(Previously:, parts I and II).
I called up Danny Watkins, a.k.a “P.O.ed” from the crew. He had a side gig running a bed and breakfast with his family out in the woods near Jefferson’s Monticello. They were sweetbreads people and laid out a nice spread. “We do ‘em up any way you like ‘em” was their motto. And do ‘em they did: Grilled, braised, breaded, seared or fried.
I asked him to stock up a bunch of provisions and take me out there so I could work through this thing and get to the other side.
“I prefer the thyroids but throw in the lamb pancreas for the nutrients,” I suggested.
“They’re offal good! exclaimed P.O.ed.
I groaned but who doesn’t like a good meat pun.
“Also make sure you bring a bottle of vanilla extract,” I told him.
“Why’s that Johnny?”
“I’ll know when I can smell it, I’ll have gotten past the worst of this and made it through.
Sucking on sweetbreads and Malt Liquor I slowly got my strength back.
Well, you all know the rest. Like you, I watched it all unfold on Cable News.
Hopeless got the virus and gave it to Mogul. Mogul was almost a goner but like Rasputin he rose from the dead to fight another day, half out of his mind, enraged, he fired up his base in large gatherings, spewing conspiracy theories, selling hats and flags, and after he had lost the election, threatening judiciaries, questioning his own parties voting apparatus and claiming wide spread fraud.
Then on that fateful day Mogul urged his followers to attack the chamber. They’re really were not that many of them but they were organized and had a special weapon.
The Death Grips.
That’s right. If you review the footage of that fateful day you will notice there was scaffolding covered with canvas on either side of the building, there’s also a tower that looks like it is for a camera crew but it was really a Death Grip painted white. Go back and review and see for yourself. All I have to say is now the question can be asked and you have the answer. How do you think the Vain Lads and the Promise Breakers got on the upper levels of the building?
They took the ultimate stage dive. They hurled themselves via the Death Grips.
Okay, it all fell apart in the end. I wasn’t surprised that General Dickson was now a little chastised after I had taken him to the woodshed and spanked him along with Marine 1 and 2.
I wasn’t going to be a whistle blower. I’d seen how well that worked out for some other folks. Besides there was a new administration. I could turn the other cheek and flip ‘em the bird at the same time. Dickson would turn around and offer me and the rest of the security detail a job with the next administration. What could I say? I had landed on my feet. Plus the crew was over the moon. A good civil servant rolls happily from regime to regime. So I was happy to break the news to Doc, Scrunchie, Roddy, Smelly, 50Watt, Shyguy and P.O.’ed that they were all still gainfully employed.
“Plus you’ll be happy to know,” I told them when we re-united for the first time. “The new Number One’s kids will let you use their powder rooms if you need to go number Two while on duty. No more Starbucks, no more porta-johns. You’re back on the inside boys!”
Hey, I’ll admit I’m not cut out for the hero business but I’m not a complete heel either. I didn’t know where that kiss with H.H. would lead. I hadn’t put the pieces together that I was a super spreader. When I figured that out i shut it down. I did the right thing I mean… oh what the hell, do you think I really care what you think?
Roddy and I split off and headed for the Big House. We had to start the reconnaissance for the new Number One team aka “Celtic and Pioneer.”
A stream of guys in tight skinny suits with weird fuhrer youth haircuts were carrying file boxes into waiting black SUVs. Young women in short skirts and long purple coats scurried out carrying laptops, snow globes and wall sconces. It was clear that all manner of pork fed vermin, rats and vultures were headed off ready to make new homes in Florida inflated resumes in hand.
And there in the middle of the line was Hopeless.
“Hey kid.”
“Hi Johnny,” she mumbled not looking at me.
“Sorry to hear you caught the bug. In fact I’m sorry about a lot of things, Hopeless.”
“What are you saying Johnny?”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t more supportive when we were together. I think I can do better. We can all do better. Who I was back then is not reflective of who I am now. I know that’s not an excuse. I’m not trying to shift the blame. I sincerely apologize for anything you misconstrued the wrong way. And let me try to explain something… If you need to lean in I get it. Lean in! and if you lean too far I’ll catch you and I’ll raise you up and put you back on that pedestal where you’ve always belonged.”
“What?”
“Hey, I’ve been doing a lot of reading and let’s just say I’ve come a long way from the Women’s March four years ago. I didn’t understand intersectionality at the time. I didn’t understand the power dynamics of a toxic work place but now that I’ve been taken down a peg or two I get it. I think a guy can change don’t you? Plus I got some pull now with this new crew. You might have to work your way back up the food chain batting those pretty eyes of yours but I can get you in the door again. These hand wringing liberals aren’t so bad once you get to know them. I’m sorry did I trigger something?”
I kept explaining and then I explained a little more and then I apologized again but she was having none of it.
“It’s too late, Dylan Donovan is waiting for me in that car. Have a good life Johnny.”
H.H. had made $1.8 mil working for Foxy News. Lord knows what perks she had scooped up working for Mogul. She’d be okay; yeah Hopeless was the kind of person who was good at wrecking other people’s lives before retreating back into her wealth and taste or something like that. That’s what people like Hopeless and Dylan did and I was left behind holding the bucket and the mop.
