Chapter 14: Be a Hero
"I'm going to take a puff. Keep an eye on those…things." A soldier said to another as he puts away his rifle. He walks away from the metal gates surrounding the entrance of the hotel.
The soldier walks over to a tree and lean against it. He then takes out his cigarette and a lighter.
As soon as he places the cigarette into his mouth though, Yuri suddenly jumps down from the large branch above the soldier and lands right on top of him. He quickly gets off the soldier and pulls him up by the back of his vest. He then turns the soldier around and slams his head right against the trunk of the tree several times. Yuri drops the soldier to the ground and he loses consciousness.
He quickly drags him to the back of the tree, completely unnoticed. Yuri kneels down and quickly opens every pouch on the soldier's vest. He managed to find three grenades and some ammunition for his rifle and gladly takes them. Yuri examines the ammo clips and puts them into the pouches of his vest.
He also sees a combat knife sheathed inside a pouch wrapped around the soldier's right leg. Yuri removes the knife and sheathes it into his machete pouch. His machete had been taken away from Alexei when he was captured so the knife will serve as its replacement.
Yuri stood up and pokes his head out from the back of the tree. He is currently facing the left side of the hotel and took a look at the metal gates surrounding the entrance. Behind the gates, the infected screeched and growled as they squeeze their fingers through the fence and maneuver their mouths through the links, trying to grab and bite the soldiers standing in front of them. There are barbed wires installed on top of the fence to prevent them from climbing over. Some lifeless infected corpses lie on top of the barbed wires to serve as a grim reminder to what happens when they try to go over.
Two soldiers laugh as they watch the infected trying to squeeze through the fence links in vain.
"Mindless fucks." One of them remarked with a grin.
"They can growl all they want, but they will never get through the gates." The other soldier said before they turn around.
Yuri turns his head to the left and sees an unguarded door. He lies down on the ground and crawls his way over to the door. He took advantage of the tall grass to conceal himself from the soldiers who are guarding the gates. Despite the soldiers turning their heads side-to-side to survey their surroundings for intruders, they could not spot Yuri crawling his way over to the left side of the hotel.
When he finds himself in front of the door, Yuri quietly gets up from the ground and looks at the keypad next to it. He enters the passcode and hears a click at the door. He places his hand on the handle and opens the door.
"Thanks Judith." Yuri said as a smile plasters across his face. "I owe you one."
Yuri slowly enters the hotel and closes the door behind him. He snorted as he shakes his head.
"I sure wonder who the real mindless fucks are." He uttered to himself. Yuri turns around and looks around the room he is currently in. He is inside the hotel's kitchen. There are blood stains splattered everywhere in the area from the stoves and counters to the marble tiled floor.
"So this building is where it all began." Yuri commented.
He takes out his rifle and walks through the kitchen. He removes the near-empty clip from his rifle and puts it away into one of his pouches. He then takes out a fully-loaded clip and inserts it into his weapon.
When he arrived at a huge pair of doors, he slowly pushes them open and steps into the enormous dining area of the hotel's restaurant. He gasped when he sees hundreds of infected staggering around the area. He quietly goes over to the nearest table and hides behind it.
Yuri pokes his head out and watched the infected move around. Thankfully, none of them noticed him, but he certainly needs to find an alternate path to get through them. He turns his head to the right and widens his eyes when he noticed something. He spots a ventilation cover at the right wall of the restaurant. Yuri glances back at the infected before he puts away his rifle and crawls over to the cover.
He held his breath for as long as he can as he crawls through the floor. When he reached the vent cover, Yuri quietly releases his breath in relief. He gets up into a kneeling position and takes out his combat knife. He uses the knife like a screwdriver to loosen the tight screws securely holding the vent cover in its place.
After successfully detaching all four screws and thankfully not getting the infected's attention in the process, Yuri slowly removes the cover and places it aside. He puts the knife back into his machete pouch and gets inside the shaft.
He crawls through the tunnels of the shaft, making his way out of the restaurant. He kept crawling until he sees some light shining through the grilles at the side of the tunnel. He goes over to the grilles and turns his head. He widens his eyes in horror as he sees what is behind them.
The hotel foyer is filled with more infected mindlessly tottering around the area. Some of them have their heads thrown back and screeching in agony. There are blood stains, clothes and suitcases scattered across the floor. Yuri can't imagine how horrifying the images of the massacre that had happened here might have been first-hand.
After regaining his composure, he continued crawling and navigating through the shaft.
Eventually, he reached the end of the shaft and look through the grilles of the vent cover. Yuri sees that he has reached a guest room. He slowly gets himself into a kneeling position and kicks the cover with his leg several times until he successfully boots it off of its hinges. When the cover lands on the ground, he gets out of the shaft and enters the room.
