Bending over the corpse, leaning against the cold steel table on which the body rested, Dan squeezed the black spots at the corner of the rotting eye. The blackness oozed out of the pores. It collected in the basin of the temple, pooling as it drained, then evaporating into a black mist. It rose into the air around us, circling the lamp hanging low over the workstation.

“Don’t breathe, Greg,” Dan said.

The swirling shadow dissipated as it rose, spreading to the dark corners of the ceiling, deepening the shadows. The air tasted sharp and bitter, like dad’s batteries we used to lick in the garage when we were kids.

Dan breathed first.

Looking down at the dead man between us, there were more dark spots, pinprick-sized swellings, reservoirs of foul ink collected under the skin.

“What the hell was that?” I asked.

Dan turned to his tray of tools, waving his gloved hands over them, divining which to use.

“I’m not really sure,” he said, rotating the scalpel in front of his face, examining an edge too fine to see. “My guess would be that it’s a waste product of some undocumented parasite. It’s always around the eyes, presents as liquid-filled black spots—but the substance vaporizes almost instantly. It’s organic, but I haven’t been able to collect enough to run any real substantive tests. Once it’s vapor, it doesn’t test as anything. Nothing.”

I rubbed my forehead. The film of sweat had started to cool in the damp basement. I shivered.

“It’s just . . . dark air,” he said.

He bent back over the body. His face tensed. He always looked ten years older when he cut, like the focus drained the life from him. He looked more like Dad than me, then, but maybe that was the grey lab coat, him holding Dad’s tools, bent over Dad’s table.

He removed an eye and placed it on a small steel tray. His hand barely moved, but when he straightened, the eye lay open, unfolded between us, a cloudy marble nested in layers of waxy wet tissue. He looked up at me, smiling.

My tongue curled inside my mouth and my throat tightened. The muscles at the back of my knees turned to turbulent water. I tasted bile, felt it burning through my chest, at the back of my throat.

“You don’t have to look,” he said. He always said. I never wanted to look but I always did, always watched, first Dad, then Dan. He held the tray out, tapping the bottom of my chin with its cold edge, the eyes sliding across its stained surface.

“Why did you need me here for this?”

“I want you to know what to look for. I need research subjects.”

“Dan, that’s not really okay. I can’t just do that—there are rules.”