Hell to the King

Hell to the King by Ozzy Cross



         “Hunk-a, Hunk-a burn’n love. Just a Hunk-a, Hunk-a burn’n love.” Sung out the Elvis impersonator.

         You know Elvis, I mean “ELVIS”, was always said to have been some one who always cared about and gave to other people. Now Randal Coax, this Elvis performing here, he has a darker secret where people don’t mean as much. Well that’s all going to end after his performance tonight.

         Let me explain something about Randal. Never at any time did he believe himself to actually be Aaron Elvis Presley. He, naturally, had the hair and the side burns. He had the walk and even the talk. The way Randal saw it, the mighty fisherman don’t just stand there with a string and hook on a stick. He buys the rod, reel, waders and even goes so far as to have a coffee mug with a fish on it and a baseball cap to match, that of which he is very seldom seen with-out. If you are going to do a hobby, do a hobby. Randal was very passionate about Elvis and was a great collector. It all started when he was eight or nine years old when he actually got to meet the King in person.

         Randal’s look, voice (talking and singing), persona and dress was so close that I wouldn’t doubt if the random Elvis sightings weren’t people seeing him.

         When he was on stage he was the King to all those watching him. When he was off stage he was the butt of every ones jokes. Randal believed Elvis to be a great and wonderful person, which I’m sure he was. Not because of the music, movies or fame but because of how he made people feel and for the little things he did for people, you know, little things like buying Cadillac’s.

         If only Randal felt the same way about people that Elvis did instead of the way he does, I wouldn’t be here to arrest him now.



         This one was a hard one. We’re not to far out of Vegas so Elvis impersonators and enthusiasts are a dime a dozen in the 200 mile radius we call, “The Crime Scene”.

         You see, there were a few killings in this circle and we suspected everyone who was an obvious Elvis fan. Normally we would suspect a lot of different people but this killer carved, “TCB” into the foreheads of all the victims. Now, we were stumped for a while on the “TCB” thing but one night I was watching a special on Elvis and they made several references to a lightning bolt symbol with the letters T, C, and B on it. This was something that the King had held dear. The T.C.B. stood for, “Taking Care of Business”. A good clue I thought, and being so close to Vegas, well…



         Randal normally got comments like, “Dude, you’re late for your spot on Ed Sullivan”, and “Do you eat at the chicken place just to be near the Colonel again?”

         He took this hassle for a long time but shortly after he had gotten married, people started teasing her. He had his fill.

         Randal met a young lady who was some what younger than himself and it was uncanny  the likeness she had to Priscilla, so naturally they hooked up. We’ll just call her, “Percy” since Randal did and we’ll go on with the case.



         Our first killing was at the somewhat fancy home of a gentleman who teased Percy and tried to get her to come home with him. He was reported to have said, “ I’ll bet your man there is in bed like his idol, dead. Why not come home with some one who doesn’t have to pretend to be another man in order to be a man?”

         Well, this unlucky guy, although lucky enough to have taken someone else home to his hot tub, became the first victim. Randal followed him home, waited for the man and his conquest for the evening to get undressed and slip into the hot tub on the back patio. Randal walked around the mans house for a while looking for a means. We found the house a mess from kitchen to bedroom. Nothing was stolen but it was obvious that the killer wasn’t worried about the victim surviving long enough to find a mess and have the police investigate a breaking and entering. Randal found five one hundred foot , heavy duty extension cords in the mans garage. I’d say most likely used for Christmas decorations. Randal plugged them all together, made a nice coil of cord on the kitchen floor, wrapped the plug end around the kitchen sink faucet, so as not to accidentally unplug it on his way out to the patio. He used a kitchen knife to cut several slice on the cord clean to the bare wires within and cut off the female end of the cord. Randal then took the extension cord and plugged it into the kitchen counter outlet.

