Everyone who was anyone was there, clogging the neon-drenched North Beach sidewalks in front of the club. Skinheads swaggering and shoving, mohawkers in their spike-studded leathers, runaways mooching cigarettes from everyone in sight, and servicemen on the prowl for action, any kind of action at all. Drunks, nymphos, thugs, homeless bums, artists, posers and nervous tourists mingled with hard-core punkers and the predators & scavengers that ran with them. The crowd was flushed and feverish, everyone chain-smoking and talking loud to be heard over everyone else. DOA and Black Flag were playing a double bill, man, the two baddest punk bands around. And it was Saturday night, the night to make the scene at the On Broadway, the baddest punk club in San Francisco.

Speedy waded through the mob and up to the club entrance to start work; he was running a little late. Those who knew the tall man moved out of his way with a nod of greeting, or a "Hey, Speedy." Those who didn't know him generally moved anyway, when they looked into his gunmetal blue eyes. Seal Team Bob was already in place at the front door. Tanned tree-trunk legs stuck out of his gray shorts and his yellow T-shirt bulged with muscle. He looked bored, but little escaped his notice. The two bouncers nodded at each other and Speedy fell in next to him, checking I.D.s, stamping the hands of those old enough to drink, and watching the growing crowd outside the entrance as they lined up to buy tickets at the window.

The parade continued into the club. A white-faced girl with inky hair gave Speedy a hooded glance of appraisal, while her sullen date glared openly at him; a giggling trio of teenage rockabillys came through with matching pompadours. Some bikers, a stoned 300 pound Samoan, a few gay couples. Speedy found and confiscated several obviously phony I.D.s, and he refused entrance to one belligerent drunk and sent him on his way. Typical audience.

There was a guy on the fringes of the crowd outside who caught Speedy's eye. A hulking, slope-shouldered man of about forty, with a bushy mustache and cocker spaniel eyes, holding a bible. He was wearing a brown leather bomber jacket and a welder's cap as he talked to a teenage girl with green hair. As Speedy looked on, the girl laughed raucously in the guy's face and walked away. The dog-eyed man shambled resignedly away in search of a new target.

"What's with the bible thumper?" Seal Team Bob followed Speedy's gaze and shrugged.

"Talks to all the girls, especially the runaways. Says he wants to be their friend." Seal Team Bob was his usual talkative self.

Something smelled off about the guy, and Speedy kept one eye on him as he processed the audience through the entrance like an assembly line worker for the next half-hour. Hundreds of people were already inside, and the club was almost full to capacity.

Outside, those too young to get in thronged the pavement, along with people still trying to panhandle the price of admission. Speedy was about to go upstairs and let Bob finish things at the entrance when he saw Dog-Eyes talking to another girl; the bible was nowhere in sight. Something made Speedy pause and watch.

The girl's name was Skid. She was a short, cheerful runaway with a scarlet mop of uncombed hair, and huge breasts. Dog-Eyes had pulled a fifth of whiskey from his coat and was offering her a hit. Skid stepped closer to him, and was reaching out a hand for the bottle when he laid a trembling hand on her breast. She instantly kneed him in the nuts. "You asshole!" she screeched in disgust. Dog-Eyes slumped a bit, then hauled off and smashed the fifth in her face. The shattering glass turned Skid's face instantly red. A lanky Marine deserter named Z-Bo charged at Dog-eyes, who attempted a lumbering getaway. The crowd surged after him howling: Skid had lots of friends.

"I got it!" Speedy barked over his shoulder at Bob, then he was sprinting toward the injured girl. The pack rounded the corner after its quarry just as Speedy came up on Skid. She was in shock, her features a red mask as she groped blindly for something to lean against. "Easy, Skid," Speedy said as he laid a hand on her shoulder. His jaw clenched in a knot as he gently grasped her chin and examined her bloody face; she stank of cheap whiskey from the broken bottle. Her eyes opened as he touched her: they were unharmed, staring at nothing in particular. Speedy let out a shuddering sigh of relief. Two shaven-skulled bootwomen came and took charge of Skid then, propping her up as she began to sway. "You can take her into the office," Speedy told them.

"Sure, Speedy." They went inside the club to clean Skid up.

