THREE
AS TERRIBLE AND DISHEARTENING AS THE DESTRUCTION
to Rockfort, Alfred couldn't deny that he enjoyed
putting down a few of his subordinates on the way
to the training facility's main control room. He'd had no
idea how gratifying it could be to see them sick and
dying, reaching for him in hunger - the same men who'd
sneered at him behind his back, who'd called him abnormal,
who had pretended allegiance with their fingers
crossed - and then expiring by his hand. There were listening
devices and hidden cameras throughout the compound,
installed by his own paranoid father, a hidden
monitor room in the private residence; Alfred had known
all along that he wasn't liked, that the Umbrella employees
feared but didn't respect him as he deserved.
And now...
Now it didn't matter, he thought, smiling, stepping
out of the elevator to see John Barton at the other end of
the hall, staggering toward him with outstretched arms.
Barton had been responsible for training Umbrella's
growing militia in small arms, at least at the Rockfort
compound, and had been a loud, vulgar barbarian
swaggering around with his cheap cigars, flexing his
ridiculously bloated muscles, always sweating, always
laughing. The pale, blood-drenched creature stumbling
toward him bore little resemblance, but was undoubtedly
the same man.
"You're not laughing anymore, Mr. Barton," Alfred
said rightly, raising his .22 rifle, using the sight to put a
tiny red dot over the trainer's bloodshot left eye. The
drooling, moaning Barton didn't notice...
Bam!
... although he surely would have appreciated Alfred's
excellent aim and choice of ammunition. The .22
was loaded with safety slugs, rounds designed to spread
out on impact - designated "safe" because the bullet
wouldn't go through the target and injure anyone else.
Alfred's shot obliterated Barton's eye and certainly a
goodly part of his brain, rendering him harmless and
quite dead. The large man crumpled to the floor, a puddle
of blood spreading out beneath him.
Some of the BOWs were unnerving to him, and he
was relieved that most had either been locked down in
various parts of the training facility or had been killed
outright - he certainly wouldn't be wandering around if
there were more than a few on the loose, but he didn't
find the virus carriers to be particularly frightening. Alfred
had seen many men - and a number of women, as
Well - turned into these zombie-like creatures by way of
the T-virus, experiments that he'd witnessed throughout
his childhood, that he'd directed himself as an adult. In
fact, there were never more than fifty or sixty prisoners
living at Rockfort at a time; between Dr. Stoker, the
anatomist and researcher who'd worked at the "infirmary,"
and the constant need for training targets and
spare parts, no one incarcerated at the compound enjoyed
Umbrella's hospitality for more than six months.
And where will we all be six months from now, I
wonder?
Alfred stepped over Barton's swollen corpse, walking
toward the control room to call his Umbrella HQ contacts.
Would Umbrella choose to rebuild at Rockfort?
Would he agree to it? He and Alexia had been perfectly
safe from the virus during its "hot" stage, both pathways
between the rest of the facility and their private home
locked down throughout most of the air attack, but
knowing that Umbrella's nameless enemy was willing
to resort to such extreme measures, did he really want to
risk refitting a laboratory so near their home? The Ashfords
feared nothing, but neither were they reckless.
Alexia would never agree to closing the facility, not
now, not when she's so close to her goal...
Alfred stopped in his tracks, staring at the banks of
radio and video equipment, at the blank computer screens
that stared back at him with wide dead eyes. He stared
but didn't see, a strange emptiness opening up inside of
him, confusing him. Where was Alexia? What goal?
Gone. She's gone.
It was true, he could feel it in his bones - but how
could she leave him, how could she when she knew that
she was his heart, that he would die without her?
The monstrosity, screaming and blind, a failure and it
was cold, so cold, the queen ant naked, suspended in the
sea and he couldn 't touch her, could only feel the cold
unyielding glass beneath his longing fingers...
Alfred gasped, the nightmare imagery so real, so horrid
that he didn't know where he was, didn't know what
he was doing. Distantly, he felt his hands clenching
tighter and tighter around something, the muscles of his
arms shaking...
... and there was a burst of static from the console in
front of him, loud and crackling, and Alfred realized
that somebody was speaking.
