped fist bumps.
Fish chuckled. “You’re gonna love this, guys. We got some crazy-ass Tea Partier in Culver City, who took it on himself to secede from the Union.”
“He means a sovereign individual.” Einstein supplied the subtitles, because Kenny was either lost in the ozone again or zooming some righteous waves the day this was covered in his high school history class. “A person who basically becomes his own independent country.”
“Kewl!”
“And right now,” Fish couldn’t stop chortling. “The independent nation of Hiram Wiedermayer owes the city of L.A about sixteen hundred bucks in unpaid parking tickets, two grand worth of court costs and twenty five large for jumping bail.”
“Whoa, y’mean I could be like, The People’s Republic of Kennyland? Or, what about like, the independent nation of Kenny-vania!” Fish’s third in command giggled at the prospect. “Dudes, that would be like, s-o-o-o freakin’ epic!”
“Ok, Mr. Prime Minister,” Einstein tapped his bud’s shoulder. “Let me ask you a question. You’re now a sovereign individual, right?”
“Fer sure, Brah. I’m like, s-o-o-o totally sovereign!”
“Ok, let’s say your presidential palace catches fire, man. Who you gonna call?”
Kenny shook his head, like his road brother was asking a really, REALLY dumb question.
“Du-uh! Like, we still got a fire department, Brah.”
“We do, Kenny. But you don’t. Remember? You’re not part of this country anymore.”
“Wull—"
“Ok,” Fish broke in. “Listen, I hate to break up the civics lesson here, guys. But we got an FTA to round up. Then we’ve gotta hit the road for Sturgis.”
“Your stuff’s on your bed,” Einstein answered.
“What about me?” Shawna elbowed her way into the conversation. “Don’t I get stuff?”
“Wait a minute,” Fish stopped her in her tracks. “I thought we settled this. You’re staying here.”
Kretschman silently shook her head at Fish and then looked over to Einstein.
“On the bed, next to Fish’s gear. No worries, man. Kenny and I have tons of extras.”
She smiled and walk into the house, stopping at the doorway to give Fish a little peck on the cheek.
“Now it’s settled, SweetPea.”
The Big Dog watched Shawna as she continued through the door and down the hallway to his bedroom. Then he turned to glower at Einstein, who just shrugged.
****
Fish pulled his bedroom door shut, still grumbling at how Shawna managed to override his objections to her coming along.
He stopped at his home office and grabbed a few sheets of paper from the tray in his fax machine. Copies of the court’s paperwork generated by Wiedemayer’s no-show at his hearing, as well as his bail revocation notice and bench warrant.
Walking back into the garage, he took a quick look toward where the piles of bounty hunter gear had been stacked, and smiled. At least, Kenny and Einstein managed to load everyone’s Fugitive Apprehension playthings into the Surveillance Mobile’s trunk, without being asked.
He fired up the engine and started backing the Surveillance Mobile down the driveway. They were four good sized, fully equipped grownups, crowded into a faded gold colored, twelve year-old Toyota Camry that was really a more comfortable setting for four jockeys. The damn car was just about invisible in any neighborhood they would ever want to surveil. But that was about the only good thing Fish could say about it.
Fish made a right and headed South on Pacific Coast Highway.
At this hour, they were only about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes from their target address. But, like almost everything else in Fish’s life, this was going to follow anything but a straight line.
First, they had to make a quick stop at a secured, 24-hr vehicle storage lot in the Marina del Rey area, to drop off the Surveillance Mobile and pick up Big Dog Recoveries’ secret weapon.
A tired old airport shuttle bus.
The kind most car rental places and big hotels employ to ferry their customers and guests to and from LAX.
Large enough to provide comfy seating for at least a baker’s dozen bounty hunters and their quarries, it was also fitted with a rust-free assortment of heavyweight stainless steel handgrips, seat frames and luggage racks.
All the better to securely hog tie a formerly fleeing scofflaw to.
Fish’s containment cell on wheels was not only perfect for transporting a larger party of ne’er do wells to the nearest graybar hotel, it also boasted plush-like seats, air conditioning and an in-dash stereo permanently locked onto a heavy metal FM station.
All Metallica, Black Sabbath, Twisted Sister and Slayer -- all the time.
