Antelope poachers kidnap and execute a member of the Tibetan posse that was trying to capture them. (Note: Tibetan antelope population plummeted from 1 million to 70,000 in five years, the animals' woolen coats making them a prime target for rustlers.)In 1996, Ga Yu recruits the resourceful Ritai, a maverick who set up a private mountain patrol three years earlier, to accompany the posse on its mission. The drama unfolds over 17 days, with the journo witnessing the ruthlessness of the profiteers, and the patrol of volunteers combating their merciless adversaries and a frequently dangerous landscape.