From pyramid!nsc!versatc!ames!ig!bionet!agate!ucbvax!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!unmvax!deimos.cis.ksu.edu!rutgers!att!ihlpy!fish Tue Apr 25 19:49:25 PDT 1989 [Synopsis: Spike has secretly come out of retirement to track down a serial killer in a marauding blue mini-van. Searching for the killer in a remote area, Spike encounters the beautiful Annie Chernak, and is distracted by her allure. He momentarily forgets his mission, and it is at this moment the killer emerges. Spike and Annie barely escape, and the killer speeds away unscathed. Shaken by the incident, Spike hurriedly departs the scene. Examining his feelings, he discovers he is badly smitten with Annie, and for the first time in years he is afraid. He knows he must find the killer before he strikes again. He also knows that he must once again find Annie... --- All day Saturday I criss-crossed the southwest suburbs, ranging from Darien and Willow Springs all the way to Frankfort and New Lenox. There was no sign of a blue Ford mini-van, nor any sign of Annie. Well, if she knew anything about racing, she would be training lightly today. I did spend a little extra time patrolling the side streets of Orland Park, but I reminded myself that I'd come here for a reason, and it wasn't to meet women. Where could he be? _Who_ could he be? I wondered what sort of mind the killer posessed. He wasn't like any of the brutes I'd faced during the Act years. They had come from various social and economic backgrounds, but they were united by a common trait: they'd had no real scruples; the Act had merely removed the thin deterrent of punishment. They were predictable, and that had made them relatively easy to deal with. This guy was something different. Cyclists were now protected by laws stiffer than those of the pre-Act years. Shocked by the brutality of the nineties, Americans had affected a kinder attitude towards bikies. The killer was not, therefore, merely a product of his times. He was an abberation, a psychopath, unpredictable. All I knew was that he struck his victims several weeks apart. His attack on Annie and me yesterday was the first he'd attempted since the incident that had first brought him to my attention, nearly a month ago. Would it be weeks before he struck again? Or would he hit somebody today? Yesterday had been the first time he'd missed. Maybe he had an itch to scratch, and I'd put it out of reach. Maybe I'd gotten him mad. In any case, I didn't think he would emerge today. I would watch the news later to find out, but I had some things to do yet. I'd looked up a couple of bike shops in the Yellow Pages, and I was pleased to see that the old Oak Park Cyclery was still in -- or back in -- business. It was on my way home, so I stopped in just before closing time. It wasn't as I remembered it. The bicycle industry had been utterly destroyed during the Act years, so the inventory was skimpy and unimpressive. Most of the new bikes were from places like Korea and Malaysia, although a few European and Japanese companies had begun dipping a toe into the American market once again. I didn't see anything I liked, though, so I poked my head into the repair area and asked the greasy-nailed guy back there if he had anything nice that wasn't on the sales floor. He did. It sat in the corner of the shop, a used Pinarello built up with Campy Super Record. It was scratched up and at least 20 years old, but it had the right sized frame. The guy said I could have it cheap, only $1800, since it had sew-up tires, and nobody used them any more. I pondered whether $1800 was cheap, but there was quite a bit of inflation these days, and it was the only decent machine he had. He let me take it out around the block for a test ride. The handlebar stem was too short for me, but I could live with it, and it cornered well. I told him I'd take it and a pair of cleats, which he threw in free of charge. I think he knew he was gouging me, and the shoes made him feel a little less guilty -- particularly when I paid him with nice, crisp, fifty-dollar bills. I removed my shades for the first time when I paid for the bike. The young mechanic-salesman (-owner?) looked at me for a moment and remarked, "You've been in here before, right?" "Not in years", I told him. "You look familiar. Can't place you, though." I thought of something Annie had said yesterday. "Lot of that going around," I returned, "but I'm sure I don't know you." "It'll come to me." He turned his attention to scribbling out a receipt, after happily counting through the wad of greenbacks I'd passed him. This was the first time I took a good look at the large poster which hung over the cash register. I recognized the photo. It was taken at the 1991 Nationals. A sweat-drenched, road-rashed bike racer held a trophy triumphantly above his head. A caption was emblazoned on a wide black stripe across the bottom of the poster. It read: Spiro Anton Bikopoulis 1965 - 1998 He noticed my looking at it. "Oh, yeah, you want a Spike Bike poster? You get one with the bike." "Uh, no, no thanks." "Yeah. I suppose everybody's got one of those by now." Hell, it wasn't a very good picture. And I'd only won the damn race on a disqualification. * TO BE CONTINUED * -- __ / \ Bob Fishell \__/ att!ihlpy!fish