EIGHTEEN
TRYING NOT TO BREATHE TOO DEEPLY, LEON
reached the bottom of the metal ladder and turned
around quickly, aiming the Magnum into the thick
gloom. Murky water sloshed over his boots, and as his
eyes adjusted to the low light, he saw the source of the
terrible smell.
Parts of it, anyway. . .
The subbasement tunnel stretching out in front of
him was littered with body parts, human corpses that
had been torn into pieces. Limbs and heads and
torsos were strewn randomly through the stone passage,
lapped at gently by the few inches of dark water
that covered the floor.
"Leon? How is it?" Ada's voice floated down from
the circle of light above the ladder, echoing hollowly
around him. Leon didn't answer, his shocked gaze
fixed on the terrible scene, his brain trying to add up
the shredded parts and come up with a number.
How many? How many people?
Too many to count. He saw a faceless head, the long
hair streaming around it in a cloud. A heavy woman's
decapitated trunk, one breast bobbing above the
rippling darkness. An arm encased in the tatters of a
cop's dress shirt. A bare leg, still wearing a sneaker. A
curled hand, the fingers slick and white.
A dozen? Twenty?
"Leon?" Ada's tone had sharpened.
"It's ... it looks okay," he called, struggling to keep
his voice from cracking. "Nothing moving."
"I'm coming down."
He stepped away from the ladder to give her room,
remembering something she'd said before, something
about bodies being dumped. . .
Ada stepped off the bottom rung, splashing into the
dark tunnel. His eyes had adjusted well enough to see
a look of disgust cross her delicate features - disgust
and something like sadness.
"There was an attack in the garage," she said softly.
"Fourteen or fifteen people died . . ."
She trailed off, frowning, and took a step past him
to get a closer look at the severed and mutilated
remains. When she spoke again, she sounded worried.
"I didn't see the attack, but I don't think they were
torn up like this."
She looked up, scanning the roof of the tunnel,
gripping her nine-millimeter tightly. Leon followed
her gaze, but only saw algae-thick stone. Ada shook
her head, looking back down at the gently rippling sea
of broken flesh.
"The zombies didn't do this. Something got to
these people after they were killed."
Leon felt a chill go up his spine. That was about the
last thing he wanted to hear, standing in the humid,
stinking dark and surrounded by savaged bodies.
"So it's not safe down here. We should head back
up and..."
Ada started forward, stepping through the tangled
limbs, the sound of her careful, sloshing movements
seeming very loud in the otherwise silent tunnel.
Damn, does she ignore everybody, or is it just me?
Watching his step, Leon followed, reaching out with
his free hand to touch her shoulder. "At least let me
go first, okay?"
"Fine," she said, sounding almost but not quite
exasperated. "Lead the way."
He stepped in front of her, and they started forward
again, Leon trying to divide his attention between the
darkness ahead and the sodden pieces of flesh and
bone underfoot. Just ahead, the tunnel turned to the
right, and there was some light reflected off the oily
surface of the water; the passage was clearer, too, with
not as many bodies.
Leon paused just long enough to unshoulder the
Remington, checking to make sure he'd chambered a
round. Whatever had gotten to the corpses didn't
seem to be around, but he didn't want to be unprepared
if it came back.
Ada waited without speaking, though he could feel
her impatience - not for the first time, he wondered if
there was more to her story than she'd told him. He
was scared, and he was also cold and tired and afraid
for Claire, who might still be wandering the station...
... he didn't even know if Claire was still alive; but he
hadn't felt right about letting Ada walk into a bad
situation on her own.
Ada, on the other hand . . . she was as calm and
controlled as a veteran soldier, expressing nothing but
a kind of irritable eagerness to get on with things
and if she appreciated his presence at all, she was
taking great pains not to show it. It wasn't that he
needed or wanted her gratitude...
... but wouldn't most people be happy to have a cop
along? Even a rookie?
Maybe not, and it wasn't the time or place to start
asking questions. Leon shut down his thinking and
started moving again, stepping gingerly over a
chewed-up chunk of flesh that he couldn't identify.
"Stop," Ada whispered sharply. "Listen."
Leon tensed, Remington in one hand, Magnum in
the other. He tilted his head, straining to hear, but
there was only a distant, hollow drip of water...
