Bonneville America Forums Forums Off Topic Discussion Forums Lounge A Bit of Fiction (LOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG)

It's raining so hard today I can barely see to the end of my driveway. I typed this up to pass the time. I've told this one for years at campfires and such, some even believed it was true. But it's not, it's total fiction.
I now present to you:

Trouble: A Cautionary Tale

It was almost too easy. A moonless night, a dark parking lot, and next to that old Buick, the prize awaited, a Hayabusa.

The man called Franklin the Ghost crept up to his prey. Franklin had been stealing bikes for five years, and no one had ever seen him or heard him. The money was good and the work was easy. Especially this Suzuki. Hayabusas were a hot commodity, drag racers loved ‘em. And they didn’t ask a lot of questions about cheap parts. And this idiot didn’t have a chain, a U-lock, not even a disc lock for protection.

Franklin broke the fork lock in about five seconds, the ignition in ten. But as he went to start up and ride away, there was a muffled ‘pfft’ behind him and a terrible pain blossomed in his back. Franklin wanted to run, but his arms and legs weren’t listening. Everything started to get fuzzy, and then went black.

A figure in camouflage fatigues emerged from the bushes. His face was done up in a grotesque war paint of silver & black flames.
In his left hand was a Pneu-Dart air-pump tranquilizer gun, normally used to safely take down animals. But tonight’s quarry was of the two-legged variety.

He knelt down beside the bike and quickly snapped on a disc lock as a black Chevy van pulled up. The driver got out and wordlessly helped load the hapless Franklin into the van.
They slid the door shut and hopped in. It had been approximately one minute since the fork lock had been broken.

“Nice shootin’ Jerry.”
“Thanks, Redeye, but I still think a 30/.06 would’ve been better.”
The driver John “Redeye” Jones, looked over at his friend before replying.
“A 30/.06 will get you the chair. If you kill him, he learns nothing. You’ll see, this psychological warfare is a lot more fun”
“We’ll see about that. And they don’t use the chair anymore, it’s lethal injection. Anyway, I can’t wait to see his face when he wakes up and sees you.”
Redeye had painted a red and yellow starburst on his face and blacked out three teeth.
“Well you don’t look very pretty yourself, bubba, and he’ll never be able to describe us this way.”

Jerry just grunted and stared out the window at the night, remembering how this all began.

It started a few years ago. Jerry had just finished a court-ordered DUI program and got his license back. The original incident was immortalized in a song called “I Drove My Mustang into a Tree.” The song was funny, but the situation wasn’t a joke. Jerry needed a new hobby that wouldn’t get him thrown in jail.

The magazine rack at a local newsstand provided an answer. Back Street Heroes was a British custom-bike magazine. Unlike the American mags, these guys turned every kind of bike imaginable into a custom.

On the cover was a Triumph triple in a Spondon frame. They called it a Spumph. Jerry’s mind took off. He had a settlement from the Mustang coming that should cover the expense, and he had never had any trouble with things mechanical…

The project began. The first piece was a Spondon “Monster” polished-aluminum frame and swingarm. Instead of a triple, Jerry used a new Triumph Bonneville engine. He scourced a set of Daytona 675 wheels and front end to keep things light. A big-bore kit and a bit of tweaking got him a reliable engine with plenty of power. It was painted high-gloss black with a Gypsy dancer painted on the tank. Jerry christened his back road dancer Gypsy.

Jerry had ridden dirt bikes as a kid, but that was quite a while ago. There was a lot of awkwardness at first (and a little fear!) as he worked the rust off his riding skills. But he was hooked. Fifteen hundred miles went by in the first week. Jerry was in love.

The name Gypsy fit her like a glove. She was exotic, full of wanderlust, and played beautiful music. He would rather play with Her than go to work.

One Sunday, Jerry went out to his garage for a morning ride. He always said, “Start the week right and blow out the cobwebs.”

But this week would not start right, and those cobwebs would incinerate in a fire of rage. For that morning, Jerry saw the emptiest place in the world. The spot where his motorcycle used to be. The shattered remains of a U-lock the only evidence she ever existed.

Jerry’s primal scream woke half the neighborhood. He pulled out his cell and called the police. The 911 operator had a terrible time understanding that, “They took Her, they took my Gypsy” was not a kidnapping, but a theft.

In Jerry’s mind it was a kidnapping, probably followed by dismemberment. The police came and took his statement, but he never saw Gypsy again.

What he saw was a red haze.

Redeye and Jerry had been friends since they were kids, and he knew his friend’s temper well. When news of the theft reached him, Redeye paid Jerry a visit and found him in his living room, a half-empty bottle of whisky at his side and pieces of a Winchester 30/.06 scattered across a table.

“Whatcha doin’ Jer?”
“Cleanin’ Daddy’s old rifle.”
“Why?”
“Goin’ huntin’.”
“But deer season is months away.”
“Ain’t huntin’ deer. Huntin’ snake, rat, maybe weasel.”

Redeye heaved a weary sigh and sat down to try and change his friend’s mind, and save his life.

“Dude, you go off like Charles Bronson in Death Wish you’ll get hunted down and probably die.”
“So what am I supposed to do?! Turn the other cheek?! They took my best friend and either sent her out of the country or sold her for parts.”

