Five Days to Midnight

Plot

Physics professor J.T. Neumeyer is at a cemetery with his daughter Jesse on the tenth anniversary of his wife's death, which occurred while giving birth to Jesse. Jesse discovers a futuristic briefcase behind her mother's headstone bearing the name "Professor J.T. Neumeyer." Despite the improbability of another professor with the same name living in Seattle and visiting the same grave, J.T. assumes it belongs to someone else. He eventually opens the combination-locked briefcase using his daughter's birth date.

Inside, he finds a police file with photos, newspaper clippings, and evidence detailing his brutal murder five days in the future. J.T. initially suspects the briefcase is a prank by a graduate student named Carl Axelrod. He contacts homicide detective Irwin Sikorski, whose name appears on the file. The detective notes inconsistencies, such as the file claiming he missed the autopsy, which he rarely does.

J.T. returns home, where his girlfriend Claudia gives him a blue parka; the case file indicates he will be wearing that same coat when his body is found.