Vendetta
By BeckyS
April 2005-2006

The Eppes family and the characters and situations from the TV show "NUMB3RS"
are the property of the Scotts and the creation of Cheryl Heuton and Nick Falacci.
No infringement is intended, and no profit is being made.

"So, how long is it we have to wait for him?" the young man in the first row of the classroom asked the slim, black-haired girl next to him. He breathed deeply but discreetly of her heavy sandalwood perfume, glad of an excuse to talk to her.

She gazed around the room, as if she could make their teacher appear out of thin air for his Tuesday noon seminar. A breeze from the open windows teased at her bangs. "Isn't it five for a teaching assistant, ten for an instructor, fifteen for an associate professor, and twenty for a full professor?"

A young black man said from the back of the room, "That's an urban legend, Janelle – it's not in the student handbook."

"Doesn't have to be," she said. "It's courtesy."

"My brother at MIT said it's thirty for a tenured professor with a doctorate, especially if he has more than one," said another girl in the far corner, "and I'd wait a lot longer than that for this professor."

Giggles erupted from the few women in the room, and more than one male student rolled his eyes. They all considered themselves lucky that Dr. Charles Eppes was faculty and a full professor, because that meant that the girls couldn't chase after him and he couldn't pursue them. The man was brilliant, young, funny, and girls found his curly black hair and deep brown eyes absolutely adorable. It didn't even matter that he was the same height as most of them. If he ever entered the race, the male students would all be out of luck.

"Jase?" Janelle said. "This isn't like him."

"C'mon, he's missed class before." Jason dug around in his backpack and pulled out a physics assignment to work on while they waited. He was willing to give Eppes a break, too. The man was not only smart but could teach, and Jason felt lucky to have gotten into one of his classes.

"Yeah," she answered, "but he always makes sure we have a sub, or at least someone leaves a note on one of the boards. Even when he gets wrapped up in a problem, he has TAs to wake him up and haul him in here."

"Oh, yeah," Jason smiled. "Like Amita."

Janelle whacked his arm. "Doctor Amita, ace." Amita Ramanujan was going for her second doctorate, which didn't put her off-base to grad students, but Janelle Taylor was sensitive to the still-enduring prejudice against women in science. One thing about Dr. Eppes, he didn't care what sex, size or color you were, as long as you wanted to learn. "So where is he?" Janelle wondered out loud.

Jason shrugged. "Maybe there's a calendar or something on his desk." He waved at the massive piece of furniture that blocked off a nook at the front of the L-shaped room, turning it into a working office.

Janelle nudged him and slipped out of her chair. "Let's go see."

"Okay, if you really have to." He got up to follow her, also curious.

But when she got to the side of the desk, she stopped cold and reached for him with a shaking hand. Her eyes widened, she covered her mouth with her other hand, and then she screamed.

Jason ran to her side and looked down at what she was staring at, and he swallowed hard. Professor Eppes was crumpled into the corner where the desk and the wall met. His head was tipped back against a drawer and blood had run down his face and into his hair from a deep gash on his forehead. It stained his hands, his shirt, and the floor where he lay.

Jason dropped to his knees and tried to find a pulse in their professor's neck, his fingers slipping on the blood. He looked up at the crowd that had gathered, faces frozen in shock. "I think," he said in a thin voice, "I think he's dead."

Chaos. That was what Dr. Larry Fleinhardt found when he slipped into his friend's classroom. A campus policeman was trying to calm the students, but since he also wouldn't let any of them leave, he was having a rough time. Larry said a silent word of thanks to the student who had come running for him, who'd practically flung himself into his office gasping, "Accident . . . Dr. Eppes . . . ." Larry had raced after him, with no idea what to expect, but he knew the first thing was to get the students calmed.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he called out. He didn't have a particularly loud voice, but he knew how to make it cut through a classroom. Most of them turned to look at him, recognized him as a colleague of their professor, and actually paid attention. "Please take your seats and remain calm. Do not talk any more than is necessary until we can sort through what has to be done."

