A Hacked-Up Holiday Massacre: Halloween Is Going to Be Jealous (19 page)

Trench paused and thumbed his chest. “That’d be me,” then continued, “…ahhh…where was I…? Oh…hereby sentence…proper punishment as yet to be determined by your executioner. We grant him complete creative freedom in his choice of retribution, as long as it takes into account the particular act of cruelty that you engaged.” Trench carefully folded the glasses and paper, returning both to his jacket pocket.

Shit-Stain, Wife-Beater, and Trucker-Cap all stared at him, wide-eyed, with bated breath. Trench strolled back to the van, passing Wife-Beater on the ground, not even giving the man a second glance.

“Now don’t get me wrong, boys.”

Trench stopped at the bumper and picked up the loose end of Wife-Beaters chain from its neatly arranged coil. “I ain’t some animal lover the way these people are. But I do hold the firm belief that ya never harm anything without having every intention of serving it up on your plate.” Trench fished in his coat pocket and produced another padlock. “Must admit though, I’ve never had a particular fondness for yard bird. More of a red meat type of guy.” Trench looped the chain around the trailer hitch and snapped the lock through its links, securing it to the van. “So let’s get this show on the road!”

Wife-Beater’s eyes widened in terror. He frantically shook his head and pleaded incoherently behind his gag.

Trench crouched beside the begging man. “You’re the one that likes to throw live chickens against the wall and spike ‘em like footballs, right?” Not waiting for a response, Trench turned and addressed the other two men. “Now, since I ain’t strong enough to throw this here fella against the wall the way he does chickens, I came up with a pretty ingenious solution. So you two check this out and tell me what ya think.”

Although he was tethered to the van, Wife-Beater flopped and tried to squirm in the opposite direction to get away.

Trench climbed into the vehicle and fired up the engine. The tailpipe blew a cloud of exhaust and dust over Wife-Beater. The tires spun, kicking up even more debris, and the van shot forward.

Wife-Beater climbed to his knees, pleading for the vehicle to stop. His bulging, bloodshot eyes shifted between the unspooling coil of chain and the van speeding away in the distance. He turned back to his buddies and saw the horror on their faces. Then his chain pulled taut and he was ripped from the ground, flying forward after the van. Dragged across the parking lot, he kicked up a cloud of dust and rocks. His muffled screams were overpowered by the roar of the van’s engine.

Shit-Stain squeezed his eyes shut and looked away. Trucker-Cap couldn’t; he continued to watch in absolute shock as the van made a wide U-turn. It eventually straightened out, racing directly for the brick wall that Shit-Stain was sitting against. Whether Wife-Beater was still being drug was open for debate since everything behind the van was completely concealed by the billowing dust cloud tinted red by the tail lights.

The van’s horn honked twice. Shit-Stain opened his eyes and saw the vehicle barreling toward him.

Smiling ear to ear, Trench hit the horn again and waved out the window. With ankles bound and hands cuffed behind his back, Shit-Stain wobbled to his feet to get out of the way. He hopped twice, lost his balance, and fell to the ground. His nostrils flaring, he attempted to climb to his feet again.

Trucker-Cap yelled at him to just
roll
out of the way but his gag made it sound like an old hound dog barking. Shit-Stain hopped once, tripped, and fell again. Before he could fail at a third attempt to flee, the van blew by and narrowly missed running him over.

The vehicle made a sharp right turn at the very last minute and skidded to a stop, parallel to the wall. The taut chain suddenly dropped to the ground and a red, white, and flesh-colored (flailing) projectile shot from the crimson dust cloud and slammed against the cement wall.

The impact splattered the object; half of it exploded into a pink mist while the rest painted the wall like a piece of art by Jackson Pollock. The chain’s links whipped against the cement with such force, they sent up a shower of sparks.

A bloody rain of bones, gristle, and brains descended over the immediate area, covering both man and machine.

“Holy shit!” Trench screamed from the van. “How’s that for a chicken toss?”

Turning on the windshield wipers to clear away the bloodstained brain matter and the single molar with a filling in it, Trench stuck his head out, honked the horn, and screamed again. “Abracadabra! Made that fucker disappear into thin air!” He jammed his foot on the gas and made another U-turn, aiming the vehicle at the remaining men.

