Chapter 18: The price of life

Dawn was a cruel reminder that the world kept turning, indifferent to what had happened to them.

Myeong, Jason, Ethan, Ryan, and Sasha hadn't slept a wink all night. They didn't even know how they'd managed to get back to the house after the accident. Everything was a blur of screeching tires, wailing sirens, and the dry sound of Chloe's flesh being pierced by metal.

Now, hours later, they stood in the lobby of a cheap hotel in downtown Salem, their bags barely packed and the feeling that if they blinked, someone else would die.

O'Brien greeted them in the lobby, his expression hardened and his uniform wrinkled. He looked like he hadn't slept either.

"We're going to keep moving until I can get you out of here," he stated bluntly. "A storm is coming. It will intensify in the next 48 hours, and I don't want you in Salem when the worst of it hits."

Myeong's mother nodded, her eyes red-rimmed. She had cried silently all night, but now she was in survival mode.

"Thanks, Detective. I don't know what we'd do without your help."

O'Brien snorted.

"Don't thank me yet. If the storm catches us before we get out, we'll be stuck here."

The group shared a tense look. They didn't want to be trapped in Salem.

"Pack light," O'Brien added. "We'll be leaving in less than an hour."

He left without waiting for a reply.

No one said anything for a few seconds.

Then Ryan slumped into one of the lobby chairs, rubbing his face with his hands.

"Great. Now we're a fucking traveling circus."

No one laughed.


Finally, it was Jason who broke the silence.

"It should have been me."

His voice was barely a whisper, but everyone heard it.

Ethan frowned.

"Don't start with that..."

"No. I was next. Maddie died when it was her turn, and I..." Jason swallowed. "I should be dead."

Myeong closed her eyes for a moment. Bludworth's words echoed in her head.

"For every death there is a life, and for every life there is a death."

When she opened her eyes, her mind was already racing.

"When we saved Jason... we messed up the list again."

The others looked at her.

"What?" Sasha asked.

"Think about it. Maddie died when it was her turn. Jason was supposed to go next. But when we saved him, Death... jumped to the next one on the list."

The air in the room seemed to get heavier.

"Chloe." Ryan clenched his jaw. "Shit."

"That means..." Ethan exhaled. "That we can still cheat Death."

"Yeah," Myeong nodded. "If we manage to keep saving each other at just the right moment..."

"You can't escape Death forever." Ryan interrupted her in a grave tone. "Sooner or later, it'll catch up with us."

Silence.

Everyone knew it.

Ethan looked at Sasha, trying to find some hope in her face.

"So what do we do?"

Sasha, seeking to ease the tension, blurted out with a tired smile, "Well, Bludworth mentioned something about a 'new life,' but... I don't have any plans to get pregnant yet."

The joke was absurd, but it was enough to elicit a nervous laugh from the group.

It didn't last long.


From that moment on, every little detail became a potential threat.

In the hotel parking lot, Ryan almost stepped on a crack in the sidewalk just as a poorly secured scaffolding wobbled overhead. On pure instinct, he stepped back just in time to avoid a loose nail falling on his face.

At the gas station where they stopped to refuel, Myeong noticed a gas leak on the ground near a lit cigarette butt. She quickly pushed Jason out of the way before he could step on it.

On the highway, a sudden gust of wind hit the SUV as they passed a truck hauling poorly secured steel pipes. The tie-down straps slackened dangerously, but the truck swerved onto the next exit before anything could happen.

Every minute felt like a deadly challenge.

Every shadow, every sound, every coincidence reminded them that they were living on borrowed time.

That night, they stopped at another hotel.

As they settled into their rooms, Myeong looked at the others. They had survived another day.

But the question still lingered.

How much longer could they continue to flee their final destination?