Two Girls Vanished in the Alaskan Forest — 3 Months Later, Hikers Found Tied to a Tree.

Mount Shasta rises alone in Northern California.

A massive white capped volcano standing apart from every other peak around it.

Even in midsummer, snow clings to its upper slopes, glowing faintly under the sun like a warning that never melts away.

From a distance, it looks calm, almost welcoming.

Up close, it feels different.

The forest thickens.

Sound dies quickly.

Wind moves through the trees without rhythm, as if the mountain is breathing on its own schedule.

For decades, Mount Shasta has been a destination for hikers, climbers, spiritual seekers, and tourists chasing photographs.

It is also a place with a quieter reputation.

Spoken about cautiously by rangers and search and rescue teams, people get lost here.

Some are found days later, confused, dehydrated, unable to explain where they’ve been.

Others are never found at all.

In official records, those cases are listed plainly.

Missing persons, presumed dead, cause unknown.

But among those who work the mountain long enough, there is a different understanding.

Shasta does not need storms or avalanches to take someone.

Sometimes people simply vanish between one step and the next.

In the summer of 2017, Mount Shasta claimed two more names.

Alyssa Moore was 25 years old.

She believed in preparation, structure, and logic.

To her, nature was not mystical or unpredictable.

It was complex, demanding, and dangerous, but manageable if you respected it enough.

She studied environmental science, kept meticulous packing lists, and trusted data more than instinct.

Hiking was not an escape for her.

It was a discipline.

Rachel Dunn was 23.

She approached the outdoors differently.

She photographed landscapes, not to document them, but to understand how they felt.

She kept handwritten journals, wrote down impressions that had no practical value, and paid attention to moments that couldn’t be measured.

She trusted her intuition even when she couldn’t explain it, especially then.

They had met during a university field course two years earlier and bonded quickly.

Not because they were similar, but because they weren’t.

Alyssa admired Rachel’s sensitivity even if she didn’t share it.

Rachel trusted Alyssa’s confidence even when it made her uneasy.

Together, they had completed multiple hikes across California, Oregon, and Washington.

Nothing extreme, nothing reckless.

Mount Shasta was meant to be the next step.

Friends later said the trip sounded reasonable.

two experienced hikers.

Late July, clear weather forecast, a defined route along the northern side of the mountain with plans to camp for two nights before returning.

Alyssa had printed maps and downloaded GPS coordinates.

Rachel packed extra camera batteries and a new notebook.

The only disagreement came days before they left.

Alyssa had decided not to rent a satellite phone.

Cell service on Mount Shasta was unreliable, but not entirely absent.

There were ridges where reception appeared briefly, and Alyssa believed they would remain close enough to marked trails to manage without emergency equipment.

She had weighed the cost, the inconvenience, the odds.

Rachel hesitated.

She didn’t argue.

She simply asked once, then again, quieter the second time.

Alyssa reassured her.

She always did.

On the morning they arrived, Mount Shasta was visible from miles away, its summit cutting cleanly into the sky.

At the ranger station, they filled out a trail registration form and spoke briefly with Mark Holloway, a ranger who had worked the mountain for over 20 years.

He scanned their paperwork, asked routine questions, and gave routine advice.

Weather, water, staying on trail.

When he mentioned communication equipment, Alyssa smiled politely and shook her head.

Mark paused longer than usual.

Shasta doesn’t announce when it changes, he said.

If something feels off, turn back.

Alyssa nodded.

Rachel remembered the sentence later.

At the time, it sounded like something rangers said to everyone.

They started up the trail just before noon.

Other hikers passed them in the first few miles.

Laughter carried through the trees.

Footsteps echoed on packed dirt.

The mountain seemed busy, alive with movement.

As the elevation increased, the forest grew denser.

The trail narrowed.

Voices faded.

By late afternoon, they reached their first campsite.

Rachel took photographs of the trees, their trunks dark and straight, rising like pillars.

Alyssa checked their position on the GPS and confirmed they were exactly where they planned to be.

That night, Rachel wrote in her journal by headlamp.

She noted the quiet how complete it felt.

No distant traffic, no animals, just wind moving through branches in a way she couldn’t quite describe.

Alyssa slept easily.

Over the next two days, they followed their route precisely.

They sent brief messages when they caught weak signal, photos of snow patches, a lava tube entrance half hidden by brush.

Their smiles were relaxed, confident.

Nothing suggested danger.

Nothing suggested urgency.

On the evening of July 28th, Rachel sent the last message anyone would receive from them.

