We last left off with an office locked into a tense atmosphere. Donna, one of the employees of the insurance company, suffered a serious cardiac emergency that caused her to collapse onto the floor of the ladies' bathroom. Jerry Wells, a quiet, older man who is a father to three and a grandfather to two, was last seen quietly contemplating his next actions as he held a sawed off semi-automatic shotgun. And now we continue… Jerry then stood up, clutching the gun tightly and taking a deep breath as he removed himself from what he was about to do. He assumed an aggressive stance as he bellowed out, "EVERYONE GET ON THE GROUND NOW!" Everyone looked up with a start, wide eyes staring up at Jerry, though none could respond. "I SAID GET ON THE GROUND!" He fired a single shot toward the ceiling. Panic ensued as his frightened coworkers scrambled under their sneered as he looked down at the sniveling cowards, "You all are going to die here. There is nothing you can do. All of the phone lines have been cut and the doors are all locked. There is no escaping your fate," his deep voice resonated coldly through the office, hitting each person's ears like acid. His heart began to beat quickly, skipping beats occasionally as he stepped heavily around the room. "You will all crawl to the far wall," he commanded broadly, "GO, NOW!" he yelled, prompting all of his trembling coworkers to scramble on their hands and knees to the far wall of the office as he demanded."Jerry, please! You don't need to do this! Please, Jerry! Put the gun down!" one of the other older men, Henry Fallow, who had known Jerry quite well pleaded."SHUT UP!" Jerry screamed angrily, stomping toward Henry and shoving the barrel of the gun in his face, "Don't you FUCKING tell me what I need to do!" His voice echoed menacingly through the deathly silent outside, Sarah had finished her cigarette and disposed of it in the ashtray. She took a deep breath as she walked toward the front door of the office building, "Well, I guess I better go in and get back to work before people wonder where I've been," she thought with dread, despising how rotten her day was going. She placed her manicured hands on the handles of the door and gave them a gentle nudge. They didn't open. She stepped back with a start and looked at the handles oddly before giving them a firmer push. They still wouldn't open. "Locked out? Sheesh, I wasn't taking THAT long, guys. Thanks!" she muttered under her breath as she grudgingly stormed to the side of the building to try another door only to find that the side door had also been locked. "Oh, shit. Of all days to lock the side door! What the hell is going on?" she shouted at an imaginary audience as she stormed quickly to the back door, carefully stepping around overgrown foliage as she cursed. Stepping up the concrete stairs, she seized the back door with one hand, only to find, that too, had been locked, "Son of a bitch! What the fuck, you guys?" she shouted, throwing her hands up in the air, "Great! This day just keeps getting better and better!"Sarah then pulled out her cell phone and dialed Donna's desk. She didn't know that Donna was laying dead on the floor of the ladies' bathroom at that exact moment. The phone rang endlessly, but never hit Donna's voicemail. Sarah looked at her phone with irritation plainly written across her face as she dialed Lisa's office phone. The same thing happened – the phone rang endlessly but never went to her voicemail. She wasn't sure what to make of the situation. Grumbling angrily, she walked back to the front of the building. She pressed the side of her face against the glass windows, shielding her line of vision with her hands as she strained to see if she could wave anyone over to let her in. From the window, she could see the office door, but it had been shut by someone. No one was moving around inside of the lobby and she couldn't see anyone at the front desk, "DAMN IT!" she screamed as she stomped the concrete. Out of ideas, she sat down on the sidewalk, cupping her head in her hands and fuming silently as she figured she would have to wait for someone to leave for their lunch , Jerry now had all of his coworkers lined up against the way. Each one was now clutching their aching chest and gasping uncontrollably. He could feel hot sweat pouring down his back as he marched along the line of coworkers, gun leaning against his shoulder, "Now, now, who shall be the first to die?" he hissed cruelly. He stopped in front of Marcus Redding and pointed an accusing finger down at him, "You cheated on your wife and left her penniless to care for your children, maybe you should die!" his voice boomed 's heart jumped to his throat, "N-no! P-p-please! I'm-m a changed man, I sw-swear!" he stammered nervously raising his hands up glared down at him and quickly turned his gaze to Cathy Stewart, "Or, perhaps you! Every time the office does a charity event, you help yourself to the collections. Just how much money have you made off with, you dirty fucking thief?" he snarled at her, his hand twitching on the trigger of the gasped loudly, all color washing from her face as she struggled to even rolled his eyes as he turned swiftly on his heels, his back to the scared line of employees, "Each and every one of you deserves to die, and you know it," he said in a low voice, "All of you will now close your eyes. NOW CLOSE YOUR FUCKING EYES!" He spun around wildly whipping the shotgun