“The noises started sometime in the night, during the hour when the moon was at its highest. Not screams, exactly. More like moans. Howls. Sounds I couldn’t put a name to. I lay in bed, wide awake, staring at the odd shapes the moonlight threw against the whitewashed walls. I couldn’t tell what type of creature he was working on in that blood red, windowless laboratory. I’d heard the panther make all types of howls and cries on the ship, but nothing like what came from that building.

Whatever it was, it was large.”