“Such morons!” he exclaimed, laughing and glancing into the rearview mirror as he moved hastily along the highway, in the opposite direction of his last project. Two police cars were speeding away from him. He felt a rush of exhilaration, pounding his fist against the dashboard. “Idiots!” he screamed, spittle flecking the mirror. “Hah!” he crowed, pumping a fist.
He reached down to turn up the music. Opera swelled inside the cramped, sweltering cabin of his old sedan.
He kept to the speed limit, following a truck loaded with lumber. His eyes darted along the lumber, trying to gauge by the evidence what the man's project was. Two by fours, a couple of longer planks. Some nice trim wedged between two of the boards...
In his mind he pictured all the things he might be able to do with the very same assortment.
He liked piecing things together.
One of his favorite hobbies was woodwork.
Of course, it had never been his favorite hobby the same way that playing with chemicals had been.
He smiled as he merged slowly, hitting his blinker, and allowing another motorist to pass. The other driver blared his horn.
But the chemist was in too good a mood to allow some grumpy-guss to spoil his excitement. He was humming now, along with the music, waving one finger in the air beneath his nose like a conductor's wand.
The sheep couldn't be blamed for bleating, could they?
The cops were no different of course.
“Stupid, stupid—stoooopiiid!” he sang along with the opera, using his own lyrics. He cackled as he turned off the highway.
It had taken them so long to find her, too. It had only taken him a few minutes to locate the particular target he'd wanted. He'd checked the library out for nearly a week before noticing Sanna's schedule.
He hadn't known her name at the time. But three days ago, he'd introduced himself. Sanna. Chem 101. He nodded. And she always chose one of three study rooms. He was glad she'd ended up in the back, corner room on that particular day.
He would have hated to change plans.
But even for that he had a contingency. He always came with alternative routes.
That was the best way to strategize, wasn't it?
“Stupid, stupid—morons,” he murmured to himself.
This was the problem with the country, after all. He was surrounded by such idiots. How couldn't they see?
Well... now he was making them see.
He grinned, leering in the rearview mirror, and moving hastily up the highway, following the GPS device as it cheerfully barked out instructions barely audible over the crooning of the falsetto voice on his radio.
In the back of the car he had a pile of books he'd stolen from the library. He'd hidden them in his bag after tearing off the barcodes to avoid triggering the security system.
The cameras above the door, of course, had been down for maintenance. Every fifteen days, they would reboot the system for one hour.
He wasn't supposed to know that.
But there were a lot of things he wasn't supposed to know.
Others simply wouldn't pay attention.
And so he'd been clear... concise.
Two more by tonight...
How much more obvious could he get?
If they weren't able to solve it this time...
Well that was their own damn fault, wasn't it?
He'd given them every opportunity possible.
He was humming now along with the music, reaching into the passenger seat and lifting the second cooler he'd brought with him.
This one...
Now this one was special.
He stroked the metal lid, humming as he did like someone taking care of a pet.
Pets were stupid, though. Bags of poop and yearning... He couldn't fathom why other apes cottoned on to the fuzzy, whiskery critters.
For that's what he was... All he was.
Some cousin to some ape evolved over millions of years...
But time didn't instill value. People thought they were so special. But all one had to do was look out a window. Traffic flowed past, quicker, faster. Thousands of people moving about their day. Thousands more in thousands of cities... Millions... Billions... hundreds of billions over the course of human history. And all of them consigned to this single, small dust speck...
He snorted.
To think someone was so important... so valuable?
No... no more valuable than a grain of sand. And why did it matter to toss sand? To step on a bug? To tear a leaf off a plant?
What he was doing was no different than pruning.
Just because the others didn't see it that way, why should it matter?
In fact, why should he care at all what evolved apes thought of him?
He let out a shuddering little breath of excitement...
He knew he was right. And they were all so dumb.
Yes... yes he would do it tonight.
Two more...
One of them... he swallowed, feeling a jolt of nerves. But he scowled deeply at this, his own mind lashing him with accusation.
No second-guessing. No hesitation. He refused to allow it.
Even this was just chemical reaction. Besides... did he even have a choice? It wasn't like finite beings in a closed system could create options, was it? No... everything was pre-determined. The chemicals in his brain, the firing of the synapses wouldn't help anyone.
Certainly not with what came next.
Two more by tonight.
One of them... himself.
It had to be. That was what he'd planned from the very beginning. He wasn't about to wuss out over some flare of fear. What would that make him?
Nothing more than an ape?
He wasn't anyway...
He shook his head at this thought, sneering.
No... he was going to die tonight. He'd already decided on it.
But the second victim?
Now that one was special. His hand still trailed against the lid of his closed lunchbox. His knuckles rapped against the metal.
He smiled again. A very special concoction for a very special night.
His last night on Earth.
Her last night, also.
This project, more than any, was the one he'd been looking forward to the most.