Pandemic: Resident Evil VI
Chapter Thirty Eight: Subject W-014
Unknown Location
June 30th, 2013
Six months, Jake Muller thought as he sat on the small cot inside of the sterile white room where he had spent the majority of the time. Six months since getting captured in the mountains of Edonia, and the young man only knew that because sometimes when he was taken for more testing, there would be a newspaper sitting on a nearby table in the lab with the date showing. Being strapped to a gurney each time, he couldn't exactly look through the paper, nor could Jake read Chinese, or whatever Asian language the print was in, but the date was in English, so it allowed him to keep track.
It wasn't much to focus on, but anything was better than thinking about how badly it hurt each time the floor of his cell was electrified in order to pacify him enough to be strapped down. The young man never knew when it was coming, and then he would be wheeled down the corridor into the laboratory, where the scientists there would take blood, or tissue samples, with another electrical pacification so that he couldn't move during the procedure. Of course, the procedures were just as agonizing, if not worse than the electricity, and Jake wasn't sure, but it seemed like these people were intentionally making every bit of this as painful as possible.
Tobias hadn't shown his face since dicking him and Sherry over in the mountains, although that woman, Ada, mentioned him to the others once or twice. As for the blonde, though, the young man had not seen her even once since Edonia, and when he asked, Ada would just laugh or pick on him about it… before having the other scientists give him another electrical pacification. Something strange happened over this whole time, though… as the months went on, the mood around the place slowly became grim; grim and anxious, almost as if these people were on a deadline that was impossible to meet.
From what he could tell, the purpose of these people experimenting on him was to somehow enhance the C-Virus that Sherry was talking about, but that also seemed to be progressing well, so what were they all so nervous about? In six months the young man hadn't managed to gather any more information than that, but given that his cell consisted of an uncomfortable cot, an intensely bright light, a metal floor, and a sealed exit that only opened from the outside… it was a miracle that Jake had learned anything at all. And to top it all off, he had been given a tattoo on his forearm like Sherry's… W-014… whatever that meant.
Unlike in Edonia, no J'avo roamed the hallways and corridors, which made sense since they probably didn't want to risk having any kind of infected tissues inside of this sterile environment. Instead, these people used human security guards; wearing light body armor and each carrying an MP5 submachinegun. No other test subjects or prisoners had been seen during his time here, unless the people in charge only had one subject out of their cells at a time, and if so, then why all the firepower?
These questions ran through Jake's mind almost as much as he walked around the cell, searching for a way to get out, even though the young man knew that there wasn't one, and in the end all he could do was wait for the next electrocution… which was actually taking a long time today. In fact, now that he thought about it, the usual check in to see if he was alive in the second part of the day hadn't happened yet, either, nor had he been given any food since this morning, but why would that be? The people running this place didn't exactly need his consent to get what they wanted, so why add more torture or play mind games?
"Hey, what's the big idea?" Jake called toward the intercom speaker in the ceiling. "Don't tell me you assholes for got about me after all this time… that would just break my heart."
He knew they could hear him, since this was usually how they checked in on him after the day's experiments were finished, and usually they just told him to shut up or something when he tried talking to them… but now all the young man could hear in response was the soft feedback from the speaker, as if… as if the place was abandoned. Sure, Jake was an experienced mercenary who had been involved in a couple wars, but the idea of being alone in a place like this was just creepy. The sudden hiss of the cell's heavy door sliding open, made the young man jump a little as it broke the silence, and then… there was nobody on the other side.
Usually a couple guards rushed in as soon as the door opened, and only after the floor had been electrified, but neither of these things happened as Jake slowly stood up, carefully making his way toward the cell's exit. Barefoot, shirtless, and wearing a pair of white sweatpants which was really all he had been given, the young man crept up to the doorframe, where he peeked out slowly into the silent corridor. Like the cell, it was brightly lit and sterile white, making it real easy for him to see the guard's black armor… but instead of patrolling, the guard was slumped against the wall, with drops of red blood on the floor around him.
