The bar was called The Pit, which was a classier name than it deserved, and it was T-Bird's favorite hangout... for a lot of reasons. For one thing, the place let them get away with the kind of screwing around his crew liked to do. Also, one of that same crew — Funboy — lived upstairs.

They were a tight bunch of guys — none of them overly bright and all of them mean skunks. He was a good decade older than any of them, but they followed him loyally, old boonie rat that he was; they knew that without him, they were just a bunch of goshdarn bolos.

Right now they were just kicking back and enjoying themselves before he had to go in and report to Top Dollar on the Arcade job. By this time, they were already on their third round of drinks, and Funboy had an idea of trying something different.

T-Bird watched in curiosity as Funboy took a bullet and challenged all of them with it, then tossed it jauntily into the air like it was a beer nut. For a moment it spun hypnotically, then disappeared into Funboy's mouth as he gulped it down with a manful swallow of hard liquor. Now that was a good trick, T-Bird thought, adding his voice to the admiring comments, but he knew another.

"See if you can top that, man? Can you top that?" Funboy then boasted, a grin of triumph splitting his handsome, dissipated face — he reminded T-Bird of a seventeen-year-old bully who'd grown older and meaner, but had never outgrown his adolescent rawness, like an aging surfer with his long blond hair and smiley-face t-shirt... who'd never been nearer the ocean than a morphine dream. He lived on the edge, T-Bird thought, but he didn't have any imagination, which was why T-Bird had made him part of the crew — he always did exactly what he was told to do, and with an enthusiasm that was gratifying to watch.

So, he doesn't think I can top him, T-Bird thought slyly, putting a bullet on his tongue and talking carefully around it. "Here's to Devil's Night, my new favorite holiday," he toasted them, looking forward to tomorrow night's profitable activities, then washed it down with his drink. Nothin' to that, but here comes the kicker, he thought, anticipating their reaction, then he stubbed out his cigar on his wet tongue, to the accompaniment of some impressive sizzles, a cloud of smoke, and a satisfying round of exclamations from his crew.

He'd learned the trick in ‛Nam — it was easy if you knew how: which was to have the tongue good and wet, the cigar nearly out... and enough booze and drugs in a person that they didn't care less if they swallowed a flame-thrower. And it impressed the heck out of his crew, which was the whole point.

"You sick fuckhead!" Funboy groaned admiringly, his unshaven face blank with astonishment.

"Are you out of your mother-fuckin' mind, man?" Tin Tin growled, his truculent black features twisted in a combination of disgust and awe. But that changed in an instant when he saw the weaselly little man seated next to him start to lift his glass.

Tin Tin was easily the biggest man in his crew and could make two of wiry little Skank. With a contemptuous gesture, he forced Skank's hand down, ignoring the other's outraged appeal to T-Bird. T-Bird just grinned and watched while Tin Tin quickly downed his bullet-and-booze cocktail before turning to Skank with a smirk.

"Pussies drink last, man," Tin Tin explained pityingly, as if to a retarded child.

Well, maybe Skank wasn't all that bright, and if Funboy was stuck at seventeen years old, Skank had never made it past twelve; but he was just as tough and mean as the worst of them, and if there was one thing he didn't like, it was being bullied by Tin Tin. He surged to his feet and pulled out his gun.

"Fuck you, Tin Tin," he spat, in his thick mush-mouthed voice, holding the gun to the black man's temple.

"Shit ain't even loaded, man," Tin Tin mocked, standing up himself, drawing one of his many knives and thrusting it like an extension of his hand to Skank's scrawny throat. The smaller man pulled back from the razor sharp blade in sudden dismay. But help came from an unexpected quarter.

"This one is!" Funboy snarled, on his feet and pointing his gun at Tin Tin, more as an excuse for a good fight than to defend Skank. Tin Tin had already drawn a second knife to counter Funboy's threat, when T-Bird decided it was time to slap his little wolf cubs back into order.

Bouncing to his feet, he grabbed Skank's gun and pulled it down, pointing his gun at each in turn, noting with satisfaction the tiny flinches each one made as they stared down the barrel. He snapped at them like a drill sergeant, vulgarly asking which one of them wanted to bet him the gun he was holding didn't have bullets in it. They didn't answer; apparently, the message had been received.

Then he grinned, letting them off the hook. "Hey! Fire it up! Fire it up!" he chanted, pumping his arms in their rallying call, and they joined him, letting off their high spirits with cries of "Fire it up!" instead of mayhem. Sometimes it was hard work keeping them from killing each other, and that Tin Tin was the worst, the way he pushed silly Skank around all the time. But heck, he wouldn't have them any other way.

"Here's your shooters," said the pretty but slatternly waitress, Darla, as she walked up to the table, bringing them their next round of drinks. "Put your guns away, huh, guys?" she begged ineffectually, but probably only because Les, the bartender, told her to say that. Then she smiled with seductive affection at Funboy.

"How you doin', pussycat?" Funboy asked as she bent down to give him a lingering kiss; those two had been an item for months, and probably for months to come... as long as Funboy kept supplying her with drugs.

Not that she was averse to sharing her "affections" with any of them, T-Bird thought with some amusement as he watched Tin Tin take the opportunity to lean over and lick the woman provocatively on the arm like she was a particularly tasty piece of candy... which she was.