In the dead of night, high up in the Rockies, my flashlight beam swept over five lifeless bodies inside the SUV. My hands trembling, I dialed 911. My voice was hoarse, shaking as I spoke. "Hello? I'm on the mountain pass... Highway 550. Everyone in my car... they're all dead." The dispatcher responded immediately. "Sir, please state your exact location. Help is on the way." My voice felt like a frozen stone hitting the pavement—hard, cold, emotionless. "I'm at the scenic turnout about five miles east of the summit. The license plate is CO-318X. Five people inside are dead." "I am the only one left alive." 1. It took over an hour for the piercing wail of sirens to shatter the silence of the desolate wilderness. I was huddled behind a boulder about fifty feet from the car, wrapped in a mud-stained windbreaker, clutching a dead power bank like a lifeline. The coroner, state troopers, and local detectives arrived almost simultaneously. There were six of us on this road trip through the mountains. Now, five corpses were frozen in twisted, unnatural positions, held in place by seatbelts and stiff limbs. Jessica, our team leader, had her head slumped against the steering wheel, forehead resting on the horn that made no sound. Chloe, in the passenger seat, had her mouth half-open as if screaming, eyes bulging in terror, staring into the dark. In the back, Ashley, Morgan, and our photographer, Hannah, were contorted—some curled up, some leaning back. Their expressions were frozen masks of agony or confusion. There were no obvious external wounds. It was as if life had been ripped out of them in a split second. I couldn't look anymore. My stomach churned, bile rising in my throat. My face was ghost-white. A cop wrapped in a heavy duty jacket shone his flashlight in my face. "You're saying you guys celebrated yesterday? Had a few drinks, planned to hit the city today? You fell asleep, and when you woke up, they were like this?" I shivered violently, nodding. "Yes." "What time did you fall asleep?" I tried to dig through my frozen brain. "Around ten, maybe? Just after we crossed the pass. I was exhausted." "What was the last thing you saw?" "Hannah was taking photos of the stars. Jess was driving. Morgan and Ashley were talking about the route. Chloe... Chloe looked like she had altitude sickness. She was just closing her eyes." The officer’s gaze was sharp as a knife, pinning me down. "They're all dead. Why are you fine?" I looked at him, blank and confused. Yeah. Why are they dead, and I'm alive? I stood on that 12,000-foot ridge with them. I drank the same whiskey. I was just as tired. But they were dead. And I was breathing. Seeing my silence, the officer’s voice softened, but the suspicion remained. "Anything else you can tell us?" I hesitated, whispering, "One thing... I don't know if I was hallucinating. After I fell asleep, I thought I heard someone calling my name... saying it was cold. So cold." "Did you wake up then?" I stared blankly and shook my head. Fear had wiped my memory. I didn't remember waking up, seeing the bodies, or getting out of the car. When I came to, I was already on the phone with 911. Seeing how weak I was, they stopped questioning me and put me in the back of a warm cruiser. Dawn broke. Through the window, I watched the forensics team working. "Preliminary assessment: Cause of death is complex," a medical examiner said, taking off his outer gloves. His voice was muffled by the wind. "Highly suspect acute altitude sickness triggering cardiac arrest or cerebral edema. Possible overlay of carbon monoxide poisoning or flash hypothermia." "Because of individual differences, some might have passed out instantly, others might have suffered. Time of death is concentrated between 1 AM and 3 AM." Listening to this, the lead detective—Detective Miller—turned his head. His eyes locked onto me. "You were in the car. Same altitude, same temperature." I nodded, my throat tight. Miller stared at me, scrutinizing. But he didn't press that point. He switched angles. "Are you sure you slept from 10 PM straight through? You didn't wake up once? You noticed nothing?" I rubbed my pounding temples. "I don't think so. The altitude hit me hard. I took some meds and was out cold." Miller narrowed his eyes, thoughtful. "Detective," the