September 22, 1998
7:38 p.m.
The night is silent. Only the occasional sigh of a breeze stirs the calm air in the abandoned portion of the Industrial District. The left slice of a crescent moon illuminates a street below. To an outside observer, a hapless civilian, the street is simply one of many in the Industrial District's unused section: dilapidated, in need of road-repair, strewn with beat-down cars and unmoving autobuses. The vehicles sag, desolate and in a state of disrepair. Their once shiny paint jobs, which proclaimed "check me out!" in their prime, are now dull and listless, marred here and there with an ugly sheen of copper rust which has eaten away at the paint. Every few feet, one of the cars' hoods is open, like a gaping maw in want of transmission fluid or antifreeze.
The street is lined with darkened, empty buildings which were once full of noise and the loud groans of machinery at work. However, they are now abandoned and useless, ripe with nothing but dust and old memories. From here, one could strain their ears and catch the barest hint of the clanging of newer machinery and the belch of factory chimneys in the New Industrial District, if one tried. But the street is empty: no one is trying.
A certain factory, abandoned and empty, looks just like any other from the outside. However, beneath its rusted exterior it houses something much more sinister.
Deep below the concrete sidewalks and cracked pavement, under the sub-basement levels of the old factory, which are now filled with broken-down machinery and empty oil canisters, the sewer system begins. However, if one were to look at blueprints for the city, one would not find this particular stretch of sewer system on any of the diagrams. They have been wiped from existence by the faceless corporation that designed them.
The Umbrella Corporation.
Deep within the tunnels of the water tanks and affluent pipes, a group of men walk quietly. They are dressed in crisp black riot gear, complete with gas masks and tinted lenses. Sharp muscles strain at their confining clothing. Tactical equipment and ammo packs are hoisted across their backs and shoulders. Gleaming weaponry, such as Tactical Machine Pistols and Submachine guns, are held firm in their hands.
Somewhere close by, another man is working, but his appearance and demeanor are much different than the task force agents. He is dressed in a lab coat. It was white to begin with, so bright it hurt the eyes to look directly at it. Now, however, the coat is covered with stains and several other bleak liquids one would not want to identify.
The man is inside a no-longer-clean laboratory room, hunched over a table, working diligently under the cheap glow of fluorescent light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. He has never liked them. In fact, he detests them. The hum they give off grates on his nerves, but he is too professional to allow such trivial things to break his focus. Undeterred, the man scrawls several formulas on a paper already covered with incomprehensible notes and equations. Every square inch of the lab is cluttered. Tables are overflowing with loose papers, notes tacked to the walls, vials of gleaming purple and green liquid hunched over the tables.
Finishing his writing, the man quickly shoves several of the coloured vials into a silver carrying case. He pauses when inputting the last vial, one of the bright purple ones. A taut smile stretches over his yellowed teeth. He strokes the glass vial tenderly, almost lovingly. He starts to place the vial in the case, but changes his mind and empties the vial into a syringe, instead. He tucks it into his coat pocket.
Suddenly a quick chorus of footsteps approaches his ears and the door to his lab slides open. He hears the sound of several weapons being cocked. "There he is," one of the men says. In the silence that follows, he can even hear their laboured breathing, sounding choppy and inhuman through their gas masks.
William Birkin looks up.
The agent at the head of the procession has his weapon trained directly at him. William backs away, the fingers of his right hand closing around the cold grip of a 9mm handgun lying on the table beside him. His other hand has not released the carrying case. His fingers clench more tightly around its smooth silver handle.
"So, you've finally come," he sneers, slowly taking a step back. His eyes dart to the door, then back to the agents. He is aware of several beads of sweat forming on his brow. He itches to wipe them away, but if he moves his hand he will most certainly be shot.
"Doctor, we're here to collect the G-Virus sample," the lead agent says flatly, the hands holding his TMP never wavering, never faltering. "Just hand it over and no-one need get hurt."
Birkin's eyes dart to the door again. "Sorry," he says in a sarcastic tone, returning his gaze to the advancing agents. "But I won't just hand over my life's work."
"Then we will be forced to kill you," the agent says. There is no emotion in his voice. Birkin recognizes the tone; he used it more times than he could count on his subjects and co-workers. The agent is also a practiced killer then. Birkin expected nothing less. If he had sensed emotion, he would have felt even more loathing and contempt for the Umbrella agent now pointing a gun at him.
