Chapter 7: Innocent Victims
Alex hurriedly slammed the heavy metal door on the horror that had been breathing down their necks in the room of death as she gasped for breath. She could barely believe what she had just seen. Actual zombies, this wasn't some movie this was her actual life. How was this possible? Questions she didn't have the answers to streamed through her mind like sharks in a deep ocean as she finally regained enough of her composure to look at the room the four of them had just entered.
The dimly old-fashioned lobby looked as though it was straight out of a horror movie. The various blue padded chairs that might have once lined the walls along the room were overturned and blood splattered. The coffee table that rested in the middle of the havoc seemed untouched and held several different magazines in tidy piles as if someone had taken great care not to disturb them. The light colored wallpaper was streaked with still wet blood from some unknown source as the rain beat down hard upon the sky lights in the ceiling. Set inside the wall furthest away from them there was a receptionist desk that was protected by a sheet of crystal clear glass. The only way out of the room was through an old fashioned wooden door to their left.
Alex was quickly snapped back from her gazing at the room when she saw Sam's muscular body thrown onto the tidy coffee table right under Tony. The shattering of the in set glass of the coffee table let forth several loud cracks as the two men hit the table squarely, sending the magazines sprawling to the dark colored carpet.
"Open the fucking door, and let's throw this asshole to those things, Maurice!" Tony screamed as he punched Sam in the face.
"Get off him!" Alex shouted frantically.
Without hesitation a calm Maurice slowly strode over to the two fighting men and grabbed the writhing Tony off of Sam and held him suspended in the air. Sam slowly brought himself to a sitting position on the crimson carpet as he brushed the shards of broken glass form his fatigues when he realized that Tony had been contained. Sam had no problem with this Tony guy, hell if he had been in the same situation he would probably feel just like Tony did now. Which was the main reason that he hadn't broken the young man's neck when he had the opportunity. The thought made Sam question his judgment of killing Tanya, but immediately realized that it had been the age-old situation of them or you.
"What the hell are you doing?!? Let me go so I can kill that son of a bitch!" Tony shouted as he fought to free himself from his captor.
"Killing the one man who knows what Umbrella is doing isn't going to solve anything," Maurice answered coolly.
"What the hell are you saying?! That you're going to let this asshole get away with killing Tanya!" Tony spat back at Maurice.
"He did what we couldn't," Maurice said calmly trying to explain it to the younger man.
"Don't you fucking say that! She could have lived, you of all people should have had faith in that," Tony spat as he finally stopped trying to fight his way out of Maurice's tight grasp.
"I loved her just as much as you did, now you have to let her go," Maurice instructed trying to act as though he had already moved on.
"I don't need you to tell me what to fucking do. I'm not your damn kid," Tony muttered as Maurice slowly lowered him to the ground.
"What's this?" Alex interrupted as she kneeled down beside the shattered coffee table with a scribbled letter in her hand.
The note had be crumpled up and carefully placed into one of the many magazines that had been piled on the decorative coffee table. It had fallen out when Sam and Tony had fought and knocked the magazines onto the floor. The handwriting on the note was scratched out as if done by a very young child. The back was decorated with a picture of a bright yellow sun and a house along with a stick figure of a boy as a young child would do. On the door of the hand drawn house was the carefully drawn number 302.
Febuwary 12
The doctor says that i will be okay. That the shots they give me will make the bad things go away from me. They says that i can sees my jack after they make me not see the bad things anymore. I miss my brother. When the doctors put me in my room the bad things are waiting for me in the dark. They are scary, but they doon't hurt me. I just pretendd that they are my friends and they is just sick. The thing with the tongue ripped my dress last night. i cried. The shots the doctor gave me makes my skin feel itchy today. Like it was burning. I don't like the doctor with the white face, he puts me in the bigg room with the monsters. i got the key out of the bad mans coat when he not looking. he showed me the key last time and told me that it was very important. Maybe i wont see the bad things tonight and I will get to see jack tomorrow.
