Fire,
The sun is well asleep,
Moon is high above,
Fire grows from the east;
How is this,
Hate so deep,
Lead us all so blindly killing killing;
Fools we are,
If hate's the gate to peace,
This is the last stop...
--Dave Matthews Band, "The Last Stop"
*****
HCF
Headquarters
San Mateo, California
November 12th, 2007
10:00 am
The room was like any other corporate conference room. However, the attitude of the meeting was quite different from that of any software or car company. The directors were all sworn to secrecy about what was to be discussed today. However, even if they were not forced to do so, their mouths were sealed. Planning the hostile takeover of another company, especially since they were planning to destroy Umbrella in every sense of the word, would be tough if someone had loose lips.
All eight directors were already in their seats and were waiting for the head of HCF to arrive. Dr. John Elliott liked to make an entrance, and damn well deserved to be allowed to do that; he made the company what it was, and not a single director could summon a bad thought against him, likewise with any employee of the Horizon Chemical Foundation.
A door hissed open, and Elliott walked into the room, standing at the head of the table. "Good morning, everyone."
There were two doors that served as the entrance into the conference room. One was just a regular wooden board, probably made with polished pine or some other cheaper wood. The other, a double-door, was made of dark-polished oak and was void of doorknobs. The doors were controlled by a remote, one that only Dr. Elliott possessed. Paranoia at times would run high on the upper rungs of the corporate ladder, but that was to be expected with the sort of things that HCF was planning. Umbrella was known for their bio-engineering discoveries and advances, but they had taken it beyond the boundaries of the law.
Infecting humans and other animals with the infamous T-Virus, and later on with the G-Virus, they became sloppy before any of their perfect plans could bloom. Umbrella's biggest failure was not containing the old mansion in Raccoon City before the hybrids broke out and revealed themselves to the public in mid-July of 1996. The city's local SWAT team, the Special Tactics And Rescue Squad, the STARS, investigated and ended up losing one team their first time into the mansion. The second time, they ended up getting the mansion destroyed, due to the fact that one of the STARS was a traitor. An Albert Wesker, I think his name was.
The mansion was in reality a front. Under the mansion was a massive laboratory where the T-Virus was developed and tested. But for some reason, the infected humans got out and either killed or infected every single living thing, including dogs, crows, plants, inside and around the mansion. It was a surprise that Umbrella had not either gotten the situation under control or destroyed the place altogether without having to worry about the STARS getting involved. Since then, Umbrella had started on a downward spiral, and HCF was also helping in closing the gap between the two corporations.
HCF had at first started out as a chemical company. Mostly medical chemicals, with the occasional preservative were manufactured there. After Umbrella's screw-up in '96, HCF had gotten ahold of research on the T-Virus and ran test after test with the infected to see if there was some sort of antidote that could reverse the mutation from human to hybrid that resembled a zombie, and ended up in succeeding. But by that time, the T-Virus was declared obsolete by Umbrella and had developed the G-Virus, which was much less contagious than its predecessor.
Unfortunately, the creator of the G-Virus, Dr. William Birkin, had refused to give up the samples to Umbrella until he had perfected it, and would then sell it to them for a good sum of money. Not unreasonable, but enough to allow Birkin to retire whenever he wanted to.
Umbrella didn't feel the same way.
After breaking into the facility under the streets of Raccoon City in 1998, where the good doctor worked, they managed to shoot him numerous times, but that only forced Birkin to inject the G-Virus into his body. While the virus was a mutagen, it could also regenerate damaged tissue. So while it healed the bullet wounds, it also made him into a massive bio-weapon. Some rookie cop killed him back then, oh, what was his name? Something Kennedy.
Unfortunately for HCF, all traces of the G-Virus was destroyed when Raccoon City was bombed and completely wiped off the map. No biggie. We have more than enough of Umbrella's research to work on some other projects that they couldn't do with their quickly diminishing budget. After the recent incidents a few years ago at the Ashford island, Elliott decided that it was time to crank up the heat on Umbrella and start finishing them off for good.
"Tom, let's kick this off with our accounting report," John suggested.
Thomas Richmond nodded and straightened the small stack of papers in his hands. Putting on his reading spectacles, he looked at the figures in front of him. "Well, as some of you may know, we were recently given a nice sum of money from a very wealthy man, billionaire Lance Porter."
"AMD Demon creator, Lance Porter?" Mark Young, the Director of Public Affairs, inquired.
"Yes, he was the main designer of the Demon processor," Tom nodded in agreement, "but for the record, it wasn't AMD's. He developed it in an AMD station, but had already forced them to allow him to sell his processor to anyone, so it's just called the Demon."
"I see."
"Maybe you do."
Elliott held up a hand. "Anyway, to what reason is Porter giving us this money?"
Tom adjusted his glasses. "It was a payment on a debt that he owed us, although it was not nearly as much as he gave us. When he was working on the prototype of the Demon, we fronted him the money to complete his project, in exchange for a free line of the processors to put into our own computers and on our servers. When the processor hit big time, he did as well, and decided that we needed to be compensated for our help.
