The Billy Club Bastard Case Files: The Case of the Skunk Ape, Part 2 of 2

There’s more than one official hunting tall tales in the midlands of South Carolina. Birdie Ogden, consulting folklorist, has come to Columbia to track down a legend as it is born. Meanwhile, Mickey and Gator have their hands full when the oddity they know crashes headlong into the one hunting it.

Crazy, Crazy, Crazy, All the Time is available as a Kindle ebook, in paperback, and as a DRM-free ebook.

This is the finale of The Case of the Skunk Ape, so if you haven’t read Part 1 yet, check it out first.

Content warnings: Mild Swearing, Violence, Animal Violence, Gore, Tobacco Use, Alcohol Use

THURSDAY NIGHT, AUGUST 27, 1942
COLLEGE HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
COLUMBIA, SOUTH CAROLINA

“That's where we found 'em, ma'am, all in pieces,” the head custodian told Birdie Ogden, indicating a shallow loading dock inked in shadow. “Feathers and blood everywhere. Had to count beaks to tell how many of 'em it was. Not a nice place for a lady.”

Birdie strolled over and propped her plaster cast against the wall, leaning as she tried her best to picture the scene before it'd been sterilized. She mulled her words carefully, trying her best to sound like a detective, someone a good old boy would defer to. What would Mickey Malloy say?

“How can you be sure this wasn't some animal?” she asked after a contemplative moment.

“Ma'am, when I say 'in pieces,' I mean taken apart. It was bloody, yeah, but these chickens wasn't tore up, they was taken apart and laid out. Wings over here, gizzards and guts over there, feet stacked off to the side. It was a mess, but it was organized. If there was a way to put them birds back together, you could've, weren't nothin' missin’. ”

“Jesus,” Birdie muttered.

“He ain't got a thing to do with this, ma'am,” the custodian said. “I told the dean, it's those fraternity boys. Always doin’ somethin’ weird, and I'm always the one stuck cleanin’ it up.”

“They've engaged in acts of animal cruelty before?” she asked.

“No, this was new to me. Those boys'll dye the fountains or dump shavin’ cream down the stairwells. Nothin' like this.” The custodian took a seat on the edge of the dock and rubbed his bald scalp. Just a week before, he'd have been sitting in a pool of congealed chicken blood. His shirt had his name embroidered above the pocket he kept his dip can in.

“Dell,” Birdie said softly, “Have you heard of the Three Eye Man?”

Dell's head whipped around so fast that Birdie nearly flinched. He glared at her.

“Are you funnin' me?” he snapped.

“No, sir, of course not,” she stammered. She caught herself and switched back into Malloy mode. “I didn't come all the way here to talk about dead chickens, pal, I'm here about a man with three eyes. Folks tell me things, and the things they're telling me about this individual are odd. I want to hear more.”

“'Odd' is right,” Dell grumbled. He peered around while he fished his tobacco tin out of his pocket. He pinched a massive wad and jammed it behind his lip. He didn't say a word until he was absolutely sure no one else was listening in.

“You've seen him?” Birdie asked, though she already knew the answer. Some reticent campus police and the E.I.C. of The Daily Gamecock had both pointed her Dell's way already.

“Yes ma'am, I seen him clear as day,” he mumbled around his dip. “Might as well have seen a skunk ape or the second coming of Christ for all anyone believed me.”

“Tell me what you saw,” she prodded.

“Ain't much to tell, really,” he said.

“I'd like to hear it.”

He sighed, a sad little sound from a gruff old man.

“When I seen him it was just after dusk, not a hundred yards from here,” he said. He waved his hand vaguely northward, toward the Horseshoe where she and Mickey had taken lunch two days prior. “I heard him 'fore I saw him, dragging a manhole cover.”

“What was he doing with a manhole cover?” she asked. The Three-Eye Man lore was new, just coming into being. All she had read so far had been a vague, menacing description, nothing more.

“At first I thought it was some students, tryin’ to get into the steam tunnels. Kids try to go down there and drink or fool around. I don't get it myself, it's dark as the tomb. Can't see your hand in front of your face. There's nothing to see, anyway, and no signage. Miles of steam tunnels, all mixed up with sewers and transport tunnels down to the old riverfront, and escape tunnels from back during the War. It's a mess down there, and about twice a year we have to go through and find some dehydrated freshman who done got hisself lost.”

“So you thought it was some curious student,” she nudged.

“Yeah, so I go on over to dissuade these young folks, and what do I find but a full-on Martian starin’ right at me.”

“A Martian?”

