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.The students immediately behind them grabbed the door frame and howled for the pushing to stop before they lost their grip.The outdoor stairway had broken away from the wall, leaving a three-foot gap of space between door and stairs.Over her friends’ shoulders, Alison saw nothing but darkness: a terrible, deep darkness, like a horror movie.The power was out all over Vista Hills.“Wait there,” one of the jocks shouted.He jumped to the crooked emergency stairs, grabbing the iron railing to steady himself.Students cheered as he wrapped an arm around the rail and held out a hand.“Come on.One by one.”Another man jumped across, grabbing the stairs as they creaked on bent and broken braces.“Women first!” someone urged.For a moment the male students looked panicked, but the idea caught on, and Alison found herself separated from Peter, pushed forward with other women.For a moment she felt a twinge of feminist guilt, and then she brushed it aside.She wanted out.They evacuated quickly but efficiently, making the jump with hands guiding them from behind and catching them in front.Alison’s legs were shaking by the time she walked down the shuddering, tilted metal stairs to the ground.Some of her friends were kneeling next to the students who’d fallen, crying as they tried to help them.One girl was on her cell phone muttering “C’mon, c’mon, put me through, damn it!” like a prayer.Flashlight beams and moonlight revealed blood and broken bone.Alison choked back bile and turned in circles, wondering what to do.Broken glass cut her bare feet.It wasn’t fun or exciting anymore.Then the ground jolted again, harder than before, and in the distance something sounded like it was crashing and falling.She sucked in a sharp breath, her heart pounding.More students stampeded down the rickety stairwell, shouting each others’ names, pulling out cell phones, yelling for campus security, and trying to move the injured students out of the way.Cries from the other side of the dorm indicated that students were leaving from other doors and windows, too.“Ally!” Peter found her, grabbing her shoulder.She jumped, her heart pounding.“Have you seen any of the RAs?”“No.Omigod, you scared me.” She shuddered, rubbing her arms.She’d been wearing a T-shirt and pajama bottoms in her dorm room, and now the cold December air was cutting through the lightweight cotton as if she were naked.“Maybe they’re on the other side of the hall?”“Let’s go.” Peter took her hand and started off.“Wait!” Alison yanked her hand back, flinching.“I cut my foot.”“Damn.” Peter turned and dropped to a knee, looking at it.Alison winced as his thumb ran over the cut.“Yeah, it’s still bleeding.There’s too much broken glass here—you can’t walk around barefoot.” He hesitated.“All I’m wearing is socks, but you can have them if you want.”Alison bit her lip, then nodded gratefully.“Thanks.”He pulled off his gym socks and Alison slid them on, wincing as they rubbed against her cut.They turned the corner and saw a group of students holding flashlights and cell phones.Alison started to run forward; then the giant snake burst from the ground, right beneath the knot of people.“Holy shit!” Peter swore, freezing.Alison stumbled, transfixed by the sight.The monstrous creature’s pale, scaly flanks were streaked with dark stains.It arched like a sea serpent while the students who hadn’t been crushed immediately screamed and scattered.Then it plunged back into the earth, ripping through a concrete patio as if the stone weren’t there.The impact shook the earth and shattered brick planters.Carefully tended trees and bushes smashed to the ground as the snake’s long, massive body slid up from the first hole and vanished down the second.Alison found herself on all fours.The ground quivered beneath her hands and knees as she watched the slaughter like a movie—like some kind of late-night monster film on television, the kind she’d always watched with a combination of fear and pleasure.For a moment she could believe this was just another Tremors sequel.But this serpent was pale and sleek, not brown and rubbery, and it was covered in small, writhing, scalelike cilia that looked like nothing she’d ever seen on a movie monster.The creature moved gracefully through the ground, as though dirt and rock were no more substantial than sea foam.Worse, the screams that followed its destructive passage didn’t stop, the way they did in movies when the scene changed.They just went on and on.That was when Alison realized she might die.Tonight, in college, at nineteen.She crawled over to the lawn and vomited.Something touched her shoulder.She spat, looking up.Peter’s face was a pale circle in the moonlight [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]