The note ended abruptly and was stained with spots from tears, but not of the young girl who had written the letter but of Alex's. Alex quickly wiped her tanned tear-streaked face, so the rest of her team wouldn't see her weakness. Damn Umbrella for their research, damn them for killing innocent people, like Tanya, like her squad, and like the little girl who had written the note. They had nothing to do with the research that Umbrella was doing, they didn't even know what they were doing. Alex suddenly felt a surging hatred for Umbrella engulf her small body. They would pay for what they had done; she would make sure of that.
"Where do we go from here?" Alex asked meekly as she finished reading the note aloud to the rest of her team.
"The chief of staff's personal office, that's most likely where they would keep the records of their patience," Maurice said as he pointed to a point on the map that wasn't to far from where they currently were.
"We should be in and out, since his office is just through that door and the last door in the hall," Sam reported as he straightened out his crumpled fatigues.
Without any more talking the four of them stepped thorough the antique oak door. The hallway the four of them stepped into looked as though it was out of the medieval age. The walls and ceiling were all cold gray steel that occasionally gave way to an iron door. Each door had an ebony steel number engraved above the handle, giving it the feel of a jail instead of a mental ward. The dangling overhead lights hung from chains illuminating only a small area of the hallway at any specific time as they swung freely on their own. The hallway wasn't straight, but instead Ted out at the end giving them two ways to go once they reached the end. Directly in the middle of the wall at the end of the hallway was a large oak door that seemed terribly out of place in the medieval style dungeon.
"Should we knock?" Tony asked sarcastically asked trying to lighten the mood and make the others forget his outburst of before.
Without hesitating to answer Alex quickly extended her slender hand and turned the brass knob of the door that would lead to the chief of staff's office. To her surprise the doorknob didn't budge, and only the wood gave a soft creak as if mocking her. Upon examining the cold brass doorknob she noticed the smooth indention for a key.
"It's locked," Alex informed them, slight irritation creeping into her usually soft voice.
"We have to get in there, we'll just have to find the key," Maurice responded as he looked over the crumpled map for any possible place that might house the small key that they needed.
"Why don't we just knock it down, it's just wood," Tony said arrogantly as he took a few steps back in order to get a run at the door.
Without waiting for an answer Tony ran and threw all of his weight into the oak and brass door. As he felt his shoulder make contact with the hard door he heard his shoulder pop. Without moving the door the least bit he crumpled to the floor.
"Looks like this guy didn't want anybody getting into his office, not even someone who could use brute force," Alex said unable to stifle a giggle that seemed out of place.
"The key could literally be hidden anywhere in this wing, we might have even passed it up already. It would probably be best to split up into groups of two to look in this area for it," Sam instructed them as if he hadn't seen Tony's idiotic act of trying to knock down the obviously reinforced door.
"Fine, Sam and I will check out examination rooms one and two which are located down this section of the hall," Maurice agreed as he gestured down the hallway to the left of where they had entered.
"You and Tony will be responsible for checking the patient rooms. The ones that you can get into that is, there is ten but they probably won't all be unlocked," Sam informed Alex after noticing that she didn't seem to grasp the idea very well from the puzzled look she wore on her tanned face.
"Fine," Tony said shortly as he stood up rubbing his sore shoulder.
As Alex walked down the eerie hall she could hear the heavy fading footsteps of Maurice and Sam, and the opening and closing of a heavy door. Even though Tony walked closely with her she still couldn't contain the knot of fear that had tied itself into the pit of her stomach. The menacing overhead lights didn't disclose anything, as the shadows seemed to creep nearer to her as the lights swung to and fro.
"You cold?" Tony asked sympathetically as he noticed the chill bumps that peppered her arms.
"No, just uneasy," Alex responded keeping her eyes on each of the metal doors that she passed.
"You know you don't have to act tough around m-" Tony started but quickly stopped when he saw that Alex had stopped dead in her tracks a couple of feet back.
Alex caught her breath as she silently traced the numbers above the door in her head. The tight knot that had buried itself deep in her stomach began to move up and tighten itself around her lungs as she concentrated on the dark bold numbers. The numbers looked like cold ebony rivers that had formed numbers on the door in Alex's mind. The steel door was scarred with deep scratches along it, as if made by a mad animal. Or a person fighting to stay out of there.
Tony didn't have to look at the door, the number 302 reflected perfectly in Alex's worried deep brown eyes. The same number that had been on the picture of the door in the child's note that they had found.