****
As it turned out, the address Fish was looking for was only about a mile from the secured vehicle storage yard where his containment cell on wheels was camped out. According to the paperwork Elias Hope faxed over, Hiram Wiedermayer’s address was on a narrow side street in Culver Village, a collection of identical little post-WWII hovels off Washington Boulevard, just a skoshe East of the old MGM studio lot.
Naturally, all the street names in this part of the galaxy had something to do with the movies MGM produced over the years.
“Keep your eyes open, guys,” Fish glanced up into his rear view mirror. “The street we’re looking for is Boys Town Court. Got it?”
“Wuhh--?”
“Old MGM movie,” Fish answered Kenny’s question before his number three in command had a chance to form the words. “Mickey Rooney, Spencer Tracy and hundreds of happy orphans.”
“Uhh, kewl. I guess.”
Hiram Wiedermayer’s street wasn’t hard to find at all.
All Fish had to do was follow the glow from the dozen or so searchlights that kept the man’s yard brightly illuminated every damn night, from sundown until after dawn.
Along with the din of an endless tape loop of various Tea Party leaders and political candidates, delivering their anti-Obama diatribes over and over again.
At volume levels high enough to drown out a 747.
The Big Dog hung a left into Boys Town Court and immediately stopped. With all the cars already parked along both sides of the street, what was left was too narrow for the ex-shuttle bus to safely get through.
Besides, it was a dead end street.
So if his bail-jumping, one-man nation should decide to fire up his independence buggy and make a run for it, he’d have no way out.
But if the man’s street was easy to identify, chez Wiedermayer was a piece of cake.
To begin with, there were all those searchlights.
Plus the bank of deafening speakers bolted to his roof.
And his was the only house on block with a humongous sign posted in the front yard. Informing any and all that, in sashaying from the sidewalk to the front door, you will have officially left the United States of America, and would now be trespassing within the sovereign borders of the nation of Concordia.
And the use of deadly force was officially authorized.
The three Big-Doggers and their ride-along huddled behind the rear of the containment cell on wheels, slipped into their bail enforcement accessories and held a quick strategy session.
Fish was going to approach the front door with Einstein, while Kenny’s job was to take his paint ball gun -- loaded with balls stuffed with pepper spray powder -- and scoot around to the rear of the house.
Just in case.
“What about me, SweetPea?”
“Look Shawna, I already told you. I don’t want you getting mixed up in this.” He pulled his black ski mask down over his face, hiding everything but his eyes and his mouth. “You want to do something? Keep an eye on the bus. I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“Dammit, Fish,” she hissed at him. “I’m better trained, better equipped and probably more experienced with this kind of thing than you are.”
Just as Fish was getting set to fire back, he felt a tap on his shoulder.
He quickly spun around to discover a tiny, sweet-looking, elderly African American woman. With a cardigan sweater draped over her shoulders, a pair of reading glasses hanging from a chain around her neck, and a warm smile.
“What you boys doin’ out here in the middle of the night? You here to do something about him?” She gestured towards Concordia’s presidential palace.
“Yes, Ma’am,” Fish nodded. “Can you tell us anything about him?”
She looked over at the house, then back to Fish.
“Just look at that place,” she shook her head and tsk-ed. “It just ain’t right. Look at them lights. Look at them speakers and that sign. You know what I think?”
“About Mr. Wiedermayer? What’s that, Ma’am?”
The elderly woman leaned in and whispered, “I think that muthuhfugguh crazy.”
Then she laughed and continued on her way.
Fish looked to Kenny and nodded.
“Ok, you got thirty seconds to hit the back yard and find a spot with a clear shot at anybody coming out the back door. Got it?”
Kenny nodded. “Fer sure.”
“Thirty seconds, Kenny.”
“I like, got it, Brah.”
The Big Dog stared at his watch, waiting for the second hand to race around to where Mickey’s minute hand usually indicated noon.
He silently pulled the front gate open.
“Ok,” he whispered. “Go!”
Kenny took off at a quiet canter, then disappeared around the side of the house.
Fish looked at Einstein.
“You’re with me,” he whispered. “This clown’s probably harmless, but I don’t want anybody taking any
chances. Get out your pepper spray. If Wiedermayer does anything weird, threatening or stupid -- if he even sneezes, you spray him down. Got it?”