ME called out. "The car wasn't airtight, windows were cracked. But the bodies... they're mostly peaceful, or frozen in sudden pain. No signs of a struggle consistent with violent asphyxiation." "Like they died in their sleep?" Miller lowered his voice. The ME nodded. "Here's the weird part. The doors." "All four doors and the trunk were locked from the inside. Central locking engaged. Keys in the ignition, engine off. Windows rolled up tight except for a sliver on the passenger side." "So," Miller looked around at the jagged cliffs, "when this happened, the car was a steel coffin locked from the inside." "No forced entry. Nobody got out." I hugged the wool blanket tighter, my knuckles turning white. The "steel coffin" metaphor made me feel like I was suffocating. Why did they lock the doors? Usually, when parked, you don't lock up like that so people can hop out to use the bathroom. "We'll check for mechanical failure," the ME said. "Carbon monoxide leak from the heater is possible, but unlikely. We're leaning towards environmental causes." Miller closed his notebook and looked at me again. "Was anyone sick during the trip? Before you got in the car?" I paused. "Chloe had bad altitude sickness. She threw up at the summit and slept most of the time. Jess mentioned chest pains while driving, but she said it was an old issue." A tech officer walked up. "Detective, the dashcam SD card is missing." "Slot's empty. We searched the car. It's gone." Miller's sharp gaze snapped back to me. "You know about the dashcam? Where's the card?" I shook my head, looking lost. "I was in the back seat, squeezed in the corner. I didn't pay attention. I just slept." "What about before the trip? Who checked the gear?" "Usually Jess or Hannah. Hannah's the photographer, she handles the tech." Miller stared at me. No malice, just crushing pressure. "It's strange, Ethan. You wake up, everyone's dead. You noticed nothing for hours. You don't know where the SD card is." "It seems the only thing you know is that you're alive. Everything else is a blank." I looked at him with fearful, innocent eyes. "Detective... the altitude meds knocked me out. I don't drive. I really don't know where the card is..." Miller stopped the questioning. The bodies were transported. There was a mountain of work to do. I was taken to a temporary holding room at the local ranger station. The heater was blasting, but I couldn't feel the warmth. Hours later, Miller returned. He placed a DSLR camera on the table in front of me. It was Hannah's baby—she never let it out of her sight. Now it was splattered with mud. "Listen to this." He hit play, his eyes glued to my face, hunting for a micro-expression. The audio from the internal mic was fuzzy, full of static and wind noise, but the voices were clear enough to cut glass. First, violent coughing and dry heaving. Then, Jess's hoarse screaming. "Shit... can't breathe... open the window! Open the damn window!" The sound of fists pounding against the door panels. Then Ashley's voice, high-pitched with terror: "I can't! It's jammed! Central lock isn't responding! Jess! Jess, what's wrong with you?!" Morgan screaming, crying: "She's having a heart attack! She's seizing! Hannah! Phone! No signal! Help us!" In the chaos, heavy breathing and the clicking of camera buttons. Hannah was trying to use the camera as a light source... or to record something. In the background, a faint moan from Chloe: "Cold... so cold..." And then, in the final ten seconds of the recording, amidst the dying gasps and despair, Hannah’s voice erupted. A final, hysterical scream using the last of her strength: "ETHAN! WAKE UP!!! WAKE THE FUCK UP!!! LOOK WHAT YOU DID!!!" 2. Click. The recording ended. Dead silence filled the room, save for the crackling of the wood stove. My mind went blank. Hannah's final, cursed scream replayed in my head like a bomb blast. "I don't know... I was asleep... I swear I didn't hear anything!" "Hannah's camera was on, sitting on her lap. That recording starts at 1:33 AM and ends at 1:46 AM." Miller leaned forward, his presence looming over me like a mountain. "In the recording, in their final moments, they were screaming your name." "Especially Hannah. She was convinced you knew what was happening. She believed this