THE DOG HUNTERS (completed)

61 - AND THIS LUCK

Yes, during this time I considered myself very lucky. Lucky to have foundVendiJob, lucky to have taken the risk to start playing the VendiJobgame, lucky to have coworkers who weren't complete assholes, who were fun to shoot the shit with, and who I didn't have to hang out with after work.

I have to say, it was fun. More fun than I'd had since I could remember.

I was now making enough to rent myself a nice room in a terrible motel somewhere just over the wall of wealth and privilege. Despite this, I decided to keep my money in the VendiBank. I felt there was no reason to mess with my stairwell home. I was still able to sleep there, and it was fun sneaking in at night, once again out-maneuvering those who might wish to grab me and get rid of me so VendiJob would go back to being proof of the lack of low strata worth.

After a couple weeks of working together Rasto, Spider (whom Rasto called Eden McSquid, I think just to get us to ask him why, which was exactly why I never did), and myself made a pact to stay at VendiJob for a year. With bonuses and other points and rewards, this would provide a payout of roughly fifty thousand tax free (thanks to a city incentive to help promote VendiJob, which as I've mentioned before,never was promoted), if we kept the money in the bank.

It was a good time, while it lasted. Rasto was the head clown and ringmaster. He wore black t-shirts with those airbrushed wolves on them, tight jeans and a house of the rising sun headband tied tight over his VendiJob hairnet, and spent much of the day reminding us about the larger goal we'd set for our team, and this helped us stay motivated and focused. Spider never talked much except to argue the merits of the Misfits and Guns and Roses, who he passionately declared were punk bands, despite Rasto's equally passionate objections (Rasto was one of those guys who knew everything, or at least always enough to bust your balls). Mostly he kept his bald head down. He was actually kind of an idiot, and I was shocked sometimes at how much he had difficulty he had following simple machine directed tasks.

After about six months Spider was gone. I can't say Rasto and I were extraordinarily surprised. VendiJob allowed you to take a day off every ten days, without messing up your games or rewards. None of us took the day off because we all understood if you did you might blow your rhythm, and if that happened it could all be lost. Spider even made a joke about it, the first time he took his, about how hard it would be to come back to this little slice of paradise. When he didn't come back for two days the next time he took a day off, Rasto turned to me with grimness and stated: "It's just you and me now, boo."

There was a couple of weeks of real hard going, since now customers were used to the speed and fluid service the three of us had offered. Lots of demand, especially with the French place for some reason, which was the trickiest to work since a lot of the meals were stews or soups, things that easily could be spilled and burn the shit out of you.

That's what took out Rasto. Several months after Spider disappeared, he spilled some green shit neither of us could pronounce onto his leg,and never really recovered. Of the many incentives and hook ups offered by VendiJob, health insurance, or health services were not on the list. Everyday you had to resign a contract stating you knew the risks, and since all the directions were super spelled out, and everything sharp, hot, greasy etc, was basically contained, then allfucks ups were on you. Actually, I think Rasto's burn wasn't superserious, but it soured his mind. He started doing that thing that I had observed others doing when I was on Skid Row, something I've done from time to time. He started muttering to himself. Cursing everything, and not with his usual good humor. Sweating more than he usually did. His presentation got so bad, it began turning patrons away, with him losing points because of it.

To help him out, we made a deal. I'd work the front line, and he'd hide in back and focus on the operational stuff, setting up the fryolators to self-clean, monkeying with the steam washers, stuff without interpersonal involvement. But even that was no good after about a month. Rasto started talking to the industrial equipment like they were people, and everything and everyone was part of the same nasty conspiracy. I knew it was only a matter of time before he turned on me. It finally happened one afternoon, when I asked him when the nextdrop off of hamburger buns was scheduled to take place. He flipped out and cursed me up and down, and then took a napkin holder and chucked it against a warming rack.

These were two actions that violated his daily contract, both of which allowed the goons to swoop in and grab him, which they instantly did,though not easily since Rasto was a six foot five, and almost two hundred and fifty pounds. And ready for a fight. He took down three of them, and when the rest started tazing him (they knew better than to draw blood with all the fancy people watching through their camera phones) he screamed and cried and ripped off his t-shirt and jeans.

"I'm a dog!" He screamed. "You got me like a goddamned dog!"