Resident Evil 0: Death's Door
(AN: Yes, I know: New story, haven't finished the rest. My replacement computer's files got deleted, and as I have no back ups, you're stuck with this. I was inspired to write a story like this from another author, Simison. His version is called Resident Evil 0: The First Nightmare. It's in my favorites, and it's a good story. This is me (yet another avatar of me, anyway) and a few others getting sent into the universe of Resident Evil, just before the events of RE0)
Pain.
That was the only thing Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the United States Army Rangers felt when he got up.
He leapt up from the position he was in (prone on the ground) and checked himself for anything he had. His combat knife's sheath was still attached to the vest with the knife still in it.
Then he checked for his self defense weapon: an Israeli Baby Desert Eagle.
Most people would consider that overkill, but when you live in the woods, a hunting weapon is the perfect choice.
Chambered in .357 magnum caliber, it had 10 rounds in the magazine. He was also in luck: he still had 3 more magazines and his reloading tool.
He heard something moving in the bushes nearby, so he pulled out the Baby Eagle.
"Out of the bush, now."
A head popped out.
It was Saeko Kusinagi, a friend of his from when he was deployed in Japan for a few months.
She was still going to school in Kyoto, but she was smarter then most of the teachers.
They stayed in contact when they could.
"Sorry. I'm a little jumpy."
"My friend, there is nothing to forgive."
He helped her out of the bush. Her school uniform was torn in a few places, but otherwise she was fine. "How did you get here?"
"I do not know. I was on my way home when I blacked out."
"Same, only I was on my way to..well..."
"Your job is secretive for a reason, Ronald."
Ron looked at his friend.
She was only carrying a wooden practice sword, but it was still lethal if used right.
"Do not leer at me, Ronald."
"I was seeing if you were armed. Since you are..."
He whipped out the Eagle while she rapidly drew her wooden sword.
The two turned to face yet another person, someone Saeko didn't know, but Ron did.
Tanner Armstrong, a civilian and a very old friend of Ron's.
"DON'T SHOOT!"
"Relax, Saeko. Don't worry, Tanner: I won't shoot you. You did, however, scare the living shit out us."
"Hello?"
'They must've heard Tanner.'
"Over here!"
Three more people walked through the woods.
Ron hoped they were the locals.
They weren't.
His brother Michael and his girlfriend Tori and Dylan Jackson walked out of the woods and into the clearing.
"Well, shit."
Among them, Ron and Dylan were the only military personnel there.
"You got a gun, Dylan?"
"My knife and M9. Where the hell are we?"
The group began talking amongst themselves while Ron looked around.
His eyes were slowly adjusting to the coming darkness, but he wouldn't feel safe unless he had an M4A1, a flashlight, or both.
"The question is, why are we here? Why us? Random people from different countries and different occupations: it makes no sense."
Ron nodded.
"Still, the fact that we're here, me and Dylan are still armed and that Saeko still has her practice sword is getting more and more suspicious with every passing second. If this is like Saw, I am not going to be happy."
He looked up into the treetops.
"Saeko, you're the lightest and tallest person here. Can you-"
Saeko nodded and climbed up the tree with great speed.
Dylan and Tanner had their heads pointed toward the ground by Ron.
He did not want them looking up her skirt.
"What do you see?"
"A city to the east. It should be no more then 10 kilometers away."
Everyone else started talking, Tanner being the loudest one there.
"Tanner, be quiet! Anything else?"
"Nothing that I can-Wait, there is a mansion about 2 kilometers west."
Ron processed the information in his head.
This was sounding familiar.
Very familiar.
Saeko landed on the ground, crouching to prevent herself from breaking anything.
"We should-"
Then they heard more movement in the bushes.
"I'll go."
Tanner looked at his oldest friend.
"Ron-"
"I'm armed, and so and Dylan and Saeko. Stay here."
He walked into the bushes, Baby Eagle pointed ahead of him.
He found the source of the noise: a hiker, bent over something.
'This isn't right. My gut keeps telling me to fire.'
"Excuse me?"
The hiker stood up extremely slowly.
So slow that it wasn't possible.
"Oh, FUCK ME."
Now he knew why.
His gut was trained not only by the military, but by 7 years of playing video games that scared the shit out of him.
This was one of those things that he killed in those games: a real-live (or real-dead, but that was merely semantics) zombie.
He dropped his weapon out of fear.
He never thought he would face a zombie in real life, so military training went out the window and fear kicked in.
He backed up, tripping over a rock.
He crawled back as fast as he could, but the zombie tripped over the same rock, putting it within biting distance.
He kicked the damned thing when the will to survive no matter the cost kicked in, and grabbed a small log.
"DIE!"
He smacked it, cracking the skull open.
Saeko, Dylan and the others ran over.
"Fuck me."
Then he puked.
"I thought you killed people for a-"
Then Tanner vomited on the spot.
It wasn't the sight of a dead body; it was the smell of a decaying corpse that made them vomit.
Saeko joined Tanner in vomiting over the now-truly dead zombie.
"It was a fucking zombie! Had to be!"
He grabbed the backpack off the zombie's back, then looked through it.
