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The glossy Polaroid was hard to keep looking at, but at the same time, Chris Redfield found he couldn't look away. Caught between nervous anticipation and fascination, the image on the photo, a teenage girl with her jugular and left breast torn away, was caught in an endless loop as well, as it reflected off of Chris' Aviator shades.
"Hope you're not getting cold feet already?"
Chris looked up over his shades at his commanding officer.
"Well...this isn't making them any warmer."
Captain Albert Wesker gave a dry smile and stepped forward, taking the envelope of Polaroids from Chris' hand.
"I'd like you to take a look at this one. Get your opinion."
Wesker handed another Polaroid to Chris, this one featuring a deer with its entire stomach torn out.
"Looks like anything could have done this" said Chris. "There's bears in these woods. Mountain lions."
"Look closer. See that?" Wesker pointed to a barely visible speck on the photo. "It's a human tooth stuck in it's hide."
Chris took off his shades to look closer. The bright morning sun almost immediately made him regret this decision, but he could now clearly see that Wesker was right. In addition to the 5 humans that had been apparently eaten, this was one of many wildlife that had been found mutilated in recent weeks.
"At least this 'Cannibal Killer' has one less tooth to work with." Chris joked.
"I take it that's your attempt at humor?" Asked Wesker.
"Well..."
"Humor is a well known stress relief tactic. Are you stressed? Because you should be. You should be, but you can't be. This operation is intended to put away an extremely dangerous individual. An individual who has killed 5 people with their bare hands. If you're stressed, you're not thinking. And if you're nothing thinking, it might just be your head being served on a silver platter."
Chris said nothing as Wesker watched him from behind the dark shades of his own.
"The briefing begins in 10 minutes. Take that time to mentally prepare yourself. You're clearly still tired." Wesker flatly stated as he disappeared though the front doors of the Raccoon City Police Department.
Chris stood alone for a moment in the quiet of the courtyard. The sun directly illuminating his brown leather jacket.
"Prick." Chris said as he put his Aviator shades back on.
"Asshole." A voice with a Southern drawl emanated from behind him.
Forest Speyer, the team's sniper, sauntered up to Chris with his regular goofy grin on his face.
"Looks like The Terminator has your blood pressure up." Forest said.
"Terminator?"
"Wesker. With the shades and the all black? C'mon, Christopher, lighten up."
"Well I just got my ass chewed for trying to stay loose. I guess I'll just keep my mouth shut like a kid from now on."
"Man, fuck that guy. Don't let him shake you. He's just a classic cop type. Can't stand a guy like you with military experience coming in. Hates that you might know a little more than he does. Which, newsflash, you do."
"Yeah, but you're former military too. You seem to get along with him."
"Yeah, but I get along with everybody."
The Sunday morning streets were mostly empty and the only sound to be heard was the chirping of the birds.
"You nervous?" Forest asked.
"Why, do I look it?"
"Fuck yeah you do."
"Then I guess I am."
"Aw, c'mon. Don't let the spooky shit get to you. If this were a drug bust, I'd get a little nervous too. You never know when a stray bullet could catch you right in the ol' melon, but this? This is just some weirdo jacking off in the woods waiting for a Girl Scout troop to wander by or a deer to step into a bear trap. As soon as we touch down in those woods, he'll come out, hands up with his tightie whities shit brown."
"Well, Forest, when you put it like that..."
"When I put it like that, I sound like a smart motherfucker don't I?"
"...something like that. I hope you're as smart as you think you are."
"As smart as you are swoll up, big boy. Now, let's go inside. Get this shit knocked out."
Forest held the door open for Chris and made an "after you" motion, grinning his goofy smile all the while. As much as he hated to admit it, Chris could feel his anxiety melting away already.
The helicopter blades slowed to a crawl, and the sound of the engine was replaced by the ambience of the woods. The Raccoon City PD's STARS Team filed off of the chopper 4 in number: Officers Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine, Lieutenant Barry Burton, and Captain Albert Wesker. As the B team for this particular operation, they looked around the drop area for the A team, but they were nowhere to be seen.
"Are we early?" asked Barry.
"We're right on time." Wesker answered.
He headed back to the chopper and spoke to the pilot.
"Is the radio still malfunctioning, Brad?" Wesker asked.
"Seems like it, Captain. I've never seen it act this way before. I could try and pop it open, see if I..."
"You do that." Wesker said, cutting off the helicopter pilot as he walked away.
"Okay..." Said Brad.
Chris, Jill, and Barry stood huddled together under a giant sycamore tree. Jill leaning with her back against the trunk of the tree, Chris leaning on his shoulder directly next to her, so close that one would assume intimacy between the two young officers. Barry, nearly twenty years older, stood on his own two feet with his arms crossed, clearly uneasy.