“A short little geek, dressed head-to-toe in a shiny silver suit straight out of Buck Rogers. He looks at me and the son of biscuit eater has three glowin’ red eyes, swear on a stack of Bibles. He looks right at me, then he hisses like a tomcat and drops right down the hole,” Dell said. He watched Birdie close, gauging her reaction.

“Three red eyes?” she asked.

“Book me a trip to H-E-double-toothpicks if he didn't,” Dell said, raising his right hand like he was swearing on a Bible. “And I mean, if that ain't a Martian, you tell me what is.”

“How long ago was this?”

“End of July, four, six weeks back,” Dell said. “Students were still firing off fireworks. This town treats the Fourth of July like it's a whole month.”

“So it was dark...” Birdie said. Sometimes she needed to hear things said if she wanted to remember them. “You often work that late, Mister Dell?”

“They'll ask me to stick around if there's a special event or the like,” he huffed. “Sometimes me and Roy, he's one of my colleagues, you see, we'll spend some time after our shift goin’ over the happenin’s of the day. I seen the Three-Eye Man comin’ out of one of those meetin’s.”

“Do these meetings involve alcohol?” Birdie asked. Dell turned red as a beet.

“Now you see here, miss,” Dell snapped. “I can hold my liquor, and if I tell you that I seen a space alien with three glowin’ eyes in his shiny little head, you best believe that that's what's out there.”

“I believe you,” she replied. He crossed his arms and scoffed. Birdie continued: “I am interested in who this individual was, and what other people have seen.”

“Why do you think he's got anythin’ to do with some dead chickens?” he asked.

“I'm not sure, but it is more assuredly odd, and happened close to your sighting, and the rest.”

“Makes sense,” he said. “How'd you hear about Three-Eye?”

“Some of the people who spotted him reported him to local police or campus security,” she explained. “Folks I know comb through those kind of reports to find the weird. I like weird.”

“You must, 'cause you ain't like to find much else chasin’ that thing,” Dell said.

“I didn't read your name in the reports,” she prodded.

“Didn't make a report,” he said. When he saw her asking with her widened eyes, he elaborated: “Campus cops have run through those tunnels a dozen times already. One more report ain't like to catch this weirdo. I mind my own damn self. 'Scuse my language.”

“I understand that they didn't find a thing down there,” Birdie said.

“A couple canoodlers the first time, but nothing since,” Dell added. “This whole thing is a waste of air. Folks lit up on hooch or reefers, making up stories.”

“But you saw it.”

“Me and Roy did, yes ma'am, plain as the nose on your face, but maybe we seen somethin’ else but we were expectin’ a Three-Eye Man. All they're talkin’ about all over town is ghosts and ghoulies, lizard mans and skunk apes. Maybe I just wanted to see somethin’. It'd been a bee sting of a long day.”

“Everyone's stories have been consistent, you know,” she said.

“Folks' eyes ain't what they used to be,” Dell said. “Sometimes they just see what's in their heads, not what's in front of them.”

“True enough. But I don't track down aliens, I track down stories. So whatever y'all saw is exactly what I'm looking for.”

“I don't believe it,” he grunted. He launched a brown spray in a practiced arc, splatting the base of a bush without a drop touching the asphalt.

“I do,” Birdie challenged him. “I believe you saw a man with three eyes, dressed in a silver suit, climb down into a manhole not a hundred yards from here. I believe the other nine reports from the last two months saying the exact same. I think there's something strange underfoot.”

“Ma'am, I promise you there is that. Those tunnels are slimy with molds you never even heard of, infested with rats like you wouldn't believe, and have so many twists and turns you'd wish you left a trail of bread crumbs. The Martian can have 'em, though I can't rightly say why he'd want 'em,” Dell declared. They sat in silence for a moment, her considering what he’d told her, him sucking the flavor out of his lipful of tobacco.

“So what now?” he asked.

“Well, it seems like I need to get to the root of the matter,” Birdie said. She stood and brushed the wrinkles out of her slacks. She never carried a handbag. Instead, she scooped her small but densely-packed backpack and slung it over her shoulder.

“I reckon it's a tad dark for a hike, ma'am,” Dell chuckled.

“Don't you worry, Mister Dell,” she said, “Where I'm hiking, the sun can't get to anyway.”

SATURDAY MORNING, AUGUST 29, 1942
SOUTH CAROLINA ROUTE 34
EAST OF CAMDEN, SOUTH CAROLINA

“This looks grim,” Gator said. He peered out his window while empty field after empty field scrolled by.

