THIRTEEN
WITHIN MINUTES OF THE ATTACK, LEON
could see that Cole was in no shape to lead. The
Umbrella worker was stumbling blind, headed only
vaguely in the direction they needed to go and more
from happenstance than by design.
And now that we know they can attack from the
ground... he and John didn't both need to be watching
the skies, so to speak.
"Henry - why don't you let me take over as guide
for a few minutes?" Leon asked, glancing back at
John. John nodded, not looking all that hot himself;
he seemed extremely tight, his gaze darting rapidly
back and forth, his hands tight on the M-16.
Maybe he's thinking about the others. About them
being "taken."
"Yeah, okay, that'd be okay," Cole nodded, his
relief all too apparent. He wiped at his sweaty brown
hair and hurried to get behind Leon, John still in
back.
Leon was nervous, but not nearly as frightened as
he had been, at least not for the three of them. The
birds, Dacs, were unpleasant and dangerous, but it
was a relief to have seen them; they weren't as terrible
as his imagination had led him to believe upon
hearing those first savage cries. Monsters from the
mind were always worse than the real thing, and the
Dacs weren't even all that durable. As long he and
John were on their guard, they should make it okay.
They were headed due south, so Leon angled them
again, realizing that he was starting to catch glimpses
of what might be the far wall. The setup was disorienting;
the trees were not all that close together, but
were scattered so that the woods seemed dense when
you looked across it; the thick ground cover, some
kind of molded plastic, didn't move underfoot, but
there were slopes and rises in the material that made
it even harder to get a feel for the size of the chamber.
This is so weird, so over the top - so utterly like
Umbrella.
It was like the vast laboratory facility beneath
Raccoon, complete with its own foundry and private
subway - unbelievable, except he'd seen it himself.
And he knew from the ex-S.T.A.R.S. that there'd also
been an isolated cove on the Maine coast guarded by
teams of viral zombies, and a "deserted" mansion in
the woods, the Spencer place - that one had been
rigged with secrets, keys, codes, and passages, like the
setting for a spy movie that no one would ever buy.
Now this - simulated environments beneath the
barren Utah salt flats. What had Reston called it? The
Planet. It was an extravagant, decadent, immoral
waste; ridiculous, except -
- except we're stuck in it, and God only knows what
we'll be up against next.
Leon kept moving, trying not to think about what
Claire and the others might be going through. Reston
had obviously assumed that the rest of the team had
been nabbed, but he didn't know. He also didn't know
how resourceful Claire and Rebecca were, or how
brilliant David was as a strategist. They'd all slipped
away from Umbrella before, and there was no reason
to think that they wouldn't do it again.
Leon was so intent on the private pep-talk that he
didn't see the clearing until they were practically on
top of it, less than twenty feet away. He stopped,
remembering the last attack and chided himself for
not paying attention.
"Let's back up and go around," he said and then
he heard the beat of wings, and knew it was already
too late. In the wilted shadows above the open space,
one, two, three of them were diving off perches,
soaring down into the rounded clearing.
Shit!
One of them started to screech and then there were
others nearby, overhead, hiding in the unlikely trees,
who joined in the song, a deafening, horrendous
cacophony of needle-sharp sound. Leon fell back,
John suddenly at his side, aiming his rifle into the
open space.
The first flew at the trees, twisting sideways as if to
fly between them. It pulled up at the last second, so
quickly that they didn't get off a shot. As it soared up,
Leon saw two on the ground, dragging their sinewy
bodies eagerly forward on folded wings.
The noise! It was painful, as shrill and terrible as a
thousand screaming infants, and Leon felt the ninemillimeter
fire more than he heard it, the heavy metal
jumping in his hands. The birds fell silent as the
closer of the two took the shot in its curving throat. A
ragged hole blew open just above its narrow chest,
flaps of gray-brown skin blossoming out like some
dark flower. Thin blood gushed from the wound, but
the second was already climbing over its spasming
body, single-minded in its attack. Leon took aim
and...
"Hey hey oh shit... "
Cole's hysterical cry distracted him, the shot jerking
right, missing. John opened up on the second Dac,
the clatter of automatic fire tearing into the animal.
Leon spun and saw Cole stumbling backwards, another
of the vicious birds lunging toward him.
How'd it get past us?