Yuri looks around the area as he wipes off the sweat from his forehead. He sees that the room is empty, with the exception of four corpses lying on the floor. Three of the bodies are headless infected corpses with their decapitated heads lying nearby. The last one is a dead body that has been covered by a blanket.
Yuri carefully walks past them and momentarily stops in front of the covered body.
"Sorry to intrude, sir." Yuri bowed his head to the lifeless body before heading over to the windows. He opens the windows and looks down. He sees the metal gates surrounding the entrance of the hotel below, as well as several soldiers standing in front of them and the hundreds of infected placed behind.
Yuri takes out a grenade from one of his pouches on his vest and looks down at it.
"Let's start the party." He said. He proceeds to remove the safety pin from the grenade. He aims at the metal gates and tosses the grenade at them.
Yuri stood at the window and watched it landing right behind the metal gates. The soldier, who was standing in front of where his grenade had landed, turned around in confusion as he heard a sound.
The soldier looks down at the ground and widens his eyes. "What the-"
BOOOOOOMMMMM!
The remaining soldiers turn to the explosion, completely startled. When the smoke is cleared, they are horrified to see that a section of the metal gates had been destroyed. The infected see the opening that Yuri had created for them and they let out ferocious screeches as they immediately run over to the opening and breach through it.
"DON'T STAND AROUND! OPEN FIRE!" One of the soldiers yelled. The soldiers quickly hold up their rifles and began firing at the escaping infected. They are able to shoot down the first wave of the infected, but as soon as their weapons ran out of bullets, this allows the other infected to quickly run over and tackle them to the ground before the soldiers had any chance to reload their rifles.
The soldiers scream in pain and agony as the infected gnaw at them or tear off their clothing and flesh.
After watching the massacre he had created, Yuri turns away from the windows and makes his way out of the room. He opens the door, turns to his left and dash through the hallway.
When he reached the end, he opens the door and runs down the stairs. He arrives at the second floor and looks down. He sees that at the bottom, there are two soldiers standing behind the door which leads to the foyer of the hotel. Between them and the door is a metal gate which is installed as extra security to prevent the infected from coming inside.
The two men are both startled and confused as they heard the loud screeching coming from behind the door.
"What the hell is going on outside?" The soldier asked the other.
"No idea. But at least we'll be safe here." The other soldier replied.
What he said prove to be a tragic mistake as Yuri unpins his second grenade and tosses it at the metal gate.
The two soldiers look down and widen their eyes in horror at the grenade.
"LOOK OU-" That was all one of them had to say before it explodes. Yuri quickly runs up the stairs and returns back to the same floor he had been before.
He sprints through the hallway and reached the other end of it. He opens the door and climbs up the stairs. As he climbed, he could hear loud screams which is a mixture of the loud screeching of the infected and the agonizing cries of Alexei's soldiers. There's no doubt by now, he would have attracted Alexei's attention as well.
"Hang on Estelle, I'm coming for you." Yuri muttered under his breath.
After climbing up three floors however, Yuri quickly stops and backs away when a bullet is fired and landed right in front of his foot. He looks up and sees a soldier pointing his rifle at him.
"Don't move!" The soldier yelled at Yuri. Suddenly, the door beside him burst open and an infected pounces onto the soldier, making him drop his weapon.
"AH! GET OFF OF ME!" The soldier cried helplessly as he whirls around, trying to get the infected off of his back. The infected lets out a howl before sinking her teeth onto the soldier's shoulder, causing him to shriek.
Yuri draws out his combat knife and goes over to the infected from behind. He holds up his knife and brings it down onto the infected's back, making her screech in pain. Yuri then pulls the infected off of the soldier's back and tosses her down to the bottom of the flight of stairs and removing his knife in the process. Yuri yells as he pounces onto the infected and as he lands on top of her, he stabs his knife into her chest, killing her instantly.
Yuri then gets off the infected and removes his knife. He turns back to the soldier who is shaking and rolling over the floor in pain. Yuri knows he is going to turn into one of them very soon. He gets out his rifle and aims at the suffering soldier.
"Sorry, sir." He uttered before he fires a well-aimed bullet into the soldier's head. The soldier instantly stops rolling and lies on the floor motionlessly.
"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!"
Yuri could hear another soldier screaming from the open door. He runs up the stairs and turns his head to the hallway. He widens his eyes as a horde of infected pinning four soldiers onto the floor and viciously gnawing at them. Despite their best efforts, the soldiers could never fight and push the infected back.
Yuri is surprised that the infected had already reached this high up after only a few minutes since he started the massacre. Some of the infected look up and see Yuri standing at the doorway. They roared at him ferociously.