Speedy wiped his bloody palm on his pantsleg and loped wolfishly to the end of the block. He reached the corner, and looked down the hill at the Winchell's donut shop across the street -- miraculously, there were no cops there. He had a clear view through its plate-glass windows: they had Dog-Eyes cornered in the donut shop, at bay against the counter. A pack of skate punks surrounded him, hacking viciously away at him with their skateboards. While the rest of the crowd watched from outside, yelling, "Get him!", "Fuck him up!", the thrashers hammered his head and shoulders like workmen driving in an old-time railroad spike. The storm of boards impacted him in a hail of mushy splats as he crouched on the floor, trying to cover up. One of the donut shop employees finally picked up the phone and started shouting into it. As quickly as it had surged together, the crowd now scattered, leaving Dog-Eyes huddled on the greasy linoleum floor.

As the chattering vigilantes straggled uphill past him, Speedy walked down and into the donut shop, where he stood over the pervert. Speedy waited patiently until the guy looked up at him. Dog-Eyes was a wreck: gashes crisscrossed his face and scalp, some to the bone; a piece of broken tooth clung to his lower lip. He sprawled there, blood-soaked, mouth hanging open and slack as he looked at Speedy with the eyes of a broken thing. Speedy jerked his chin at him: "You got off easy." Then he spat in his face and left the donut shop. The employees stared dumbly after him, all of them dressed alike, members of the same club. He could hear approaching sirens wailing in the distance as he trotted uphill to the On Broadway.

Seal Team Bob had already moved inside by the time Speedy got there, and the ticket window was shut down. The first band was warming up as he mounted the steep flight of stairs. At the top, he swung to the right and pushed his way past a clump of women on his way to the main bar; two of them were making out with each other. The stench of clove cigarettes filled the air, like burning crayons. There was a tray filled with glasses of ice water on the bar. Grabbing one, he turned around just in time to see Ginger Coyote making a beeline for him, looming head and shoulders above most of the crowd. Ginger Coyote had been a defensive lineman for the San Francisco 49ers before she finally discovered she was a woman trapped in a man's body. She hadn't gone to Denmark yet, though. She looked like Frankenstein in drag, and she was the owner of the On Broadway.

"You did right to send Skid to the office, Speedy," she cooed in her deep bass voice. "Seal Team Bob is stitching up the poor girl's face right now. All she got was a clean slice on the bridge of the nose. But Speedy -- " Ginger Coyote leaned down and looked in his eyes conspiratorially. "If that freak comes around my club again, bring him to me." Speedy looked Ginger Coyote in the eyes and nodded without saying a word, then downed his glass of water.

The warm up band was playing its set as Speedy made his rounds, starting with the big room. A halfhearted pit had formed, swirling widdershins in front of the stage. Two couples were having a piggyback battle, the girls shoving at each other from their boyfriends' shoulders. Some mohawk girls were skipping around flailing their arms while other people pogoed up and down. A skinhead bouncer named Fuckup was standing at the corner of the room with his arms folded. His shaved head bobbed grimly to the music as he watched the pit and the rest of the big room. He saw Speedy and gave him thumbs up: under control. Speedy came over to stand next to him, eyes scanning the crowd. "Who all's working tonight?" he asked.

"Only four of us: you, me, Seal Team Bob and Roy," Fuckup answered. He looked at Speedy out of the corner of his eye to gauge the other man's reaction. Speedy frowned: that was a small security crew for a Saturday night with two major bands -- Ginger Coyote was trying to cut corners. Speedy shrugged and looked around the room. All the booths around the edges of the room were crammed with people, and the barmaids had their hands full serving them. Slash and his crew of skinz were sitting at one table, all alike with their shaved heads, red suspenders and Doc Martin boots. One skin was getting his ear pierced with a safety pin while his cronies passed around a bottle of amyl nitrate, snorting deeply at it. Speedy glanced up at the horseshoe-shaped balcony running around the room: a couple of hairy bikers playing drinking games, slamming down pitchers while a trio of gays looked on bemused.

Speedy left the big room and walked along the u-shaped gallery that ran around the outside of it, weaving between the clumps of people and nodding to those he knew. He needed to find Roy and didn't see him anywhere. He decided to check on the side exit. Speedy trotted up the carpeted steps to the curving second-floor gallery. He walked to the end, where the exit to the side alley was. Sure enough, he found Roy there.

