"The choice is yours, and yours alone." "No one else can make it for you." "Not the government." "Not a doctor." "Not even your family." "It's ajourney you can only travel alone." "Now, Preston, what an amazing adventure you've courageously chosen." "What an amazing adventure." "And I am only here to help, to point you towards your very own yellow brick road." "You can stop this at any time." "I'm about to insert a saline IV." "When you flick the switch in your hand, Pentothal will flow into your veins and send you into a deep, sweet, restful sleep." "Soon after, potassium chloride will induce a painless, massive coronary, while you're dreaming of a better place." "So, here we go." "Goodbye to you, my trusted friend" "We've known each other since we were nine or ten" "Together we've climbed hills and trees" "Learned of love and ABCs Skinned our hearts and skinned our knees" "Goodbye, my friend It's hard to die" "When all the birds are singing in the sky" "Now that spring is in the air" "Pretty girls are everywhere" "Think of me and I'll be there" "We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun" "But the hills that we climbed were just seasons out of time" "Open the pod bay door, please, HAL." "Let me get hit by a freight train." "Evaporated in a nuclear blast." "Or a massive coronary after the touchdown when the Hawks win the Super Bowl." "Anything so I don't ever have to face making this decision." "Yeah, I'd make it a thing." "Poetic." "Go down Niagara Falls or leap into the Grand Canyon." "With my luck I'd survive the fall." "I'd lie in pain while prairie dogs ran over me." "I don't believe in it." "Doctor-assisted or otherwise." "Life is too interesting, no matter what the problem." "I can't wait to see what happens." "This guy's life was getting blown out in the fourth quarter." "He didn't want to see the end of the game." "Preston Williams, aged 48." "Union card." "Local 153." "Cement finisher." "The writing on the suicide note matches the signatures on the licence and the credit cards." "This wasn't an assisted suicide." " It was a murder." " No." "We've been getting two a month." "The last one is having a funeral today or tomorrow." "The scenes are all set up the same." "Same motel, different room." "The victim's the one that always checks in." "He always leaves a note." ""Hoo-yah!"" " Ex-Marine." " No such thing as an ex-Marine." "This might be under the guise of assisted suicide, but it's a murder." "The autopsies confirm terminal illness." "Frank, are you seeing this?" "Only the evidence." "Contusions on the wrists." "Adhesive particles around the mouth and the wrist." "If his wrists were tied, how could he give himself a shot?" " Maybe the victim asked for restraints." " I've got plain-clothes watching the motel." "The lady that runs it, and the cleaner, they know to alert us if they see anybody with a medical bag." "Can I get a pair of haemostats?" " Here." " Thanks." "They say you can't eatjust one." "Seattle Crisis Centre." "This is Del, may I help you?" "Sir, you should call 911 for that." "I can connect you." "You're not alone, Mrs Hadden." "Many people get depressed during the holidays." "Different things work for different people, but the 12-step programme worked for me." "Linda." "Linda, listen to me." "This is some tough love, Linda." "He may say he's sorry, but he will do it again." "Won't he?" "The only way to help him, to help yourself, Linda, is to never allow this to happen again." "Your life is too precious, too sacred to waste it in this vicious cycle." "All right." "Good." "Good for you, Linda." "Now, my name is Steven and you can call for me any time." "Good." "God bless you, Linda." "Bye-bye." "Seattle Crisis Centre." "This is Steven." "How may I help you?" "OK, look, I'm going to help you through this, but we have to talk." "Who am I listening to?" "My name's Eleanor." "And..." "You're afraid." " Tattle Tale Lounge." " Yes." "May I ask, where are you located?" "Here's my thing." "I don't know why anyone would be in such a rush to get to this." "I can't even get my own hair right." "Just imagine what an undertaker will do." "They'll have me looking like one of the B-52s, and I won't be alive to bitch about it." "All I ask is that I go before my daughter." "Frank, would you?" "If you were diagnosed as terminal and in pain, would you have a doctor assist you?" "You have to be there before you can answer that question, Lara." "In this case, I'm convinced it's a homicide." "The subject may believe that he's helping, that he cares." "That's why he might be here today." "He is, however, excited by the fact that he's present at the moment of death, that he has control over another person's life." "That's one thing I don't believe in, one person