"It was kind of creepy, though." Jenny was saying. "I don't think I want to do it in a church again. I don't care what the guy looks like."

Sex in a church? Marilyn knew she was in danger of eternal damnation just for being Jenny's friend, so she kept her mouth shut, afraid she'd be sent right to hell if she said anything.

"Hold it a second, honey. My hams are tightening up. Let me stretch."

Jenny stopped, bent to grab her calves and stretched her hamstring muscles, almost touching her nose to her legs. Marilyn had fallen behind, too mortified over Jenny's church-sex story to keep up. She passed Jenny, knowing her friend would easily catch her.

"I'm so tight," Jenny said, her back to the canal.

She straightened, shook her hands and rolled her shoulders.

And felt a tremendous stinging sensation in her legs. Then, much to her shock and surprise, she fell on her face, breaking her nose.

The creature struck, lightning-fast out of the water, lunging, two feet above the ground, jaws wide open. The prey didn't move, making it easier to take.

"What's happening?" Jensen said.

"Nothing. The blonde's just stretching. We passed her."

A bead of sweat dropped off Jensen's nose and landed on his forehead. Her heart was pounding.

The monster snapped its jaws shut, slipped into the water, swallowed, and moved on.

Marilyn was several paces past Jenny, still worried about eternal hell fire when she heard a grunt, followed by a thud. Then a scream.

As she turned to look, a thought flashed through her mind: the ground has opened up and swallowed Jenny whole, taking her straight to hell for having defiled a church.

That wasn't entirely true; most of Jenny was still above ground. Her legs, however, from mid-thigh to ankle, had disappeared and could have, for all Marilyn knew, been sucked down to Hades. Jenny's feet lay on the ground five feet behind her torso; red meat, white bone, and tan skin protruding from little booty socks and expensive sneakers. She was on her stomach, clawing at the ground and grinding her thigh-stumps into the dirt. Blood gushed from her crooked nose and ran down her mouth and chin to her neck. She was working her jaw up and down, blowing blood bubbles. Jets of blood rhythmically squirted from her thigh-stumps, making black mud. She stared at Marilyn, wide-eyed and confused.

"Help me, Marilyn," she bubbled. "I can't get up. My legs won't move."

Marilyn covered her mouth and screamed.

"Whoa!" Lawless shouted. "It got her! It got her! It took her legs! It's Weston, just like Weston!"

"Who? Who got attacked?"

"The monster took the blonde's legs and she's ... she's ... Oh no..."

Then the vision was gone and the ceiling was once again a ceiling.

Marilyn continued to scream into her hand, knowing nothing but terror, seeing nothing but ruin. She froze, unable to run for help, unable to assist her friend, unable to even take her hand away from her mouth so someone could hear her screams.

The severed nerves in Jenny's legs had recovered from the shock of being bisected by the creature's razor-sharp teeth, and she wailed, "Oh my God, Marilyn! I think I broke my legs. Oh my God, help me!"

Waves of the most intense pain she could imagine spread through her body from her legs; she howled, grabbed handfuls of gravel and sand. The pain terrified her. She screamed and was frantic for something to do, to find some course of action to slow the waves of pain that threatened to kill her.

She rolled onto her back, screaming and moaning, and looked down, expecting to see her long beautiful legs, legs men stared at and lusted to part, bent at odd angles, perhaps even bleeding.

What her eyes focused on instead were her tennis shoe-clad feet, ankles pointed straight up, five feet away. She stared at them, knowing they were her feet, but not understanding what they were doing over there when she was over here.

Then she saw that her legs were gone, and she passed out.

Marilyn finally thought to drop her hand. She screamed into the evening air, loud enough to carry four blocks. She screamed again, louder.

All she thought or knew to do was scream.

She screamed until the man who owned the house next to the canal peeked over the back fence; until he dialed 9 1 1 on his cordless phone; until he resumed peeking over the fence at the screaming woman.

She screamed until the dogs in the neighborhood howled back, sensing her pain, joining in raising the alarm.

She screamed until a man training for a marathon found her; until he vomited when he saw Jenny lying in the dirt, apparently dead.

She screamed until an elderly couple, out for their own evening stroll on the canal bank, came to investigate; until the old woman covered her eyes and started to cry; until the old man tried to comfort Marilyn, but she pushed him away.

She screamed until her voice gave out and she could only cry.

When the police arrived her throat was too raw to speak and she was too upset to write. An ambulance took her to the hospital where she underwent treatment for shock.

Jenny had bled out and was dead.

