Now this is more like it. Jack was grinning. He felt better than a troop of traveling clowns, more lit up than a Macy's Christmas window.

Okay, so maybe this little room is colder than a pimp's heart, but does that make it a bad place?

There were no windows and no furniture, and Jack Wirta, America's most engaging private dick, was forced to sit on the floor, contemplating concrete. Does that make this a bad experience? Fuck no. Concrete can be beautiful. Behold, its rough-hewn perfection. Study the poured-block worlds below. There are shapes lurking behind this gray molecular mass… little mountains and valleys, tiny fields of creation… microscopic and pure. A complete gnat-size world full of itty-bitty bumps and crevices that make up a carnival of untold beauty. Or an untold carnival of beautiful bumps and crevices… or a concrete carnival of untold bumpy canyons. Anyway, all kinds'a good shit.

Better still, Jack Wirta, heavy thinker, is having some world class thoughts. Even Emil Matasareanu and his dim-witted buddy Gene Philips couldn't fuck up this shoot-out. Jack was grinning, but suddenly, he felt sick. Time out… need to vomit. Auggh… auggh… ahhh… wooph, splash. Oh-oh… Jack did a boo-boo.

But, hold on… let's take a closer look. Even vomit can be morphed into something beautiful. What used to be a Big Mac is now a pool of regurgitated floor art.

He put his fingers in it and began to draw designs.

Sure it smells a little funky, but Jack Wirta, grinning artist, can work past that. Picasso had his oils. Wirta has his vomit.

The door swung open, crudely breaking his creative flow. Jack saw two of the neatest-looking commandos coming toward him dressed in cammies, with their heads in shiny metal pots.

"It's kicking in," one of them said to the other. "He's stoned outta his mind."

"Let's get this fucking asshole outta here."

"Jack Wirta, fucking asshole, is ready to go, sir!"

They yanked him up to his full forty-foot height. It was awesome up there, his feet dragging a perfect line of vomit across the floor. Toe art. Would the wonders ever cease? "I gotta go. Yes, yes. Here we go," he caroled as they pulled him out the door.

They muscled him down the corridor. A beautiful concrete corridor full of abstract microscopic crevices. How could he have missed all this before? Oh yeah, he remembered now. He'd had his head in a canvas sack.

And then he was outside. "This is so fucking great," he told the man on his left. "I've got to do this more often- get out in the forest with all the little creatures." He smiled at the man on his right, who didn't answer but shoved him into the back seat of a car.

"Shut your piehole, you moron."

"Moron Jack, shutting his piehole as instructed, sir," Jack giggled.

Valdez came out of the concrete block building. "Hey Vinnie," Jack waved at him. "We're going for a ride."

"Take him down the mountain, then put him behind the wheel. Head him onto the 134," Valdez said.

"Hey, good idea," Jack grinned. "Bye, Vinnie." He waved at Valdez.

The car started moving. Jack was having a ball. "We're going on the freeway, we're going on the freeway," he chanted.

The two men in the car with him didn't seem to find him amusing. "Hey Wirta, for the last time, shut up!" one of them growled.

Jack put his finger to his lips and turned an imaginary key. "Birds… I see birds," he shouted, and pointed out the window at some hawks sailing above.

The man in the back seat with him hit Jack hard in the stomach. He doubled over, gasping for breath. "No fair," Jack whined. After a moment he struggled upright and looked over at the glowering man who had just punched him. Something wasn't right. He felt strange. What was it? Oh yeah, I know. "Gotta puke." And he let fly, hitting the commando in the chest and lap with projectile vomit.

"Goddamn!" the man said.

They were down by the gate that went across Santiago Road, leading them out of the Cleveland National Forest. A ranger opened the gate and waved the car past.

"Hi," Jack grinned. "We're going to go on the freeway."

The man didn't hear him. They continued on, heading down toward the 134 Freeway that was coming into view a short distance in front of them.

Jack heard a helicopter overhead. "Hey!" he cried out happily. "Helicopter!"

"Shut the fuck up," the man with the vomit on his uniform growled.

"But, it's a helicopter," Jack persisted.

The roar became deafening, then for a second Jack could see the chopper was hovering in front of them, cutting them off. The car swerved, and in that instant Jack thought he saw someone he knew hanging out of the helicopter door. "Hey… it's Shane!" he called out.

The car skidded sideways attempting to maneuver around the chopper, then careened off the road, down a dirt trail, and into the trees. The helicopter was forced to pull up to avoid hitting the tall pines. Jack felt the car come to a stop, then the two commandos were pulling him out of the back seat.

"Are we here?" he grinned, as they shoved, him into the front seat and buckled him in behind the steering wheel.

The man without the vomit got in beside Jack, butting him over slightly so he could also squeeze behind the wheel. Then the car started rolling again; The man wedged in next to Jack was driving awkwardly, negotiating a narrow track through the overgrowth. The helicopter sounds faded.

"Wheee!" Jack grabbed for the steering wheel, but the man knocked his hand away.

"Not yet, asshole."

"Okay," Jack grinned stupidly.

A half mile further, the car emerged from the trees and came to a stop at the base of a freeway ramp. The man jumped out. "Now. Get it on up there."

"Yes sir. On the case, sir."

The man slammed the door shut and Jack hit the gas. He was shooting up onto the freeway. "Here I come!" he shouted at the windshield.

Damnedest thing, though. Cars were honking at him and the drivers all seemed angry. "What'd I do?" Jack whined. Something is definitely wrong. What the heck is it? What is pissing these other drivers off? Is it… yes, yes… maybe this is it: The cars are coming at me. "Hey, everybody! I'm going the wrong way!" he shouted.

Suddenly, the helicopter was in front of him again, flying sideways along the freeway, trying to warn oncoming traffic, rising occasionally to pop over an overpass, then dropping down again. It was trying to block him.

Traffic was pinwheeling everywhere, tortured rubber burning and squealing. Jack was aiming the car more than driving it. He spun the wheel to the right as a horn blared and a big rig started jackknifing, all eighteen tires smoking. "Good one," Jack shouted.

His car began pinwheeling as well-round and round, trees and signs and off-ramps whirling by in a confusing array of colors and shapes. Then it shuddered to a stop.

The helicopter hovered in front of him, and landed on the freeway. Men were running around waving their arms and stopping traffic. Jack was still sitting behind the wheel smiling when the door was yanked open. Shane Scully unbuckled him and pulled him out.

"Shane, we're taking a trip. We went up the freeway off-ramp," Jack grinned.

"What the fuck's wrong with you?" Shane asked, looking into Jack's eyes, staring at blown-out pupils.

"Nothing, Shane. Nothing," Jack said. "I'm having great thoughts. Oops, Gotta vomit."

And he threw up on his ex-partner's shoes.