... and a soft thumping. A rapid but random sound,
like padded hammers on a padded surface. Whatever
it was, it was getting closer, coming toward them from
where the tunnel turned up ahead.
Why isn't it splashing, why don't we hear water?
Leon backed up a step, raising both weapons
slightly, remembering how Ada had looked at the
ceiling before...
... and saw it, saw it and felt his heart stop in
midbeat. A spider the size of a big dog, skittering over
the wet stones halfway up the inner wall, its bristling,
hairy legs tapping -
- not possible -
- and then there was a series of deafening explosions
next to his right ear, bam-bam-bam-bam, the
muzzle flash from Ada's Beretta strobing the hellish
tunnel as she fired. The booming echoes pounded
through the dark as the giant, impossible arachnid
dropped from the wall, splashing into the inky water.
It crawled toward them, wounded, dragging two of
its multiple legs through the murk behind it, dark
fluids spilling out from its grotesquely rounded body.
It humped itself over a human head, the mutilated
skull rolling out from beneath its swollen, pulsing
abdomen, and Leon could see its shining black eyes,
each the size of a ping-pong ball...
... and he squeezed the trigger on the Remington,
not even feeling the kick of the thundering blast, his
entire focus on the inconceivable arachnid. The round
hit it squarely, blowing its alien face into a thousand
wet pieces. The spider flipped over backwards with a
skidding splash, its thick legs quivering, curling in
over its furred body.
His ears ringing, his heart pounding, Leon chambered
another round, his mind telling him that he had
not just blown away a spider that big, the physics was
wrong, it couldn't happen because it would collapse
under its own weight...
... Ada pushed past him, running ahead, shouting
back to him.
"Come on, there could be more coming!"
Leon took off after her, forced by Ada's reckless
behavior to put his shock on hold. He sprinted
through the dark, jumping over the disturbed and
gently rocking hunks of flesh, past the closed dead
spider that would never have existed in the reality
he'd known before Raccoon.
"Drop your weapon," Irons commanded, and the
girl did so, hesitating for only a second. The Browning
clattered to the floor, and Irons had to resist the urge
to laugh again, scarcely able to credit how stupidly
she'd acted. The Umbrella assassin had obviously
grown arrogant, walking into his Sanctuary as if she
owned the place - and her smug, inflated conceit had
cost her the game.
"Turn around, slow - and keep your hands where I
can see them," he said, still grinning. Oh, what a
gloriously easy conquest! Umbrella had underestimated
him for the last time.
Again, the girl did as he asked, pivoting slowly, her
hands empty and open. The look on her face was
priceless, her aquiline features fixed in a mask of fear
and shock; she hadn't expected this, she thought it
would be a simple task to take out Brian Irons. After
all, he was a broken man, a shadow of his former self,
his city, his life taken away. . .
"Mistaken, weren't you?" he said, feeling the humor
leak out of the situation, feeling the anger stir
again. He kept the VP70 trained on her ridiculously
young face; insulting, that they'd sent a child in to do
their dirty work. Even such a pretty one. . .
"Calm down, Chief Irons," she said, and even
angry, he was pleased to hear the strain in her sultry
voice, the edge of fear beneath her useless plea. He
was going to enjoy this, even more than he'd imagined
. . .
. . . but first, some answers.
"Who sent you? Was it Coleman, from headquarters?
Or did your orders come from higher up ...
... someone on the board, perhaps? There's no point in
lying, not anymore."
The girl stared at him, her eyes wide with feigned
confusion. "I ... I don't know what you're talking
about. Please, there's been some kind of a mistake..."
"Oh, there's been a mistake, all right," Irons spat,
"and you made it. How long has Umbrella been
watching me? What were your orders, exactly - were
you supposed to kill me outright, or did Umbrella
want to see me suffer a little more first?"
The girl didn't answer for a moment, obviously
trying to decide how much to tell him. She was good,
her expression still carefully arranged to show only a
bewildered fear, but he saw right through it.
She's been caught, she must know that I won't let her
live and she's going to try and conceal the truth, even
now. Young, but well-trained.
"I came to Raccoon looking for my brother," she
said slowly, her wide gray eyes fixed on the gun.
"He was with the S.T.A.R.S., and I just..."
"S.T.A.R.S.? Is that the best you can do?" Irons
laughed bitterly, shaking his head. The Raccoon
S.T.A.R.S. had fled well before things had fallen to
Shit - and last he'd heard, Umbrella had already
"converted" the organization to their purposes, and
was working to eliminate those who wouldn't cross
over. As a cover story, it didn't play.