Physics boy nodded.
As the two silently headed for the front door, Einstein pulled his pepper spray canister off his utility belt, shook it a few times and released the safety.
They each took up a position at the outside edge on either side of the front door. A safety precaution in case their no-show sovereign individual felt like pumping a couple of rounds through the middle of the door before opening it.
Fish checked his watch. Kenny should be in place by now.
He nodded to Einstein, who was standing right next to the doorbell button.
Einstein pushed the button and the two could hear an old fashioned doorbell buzzer going off, somewhere in the rear of the house.
No answer.
Half a minute later, Fish gave another nod and Einstein pushed the doorbell button a second time.
Still no answer.
“I got an idea,” Fish whispered to his second in command. “Keep pushing it ‘till I tell you to stop. Push it a ton.”
Einstein shrugged and followed his boss’ orders, hitting the doorbell button so many times even Fish was getting annoyed.
“HAMMER-VIBER! GET YOUR SCRAWNY, CHICKEN-SHIT ASS OUT HERE!” Fish was doing a pretty fair impression of a pissed off, loud and obnoxious drunk.
“YOU HEARD ME, HAMMER WIPER! YOU AND ME…IN YOUR FRONT YARD…MANO TO MANO. NOW, YOU LITTLE SON OF A BITCH!”
The Big Dog pounded on the door a few times with his fist.
“GET THE FRUCK OUT HERE, HAMMER DINGER! I’M GONNA KICK YOUR FUGGIN’ AZZ!”
Fish pounded on the door a few more times.
“OPEN THIS GOT-DAM DOOR NOW, HAMMER HEAD! BEFORE I KICK IT IN!”
“You’ve got the wrong person,” the strident, irritated voice filtered through the heavy oak door. “My name is Wiedermayer. Hiram Wiedermayer. Now, go away!”
“NO, I AIN’ GOIN’ AWAY…WEIMERRUNNER!” Fish pounded on the door one more time. “YOU GAVE MY WIFE THE FREAKIN’ CLAP, YOU SUMMABITCH! SHE DANCES DOWN AT THE STRAWBERRY HIPPO! NAME’S CIMMANIN!”
“Look, I’ve never even heard of the Strawberry Hippo, friend. And I don’t know any dancer named, uh…what was that name?”
“CIMMANON! HER NAME’S CIMMANON, YOU SON OF A BITCH! SHE TOOK YOU INTO THE VIP ROOM. AND YOU GAVE HER A DOSE, ASSHOLE! NOW, CIMMONIN’S GOT THE CLAP…IN HER GOT-DAMN THROAT!”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Really.” Wiedermayer’s voice came back through the locked door. “But I don’t know who you’re talking about. Or what you’re talking about.”
“SO, NOW I GOT THE CLAP, WIMMERWINDER! AND SO DOES MY GIRLFRIEND, VICKIE! NOW, GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE SO WE CAN SETTLE THIS LIKE GENNELMONS!”
“Ok, fine!” Wiedermayer’s voice filtered through the door one more time. “But once I prove I’m not who you think I am, I want you to go away.”
“WIMMERWINDER! GET YOUR SCRAWNY ASS OUT HERE!”
Wiedermayer unlocked the door and pulled it open.
“Hello Hiram,” Fish held up a copy of his bench warrant and stuck his booted foot in the door before the startled Tea Partier had a chance to slam it shut. “Looks like you’ve got a little unfinished business with the city of Los Angeles.”
Hiram backed away from the door.
“What is this? What are you doing?!”
“I don’t know what it’s called in your neck of the woods,” Fish pushed the door open and walked into the house. “But back in the good old U.S. of A., we call it taking your keister downtown.”
Concordia’s one and only citizen spun around and started beating feet down the hallway, headed for the back door.
“But you can’t do that! You got to show me a warrant! That’s the law!”
“I already did, man. And you’re right, it is the law -- in the U.S.” Fish let out a loud guffaw. “But check it out, Wiedermayer. We’re not in the United States. We’re in – what the hell do you call this place? Concordia?”
Wiedermayer yanked the back door open and leaned out into the night.
