Six(8)

I printed off the results and walked over to where Damon was sitting.

“This can’t be right, can it?” I asked, shoving the piece of paper in his face.

He scowled at me as he grabbed the paper and looked down at it. The annoyance on his face morphed into confusion.

“How are the other tests coming out?” he asked, his eyes never leaving the page.

I shrugged. “Normal for this place.”

“Do we need to recalibrate and rerun?”

“That’s what I was wondering.” I turned back to my station and looked at the stack of completed, all normal tests from before and after.

The telltale beep and click of the door’s security flickered in the back of my mind.

“Holy shit.” Damon’s low curse was unusual, and my head popped up as I turned back and looked toward the door.

I barely had time to even comprehend who was standing there and why.

Time stopped.

The only thing I registered was the gun in a man’s hand and each snap as it fired off. Precise shots from its silenced barrel that ended emerging screams.

In my peripheral, three of my lab mates fell to the ground. Five shots in all, but I was still standing, staring straight down the dark, life-ending barrel. I shifted my eyes to focus behind the gun to the man, to see my killer before I died, and my heart stopped.

Simon?

His expression was calm and serious—a man on a mission.

His finger lingered on the trigger, but then his arm relaxed to his side.

My heart raced, beating against my chest so fast it felt like it was trying to break out from my ribs. I couldn’t think, couldn’t move. Could only stare at him. Complete shock had hijacked my system.

He reached out and grabbed my arm, pulling me toward the door. “I need you.”

Words that made my knees weak the day before made them weak again, but for a completely different reason. I stumbled, my feet seeming to have lost all memory of how to function. He was strong, and there was no resisting, even if I could.

As we moved through the door, I turned back and stared in wide-eyed horror.

The walls were dripping with red. Marcy, Damon, Murphy, Dr. Alma, and Ian were sprawled out on the floor. Their eyes were empty as blood pooled beneath them.

A scream built in my chest, but it wouldn’t come out. The world fell from beneath me as I tried to understand, to process what was going on, that they were all dead.

Pain in my arm brought my attention back to the man who just last night was a dream come true. Now he seemed to be a thing made of nightmares.

I was still asleep. That had to be it. None of it was real.

“Open it.”

I blinked up at him, then at the sign above the door—Morgue. The shock started to wear off, and I shook my head as I pulled back. “No.”

He held his gun up again and pressed the still warm tip to my forehead. “Open it, now.”

I was going to die.

My life ending in a mess.

I didn’t want to die. Not today. Not for a long time.

Why is this happening?

Tears began sliding down my cheeks as I prayed that it was empty, that all the bodies inside were dead. My hand shook as I reached out and slid my card through the reader, then entered in the six-digit code.

There was no pause in his stride as he entered, only a cool, deadly killer.

Meticulous.

Three snaps.

Cheryl.

Dr. Mitchell.

Micah.

They all slumped to the ground.

My stomach dropped. An explosion of screams was held in by the coiling suffocation around my chest. Squeezing. Choking.

He released me, and I fell back against the wall. Harsh, gulping breaths burned my lungs. The world spun, and my fingers dug into the wall for support.

Loud slams of the fridge doors opening and the ratcheting thumps of the drawers sliding out blasted in my ears. I flinched with each one. He wasted no time opening them all, exposing the bodies, disturbing the dead.

I wanted to scream at him to stop, but fear had me planted in place.

All of his focus was on whatever he was looking for, paying no attention to me. It was my chance to get away.

Run.

I reached out to the side with a trembling hand, using it to guide me to the exit. My feet shuffled in slow uncooperative steps, praying to any higher power that was listening to let me make it out alive.

With a sudden flex of his arm, the gun was pointed straight at me again, and I froze in terrified horror.

“Don’t.” He didn’t even look my way.

I whimpered, my teeth chattering, frozen. “P-Please, Simon.”

“Shut up.”

When he opened one of the last doors and pulled back the sheet, his movements stopped. It was only a brief second, but it seemed he’d found what he was looking for.

“Three?”

He flipped up the earlobe of the man. I couldn’t see, but that one action told me that was the body of John Doe.

For a few seconds the silence was deafening, then the calm demeanor slipped. A string of curses exploded from him, echoing off the tile walls. Then the calm was back as quickly as it had disappeared.

A beeping went off, and he walked straight forward, pointing his gun once again at my head.

“I have information about him you don’t.” My mind raced, my mouth spitting out words I wasn’t sure I could back or would matter to him, but I’d say anything to buy more time.