Leon aimed, the Dac no more than five feet away
from Cole, and even as he pulled the trigger another
of the creatures was swooping down from directly
overhead. At such close range the nine-millimeter
round punctured the bird's chest and blew a fist-sized
hole out its low back, the Dac dead before it crumpled
to the ground. The newcomer gave one mighty flap,
the tips of its huge wings brushing the floor, and flew
back up and away.
"Henry, get behind me!" Leon shouted, glancing
up and seeing yet another Dac coming down from a
series of perches directly above, tucking its wings in
and diving straight for him.
He needed help. "John ... !"
The diving bird spread its leathery wings only a few
feet from the floor and touched down, surprisingly
graceful in its landing. It turned toward Leon and
lurched forward. Behind him, he heard the spatter of
bullets - and heard it stop, heard John cursing, heard
the M-16s aluminum alloy body clatter to the ground.
The Dac in front of Leon opened its long beak and
squawked, a burst of angry, hungry sound, sidling
forward on its bent wings as fast as Leon could back
away. The creature was weaving back and forth and
Leon didn't have enough ammo to waste, he had to
get a clear shot -
- and it jumped, a strange, sudden hop that put it
only a foot away. With another shrill screech, it
bobbed its head forward, its open beak closing on his
ankle. Even through the thick boot leather, he could
feel the pegs of its teeth, feel the power in its jaws -
- and before he could fire, John was there, he was
stamping down on the Dac's snaking neck and pointing
his handgun -
- and bam, the round snapped its spine, a vertebral
knob on its sleek back exploding, shards of pale
bone and runny blood spraying outward. It let go of
his ankle, and though its neck continued to twist its
body was still, bleeding and still.
How many, how many left...
"Come on," John called, scooping up the rifle and
turning to run. "Get to the door, we have to get to the
door!"
They ran. Through the clearing, Cole right behind,
the beat of wings behind them, another shrill voice
crying into the air. Back into the trees, the lifeless
woods, stumbling over branches and veering around
the gnarled plastic trunks.
The wall, there's the wall!
And there was the door, a double-wide metal hatch,
a deadbolt set low at the right side -
- and Leon heard the terrible screech in his ear,
inches away, and felt the gust of air across the back of
his neck -
- and he let his legs give, collapsing to the ground,
and felt sudden pain as something snatched a chunk
of hair and ripped it from his scalp, from the back of
his head.
"Look out!" Leon screamed, looking up to see the
massive bird swooping in on John, almost to the door,
Cole beside him.
John turned, not a flinch, not a backward stumble.
He raised the handgun and pulled the trigger, a dead
shot, and the Dac dropped as if made of lead, its tiny
brain suddenly liquid, blowing up and out.
Cole was fumbling with the door, John still aiming
over Leon's head, and Leon heard another one
screaming as if in a fury, somewhere behind -
- and the door was open - Leon ran, John covering
him as he stumbled after Cole, out of the cool,
dark woods and into a blinding heat. John was right
behind him, slamming the hatch closed...
... and they were in Phase Two.
Rebecca was running, out of breath and exhausted
and unable to stop, to rest. David and Claire were
running with her, holding her up, but she still felt that
each step was an effort of pure will; her muscles didn't
want to cooperate, and she was disoriented, her
equilibrium a mess, her ears ringing. She was hurt,
and she didn't know how bad - only that she'd been
shot, that she'd hit her head at some point, and that
they couldn't stop until they were well away from the
compound.
It was dark, too dark to see where the ground was,
and cold; each breath was an iced dagger in her throat
and lungs. Her thoughts were muddled, but she knew
that she'd suffered some brain dysfunction, she wasn't
sure what exactly; as she staggered along, the possibilities
haunted her. The bullet was easier; she knew by
the hot and throbbing pain where it had gone. It hurt
terribly, but she didn't think she had a fracture and it
wasn't gushing; she was much more concerned about
the loss of coherency.
Shot through left gluteal, lodged in ischium, lucky
lucky lucky ... shock or concussion? Concussion or
shock?
She needed to stop, take a temporal pulse, check
her ears for blood ... or for CSF, which was something
she didn't even want to think about. Even in her
confused state, she knew that bleeding cerebrospinal
fluid was about the worst outcome for a blow to the
head.
After what seemed like a very long time, and more
twists and changes in direction than she could count,
David slowed, telling Claire to slow down, and that
they were going to sit Rebecca on the ground.
"On my side," Rebecca panted, "bullet's on the
left."