"This crew doesn't seem like the type to be tardy", said Barry as he looked to Chris and Jill for recognition, only to find them laughing as they quietly shared an inside joke. "Am I the only one concerned here?"
"Barry, I know Forest can barely tell time. And the teenage girl. The medic? I don't know if she's even out of high school yet. Any excuse she can find to stay out past her curfew and she'll do it." Chris reassured.
"Well, I'd feel a little better if the radio was working at least."
"That's probably why they're late", Jill spoke up. "Now that they heard the helicopter they're probably heading this way now."
"..." Barry grimaced and sighed to himself.
Barry, irritable, walked away from the two younger officers and headed back to the chopper. He came upon Brad leaning over the radio, fiddling with exposed wires.
"Think you can fix it?" Barry asked.
"Shit!" The pilot exclaimed. "Don't sneak up on me like that!"
"Sorry, Chickenheart, but I wasn't trying to."
"Don't call me that! I'm just a pilot. I shouldn't be here in the middle of the woods at night with a killer on the loose!"
"Look, it was just a joke. Everything's gonna be fine. We'll get you outta here soon enough. Where's Wesker?"
"I don't know. I thought he was with you?"
"I thought he was with you?"
Barry furrowed his brow in confusion, when a piercing scream broke the tranquil, humid night air.
"W-w-what was that?!" Brad nearly screamed.
"Hmm...sounds like it could be a panther. They've been spotted this way before."
"Panther?! Oh...shit."
"Relax, they'll leave you alone as long as you stick close..."
Before Barry could finish his thought, a gunshot sounded out close by.
The 9 members of STARS stood filed in to the RPD conference room. Someone shut off the lights and only the dim light of an old projector was visible.
"As you all well know", Captain Wesker spoke from the front of the room, "the recent murder of Elaine Hart marks the 5th cannibal killing in the Raccoon area within 2 months. In addition, 6 others have disappeared, with the last known location of each being the Arklay Forest. This, in correlation to the location of each murder scene, leads us to believe that the killer is operating out of this expansive area. While this is a considerable amount of land to cover, we will be covering it in separate shifts. The Alpha Team, Officers Sullivan, Chambers, Speyer, and Lt. Aiken, will be transported by chopper at 1200 hours where they will perform a perimeter search until midnight, upon which The Bravo Team, Officers Redfield and Valentine, Lt. Burton, and myself will take over the search until 1200 tomorrow. Are there any questions at this time?"
Forest Speyer raised his hand.
"Yes, Officer Speyer?"
"Will there be a monetary reward for me when I pop this motherfucker between the eyes?"
The rest of the team murmured and chuckled at Forest's comment while Wesker remained stoic as always.
"We have roughly 3 hours before your departure Alpha Team. Take this remaining time to prepare yourselves. Bravo Team, I recommend returning home to catch up on your sleep before this evening."
At that, Wesker turned the lights back on and exited the room.
"I've only got one question." Chris remarked. "Does Wesker know there's no point in using a projector if there's no slides?"
The room broke out into laughter in the stern Captain's absence.
"I guess he just wanted it for mood lighting." Jill wisecracked.
"Well, everybody be careful out there." Barry said as he stood for his seat. "And go ahead and catch this son of a bitch so I can sleep tonight."
Everybody gave their farewells to Barry as he exited the room and others began filing out as well.
Chris headed to the bathroom to piss before heading back home. On the way out, he ran into The STARS' only black member, Kenneth Sullivan.
"What do ya say, Chris?" Kenneth asked.
"I say, I don't feel like playing cops and robbers today, Ken."
"Yeah, I hear that. It's hard to get back in the groove of working on a Sunday after having weekends off for so long."
"I guess that's the only benefit of working for STARS instead of regular patrol."
"Hey, I wouldn't go that far. I hear you've got some pretty good benefits coming your way."
"...I don't follow."
"Cmon, man. You and Valentine? Everybody can see it. I mean, I'm married and old. I haven't seen any action like her in years. What's it like?"
"Ken...I think you're confused."
"All right. A man that plays it close to the vest. I can respect that. Just know, if you ever wanna share some details, my lips are sealed."
"I appreciate that." Chris said as he exited the small bathroom.
"...Jill Valentine...damn..." Kenneth spoke aloud in the empty bathroom.
Chris stepped back out into the courtyard of the RPD, the sun a little higher in the sky now. Jill stood a few feet away finishing off a cigarette.
"Hey." She said as Chris approached her.
"Hey. You got one for me?"
"Sorry, last one."
"Ah."
Everyone else was either inside or had gone back home.
"Jill, I...I wanna apologize-"
"Stop." Jill turned to look at Chris for emphasis as she spoke. "There's nothing to be sorry for. Nothing to talk about."
"So we're never gonna talk about it?"
"What else is there to talk about?"
"I took something good and ruined it. I just couldn't accept that we were friends. I had to try and fuck you too. Now, things will never be the same."
