Edits 27/05/2019 Updated grammar, spelling and James Name.
Chapter 10
Gun shots and a lot of moans. That's what James could hear echoing around the RPD. The undead were certainly excited about something, and no doubt it was someone blowing off a few rounds at the infected. Stupid, that attracted them like moths to a flame. But whoever the idiot was, he was making the job easier for, James because the infected that were in the grounds of the RPD were fast –or slowly- moving away towards the gates on the other side of the grounds, ready to ambush the poor idiot who came through those gates.
James thought he really should help this sorry soul whoever it was. So James produced a heavy, wooden mallet and smashed it over the nearest zombies' head, killing it stone dead. Then he tossed the mallet away and walked towards the RPD entrance. Hey, he's taken down one; as far as James was concerned he's done his bit to help the gunman. Why make it too easy for him? Anyway, if the guy had any intelligence he'll go down the steps, under the RPD entrance and back up the other side to avoid the zombie horde.
As James approached the entrance he noticed a movement from the second story of a nearby building. A security camera had him firmly in its sights, or he assumed it was, because as he walked the camera followed. James came to a stop and jumped back a few paces and sure enough the camera turned to get him back into view. Then he jumped forward, then backwards rapidly and the camera kept trying to keep him in view. Since James had an audience somewhere in this dead city he tapped danced on the spot, pranced about and even moon walked across the garden, and still the camera kept him firmly in its sights. "Smile, you're on candid camera!"
Deciding to forget about the funny security camera James approached the heavy doors of the RPD, and with one swift kick the doors burst open and he prepared to slaughter whatever zombies waited on the other side. He held two large, multi-barreled guns, and he had morphed his clothes to look like Rambo.
"OKAY, NOBODY MOVE!" He cried when the doors swung open. The impacted the walls, bounced back, and slammed shut right in his face, flattening his nose. Well, that was awkward and embarrassing. Hopefully no one saw that.
James pushed on the doors gently and he entered the police station. The massive hall was large, echoy and silent which was emphasised by the way his spats clattered on the dull, tiled floor. The place was empty, no zombies or monsters, or massively built creatures that looked like advanced cancer patience's. Nothing, he was safe and that was boring to him, but it just made his job easier, James guessed.
To the left and right of him were a couple of doors. Both were boarded up and for good reason. He knew there were zombies waiting on the other side of those two doors. James, and some of the other police officers had boarded them up a few days ago in an effort to contain the invading infected. But since it was unlikely anyone was left alive in this building James quickly wrenched the boards off both the doors with his bare hands to allow easy access later, and he tossed the planks anywhere out of sight. He then decided to take the door on his right that lead to dog kennels and prison cells. He didn't know where the weapons caches' were hidden, but if he took the whole RPD apart stone by stone then he'll be able to find them, eventually.
He turned the handle and opened the door, and screamed wide eyed like a girl when a decayed hand reached in through the gap, clasped his wrist and pulled him through the door. There was a horde of these creatures through there! Bloody, blind, husks of faces, their teeth snapping at him.
"Whoa, wait guy's, you don't want to eat me!" James said. "You like live food, right? But I should've died more times than I can count." But the undead didn't care, they clawed at his Rambo esk, perfect muscle body, trying to get at his soft insides. "Plus my skins like a rhino's, tough and tasteless!"
A nearby zombie stuck James' fingers into its mouth and bit down and pulled, trying to separate them from James' hand. But instead, his fingers just stretched like they were made of rubber. "Did I mention I am very rubbery too." He grinned broadly.
Another zombie had him by the shoulders and was trying to pull him towards his chomping teeth. Most of the front of its face was missing, noticeably his lips, leaving both sets of its teeth exposed, and they were brown and bloody. "EWWWww! Ugly plaque build up!" James quipped before he head butted the zombie in the face smashing its nose off.
Click, click. That sounded like a shot gun being loaded. BANG! and the wind was knocked out of James as scattered pellets tore through his body and all the zombies around him dropped dead as a spray of scattering shot tore through the entire horde. Taken by surprise James fell back, impacted the wall and slowly slid down the wall leaving a bloody smear; a massive hole in his chest was leaking blood badly. He sat down against the wall and just stared ahead with vacant eyes.