"... please, if anyone can hear me - this is Doctor
Mario Tica, in the second floor lab," the voice was saying,
breaking with fear. "I'm locked in, and all the tanks
have gone down, they're waking up ... please, you have
to help me, I'm not infected, I'm in a suit, swear to God,
you gotta get me out of here..."
Dr. Tica, locked in the embryo tank room. Tica, who
had long been sending private reports to Umbrella about
his progress with the Albinoid project, secret reports that
were different than the ones he showed Alfred. Alexia had
suggested that Tica be sent to Dr. Stoker some months
ago ... wouldn't she be amused, to hear him now?
Alfred reached over and turned off Tica's babbling
plea, suddenly feeling much better. Alexia had warned
him time and again about his peculiar episodes, the
flashes of intense loneliness and confusion - stress, she
insisted, telling him that he was not to take them seriously,
that she would never leave him voluntarily. She
loved him too much for that.
Thinking of her, thinking of all the trouble and pain
that Umbrella's incompetent defenses had brought about
for them both, Alfred abruptly decided not to place his
uplink call. HQ had certainly heard about the attack by
now, and would be sending a cleanup crew soon enough;
really, there was no need to speak with them ... and besides,
they didn't deserve to hear his observations of the
situation, to have foreknowledge of the dangers they'd
be facing. He was no employee, no ignorant lackey who
had to report to his superiors. The Ashfords had created
Umbrella; they should be reporting to him.
And I did speak to Jackson only a week ago, about the
Redfield girl...
Alfred felt his eyes widen, his mind working madly.
Claire Redfield, sister to Chris Redfield, he of the meddlesome
S.T.A.R.S. holdouts, had arrived mere hours before
the attack. She had been caught in Paris, inside Umbrella's
HQ Administration building, claiming to be searching for
her brother - and they'd sent her to him, to keep her
locked up while they decided what to do with her.
But ... what if the plan had been to lure her brother
out into the open, to crush his ridiculous insurrection
once and for all, a plan they'd conveniently forgotten to
tell him? And what if she'd been followed to Rockfort
by Redfield and his comrades, her very presence a signal
for them to attack...
... or perhaps even allowed herself to be captured in
the first place?
It was as if a puzzle was falling into place. Of course,
of course she had. Clever girl, she'd played her part
well. Whether or not Umbrella had unwittingly encouraged
the attack didn't matter, not now, he would deal
with them later; what mattered was that the Redfield
witch had brought the enemy to Rockfort, and she might
still be alive, stealing information, spying, perhaps even
planning to, to hurt his Alexia...
"No," he breathed, the fear immediately transforming
into fury. Obviously that had been her plan all along, to
do as much damage to Umbrella as possible and Alexia
was undoubtedly the brightest scientific mind working in
bioweapons research, perhaps the brightest in any field.
Claire wouldn't get away with it. He'd find her ... or,
better yet, wait for her to come to him, as she surely
would. He could watch for her, lay in wait like a hunter,
the girl his prey.
And why kill her immediately, when you could have
so much fun with her first? It was Alexia's voice in his
thoughts, reminding him of their childhood games, the
pleasure they'd shared in their own experiments, creating
environments of pain, watching things suffer and
die. It had forged the bond between them in steel, to
share such intimate things...
... I can keep her alive, let Alexia play with
her ... or better, I could invent a maze for her, see how
she fares against some of our pets... There were many
possibilities. With few exceptions, Alfred could unlock
all the doors on the island by computer; he could easily
lead her wherever he wanted, and kill her at his discretion.
Claire Redfield had underestimated him, they all had,
but no more ... and if things worked out the way Alfred
was starting to hope, the day would end on a much happier
note than the dismal discord which had marked its
beginning.
If there were infected dogs roaming the grounds, they
were hiding. The open yard Claire stepped into was littered
with corpses, their flesh a sickly gray beneath the
pale moonlight except for where the countless splashes
of blood had fallen; no dogs, nothing moving except the
low clouds scudding across the thickening night sky.
Claire stood for a moment, watching the shadows, wanting
to make sure of her surroundings before leaving the
exit behind.
"Steve," she whispered harshly, afraid to shout for
fear of what might be lurking. Unfortunately, Steve
Burnside was as scarce as the howling dog she'd heard;
he hadn't just wandered away, it seemed, he'd taken off
at a sprint.