It was short, casual.

A photo attached showing the slope below them, green, fading into shadow as the sun dropped behind the mountain.

There was no indication that it was a goodbye.

The second morning on Mount Chasta began with light filtering weakly through the trees, pale and diffused, as if the forest refused to fully wake.

Rachel noticed at first the air felt heavier than the day before.

Not warmer, not colder, just dense in a way she couldn’t articulate.

Sound traveled strangely.

When she zipped the tent, the noise seemed to disappear immediately, swallowed by the trees.

Alyssa checked the weather on her phone.

No signal.

She wasn’t concerned.

They had expected that.

The forecast from the day before still stood in her mind, clear, stable, nothing unusual.

They ate quietly and packed their gear with practice efficiency.

Alyssa led, following the trail markers and the GPS track.

Rachel lagged behind occasionally, stopping to photograph the way sunlight caught on patches of lingering snow, the sharp contrast between white ice and black volcanic rock.

The terrain changed as they moved higher.

The forest thinned in places, replaced by stretches of loose gravel and hardened lava flow.

In others, the trees closed in again, tighter than before, their branches interlocking overhead.

At times, the trail felt less like a path and more like a suggestion, a narrow line where footsteps had once passed.

Around midday, Rachel paused and looked back.

Alyssa had already rounded a bend in the trail, out of sight.

For a moment, Rachel stood alone, listening.

There were no birds, no insects, just wind brushing against stone.

She felt a sudden urge to call out.

Instead, she took a photograph.

Later, investigators would find it on her phone.

An image of empty trail, trees leaning inward, the path disappearing into shadow.

They reunited minutes later, and Rachel didn’t mention the feeling.

She told herself it was fatigue, the altitude, overthinking.

That evening, they camped near the entrance of an old lava tube.

Its opening partially concealed by brush and fallen branches.

Alyssa chose the site deliberately.

It was sheltered from wind and slightly elevated above a shallow basin where cold air collected overnight.

Rachel didn’t like the location.

She circled the area slowly, camera hanging unused at her side.

The opening to the lava tube was dark, the interior unreadable even with her headlamp.

She imagined sound traveling differently inside it.

I imagined voices carrying in ways that didn’t make sense.

Alyssa noticed her hesitation and asked if something was wrong.

It just feels closed in, Rachel said.

Like the mountain is watching.

Alyssa smiled, not dismissive, but confident.

It’s just geology, she said.

Lava flows, erosion.

There’s nothing here.

Rachel nodded.

She always did.

That night, sleep came harder for her.

She woke twice, certain she had heard movement beyond the tent.

Each time there was nothing, no footsteps, no animals, only the soft shifting of trees and the sound of Alyssa breathing steadily beside her.

On the third day, they climbed higher still.

Snow patches became more frequent, forcing them to step carefully along narrow edges where meltwater sllicked the rock beneath their boots.

Alyssa moved with precision, testing each step before committing her weight.

Rachel followed closely, her attention divided between her footing and the unease she couldn’t shake.

By late afternoon, they reached a ridge line with a brief partial view of the valley below.

For a moment, cell signal flickered into existence.

Rachel took the photo.

It was a wide shot, nothing remarkable.

Trees fading into distance, the slope of the mountain cutting diagonally across the frame, the light already beginning to fall away.

She attached it to a message and typed a single sentence.

Up high now, camping soon.

The message sent at 6:41 p.m.

That was the last confirmed communication from either of them.

Night came quickly.

Clouds moved in without warning.

Not thick enough to storm, but enough to erase the stars.

Temperatures dropped.

The wind picked up, sliding through gaps in the terrain and funneling sound unpredictably.

Alyssa double-checked their position on the GPS.

The device showed them exactly where they expected to be.

They ate in silence.

Rachel wrote one final entry in her journal.

It was shorter than the others.

There was no poetry in it.

No reflection.

Hard to sleep.

Feels like something is wrong, but I don’t know what.

Sometime during the night, the GPS stopped transmitting.

No one knows exactly when.

Back home, the silence went unnoticed at first.

Rachel’s brother, Daniel, expected updates to be sporadic.

He knew cell service was unreliable.

Alyssa’s mother assumed the same.

They had been reassured by previous trips, by experience, by the belief that preparation equaled safety.

By the morning of July 30th, the silence had grown heavier.

By the afternoon, concern turned into unease.

By evening, it became something else entirely.

At the Mount Shasta Ranger Station, Mark Holloway reviewed the trail registry and frowned.

Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn had not signed out.