He turned to the campus patrolman, who looked as young as the students – and as rattled. "I was told an accident . . . ?" He checked the name tag. "Officer Monroe?"

Monroe shook his head. "More like murder."

"But murder . . ." Larry shook his head and started toward the desk. "Murder means someone . . . died?" He stepped around the desk and stopped abruptly. His face went white. He forced himself to move forward, to kneel next to his friend. Charlie's head was thrown back, exposing his throat, and his eyes were closed, dark lashes spread like a fan against his cheeks. Larry steeled himself to feel for a pulse, careful not to disturb any potential evidence. He felt ill as he watched the beaten face of his friend for any sign of life, as he felt no pulse against his blood-slick fingers.

A feminine voice carried across the room from the doorway.

"Professor Fleinhardt?"

Amita. No, she shouldn't see this. He dragged himself up and forced himself back into action. "Amita, would you and Officer Monroe please escort these students into my classroom." He turned to the class and raised his voice. "No one leaves; no one goes home. We'll let you know what we can as soon as we can."

They shuffled out with backward glances, but obedient as children in their shock.

"Charles?" he whispered to the man on the floor. "No. Not you . . ." He saw Charlie's cell phone on the desk and picked it up, turning it over in his hands as if it were a precious artifact. Then he flipped it open, searched through the address book and dialed one of the numbers. There were the sounds of a call being forwarded, then a voice that seemed very far away.

"Good morning, this is the Federal Bureau of Investigation. How may I direct your call?"

Soon the room seemed full again, this time with uniforms and suits that all looked terribly out of place in the halls of academe. He leaned against a corner of the small study area by the desk, his eyes never leaving the body of his friend, and let the sounds wash over him. He slowly realized that one of the voices was talking to him, and that one of the men in a suit was pulling on his arm.

"Professor?" the man asked. "Would you please come to the back of the room with me for a minute?"

Larry followed him and lowered himself to one of the student chairs. He barely registered the paramedics crossing in front of the white boards. Then he was jolted back to the present by the flash of cameras taking pictures of the crime scene – of Charlie. "I can't believe it. I just can't believe that Charles . . ."

"Professor, I'm Assistant Director Merrick. I run the Los Angeles FBI office. Don Eppes works for me, and Charlie—" he shot a regretful look at the front of the room, "Charlie worked for us sometimes, too."

"Oh. Yes." He looked up to see a man about his own age who had a pinched look around eyes that gazed steadily at him. "Can you find Don?" he asked. "I tried to call him, but he isn't at work and he isn't answering his cell phone."

Merrick put his hand on Larry's shoulder and squeezed gently. "He's on a stake-out. They're at a critical point; it wouldn't be safe to try to pull him out right now."

"But he needs to know – someone has to tell him—" His stomach turned over at the thought of being the bearer of that news.

"I'll tell him as soon as it's safe," Merrick said. "Do you know where his father is? Have you been able to reach him?"

Larry shook his head. This was going to just about kill Alan Eppes. "I think he might be out of town. San Diego; maybe a day trip into Mexico. I'm not sure." He looked up. "Don would know."

Merrick sighed. "All right. I'll take care of things for now." He pulled a card from his wallet and a pen, and wrote a number on the back of it. He handed it to Larry, who took it with an air of abstraction. "Call me at that number as soon as you hear from either of them, and tell them to call. It'll reach me any time. You can go home now, if you want. I'll get in touch with you as soon as I know anything."

Larry stood, but stared at the far corner of the room where people were doing . . . things. This was wrong – it was just wrong. He realized Merrick was waiting for him. "Be gentle," was all he could finally say.

Merrick nodded. "I never really understood him, but he gave us everything he had. He's part of our family, too."

Larry pressed his hand up against his forehead, then his fist against his mouth. There was nothing more to say, so he just nodded and walked slowly out of the classroom, wondering what he was going to tell Amita.