Roy was new, a buddy of Fuckup's, and Speedy had his doubts about him. He was a huge egg-headed dude, always wearing a shit-eating grin. Roy had the side door exit open, grinning down at a girl standing on the ancient fire escape outside.

Roy turned the grin on Speedy. "Hey, Speedy! This babe says she'll suck our dicks if we let her inside. Whaddaya say?"

Speedy looked at the girl. She was short and skinny, maybe fourteen years old tops. She had spiked hair and ripped fishnet stockings; her mascara made her look like a raccoon. She grinned back at Speedy lasciviously, popping her gum. "I love cock," she said matter-of-factly, looking him dead in the eye.

"Maybe in a few years," he said. Roy groaned as Speedy shut the heavy door in her face. Speedy could hear her screaming something and hitting the door as he threw the bolt, but the noise was muffled by the door's thickness; he couldn't understand a word, but he had a good idea what she was saying. He turned to Roy. "No one comes through the door," he said. Then he turned and walked away into the depths of the club without waiting for Roy's response.

Speedy walked back along the gallery, down the stairs to the main bar and hung out there for about a half-hour. He was about to make another round when the office door opened behind the bar. Seal Team Bob led Skid out of Ginger Coyote's office, guiding her by the elbow. Skid was half-looped and smiling -- Bob must have fed her enough booze to sew her up in peace. Speedy walked up and checked her out: the gash would leave a gnarly scar, but Bob had done his usual expert job of stitchery. Speedy smiled briefly, and continued his patrol of the club. One of the two headliner bands, Black Flag, had been playing for a while, and concertgoers packed the big room. He snaked his way through the jammed crowd, skirting the main pit, which was a churning mass of thrashers slamming each other violently in time to the deafening music; occasional stage divers climbed up next to the band, and leapt out into the audience to be caught and passed around. There was a smaller girl's pit to one side where the action was a little less intense. Fuckup was there, back against the stage, watching the crowded room for trouble, shifting his weight from foot to foot in time with the beat, his arms dangling loosely like a shaved ape. Speedy kept moving. Nothing much happened for the next hour, until he was passing the facilities on his way to the main bar.

The restrooms at the On Broadway were small, and only had facilities for one person at a time. Even so, the line waiting to use the lady's room was ridiculously long. Speedy saw a skinhead girl from New Zealand named Els standing at the head of the line and walked over to her. "What's up?" he asked the Kiwi girl.

Elsa was pissed off, and let Speedy know it. "That jerk Bash went in there awhile back with two sluts. Do your bloody job, Speedy!"

"Right," Speedy muttered. He rapped briskly on the lady's room door. "Come on out, Bash!" Silence, except for furtive rustling. Speedy unlocked the deadbolt with his passkey and pulled it open, fast. Bash sat on the toilet with his pants around his ankles, and his triple-mohawked head thrown back in concentration -- blood ran down his arm from a fresh hypodermic wound on the inside of his elbow. A skinny bleach blonde knelt between his spread knees, her head bobbing up and down on his veiny shaft. Another bleach blonde stood at the sink, her arm tied off with a bandanna, just pushing the plunger home on the syringe jammed into her arm. She leaned heavily against the sink, lost in the rush. It was hot in the tiny restroom, and all three were drenched in sweat.

The girl sucking off Slash noticed Speedy at the open door and turned her head to face him. Slash's cock slipped from her mouth with a 'plop' as she turned, just as he started to spew his load. Slash groaned and his pearly jizz splashed against the cocksucker's face as she looked at Speedy, her mouth still open in surprise; the cum dripped down her cheek.

Speedy smiled in weary sympathy. "Outside, you guys. People need to use the bathroom." Slash and the needle-girl were suddenly drawn back into awareness, and they stared at Speedy with startled eyes. They looked like children caught at playing doctor. The women in line outside crowded the open door, staring in contempt. Elsa and a few others laughed derisively as the trio frantically tried to cover up their business in the cramped bathroom.