That alone did not trigger alarm.

Delays happened.

Plans changed.

But when he attempted to check their GPS registration and saw no active signal, a familiar tension settled in his chest.

He had seen this before.

Search and rescue was notified early the next morning.

Initial teams moved out along the registered route, following the same trail Alyssa and Rachel had taken days earlier.

The weather remained calm.

Visibility was good.

Too good.

They found the first campsite easily.

A fire ring.

Flattened ground where a tent had stood.

food wrappers packed neatly into a bag just as Alyssa would have insisted.

The second campsite took longer.

When they found it, there was less left behind.

No obvious disturbance, no signs of struggle, just absence.

Tracking dogs were brought in and given clothing provided by the families.

The dogs followed the scent confidently at first, leading the teams uphill toward the ridge line.

Then, near a narrow stream fed by melting snow, the behavior changed.

The dog circled, confused, whining, pulling back toward their handlers.

Mark Holloway watched from a distance.

He didn’t need the explanation when the handler approached him.

The scent ended there, not faded, not scattered, ended.

In his years on the mountain, Mark had learned to recognize the moments when hope quietly receded.

He did not say it out loud, not to the families, not to the press, but as the search expanded outward, he felt it settling in.

Whatever had happened to Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn, it had not followed the rules.

By the third day of the search, Mount Chasta no longer felt indifferent.

It felt resistant.

Search and rescue teams expanded outward from the last known points, moving methodically through terrain that grew more hostile with every mile.

The northern slopes were uneven and deceptive.

Trails vanished beneath patches of old snow.

Lava rock fractured underfoot, sharp enough to shred boots and skin alike.

Dense stands of pine closed in tightly, limiting visibility to a few yards at a time.

Helicopters circled overhead during daylight hours, their rotors beating against the thin mountain air.

From above, the forest looked endless and uniform, a green surface that gave nothing away.

Thermal imaging cameras scanned ridges, clearings, and ravines.

They found nothing.

Mark Holloway stayed close to the command post, coordinating teams and reviewing maps.

He slept little.

When he did, it was in short stretches, his mind replaying the same details over and over again.

Two experienced hikers, clear weather, no distress signal, no signs of injury, no equipment left behind beyond what was expected.

It didn’t fit.

On the ground, searchers called out Alyssa and Rachel’s names, their voices dissolving quickly into the trees.

In certain areas, the forest seemed to absorb sound completely.

Shouts felt muted, swallowed before they could echo.

More than one volunteer commented on it, lowering their voice instinctively as if speaking too loudly might provoke something unseen.

By day four, the media arrived.

News vans lined the access road near the ranger station.

Reporters repeated the same questions, their tone careful but persistent.

How prepared were the women? Was foul play suspected? How long could they survive in the conditions? Mark answered with restraint.

He spoke in facts only.

Two hikers missing.

An active search underway.

No conclusions drawn.

Privately, he began to prepare for the moment the search would change.

Alyssa’s mother arrived that afternoon.

She stood at the edge of the command area, arms folded tightly across her chest, watching teams come and go.

She spoke little, but when she did, it was with certainty.

Alyssa was capable.

Alyssa was cautious.

Alyssa would not make careless mistakes.

Rachel’s brother arrived the following morning.

He asked different questions.

Where exactly did the dogs lose the scent? How steep was the terrain beyond that point? Were there caves, old structures, places someone could hide? Mark answered honestly, “Yes, there were lava tubes, abandoned shelters, areas that had not been mapped in detail.

” Daniel listened, his expression darkening.

On the fifth day, searchers discovered a narrow side path branching away from the main trail near the second campsite.

It was faint, easily missed, but clearly man-made.

At some point in the past, it led toward a cluster of trees and then disappeared beneath undergrowth.

The finding reignited hope.

Teams followed it carefully, scanning for disturbed soil, broken branches, any indication of recent passage.

They found nothing.

The path ended abruptly at a rocky outcrop overlooking a steep drop.

Below it, the forest thickened again.

Dogs were brought back to the area and released once more.

They tracked confidently for several minutes, then stopped.

One sat down, another refused to move forward.

The handler shook his head.

To those unfamiliar with search work, it looked like confusion.

To Mark, it looked like a boundary.

That evening, weather rolled in without warning.

Clouds gathered low around the mountain, cutting visibility in half.

The temperature dropped sharply.

Snow began to fall at higher elevations.

Light at first, then heavier.

Search operations slowed.

Helicopters were grounded.

Ground teams pulled back for safety.