"FUCK!" Yuri shouted before he quickly closed the door and continued running up the stairs.
When he reached the top of another flight of stairs, Yuri could hear the door bursting off from its hinges and the infected began running their way up. This causes Yuri to sprint faster than he ever did before.
However, after climbing up three more floors, Yuri sees that the next flight of stairs is blocked by several suitcases and a hotel luggage trolley. This causes Yuri to turn to the door beside him and enter another hallway. When he reached the middle, he whirls about as sees the infected reaching the door and running over to him.
"COME ON!" Yuri shouted at them as he began firing at the infected. "I'LL TAKE YOU ALL ON!"
Yuri slowly backs away as he continuously fires at the advancing horde of infected. Several infected fall onto the floor dead as the bullets shot through their heads and bodies.
After Yuri's rifle ran out of bullets, five remaining infected charge towards him. Yuri puts away his rifle. He steps forward and kicks the nearest infected to the floor.
When he turns to the second nearest infected, he draws out his combat knife and slashes it across his throat. As the infected rolls his eyes back and slumps to the floor, Yuri turns to the third infected and quickly stabs his knife into the side of his head. He then pushes the third infected against the wall just as the first one recovered and got back up to its feet.
Yuri turns to the first infected and kicks him in the stomach, causing him to fall onto the floor again. The fourth infected grabbed Yuri from behind and before he could bite him, Yuri quickly bends over and tosses him to the floor.
Yuri swiftly turns around and swings his fist across the fifth infected, sending her sprawling through the floor.
He turns back to the lifeless body of the third infected and removes the combat knife from the side of his head. As the first infected got up from the floor again, Yuri throws his knife at his forehead, killing him instantly.
As the fourth and fifth infected recovered and got up from the floor, they both charge at Yuri. Yuri turns to the fifth infected and swiftly grabs her arm. He whirls about and throws her at the fourth infected, sending them stumbling onto the floor.
Yuri yells as he runs over to the two remaining infected and kicks off the fifth one off of the other. The fourth infected roared at Yuri one last time before he quickly stomps his foot onto his head, killing him instantly.
He then grabs the fifth infected by the collar of her blouse and pulls her up. He then places his hand behind her head and yells again as he charges over to the wall and smashes her head against it. Yuri then releases his grip and the infected falls to the floor, leaving a trail of blood on the wall.
Yuri takes a quick break to catch his breath before he goes over to the lifeless body of the first infected and removes the knife from his forehead. After he puts it away, he turns around and makes his way to the left end of the hallway.
He reloads his rifle as he ran. As he opens the door, he sees a soldier firing his shotgun at a group of infected. Despite being able to shoot down several of them, he eventually runs out of bullets and the two remaining infected pounce onto him and pin him to the floor.
The soldier cried for help as soon as they did. Yuri quickly fires his rifle at the infected, getting them off of the soldier. When the soldier removes the dead infected off of his body however, he widens his eyes and drops his jaw in horror and sees that his left arm and right leg have been bitten.
He turns to Yuri who walks over and stands above him.
"Kill me." The soldier begged.
Yuri sighed before he aims his rifle at the soldier's forehead and fires a shot. After killing the soldier, he puts away his rifle and kneels down. He opens the soldier's ammo pouch, found some shotgun shells inside and takes them all. He takes out his shotgun which originally belonged to Rita and inserts the shells into it. After pulling back the fore-end of his shotgun, he gets up and continues running up the stairs.
After climbing up two floors, he looks up and sees that the stairs are blocked again by another pile of suitcases and a luggage trolley. Yuri turns to his right and opens the door beside him.
"FIRE!"
Yuri gasped as he sees a group of soldiers kneeling down at the middle of the hallway. He quickly gets out of the way as soon as they fire their rifles. As he hides behind the door, he could hear loud screeching from the infected coming from below. He knows that there are more of them coming their way up.
He closes his eyes and kneels down as he stayed hidden behind the door. He could hear the infected arriving and runs through the doorway that Yuri had opened for them.
The soldiers yell as they fire at the advancing infected. But despite their best efforts, the number of infected charging towards them is overwhelming. The surviving infected reach the soldiers and tackle them to the floor.
Yuri could hear screaming and agonizing cries from the soldiers as he kneels behind the door. He pokes his head out to make sure that all of the infected have entered the hallway. When the coast is clear, Yuri closed the door.
This got the attention of the infected who were standing near the doorway. They turn around and suddenly, Yuri fires a huge blast from his shotgun, destroying the door and killing the infected who were near it.
