A promise made twenty-eight years ago calls seven adults to reunite in Derry, Maine, where as teenagers they battled an evil creature that preyed on the city’s children. Unsure that their Losers Club had vanquished the creature all those years ago, the seven had vowed to return to Derry if IT should ever reappear. Now, children are being murdered again and their repressed memories of that summer return as they prepare to do battle with the monster lurking in Derry’s sewers once more.
Авторы: King Stephen Edwin
DERRY NIGGERS GET THE BIRD : Blue
THE LOSERS ARE STILL LOSING, BUT STANLEY URIS IS FINALLY AHEAD : Orange
Richie thinks, opening a fresh beer for himself, it isn’t bad enough It can be any damn monster It wants to be, and it isn’t bad enough that It can feed off our fears. It also turns out to be Rodney Dangerfield in drag.
It’s Eddie who breaks the silence. ‘How much do you think It knows about what we’re doing now?’ he asks.
‘It was here, wasn’t It?’ Ben says.
‘I’m not sure that means much,’ Eddie replies.
Bill nods. ‘Those are just images,’ he says. ‘I’m not sure that means It can see us, or know what we’re up to. You can see a news commentator on TV, but he can’t see you.’
‘Those balloons aren’t just images,’ Beverly says, and jerks a thumb over her shoulder at them. ‘They’re real.’
‘That’s not true, though,’ Richie says, and they all look at him. ‘Images are real. Sure they are. They —
And suddenly something else clicks into place, something new: it clicks into place with such firm force that he actually puts his hands to his ears. His eyes widen behind his glasses.
‘Oh my God!’ he cries suddenly. He gropes for the table , half-stands, then falls back into his chair with a boneless thud. He knocks his can of beer over reaching for it, picks it up, and drinks what’s left. He looks at Mike while the others look at him, startled and concerned.
‘The burning!’ he almost shouts. ‘The burning in my eyes! Mike! The burning in my eyes — ‘
Mike is nodding, smiling a little —
‘R-Richie?’ Bill asks. ‘What i-is it?’
But Richie barely hears him. The force of the memory sweeps through him like a tide, turning him alternately hot and cold, and he suddenly understands why these memories have come back one at a time. If he had remembered everything at once, the force would have been like a psychological shotgun blast let off an inch from his temple. It would have torn off the whole top of his head.
‘We saw It come!’ he says to Mike. ‘We saw It come, didn’t we? You and me . . . or was it just me?’ He grabs Mike’s hand, which lies on the table. ‘Did you see it too, Mikey, or was it just me? Did you see it? The forest fire? The crater?’
‘I saw it,’ Mike says quietly, and squeezes Richie’s hand. Richie closes his eyes for a moment, thinking he has never felt such a warm and powerful wave of relief in his life, not even when the PSA jet he had taken from LA to San Francisco skidded off the runway and just stopped there — nobody killed, nobody even hurt. Some luggage had fallen out of the overhead bins and that was all. He had jumped onto the yellow emergency slide and helped a woman away from the plane. The woman had turned her ankle on a hummock concealed in the high grass. She was laughing and saying, ‘I can’t believe I’m not dead, I can’t believe it, I just can’t believe it.’ So Richie, who was half-carrying the woman with one arm and waving with the other to the firemen who were making frantic come-on gestures to the deplaning passengers, said: ‘Okay, you’re dead, you’re dead, you feel better now?’ and they both laughed crazily. That had been relief-laughter . . . but this relief is greater.
