He heard The Kid a long time before he saw him. It was the heavy, crackling roar of unmuffled straightpipes thundering toward him from the east, branding the day. The sound was coming up Highway 34 from the direction of Yuma, Colorado. His first impulse was to hide, the way he'd hidden from the few other survivors he'd seen since Gary. But this time something made him stay where he was, astride his bike on the shoulder of the road, looking back apprehensively over his shoulder.

The thunder grew louder and louder, and then the sun was reflecting off chrome and (??FIRE??).

something bright and orange.

The driver saw him. Downshifted in a machine-gun burst of backfires. Goodyear rubber peeled off on the highway in hot swatches. And then the car was beside him, not idling but panting like a deadly animal which may or may not be tamed, and the driver was getting out. But at first Trashcan only had eyes for the car. He knew about cars, he liked cars, even though he had never gotten so much as a learner's permit. This one was a beauty, a car someone had worked on for years, put thousands of dollars into, the kind of thing you usually only saw at funnycar shows, a labor of love.

It was a 1932 Ford deuce coupe, but the owner had not stinted nor stopped with the usual deuce coupe customizing innovations. He had gone on and on, turning it into a parody of all American cars, a glittering science fiction vehicle with hand-painted flames billowing out of the manifold pipes. The paintjob was flake gold. The chrome headpipes, which stretched almost the whole length of the car, reflected the sun fiercely. The windshield was a convex bubble. The back tires were gigantic Goodyear Wide Ovals, the wheel-wells cut to an exaggerated height and depth to accommodate them. Growing out of the hood like a weird heating duct was a supercharger. Growing out of the roof, solid black but shot with red flecks like embers, was a steel sharkfin. Written on both sides were two words, raked backward to indicate speed. THE KID THE KID, they said.

"Hey, youall long tall an ogly," ogly," the driver drawled, and Trash shifted his attention from the painted flames to the driver of this rolling bomb. the driver drawled, and Trash shifted his attention from the painted flames to the driver of this rolling bomb.

He stood about five feet three inches. His hair was piled and swirled and pomaded and brilliantined. The hair alone gave him another three inches of height. The swirls all met above his collar in what was not just a duck's ass but the avatar of all the duck's ass hairdos ever affected by the punks and hoods of the world. He was wearing black boots with pointed toes. The sides were elasticized. The heels, which gave The Kid another three inches, bringing him up to a respectable five-nine total, were stacked Cubans. His pegged and faded jeans were tight enough to read the dates of the coins in his pockets. They limned each nifty little buttock into a kind of blue sculpture and made his crotch look like he'd maybe stuffed a chamois bag full of Spalding golf-balls in there. He wore a Western-style silk shirt of an off-burgundy color. It was decorated with yellow trim and imitation sapphire buttons. The cufflinks looked like polished bone, and Trash later found out that was just what they were. The Kid had two sets, one made from a pair of human molars, the other from the incisors of a Doberman pinscher. Over this wonder of a shirt, in spite of the heat of the day, he wore a black leather motorcycle jacket with an eagle on the back. It was crisscrossed with zippers, the teeth glimmering like diamonds. From the shoulder-flaps and waistbelt three rabbits' feet dangled. One was white, one brown, one bright St. Paddy's Day green. This jacket, even more wonderful than the shirt, creaked smugly with rich oil. Above the eagle, this time written in white silk thread, were the words THE KID THE KID. The face now looking up at the Trashcan Man from between the high pile of gleaming hair and the upturned collar of the gleaming motorcycle jacket was tiny and pallid, a doll's face, with heavy but flawlessly sculpted pouting lips, dead gray eyes, a wide forehead without a mark or a seam, and strange full cheeks. He looked like Baby Elvis.

Two gunbelts were crisscrossed on his flat belly, and a giant .45 leaned out of each of the sagging holsters on his hips.

"Hey, boy, whatchall say?" say?" The Kid drawled. The Kid drawled.

And the only thing Trashcan could think think of to say was, "I like your car." of to say was, "I like your car."

It was the right thing. Maybe the only only thing. Five minutes later Trash was in the passenger seat and the deuce coupe was accelerating up to The Kid's cruising speed, which was about ninety-five. The bike Trash had ridden all the way from eastern Illinois was fading to a speck on the horizon. thing. Five minutes later Trash was in the passenger seat and the deuce coupe was accelerating up to The Kid's cruising speed, which was about ninety-five. The bike Trash had ridden all the way from eastern Illinois was fading to a speck on the horizon.

