Switch was always good at putting two and two together.  When the article on cold fusion disappeared from his screen before his eyes, he had known something was wrong.  When he duplicated the deleted research in his brother's ample basement, he had known there was a massive problem.  Now, several hours too late, he knew he was in deadly danger.

He watched the flashing lights from a distance.  It was only a bitter irony that the body in the rubble was not his own.  Jacob had thought the nightlife in Deep Ellum was too dangerous for him to come to last night's rave.  Switch swallowed the taste of bile, forced it down into his burning gut.

"I'll pass, Jason."  Jacob says.  He's trying to annoy me, I think.  No one calls me that but Jacob and mom.

"Are you sure?  They're really good." And I want to hear them live before the drummer OD's again.

"Too dangerous down there."  There's a glint in his eye.  He's trying to rag me, but I don't give a flying squirrel that he doesn't like my lifestyle.

"Well, at least your Jag will have a good time."  I hold out my hand, palm up.  He looks at my hand like it's a toad, then suddenly grins and hands over the keys.

"Park someplace safe."  There's not even a hint of concern in his voice.  He has a fetish for insurance coverage.

I hit Central and get the Jag up to 150 before I reach the exit for the Arts District.  Not a cop in sight.

Switch sat in the darkness in his twin's Jaguar, watching the police and firefighters poring over the smoldering ruins of Jacob's Turtle Creek home.

Plenty of cops in sight now, he thought, disgustedly.

Etching the sight into his brain was more difficult than usual due to the late hour.  Nevertheless, he concentrated and memorized it all: he knew he would need it later. A midnight-blue Grand Am slowed down as it passed, passengers gawking at the wreckage.

The alcohol was long gone, leaving only a dull exhaustion like a fire behind his eyes. Nevertheless, he watched and waited.

A hollowness settled into him, filling him like the smoky silence after a warehouse rave.  He watched the tiny figures moving through the ruins, pointing here, watering there, picking up things with tongs and dropping them into evidence bags.  The body bag was loaded into the waiting ambulance.  There was no need for a siren.  Jacob was long dead.

Switch needed to think.  Nevertheless, he waited and watched.  Watching the ambulance drive quietly away, he shook the tears from his vision.  Contrary to the common lore about identicals, Switch had seldom been close to Jacob.  Using Jacob's house and basement while Switch attended the Dallas convention was an imposition of convenience, a little jab that only a family member would understand.  It wasn't meant to cut this deep.

Nevertheless, whoever destroyed his twin's house and -- face it -- killed his twin would feel this same desolation. Every detail must be remembered.

Cars, license plates, faces.  A cell phone ringing in the wreckage.  Gaits and gestures.  A dog barking far away.  The chimney gently crumbling away from the house.  Another Pontiac coming the other way.  No, the same Grand Am.

Switch perked up.

A nondescript male face poked out of the window and asked an officer a question.  The officer appeared curious, then suddenly straightened. It briefly reminded Switch of a scene in Stalag 17 --a Nazi soldier recognizing a plainclothes superior.

The officer gestured down the road and shook his head.  He then pointed to the rubble and shrugged.  The car pulled away, its headlights brushing briefly across Switch's face.  He ducked until the light passed, then noted the license plate for future reference.

Someone would pay.

As he sat in the car, seeing everything and feeling nothing, an idea began to form.

Someone would surely pay.

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