was your doing. Explain that." "I don't know!" I snapped my head up, my voice shrill with panic I didn't realize I had. "I was asleep! I woke up and they were dead! I don't know why she said that! I didn't do anything! She was yelling at me to wake up too, right?" Miller saw my agitation and softened his tone, though his eyes remained cold. "Okay. Let's try this. You said you heard someone calling your name in a dream. Tell me about that." I slumped back in the chair, drained. "I felt... tugging. Shaking. Someone telling me to wake up... It was loud, chaotic. I felt sick. My consciousness was fading in and out. It felt like a nightmare." Miller picked up the camera, his voice terrifyingly low. "Did it ever occur to you that it wasn't a dream?" "That they were desperately begging you to wake up, and you... you just didn't respond?" A chill crawled up my spine. The blurred images from my "dream" suddenly sharpened into high definition. I could see Jess's twisted face pressed against the steering wheel. Chloe's pale, bloodless skin. Hannah raising her camera in the dark, pointing it at me with rage and accusation... "Why didn't you wake up?" Miller's voice was an ice pick. "They drank the same booze. They had the same sickness. They all woke up. Only you slept like the dead." "Even with altitude sickness, you weren't in a coma—otherwise you'd be a corpse right now from hypoxia. So why, when they were screaming and shaking you, were you the only one oblivious to mass death?" Yeah. Why couldn't I wake up? Why am I the only one breathing? What happened during those lost hours? Terror flooded my brain. My heart raced. "How was your relationship with them?" Miller pivoted again. I took a deep breath, trying to find calm. "We met online. A hiking group. It was fine. Jess was the leader, experienced. Hannah loved photos. Ashley and Morgan were social. Chloe was weak but nice." "Any conflict? Even small ones?" I hesitated. "Yesterday at the checkpoint... my ID photo had an issue. We got held up for twenty minutes. Jess was annoyed. She called me 'dead weight.' It was awkward, but it blew over." "And the others?" "Ashley smoothed it over. Morgan stayed quiet. Hannah played with her camera. Chloe was sick, sleeping." "Did they exclude you?" He pressed harder. "Collective bullying?" I went silent. Memories I'd suppressed bubbled up. My suggestions on the route ignored. Getting food last. Standing on the far edge of every group photo. Yeah. I guess that's exclusion. Miller saw my silence. He pulled out an evidence bag containing Hannah's phone. He opened WeChat and pulled up a group chat named "Suicide Squad 318." There was a message sent at 12:15 AM. Jess: Stay sharp. Once we cross the pass, we're good. I'll drive the second leg. Let that Twig sleep till he rots. Can't count on a wimp like him for anything. Useless dead weight. Replies followed: Ashley: K. Morgan: Copy that. Hannah: Yep. Ten minutes later, they entered the death zone. Half an hour later, the recording started. I stared at the words "Twig," "rot," and "dead weight." My blood ran cold. To the leader, I was just trash. My face darkened, lips pressed into a thin white line. Miller slid a tablet across the table. "Did you know there were two group chats?" I looked up, confused. "There's the 'All Hands' group with you in it for splitting bills. And then there's this one." Miller tapped the screen. "This is where they roasted you. Planned around you. Are you telling me you felt none of that hostility?" The screen's glow illuminated my stunned face. Of course I felt it. In Litang, when the hostel was full, Ashley typed: "Having a guy is annoying. Should we handle him like the last one? His watch looks expensive..." When I lagged behind due to the altitude, I heard Jess whisper to Hannah: "If he keeps slowing us down, we ditch him at the next stop..." I didn't know exactly what they meant, but the malice in their eyes? That was real. "Ethan, were you angry at them?" Miller put the tablet away, watching me. "Yes," I rasped. "Did you ever, for a split second, wish something bad would happen to them? Or that this trip would end? Even in an extreme way?" His question cut straight to the bone. I looked up, meeting his gaze. "I resented how they treated me, but I didn't hurt