“George!” My mother yelled as she opened my door, “Do you have your things ready?” “Yes, Mom.” I said as I walked out of my room and began to walk towards the front door. I grabbed my two suitcases and rolled them. We were out of the house and driving to Portland International Airport. We had left a few hours before our flight, and since our flight was at Midnight, I used the driving time to sleep in the backseat. Unfortunately for my father, he had to drive us all the way from our home in the southernmost part of Oregon, to Portland, which was at the opposite end of the state. Nevertheless, we made it on our flight and began the long flight to Cincinnati International Airport, which is ironically in Northern Kentucky. From there, we picked up a car in Cincinnati we had bought before the move. Then, we drove South for some time until we were finally in our new home, a ranch style house about 220 miles east of Nashville, in a place where the Appalachian Mountains were literally right behind us, without actually being in the mountains.
About Five years later, I was 16 years old, and I had plenty of Friends as I had been settled in the local community for a while. One day, about a week before Thanksgiving, my parents went out for the weekend, as they were Flying back to Portland to visit some family. And as you do, I invited four of my friends, Jimmy, Albert, Frank, and my best friend of all, Peter. I had recently gotten my first car, a 2007 Ford F-150, with 4 doors. And honestly, my parents were pretty loaded to by me a large vehicle like that at my age. Anyway, after by parents left around 6:30, I called up my buddies, and we agreed to meet at a gas station uptown. Not to get gas, of course, but so I didn’t have to go to each of their houses to pick them up. When I got there, I turned off the truck and stepped out.
“Howdy, George,” Peter said as he walked towards me with his hands in his Jean pockets. As soon as Peter greeted me, all my other friends just happened to show up. I don’t know exactly how they got there, but my guess was that their parents dropped them off. After some short greetings, we got in the truck and left. Being country boys, we were into country roads, and going fast. As I got up to 65 miles an hour on a straight country road that strayed from town, one that specifically goes straight to my house near the mountains, The three guys in the backseat, Jimmy, Albert and Frank, told us they had all brought their hunting rifles. And upon hearing this, I slowed down to 40 so I’d be at a safe enough speed to focus on conversing.
“Hold on,” I said, “Do you really intend to use those?”
“Maybe…” Frank said, with a chuckle.
By the time we got to my house, it was 6:55 and we were getting hungry, and as hungry teens do, we all chipped in some money and ordered a few pizzas.
Since they were my guests, I felt a responsibility to grab their things from the truck for them; really though, I was getting their guns. I carried one rifle at a time, one was Jimmy’s, one was Frank’s, and one belonged to Albert. Unsurprisingly to myself, Peter hadn’t brought a rifle, as me and him are good enough friends to where I trust him with one of my rifles.
“Alright guys,” I said, shutting the door behind me, “I got all your guns. Is that everything?”
“Nope,” said Albert, who was loading his rifle with ammunition, which is very unsafe I might add,
“Jimmy brought a whole lot of beef jerky, or some weird shit like that.” Albert explained, giving Jimmy the side eye, like he was some kind of weird creature.
Jimmy is a rather large fellow, bigger than us all, and he tends to do odd things like that. Albert, who is his brother, will say he’s just weird, but Jimmy would tell you he’s not weird, but rather intelligent. Regardless, I don’t really think it’s my business to decide whether Jim is weird, or smart.
Deciding not to further engage in the discussion, I simply went back outside, and walked over to the truck. I opened the back left door, where Jimmy sat, and I looked under his seat. And lo and behold, there were 5 bags of 1 pound of beef jerky.
“Damn right he brought a whole lot!” I said to myself as I carried the bags to the front door, struggling to use my free hand and open the door. As I walked in, I noticed everybody was quiet. Their eyes were wide, and they seemed to be looking at the television. They were looking at the news channel, and the headline read, “5 MISSING PEOPLE IN UNICOI COUNTY.”
A news reporter stood in front of a screen with five people on it, their names attached to an image of each of them. One of them, was my neighbor’s daughter, about my age.
Allison Davidson.
And then the news reporter, Henry Jackson, said something that made my stomach twirl.
“According to eyewitness accounts,” he said, stopping mid-sentence, “4 of the 5 missing people were last seen walking into the mountains on the side of Interstate 26.” He continued, “Though not as a group. If you have any information, call the number at the bottom of your screen.”
The number stayed there for 15 seconds; 15 seconds I took to write it down.
And then, it flipped from news to a toothpaste commercial.
At the moment though, I finally realized all the guys that originally were watching, were all outside smoking cigarettes, at least that’s what I thought until I went outside to check on them.
All 4 of them; Jimmy, Albert, Frank, and Peter, were looking at something in the distance that caught me off guard.
A fire.
“Holy shit.” said Frank as he turned to face me, “Do you know anything about this?”
“Absolutely not.” I replied, as I felt the blood drain from my face. They all turned to look at me, and I said,
“Get your fuckin’ rifles.”
They stood there, perfectly still.
“Did I stutter?”
“Oh- sorry.” Frank said, “Follow me, guys.”
About a minute later, all of them returned to the back deck, rifles in hand.
“Alright,” Jimmy asked, “What’s the plan?”
“I say we go circle around the area, and make sure there isn’t some dipshit playing jokes on us.” I said as I loaded my rifle.
“Sounds good,” said Peter, “Let’s get going.”