Carefully, David and Claire lowered her down to
the cold flat earth, gasping, catching their breath, and
Rebecca thought she'd never been more glad to lie
down. She caught just a glimpse of the black sky as
David rolled her over: the stars were amazing, clear
and ice against the deep black sea ...
"Flashlight," she said, realizing again how strange
her thoughts had become. "Gotta check."
"Are we far enough?" Claire asked, and it took
Rebecca a moment to understand that she was talking
to David.
Oh, crap this is not good. . .
"Should be. And we'll see them coming." David
said shortly, and he turned on his flashlight, the beam
hitting the ground a few inches in front of Rebecca's
face.
"Rebecca, what can we do?" He asked, and she
heard the worry in his voice and loved him for it.
They were like family, had been ever since the cove,
he was a good friend and a good man...
"Rebecca?" This time, he sounded afraid.
"Yeah, sorry," she said, wondering how to explain
what she was feeling, what was happening. She decided
it would be best to just start talking and let
them figure it out.
"Look at my ear," she said. "Look for blood or
clear fluid, I think I've had a concussion. I can't seem
to gather my thoughts. Other ear, too. I was shot and I
think the bullet lodged in my ischium. Pelvis. Lucky,
lucky. Shouldn't be bleeding much, I can disinfect it,
wrap it if you'll hand me my pack. There's gauze and
that's good, though, the bullet could've snapped my
spine or gone low, chewed through my femoral artery.
Lot of blood, that's bad, and me the only medic being
hurt..."
As she spoke, David shone the light across her face,
then gently lifted and checked the other side before
resting her head in his lap. His legs were warm, the
muscles twitching from exertion.
"A little blood in your left ear," he said. "Claire,
take off Rebecca's pack, if you would. Rebecca, you
don't have to speak anymore, we'll fix you right up;
try to rest, if you can."
No CSF, thank God. . .
She wanted to close her eyes, to sleep, but she
needed to finish telling them everything. "Concussion
sounds minor, explains displacement, tinnitus, lack
of equilibrium - may only be a couple hours, maybe
weeks. Shouldn't be too bad, shouldn't move though.
Bed rest. Find my temporal pulse, side of my forehead.
If you can't, I could be in shock - warmth,
elevation..."
She took a breath, and realized that the darkness
wasn't just outside anymore. She was tired, very, very
tired, and a kind of hazy blackness was encroaching
on her vision.
That's everything, told them everything...
John. Leon.
"John and Leon," she said, horrified that she'd
forgotten for even a moment, struggling to sit up. The
realization was like a slap in the face. "I can walk, I'm
okay, we have to go back..."
David barely touched her and somehow, her head
was in his lap again. Then Claire was lifting the back
of her shirt, dabbing at her hip, sending fresh waves of
pain coursing through her. She squeezed her eyes
closed, trying to breathe deeply, trying to breathe at
all.
"We will go back," David said, and his voice
seemed to be coming from far away, from the top of a
well that she was falling down. "But we have to wait
for the helicopter to leave, assuming that it will - and
you'll need time to recover..."
If he said anything else, Rebecca didn't hear it.
Instead, she slept, and dreamed that she was a child,
playing in the cold, cold snow.
Desert!
There weren't any animals in sight, they had to be
on the other side of the dune, but Cole thought he
knew which ones belonged to Phase Two. Before John
or Leon could get even a step away, before Cole's ears
had stopped ringing from the Dacs' terrible cries, he
started babbling at them.
"Desert, Phase Two is a desert so it must be the
Scorps, scorpions, see?"
John was pulling a curved magazine from his hip
pack, scowling into the artificial sunlight that beat
down from above. It had to be at least a hundred
degrees in the room, and between the white walls and
glaring light it felt a lot hotter. Leon scanned the
shining sands in front of them, then turned to Cole,
looking as though he'd just eaten something sour.
"Wonderful, that's just great. 'Scorps'? Scorps and
Dacs ... what are the other ones, Henry, do you
remember?"
For a single second, Cole's mind went blank. He
nodded, wracking his brain, all of the sweat on his
body already evaporated in the bone dry heat.
"Uh - they're, they're nicknames, Dacs,
Scorps ... Hunters! Hunters and Spitters, the handlers
all had these nicknames..."
"Cute. Like Fluffy, or Sweet Pea," John interrupted,
wiping his brow with the back of one hand.
"So where are they?"
