"Is there something you need?" he asked.

"Yes," Warwick said.

Dr. Chandler waited for the rest but none seemed forthcoming. "What is it you need?"

Warwick undid his shirt and slipped it off his thin shoulders. His upper torso was a symphony of scars. Intricate designs covered most of his chest. Long curves arched his breast. A pyramid started at his breast bone and reached to his bellyb.u.t.ton. Near the top of the pyramid was a box. It had an X in the center where a door into the box was located. Surrounding the box were swirls of sliced skin, chunks were missing exposing dried meat. Between the swirls were symbols Dr Chandler had never seen before. "There"s a crack in the design. That"s how it got out."

"What got out?"

"The panther." Warwick pointed at a red spot on his chest. It was the size of a pimple and it broke an image against the door. Dr. Chandler hadn"t noticed it before. He leaned forward and saw a tiny, highly detailed padlock. The red dot was at the apex of the link.

"Jesus, Warwick!"

"I need to fix the link for its coming back. I can"t hold it at bay." He leaned against the closed door. "I need your help, doctor."

"Do up your shirt, first."

"Do you see the break in the design?"

"Yes, Warwick, I see it."

"Can you help me?" He started to b.u.t.ton up his hospital shirt.

Dr. Chandler gently took him by the arm and led him to the seats. "Can you explain the scarring?"

"It"s a design."

"Yes...but why do you do this? Why do you take a razor and put designs on your body?"

Warwick was silent. He looked at the floor, then at the window.

"Warwick..." Dr. Chandler prodded. "Why do you cut yourself?"

Getting off his seat, Warwick walked to the window and looked out. "There are a lot of people down there, enjoying the sun. Some kids as well."

Dr. Chandler said nothing. He watched his patient, keeping a note on his body language. He had a GPS alarm issued at the front desk, just in case, but he doubted he would need it. Warwick had never caused trouble before.

"Have you heard of Underwater Panthers?"

"No."

"Native American Demon. It"s supposed to cause floods and destructions."

"And this is the panther you mentioned?"

"Yes, but it doesn"t have snaky bits, traces of toadery or bison"s horns, as the literature claims. It rises up from h.e.l.l, through the core of the Earth, into the ocean. You"ve heard of fisherman lost at sea..." He let the sentence hang and kept looking outside. "I do it for them, you, and everyone."

"Do what?"

"Cut myself!" He rolled up his sleeve. "The first two cuts were for me only. I was very selfish years ago." Warwick showed his wrist. Two thick scars rode across the veins. "Back then, I didn"t know I had to cut up to get the job done."

"Warwick, come take a seat. Let"s talk about this."

His patient didn"t move. "Do you know why I tried to kill myself?"

"Yes," Dr. Chandler answered. "It"s in your case file."

"There"s a lot of screams in the darkness, doctor. A lot of screams and a lot of whispers." He paused, turning from the window. "I thought I loved her. I thought Sally loved me. Turned out she loved anyone with a c.o.c.k and a bag of weed." Warwick ran his hands through his hair. "When I got out of the hospital, the screams followed me. I cut Sally"s name into my arm and the screams stopped." He smiled. "Absolute peace. It was beautiful while it lasted. I even got back with her; knowing it wouldn"t last made the relationship easier. I wasn"t stressed out with keeping the fire alive. I didn"t worry where she was, or who she was with, because, s.h.i.t, I didn"t give a f.u.c.k." He looked at the doctor. "That makes life a lot easier. You should prescribe a razor blade to everyone."

Dr. Chandler wanted to ask about the screams in the darkness, but knew that was up to his patient. It worried him to hear about the screams. The subconscious mind could be reaching out in Warwick"s dreams. Helping Warwick meant a.n.a.lyzing the dreams, the screams and guiding him to discover what it all meant. To do that, he had to keep Warwick on track. He asked, "If that"s the case, why are you back here... and what"s with all the scars?"

Warwick laughed. It was more of a snort than a laugh and it was short lived. "It"s easy to start cutting. Pain is in the mind, doc, you know that. Switch off the mind, switch off the pain." He glanced down at the floor. "Yeah, easy to start, hard to stop."

"Go on," Dr. Chandler said. He wanted Warwick to fully open up and now he was. It was amazing. Once it was all out, he could help him and get the need to cut out of his head. He was worried that his patient stood so close to the window. Gla.s.s was a major concern. Warwick had his back to it, so Dr. Chandler tried to put it out of his mind. He needed to focus if he was to help his patient. "Please, Warwick," he said. "Continue."

After a moment of silence, Warwick said, "I suppose if I didn"t put Sally"s name onto my arm, I may not have...all this." He opened his arms, fingers pointing toward his chest. "It took only a few months for me to cut my arm again. This time I was copying a design out of an occult book. It had the seal of Lucifer in there and I tried to copy it exactly."

"But?" Dr. Chandler coaxed him along.

He looked at the doctor. "But, with skin, unlike paper, you can"t erase a mistake." He rolled his sleeve up to his left elbow and showed his forearm. On it was an octagon pattern with intricate webbing reaching to the corners. "This is the mistake." Warwick pointed to a thin line crossing another. "I think I had a pain spasm, like getting a tattoo-sometimes the arm will twitch of its own accord. Similar thing, I think." He shrugged his shoulders and then rolled down his sleeve. "A week later, I saw the panther. And it saw me."

Dr. Chandler pulled a pad out of his briefcase and made some notes. This was all new information, not in Warwick"s file. A knock at the door distracted him. He looked up and saw Betty Jones.

"Are we finished here, doctor?"

"Not yet." Dr. Chandler resisted the chance to call her Nurse Betty. She hated her nick-name. He knew she also hated the film and the TV series.

