Copyright© 2002 Kenny N Gamera

Mr. Young, the van driver, stuck the shovel into the sand with finality and looked at the men standing around the lip of the shallow pit. Two stood to his left. One of the others stood to his right and front. He looked at each with a question in his eyes. It was the fourth man, the one behind him, who answered with a single gun shot. Mr. Young knocked over the shovel as he fell.

The men walked over to the bound girls and woman. The men listened to the sobs muffled by the tape that covered each of their mouths. They cracked jokes at the expense of the struggling girls and the intelligible pleas they made. Laughing, the men made their first selection. A big one, with of dark body hair that covered his body everywhere his clothing left unexposed, grabbed Miss Russell by her long, blonde hair. He lifted her up to her feet. With her taped legs dragging uselessly behind her, he pulled her by the hair back to the pit.

Her screams were unheard until the tape had been pulled from her mouth. After that, they echoed uselessly through the meadow and into the woods of short, scrubby oaks and scraggly pine trees. For what seemed forever to the waiting girls, pleas and screams alternated and mixed with the loud laughter of the men. A loud gunshot marked the end of her screams and her pleas but not the laughing.

They came for Amber.

After Amber, the men lit a fire near the remaining girls. They sat around the flames and passed a bottle. As the whiskey went from hand to hand the laughter continued. They joked about the surviving girls and the two which they had just had. They finished the bottle. With a hard group, it flew into the fire.

They came for Joann.

Between the whiskey and the men's previous exertions, Joann lasted longer than had either Miss Russell or Amber. She lasted longer than her screaming. The two waiting girls could only listen to the laughing men and the sounds of their voices. It ended with just a sound of Joann's body hitting the bottom of the pit.

Finally, Maria lay alone as the men raped January. She didn't scream. She didn't plead. Maria just heard her crying in the silent moments between the men's jocularity and the slapping of flesh against flesh. January's only words were a "please" just before the gunshot.

Maria couldn't even cry as she was lead to the pit and thrown to her back. A tall skinny man with long greasy hair pulled out a knife and cut the tape holding her ankles together. He pushed her legs apart and felt into her dry sex. She shuttered as he announced to his friends, "Cherry pie for dessert."

She thought of Bobby and homecoming the next week. He asked her to marry him after college, and she was going to...

She cried as the man pushed his little penis into her and broke the barrier inside. He pumped over her body with short, quick rabbit strokes and came quickly into her. The next man finished even more quickly. He pulled out just before the end and sent a little dribble over her pushed up skirt. The others teased him.

The third man went slower, as if he were making love to the girl rather than raping her. One hand went beneath her sweater, and he kneaded her breast through her bra. He kissed her cheek after he spent himself inside of her.

The big man was last.

He turned Maria over and, after cutting loose her wrists, forced her to her hands and knees. He roughly pushed her head against the sandy soil, which forced her to arch her butt into the air. When she felt his penis against her back hole, she clenched her eyes shut. The pain grew as the man pressed into her rectum.

His body hung over the helpless, motionless body of the girl like a bull over a breeding cow. She cried no more tears; she made no sound; she only endured the act as the big man pumped away at her.

He pulled her up by the hair and she felt a thick leather belt being looped over her neck. As he fucked Maria's body, he tighten the it around her. Without a will other than its own sense of survival, her body fought for air and squirmed against the man. At last, the man came with a loud moan even as the final shaking of her body stopped and it collapsed.

Her dying mind felt the hands grab her and tossed her into the pit. Through her bulging eyes, she looked into the lifeless face of Joann, blood slowly dripping from the slit in the throat. She felt the first shovel of dirt hit the lifeless meat of her body. The last she heard as the world turned black and her mind joined her body in death was the big man's deep laugh.

"Now, there is one dead cheerleader."

Artie left the bar across from the old grain elevator in a weaving pattern. The guys had been around the table talking about things that should not be talked about, like the cheerleader gangbang of a month ago or that couple from Oregon and their daughter. He finally felt the need to leave the group before he exploded.

Not that such talk sickened him or caused him shame, he just had a heightened sense of self preservation. One does not talk about certain things in public, nor sometimes in private. One never really knows if someone may hear something that could jeopardize his skin. Artie did not like his skin being jeopardized.

