– OK. So, what, you want me to find out where he went to ground? Make sure that crack is sealed up? Doesn’t sound like a gig that’s gonna pay out the way I need.

– Well, thing is, yeah, I’d like to know where the fish was, but that’s not really the gig.

– What is?

– That scene you described at Doc’s? The way he “spazzed” out? He wasn’t the first.

– Say what?

He runs a hand over the top of his head, smoothing loose strands of his long hair.

– We had another case just like it earlier this week. A new fish went kind of haywire. This one had gone through his, you know, adjustment period, but he was only out in the population about a month. Then he just went…well, I guess spastic is the word.

– What’d you do with him?

– Hurley was there.

– Oh.

– So that was that.

– It’d have to be.

He pulls his hair free of the rubber band that holds it in a ponytail.

– Yeah. But that’s not the whole deal.

He collects his hair, pulls it back.

– What I’m hearing, there’s been others.

He redoes the rubber band and fiddles with the new ponytail until it sits the way he wants it to.

– So when I say that I don’t think we have to deal with this as a security problem, but as a social issue? I mean social with a lowercase s. ’Cause I think what we may have here is, I don’t know for sure, but it looks like kind of a drug problem in the community.

Junkies. They get infected, they go one of two ways. First way, they couldn’t be happier to be off the junk. Second way, they can’t believe how hard it is to get high.

Sure, the blood is a rush, it’s a rush like no other. But it’s not the kind of thing you can do recreationally. There’s too much demand and not nearly enough supply. With a few thousand of us trying to make it on the island, and all of us needing at least a pint a week to get by, there’s just no way to get your hands on enough blood to keep a steady natural high going. You might get your hands on enough to gorge for a week or two, but the havoc you’re going to wreak doing it is gonna beat a path to your door. And someone’s gonna follow that path. Could be the local Clan looking to get rid of a troublemaker, could be a Rogue looking to get what you’ve stocked up, or it could be a Van Helsing. Any way you slice it, that kind of deal won’t last. So a junkie who wants to keep getting high? It’s gonna be a problem.

You pump enough junk, crack, crank, x, morphine, special K, LSD, or whatever else into your veins and you’ll get high. But soon the Vyrus is gonna clean it right out. Your everyday junkie has enough trouble keeping himself in dime bags. Now what if that same junkie needs a week’s worth of skag just to put him on the nod for a half hour?

Bleach, Sterno, gasoline, formaldehyde, glue, cleaning products of all types; all those standard alternative highs get a run for their money. I’ve seen a junkie with the Vyrus so desperate for a good old-fashioned high, he shot Prestone into his eye. Didn’t give him a buzz, but it sure as shit distracted him for awhile. These types tend to weed themselves out of the population.

But if it was out there, if there was a readily available substance out there that could cut its way through the Vyrus and get you dependably high? Everybody would be trying it at some point.

Lot of time on your hands in this life. Hard to punch in on a nine to five. Hard to make a regular living that lets you go take in a movie or grab a bite out. Hard to fill the hours when the sun is up. Something that could make the time pass a little more quickly, I’d give it a shot. And Terry, he’s no prude. Check out the aging hippie look he’s sporting and you got to figure he tried it all back in the day. But he has other concerns.

Terry’s trying to change the world. That takes time. And it takes subtlety; so he says. Not only is a bunch of guys spazzing out in public bad for the cause, it’s also more than a bit perplexing. These are new fish, for Christ sake. How the hell are they tapping into this shit? There’s some new way of banging DMT, or some new cocktail of industrial solvents out there, word should have gotten to Terry before the fish stumbled across it.

– So you want to know what it is and who cooked it up.

– That’s it. Just, you know, the skinny on where these kids are getting it.

– And that’s it, just the info?

– Well, yeah, what else would there be?

I fiddle with my Zippo, snap it open and closed.

– I just don’t want you thinking that I’m gonna be dealing with anyone who might be making this stuff.

He strokes his chin.

– I’m not sure I follow. What’s your point?

– The point being, I don’t kill for you anymore, Terry.

He scratches the back of his neck.

– Wow. That hadn’t really occurred to me. Like I said, Joe, I see this as a social issue. That’s why I feel comfortable asking you, as an associate in the community, to look into it. Because I know we share many of the same concerns.

He stops scratching.

– If it turns into a security issue, well, we’ll deal with it in-house at that point.

– Fine by me.

I stand up.

– Guess I’ll get to it.

He stands.

– All right. All right, Joe. That’s good to hear. It’ll be good having you doing some work with us again.

– Yeah, sure.

He walks me to the door.

– And, you know, like I say: a social issue. Just between us for the moment. Till we know what we’re dealing with.

– Any way you want it. You’re paying.

– Great. Great.

He leads me down the hall to the tenement’s entrance and opens the door.

– So, hear from you in a couple days?

– Sure.

– All right.

He slaps me on the shoulder.

– Good to see you, Joe.

– Yeah, you too, Terry.

I go down the steps and cross the street. On the opposite sidewalk I look back and Terry is still standing there in the open doorway. He gives me a big smile and a wave.

– Keep the faith, Joe.

I lift my hand slightly and he pops back inside and closes the door.

At the end of the block I turn the corner and see Tom and Hurley coming in the opposite direction. We walk toward each other, Tom pretending like he doesn’t see me. Hurley takes up three-quarters of the sidewalk, and I know Tom ain’t gonna budge off the rest of it. I step into the gutter to let them by.

A little smirk creases Tom’s face.

– That’s right, asshole, better make some room.

I let them go past.

– How’s that perimeter, Tom?

They keep walking.

– Everything secure?

Walking.

– You pick up Terry’s dry cleaning while you were out?

He keeps walking, but throws me the bird over his shoulder.

Tom’s got it in for me about as bad as Predo does. Those guys ever came across me dying in the streets, they’d kill each other fighting over who got to sit closer to watch me go. Whatever, doesn’t change the fact that he’s a world class punk. And about as easy to get a rise out of as a thirteen-year-old’s prick. But I keep doing it anyway. Man’s gotta have hobbies.

Terry can social me this and security me that, but what it boils down to is he doesn’t want anyone to know I’m looking into this. Not even his own people. Especially not his own people. Fair enough. Terry wants this done quiet, he knows what that costs. He knows me digging around on Society turf without an explicit license from the council could get hairy. And he’ll pay for that. Slippery as he may be, Terry always comes across when the bill is due.

So me, I’m feeling pretty good about things. A gig that should take care of my rent and empty fridge at the same time? What’s not to feel good about? I even got a couple leads. I can go poke around Doc’s, see if anyone noticed if The Spaz had company that night, do a little sniffing around in that vicinity. Might turn something up. But I’ll save that for later. Right now I got another idea. Someone in this town’s figured out a new way to get high. And if getting high is involved, I know the man to talk to.