The Five

by Robert R. McCammon

  “So what does this have to do with a scumbag druggie nut trying to kill Ariel?” Nomad asked. “And where’s Jeremy Pett?”

  Good questions, True thought. He’d been going over both of them at the field office, in a conference call connection with the Tucson office, the Tucson police, the San Diego badges, the city attorneys and, it seemed, everybody else with any splinter of a stake in this. He’d even gotten a call from Austin about an hour ago, and that brought him to his next statement.

  “Hold onto your questions,” he said. “Roger Chester called me. You’re headlining at the Casbah tonight.”

  “Oh whoopie whoopie yay yay!” Nomad was nearly back to his bristling, snarly self. “Where’s that fucking Jeremy Pett, is what I want to know!”

  “Just listen for a minute.” True couldn’t begin to tell John Charles what he’d been going through with the Casbah management to meet the security standards. One big problem was that, being out by the airport, the area was full of parking decks. There were a couple of them right across the street, and he was going to have to put men on every level. “After the Casbah is what I’m talking about now. Tomorrow night. The tickets have sold out at the Cobra Club, and you’re headlining there too, by the way. They’re wanting you to headline again on Sunday night. Then, on Monday night, you’re booked into…wait, let me get this.” He reached for his wallet, a slimline, and brought out the piece of paper with the FBI seal at the top that he’d used to write down The Five’s new schedule. “Okay. You’re booked into the Sound Machine on Santa Monica Boulevard on Monday night. Headlining with—I cannot believe I’m saying this—Sack Of Buttholes.” True looked at Ariel. “Is that for real or did I get set up?”

  “It’s for real,” she told him. The SOBs were also out of Austin and were repped by the Roger Chester Agency.

  “Jeez,” True said. “Alright, then. Pardon this paper, I’ll get all the info to my PDA. Now…on Tuesday night, you’re playing at Magic Monty’s in Anaheim. Chester thinks you’ll sell out of merchandise tonight, so he’s making direct shipments to Hollywood and Anaheim. You still with me?” He looked up at his charges.

  “This is crazy,” Chappie said, her eyes wide. “Are you wanting them to get killed?”

  “Mom,” Berke cautioned. “It’s our job, okay?”

  “You don’t need to be killed for it! Christ Almighty! Get back to Austin and wait until they catch him!”

  “Go ahead,” Berke said to True. “What else?”

  “Then you’re back to the regular schedule: the Red Door in Phoenix on the 8th; the next night Staind Glass in Albuquerque; on the 15th the Lizard Lounge in Dallas; and on the 16th back in Austin at the Vista Futura.” True had realized, after speaking with Roger Chester, that he was facing a massive endeavor in scouting out all these locations and setting up security, much less keeping the mobile teams rolling. City lawyers were not so keen on putting their citizens at risk, the police departments didn’t want to feel they were being pushed around by the FBI, and for the first time today True had heard from the Tucson office the mention of all the money that was sinking into this operation. Though True was the big dog, he was not the only big dog and there were large hands on the leashes. Also today, the large hand on the leash in Tucson had pointed out that, while reports were coming in of Jeremy Pett being sighted in a dozen states including Alaska and Florida, if Pett had any sense of survival he would have headed straight to Mexico while he was so close to the border. Had he made it in soon after his description had gone public? Had he already gone before? The pickup truck’s tag hadn’t been seen on any of the cameras at the border crossings, but a man who wanted to get through could walk it.

  Careful with this one, Truitt, the warning had been delivered. This could really blow up in your face.

  This road managing job was hard work. He was a detail guy, sure, but planning the gas stops and the meal stops and where the band was going to stay in all those cities, and then putting together the security both outside and inside the clubs and clearing his operation with the local police and mobilizing agents from different field offices…it was tougher than he’d expected.

  He wouldn’t be doing this, if he wasn’t—

  “How about Pett’s family?” Nomad asked, breaking into True’s thoughts. “His mother and father. Have you checked his house?”

  “The first day,” True answered. “We’re watching the house and we got their okay to set up a tap and an intercept. They haven’t heard from their son since the accident in Houston. He briefly visited them before he went back to Iraq. I’ll tell you that Mr. Pett is also a veteran Marine, of the hard-bitten old school, who I am told seems to think his son lacked the toughness to make it a career. Pett’s mother, I also am told, is hardly a presence in the house. The agent who went there described her as ‘trying to make herself invisible’.”