Someone came down the hall. A woman and a very smoking hot one at that. She wore pinkish, red clothes and looked a little like a biker. She was a brunet, had a smooth, heart shaped face, and a well proportioned body. She pushed her shot gun back into its holster on her back and drew her pistol. Gingerly she stepped over the mass of corpses. She walked right past James and entered the door he'd just been pulled through and shut the door behind her.
It took James a couple of minutes before he realised. "Hang on, what the fuck am I doing laying on the ground bleeding out? I can't die."
James leapt to his feet and dusted down his now perfectly smooth, red suit he'd changed into. He considered going after the girl and trying to woo her with his new charms. But no. He forced his mind back to the matter at hand. He wasn't here to pick up girls. He had to find that weapons cache so he could impress Elaine and get off with her.
Man the RPD was creepy when it was quiet. Even before all the blood and gore and broken windows and so on it was creepy. This place used to be a museum after all, before it was a police station and James always found museums creepy. All the staring, vacant eyes of dummies made of plastic just staring at you with no life in them whatsoever, was just creepy. But then again, that was like a night out on the town in this city.
James entered a long hallway with shattered windows down one wall. Shattered glass on the floor crunched under his spats. To make this boring trek more fun he began to randomly goose step down the corridor making as much noise as possible to attract something, anything, he was getting bored!
Halfway down the corridor something did happen. Something hit him sharply on the back of the head causing his large teeth to fly out of his mouth and clatter to the floor. "OK, WHO THREW THAT?" His teeth chattered by themselves as James started to feel a pinching on the small lumps where his ears should be.
Picking up his teeth and replacing them in his mouth he pulling a mirror from his pockets he gazed at his own reflection. He saw a bloody, decayed, black crow pecking at where his right ear was... or should be. "Oh look, crow earrings!" Within seconds a swarm of those crows came flying through the shattered windows like a hurricane and began pecking and biting his body. Some of them were pecking in very unusual places.
James didn't panic. He just stood and let the crows get on with it. "Now here," he put on a David Attenborough type accent, "we have a most interesting specimen of Raccoon City. The undead crow birds, also know under the scientific name as 'Crowsus - FuckingAnnoyingus, an infected species that attacks, without warning, any creature that has a heartbeat." He held out his right arm and continued his commentary. "See how they peck and bite at the smaller appendages in an attempt to snap them off. They are also prone to trying to bite off the geniTALS!" His voice went high pitched when one of them did "...of their intended victim."
James cleared his throat before continuing on. "BUT WHAT SHOULD YOU DO IN SUCH A SITUATION YOU MIGHT ASK?" His accent was now one of a TV salesman. "OF COURSE, YOU COULD LET THIS UNDEAD BIRDS PECK AT YOU UNTIL YOU DIE. BUT DO YOU REALLY HAVE THE TIME? SO WHAT CAN YOU DO, WHO CAN YOU CALL?... No, not them... they've been out of business for years. WHAT YOU DO IS..." He twisted his form left and raised his arms. "ENTER SPIN CYCLE!" He screamed, crossing his legs over James sent himself into a mad spin that threw the crows off his body and scattered them all over the hall. Some died from the impact with the walls, those that survived flew back outside and began to re-group into a massive, black swarm.
James stopped his mad spin and looked out at the swirling swarm. It looked like an oncoming hurricane that was going to rip him to pieces.
"NOW THEY ARE OFF, BUT ARE ABOUT TO COME BACK FOR SECONDS. WHAT DO YOU DO NOW FOLKS?" James asked no one in particular. He flung his arms up into the air and cried, "BRING ON THE WALL!" The next moment the crows vanished as a solid brick wall fell from the sky and smashed their tiny, undead bodies into paste onto the pavement outside.
James leant against the windowsill and looked down at the wall. In it were dozens of crow shaped holes all in different poses. Some were in ridicules positions, like doing the splits or being arranged in a triangle. Unfortunately the crows didn't have the intelligence to try to make the shapes.
Continuing on, James kicked down the next door and continued his search. Every room in this wing of the police station and he found practically nothing. It wasn't' until he arrived on the roof that something interesting happened, or had already happened. There was a crashed police chopper in the side of the wall. "OOH, JUST LIKE IN VEGAS!" James grinned, remembering the scene of a Cadillac being stuck into the wall of a casino. "I like it! It has class, it has panache." He talked in the accent of an art critic. "It just screams. 'Look out, danger.' Just goes to show, you can never always expect the unexpected!" No sooner had those words left his mouth then something slammed into him, knocking him to the floor on his front.
