~ Resident Evil: Midnight Crisis
~ A Resident Evil Fanfiction Work Created By..
~ Nickah 4:20 ( SkaterNIB@yahoo.com )
(Disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil. Capcom does. I own this story and the characters
used in it. Don't steal. =/ )

( Note : Woo. I am just crankin' out chapters now lol... anyways, expect more Resident Evil-ish themes and alot more violence to come now.. Now that I have the intro out of the way, I can begin with the actual plot! Mwahah.. err.. sorry ^^; )

Chapter Three: Dance of Entropy

Branches and other foliage scratched at Nick's face and hands as he dashed through the woods, flailing his arms blindly to try and push the branches out of the way. Blood was beginning to leak from several long cuts on his face and arms that had been inflicted by the branches jagged ends. His legs continued to pump as he became more and more lost in the woods. Gradually, he began to slow down... eventually coming to a stop. His chest heaved up and down as he tried to catch his breath; the flight had taken its toll on him. He straightened up, checking out his surroundings. He saw nor heard nothing, except for a deathly silence. The moon was high in the night sky, its face seemed to leer at his misfortune. He collapsed to the ground, leaning against a large oak tree. His thoughts began to wander back to the carnage he had witnessed earlier, no matter how hard he tried to push those thoughts away...

Back at the school... Alex was still alive and kicking. He had lost track of Joe several mutilations ago, his eyes becoming adjusted to the horror that had befallen him. While his parents were taking care of things, Alex had managed to sneak past the guards and get upstairs. For the last fifteen minutes he had been watching the carnage in the window that had overlooked the courtyard of the school. No matter how much his mind urged him to move, his body just wouldn't obey. He pressed his hand against the glass as a boy he knew flung himself against one of the doors that lead upstairs from the courtyard.. just to find it was locked. He closed his eyes as he saw a pack of undead close in on the boy.. he knew well what would happen next.

His eyes flicked back open a few moments later.. all that remained of the boy was a pile of dead meat. The last killing he had witnessed must have brought him out of his stupor. Standing up and brushing himself off, he decided to look around. Cautiously, he began to explore the second floor of the school, looking around for anything that he could use, or somebody that could help him. Briefly he wondered where those guards had gone... as soon as the carnage started he couldn't find a single one of them. Alex wasn't sure what he was afraid of more; running into one of those armed attack squads or an undead beast. Fortunately for him, he found neither of them; the whole second floor was deserted. Pondering what to do next, he realized what was also on the second floor - the resource officer's office. He ran down the hall, his arms and legs pumping. Once he had some sort of weapon, he'd have a much better chance of escaping this hellhole.

After a brief run, he found the office... locked. Frowning, he began to inspect the glass on the door. It looked like it could be kicked down. Stepping back a bit, he focused on a spot in the center of the door. Shifting his weight to his back foot, he used his front foot to kick out the window, sending glass shards all over the inside of the office. Nimbly hopping through the window, he began to look through the office. It looked like it did every other day, all the papers kept neatly on the desk, nothing out of order. He scavenged through the cabinets and such on the wall, finding nothing but stacks of papers. He frowned, his search growing more desperate now. He pulled out one of the drawers to his desk and began rifling through it. He stopped as his eyes caught on something black and metallic. He reached in, his fingers closing around the grip of a Sig Sauer Pro 9mm Handgun. He checked the clip... full. Upon further inspection, he found several extra magazines and a box of bullets for the handgun.

"Now we're in business.." He said, standing up and flipping off the safety of the gun. The firearm was surprisingly light and seemed pretty sturdy. He was about to exit the room when he noticed a paper out of place on the officer's desk he hadn't noticed before. Curiosity getting the better of him, he picked it up and began to read...

"Officer O'Brian,

Your conduct lately is unacceptable. This operation must not be compromised, or else our own lives will be at stake. If you attempt to interfere with the operation again, you will be eliminated.

- Sergeant Nichols"

Alex puzzled over the message. He had no idea what the heck this meant... but somehow he knew it must be tied in with the mysterious happenings of late. Pocketing the letter, he began to head out of the office. He was on his way to the stairways that lead to the front entrance when a loud crash stopped him in his tracks. He heard the shuffling of feet down the hallway... his eyes locked on the shadowy shapes lurking around down the hallway. "Now or never.." He thought as he kicked open the door that lead downstairs.

He hustled down the stairs, leaping down the last five and barely landing on his feet. A zombie that had been feasting on its latest meal looked up at him, its eyes pale and glassed over. Alex raised his Sig and fired a round into its shoulder. The zombie flinched, but kept coming. Backpedaling away, he fired a volley of shots that hit it in various places... the knee, the arm, the chest... but it kept coming. Beginning to panic, he raised his firearm again and fired. Luckily for him, the bullet hit it in the head and it went down and stayed there. "Guess only a bullet to the head will work on these creeps." he thought as he ran out of the school, dodging by some zombies and shooting down others. His destination: the police department...

