Resident Evil - Genesis Part 19

He'd tried not to think about it, but Rain was right. It was his responsibility.

Dead people all over the place. And the people best qualified to stop them were cut to ribbons before his eyes. Because he missed something, because he f.u.c.ked up, over half the team was dead.

"Whatever they are, there's too many of them out there," Rain said.

"Whatever they are?" Kaplan repeated, trying and failing not to sound hysterical. "It's pretty obvious what they are. Lab coats, badges-those people used to work work here!" here!"

"All the people working here are dead."

"Well," Spence said philosophically, "that isn't stopping them from walking around."

"Where did they come from? Why didn't we see them on the way in?" Kaplan couldn't stop moving-if he stopped moving, he feared he'd die, and if he died, he'd become one of them.

Rain spoke in a deliberate voice. "When you cut the power, you unlocked the doors. You You let them out." let them out."

Something else that was on him. No, it wasn't enough that he got One and the others killed, but he was responsible for letting all the dead people out to kill J.D.-and, for all he knew, Alice and Addison, too.

The panic took over completely.

"We're never gonna make it to the surface."

Rain shook her head, then kicked the clip out of her rifle. "I've got one in the breech, and one spare mag."

Spence shook his head. "We are so f.u.c.ked."

Twenty.

THE ENCOURAGING THING FOR ALICE WAS that this was all starting to look familiar.

Unfortunately, each memory that was triggered had an unpleasant connotation.

She walked through the abandoned corridors of the Hive, dimly illuminated by the emergency lighting. Matt had wandered off, and Alice had lost track of Rain, J.D., Kaplan, and Spence.

At the very least, the corridor through which she walked was empty, and so bereft of the undead horrors.

Some areas she walked through meant nothing to her, but others triggered flashes. Here, the office belonging to the person in charge of Project: Open Book. There, the lab where they did some of the preliminary work on the Nemesis Program. Over that way were the cubicles where the support staff for Pharmaceuticals worked, answering phones, processing invoices, making photocopies...

She turned another corner, and the name Clarence fell into her head as she spied a wall lined with eight animal cages: two horizontal rows of four. Each cage had wire mesh on the door-mesh that was currently covered in blood and ripped open from the inside inside.

Was Clarence one of the animals? She couldn't remember.

With each memory that came back also came the mounting frustration of what she didn't didn't recall. recall.

She heard a noise and whirled around, but saw nothing.

Typical.

Again, she looked at the cages. She could not for the life of her recall what kind of animal was housed in those cages, but the evidence suggested that they had broken out on their own, and they were probably in the same condition as the Hive employees they'd been spending the last half-hour shooting, punching, and hitting.

Then she heard the footsteps.

No-not feet.

The scratchy sound of clawed feet on metal floor.

Tap tap tap tap tap...

She turned to face the doorway through which she heard the noise just as a large doberman came into view.

The doberman was covered in blood. Large chunks of flesh were missing, and Alice could see its rib cage, not to mention several internal organs, none of which seemed to be doing much of anything. The dog's eyes were watery and white.

Dead dog walking.

Despite its deceased state, the dog was somewhat more agile than its human counterparts, and started running down the hall toward Alice.

Somehow intuiting that offering to pet it and saying, "Good dog," wouldn't really cut it, Alice turned and ran to the door on the far end of the corridor. Miraculously, she remembered that it was one of the chemistry labs, and it had a door that latched shut.

Running as fast as she could go in the maddeningly impractical boots she'd been stupid enough to put on back at the mansion, Alice barely made it into the lab ahead of the dog.

Staring through the round window in the door, she watched in horror as the doberman leapt up and scratched at the door, trying to gain ingress, blood dripping from its teeth.

Letting out a long breath, Alice turned around- -and found herself face to face with the blood-covered, very dead face of Clarence White.

At once, Alice finally remembered that Clarence was the person a.s.signed to care for the fleet of dobermans, though Alice still couldn't for the life of her recall why why they had a fleet of dobermans down here. Animal experimentation, maybe? Certainly not beyond the realm of possibility for Umbrella. they had a fleet of dobermans down here. Animal experimentation, maybe? Certainly not beyond the realm of possibility for Umbrella.

That went through her head in one millisecond.

In the next, she hit Clarence with a series of well-placed punches to the chest, then executed a perfect spin-kick that sent the guard flying into a gla.s.s shelf full of beakers and chemicals.

Alice blinked.

Holy s.h.i.+t.

One's words came back to her: "You and I have the same employer-we all work for the Umbrella Corporation. The mansion is an entrance to the Hive. You are security operatives placed there to protect that entrance."