Instinct made him feel for his keys in the pocket of his faded blue jeans. He cursed at not finding them. He cursed at the judge who had taken them away. He cursed the officer who had arrested him in the first place. He did throw in a general curse about the world in general and the low level of fairness it displayed to him.

His hand found the pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket. Something reminded him of where he had felt his lighter. He reached into that pocket and pulled out the cheap plastic device. Despite the wind he got the cigarette lit and pulled in a lungful of tar and nicotine.

A lonely car drove past.

He crossed the street and turned left. The street lights shone meekly above him as he walked along the long half of the elevator. His granddad had stored his harvest there. His father had worked there. Now, it just stood there as a monument to Artie's failure in escaping the crash of the not quite town of his birth.

He picked up a stone and looked for a window to throw it through. There were none. Only a few scraps of plywood here and there, some open space, and spider webs. With a loud grunt, he threw the stone against a concrete silo, twice as tall as the two store shops that sat across from it. It made a small noise as it struck the side. Artie strained to hear even that result of his violence.

Artie leaned against a telephone pole and gentle knocked the back of his head against it. Lips pulled back, his upper teeth ground against his lower. He closed his eyes tight and sucked his breath through his clenched jaws. It escaped as a sigh like a snake's hiss. His hands made and unmade fists with his nails biting into his palms.

His eyes opened at a sound and he looked up. The faint sound of footsteps echoed in the night breeze. He peered around till he saw a shadow move slightly against the elevator. He slyly turned to where he judged the source to be. In the darkness of a hidden corner, he made out a little flash of white.

He stumbled forward quietly, his body mostly making up for the beer and whiskey in his system. The figure in the shadow did not react to him. He moved closer, maneuvering himself to the cover of a wild bush growing through the cracked asphalt.

Though the figure still stood mostly in the dark, Artie made out the hint of long dark hair and a leg: a girl's leg. He looked both ways down the street. It was late, and only an occasional fudgie on his way down the state route to the vacation lands to the north would pass for now. He stepped from his bush and walked now with purpose to his target. His left hand felt for his switch blade in his back pocket.

It was late at night, and no one was about in the little crossroads. No one heard the scream.

"Artie is dead."

Steve rubbed his temple as the blood moved noisily to his brain. His eyeballs pulsed with the beat of his heart. He tried to make sense of the sound coming from the telephone in his ear.

"Wha?" he mumbled into the bottom portion, the one you talk through.

"Dammit, Steve, this is Hugh," responded the frantic voice from the part you hear through. "Artie is dead."

"So the fuck what," answered Steve. He tossed the phone back on the part that hangs the phone up. He stared at his feet and the dirty carpet below them. The phone rang; he picked it up, and put it back down. He dropped it to the floor before it rang again.

His fingers rubbed against the pressure in his eyeballs. He then spun back on his back and threw the covers over his head.

The sheriff looked up at the State Police van that pulled along the sidewalk. It's polished surface gleamed against the late morning sun, as men began to emerge from the van. He looked over at his old cruiser and sighed, before walking to the men. One of them looked up at the sheriff and approached him with long strides.

When they met the man reached out with his right hand palms open. "Sheriff Kelly, Detective Fred O'Donnell, State Police."

The sheriff took the detective's hand, and they shook formally. The sheriff passively allowed the stranger to guide the motion. Neither tested the other. They released with the minimum of pumps.

"The body is this way." The sheriff motioned with his head to the corner where the offices of the old grain elevator met the silos. A sheet covered form lay inside a fence made of yellow tape and a broom handle shoved in the dry ground. With that, they walked to the body.

"Who was it, ' asked Detective O'Donnell.

"Arthur Kelly, local piece of crap."

"Relative?"

"Unfortunately." The sheriff lifted up the tape for the detective to pass under. "Cousin."

"What can you tell me about him, Sheriff?"

"Besides that he was a piece of crap?"

"If you could, please."

"Loser. In and out of jail. Mostly, for minor things. I arrested him myself for driving with a suspended license. County got to sell his car for that one. He probably was walking home when he got it."

