Legal disclaimers: You know the drill, don't own anything but what's original to this story and just having fun with the RE idea.
Disclaimers: See earlier parts.
Sentences
/August 1st, 1998, Racoon City/
Reports of a power failure at the Mall had come first, then several reports of continuing gunfire there, followed by shouting and terrible screams. The police would normally have just sent a unit by the Mall to get an eyes-on from professionals on the ground of what was actually occurring, then responded as the report required action. Back-Up units if just a civil disturbance, which regular street units could and would deal with. SWAT would have been despatched if the reports had led police to the scene of a gangland gun battle, riot or similar disturbance.
Once the S.T.A.R.S. would have come after the SWAT teams on the list of Back-Up, but since the catastrophic outcome and fallout of the Spencer Mansion mission even the remaining S.T.A.R.S. still on active duty in the city had been blacklisted by civil authorities. It didn't help that even the S.T.A.R.S. Agents themselves didn't know what to make of the seemingly insane reports submitted by the survivors of that mission-but many had taken the view that the survivors were suffering from severe trauma at best and had grossly exaggerated what had actually occurred in an attempt to Cover-Up the reality of a utterly botched mission. The one's who didn't believe it was a Cover-Up were, at best, only able to accept that the survivors and their teams had been attacked by wild animals possibly mutated or somehow affected by Toxic waste illegally dumped somewhere nearby.
It didn't change the fact that the survivors had possibly finished the S.T.A.R.S. organisation as a force and authority in Racoon City for good with everything they'd said. What they'd said about Umbrella Corporation, which had the money and the influence to get the entire S.T.A.R.S. organisation worldwide shut down if it wanted to, being just a part of it.
The situation at the Mall had, however, even before the rolling sharp crack of sound and flash of light from inside which several people had sworn was a bomb detonation, gathered a response which even watching members of the street gangs who roamed the streets at will and often saw SWAT teams in action would have described as excessive. In fact, anyone asked would have described the events which followed as crazy.
First of all, just minutes after the first police car had arrived, literally a dozen more had arrived so quickly that cars had been skidding to a stop all around the Mall. Police officers armed with shotguns and pistols had leapt out of cars, ordered curious crowds gathering despite the awful weather and late hour back virtually at gunpoint and set up a perimeter using their cars and Incident Scene tape to mark out where people were most certainly not allowed. Just minutes later two full armoured vans of SWAT officers had arrived and proceeded to form a hard perimeter, creating defences out of steps, walls, metal bins and even parked cars. The strangest thing about their actions, though, was the fact that they made no attempt to enter the Mall, despite their numbers and amply demonstrated extensive firepower.
A senior Police officer arrived with four more police cars and two more SWAT team vans only a few minutes later, which raised several eyebrows since the presence of so many heavily armed men in one place practically stated the authorities suspected Terrorists or a major-league figure in organised crime was inside the Mall. To most peoples thinking, at least.
The newly arrived senior officer quickly assumed overall command. However, yet again all that the SWAT officers did was reinforce their positions and stand ready, as though expecting the trouble to come out of the Mall and crash into them outside.
They seemed content to sit back and wait, although sharp-eyed people amongst the crowds noticed the signs of both frustration and anger on the faces of most of the SWAT team officers. Evidently, they didn't know why they weren't been sent in either-and didn't like that very fact at all. Which made the awful explosion, when it so suddenly came, all the more shocking...
Y
The entire building shook as though it was being thrown around by the concussive force of a nuclear detonation when the explosives-packed barrel finally erupted in a sheet wave of fire and exploding chemicals of every description, everything standing up when the violence of the chaotic eruption threw gale-force blasts of moving air throughout the structure being catapulted metres in every direction. Every piece of glass in the building shattered like it had been struck by screams straight from Hell, steel walkways set and secured into concrete and stone literally flapped like the wings of mad birds with a screaming, screeching wail that belonged nowhere but in nightmares.
Steel doors and frames buckled and twisted into shapes that their designers would never have recognised, even as nightmare heat and flames vomiting forth from the ground-floor explosion slagged and melted things intended to survive the intensity of heat created by blazing full oxygen cylinders. Stone caught fire as concrete simply melted out of areas between blocks, water held in flasks, fountains and even in refrigerators simply evaporated. Plastic shelves, bottles and stands simply turned to sludge and coated areas of floor in a liquid so hot it would melt bone.
Secondary explosions occurred as gas cylinders that supplied heating systems in the Mall when necessary cooked off and blew up, blowing gaping craters in walls, ceilings and floors. Electrical systems shorted throughout the building, starting electrical fires everywhere even as cables were torn loose and wiring literally fell out of collapsing segments of the damaged structure, sparking lives wires making parts of the battered building death traps for anything with a heartbeat as they connected with metal and filled gaps in stone. Blazing flames threatened to roll right up the walls of the battered building, all the way to the roof, only the awful distortion of the air currents inside the structure caused by the building inferno preventing the event-temporarily.