"I'll say no more." He grinned broadly as another one of those skinless, blood red Lickers started crawling all over his vulnerable form.
"HELP! BUTT RAPE!" James cried before he kicked the Licker off him. "GET OFF, you're wrinkling my suit."
The Licker flicked out it's whip like tongue and it snapped it directly at James, who avoided it with no effort. Then sending himself into a spin he emerged dressed in an Indiana Jones costume, complete with whip. The same Licker backed up, ready for an attack. But Indiana James Mask flung the whip back and snapped it forward lassoing the Licker around the neck.
Grinning James wiggled his eyebrowless brow at it before he sent himself into another spin. The whip became taught and the Licker was sent whirling around and around as James span.
"Around and around you go where you stop, I DON'T CARE!" James let go of the whip and the Licker was sent flying high into the air as the whip untangled itself from the nightmarish creature. Of course, what goes up, must come down, and the Licker did. It came down and crashed through the skylight a little ways away with a smash.
James was about to follow it when he heard gun shots. BANG, BANG, BANG. Someone had a gun. Which meant someone was alive. Maybe that hot biker chick! James leapt over and leaned sharply into the skylight without falling into it. But no, it wasn't that biker chick. It was someone in a cop uniform desperately trying to fight off that Licker. 'Boy, he must've shat his pants!' James thought. The guy was running for a door, opened it and slammed it shut without killing the Licker.
"What a pussy! Do I have to do everything myself?" James yawned, dropping into the room and somersaulting to the floor. He landed on the back of the Licker. James clothes had altered to those of a cowboy and he began treating the Licker like it was a horse.
"YEEEHAA! COME ON SKINLESS, IT'S TIME TO RIDE OUT!" The Licker bucked and hissed trying to throw the cowboy off. James sharply kicked it in the stomach with the spurs on his boots, trying to get it to behave itself. But instead, after a few minutes of this all he'd managed to do is kick it so many times he'd chopped it in half.
Falling on the floor James huffed and quipped. "Man, you aren't half the horse I thought you were." James got to his feet and produced a revolver. "Time to put the old yellah out of its misery." James aimed the revolver and with one shot at the still squirming Lickers head he killed it stone dead.
Man, he was getting nowhere in this venture! What the heck was Chief Irons thinking when he decided it was best idea in the world to lock the guns away in secret places? James kicked the door down and walked past the cockpit of the destroyed helicopter that was poking in through the wall.
He really wasn't getting anywhere. For the past few hours he'd searched the police station top to bottom, ran into a few zombies on the way, but most he'd found were dead. If he didn't know any better, he'd swear he wasn't the only efficient zombie killer in this police station.
Once, while walking down a corridor that had its windows covered in wooden boards that were nailed to the walls; a dozen bloody, scratched, blackened nailed, hands reached in and grabbed him and tried to pull him through the window. Thankfully the wooden boards kept him safe and he managed to break away and continue his search. But not before giving those hands that were reaching in through the wooden boards a quick manicure. Hey, the undead had a desire to look good too. Probably. Though he admitted he probably went overboard when he used a hack saw to give them that manicure, which resulted in the undead not having any hands afterwards. But oh well, they can't feel anything. They certainly can't now with no hands! James decided to get out of there before the zombies decided to sue... could they sue? Did zombies have zombie lawyers? But saying that who could tell the difference?
Now heading down to the garage, he entered the police cells to begin searching them. But all he'd found were a few open kennels with angry, barking, undead dogs and an open man hole cover that he decided not to go down, because he could hear strange thudding noises coming from it.
Leaving the kennels he walked down to the end of a row of cells. As he passed the last one he saw something he didn't expect to see.
"Hey you!" Said a voice which made James spin around. Someone was sitting in a cell, a tall man wearing a dull shirt, dull trousers and an even duller hair cut. "Aren't you that psychopath murderer from a few weeks ago?"
"No." James said cheerily. "But I guess we must be related!" The masked James went up to the cell bars and leant against them. "So what are you in for? Let me guess, you were arrested by the fashion police?"
"I locked myself in here." The man explained. "I'm waiting right here until things blow over, or someone comes looking for survivors."
"Hey, weren't you the journalist who kept snooping around the green headed murderer case?" James smiled, he could never forget this guy. Ben Bertolucci his name was, and he'd kept hounding the police force for information. Eventually he was arrested for some charge or other and was dumped in this cell.