"Job? Family?" said O'Donnell as he hunkered down before the sheet.

The sheriff watched as O'Donnell lifted the cover from the body. "Unemployed. Hasn't worked more than a few days in his life. We think he grows, well grew, pot up around the Mill's place with his buddies. Not enough to get the attention of you guys with the state, but enough to get by on."

The detective drew in his breath as he lifted the sheet.

"Pretty ain't it." The sheriff grinned to himself as he continued. "Wife and two kids. She left him and town with two black eyes as souvenirs about two, two and a half years ago. Don't think she ever divorced him, though. I'm sure she'll be happy."

O'Donnell swore to himself when he saw the head region of the body.

"Yep," answered the sheriff, "pretty work. Got his own switch blade in the crotch and his throat ripped out."

"Jesus Christ," said O'Donnell as he bent to examine the wound at the throat. "How the hell could they have done that?"

"Looks like some of the sheep that I have seen killed by the wild dogs around these parts. I figure it was a dog that done it."

"And the knife?"

"The dog's owner." The sheriff shrugged his shoulders. "Him and his buddies have been rumoured to have raped more than a few of the local girls. I figure that someone's daddy may have took offense."

O'Donnell stood up. "Jesus Christ."

"You said that already, Detective."

"Who are these 'buddies' you keep talking about, Sheriff?"

"I'll give you a list."

Shame about Artie, thought Dick Peters as he carefully made his way through the dark woods. When Hugh had called him about the State Cop and Sheriff Kelly, he spent a few moments working on lies before he realized he didn't need to. Hell, the sheriff even saw him in the bar until close. Followed him home too. That was the nice thing about have cops as neighbors.

He really wondered about all the questions about the dog, though. What the hell would they want to know about a fucking dog. It was no worry for him; he didn't have a dog. The old woman was allergic to them.

He stopped in his thoughts when he heard another set of feet in the dried leaves that laid scattered over the ground. He listened with his body motionless. The rustle of feet continued without any apparent attempt towards concealment. Dick lowered his body and watched in the direction of the sound. His hand moved to the hunting knife on his belt.

It was a girl with long dark hair tied into a tail. Young, she may have been just old enough for high school. Her head was turned down and her feet drug through the leaves. She wore a short, pleated skirt.

Musta been thrown out of the car by a frustrated date, thought Dick from his hiding spot. He entertained the notion of taking care of Miss Attitude, himself, but thought better of it. Not so close to the pot, he reminded himself. He could wait till he got home to the wife.

The girl passed by. When she was clear, Dick again began to move to the plants he and the guys had planted together. He thought about what he would buy with his share of Artie's share. When, he felt something on his back. It was a hand. He spun around with his hand going to his knife. It was Miss Attitude. Her clothing was soiled and her legs filthy with rubbed in dirt. Dick looked up at her face from his crotched position.

He screamed.

Steve and Hugh sat together at a table in the bar. Hugh looked at his watch and Steve swore.

"Call 'im."

Hugh looked up from his watch. "I tried that already. His ol' lady ain't seen 'im since he left for the patch last night."

"Sonava bitch ran on us." Steve swore again. "Probably took all the pot too."

"Keep it down. That state cop is still around about Artie."

"Fuck Artie."

"Yeah, but do you want that trooper thinking about nailing us on a drug charge." Hugh looked around. "Besides, I don't think that Dick ran on us. I think that who ever got Artie got him."

Steve drank his beer. "Fuck Artie. And fuck Dick, too."

Hugh left early; the cops were at the bar. They were just drinking, but Steve was acting crazy. And he was talking shit, too. Cops and Steve talking shit were a bad combination. Hugh needed to be somewhere else.

Not that he wanted to leave the relative safety of the bar. Steve may not have thought much of it, but Artie's death and Dick's disappearing had Hugh scared shitless. Someone was after them, meaning Hugh did not want to be alone. But Steve was making the bar unsafe, too.

Nowhere the fuck to go to, now, thought Hugh as he entered his truck. Nowhere to hide.

Course, it was just a half hour to the next town where things were just a little livelier than around this shithole. There would be more people, more cover. Maybe, he could even score a little action. Action would be good.