She managed to pull the trigger, and she heard the thing squeal again. She opened her eyes and stared at it. It was shaking itself, and this time the discoloured blood was pouring out of its eyesockets too. One more shot should kill it. She squeezed the trigger one more time, and the thing let out one final hiss and fell, smacking into the grimy tiled floor.
It thrashed for a few moments, its clawed limbs swirling and twisting in the air around it, but gradually it stilled. Claire stared at it. What had it been?
She felt something rising in her stomache, and her chest tightened. I need to throw up, she realized. That was disgusting. I want my brother, I want to go home....
She clawed at her throat, but the bile kept climbing, so she just leaned over. After a few minutes she wiped her mouth. I need to escape. I need to find Jill. I need to find Rebecca. I need to find Barry. I need to find Brad. I need to find my brother.
She stood up. But were they even alive? She stared at the horrible monstrosity splayed on the ground in front of her. Don't look at it, she commanded herself, feeling her chest clench up again. Her throat burned.
After another second, she stood up, and wiped her mouth again. She could feel her brown ponytail sticking to her neck, glued there with sweat. But she had the feeling that that demonical creature was piecemeal compared to the other things she'd encounter here....
As she took a few more steps down the hall, she felt her hands shaking as they clutched her gun. C'mon, Claire, stay in control. She kept repeating this phrase to herself as she opened the next door. Would another of those tongue things be in here? No. It was another hallway, but to her surprise, the window side was boarded up completely, like a barricade. Maybe there really were survivors here!
As she stepped over chunks of splintered wood, she walked past a double-doored room, but she knew it was just a Debriefing Room, not the S.T.A.R.S. Office. Besides, she didn't want to see more destruction than she had to right now. As she passed it, she saw the end of the hallway in sight. A single wooden door signaled the end of the passage.
She opened it, afraid for a moment that it would be locked. But it wasn't, she thanked God that it wasn't. But she froze when she stepped through it, for she was literally surrounded by zombies. A red-haired woman and several policemen lurched toward her, mixtures of blood and saliva flowing out of their mouths and over layers of dried skin. She raised her handgun again, and backed up into a corner, so that she could see them all. She opened fire and counted how many bullets it took to down them all. Fourteen. Holy Christ, fourteen bullets. And she was running low on ammo. She looked around her now that all the former-humans were immobilized.
Two doors down a mini-hall, the wooden one she had come through and a steel one that she remembered lead to weapons storage, files and lockers. At the end of the passage stairs going up and the door to a darkroom stuck under them. She remembered that the S.T.A.R.S. lockers were also in there. Jill's, Chris', and Brad's.
But they needed keys, and the actual S.T.A.R.S. room was up those stairs. She moved towards them and ascended, her boots thudding on each step. As soon as she was up them, she walked past a carpeted room with a few weird, pysedo-religious statues in it and opened another door. Now she was in the dark hallway that led to her brother's office.
She could see the entrance clearly now, a plain door with a paper taped up next to it that read "S.T.A.R.S. Office" in official-esqe lettering. She tugged on the door and it swung open.
It was the same place she remembered. Four desks were lined up, back to back, with a space in the middle. Right now each desk had only one occupant, but they used to be shared by two people, one from the ALPHA Team and one from the BRAVO Team. A head desk was at the end of the room, under a huge S.T.A.R.S. Flag. It had been Wesker's, but since he had been killed at the Spencer Mansion, it was cluttered with old paperwork and had an abandoned feeling. Another desk by the door had been Enrico Marini's, the leader of the BRAVO Team. At the opposite end of the room, between a bookcase and a steel cabinet was the Information center that Ed Dewey and Brad had used. The desks in the middle of the room had been for Chris, shared with Ken Sullivan, Jill, shared with Richard Aiken, Rebecca, shared with Joseph Frost, and then Barry's by Wesker's desk, shared with Forest Speyer. Half of those people she knew for sure were dead. It hurt just to be in this room.
She took a step toward Chris' desk, and saw his diary on top of a stack of CDs, books and half-finished reports. She picked it up. It was an ugly pea green, and she remembered teasing him about it being a diary, a girl thing. "It's official, Chris," she'd tease. "You're a freaking fairy. I mean, what grown man keeps a diary?"
