It's a house centipede! I love those things, they're pretty interesting and eat spiders and other bugs, and my cat crunches them if they wander where she can get them.

I'd understand someone being afraid of those. Where I am, they fall out of old spickets and crawl up drains, especially if you live in an old building. It's gotten to the point where if I want to guarantee that there's no centipede in my glass of water, I either need a filter on the faucet or I need to turn on the water, let it run for a few seconds to make sure nothing falls out, and then put my cup under. Can be a bit startling to someone who's not used to alienesque insects in their piping. Here it's just common knowledge that if it's an old house, they'll be around somewhere.