I found Mogul in the office he would soon be vacating. The emperor was fully dressed in that hideous blue suit with the red tie. He was wrestling with the Pepsi dispenser. He’d ripped it out of the desk and was trying to find where the line went.
“Johnny! Welcome! How are you! Can you help me figure out how to get this thing working?”
“Sorry chief, that’s above my pay grade.”
“Aw screw it. He grabbed a fistful of magic markers out of the desk drawer yanked the caps and brought them up to his nose inhaling deeply.
Christ its come to this. Johnny can you believe it? Hopeless just told me she couldn’t come to Florida to be part of my government in exile.”
I gave him that famous stare of mine and something in him seemed to crack a little. A small chink in the armor.
“What the hell happened chief?” I asked hoping he might incriminate himself. I did have a tape running.
“What could I do Johnny? There was no way to control this thing.
“Why not tell people to wear a mask.” I said in as even a tone I could muster.
“Wear a mask / don’t wear a mask, I told them both, I covered all the bases but don’t you see? It was still gonna happen. The only way to shut it down was to get a vaccine but that takes time so instead I had to figure out how to reach herd mentality.”
“Herd mentality?”
Yes, you get a whole bunch of people to buy into your premise that it doesn’t really matter, that it’ll be gone by summer, that it’s like the flu,
and next thing you know they are all buying into the bullshit.
Herd mentality.”
Sure a few people will die but that’s inevitable, I mean come on, you gotta cull the herd right? Something else is going to take them out any minute anyway. So I figured I use my powers as a pitch guy, I get ‘em revved up, and yeah I sold a little merch, I made a little money, took in some donations along the way, hey I won’t deny it but I busted my ass! and I got people to come together in large groups where the disease could easily spread and since they all believed it I knew we’d reach herd mentality when they went back to all their little towns and took one for the team.
“I’d say they took one for you sir.”
“Well, they were real patriots.”
This was all very hard to process but he continued:
“Anyway, we had all these events and I had them convinced not to wear masks. That covered the older crowd. But in the spring we were planning to promote “MASBGA” ‘Make America’s Spring Break Great Again’.
“We’d go after the younger demographic and steal ‘em away from the liberals. I planned on having gigantic events that were all about using the hormones of youth to build the base. Free MASBGA tattoos, we’d even pay kids to tattoo my likeness on parts of their body that were visible from ten feet away.
“We’d have all the young people descend on Florida and get em swapping spit. That’s where the machines were going to come in. We’d have those Death Grips hurling infected kids around and around before flinging them into countless mosh pits. They’d be like grenades going off. Everyone with the program, pulling the ultimate rager, in one giant seething mass of disease and we’d be there…herd mentality!”
At this point he was standing on his desk having whipped himself up in a swirling cloak of showmanship. But then he stopped and caught himself.
“That was the plan,” he let out a short sigh. “The whole thing would have been over by the college graduations in May. Instead they stole the election and here we are Johnny.
“Hey, you interested in buying those Death Grips off of me? Could be a whole new start for you.”
When I didn’t answer he went back to ranting and raving. After a while I just started to gloss over, there was something about a quid pro quo and a rigged witch hunt leading to the rigged egg hunt in the rose garden, something, something, ripping up Renaissance’s vegetable garden, Muse’s holiday decorations…
I couldn’t wait for the chopper to arrive.
I helped Mogul down from the desktop. He immediately started going through the drawers.
“Where is that cassette? he asked, “I need music for my sixteen gun salute.”
“Is this what you are looking for sir?”
“Great!”
I could hear the thud thud thud of the chopper blades.
“Oh Johnny I almost forgot. There’s an RNC think tank anthologizing all my tweets from the last four years. Can you believe it? It seems I’ve re-invented an old poetry form that came from Japan. I didn’t even know it existed but apparently I’m capable of writing some of the best haikus of the last 35 centuries.”
Mogul’s handlers came in and took him away. He didn’t look back.
Off he went, clutching the cassette tape of the Village People’s Greatest Hits in his meaty paw.
Now it was just me and Roddy.
“Hey Johnny wanna go downstairs and bowl a few frames?”
I laughed.
“Roddy, I thought you only knew about rugby, cricket and that game you think is called football. Sure let’s have a go.”
I stopped at the front entrance and made sure the door was locked from the inside before we headed down to the basement to the presidential bowling alley.
Roddy split the pins on his first shot but then clipped the ten pin just as the ball fell into the gutter. The ten pin shot across taking out the seven for a sweet spare.
I lit a match to a Marlboro. Then I hit a lucky strike. It made that beautiful sound like the perfect upper cut to the jaw that can knock out all your teeth.
“You know Roderick,” I said exhaling with satisfaction,“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful four years. You ready to get your college education son?”
“You bet Johnny!”
I started whistling; blowing five hard notes that herald in the chorus to that disco classic.
Roddy started to sing in his beautiful Irish tenor:
“It’s fun to stay at the YMCA.”
And then I hit another strike.