He unscrewed the cap and looked at it now, seated on a stool at the examination counter near the sink. After a few moments, the surface of the six or so ounces of white blood rippled, and Bennett shivered. He took a deep breath in order to collect himself. He thought about what to do, and then pulled an identical jar down from the shelf above. He filled it with the same amount of water and set the jars down side by side. He needed to make certain that the disturbance was not the result of vibrations from a passing truck or some such.

He watched and waited.

There it was again. The viscous white fluid rippled—he saw it—while the considerably less dense water surface did not undulate at all.

Something was moving inside the blood sample.

Bennett thought for a moment. He poured the water down the sink drain, and then slowly poured the oily blood from one jar into the other. The fluid was syrupy and poured slowly but neatly. He saw nothing pass through the thin stream. The bottom of the first jar remained lightly coated with the white blood, but he saw nothing there.

He set the new jar down, and again he watched and waited.

He did not have to watch very long. The surface undulated and Bennett nearly leaped out of his stool.

He heard a noise behind him then, a scratching or a rustling sound. He turned, made jumpy by his discovery. Overhead lamps shone down on the empty stainless-steel tables behind him, every surface wiped down, the floor drains mopped clean. The Flight 753 victims locked away inside the walk-in cooler across the morgue.

Rats, maybe. There was nothing they could do to keep the vermin out of the building—and they had tried everything. In the walls. Or beneath the floor drains. He listened for a moment longer, then returned to the jar.

He poured the liquid from jar to jar again, this time stopping halfway. The amounts in each jar were roughly even. He set them underneath the overhead lamp and watched the milky surface for a sign of life.

There it was. In the first jar. A plip this time, almost like that of a small fish nibbling at the surface of a cloudy pond.

Bennett watched the other jar until he was satisfied, and then poured its contents down the drain. He then started over, again dividing the contents between the two glass vessels.

A siren in the street outside made him sit up. It passed, and in what should have been the ensuing silence, he heard sounds again. Movement-type sounds, behind him. Again he turned, feeling equal parts paranoid and foolish now. The room was empty, the morgue sterilized and still.

Yet…something was making that noise. He stood from his stool, silently, turning his head this way and that in order to get a fix on its source.