"The G-Virus is sheer perfection," Birkin snarls, taking another step back, his eyes flying between the door and the men. He wishes he would stop sweating. "Something far more complex than a hopelessly inferior mind like yours would be able to comprehend."
To the door. Back to the agents.
"Last chance, Doctor," the agent says, unaffected by the insult. His finger tightens on the TMP's trigger.
Door. Agents.
"Go to –" Birkin starts, but before he can say 'hell,' he strays too close to a table and knocks a thermos of coffee to the floor. The loud snap it makes as it connects pierces the air like a gunshot. Birkin barely has time to widen his eyes before the men open fire. The noise is not deafening, but Birkin does not notice. His body is riddled with bullets. Dark red circles explode through his lab coat and add their colour to its decoration. As his twitching body slumps onto the floor, the lead agent thrusts a hand out at his men.
"Stop!" he commands. The gunfire ceases instantly. "You might hit the sample."
The agent takes three quick steps towards him kneels down. Birkin is too dazed to stop him as the man wrenches the carrying case from his feeble fingers. Birkin tries to close his grip around the case, but his fingers will not respond, and it is slid from his dying grasp. Electric jolts of pain are arcing through his body, but it isn't as bad as he had thought. He had shot people before, seen them scream and writhe. It wasn't nearly that bad. They were just weak.
Birkin dimly hears "let's go" and then the sound of receding doorsteps. The door closes behind them, and he is alone, except for his choked breathing. As he looks around with dimming eyes, he can discern several shattered vials on the floor, and a group of rats enthusiastically licking the green and purple puddles. With his last ounces of strength, Birkin reaches into his dripping red lab coat, and to his relief feels the syringe in his pocket. Miraculously, the gunfire did not shatter it.
Birkin withdraws the syringe and plunges it into his skin. As the purple liquid courses into his veins, into his body, Birkin's eyes turn a searing red. A demonic growl rises on his lips…
xxxx
September 22, 1998
8:12 p.m.
Rick sighs loudly as he sloshes through the dirty sewer, his steps heavy. He has been working all day, and he is exhausted. The 32-year old maintenance worker is covered in sweat and smells like a plumbing pipe. As he stoops over, finds the leaking pipe he was assigned to fix and begins to open his tool kit, he finds himself thinking how the life of a maintenance worker is full of filth, grime, and exhausting tasks. Grunting heavily, he bends over and takes out a wrench.
After banging away at the leaking pipe for several minutes, Rick becomes aware of a loud squeaking close by. Squinting in the gloom, he looks around. Unable to locate anything, he returns to work. However, he hears the sound again several seconds later.
Rick looks up in annoyance once more, setting his wrench aside. This time he sees the glowing red eyes of a rat glaring at him from the darkness. Rick laughs. The little buggers were everywhere down here, a general hindrance to everyone. Amused, he starts to pick up the wrench again, when the rat bolts out of the darkness and runs right at him.
"What the f-OW!"
Rick yells in alarm as the rat sinks its needle-sharp teeth into his sleeve, squeaking angrily and frothing at the mouth. Rick swings his arm back and forth, bellowing in pain, as the rat's teeth rip through his sleeve and puncture his skin. Snarling, Rick swings his arm as hard as he can, and the rat is dislodged, flying deep into a river of sewage. Its loud, angry squeaks soon die away as it is washed down the tunnel.
Rick sits down heavily, clutching his meaty arm in his other hand, examining the bite as he fights for breath. A bright patch of blood has formed on his arm. Rick curses under his breath as he presses his sleeve into the cut, to stop the flow of blood.
"Rick?" the voice of his co-worker, Max, drifts down the tunnel. "What the hell was that?"
Rick looks down the tunnel. There is no sign of any other rats.
"Nothing. Bit by a rat. I'm comin' back now."
The maintenance worker collects his tools and marches off, stopping once to look at the dark tunnel behind him. It looks somewhat threatening in the blackness.
Damn thing probably had rabies, he thinks. Fuck this…
Rick walks back towards his partner. Soon, he'd be back on the surface and he could get the bite checked out. But it was probably nothing. Just some stupid rat with rabies that bit him because he came too close to it.
Yeah. It was probably nothing.