  “I think he’s probably gone to Mexico.” Terry finished his stew and put the spoon aside. “I think he’s done what he wanted to do, and he’s gone.”

  “You don’t know that!” Chappie said. “I think it’s insane, you putting yourself out there like—” The Clash played their little snippet of ‘London Calling’ again, and Chappie looked at another number she didn’t know on her cellphone screen. “Sitting ducks,” she finished, before she answered. “Hello? Oh, Jesus. Wait a minute.” She asked the gathering if anyone wanted to talk to the National Star.

  “Another thing,” True said when Chappie had refused the call. “At your sound check this afternoon—in about ninety minutes from now—there are going to be all sorts of media folks present. Roger Chester clued me in that People magazine is sending a reporter and photographer. The local news will be there. Maybe some other magazines and who knows who else.”

  “DJ Talk It Up will be there,” Nomad said. “Trying to get a little piece of Ariel.”

  “Who?”

  “Don’t mind John,” Ariel advised. “It’s a guy with a podcast. He called this morning.”

  “Nobody gets past me.” True’s blue eyes were burning bright. “That’s what I want you to know. I see all credentials and talk to everybody who wants a piece of whomever. Right?”

  “You’re the road manager,” Berke said.

  “And I thought I used to be fucking crazy,” Chappie muttered into her coffee cup.

  True grunted but said nothing more. All this talk about crazy and insane.

  He had decided not to tell them the rest of it, either about Connor Addison or the guy with the .22 rifle who’d been captured making his torturous climb up Hell Mountain. No, best not to tell them. He didn’t want anybody to get—what was the term Berke had used?—‘creeped out’.

  “I’m going to take a nap for an hour,” True said as he stood up. He took his bowl and glass to the sink, and he realized he was avoiding eye contact with everyone. Then he went directly to the couch in the den, where he had set up his ‘command center’ on the desk next to the computer and wireless cable modem that Floyd Fisk had used.

  When the Scumbucket pulled up to the Casbah just before three o’clock with True at the wheel, it was clear the circus had come to town. Satellite trucks bearing TV news logos were nearly blocking Kettner Avenue, and the police were on hand to try to keep everybody moving. The Casbah’s crew helped with unloading the gear. The music room was small—intimate, they would say—and only held about a hundred and thirty or so patrons, but there were at least forty news media people milling around waiting for The Five. The ceiling was low and the stage was backed with a wall of what appeared to True to be black leather seat cushions. He introduced himself to the owner and the manager and talked to them for a few minutes, and then as the equipment was set up on stage True put himself between the band and the media hounds and tried to maintain some order.

  Ariel was amazed at this turnout, at the shouting for attention and the glare of the camera lights that followed her as she made her way across the room. Berke didn’t look right or left. Terry ducked his head down, suddenly a lot
shyer in a spotlight than he’d ever thought he would be. Nomad just laughed; here were all these cameras grabbing his image for national exposure, and instead of a young long-haired, street-tough Elvis he looked like the loser in a four-man cage fight.

  The Casbah’s owner, a bearded man named Tim Mays, got up on stage and told the assembly that they were welcome to do their interviews for one hour—starting now—but after that they had to clear out so the checks could be done and everything prepped for the show tonight.

  True was true to his word and started asking to see credentials—business cards, personal identification, whatever—of people lining up for interviews, which seemed to piss some of them off but he couldn’t care less about that; the way he blocked the path to the table where The Five had parked themselves said he was the big dog in this room, and if anybody didn’t like it they might as well pack up their digital capture gear into their black bags—which had to be searched, for the sake of security—and move their asses on out da doah.

  The People magazine team, a young Asian-American woman wearing pink eyeglasses and a lanky guy with curly brown hair who carried his expensive Nikon like it was a five-dollar basketball, came on in and set up to do their interview. How does it feel to suddenly be so successful? Now, how long have you guys been together? John, what did you think about when you made that jump? Oh…yeah…you go by the name Nomad, right? Do you guys have any idea how you got on Jeremy Pett’s radar? What about Connor Addison? Tell me a little bit about yourselves, just a brief bio. What’s your plan after this tour is over?

