It strikes me as an interesting paradox that a Buddha -- an enlightened one -- would be unable to figure out, even after four-and-a-half years, that he had become enlightened. Fat had become totally bogged down in his enormous exegesis, trying futilely to determine what had happened to him. He resembled more a hit-and-run accident victim than a Buddha.

"Holy fuck!" as Kevin would have put it, about the encounter with Zebra. "What was THAT?"

No wimpy hype passed muster before Kevin's eyes. He considered himself the hawk and the hype the rabbit. He had little use for the exegesis, but remained Fat's good friend. Kevin operated on the principle, Condemn the deed not the doer.

These days, Kevin felt fine. After all, his negative opinion of Sherri had proven correct. This brought him and Fat closer together. Kevin knew her for what she was, her cancer notwithstanding. In the final analysis, the fact that she was dying mattered to him not in the least. He had mulled it over and concluded that the cancer was a scam.

Fat's obsessive idea these days, as he worried more and more about Sherri, was that the Savior would soon be reborn -- or had been already. Somewhere in the world he walked or soon would walk the ground once more.

What did Fat intend to do when Sherri died? Maurice had shouted that at him in the form of a question. Would he die, too?

Not at all. Fat, pondering and writing and doing research and receiving dribs and drabs of messages from Zebra during hypnagogic states and in dreams, and attempting to salvage something from the wreck of his life, had decided to go in search of the Savior. He would find him wherever he was.

This was the mission, the divine purpose, which Zebra had placed on him in March 1974: the mild yoke, the burden light. Fat, a holy man now, would become a modern-day magus. All he lacked was a clue -- some hint as to where to seek. Zebra would tell him, eventually; the clue would come from God. This was the whole purpose of Zebra's theophany: to send Fat on his way.

Our friend David, upon being told of this, asked, "Will it be Christ?" Thus showing his Catholicism.

"It is a fifth Savior," Fat said enigmatically. After all, Zebra had referred to the coming of the Savior in several -- and in a sense conflicting -- ways: as St. Sophia, who was Christ; as the Head Apollo; as the Buddha or Siddhartha.

Being eclectic in terms of his theology, Fat listed a number of saviors: the Buddha, Zoroaster, Jesus and Abu Al-Qasim Muhammad Ibn Abd Allah Abd Al-Muttalib Ibn Hashim (i.e. Muhammad). Sometimes he also listed Mani. Therefore, the next Savior would be number five, by the abridged list, or number six by the longer list. At certain times, Fat also included Asklepios, which, when added to the longer list, would make the next Savior number seven. In any case, this forthcoming savior would be the last; he would sit as king and judge over all nations and people. The sifting bridge of Zoroastrianism had been set up, by means of which good souls (those of light) became separated from bad souls (those of darkness). Ma'at had put her feather in the balance to be weighed against the heart of each man in judgment, as Osiris the Judge sat. It was a busy time.

Fat intended to be present, perhaps to hand the Book of Life to the Supreme Judge, the Ancient of Days mentioned in the Book of Daniel.

We all pointed out to Fat that hopefully the Book of Life -- inwhich the names of all who were saved had been inscribed -- would prove too heavy for one man to lift; a winch and power crane would be necessary. Fat wasn't amused.

"Wait'll the Supreme Judge sees my dead cat," Kevin said.

"You and your goddam dead cat," I said. "We're tired of hearing about your dead cat."

After listening to Fat disclose his sly plans to seek out the Savior -- no matter how far he had to travel to find him -- I realized the obvious: Fat actually was in search of the dead girl Gloria, for whose death he considered himself responsible. He had totally blended his religious life and goals with his emotional life and goals. For him "savior" stood for "lost friend." He hoped to be reunited with her, but this side of the grave. If he couldn't go to her, on the other side, he would instead find her here. So although he was no longer suicidal he was still nuts. But this seemed to me to be an improvement; thanatos was losing out to eros. As Kevin put it, "Maybe Fat'll get laid by some fox somewhere along the way."

By the time Fat took off on his sacred quest he would be searching for two dead girls: Gloria and Sherri. This updated version of the Grail saga made me wonder if equally erotic underpinnings had motived the Grail knights at Montsavat, the castle where Parsifal wound up. Wagner says in his text that only those who the Grail itself calls find their way there. The blood of Christ on the cross had been caught in the same cup from which he had drunk at the Last Supper; so literally it had wound up containing his blood. In essence the blood, not the Grail, summoned the knights; the blood never died. Like Zebra, the contents of the Grail were a plasma or, as Fat termed it, plasmate. Probably Fat had it down somewhere in his exegesis that Zebra equaled plasmate equaled the sacred blood of the crucified Christ.

The spilled blood of the girl broken and dying on the pavement outside the Oakland Synanon Building called to Fat, who, like Parsifal, was a complete fool. That's what the word "parsifal" is supposed to mean in Arabic; it's supposed to have been derived from "Falparsi" an Arabic word meaning "pure fool." This of course isn't the actual case, although in the opera Parsifal, Kundry addresses Parsifal this way. The name "Parsifal" is in fact derived from "Perceval," which is just a name. However, one point of interest remains: via Persia the Grail is identified with the pre-Christian "lapis exilix," which is a magical stone. This stone shows up in later Hermetic alchemy as the agent by which human metamorphosis is achieved. On the basis of Fat's concept of interspecies symbiosis, the human being crossbonded with Zebra or the Logos or plasmate to become a homoplasmate, I can see a certain continuity in all this. Fat believed himself to have crossbonded with Zebra; therefore he had already become that which the Hermetic alchemists sought. It would be natural, then, for him to seek out the Grail; he would be finding his friend, himself and his home.

Kevin held the role of the evil magician Klingsor by his continual lampooning of Fat's idealistic aspirations. Fat, according to Kevin, was horny. In Fat, thanatos -- death -- fought it out with eros -- which Kevin identified not with life but with getting laid. This probably isn't far off; I mean Kevin's basic description of the dialectical struggle surging back and forth inside Fat's mind. Part of Fat desired to die and part desired life. Thanatos can assume any form it wishes; it can kill eros, the life drive, and then simulate it. Once thanatos does this to you, you are in big trouble; you suppose you are driven by eros but it is thanatos wearing a mask. I hoped Fat hadn't gotten into this place; I hoped his desire to seek out and find the Savior stemmed from eros.

The true Savior, or the true God for that matter, carries life with him; he is life. Any "savior" or "god" who brings death is nothing but thanatos wearing a savior mask. This is why Jesus identified himself as the true Savior -- even when he didn't want to so identify himself -- by his healing miracles. The people knew what healing miracles pointed to. There is a wonderful passage at the very end of the Old Testament where this matter is clarified. God says, "But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in his wings, and you shall break loose like calves released from the stall."