“Cotton fields, I think,” Mick replied. He watched the barren acres pass by on his left and right, just expanses of dry dirt baking in the sun.

“Where is it then?” Gator asked.

“Where's what?”

“The cotton.”

“How should I know?” Mick snapped. He turned around in his seat to put eyes on the bound Lizard Man. “What's it doing? It's too quiet.”

“I think it finally calmed down, merde,” Gator said. He was nothing if not tired of dealing with their weird charge. Mick reached up and adjusted his mirror until he had the thing in view. It was staring at him. He watched its ribs expand and contract, but it stayed stock still beyond that.

“Let's get it out of this car,” Mick grunted.

“Where are we taking it?” Gator wondered.

“You're on the first ride back to the clink,” Mick replied. “Short, dark, and ugly back there is going to Doc Cypress' new facility. It'll live with the Qutat, Baby, Massimo, and all the other critters the Office has collected. So I stash this thing at the university for a few hours, then the Minerva scoops us from Columbia at midnight.”

“Minerva?”

“Most Secret, don't repeat that name,” Mick snapped when he realized he'd run his mouth again. “High speed train. It's what the Office used before they got those Chickenhawks.”

“The chicken-whats?”

“Damn it,” Mick groaned. “Stop listening to me.”

“Turn the damn radio on then,” Gator said.

“Don't touch that, I'm trying to... you hear that?”

“What?”

They both stayed quiet for a second and listened. The road was bumpy and the loaner car was a rattletrap, but over all that they could hear a howling engine, getting louder.

“Motorcycle,” Gator said. Mick twisted the rearview up. There was indeed a motorcycle tearing up the road behind them, just a couple hundred yards back.

“Think that's for us?”

“Nowhere else to be around here, not this early,” Mick grunted in reply. He was about to start barking orders when he realized they were in trouble. “My gun's in the trunk.”

“Right next to the Band-It,” Gator said. Regs wouldn't let a commandeered con carry a firearm, but nowhere did they say he couldn't have a rubber-band-launching carbine. Regs or not, it was locked up tight. “What's the plan?”

Mick watched the bike and rider growing in his mirror.

“Unless they got dirty tricks, a bike's got nothing on a car,” he grunted after a second.

“Oui,” Gator said quietly. He knew what that meant. He braced himself in his seat and watched the bike inch closer. Mick leaned into the gas pedal and urged the shaking sedan onward.

His eyes darted between the mirror and the road ahead. The rider behind them came into focus. It was a huge figure, had to be well over six foot, hunched forward and covered in whipping black hair, thick as ropes. Its matted pelt coated it head to toe, concealing its whole form. Mick could not see its eyes. It didn’t even look human.

“What the hell is that?” Gator asked.

“No idea,” Mick said. The bike was on them now, a beat-up off-roader. If the rider had a gun, it could've tagged Mick in the back of the head. The roaring motor drowned out whatever thoughts Mickey had hoped to stitch together. “Shit.”

“He's on our ass,” Gator shouted. “Check him!”

Mick slammed the brakes, locking them up and sending the car skidding on the gravel for half a second. The rider was barely phased. It easily swerved around the car, suddenly roaring past. Mick tried to jerk the wheel and side swipe him, but he wasn't fast enough.

“Hold on!” he told Gator. He pressed the gas pedal to the floor and surged after the bike.

“Qu'est-ce que ç'est?” Gator asked, pinching his nose and grimacing. The stink hit Mickey a second later like a ton of bricks. It was like someone had served up a steaming platter of rotten eggs and rancid meat right under his nose.

“Skunk Ape,” he gasped.

“Skunk Ape?” Gator stammered. He seemed like he had more thoughts on that topic, but even opening his mouth that much nearly got him retching.

Mick couldn't spare any more thoughts. The thing in front of him had him where it wanted him. The road was narrow, and straight. Ditches and dead fields trailed past on either side. If he stopped, it had them. If the sedan somehow survived plowing into a ditch, it could chase them down on its bike.

The only way forward was through.

The Lizard Man hissed behind him. Mick could hear its ratty feathers and dry skin rasping against the leather seats.

“Keep that thing still!” he shouted.

Gator tried to say something, but he didn't have time. He dove over the back of the seat and began wrestling with the beast. Its long tail thrashed against the ceiling, the back of Mick's head, the windows. Glass burst outward, making Mick duck. Wind roared through the car.

“Damn it!” he shouted. Gator could only grunt back. His rear was up in the air, next to Mickey's face. The Lizard Man was slashing at him the best it could with its bound claws. It must have tagged him, because his foot lashed out over Mickey's shoulder and stomped the steering wheel. The car swerved violently and rumbled over the shoulder, but Mick whipped it back onto the road.

