Chapter 2: The Trial of Mr. Bass

A portion of the scuttlebutt reported by Long Tall Willie and Angry George concerned an almost forgotten Catstalker Gene. Frustrated and feeling lost and despondent over the incarceration of his mentor, Catstalker Gene reverted to his old tricks of torturing, mutilating and desecrating helpless animals. When the local cat and dog population proved inadequate to sate his sadistic tendencies, the lad decided to move onto larger and more challenging prey. Sneaking into Fat Dog’s chimpanzee enclosure one night, the mentally diseased juvenile selected one of the weaker and more defenseless baby chimps to exercise his perverted mania. In plain sight of the entire chimpanzee troop, the knave tortured and brutally slaughtered this poor defenseless creature. Knowing the immature monster as I did, I was certain that he laughed in utter delight to the hoots, screeches and screams of the entire chimp pack as he went about this filthy work.

Having had a delightful time with his new victim, Catstalker Gene decided to repeat the experience the very next night. Once again, the vicious brute snuck into the barn that housed the apes. He had made a decision to repeat his depredations on yet another younger and more defenseless member of the troop. Having identified the victim the previous evening, he stealthily approached the cage where he had noticed the young ape. What he was not aware of was the fact that Fat Dog had taken the time to rearrange the cages in the simian compound following the unfortunate and suspicious death of the baby chimpanzee the previous night. As Catstalker Gene opened the cage holding what he believed to be the younger twin of his recent victim, he was greeted instead by a huge surprise. The cage he had unlocked no longer housed the defenseless infant but rather a fully grown male chimpanzee.

As he unbolted the cage, the fully matured male inside recognized his human liberator as the very devil who had grievously tortured and murdered one of its kind. The enraged beast literally tore the poor tar apart. Afterwards, all that remained of Catstalker Gene was a blood-soaked and mutilated torso. The poor unfortunate’s arms and legs had been literally torn off and scattered in every corner of the enclosure. His noggin had also been savagely torn from its moorings and was nowhere to be found. The bloody torso appeared as if it had been trampled by a herd of stampeding oxen. Besides the massive pool of blood, the mutilated body had been flattened to unrecognizable proportions. The shredded clothing that remained clinging to the murdered victim resembled sailor’s slops, but without a head or any kind of recognizable marks on the corpse’s trunk, the identity of the victim remained a total mystery. Eventually, the head of Catstalker Gene was recovered inside one of the chimp cages. Once identity was established, inquiries were made of the Captain and crew to attempt to determine the details surrounding the exact cause of death. Based on answers received, the authorities had no other choice but to rule the death purely an accident. They surmised that the unlucky youth had in all probability too much to drink and stumbled accidentally into the ape enclosure. Since one of the cages appeared to have been opened, the authorities ruled that the boy had made a series of inebriated mistakes that eventually cost him his life. Given his rabid addiction to bully, torture and annihilate all manner of weaker creatures, I felt absolutely no pity or remorse whatsoever for his tragic demise. The perverse lad was nothing short of an apprenticing monster and I concluded that his horrific end was more than justified

The trial of the hated First Mate, Mr. Bass opened during the weeks I was recovering. My weakened condition did not allow me the opportunity to witness the trial in person, so I dispatched Powder Monkey to act as my eyes and ears and to report back on each day’s outcome. Since Sergeant O’Toole was very popular with the troops stationed at the fort, there was an abundance of fellow soldiers prepared to testify to his good nature. The first several days of the trial were spent hearing from these soldiers extolling the virtues of their former com