Matthew Reilly - Area 7

goo all over the floor. Hawkins' eyes were locked on

the swaying antennae on its head, clocking from side to side

like a pair of metronomes.

It was three feet away ...

Two feet ...

Hawkins tensed to run, but for some terrifying reason,

his legs wouldn't move. He tried to raise his gun, but

couldn't--it was as if every muscle in his body had gone

completely, instantly limp. He watched helplessly as, to his

horror, his gun slipped from his unresponsive hand and

dropped loudly to the floor.

The antennae kept swaying.

One foot away ...

Hawkins was sweating profusely, breathing in short,

rapid breaths. He just couldn't take his eyes off the antennae.

They seemed to move in perfect rhythm, swaying in smooth

hypnotic circles ...

He watched--completely defenseless--as the creature's

sinister-looking head came slowly up to his knee.

Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit.

And then, suddenly, unexpectedly, like a cobra coiling

up off the ground, the creature's long pointed eight-foot tail

lifted off the floor and swung forward--over its low reptilian

body--so that now it was pointing forward, arcing over its

frame like a scorpion's stinger, the tip of the tail pointing

right at the bridge of Paul Hawkins's nose.

Hawkins saw it happen and his terror hit fever pitch. He

desperately wanted to shut his eyes, so he wouldn't see it

happen, but he couldn't even do that--

"Hey!"

The creature's head snapped left.

And in an instant, the trance was broken and Hawkins

could move again. He looked up and saw ...

... a man.

A man, standing a short way down the aisle. Hawkins

hadn't even seen him approach. Hadn't even heard him.

Hawkins took in the man's appearance. He had wet hair, and

Contest 497

was wearing jeans and sneakers and a white shirt that hung

out at the waist.

The man spoke to Hawkins.

"Come over here. Now."

Hawkins looked down warily at the big alligator like

creature at his feet. It ignored him completely, simply faced

the man in jeans, its body dead still.

If it had eyes, Hawkins thought, it was definitely glaring at him. A low rumbling noise rose threateningly from the depths of its throat.

Hawkins glanced questioningly at the man. The man just kept his eyes levelled at him.

"Come on," he said, eyes unmoving. "Just leave the gun

there and walk very slowly over to me."

Tentatively, Hawkins took a step forward.

The creature at his knee didn't move. It remained steadfastly

focused on the man in jeans.

The man pushed Hawkins behind him and slowly

stepped backward, away from the creature.

Hawkins looked down the aisle behind them and saw

two figures standing maybe forty feet away--a small one in

white, and another, equally small, who looked like ... he

squinted ... like a little girl.

"Move," Swain said, pushing Hawkins down the aisle,

his back to him.

Swain kept his eyes averted, directed at the bookshelves, away from the creature's swaying antennae, watching

it only out of his peripheral vision.

The two men stepped slowly down the aisle, away from

the frozen creature.

And then suddenly it began to follow them, moving

around the corner in a darting crablike manner that belied its

size. Then it stopped.

Swain pushed Hawkins farther down the aisle. "Keep

moving. Just keep moving."

"What the--"

"Just move."

Swain was walking backward, still facing the creature.

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Matthew Reilly

Again it made a darting, scuttling movement ten feet forward,

and then stopped again, well short of Hawkins and himself

It's being cautious, he thought.

And then it charged.

"Oh, shit!

The large animal bounded down the narrow confines of

the aisle.

Swain looked frantically for somewhere to run. But he

was still ten feet away from the nearest cross-aisle into the

maze of bookshelves.

There was nowhere to go!

Swain braced himself, the ground beneath him vibrating

under the thumping weight of the fast-approaching creature. Christ, it must weigh nearly four hundred pounds.

Hawkins turned. He saw it over Swain's shoulder.

"Holy Christ ..."

Swain just stood there, feet spread wide, taking up the

whole aisle.

The creature kept coming. It wasn't stopping.

"It's not stopping!" Hawkins yelled.

"It has to!" Swain called. "It has to stop!"

The creature bounded forward, bearing down on Swain

like a runaway freight train, until abruptly, three feet short of

him, it reared on its hind legs and clasped the bookcases on

either side of it with its clawed forelimbs, bringing it to a

sudden, lunging stop.

The four-sided jaw stopped inches away from Swain's

unmoving face.

The creature hissed fiercely, challenging him. Its saliva

dripped down onto the floor in front of his shoes.

Swain averted his gaze again, stared at a nearby bookshelf, keeping his eyes off the animal's oscillating antennae.

The horrifying alligator like creature, now standing up on its

hind legs, towered over him, loomed above him like an evil

apparition.

Swain wagged a finger at the infuriated animal: "Ah-ah-ah. No touching."

Contest

And he began to walk backward again, pushing Hawkins.

Hawkins stumbled down the aisle, looking back over

his shoulder every few seconds. This time the creature didn't

follow them, at least not immediately.

They reached the little white man and the girl, and were

a good thirty feet from the creature when it began moving

toward them again.

The little man spoke: "Sequencing! She's sequencing!

The man in the loose-fitting shirt and jeans looked at

Hawkins, standing there in his well-pressed police uniform.

"We don't have time to talk right now, but my name is

Stephen Swain, and at the moment we're all in big trouble.

You ready to run?"

Hawkins answered without thinking. "Yuh-huh."

Swain looked back down the aisle at the large dinosaur like creature. Twenty feet. He picked up Holly.

"You know the way back to the main stairwell?" he

asked Hawkins.

The young cop nodded. "I think so."

"Then you lead the way. Just keep zig-zagging. We'll be

right behind you." He turned to the others. "You two ready?"

They nodded. "Okay then, let's move."

Hawkins broke into a run, the others close behind him.

With a great lunge, the creature leaped forward in pursuit.

Swain brought up the rear, carrying Holly on his hip. He

could hear the pounding of the great weight on the floor behind him.

The stairs. The stairs. Got to reach the stairs.

Left, right, left, right.

He could see the cop weaving up ahead, and then

abruptly he saw the aisle with yellow tape running down its length up ahead. The aisle that led back to the main stairwell block.

"Daddy! It's catching up!" Holly yelled from his shoulder.

He looked behind him.

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The creature was indeed closing in on them--a giant

black-green monster galloping down the narrow aisle with

its salivating jaws bared wide.

Swain wasn't worried for himself. Selexin had been

right about that. Whatever it was, it was another contestant,

and it couldn't touch him. Not yet. Not until that number on

his watch read "7."

But if it got Holly ...

He saw the cop round the corner up ahead entering the

police-taped aisle, followed by Selexin. Swain rounded the

corner last of all, panting hard, and saw--

The door!