She unlocked the little gold clasp which didn't need a key, and flipped to the end of the book. Maybe she could find out what had happened....
"I talked it over with Jill and Barry. We have decided to fly to Europe and attack Umbrella from there. Brad's at the S.T.A.R.S. Safe House on the edge of town, Jill's backup since she's decided to stay and investigate Umbrella's underground labs for a while longer. I have decided not to tell my sister because doing so could put her in danger. Please forgive me Claire."
I forgive you. Now I know you're safe, she thought. But now how I get out of this? And what's happened to Jill and Brad? Where's Rebecca? She set the book back on the desk again. It was horribly cluttered, and she knocked an empty pepsi can off with a swipe of her hand. Than she turned around and looked at Jill's desk.
It was cleaner, but it hadn't been used as much. Her computer was on, strangely enough, but a message was on screen saying that the Internet was inaccessible at this time. Great. Grand. Wonderful. Then Claire's eyes snapped to another diary on top of the comp--Jill's.
This she didn't want to read through. She didn't know Jill as well. But what if there was some valuable information in there? What if Jill had left a message? She was about to reach out for it when a beep caught her attention from behind. The fax on Enrico's desk was buzzing, and some kind of document was coming out of it. She hurried over. Was it someone saying help would be there soon? Her heart sank when she saw that it was just some kind of boring official message answering an inquiry. But her face lightened when she saw it was to Chris.
It was from the FBI. Subject: Brian Irons, chief of Racoon City Police. Ah, yes. She remembered him. At least, she remembered going out of her way to avoid him, at the S.T.A.R.S. member's urging. Actually, at every R.P.D. members she had talked to's urging. But no one had to advise her to stay away from that man. His horrible little piggy eyes, his fatness, the way his eyes followed her, everyone....She'd always felt he'd had problems. But more than that, he was a fucking lousy Police Chief.
So what was this report about? She reached and grabbed at the pages as the fax spit them out, scanning the contents of each one. "Oh. my God..."
Apparently, at Chris' request, the Feds had done a little digging. Irons was not only spawned on a damp locker floor, but he was also an intellectual rapist. When he was at the Raccoon City University, he had been charged with rape three times but had been dismissed from the charges because of his "phenomenal intellectual standing." He, she hoped at least, were dead. She shoved the papers in the sidebag she had, one made of pleather ("Fake, for the Animal's Sake," it read), and turned to exit the room.
Before she opened the door, she turned around.
Joseph.
Forest.
Ken.
Enrico.
Richard.
Ed.
Her eyes burned. She realized she was crying. They had been such great people. The best people.... She wiped her eyes. She wouldn't forget them. They'd have to live through her. And if the other S.T.A.R.S. members were still alive, then through them, too. Then she opened the door.
A child's scream. "Help me!" Claire couldn't see clearly through her tears, but she could make out the figure of a little girl running from a lurching zombie. Oh my God! A kid! What the fuck...? She thought as she held up her Remmington. One blast from the rifle made the virus carrier go down, but she still had to go after the kid! Her eyes still stung, but she ran down the passage and banged opened an oval-shaped door. It was way too dangerous for that little girl to be alone! She'd die for sure! And Claire didn't want to see anyone else die.
However, the little girl was no where in sight in the next room. Some kind of waiting room, she guessed. There was an empty drink machine by a cracked window, with stiff-looking green couches lining the walls and a broken magazine rack beside them. Thick wooden floor boards were under her feet. Hey, she thought. Is it my imagination, or do I hear....
Footsteps. She grinned as she saw Leon walk out of a murky passage, but he didn't see her. "Leon!" she cried, her smile widening. She waved a hand at him, and they walked towards each other. I must look ridiculous, she thought, smiling when I'm still crying a little. But she didn't really care. Another person, another human being who wasn't dead, who still had feeling and could talk to her! Another human being who breathed and thought and was warm and alive and here with her. God, she was glad to see him. "Leon!" she said again when they were standing in front of one another.
"Claire! You made it!" he said. He was smiling too, but not as widely. "Glad to see you're still among the liv--hey, have you been crying?"