Ambient temperature inside the Mall rose twenty degrees in thirty seconds, the humidity immediately developing to such a degree it was like taking a Sauna in the steam of a pool of lava when anyone tried to move-and the effects of the blast had only just started to be felt. The temperature continued to rise even as the fire built itself up to greater and greater heights, everything in the Mall-including the Mall itself-merely more fuel for the fire, including the bodies of the dead, walking or otherwise. Worst of all, though, was what the fires ultimate purpose was, inside the Mall at least, a purpose signified only by a strange light-green glint sometimes visible inside the fire itself-and outside as a light, invisible film coating everything as high up as the fire could reach-so far.
Umbrella Scientists had been working since the Vietnam War to make T-Virus weapons fireproof, or at least resistant, to prevent easy fixes by their enemies such as having areas affected doused with Napalm. While true immunity from fire had proved impossible to engineer into the Virus, they had discovered a way around the problem after over twenty years of trying: the Conflagration Theory, the method of using fires own energy against it to allow the T-Virus to not only survive fire but be enhanced by it. The hotter and faster a fire burnt the faster the T-Virus bred and developed, the fires very existence sustaining and enhancing the effects and purpose of the Virus. When the fire died, the Virus would only live on through its Hosts.
It had been scientifically proven that very little short of a direct Nuclear strike would utterly eliminate the Virus-so Cain had considered Chris Redfield and his companion perfect Test Subjects for the new and improved Virus. After all, Umbrella needed the data and, more to the point, with all the troubles in Racoon City these days, even events like the Mall attack would be easy to explain away-even with the increasingly paranoid press these days. Chris Redfield's presence would, in fact, be an aid in that regard...
Outside the Mall, the devastation appeared even worse. Exploding windows and emergency exit doors vomited blasts of flame twenty feet from the structure itself, catapulting the scorched remains of steel and plastic doors much further as the sheer kinetic force blasting out from the explosion sent the mangled remains spinning through the night air like melting fragments of a gigantic child's toy. Echoing blasts catapulted people from their feet with bleeding eardrums and noses, even as screams, shouts and wails of horror echoed everywhere in horror and disbelief at what was happening. Cars parked too close were picked up and flipped through the air so quickly they almost seemed to actually fly before they landed, hard, amidst crashing steel and crunching plastic remains. Few people were caught in the blasts, but very little was ever found of those that were.
People simply turned and ran if they were able, some crawling slowly in helpless desperation, even as stunned Police officers-the closest to the blasts-tried feebly to drag themselves back to their feet and restore some kind of order. The literally shattering, nightmare roar of the explosion echoed across the city like a call to arms in Hell, shaking awake or apart everything in half a mile and being heard by everyone, everywhere in the city. The monstrous fireball that followed lit up everything as though the sun was rising in the middle of the night.
Children woke up screaming everywhere, elderly people died of shock in their sleep or came awake believing a new War was breaking out, young adults awoke to scenes of indescribable chaos as, for a long, long moment nobody could even tell if it was night or day. Once they could, everyone who thought about it wished that matters had stayed that way so they couldn't even possibly tell what was really happening.
Chief of Police Brian Irons was awake and alert in RCPD headquarters, directing the Mall incident Police response personally. When he found himself looking out of his office window and then at his clock, which told him it was one thirty in the morning, just to tell what time it really was, he swore using language that would have shocked every officer in the RCPD. He pulled out his mobile, dialled a very specific number and waited for it to connect, so that he could get his new Orders. He knew that he wasn't the smartest man in the room most of the time, but he was smart enough to know when radical change was occurring.
Trent, who was in Umbrella Corporate Headquarters in Racoon City talking directly to the Board of Directors and President of Umbrella Corporation via a secure video link to give them an update, even as he made notes on how to deal with Cain's current stupidity on a notepad, saw the sudden flash of light before he felt the heavy rumble of what should have felt like thunder. He knew Cain, which meant he knew better. In ten minutes flat he had finished updating the leadership of Umbrella, a minute later he was in an armoured Limo headed to the scene. For this level of stupidity, not even Cain's level of militaristic arrogance and favour amongst the Umbrella hierarchy for using the most violent means available to get the job done, every time, would shield him from the repercussions.
Harvest, who was simply standing still in the street in front of the Umbrella headquarters building letting the awful weather soak her through, freeze her to the bone and whip her long hair around so hard it actually hurt, arms and legs fully extended and thrown back, actually staggered when the blasts edge caught her. Immediately afterwards, still soaked through and seemingly uncaring, she strode back into the Umbrella building and went looking for Cain, Murder in her mind. Cain had finally, once and for all, gone way too far...
Ada, who had retrieved her jeep and was almost at Giselle's apartment at last following her confrontation with Birkin and Cain, was nearly blinded momentarily by the sudden massive flash of light. She stood on the brakes, fought the wheel to prevent a skid, gritted her teeth and waited for the "sunspots" to pass. What else was going to happen tonight in this damned city? Bad enough it was obviously already lost to the Virus.