controlling another person's life." " And you work with Millennium?" " Right now." "Because they present cases like these." "I don't think that they're presenting us with cases, but with lessons." "Excuse me." "Who are you?" "How do you know my mother?" "My name is Lara Means." "This is Frank Black." "Our sincere condolences to you and your family." "We are consultants to the Seattle Police Department, regarding the circumstances of your mother's passing." "We're here only to observe the possible attendance of any potential suspects." "We've told the police." "My mother died of complications from Alzheimer's." "An autopsy indicates a massive coronary due to potassium chloride injection." "My mother died of complications from Alzheimer's." "There'll be no suspects here." "Now, please." "Please leave." "Your presence is upsetting my father." "We beg your pardon." "Steven Kiley." "Does that name ring a bell?" "What can I get for you?" "Come on, buddy, my shift's almost over." "The clock's ticking." "The clock is ticking for all of us." "I'd love a hot sake." " A what?" " Sake." "It's a Japanese drink mistakenly called rice wine, but it's really a beer." "It's brewed, after the kneading of steamed rice called koji, with a cultivated mould and water." "It can be served hot or cold, but I like it hot." "Did you serve in Vietnam or something?" "Oh, I've been... and can take you, everywhere." "Is that right?" "Where are you from?" "This is Officer Nello." "Get me Detective Geibelhouse." "May I?" "Should we go out for some beers?" " Some saki?" " You don't need that to remove any pain." "And you are in pain." "Aren't you, Eleanor?" "Because that is what we are all really afraid of, isn't it?" "Not dying." "But living with pain." "Which, I'm so sorry... will happen to you." "No, no, no." "Not me." "I would never hurt you." "You're such a beautiful person." "There's been weight loss, jaundice, stomach pain, altered bowel habits." "And you can feel, if you press deeply, a hard lump." " I haven't told anyone." " I know." "You're afraid to even go to your own doctor." "But I can tell you, Eleanor, it is inoperable." "Don't be afraid." "I will take the pain away." "And I will keep the promise to send you anywhere you want to go." "On a wonderful journey." "I've been sent here." "No." "No doctors found by that name." "Must be an alias." "But..." "I know I've heard it before." " Hello?" " Frank?" "We got a possible at the motel." "Thanks." "Geibs says there's a suspect at the motel." "Goodbye, Charlie" "Hate to see you go" "Goodbye, Charlie" "Gee, I'm feeling low" "But I'm cluin' you in" "Someone's doin' you in, pal" "Now don't you know lechery leads you to treachery?" "Things boomer..." "It's him." " He's gone." " She's not." " Check the perimeter." " Get an ambulance." "The medical examiner's report is back on Preston Williams." "Although the cause of death was a coronary from potassium chloride, it was discovered that the victim had secondary diabetes." "Cholelithiasis had caused the onset of gangrene in the gall bladder." "Apparently he sought treatment, but lacking sufficient insurance he basically had to let it go untreated." "He was ashamed and hid the disease from his family and his friends." "No one knew but his one-time doctor." "The physicians attending Eleanor Norris in ICU felt a tumour in her abdomen." "But they wouldn't run any tests unless she came out of her coma." "She hadn't seen her doctor about the problem, either." ""To my Mom, my brother Tim, and anyone else who needs to know 'why'."" ""Please don't be mad or sad, but why put off tomorrow what you can do today?"" ""I love you all and will see you again in heaven." "Love, El. "" "She must have been aware of the problem." "I have been all over the world and I have seen some ugly motel-room paintings of clowns, wheat fields, waterfalls, clowns in wheat fields." "But even in Athens I never saw a painting of Greeks eating walnuts." "In Greek mythology, walnuts symbolise the gift of prophecy." "That may be the reason for the restraints." "Maybe the patients don't know they're sick." " Then it is murder." " Is it?" "I mean, he's somehow been right." "Is it murder if he is saving them from years... years of pain, indignity?" "If they haven't had the choice for themselves, yes, it is murder." " And this is his murder weapon." " Glass IV bottles." "Doctors and hospitals haven't used those in nearly 10 years." "It's all plastic now." " A medical supply store?" " Don't carry 'em." "I even went to those antique stores that carry old medical supplies." "Nothing." "Is there such a thing as a medical dumping ground?" "My father." "But he lives in St Louis." "Are there any old hospitals in Seattle that have been shut down but haven't been torn down