As he wandered through the countryside, he couldn't quite believe he'd done it. He'd done it. Gene Black had actually done it. Finally. And although it had been something he had been planning for months, years, maybe his whole life, he didn't feel quite as good as he thought he would.

He had dreamed of being a murderer for as long as he could remember. He had wanted to feel life draining away in his hands, to watch as the soul departed the body. If it did. It was all about experimentation and, perhaps understandably, there was nothing he could research about it on the internet. He thought maybe he would start a blog about it, but he wasn't technical enough to hide his identity, so he'd need a bit of help. And he never intended to get anyone else involved, it just wouldn't be fair.

And that's where the trouble began. He had killed the woman, strangled her, just that morning. He had no idea who she was, and no clue where she had been going, and at that moment he hadn't cared. Now, however, he realised he did. He realised that he actually felt guilty about the death. He hadn't expected that.

Looking about him, he saw he had walked off his normal track and into a field of heather. Bad news. He could feel his allergies already beginning to tighten his chest and squeeze his head. He looked back to the path he had left. And then he lay down, in the midst of the heather, in the midst of the thing that could - would, probably - kill him.

Experimenting on himself was a much better plan.