But there is something. . .
He narrowed his eyes, studying her pale, anxious
face. "And just who is your brother?"
"Chris Redfield, you know him - I'm Claire, his
sister, and I don't know anything about whatever
Umbrella did, and I wasn't sent here to kill you." She
spoke quickly, all but stumbling over herself to get her
story out.
She did look like Redfield, through the eyes at
Least ... although why she thought that connection
would help her somehow was beyond him. Chris
Redfield was a pompous, disrespectful upstart who
had openly defied him many times; in fact.
"Redfield was working for Umbrella, wasn't he?"
Even saying it aloud, Irons could see that it was the
truth and his anger swelled up like a red tide, an
acid heat that flushed through his veins and made him
feel sick.
Even my employees, all along. Treasonous Umbrella
puppets.
"The Spencer estate, the accusations against Umbrella
... it was all a setup, they had him stirring up
trouble to ... to distract me so they could steal Birkin's
new virus..."
Irons took a step toward the girl, barely able to keep
himself from pulling the trigger in spite of his plans.
The girl, Claire, took a step back, holding up her
hands, palms out, as if to ward off his righteous
fury.
"That's how the S.T.A.R.S. knew to get out of
town," he snarled, "they were warned to get out of
town before the T-Virus leak!"
He took another step forward, but Claire had
stopped, her eyes going even wider. "You mean Chris
isn't here?"
Her small, hopeful whisper only fed the red, burning
heat that pounded through him and the feelings
were so powerful that they transcended rage, focusing
his intentions into something brutal and precise. It
wasn't enough that he'd been betrayed by Umbrella
and the S.T.A.R.S., it wasn't enough that he'd been
manipulated, tormented, hunted.
No. No, I have to be lied to by this little girl, a spy
and an assassin from a family of traitors, A lifetime
devoted to service, a lifetime of hard-won experience
and self-sacrifice, and this is my reward.
"A slap in the face," he said, his voice as cold as
this new savagery that filled him up, transforming
him into the hunter. "Treating me like an idiot. You
don't even have enough respect to lie well."
He extended the nine-millimeter and walked toward
her, each step measured and deliberate and
her fear was real this time, he could see it in the way
she stumbled back, her lips trembling, her young chest
heaving in a most delicious way. She was terrified,
trying to look for a weapon and watch him and get
away all at the same time, succeeding at none of them
as he marched forward.
"I have the power," he said, "this is my Sanctuary,
this is my domain. You are the intruder. You are the
liar, you are the evil - and I'm going to skin you alive.
I'm going to make you scream, you bitch, I'm going to
make you wish you were never born. Whatever they
paid you, it wasn't enough."
She backed against one of the shelves, tripping over
the leg of the worktable, almost falling on top of the
covered trap door in the corner. Irons followed,
feeling that beautiful, exciting power course through
him, feeling excited by her helplessness.
"Please, you don't want to do this, I'm not who you
think I am!"
Her pathetic entreaties made him stop and laugh,
wanting to add to her terror, wanting for her to know
that his control was absolute. She was wedged between
a trophy shelf and the covered pit, and Irons
stayed a safe distance away, enjoying the look in her
glistening, overbright eyes - the panic of a trapped
animal, a soft, warm, powerless animal of tender,
pliable flesh...
Irons licked his lips, his hungry gaze traveling over
her limber, smooth, cowering form. Another trophy,
another body to transform . . . and it was time to get
down to business, to...
"Graaagh!"
What the...
The board that covered the subbasement entrance
flew into the air, splitting with a tremendous crack,
one jagged piece hitting Irons's hip. He staggered, not
understanding - he was in control and yet something
had gone horribly, horribly wrong.
Something wrapped around his ankle, something
that squeezed so tight he heard the bone being
crushed, felt incredible, spiking pain travel up his
leg...
... and he locked gazes with the girl, her eyes bright
with a new terror, and in that instant of contact, of
clarity, he wanted to teil her so much, wanted to tell
her that he was a good man, a man who'd never
deserved any of what had happened to him...
... and the vise-like grip jerked, and Irons was
falling, dropping the gun, pulled into the pit by the
screaming and the pain and the beast that waited for
him below.
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