yet?" "Whoa." "What?" "This is where I brought Catherine when she was in labour with my daughter." "They closed this wing six months before they closed the entire place two months ago." "It's like seeing a loved one dying in a hospital or laying in a coffin." "It's not the memory I wanna be left with." "Private supply." "Frank?" "Man..." "Oh..." "Eugh." "He's been dead at least six months." "Normal decomposition, partial skeletonisation." "Surgical scars, but in a pattern that a pathologist uses during an autopsy." " This one's more recent." " Could they have been forgotten?" " There's a cut on her throat, a tracheotomy." " Ground zero." "Advanced liver cancer." "If this is our subject's work, that's three women, two men." "Most serial killers don't cross gender lines like this." "It's not about gender." "To him, this is about the quality of a human life." " Hey, me, good book, a long autumn walk." " Here's the subject." "There's a distinct possibility he was a doctor in this hospital." "He had theories and ideas about sustaining life that were considered unorthodox." "So he's rejected by his peers." "He opened this body in secret." "An experiment." "Here was his epiphany." "He made an incision to save her life." "Then he realised that's not what she wanted." "So from this victim forward, he tried to save lives... by taking them." "He's still in this neighbourhood." "Aside from a hospital, where would you have access to terminally ill patients?" " He's possible, he's very possible." " I could see it." "No, it's not her." "Can't count him out." "Move the conversation toward terminal illness." "That'll be the tell." "You should have no trouble acting depressed." "I'm not depressed." "I'm just quiet." "Anger, denial, depression." "We expect them." "It's grief control." "You have to give in to these feelings in order to be healed, in order to move on." "It's very important." "So if you're feeling as if..." " May I help you?" " Yeah, I need to talk to someone." "I..." "Of course." "Russ." "I'm sorry, sir." "I'm off to my second job." "This is Russ Ketteringham." "And he is wonderful with people." "Thank you." " What's your name?" " Frank." "Hi, Russ." " Russ, I'm not feeling too good." " In what way, Frank?" "My wife and I are separated, and my daughter's living with her." "I have these nightmarish visions that are the manifestation of pure evil." "Uh-huh." " What did you do?" " Dropped him like a bad habit." "Now I'm alone, no prospects." "My life is just my work." " I have a brain tumour." " Is it operable?" " There's nothing the doctors can do." " Have you considered alternative medicine?" "What do you mean?" "Like acupuncture or coffee enemas?" " I was thinking more of..." "... visualisation, prayer." "This is going to sound silly, but this guy that was at that desk..." "Steve?" " Right." "Kiley." "Yeah." " Where else does he work?" "Hold it... please." "ALS." "Lou Gehrig Disease." "You know, I was kinda curious." "Lou Gehrig died of an incurable disease." "Babe Ruth died of an incurable disease." "Mickey Mantle." "Sometimes I wonder if it's really the Red Sox that are cursed." "If Eleanor Norris and Preston Williams were patients at County," "Kiley could have had access to their history, which would explain his prophecy." " Pretty good." " Yeah." "I can only imagine the pain you must have endured." "From waking up one morning, muscles stiff and aching, to eventual paralysis to the point where you couldn't even swallow." "All that time your brain remained alert, lucid, trapped in a nightmare you couldn't wake up from." "You didn't have the publicity and press agents of a Stephen Hawking." "You didn't have his fancy-shmancy voice modulator and his PBS specials." "No." "You suffered in anonymity." "And it was all for nothing, Gary." "I could have relieved your unrelenting pain, and propelled your soul on to the other side." "If God in his infinite wisdom wouldn't come for you, you could have gone to God." "We're looking for a nurse, Steven Kiley." " He should be in the morgue." " Great." "Thanks." "Geibs." "Steven Kiley?" "Three guesses who I am." "The first ain't Marcus Welby." "That's where I heard the name." "James Brolin on Marcus Welby." "If you are here to arrest me, may I ask that you please do so?" "I've diagnosed myself as having developed a haematopoietic malignancy from leukaemia." "There is so much to do and I haven't much time." "Graduate of Harvard Med School... barely." "Interned at Chicago County Hospital." "Pursued an unsuccessful career in "theoretical and experimental medicine"." "Seven papers were rejected by The New England Journal of Medicine." " I was a published researcher." " Ladies'Home Journal?" "You did your residency here in Seattle at Memorial." "Resigned suddenly