Hiking the Mount
Red sat his tattered blue bag up against a rock on the hill. Jonathan pulled out his slingshot from among the folds of the jackets he had lugged up the frozen trails. Red and he began firing pebbles at the surrounding trees, playing horse with their shots. Red heard his Labrador running in the trees behind him, chasing the strange scents across the forested hill. The clouds rolled past, the boys continuing shooting until Jonny had finally gathered both his breath and the losing letters; H-O-R-S-E. The three companions continued hiking up Mt. Herman, occasionally stopping to chew on pre-packaged sausage bites or sip on some water out of a metal bottle with a few scratches in the paint.
Red reached the summit, viewing the American flag waving in the worsening weather. His Labrador had already been among the red rocks for some time, occasionally running back to the two boys to make sure he was still in safe company. Jonny also summited, taking a picture of the surrounding scenery with his phone. The boys and their dog sat for a while, eating lunch and simply listening to the wind blow past the trees. It wasn’t necessarily silent, but the sounds were what Red imagined silence to be; simple sounds of wind and weather. No words were spoken until the pair heard a slight murmur coming from the trees behind them. It sounded like a dull hum, coalescing with the wind to give Red the sense of dread that morning mass often gave him. There was no litany, simply the mass of harmonies that would worry anyone.
Jonny broke the sounds up first. “You hear it Red?”
“Ye,” Red grunted. “Whaddya suppose is…”
Red’s dog investigated the sound first, skipping over the rocks in an attempt to find this new friend of his. Red and Jonny packed up their lunches and followed the dog’s incessant barking to an old shack of gray wood. The shack was leaning from the wind, warped boards in a shambled state. The slats left enough room between each other to forget their purpose, whispering as the wind passed through. Three figures, dressed in purple clothes, created the murmur which had now become a dull roar. Red shivered, though he was warm and insulated from the Colorado winds. The golden Lab’s barking hadn’t stirred the humming strangers, nor were they even aware of the companions’ presence. Until Jonny’s size thirteen feet snapped a twig that had fallen among the dust and pebbles. The humming stopped, and the shadowy faces all turned to face the newcomers.
Red could see now that all three of the plum-colored chanters wore gilded masks, with dark eyes and three tendrils attached where typical masks would have held a mouth. He tried defusing the clear and unspoken tension; they had interrupted something important to these masked men.
“Hey there,” his arm shook ever so slightly as he tried to wave feebly. “Just passin’ through. Be out of your, erhm, hair in just a moment.”
“Sorry to disturb you folks,” Jonny’s voice trembled slightly as he corralled Red’s dog, who had since stopped his barking and now emitted a low growl from his muzzle ever so quietly.
The wind was now thundering, whipping the boys’ uncovered ears. The masks simply stared back at them. Red decided to move, turning back towards the trail, his eyes to the ground when he heard the bedlam begin.
One of the robes had an antique weapon hidden beneath the deep purple folds, and now drew it upon Jonny. The combustion broke up the still-growing winds, as did the shattering of Jonny’s collarbone when the lead ball hit home. Red saw the blood eschew from the wound, splattering the rocks in red. The other two were upon him, muffling his screams with a sock that tasted like chemicals. It was the taste he imagined accompanying the smell of formaldehyde when he had dissected the frog carcass in Mrs. Williams eighth grade biology class. The other man, now revealed to be a huge brute, towered above both of the relatively large high schoolers. He kicked the dog swiftly, and Red cried out around the sock as he heard his poor dog whimper in pain. He felt a thump against his right temple, and felt his hot blood trickle down his neck as he slowly lost consciousness.
The cultists gathered up their trophies into the shack, not breathing a word among them. The woman cleaned and reloaded her antique flintlock, making sure there was no powder residue left of the well-oiled wood of the muzzle before placing it beneath the folds of her robes once more. The three resumed their humming, speaking an unintelligible string of words around their tentacled altar. Once they had finished their prayer, the Brute slung the two wards onto his back, ensuring the weight was distributed evenly for the journey down the mountain.
As the three trekked back down the western slopes of t. Herman, forgoing any trail, the wind lashed all around them, and it began to snow. The flag was ripped from its pole in the tumult, and flew down towards Monument, Colorado as the first snowstorm of the winter hid the footprints of the kidnappers from even the most talented hunters.
