Justice Served

Yesterday on my ride from work I see a guy feverishly riding a bike in high gear and a dude with blond dreadlocks running after him screaming "Stop than man! Stop that man!"

I think for about five seconds whether I should follow the bike or pretend it's not happening. I figure I'd catch up with him and ask him why there is a man running behind him suggesting that he be stopped. The biker sees me and turns onto a four-lane one-way street against moving traffic. I follow him, but stay in the empty bus lane, watching him cross in front of several cars. Then I hear a boom sound and see him flying over a blue Toyota Tercel with a busted windshield.

Dreadlocked man catches up with the scene and picks up the bike with a cut cable lock wrapped around the handlebar and a deformed front wheel. The bike thief -- a troll man with bloodless skin and bruises for eyes -- is alive and is trying to walk away, but he is forced to stay still by a very tall pedestrian who happens to be a doctor. "Hold on, let me check you eyes," he says. The driver of the Tercel hands me a pen and an envelope from a bank statement asking to write a note explaining what happened. I try, but my hands are shaking. I leave him a voicemail instead.