EIGHTEEN
CARLOS WATCHED JELL CLIMB THE LADDER
once more, trying not to get his hopes up again. If this
didn't work, he was going to be deeply - no, majestically
pissed.
Hell with it. If this doesn't work, we should just walk
out, or see if we can get to that factory and steal ourselves
a ride. She's right, these people are andar lurias,
lost in space; the sooner we get out of their territory,
the better.
He stared blankly out at the dark yard for a few moments,
so bone-weary that he wondered how he would
do one more thing, take one more step; it seemed impossible.
All that kept him going was his desire to
leave, to get away from this holocaust and try to recover.
When the first massive peal of sound rang out, its
deep and hollow tone rolling out from the top of the
tower, Carlos realized he couldn't keep a lid on his
hope. He tried, telling himself that there was going to
be a glitch in the program, telling himself that Umbrella
would send assassins, that the pilot would be a
zombie; nothing worked. A helicopter was coming for
them, he knew it, he believed it; he just hoped the rescue
team wouldn't have any trouble finding a place to
land...
... spotlights! There were four of them on the ledge
and a crusty-looking control box near the door that led
back inside; the light would guide the transport in
faster. Carlos hurried toward it, glancing up to see if Jill
had started down yet. She hadn't...
... and when he looked ahead again, he saw that he
wasn't alone. As if by magic, the giant, mutilated freak
that had been chasing Jill was simply there, close
enough for Carlos to smell a burnt meat smell, snarling,
its piggy, distorted gaze turned to the top of the ladder.
"Carlos, look out!" Jill screamed down, but the
Nemesis-monster ignored him completely, taking a
mammoth step toward the ladder, the eyeless snakes
that were its tentacles whipping around its colossal
head. One more step and it would be at the base of the
ladder and Jill would be trapped.
- she said bullets don't hurt it -
Desperate to do something, Carlos saw the large
green power switch on the spotlights' control panel and
lunged for it, not sure what he expected. To distract it,
if they were lucky...
... and all four lights snapped on at once, blinding,
instantly heating the air around them and illuminating
the tower, probably for miles to see. One of the beams
was full-on blocked by the freak's hideous face. The
light actually forced the thing to stumble backwards,
giant hands covering its mutant eyes, and Carlos acted.
He ran at the blinded Nemesis, M16 held high, and
slammed the rifle against its chest, pushing as hard as
he could. Off balance, it stumbled backwards, its legs
slapping the ancient railing...
... and with a brittle snap, a wide section of the railing
gave way, falling into the darkness, the Nemesis
plummeting after it. Carlos heard a sickly thump from
the ground below at the same instant that the overheated
spotlights shut down, making glowing dark
shapes float in Carlos's eyes for a moment.
The huge, mellow sound of the bells continued to
fill the air as Jill scrambled down the ladder and unslung
the grenade launcher, joining Carlos at the broken
railing.
"I ... thanks," Jill said, looking into his eyes, her
own gaze sincere and unwavering. "If you hadn't hit
the lights, I would have been dead. Thank you."
Carlos was impressed and a little flustered by her
candor. "De nada," he said, suddenly very aware of
how attractive she was - not just physically - and how
little experience he actually had with women. He was a
self-educated twenty-one-year-old mere, and he hadn't
exactly had a whole lot of time or opportunity to date.
She can't be much older, twenty-five at the outside,
and maybe she...
Jill snapped her fingers in front of him, bringing him
back to reality and reminding him of how tired he really
was. He'd totally spaced out.
"You still with me?"
Carlos nodded, clearing his throat. "Yeah, sorry. Did
you say something?"
"I said we need to move. If it's still that feisty after a
grenade in the face, I doubt a two-story drop will kill it."
"Right," Carlos said. "We should circle around front,
anyway. They'll probably drop a harness if they can't
set down."
Jill nodded. "Let's do it."
Ushered inside by the deep voice of hollowed metal,
Carlos suddenly wondered if Nicholai was still alive -
- and if he was, what he would do when he heard the
tolling bells.
Nicholai heard the bells on his walk back into town
and scoffed irritably, refusing to be baited. He hadn't
expected the barely skilled trio to make it, but so what
if they had? Davis Chan had filed another report, from
a woman's boutique of all places, and Nicholai meant
to track him down.
And why should I care if they limp away with their
miserable lives, with what I've got?
Nicholai pulled the slender metal case out of his
pocket for the third time since leaving the hospital, unable
to resist. Inside was a glass vial of purplish fluid
that he'd synthesized himself, with a little help from an
instruction sheet that Aquino's assistant had thoughtfully
left behind.
Nicholai knew it would be safest to store the sample
someplace, but the small container represented his authority
over the other Watchdogs and a newly elevated
status with Umbrella; he was a leader, a supervisor of
lesser men, and he found that carrying the vaccine with
him and occasionally holding it made him feel powerful.
Grounded, in a way.
Smiling, Nicholai slipped the container back into his
pocket, within easy reach, and started walking again,
deliberately ignoring the bells. Things were going very
well - he had the vaccine; he knew where Chan was
and where Franklin was going to be in just under fortyeight
hours; he'd already rigged the hospital to blow;
and he would push the button as soon as his meeting
with Franklin was over. Nicholai thought he might
duck over to the factory and get rid of Terence Foster
while he waited on Franklin, there was plenty of
time -
- just like there was plenty of time to track Mikhail,
to play at being a noble team member, to decide who
would die first among them. . .
