Daniel laughed tightly. “Well, that didn’t work out so well. And now some poor arrogant tailored-suit schmuck is dead. I guess he didn’t have the super-healing. Why not? Experimental? Some kind of side effects? Doesn’t work on everyone?” His mind was racing now, the adrenaline and the problem keeping him on track. It felt good, to be firing on all cylinders again.

Outrunning the serpent.

“Yeah, there’s a downside, mostly for the Company.” She finished making the sandwiches, pushed one across the table to him, and demolished another in four bites.

Daniel had to wait for her to keep talking anyway, so he took a cautious bite. Too much mustard. The woman looked into his eyes then, with a kind of haunted compassion or…something. Something hard to pin down. Maybe pity. He liked the eyes but he didn’t much like that expression, and he resolved he wasn’t going to fall for her sneaky womanly wiles, but there was still something in her that attracted him. Maybe it was because she had guts. In some other circumstances…

She kept eating. Kept staring at him.

Dragging his mind back to the now, he barked, “Come on, talk between bites.” Daniel still felt on the ragged edge of control, and his weapon hand started shaking.

She stared at the gun and those shakes and said, “All right. Just let me tell it my own way, okay?”

Another quarter of a sandwich went down her throat. She finished a cup of juice, poured herself some more. “I was a terminal patient. Cancer. Hodgkin’s. I had maybe two weeks to live. I was already in hospice, doped up. The Company made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Be a test subject for a new cure, they told me. Of course I said yes.”

She paused to eat another sandwich, and as she did she watched him fidget impatiently, watched his flickering eyes.

She’s worried about  me, Daniel realized. Thinks I’m losing it. but I’m not. He thought she was looking much better now, and her wounds were visibly shrinking. The bruising was getting smaller, the holes were closing, everything. His eyes moved all over her body, watching it happen. Unbelievable. But he had to believe it. It was right in front of him.

As he took the last bite of his sandwich the woman across from him sighed, as if regretting something. The next second he found himself falling over backward as the dining room table flew up in his face. He forced his finger not to pull the trigger in reflex, and by the time he disentangled himself from the chair, table, tablecloth and sandwich makings, she was gone.

Story of my life. The good ones always leave.

-4-

Staring down the barrel of Daniel Markis’ gun wasn’t Elise’s idea of a good time. There was no guarantee he wouldn’t snap and shoot her like he shot Jenkins, so as soon as she had enough calories in her to survive, she’d gotten the hell out.

It didn’t mean she felt good about it.

Everything in her wanted to stay with him, to explain what was going on, to hold his hand and ease the confusion in his tortured eyes. She could see the pain underlying the bravado, with compassion hidden behind his need to control an uncontrollable situation. but as a scientist, she knew there were just too many variables.

So she ran.

But she didn’t want to.

She’d driven them in Jenkins’ SUV to Markis’ neighborhood, so she had the keys. Where the usual controlling jerk would have insisted on driving, Jenkins’ privileged upbringing meant he liked to be chauffeured. Serve me had been the subtext of his every move, just like his father, who was far more powerful and frightening. They’d parked around the corner and out of sight.

Running to the vehicle, she hoped that Daniel wasn’t so out of control that he’d try to chase her down with a gun in his hand in broad daylight. Hopefully he’d just accept what happened and calm down.

I have a plan, she thought as she climbed into the seat. Or the beginnings of one, if only he’ll cooperate. He’s exactly the man I need. Her mind flirted with what that might mean for the future, then forced it away. No time for such thoughts, Elise. Not now.

Driving away briskly, she checked the rear view mirror, seeing nothing following. A mile later she pulled into the back of a strip mall and changed out of her rags and into the nondescript clothes she had brought for that purpose. Sight of the crisp man’s suit hanging there on the back seat hook sent a wave of nausea rushing over her. Thank God it wasn’t me that killed him, but I’m still glad he’s gone and can’t hurt me anymore.

***

In Daniel’s teens, when he was young and foolish, he’d thought war would be fun, or would make him a man, when he went to the Gulf. In his twenties he deployed to Afghanistan to get some back for the Twin Towers, when Bin Laden seemed so near, just over the next mountain, and everybody in a turban might be Al Qaeda and he thought who cares, shoot them all anyway, let God sort ‘em out.

If you listened to Dr. Benchman, you’d think he’d be having flashbacks right now. The VA psychiatrist had convinced himself Daniel Markis was a full-blown PTSD case, a danger to himself and society, and nothing Daniel could say could convince him otherwise.

He’d been ordered to see the shrink because he’d clocked a Marine lieutenant who started mouthing off about Air Force “blue-suiters.” They’d both been drunk, and it had been a mistake, but it sure felt good at the time. About broke my hand along with his pretty jaw, he thought. Of course, I never told Benchman about the serpent in my head. Thank God he never thought to try to get my carry permit revoked.

Daniel felt lucky, really, because he’d had more than nineteen years in, and by the time the whole JAG process was done, what with his lawyer successfully drawing it out and staving off the threat of a court-martial, he was happy to make a deal, sign that Article 15 and get his retirement orders. Twenty years, thirteen days, but it was enough to qualify, and life was much better as a retiree with fifty percent disability than as a disabled vet with nothing but the VA to help out.

Sitting there at the righted table, he tried to concentrate on the present. Brain fog was closing down again, because the speed was wearing off. He wanted a drink. He wanted a nap. He stared at the dead man leaking all over his old wall-to-wall carpet, and the body wasn’t going to resurrect itself if it hadn’t already, he was pretty sure. Elise, if she was telling the truth, had said Jenkins didn’t have the healing drug, or whatever it was.

At least there were no sirens racing for his house, so it appeared no one had reported the gunshots. His basement walls were thick, cinder block set mostly below ground. I guess no one heard the two extra pops when I…his mind shied away.

On the other hand, Elise was probably already reporting to her Agency masters and there would soon be a cleanup team on the way. They might make it all go away, or they might set it up to implicate him, or they might come try to recruit him using a different approach - something a lot more certain. Like eight Men In Black with body armor and tranquilizer darts and beanbag rounds. Imagination spinning, he tried to stay on track, tried to stick to the facts.

Instead, he sat there staring at the body.

Should he call the cops? Was it easier to deal with the local authorities, claim a righteous shoot in his own home? If he did, he’d have to rearrange the scene, because he’d simply executed Jenkins. No matter how you sliced it, he’d killed him in hot blood, without just cause.

With Miss Wallis, had she stayed dead, he’d have had justification. She’d had a weapon, she’d fired on him. In fact, the weapon should still be down there, all the proof he needed. Elise had bolted out his still-open side door. She’d had no time to detour to the basement.