Until now, she hadn't given much thought to what that really meant meant. One had asked her for a report, as if she was his subordinate-and apparently she was more than that. She was, if not part of his actual team, part of the same division of the company.

And that meant she knew how to kick some serious a.s.s.

Amid the sound of shattering gla.s.s, Alice heard the sound of bone snapping. She hoped that meant that Clarence would stay dead.

She looked down at the corpse. It didn't move, which made it unusual for corpses around here.

It also had a nine-millimeter pistol sitting in a holster.

If she knew how to spin-kick, maybe she knew how to shoot a gun, too. After all, she wouldn't have had a full armory in her dresser drawer if she didn't know how to use its contents, right? She certainly had nothing to lose by taking the pistol-Clarence sure as h.e.l.l didn't need it anymore.

Gingerly, she undid the buckle on the holster, slowly pulling the pistol out, hoping Clarence wouldn't choose this moment to come back to unlife.

Then the dog crashed through a window Alice hadn't even realized was there and came at her.

Fingers tightening around the grip of the nine-millimeter, she ran for the door, and again ran through it and closed it on the dog in the nick of time.

This was getting tiresome.

She clicked off the safety of the nine-millimeter. It was only a matter of time before the pooch from h.e.l.l jumped back out through the same window.

Turning around, she found herself confronted by seven more dobermans.

One was missing an ear.

Another was missing its throat.

Two had broken limbs.

One had a ma.s.sive gash in its side.

All seven of them leapt for her at once.

Gripping the nine-millimeter with both hands, she aimed straight for the lead doberman's head and fired.

Seconds later, she'd emptied all sixteen rounds in the clip. Seven of the sixteen were perfect head shots that took the dogs down.

That took her out of immediate danger, but the only potential source of fresh ammo was Clarence's body in the lab, and Alice was not not going back in as long as the other dog was there. going back in as long as the other dog was there.

Then she heard growling.

Suddenly, the other dog being in the lab was less of an issue.

The doberman leapt out at her, and it was between her and the lab door, so that trick was not going to work a third time. And the nine-millimeter was now a useless piece of metal.

Alice saw some crates piled against a wall, and then her legs moved almost of their own volition. She ran to the crates, stepped up onto one, then up to another more highly piled one, then along the wall, building up momentum.

Pus.h.i.+ng herself off the wall, she delivered a powerful kick to the doberman's head, breaking the neckbone with a resounding snap.

She landed elegantly on her feet, wis.h.i.+ng she'd remembered she could do stuff like that earlier.

There had been eight cages, so she felt confident that the danger from undead pooches had pa.s.sed.

However, she was still unarmed.

Sort of. Turned out her body was a lethal weapon.

She needed to find the others. The only chance they stood was together.

If they stood any kind of chance at all. Who knew what else was lurking down here. Killer bunnies? Monster c.o.c.kroaches? Zombie rats?

Something worse?

Continuing through the corridors, she found a huge room full of cubicles-and movement!

Das.h.i.+ng into the room, she saw Matt being attacked by one of the undead. Looking around, she spied a paperweight that had a picture of a white rabbit, a girl in a blue dress, and a man with a big head wearing a large hat, as well as the inscription alice in WONDERLAND.

Alice thought that was more irony than she really needed as she grabbed the paperweight and slammed it into the undead woman's head.

She fell to the floor, unmoving, allowing Matt to get up.

However, Alice didn't spare Matt a second glance, because Alice realized that she knew who this woman was.

Lisa Broward.

They were standing in a park. There was a statue-the same one that was wrapped in plastic in the hallway right before One and his team came in. Alice and Lisa were talking amidst the fallen leaves of autumn.

"I can help you get get the virus. I have access to security plans, surveillance codes, the works the virus. I have access to security plans, surveillance codes, the works."

Alice hesitated.

"But-? " Lisa prompted.

"But there's going to be a price."

"Name it."

Matt knelt down beside Lisa, breaking the spell. Alice blinked, unable to remember the rest of the conversation.

What did it mean, "get the virus"?

And why was Matt now cradling Lisa's head?

"Who is she?" Alice asked.

"My sister."

Alice's response died on her lips. She hadn't been expecting that. After a second, she said, "I'm sorry."

Something wasn't right here. Correction, something else else wasn't right here. wasn't right here.

"You're not a cop, are you?"

His silence spoke volumes.

"If there's something you're not telling me, something she was involved with..." She trailed off. She really wasn't in a position to be making threats, given how little of her own memory she retained.