The mountain, which had offered cooperation for days, withdrew it suddenly.

By the end of the first week, exhaustion set in.

Volunteers rotated out.

New teams came in, less familiar with the terrain, relying heavily on maps and briefings.

The search radius expanded to nearly 15 mi in all directions.

Still nothing.

No clothing, no backpacks, no footprints, no blood, no signs of a fall or animal attack.

It was as if Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn had stepped off the mountain entirely.

At the daily briefing on day 8, Mark stood before the assembled teams and spoke carefully.

Resources were finite.

Conditions were worsening.

The likelihood of survival diminished with each passing hour.

No one argued.

They didn’t need to.

By the 10th day, the decision was made.

The search would be suspended.

The announcement came quietly without ceremony.

A press conference was held that afternoon.

Cameras captured the words, but not the weight behind them.

Official efforts were being scaled back.

The case would be reclassified as a missing person’s investigation.

Alyssa’s mother listened in silence.

Rachel’s brother stared at the ground privately.

Both refused to accept it.

They organized their own efforts.

Flyers were posted in nearby towns.

Online appeals spread through hiking communities.

A reward was offered for information.

Weeks passed.

Mount Shasta returned to routine.

Trails reopened.

Tourists climbed the lower slopes unaware of how recently the mountain had been searched.

Inch by inch.

Rangers continued their patrols, alert, but constrained by protocol.

Mark Holloway drove past the northern trail head one evening and stopped his truck.

He sat with the engine off, listening to the forest.

It was quiet, too quiet.

He thought of the dogs at the stream.

the way the scent had ended, not scattered, not fading, ended.

In his experience, there were only a few explanations for that.

None of them were good.

Time did not heal the silence around Mount Shasta.

It stretched it.

In the weeks following the suspension of the official search, the mountain slipped back into routine with unsettling ease.

Trail registers filled again.

Weekend hikers posed for photographs beneath the summit.

Cars lined the parking areas on clear mornings, their owners unaware that the ground beneath their boots had recently been combed by dozens of search teams calling two names that never answered.

For Alyssa Moore’s mother, time became something to endure rather than measure.

She stayed in a small motel near the ranger station, convinced that leaving would somehow sever whatever fragile connection still existed between her and her daughter.

Each morning, she walked to the edge of the trail head and watched strangers prepare for hikes Alyssa would never finish.

She memorized their faces without meaning to, wondering which of them would understand too late what it meant to trust the mountain.

Rachel Dunn’s brother returned home after 3 weeks, but Mount Shasta followed him.

He replayed maps in his mind, tracing routes that no longer mattered.

He contacted private searchers, former rangers, anyone willing to listen.

Most gave him the same answer, gently phrased, but absolute.

Without new evidence, there was nothing more to be done.

The reward went unclaimed.

Occasional tips surfaced.

A hiker claimed to have heard voices near a lava tube weeks earlier.

Another reported seeing a backpack off trail.

Each lead was checked.

Each one dissolved into nothing.

The forest offered no confirmation, no denial, just space.

Mark Holloway continued his patrols.

Officially, the case was dormant.

Unofficially, it never left him.

He slowed near certain areas, places where the search had stalled without explanation.

the stream where the dog stopped.

The ridge line where the GPS signal last flickered.

The lava tube entrance near the second campsite.

He told himself there were logical explanations.

Water disrupted scent.

Electronics failed.

People misjudged terrain.

The problem was that logic had stopped providing comfort.

By late autumn, snow returned to the upper slopes.

The northern side of the mountain became inaccessible, sealed off by ice and cold.

Whatever answers remained there were buried, preserved, waiting.

Four months passed.

On a cold morning in early December, two hunters parked their truck along a rarely used service road on the eastern flank of Mount Shasta.

They were locals familiar with the terrain.

Drawn to the area by reports of deer movement before winter set in fully.

They carried rifles, packs, and the expectation of isolation.

They followed an unmarked trail that faded quickly into forest.

The ground was covered with needles and frost.

Each step produced a muted crunch, sound disappearing as quickly as it formed.

About an hour in, one of them stopped.

He smelled something wrong.

At first, he assumed it was an animal carcass.

Mountain lions and bears left remains behind all the time, especially this close to winter.

The smell was strong, sour, carried low on the cold air.

Unpleasant, but not alarming.

They moved closer, pushing through underbrush, following the scent as it intensified.

The forest opened slightly into a small clearing dominated by an old pine, its trunk thick and scarred with age.

That was when they saw them.

Two human figures stood upright against the tree, bound tightly, their backs pressed to the bark.

