Chapter 4

Flashback – Jack – Undisclosed location

Now this was fucking nice as hell! I was almost sad I doctored up Banzai's burrito – nah, the little fart deserved it after he doctored the hell out of my burrito and almost scared the shit out of me with his wild-assed driving. When he jumped that damn canyon in the Frankenmonster it was a feat that would have terrified Evel Knievel.

You see, Banzai jury-rigged up a nice as hell shower from all the crap he collected and which we hauled around. Damn he could give Rube Goldberg a run for his money! Of course the little fart rubbed it in several times by making sure I knew that if I had thrown away all the crap earlier, he couldn't have made this nice as hell shower. Then he once again made me wait until he was done. But it was worth it because I liked showers better than baths - nothing was worse than sitting in your own slop, trying to get clean, other than not being clean at all.

Anyway he took a big black bag, duct taped a hose to it and then duct taped a shower nozzle (where the hell he came up with a shower nozzle I sure as hell didn't know since I had given up watching him haul crap out to the Frankenmonster) to the end of the hose. He filled the bag with water (we also had an overabundance of that now), hung it in the sun for about thirty minutes and we had an instant hot water shower.

But more amazing than the shower was the washing machine he rigged up. Yeah, we had clean bodies and clean clothes and this time Banzai even used soap (I'm sure he hoped to meet with Mira and wanted to make a clean impression). He took this clean barrel with a removable lid, put some water and soap in it, then put the lid on it and sloshed it around for fifteen minutes, then rinsed the clothes the same way.

I ran all the water out of the bag, air dried, put on my clean clothes and headed back toward the Frankenmonster. I suddenly stopped in my tracks, started to laugh and questioned, "Damn Banzai what are you doing now."

He turned, grinned and answered, "Well I figured since the guards and the prisoners thought this was a 'devil truck' I would make her look the part."

Banzai had been busy again, this time with spray paint. The Frankenmonster now sported a painted on mouth and teeth. It reminded me of the mouth and teeth on some of the Super Cobra attack choppers I'd seen.

Banzai asked, "Hey Jack, I'm hungry. How about you bring me the manifold burrito you made."

Damn, now things were going to get really fun. I answered, "Sure. One manifold burrito al-la-Jack coming up."

We actually ran the Frankenmonster for a bit to heat things up so we could 'cook' our burritos. I walked over and used my shemagh to grab our burritos then headed toward the errant artist and offered, "Here you go, I hope you like it."

He smiled and replied, "Oh, I'm sure I will."

I waited until he took his first bite. But he just smiled and commented, "This is good but I wish it was a little spicier."

I thought 'what the fuck', then I took a bite of mine and...

Flashback – Ben – Undisclosed location

Jack took a bite of 'his' burrito and I thought the top of his head was going to explode like in the cartoons when someone ate something too hot. He didn't realize I had switched the position of the burritos on the manifold because I knew he'd doctored the hell out of mine.

Jack barely croaked, "I need water."

I teased, "Damn Jack, you might have used up the last of our water with your shower."

He looked frantic and tried to swear but it was unintelligible! I took mercy on him walked to my Frankentruck and pulled out my surprise. I held it up and said, "It's warm but it's drinkable."

Jack sprinted to me, snatched the beer from my hand and tried to twist the top off and couldn't. Then he croaked, "Bottle opener?"

I took the beer back, put the edge of the cap against the armor plating, smacked down on my hand and the top flew off the beer. Jack snatched it again and gulped it down.

I smiled at him and offered, "Here why don't you eat your burrito and give me that one."

He sheepishly said, "But won't it be too hot."

I laughed and bragged, "Hell no Jack. You of all people should know that things are almost never too hot for me." And then I added salt to the wound, "Let's see, that's two for me and none for you."

Flashback – Jack – Undisclosed location

I mimicked, "'That's two for me and none for you'. Just wait I'm going to get even."

But truthfully, I was glad he decided to take the doctored burrito. I watched him in amazement as he ate it with no issues. Damn he must have a cast iron stomach.