Deadly Silence: Resident Evil
Chapter Thirty Eight: The Tyrant
Valentine couldn't help continually crying out in pain as she was dragged through the security door, and pulled across remarkably shiny floor of some kind of laboratory. All along the walls there was expensive looking monitoring equipment, as well as control panels with indicator lights and buttons that were blinking in random patterns. Several glass storage tubes were standing in neat rows at the center of the room, but although each one was empty, they were all far bigger and taller than what was needed to hold a person.
Like the rest of the facility, this place was incredibly brightly lit, but so pristine that it looked like no one had been inside since before everything went to hell in this place. Of course, the floor wasn't looking so shiny now that the young woman's boots were scuffing it up, but what else could have been expected while she was being dragged around by the hair? For a moment there was relief when Wesker let go of her hair once they reached the far end of the room, but then it returned when the Captain pulled her to her feet.
Backhanding her across the face when she tried to fight back, Valentine was left dazed for a second, but it was long enough for him to twist her arm behind her back and shove her forward so that the young woman's face was pressed up against some really thick glass, and… and what in the living fuck was that?! It was another of the storage tubes set against the back wall, but unlike the others, this one was definitely not empty.
"Magnificent, isn't it?" Wesker asked, grabbing her hair again to make her look more closely at the occupant. "Nothing to say for once, Jill? Fine then, just stand there in awe at the ultimate biological weapon… Tyrant."
It stood higher than a man, almost eight feet tall if she had to guess, but also stocky and muscular, with its pale-white skin just a tiny bit blurred by the fluid that filled the tank. No hair at all, nor lips, or even genitals, this… abomination just stood there motionless, except for the slow beating of its gigantic, exposed heart… as well as a slight, random twitching every now and then from the insanely large set of claws that was mounted onto its torso where the left arm should have been.
"That's right, Jill, I'm taking the data, the refined T-Virus sample, and the Tyrant prototype." The Captain explained. "And then I'm going to sell all of these secrets to the highest bidder, and then Umbrella will see which of us needs the other… but first you and your friends have to die."
Pulling her away from the glass, Wesker suddenly rammed her face back into it, before kicking her in the back of the leg so that Valentine had to kneel down, and finally looping his arm around her neck in a kind of sleeper hold. The way he had done it, her arms were trapped above her head, and the Captain's grip just got tighter until the young woman's vision was starting to darken until…
Boom! Wesker's grip on her neck was released when a large caliber bullet struck him in the back, forcing the Captain to stumble sideways where he fell against the largest control panel in the room… but it wasn't quite enough to stop him from reaching for his own pistol. Boom! The second shot, which Valentine saw came from Burton as he pulled the trigger of his magnum revolver, slammed into Wesker's chest, lifting the man off his feet, where he crashed down right on top of the control panel… and didn't move.
"B… Barry!" Valentine exclaimed between coughing. "You… came back!"
"I couldn't let him hurt any more of my friends, Jill." The big man answered, clearly having mixed feelings about what he had done. "Come on, we have to find a way out of here before he misses a check in time or something!"
It took the young woman a couple attempts, mostly due to the coughing as she crawled across the floor toward him, but she eventually was able to tell Burton the truth; that no one was holding his family hostage… it was just him… the man who had been supposed to be their leader, who was now… holy shit, Wesker was still moving, and now he was reaching for his pistol and… no, he wasn't after the pistol… he was pushing buttons on the control panel!
The big man ran over to it, and pulled the Captain away from the buttons so that he fell to the floor in a bleeding heap, but apparently the damage had already been done. With a sharp beep of the control panel, the amber colored indicator light above the Tyrant's storage tank turned green, and then there was a gurgling sound as the water inside the tank began to drain out. Valentine's eyes were fixed on the tank as the last of the water vanished, and the monster's heart began to beat faster.
"Barry, I think… I think it's waking up!" The young woman exclaimed, frantically searching the control panel. "Where is it?! There's gotta be an emergency stop, or an override, or something"!