The clamorous bells pounded at him, seeking to remind
him of his failure, but he refused to be distracted
by the escape of three incompetents. He was getting
closer to town, he could see the combined glow of hundreds
of small and not so small fires encasing the dark
city; even if he wanted to, he wouldn't make it back to
the clock tower before the first helicopter came. And he
didn't want to, he'd had the opportunity after killing
Aquino and had decided that it wasn't worth his time. It
was the right decision ... and the strange doubts that
curled up inside of him at the sound of the bells were to
be disregarded; it meant nothing, that they had survived,
it didn't mean that they were as good as him.
Besides, he still had a few dogs to put down to ensure
his monopoly on information. He thought that
Chan might choose to bunk down at the store he'd reported
from, as late as it was. Nicholai would kill him,
take his data, and retire for the evening somewhere in
the city. At the Watchdog briefing he'd heard that food
was scarce, but he was certain that he could manage
raid a few pantries for canned goods, perhaps. In the
morning he would file his own report, to keep up his
cover, and spend the day hunting up information of his
own before heading west again.
Everything was fine, and as he gradually crossed
over from the suburbs into the city, the sound of the approaching
helicopter didn't bother him a bit. Let those
spineless, shit-eating bastards run, he felt great, in control,
better than great. He only had a headache because
of those damned bells.
They retraced much of their winding path through
the clock tower, Jill wanting to make sure the Nemesis
either got confused or had plenty of time to wander
away before they went out to meet the 'copter. As
they walked, they hammered out a story to tell whoever
was running the evac - Jill was Kimberly
Sampsel (the name of Jill's best friend from fifth
grade), she'd worked at a local art gallery, no family,
and she'd only moved to Raccoon recently. Carlos had
found her just after his platoon leader, the only other
U.B.C.S. member to have survived, had been killed by
zombies. Together, they'd made it to the clock tower,
end of story.
They decided not to mention Nicholai, the Nemesis,
or any unidentifiable creatures they'd seen running
around; the idea was to appear as ignorant of the facts
as possible. Neither of them wanted to take any
chances on the allegiance of the rescue team, and Jill
had no doubt that there would be someone on the transport
waiting to debrief them, so the simpler the story,
the better. They'd just have to pray that no one had her
pic on hand. They could worry about how to slip away
once they got out of the city.
At the front doors of the clock tower they paused for
a moment, readying themselves, Jill feeling a strange
mixture of happiness and anxiety. Rescue was coming,
but they were so close to getting out now that she was
afraid something would go wrong.
Maybe that's just because Umbrella is doing the rescuing,
God knows they don't have a very good track
record for keeping their shit together...
"Jill? Before we leave, I want to tell you something,"
Carlos said, and for a few seconds, Jill thought her anxiety
was about to be confirmed, that he was going to
tell her some terrible secret he'd been holding back,
but then she saw his careful, thoughtful expression and
thought different.
"Okay, shoot," she said neutrally, thinking about the
way he'd looked at her out on the balcony. She'd seen
that look before, from other men - and she wasn't sure
how she felt about it from Carlos. Before he'd left for
Europe, Chris Redfield and she had been getting pretty
close...
"Before I came here, I was approached by this guy
about Raccoon, about what was going on here," Carlos
started, and Jill had just enough time to feel stupid
about her assumption before-his words sank in.
Trent!
"He told me that we were in for a rough time, and
offered to help me out. I thought he was crazy at
first..."
"... but then you got here and found out he wasn't."
Carlos stared at her. "You know him or something?"
"Probably as well as you do. It was the same with
me, just before the estate mission, he gave me information
about the mansion and told me to be careful who
I trusted. Trent, right?"
Carlos nodded, and although they both opened their
mouths to speak, neither of them said a word. It was
the sound of the approaching helicopter that cut them
off, that made both of them grin and exchange looks of
joy and relief.
"Let's talk about him later," Carlos said, pushing
open the front doors, the chop of the 'copter's blades
filling the tower's lobby as they both stepped out into
the yard.
Jill only saw one transport helicopter but didn't care,
there obviously wasn't anyone else to evacuate, and as
it swung over the crashed trolley, she and Carlos both
started to wave their arms and shout.
"Over here! We're over here!" Jill screamed, and she
actually saw the clean-shaven face of the pilot, his
smile glowing by the lights in the cockpit as he flew
closer -
- close enough that she could see the smile disappear
hi the same instant that she heard the weapon discharge
to their right, a look of horror dawning on that
youthful face.
Shhhh...
A line of colored smoke, streaking toward the hovering
ship from someone on the roof of the tower's adjunct
buildings, surface to air, bazooka or rocket
launcher...
...BOOM!
"No," Jill whispered, but the sound was lost as the
missile slammed into the 'copter and exploded, Jill
numbly thinking that it had to be a HEAT rocket to do
the damage it was doing as the airship spun toward
them, listing badly to one side, fire spouting from the
shattered cockpit.
Carlos grabbed her arm and yanked, almost jerking
her off her feet, pulling her out into the yard as a high,
climbing, whining noise blew over them, the burning
helicopter stuttering forward as they huddled behind
the fountain...
... and then it crashed into the clock tower. Flaming
chunks of metal and stone and wood showered down
upon them as the transport plunged through the roof of
the lobby, and like the voice of destruction, Jill heard
the Nemesis's triumphant scream rising above it all.
0 comments
Post a Comment