"Yeah, but I ain't covering your sorry ass anymore." He explained.
"Seriously, we're not the same person. I'm just wearing his mask." James grinned his white teeth again.
"Yeah, perfect time to play Halloween, man. Those zombies don't care if you're crazy, they only care if you have a heartbeat. Anyway, I'm onto something far bigger than a murder investigation." He explained.
"What?" James asked genuinely interested.
"Oh no, I'm not passing on my info with anyone else until I know I'm safe. This info doesn't leave this cell..." He crossed his arms over his chest. "and while I've got the key..." he held up a silver key in his right hand. "No one is getting to me."
Ben wasn't prepared however when, after he blinked, James had mysteriously materialised inside the cell right next to him. "Is that a fact?" James asked jokingly.
Ben yelped and dropped the cell key to the floor. "How did you do that?"
"I've punched my way through solid brick walls, you don't think a few bars on a prison will keep me out." James walked over to the cell wall and leant against it. "Now, you said the info doesn't leave the cell, so come on Colombo, spill the beans."
"Hmm." Ben considered. "I guess you're not likely to live to use it if you step out of this cell anyway." Ben went to an opposite wall and leant against it.
"You know Umbrella is behind this, all of it. I've uncovered documents that S.T.A.R.S. members Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine uncovered evidence that Umbrella was conducting bio-weapon experiments in some mansion out in the hills. The one that blew up. They created something called the T-virus, that turns any living creature into a mutation with the only desire to kill all those around it."
"Sounds like my neighbour's dog." James quipped.
"But Chief Irons is under Umbrella's pay roll. The police were totally unprepared for this terrible disaster because of interference's at the top. Chief Irons clearly hindered investigations into the mansion disaster. He suspended Chris and Jill to keep them quiet, and when this outbreak started happening, to slow the police down long enough for the virus to destroy the evidence; he had weapons moved to a safer location that was to be undisclosed. All this just to keep the outbreak quiet."
"Woah, woah, hold up, turn back a few pages. Chief Irons is responsible for us not knowing where our weapons were? That he's responsible for the death of all those police officers, all those innocent civilians? My family and friends, just because Umbrella wanted to keep this damn outbreak quiet for as long as possible?" James' blood started to boil, but he tried to remain calm, but the Mask seemed to be saying 'fuck being calm'. Moans and groans could be heard from somewhere in the police station. zombies on the move. "Keep it quiet? He's doing a fine job of it! And he knows where the weapons cache is?"
"Yeah." The reporter said sensing the change in James' mood.
James was aware smoke was billowing out of his ears. Then suddenly he had a hunting rifle, was wearing a hard hat like those in old jungle films would have, and he'd grown a very long moustache. "Time for the hunted to become the hunter." And he cocked the rifle.
James slickly stepped out of the bars and turned back to Ben briefly to say. "Enjoy your stay, I hear they do good bread and water here." Before running off, through the car park, around the police station before arriving where he knew Chief Irons office was. If he was still alive, and hopefully he was, James was going to kill him!
James stopped just outside Irons office and decided to knock on the door gently. He then pressing the side of his head to the door, but he couldn't hear anything, no movement. No wait, there was movement but not movement made by anything human.
He cocked his head to the side and side-head butted the door open. All four walls were covered in pictures, display cases and stuffed animal heads. Irons must feel right at home in this new world, since his office was decorated by dead things. There was one recently new dead thing in this office, and it was walking.
Standing by the desk, its neck slowly turning to find its target was a zombie woman. She was petite, with long blond hair and a heart shaped face which was pale. She wore a long white gown with a large blood stain on the stomach where an undead had bit her. It looked like the mayors daughter, only a little deader.
In James warped mind, he thought the zombie was a bit of a looker. A pity she was only after him for one thing. For food. She raised her arms and began shuffling towards him.
"Whoa baby!" James said. "Sorry darling, but I only go live ones." Her arms grabbed him by the shoulders and she tried to pull him towards her snapping mouth. "Okay, if you insist!" and James kicked out the legs from under her so she laid back in his arms and she continued clawing at his back. "Like it rough eh? Pucker up, sugar tits!" James didn't know what possessed him to do this, but he kissed the zombie girl on the lips. He did this for five seconds before releasing her. "Seriously, you need to work on your kissing; and some breath mints wouldn't hurt."