Why? Why would he choose to be alone? Maybe she
was wrong, but Steve's bit about not wanting to be
slowed down just didn't ring true. When she'd unknowingly
stumbled into the Raccoon nightmare, running
into Leon had made all the difference in the world; they
hadn't stuck together the entire time, but just knowing
that there was someone else as shocked and scared as
she was ... instead of feeling helpless and isolated,
she'd been able to form clear objectives, goals beyond
mere survival - finding transportation out of the city,
looking for Chris, taking care of Sherry Birkin.
And simply from a safety standpoint, having someone
to watch your back is a hell of a lot better than going it
solo, no question.
Whatever his reason, she was going to do her
damnedest to talk him out of it, assuming she could find
him. The yard in front of her was much bigger than the
one she'd just stepped out of, a long, one-story cabin to
her right, a wall without doors to her left, the back of a
larger building, perhaps. A low fire was burning in one
of the wall's broken windows, and there was plenty of
debris strewn among the dead, evidence of the forceful
attack. To her immediate right was a locked gate,
a moonlit dirt path on the other side, and a closed
door ... which meant that Steve was either in the cabin
or had gone around it, using the trail at the far end of the
yard that also headed to the right.
She decided to try the cabin first ... and as she
hopped the few steps up to the railed porch that ran most
of the length of the building, she found herself wondering
who had attacked Rockfort, and why. Rodrigo had
said something about a special forces team, but if that
was true, whose orders were they following? It seemed
that Umbrella had its share of enemies, which was definitely
good news - but the island attack was a tragedy
nonetheless. Prisoners had died along with employees,
and the T-virus - perhaps the G-virus, too, and God only
knows how many others - didn't differentiate between
the guilty and the innocent.
She had reached the plain wooden door of the cabin,
and holding the 9mm at the ready, she gently pushed it
open and immediately closed it, her course decided by
the two virus carriers she'd seen inside, both stumbling
around a table. A second later there was a thump at the
door, a low, pitiful moan filtering out.
The trail it is, then. She doubted that the cocksure
Steve would have left anyone standing if he had gone into
the cabin, and she probably would have heard the shots...
... unless they got him first.
Claire didn't like it, but the grim reality of her situation
was mat she couldn't afford to waste the ammo to find out.
She'd follow the path, see where that led and if she
couldn't find him then, he was on his own. She wanted to
do the right thing, but she also felt pretty strongly about
saving her own ass; she had to get back to Paris, to Chris
and the others, which she certainly couldn't do if she blew
her ammo and ended up being someone's lunch.
She moved back along the porch, all of her senses on
high as she neared the end of the building. She hadn't
forgotten about the zombie dog or dogs, and listened for
the patter of claws against dirt, for the heavy panting
that she remembered from her previous experience in
Raccoon. The damp, chill night was quiet, a shivering
breeze sweeping lightly through the yard, the only
breathing she heard her own.
A quick glance around the corner of the cabin; nothing,
only a man's body lying half in and half out of the
building's crawl space, some five meters away. Another
ten past that and the path turned right again, much to
Claire's relief - she'd seen that leg of the trail through
the locked gate, and it had been empty then.
So he must have gone through that door, the one on
the west wall... It was also a relief to know something,
to know anything certain when it came to Umbrella. She
started down the path, thinking about what it would take
to convince the macho teen to stay with her. Maybe if
she told him about Raccoon, explained that she'd had
some practice with Umbrella disasters...
Claire was just about to step over the lone corpse's
upper body when it moved.
She jumped back, her semi pointed at the man's
bloody head, her heart hammering - and she realized
that he was dead, that someone or something in the
shadows of the crawl space was pulling him inside by
his legs, a strong and steady series of jerks...
... like a dog backing up with something heavy in its
jaws.
She didn't think anything after that, instinctively leaping
over the dead man and sprinting away, aware that the
dog - if that's what it was - wouldn't be preoccupied forever.
The realization that it had been less than a meter
away lent her speed as she took the corner, her boots slapping
against the wet, hard packed earth, her arms pumping.
