Savages

The rest happens in silence, well,

Not silence, there’s this weird sound of rushing water in Ben’s ears as—

Chon spins and tumbles backward and Ben—

—screams, then

Starts shooting into the back of the van, and—

—the van door slides open and this guy tumbles out, bullet holes all over him as

Chon straightens up and fires the shotgun—

—and this guy slams back against the van like a crash-test dummy.

Chon pulls the body aside, gets behind the wheel.

Ben jumps in and they head down the road.

178

Ben flips out.

“Easy,” Chon says. “Steady.”

“I killed someone!”

“And thank fucking God,” Chon says.

The first shot had just missed him. The second would have killed him if Ben hadn’t opened fire. He looks over at Ben, tears pouring down his cheeks, his face twisted in pain.

Brings it back.

The first time.

Popping that particular cherry.

No time for guilt then.

AQ all over the fucking place. Sniper fire coming from everywhere. Buddies going down to the zip-zip of bullets. Chon, flat on the ground, forced himself to look up, find a target, fire.

You killed one, pup? Kill more.

Now he tells Ben, “Chill.”

“I can’t.”

“What did you think it was going to be, Ben?”

And don’t you know it’s going to get worse?

179

Focus, focus, Ben demands of himself.

Focus on saving O.

With one of theirs killed, the BC will feel obligated to Do Something About It and they might do it to O if they suspect our involvement in the robbery.

Gotta give them someone else.

It’s too bad, the dope is mid–six figures but they have to dump it. Dump the dope and their guilt onto Somebody Else.

It’s ugly, it’s wrong, and—

They drive the van to Dana Point.

DP is a funky old surf town that has retained some of its funk. It used to be famous among surfers as “Killer Dana” for a big wave that crashed right onto the point of Dana Point. But then they built the harbor and the marina and fucked up the wave. All that’s left of Killer Dana is an eponymous—

—good word, Chon has postulated that

Alcoholics Anonymous is also

Alcoholics Eponymous—

—surf shop that maintains the legend, anyway.

Dana Point also has a small but distinct barrio with a small but growing gang problem. Ben has it in mind to give the small but growing gang problem a bigger problem. Chon pulls the van into the barrio, finds a nice little cul- de-sac, and leaves it there.

He and Ben walk.

180

On the walk Ben conducts an internal Socratic self- cross-examination.

You took a human life.

Yes, but in self-defense.

Not really, you were robbing him, he was the one defending himself.

Actually, he was robbing me first.

So two wrongs make a right?

Of course they don’t, but when he pulled the gun he left me no choice.

Certainly he did. Would it not have been the moral choice to allow him to kill you instead of committing a murder yourself?

I guess, but I just reacted.

Exactly. You didn’t think.

There wasn’t time to think. Only react.

But you put yourself in that situation. You committed a robbery, you carried a gun. Those were choices.

He would have killed me.

Now you are merely repeating yourself.

He would have killed my friends.

So you were saving them, not yourself?

I don’t know what the hell I was doing, all right?! I don’t recognize myself. I don’t know who I am anymore.

And it’s all fun and games until someone loses an I.

181

When the dope van didn’t arrive Hector and his boys drove the route and found two of their men sitting beside a body in the road.

Gun still in his hand.

Lado had him carefully wrapped in sheets of canvas and put respectfully in the back of the truck.

“Bury him like a man,” he ordered. “He died doing his job. Money to his family.”

Then he went off to find the killers.

182

Two DP wannabe gangbangers spotted the strange van and took about fifteen seconds to boost it.

Joyrode it down to Doheny Beach, where they looked in the back and couldn’t believe their luck.

All that yerba.

Wide-eyed, Sal looks at Jumpy and asks, “How much you think this is worth?”

“Lots.”