“Help!” he started screaming. “Help! Murder! Unlawful arrest! Somebody call 911!”
A paintball stuffed with pepper spray powder suddenly burst against the doorframe.
“HELP!”
A second one caught him in the belt buckle.
“HELP! POLICE!”
He took off running for the side of the house, desperate to get to the driveway.
“HELP ME! KIDNAP! SOMEBODY CALL 911!”
Another paintball splattered against the backyard gate.
Then Wiedermayer tried a small change in tactics -- reaching out to his neighbors in a language they were probably more familiar and comfortable with.
The same ones he, his political party and Donald Trump wanted to forcibly evict, by the millions, from the land of the free.
“AYUDA! Help!”
No response from the potential deportees living all around the border between the United States and Concordia.
“AYUDAME! For Chrissake, help me!”
He yanked the wooden gate open. “SOMEBODY CALL THE POLICIA!”
Then he ran through.
And straight into Deputy Shawna’s outstretched forearm.
Which caught the man in his Adam’s Apple and toppled him to the driveway.
Shawna was on him before he finished surrendering to gravity, rolled him over onto his stomach and slapped a pair of the oversized zip ties around his wrists, behind his back.
Meanwhile, Hiram Wiedermayer, former US citizen and now sovereign individual and Premier for Life of the nation, Concordia, continued yelling non-stop at the top of his lungs.
“YOU CAN’T DO THIS! I’VE GOT RIGHTS! THIS IS ILLEGAL SEARCH AND SEIZURE! I WANT MY LAWYER! HELP! MURDER! KIDNAP!”
Fish appeared just as the deputy fished something out of her jacket pocket, a bright red foam rubber ball, a little larger than the ones kids used to play jacks with.
The ball was attached to a pair of elastic cords, which she fastened together behind Wiedermayer’s head while he continued yelling at the top of his lungs.
“You have the right to remain silent, dirtbag!”
Concordia’s Premier for Life took this as his cue to clamp his mouth shut tight.
Shawna pinched his nostrils together, cutting off the flow of air into his lungs. When Wiedermayer finally ope ned his yap to gulp down a breath, she stuffed the gag ball into his mouth and tightened the cords.
“For Chrissakes, use it!”
The Big Dog fired off a loud guffaw.
“So, when did law enforcement start buying their toys from the Adam and Eve catalog?”
“Not all our toys, SweetPea,” she chuckled and reached into her back pocket. Then she pulled out a pair of Barbie pink handcuffs that were partially wrapped in black velvet.
“Just the good stuff.”
“Shawna,” Fish chuckled a second time. “You have the right to remain kinky as hell.”
****
Fish pulled back into his driveway a few minutes shy of nine thirty.
Rush hour was still raging all over southern California and as far as everyone in the Surveillance Mobile was concerned, they had already put in one Hell of a long day.
Rounding up the entire population of Concordia and then wrangling him over to the LAPD’s Venice Boulevard facility took all of forty five minutes.
Plus another four and a half hours for the forces of good to get Premier for Life Wiedermayer fingerprinted and booked, shoot front and sides of his mug and involuntarily spray him down for the fleas, lice and other six-legged what-have-you’s that occasionally hitch rides on some of L.A. county’s ne’er do wells.
Add to that the hour it took to get the LAPD’s body receipt for Fish to hand over to Elias Hope.
Then tack on another hour to return the airport shuttle bus turned containment cell on wheels to the storage yard and pile back into the Surveillance Mobile.
Which finally put all four back on the road, headed for Big Dog Recoveries’ world headquarters in Malibu, at a little after seven in the morning.
Smack in the middle of one of L.A.’s world-famous, time zone-clogging rush hours.
And just in time for the heavy metal FM station to which the Surveillance Mobile’s radio was tuned, to launch into a fifteen year-old, recorded interview with P-FREELY, the all-but forgotten lead singer of a nineties era hair and headbanger group called BUNZ ‘N GUTTER.
Like hundreds of other wanna-be bands that gigged up and down the Sunset Strip at the time, they were charmingly short on talent. But long on sex, drugs, wearing women’s fashions and attitude.
In fact, all that separated BUNZ ‘N GUTTER from everyone else was P-FREELY.
And his reputation for drunkenly urinating on the stage at every performance the band ever played.