There was a Browning HP with two extra magazines in it, which did not help the poor hiker one bit, a thankfully unopened bag of trail mix, four water bottles-still sealed-and a newspaper.
"Who the fuck carries a news...paper..."
He became engrossed in the reading.
The reason?
The date and year.
The newspaper was new, although had enough bloodstains to make it seem a few months old, but the date was still there. July 23rd, 1998.
He reread it a dozen times, then pieced together the title: Raccoon Times.
"We are fucking screwed."
"What is it?"
He handed the paper to Dylan.
He saw the date.
"So we're 15 years in the past?"
"Does this mean we need to avoid going home?"
Tori wasn't as smart as Ron or her boyfriend, Michael, but she had a fair concept of time paradoxes.
She did not, on the other hand, know a thing about multiversal paradoxes.
"Not likely."
He gave the newspaper to Dylan. As Ron wanted, he read the title.
"Raccoon Times?"
Only his older brother got the message.
"Welcome to the world..."
Ron stood up and retrieved his Baby Eagle.
"Of Resident Evil."
His pitch and tone of his voice change to the one that announced the names of the games.
It was a talent of his. (AN: I can make a good imitation of that man's voice from RE4 and RE5)
"Resident Evil?"
Of all the people that could ask that question, it was Saeko.
"It's known in Japan as Biohazard. And with good reason."
"What is Resident Evil?"
"It's a video game series. It practically invented survival horror, as you must save as much ammo as you can while solving puzzles and making the area safer by killing zombies and other monsters."
"Is that it?"
"There's a long and complicated story behind it that I do not want to stay around here to tell you for. If there's zombies out here, Cerberus packs aren't far behind."
"Cerberus?"
The sound of barking reached their ears.
"Start running. NOW!"
Ron put the backpack onto his back and led them away from the body.
"Hopefully that zombie corpse will keep them happy until we get to the Bravo Team chopper crash site or the Marine MP jeep."
"Why?"
"The chopper and jeep might have guns for you guys, along with health items and ammo!"
Saeko frowned at the mention of firearms.
"As much as you hate them, Saeko, letting these things get close is a bad idea! Your wooden sword won't do shit against a Hunter or a Chimera, let alone a Tyrant or anything else we're going to face tonight!"
Saeko hated it, but Ron clearly spoke with experience. He knew the series better then any of them.
Then the STARS Bravo Team Huey passed over their heads.
"Thank God for my memory! Follow that chopper!"
The Cerberus pack was just 10 meters behind them: Saeko was greeted with the sight of her second BOW.
"Ron, how do we kill them?"
"We don't have enough ammo in the Browning HP and we can't run and shoot at the same time! Just keep running!"
Saeko wasn't happy with that.
She stopped and struck one with her practice blade, hitting it in the weakened head and killing it.
She managed the feat two more times before she saw Ron stop and use the handgun from the hiker's backpack two kill one of the zombie dobermans with a headshot.
But Saeko realized quickly that there were too many for her and Ron to deal with on their own.
She resumed running, and the dogs stopped chasing them.
They were just too much of a pain to follow and kill.
They turned away.
"You see what I mean? Those things always hunt in packs of ten to 20. Always. Sure, they get easy to pick off once they've split up, but not outdoors and not in the open!"
"I am sorry, but they were getting on my nerves."
"And they nearly bit you twice! Close quarters is only for a last resort!"
The Japanese girl sighed.
Listening to Ron would save them in the long run.
Tori looked at Ron.
"Why not run for the city?"
"More Cerberus packs, for one, and it would take us days to get to Raccoon City. Once the Management Training Facility and Spencer Mansion are destroyed, we'll be seeing a lot of Hunters, zombies and just about everything I can think of in that forest, and we'll be in the open, with no cover, and limited ammo and weapons. We've only got two regular handguns and my Baby Eagle. That won't be enough."
"So, we play through the fucking games to stay alive? That's your plan?"
"Either that or a suicide run through Raccoon Forest. Two days, or one week. Your choice. I'm going for the slightly safer option."
"Slightly?"
Ron looked at the group.
"Because we'll still be facing them, but with two extra people, maybe three and extra weapons."
Ron knew how to dumb it down enough for them to understand perfectly, because they lined up behind him.
"Hide the guns in my backpack. I plan on getting as many as I can for you guys."
Ron unclipped his Baby Eagle and holster from his leg, and gave it to Saeko, who put it in the backpack that they took from the dead zombie.
Dylan put his M9 in the bag.
"The chopper crash site should only be a kilometer or so away. Let's get our asses moving!"
You can compare the two stories for changes, but I'll save you the time.
My story has 6 people, Simison's has 8.
Mine has two people armed with guns and one with a wooden sword, plus a zombie gave them one more, while Simison's doesn't give anyone a gun until chapter 2.
Mine has a large pack of Cerberus attacking the group through a very long chase, with sword girl killing two, while Simison's has them hide in the treetops. (think about the crows, man!)
My story has the group one kilometer-more or less-from the crash site while Simison's people don't reach that point until the second chapter.
Next Time...What in the name of hell am I doing? That'll spoil it!
I'll just do what he did: creepy messages from the game.
The door to safety is shut...There is no turning back...