Still the zombie girl snarled and tried to claw at his form. There were suddenly a lot of weird ideas going through James' head. He was thankful he had enough sanity to back off, he was sure there must be a law against raping the dead. Before he lost it totally, and acted out those disgusting thoughts, he grabbed the zombie girl by the head and twisted her neck sharply so he heard her neck broke and the body went limp.
"Good night darling." He said. At least he'd put her out of her misery. Did the undead even feel misery? Either way, he dropped her to the floor in a pile of limbs.
That's when he noticed something. James had been in Irons office before, and he'd never noticed an open panel in the wall leading to a small red brick room. That sneaky little Irons, he had a secret escape tunnel and he'd stupidly left it open for any idiot to find and follow him. That's exactly what James did, he followed Irons' escape tunnel down a lift shaft, down a creepy tunnel lit by flaming torches... "Ominious!" and into a large stone room. The walls and wooden tables were laden with numerous items of devices of torture.
"Man, Irons has one creepy fetish!" James smiled. A smile that disappeared from his face when he saw something he really didn't want to see. Chief Brian Irons, or half of him. His torso had been ripped apart. The lower half of his body was missing, leaving only his head and torso, and one complete arm. The rest was missing. James really didn't want to see that, because he really wanted to be the one to gut the bloated gas bag. James nudged Irons remains with his shoe and tastelessly said. "Hey, you okay there buddy?" But the corpse didn't answer. "Nasty wounds, probably better if you have a bit of a lie down, get your breath back... and your legs." He nodded by a large hole in the floor where a pair of legs stuck out from under an open hatch. "They're over there, under the hatch."
Well, that's put pay to finding out where the hidden weapons cache was. After all, he can't interrogate a corpse. But then suddenly this Mask sense was tingling! Surely Irons would want access to some weapons, and they were supposed to be sealed in a secret position; and what better secret position than a secret room under the police station? After a couple of minutes ripping down tool wracks, blasting apart tables and ripping away shelves with his bare hands he hit the jack pot! Behind one of these shelves was a mother load of secret weapons!
Pistols, magnums, shot guns, knives, explosives and enough ammo for all.
"JACK POT!" He called out and quickly gathered them all up onto a sack he'd magically produced and filled up. "Oh well, waste not, want not! HA!" and he lifted a heavy bag onto his back and turned to make his way out of the RPD, when he suddenly felt something in his stomach.
James looked down to see something long, sharp and hairy sticking through his torso. The wound bled a lot but, he wasn't concerned about that. What he was concerned about was the long arm of the creature that was pulling him down the nearby hatch!
James didn't have time to resist as he was pulled straight down into a damp, dark corridor that he didn't even know was there!
That's when he saw it, and he shrieked so loud he could shatter glass. The arm that pulled him down wasn't an arm at all, it was a leg, one of eight that belonged to a massive spider. Not just massive as in dinner plate sized, he was talking FUCKING ENORMOUS SUV SIZED!
James hated spiders. It was his all time second worst fear! The worst being on a ship in the middle of the ocean, there's a storm, he gets swept overboard, there's a massive shark that comes up to him, it opens its jaws and says. 'Excuse me, but there's also a big fucking spider in here with you!'.
"My, my, what a big boy you are!" James said in horror as the spider bared its massive fangs, "AND WHAT SHARP TEETH YOU HAVE!"
James quickly came up with an amusing way out of this. He let his red suit morph into a gown of a dentist. He pulled himself off the leg that skewered him, went up to the spider, lifted the disgusting creature up by the head so it stood on its hind legs. He forced its mouth open, produced a flash light and peered down its gullet.
"You know, I don't like the look of those choppers. I'm going to have to drill." James produced a surgical drill that whizzed loudly when he activated it. "But don't worry, you won't feel a thing... Until I jam this down your throat!" He added in the voice of the Simpsons Character Dr. Nick Riviera
After a few seconds, and a lot of shrieks from the spider, several white fangs dropped to the floor leaving the giant spider with nothing but gums.
"There, that wasn't so bad was it?" James said as he rammed a cherry, lollipop into the spiders mouth to add insult to injury "Well, it wasn't for me!"
Despite this jest the spider still wasn't letting James go so easily. This was getting irritating. Those cold, dead, eight eyes just kept staring at him with... do spiders even have facial expressions?