them! Just because you can't find the killer doesn't mean you can frame me!" "But I have evidence that you're lying," Miller sneered. He slid a photo across the table. It was from Hannah's camera—the picnic at Ranwu Lake. I was sitting on a rock at the far edge, wrapped in my jacket, looking spacey. No smile. The others were crowded around the mat. Jess with a bottle, Hannah throwing up a peace sign, Ashley and Morgan fighting over a cookie. Chloe was wrapped in a blanket, sleeping. They were a warm, tight circle. I was background noise. "You said you fell asleep at 10 PM. The timestamp on this photo is 11:15 PM. You were awake. You were with them." "Ethan, you've been lying from the start. You are the killer." 3. I stared at myself in the photo, my pupils dilating in disbelief. I looked up at Miller, trembling. "Detective, how can you suspect me? I'm a survivor, but I'm also a victim! Just because of a photo? That's slander! Do you know how traumatizing this is?" "I said I probably slept around ten. I didn't say exactly! My brain was foggy! And look at me—I'm skinny, I'm sick. How could I kill five fitness-obsessed women who all outweigh me?" Miller stared dead at me. "Yeah. It does seem unlikely." Suddenly, the ME walked in and handed a freshly printed report to Miller. "Her time of death doesn't match the others." He circled Chloe's name with a heavy red pen. I sat up straight as if pricked by a needle, eyeing the report. Miller caught my reaction. "Explain." The ME opened the file, voice raspy. "Rectal temp, rigor mortis, corneal clouding... everything is different. She died significantly later than the other four." "Given the environment, we estimate she survived nearly two hours longer than the rest." Silence filled the room. "Also," the ME continued, "She didn't have altitude sickness. Blood oxygen, organs... normal. She wasn't sick. She couldn't have been comatose." Every eye in the room turned to me. My blood froze. "Impossible! Chloe was sick the whole time! She was huddled in that blanket!" I shouted, my voice cracking. "The photo! Look at the photo! She looks terrible!" "True, she looks weak in the photo," Miller admitted, glancing at it again. The ME was firm. "Physiology doesn't lie. She was healthy. And she died of cyanide poisoning. It was murder." Miller looked back at me. "Is it possible Chloe was acting?" A chill shot up my spine. Chloe was faking it? Why? "So... Chloe is the real killer?" I asked, voice trembling. "But why spare me?" Miller smiled, a cold, humorless thing. "Exactly. Why spare you? She didn't even spare herself." "Ethan, did you know these people before?" "No! Just internet strangers! I never thought this would happen..." My mind was a blender. "Did you know Chloe had a grudge against anyone?" I thought hard. "Jess stole Chloe's boyfriend a while back. But Chloe said it was fine. She said, 'It's just a man, let Jess have him.'" A terrifying thought bloomed in my mind. "Are you saying... Chloe killed the other four for revenge, then committed suicide out of guilt?" Miller nodded slowly. "That's a valid theory." "But I found something interesting, Ethan. The bodies were twisted, yes. But their hands... they were all arranged in a specific gesture. A gesture of atonement. Who were they apologizing to?" "I... I don't know! I swear!" My voice shattered. "I didn't see any gestures! I was scared out of my mind! I ran! I hid!" I babbled, trying to use chaos to mask my panic. "Ethan!" Miller's voice boomed like thunder. "Look at me! Answer the question! What does that gesture mean? Who did they wrong?!" His shout broke me. I shuddered violently. Under the crushing pressure, a desperate cry tore from my throat: "I don't know! Maybe they found a conscience! Maybe right before they died, they realized they were wrong! Wrong about what they did to my brother..." I clamped my hand over my mouth. My eyes widened to the point of pain. FUCK. I screamed internally. I blew it. The silence in the interrogation room was heavier than gravity. It's over. The thought drowned me like icy water. Three years of planning. The stalking. The calculation. The perfect escape. Ruined by one slip of the tongue? Miller didn't pounce on the mention of my brother. Instead, he reached into a drawer and pulled out a