Both of them started searching the control panel, finally resorting to pressing random buttons, but it seemed that nothing could stop the process once it was started… and then the monster's heavily glazed over eyes opened. For a moment it just looked around as if confused, but then punched the reinforced glass so hard that some cracks formed around the impact mark. The angry roar that followed was muffled by the glass, and as the two of them started backing away toward the door, Valentine was just noticing that Wesker was gone and…
SMASH! With a swing of its massive claws, the glass was exploded outward, raining down onto the floor as the Tyrant took its first step out of the storage tank. Thump… thump… thump, the monster's slow, deliberate footsteps made the floor vibrate as Valentine and Burton backed away, and it was just starting to raise its large claw when the big man aimed his magnum revolver.
Boom! The first shot struck the monster in its most obvious target, it's exposed, oversized heart, but although the large caliber bullet made Tyrant stumble back a couple steps, there was no significant damage that they could see. Boom! The second shot slammed into the center of the monster's chest, again making it stumble backwards, but only temporarily delaying it from resuming that same slow, deliberate approach. Boom! The third shot struck it right between the eyes, rocking the monster's head back so violently that it was knocked off its feet, shattering one of the central holding tanks as it crashed right through on the way down to the floor.
"Run!" Valentine yelled, grabbing Burton's arm when Tyrant started to get up almost immediately. "Come on, Barry, run!"
In this particular instance, it seemed that Wesker had the right idea, running away from the monster, with his blood trail leading out of the lab and back down the hall to the elevator. Thankfully, the security door closed and locked behind them, hopefully giving them time to get up the elevator, but the young woman's heart nearly stopped when they reached the shaft, only to find that the car was not there.
The Captain must have already taken the elevator up, so Valentine had to push the button and wait for it to return… which normally wouldn't have been so bad… if Tyrant wasn't already roaring and putting dents into the heavy metal security door. The elevator's cables were starting to move now, which was great since the car would be down there in a matter of seconds, but not so great when the door to the laboratory flew off its hinges with a loud crash!
"God damn this thing!" Burton yelled, passing the young woman her pistol and shotgun. "At least its slow moving, so maybe we won't even…
Suddenly the monster stopped moving, crouched down, and then sprinted, moving down the hall toward them with greater speed than should have been possible. Boom! Startled by this sudden burst of speed, the big man aimed his revolver and fired the last round in the cylinder, sending the bullet right into Tyrant's knee, knocking it off balance. With another roar that sounded almost like surprise, the monster did a kind of sideways dive, its claw making a long trail as it easily tore through the wall's material before falling on its face.
As before, Tyrant began to get up almost immediately after falling down, as if all of Burton's bullets had done nothing at all, but at least the fall had given the elevator car time to reach them. Rushing inside and pushing the button as fast as she could, the young woman's heart was about to bust right out of her chest as the monster slowly got to its feet, but then the elevator's door closed, and it started moving up.
More of Wesker's blood was inside, but at the moment Valentine didn't really care about the Captain, as she was more concerned with how the hell they were going to get out of this nightmare, especially with something like the Tyrant after them now. Okay, the good news… the elevator had gotten there on time, as far as she knew, Redfield and Chambers were still alive, and there didn't seem to be any other ways up from that lowest level except for the elevator… okay, so it was pretty obvious what had to be done.
Once the car reached the top of the shaft, and the two of them got out, the young woman took out her water canteen, and set it on the door's track right where it was going to close, so that if the elevator tried to go down again, it couldn't since the door was still open. She didn't know, nor did she care if the monster was smart enough to use the elevator button, but there was no reason not to be careful.
"Okay, I think that's gonna work." She said, still trying to catch her breath while the door tried, and failed to close. "All right, let's keep going… we have to find the others and get out of here before something else…
Suddenly both of them jumped as an ear-splitting alarm started to sound throughout the facility, blasting and echoing throughout the halls and corridors, while the bright white lights of the place went out, quickly replaced with different lights that were a more subdued red color, denoting some kind of emergency. There was still some white, though, coming from flashers mounted on the corners of the ceiling, while a female voice started to be heard.
"The Self Destruct System has been activated." The voice announced calmly. "All personnel must evacuate immediately. Repeat, the Self Destruct System has been activated… this is a First Class Emergency… deactivating and releasing all locks."