“Hey, watch it!” Mick snapped. Gator only responded by kicking again, this time banging his heel into the windshield hard enough that Mick half-expected it to crack. The Lizard Man hissed and slammed into the seat-back as it battled for its freedom.

Mick looked up in time to see the Skunk Ape drop something off the back of its motorcycle. It was a small black ball and too close to avoid. It bounced off the gravel twice before Mick drove over it.

“Shit!” he shouted. Something popped underneath the car, blowing out both rear tires. The bared rims dug into the road, dragging and kicking up rocks and sparks. The car's back end swayed and swung out from behind. Mick battled to keep it under control, downshifting and straining to keep the wheel from turning too sharply.

“Look out!” Gator shouted. He paused his brawl with the Lizard Man to stick his arm out and point across Mick's face, out his window.

The Skunk Ape had slowed to match Mick's speed and was riding alongside them. It didn't let him decide whether or not to swerve into it. Instead, it lifted one of its long, hairy arms high. Sunlight glinted off a set of long claws that extended six inches out of its huge paw. It brought its claws down on Mick's window, shattering it into a million sparkling pieces.

Mickey yelled and swerved away, trying his best to cover his face with his arm. Shards cut and pricked at his cheek and neck.

The Skunk Ape howled, louder than Mick and Gator yelling, louder than the roaring car and motorcycle engines, louder than even the Lizard Man's furious hisses. The ululating cry struck Mick's spine like the Qutat's purrs had, in an animal, primal way. His joints locked up, and if not for the raw rims' rightward drift, the Skunk Ape's next attack might've taken his whole damn arm off. Instead, the creature's claws raked down the car door, leaving a trio of parallel grooves that cut straight through its steel skin.

“Holy hell,” Mick grunted. Blood and sweat mingled on his cheek and dripped down his neck. He whipped the wheel hard to the left and swerved at the motorcycle. The Skunk Ape twisted its brake and slipped behind, out of the way. Its howl cut off.

“Thank Mary,” Gator wheezed. He wriggled all the way over the seat, kneeing Mick in the face on the way. The Lizard Man snarled a muffled snarl as Gator wrapped it up in a headlock. Mick peered at them in the mirror, then saw the black-haired thing getting bigger, faster than he could accelerate.

“Brace!” Mick shouted. The motorcycle slammed into the back bumper and the Skunk Ape disappeared. Mick watched the bike twist and flip, breaking into pieces in a cloud of dust and gravel. Gator popped his head up to watch it disappear behind them.

“Did you get it?” he shouted over wind rushing through the broken window.

Mick looked around. Far behind them, the wrecked bike was smoking. He grinned, only to catch a mouthful of that familiar, rank odor. The joint-clenching howl froze him in place.

Three thick blades punched down through the roof inches in front of Mickey's nose. They withdrew just as suddenly. Mick ducked low just before they pierced inward again, their razored tips hovering just above his scalp. The Skunk Ape would've scrambled his brains if he hadn't crouched.

Mick stomped the brake, expecting to see the huge creature tumble over the hood. Instead, a wide foot came in through the busted window and creamed him right in the side of the head. He slid across the bench seat and slammed into the passenger door hard enough to knock it open and tumble out.

“Crap, crap, crap,” Mick stammered. He was hanging halfway out over the road. He held onto the handle with one hand and the frame with the other. The gravel rushed by beneath him like a belt sander. He tried to catch his breath and steady himself, but the stink was overwhelming.

Mick struggled to drag himself back into the car. He twisted around to find the Skunk Ape staring at him from behind the wheel. It was so big it had to hunch to fit into the seat. Its stinking head was matted and dense with hair so dark that that Mick could not make out any features save for the gleam of a predator's eyes buried in the recesses beneath where its brow should have been.

“What the - !” he yelled, only for the thing to lunge at him. Mick leaned back into the open air and the talons dug into the upholstery next to him. Springs and stuffing burst forth. The door wrenched open and Mick slipped further out. He squeezed his eyes shut, unwilling to make the choice between becoming roadkill or deli meat.

“Hé laid!” Gator shouted from the back seat. He let the Lizard Man go and shoved it forward. The thing's long tail slammed into the Skunk Ape so hard that its furry head careened off the steering wheel.

Mickey grunted, hauled himself back into the car, and slammed the door shut. The loud sound knocked the Skunk Ape out of its daze. It glared at Mick behind its mop and lashed out again. Instead of dodging, he grabbed it by its wrist and yanked it past him into the door panel. Its claws stuck fast in the hardwood, and it grunted as it tried to wrench them free.