For a moment, neither hunter spoke.

The mind searched desperately for alternatives.

Mannequins.

Some kind of sick joke.

Anything but what their eyes were telling them.

The bodies were naked, skin darkened and drawn tight by cold and exposure.

Ropes and cords wrapped around their wrists and torsos, securing them to the tree in a way that looked deliberate, almost careful.

Their heads were tilted slightly, as if placed at the base of the tree.

Two pairs of hiking shoes were arranged neatly side by side, clean, untied, facing outward.

Silence followed.

One of the hunters turned away first.

The other reached for his phone with shaking hands, knowing there would be no signal, but needing to do something, anything.

They did not approach the bodies again.

They backed away slowly, retracing their steps, the forest unchanged, indifferent to what it had concealed for months.

It took nearly an hour to reach a point with reception.

When the call finally connected, the words came out broken, disjointed, two bodies, women, tied to a tree.

By nightfall, Mount Shasta was closed again.

This time, not for weather.

The clearing was sealed off before dawn.

Yellow tape cut through the forest like a wound that did not belong there.

Bright and artificial against the muted greens and browns of Mount Shasta.

Flood lights were set up as investigators arrived by helicopter, their blades scattering pine needles and loose frost across the ground.

The bodies remained where they were found.

No one rushed to move them.

Photographs were taken from every angle.

Distances were measured.

The position of the ropes, the knots, the way the women’s backs pressed into the tree were documented with clinical precision.

The forest stood still as if aware that something irreversible had finally been acknowledged.

When Alyssa Moore’s mother was notified, she did not scream.

She asked one question, almost politely.

Are you sure? Rachel Dunn’s brother received the call an hour later.

He dropped his phone and did not pick it up again for several minutes.

When he did, he asked for details no one was ready to give.

Were they together? Did they suffer? How long had they been there? There were no answers yet.

Mark Holloway arrived at the scene shortly after sunrise.

He stood just outside the cordon, his hands resting on his hips, staring at the tree.

He had imagined this moment for months.

Not the specifics, just the certainty.

Seeing the shoes was what stayed with him.

They were clean, placed carefully, untied.

This was not panic.

This was not chaos.

Someone had taken time.

News spread quickly.

By midday, Mount Chasta was back in national headlines.

Helicopters hovered again, this time carrying cameras instead of searchers.

Reporters spoke in hushed voices, careful not to cross the line between tragedy and spectacle.

The words repeated everywhere were the same.

Found, bound.

4 months later, the families were brought to a private room at the ranger station.

No images were shown.

None were needed.

A description was enough to collapse the remaining hope they had carried like a fragile burden.

Alyssa’s mother pressed her hands together as if praying to something she no longer believed in.

Rachel’s brother stared at the floor and nodded slowly, absorbing information with mechanical calm.

He would later say that this was the moment he stopped imagining rescue scenarios and began imagining a stranger’s hands.

That night, Mount Shasta was silent again.

But it was a different silence now.

It was the silence after truth begins to surface.

The forensic work began slowly, deliberately, as if haste itself might erase something important.

The bodies were cut free from the tree only after hours of documentation.

Each knot was photographed before it was loosened.

Each rope was tagged separately.

Investigators noted the materials immediately.

One cord was paracord, military grade.

Another was a standard polyropylene rope, the kind sold in hardware stores.

A third appeared to be a hiking strap, similar to those used to secure gear to backpacks.

Different sources, different purposes.

The women’s remains were badly deteriorated, but the cold, dry air had slowed the process enough to preserve critical details.

Skin was darkened and leathery in places, stretched tight over bone.

Facial features were partially lost to exposure and scavenging animals.

Hair remained intact, one dark, one lighter.

Despite the condition, the scene told a clear story.

This was not where Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn had died.

There was no pulled blood at the base of the tree, no disturbed soil beneath their feet, no signs of a struggle in the clearing.

Whatever violence had occurred, it had happened somewhere else.

The bodies were transported by helicopter to the county morg later that afternoon.

The clearing was searched outward in expanding circles.

The forest floor, thick with pine needles and volcanic ash, yielded little footprints did not hold here.

Time and terrain erased nearly everything.

The shoes were collected last.

They were clean, dry, their laces unfraid.

Investigators noted the way they were positioned, parallel, toes facing outward, placed close enough to suggest intention rather than convenience.

At the morg, the autopsies began the following morning.

Identification came first.

Dental records confirmed what everyone already knew.

Alyssa Moore, Rachel Dunn.

