Well, I suppose I'll have to start on Dad's computer. Life hasn't been pleasant for me recently; Mom's laptop took a shit, I'm sick and suffering from a skin condition on my wrist that impairs my typing speed, and I lost my flashdrives.
You people better be grateful I'm still alive xD
"Ellie, I don't think that's Dad anymore." I backed up, but my sister was frozen in her place. "Ellie..."
Tears formed at her emerald green eyes, and a whimper came from her lips.
"Ellie!" I finally shouted.
The thing that inhabited my father's body lunged towards us and I finally had to push her away. Instead of grabbing her, he bit at me.
I held my arms up and blocked his attack, but he was too heavy for me to keep my stance. I was pulled to the ground by his bloodied hands.
Just when I thought it would be the end of me, Ellie snapped out of her trance and pulled me away from his grip.
In a matter of seconds, Dad's brain matter covered the floor, and splattered across the tops of my combat boots.
Ellie's tanned face was drained of color as she watched this happen. Hell, if I wasn't as pale as most humans could get, I would have done the same.
I looked around for where the bullet came from as she pulled me to my feet. Two men were standing by the front door.
One was easily a foot taller than I, with red hair and blue eyes. He had a strong but friendly facial structure. The other appeared to be of Hispanic descent, and a few inches shorter than the other. His hair was nearly jet black, and his eyes were barely a shade lighter.
"Sorry to sound rude, but were either of you bitten?" the red haired man asked. He had a very thick Russian accent, but his words were comprehensible.
Ellie and I both shook our heads, "No." I spoke.
The living room was basked in the gorgeous evening light. Had there not been blood, or my father's corpse on the floor, the house would have looked beautiful.
Ellie had regained her voice by then, and asked "You both work for Umbrella?"
The two men looked at each other for a moment, until the dark haired man spoke. "We did, until they left us for dead."
"We pretty much consider ourselves freelance." the other said with a bit of a smile. "My name is Nicolai Ginovaef." he introduced himself.
"Carlos Oliviera," the other stated. "Are you sure neither of you were bitten? No scratches, or anything like that?" he asked again.
I nodded, "Positive." My voice sounded more weak and distant than I intended for it to. I cleared my throat and introduced my sister and I.
"Our father worked for Umbrella as well. He was one of the lead botanical geneticists..." Ellie explained.
"Wait a minute, why did you ask if we were bitten? Are you saying that what caused those men and our... father to become like that is infectious?" I asked.
Carlos shrugged, "We're not exactly sure. All we know is to not get bitten, and kill anyone who tries."
For a split second, we were silent. It wasn't until Nicolai spoke that we were actually getting somewhere.
"We've been asked by another scientist, Dr. Ashford, to help him locate his daughter, Angela."
"Angie is missing?" Ellie asked, slowly coming back to reality.
"You know her?" Carlos inquired.
"Yeah, our fathers were friends. Ellie and I would babysit her when she was younger." I explained.
Nicolai nodded, "He's offered that if we can get her out of her school and to him, he can get us out of the city. He looked at our wall clock, "It's eight o'clock. Umbrella has already blocked all exits out of the city. The only way out now, is if we catch that ride."
My head was swimming. We were trapped?! We'd only been there for a few hours and hell had already risen. It was so surreal, but I forced it out. Right now, it was survival.
"However, I suggest we attempt to fine a weapons store, unless you have something a little more... protecting."
I made note of that. A long black skirt didn't provide much protection and it was easy to grab.
"There's a local surplus and pawn shop just up the road. Ellie and I passed it earlier when we were going for coffee." I mentioned.
"Alright then, it's a plan. I suggest that we hurry." Carlos suggested.
"I do need to grab something; I'll be really quick." I said and dashed up the stairs. Skillfully, I avoided the entire section of the hallway that had been occupied by the two corpses that had attacked me earlier.
I searched through a box to locate my hunting knife that a distant relative had given me. It may not be useful, but it was better than nothing. I also yanked the photo album down and pulled out the picture of my mother and father on the day we were born, holding two pink bundles. I wasn't taking any chances that we may not be there in the future.
Nearly flying down the stairs, I regrouped with the others before leaving the house.
Although Ellie and I were out not even an hour earlier, it seemed as if the neighborhood had gone 'tits up, in no short order' as one of my favourite characters stated in Doomsday.
"Where is that store?" Nicolai questioned.
"Just down the street. I'll lead you guys." Ellie was finally feeling like herself again, taking the lead like usual.
As we hastily made our way out of the neighborhood, I studied the ways the once-human-creatures behaved. They were virtually stupid and could barely walk. The ones I could get a good look at (although I really didn't like being even a meter near one), had whitened eyes as if they were blind -clearly they weren't, however- and seemed to not notice one another. This was puzzling. How could they tell the difference between one of their own, and one of us? If they were pretty much brain-dead, then what enabled them to know?
