Chapter 10:
It was just as dark in the morgue as it was in the rest of that section of the parking structure. It made sense if the power wasn't on, but they weren't sure if they were going to stay long enough to fix that. Walking in, they were met with a dead man lying by the door, but he didn't move as they passed.
The room looked like any other morgue you would see in movies. There were rows of metal cold lockers along each wall, but the middle of the room was a mess of cleaning supplies and carts. A piece of paper sat on a table telling them of a kleptomaniac who was supposed to be lying in one of the lockers. Perhaps he stole something that could be of use.
They decided to go through each locker one by one to see if there was anything that could be helpful in them. People hide shit all the time, as they so learned throughout the night. Walking up to the first one, they looked at each other expectantly, but no one made a move.
"Rock, paper, scissors to see who opens it?" Veronica suggested, albeit a little shyly. She was still thinking of what Claire had said. She was too giddy despite the situation they were in.
"Oh, you're so on!" Claire smirked. Might as well make this enjoyable somehow.
"Rock, paper, scissors," they both said in unison before showing their hands. Claire had rock and Veronica had scissors. She groaned as Claire jokingly smashed her scissors before turning to face her punishment. Carefully, Claire watched Veronica pull back the tray only to find...nothing. This went on with every locker, eventually finding some red herbs. At one specific door, they pulled it out by an inch only for a body to be spasming uncontrollably inside.
"I'm just gonna close this," Veronica mumbled, pushing it back in. At the end of that line, Claire opened it to a dead body, but before she could close it, something caught her eye. By the corpse's shoulder was a flash grenade.
"Vee, take the grenade." She gave her a look.
"No way! You're the one that lost this one. You take it!"
"Oh c'mon! I have to close it in case he does move! I don't even think he's undead." Claire gave her doe-eyes and batted her lashes. "Please?" Veronica blushed at such a cute face then huffed. Damn my weakness for pretty faces.
"Ok fine! But if he suddenly jumps out at me, I'm gonna kill you as a zombie first!"
She hesitantly reached out for it then quickly snatched it from the tray. The dead man did not move, much to their relief. Claire quickly pushed the tray back in and then they continued onto the other wall.
"See? That wasn't so bad, was it?" Veronica stuck her tongue out in response.
Quickly moving down the line, they didn't find much, except for one that opened to monstrous-sized cockroaches that made Claire shout in surprise. She shut that door so fast, you would think she was getting attacked. Clearly, she did not like bugs. Not that Veronica blamed her.
Finally, they made it to the end of the line and found the body they were looking for. Veronica pulled back the tray watching the dead man carefully. Claire looked over and, low and behold, there was the pink diamond key by the hand! Looking for him was useful!
"The key!" Claire glanced up at her expectantly.
"Nuh-uh! I'm so not getting it this time!" Veronica said while holding her hands up.
"Vee, I'm telling you. It's not gonna get up! Is someone getting a little sca- AH!" She shouted in surprise, backing away in time as the body suddenly jumped up at her and roll onto the ground with a yell. As if on cue, the corpse near the doorway began groaning as it got up from its spot. Damn! We should have killed that one earlier!
"Great!"
Veronica shot at the one on the floor while Claire worked on the other one. This one, however, decided to quick attack instead of usually lugging itself towards her. He lunged at Claire, arms trying to grab her at close range. Claire was lucky enough to catch it by the shoulders in time and reached to her belt for a weapon.
She pushed, what she realized too late, a grenade she had into the zombie's mouth then shoved it to the floor, pulling the pin in the process. Both survivors ducked down in time for an explosion to go off, causing head chunks to splatter everywhere and a ringing in their ears. They both stood back up and looked at the mess in amazement.
"That worked! That was impressive!" Veronica blinked.
With the new key in hand, they quickly left the room and started heading back the way they came. As they approached the door leading out of the kennel, however, a loud hiss caught their attention. It sounded like a Licker was in the hallway on the other side of the door. Veronica made sure her gun was loaded before both girls quietly peeked outside.
There was no immediate sign of the monster till they turned the corner. Upon the ceiling, there it sat, sniffing at the air. Veronica had thought about shooting the thing, but ammo was getting low and they just needed to pass it to get to safety. So instead of attacking, she took a look around at the supplies on the floor. Lying just across from her was a tin can, just what she needed.