Alex hurriedly slammed the heavy metal door on the horror that had been breathing down their necks in the room of death as she gasped for breath. She could barely believe what she had just seen. Actual zombies, this wasn't some movie this was her actual life. How was this possible? Questions she didn't have the answers to streamed through her mind like sharks in a deep ocean as she finally regained enough of her composure to look at the room the four of them had just entered.
The dimly old-fashioned lobby looked as though it was straight out of a horror movie. The various blue padded chairs that might have once lined the walls along the room were overturned and blood splattered. The coffee table that rested in the middle of the havoc seemed untouched and held several different magazines in tidy piles as if someone had taken great care not to disturb them. The light colored wallpaper was streaked with still wet blood from some unknown source as the rain beat down hard upon the sky lights in the ceiling. Set inside the wall furthest away from them there was a receptionist desk that was protected by a sheet of crystal clear glass. The only way out of the room was through an old fashioned wooden door to their left.
Alex was quickly snapped back from her gazing at the room when she saw Sam's muscular body thrown onto the tidy coffee table right under Tony. The shattering of the in set glass of the coffee table let forth several loud cracks as the two men hit the table squarely, sending the magazines sprawling to the dark colored carpet.
"Open the fucking door, and let's throw this asshole to those things, Maurice!" Tony screamed as he punched Sam in the face.
"Get off him!" Alex shouted frantically.
Without hesitation a calm Maurice slowly strode over to the two fighting men and grabbed the writhing Tony off of Sam and held him suspended in the air. Sam slowly brought himself to a sitting position on the crimson carpet as he brushed the shards of broken glass form his fatigues when he realized that Tony had been contained. Sam had no problem with this Tony guy, hell if he had been in the same situation he would probably feel just like Tony did now. Which was the main reason that he hadn't broken the young man's neck when he had the opportunity. The thought made Sam question his judgment of killing Tanya, but immediately realized that it had been the age-old situation of them or you.
"What the hell are you doing?!? Let me go so I can kill that son of a bitch!" Tony shouted as he fought to free himself from his captor.
"Killing the one man who knows what Umbrella is doing isn't going to solve anything," Maurice answered coolly.
"What the hell are you saying?! That you're going to let this asshole get away with killing Tanya!" Tony spat back at Maurice.
"He did what we couldn't," Maurice said calmly trying to explain it to the younger man.
"Don't you fucking say that! She could have lived, you of all people should have had faith in that," Tony spat as he finally stopped trying to fight his way out of Maurice's tight grasp.
"I loved her just as much as you did, now you have to let her go," Maurice instructed trying to act as though he had already moved on.
"I don't need you to tell me what to fucking do. I'm not your damn kid," Tony muttered as Maurice slowly lowered him to the ground.
"What's this?" Alex interrupted as she kneeled down beside the shattered coffee table with a scribbled letter in her hand.
The note had be crumpled up and carefully placed into one of the many magazines that had been piled on the decorative coffee table. It had fallen out when Sam and Tony had fought and knocked the magazines onto the floor. The handwriting on the note was scratched out as if done by a very young child. The back was decorated with a picture of a bright yellow sun and a house along with a stick figure of a boy as a young child would do. On the door of the hand drawn house was the carefully drawn number 302.
Febuwary 12
The doctor says that i will be okay. That the shots they give me will make the bad things go away from me. They says that i can sees my jack after they make me not see the bad things anymore. I miss my brother. When the doctors put me in my room the bad things are waiting for me in the dark. They are scary, but they doon't hurt me. I just pretendd that they are my friends and they is just sick. The thing with the tongue ripped my dress last night. i cried. The shots the doctor gave me makes my skin feel itchy today. Like it was burning. I don't like the doctor with the white face, he puts me in the bigg room with the monsters. i got the key out of the bad mans coat when he not looking. he showed me the key last time and told me that it was very important. Maybe i wont see the bad things tonight and I will get to see jack tomorrow.
