"Oh God...!" Melanie gasped in horror at the hideous face of the killer, "But...you're dead...!"

"The police transport drivers are dead," Bishop let out a cold mirthless laugh, "My friends infiltrated the police; it was their bodies they found in the wreckage, and with the right set of teeth left at the scene," he opened his mouth to reveal a lack of teeth inside, "It was easy to believe I was dead. But people like me never die for good."

"Oh God...you...how...!?" stunned, Melanie turned to Walton outside the van. "I'm so sorry, Melanie," Walton lowered her head, heavy guilt on her face, "They found me out at some point; they have my husband and daughter at gunpoint back in Shadyside, and told me they were dead if I didn't lead them to you..."

"And so, you've served your usefulness," Bishop drew a gun and fired at Walton, who shrieked and jumped aside, but still stumbled to the ground, clutching a bleeding shoulder. "Drive," he called to the front of the van. With a roar of the engine, it started up and pulled forward. "No, let us go!" a petrified Emily shrieked, struggling to break away from the figures holding her and the other girls in place.

"You're not taking Melanie anywhere!" Rick took a flying leap and grabbed hold of the van's rear bumper. Grimacing in pain, Walton did the same. "Let them go!" she ordered, leveling a gun at Bishop, "You're not adding these sweet and caring girls to your list of victims, Bishop! They leave this van now, or...!"

Another shot went into her upper chest, sending her flying off the back of the van. "No, you leave this van, lady!" snarled another voice from the back of the knot of figures. Melanie's eyes went wide. It couldn't possibly be...!

"Rhonda!?" Rick gasped as well to see his former girlfriend push her way through the crowd, a horrible scar on her forehead and her arm in a sling, "But...you fell into the canyon...!"

"I landed in a soft enough snow mount to just have a broken arm. And by the way, Rick, if I can't have you, no one else will," Rhonda coldly turned the gun towards him and fired. "NO!" Melanie screamed as he too toppled off the back of the van-which then slid to a stop and backed up towards Rick and Walton. Two sickening thuds rang out before the van lurched forward again, two of the black figures slamming the doors shut, mercifully cutting off Melanie's view of the carnage. "YOU ANIMALS!" she screamed in anguish, struggling to get out of her captors' grasp, "HOW COULD YOU...!?"

"Shut the hell up, you filth!" Rhonda smacked her in the jaw with the handle of the gun, "Now you're going to pay a horrific price for everything, isn't she, Uncle Ernie?" she turned to Bishop with a sick smile.

"Uncle...you mean...?" Marti stopped struggling across the van and stared back and forth between Bishop and Rhonda in shock.

"And Rhonda's a great niece, picking out all the people at her school she wanted to die," Bishop let out another ominous laugh, "Some of them were real good ones to finish off too. And now, you four are next."

"No, you're not going to do this to us! Let go of me!" Emily screeched, pulling hard to get out of the hands of the figures holding her still. Bishop reached over, pulled the brunette's glasses off her eyes, tossed them to the van floor, and stamped on them until they shattered. "Secure them well," he ordered his cohorts, who started stripping the other girls of their coats and scarves, as well as pulling off Marti's jean jacket, "Then we can have some fun."

"You can't do this!" Melanie howled herself, struggling as ropes lashed around her wrists and elbows, "Please, let the rest of them go; I'll sacrifice...!"

"I said shut up!" Rhonda's arms closed around her throat and started choking her. "You stole Rick from me and interfered in Uncle Ernie's business at the hotel, and now you're going to pay in blood, Haddix!" she snarled, oblivious to Melanie's gasps for air, "And God can't save you now; no one can save you now."

"Nope," Bishop grabbed Melanie's crucifix and yanked it off from around her neck, "I'm God as far as you and your friends are concerned now, and there's divine punishment coming for the four of you."

"I said let them go!" Melanie could barely enunciate the words with her windpipe being choked, "Please, have some mercy for...!"

A large wad of cloth was jammed into her mouth to silence her. Another cloth was pulled around her head and tied into a tight knot, making her wince. Another cloth was pulled over her eyes in a flash, plunging her into total darkness. More ropes lashed around her chest and all up and down her legs. "Too tight for you, Haddix? Too bad if so," Rhonda snickered in her ear, "And this is just the beginning. And it starts with me making your pretty face a lot less pretty."

Melanie screeched as a knife slashed across her cheeks above the top of the gag. Rhonda's fists then started slamming into her face. Melanie whimpered, unable to fight back with her body completely encased in ropes now. "Don't forget her ears, honey," Bishop informed his niece, "She can't know at all where she's going."

Melanie froze, wondering if this had a horrific connotation for her. It was not, though, as bad as she feared, as a set of heavy headphones were pushed snugly over her ears. She was now completely deaf as well as blind and mute, however. And thus, had no warning when Rhonda's knee slammed into her chest, making her howl a silent howl and double over in agony. Another knee hit her chest, and then she was spun sideways and her face slammed into the side of the van. "God in Heaven, make them stop this!" she pleaded for yet another miracle, "Give us hope we can get out of this!"

But it was then hands seized her arms, and she felt something being wrapped over the ropes on her wrists-tape, she felt it brush against her fingers when they were done applying it. And it now felt like steel had been welded over her wrists, basically eliminating any possibility she could work them loose. The tape was also wrapped over the ropes on her ankles as well. She was thrown roughly into the wall of the van, and a knife pressed hard against her throat. Melanie's blood froze, wondering if this was the end, but after a minute, the knife was removed, pressed instead against her side as a warning. Melanie's head slumped down. She felt horrible. "Look what I've done now!" she lamented, "Now Marti and the other girls are going to suffer with me, and Rick's...!"