She carefully picked it up then motioned Claire to step to the side safely, just in case. Veronica slowly stepped forward till she was close enough to the creature then tossed the can up ahead in the hallway. It screeched at the clanging sound it made before diving over to see what it was.
Her heart was beating so fast in her chest with the memory of the attack from the kennel, but she remained calm despite her nerves. She didn't know she had that ability till this moment, and she wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad one. As it clawed at the concrete wall, Veronica grabbed a small rock then took the other girl's hand in hers to lead them towards the exit.
To their luck, the Licker was still trying to find its prey as they approached it. Once they reached the corner, she tossed the small rock towards the red light on the other side of the room. It hit the wall with a loud crack. Hearing the noise, it crawled quickly to the source, allowing both girls to leave without a scratch.
When they finally made it a few feet away from the door outside, they both let out a loud intake of breath from holding it in. Not wanting to get caught is hard work. But it's paid off! Now that they had a new key, they can finally get up to the chief's office and find that keycard.
The duo ran towards the elevator where Veronica opened the control room door to get the power on. It wasn't a large room, if anything it was clear that whoever worked it had nothing better to do. It was littered with paperwork, cigarettes and the trashcan was overflowing with garbage. With the lockers in it, it seemed more like a breakroom with a task.
The most obvious thing to do to get the elevator working was to pull the lever that sat on a machine. With that done, the elevator whirred to life with sound and Claire gave her a thumbs up from the other side of the window. Before Veronica left the room, however, she looked around and found a blue herb, a gunpowder can, and a stock for the grenade launcher. Claire added it to her gun for her before both girls got into the elevator.
The ride up was silent as they anxiously waited for it to stop. What they weren't expecting was for the gate to slide open to the outside. It was a small balcony that seemed to lead to a secret entrance to the inside of the building. This place really did have secret doors. To think that was a joke I made hours ago.
As they stepped out of the elevator, they were met with cold rain and wind. It still hadn't stopped even with how long they'd been inside. If anything, it may have only softened a little. After being warm and dry for so long, Veronica couldn't help but shiver as she got drenched all over again.
They quickly jogged to the other side, trying their best to not get too wet. The warm glow of light from the tall windows reflected in the puddles beneath their feet. Flashlights weren't really needed. A gate stood high on the other side providing them a feeling of safety in this small space from the outside.
They stopped at the open doorway and looked back at the elevator they had come from. Veronica did note that there was a green herb just to her side on the floor, but she decided to save that for later. Her herb bag was stocked full and she didn't feel like sitting in the rain picking leaves at the moment.
Peering around the corner, they could see a dark hallway leading to an open doorway where light flooded through. It was rather quiet so this almost looked safe. Veronica was about to take a step forward but was stopped by a gentle hand on her arm.
"Hey, uh, about earlier…" Claire began before hesitating. To Veronica's surprise, she looked a little nervous. "You know with the whole flirting thing?" Veronica swallowed the lump in her throat at where this could all be going.
"Um, what about it?" Claire let out a small breath before continuing.
"You kinda got quiet on me for a sec and I couldn't really read what you were thinking, so I just wanted to make sure you weren't uncomfortable with that. 'Cause I do think you're pretty rad and all. I don't want you to be uncomfortable and if you were I can totally stop-," Claire's nervous rambling was cut abruptly short by Veronica leaning over and pressing a small kiss to her cheek. Pulling back, she could see the pink dusting Claire's entire face. It was cute.
"Claire, it's ok!" she said as she smiled while reaching down to take Claire's hand in hers. "I'm not uncomfortable with it, trust me. I was just surprised is all! If anything," she gave the hand a squeeze, "the feelings mutual."
With a wink, albeit kind of awkwardly, she let go and began leading the way towards the open door, leaving a shocked Claire lagging behind. Veronica honestly couldn't believe she pulled that off. Just the look on Claire's face made her pull up her big girl pantaloons in wanting to say what she had been feeling. If she were honest, she was proud of herself. When she reached the end of the hall, that's when she finally realized Claire was still frozen where she stood.
"Well, you coming…Claire-bear?" she grinned. Claire's face melted to a bright smile as she nodded. She jogged over to meet the other, giddiness in the both of them as they entered the room.