Zombies were slow, uncoordinated; the dogs that both
she and Leon had run across were vicious and lightning
quick. Even armed, she wasn't interested in facing off
with one of them, a single bite and she'd be infected, too.
Arrroooooo! The gurgling howl came from farther
away than the crawl space, from somewhere back in the
front part of the yard.
Shit, how many... Didn't matter, she was almost
there, her salvation ahead on the left. Not daring to look
back, she didn't slow down a step until she reached the
door, grabbed the handle and shoved. It opened easily,
and since she didn't see anything with teeth directly in
front of her, she jumped in and slammed the door behind
her...
... only to hear the multiple wails of zombies, to smell
the feverish rot of the dying virus carriers even as something
crashed into the door at her back and began to
claw at it, growling like some feral monster.
How many dogs, how many zombies? The thought
flashed through her panicked mind, the need to conserve
ammo deeply ingrained after Raccoon, and what if I'm
about to hit a dead end? She almost turned back in spite
of the risk, until she saw where the zombies were.
The passage she'd entered was thick with gloom, but
she could see several stumbling men locked in a caged
area to her left, all of them pretty far gone. One of them
was beating on the mesh door, its nearly skeletal hands
hanging with ribbons of damaged tissue, oblivious to
the pain of its disintegrating body.
Must be the kennel...
Claire took a few steps farther in, focusing worriedly
on the simple and somewhat flimsy lock holding the
door closed - and saw the three uncaged zombies just as
the first was reaching for her, its gaping mouth dripping
with saliva and some other dark fluid, its bony fingers
stretching out to touch her. She'd been so intent on the
caged creatures, she hadn't realized that there were
more of them.
She reflexively dropped her weight and snapped her
left leg into its chest, a solid and effective side kick that
knocked the creature back. She could feel her boot sink
into its deteriorating flesh but didn't have time for disgust,
already bringing the 9mm up...
... and with a thin metallic crash, the kennel door
banged open, and suddenly she was facing seven instead
of three. They crowded toward her, clumsily maneuvering
past a Dumpster, a few barrels, the bodies of their
fallen brethren.
Bam! She shot the closest one without thinking, a
neat hole punching through its right temple, understanding
that she was doomed as it crumpled and hit the dirt.
Too many, too tightly grouped, she'd never make it -
- the barrels! One of them was marked flammable,
same trick I used in Paris...
Claire dove for cover behind the Dumpster, switching
the gun to her left hand as she landed. The target marked
in her mind's eye, she came up shooting, only her arm
curling around the Dumpster as the confused zombies
teetered and searched, moaning hungrily...
Bam! Bam! B...
... KA-BLAM!
The Dumpster slammed into her right shoulder,
knocking her over backward. She curled into a ball on
her side, ears ringing, as jagged, burning shreds of metal
rained down from above, clattering atop the Dumpster, a
few of them landing on her left leg. She slapped them
off, scarcely able to believe that it had worked, that she
was still alive.
She sat up, pushing herself into a crouch, looking out
at what remained of her assailants. Only one of them
was still whole, leaning heavily on the kennel, its
clothes and hair on fire; the upper body of a second was
trying to crawl toward her, its black and bubbling skin
sloughing off as it inched forward. The rest were in
pieces, the burning earth licking up to claim the pathetic
remains as its own.
Claire quickly dispatched the two left alive, her heart
aching a little at the dismal end these people had come
to. Ever since Raccoon City, her dreams were haunted
by zombies, by the stinking, dripping creatures that
sought live flesh as sustenance. Umbrella had unintentionally
created these particular monsters, like nightmarish
walking corpses straight out of the movies, and it
was kill or be killed, there was no choice.
Except they were people not so long ago. People with
families and lives, who hadn't deserved to die in such
terrible ways, no matter what evils they may have committed.
She looked down at the poor burned bodies,
feeling almost sick with pity and a low but insistent
fever of hatred for Umbrella.
Claire shook her head and did her best to let it go,
aware that allowing herself to carry all that pain might
make her hesitate at some crucial moment. Like a soldier
at war, she couldn't afford to humanize the enemy ... although
she had no doubts as to who the real enemy was,
and she hoped fervently that Umbrella's leaders would
all burn in hell for what they'd done.