Along with a voice one rock critic described as sounding like, “a cat caught in a Cuisinart.”
Fish turned onto his street in the North Malibu Barrio and took a quick right into his driveway.
Then stomped on his brakes.
“What the Hell?”
A humongous RV was blocking the upper section of his driveway.
A factory stock recreational vehicle that had to be at least forty feet from front to rear.
With no cutesy bumper stickers advertising where its owner had been. Or which middle school their kid was an honor student at.
No garish, mutli-hued combination of swirling, metallic painted stripes trying to give the impression that the vehicle was a custom job.
Not even any signage affixed anywhere on the bus, advertising the owner’s business, so they could write the whole thing off their taxes.
Just a simple vanity license plate that read, “MRBAIL”.
Fish walked up to the door behind the RV’s passenger seat and pounded hard.
“Hey, Elias.”
No answer.
Then he moved toward the rear of the unit, pounding on the outside wall as he went.
“Here, Elias,” Fish whistled a few times, like he was paging his dog. “Here, boy!”
Still no answer from inside the RV.
He returned to the garage, where Einstein, Kenny and Shawna were watching the proceedings with expressions of wonder, polite disinterest or amusement on their faces. Depending on where you looked.
“Dude, like, what’s goin’ on with like, your bud?”
Fish just shrugged. “You got me, Kenny.”
Einstein chuckled. “According to Newton, a body at rest will stay that way until it’s acted on by an outside force.”
“Wull, maybe we should like, get ahold of that Newton dude, Dude. See if maybe he could like, do us a solid here.”
The Big Dog looked at Kenny and shook his head, chuckling.
“Not likely, Kenny.”
“Wull, how come?”
“Because, man,” Einstein waded in. “Dude’s been dead for almost three hundred years.”
“Whoa. Bummer.”
Deputy Shawna reached over and gently touched Fish’s arm.
“SweetPea, you mind if I give it a try?”
Fish shrugged and then chuckled. “Hey, knock yourself out, Shawna. Mi amigo es tu amigo.”
“Aww, thanks, Sweetie,” she kissed him on the cheek.
Then she rooted around in one of her saddle bags, pulled out a small bullhorn and aimed it at the RV.
“YOU, IN THE RV! THIS IS THE POLICE!”
If any of Fish’s neighbors had plans that included sleeping in that morning, the volume and clarity produced by Deputy Kretschman’s little bullhorn made quick work of them.
“SHUT OFF YOUR ENGINE AND TOSS THE KEYS OUT THE DRIVER’S SIDE WINDOW!”
No answer forthcame from inside the huge RV.
“SHOW ME YOUR HANDS, DRIVER!” Shawna looked away from the bullhorn for a moment to smile at Fish. Then she went back to the business at hand. “I SAID, SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!!”
A small, frosted white plastic hatch suddenly popped up on the roof of the RV.
“That you, Fish?”
Fish chuckled and politely took the bullhorn from Deputy Shawna. Then he raised it up in front of his mouth.
“That’s affirmative, driver. NOW, SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!”
“I CAN’T! Not right now!”
“WHY NOT, DRIVER?”
“I—I just can’t, is all.”
“DRIVER, DO I HAVE TO SEND IN THE DOGS?”
“Goddammit, Fish! ‘Cause I’m in the crapper and I’m trying to take a dump!”
“ALL RIGHT DRIVER,” The Big Dog was having way too much fun with this. “THEN, WHAT IF YOU JUST SHOWED ME ONE HAND?”
“Jesus Christ, Fish! You got my body receipt?”
“THAT’S A ROGER. THE JOB ISN’T FINISHED UNTIL THE PAPERWORK’S ALL DONE!”
Fish looked over to Shawna and winked. Which she answered with a quick peck on his kisser.
“TELL YOU WHAT, DRIVER. HOW ABOUT YOU JUST SHOW ME THREE FINGERS? C’MON, TRES LITTLE DIGITS. CAN YOU MANAGE THAT?”
“How about this, Fish?” Elias’ hand slowly pushed up through the vented opening.
It was tightly closed in a fist.
Except for the extended middle finger.
“THAT WORKS FINE, DRIVER. YOU MAY GO ON ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS.”