Bash tried to make the best of an embarrassing situation as he pulled up his pants and grabbed his leather jacket. "Fuck you, Speedy!" The two blondes huddled behind him as he puffed out his chest and swaggered out the door and got in Speedy's face. "Fuck you! You ain't so bad!" He reached his right hand into his coat, and started to pull out a revolver. Speedy lunged in and grabbed the pistol barrel, wrenching it backward along with Bash's trigger finger. Bash yelled and flopped onto his knees in a futile effort to relieve the pain.

"That's it -- you're all 86'ed! You give me any more trouble, I'll tear your finger clean off!" Speedy jerked his head at the two bimbos, who led off toward the entrance stairway. He allowed Bash to stand up, but kept enough torque on the pistol barrel to have the mohawker hobbling hunched over like an arthritic old man. Speedy led Bash through the crowd to the head of the stairs. Several people grinned openly at the mohawker's predicament -- he wasn't very popular. Bash tried to balk when they started down, thrusting his feet against a lower step and refusing to go any further. Speedy twisted the pistol back even harder, saying, "Uh-uh!" Bash cursed in pain but didn't offer any more resistance as Speedy led him the rest of the way downstairs to the entrance. One of Bash's girlfriends held the door open while the other waited outside on the neon-lit sidewalk. "This is fucked up!" spat the drug slut holding the door.

Speedy shrugged as he removed the pistol from Bash's finger. "You can thank Bash for that."

Bash straightened cautiously, stepped out over the threshold, and whirled back with his hand outstretched. "The piece!" he demanded. Speedy looked at him for a moment, then emptied the bullets into his hand and gave the pistol to the mohawker. He shut the door in Bash's bony face, making sure it latched before dumping the bullets in the trash can at the foot of the stairs and heading upstairs. He continued walking around uneventfully for the rest of Black Flag's set, until the break.

DOA was setting up as Speedy came into the main room, and there was a temporary lull in the action. People were milling around drinking, smoking, and hitting on each other. But their voices were a little too loud, the laughter a little too brittle. There was an energy in the air that Speedy wasn't sure he liked. He sought out Seal Team Bob, and found him in the main bar.

"Whaddayou think?" Speedy asked the big ex-squid.

"Yeah." Bob's eyes watched the crowd like a hawk as Speedy moved off.

Fuckup was on-stage helping the band finish setting up. Roy was talking to a girl in the downstairs gallery, grinning his fool head off as usual. And DOA began to play.

As the band kicked off its first number, Speedy watched from the gallery as a major pit began to form in the big room. More and more people streamed into the center of the room, slam dancing maniacally to the machine gun riffs of the band and the enraged vocals of the lead singer. The carnivorously expanding melee instantly absorbed the girl's pit. Fuckup climbed off the stage, but was swept into the angry core of the mob where Speedy could no longer see him.

Someone raised the already deafening volume on the sound system to aching intensity. The band played harder and faster. And the audience went berserk.

Speedy stepped into the big room and looked around for the other bouncers. Roy was nowhere in sight, and Fuckup was still submerged in the seething pit. Seal Team Bob materialized at Speedy's side. Everyone in the pit pummeled and kicked at each other as hard as they could, while trapped non-participants were being thrust against the walls of the room where they were pinned.

Even in the short time that DOA had been playing, blood was liberally splashed over most of the thrashers. A topless brawny girl with immense tits, wearing a gauntlet studded with roofing nails, flailed at those around her, shredding their shirts and slicing open their stomachs -- a stocky skinhead punched her in the jaw, knocking her out cold. The mob of thrashers kicked her unconscious body to the outer edges of the pit to join the growing drifts of limp, unmoving forms sprawled on the floor there. The band played on.

Speedy ducked as a flying bottle sailed past him to smash against the wall -- a piece of shrapnel sliced open his cheek. A tiny hot-eyed woman darted up to dab at the blood on his face with her fingers, then leer at him as she licked her fingertips and stroked her crotch with her other hand before the whirling mob swept her from sight. "Blood!" she screeched. "Blood!" Glasses and bottles were shattering throughout the room, exploding on the walls and cutting everyone in range.

Slash and his satellite skinz began picking up chairs and clubbing people with them. Tables were being used as battering rams, knocking people down and crushing several against the wall. Then a kid climbed on stage and dove off, expecting to be buoyed up in the arms of his fellow concertgoers. Instead the slam dancers playfully parted beneath him and he fell headfirst into the crowd, which closed over him like a stormy sea. Speedy could see at least at least a dozen people lying on the bloody glass-strewn floor, not moving.