The note ended abruptly and was stained with spots from tears, but not of the young girl who had written the letter but of Alex's. Alex quickly wiped her tanned tear-streaked face, so the rest of her team wouldn't see her weakness. Damn Umbrella for their research, damn them for killing innocent people, like Tanya, like her squad, and like the little girl who had written the note. They had nothing to do with the research that Umbrella was doing, they didn't even know what they were doing. Alex suddenly felt a surging hatred for Umbrella engulf her small body. They would pay for what they had done; she would make sure of that.
"Where do we go from here?" Alex asked meekly as she finished reading the note aloud to the rest of her team.
"The chief of staff's personal office, that's most likely where they would keep the records of their patience," Maurice said as he pointed to a point on the map that wasn't to far from where they currently were.
"We should be in and out, since his office is just through that door and the last door in the hall," Sam reported as he straightened out his crumpled fatigues.
Without any more talking the four of them stepped thorough the antique oak door. The hallway the four of them stepped into looked as though it was out of the medieval age. The walls and ceiling were all cold gray steel that occasionally gave way to an iron door. Each door had an ebony steel number engraved above the handle, giving it the feel of a jail instead of a mental ward. The dangling overhead lights hung from chains illuminating only a small area of the hallway at any specific time as they swung freely on their own. The hallway wasn't straight, but instead Ted out at the end giving them two ways to go once they reached the end. Directly in the middle of the wall at the end of the hallway was a large oak door that seemed terribly out of place in the medieval style dungeon.
"Should we knock?" Tony asked sarcastically asked trying to lighten the mood and make the others forget his outburst of before.
Without hesitating to answer Alex quickly extended her slender hand and turned the brass knob of the door that would lead to the chief of staff's office. To her surprise the doorknob didn't budge, and only the wood gave a soft creak as if mocking her. Upon examining the cold brass doorknob she noticed the smooth indention for a key.
"It's locked," Alex informed them, slight irritation creeping into her usually soft voice.
"We have to get in there, we'll just have to find the key," Maurice responded as he looked over the crumpled map for any possible place that might house the small key that they needed.
"Why don't we just knock it down, it's just wood," Tony said arrogantly as he took a few steps back in order to get a run at the door.
Without waiting for an answer Tony ran and threw all of his weight into the oak and brass door. As he felt his shoulder make contact with the hard door he heard his shoulder pop. Without moving the door the least bit he crumpled to the floor.
"Looks like this guy didn't want anybody getting into his office, not even someone who could use brute force," Alex said unable to stifle a giggle that seemed out of place.
"The key could literally be hidden anywhere in this wing, we might have even passed it up already. It would probably be best to split up into groups of two to look in this area for it," Sam instructed them as if he hadn't seen Tony's idiotic act of trying to knock down the obviously reinforced door.
"Fine, Sam and I will check out examination rooms one and two which are located down this section of the hall," Maurice agreed as he gestured down the hallway to the left of where they had entered.
"You and Tony will be responsible for checking the patient rooms. The ones that you can get into that is, there is ten but they probably won't all be unlocked," Sam informed Alex after noticing that she didn't seem to grasp the idea very well from the puzzled look she wore on her tanned face.
"Fine," Tony said shortly as he stood up rubbing his sore shoulder.
As Alex walked down the eerie hall she could hear the heavy fading footsteps of Maurice and Sam, and the opening and closing of a heavy door. Even though Tony walked closely with her she still couldn't contain the knot of fear that had tied itself into the pit of her stomach. The menacing overhead lights didn't disclose anything, as the shadows seemed to creep nearer to her as the lights swung to and fro.
"You cold?" Tony asked sympathetically as he noticed the chill bumps that peppered her arms.
"No, just uneasy," Alex responded keeping her eyes on each of the metal doors that she passed.
"You know you don't have to act tough around m-" Tony started but quickly stopped when he saw that Alex had stopped dead in her tracks a couple of feet back.
Alex caught her breath as she silently traced the numbers above the door in her head. The tight knot that had buried itself deep in her stomach began to move up and tighten itself around her lungs as she concentrated on the dark bold numbers. The numbers looked like cold ebony rivers that had formed numbers on the door in Alex's mind. The steel door was scarred with deep scratches along it, as if made by a mad animal. Or a person fighting to stay out of there.
Tony didn't have to look at the door, the number 302 reflected perfectly in Alex's worried deep brown eyes. The same number that had been on the picture of the door in the child's note that they had found.