And so, we broke up into groups. Albert, Frank, and Jimmy were in one group, and me and Peter were in another.
Albert, Frank, and Jimmy checked out the area of the property to the right of the fire, and Peter and I checked out the area to the left of it.
As we walked over to the woods that were to the left, (the entire backyard was forested by the way, so the fire would’ve looked like someone was camping there.
We continued to search, crunching leaves as we did so. When suddenly I heard what sounded like a scream of terror, and then a loud BANG, all coming from the other side of the property, by a creek called Frederick’s creek.
And then Peter turned to me and said, “RUN!” and we began to take off, rifles in hand. Once we made it to the back door, we banged on it and Albert let us in.
The guys were all sitting at kitchen table by the back door, with their rifles leaned against the walls. They were all panting, probably because they had just run as fast as possible back to the house.
“What the hell happened?” I asked Jimmy, who seemed to be keeping the most composure.
“Some sick fuck tried to grab my neck- so I shot him in the shoulder.” Frank said, interrupting us.
“Well, you probably missed.” Said Albert jokingly.
“This isn’t a fucking joke, asshole.” Said Frank, clenching his fists.
At that moment, somebody ringed our doorbell. It was a pizza delivery driver, a skinny black guy with a nametag that read, Patrick.
“20.62.” He said as he held out the pizza.
“Hold on, I got to get my money out.” I said as I walked to my room, intending to get my wallet.
When I returned to the door, the delivery driver was peeling out and speeding off down the road in his little Ford focus hatchback, and the pizza was sitting on the front deck.
“Why did he leave?” I asked as I turned to my friends.
“I don’t know, but he looked at the bushes by the driveway, and then he dropped the pizza and ran away. Said Jimmy, opening a Dr. Pepper from the fridge. I just decided to grab the pizza and close the door. We sat down and ate for a while, before we decided to clean up everything.
I looked out the back door, and I saw something that will haunt me to this day. There, standing about 5 feet away from the back door, was a hooded figure, about 6’1”. I couldn’t see its face, but I knew that it was a man. its build, it’s body language. He had dirty work boots and Beaten jeans. Along with a White hoodie. I could also see that it wielded a weapon, an axe.
At that moment, I was more afraid than I ever had been. I screamed, and in unison, all the guys, including me, aimed our rifles and fired, causing a massive BANG and sending glass to fly everywhere. As I would soon learn, we missed all our shots due to our Panic.
We bolted our rifles and ran out the door. I pulled out my keys and started the truck, and everybody piled in. I reversed onto the road, and absolutely flew down the road. I was almost reaching 75 miles an hour, when I saw a car in my rearview mirror, a white mid-2000’s Ford Econoline Cargo van. It was going just as fast as we were, so I decided to hit the gas even harder.
When we were almost 2 miles to town, our back windshield was shot out, sending glass everywhere. This lunatic must’ve stolen my dad’s pistol from my house or something. The guys in a back screamed in terror, and I went Pushed the gas even farther.
By the time we were within a mile to town, I was going 100 miles an hour, and when I checked my rear-view mirror, the van was gone. So, I decided to slow down to 60. That was a big mistake of mine.
About 10 seconds later, I once again saw the van in my rear-view. And it was too late for me to speed away.
He shot my rear tires, and I lost control and found myself in a ditch.
The Van pulled over, and the hooded man stepped out. With all of my strength, I pulled myself out of the sunroof, so half of my body was out of it. “FUCK YOU!” I yelled out. Upon hearing me cursing in his direction, the man walked over to me and pointed the stolen pistol at my face.
“Your death will not be in vain,” The man said, “Your sacrifice will make Lord Frederick very happy.”
I closed my eyes. I prepared for death. I remembered all my fun times with my father, my mother’s home cooked food, and most of all, my older brother Roger, who moved back to Oregon when he turned 18. and just as I was ready for death, I opened my eyes and I saw Peter rushing the man. He tackled him and punched him in the face multiple times. Eventually, the mysterious man Kicked Peter in his side, making him fall off. As Peter groaned in pain, the man walked over and began to kick Peter in his side multiple times, causing him to groan. However, in his rage, he had failed to notice that he’d accidentally kicked his gun right by the side of the truck. All I had to do was get the gun and kill the motherfucker.
I used all my strength to get out of the sunroof, launching myself onto the ground, landing on my shoulder.
“Ow, shit!” I said as I began to feel the pain in my shoulder. Regardless, I realized I had to get the gun. So, I stumbled to my feet. And picked up the pistol, a Colt 1911. Fortunately for me, and Unfortunately for Peter, He was still being beaten, so the man was distracted. I aimed at his head and shot. The bullet immediately entered his brain, killing him instantaneously.
The man fell onto the asphalt, and blood pooled around his head. I looked over to Peter, and he was battered and bruised.
“Thank you-“ He coughed, “I owe you everything, George.” He said as he stumbled to his feet.
When we checked on the rest of the guys, I realized that they’d been doing their own thing the whole time. the shattered glass had cut them really bad, since they were in the back, and not protected by a headrest. They had been recovering, groaning and swearing away. I told Peter to call an ambulance. I walked over to the man’s dead body as sirens wailed miles away, and I noticed something, something I hadn’t noticed before in my primal fear.
Carved onto his hand were the words,
Children Of Frederick.