         Randal took the cord out through the kitchen door leading to the patio. As he approached the ground level hot tub containing his victims he grasped, in one hand, a small coil of cord and in the other, the sliced up end. Randal made his way to the other side of the tub and faced the two soakers. I’d assume that the man and woman were making out or something a little more racy because we didn’t see any signs of them trying to get out and away. Now what transpired from here is unknown but we figured Randal dropped the whole coiled up end into the hot tub to make sure there was enough cord to keep the live end from being kicked out by the trashing, then of course dropped in the live end. Even though the execution shorted out the entire house, Randal waited for the two to become crispy critters and searched the house for the fuse box and killed the power to the whole place, Returned to the hot tub and, with a utility knife, carved “TCB” into the forehead of just the man. Now the victim had pissed off a lot of people in the bar that night so the incident with him and Percy didn’t exactly set off any alarms with us when the bartender was questioned about the victim being there and being seen with anybody.



         The Second victim was an auto mechanic in his own garage. This man was working on a car from underneath. He had a vehicle up on a hydraulic lift and was standing under the car. The mechanic was using an air ratchet and didn’t hear Randal come in, pull the safety lever, cut the hydraulic hose, dropping the car down onto the mechanic killing him. Randal then used a floor jack, lifted the vehicle and with his utility knife carved “TCB” on the forehead of victim number two.



         Victim three. A woman, in her yard, burning paper, weeds and what not, standing facing the fire leaning on a rake. Randal came running at her with a container of gasoline and through it on her as he approached. Fire flashed from the fire catching the woman and part of her yard on fire. As she turned around Randal pushed her knocking her into the fire. He grabbed her by the feet and drug her from the fire. Randal used a garden hose lying close by to put out the fire incasing the woman. Randal then used his utility knife to slice the woman’s charred throat, finishing her off, then proceeded to carve his trade mark into her forehead.



         Victim four, was a man working on the roof of a house. When the other workers went off to lunch the victim decided to get a jump on things and carry some shingles up to the roof. The man grabbed some shingles, put them on his shoulders and started up the ladder to the third story roof. When the man was about four rungs away from the top, Randal came out of hiding, grabbed the ladder by the second rung from the bottom and pulled the ladder out from under the roofer causing him to crash to the ground breaking his neck and killing him. Randal once again left his sign, “TCB”.



         We have no idea why victims 2,3,4 was killed. We had no leads or reports like we did with the first victim but what we did have was the “TCB”. Yes, it had to be him and NO it’ couldn’t have been a copy cat killer, I’m sure you’ve seen enough movies and T.V. to know that we don’t release information until the investigation is over. No one knew about the “TCB” carvings but us.

         What pointed us directly to Randal was the death of Percy, which occurred the same night I saw the documentary on Elvis. Percy’s sister came over to her house early the next morning and knocked on the door. No one answered and this concerned the sister for Percy’s Vehicle was parked in the drive-way, she could hear that Percy’s T.V. was still on and the front door ajar.  Percy’s sister entered the house and noticed that the living room carpet was soaked with water. She called out to her sister but no one answered. The sister searched some through the house and heard water running in the bathroom. She opened the bathroom door and found Percy laying in an overflowing tub, looking with dead eyes toward her sister. Percy’s wrists were slashed in a perfect suicide fashion and sitting on the toilet was a teddy bear with a small t-shirt on which read, “Let me be yours”. This teddy bear was stabbed with a paring knife. On the knife hung a note that read, “ I am/was the killer who Took Care of Business. I can no longer go on.”

          Clues to Randal? Well, out of force of habit I guess, Randal Still carved “TCB” on her forehead. Now, yeah, Percy may have been talented enough to use a mirror to do the carving but I doubt that she was talented enough to do it post-mortems. We asked the sister who had access to the house she replied, “Only Randal, her husband. But he loved her to much to have harmed her.” I asked if there were any recent arguments. Her sister then informed us that Percy had come to her and told her that Randal was committing crimes and that she was debating on turning him in. She started to say, “If Randal was this killer that’s been going around, then..” I cut her off by saying, “He prevented her from snitching?” She answered with, “Yeah”. I asked the sister if she knew of Randal’s where-abouts. She told me that Randal was an Elvis impersonator and that he had to perform tonight in some casino on the strip. So now here I am to, well, take care of business.