. . . 36 Hours and Counting . . .

Ray’s head felt like a cracked egg. Sticky stuff ran out of his nose, mouth and hair. He couldn’t open his left eye. His right eye opened, but only half-way. The brilliant scene of the lab glared into his brain. He closed his eye again. Just breathing was difficult. He laid there for a time, touching his head, feeling for the wound. A patch of hair and scalp had been removed from the back of his skull.

Gradually, he became aware that he was lying across something hard and painful. Feeling it with the groping fingers of his left hand, he vaguely recognized the paper-cutter that had dropped him earlier. Groaning, he rolled away from it and struggled to his elbows. He forced himself to open both eyes, then he closed them again, squinching them tightly against the brilliance. How could the lab fluorescents be so damnably bright? They had always been a flickering, bluish glow that failed to completely illuminate the place. Many of his students called this lab The Cave.

This light seemed different, it was more like... His eyes snapped open, and despite the glare, he looked to the high row of windows that ran the length of the lab’s north wall. Daylight flooded in and drove a fist into his skull, but he struggled not to close his eyes again. It was morning, of that he was sure. Straining, he turned to look at the big clock on the wall. It was nearly seven. It was Saturday, so only a few people would be coming in, but it didn’t matter. There were people on the campus by now, and it was daylight outside and he needed to get out of here.

It was when he climbed to his knees that he noticed the gun in his right hand. He paused to look at it stupidly. Ingles’ pistol, it had to be. He gripped it in his bloody hands. He looked around the lab now, and finally saw Brenda.

She lay face down beside him with her hand draped over the paper-cutter. He dropped the gun and reached out to her, and made an odd, gurgling sound in his throat. Moving stiffly, he rolled her over onto her back. Three holes punctured her blouse. There was dried blood soaked in circles around the wounds, but not much of it. The bullets must have stopped her heart quickly. Ray felt her carotid for a pulse, but he had little hope. She was dead.

Breathing through his mouth, he looked at the gun in his hand, then at Brenda’s body. He nodded his head. Ingles’ hadn’t needed to make a citizen’s arrest. Instead, he had set them up and done away with both of them. Ray could see the logic clearly, despite his aching head. Shooting them both would have resulted in proof of a third party. Instead, Ingles had removed Brenda directly and hung yet another crime around Ray’s neck.

He looked at Brenda again, at the shocked, blank look on her face. He closed her eyes with his clumsy fingers, sure that he was making a mistake, but not caring at that moment. He wondered if tears would come, but they didn’t. He was too stunned even to grieve for her. That would have to wait until later. He and his son were still among the living, so they came first.

Then there came a rattling at the lab doors. Ray’s eyes flicked to the clock again. It was seven now, straight up. It had to be the janitor, Charley Tai. Lab aides and grad students didn’t get up this early.

Ray heaved himself up and went into Brenda’s office. He stumbled into the desk, closed the door behind him and locked it. Inside, he flicked off the lights. Like many of the faculty and staff offices, Brenda’s office door had a tall glass window in it. Ray watched from the darkened interior of the office. The main lab doors swung open. Charley walked in, kicked down the doorstop and began emptying trashcans. Ray looked around and noticed the door at the back of Brenda’s office. She rarely used it and always kept it locked for security reasons. He fumbled in his pocket and felt the master key that had helped get him into all of this in the first place. He found his baseball cap, part of his disguise—how absurd that all seemed now—and pulled it down over his head wound. The pain he felt from just brushing the bloody gash made him wince.

He pushed junk out of the way of the outside door and worked at getting the key in the lock. Out in the lab, Charley Tai was cranking up the vacuum now, providing cover noise. The janitor had yet to make the grisly discovery that awaited him.

Ray paused at the door. On impulse, he stepped to the Brenda’s terminal and typed a message to Agent Vasquez. With each keystroke he left a bloody fingerprint, but he figured it didn’t matter. He looked guilty as hell anyway.

Agent Vasquez - Shooter = Santa = Snowflake = Frosty = Ingles.

He hit the enter key and then unlocked the door. Behind him, he heard a shout of dismay and horror. He threw open the door and rushed out into the blinding sunlight.