"Oh, yeah....I guess, a little." She dabbed at her eyes. "Chris isn't her. But it's nothing, I know he's safe...."
"That's great. Listen, did you see--"
"A little girl go running by you?" Claire finished for him.
"Yeah. You just missed her: a blonde little girl in a school uniform. She had some kind of fancy necklace. It's too dangerous here for her!"
"I know. Leon, I'll go look for her. You go find us a way out of here!"
"Of course. But before I forget--" he brushed his reddish-brown bangs out of his eyes and unhooked a walkie-talkie from his belt. She saw he also had a spare one. "--so we can keep in touch. Are you sure you're all right? I mean--"
"I'm fine," she said, grabbing the radio. "I'll call you if I'm in trouble....God, it's all so weird, isn't it? I mean, I loved horror movies as a kid. I always thought that if I were there, I'd do this or that, that I've have no problems getting away. But now, I'm so scared. It's like I don't know anything."
"I know what you mean. It's like no rules apply here. Like there's no structure. Listen, Claire--the girl went through a boarded up door at the end of that passage." He gestured towards where he had come from. "There's no way we can follow her. I think we just have to search the R.P.D."
"Yeah, you're right. But...Leon, I think there are still other people somewhere in this city! Jill...Brad...Rebecca--"
"Who?" Leon asked, his expression becoming confused. "Who are they?"
"They're S.T.A.R.S. members. I just came from their office. I think they're in town somewhere. Could we--"
"Claire. We can't go outside again. The streets are crawling with zombies! Just look out the window! Go on, look!"
She glared at him, but walked over to the window and pressed her forehead against it. "Jesus," she muttered, her eyes widening and her mouth hanging open. There were so many of them. It looked like the streets were alive!
"You see? And Claire, if they're S.T.A.R.S. members, we just have to trust them to get out on they're own. They're professionals."
Forest was a professional. So were Joseph and Richard and....Her thoughts turned bitter and her face darkened. She turned away from the window though, and decided she didn't want to argue. To some extent, he was right. They had survived the Spencer Mansion. They were probably having more luck than she and Leon were, she told herself. At least, Jill must be. Rebecca was still a rookie and Brad was mostly a coward. She still hoped they were all right....
"Alright, you win. We have to trust them....I'm going to go look for the girl. I'll radio you soon." She smiled sadly. "I really hope they're OK."
Leon nodded. "Just trust them. I'm gonna go look for some escape route."
They walked in opposite directions, she to a door nearly hidden by a boring gray wall, he to the door she'd just come through.
She walked into a library. She remembered this place. Book shelves were everywhere, even a stairway to her right led up to more bookshelves. Yes, she remembered it here. She also remembered there was nothing upstairs useful, just the way to the gears for the clock on top of the R.P.D. She walked to the door leading out onto the landing looking out over the main entrance into the station, the huge room she had walked into when she first came inside the building.
On the landing there were more zombies than in the hall with the darkroom. "Oh, shit!" Her remmington had one shot left and her handgun had only one left as well. Her knife was, as Kendo has said, sure death. She didn't doubt that now. She looked ahead of her. There was no room to get around the zombies, and three of them in a line were shiffling drunkenly towards her. "G-get away!" she knew that was hopeless. They couldn't hear her, could't reason. But she was still pleading with them. "Get back! No! Please! Stay away! Get back!" She shoved her shotgun in front of her like a shield. She waved it at them. "I'll kill you..." she knew that was stupid, too. They were already dead. Damn it! she thought. I can't die like this!
She closed her eyes and heard...shots! A gun being fired! She opened one eye a little, and saw all three carcases slumped in a row in front of her. Who?? "Leon?" she called, looking around her. No one--wait! Across the building, she could see someone dissapear into a wooden door. Not Leon, se was sure. It was someone smaller. "Wait!" she gasped, but she knew the apeal was too quiet to be heard. She dashed over, around the looping railing, towards the door. She tugged at it and it swung open.
Another waiting room. This time it had fine wooden walls, bookshelves, a secretaries desk....But the same stiff couches, the same crisp atmosphere. And--oh!--another one of those chests. She wondered for the second time if those would be a good place to stash stuff. There was a door across the room, and she moved for it. But then a glittering object caught her eye. A lighter! She grabbed it. No doubt that would come in handy.