  Everybody looked to Nomad for the answer to that one. He said, “We’re working on it.”

  “Good luck,” said the People reporter, after the pictures had been taken of The Five on stage against the black cushion background, their faces pressed together as if they were one single entity, their right hands extended, palms out, each five fingers strong. No smiling, exude confidence and toughness, and let your shiner and the fading scratches on your cheek speak to every poor man’s son.

  “Ariel? Hi, there.”

  The voice caught her as she was returning to her seat at the table and her bandmates were in their own conversations with other reporters. A hand touched her elbow. She looked to her left, at a smiling, heavy-set young man wearing a white ball cap with DJ on the front in gold glitter.

  “How ya doin’? Okay if I set up and get a couple’a questions in? Your manager passed me through, I’m clean.” His smile never quit. His wide shoulders strained against a white nylon jacket that was really a couple of sizes too small; he stood about five feet seven and had big front teeth. The cap was pushed down low and tight on his head, with a huge curved bill. His hair was a sandy color on the sides and his deepset eyes were light brown. He had a bulbous nose that could round a corner before his Pumas did. “Just be a minute,” he told her. He was already setting up a tripod for a video camera next to the table. A black camera bag lay at his sneakered feet. “Go ahead, siddown.” Somebody else behind him told him to hurry up, and he shot a dark glance at the guy and said, “We’re all pros here, right? You shoulda got here early.” Then he switched his smile back on for Ariel, and he reached in to help her with her chair.

  “DJ Talk It Up,” he said when Ariel was sitting. “A.K.A. Dominic Jankowski, but don’t let that get out. Pleased to meet ’cha.” He offered his hand and she shook it; he was wearing a ring on every finger. “Lemme get this thing ready, we’ll be off and runnin’.” He was attaching the camera to the tripod, which had seen heavy use and suffered some mishaps. One of the banged-up legs looked to be secured by a thick winding of duct tape. “I didn’t mean to cause nobody no worry when I made that call,” he explained as he worked. “I just believe in goin’ for what you want. Got to, all this competition out here. You know what I mean.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” she said.

  “You are a talented person,” he said, throwing another smile at her. “I saw your videos. Got a fan-fuckin’-tastic one of you on YouTube doin’ the snake song. You wrote that?”

  “I did.”

  “I like what that says. Very beautiful. Okay, we’re ready.” The camera was positioned on her face. “Just…lemme…get this little fuck turned on.” The switch was fighting his finger.

  Ariel shifted in her seat. The next two people behind him were trying to get her attention, waving cameras at her. “Can I ask what this is for?”

  “My website, Rock Da Net Dot Com. Didn’t you check it out?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “It’s where DJ Talk It Up lives, my lady. Where he fries the night wires, talkin’ it up. There ya go.” The red light came on. “In business.”

  “Talking up exactly what?”

  “Ariel!” DJ Talk It Up spoke to her as if they were dear friends who hadn’t seen each other in years. “Talkin’ about you. And your band. And every other band I think is shootin’ straight for the stars. We’re recordin’ now, this’ll be for my Sunday night show.” He came around to peer into the lens over her shoulder, his cheek next to hers. She thought he was wearing a cologne that smelled like Band-Aids. “DJ Talk It Up on da Sunday night, yo yo yo!” He slung the fozzie finger. “We’re down here in San Diego at da Casbah, talkin’ to Ariel Collier, she be da dream girl of Da Five, check ’em out on this clip right here.” He straightened up and adjusted his cap. “I’ll edit the clip in, you’ll like it. You from up Boston way?”

  “Manchester.”

  “Philly,” he said, with a heart thump that went into a peace sign.

  “Detroit,” said Nomad, who suddenly came up beside the DJ. “Can whip Philly’s ass.”

  “Hey, my man!” DJ Talk It Up gave a crooked grin and balled up his fist to bump knuckles, but he only punched air. “Mr. Nomad, lookin’ mean!” He dropped his ghetto-by-way-of-bad-acting-lessons accent. “We’re recording here, see the light?”

  “Rock Da Net Dot Com,” Ariel said, lifting her eyebrows.