Despite the feelings rushing through them, they were surprised by the room they were met with. The walls were the same emerald green colored wallpaper with dark wood trimming that they had seen throughout parts of the station. But that wasn't the weird part. It was the many taxidermied animals placed all over the room. There was a point where taxidermy could be classy and kind of cool, but this was just overkill. The many eyes staring at them made Veronica's skin crawl.
"What in hell?" she muttered under her breath.
Besides the many animal corpses sitting around, the room was quite large and spacious. It had not only room for the large main desk but for a sitting area consisting of two leather armchairs and a low round wooden coffee table. Shelving of more animals, books, and a few boxes stood against every wall adjacent to them. The flags that they stood next to were expected, just not everything else. All the other offices were just so small in comparison.
"Think he's trying to compensate for something?" Claire snarkily commented before walking over to the giant desk next to them.
She pushed the oversized leather chair out of the way to pick up a few pieces of paper that sat on the desk. Silently she began reading to herself. While she did that, Veronica passed her to look at a table consisting of an old hourglass and some trophies. Next to it, was another police-grade box, and began digging through to see if there was a keycard.
"Vee!" Claire called before walking over with the papers in hand. "You're not gonna believe this!"
"What is it?"
"These are emails sent to Chief Irons from someone initialed W.B. Listen to this, 'As thanks for your unwavering support, I have deposited a small sum into your account, to use as you see fit. I hope I can count on you to maintain surveillance over your subordinates, especially the ones who survived that mansion. Get rid of them if you must.'" She handed the paper into the shocked girl's hand. "Vee, are you kidding me!"
"I…" Veronica read over the words again, "I was right?! I-." She couldn't believe this and turned the page to quickly read over the next, skimming over parts that didn't matter. "'...ran into some trouble with Umbrella headquarters…want to take the fruit of my research away…keep doing what I tell you to and everything will be alright.'" She turned to the next page. "'You are to up security around my lab…shoot any suspicious person on sight. Doesn't matter if they kill them, or even if they're Umbrella employees'? What is this guy on?!"
"Keep going."
"'I'm so close to completing G, and no asshole is going to get in my way.'" She turned to the last page. "'Get your shit together and do your fucking job! I TOLD YOU I need more security in the sewers! Don't you know how critical of a time this is for me!? As for the money, I can pay you whatever once I take over, but not before. Why don't you get that!? Never forget how expendable you are. W.B.'...Claire holy shit."
"I don't know how you did it, but you called the mission incident. It was no accident. And from the sounds of it, Umbrella seems to be related," she said while taking the papers back to look over again.
"But why? 'Cause then that would mean that this outbreak was all their fault, right? Umbrella deals with scientific stuff and chemicals all the time. They have the capability of making shit like this. The mission incident and the cannibalistic attacks were only the beginning…Allegedly."
She found her brain working into overdrive, the murder mystery practices coming into play. She began to drift away to start pacing as she got her thoughts together. This was terrible…but also, kind of exciting!
"Everything up to this point dealing with Chris and S.T.A.R.S was all under the power of Umbrella. The police were only covering everything up since they were being paid off! At least, according to those emails."
"With what these are saying, it sounds like it. Like if it wasn't them, it would have to be related in some way. It also says, that the sewers seem to be hiding some sort of Umbrella…something. And whatever this 'G' is, must be important enough to shoot your own faculty for."
"Why do I feel like this is just the tip of the iceberg about this so-called pharmaceutical company."
"But why infect the city? If they wanted a rise in stocks, why haven't they cured anybody or given a vaccine yet? Play the hero and all that."
"I don't know. They were well-liked all over the world with good medicines and clearly they had a lot of power over, basically the whole city! It doesn't make any sense to just dump it all down the drain…unless…" the gears in Veronica's mind began to turn again.
"Unless what?" Then it hit her.
"It was an accident."
"What?"
"Well, if it's not that, then we only have two other options: This was actually planned and they're still coming up with some sort of rescue contingency plan to raise stocks, or they're trying to take over the world. Take your pick."
"Well, I guess even highly guarded and carefully protocolled companies can have their bad days."
"You could say this was the epitome of a bad day," Veronica said watching as Claire set the papers down. Then something came to mind and it unsettled her. "Didn't…Sherry say her parents worked for Umbrella?" Claire's eyes widened in realization.
"Oh shit."
"Then that's why Irons took her. We gotta hurry!"