Not wanting to be surprised again, she carefully and
thoroughly checked the passage's shadows in her evaluation
of next-step choices. In the back of the kennel was
an actual guillotine, stained with what appeared to be
real blood. Just looking at it made her shudder, reminding
her of RPD's Chief Irons, and his hidden dungeon;
Irons had been living proof that Umbrella didn't run
psych tests on their undercover employees. Behind the
nasty execution device was a door, but Steve obviously
hadn't gone that way, not with the zombies locked in.
Next to the kennel was a kind of metal sliding shutter,
but it wouldn't open ... and next to that, the only door
he could have gone through, because the passage was a
dead end just past it.
Claire walked to the door, suddenly feeling very tired
and very old, her emotions spent. She checked the handgun
and then reached for the handle, absently wondering
if she would ever see her brother again. Sometimes
holding on to her hope was a tremendous burden, made
all the heavier because she couldn't set it aside, not even
for a moment.
Steve jumped when he heard the explosion outside,
reflexively looking around at the small, cluttered office
as though expecting the walls to crumble. After a few
beats he relaxed, figuring it was probably just another
heat blast, nothing to worry about. Ever since the attack,
the unchecked fires burning throughout the prison compound
occasionally rolled over something combustible,
a canister of oxygen or kerosene or whatever, and then
ker-blooey, another explosion.
It was just such a blast that had kept him alive, actually
- he'd been knocked out by a flying chunk of wall
when an oil barrel had blown up, the debris covering
him completely, hiding him. When he'd finally come to,
the big zombie chow-down was pretty much over, most
of the prison guards and prisoners already dead...
Bad train of thought. He shook it off and returned his
attention to the computer screen, to the file directory
he'd stumbled across while trying to find a map of the
island. Some dumbass had written the pass code number
on a sticky note and slapped it on the hard drive, giving
him easy access to some obviously secret stuff. Too bad
most of it was dull as dishwater - prison budgeting,
names and dates he didn't recognize, information about
some kind of special alloy that metal detectors couldn't
pick up ... that one was kind of interesting, considering
he'd had to walk through a two-way lockdown metal detector
to get to the office, but three or four well-placed
bullets to the mechanism had taken care of that. Good
thing, too; he'd found one of the main gate emblem keys
tucked in a desk drawer, which would definitely have
triggered a lockdown on his way back through.
All I need is a goddamn map to the nearest boat or
plane and I'm history. He'd pick up the chick after he
cleared a path, too, play the knight in shining armor...
... and she'd undoubtedly be appreciative, maybe even
enough to want to...
A name on the file directory caught his eye. Steve
frowned, peering closer at the screen. There was a folder
labeled Redfield, C... as in Claire Redfield? He
tapped it up, curious, and was still reading, totally absorbed,
when he heard a noise behind him.
He scooped his gun off the counter and spun around,
mentally kicking himself for not paying better attention
and there was Claire, her own weapon pointing at
the floor, a slightly irritated look on her face.
"What are you doing?" she asked casually, as if she
hadn't just scared the crap out of him. "And how did you
get past the zombies outside?"
"I ran," he answered, annoyed by the question. Did she
think he was helpless or something? "And I'm looking for
a map ... hey, are you related to a Christopher Redfield?"
Claire frowned. "Chris is my brother. Why?"
Siblings. That explains it. Steve motioned toward the
computer, vaguely wondering if the entire Redfield clan
kicked ass. Her brother sure as hell did, ex-Air Force
pilot and S.T.A.R.S. team member, a competition
marksman and a serious thorn in Umbrella's side. No
way he would have admitted it out loud, but Steve was
kind of impressed.
"You might want to tell him that Umbrella's got him
under surveillance," he said, stepping back so she could
read what was on the screen. Apparently Redfield was
in Paris, though Umbrella hadn't managed to locate his
exact whereabouts. Steve was glad that he'd run across a
file that meant something to her; a little gratitude from a
pretty girl was always a good thing.
Claire scanned the info and then tapped a few keys,
glancing back at him with a look of relief. "Thank God
for private satellites. I can get through to Leon, he's
a friend, he should have hooked up with Chris by
now..."