Timidly, Trashcan Man suggested that at such a speed The Kid would not be able to see a wreck or a stall in the road if they came to one (they had already come to several, as a matter of fact; The Kid simply slalomed around them, the Wide Ovals shrieking unheeded protest).

"Hey, boy," The Kid said. "I got the reflexes. I got the timin. I got three-fiffs of a second. You believe that?"

"Yes, sir," Trash said faintly. He felt like a man who has just used a stick to stir up a nest of snakes.

"I like you, boy," The Kid said in his odd, droning voice. His doll's eyes stared out over the fluorescent orange steering wheel at the shimmering road. Large Styrofoam dice with death's heads for pips dangled and bounced from the rearview mirror. "Getchall a beer out'n the back seat."

They were Coors and they were warm and Trashcan Man hated beer and he drank one fast and said how good it was.

"Hey, boy," The Kid said. "Coors beer's the only only beer. I'd beer. I'd piss piss Coors if I could. You believe that happy crappy?" Coors if I could. You believe that happy crappy?"

Trashcan said he did indeed believe that happy crappy.

"They call me The Kid. Outta Shreveport, Looseyanna. You know that? This here beast won every major carshow award in the South. You believe that happy crappy?"

Trashcan Man said he did and got another warm beer. It seemed like the best move under the circumstances.

"What they call you, boy?"

"The Trashcan Man."

"The whut?" whut?" For one horrible moment the dead doll's eyes rested on Trashcan's face. "You jokin me, boy? Ain't nobody jokes The Kid. An you better believe For one horrible moment the dead doll's eyes rested on Trashcan's face. "You jokin me, boy? Ain't nobody jokes The Kid. An you better believe that that happy crappy." happy crappy."

"I do believe it," Trashcan said earnestly, "but that's what they call me. Because I used to light fires in people's trashcans and mailboxes and stuff. I set old lady Semple's pension check on fire. I got sent to the reformatory for it. I also burned down the Methodist Church in Powtanville, Indiana."

"Didja?" The Kid asked, delighted. "Boy, you sound as crazy as a rat in a shithouse. That's okay. I like crazy people. I'm crazy myself. Tripped right outta my fuckin gourd. Trashcan Man, huh? I like that. We make a pair. The fucking Kid and the fucking Trashcan Man. Shake, Trash." The Kid asked, delighted. "Boy, you sound as crazy as a rat in a shithouse. That's okay. I like crazy people. I'm crazy myself. Tripped right outta my fuckin gourd. Trashcan Man, huh? I like that. We make a pair. The fucking Kid and the fucking Trashcan Man. Shake, Trash."

The Kid offered his hand and Trash shook it as quick as he could so that The Kid could put both hands back on the wheel. They whizzed around a bend and there was a Bekins semi nearly blocking the whole highway and Trashcan put his hands over his face, prepared to make an immediate transition to the astral plane. The Kid never turned a hair. The deuce coupe skittered along the left side of the highway like a waterbug and they skinned by the cab of the truck with a coat of paint to spare.

"Close," Trashcan said when he felt he could speak without a quaver in his voice.

"Hey, boy," The Kid said flatly. Then one of his doll's eyes closed in a solemn wink. "Don't tell me-I'll tell you. How's that beer? Pretty fuckin gnarly, ain't it? Hits the spot after ridin that kiddy-bike, don't it?"

"It sure does," Trashcan Man said, and took another big swallow of warm Coors. He was insane, but not yet insane enough to disagree with The Kid while he was driving. Nowhere near.

"Well, no sense beatin around the motherfuckin bush," The Kid said, reaching back over the seat to get his own can of suds. "I guess we're goin to the same place."

"I guess so," Trash said cautiously.

"Gonna jine up," The Kid said. "Goin west. Gonna get in on the motherfuckin ground floor. You believe that happy crappy?"

"I guess so."

"You been gettin dreams about that boogeyman in the black flight-suit, ain'tcha?"

"You mean the priest."

"I always mean what I say an say what I mean," The Kid said flatly. "Don't tell me, ya fuckin bug, I'll tell you. It's a black flight-suit, and the guy's got goggles. Like in a John Wayne movie about Big Two. Goggles so big you can't see his motherfuckin face. Spooky old cock-knocker, ain't he?"

"Yeah," Trashcan said, and sipped his warm beer. His head was beginning to buzz.

The Kid hunched over the orange steering wheel and began to imitate a fighter pilot-one who had done his stuff in Big Two, presumably -in a dogfight. The deuce coupe rollercoastered alarmingly from one side of the road to the other as he imitated loops and dives and barrel rolls.

