Las Plagas: Resident Evil IV
Chapter Twelve: A Hooded Man
It seemed like more than a minute passed between the red skinned villager being dragged back through the shed door by the unknown attacker, and the time when footsteps could be heard coming back toward where Leon and Luis were still helplessly chained together… although it was probably only a few seconds. Whatever the time measurement was, it didn't stop the two of them from trying again and again to get their arms free of their bonds, which on one hand was easier since the dark haired man was no longer panicking, but then again they had fallen over sideways, so moving at all was a bit difficult.
The dry wooden door had fallen shut again on its own after the action was over, leaving the Agent and his cellmate alone in the small tool room with the bodies of the two villagers who had been killed… the good news about this was that one of them had a set of keys on his belt, one of which must have been able to fit into the padlock that Leon could feel with his fingers… not that it mattered now that the shed door was slowly opening again.
"Parece que estamos seguros por el momento." A voice said as the footsteps behind them entered the room. "Well, aren't you two a just a sight to behold?"
What surprised Leon the most at first was how different this person's voice sounded between speaking Spanish and English, talking the local tongue like a native, but then such a thick cockney accent when saying things he could understand that it almost sounded… maybe forced? Trying his best to turn his head around so that he could see who was there, the Agent was surprised again when he saw a man standing there in a tattered black long coat.
Heavy boots and the legs of black trousers could be seen at the bottom where the coat was torn the most, while a raggedy pair of old leather gloves covered his hands, and the coat's thick hood was pulled up over the man's head… leaving only his cold blue eyes visible between that and the thin purple scarf that was pulled up to cover the majority of his face. However, it was only after looking at the sandy colored hiking backpack that the hooded man was wearing, that Leon noticed the blood dripping down from the blade of the long knife in his hand… a knife that looked exactly like the one the Agent had lost in the village.
"Hey quien demonios eres?" Luis asked as the hooded man took the key ring off the dead villager's belt. "No eres de por aqui, no con ese acento."
"Bien al menos uno de ustedes presta atencion a su entorno." The hooded man replied, laughing a little while stabbing the knife into the floor next to Leon's head hard enough so that it stuck there. "Pero estaria mas preocupado por el chico que no hable espanol… heh… makes me wonder how someone like you managed to survive Raccoon City in the first place."
For a second Leon was shocked to hear about Raccoon City from someone who lived in a place like this, but from it his mind could only draw two conclusions: Either this person spent a lot of time out in the real world, which was doubtful from how he wore the same kind of shabby old fashioned clothes as the rest of the villagers, or he was some kind of enemy agent there to do… who even knew what, kind of like Ada Wong's mission back in '98. Well, regardless of what the hooded man's deal was, Leon wasn't going to be played for a fool… in fact, he was going to get some straight answers from this guy… as soon as the padlock opened.
Click, the instant the chains fell away from his arms, the Agent grabbed the knife from the floor while rolling backwards away from the stranger. Taking a split second to look at the knife, and seeing from the engraving near the hilt that it was, in fact, the one he had stabbed into that villager's head while fighting Salvador, Leon jumped to his feet while holding up the weapon, not in a completely threatening manner, but definitely a stance that let everyone in the room know that he was in charge.
"Leon, what are you doing?" Luis asked as he and the hooded man got up. "I'm pretty sure this guy just saved our lives."
"Yeah, that might be true." The Agent said, not taking his eyes off the hooded man. "But if he's not like the villagers, then why didn't they capture him, too, huh? Better yet, how did he know where to find us, and most importantly, how did he know I survived Raccoon City?"
"They didn't capture me because I'm not an idiot who burns down people's houses." The hooded man answered, scoffing at the questions. "Unlike you, I speak Spanish, and I know how to use a thing called stealth, which is useful for, oh I don't know, maybe listening to the locals talking about the new prisoners, perhaps?"
As far as excuses went, these were pretty good ones, but that didn't explain how he knew about Raccoon City… at least not until the hooded man made Leon feel kind of stupid when the stranger said that he couldn't have possibly heard about it while the Agent was in there telling Luis all about his mission and background. Yeah, he probably shouldn't have given out so much information about himself, regardless of believing at the time that the dark haired man was the only one around who spoke English.