"Hey buddy!" James said, holding up his left clenched fist. "How many fingers?" and his hand opened revealing his hand had eight fingers on his left hand. "I think you can see where this is going!" He added deadpan before ramming his eight fingers into the spiders eight eyes.
The beast bucked and backed away, allowing James to break free. Before leaving James decided to introduce this giant spider to its arch nemesis. As James watched, his ability to warp reality took on a new height as the space around him began to transform. The black, stone room became white and smooth. Within seconds the entire area had become a large, plastic bowl shape structure, the spiders arch nemesis. "You're trapped now, trapped..." he paused as if to give comical tension "...in this enormous bath!"
He quickly gave the spider a cheery wave before he vanished over the edge of the basin and continued on his mad quest to amuse himself.
After about five minutes of wandering in the cold, putrid water of the Raccoon City sewers he reached a conclusion. "I've gone the wrong fucking way!" He meant to go back to the RPD.
James pushed himself through the water, coming across only dead zombies and dead giant spiders. Someone had been efficient. At the end of the sewer he came across a door that appeared to have a weird locking mechanism. But James had no time for this, so he just pressed himself against the bars, and in true T-1000 style his form melted through the gaps like water.
On the other side and down a corridor he found a huge cave with a cable car suspended high above a huge drop to the cave floor. He whistled, and wondered what on earth a cable car was doing under the city.
The door behind him he'd just came through began to open. Spooked, he quickly leapt above the cable car and flattened himself to the roof to hide from whatever monster came through those doors. But it wasn't a monster, it was just that cop he'd seen earlier, the pussy who ran from the Licker. He looked in a pretty bad way. His uniform was stained red with blood and a bandage was wrapped around his torso. He'd clearly been injured. Walking along with him was a hot, Japanese girl in red. Wow!" For an apocalypse city James was finding his fair share of babes!
James so wanted to race down there and woo her. But something was stopping him. Only once the man and the woman had climbed into the cable car and set it in motion with him still on top did he explain his own actions, and weirdly he did it out loud, to no one. "Yeah, I know it's out of character for me not to see a babe and go drool over her. But Mr. TimeLordParadox is following RE continuity after all." What the heck was he talking about? It was like his mouth and tongue were both moving without his brains permission. "Speaking of which?"
Almost as if he expected it, a massive, dark figure fell from the ceiling and landed on the roof of the cable car with him. OH, FOR GOD SAKE, NOT ANOTHER ONE! Standing tall and imposing was a creature so disgusting, so disfigured that it made the elephant man a looker.
A fold in this creatures right arm suddenly parted down the middle, revealing a massive, bulbous, red eye that rolled this way and that; looking. That was the first thing James noticed. The second was the thing had two heads, one head was that of a blond haired man, and it sat in the centre of this creatures chest. The second head was more of a bulb, and sat on slanted shoulders. His arms were not arms. But claws and his torso looked out of proportion with his the rest of his body. The creature also had loads of growths all over its body like some kind of aggressive form of cancer.
"I guess chemo therapy didn't, work did it?" Like every other miserable creature he'd met, this one had no sense of humour. The creature raised a long, lance like finger and like a whip he tried to stab it at him. James leapt out of the way and the lance went straight through the roof of the cable car.
It quickly pulled itself free and raised the finger again, pointing directly at James. "Didn't momma ever tell you it's rude to point?" James quipped as it tried to skewer him again, and again only succeeded in piercing the roof of the cable car.
BANG! Went a gun from inside the cable car and a spray of pellets fired up through the roof impacting the giant creature. It roared loudly, and it then dug its long, tentacle like fingers into the roof of the cable car. There came another bang from a shot gun and more pellets sprayed it, but it wasn't slowing down or dying.
"Hey! Are you ignoring me?" James shouted at the creature who seemed more interested in attacking whoever was shooting at it, than amuse James.
Bang! Another shot rang straight through it, and still it continued to attack the cable car. Feeling irritated, James pulled a long, hefty baseball bat from the inside pocket of his jacket. He cocked the bat back and just to be irritating he tapped the massive creature on the shoulder with his free hand. "Hey buddy, can I talk to you for a second?" He said, and when it turned to roar at him James let him have it. With one swipe across the torso the creature stumbled back and with another bang from the shot gun the creature lost its balance and fell into the darkness below.
"Hey! Wait for me!" James cried and leapt down after it. He wasn't finished with it yet.