The girls scavenged each and every drawer in the room for a keycard but came up with nothing. When the room was fully ransacked, they came up to two doors that led out. One had a heart insignia on it while the other was blank. They both sat on the chairs at the coffee table and laid out the map to look at.
"So looks like we're here in the East Wing and the heart door leads to the outside hall. We just need the key like the others. The other door goes to a 'Private Collection Room'," Veronica explained. Claire hummed as she looked over it and the little book she had.
"Well from what I noted, there's a shutter here blocking us from the rest of the station," she pointed out.
"Right. So it's either we don't go back out or we find another way around if we have to head that way."
"Hopefully we won't need to and we'll find this keycard here."
"Then let's do this the easy way first."
They took another moment of getting their pouches sorted out and packed up before getting up. However, before they could, Veronica noticed a book left open on the table next to some ammunition and a beer bottle. Not exactly the best combo to see next to each other, but curiosity had her pick the book up. Scanning the contents, she realized it was a taxidermy log.
It would name the type of animal, where it was located, its length, weight, and age before leaving a small descriptive paragraph. The first was a white-tailed deer and the entry said that, presumably, Irons wanted to try a more 'challenging animal'.
"What's that you got there?" Claire asked after finishing up her pack.
"It's a taxidermy log. Considering the room, I would think it was Irons." She flipped the page and felt like she was gonna be sick. This was getting weird…er. Claire saw her face change and leaned over to see.
"What? What's it say?"
"I'm not sure you wanna know."
"Just tell me! At this point, I should be used to disgusting."
"'Siberian Tiger. Male.' I'll spare you the details on the animal. ' I nearly came when I sliced its yellow belly open and its warm guts spilled out. I still smell of wild beast. This is the life.'" Clair leaned back and stared at the table in front of her.
"Ok. That proved me wrong in every capacity."
"There's one more entry…I'm afraid to read it." But she turned the page anyways, her curiosity getting the better of her. Claire's eyes shot back up to her expectingly as she wanted to be read to. "'Pig, female. 22 years old'?" She raised an eyebrow. "Do pigs live that long?" Claire merely shrugged. "'The specimen's body is soft, sweet, and white all over. And it's all mine. Forever.'"
"What a fucking weirdo! And that's saying something 'cause I've met quite a few." Veronica nodded and was about to put the book down when something caught her eye. The details of the animal. Caught in Raccoon City, 5'3", 110 lbs…this didn't sound like a pig anymore. "Oh my god!" She threw the book on the table to get it away from her.
"What!? What happened?"
"That's not a pig!"
"What?"
"That. Is Not. A PIG!"
Claire picked up the book and read over the page. It finally hit her once she saw the height. She shut it then threw it at the wall behind Veronica in anger.
"What a fucking monster!"
"How was he ever chief of police?! It doesn't make sense! Don't they, like, test you psychologically?"
"Yes. But maybe he was pretty good at hiding how sick he was. Chris always felt off about him, but we both put it off to just being a strict boss that was kind of an asshole! What kind of superior…superior…" Claire stood up as she remembered something.
"What?"
"Do you remember that note? The one we found near the lady statue?"
"Yeah?"
"It had to have been Irons!"
"My god! You're right. The guy was clearly psycho and it said that he was a superior officer. I can't believe this!"
"I have so much to process. The mansion, Umbrella, a psycho chief of police…" Veronica couldn't agree more. In just the last fifteen minutes alone, they have uncovered so much. One thing after another. It hurt her head. Her stomach sank with one last terrible thought.
"Clarie, we have to hurry! That deranged maniac has Sherry!"
Both girls were up and running to the plain door near them without another word. They drew their weapons and carefully opened it to a short hallway. They had no time to lose.
The hall was safe and empty save for the taxidermied tiger. At least the path was bright as it was illuminated with beautiful ornate ceiling lamps. But Veronica couldn't focus on the good parts. There was so much ugly information in her mind. They turned a corner to find the next door and carefully peeked in.
It was a large room filled with cabinets that held multitudes of artifacts from the museum. Vases, masks, plates. All highly detailed and beautiful. It was a shame to see hidden here in the back. There were still more taxidermied animals, including a giant bear, but besides that, the room was safe and contained.