Lianna Styx, most of the way back to Umbrella headquarters on foot, had to stop and stare at the explosion and massive flash of light, even as she realised that the side of the building near to her had to have shielded her from the worst of the fallout given how close the explosion looked and sounded to be. Her calculations told her, down to the extent of decimal places possible, just what kind of bomb and how big had to have been used to accomplish the result. She did not like the conclusions she came to, since her conclusions also told her from just what level of authority such an attack would have had to have been authorised.
In Jill Valentines apartment building, startled S.T.A.R.S. survivors, Amber Bernstein and Billy Coen all spun to the window to see the explosion and flash of light-only they all had to dive flat as the impact wave of the explosion shattered windows and catapulted glass across the room with enough force to embed it in the far wall. Barry Burton, still shocked from the sudden death of his old friend with no visible wounds, was still the first person to say what everyone was thinking.
"I think we know where Chris is now..." said Barry, slowly and carefully...
Y
The force behind the blast made Serena and Chris's position of attempted cover about as useful as hiding behind strands of straw in a hurricane. The glass in the room exploded in all directions as though it was being catapulted through a spinning shredder, fragments slashing into every surface so deeply inch-long shards disappeared completely inside stone and concrete walls. The counter, made of a combination of wood, plastic, metal and shattered glass, was physically lifted off of the floor and slammed backwards into the wall behind it so hard it left an impact crater before the battered remains collapsed on top of Chris and Serena's position.
Plastic guns, blunt knives, dud sticks of dynamite, other weapons and survival gear of every description flew around the shop as though gravity had abandoned them and rained down in such a random assortment of places and ways that even a computer couldn't have calculated all of the possibilities. They were followed every time by the shattered remains of the counter or drawers they had been held in, which often shattered completely when they landed.
The echoing roar of sound that slammed down hard behind the massive explosion punctured eardrums and even broke bones, forcing those few who could still hear after the initial assault to clap both hands over their ears, crouch into a ball and helplessly hope that they weren't left both dead and crippled. Far-arcing flashes of fire catapulted high lit small fires inside the Hunting shop Serena and Chris were in, as well as even further up, all the way up to the Security Office right at the top of the building. The awful, killing stink of a chemical fire immediately began gathering even as the kind of silence that only the close presence of death can create fell over the entire Mall-before the silence was broken one last time, by the sound of multiple explosions coming from the first-floor gun shop...
Serena had to blink several times before her eyes would focus, then shake her head hard to blow away the cobwebs. She actually had to stop and check that everything was still attached before she tried to move, despite the grinding edge of the shattered remains of the counter trying to crush her chest and arms. Thankfully, heavy bruising and several small cuts notwithstanding, added to what she suspected was a slight case of shock...she was fine, if feeling increasingly battered as time went on.
The tent had done its job, thankfully, catching the worst of the debris and protecting them from simply being boiled alive by the heat exploding from the blast. Any chemicals that had been spread about by the blast had been caught, in any case-which didn't mean they were remotely safe from the effects, especially given Umbrella's habit of creating very hard to kill chemical and biological weapons which did not exist anywhere else on Earth.
Chris was unconscious and she could see a trickle of blood slipping down his scalp, onto his neck and shoulder. His breathing was slow and steady, though, a quick check revealed that his eyes were fine, his pulse was strong. He was just unconscious, his skull hadn't been cracked or his neck broken. Most likely he had a Concussion, but she had her own problems to worry about, not least the fact that if she couldn't throw the remains of the counter off of them they'd both end up with either broken bones or simply be dead.
She felt around with her hands, got her fingers around a lower edge that felt relatively stable and applied pressure to see what happened. The counter shifted slightly, settling more, the upper edge falling in on them harder, the lower edge shifting away. She fought it, strained against the weight suspended above her. The lower edge crept back towards her, the upper edge slowly shifting away. The closer it got the harder she had to pull, the more weight she had to fight against-and she had little leverage to help her.
She felt the hard muscle in her arms, shoulders, hands, back and chest tighten as she fought against a weight that had to be at least twice that of her own, most likely even more than that. Her jaw creaked as she bit down and set herself, heels wedged against the floor to hold her in place, straining to get the job done-and, suddenly, the remains of the counter shifted and tumbled away from her and Chris to the floor with a thud and loud bang of sudden, sharp impact. She breathed in deeply, managed to unzip and open the tent, dragged Chris out so that he wasn't accidentally suffocated and grabbed her MA-80 before, after a brief stagger, striding over to the outside of the shop to take in, with her own eyes, just what had actually happened.
What she saw told her what she already knew, that God might have Created the world and everything they knew but that the Devil knew all of the best jokes. They were trapped in here beyond any hope of rescue, no question given just what she could see, let alone smell and hear. They had no way out and they were going to die here.
The explosions she'd heard from the first floor could only have been the gun shop survivors, who had to have realised what had happened and used grenades to make sure they all rested peacefully. Yet another score to settle with Umbrella, far too many too be settled with that monster corporation which had clearly forgotten a long, long time ago that everyone lived somewhere-and that there was always one willing to make a stand, to see that actions had consequences. She couldn't die now, she had too much left to do-but it didn't look like she was going to get the choice...
/End of Part Eleven. All Reviews appreciated/.