The official confirmation did not soften the blow.

It formalized it.

The cause of death, once determined, was unambiguous.

Both women had died from asphixxiation.

Deep grooves were present around their necks consistent with liature strangulation.

The marks were uneven, suggesting force applied by hand or rope, tightened gradually rather than abruptly.

There were no fractures to the hyoid bones, indicating prolonged compression rather than a single violent snap.

Time of death was estimated to be between late July and early August.

The range aligned closely with the date of their disappearance.

But the strangulation was not the only trauma.

Alyssa’s ribs showed multiple fractures on her left side.

Rachel had similar injuries on her right.

The fractures were not consistent with a fall.

There was evidence of healing in the bone tissue, indicating the injuries had occurred days, possibly weeks before death.

Rachel’s skull revealed a linear fracture at the base caused by a blunt force impact.

There was bleeding around the injury site.

She had been alive when it happened.

On Alyssa’s body, forensic examiners documented areas of chemical burns along the abdomen and thighs.

The damage was irregular, patchy, not fire, not heat, likely caused by exposure to an acidic or alkaline substance.

what substance they could not determine.

Any residue had long since degraded.

The burns too were inflicted before death.

Neither body showed signs of sexual assault.

There were no genital injuries, no semen, no trauma consistent with rape.

This absence complicated the narrative investigators expected.

It removed one of the most common motives and replaced it with something harder to categorize.

Both women were severely emaciated.

Muscle mass had wasted significantly.

fat reserves were nearly gone.

The condition suggested prolonged deprivation rather than sudden loss.

They had not eaten normally for an extended period of time.

Stomach contents offered further insight.

Traces of plant matter were found.

Berries, roots, possibly grass, nothing processed, nothing consistent with the food they had packed for their trip.

They had been alive long enough to try to survive somewhere.

The conclusion was unavoidable.

Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn had been held captive for days, possibly weeks, before they were killed.

They had been restrained, injured, deprived of food, and kept alive deliberately.

Only then had they been brought to the clearing.

Only then had they been arranged.

When the findings were shared with the families, the room went quiet.

Alyssa’s mother closed her eyes and pressed her hand to her mouth as if holding something back from escaping.

Rachel’s brother asked for clarification that no one wanted to give.

He wanted timelines, sequences, a version of events that would make sense.

None of it did.

For Mark Holloway, the autopsy report confirmed what the mountain had hinted at from the beginning.

This was not an accident, not a miscalculation, not the wilderness turning hostile.

This was intent.

Someone had taken Alyssa and Rachel off the mountain surface and into its hidden spaces.

Someone who knew where those spaces were, someone patient enough to wait, and someone who had walked away.

With the cause of death established, the focus of the investigation shifted back to the mountain.

The clearing where the bodies had been displayed was no longer treated as an end point, but as a message.

Investigators moved outward again, not searching for where Alyssa Moore and Rachel Dunn had died, but for where they had been kept alive.

Search grids were redrawn.

Attention centered on areas previously considered secondary.

Lava tube systems, abandoned structures, old logging spurs, and sections of forest rarely traveled even by experienced hikers.

Mount Chasta was riddled with hidden spaces formed by ancient volcanic activity.

Some were mapped, many were not.

Teams entered lava tubes carefully, moving in pairs, lights cutting narrow paths through the darkness.

Inside, sound behaved unpredictably.

Footsteps echoed and overlapped, making it difficult to determine distance or direction.

Some tunnels narrowed quickly, forcing investigators to crawl.

Others opened into chambers large enough to stand in.

Most were empty.

A few showed signs of human presence long before 2017.

Old fire rings, rusted cans, scraps of plastic left behind by climbers or squatters years earlier.

Nothing recent, nothing that could be linked to captivity.

300 yd east of the clearing, a structure appeared on aerial imagery that had been overlooked during the initial search months earlier.

It was a small hunting cabin, partially concealed by tree cover, accessible only by an overgrown spur that no longer appeared on official trail maps.

Investigators reached it shortly afternoon.

The cabin measured roughly 3×4 m.

Its wooden walls were weathered but intact.

The corrugated metal roof sagged slightly under accumulated debris.

The door hung on rusted hinges and showed no sign of forced entry.

Inside, the space was bare.

No furniture, no bedding, no clothing.

The dirt floor was coated in a uniform layer of dust and pine needles.

An old stone hearth sat unused in one corner.

On a shelf, several rusted food cans remained unopened.

There were no footprints, no drag marks, no stains visible to the naked eye.

