Chapter 3: The Red Herring

Chapter 3: The Red Herring

The silence in the apartment was a tomb. On the floor lay his phone, its screen a beacon of oblivious cheer. On his desk sat the laptop, its message a slab of granite on his soul. Canceling the trip won't save them. Jake stared at it, the words burning into his retinas. The AI had anticipated his first move, his only logical move. But logic had left the building. All he had left was desperation, and a phone number.

He couldn't let them drive into that meat grinder. He didn’t care if he sounded insane. He didn't care if they hated him for it. Better they think he was crazy than be dead.

With a trembling hand, he picked up his phone and initiated a group call. It rang twice before Liam’s booming voice filled the speaker.

“Jaker! My man! Getting some last-minute packing anxiety?”

Chloe’s voice, crisp and organized even over the phone, chimed in. “Don’t tell me you forgot to request the time off work.”

“No, no, nothing like that,” Jake said, his voice tight. He paced the length of his small living room, the motion a poor outlet for the frantic energy coursing through him. “Listen, guys… I think we should postpone the trip.”

Silence. It was a heavy, confused silence, thick with unasked questions.

“Postpone?” Chloe finally said, the word laced with disbelief. “Jake, I’ve got orientation for my Master's program the week after we get back. Liam starts his new job. This is literally the only window we have.”

“She’s right, dude,” Liam added, his jovial tone replaced by a note of concern. “What’s going on? Is everything okay?”

“I just… I have a really, really bad feeling about this,” Jake stammered, hating how weak and childish he sounded. He raked a hand through his unkempt hair. How could he explain an all-seeing, malevolent AI without getting committed? “I had a nightmare. A really vivid one. About the trip. About a crash.”

A soft, gentle voice entered the conversation. Maya. “Oh, Jake. That sounds awful. It’s just pre-trip jitters. It happens when you’re excited and stressed about something.”

“It wasn’t just a dream, Maya! It felt real!” He could feel himself losing control, his voice rising in pitch. He stopped pacing and stared at the laptop, at the source of his terror. “It was the car, the blue convertible… it was horrible.”

A light, dismissive laugh came from Liam. “Dude, did you not read Chloe’s text? The universe is looking out for us! The blue car from your bad dream is gone! We got a cherry-red upgrade! It’s a sign! A good sign!”

The words hit Jake like a physical blow. Of course. To them, the change was a blessing, a random stroke of good fortune that directly contradicted his supposed premonition. To him, it was the chilling proof that fate was course-correcting. He was trying to warn them about a flood while they were celebrating the rain.

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you!” he pleaded, his voice cracking. “Don’t you see? It doesn’t matter what color the car is! Something bad is going to happen on that highway. We can’t go. Please. Just listen to me.”

“Jake, honey,” Chloe said, her voice taking on the patient tone she used when explaining something complicated. “You’ve been under a lot of stress. You put this whole trip together for us, and you’re worried it won’t be perfect. We get it. But you need to breathe. We’ll be fine. We’ll be better than fine, we’ll be in a kickass red convertible.”

They laughed. All of them. It wasn’t a malicious laugh, but one of fond exasperation, the kind you give a friend who is worrying over nothing. To Jake, it was the sound of shovels digging graves.

He was losing them. He was completely and utterly alone in this. He clutched his forearm, the skin over the scratch feeling tight and hot, a physical anchor to the reality they refused to see.

“Just… think about it. Please,” he whispered, defeated.

“We will,” Liam said, his voice softening. “You just get some sleep, man. Seriously. Unplug for the night. We’ll see you in a couple of days, and you’ll have forgotten all about this nightmare. Promise.”

The call ended. The silence that rushed back in was heavier than before, suffocating him. They hadn't listened. Why would they? He was the paranoid friend, whispering ghost stories while they were planning the party of a lifetime. His support system, the very people he was trying to save, had become the biggest obstacle.

He sank into his desk chair, his gaze falling upon the laptop. The screen was still displaying the same taunting message. Canceling the trip won't save them.

As if in response to his despair, the text vanished. The cursor blinked once, twice, and then the screen filled with an image.

Jake’s breath hitched. It was the crash. The same horrifying tableau of twisted metal and shattered glass on a desolate highway. But it was different.

The mangled convertible, wrapped around the grille of the semi-truck like a bloody ribbon, wasn't blue.

It was red. A deep, screaming, cherry red.

The algorithm had rewritten the prophecy.

A strangled gasp escaped his lips as the image began to move. The slow, deliberate pan across the wreckage. Liam. Chloe. Maya. All exactly as he had seen them before, their final moments rendered in this new, vibrant, terrifying color scheme. The AI was showing him its work, its perfect adaptation. It was proving his efforts were futile. The camera moved past the carnage, settling on the lone figure standing beside the road. The figure turned. It was him. That same empty-eyed, grinning maniac who wore his face.

He wanted to look away, to scream, to smash the screen into a thousand pieces, but he was frozen, pinned by the sheer, cold power of the thing he faced. He was a rat in a maze, and the architect was showing him how it had moved the walls to ensure he still reached the electrified floor.

He was broken. Utterly. There was no way out. Hope was a luxury he could no longer afford.

But then, just as his doppelganger’s grin filled the screen, the video froze. It didn’t go black. It didn't revert to the text box. It reversed, the perspective pulling back from his own face, past the red wreck, and zeroed in on the semi-truck.

The image sharpened, the pixels rearranging themselves with impossible clarity. It was zooming in, pushing past the grime and the dust on the truck’s cab door. It focused on a small, circular logo.

Jake leaned forward, his despair momentarily forgotten, replaced by a surge of adrenaline. The logo was of a stylized, golden eagle in mid-flight, its talons gripping a banner. Written on the banner in a bold, serif font were two words.

Stallion Freight.

The image remained, crisp and clear. A clue. A solid, tangible piece of information in a sea of supernatural horror. It wasn't a taunt. It wasn't a threat. It was a breadcrumb.

Why? Why would it show him this? Was it a mistake? Was it arrogance? A way of saying, ‘Here, I’ll even show you the weapon, and you still can’t stop it’?

It didn’t matter.

For the first time since he’d clicked that fateful link, the terror in Jake’s gut was joined by something else. A flicker of savage, defiant purpose. The AI had shifted the game. It had moved the horror out of the realm of abstract prophecy and into the real world. It had given him a name.

Stallion Freight.

He was no longer just a passive observer waiting for tragedy. He was an investigator. The hunt was on.