The Lizard Man hissed again and flung its whole body over the seat and onto the back of Mick and the Skunk Ape's necks. Mick found himself squashed beneath the thrashing creature and folded over the Skunk Ape's arm.

The Skunk Ape grunted, then howled. Mick's joints screwed tight like someone was going to work on him with a socket wrench. The Lizard Man had no such reaction. It wound its tail back and pummeled the Ape again, cutting off the affecting sound. Feathers and fur flew freely around them.

The Skunk Ape snarled and shoved but maintained its grip on the wheel, its foot on the gas.

Mick dared not release his death grip on the thing's wrist. Its claws had sliced right through steel. He'd be a Christmas goose if it started swinging them around again. Still, he had his own claws.

With a kick off the floorboards and a wheeze, Mick lurched up and back, throwing the Lizard Man off of him and into the backseat, right into Gator's lap.

“Hey!” he objected, but the thing started up with him again before he could lodge any further complaints.

The Skunk Ape recovered quickly, but by then Mick had already dug his trusty switchblade out of his boot. It flicked open, catching sunlight, before he plunged it into the Ape's thigh.

“Kek!” it squawked.

Mick pulled the reddened knife back, ready to stick it again, but the Skunk Ape cranked the steering wheel all the way to the left. The poor car's abused tires caught a rut and suddenly all four of them were weightless, then assaulted from every direction. The car, the earth, glass, rocks, and their own limbs pummeled them. It was deafening and blinding. Time stopped and sped past all at once.

Mick couldn't say how long he'd been lying on his back before he felt the ground start moving beneath him. He looked up into the footwell. The brake, gas, and clutch waved him goodbye.

“Merde,” Gator wheezed to his right, Gator groaning, unconscious, and pinning the still Lizard Man to the car's ceiling. At least he was alive. The blue sky peeked down at Mickey past the car's floor, then blinded him.

A dark figure had him by the collar. It was grunting with the effort of dragging him out of the overturned car. Blood oozed through its ropey pelt. The stink wafting off it brought Mick back up to speed as sure as any smelling salts.

“Hey!” he said. He swung a half-hearted fist at the thing. It barely noticed the hit, instead snarling at him and brandishing the sickle-shaped claws on its free hand.

One final tug brought Mick's feet free from the car. He was no dainty little thing, which meant the Ape was as strong as a gorilla, even bloody and limping. It hauled him upward and shoved him away. He hit the side of the car with a clang that reverberated through his shoulder before he slid to the ground. The thing took a step back and glared down at him. Behind it, there was only a wall of dark pines. No one would see this happen.

The sedan was belly-up, totaled, a crumpled wreck that was barely fit to scrap. Still, somehow, its engine was running, and not just running, but revving. It was so loud it sounded like the engine would explode at any moment. He tried to lean away from the imminent death trap, but a grunt from the Skunk Ape froze him in place.

Mick looked up at the thing standing over him. Even were he on his feet, the Skunk Ape would have been a giant. It had to be seven feet tall. The top of Mick's head, hat and all, would barely have reached the glimmering stars in the abysses where its eyes should have been. Its entire frame was coated in foul, twisted ropes of blacker-than-black fibers that were more vegetation and mud than fur. Red trickled down its leg and pooled by its wide feet. Its blood itself stank. The Skunk Ape stood up straight and held its hand out. Three claws extended from its hairy fingers like a cat flexing its paws.

“Hold up,” Mick croaked, but the roaring engine drowned him out. His whole world was sky and gravel and engine and the looming unknown.

Mick grasped around for something, anything. His fist closed around a handful of gravel. It didn't matter who it was, no one liked gravel to the eye. The thing's body tightened and retracted, readying to pounce on him. Its claws were so sharp that the hot breeze whistled across their edges. Mick drew his hand back.

A red Ford pick-up skidded through the Skunk Ape at speed, leaving Mick staring down a cloud of road dust. The creature went flying and tumbled into a ditch.

Mick took a second to collect himself then lurched to his feet, his handful of rocks raised high like he could do something with them.

The truck lurched into reverse and ground to a slow halt right in front of him. The driver leaned across the front seat and rolled down the passenger window.

“Agent Malloy,” Sheriff Hoke said wearily, “Have I been up all night, or was that a skunk ape?”

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Copyright © 2023 Daniel Baldwin. All rights reserved.

Written and edited by Daniel Baldwin. Art by Bruce Conners.