"Neeeeyaaaahhhh ... ... eheheheheheh eheheheheheh ... ... budda-budda-budda budda-budda-budda ... take that, ya fuckin kraut ... Cap'n! Bandits at twelve o'clock! ... Turn the air-cooled cannon on em, ya fuckin dipstick ... ... take that, ya fuckin kraut ... Cap'n! Bandits at twelve o'clock! ... Turn the air-cooled cannon on em, ya fuckin dipstick ... takka takka ... ... takka takka ... ... takka-takka-takka! takka-takka-takka! We got em, sir! All clear ... We got em, sir! All clear ... How-OOOGAH! Stand down, fellers! HowOOOOOOOGAH!" How-OOOGAH! Stand down, fellers! HowOOOOOOOGAH!"

His face gained no expression as he went through this fantasy; not a single well-oiled hair fell from grace as he jerked the car back into its lane and pounded on up the road. Trashcan Man's heart thudded heavily in his chest. A light sheen of sweat had oiled his body. He drank his beer. He had to make wee-wee.

"But he don't scare me," The Kid said, as if the former topic of conversation had never lapsed. "Fuck no. He's a hard baby, but The Kid has handled hard babies before. I shut em up and then I shut em down, just like The Boss says. You believe that happy crappy?"

"Sure," Trash said.

"You dig The Boss?"

"Sure," Trash said. He hadn't the slightest idea who The Boss was or had been.

"Fuckin better better dig The Boss. Listen, you know what I'm gonna do?" dig The Boss. Listen, you know what I'm gonna do?"

"Go west?" Trashcan Man hazarded. It seemed safe.

The Kid looked impatient. "After "After I get there, I mean. I get there, I mean. After. After. You know what I'm gonna do after?" You know what I'm gonna do after?"

"No. What?"

"I'm gonna lay low for a while. Check out the situation. Can you dig that happy crappy?"

"Sure," Trash said.

"Fuckin A. Don't tell me, I'll fuckin tell you. Just check it out. Check out the big man. Then ..."

The Kid fell silent, brooding over the top of his orange steering wheel.

"Then what?" Trashcan asked hesitantly.

"Gonna shut him down. Send him around dead man's curve. Put him out to pasture on the motherfuckin Cadillac Ranch. You believe it?"

"Yeah, sure."

"I'm gonna take over," The Kid said confidently. "Gonna strip his gears and leave him at the Cadillac Ranch. You stick with me, Trashman or whatever the fuck ya call yaself. We ain't gonna eat no pork and beans. We're gonna eat more chicken than any man ever seen."

The deuce coupe roared down the highway with painted flames shooting up from the manifold. Trashcan Man sat in the passenger seat, a warm beer in his lap and troubled in his mind.

It was almost dawn on the morning of August 5 when Trashcan Man entered Cibola, otherwise known as Vegas. Somewhere in the last five miles he had lost his left sneaker and now, as he walked down the curving exit ramp, his footfalls sounded like this: slap-THUMP, slap-THUMP, slap-THUMP. slap-THUMP, slap-THUMP, slap-THUMP. They sounded like the flap of a flat tire. They sounded like the flap of a flat tire.

He was almost done in, but a little wonder came back as he made his way down the Strip, which was jammed with dead cars and quite a few dead people, most of them well picked over by the buzzards. He had made it. He was here in Cibola. He had been tested and he had passed the test.

He saw a hundred honky-tonk nightclubs. There were signs that read LIBERAL SLOTS LIBERAL SLOTS, signs that said BLUEBELL WEDDING CHAPEL BLUEBELL WEDDING CHAPEL and 60- and 60-SECOND WEDDING BUT IT'LL LAST A LIFETIME! He saw a Silver Ghost Rolls-Royce halfway through a plate glass window of an adult bookstore. He saw a naked woman hanging upside down from a lamppost. He saw two pages of the Las Vegas Sun Sun go riming by. The headline that revealed itself over and over again as the paper flapped and turned was go riming by. The headline that revealed itself over and over again as the paper flapped and turned was PLAGUE GROWS PLAGUE GROWS WORSE WORSE WASHINGTON MUTE WASHINGTON MUTE. He saw a gigantic billboard which said NEIL DIAMOND! THE AMERICANA HOTEL JUNE 15-AUGUST NEIL DIAMOND! THE AMERICANA HOTEL JUNE 15-AUGUST 30! Someone had scrawled the words 30! Someone had scrawled the words DIE LAS VEGAS FOR YOUR SINS DIE LAS VEGAS FOR YOUR SINS! across the show window of a jewelry store seeming to specialize in nothing but wedding and engagement rings. He saw an overturned grand piano lying in the street like a large dead wooden horse. His eyes were full of these wonders.

