Five chairs in the Conference Room sat empty and alone, missing
its assigned occupant. On the other hand, the remaining seven seats
were occupied by living, if not very shaken, members of the Omega and
Beta teams. The Beta team had suffered the most, its only remaining
members being Em and Zach. Sean had been the only Omega team casualty.
Suspicion was beginning to arise within the ranks of the soldiers,
and along with it, a foreboding shadow of paranoia.
"Alright, can anybody account for everybody who is missing
right now? We know about Todd, but where is Monty? Where is Gordy, or
Sean, or Nora?" Lyle cleared his throat. "Have they just gotten lost
in this place or were they killed, do any of you guys know?"
Noah spoke, tremors still possessing his quivering hands and
he spoke with nervous, ragged breaths. "Sh-Sh-Sean's dead. I found
him in the..th-the locker room. He, he didn-..." Noah stopped. He
secured his hand over his mouth and clenched his eyes shut, sobbing and
rocking back and forth in his chair. Elizabeth left her seat and
consoled Noah, placing her hand on his shoulder and speaking to him
in a quiet, relaxing, and sympathetic tone.
"Alright guys, what happened to the other three?"
Zach spoke up, lighter still held in his gloved hand. "Gordy's
dead too. We ain't jus' dealin' with regular zombies anymore guys.
We ran into this HUGE sonovabitch, the thing was at least seven foot
high. The bitch ripped up Gordy real bad, chewed up his insides an'
whipped him around. I dunno what really killed 'im, all that shit or
just the fright. When we first bumped into it he was to a'scared to
move. He just stood there lookin' at the bitch, like he was hypnotized
er somethin'."
"Where is the creature at right now Zach, did it follow you?"
Zach now held the attention of every team member. Their eyes were
cast upon him like a pack of wolves on cornered pray, save for Noah
who was still suffering from his massive panic attack.
"Naww, none you guys gotta worry about that thing anymore. I
lured 'er over in the kitchen and lit 'er up real good." Zach bashed
his fist on the table, still beaming with pride from his kill. "I
didn't check the body or anythin', but judgin' by how that thing was a
screamin', there ain't no way its still walkin' around here."
"I see, brilliant work Miller. We're three men short so far,
but does anybody at all know the wherabouts of Nora and Monty?"
All of the team remained silent.
"I-I...I-called them on..on the ra-dio," gasped Noah.
Seemingly unsatisfied, Grace stood up from her seat. "No,
no, no, no. Something just seems way too fishy here. Just think you
guys. Think about how easy it was for us to put a spy here in this
lab! He may have been caught, but-"
Seth interrupted. "Actually, they didn't find out about Doug.
He got caught up in the same mess as all these other Umbrella workers
have gotten into. He got attacked, maybe by something like one of the
monsters that Zach ran into."
"He's right, I was with him."
"Yeah, so was I. I swear to God, there wasn't much of anything
left of Doug. He was just a big pile of shit and blood."
Grace continued on, taking the newly provided information into
account. "So, if we sent our spies to Umbrella's labs here, wouldn't
it make just a wee bit of sense that they would send spies here? C'mon
guys this is fucking Umbrella we're talking about here! Raccoon
coverup, Rockfort Island bombing!!! If they can save their asses from
shit like that don't you think they could be sneaky enough to send ONE
little spy to monitor two S.T.A.R.S. teams?"
The soldiers all remained quiet. Elizabeth stood up and took
Grace's side. "Guys, what Grace is saying really does make a lot of
sense. All of our team dropping like flies, and especially Todd's
death! I know the whole 'spy' thing seems sorta far fetched, but it
makes sense!"
"The girls are right. I think Umbrella has got some kind of
wire on us. Who could this spy possibly be though?" questioned Lyle.
"Maybe this two-faced bastard already died too, he or she might
be out of our hair," suggested Em.
"I think it's a crock of bullshit," said Noah, now relieved
from his previous panic attack. "Spies?! Cmon guys this isn't 00
fucking 7!! Get real, we need to think of some kind of plausible
idea. Just because the team's getting killed off by big monsters does
NOT mean that there's a traitor among us!!"
All eyes were intentively focused on Noah after his little
rant. Em stood up from his chair and pointed an accusatory finger at
Noah. "That is the EXACT words that we'd here from a traitor, huh?
Is that true Noah, are you skulkin' around try to fuck us all over?!
If there's anybody that I'd accuse of being the spy, it would be YOU
Noah."
"Holy shit, Em is right guys! Noah's been the spy all along!"
"Wait guys, what are you-"
"Always being scared, it all makes sense. Nobody would suspect
the little scardey cat of being a spy!"
"No it's not what you thi-"
"A very good facade Noah, very good."
"Would you please listen?! I'm not a-" Noah was interrupted
when Em's meaty fist collided with Noah's scrawny face. He tumbled
backwards into his chair and draped over the edge of the armrest,
a tiny stream of blood was flowing from his smashed nose. He felt
hands grab the back of his vest and his arms and legs were lifted from
the ground as he drifted away into the darkness.
--------------------
His eyes opened and began to refocus, adjusting to the new and
different lights of the room. He was in a small, windowless room about
seven feet across and six feet wide. There were shelves adorning
three of the four stainless steel walls, each loaded with food and
other various cooking supplies. Holding his throbbing head, Noah
wiped a string of drool away with his forearm and slowly shuffled
towards the door. "Wha-, where am I?" He remembered Sean, then
calling everybody to the Conference Room. "Oh shit, they've locked me
up." Noah nearly leapt at the Pantry door and repeatedly bashed both
of his tired fists against the silver door and screamed as loud as he
possibly could.
--------------------
The S.T.A.R.S. traitor had been captured and was now contained.
Lyle spoke up. "Very fine work Grace, without your reasoning and
thinking, none of us would have even thought about Noah's deception."
Grace smiled as she received other positive comments while Zach
drifted over towards the now blackened oven. Pestilence's corpse was
all over the back of the kitchen, both arms and her corpulent belly had
exploded and where splattered on the walls of the kitchen. Everything
that was left of Pestilence was severely burned and charred black.
"Guys check this out. Here's what's left of the thing I was
tellin' y'all about." All the soldiers gathered around the decimated
body.
"Damn Zach, you weren't kiddin'."
All the soldiers' hearts skipped a beat when pounding suddenly
erupted from Noah's pantry prison. After realizing it was only the
now conscious Noah, everyone calmed down and ignored the screaming and
pounding.
Lyle groaned, "Alright guys, we have to leave Lyle inside of
the pantry, got it?"
Zach snickered, "Hey Cap'n, Noah is the explosives guy, right?
Doncha think that someone with such 'skill and precision' could blast
his way outta there? Hell, he might just make a bean can grenade!"
After the brief chuckle subsided, Lyle stated, "Even if he did
find a way to blast himself out of there, he'd basically be digging his
own grave. Those shelves would tumble and he'd get caught in the
explosion. Don't worry guys, NOTHING is going to happen to Noah
Squyres."
Zach chuckled once more, "Hell, if that's even his real name."