Esther paced her small room later that night, her mind swirling with different thoughts and feelings about the conversation Abel and herself had earlier...

"She had a number of different papers on her desk. All had sketches of symbols and diagrams on them. Now that I think about them a little harder, I believe they are from the old world, before the Armageddon. No one uses that language or type of thinking anymore. I'm surprised she even knows it, as not even a handful of people from the Vatican are familiar with it."

"Well..." Esther contemplated, trying to think of something in Ren's defense. "Well, she could have run across them in books here at the church. Maybe one of the books has some of those things in it, perhaps not an entire novel dedicated to them, but a brief mentioning...or something of that nature."

"That is possible, but extremely doubtable. The diagrams showed extreme complexity, even in their scribbled form, and the symbols were mysterious to me, many of them unrecognizable, and I have seen some of these books before."

"Maybe they aren't even real symbols. If she did come across them, she might have just taken an interest in how they were styled and decided to make a few more in the same way. Her fiancé was quite the innovator, as you, yourself, said, so maybe she just picked up some of that thinking from him."

"She does have plenty of time on her hands, I suppose." Abel made a face as if he was considering this possibility, but Esther knew he was just doing that so she wouldn't be as mad, or argumentative, with him.

"On to the next item I found then. A rosary. A simple, ordinary, everyday, run-of-the-mill rosary. Well, except for the fact that it was covered in blood."

"Are you sure you weren't seeing things through your need to find something?"

"No, no – it was plenty real. I made sure to check for myself by chipping some of it off."

"It wasn't the paint of the beads?"

"No, the beads are blue in color. Besides-"

"Maybe what you picked off was the remainder of an older color. Blue is just the color that is underneath, and the last of the red has just chipped away."

Abel sighed. "Besides the fact that I checked myself, Ren admitted it was blood. From Aeron, of course."

"And what's wrong with that answer?"

"Afterwards she said that she had washed it before; she had just missed a few spots."

"And?"

"And if you would have seen her room, you would have known that that was a blatant lie. Nothing she had was covered in any dust or dirt what-so-ever. She didn't even have to clean today. She probably wouldn't have to clean for a month and her room would still be so sanitized you could eat a feast off of the floor and lick the scraps from the cracks besides."

Esther arched an eyebrow. "Don't you think you're exaggerating a little?"

"Maybe, but you're missing my point, Miss Esther."

"Which is?"

"She's suspect. A prominent one at that. You and the Bishop may deny it all you want, but watch her carefully for one day, Esther. Notice how she acts, how much she smiles. No one can smile so easily after what's been going on in this town; not so soon after the one person they had in the world is dead... Mourning can go on forever." Abel's eyes softened and Esther saw knowledge enter them like he truly understood what he said, like a past experience had taught him these things...

Esther heaved a great sigh and fell onto her bed. She didn't want it to happen, but the more she thought about everything, the more doubt crept into her mind about Ren.

'This is so confusing,' Esther thought. She stopped her pacing and flopped down on her bed, the mattress groaning in complaint. 'Maybe some sleep will help...'

But before she could fully close her eyes, a loud siren went off and the bells of the church rang loudly. Such an unexpected and earsplitting din surprised Esther so much that when she jumped she rolled off of the bed and hit the hard marble floor.

"Damn..." Esther stood and rubbed her lower back, the place where the bulk of her weight had pin-pointed and hit the floor, slightly wincing as she did so. She ran out of her room, almost getting trampled as she stepped out into the hallway because of the other nuns and priests that hurried from their rooms to the entrance of the church.

"Father!" she called to Abel as she arrived with the rest of the crowd at the main doors. "Father, what's going on?"

"I'm not sure. All we know is there were gun shots, so it could be any number of things, but we're to move out right away. Let's go."

"Right." Esther upholstered her gun, and ran into the night.

More gun shots filled the air as Esther, Abel, and the other members of the church closed in. Esther's heart pounded hard against her chest. 'I didn't see Ren. She could have been in her room...but….' Esther bit her lip as she rounded the corner of one of the apartment buildings, her gun held straight in front of her, ready to fire if the situation called for it.

In the middle of the street a figure stood shaking. Esther gulped. The figure seemed to be wearing a long coat of some sort. It was hard to tell because the figure was cloaked in darkness, the nearest street lamp not fully illuminating the scene. The killer stumbled back and fell to the ground, light cast on their face. A frumpy haired man sat panting, covered in blood from the massacre at his feet, shaking from head to toe, a gun, all the bullets spent, gripped in his hand.

Even though it was a gruesome scene, the ring of nuns and priests relaxed. Many of them sighed and put the guns away.

"Another local fight it seems." Amadea spoke directly across from Esther in the circle. Amadea walked forward to the man that sat, stunned, on the ground. She knelt down and took the gun from his hand. The man jolted at her sudden presence, and cowered when she put her hand on his shoulder.

"Bishop….Bishop I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I don't know...I didn't...I heard things. They said things. All of them! My brother, they could have killed my brother! I'm sorry...," the man buried his face in his hands and sobbed, repeating 'I'm sorry' like it would bring the bodies that lay motionless in the street back to life.

Amadea look solemnly at the weeping man. She gestured to two nuns who stepped forward and coaxed the man up; supporting him as they walked down the town to the police station.

"Father, Esther…," Amadea spoke as they approached her, "you are welcome to go back to the church if you wish. We have sufficient help here to take care of the task."

"We'll stay," Abel said. "I doubt we will be able to go to sleep this night after what has happened anyway, right, Esther?"

"Yes," Esther spoke softly. She couldn't fight the sorrow that hit her when she saw the scene in full, but she was relieved that this had nothing to do with the murders, and that it was not Ren that wielded the gun.

The killer walked to the window, lifting the curtains that blocked their view, and peered outside. They couldn't see it, but the figure knew what was happening. By the sound of things, everything had gone as planned.

The curtains dropped as the figure walked back over to the body and the brief case. With barely a sound, the killer finished collecting the vitals for that night, clicked the case closed, and exited the small apartment, gliding down the stairs and into the night undetected.