clear evidence bag. My eyes, filled with dread, locked onto it. Inside lay a photo. Small, edges worn. A color print. A man standing on a hillside covered in wildflowers. White casual wear. Smiling. Pure. Like sunlight. Evan. My brother. My only blood. How is that here? I hid it... Terror spiked. I grabbed the muddy backpack I'd been clutching this whole time. The secret compartment. Sewn between the waterproofing and the lining at the very bottom. I put it there myself before we left! How did they find it? Why is it in a police bag? Miller spoke. "Ethan. You hid this photo very well. Waterproof material. Double stitched." Slowly, deliberately, he flipped the bag over. The back of the photo was now facing me. No date. No name. Just four words written in red marker. Blood for Blood. BOOM. My mind exploded. The mask was gone. "We ran a check. Your brother joined a hiking group three years ago. Same route. Coincidentally... he was teamed up with these exact five women." "He went missing. Never found. Ethan... don't you think that's too much of a coincidence?" "AHHHH!!!" A scream, inhuman and raw, tore out of my chest. I launched myself out of the chair, diving for the table, clawing for the bag. My eyes were bleeding red. Tears, snot, saliva—I was a mess. "Give him back! Give him back to me!!" I roared, scrabbling at the plastic. Miller was ready. He swept the bag behind him and pinned me down by the shoulders. "Get off me! Give me my brother!" I struggled like a trapped animal. Miller barely held me. "You don't get to touch him! You're not worthy! He's clean... he's pure... he shouldn't hear this!" "Don't talk about this in front of him! Don't dirty his ears!" "They deserved to die! They were animals! No, worse than animals!" "They destroyed him!!" 4. I sobbed hysterically, body convulsing with grief and rage. "Those monsters! My brother was nineteen! He just graduated high school! He was kind! At 15,000 feet, in Death Valley, he was starving, but he gave his last half of a compression biscuit to Hannah because she was crying about being hungry!" "He gave his only oxygen tank to Morgan because she faked dizziness! And he had a splitting headache! He gave his sleeping bag to Jess because she was cold! He slept in a thin jacket in the corner at below-zero temps! And what did he get?!" My voice cracked, filled with venom. "What did he get?! Those wolves in human skin! They saw he was weak! They saw he couldn't fight back! They... they..." The pain choked me. I gasped for air. "They drugged him... They used him to keep warm... in that freezing car! My brother bled out... he died with his eyes open!" "He didn't understand! He gave them everything! Why... why did they do that to him?!" I glared at Miller, hatred radiating off me. "And then? Once they were fed and warm? They took his valuables. They smashed his face in with a rock so he couldn't be identified!" "They threw him... like garbage... off the deepest cliff in Death Valley!!" I curled into a ball, digging my nails into the table. "I looked for him. For three months! I climbed every rock under that cliff! I only found... I only found pieces of his backpack... and..." I choked. "And a piece of his skull." I hammered my chest, wailing. "They didn't even leave me a body to bury! They wouldn't even let me hug him one last time!!" My screams dissolved into uncontrollable sobbing. I slumped in the chair, broken. A hollow shell filled with sorrow. The room was silent. Miller loosened his grip. His eyes held shock, and maybe a sliver of pity. Blood for Blood. The motive was clear. "So you killed them?" I looked up through blurry eyes. "I said they deserved to die. I didn't kill them... I hadn't made my move yet. They just died! It was karma!" "I have nothing to hide now. I planned to kill them... but I don't know why they died early." "Ethan." Miller's voice changed. The interrogation tone was gone. It was eerily calm. I looked at him. He pulled out another item. A phone. Screen shattered. Covered in mud and dried brown stains. Heavy-duty outdoor case. Chloe's phone. My pupils shrank to pinpricks. Impossible! I got rid of it! I remembered prying it from her stiff dead fingers and chucking it into the abyss! How is it here?!
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