Detective Dave Baskel's Internet search for big snakes was interrupted. He took one look at the dead woman and dialed Lawless's cell.

"It's over."

Lawless tried to sit up, but the room spun so he stayed on the floor.

Jensen sat on the couch and rubbed feeling back into a foot that had fallen asleep. How long had the vision lasted? Ten minutes? Fifteen? Five? She should have been paying attention.

"What good did that do?" she finally asked. "You got to see a woman die, but you couldn't do anything to prevent it."

Trying again, this time Lawless stood and shuffled to the couch. His face and shoulders sagged.

"You okay?" she asked.

"I feel like shit. I can't believe I just saw that." His eyes were red.

They were quiet for a minute, then she said, snapping her fingers and jumping up, "I have an idea." She grabbed a pen and a pad of paper. "Let's go through the vision, from start to finish."

"What for? It's over. She's dead."

"Maybe we overlooked something. Come on, lets try it."

They started at the beginning, his head on her lap, and worked through the vision while she took notes. He was surprised at how much he remembered.

"Okay," she said. "Let's do it again, but this time I want you to sit up, look me in the eyes and let me ask some questions."

"Why?"

"Maybe there's something you saw, but didn't notice."

Their eyes met, and he was sucked in.

"Pay attention to your surroundings, not what people are saying. Got that?"

"Got it."

"Okay. What are you walking on?"

"A canal bank."

"Dirt or gravel?"

He hesitated. "Both."

"Is the bank elevated?"

"Yes. About four feet."

"Good." Jensen wasn't sure why that was good, but whatever they were doing seemed to be working. She scribbled "4 feet high" on the pad without breaking eye contact, hoping she could read it later.

"What do you see to your left?"

His eyes flicked left, a millisecond. "Fences. Trees. Backyards."

"Are the fences new or old?"

His creased his brow. "How would I know?"

"Is the wood dark or light?"

"Oh. Dark. Old wood."

She wrote it down.

"What's on your right?"

His eyes flicked right, another millisecond. "Buildings. Maybe offices. Hard to tell."

"Old or new?"

"Not new, but not real old."

She frowned. "Big or little buildings?"

"One very big, like a gymnasium. The others smaller."

"Bingo! I know where the women were walking! I drive by it every day." She turned away, excited.

Breaking eye contact with her all at once left him disoriented, similar to how he felt when the vision ended. He rubbed his eyes. "Where?"

"Houses on the left and gymnasium on the right: they were walking on the canal that runs by Big Valley Christian School!" She jumped up and paced. "You know what this means, don't you, why you had this vision? It means you'll know where it's going to strike, before it strikes." She was pumped.

He shook his head. "There wasn't enough time to warn them."

"There might be next time, and maybe, if we know what canal it's in, we can get some guns there and put a few bullets in the water. We could get lucky."

He thought, then nodded and said, "It's a long shot, and it would be dangerous to the guns, but it might work."

His cell phone chirped. He dug it out of his jacket and looked at the number: Baskel.

"Lawless."

"Dave Baskel. There's been-"

"There's been another killing, I know," Lawless cut in. "On the canal by Big Valley Christian."

Silence on the line. "You want to tell me how you know that?" Then, "Oh, of course. You're in your car. Sometimes I forget we all have radios."

"We're not in the car, we're at Jensen's apartment."

Silence again. "She's got a radio at her place, then."

"No. No radio."

"Then how do you know someone's been killed?" He had put an edge in his voice.

Lawless sighed. "There's more to the story than what we told you this afternoon."

Now Baskel was mad. "You purposely withheld information from me? And now someone else is dead?" His voice threatened violence.

"There's nothing we could have done to save the blonde. This isn't exactly science."

"You going to tell me what the hell it is, then? And how'd you know the victim was blonde? No one said blonde on the radio."

"Her name is Jenny. I don't know her last name but her husband's name is Richard. Her legs were taken off, like Hank Weston's."

More silence. Then, menacing, "Get your ass down here." Baskel clicked off.

Lawless looked at Jensen; she was chewing on a fingernail. "Might as well give him both barrels. We're going to need his cooperation, fast."

They grabbed their things and left.

"You drive," Lawless said. "I'm not safe."

After the attack, the creature swam east in Lateral No. 6, heading for the Main Canal five miles away. It would enter the Main Canal and follow it southeast three miles until it passed under Homes Road. A mile after this junction, Lateral No. 3 split off the Main Canal and ran through the heart of Modesto.

It wanted to see how the hunting was in Lateral No. 3.