All three of them looked across Phase Two, at the
massive sand dune that towered in the middle of the
room, glittering beneath the giant grid of sunlamps
overhead. Twenty-five, thirty feet high, it blocked
their view of the southern wall, including the door in
the far right corner. There was nothing else to see.
Cole shook his head, but he wasn't telling them
anything; the Scorps were elsewhere, and they'd have
to cross the bright and burning sand dune to get to the
exit.
"What were the other phases, mountain and city?
Have you seen them?" Leon asked.
"Three is like a, whadayacallit, a chasm, on a peak.
Like a mountain gorge, kind of, real rocky. And Four
is a city - a few square blocks of one, anyway. I had to
check the video feeds in all of the phases when I first
got here."
John looked up and around, squinting against the
harsh light. "That's right, video ... do you remember
where they are? The cameras?"
Why would he want to know that? Cole pointed left,
at the small glass eye embedded in the white wall
some ten feet up. "There are five in here; that's the
closest..."
With a huge grin, John held up both hands and
extended his middle fingers to the lens. "Bite it,
Reston," he said loudly, and Cole decided that he
liked John, a lot. Leon too, for that matter, and not
just because they were the only ticket out. Whatever
their motivations, they were obviously on the right
side of things; and the fact that they could still joke at
a time like this...
"So, we got a plan?" Leon asked, still looking at the
wall of yellow-white sand looming in front of them.
"Head that way," John said, pointing right, "and
then climb. If we see something, shoot it."
"Brilliant, John. You should write these down. You
know, I..."
Leon broke off suddenly, and then Cole heard it. A
chattering sound. A sound like nails being tapped on
hollow wood, the sound he'd heard when he was
fixing one of the cameras only last week.
A sound like claws, opening and closing. Like mandibles,
clicking...
"Scorps," John said softly. "Aren't scorpions supposed
to be nocturnal?"
"This is Umbrella, remember?" Leon said. "You
have two grenades, I've got one..."
John nodded, then said, "You know how to work a
semiautomatic?"
The big soldier was watching the dune, so it took
Cole a second to realize he was talking to him.
"Oh. Yeah. I haven't ever used one, but I went
target shooting a couple of times with my brother, six
or seven years ago..." He kept his voice low as they
did, listening for that strange sound.
John looked directly at him, as if sizing him up -
- then nodded, and pulled a heavy-looking handgun out
of his hip holster. He handed it to Cole, butt first.
"It's a nine-millimeter, holds eighteen. I got more
clips if you run out. You know all the gun safety rules?
Don't point it at anyone unless you mean to kill, don't
shoot me or Leon, all that stuff?"
Cole nodded, taking the gun, and it was heavy
and although he was still more scared than he'd ever
been in all his thirty-four years, the solid weight of it
in his hand was an incredible relief. Remembering
what his little brother had told him about safety, he
fumbled through checking to see if it was loaded
before looking at John again.
"Thank you," he said, and meant it. He'd lured
these two guys into a trap, and they were giving him a
gun; giving him a chance.
"Forget it. Means we won't have to worry about
covering your ass on top of ours," John said, but he
wore a slight smile. "Come on, let's move out."
John in the lead and Leon behind him, they started
east, walking slowly through the changeless environment.
The sand was really sand; it shifted underfoot,
and with the blasting heat, it made for a real workout.
They'd only gone a short distance when Leon called
for a halt.
"Thermal underwear," he muttered, bolstering his
handgun before pulling off his black sweatshirt and
tying it around his waist. He wore a thick, textured
white shirt underneath. "I didn't realize we'd be
hitting the Sahara..."
They all heard it, only a second before they saw it -
- before they saw them, three of them, lining up at the
top of the dune. Tiny rivers of sand trickled down
from beneath their multiple legs, each as thick and
stocky as a sawed-off baseball bat. They had claws,
giant pincing claws that were narrow and black,
serrated on the inside, and long, segmented bodies
that dwindled to tails, curling up and over their
Backs - and tipped with stingers. Wicked, dripping
stingers at least a foot long.
The trio of sand-colored creatures, each five or six
feet long, maybe three feet high, started to chatter -
- the slender, pointed, tusk-like projections beneath the
rounded arachnid eyes tapped against one another,
beating out the strange tattoo of clicks that they'd
heard before...
... and then all three of the creatures, the monsters,
were sliding down toward them, perfectly balanced,
scuttling through the moving sands with ease.
And at the top of the dune, another three appeared.
0 comments
Post a Comment