Retracing his steps correctly, stumbling over the corpse of the murdered man.
He crouched down to take a closer look.
It was one of the teachers, no doubt. He didn't know his name, but he had seen him several times. As to the specific motive for his murder, or why he had been around, as he had, late at night, he had no way of knowing.
All Desmond knew was that he had failed in many ways. Disappointed a lot of people.
There would have been no way to save this man.
But at the very least, he could have avenged him by putting his killer down. And he hadn't been able to do that.
He disassembled his pistol and left it lying on the floor, plus the bullets left inside, next to the professor's body. This gave him plausible deniability. About why he hadn't alerted the others in some way, by shouting or shooting.
The magic that woman had demonstrated at the end should have been enough. But just in case.
He couldn't leave anything to chance.
Trembling slightly and still bleeding, he slipped back into the tower. And went first to his bedroom.
He caught Christina awake.
"What were you doing outside? Desmond, what's the matter? What happened to you?"
Seeing thanks to the moonlight coming through the window, not using the reinforcing magic in his eyes, he went into the bathroom and turned on the lights.
He stood looking at himself in the mirror, leaning forward, one hand on the sink and the other on the wound in his stomach where she had shot him.
"Desmond." Christina approached him from behind, speaking slowly and softly. Tell me what happened, please.
Desmond clenched his blood-soaked hand into a fist and smashed it against the bathroom mirror, shattering his image into a thousand pieces.