As she placed a hand on the doorknob, she instantly recoiled. It burned! Her hand was bright pink, and she held it at the wrist, biting her lip. A fire! But how bad? It wasn't hot enough to be on the other side of the door. Threr was no smoke coming through the bottom....She looked around and saw a jacket hanging off the back of the secretary's chair. She could open the door with that. She wrapped her hands in it and pulled it open.
There was smoke coming from around the corner, and it made her face itch. But what scared her more was the moans coming from around that same corner. Her eyes watered and she held the jacket to her mouth. This was pretty bad. She stumbled backward, and remembered that there was another door this way. It led to a hallway which led to either offices or the roof. This was her best bet. She didn't want to retrace her steps.
As she groped for the other door she thought of the little girl. I hope she stays away from here, Claire thought. I hope she's still alive. She finally found the other door and pushed it open.
Now the air was cold, desperately cold. The jacket had a little soot on it but she put it on. It was plain with a basball tee look. She marveled at how fast the air had changed. What was wrong with this place?!
She walked ahead. A steel door in front of her lead led to some offices. Furthur along the hall was a path to the roof and the helipad. She knew there was also a way down from the roof, to the R.P.D.'s garage entrance and gaurd cabin. Maybe there would be more ammo there. Maybe there'd be Jill. Or Brad. Or Rebecca. So she chose the roof, and walked quietly in that direction.
She knew it was more of a risk becuase 1. It led outside, to where the undead masses were, and 2. Because it didn't garrenty her a way back into the main part of the R.P.D. But she had to choose it on the off-chance that it would lead her to another human being. Maybe even the person who had saved her on the landing.
She reached a long row of windows. It was then she realised that her adrenaline was really pumping, how truly terrified she was of those windows. She didn't know why, but she wanted to get away from them. Her fear was justified as first one wondow cracked, a long line through the center, than another. Then another.
She backed up as they all suddenly broke, and wisps of black flew through. Crows, she realised. A flock of crows. They rushed at her. Oh. my God, she thought. Like Chris said--these are the same kind of crows that killed Forest....
It thrashed for a few moments, its clawed limbs swirling and twisting in the air around it, but gradually it stilled. Claire stared at it. What had it been?
She felt something rising in her stomache, and her chest tightened. I need to throw up, she realized. That was disgusting. I want my brother, I want to go home....
She clawed at her throat, but the bile kept climbing, so she just leaned over. After a few minutes she wiped her mouth. I need to escape. I need to find Jill. I need to find Rebecca. I need to find Barry. I need to find Brad. I need to find my brother.
She stood up. But were they even alive? She stared at the horrible monstrosity splayed on the ground in front of her. Don't look at it, she commanded herself, feeling her chest clench up again. Her throat burned.
After another second, she stood up, and wiped her mouth again. She could feel her brown ponytail sticking to her neck, glued there with sweat. But she had the feeling that that demonical creature was piecemeal compared to the other things she'd encounter here....
As she took a few more steps down the hall, she felt her hands shaking as they clutched her gun. C'mon, Claire, stay in control. She kept repeating this phrase to herself as she opened the next door. Would another of those tongue things be in here? No. It was another hallway, but to her surprise, the window side was boarded up completely, like a barricade. Maybe there really were survivors here!
As she stepped over chunks of splintered wood, she walked past a double-doored room, but she knew it was just a Debriefing Room, not the S.T.A.R.S. Office. Besides, she didn't want to see more destruction than she had to right now. As she passed it, she saw the end of the hallway in sight. A single wooden door signaled the end of the passage.
She opened it, afraid for a moment that it would be locked. But it wasn't, she thanked God that it wasn't. But she froze when she stepped through it, for she was literally surrounded by zombies. A red-haired woman and several policemen lurched toward her, mixtures of blood and saliva flowing out of their mouths and over layers of dried skin. She raised her handgun again, and backed up into a corner, so that she could see them all. She opened fire and counted how many bullets it took to down them all. Fourteen. Holy Christ, fourteen bullets. And she was running low on ammo. She looked around her now that all the former-humans were immobilized.