Landing on the stone floor with all the grace of a cat he looked around, left and right, but all he could see was darkness. "Hey! Calm down and I'll take you back to hospital, how does that sound?" Still no reply, just shuffling in the pitched darkness. "Or if you prefer, give me a shot gun and I'll put you out of your misery!"
James produced a match from his pocket and he struck it across his elbow so it ignited. He screamed like a girl so loudly his teeth screamed with him. "FRANK, HOW COME YOU AIN'T DEAD?" Standing inches from James in the flickering light the tall, pale faced, balled giant just stared at him with that blank expression. His coat had been burned off revealing his powerful looking chest, on which James could see a beating heart actually graphed onto his skin. "Heart transplant didn't go well did it, no wonder you're so pissed." James grinned "You should sue."
The moment those words left his mouth, Frank had lifted his powerful arms up and crashed them down onto James head. Flattening him like an accordion and his body actually folded up like one. "No sense of humour, some people."
Out of the darkness came another figure, the cancer patient with two heads. The two giants stood facing each other as James unfolded himself back into his original shape.
"Hey, Two Face." He decided to name the new creature. "Meet Frank. Frank, Two Face. Come to think of it, did you two go to the same surgery?" James sent himself into a whirl and emerged in the black and grey clothes of a wrestling referee. "Now I want a nice clean fight, nothing below the belt or in the chops. Do either of you still have chops? HEY, TWO FACE WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"
Two Face was slowly walking away towards the cave wall and began leaping from ledge to ledge until he reached a tunnel at the top and vanished. "I guess Frank wins by default... GAH!" He muffled as Franks large hands grabbed him by the head and crushed it.
Frank lifted James off the ground so his legs dangled below. The masked man squirmed until his head popped free above Franks clenched fingers, though his neck was still trapped in his grip and was now elongated.
"Say Frank, what exactly is it about me that attracts your attention?" He asked. For a moment James thought Frank wasn't going to answer, but the look on the giants face told him otherwise as he raised his giant hand and pointed it directly at James' face. "What my face? Yeah, gorgeous isn't it! Bit on the green side though, don't you agree? Or don't you like people with green heads? Racist!" Frank ignored his flippant comments as the giant gripped the small hooked nose and pulled violently, stretching it out away from his face until it was incredibly long. Ah, it's not his face Frank found offensive. James suddenly realised as he got the hint.
"Okay, I take a hint it's not my head that offends you, it's my mask isn't it?" As if to answer Frank grabbed James' lips and pulled on them causing them to stretch as if he was trying to remove the Mask from James face. "Sorry I asked!" His lips said despite being five feet away from his head. But this creature can't want the Mask can it? How could he possibly know about it? Well, he wasn't about to give it up without a fight.
James arms stretched behind Frank, went under the remains of his coat and grabbed some kind of dull, grey undergarment and pulled on it with such force he could stretch it over Frank's head; and he did. It snapped shut right over his eyes, yet his face remained the cold mask of un-amusement. Frank let go of James' lips and this allowed James to cry. "HA! WEDGIE!" and Frank hit James so hard he flew backwards, and smacked into the stone wall behind him.
As Frank slowly approached, his footfalls creating loud thuds. James emerged from the crumbling stone, now dressed in a hard hat, blue overalls and a red shirt. He also held a heavy pick axe which he was leaning against his shoulder.
"HI HO, HI HO, IT'S THROUGH YOUR SKULL THIS GOES!" and James swiped the axe down onto Franks head and it embedded itself straight into the top of his skull up to the handle. Frank came to a stop, but only for a moment as he reached up and snapped the axe's pole in two. The angry giant, now with the head of a pick axed buried deep into his skull, continued his menacing walk towards James who just backed away at Franks approach.
"WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!" James fumed.
Suddenly James saw a bright light firing from wherever that cable car high above had gone. A flare of some kind, it arched through the air and started coming down directly towards them. James produced another, sturdy bat, ran to where the flare was going to land and before it hit the ground James smacked the flare and it went directly at Frank, who caught it the second before it burst into a brighter white flame.
Frank was blinded for just long enough for James to morph into a cowboy outfit complete with lasso that he swung, and used to place a loop over Franks shoulders trapping his arms. Then, with Frank tired up, James knocked him down and hog tied him so his massive arms and legs were bound together. From James' back pocket he produced a red hot branding iron with the initials J.M. on it which stood for James and Mask naturally, and he pressed it sharply onto Franks rear end and held it there for so long it began burning into his flesh. It ended up going so deep that no matter how much James tugged he couldn't remove it, so he decided to leave it there.
