Chapter 2
Deja Vu
The third man watched from behind a rock, he watched Rick peaking around the corner of the house. He watched as Rick recoiled at what he had seen, and that made him smile. It made him smile because not long ago, two weeks maybe, it was hard to tell, he was the one peaking around the corner of the house.
"Come on, come on" the third man whispered. "Run off all scared like to the chapel and pray." He said it just as Rick stood up from the corner of the house, and ran towards the chapel.
Just then a grunt came from the right of the third man. He looked swiftly to his right where he had a man tied up with some rope he had found in the boat house. Of course now there was more rope in the boat house. Everything came back here. Soon enough Rick would find the boat house, and run, hoping desperately to get out of this place. He ran to the tied up man and slapped him hard across the face. Blood splattered from the man's already broken nose to the rocks beyond.
"There is no way out" the third man growled. "How many of you are going to think you have figured it out, and follow the same path like robots. HUH?" He grabbed the man by the hair and drug him into the woods.
**********
Rick was horrified. This all had to be a dream. This couldn't be real. Nothing here made sense at all, and he was positive he just seen another him talking to Jamie. He ran towards the chapel, as fast as he could run. The only thing he could think of was to pray. He had to get somewhere safe so he could think things through.
He swung open the door to the chapel, which made an exaggerated squeak, and jumped inside. His stomach rose to his throat as he looked around. Blood everywhere, people that looked like him laid slumped in the old pew's, and one with his feet tied to the rafters, had been sliced from scrotum to scalp. His blood dripping off his fingers into a puddle on the floor. It made a plopping sound, like a sink in the middle of the night that won't stop dripping.
Rick gagged several times and turned to vomit in the corner. His eyes fell on something that stopped him though. Vomit, lots of it, already laid in the corner. Rick took another look around, and realized that if blood still dripped from the body that hung upside down, then it must be a fresh kill. He opened the door, and saw what looked like an old boathouse sitting just to the right of the house. He thought about running toward it and changed his mind. He slowly closed the door and turned around.
Where is the smell, he thought. Why doesn't it smell like vomit, copper, piss, and shit in this chapel. He walked around, and though it really looked ugly, and gruesome in the chapel he found it was tolerable. He counted the number of Ricks in the chapel and there were five. Each had died in a different way. Neck slashed, head bashed in, one with a hole in his chest, one with his stomach open intestines laying across the pew, and the one hanging upside down.
Rick remembered the lamp, and the furniture in the house. The way it had always came back. But the furniture had disappeared when "broken" why hadn't Rick. If there were five of him laying in this chapel, how many more of him were out there? One thing he knew for sure is that he hadn't seen anyone else here except the kids, Jamie, and the Shadow man. Since Jamie, and the kids were pretty much oblivious to everything that went on, either the shadow man was slicing people up, or, and he gulped hard as he thought this, one of the Ricks was out there doing it.
He walked to one of the two windows of the small chapel and surveyed the tree line. His focus now changed from getting off this "island" to staying alive. There wasn't anything to see though. The trees were still, and there wasn't any wind at the moment. Not a branch moved. He looked toward the boat house, and thought maybe he could find a weapon there. He opened the door, took one more look around, and made a run for it.
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The third man stood still as a statue five feet in from the tree line, and watched as Rick opened the door and ran from the chapel towards the boat house.
'That's right' the third man though. 'Run from all those bad, bad bodies and find you a way off this island. Find you a weapon to protect yourself from the bad man.' He laughed at that thought, and turned back around. Tied up Rick in tow he didn't make any attempts to hide the noise as he stomped deeper into the forest.
He walked for probably half a mile before stopping at a deep ravine. Another grunt came from his side, and although it pleasured him, he decided against slapping him this time. He just turned on him and sighed.
"You know what I have to do now don't ya Rick?" The third man asked.
"Its not going to work you know, we are in her head." The tied up Rick said. "You can kill everyone of us and another will just come to replace him. You can even kill yourself. Her mind makes up for it."
The third man reached down, and grabbed his neck tightly.
"You think I don't know where we are? You think I haven't tried everything I know to try to get out of here? All I am doing is crowd control for you fucks. What if she does wake up huh? Where does that leave us? I don't need one of you assholes trying to convince her it's better to live her life, cause then it's the end of us pal. You hear me? YOU HEAR ME?"
It was to late though. He had squeezed to hard and to long. Rick was dead. With a huff the third man scooted him over and pushed him into the ravine. His body looked like a rag doll as it bounced, broke, and twisted down to its final resting place. It was hell, pure hell, and there wasn't any way out.
**********
Rick never actually made it to the boat house. He didn't see anyone watching him, but he felt it. He knew that out in those woods someone watched him intently. He waited until he ran out of view between the east side of the house, and the boat house, and made his way back to the corner. He stooped down and stayed very still, he held his breath so he could hear. It wasn't long before he heard someone tramping through the woods, and decided that probably is who he needed to follow. He ran quickly and quietly as he could into the woods.
Once in the woods he made a long arc around where he heard the sounds coming from. He stooped down and held his breath again. He heard some talking coming from not to far away. Staying stooped, and low to the ground he crept as close as he was comfortable with, and settled down to listen.
"I don't need one of you assholes trying to convince her it's better to live her life, cause then it's the end of us pal. You hear me? YOU HEAR ME?" He heard a voice say that sounded eerily like his own.
Her? What is he talking about. What the fuck is going on? Rick almost screamed and rushed in to demand an answer when he heard a thumping sound, like rocks rolling down a hill. He moved very slowly from tree to tree, eventually seeing what he had figured all along. Another Rick stood looking down on the edge of a ravine with a wicked smile on his face. The smiled raised bumps on the back of Ricks neck, and arms. He realized then that if he ever had to tango with this...crazy version of himself he would probably lose.
He moved closer to the edge, and when he got close enough to see into the bottom of the ravine he almost fainted, if that were possible here. Way down at the bottom of the ravine laid hundreds of dead Ricks. If not thousands.