and without warning five months ago." "Were they about to catch you at something?" "Why would you go from being a doctor to a nurse, Ellsworth?" "I don't like doctors any more." "Nurses are fine." "They help people." " Who?" " Your real name is Ellsworth Beedle." "I didn't name myself that." "My choice was to name myself Steven Kiley." "Steven Kiley is a fictional name on a fictional television show." " Is that how you see yourself?" " No, I just liked the name." " It was a good show, though." " Do you know why you're here?" "I am told that they believe I murdered several people." "It's rather fantastical." " Why do you think you're under suspicion?" " I have no idea." "I was just doing my job, and bang, zoom, goodbye, Charlie." ""Goodbye, Charlie"?" "It's an expression when you're leaving." ""It's been a slice. "" ""Happy trails. " "Auf Wiedersehen. " "Goodbye, Charlie. "" ""Goodbye, Charlie" was the song playing in the room when we found Eleanor Norris." "Bobby Darin was one swinging' cat." "Either of you into Bobby?" "I knew it." "But, you know, Bobby Darin changed his name." "He was born Walden Cassotto." "He was sick his entire life." "Had rheumatic fever." "They didn't expect him to live past 16." "If he had called it quits when he was 16, there'd have been no "Mack The Knife", or "Somewhere Beyond The Sea"." "You know that one?" "There would have been no Academy Award nomination for..." " Captain Newman." " Captain Newman MD." "But he developed congestive heart disease." "He had multiple heart surgeries, which really had no effect." "So he made a choice to stop having them, knowing that he would not live much longer after making that choice." "He died, dignified and remembered, at the age of 37." "Would you perhaps be indicating your belief in doctor-assisted suicide?" "I don't think we need doctors." "With a little education, we could all help each other out when the time comes." "Then perhaps you'd be willing to explain how you assisted Eleanor Norris?" " Preston Williams?" " I don't know anyone alive by that name." "Do you know anyone dead by that name?" "See, I don't even subscribe to the notion of "dead"." "There's only alive." "Or elsewhere." " Where's "elsewhere"?" " Isn't that what you both are looking for?" "Isn't that really why you're here?" "This other plane that you go to - is that how you know people are ill?" "Other cultures understand what I'm telling you." "They know that plane." "The Tibetan Book of the Dead speaks of a calm preparation for death as a glorious part of life." "In West Africa, several years are spent planning their own funerals." "Mexico has a day of the dead." "But in America, death is fought with healthcare dollars, spent mostly in the last months of life, and not for the benefit of dying patients." "It's for the doctors." "Their convenience and their wallets." "What if everything you're saying could be proved beyond the shadow of a doubt?" "There is still the law." "Without the law, there's chaos." "The end of order is the end of the world." "Obeying immoral laws is the end of the world." "But at least you're getting warmer, Frank." "Lara?" "Tell me, Steven, so I can know, so that I can grow closer, so that I can grow." "How did you get to that other plane?" "One night on call, making my rounds, eager to get home, a patient, in her 80s, she was..." "Her body was racked with arthritis." "She had congestive heart disease, pneumonia had set in." "Her entire body was jaundiced, skin stretched paper-thin over a fluid-filled abdomen, swollen five times normal size." "I entered her room." "I could hear her gasping for air." "I remember thinking..." "You know how clear your mind can be in an emergency?" "I thought "Why didn't she push the call button?" "She's done it before. "" "I moved to her." "She couldn't breathe." "Without even considering her, I inserted a surgical tool and began a tracheotomy." "Then..." "Then I saw her." "Her teeth yellowed, surrounded by chapped, parched lips." "She stared up at me with eyeballs sunken in their sockets." "And those eyes spoke." "Her eyes did." "Begging "Let me go. "" "And did you?" "She found the other plane." "And so did I." "His fingerprints aren't anywhere." "Not in any of the motel rooms." "There is no evidence in his apartment or his car." "Not a hypodermic, an IV bottle, a piece of tubing." "There's nothing out of place." "None of the victims' family members will come forward." "We nearly had him on the woman in the hospital." " He won't confess." " We've got nothing to hold Kiley on." "We're gonna have to let him go." "His record's cleaner than mine." "His employers love him." "He's an exemplary employee." "He's working two jobs." "He's never been late to either one." "He's never taken a sick