Seeing the approaching headlights, Shit-Stain curled up in a ball and started to cry. The van swerved around him (dragging the chain with the blood-soaked sleeveless undershirt still tangled around its end) and skidded to a stop in front of the tree with Trucker-Cap. Leaving the engine running, Trench jumped out, unlocked the padlock around the trailer hitch, and dropped Wife-Beater’s bloody chain to the ground. He strutted over to the metal coil beside Trucker-Cap and grabbed the other end of his steel noose.

“This here’s dedicated to the one that pulls the heads off live chickens.” He winked at Trucker-Cap. “And there he is!” he said, playfully pointing at him.

Trucker-Cap frantically shook his head, the chain around his neck jingling like bells. Tears streamed down his puffing cheeks. Snot shot from his nose. He fought to break free from his restraints, his hands turning purple from pulling at the cuffs with such ferocity.

Trench ignored the man’s theatrics and padlocked the end of his chain to the trailer hitch.

While Trucker-Cap begged for his life and Trench returned behind the wheel, Shit-Stain gingerly climbed to his feet and started to hop in the opposite direction.

An engine roared. The van shot forward. The chain pulled tight.

And Trucker-Cap’s head ripped right off. His noggin was yanked away so fast that his ball cap simply dropped into his lap like it had been perched atop a balloon that had just been popped. A moment later, everything in the immediate vicinity of the tree was drenched in an arterial spray that shot from the corpse’s neck stump.

Shit-Stain refused to look back at the massacre. He kept hopping, hoping that if he didn’t fall there might be some chance he’d get away. Before he could get far, something round and hard, like an extra-large coconut, clobbered him over the head with a wet splat. He wobbled and stumbled to the ground. Both he and Trucker-Cap’s decapitated head landed in the dirt next to one another. Staring face to face with his buddy’s wide-eyed severed noggin, Shit-Stain began to vomit. Since his mouth was plugged with cloth, part of the puke shot up his nasal cavity and bubbled out his nose, while the rest forced itself back down his throat, choking him.

He was quickly rolled on his side. There was a flash of a blade then the cloth gag dropped away from his vomit filled mouth.

“Not gettin’ out that easy, hoss,” Trench said, holding an open Buck knife. He patted the man on the back like he was trying to burp a baby. “C’mon. Get it all out.”

Shit-Stain heaved, coughed, and hacked out the remaining vomit while its acid burned his nostrils and throat. With strands of snot and spittle hanging off his face, he looked up at Trench with watery, bloodshot eyes. “Please! Please, mister! They were chickens for Christ sake!”

While alternating the Buck knife from hand to hand, Trench carefully slipped on leather work gloves. “Don’t matter if it was only a cockroach, hoss” he said, waving the blade around. “I was hired to do a particular job and it’s time I finish it.”

“Oh, God! Please don’t!”

Trench crouched next to Shit-Stain and pointed the knife at his face.

“Now, you…you were the one guilty of tearing off them chicken beaks for a chuckle.”

“They’d already been through the hangin’ line. They was dead, Mister! Their throats already slit! I swear!”

“Hell, now. I’d seen the tape and I beg to differ. Them chickens hadn’t even made it to the line. They were squawkin’ in the coop when ya pulled ‘em out and did your business. Eye for an eye, remember?” He knelt, clamping his meaty thighs around Shit-Stain’s head to hold it still. Trench stuck a finger in each nostril, pulled the man’s nose up, and placed the blade underneath it. “Now, you hold still when I start cuttin’. I’m gonna be mighty pissed if I slice myself on your account.”

“NO! Wait! Wait! What you’re doing…how is it any different than what we did to those birds?”

Trench paused for a moment then let go of the man’s nose. “Hmmm. Ya know…this is wrong.”

Shit-Stain nodded; a glimmer of hope danced in his eyes that he might be set free, unharmed (at least physically).

“A chicken’s nose is really just two holes on top its beak,” Trench said, repositioning himself beside Shit-Stain’s right shoulder. “So their beaks would be the equivalent of our mouths. And it’d make more sense if…” Trench stabbed the knife into the dirt, freeing both hands to stick into Shit-Stain’s mouth.

The bound man screamed as one of the gloved hands hooked onto the roof of his mouth while the other clamped down on his jawbone.