She gave a curt nod. "Very well," she said and moved away from the door. It shut silently behind her.

Warwick looked shaken by her visit. "That was weird," he said.

"What makes you say that?"

"She comes in when I"m talking about the panther."

Dr Chandler smiled. "You"re starting to sound like Jerry and Dean, with their conspiracy theories."

Warwick shrugged. "You never know," he whispered.

He was starting to lose Warwick again-d.a.m.n that nurse barging in! He tried to think of a way to get back on track, he could still save this. But how? Progress, he thought. Keep moving forward. "What did the panther want?"

Seeming to study him, Warwick came to a decision. "You."

"Me?"

"Not you exactly, but, like, people. Meat. Blood. Bones. Tasty."

"I find that hard to believe."

"You would, you"re a doctor."

"What I find hard to believe is that a panther from h.e.l.l would swim through the core of the Earth, enter the ocean and swim up through your scars, just for a feed."

Warwick smiled.

The doctor"s eyebrows arched. "You know how that sounds, don"t you?"

"Sounds like I"m crazy."

Dr. Chandler nodded.

"Maybe not to feed, then."

"Maybe not," he copied, and then waited for Warwick to continue. When he didn"t, Dr. Chandler said, "What"s the link you need to fix?" When he saw his patient"s eyes light up and a smile cross his face, Dr. Chandler quickly said, "I"m not saying I believe you-" Because I don"t, he thought. "-but I need to understand what you want to do."

"No problem." Warwick dropped his shirt to the floor. "Can you see that red spot?"

"Yes, I saw it earlier."

"It"s breaking a link and the panther gets through that opening. I need to cut through the dot to reset the line."

"What makes you think the design works?"

Warwick took a step back as if he"d just been slapped. His eyes narrowed. "You know it works."

"I don"t know." Dr. Chandler struggled to keep his voice neutral. "Explain it to me."

"The voice told me."

"Voice?"

"Inside my head. The voice that carried the screams." He looked toward the window. "When I was depressed and cut my wrist, the voice came to me then. Told me I wasn"t going to die." He ran his hands though his hair. "I didn"t listen to it at first. It was silent for a very long time. But when Sally screwed around on me, the voice returned. I was so hurt-and-it seemed to understand my pain. It told me to cut her name into my arm. It taught me that pain can be ignored. It silenced the screams."

Dr. Chandler was stunned. He looked at his notepad and realized he hadn"t written anything.

"But I should never have carved anything into my arm. Once you start cutting, the beast comes."

"The panther?"

"Yes. And with this break it can enter our reality, again. Time is running short, doc."

"Are you saying that if you never cut yourself, the panther would never have appeared?"

Warwick nodded. "And the voice would have gone away."

"Only one voice?"

"Yes, a male, older than me, I guess. The guy sounded like he was in-" Warwick groaned and clutched his chest. The groan turned into a grunt. His breath came in hard and fast.

Dr. Chandler got to his feet, turned towards the door for a.s.sistance, when it opened and Jerry entered followed by Dean and Tina. The two were discussing aliens again and Tina"s mascara was a messy blur, as if she"d been crying.

Jerry was the first to notice Warwick. "Dude, are you okay?"

"I"ll get a nurse," Dean added. He turned to go.

"No," Warwick said through gritted teeth. "It"s here."

Ignoring him, Dean opened the door. "h.e.l.lo!" He faced Dr. Chandler. "Back in a sec. They probably couldn"t hear me." He ran out the door.

Warwick dropped to his knees. Jerry was at his side instantly. "Hey, everything"s gonna be okay," he said in a soothing tone. He gave Warwick"s shoulder a gentle rub. His hand came away red.

"It"s chosen us," Warwick said.

Tina walked up to him. Squatting down, she said, "Here you are, sweetheart," and handed him razor blade.

He smiled.

Dr. Chandler got to his feet, ready to take the blade away, but surprisingly, Warwick didn"t accept it.

"It"s too late," he said. "It"s behind you."

Tina turned. "There"s nothing-" Her head snapped to the side. Blood poured from four claw marks. She tried to scream but only a gurgle came out. Suddenly, her neck split apart. Ripped flaps of skin drooped to her collar bone. Dr. Chandler watched her tongue slide out through her neck, forming a Columbian necktie.

Jerry rushed to the door. He grabbed the handle but the door wouldn"t budge. "It won"t allow you to escape," Warwick said. Facing Dr. Chandler, he said, "I"m sorry."

Dr Chandler had fallen back onto his chair. His mind was reeling and his muscles had turned to jelly. He couldn"t take his eyes off Tina. In the background, as if a million miles away, he heard Jerry screaming. A few moments later, Jerry was silent. Maybe Warwick was right; the panther from h.e.l.l came for a feed.

Something wet licked his cheek.

He couldn"t recoil from it, he was frozen solid. The panther"s hot, putrid breath hit his face, stroked his hair. A wet guttural growl rose up from the beast"s throat.

"What?"

Warwick"s voice broke the trance on Dr. Chandler and he quickly got up from his chair. He stumbled to the desk, eyes searching madly for the panther.

"Why?" Warwick was backpedaling. He held his hands up. "But I"m the vessel. Without me, you can"t-"

The door opened. Dean walked in. He smiled as he stepped over the torn body of Jerry. He looked from Jerry to Tina. "Nice work."

"Now I understand," Warwick said.

"Good."

"You"re not having me." Warwick ran for the window.

Dr. Chandler reached out for him, "Warwick. No!"

Warwick"s body was locked in slow motion as he hit the gla.s.s. It shattered around him. Each chunk and sliver hung the air, suspended momentarily, drifting to the floor like feathers. Suddenly time sped up and Warwick disappeared through the window. The gla.s.s clinked on the floor.