She'd already started typing, absently explaining herself
as her fingers moved across the keys. "... there's a
message board we both use ... there, see? 'Contact
ASAP, the gang's all here.' He posted the night I was
caught."
Steve shrugged, not really interested in the life and
times of Claire's pals. "Go back a file, the longitude and
latitude of this rock are written down," he said, smiling a
little. "Why don't you send your brother directions, let
him come save the day?"
He expected another irritated look, but Claire only
nodded, her expression dead serious. "Good idea. I'll
say there's been a spill at these coordinates. They'll
know what I mean."
She was pretty, all right, but also pretty naive. "That
was a. joke," he said, shaking his head. They were in the
middle of nowhere.
She was staring at him. "Hilarious. I'll tell it to Chris
when he shows up."
Entirely without warning, a fiery rage welled up inside
of him, a tornado of anger and despair and a whole
bunch of feelings he couldn't even begin to understand.
What he did understand was that little Miss Claire was
wrong, she was stupid and snotty and wrong.
"Are you kidding? You actually expect him to show,
with what's going on here? And look at the coordinates!"
The words came out hot and fast and louder than
he intended, but he didn't care. "Don't be such an
idiot - believe me, you can't depend on people like that,
you'll only get hurt in the end, and then you'll have nobody
to blame but yourself!"
Now she was looking at him like he'd lost his mind,
and on top of his fury came a crushing wave of shame,
that he'd freak out for no good reason. He could feel
tears threatening, only adding to his humiliation, and
there was no way he was going to cry in front of her like
some baby, no way. Before she could say anything, he
turned and ran, blushing furiously.
"Steve, wait!"
He slammed the office door behind him and kept
going, wanting only to get out, to get away, hell with the
map, I've got the key, I'll figure something out and I'll
kill anything that tries to stop me...
Through the long hall, past the dead metal detector
and out, his weapon ready, a part of him bitterly disappointed
as he ran past the kennel, twice nearly tripping
over wet and smoldering body parts - there was nothing
to shoot, no one to blast into oblivion, to make him stop
feeling whatever it was he was feeling.
He barreled through the door that came out behind the
bunkhouse and started around the long building, sweating,
his heart pounding, his thick hair sticking to his
scalp in spite of the cold air - and he was so focused on
his own strange madness, his need to run, that he didn't
see or hear anything coming until it was almost too late.
Wham, something hit him from behind, knocking him
sprawling. Steve immediately rolled onto his back, a
sudden mortal terror blocking out everything else - and
there were two of them, two of the prison's guard dogs,
one of them circling back from having jumped on him,
the other growling deep in its throat, its legs stiff and
head down as it slowly approached.
Jesus, look at 'em...
They had been rottweilers, but not anymore; they'd
been infected, he could see it in their glazed red eyes
and dripping muzzles, in the strange new ridges of muscle
that flexed and bunched beneath their almost slimylooking
coats. And for the first time since the attack, the
immensity of Umbrella's craziness - their secret experiments,
their ridiculous cloak and dagger mentality - really
hit home. Steve liked dogs, a hell of a lot more than
he liked most people, and what had happened to these
two poor animals wasn't fair.
Not fair, wrong place at the wrong time, I didn't deserve
any of this, I didn 't do anything wrong...
He wasn't even aware that the object of his pity had
changed, that he was admitting to himself how shitty
things really were, how badly he'd been screwed; he
didn't have time to notice. It had been less than a second
since he'd rolled onto his back, and the dogs were getting
ready to attack.
It was over in another second, the time it took to pull
the trigger once, pivot, pull it again. Both animals went
down instantly, the first taking it in the head, the second,
in the chest. The second dog let out a single yip of pain
or fear or surprise before it collapsed in the mud, and
Steve's hatred for Umbrella multiplied exponentially
with that strangled sound, his mind repeating again and
again how unfair it all was as he crawled to his feet and
broke into a stumbling run. He had the key to the prison
gate; he wasn't going to be their captive anymore.
Time for a little payback, he thought grimly, suddenly
hoping, praying that he crossed paths with one of them,
one of the sick, decision-making asshole bastards who
worked for Umbrella. Maybe if he got to hear them beg
for death, maybe then he'd feel a little better.
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