The veins in Trench’s forearms bulged as he pulled apart with all his might. There was a sickening crack, a tearing sound, then gurgling.

With eyes rolled back in his head and tongue dangling practically to his chest, Shit-Stain floundered on the ground. His bladder and bowels released, coating him in a muddy mixture of shit, piss, and blood.

Trench stepped back and looked at the bloody mandible in his hand. “As for your comparison of me and you, I already told ya…I only kill what I plan on eatin’.” He gave the jawbone the once over. There was hardly any meat there but he’d find use for it somehow, having been raised to use all parts of the buffalo.

While Shit-Stain gasped and gargled out his dying breath, Trench turned around and took in the carnage coating the area.

He walked to the back of the van, climbed in, and slid one of the extra large (320 qt) polyurethane coolers to the edge of the open door, tossing the jawbone into it. He double-checked to make sure the cooler’s drain plug was firmly in place (or there would be one hell of a mess inside the vehicle) then removed the axe and snow shovel (perfect for scooping up the squishy bits) that were mounted on the van’s interior wall.

Trench checked his watch and smiled. Ahead of schedule.

He stepped from the vehicle to start gathering the meat for his next couple of meals.

AN HOUR LATER, THE cargo van plowed down the rural highway toward the rising sun. Trench sat behind the wheel with a cell phone raised to his ear.

“Gotcha. Yes, sir, I understand.”

A billboard blew by, announcing ANDERSON FUR FARM – NEXT RIGHT.

“Will do. Okay, I’m at the next one. And just to be clear, you’re fine with me keepin’ as many skins as I want, right?” Trench smiled and nodded. “Why yes, sir. You did promise lotsa perks with the job. Okay, sir. I’ll be checking-in to give ya an update when I’m through here and headin’ to the next one. Uh-huh, will do.”

Trench snapped his cell phone shut and tossed it into the passenger seat. It landed on top of the folded pouch that contained his skinning tools. Since the minks wouldn’t be harvested until next month, the amount of employees needed to run the farm would be next to none. Trench could only hope that there would still be enough working today to reupholster his leather couch. He estimated he’d need the skins of four or five normal-sized employees. Maybe less if some of them were big ol’ fat people.

Whether skinny or fat, they were cold, heartless monsters, deserving of the same fate as that of their victims.

Trench put on his blinker and began to slow for the upcoming exit.

It was time to go to work.

BY BIZARRE HANDS

by Joe R. Lansdale

When the traveling preacher heard about the Widow Case and her retarded girl, he set out in his black Dodge to get over there before Halloween night.

Preacher Judd, as he called himself—though his name was really Billy Fred Williams—had this thing for retarded girls, due to the fact that his sister had been simple-headed, and his mama always said it was a shame she was probably going to burn in hell like a pan of biscuits forgot in the oven, just on account of not having a fun set of brains.

This was a thing he had thought on considerable, and this considerable thinking made it so he couldn’t pass up the idea of baptizing and giving some God-training to female retards. It was something he wanted to do in the worst way, though he had to admit there wasn’t any burning desire in him to do the same for boys or men or women that were half-wits, but due to his sister having been one, he certainly had this thing for girl simples.

And he had this thing for Halloween, because that was the night the Lord took his sister to hell, and he might have taken her to glory had she had any Bible-learning or God-sense. But she didn’t have a drop, and it was partly his own fault, because he knew about God and could sing some hymns pretty good. But he’d never turned a word of benediction or gospel music in her direction. Not one word. Nor had his mama, and his papa wasn’t around to do squat.

The old man ran off with a buck-toothed laundry woman that used to go house to house taking in wash and bringing it back the next day, but when she took in their wash, she took in Papa too, and she never brought either of them back. And if that wasn’t bad enough, the laundry contained everything they had in the way of decent clothes, including a couple of pairs of nice dress pants and some pin-striped shirts like niggers wear to funerals. This left him with one old pair of faded overalls that he used to wear to slop the hogs before the critters killed and ate Granny and they had to get rid of them because they didn’t want to eat nothing that had eaten somebody they knew. So, it wasn’t bad enough Papa ran off with a beaver-toothed wash woman and his sister was a drooling retard, he now had only the one pair of ugly, old overalls to wear to school, and this gave the other kids three things to tease him about, and they never missed a chance to do it. Well, four things. He was kind of ugly too.