Synbat by Bob Mayer

equipment and papers. He stepped over the threshold between the open doors, Chico behind him.

Hill noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned left, but much too slowly. Hill was still futilely trying to bring his gun to bear when he felt something ice-cold rip into his gut. As the tear spread up to his chest, the coldness was followed by searing hot pain.

Hill still couldn’t make out what tore into him as he was propelled onto his back, gun forgotten. His hands clasped his belly, fingers encountering something soft and wet. His unbelieving eyes saw intestines bulging against his hands.

That tableau stayed frozen for the long heartbeat of a second. A shadow loomed over Hill’s right side and he could hear Chico screaming, as if from a very long distance away. Hill’s own scream died in his throat as his trachea and carotid arteries were severed. Lying in a pool of his own blood, his last breath wheezed out of his slashed flesh.

Upstairs, Parson heard nothing. He was sitting at the security consol e, his hands trembling as he tried to figure out what to do. He was in for it now, he knew. Murder one. The big chair. Those dumb mother fuckers, he wanted to scream. The two had been idiots from the start — Chico’s sister not having enough gas and Chico wasting the old man even though he said he’d give them some fuel.

Parson heard the doors to the elevator open behind him and spun around.

He blinked and stared for a fatally long second, not believing what he was seeing. Then he screamed and leapt to his feet. He raced for the front door, but the figure jumped onto him from behind, the impact slamming Parson against the thick glass.

At the sound of Parson’s scream, Leslie looked up from the guard’s body.

She watched the chase across the lobby with detachment, as if it were being played out on a movie screen.

The blood pulsing from Parson’s cut throat splattered against the inside of the glass door, marking it with a cascade of bright crimson. Leslie finally reacted, jumping into the driver’s seat and cranking the engine. The doors to the building were being opened and they were coming out. She pressed down on the gas