They approach a menacing rectangular brick building (bunker) that Peter is fairly certain could withstand a nuclear blast. Uneasily he asks, "Where exactly are we?"
"Math and physics building," Leight grins. Once again, he is far too excited about murder and misfortunate (and math and physics).
There's a blast of frigid air as they go inside. Peter shivers, but it isn't just the cold. He thought he was past this. Clearly, he isn't. He hasn't escaped his memories of his university days (far too many years of them). Because his college experience wasn't the ideal admissions offices tout in their brochures.
Peter buried himself under a mountain of textbooks and barely ever came up for air. He didn't remember playing with Frisbees in grassy quads on sunny days; he remembered drowning in stress and acrid black coffee in his dorm room at three in the morning.
His college days aren't exactly something he wants to relive, and yet here he is, not only considering taking a job on the edge of a university campus, but being dragged through this labyrinth of an architectural do-not-replicate by the man he's trying so hard to escape. Clearly, this just isn't Peter's day.
He lets Leight lead him through the labyrinthine hallways, and everything he sees (or doesn't see) confirms his suspicion that this Cold War-era building may as well be a nuclear bunker. He doesn't know exactly where they're going or who the victim, and he doesn't ask. He doubts Leight would tell him.
The stairs are Escher-esque, and he's drowning in the paradox. He doesn't know how many flights they go (the twists and turns are never-ending), but it feels like an infinite loop. Abruptly, Leight opens a door, leads them out of the stairwell, and through yet another maze of halls.
Peter is certain he could spend every day of the rest of his life in this building and still never know how to navigate. He wonders, vaguely, how Leight is managing so well. Unless he's just guessing, in which case they are unequivocally fucked.
But apparently Leight knows what he's doing because Peter suddenly spots the Captain and the Lieutenant around a corner. They're standing in front of a door speaking in futile whispers that echo. Peter nods in greeting as they approach, but no words are exchanged because Leight has already pushed past them and through the door.
They walk into a windowless office. One wall is covered floor to ceiling with chalkboards, which are scribbled with rather terrifying equations that Peter doesn't think he ever could have solved, not even in his mathematical heyday. The other three walls are lined with bookcases, which are spilling over with books—books in unorganized stacks and piles and skews that remind Peter of the apartment that will soon no longer be his.
There's a desk at the center of the room, and it's covered with loose sheets of paper, which bear the same sloppy scrawl as the chalkboards. Seated at the desk is a body, which is slumped over the surface. Rigor hasn't set in, and if Peter didn't know better, he'd say the man was sleeping. But Peter does know better. Or, he knows well enough to know that Leight would not be poking and prodding a sleeping man with a pencil. Or, that no man could sleep through being poked with such ferocity.
Peter shakes his head and turns to the Captain. He doesn't have to ask.
"Dr. Dara, age 58, unmarried," the Captain announces. "Professor of mathematics at Crick for the last 25 years. Originally from Rangoon. Did his graduate work at MIT, and never left the States. Specializes in number theory, apparently—whatever that means. Found dead this morning by Kyle Yates, a student who came to office hours."
"Enemies?" Peter asks.
"At least 83 of them," the Lieutenant responds enthusiastically.
"83?"
"The number of students who failed Dara's course last semester," the Captain clarifies. "Calculus III."
Peter frowns. "How many passed?"
"Five."
"What about the curve?"
"Apparently Dara didn't believe in curves."
Peter groans. He turns around to see that Leight has moved away from the body to stare intently at the chalkboards. Peter disregards him and takes his turn. Dara is (was?) a short, thin man, with thoroughly grayed hair, silver half-moon spectacles, and a wool sweater vest. Cause of death isn't obvious. There are no visible wounds or traumas. His frown deepens. "Are we sure this is murder?"
Absently, Leight answers, "Definitely murder. Check the teacup."
Peter's eyes wander around the desk until they fall on the small blue and white teacup inches away from Dara's right hand. He bends over and peers and inside cautiously, not touching it or anything else. The cup is half empty and half full of a light brown liquid. He inhales. Thick, nutmeg, heavy, sweet, milk-diluted chai.