"Yeah. You're probably right."
Chris met her gaze, clearly hurt.
"What?" She asked. "I can't lie. Things won't be the same now."
"So...you're telling me you don't have any feelings for me at all?"
"Yeah, as a fr-"
"As a friend?" Chris cut her off. "Yeah..."
"Can I fucking talk?"
"..."
"Yeah, as a friend I love you. I never gave it any more thought than that, because we work together. You know what would happen if we got caught together?"
"That's bullshit, Jill. There's policies in place for workplace relationships. We just have to take the proper channels."
"That's not the point!"
"Then, what is the point?"
Jill shook her ahead and looked across the otherwise empty courtyard to the parking lot.
"I don't expect this to register in your thick, blockhead, but here goes anyway. Do you have any idea how hard I had to work to get a job like this? Without fucking anybody? I know you don't have to think about that shit, but look around. How many female officers work here? You can count them on one hand. How many female STARS members are there? And don't count the medic. She's an RN who got lucky with a temp job that turned full time. I'm the only one. I'm the only one to ever make this team. And I'm sure it was hard for you too, but I don't have the benefit of having arms the size of my head. I didn't have the benefit of being in the Air Force from the time I was 18 like you. I had to do it all on my own. And it was fucking hard. Now, I have the dream job I always wanted, and you want me to risk it all for you?"
"..."
"People already say I got this job by fucking you, and it's not even true. If we start going out, things will only get worse."
"Who cares what people say?"
"It's not that simple! As good of a job as this is, I want more. I want to be the best I can be. The people that hire, that make the decisions that affect the rest of my life, pay attention to details like, 'She fucks every male teammate she has.'"
"Okay!"
"Okay, what?"
"Okay, I'm sorry. Okay, I get it. Okay, I understand. I didn't know."
"Yeah..."
Jill walked over to a nearby sewer grate and dropped her dead cigarette into it.
"Sorry, I kinda went off on you." She apologized.
"No, it's okay. I deserved it."
"Well...kinda."
"But...what about that asshole patrolman? Kevin? Didn't you go out with him once?"
"Jesus. That was an undercover stakeout! He can call it a date all he wants, but that dipshit knows better."
"Yeah. Sorry."
"Chris...I don't know what'll happen down the road, but for now, we're partners. We're friends. As long as we work together, that's all it'll be. And that goes for every other swinging dick in the building."
"Okay."
"So you'll just have to settle for being the work husband for now."
"I think I can live with that."
"Just don't expect any meals...or poon."
"Fiiiiiine. So, are we good?"
"We're good, dummy."
They both opened their arms to the other at the same time and hugged each other tightly in the heat of the morning sun.
Barry rushed over to the source of the gunshot, the tree where he'd just been standing with Jill and Chris.
"What the hell?!" He shouted as he approached.
As he grew closer, he could see them both crouched down. Jill was cringing in pain and Chris was tending to her forearm. It was bleeding.
"Jill, are you shot?" Barry hurriedly asked.
"No, I'm bit. By that."
She pointed to the carcass of a mutilated Doberman. It looked several days decayed.
"Damn. I'll grab First Aid from the chopper. We don't want that bite getting infected. That thing could have rabies."
Barry turned back to the chopper only to find 3 more decaying dobermans blocking his path. Only they were alive. He drew his sidearm and approached them. They split up and began to circle him. He cursed his stupidity under his breath. The one to his left began to growl and looked ready to pounce. Taking no chances, Barry took aim and fired, his shot catching the oversized animal right in the gut. It gave a pitiful cry and collapsed. He turned to the other two, only to find they looked no more hesitant than before. Behind him, he heard another growl. He turned and saw the impossible. The dog he had just shot was standing again as if it had merely been swatted with a rolled up newspaper. It charged Barry as he watched on in awe and terror. Just before it reached him, it exploded in a burst of gore and fractured bone. Wesker appeared a few yards away with the smoking gun in his hand. A hell of a shot...
"Let's regroup back to the chopper." He called over to them. "Feel free to fire on these mongrels if they make a move."
Barry called back over to Wesker to notify him of Jill's injury, but he realized he couldn't hear his own voice. A rush of wind hit him, as the trees and grass whirled all around him. Their helicopter lifted off into the summer night as more dogs appeared and descended upon them from the darkness of the forest.
END CHAPTER 1.
WARNING - END RAMBLE: This is meant as a prequel to the Fall 1998 series I've written so far, and a companion piece to the final part of the series that I'll be writing next. I apologize to fans of that series that have been waiting for the conclusion, but I'm only just now getting settled in after several hectic years of school and work, so I can finally focus on writing again. Please, feel free to leave feedback, good or bad. If all goes according to plan, this story will be released via 1 chapter per week. Once it's finished, I'll begin work on the 3rd and final part of Fall 1998, which is already outlined and ready to go. Thanks for reading!