Every infected in the hallway turn to Yuri and dash over to him. Yuri continuously fires his shotgun at the infected as he slowly walks down the hallway. With every blast he made with his shotgun, he shot down several infected, making his job in clearing out the hallway easier for him.
When the soldiers fully transformed into their new infected forms, they rose from the floor and dash over to Yuri. Yuri turns to the newly-turned infected and fires all of them down with his last shotgun round.
As he reached the middle of the hallway, he turns around and sees another group of infected entering through the doorway.
Yuri quickly takes out his third and final grenade and removes the safety pin. He tosses it at the group of infected, turns around and pounces to the floor.
When he landed, the grenade exploded, killing the entire group of infected. Yuri coughed as smoke consumed the hallway. He then gets up from the floor when it cleared. He turned around and took a brief look at the destruction he had created. Afterwards, he turns his head back to the front and puts away his now-emptied shotgun.
He runs over to the other end of the hallway. Yuri opens the door and climbs up the stairs. He kept going upwards until he reached the thirtieth floor, which is the highest guest room floor of the hotel. He opens the door and stopped.
Yuri sees that standing right in front of him and at the middle of the hallway was Yeager, holding onto his own combat knife tightly with his right hand.
"Yeager, right?" Yuri said as he glared at his enemy.
Yeager snorted in response. "You never should have come back here." He said icily to Yuri.
"I've come back here to save Estelle. And you're certainly not going to stop me." Yuri said as he steps forward. "Now where is she?"
"Don't worry about her. She's still alive. In fact, she and Alexei are waiting for you at the rooftop." Yeager gestures to the red door beside him. "Too bad I cannot allow you to see her again. But you can save all of your troubles by shooting me with your guns right now."
Yuri stopped when he is near Yeager by a short distance. He shakes his head at him and draws out his own combat knife. A lopsided grin takes form on Yeager's face.
Yuri slightly tilts his head to the side and he said flatly to Yeager, "Let's get this over with."
The two men yell as they charge towards each other. When they are near each other, Yeager swings his knife horizontally. Yuri dodged by sliding through the floor and slashes Yeager's lower leg with his knife.
Yeager yells in pain as he turns around and sees Yuri quickly getting up. Yuri ran forward to him and swings his knife horizontally at him. Yeager dodges his attack by backing away. He quickly brings his knife up and swings it vertically at Yuri. Yuri kneels down and blocks the attack by holding up his knife and the two stayed at a stalemate.
The two men push their knives against each other for a moment until Yeager managed to push Yuri back, sending him falling to the floor. Yeager brings down his knife at him but Yuri quickly rolls over. However, as Yuri gets up, Yeager turned and swings his knife vertically at him, damaging Yuri's vest and slashing across his chest.
Yuri cries in pain as he backs away from Yeager who stood up from the floor. Yeager slashes his knife diagonally at him but Yuri quickly dodges his attack by rolling over the floor. Blood is now pouring out from his chest wound as Yuri gets up and holds up his knife in front of his face. He stared boldly at Yeager as he stood still.
Ignoring the pain coming from his leg, Yeager dashes at Yuri and swings his knife diagonally again. Yuri stepped to his right and the attack missed. Yeager turned to Yuri and slashes his knife horizontally at him. Yuri dodges his attack again by ducking down and swiftly stabbing the knife to the side of his abdomen. Yeager lets out an agonizing scream and drops his weapon as Yuri pushes him and pins him against the wall.
As Yeager looks down at him with his eyes wide, Yuri removes his knife from his abdomen. He lets out a yell as he looks up at Yeager and brings his weapon down at his chest. Yeager stops him by grabbing his wrist. He grits his teeth as he tries to restrain Yuri. However, Yuri overcomes his opponent by pushing back. He yelled again as he slowly lowers his knife and the blade sinks into Yeager's chest.
Yeager lifts his head up and choked as the knife stabbed through his chest. He lets out one final gasp before his eyes rolled back and his head slumped to the side.
Yuri then removes his knife and tosses Yeager's body to the floor. He breathed heavily as he stared blankly at his opponent's lifeless corpse. He briefly looks down at his knife which is now covered with blood. He swings his knife to flick off the blood before putting it away into his machete pouch.
He turns to the elevator which is located at the middle of the hallway. Next to it is the red door. Yuri walks over to the door and opens it, revealing a staircase. He looks up and sees that it is only a few flights of stairs leading up to the rooftop of the hotel. At last, he will be able to see Estelle again. But unfortunately, Alexei will also be waiting for him up there.
He narrows his eyes and said under his breath,
"Estelle…I'm coming for you. And Alexei…I'm going to take you down."
Sovereign: I would like to thank AquaBluey for reviewing and Crimson-Tuna-Sub for checking out my story. Thanks guys!