Two doors down a mini-hall, the wooden one she had come through and a steel one that she remembered lead to weapons storage, files and lockers. At the end of the passage stairs going up and the door to a darkroom stuck under them. She remembered that the S.T.A.R.S. lockers were also in there. Jill's, Chris', and Brad's.
But they needed keys, and the actual S.T.A.R.S. room was up those stairs. She moved towards them and ascended, her boots thudding on each step. As soon as she was up them, she walked past a carpeted room with a few weird, pysedo-religious statues in it and opened another door. Now she was in the dark hallway that led to her brother's office.
She could see the entrance clearly now, a plain door with a paper taped up next to it that read "S.T.A.R.S. Office" in official-esqe lettering. She tugged on the door and it swung open.
It was the same place she remembered. Four desks were lined up, back to back, with a space in the middle. Right now each desk had only one occupant, but they used to be shared by two people, one from the ALPHA Team and one from the BRAVO Team. A head desk was at the end of the room, under a huge S.T.A.R.S. Flag. It had been Wesker's, but since he had been killed at the Spencer Mansion, it was cluttered with old paperwork and had an abandoned feeling. Another desk by the door had been Enrico Marini's, the leader of the BRAVO Team. At the opposite end of the room, between a bookcase and a steel cabinet was the Information center that Ed Dewey and Brad had used. The desks in the middle of the room had been for Chris, shared with Ken Sullivan, Jill, shared with Richard Aiken, Rebecca, shared with Joseph Frost, and then Barry's by Wesker's desk, shared with Forest Speyer. Half of those people she knew for sure were dead. It hurt just to be in this room.
She took a step toward Chris' desk, and saw his diary on top of a stack of CDs, books and half-finished reports. She picked it up. It was an ugly pea green, and she remembered teasing him about it being a diary, a girl thing. "It's official, Chris," she'd tease. "You're a freaking fairy. I mean, what grown man keeps a diary?"
She unlocked the little gold clasp which didn't need a key, and flipped to the end of the book. Maybe she could find out what had happened....
"I talked it over with Jill and Barry. We have decided to fly to Europe and attack Umbrella from there. Brad's at the S.T.A.R.S. Safe House on the edge of town, Jill's backup since she's decided to stay and investigate Umbrella's underground labs for a while longer. I have decided not to tell my sister because doing so could put her in danger. Please forgive me Claire."
I forgive you. Now I know you're safe, she thought. But now how I get out of this? And what's happened to Jill and Brad? Where's Rebecca? She set the book back on the desk again. It was horribly cluttered, and she knocked an empty pepsi can off with a swipe of her hand. Than she turned around and looked at Jill's desk.
It was cleaner, but it hadn't been used as much. Her computer was on, strangely enough, but a message was on screen saying that the Internet was inaccessible at this time. Great. Grand. Wonderful. Then Claire's eyes snapped to another diary on top of the comp--Jill's.
This she didn't want to read through. She didn't know Jill as well. But what if there was some valuable information in there? What if Jill had left a message? She was about to reach out for it when a beep caught her attention from behind. The fax on Enrico's desk was buzzing, and some kind of document was coming out of it. She hurried over. Was it someone saying help would be there soon? Her heart sank when she saw that it was just some kind of boring official message answering an inquiry. But her face lightened when she saw it was to Chris.
It was from the FBI. Subject: Brian Irons, chief of Racoon City Police. Ah, yes. She remembered him. At least, she remembered going out of her way to avoid him, at the S.T.A.R.S. member's urging. Actually, at every R.P.D. members she had talked to's urging. But no one had to advise her to stay away from that man. His horrible little piggy eyes, his fatness, the way his eyes followed her, everyone....She'd always felt he'd had problems. But more than that, he was a fucking lousy Police Chief.
So what was this report about? She reached and grabbed at the pages as the fax spit them out, scanning the contents of each one. "Oh. my God..."
