Claire Redfield was distressed.
Under that pretty head of red hair, her thoughts were racing as she attempted to comprehend a handful of things: the fact that Leon S. Kennedy was not the most fantastic driver in the world, the fact that Raccoon City appeared to be infested with the walking dead, and that it would be difficult to find her brother in the city because it appeared to be infested with the fuckin' walking dead.
She thought all of this in a second, proving that her thus far partially-completed college education had indeed resulted in a quick-thinking mind, because the police vehicle she was in appeared to be in the middle of a crash.
Claire didn't really know if she could blame Leon for it or not. The Department of Motor Vehicles does not prepare license applicants for crisis situations, much less fuckin'-monster-in-the-back-of-the-car situations, and thinking about it now, she didn't actually know whether or not Leon had a license at all.
Leon S. Kennedy did have a license, and he didn't have any training for dealing with fuckin' monsters in the back of the fuckin' car or 18-wheelers driven by the fuckin' monsters because what the fuck.
And so, crash.
Claire and Leon, standing on either side of the flaming wreckage, picked themselves up and were surprised to find that their weaponry and basic belongings had miraculously stayed on their person.
The redhead looked up into the roaring flames which were once a fully-functioning police vehicle, and sighed. The sigh was accompanied by a chorus of groans. Perplexed, Claire turned and found, Jesus H. Christ, a street of fucking zombies. They were all over the place, hanging out of wrecked cars and laying on the ground and shuffling about and damn if they didn't seem incredibly interested in her. Claire was about to make some kind of suave action movie remark about how popular she was when she realized that maybe this wasn't a remarkably engaged audience and it would be better to focus on trying to not get eaten by fucking zombies.
Claire readied her Browning. Years spent with her meathead brother around guns of all shapes and sizes meant that landing a shot on a slow-moving target from a few paces away with a sturdy pistol would be a cakewalk, but she had to weigh her options. The zombies were interested in her, sure, but only in a general sense; they seemed to have already lost immediate interest and were milling about once more. A gunshot, without a doubt, would draw all sorts of attention. If it were possible to serpentine through them, a school bus up ahead could provide a place to hide out. All she needed was a bit of subtlety, and a lot of-
The cacophony of gunfire filled the street. The shots landed all over the place: a car, a lamppost, the ground, the side of a building. One round maybe hit one of the fucking zombies in the leg, but such creatures didn't express any pain, and investigating a more specific reaction would have to wait because someone had to go and be a dumbass.
As Claire had expected, the small horde of mildly interested creatures was now starting to rush. No doubt about it: they were after blood. Or brains. Or whatever they could get their hands on. But where the hell did those shots come from?
Leon appeared at Claire's side. Despite the need to get away from the fuckin' walking dead and the fact that his empty Glock implied that this madness was his fault, Claire still took a moment to look at him questioningly.
"What are you doing here? I assumed you were on the other side of the, you know. The fire."
Leon shook his head. "No, I walked around it."
"Really? It was that simple?"
"Yeah. It's not like the wreckage filled up an entire avenue or whatever. That would be a stupid reason for us to split up and have to go our own separate ways on this adventure."
They held this for a moment before Claire said:
"Maybe let's go now."
"I'm empty," Leon said.
"You're a dumbass and I know. Follow me."
Claire, with Leon being a good boy and following directly behind, darted to the sidewalk, running alongside a building and avoiding the street where the mass of shambling carnivores walked. A single creature stood between them and the bus, and Claire figured they were close enough to risk attention: in a single motion, she deftly brought up the Browning and put a round right through its head. The zombie's brains splattered all over the door of the bus, which caused Claire a moment of hesitation as she had to sweep aside zombie brains to pull the handle.
She and Leon clambered into the bus and shut the door tight as the horde approached.
So this was going well.
The bus was clear, and suspiciously empty. Claire guessed that the occupants had filed out in order to get a look at what was going on, and had likely ended up joining the undead army pointlessly slamming on the door they had just shut. The bus, as it happened, was safe enough; the doors had seemingly shut out all invaders quite effectively, and it had survived the apocalypse without so much as a broken window.
Claire led Leon to seats in the middle of the bus, hoping that staying out of view of the horde they had just avoided would cause them to die down.
"So," Claire said. "About the fucking apocalypse."
"My gun is empty." Leon held up his quite empty Glock.
"I'm aware. What the hell was that, by the way?"
"I was rescuing you," Leon said proudly.
"What, are you expecting a blowjob? You wasted a clip of ammo." Claire adopted a sarcastic tone as she leaned back in her seat: "I can rest easy now, knowing the day is saved."
Leon was displeased with her mockery, but he understood stress given the situation. He also understood that when he had followed Claire, he saw that under those hip huggers was a great butt. In order to one day touch it, he accepted Claire's remarks.
Also, he wasn't entirely an idiot: in the moment, Leon had seen himself as a knight in shining armor, but he knew immediately afterwards that his work had been less than spectacular.
But he liked this Claire girl. If this was the end of the world, it would be nice to face it with a friend. That the friend happened to be hot was a bonus.
"I guess," Leon said, "we should see if there's a nearby building where we can hide out for a little while. The blockade outside of the city looked abandoned, so-"
"But really, what the hell was that?" Claire sat up in her seat. "You're a police officer. Your aim is fucking terrible."
"I've never actually been a police officer!" Leon appeared defensive. "This is my first day!"
"Didn't you go to an academy?"
"Well, sure, but that doesn't prepare you for a situation like this. Nobody throws the rookie into a crisis situation on day one!"
Claire turned to look out the window. The dead, their flesh rotting and hanging off of their near-skeletal forms, were everywhere, and it appeared as though the whole city was on fire. And if it wasn't all torched, maybe it should have been. Scrubbing this whole mess from the Earth might not be a bad plan. If they were lucky, which it really looked like they weren't, Raccoon City was as far as this catastrophe spread.
"Well, it's quite a first day," Claire said. "I get the feeling basically everyone else but us here is dead, so I guess it's up to you whether or not you got fired or you instantly became the highest-ranked cop in the city."
Leon actually chuckled. Claire looked over and saw that the man, wearing a wry smile underneath a mop of blond hair, was actually a bit handsome when he wasn't fucking everything up.
"If memory serves," Leon said, "we should be pretty close to the police station. If we can get in there, we can maybe regain our bearings. A nice, safe place would be pretty great right now."
"Yeah," Claire agreed, "if there's any place that should be a secure spot to hold up, it is without a doubt the Raccoon City Police Department."
A few minutes of frantic zombie-dodging later, Claire and Leon stood in the open, ornate, marble-layered lobby of the Raccoon City Police Department.
"This room does not need to be this large," Leon noted.
"Take it up with the chief, I suppose," Claire remarked. "I'm more curious about how they still have the power on. It's basically a fucking nightmare outside."
They stood there, pondering the question they both knew would likely never be answered, taking in the silence. Leon stepped up to the angelic statue standing front and center in the room, but froze in his tracks as a supremely unwelcome noise sounded from the door far to the left.
A groan. Followed by another two of them, forming a very scary and very hungry chorus.
The Raccoon City Police Department welcomed Leon and Claire the only way Raccoon City currently knew how: with a pack of motherfucking zombies.