Had he been attacked? Jake didn't see anyone else as he stepped out to look farther down the corridor, and no alarms were going off, so what was going on here? Figuring that maybe this was his chance to escape, the young man quickly, but quietly moved over to the fallen guard, hoping to take his weapon and leave while the laboratory dealt with… whatever the hell was going on, but once he got over to the fallen guard, Jake realized that his MP5 was missing. The rifle, ammo, and even the baton all the guards carried were all missing, and there was drying blood all down the front of his armor… coming from a nasty bite wound on the side of his neck.
Again looking down the corridor for threats when he realized what this meant, the young man searched the body again, but didn't find anything useful, since even the guard's boots were the wrong size, but then Jake noticed that the air was getting warm. Yeah, it was getting so hot near the body that his forehead started to sweat as if someone had turned the lab's heaters on, but it was still cold once he stepped back, making the young man realize that it was the body itself that was starting to smolder.
Yeah, as strange as it sounded, the dead guard's body was visibly smoldering with heatwaves as if it were slowly being cooked from the inside, and his visible skin was turning a red color as… as the body started to move. Jake had heard of zombies coming to life back in the early days of BOWs, but those had been slow and awkward, while this thing was fast. Roaring like an animal as it lunged toward him, the red monster swiped at him with fingers resembling claws that were ripping through the end of its gloves, and if Jake hadn't fallen down backwards out of shock, the thing might have cut his throat.
Instead, some sparks were made when its claws struck the wall, but it did give the young man enough time to pull his legs back and slam them into the red monster's chest just as it turned toward him, knocking it down. The amount of heat coming off this thing's body was unbelievable, since kicking it felt like he had put his feet too close to a campfire, and now the monster was smoldering even more as it scrambled to get up. With no weapons, Jake was forced to rely on hand to hand combat, which was never preferable when dealing with any kind of BOW, but it was either that or get torn apart.
Trying to stay calm while backing off a little more each time, the young man kicked the legs out from under the monster when it tried to run at him again, and then ducked under its claws when it attacked again, before palm-striking it in the side of the head, but each time the monster was knocked down, it just got right up again. Now it was smoldering to the point where black smoke was coming off it's completely reddened skin, with the heat so intense that Jake was forced to retreat back into his cell… which gave him an idea.
"All right, you freak." The young man said angrily, backing farther into the cell. "Come on… come get me, I'm right here."
Roaring as more black smoke rose from its body, the monster ran full speed into the cell, allowing Jake to drop down and trip it with his legs, causing its red skull to hit the metal floor with a loud whack! Already scrambling for the open door, the young man knew this was probably his only chance to survive, so he dove through the exit, slamming his hand onto the large button on the control panel, and then landing hard just as the door slid shut in the monster's face.
Now it was at the door's window, silently roaring and clawing in an attempt to free itself while its body smoldered more and more until… until, holy shit, the thing just burst into flames. For a few seconds its claws could still be seen hitting against the security window, but then there was just fire until… until the monster was just gone. It must have completely incinerated itself, but Jake had never heard of such a creature before, and… well, if they all self-destructed like that, then this was probably why he never heard of them.
"Not bad, kid." A familiar voice suddenly crackled through the intercom, making him jump. "Most people don't last more than a few seconds against my Crimson Heads, but you did all right."
"Tobias?!" Jake exclaimed angrily once he realized who was talking to him. "You… you left that thing there for me?! What the fuck is wrong with you?! I could've been killed!"
The young man wasn't sure what he expected the yellow eyed man to say in response, but it wasn't a high-pitch mockery of his own words, followed by a cold sounding order for him to quit whining. Tobias then shocked him further by telling Jake that he should be grateful for being let out of that cell in the first place, and that if he couldn't handle a little encounter with one Crimson Head, then he might as well go back into his cage and hide under the bed.
"I'm opening the door at the end of your hallway." The yellow eyed man continued. "Come to the security station, I need to talk to you."
With that the intercom went dead, and there was a hiss as the door at the end of the corridor slid open, meaning that there would have been no escape if the young man had tried to run from the monster the other way. Oh yeah, he was going to go to the security room, and then Jake and Tobias were going to continue their conversation from back on the mountains.