day." "Although he is sick." "Terminal." "Our physicians confirmed it." "The guy's a damn saint." "Or worse." " We were worried." " I'm so sorry." "I was detained." " Better late than never." " Oh, well..." "As Henry James said on his deathbed:" ""Here it is at last, the distinguished thing. "" "In the old days, nobody would leave a note." "Few people knew how to read or write." "Besides, if someone confessed to having taken their own life, they'd be dragged through the streets, their bodies pitched on a stake and their family's possessions taken away." "Imagine that." "How far we've come." "Now, in my humble opinion," "I think it's polite and only fair to your family and friends, and fair to yourself, to leave a few last thoughts before you go." "Anne Sexton, Pulitzer prizewinning author, did not leave a note, but... in a poem she wrote:" ""Death's a sad bone;" "bruised, you'd say, and yet she waits for me, year after year, to so delicately undo an old wound, to empty my breath from its bad prison. "" "Here's my thing." "If a pack of predators can detect the weak or sick of the herd, couldn't Steven Kiley be functioning on the same primal instinct?" "We've seen serial killers pick their victims this way." "It is difficult to fit him into the psychological profile of a serial killer." "His killings are organised, yet he crosses gender lines." "It doesn't fit." "This thrill ride does not discriminate." "It can be taken by the old, by the young, black, white, people with heart problems or back problems." "All you need is a ticket." "It's the gift of prophecy." "Like a map, to help guide you on your path when you reach the other side." "He believes his acts were altruistic." "Yet his victims are bound." "This is a matter of control." "Under the guise of helping other people to die, he holds their lives in his hands." "The body has a reflex which can cause you to remove your finger from the switch." "Now he's been diagnosed terminal, he doesn't even have control over his own body." "Or time." "Interrupting the solution flow would make you lapse into coma." "You'd be back where you started." "We had control over him today." "To relieve that anxiety, that helplessness, he'll have to help others his way." "If you think you'll have some difficulty pushing the switch, let me know beforehand." "I'll give you a little push." "None of the surveillance officers have seen him." "Not at the hospital, crisis centre, not at home." "Let's get more aggressive." "We do a close-up inspection of the rooms, in case he slipped into one of them." "Now, your emotions at this time are entirely your own, and no one else's." "You learn so much about yourself at a time like this." "I've seen Marines cry and waitresses accepting and peaceful." "Everyone is different." "Isn't that beautiful?" "Hello?" "Anybody around?" "The last few weeks at this time are marked "encounter"." "They have terminal encounter groups at the crisis centre." " She's his assessor." " Yeah." " Seattle Crisis Centre." "How may I..." " Is Mabel Shiva at the encounter group?" "She was supposed to be." "It was cancelled." "None of them showed up." "Hello, this is Mabel Shiva." "I'm not home at the moment... or will I ever be again." "You little devil, you." "Call Geibs." "They're there." "We haven't much time." "Request paramedics for six, possibly seven individuals injected with potassium chloride." "Goodbye to you, my trusted friend" "We've known each other since we were nine or ten" "Together, we've climbed hills and trees" "Learned of love and ABCs Skinned our hearts and skinned our knees" "Goodbye, my friend, it's hard to die" "When all the birds are singing in the sky" "Now that spring is in the air" "Pretty girls are everywhere" "Think of me and I'll be there" "We had joy, we had fun" "We had seasons in the sun" "But the hills that we climbed" "Were just seasons out of time" "Let's go!" "Seattle PD!" "No pulse here." "Alert the officers arriving on the scene." "We are looking for an African-American male, 48, strong build, driving a grey '78 LeBaron, Washington plates, John Indigo Oscar 157." "I thought for sure he would have gone with them." "Look at this." "Frank, how would you answer the question?" " What question?" " The Millennium Group's question." "Should we have arrested or assisted?" "I don't think that that's a question they really want answered." "...you're out" "Goodbye, Charlie, goodbye..." "How else are you gonna get to know a guy like this?" "Besides, it's a cool song." "All right." "So what's the question they really want answered?" "Was he from heaven... or hell?" "Cashin'in your chips" "Wild-eyed Charlie" "Time you came to grips" "And there ain't no doubt" "Strike three, you're out" "Goodbye, Charlie" "Goodbye" "I made this!"