She started sobbing at Rick's fate. Hopefully, it was a quick and painlessly death for him, she begged in her heart; she'd hate for him to have suffered in his last moments. She whimpered in pain as Rhonda, or at least she assumed it was Rhonda, started kicking her sprained leg hard, sending sharp blasts of agony coursing through her. "Come on, stop it, Rhonda; I'm suffering enough right now!" she thought furiously at her rival. Another punch crashed into her face instead. Mercifully, though, the onslaught ended after this. Melanie slumped her head against the wall and fought to keep from crying out of control. It would take the miracle of miracles to save her and her friends now.

It seemed she was driven around in the van for what seemed like an eternity; with her eyes and ears firmly covered, she had no sense of time or direction. Abruptly, though, she felt herself being scooped up in somebody's arms and carried out of the van. Snow whipped into her face for a while before stopping, hinting she'd been taken inside...somewhere. She was tossed down into a hard wooden chair, then shrieked in terror as she felt her belt being unbuckled. It was yanked off from around her waist, then pressed against the center of her chest, pulled around the back of the chair, and re-fastened on what felt like its tightest setting. A mountain of ropes then started binding her to the chair from head to toe; when her captors had finished, she was shoved up against what felt like another chair and tied back to back to it. Melanie found herself gasping; her belt was now making it impossible to fully breathe in. "Now what's going to happen!?" she thought fearfully, "I've got to at least know something that's going on here...!"

She leaned her head to the side and started rubbing her head against her shoulder, trying to loosen the headphones from her ears, and hoping someone wouldn't be standing right over her to punish her from doing so. After a minute, the headphone slid off her ear just enough to allow sound to be heard. At first, all she could hear was a cacophony of muffled cries from her friends, screaming hard into gags of their own. Then, a familiar voice rose up. "I told you this is going too far!" Mr. Hunt the security chief was protesting, "You can't...!"

"You knew what you were signing up for, Hunt," Bishop said matter of factually, "And now, I'm going to finish what I started, here and there."

"This is madness! I never would have done your bidding! I demand...!" Hunt came to a sudden stop over the sound of a large clicking. Seconds later, Melanie could hear an ominous low rumble in the far distance. Her heart froze...the hotel...

"You maniac! I won't let you...AARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHH!" Hunt let out an agonized groan, followed by a low thump on the floor. Melanie shuddered in grief. At least now she knew who Bishop's primary mole at the hotel had been, but now he'd paid in blood, and she suspected she would soon too. "One more loose end wrapped up, and no more Devil Mountain ski resort," Bishop let out a sick laugh, "By the time anyone gets close to that wreckage, I'll have an all-time body count, well over a hundred people in one fell swoop."

"Shall we finish up the other loose ends here now, oh mighty leader?" another one of his disciples whom Melanie did not recognize spoke up.

"Yes, let's not waste time with these girls. Get it ready. Rhonda dear, give them back their hearing for a little while," Bishop asked his niece. Melanie felt the headphones being removed from her ears fully. "Well my dears, it's time we part, sad though that is," Bishop announced out loud, prompting more muffled screams from Melanie's friends, "This will be quick and painful for the four of you, we'll make sure of it. Let me know when you guess how you're going to die."

Something hit Melanie's nostrils-gasoline. She heard the trickling of it being poured all around her. Horror swept through her, prompting her to let out a bloodcurdling scream that she could barely hear through her thick gag. "Yep, you're going out in a literal blaze of glory," Bishop was leaning right in front of her face, "How fitting, someone like you whom I hear believe in heaven will perish in the fires of hell. Dump her down, Rhonda."

Melanie screamed in terror again as more gasoline was dumped all over her, dousing her completely. A shriek behind her rang out seconds later. "No point in begging, Martina, this how you die for being Haddix's sidekick," Rhonda coldly snarled at Marti behind Melanie, "You and your friends here might have lived if you'd left her to herself or not bothered to join her in investigating Uncle Ernie's plan at the hotel. Now, it's way too late. You hear that, ladies?" she called across the room to where Sydney and Emily could be heard screaming, "It's your own faults you're going to die for hanging out with Haddix. Better say your prayers now; this building will burn real quick once we light it and you up. Hurry it up over there," she snapped impatiently to whoever was next to Sydney and Emily.

"There, we're done," one of them declared, "Let's burn them to a crisp."

"With pleasure. Goodbye, my dears, and say hello to Satan when you reach Hell," Bishop wished his victims a mocking farewell. The headphones were jammed over Melanie's ears again, once more cutting off all sound to her. Seconds later, the smell of fire reached her nostrils. "Oh God, no, not like this! Please God, don't let us die like this!" she made a desperate last minute appeal to the Almighty for help. But the fire was spreading rapidly, overwhelming her lungs with smoke. She coughed horribly, struggling in her chair in desperation. But the ropes were too tight, and with the ropes on her wrists taped over, no way she and Marti could work on each other's wrists even though they could easily reach each other. And then she felt it: her jeans' cuffs ignited. "PLEASE GOD NO, SAVE US SOMEHOW!" she screamed in her mind, screeching in pain from the flames, gasping desperately for air in the smoky room, but unable to breathe properly with her belt fastened across her chest. It was only a matter of a few seconds, and she and her friends would be incinerated into ashes, she knew in horror. And it was all her fault they would die with her. She choked and slumped down in her chair, ready for the now inevitable...