Forensic teams processed the cabin anyway.

Samples were taken from the floor, the walls, the doorframe.

Ultraviolet light revealed nothing.

No blood, no biological residue.

Whatever had happened to Alyssa and Rachel, it had not happened here, or it had been cleaned with exceptional care.

The proximity troubled investigators.

The cabin was close enough to the clearing to matter, too close to ignore, but it offered no confirmation, only possibility.

Attention returned to the items recovered from the bodies.

The ropes were analyzed in detail.

The paracord was consistent with equipment sold at military surplus stores.

The polyropylene rope was common, mass-roduced.

The hiking strap bore signs of wear consistent with extended outdoor use.

It was not new.

It could have belonged to anyone who spent time on the mountain.

There were no fingerprints.

DNA testing revealed only two profiles, Alyssa’s, Rachel’s.

No foreign material was recovered from the knots, suggesting the person who tied them had either worn gloves or left nothing behind that could survive months of exposure.

The knots themselves drew interest.

They were functional, secure, not decorative.

The pattern suggested someone accustomed to tying restraints quickly and efficiently.

Someone who had done it before.

Investigators reconstructed a likely sequence.

Alyssa and Rachel were taken off trail, controlled, moved into terrain where sound, sight, and GPS would fail.

They were held somewhere concealed, fed minimally, injured deliberately, kept alive.

At some point, the decision was made to end it.

They were transported to the clearing.

The bodies were positioned.

The shoes were placed.

Then the killer left.

No vehicle tracks were found near the site.

There were no roads close enough to explain transport by car.

That meant the bodies had been carried or at least guided on foot through rough terrain.

This narrowed the profile.

The person responsible was physically capable, familiar with Mount Shasta, comfortable moving through dense forest without leaving obvious traces.

Patient.

Investigators canvased local communities.

Rangers compiled lists of individuals known to frequent the mountain year round.

Hunters, guides, off-grid residents, former employees, people who knew the back country well enough to disappear into it.

Three names emerged repeatedly, each for different reasons, each without enough evidence.

The first was a former ranger who had left the service years earlier under disciplinary circumstances.

He knew the terrain intimately.

He lived alone.

He had been vocal about outsiders disrespecting the mountain.

The second was a former military veteran living in a trailer outside a nearby town.

He had survival training, a history of anger issues and gaps in his employment record during the summer of 2017.

The third was a reclusive hunter who lived deep in the forest and rarely interacted with anyone.

He bought supplies once a month, paid in cash, and avoided attention.

All three were questioned.

All three denied involvement.

Search warrants were executed.

Properties were examined.

Vehicles were inspected.

Dirt was sampled.

Fibers were collected.

Nothing tied any of them directly to Alyssa Moore or Rachel Dunn.

As the weeks passed, the investigation stalled.

Evidence had established what happened.

It could not establish who did it.

Mark Holloway read through the reports late at night, sitting alone in his office after hours.

He traced roots on maps until they blurred together.

He imagined the mountain in sections in hidden layers invisible to most people.

Somewhere on Mount Shasta, there had been a place where two women were held and broken slowly.

And whatever that place was, it remained undiscovered.

When local leads failed to produce answers, the case was escalated.

An FBI behavioral analyst was brought in quietly without announcement.

There was no press release, no public acknowledgement.

Officially, the investigation remained under state jurisdiction.

Unofficially, everyone involved understood what the request meant.

The killer had not made a mistake.

The profiler began by reviewing the case file from the beginning.

Not just the evidence, but the order in which it appeared.

The disappearance, the silence, the delayed discovery, the display.

He spent hours studying photographs of the clearing, enlarging details most people would overlook, the spacing between the bodies, the height at which the restraints were placed, the symmetry of the shoes.

This was not improvisation.

According to the profile, the offender was likely male between 30 and 50 years old.

He possessed extensive familiarity with Mount Shasta, not as a visitor, but as someone who moved through it regularly and confidently.

He understood where sound died, where trails blurred into nothing, where rescue efforts slowed.

He did not act in panic.

The prolonged captivity indicated control rather than impulse.

The victims were kept alive intentionally, injured, but not fatally, deprived, but not abandoned.

This suggested patience, planning, and an emotional need to dominate rather than destroy quickly.

The absence of sexual assault was significant.

It removed gratification as a primary motive and replaced it with something colder.

Power, observation, the act of deciding when suffering ended.

The placement of the bodies pointed to the same conclusion.

They were not hidden.

They were presented.

The profiler noted that the killer wanted them to be found, but not immediately.