"Okay, fine." Leon said, slowly lowering the knife. "So, who are you then?"
"You mean, besides the guy who just saved your life?" The hooded man laughed. "I'm nobody special, really, just a traveling peddler, a merchant if you like the fancy words. Now, I see you're a bit thick, friend, so you might not have noticed that things are a little crazy around here… so as a special offer, for today only, I'm dealing in exactly what you need at the time."
The Agent tensed up a little when this Merchant reached into his coat, but then almost laughed himself at what the hooded man pulled out. It was a pistol, a Colt .45 revolver to be exact, and along with it a holster attached to a cartridge belt that was completely lined with bullets. It was certainly what he needed, since the 9mm pistol he had brought was kicked over the cliff back at the bridge, although Leon personally didn't care for revolvers… they held fewer rounds and were slower to reload, but still, in this case a weapon was a weapon.
"See, now isn't this nice?" The Merchant continued as the Agent took them. "Now, that's a man's gun, so it might take you some getting used to… sort of like giving a twelve year old his first beer, ay?"
Trying his best to ignore the insults that flowed form the hooded man's mouth like a whole separate language, Leon put on the belt, and had to grit his teeth a little to ignore the Merchant's snickering as his hands fumbled more than he wanted to admit while loading the revolver. The Agent imagined that he would get used to this awkward weapon after a while just like with everything else, and it was a larger caliber than the 9mm, which based on how the locals shrugged off injuries, he was going to need.
Luis asked the hooded man if he happened to have another weapon handy, only to look disappointed when the Merchant picked up a pitchfork from the floor and pushed it into the dark haired man's hands, and then the three of them walked out of the shed, and back into the freezing cold outside air. The sun could just barely be seen through the thick gray clouds, and a couple hours must have passed, since it was a lot higher up than it was before… and so was the place where they were standing.
Unlike the forests that surrounded the village, this place looked more like the mountains, or rather… carved right into the mountain? There were trees, but only visible up on the ridgeline that was high above, with this area being like a geographical depression… had to be a way out, though, or else how would the shack have been built? This was a higher part, though, and as the Agent looked farther down into the carved out surface, he could see other buildings that skirted the perimeter of a bottomless pit… as well as a few less than stable rope and plank bridges that spanned right across the abyss.
"Okay, the first thing we have to do is figure out where we are." Leon said, starting toward the path that went down toward the other buildings. "It looks like we're going to have to do some searching around to find a way out, though… all right, let's get moving."
"Are you fucking serious right now?" The Merchant asked, stopping Leon in mid-step. "Well, unless your plan is to get beat up and captured for the third time in a single day, you might want to take a look around you, because all the answers are right here."
The Agent wasn't sure what he meant by that, so the hooded man scoffed again, before motioning for the two of them to come closer while he crouched down on the ground. The first thing he did was pick up some of the dirt, which seemed to sparkle a bit when it was scattered by the wind, and then the hooded man pointed to the footprints of all different sizes that went back and forth from the shed to the path. Finally, he put his finger to his lips, and told them to listen to the other sounds that could be heard over the wind.
At first Leon didn't hear anything, but wait… there was something else… he could hear what sounded like digging… and something heavy and metal being moved along a track, along with… a furnace? The Merchant then explained that not only was this place the village's personal gold mine, but that it was a very active one where plenty of workers toiled all day long without rest… the perfect place to hold prisoners, since the only way out was right through the main work area.
"What did you think?" The hooded man asked, standing back up. "That the Chief left you there with only two guards, and then just forgot about you? You're not dealing with brainless zombies this time, kid; I know it's a stretch for a dolt like you, but you can't just bull-charge your way through this like you did on the Starlight… you're gonna have to use your head."
"Well, then how did you get in here?" Luis asked, unable to hide the nervousness in his voice. "You couldn't have gone through the main entrance if the workers are here, they would have spotted you… so I'm guessing you found another way."
In response, the Merchant snapped his fingers before pointing at the dark haired man as if he approved of his observations, and thankfully saying that they were correct. There was, in fact, another way out, but it wasn't going to be easy to get to.
