The Last Riddle

The zombie state hits hardest at 3 AM—when you've been awake too long and your body moves on autopilot through the crime scene, capturing photos, bagging evidence, feeling nothing. Detective Marco Reyes had been operating like this for weeks, ever since the case began.

She called herself only Sphinx. That was the name painted in elegant script on the card found beside each body. No prints, no DNA, just the card and a single white dog hair—impossible to trace, maddeningly perfect.

'You look like hell, Marco.' His partner, Detective Liu, leaned against the doorway. 'Go home. Sleep.'

'Can't. Got a lead.' Marco gestured to the victim's hand. 'Palm print. Partial, but clear enough. She was reading palms professionally. Someone she read must have—'

'Go home.' Liu's voice softened. 'Your fox called again.'

Marco froze. 'Vivi?'

'She said it's time. Whatever that means.' Liu studied him. 'You haven't been sleeping. You're missing your dog's appointments with the vet. You're becoming the kind of zombie we're hunting.'

The words hit harder than they should. Marco drove to the waterfront anyway, where Vivi waited in her red dress, watching the dark water. His ex-wife. The only person who could read him like a palm.

'Sphinx isn't a person,' she said without turning. 'It's what the killer leaves behind—questions, riddles, impossible answers. The dog hairs? That's from the pound. All those palm readers? They worked the same tent at the carnival.'

Marco's exhausted mind suddenly connected it all. The murders weren't random. They were a message to someone who'd asked the wrong questions.

'The killer is solving a riddle,' Vivi said. 'And you're the final clue.'

Marco's phone rang. Liu's voice cracked: 'They found another body. Your dog, Marco. They took your dog.'

The zombie fog evaporated. Everything became sharp, clear, perfectly focused. Some cases you solve. Some cases solve you. And sometimes, the riddle you've been chasing has been waiting all along for you to finally wake up and see it.