The two bouncers looked at each other in dismay. The audience was totally out of control. "We have to reach the stage!" Speedy yelled as loudly as he could to the burly ex-seal. Without hesitation Seal Team Bob bulled into the crowd, tossing dancers to both sides of him. Speedy followed closely in his wake, crouched over with both arms up to guard his head and neck. Even so, countless random impacts rocked and buffeted him. It was like jumping into a washer on spin-cycle. A punch to his temple left his ears ringing -- someone snagged his shirt and ripped it half-off. A hand slapped up against his face, the thumb probing for his eye socket. He ducked and it slid away, the thumbnail scoring a gash on his already bloody cheek. After a seeming eternity, they were beneath the stage. Bob stiff-armed a space for them as Speedy looked up to find DOA's singer staring directly down at him. Speedy made the cut-off gesture to the singer, frantically drawing his finger across his throat. "Shut down, man!" he roared, but his voice was unheard this close to the stacked speakers.

The singer stared for a moment, then grinned evilly as he turned to the band and pumped his fist up and down, signaling for an even faster number. The crowd began brawling even more violently. With a choked sob of rage, Speedy rocketed up and began to scramble up onto the stage. The singer recoiled from the naked blood lust in the bouncer's eyes, and backpedaled away, dropping his mike. It hit the stage boards with an amplified thump. Ignoring the retreating singer, Speedy headed straight for the sound system and yanked the power cord violently from the outlet. The music died abruptly in mid-chord. The band members shouted catcalls at him and the audience boomed ominously in sudden frustration. Still, Speedy walked stiffly to the front of the stage, faced out at the packed house and cried, "The show -- is OVER!" He stood there panting harshly, waiting for the audience to wash up over him and carry him away.

Then Seal Team Bob pulled himself up on stage. He glowered once at the band members (who shut up instantly) and turned to face the audience impassively, arms folded. Out in the crowd, Fuckup appeared and started working his way toward them, covered with countless small wounds. "You heard him!" he yelled angrily, glaring at everyone around him. "A lot of people are hurt! Pick up your buddies and get them home!"

That broke the spell. People looked around at each other, then at all the injured and unconscious. Friend sought friend, calling each other's names. Slash sneered, and flipped the bouncers off: "Fuck off, Speedy -- you pussy!" He and his dog pack of skinz left. The exhausted crowd began gathering their wounded together and filtered through the wreckage and down the stairs to the exit. Ginger Coyote stood at the entrance to the big room as the audience members walked past her, looking at her trashed club.

* * *

Speedy had wanted to have a heart-to-heart talk with singer-boy, but the band had already ducked out the exit. They found Roy out cold in a corner, buried under some overturned chairs. He was still out unconscious an hour later on a couch in the office. A girl they found knocked out next to the stage had just left in an ambulance, still in a coma; the kid who stage-dived head first into the crowd had broken his back, and another guy had an eye gouged out by some anonymous sweetheart in the pit, maybe the same one that had tried for Speedy there at the end. The club itself was a shambles: Ginger Coyote hadn't saved any money by cutting corners on security after all.

Speedy and Seal Team Bob sat at the main bar, waiting to get paid. Speedy had a beer in front of him as he sat there in his rag of a shirt. The blood had clotted on his cheek; he hadn't gotten around to cleaning it up yet. At the moment he was staring down at his bottle of beer, turning it back and forth in his scarred hand as he peeled of the label in strips. Fuckup came out of the office, got a beer for himself, and came to sit on a barstool next to the other two bouncers. The skinhead handed them each a wad of bills. Speedy pocketed his without counting it; Bob thumbed through his, stuck it in his wallet and left without saying good-bye. Fuckup watched the big man until he was gone, then turned back to Speedy.

"Roy's coming around. He's gonna be okay." Speedy grunted, then the two sat in silence for a while. "There's gonna be a show at the Tool & Die tomorrow night," Fuckup observed. "I need one more guy to bounce with me. You wanna work it?"

Speedy stopped turning the bottle and squeezed it for a second. Then his hand relaxed. Rent was due in a couple of days, and he was still a little short. "Why not?" he asked.

^