He doesn't stop frowning. "Mal, you can't know he was poisoned just by looking at his normal-looking tea."
He doesn't see Leight shrug, but he knows it happens. "It's the only viable murder method."
"Are you forgetting that you haven't proved your premise? It's murder because of the supposedly poisoned teacup; the teacup is supposedly poisoned because it's murder. Circular logic is a fallacy, Mal."
"Yes, it is, but my premise is solid. The victim's wasn't."
Peter's eyebrows scrunch together subconsciously. He jerks up. Leight's back is still to him as he gestures toward the chalkboards.
"These are wrong."
Peter stares at the equations. It's like trying to translate a foreign language. He can recognize the symbols (summations, integrals, Greek letters, Arabic numerals, x's, y's, and z's), but he can't translate. The meaning's lost, and he doesn't remember when Leight became an expert at number theory (whatever the hell that means).
"What do you mean they're wrong?" the Lieutenant sputters.
"The answers on this board are wrong. All of them. The mistakes are too gaping to be accidental."
Peter blinks. "You're saying they were purposeful."
"I believe," Leight simpers, "there is more to our mad professor than meets the eye."
Peter is sitting in a taxi. He hopes this doesn't foreshadow the failure of the rest of his resolutions. He knows it probably does. But he doesn't want to think about any of that. He doesn't want to think about anything that is even remotely related to Malcolm Leight; however, he can't find a line of thought that doesn't lead straight to Leight.
Leight's gravitational field has overwhelmed Peter's consciousness over the last two years. If Leight's a black hole, Peter's too far past the event horizon to have any hope of escape. He takes a few deep breaths to center himself. Then he tries to remember everything he supposedly learned in four semesters of college calculus.
By the time the taxi reaches their apartment, Peter has concluded that no, he didn't learn anything at all. As usual, he pays which he can only do because of his trust fund (because of course he has never seen a dime of the money the police department pays Leight).
They go up the stairs, and Peter is keenly aware of the silence, but he doesn't say anything because Dara's equations aren't the only things that are wrong. Everything about this is day is glaringly, sickeningly wrong.
He's just closed the door when Leight finds a magic marker and begins writing on a crackled sea foam green wall.
"Mal," Peter groans. "What are you doing?"
Leight's wrist moves rapidly and gracefully as he graffitis a series of familiar equations on the wall of this room they do not own.
"Those are Dara's equations, aren't they?" Peter accuses rhetorically.
"Yes." Leight's voice is distant. He's consumed by his work. "I'm solving them. Properly."
"How do you—"
He keeps writing, even as he cuts Peter off. "I've studied advanced mathematics, Peter, which isn't terribly difficult. But these? These aren't advanced at all. You don't need to be very clever to do a surface integral or solve a Bessel function."
Peter doesn't feel very clever; he does, however, feel a little affronted by Leight's stupid, oblivious arrogance. He watches as Leight continues to scribble, torn between so many contradictory emotions. He's hurt and annoyed and fascinated all at once. His hero worship routine is getting stale, and annoyance wins out. It creeps into his voice as he asks, "Do you need me for anything?"
"No." Leight doesn't turn around, doesn't stop writing, doesn't flinch, doesn't give a damn.
"Right," Peter grinds out. He isn't surprised. He clenches his keys tightly in his fist and walks out the door.
"Where's Leight?"
Peter smiles weakly at the Captain, whom he meets on the steps outside the house where Dara rented a room. He called the Captain after he left the apartment, needing to be useful, but he may have used plural pronouns instead of singular. "He got a hunch," he lies, oh so smoothly. "Where's the Lieutenant?"
"Took the evidence back to the lab." The Captain pauses to knock on the door. He doesn't look at Peter. "What did Leight ask you to look for?"
Of course, Peter thinks. Of course he couldn't possibly have his own crime scene insights. Of course he's just Leight's lapdog, and if Leight's busy with a hunch, he would send Peter to find the evidence. Of course everything is all about Leight all the time, and Peter should know better than to expect otherwise.
.
.