Outside the Door

Ansel made very particular note of the door and its number as he pulled it closed. He kept his hand on the knob until he heard the secure click and hum of the lock sliding into place and the electric security device activating.
His face carried a sour and perplexed expression as he turned away and walked down the hall, falling into step with John. He was sure he had recalibrated the sleep meds for this room .
"Why again?" he murmered quietly to himself, involuntarily wiping his moist mouth with the back of his hand.
"What?" snapped John, irritably next to him. John had also been pondering on the peculiar circumstances surrounding the continuing difficulties with this patient. He was not pleased with the implications.
"Nothing," Ansel sulked. " I was just thinking....I am sure I recalibrated the mechanism for this room days ago."
"Yes" John replied, "I know you did. I watch everything regarding this room very closely. I would not have allowed any negligence or forgetfulness to occur. Yet, somehow, these.....inconveniences....continue. I watched you work on the machine. Everything you did appeared to be in accordance with the task you were instructed to perform. Yet, still......"
John stopped walking and turned to face Ansel.
"I am trained to detect deceit in all forms. No one can lie to me - either through words or actions. But you..., you performed a task completely intended to deceive, and I failed to recognize it." He paused, again considering the form before him. "The how, however, pales when I stop to consider the why."

Ansel's surprise was palpable. He stopped at John's words, stunned by his accusation. He left his mouth gaping, setting free a long, clear bead of saliva that swan dived toward the cold grey tiles of the hallway and faintly splashed.

John continued to stare fixedly at Ansel. He was well trained for these kinds of confrontative situations. He know what people were thinking and feeling often before they did. It distrubed him greatly that he had failed to recognize ansel's duplicity.
Ansle, however, remained standing, gaping, motionless as John surveyed him. This too was unnerving. This reaction to his accusation was as inexplicible as the need to accuse him had been. As he tried to make sense of these anomolies, John took a step closer to Ansel. He hoped that advancing on him would elicit a response from the still figure - give him something more to read, to deduce, to analize and return control to him. As John began to slide his foot forward the air around Ansel suddenly shifted, setting off a brief glimmer in the dim light. The outline of Ansel's body flickered and glowed for a second, then dulled back. A look of horror attacked John's face as he realized what was happening. Quickly he jumped away from Ansel, wanting to distance himself as much a possible, but not wanting to abandon the hallway to the presence of such a creature.
"Water beast" John whispered as he watched Ansel's now undulating form fold and billow as the humanesque shape began to melt away and dissolve into droplets and mists of water.