"Wait, rewind it!" Kevin piped up. Something caught his attention in the chaos on screen.

Katherine pressed a button and Kevin watched the scene play in reverse—Relief …panic…shock… "Stop, there!" he said. The image froze. Sam and JB were a frantic blur in the blackness. JB stared bug-eyed at the limp strip of fabric in his hands. Sam hung mid-scream with arms outstretched toward the broken sash. But that's not what Kevin was interested in.

"What do you see, Kev?" said Jordan, eyes transfixed on the frozen image.

Kevin pointed to the corner of the screen, where a glass-like form had appeared right behind Sam just seconds before the sash tore. "Look right there. You can barely see it, but I think they were followed."

"I see it!" said Katherine. "Some invisible time traveler is there watching them."

Jonah scooted closer to the monitor and cocked his head. "I think I see it too. I don't get it, though. I thought time was so damaged that nobody's elucidator let them turn invisible?"

"This guy is clearly the exception," said Kevin, "and I think he's the same person who killed Mary Ashford. I see a hood on him here, though it's really hard to tell. You'd think the crazy HD of this thing would give us a better look."

"He probably knew he'd be caught on camera," said Katherine, "so he picked a time when the focus would be on something else, like this." She gestured toward JB and Sam panicking in the void. "And I'm sure he planned on them also being too distracted to notice."

"Um, and how would he have known JB and Sam would get separated in outer time?"

"Oh, that's not what I meant," she said with a smirk. "They seemed pretty distracted already."

"So we think the hooded psycho followed them here," said Jonah. "Does this mean he's been watching them the entire time?"

"Probably. It sounds like he'd been watching Mary too." Kevin swallowed. He didn't want to relive the sight of Mary's lifeless body floating in that pond. Of course, he couldn't let his siblings know how much that had disturbed him.

"You know, I read about the Mary Ashford murder in one of my law classes," said Katherine. "But it was more about that creep Thornton and his trial. Mary was just a footnote in her own death. Granted, the trial was wild, but still. Mary deserved better."

Kevin suppressed a shudder. He wished they would stop talking about Mary. "Could we focus back on the hooded guy? What do you think is his deal? To just randomly cause chaos?"

Jonah scowled. "It's like Second all over again—" he started, but cut himself off hastily. "I mean, not really. Second, at least thought he was doing the right thing. "

"Nice save, Jonah," said Kevin.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to say you were anything like the hooded guy."

Jordan glared at his twin. "Of course not. Kevin isn't Second. Second is Second. Kevin is Kevin."

"Right," said Jonah. "Exactly."

"This guy is nothing like Second," said Katherine. "Didn't you hear him laugh about accidentally killing Barbara Forrest? Whoever this person is, he's evil. Trust me, when you study law and learn about the worst kinds of people in the world, you start to recognize the difference between the ones who just made poor decisions and the ones who are real sociopaths. The hairs on the back of your neck stick up and you just know."

Kevin got goosebumps just listening to his sister describe the sensation. He knew she was right. The man in the hood was no misguided vigilante.

"Let's see what he does," said Katherine. "Elucidator, resume the scene, but slow it down."

JB, Sam, and the hooded man drifted back into motion. Kevin squinted at the glassy figure in the corner. At half speed, he floated up behind Sam, thrust out his arms, and…

"What?" all four of them said together.

"Elucidator, pause it again," said Katherine. She then addressed her siblings. "You saw that, right?"

Jordan shook his head and blinked several times. Jonah squinted and said, "Did the hooded man just push Sam back toward JB? Was he trying to save her?"

"That's what it looked like," said Kevin. "Maybe he's not an evil sociopath after all?"

Katherine crossed her arms, looking unconvinced. "It's like he's playing God."

"What do you mean?" said Jonah.

Katherine raised her eyebrows. "Aren't you supposed to be a psych graduate?"

"Yeah, psych as in psychology, not psychic. I can't read minds."

"Yeah, obviously," she said. "I'm not talking about reading minds. I'm talking about the criminology class we both took."

Jonah snorted. "That was forever ago at the community college. I went on to study developmental psychology, not criminal profiling. I'm surprised you remember anything from that long ago."

"It was my first year of college, of course I remember!"

"Okay, then tell us, Katherine," Kevin said. "Get to the point." He wasn't interested in their bickering.

Katherine straightened. "Right, right. Okay, so in that class we had to do a project on a specific criminal and analyze their behavior. I got assigned Ted Bundy—awful human being, by the way. Ming was in the class too and she got to talk about Cyntoia Brown, whose case is way more layered—"

Jordan snapped his finger. "Focus, Katherine."

"Yes, so anyway, Ted Bundy killed over thirty women. He was a monster. But he also volunteered at a crisis call center where he talked people out of suicide. He once even saved a little girl from drowning."

Kevin was growing impatient. "Okay, so we now know of two murderers who also saved people. How does that help us?"

"My writeup had to explain why someone capable of murder was also capable of saving lives. And it's kind of obvious." She paused and waited for one of them to respond—or maybe just for dramatic effect. No one said anything, so she sighed and finished, "It was all about control. He wanted to be the one in charge of who got to live or die. My guess is the hooded man wants to kill Sam himself, and on his terms. It's a game to him."

Kevin held his knees to his chest, hating how childish he must look. Their parents had taught him that there was no such thing as pure evil, that there were only people in bad circumstances who deserved empathy. No one actually enjoyed causing harm. Yet, here Katherine was giving him two examples of men who killed, seemingly just for fun. "Why?" was all he managed to say.