"Come on, Ricky-boy, I think you've just about had one too many--"
Rick reached up with a knife in his other hand and slit a deep gash in Darrell's throat. Darrell's voice cut off in a dreadful, gargling sound as his face stuck somewhere between the usual grin and a grimace of terrible realization.
I staggered back as Rick leaned Darrell's body over the fire, leaking the blood from his throat onto the flame with a loud crisp sizzle. Behind Darrell's twitching body, I could see that familiar glow from the old outhouse coming from Rick's eyes and mouth. A red mist began rising from the fire and then swirled up into a huge, indefinite shape. I jumped up into the back of the van and shook my sleeping buddy and yelled, "Jeremy!
Jeremy, wake up!" He groaned with annoyance in reply.
Behind me, I felt an ominous presence growing. I looked back to see the red mist now swirling around Rick's body and connecting with the red light coming from his face. His body rose from the ground looking like the lost footage from some wacked out B-movie starring Chris Farley as a hell-raising demon.
Jeremy finally opened his eyes. He squinted at the red chaos behind me and then his eyes shot open wide like silver dollars. "Holy shit!"
We ran toward the front of the van, pulling the doors shut as we went.
That eerie red glow was coming in through the foggy back windows. Jeremy jumped into the driver seat and looked around for the keys that we both knew were probably still in Rick's pants pocket. Then, the van started to shake. We both grabbed hold of whatever we could to try and hold ourselves still. The shaking only increased until the van was rocking.
My stomach dropped sideways as the van began to tip just enough to almost fall over. It came back down on all four wheels with a slam and then began to tip the other way. My stomach fell again and before I could focus to try and calm myself, the van fell on its side with a crash of glass and metal hitting solid ground.
I slammed into the new floor of the van landing on my back as Jeremy came flying down, right shoulder and head first. I barely registered the crack when he landed as reality faded.
When I came to, the van was shaking again. I pulled myself up and steadied my balance with the now sideways bucket seat and knelt down to take a look at Jeremy. He lay crumpled upside down against the passenger seat and cast in that red glow. He was unconscious, but when I put my hand in front of his mouth I could feel his warm breath contrast with the cool dry autumn air.
It was only as it started to return that I realized my hearing must have subsided for a short period of time. That was when I heard the wind. It sounded like a hurricane was just outside the van. The shaking came back full force.
I was afraid to move my friend in his current position but I also knew I couldn't leave him in this situation. I carefully pulled him up, relieved that he was light enough I could do so. Then, I stepped up onto the side of the bucket seat and pushed my way up toward the driver side door. I knew it would be too difficult to open it, so I began turning the crank for the window instead.
As the window opened, the sheer volume of the wind drowned out what little hearing I still had. I pushed Jeremy up and out the window, careful to set him on the side of the still-shaking van. I saw his body half roll back and forth as I pulled myself up until I was sitting inside the open window.
A huge red vortex was rising up to the sky from behind the van and Rick was nowhere to be seen. Now I knew where the wind came from.
I pulled my legs out from inside the van, crossed the window, and sat back down to where my legs hung over the bottom of the van. I then reached over and pulled Jeremy by the arms as I jumped down. Going first and pulling him with me, I aimed so I would break his fall. It hurt like hell, but I knew he would've done the same for me.
When I got out from under Jeremy and looked up at the sky, my breath stopped in my chest for a moment. The red mist was spreading up the vortex, into the sky, and out toward the horizons like red wine spilling upward into the atmosphere. I caught my breath and leaned down, pulling Jeremy's body over my shoulders. Then, I ran for the edge of the hill, slid down onto the dirt road, and started to run.
Beyond the dirt road, I came into a thick forest. When I couldn't run any farther, I stopped and set Jeremy down and collapsed onto the ground, breathing rapidly. The red mist was now taking up a large portion of the sky.
I couldn't help but feel like that might be a bad sign for a lot of people. I had mostly caught my breath by the time I made my decision. I only hoped that Jeremy would be safe.
I did my best to hide him before I left him there. Then, I made my way back toward the hill. I had gained enough momentum from running that it didn't take much extra effort to get myself up onto it. I watched the swirling cylinder of red from behind the van, that deafening wind blowing everything away from it.
I had no clue what the hell I could possibly do to stop what was going on, but I knew I had to try something. I pushed against the wind in the direction of the vortex. The closer I came to the back of the van, the harder it was to move. I could see that it seemed to be coming directly from the fire.
As I came around from the side of the overturned van, I saw the cooler backed against one of the large gray rocks that crown the hill.
I knew then what I hoped might work. I threw my body against the blasting air coming from the red swirling whirlwind. The air seemed to stiffen as I realized whatever it was knew I was there and what I had planned to do. A red outline of Rick appeared in the base of the vortex and spoke to me.
"Go away or die," it said in an echoing thunder. I pushed on anyway, trying to ignore the figure as it pulled from the vortex. I was only mere feet from the cooler when it reached out and grabbed my shoulder, its hand burning through my clothes and searing my flesh.
I screamed and tried to jerk away, but the wind pushed me back. I was near to fainting when the pain simply subsided and my mind went blank for a split second. Then, I saw flashes of... something.
At first I didn't know what it was, but before long, they became more complete. It was this very spot. But it wasn't at all like now. The gray rocks formed the bottom of a stone cylinder pointing up to the sky. Inside, a light brown-skinned man dressed in strips of leather and feathers clutched a long thick, whittled tree branch and screamed up at the sky as flames engulfed the lower half of his body. Somehow, I knew then he was a powerful medicine man.
Outside of the stone cylinder, a number of other Native Americans danced around the circular stone building chanting and waving their spears into the air. The medicine man's screaming became a horrible, corroding sound. As if his screams were being melted down by the fire. Then all but that bottom layer of gray rocks remained and Red Rick's hand was burning into my shoulder again. I could feel the flesh beginning to give way. I screamed and jerked myself forward, stumbling to the ground and reaching out for the cooler. Rick screamed, "No!" as my fingers clasped around the edge of the white plastic handle of the cooler.
Leaves and rocks flung at me from all directions as I pulled the cooler to me with all of my might. Rick reached out and grabbed my ankle with his burning red hand. I felt the thin flesh melt around it and I had to fight with everything I had to stay conscious. I pulled backward then, bringing the cooler with me and thumped it against Rick's head. He fell backwards with that familiar Farley clumsiness and the red vortex began to widen toward me.
I jumped up with a force I didn't know I had and simultaneously flung open the cooler. The half-melted ice spilled onto the red fire coming out of the ground where our meager campfire had been. A great explosion of red mist scattered dirt, rocks, and steaming embers everywhere. I watched as all of the mist including what had spread into the sky simply dissipated.