As he walked on he began to see other signs, their neon dead this midsummer for the first time in years. Flamingo. The Mint. Dunes. Sahara. Glass Slipper. Imperial. But where were the people? Where was the water?

Hardly knowing what he was doing, letting his feet pick their own path, Trashcan turned off the Strip. His head dropped forward, his chin resting on his chest. He dozed as he walked. And when his feet tripped over the curbing, when he fell forward and gave himself a bloody nose on the pavement, when he looked up and beheld what was there, he could hardly believe it. Blood ran unnoticed from his nose to his tattered blue shirt. It was as if he was still dozing and this was his dream.

A tall white building stretched up to the desert sky, a monolith in the desert, a needle, a monument, every bit as magnificent as the Sphinx or the Great Pyramid. The windows of its eastern face gave off the fire of the rising sun like an omen. In front of this bonewhite desert edifice, flanking its entranceway, were two huge gold pyramids. Over the canopy was a great bronze medallion, and carved on it in bas-relief was the snarling head of a lion.

Above this, also in bronze, the simple but mighty legend: MGM GRAND HOTEL MGM GRAND HOTEL.

But what captured his eyes was what stood on the grassy quadrangle between the parking lot and the entranceway. Trashcan stared, an orgasmic shivering consuming him so fiercely that for a moment he could only prop himself on his bloody hands, the unraveling end of the Ace bandage trailing between them, and stare at the fountain with his faded blue eyes, eyes that were halfway to being glareblind by now. A little groaning noise began to escape him.

The fountain was working. It was a gorgeous construction of stone and ivory, chased and inlaid with gold. Colored lights played over the spray, making the water purple, then yellow-orange, then red, then green. The constant ticking patter as the spray fell back into the pool was very loud.

"Cibola," he muttered, and struggled to his feet. His nose was still dripping blood.

He began to stagger toward the fountain. His stagger became a trot. The trot became a run, the run a sprint, the sprint a mad dash. His scabbed knees rose, pistonlike, almost to his neck. A word began to fly out of his mouth, a long word like a paper streamer that rose to the sky, bringing people to the windows high above (and who saw them? God, perhaps, or the devil, but certainly not the Trashcan Man). The word grew higher and shriller, longer and longer as he approached the fountain and that word was: "CIIIIIIIIBOLAAAAAAAA!"

The final "aahh" sound drew out and out, a sound of all the pleasures that all the people who have ever lived on the earth have ever known, and it ended only when he struck the lip of the fountain chest-high and yanked himself up and over and into a bath of incredible coolness and mercy. He could feel the pores of his body open like a million mouths and slurp the water in like a sponge. He screamed. He lowered his head, snorted in water, and blew it back out in a combined sneeze and cough that sent blood and water and snot against the side of the fountain in a splat. He lowered his head and drank like a cow.

"Cibola! Cibola!" Trash cried rapturously. "My life for you!"

He dogpaddled his way around the fountain, drank again, then climbed over the edge and fell onto the grass with an awkward thump. It had all been worth it, everything had been worth it. Water cramps struck him and he suddenly threw up with a loud grunt. Even throwing up felt grand.

He got to his feet, and holding on to the lip of the fountain with his claw hand, he drank again. This time his belly accepted the gift gratefully.

Sloshing like a filled goatskin, he staggered toward the alabaster steps which led to the doors of this fabulous place, steps that led between the golden pyramids. Halfway up the steps, a water cramp struck him and doubled him over. When it passed he lurched gamely onward. The doors were of the revolving type, and it took all his feeble strength to get one of them in motion. He pushed through into a plushy carpeted lobby that seemed miles long. The rug underfoot was thick and lush and cranberry-colored. There was a registration desk, a mail desk, a key desk, the cashiers' windows. All empty. To his right, beyond an ornamental grilled railing, was the casino. Trashcan Man stared at it in awe-the serried ranks of slot machines like soldiers standing at parade rest, beyond them the roulette and crap tables, the marble railings enclosing the baccarat tables.

"Who's here?" Trash croaked, but no answer came back.

He was afraid then, because this was a place of ghosts, a place where monsters might lurk, but the fear was weakened by his weariness. He stumbled down the steps and into the casino, passing the Cub Bar, where Lloyd Henreid sat silently in the deep shadows, watching him and holding a glass of Poland water.