Redeye gave Jerry a hard-eyed stare and began in a calm, dead-serious voice,
“No, you shouldn’t turn the other cheek. I have a plan. I’ve been thinking about this off and on ever since my tattoo shop was broken into last year. Here’s the idea…”

A hard bump as the van turned down a gravel road jolted Jerry out of his reverie and back to the present. Once out of sight of the main road, Redeye pulled over, shut off the engine, and turned on the interior lights. The back of the van was empty, except for Franklin and a crate full of the tools needed for the night’s work. The floor had been covered in plastic to ease the clean-up chore afterward.

“Here, put these on and check his wallet. I’ll get the clippers.”

Jerry handed Redeye a pair of latex gloves, donned a pair himself, and removed a battery-powered hair clipper from the crate. Redeye sifted through the contents of the wallet while Jerry proceeded to shave the unconscious Franklin’s head. He finished, and looked up at Redeye.

“What’ve you got?”
“His name’s Franklin Edale, lives in Crescent Heights. No credit cards, no voter’s reg, just a Social Security card, some pictures, and forty-four dollars cash.”

Redeye replaced the wallet and picked up a portable tattoo machine. For the next several minutes the buzzing of a tattoo needle on skin filled the van. He finished and sat back to admire his work. On Franklin’s forehead, about an inch above his eyebrows, were the words “MOTORCYCLE THIEF” in half-inch block letters. Psychological warfare had begun.

On the drive back to town, Franklin regained consciousness. He tried to sit up, and found his hands and feet were bound with plastic zip-ties. His struggles only served to show him that his bonds were secure. They also alerted Jerry and Redeye that he was awake. Jerry spun in his chair and displayed his best Jack Nicholson evil grin.

“Well, well, our thief awakes. How are you doin’, thief?”
“What’s going on here? Let me go!” Franklin backed away and made for the door but Jerry was on him in a flash, pinning him to the floor.
“I’ll tell you what’s going on, you tried to steal my bike, and now you have to pay.”
“O God, please don’t kill me!”
“God? You should have thought about God before you became a thief, Franklin. That’s right, I know who you are, I know where you live.”

Panic filled Franklin’s eyes. “What are you going to do with me?” Tears rolled down his face.

“We’re going to let you go, this time. But you’re a marked man, Franklin.”
Jerry held up a mirror to show him the mark.
“If we catch you stealin’ again, you’re a dead man.”

Redeye called out from the front of the van, “We’re here. Durty Harry’s dead ahead.”
Durty Harry’s was a notorious biker bar.

“Durty Harry’s!” Franklin shrieked, “You can’t let me out here! They’ll kill me!”
Jerry answered, “Then you better hop outta here, fast.”

The van came to a halt in Durty Harry’s parking lot. It was filled with mostly Harleys, with a few Triumphs, a Norton, even a couple of Japanese bikes thrown in for variety. Redeye came back to help unload their passenger.

“Remember what I said, Franklin, you’re a marked man.”
Franklin looked into the two faces in war-paint and asked, “Who are you?”
Jerry put his face inches from Franklin’s and said, “Trouble.”

With that, the door was opened and Franklin the Ghost was thrown into the parking lot. He was last seen hopping away like the Easter Bunny.

Redeye looked at Jerry and smiled, “Round One.”

Time passed, and Jerry and Redeye repeated their ambush. Things went like clockwork until they came to their tenth victim, Kevin Taylor. Kevin didn’t get away, the boys at Durty Harry’s caught him, and put him in the hospital. To make matters worse, Kevin was only 17, a minor.

The ambushes got harder to spring. Word had gotten around and thieves were either retiring, or plying their trade in other cities, other states. Many nights were spent lying in wait with nothing to show for it but aching joints and tired eyes.

Trap number twelve proved their undoing. Instead of another thief, Jerry put a dart into an undercover policeman. When he rolled his “victim” over, Jerry found himself staring down the barrel of a .40 cal Sig. Redeye found his van surrounded, and was likewise cordially invited for an extended stay at the lovely Graybar Hotel. The game was over.

Then a curious thing happened. Letters started to pour in, supportive of the men called “Trouble“. A high-priced attorney agreed to take the case “pro bono”. He explained that his Desert Scrambler, once owned by Steve McQueen, had been stolen, and he sympathized with their plight.

The District Attorney was having his own problems. Kevin Taylor had recovered from his injuries, but said he couldn’t identify his assailants. The police managed to find five other men with “MOTORCYCLE THIEF” on their foreheads, but strangely enough, they couldn’t, or wouldn’t, ID their attackers.

The forensics team went over the van with a fine-tooth comb but it was clean as a whistle.

The charges against Redeye were dropped, since it isn’t against the law to sit in a van with strange make-up on your face.

Jerry was charged with one count of assaulting a police officer. The Judge seemed sympathetic to the defense, and imposed a minimum sentence in county jail, followed by probation.

Jerry didn’t seem overly surprised at the sentencing. When asked, he said that he felt he could count on the fairness and honesty of Judge Edward W. Turner.

Jerry and Redeye are retired from the vigilante business these days. And while motorcycles still get stolen around here from time to time, the rate of theft is one of the lowest in the country. You see, you never know when Trouble will be hiding in the bushes.

Hope you liked it!

MAN, THAT WAS LOOOONG! But a good read nonetheless. Too bad it ain't true.

It just goes to show ya, "Revenge is a dish best served cold", alright!

(and SOMETIMES it's even BETTER with a free tattoo thrown in as dessert, huh Brian?!)

Excellent writing, Brian. Do you do this for a living? (write, not lurk in makeup with a zipgun)?

No I don't.(write, that is)
I'd love to publish this but wouldn't have a clue how to go about it.