Time mattered.

The delay allowed for decomposition, for evidence to degrade, for search efforts to exhaust themselves.

By the time discovery occurred, the narrative had shifted from rescue to horror.

This was intentional.

One line in the report stood out to everyone who read it.

This behavior is consistent with an offender who has committed similar acts before or who is actively rehearsing for future escalation.

The profiler warned against assuming this was an isolated event.

Mount Shasta’s terrain made it an ideal environment for someone seeking privacy, control, and invisibility.

The killer likely blended into the local population or avoided it entirely, living on the margins where attention rarely lingered.

He may have followed media coverage closely.

He may have returned to the area after the discovery.

He may have stood among the searchers.

The analysis ended with a recommendation that unsettled even seasoned investigators.

Expect repetition.

Mark Holloway read that line more than once.

In his experience, mountains did not repeat themselves.

People did.

The official investigation continued, but momentum slowed.

Without new evidence, interviews grew repetitive.

Tips dwindled.

Resources shifted elsewhere.

Files thickened with reports that led nowhere.

Years passed.

Mount Shasta remained open.

Hikers still signed trail registers.

Rangers still issued warnings about weather and terrain.

New faces arrived, unaware of the names that had once dominated briefings and headlines.

A small memorial plaque was installed near the northern trail head.

It bore Alyssa Moore’s name and Rachel Duns beneath it.

No details, no explanation, just dates and a quiet reminder to walk carefully and return safely.

Mark sometimes stopped there at the end of his shifts.

He would stand for a moment listening to the forest, watching visitors pass without slowing.

The mountain looked the same as it always had, solid, indifferent, silent.

But he no longer believed it was empty.

Somewhere within its hidden spaces, he believed.

Someone still remembered exactly where Alyssa and Rachel had been held.

Someone still knew how long they had waited.

Someone still knew what it felt like to tie the final knot, step back, and leave them standing in the trees.

And as long as that person remained free, Mount Shasta would continue to keep its secrets.

The years that followed did not bring resolution.

They brought distance.

Alyssa Moore’s mother returned home after the first winter.

The motel room near the ranger station had grown unbearable, filled with reminders of waiting that no longer served a purpose.

She packed her belongings slowly, leaving behind nothing personal.

At home, Alyssa’s room remained unchanged.

Her boots stayed by the door.

Her maps were still folded the way she had left them.

Friends noticed how her mother spoke of her in the present tense, then corrected herself every time.

Rachel Dunn’s brother became quieter.

He stopped giving interviews after the second anniversary.

When asked what he wanted now, he said only that he wanted someone to say her name out loud again, somewhere official, somewhere it would be recorded.

The case remained open.

Periodically, it was reviewed.

Evidence was re-examined.

New technologies were applied to old samples.

Each time the conclusion was the same, there was not enough.

No arrests were made.

No charges filed.

The suspects faded into obscurity.

their names buried in reports no one outside law enforcement would ever read.

If the killer followed the case, there was no sign of it, no messages, no taunts, no repetition that could be proven.

Mount Shasta did not change.

Snow returned every winter, melted every spring.

Trails eroded and were repaired.

New lava tubes were mapped.

Others collapsed and vanished from memory.

Rangers rotated through assignments.

New ones arrived younger, unaware of the weight certain locations carried.

Mark Holloway retired quietly three years after the bodies were found.

On his last day, he drove the northern access road one final time.

He stopped at the trail head just before sunset, the mountain glowing faintly pink above the treeine.

The memorial plaque was still there, slightly weathered, easy to miss if you weren’t looking for it.

He stood in front of it longer than he intended to.

He thought about the profiler’s warning, about repetition, about patience.

He thought about how carefully the shoes had been placed.

In his career, Mark had seen people disappear for many reasons.

Weather, injury, panic, bad luck.

Those cases hurt, but they made sense.

This one never had because it required someone to wait.

Because it required someone to choose.

Somewhere beyond the marked trails, beyond the places hikers photographed and remembered, there were still spaces on Mount Shasta where sound did not travel and time felt suspended.

places where two women had been held long enough to lose strength, long enough to hope, long enough to understand they were not being rescued.

Those places had never been found.

On a clear morning the following summer, a new entry appeared in the trail register.

Two names, a planned route, an estimated return time.

The ranger on duty glanced at the form, offered routine advice, and signed the bottom.

His pen hovered for a fraction of a second longer than necessary before moving on.

Outside, Mount Shasta stood unchanged.

The mountain did not react.

It never does.