He came to a table upholstered in green baize, the mystic legend DEALER MUST HIT 16 AND STAND ON DEALER MUST HIT 16 AND STAND ON 17 inscribed thereon. Trash climbed up on it and fell instantly asleep. Soon nearly half a dozen men stood around the sleeping ragamuffin that was the Trashcan Man. 17 inscribed thereon. Trash climbed up on it and fell instantly asleep. Soon nearly half a dozen men stood around the sleeping ragamuffin that was the Trashcan Man.

"What do we do with him?" Ken DeMott asked.

"Let him sleep," Lloyd answered. "Flagg wants him."

"Yeah? Where the Christ is is Flagg, anyway?" another asked. Flagg, anyway?" another asked.

Lloyd turned to look at the man, who was balding and stood a full foot taller than Lloyd. Nonetheless, he drew back a step at Lloyd's gaze. The stone around Lloyd's neck was the only one that was not solid jet; in the center gleamed a small and disquieting red flaw.

"Are you that anxious to see him, Hec?" Lloyd asked.

"No," the balding man said. "Hey, Lloyd, you know I didn't-"

"Sure." Lloyd looked down at the man sleeping on the blackjack table. "Flagg will be around," he said. "He's been waiting for this guy. This guy is something special."

On the table, oblivious of all this, Trashcan Man slept on.

Trash and The Kid spent the night of July 18 in a motel in Golden, Colorado. The Kid picked two rooms with a connecting door. The connecting door was locked. The Kid, now well in the bag, solved this minor problem by blowing the lock off with three bullets from one of his .45s.

The Kid raised one tiny boot and kicked the door. It shuddered open in a fine blue haze of gunsmoke.

"Betcha fuckin A," he said. "Which room? Take your pick, Trashy."

Trashcan Man opted for the room on the right, and for a while was left alone. The Kid had gone out someplace. Trashcan Man was slowly considering the idea of simply fading away into the gloom before something really bad could happen-trying to balance that possibility against his lack of transportation-when The Kid returned. Trashcan Man was alarmed to see that he was pushing a shopping cart which was full of six-packs of Coors beer. The doll's eyes were now bloodshot and rimmed with red. The pompadour hairdo was coming unraveled like a broken and expanding clockspring, and greasy bunches of hair now hung down over The Kid's ears and cheeks, making him look like some dangerous (albeit absurd) caveman who had found a leather jacket left by a time-traveler and put it on. The rabbits' feet bobbed back and forth on the belt of the jacket.

"It's warm," The Kid said, "but who gives a rip, am I right?"

"Right, absolutely," Trashcan Man said.

"Have a beer, asshole," The Kid said, and tossed him a can. When Trashcan pulled the ringtab, he got a faceful of foam and The Kid roared with oddly diminutive laughter, holding his flat belly with both hands. Trash smiled weakly. He decided that later tonight, after this small monster had succumbed to sleep, he would slip away. He had had enough. And what The Kid had said about the dark priest ... Trashcan Man's fears about that were so big he could not even get them to coalesce. Saying things like that, even if you were joking, was like shitting on the altar of a church or holding your face up to the sky in a thunderstorm and begging the lightning to come hit you.

The worst thing was that he didn't think The Kid had been joking.

Trashcan Man had no intention of going up into the mountains and around all those hairpin turns with this crazy dwarf who drank all day (and apparently all night) and who talked about overthrowing the dark man and putting himself in his place.

Meanwhile, The Kid had put away two beers in two minutes, crushed the cans, and tossed them indifferently on one of the room's twin beds. He was looking morosely at the RCA Chromacolor, a fresh Coors in his left hand and the .45 he had used to blow open the connecting door in his right.

"No fuckin lectricity, so there ain't no fuckin TV," he said. As he grew more drunk, his Southern accent grew more pronounced, putting fur on his words. "Don't I hate that. I love it that all the assholes got wasted, but Jesus-jumped-up-baldheaded-ole-Christ, where's HBO? Where's the goddam rasslin matches? Where's the Playboy Channel? That was a good one, Trashy. I mean, they never showed guys gettin right down and eating hair pie, munchin the ole bearded clam, you know what I mean, but some of those ladies had laigs went right up to their chins, chins, you know what the motherfuck I'm talkin about?" you know what the motherfuck I'm talkin about?"

"Sure," Trashcan said.

"You're fuckin A. Don't tell me, I'll tell you."

The Kid stared at the dead TV. "You numb cunt," he said, and shot the TV. The picture tube imploded with a great hollow bang. Glass belched out onto the carpet. Trashcan Man raised his arm to shield his eyes, and his beer gurgled out onto the green nylon shag when he did.