down and waving it over the group. Hesitantly, each person shut their eyes, their hands clamped firmly together in a prayer position or covering their eyes as tears swept slickly through their took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he took several steps back. He had no choice but to shoot them. He had to keep up his end of the deal or else… unspeakable horrors would befall his family. He just couldn't go on living if anything happened to his precious grandchildren or children. He looked mournfully onto his terrified coworkers, each one with their eyes closed before raising his gun and firing at random into the line. Terror broke out, his coworkers began screaming, which was much more of a shock to Jerry than he had imagined it would have been. He snapped away from wherever his mind had been and came to a sickening realization of what he was doing. His finger clamped down on the trigger as he panicked, spraying the office with bullets as the screams faded away. When all were silent, their bodies slumped over each other against the wall, his hands fell numbly to his sides. The gun dropped with a clack to the floor as Jerry stumbled backward. He had killed them. He had killed them all. His knees gave out from under him. He fell backward, his head striking the side of a cubicle. The whole world blurred around him as his head landed limply on the ground. Images of his grandchildren flashed before his eyes as he realized that he would never see them later, police arrived on the scene where they found a woman, Sarah, laying unconscious in front of an attractive office building. She was dressed well and assumed to work inside of the office building. The cause of her condition was unknown and she had been found to have a dangerously weak pulse. As a result, she was immediately given emergency treatment as she was rushed by ambulance to the hospital. Upon discovering the doors to the office were all locked, emergency responders were called in to gain entry to the building. They couldn't reach anyone inside of the building, though the parking lot attached to the building was filled with cars. The suspicions of the emergency responders were raised and they promptly made the decision to break down the door to get the people inside out of the building. Once inside, they found the door from the lobby to the office to also be locked. A group of police officers shouted, "Police!" as they forced the door open. Carefully, the three officers spread out to examine the area, "Police! . The entire office area was in complete disarray. Chairs had been flipped over, phones lay on the floor, papers littered the walkways. The responders entered with caution despite none being able to detect any movement whatsoever. Officer Lee Evans led the group slowly through the office, his eyes trained on his path ahead to stay alert should something happen. As he passed several cubicles, he spotted a gun laying on the floor ahead, surrounded by shotgun shells. Lee informed his comrades without tearing his eyes away, "We've got a shotgun, it looks like someone went postal.""Leave the speculation to the detectives, officer," Officer Rae Davis chided, her gun raised defensively as she slowly crept through another part of the area. As Lee bent down to examine the gun, Rae inched forward, leaving the empty cubicles as she crossed the he examined the position of the gun, his eye caught sight of a man's hand. He stood up and pulled out his flashlight to better examine what he saw. The light revealed the body of Jerry Wells, his head surrounded by a thick halo of blood. He kneeled down and placed two fingers on the wrist to check for a pulse. Officer Lee frowned and shook his head sadly, "We have a body over here. Older man, probably in his 60s," he examined the area and found blood on the edge of the desk, "Looks like he fell back and busted his head open.""No movement on my end, Tim, what about you?" Rae called out, still searching her area for any sign of the workers of the building."Negative. Nothing here but a huge mess. Looks like someone left in a hurry. Possibly some sort of scuffle," Officer Tim Gold then came upon a sight that made her blood run cold. Lined up against the wall were at least forty office employees, all dead. Shotgun shells littered the floor around them. "Tim! Lee! Get over here!" She called, to which, both officers immediately ran over, ready to draw their guns. Tim's jaw dropped open at the grisly sight and Lee stared in complete shock."What the fuck?" Lee exclaimed softly, studying the dead bodies."So, Lee's old man lined up his coworkers and shot them?" Tim asked, piecing together what they were seeing at the scene."No, look closer at the bodies," Rae nodded to the group, "they weren't shot. There's no blood, and look," she said, kneeling down and shining a flashlight on one of the bullet casings, "This is a blank. All of them are. There are no bullets, no bullet holes, and no shot wounds," Rae explained to the baffled shook his head, trying to make sense of the murder scene, "Ok, so then the old man fired blanks, scared himself to death, fell onto a desk, busted his head open and died. But, how did everyone else die then? And, why are they lined up like that? This doesn't make any damned sense."Officer Rae shrugged, her eyes fixated on the corpses of the deceased, "I don't know, Lee, but I think this case is beyond our jurisdiction."Click here to go to Chapter 3