Breathing a silent sigh of relief, Veena checked in the direction of the nurses’ station. All was quiet. She hurried on, reaching Hernandez’s door in seconds. Pushing it open, she stepped in and returned the door to its near-shut position. Although the TV was on, the volume was low. The overhead lights were dimmed, causing the corners of the room to be lost in shadow. Veena had no trouble seeing Mrs. Hernandez. The woman was fast asleep, with the head of her bed elevated about forty-five degrees. The fluorescent-like light emanating from the TV dimly illuminated her facial features while leaving her orbits in deep shadow, giving her a ghastly appearance, as if she were already dead.

Thankful the woman was asleep, and wanting the anxiety-producing affair over with as soon as possible, Veena rushed to the bedside, pulling the syringe from her pocket. She was careful not to nudge the noisy, metal bed rails as she reached for the IV line. She was also careful not to pull on it for fear of attracting the patient’s attention and waking her. Holding the IV port in one hand, she used her teeth to remove the needle cover. Then, holding her breath, she inserted the needle. When she could see the needle tip within the lumen of the IV line, she prepared to slowly depress the plunger. Instead, she almost leaped out of her shoes. For no discernible reason, Mrs. Hernandez rolled her head in Veena’s direction and looked up into Veena’s face. A slight smile played across her lips.

“Thank you, dearie,” she said.

Veena felt her blood run cold. Knowing she had to act that instant or she’d never be able to do it, she forcibly depressed the plunger of the syringe, shooting the bolus of succinylcholine into the patient’s bloodstream. What had pushed her over the edge was sudden, inappropriate defensive anger that the woman had the insensitivity not only to wake up but to thank her, apparently thinking Veena was giving her medication to help her.

Although Veena hadn’t seriously thought about what she’d be forced to witness after injecting the paralyzing drug, she was horrified by what she did see. Contrary to a peaceful, cinema-like passing, which had been her general assumption and what Cal had intimated, it was anything but. Within seconds Mrs. Hernandez’s body reacted to the large dose of succinylcholine with rapid fasciculation of her musculature. It started with her facial muscles giving her waves of grotesque facial contortions. Adding to the unexpected horror was the intense fear that clouded her eyes. As her hand lifted in a vain attempt to reach out to Veena for help, it too started to jerk about uncontrollably. And then came a sudden ominous, purple darkness that spread over her face like the shadow that seeps across the face of the moon during a lunar eclipse. Unable to breathe yet fully conscious, Mrs. Hernandez was being rapidly suffocated and turning deeply cyanotic.

Horrified at what she had wrought and wanting nothing more than to flee, Veena was forced by her guilt to remain rooted to her spot and watch her patient’s death throes. Luckily for both it was soon over, and Mrs. Hernandez’s eyes gazed blankly out at eternity.