Apparently, at Chris' request, the Feds had done a little digging. Irons was not only spawned on a damp locker floor, but he was also an intellectual rapist. When he was at the Raccoon City University, he had been charged with rape three times but had been dismissed from the charges because of his "phenomenal intellectual standing." He, she hoped at least, were dead. She shoved the papers in the sidebag she had, one made of pleather ("Fake, for the Animal's Sake," it read), and turned to exit the room.
Before she opened the door, she turned around.
Joseph.
Forest.
Ken.
Enrico.
Richard.
Ed.
Her eyes burned. She realized she was crying. They had been such great people. The best people.... She wiped her eyes. She wouldn't forget them. They'd have to live through her. And if the other S.T.A.R.S. members were still alive, then through them, too. Then she opened the door.
A child's scream. "Help me!" Claire couldn't see clearly through her tears, but she could make out the figure of a little girl running from a lurching zombie. Oh my God! A kid! What the fuck...? She thought as she held up her Remmington. One blast from the rifle made the virus carrier go down, but she still had to go after the kid! Her eyes still stung, but she ran down the passage and banged opened an oval-shaped door. It was way too dangerous for that little girl to be alone! She'd die for sure! And Claire didn't want to see anyone else die.
However, the little girl was no where in sight in the next room. Some kind of waiting room, she guessed. There was an empty drink machine by a cracked window, with stiff-looking green couches lining the walls and a broken magazine rack beside them. Thick wooden floor boards were under her feet. Hey, she thought. Is it my imagination, or do I hear....
Footsteps. She grinned as she saw Leon walk out of a murky passage, but he didn't see her. "Leon!" she cried, her smile widening. She waved a hand at him, and they walked towards each other. I must look ridiculous, she thought, smiling when I'm still crying a little. But she didn't really care. Another person, another human being who wasn't dead, who still had feeling and could talk to her! Another human being who breathed and thought and was warm and alive and here with her. God, she was glad to see him. "Leon!" she said again when they were standing in front of one another.
"Claire! You made it!" he said. He was smiling too, but not as widely. "Glad to see you're still among the liv--hey, have you been crying?"
"Oh, yeah....I guess, a little." She dabbed at her eyes. "Chris isn't her. But it's nothing, I know he's safe...."
"That's great. Listen, did you see--"
"A little girl go running by you?" Claire finished for him.
"Yeah. You just missed her: a blonde little girl in a school uniform. She had some kind of fancy necklace. It's too dangerous here for her!"
"I know. Leon, I'll go look for her. You go find us a way out of here!"
"Of course. But before I forget--" he brushed his reddish-brown bangs out of his eyes and unhooked a walkie-talkie from his belt. She saw he also had a spare one. "--so we can keep in touch. Are you sure you're all right? I mean--"
"I'm fine," she said, grabbing the radio. "I'll call you if I'm in trouble....God, it's all so weird, isn't it? I mean, I loved horror movies as a kid. I always thought that if I were there, I'd do this or that, that I've have no problems getting away. But now, I'm so scared. It's like I don't know anything."
"I know what you mean. It's like no rules apply here. Like there's no structure. Listen, Claire--the girl went through a boarded up door at the end of that passage." He gestured towards where he had come from. "There's no way we can follow her. I think we just have to search the R.P.D."
"Yeah, you're right. But...Leon, I think there are still other people somewhere in this city! Jill...Brad...Rebecca--"
"Who?" Leon asked, his expression becoming confused. "Who are they?"
"They're S.T.A.R.S. members. I just came from their office. I think they're in town somewhere. Could we--"
"Claire. We can't go outside again. The streets are crawling with zombies! Just look out the window! Go on, look!"
She glared at him, but walked over to the window and pressed her forehead against it. "Jesus," she muttered, her eyes widening and her mouth hanging open. There were so many of them. It looked like the streets were alive!
"You see? And Claire, if they're S.T.A.R.S. members, we just have to trust them to get out on they're own. They're professionals."
Forest was a professional. So were Joseph and Richard and....Her thoughts turned bitter and her face darkened. She turned away from the window though, and decided she didn't want to argue. To some extent, he was right. They had survived the Spencer Mansion. They were probably having more luck than she and Leon were, she told herself. At least, Jill must be. Rebecca was still a rookie and Brad was mostly a coward. She still hoped they were all right....