  “Excuse me, I’m with the Globe magazine.” A bearded man in a dark blue coat and open-necked shirt leaned in, a camera ready. His voice was a little testy. “Do I have to make an appointment to ask a few simple questions, or should—”

  “Don’t push me!” DJ Talk It Up spun on him with a ferocity that even made Nomad step back. “I’m standin’ here, don’t push me!”

  “I’m a professional, don’t you raise your—”

  “Get your motherfuckin’ ass to the back of the line, dickweed! I’ve been waitin’ here for hours!”

  “What the hell is this about?” True shouldered the Globe reporter, or freelancer or whatever he was, to one side. “Anybody causes any trouble in here, they’re going out. Are you causing trouble?” He directed this question to the Globe man.

  “Sir, I am waiting my turn. That is all. This individual is wasting the hour that we professionals have been given to—”

  “Bite my dick,” said DJ Talk It Up.

  The upshot of all this was that the Globe spun toward the door, True walked away rubbing his temples because he had a ferocious headache, and after the crimson heat receded from DJ Talk It Up’s face he said this video would go over great on the website, his fans would go crazier than shithouse rats.

  The interview went on for about seven more minutes, during which Nomad learned that DJ Talk It Up recorded the podcast in his aunt’s basement in L.A., where he was staying until his new crib in Westwood was redecorated. DJ Talk It Up said he’d just put the finishing touch on track number finito for his new CD, his own style of music he called grindhop, and both Dizzy D at Walkaround Records and Jasper Jack at Mutha’s Angry Boy were interested, and he’d used lots of samples from bands like Insane Clown Posse to make his statement. Maybe Ariel and Nomad would like copies? He could bring them to the Cobra Club tomorrow night.

  “I don’t really have a lot of time to—” Nomad began, but Ariel said, “Sure, I’ll listen to your music.”

  DJ Talk It Up smiled. “Okay,” he replied. “Yeah. Great. I’ll get it, like, cleaned up.” He st
ood silently for a few seconds, staring at her. Nomad thought the dude was zoning out. Or maybe he was in love. Then the DJ’s smile widened and he said, “I guess that does it.” He turned off the camera. “Hey,” he said before either of them could turn to the next person waiting. “Ariel, can I ask a big favor? I might have some more questions for you. Could you—and you might say no, and I’d understand—work me a backstage pass? Since I’m coming anyway. I could shoot some more video.” His grin showed the big front teeth. “Swear to God I won’t bring my fucking Uzi.”

  “No can do,” Nomad said. “And you know, that’s not very funny.”

  DJ Talk It Up smiled broadly at Nomad, but his eyes were vacant. “Sorry, man,” he amended. “Us Philly guys, we don’t got no class.”

  “I can get you a pre-show pass,” Ariel told him, as Nomad looked on in astonishment. “You can come back before our set. Will that do?”

  “Like honey on money,” he answered, which Nomad thought must’ve been something this guy had heard in a ’70s black exploitation flick, something like Super Fly Goes To Hell Up In Harlem.

  When DJ Talk It Up had packed his camera and taken his tripod and gone, Nomad asked Ariel if she had lost her mind today, if she didn’t smell the whiff of bozo like he did, and if they wanted a loser like that anywhere near the Cobra Club, much less backstage.

  “Pre-show won’t hurt,” she said, and her voice was firm. “Everybody deserves a chance.”

  Nomad didn’t reply, but he knew the City of Angels. It made people want things before they’d earned them. And anyway, deserve was not a word in his dictionary.

  TWENTY-FOUR.

  The hour passed and the sound check went on. They returned to Chappie’s, rested as True went into the den and hit his cellphone making sure all the last-minute security details were in place, they ate the dinner Chappie made for them, whoever wanted to change clothes and shower did so, and then they headed back to the Casbah. The place was overflowing. First up were the Mindfockers, six guys from the San Francisco area who delivered heavy-guitar distorto-and-vibrato-drenched head-banging rock, and after the Mindfockers’ double encores the Mad Lads got up there in front of the black leather seat cushions and the big clunky air-conditioner that looked like it was about to fall out of the wall and those four dudes laid down some serious vibe with funky guitars and a bright red Elka X-705 combo organ that made Terry salivate. The Mad Lads’ lead singer opened a music case, brought out an accordion and knocked the house down with a rollicking Cajun-peppered version of ‘In The Midnight Hour’.