Back in the forest outside the school, Nick had drifted into a troubled sleep. He had only been sleeping for about fifteen minutes but his brow was dripping with perspiration, his dreams haunted by walking corpses. With a start he woke up... looking around, his eyes wide with fear. Cursing loudly, he could have kicked himself for falling asleep out in the open like that. He stood up, checking his Beretta and inserting a fresh clip. The wind howled in the distance, several leaves tumbling about on the forest floor. The hairs on the back of Nick's neck began to stand up, his instincts alerting him that again something was not right. Seemingly out of nowhere an undead dog exploded out of the brush, its teeth bared. The remains of its last meal seemed to be stuck in its jaws. Instead of turning and firing, Nick instinctively hit the ground, flat on his back. The dog leapt clear over him as Nick raised his weapon. He squeezed the trigger twice, sending a round ripping through its gut from pointblank. The dog yowled as its blood began to seep from its wound.. Standing up quickly, Nick fired the final shot to its skull. Before he could congratulate himself, several howls resounded through the night. Deciding not to be a sitting duck, he took off.

He was running through the woods yet again, shapes flitting through the foliage next to him, running alongside him from a distance. Turning suddenly, he began to strafe facing the movement. Then he saw them, two more dogs running towards him, weaving through the trees to become a more difficult target. Continuing to strafe, he aimed where he thought the closest one would pop out. His guess was correct. It was dead again before it knew it had been shot at.

"Nick, 2. Undead creeps, zip." He muttered, setting the next one up in his sights... and fired. A grimace spread across his face as the shot missed, hitting the tree next to the dog and ricocheting away harmlessly. His eyes narrowed as he aimed again... and missed. Now he was beginning to become desperate, his were beginning to feel like iron weights. Deciding the unexpected always worked best, he began to run straight towards the dog, handgun aimed. The dog didn't expect this and froze just long enough for Nick to aim a shot between its eyes. With one last gunshot, the threat had been eliminated... for the moment. Sinking to his knees in exhaustion, he began to reload his clips again. A sigh escaped his lips as he checked his ammo supply. He had less than half a box left with all clips loaded. He still had enough ammo to last... but he would need a new supply soon. A grim expression was etched on his face as he continued onward through the woods.

He had been traveling for a half an hour when an unfamiliar sound caught his attention. It sounded like... crying? Blinking once, he looked around. He called out and listened... the crying had stopped.

"This doesn't sound good..." He muttered to himself as he began to cautiously move from tree to tree, towards where he had heard the crying. His eyes caught on a patch of bushes, his mind beginning to think of all the possibilities of what could be in those bushes. He didn't like any of them. Slowly, he advanced towards the bushes... then with a big sweeping motion, swept them apart to reveal a blonde haired girl with smooth, fair skin. Her eyes were wide with shock as she looked at him, and his eyes widened with recognition..

"Steph!?" He practically shouted.

"Nick!?" She shouted back. He pulled her out of the bushes and she brushed herself off.

"Steph what are you doing out here!? Don't you know there are those... things out here?" Nick said looking around with wide eyes. He knew for a fact that they were going to attract something nasty...

"Nick it was horrible... at the school... everybody was... dead!" She began to sob again as memories of the bloodbath began to haunt her. Nick shuddered visibly as he remembered as well.

"It's ok Steph... it's ok..." Nick said quietly, trying to comfort himself as well as her. He lifted her chin, showing her the Beretta. "We'll be ok.. we just need to get out of these woods, alright?" He said calmly. Steph seemed to be alright.. well.. as alright as anybody who had just seen almost everybody she knew slaughtered...

"Ok.. lets get out of here." She said. They both began to walk away from the spot hurriedly.. Nick knew what lurked in the woods and didn't want to meet them again.

Back at the infirmary, Joe was at the last of his options. The zombies outside were going to break down that barricade sometime soon and the only people inside the infirmary were crippled or in a coma. Leaning against the wall, he sighed. He was just debating jumping out the window and leaving all these people behind when a familiar moan filled the air. His eyes widened in pure horror, the hairs on the back of his neck standing straight up. He turned around and to his horror saw the "patients" beginning to stir in their beds.. more unearthly moans filling the air.

"Oh... god... no..." Joe stuttered as he began to look around for any means of escape.....

( Hah feel my cliffhanger ending of doom! Hah hah hah hah hah... err.. hah. I love doing that to you people =P )