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shoes as the floor came rushing up in a crazy, tilting dream. Arlene had fallen face down, her hand still clasped around the sticks she had been counting for the child’s birthday party that was supposed to be held later that day. Donna crouched on the floor beside her friend, confusion filling her mind. “My God, Arlene, we’re going to die!” she screamed, putting her face close to her friend’s ear. “They’re going to kill us!” She could see blood beginning to pool on the floor near Arlene’s face, but her friend was breathing; she was still alive. Donna looked up to see the masked man standing over her, gesturing with a knife and screaming at her to stay there. She wanted to help Arlene, but all she could do was cry. Donna wanted her mother, she wanted her bed, she wanted her cat; she did not want to be lying on the floor watching blood pour from a tiny hole beside her friend’s nose. Donna Warren’s mind went wild with panic, but she could not move.

    The stairs up to the kitchen: the conveyor belt to the right is the one that broke down shortly after Derek Wood started his job, prompting the plan to rob McDonald’s. [RCMP crime scene photo.]
    â€œHurry up!” Freeman MacNeil yelled at Wood.
    Derek Wood ran upstairs.
    Up in the kitchen, Neil Burroughs was scrubbing the sinks. Because the steel door at the bottom of the basement stairs was closed, and because there was a lot of noise from the equipment in the restaurant, he couldn’t have heard the shot, or the screams from the basement. Burroughs was down on one knee, wiping the stainless-steel skirt below the sinks, when he suddenly felt weak and fell to the floor. Something was wrong, but he could not figure out what had happened. Blood was coming from his ear, and there was a terrible taste in his mouth. He could see the blood beginning to pool on the floor, and knew he needed help.
    As he began to push himself up from the floor, Neil realized someone was standing beside him: shocked and confused, he did not see the mask the man was wearing as a threat. Neil Burroughs wanted help—he needed help—and he hoped this stranger would deliver it. He looked into Darren Muise’s eyes, and Muise stared back at the helpless man in front of him. Burroughs sought sympathy, and help, but instead he saw, in those eyes, a frightening expression heightened by the ghoulish rubber mask that framed them. Muise took a brown-handled hunting knife and plunged it five centimetres into the soft tissue on the left side of Burroughs’ neck, then pulled it back in a clumsy, failed attempt to severe the jugular vein.
    Face down on the cold tile, blood streaming from his ear and neck, Neil Burroughs began to think of Justin, his three-year-old son, and Julia, his wife and best friend. He was going to teach Justin to play ball this summer; whatever was going on here would not prevent him from doing that. Once again, Burroughs pushed himself up from the floor. In the spinning confusion around him, he now saw two men. Maybe this new stranger would understand; maybe he would help.
    â€œHelp me! Please help me!” Burroughs could not be sure if the words were coming out, if the tall stranger could hear his plea. He could see his blood covering the arms of the masked man, who was still standing there; he could hear as the man shouted excitedly to the newcomer: “The guy won’t die! Derek shot him, and I cut his throat, and he still won’t die!” The masked man ran off, and Burroughs again begged: “Please, please help me!”
    It made no sense. He could see that the stranger was listening, but why was he raising that shovel handle? The young father was kneeling now, looking into the face of the stranger, trying to understand what was happening to him. Why did someone he did not know want to hurt him? He was just cleaning the kitchen, doing his job, trying to support Justin and Julia. Why was this