Kyle and AUNT MAGGIE burst out of the thicket.
They scramble over the chain-link fence.
Hit the apartment side hard.
Still running—
KYLE (breathless):
“Wait— stop!”
He grabs Maggie’s wrist.
Stops her.
KYLE (breathless):
We're not in the shadows.
We're fully in the SUNLIGHT.
The treeline casts a razor-sharp divide between shade and light.
Maggie whips around, gun still up.
MAGGIE:
“Kyle— what’s chasing us?!”
Kyle can barely speak. He nods toward the thicket.
KYLE:
“I don’t know. Just… look.”
---
[THE TREE LINE]
The thicket is unnaturally dark.
Dense shade from the tunnel mouths
all the way to the apartment fence.
The sunlight stops at a clean line.
Smoke-like figures prowl just inside the darkness.
Low to the ground.
Circling.
Almost curious.
They pulse—
For a few seconds—
Solid.
Monstrous muscle.
Claws.
A jaw too wide.
Then—
Smoke again.
If you blink a couple of times, you miss it.
Then you second guess yourself.
Another pulse.
Closer this time.
A LONG, LOUD, DEEP HOWL-SCREECH tears through the air.
Again.
Higher pitched now..
Commanding.
Echoing from the tunnels.
Everything freezes.
The prowling shapes stop.
Heads tilt.
Listening.
Sonar Clicking.
Then—
They answer.
Short shrieks.
Several of them.
The shapes pivot—
Scurry back into the deeper shade.
One pulses fully solid as it turns—
Then vanishes into smoke as the group disappears, stampeding toward the tunnels.
Silence falls.
The line between light and dark remains untouched for now.
[KYLE & MAGGIE]
They still stand firmly in the sunlight.
Neither able to breathe easily.
Their eyes pulse WHITE—
Not long.
Just a few seconds.
Like a residual wave hit them.
They blink.
Disoriented.
Maggie lowers her gun slowly.
MAGGIE:
(quiet, shaken)
“There’s more than one.”
Kyle nods.
Still clutching Lolita’s anklet.
Behind them, the UNIVERSITY SHORTCUT sign hangs above the sidewalk.
Bright.
Normal.
Inviting.
The treeline behind it looks harmless now.
Like nothing lives there.
But they both know better.
---
(HOLD on the sharp line of sunlight and shadow.)