All the while James was aware the cable car had been called back to its original position and had set off along the chasm yet again.
DING, DING, DING, DING! Went James digital watch on his left wrist. The time was 5:30am... 5:30am?! It would be sun up in a few hours. He needed to get the weapons he'd collected back to Elaine and the gang before the sun came up or James, the original James was zombie chow without the Mask's powers.
"Sorry to have to leave you all tied up like this." James said grinned broadly at Franks bound form. "But I gotta go before sun up or I'll turn back into a pumpkin!" Frank finally managed to rip his bonds apart and he stood up. Man, this guy's just gonna keep coming. James thought, I'd better get rid of him now.
"But before I go let me give you a parting gift." James' clothes morphed back into those of a construction worker and from his back pocket he produced a large cement mixer. He tipped it up so cement poured out of it around Franks feet and within seconds he was standing in solid cement shoes. The giant was stuck. "I think they suit you." James grinned again. He rushed over to the cave wall, produced a jack hammer and hammered away at the wall until he struck a water main. Water began to pour out into the cavern and it rapidly began to fill up.
"Aren't you guys happy Mr. Paradox rated this story an M? This stuff ain't for babies!" James said for no logical reason he could think of. Just as the water covered James head he said. "I hope you can hold your breath Franky, NOT!"
Then Frank vanished under the rising water.
Of course, James was unharmed. He emerged later from deep underground at some kind of train depo or something. He'd arrived just in time to see a platform with a large, diesel engine on it suddenly begin to drop down into the ground on a large elevator. James so wanted to follow, but time was running out. He needed to get back to the hideout before the Mask decided to detach itself again.
Rushing through the zombie infested streets he soon arrived at the roof top where mere hours ago he had battled Frank for the first time. The sky was yellow with the rising sun, he'd just made it! Now with a heavy sack on his back, guns sticking out of the opening at the top; James approached the door to the hideout. He noticed the inverted James shaped hole he'd created earlier when Frank threw him, it had been boarded up.
Suddenly the Masked James came to a stop. There's just one thing he had to do before presenting himself to them with these weapons.
Dropping the sack to the floor with a clang James reached behind his head and instinctively knew what to do. He found a fold at the back of his head where the two sides of the Mask met. Digging his nails into it, he began to pull and the Mask began to part. He pulled harder, but the Mask fought to stay attached to him and James continued to pull. A whirl of wind circled around him and his own red suit blurred as his borrowed leather jacket began to reform back into existence. The Mask turned from a warm, rubbery texture, back to a cold, wooden one as it reformed itself back into its inert Viking mask shape. The Mask clung to James' cheeks and he yelped a little, the Mask really didn't want to come off, but eventually it did and his face snapped back into place.
He was just James again.
Wow, what a rush. James thought. That was actually fun, he'd defeated zombies, Lickers, giant spiders and even a couple of giant monsters, and came back unharmed, un-frightened, and inside he was still laughing at all he'd done tonight. But, now that he thought about it, he realised his humour had taken on a very dark tone later in the night, especially when it came to dealing with Irons and Frank. Just thinking about what he was going to do to them, just sent a shiver down his spine. He admitted he'd seriously tripped out, but at least he'd done some good and got some weapons for Carl and the gang.
Deciding not to dwell on it any longer James took the Mask and tucked it under his arm inside his leather jacket where it would remain safe. He hauled the sack of guns back onto his shoulders.
He approached the door, pushed it open and walked inside said. "Hello, guys?" He had no idea how he was going to explain where he got these guns from, but he'll dream up some story later. Right now he really needed some sleep, and he quickly got some as something sharply hit him hard on the back of the head. He dropped everything, the guns and the Mask, and he fell to the floor, his mind blacked out into unconsciousness.
To Be Continued...
Authors notes: Been a while since I've updated this story so I hope I didn't disappoint.
This is more of a fun run around with James in the Mask taking part in the action of Resident Evil 2 without the main, playable characters actually knowing of his existence. I've also put in an explanation why the doors in the RPD in RE 2 were boarded up in RE 3 –which at first is set before RE 2-
Update (21/06/12) changed the confrontation between the Mask and Chief Irons as I was not happy with it. Now the Mask comes across Irons' mutilated remains.