I'd already attached the knife to my belt, and I kept my hand on it. It probably wouldn't do any good, but I felt safer knowing that I had at least something to protect myself with.
The evening light was beginning to fade, and the street lamps were coming on. I guess the system is automated...
"Here it is." Ellie pointed ahead.
"Good, we're losing light fast..." I said.
"Carlos and I will guard the entrance, but you two have to hurry." Nicolai explained to us.
We nodded and hurried inside.
"Jesus, Aria, how do you wear these everyday?" Ellie asked, frustrated at being unable to lace her combat boots.
"You get used to them after a while." I smiled and laced them up for her.
My sister looked so different, it was frightening. Her wavy blonde hair was braided to stay out of her way. She wore dark -nearly skin tight- pants and an olive green long-sleeved shirt. She found a hunting knife and secured it on her garter belt.
"Thanks." She smiled and stood, "I'm going to find some stuff for you." She left the dressing room stall.
I sighed and brought my knees to my chest. It was kind of cold. All I had on was the tank top I was wearing underneath my sweater, the black shorts I was wearing under the skirt, and my black and white striped stockings.
Things were beginning to settle in. Dad was dead.
A tear formed at my eye, but the emotion stopped when I heard something in the stall next to me. Slowly, I stood and exited the dressing room I was in. The door next to mine was barely cracked, and I could hear something rustling about.
My heart began to race as I carefully pushed the door open.
Suddenly, a mangled woman darted out of the stall and had me pushed against the wall behind me. I stuck my hand under her chin to prevent her from biting me, but it was her nails that had me worried.
As sudden as she had come out, a larger hand from behind had yanked her shoulder backward, releasing me from her weight, and snapped her neck.
Nicolai looked at me, "Are you alright? No bites or scratches?" An expression of worry clouded his face.
I nodded, "No, I'm fine. Thanks." I said gratefully.
He nodded and moved aside so Ellie could squeeze through the cramped hallway. She too, was worried.
He gave a quick smile and left the dressing room area.
Ellie quickly took my hand and lead me back into the stall.
We were back on the streets in fifteen minutes. I was equipt with a 9 mm handgun (I advised the group that giving me a gun at all was a bad idea; my aim was shit). Ellie however, was a much better aim than I and had a .308 bolt action rifle with a high power scope. It was my idea, that Ellie and I have melee weapons. Carlos and Nicolai were impressed with my reasoning behind this idea; if we were going to safely extract Angie from the school, we would have to go in quietly and avoid attention.
Both my sister and I chose baseball bats (who would've thought that playing softball for nine years would ever be useful).
Nine-thirty at night; the sun was fully down and the streets were already filled with the undead inhabitants of Raccoon City.
"Do you know where Raccoon City Juniour High is?" Carlos inquired as he took out an undead woman.
"It's like on the other side of town, but I know a way we can get through." Ellie answered.
"You do?" I asked quietly.
"Yeah, remember all those 'Nature Hikes' I took with my friends when we'd visit the city? We ended up finding a path that followed the subway system, leads to just outside the school."
I remembered the summers we spent in the city throughout high school. Ellie would usually sneak out at night to go to the parties (I'd only been to a few. They were annoying in my opinion...) and would occasionally leave the hotel and 'Go for a nature walk.' I knew my sister enough to know that there was nothing involving nature trails (but I also knew that she wasn't doing anything potentially dangerous).
"Where is it?" Nicolai asked.
"St. Michael Clock Tower."
"Christ, that's right next to the hospital..." I muttered; it suddenly hit me that the vast majority of these undead were probably from the hospital.
"We don't have much time, follow us." Ellie called to the two men.
They ceased their firing and caught up to my sister and I. Carlos looked to Ellie, "Are you sure the system won't be crawling with those things?"
"Not a lot of people know about it... It should be clean for the most part," She replied earnestly. "Unless some dumbass left the door open, but the kids these days aren't as stupid as we were."
I wanted to protest that, but I chose to just let it die. I was hoping that the Raccoon City teens had lived up to Ellie's assumption.
Hey guys, in case you didn't notice, that beginning author's notes were written back in November. A lot of stuff has changed, for example, I've found my flashdrives, lost them again, found them again and then lost and found them a third time. Now I just keep them hook to my keys so I won't lose them again...
My wrist is better, but I've also got a full plate when it comes to school. This semester, I ended up with the equivalent of all core classes. Don't you just love high school scheduling?
But alas, I promised to have this chapter in by the end of the month and I intended to upload it like so (even if that meant losing my shit like that guy in the 'Shut Me Up' music video by MSI).
Anywho, I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! I plan on getting chapter three up by the beginning of March, probably? Again, it depends on my scheduling. Leave a review -you guys know I love those- like my Facebook page, favourite this story, I don't care.
Also... I had inadvertently included a Doomsday reference in the chapter xD
I love you :) This is Philosophical Zombie... Signing off!
