Mark
Thomas Martinelli arrived to his room, closed the door and cried out. He
thought that now was the time to clean up his declined honour.
Some years ago, when he wasn’t aware
of the musical movement that was starting in San Francisco, he and his cousin
Vinny have stolen some stuff from a kombi. Vinny took most of the appliances.
He just kept an Alembic Spoiler black bass, the one that standing on the
corner, seems to claim his behaviour.
—I didn’t know, Cliff —Mark muttered
while the instrumental version of the deceased Cliff Barton’s «Orion» was coming
out of the speakers.
He approached the instrument and
patted the tuning pegs the ones that he cleaned up daily. As he already knew
it, they were clean, no dust at all and his hand went through it, as rolling on
ice.
—Damned fucking Vinny —he said while
he clenched his fist—. I wish you burn in hell.
A few weeks later of the kombi break in,
Vinny died. It was during a jewellery assault on Mission Street. Mark then,
decided to keep himself busy in other businesses. He finished his secondary
studies at Gateway High School. He has already finished high school when he
started working in his neighbour Phil Doherty’s car service. There, among other
things, he learned to appreciate, the one that will be later his favourite band,
Metallica
Mark with long hair and wearing ripped
pale blue jeans, became so obsessed with the band that he was in all the band’s
concerts held in San Francisco. He knew about Cliff Burton’s death, during his
normal roster shift at the car service station. Burton has died in the gelid Scandinavia
. Mark still remembered the last concert in San Francisco. He has been opposite
Cliff, so close that he when cliff shook his long hair he could have felt the
Cliff’ sweat «Should have died Lars» he muttered and laughed without care. Mark
was mourning Cliff sadly.
One afternoon he collected all the
fanzines and magazines that talk about his deceased hero. At the beginning Phil
Doherty was touched by the pain of his apprentice, pal and party partner. Later
on the pity was replaced by fury. Mark wasn’t working like before, he was
always late to work and he just read again and again the magazines while the
Master of Puppets album was played on and on.
—Stop acting like a weirdo Mark —Phil
said once, while poking Mark’ shoulder— If you don’t stop this, I will kick you
out from here.
Mark, far from listening, raised his
head. His messy hair fell all over his face. Among it, a panic expression could
have be seen on his vaguely noticeable face.
—Shit, I robbed him —called out and
rushed away of the service while holding a wrinkled magazine between his
fingers.
That is how he arrived home. Standing
close to black bass, the one that once he and Vinny robbed without knowing was
Barton’. He said himself that giving it back to Cliff family was the best thing
to do. He made a couple of calls, contacted a fanzine writer. Mark without
mention the bass, told the writer «I got valuable information concerning
Metallica», hanging up he went out. Before closing the door, Mark gave a last
look to the musical instrument, carefully place next to his bed.
October, 27 1986, a month later from
Cliff Burton death, Mark Thomas Martinelli cross the street with bid steps, decided to return
the bass, the same that long ago he stolen from the deceased bass player.
However, without reaching the sidewalk, Mark was hit by a psychedelic hippie
coloured painted kombi. The hippies run to help the wounded, but they just saw
him dying while was babbling something like:
«I didn’t know it Cliff, I didn’t».
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Cliff Burton's Alembic Spoiled bass (see pictures) was stolen and never found.
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Cliff Burton's Alembic Spoiled bass (see pictures) was stolen and never found.