John nodded. "I'll be sure to thank him. How're our figures working?"
"Well, let's go back to when we merged with Tylenol," Richmond continued. "That's sometime in early 2004. Balance: Twenty-eight billion dollars. Late '04, we started making advances and enhanced the effectiveness of aspirin. We had thirty-nine billion then. For early 2005, our stock split and went sky-high after we put out a new treatment that totally erased the need for chemotherapy. We went up to seventy billion then. And now we've been getting lots of sponsors recently wanting to put a name on whatever new developments we get."
"And let's not mention the fact that we've been taking chunks out of Umbrella," Dr. Elliott added.
"That also helped," Tom agreed. "Our current balance is approximately eighty-point-four billion dollars."
That got a low whistle out of a couple of the younger directors. John grunted in amusement. "What about your estimates on Umbrella?"
Richmond gave his boss a sly smile. "In early 1995, before the Raccoon City incident, they were huge, and they had around ninety-four billion dollars to use with as they wished. Early this year, they lost over two-thirds of their company to law suits and government interference and radical extremists trying to do all they can to sabotage any experiment they were developing, and with the STARS' quest to destroy just about every facility in the US and Europe, they've been given no quarter by anybody."
"Balance estimate?" Elliott asked.
Tom gave them a mischievous grin. "Twenty-one billion."
John sat back in his padded leather chair. "Wow. We've really got 'em by the balls, don't we?"
The accountant adjusted his glasses for the second time. "Uh, yes, sir, I would have to say that we do. At this rate, we could very well be able to finish 'em off by early 2009, earlier if something drastic happens."
The head of HCF smiled at the thought of striking the lethal blow against Umbrella. Then it'll be our turn to step up to the plate, and we won't strike out.
"Okay, moving on. Research and Development. We're almost ready to publicly announce our change of venue into genetics, and we need something to show for it before we do."
Dr. Edward Mayes raised his head up toward the cabinet members. "Right now we have some new developments on using specific human cells to clone single body parts, rather than an entire body. It looks much more acceptable in the public."
John smiled knowingly. "Okay, now what's the real project?"
Mayes returned his smile in full. "We've been making large amounts of advances in the research of bacteriophage, and we have been able to refine it to have a much more broad host base."
Elliott knew what he was talking about, because he himself had a Ph.D in bio-engineering, but he had a feeling that the others were having trouble grasping it. "Okay, Eddie, elaborate. But remember, bad english only, let's not try to decipher doctor-speak."
The Director of Research and Development chuckled along with the rest of the cabinet, then continued. "All righty, here we go. Many viruses are host-specific; they can only infect a specific kind of cell, such as bacterial cells, human brain cells, or sheep liver cells. Bacteriophage, if you haven't figured it out by listening to the name, infects only bacteria cells. We aren't worried about that, however, because with some tweaking, we can widen its selection of host cells. What we are more interested in is the actual makeup of the virus. The virus itself is a protein crystal with a DNA core. Once the crystal touches a cell-membrane, it dissolves and allows the viral nucleic-acid to enter the cell. The cell immediately absorbs the viral genome into its own DNA. The new genes take over the cell's functions and the cell manufactures dozens of new viral crystals and DNA strings. These crystal shells combine with the new DNA copies to form new viruses; the viruses dissolve the host cell, infect neighboring cells, and begin the cycle again.
"So far, there has been no publicly known virus capable of infecting all cells; such a virus would theoretically infect the whole ecosystem if it were to be released in an airborne form. Umbrella's T-Virus appeared to be the closest thing to such a virus," Mayes' eyes scanned around the oval oaken table, and met each and every one of the directors' amazed stare. "Unfortunately, Umbrella destroyed all traces of the T-Virus when the FBI began to investigate into their experiments, so we cannot say for certain one hundred percent that the virus was a form of bacteriophage."
"But you've been able to re-create the success of the T-Virus through this altered virus," Elliott sipped his water.
"We're not far from building a perfect clone of the T-Virus, if our speculation was correct and Umbrella had used bacteriophage as the template for it."
"Whoa, back up the truck," a deep voice from the far end of the table said. The man spoke softly, but the sound rumbled throughout the room.
Elliott looked at the aging but still fit Darnell Wallace. Wallace, the Director of Security, held up a hand just high enough to get everyone's attention. The ebony-skinned man waited until all were looking right at him before he spoke in a voice that could make James Earl Jones crumble. "Just exactly why are we creating such a virus?"