"Alright, you win. We have to trust them....I'm going to go look for the girl. I'll radio you soon." She smiled sadly. "I really hope they're OK."
Leon nodded. "Just trust them. I'm gonna go look for some escape route."
They walked in opposite directions, she to a door nearly hidden by a boring gray wall, he to the door she'd just come through.
She walked into a library. She remembered this place. Book shelves were everywhere, even a stairway to her right led up to more bookshelves. Yes, she remembered it here. She also remembered there was nothing upstairs useful, just the way to the gears for the clock on top of the R.P.D. She walked to the door leading out onto the landing looking out over the main entrance into the station, the huge room she had walked into when she first came inside the building.
On the landing there were more zombies than in the hall with the darkroom. "Oh, shit!" Her remmington had one shot left and her handgun had only one left as well. Her knife was, as Kendo has said, sure death. She didn't doubt that now. She looked ahead of her. There was no room to get around the zombies, and three of them in a line were shiffling drunkenly towards her. "G-get away!" she knew that was hopeless. They couldn't hear her, could't reason. But she was still pleading with them. "Get back! No! Please! Stay away! Get back!" She shoved her shotgun in front of her like a shield. She waved it at them. "I'll kill you..." she knew that was stupid, too. They were already dead. Damn it! she thought. I can't die like this!
She closed her eyes and heard...shots! A gun being fired! She opened one eye a little, and saw all three carcases slumped in a row in front of her. Who?? "Leon?" she called, looking around her. No one--wait! Across the building, she could see someone dissapear into a wooden door. Not Leon, se was sure. It was someone smaller. "Wait!" she gasped, but she knew the apeal was too quiet to be heard. She dashed over, around the looping railing, towards the door. She tugged at it and it swung open.
Another waiting room. This time it had fine wooden walls, bookshelves, a secretaries desk....But the same stiff couches, the same crisp atmosphere. And--oh!--another one of those chests. She wondered for the second time if those would be a good place to stash stuff. There was a door across the room, and she moved for it. But then a glittering object caught her eye. A lighter! She grabbed it. No doubt that would come in handy.
As she placed a hand on the doorknob, she instantly recoiled. It burned! Her hand was bright pink, and she held it at the wrist, biting her lip. A fire! But how bad? It wasn't hot enough to be on the other side of the door. Threr was no smoke coming through the bottom....She looked around and saw a jacket hanging off the back of the secretary's chair. She could open the door with that. She wrapped her hands in it and pulled it open.
There was smoke coming from around the corner, and it made her face itch. But what scared her more was the moans coming from around that same corner. Her eyes watered and she held the jacket to her mouth. This was pretty bad. She stumbled backward, and remembered that there was another door this way. It led to a hallway which led to either offices or the roof. This was her best bet. She didn't want to retrace her steps.
As she groped for the other door she thought of the little girl. I hope she stays away from here, Claire thought. I hope she's still alive. She finally found the other door and pushed it open.
Now the air was cold, desperately cold. The jacket had a little soot on it but she put it on. It was plain with a basball tee look. She marveled at how fast the air had changed. What was wrong with this place?!
She walked ahead. A steel door in front of her lead led to some offices. Furthur along the hall was a path to the roof and the helipad. She knew there was also a way down from the roof, to the R.P.D.'s garage entrance and gaurd cabin. Maybe there would be more ammo there. Maybe there'd be Jill. Or Brad. Or Rebecca. So she chose the roof, and walked quietly in that direction.
She knew it was more of a risk becuase 1. It led outside, to where the undead masses were, and 2. Because it didn't garrenty her a way back into the main part of the R.P.D. But she had to choose it on the off-chance that it would lead her to another human being. Maybe even the person who had saved her on the landing.
She reached a long row of windows. It was then she realised that her adrenaline was really pumping, how truly terrified she was of those windows. She didn't know why, but she wanted to get away from them. Her fear was justified as first one wondow cracked, a long line through the center, than another. Then another.
She backed up as they all suddenly broke, and wisps of black flew through. Crows, she realised. A flock of crows. They rushed at her. Oh. my God, she thought. Like Chris said--these are the same kind of crows that killed Forest....