Atdtda30: Of beef and beef, 852

[Paul Nightingale]

A brief section that functions as a coda to the longer 59.1. Flaco is
energetic, "determined to go back to Mexico" in search of "a nice normal
shootin war". Action is all, taking sides "in the bigger fight": that he
seeks "peons like me I can shoot back at" emphasises both decision-making
and an awareness that he is no more than a foot-soldier. In the previous
section Flaco celebrated the explosion he himself had been caught up in:
"... they don't care who the hell they do this to" is juxtaposed to Reef's
own puzzlement (851).

For Flaco, Reef's obsession with Vibe is an unwarranted personalisation of
the issue, and also an excuse for prevarication, "just another dream they
like to tease us with" (852). He mocks "retribution": because it
misleadingly offers closure? At the end of the previous section Reef, of
course, has been visited by a dream-like Kit, whose voice in the darkness is
juxtaposed to "tears and snot all over his face". A passage like this
isolates the character, mocking the notion of individuality, the individual
divorced from social context. For Flaco here, all is context. Introspection
versus "the bigger fight".