Free What Happens in the Darkness by Monica J. O'Rourke Page A

head but the snarls continued.
    She crept toward the beam, afraid to move any faster.
    The cracked two-by-four was all that stood between her and the dog.
    The dog lunged. Its snarls and moans bounced off the tunnel walls. Its broken limb prevented it from gaining too much momentum. Its mouth clamped down on Janelle’s calf.
    She screamed, pulling her leg free, jumping out of its way, landing on the beam. Adrenaline kept her moving, kept her from feeling the bite too badly. Blood soaked through her jeans. Walking sideways she inched up, arms flapping like a bird’s injured wings. The wood groaned and cracked in several more spots. She reached the tip of the beam and touched the tunnel ceiling, planted her palms against it for support.
    The dog was too close, barely a foot away the end of the beam, and Janelle couldn’t go any farther. It lunged, snapping crazily at her feet.
    She gripped the concrete ceiling so tightly her fingernails bled. “Stop!” she screamed, but the dog ignored her, lunged at her, tried to bite, its wounded leg the only thing keeping it from getting the momentum it needed.
    Sobbing, Janelle looked away from the dog, tried to move farther up the beam. Nothing left but ceiling. Nothing useful in her backpack either, nothing that would make any kind of weapon.
    The only thing left was the flashlight—her heavy-duty flashlight, weighing in around four pounds but thick, solid. She didn’t know if it could kill the dog but thought she might be able to do some damage. It was her only hope.
    Planting her feet more firmly on the beam she shifted her weight, leaning her shoulder against the wall for leverage.
    The dog showed no sign of tiring. It leapt into the air, flipped, and landed on its three good legs. It did this over and over, gaining more height each time, fangs snapping madly every time he was airborne.
    She shined the light in its face when it jumped up at her again. It tried to hook its paws around the beam.
    The light in its eyes showed nothing but a black craziness. It lunged again, paws making purchase with the wood, bringing itself inches from her. She raised the flashlight and smashed it down on the dog’s head. The animal squealed and dropped off the beam.
    The force of the blow threw her to the ground, and the flashlight flew out of her hands.
    She landed hard on her back, and it knocked the wind out of her. She groped until she found the flashlight lying in a pool of something. She could feel it was badly damaged. The parts rattled when she shook it.
    “Oh no . . .” she cried, tears falling again. “Oh no.” Frantically she shook it, but that failed to make it work again.
    In the blackness she couldn’t see the dog but it made no sound, and she assumed she had knocked it out or killed it.
    She stood on the tracks, sobbing. This was it, she decided. Enough. There was no way out of this. It probably would have been better if she’d let the dog rip out her throat.
    The blackness of the tunnel overwhelmed her. How was it possible not to be able to focus your eyes on something , some light source or another?
    She forced herself to move again in the direction she guessed she’d been heading in. She walked haltingly, her arms sticking straight out ahead to feel for objects before smashing into them.
    On her right, something flashed, a tiny speck of light, the size of a pencil point.
    She reached out, but a wall blocked her path. She screamed in anger, frustration. This wasn’t fair! To have come so far, to have survived, only to be taunted by yet another speck of unreachable light. What the hell was going on here?
    But she discovered it wasn’t a wall, it was the edge of the station platform, and it was level with the top of her head. Groping the edge, she managed to pull herself up.
    She moved toward the light, her heart speeding, her breathing shallow. The closer she got to the light source, the larger it became.
    Standing at the bottom of the Seventy-Seventh Street station’s