Nightcrawlers: Reign of Terror

by Ron L. Carter

  Chapter 15

  Cooper was laying low for several days at the shack, not trying to draw any suspicion to himself. The following day after he killed Mark Silvers he got up early in the morning hours and started digging a hole back behind where he always parked his truck. He made the hole about twelve feet in diameter and dug every morning and after it got dark for several days. Once it got too deep and he couldn't climb out without some type of help, he tied a rope to the back of his truck so he could pull himself in and out of the hole. He scattered the dirt all around so there wasn't a big pile of dirt outside the hole.

  Once he had it as deep as he wanted, he then started taking the dogs with him out into the desert while he looked for some Mojave rattlesnakes. Since they were the deadliest of the rattlesnakes in the desert, he wanted to collect a lot of them and put them in the pit. He carried a large empty paint bucket with a lid and a long six foot rake handle with him. He made a lasso and attached it to one end of the rake handle so he could lasso the snakes around the head and capture them.

  He spent four days hunting for them and each day he would bring what he found back and dump them in the pit he'd dug. When he had about twenty of them then he covered the hole with a tarp he had used to cover the bed of the truck. He then threw a thin layer of dirt over it and covered it with limbs of desert bushes so nobody knew it was there.

  It had taken him eleven days of work and he was now ready to make a visit to Frank Townsend's house in Johannesburg. He waited until it was almost dark before he left the shack with the dogs. When he got to Frank's house it was nice and dark. The people from Johannesburg weren't familiar with his truck so he felt safe in taking it into town. He drove by Frank's house very slowly and his car was in the driveway. There was a light on in the living room of the small house and Cooper believed Frank might be watching something on television; just like Ashley had said. He parked his truck down a few blocks from the house and looked around to make sure nobody was watching him as he and the dogs got out.

  Cooper had covered his face with charcoal and wore black clothes before he went up to the house. When he crept up to the house he peeked through the window and Frank was sitting in a lounge chair watching television. He slowly made his way around to the back and checked the door to see if it was locked. As he very gently turned the handle he soon found it was locked so he went over to the window of the bedroom and it was also locked. He had only one choice and that was to break through the door. The house wasn't very big so he figured the dogs could be on Frank before he had a chance to realize what was happening.

  He told the dogs to get ready and gave them an order. He then hit the door hard with his shoulder and the door flew open. As soon as he did that the dogs went running straight for Frank and had him pinned down in a matter of seconds. He didn't even have a chance to fire the rifle he had grabbed that was sitting next to him against the wall. Skeeter bit down hard on his arm and he immediately dropped the gun.

  Cooper quickly approached him and told him to sit back down or he was going to let the dogs finish him off. He slowly followed Cooper's instructions and sat down. Cooper immediately wrapped duct tape over his mouth. He then told the dogs to let him go as he grabbed Frank by the back of the collar of his shirt with both hands and threw him face down to the floor. He wrapped the duct tape around his hands so he couldn't get free. He said, "We're going to take a little walk Frank and I don't want you to try to run or I'll have the dogs kill you. Do you understand me?" Frank shook his head up and down.

  Cooper walked him back to his pick-up, still making sure nobody was watching. When he got there, he had Frank lie down face first in the bed of the truck. He had him bend his knees and raise his feet toward his back and hands. He then wrapped his feet several times with duct tape and then hog tied his feet to his hands. He told Frank, "We're going to take a ride and its going to take a little while so don't do anything stupid. If you try anything I'll pull over and have Skeeter and Samson rip your throat out."

  Once he had Frank in the truck he then headed back to the shack. They were on the dirt road leading to the shack when Frank decided to try in desperation to escape on one of the sharp turns Cooper was making. When Cooper came to a big turn in the winding road Frank managed to roll his body with the turn and flop his body up and out onto the side of the dirt road. He was lying there trying to catch his breath when Cooper stopped the truck and went walking up to him. He looked down at him, "What a stupid thing to do Frank. What did you think you would accomplish by doing that? You're still tied up, you big dummy." He then gave Skeeter and Samson the command to attack, but not kill. They ripped on Frank for about thirty seconds before Cooper had them heal. He then picked the bloody Frank up and threw him in the back of the truck again. "Don't do something stupid like that again. The next time I won't stop the dogs from killing you." By the time he got back it was around midnight and he was tired. He left Frank in the bed of the truck with Skeeter and Samson as he went to the shack and slept for a few hours.

  When daylight came, Frank was still in the truck with the dogs as Cooper backed it up until the tail gate was at the edge of the hole he had dug. He then took the tarp off the hole and threw it aside and had the dogs jump out of the truck. He left Frank tapped together, accept he took off the tape that covered his eyes and tied a rope around his shoulder. He said to Frank, "I don't believe you know me, but I want you to know who I am. You and your vigilante group shot my twin brother in the back not too long ago at Red Mountain. You shouldn't have done that Frank." Frank shook his head as if to say it is wasn't him that did it. Cooper told him he didn't really care who pulled the trigger, he felt they were all guilty just by being part of the group. He then lifted Frank's body up and pushed him over and into the hole. As soon as his body hit the bottom of the pit, a few of the angry snakes sank their fangs into the intruder. As he jerked around a few times they lashed out and struck him in the face and over several other parts of his body.

  Cooper left Frank in the hole for the rest of that day and again the next day. By then Frank had died from the snake bites and his body was already starting to swell. Seeing that he was dead Cooper pulled Franks body up and out of the hole and laid it in the back of the pick-up. He checked inside his clothes to make sure none of the snakes were pulled out of hole with Frank.

  That night, around midnight, he drove back to Frank's house and quickly pulled his body off the end of the tail gate and dumped it in front of his house. It wasn't until the next morning that the neighbors found his body. He'd already started ballooning up from all the places he'd gotten bitten by the snakes. His round bald head looked like it was the size of a basketball.

  Cooper was very happy with what he'd done as he sat on the couch and thought about it that night. He said, "I let him off too easy, he didn't have to burn or be thrown a hundred feet to his death, like the other two guys. He just had a few little snake bites and that was all. I should've been tougher on him." Then he laughed out loud.

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