Across from the bear, was a cell-like containment area. Behind the bars, they could see a phone, a desk covered in blank keycards, and a few wine bottles. But to their luck, one that was in working condition was swinging from a coat hanger in a badge. Claire sighed out in relief.
"Thank god…the keycard."
They tried to open the door only for them to realize it was locked. Just like every door in this damn place. Both girls tried to squeeze their arms through the gate, but the holes were just too small. There was a box on the gate that Veronica looked at, but she only sighed in disappointment.
"Damn!"
"This is an electronic lock. It's missing pieces," Veronica explained.
"How are we possibly going to do this now?!" Claire huffed with a hard kick to the gate.
"Let's keep looking! Can't lose hope yet," Veronica assured her before turning to search the room.
It took Claire a moment to cool down before following. They looked past more vases and even some Egyptian masks when Claire noticed a familiar-looking picture frame. In it was of two ladies worshiping an ornate heart. One similar to the insignia on the door they need. She flipped the frame and realized it was indeed the key to the door out of the office!
"I got it! There are power panel parts in the third floor east storage room and the clock tower," Veronica said from beside her. Glancing over, she could see Veronica looking over a piece of paper about the lock maintenance. "A clock tower?" She vaguely remembered seeing the giant clock in front of the building. "It must be on the third floor to the station. We have to get back up somehow."
"And I just found out how!" Claire replied while popping out the key from the frame.
Holding it up, Veronica grinned in relief that things were starting to look on the brighter side. They both ran out to the main office then unlocked the heart door. Peeking out, they found a waiting room and a staircase that led to both the upstairs and down. It seemed safe especially since the gate was still closed off to the rest of the station. If Mr. X was still around, it wouldn't immediately walk in after them.
Looking at the map, the downstairs had only two rooms: the Observation room and the Interrogation room. The upstairs had a little more to it. There was the landing at the top of the stairs, a balcony and to their luck, the East storage room. Just what we need! That and that room went straight through to the clock tower since it was on the third floor!
"This will be a piece of cake!"
"Please don't jinx us," Veronica chuckled while putting the map away. Since it would be an easy place to look for any extra supplies, they decided to go downstairs first. Going down the flight of steps, they carefully made their way to the bottom. There was a door that was swung open to a winding hallway.
Just across from that door was another that was barricaded and the window on it was boarded up. A zombie was pressed against the other side peering at them and trying to get through but to no avail. Not wanting to take any chances, Veronica used her hammer through the broken glass and killed it quickly.
When they turned the corner all they could find was a long dark hallway with all of the windows but one being boarded up. Luckily there wasn't a zombie waiting at it like they had been seeing all night. They wouldn't be down there long anways.
It was empty of zombies but there were two doors, each with a different insignia. One had the green club, while the other had the red heart. Lucky them, they had one of those keys. While Claire unlocked the door, Veronica went down the hall to some lockers that stood at the end. She found some gunpowder in one.
When inside the room, they noticed that they were in the Interrogation room. It was easy to tell by the clear two-way mirror on one wall and the table with chairs that sat in the middle of the floor. There was a camera sitting next to a table on the side, but they didn't bother. It was dead. On the mirror, someone had written 'Let me out' with their finger.
"Creepy," Veronica muttered as she picked up some ammo she found to hand to her friend. Claire walked to the other side to look at a cabinet of supplies and found something weird.
"Hey! Look at what I found!" Claire said before jogging over. She was just about to hand it over when a loud hiss reached their ears from the room over.
Suddenly there was a loud crash and glass was flying everywhere. Both girls recoiled in surprise before realizing what the noise was. There on the floor still recovering from the impact of the now broken mirror was a Licker.
"Shit!" Claire gasped while both girls booked it out of there.
The Licker screeched at hearing the commotion and lunged for an attack. Luckily for them, they had made it out and Claire had shut the metal door behind her in the nick of time. They could hear it slashing at the door and the walls, but they were safe. Veronica bent down to rest on her knees as she took some deep breaths.
"Fuck man!"
"I didn't think they could possibly be quiet until now."
"It was the glass. From what I can tell in cop shows, it's so the one being interrogated didn't hear the people watching them. I guess that thing just waited for us to be loud enough."
"We gotta be more careful."
"We don't have to go back in there, do we?"
"There might be something important in there. We should really check!" Veronica groaned.
"Fine. At least it's only one this time."