Before the over-articulate Dr. Mayes could reply, Elliott gave the answer. "Umbrella is giving our entire industry a bad name. They're experimenting on the innocent, to create things that prey on even more unsuspecting innocents. We cannot let that happen. Not only do we need to destroy the threat, we must also show to the world that while what they did was wrong, the actual ideas they had to generate these creatures were not. By cloning humans, and using those clones for our experiments, in the eye of the public, we hope to not be seen as monsters. If anyone asks, we just say that we take the DNA composition of humans and alter it, so that when it grows and matures, it was never a clone in the first place, thus eliminating any problem from the authorities. But our goal, most of all, is to take those bastards from Umbrella down. This… T-Virus clone, if you will, is going to be the one thing that could save our industry."
Wallace nodded slowly. John smiled, the gears in his head working full speed. So, next order of business... "Are we still in touch with our friends in Russia?"
All eyes turned to Brian Morrison, the head of Foreign Affairs. He nodded confidently. "The Red Wolves Faction are still in contact with us, but why would we want to contact them?"
"Insurance, my boy, insurance. We use them to cause trouble to our competition, while we find some new friends in Eurasia and see what they can do for us."
Richmond raised his eyebrows. "Why do we need to find a friend in Eurasia? We've got eighty billion dollars."
John shook his head. "We don't need the money; you're right. But we are an American-based company. By getting friends overseas, we have more power. And let me tell you, once we land on Europe and Asia, there won't be a single thing that can stop us from completely obliterating Umbrella off the map."
San
Francisco University
San Francisco, California
December 6th
2007
Sherry walked through the San Francisco University campus with urgency in her step. It had been nine years since that nightmare that had cost Sherry her entire family, nine years since Raccoon city had been over-run by monsters that fed off the flesh of others.....nine years since she had been pulled from the mouth of hell by 2 other survivors. Nine years later, and it was all starting to happen again.
Several weeks ago, a freshman had been attacked when he was jogging at night by what he described as a 'rabid dog'. Last week, a lost tourist had been wandering around, and had stopped to ask for directions, and claimed he almost got mugged by some freak in a Halloween costume. Last night, however, was the worst. A sophomore co-ed who lived on the top floor of Sherry's dorm, had been mauled to death and dismembered. Police were only able to find 40% of the remains, and the corner ruled her death as "A vicious assault from a cannibalistic cult."
The pieces fit too perfectly to be a coincidence. Sherry knew that if she didn't do something fast, the university, and perhaps the entire bay area, was going to end up being plunged into chaos. Sherry pulled out her cell phone and quickly dialed the number she had so many times before and waited for the other end to pick up.
"...Hello?" came a seemingly distracted voice on the other end.
"Claire... It's happening again... It's..." but Sherry froze as she could hear panting, and a slight growl from behind her. She slowly turned around to come face to face with one of the things that had been haunting her for years. The beast looked as though it could have been a german shepherd at one time, but was missing too much skin and muscle mass in various parts of it's body to be called anything else but a monster.
"Sherry, what's going on, again? Sherry? Sherry!"
Claire screamed into the handset, but Sherry had already dropped her phone, running from demons past and present.
Claire put the phone down with a frustrated click. It was not her nature to hesistate - immediately rolling the chair out from under her desk, she walked to the front of the STARS office to grab her coat rather noisily. Jill Valentine, adjusting her glasses, shuffled through some paperwork at her own desk. With the sudden commotion, she raised her head, looking up at Claire with concern. The woman at the office door turned around, simply returning an anxious glance slightly obscured by a brown ponytail.
"Jill, it's Sherry. Something... seems to be up," she managed to utter, trying to hide her insecurity in a show of stoic strength. "Do you think that... "
Jill calmly put down her papers, and adjusted her glasses. All too often, Jill understood what Sherry meant to Claire. A strong bond formed between the two when they escaped together from the ravages of Raccoon City and the madness of Dr. William Birkin, and in their years together, had only grown closer - especially since Claire had little to call family anymore. Jill was sometimes envious; Sherry had grown up to be a very intelligent, and independent young girl with a keen interest in philosophy, but more than anything she loved Claire. Jill, herself suffering from the losses in the battle against Umbrella, instead poured herself into her work at STARS, and quickly ascended the ranks to captain. At Claire's request, she was assigned to the San Francisco branch. It was a labor of love and sacrifice, and it was something that she could share together with those that... survived.
"It's been a couple of months... the CIA could get a fix on someone in even less time if they wanted to, so I'm not surprised," Jill said, matter-of-factly. "Maybe they don't know she's here yet... after all, we suspected this place had some activity."
"Just when things were going our way," Claire muttered, more to herself than to her concerned friend. "She could have finally had a normal life. I don't like having her move all the time... she never gets a chance to make friends."
Jill tapped the papers into place against the top of her oaken desk, and stood up from her executive black leather chair to put the files into their proper cabinet drawers. Locking the file cabinet with a satisfying click, she turned around, facing Claire.
"We've got them on the ropes, Claire," Jill said, offering a sympathetic smile. "If anything, they're afraid of us, now. I'm sure Sherry's fine... she just got caught in the crossfire."
Claire nodded, but Jill's assurance was not enough for her. She had to see with her own eyes that Sherry was okay.
