Tabula Rasa(64)

I thought it was dangerous doing this so close to the campus, but Shannon reasoned that if Stevens was able to commit sexual assault here and get away with it, that it was as good a place as any to kill him. And Stevens did have that horrible basement he’d taken me to. Of course Shannon was right, but I still looked over our shoulders from the front porch, paranoid someone would come up the path. But it was late on a weekday. Surely everyone was asleep already.

Shannon rang the bell, dragging Professor Stevens out of what must have been a sound sleep from the bleary-eyed grumpiness that answered the door. Shannon had instructed me to wait behind the bush until he was inside. So when the door opened, a strange man dressed in black was all the professor saw on the darkened porch.

“This better be good,” he snarled at Shannon.

“Trust me, it is.” Shannon lunged forward and knocked the professor out with a chloroform soaked rag, then with speedy smooth practice, he handed it out to me all while he kept the Professor from hitting the ground. I disposed of the bag in Stevens’ trash at the end of the drive. Both Shannon and I wore gloves, appearing as shadows everywhere except for our faces.

We’d talked about this in the car on the way over. It wasn’t all chloroform, but I wasn’t sure about the other ingredient. He’d assured me the concentration and mixture he’d made would keep someone unconscious for about fifteen minutes—just enough time to move things to the next phase.

I went inside the house, trying not to flashback to the last time I was brought in here. It looked much the same—exactly like one would imagine a stuffy botany professor’s house might look. Lots of old books. Lots of plants—many exotic and rare. There were several plant lights for the exotics that needed a high amount of light but weren’t close enough to a window to get it. These were turned off for the night.

I felt as though the plants watched me. As if they’d been awakened from their sleep by our intrusion. The average person might think this completely crazy, but when you study plants, you realize they are even more alive than you imagine. They simply exist on a different time scale than us. On time lapse photography, they seem to live with purpose. A few might even be said to have goals. During my time at the University, I’d anthropomorphized plants to a degree I couldn’t back away from, even though as a scientist I was meant to look at things coldly and clinically. I wasn’t sure how I could have ever done science that required animal experiments since I now saw plants as nearly sentient.

This sensation wasn’t minimized knowing what I was about to do. The creepy feeling that Professor Stevens’ plants watched me accusingly only escalated as I made my way through the main level of the house. I briefly panicked about what would happen to the plants when Stevens was gone. Would they all die? Would a relative or some students at the university take them under their wing and care for them? Could I orphan all these plants? Now I was being crazy. Because surely I still prioritized people over greenery.

But I knew even if I got cold feet, Shannon was determined. After all, he hadn’t decided to kill Professor Stevens as a favor to me but because he was angry and wouldn’t be satisfied until the man was dead. Maybe I should have stayed home. During the trip I’d shoved any doubts or dread into the back corners of my mind as if shoving it back there often enough would somehow make the issue vanish altogether.

It’s one thing to think about killing someone. It’s another to actually do it. Most of us have the good sense to know that the reality won’t be anything like the fantasy. I had that good sense, but I’d acquired it far too late in the game for it to do me any good.

I quietly crept down to the basement where Shannon had made use of Professor Stevens’ bondage equipment to tie him up.

My heart thundered in my chest as though race horses galloped through my veins.

Shannon took out a small 22 caliber handgun. He attached a silencer to the barrel and inserted a magazine, slamming it a little harder than was necessary.

“It’s quiet anyway, but with the houses so close together here, it’s best to be careful,” he said, almost as if he were talking to himself. “They call this an assassin’s special. The mob used to use these for hits because they’re so quiet and discreet. You can come right up behind someone, and shoot the back of the head. The bullet’s so small it just ricochets around in there. They never see it coming, and there’s no exit wound. Neat. Clean. If I’m not using a sniper rifle, I prefer this. Keeps it simple. And I like the challenge of having to get so close into their space to pull it off.”

“Shannon?”

“Yeah?”

“Could we not... with the commentary?” I was sure I was going a little green. We shouldn’t have eaten so close to this event. But of course Shannon wouldn’t be bothered by things like that.

“Too much for you?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“You wanted to come.”

Because it was my revenge. Not his.

“So... you don’t want him dead now? Is that it? You want him to just waltz along through life thinking he’s gotten away with it? You want him to victimize other women?”

“What do you care what he does to other women?” I asked.

Shannon rolled his eyes. “Just because I don’t feel all the range of emotions you feel doesn’t mean I don’t know intellectually if something is right or wrong. You might not think I have a working moral compass, but I was trained to take out the bad guy. And this guy is as bad as they come. I can smell it on him. It wasn’t just you he’s done this to. And he’ll keep doing it. He can’t help it. Someone like me needs to remove him from civilized society.”