Hi all. It's a longish chapter today because I have had enough time to write it all. Now that school's back, it's hard for me to get on the net without fighting my brother for it. As he's older than me and through the years has perfected the art of delivering an effective yet painful dead-arm, it is needless to say he generally wins. I'll try to make up for it with longer chapters.
Thanks for the reviews!
Chapter 5: Search begins
"You should've turned right back there," advised Barry.
"No," Chris argued, "That would've taken us to the hospital."
"Face it," Claire piped up from the back seat, "You have no idea where you are going."
From the front passenger's and driver's seats, there was no response as the two men steadily ignored her.
"Why is it men never ask for directions," Jill grumbled from beside Claire.
As if to prove her wrong, Chris swerved to the side of the road. He approached the elderly man who was feeding the ducks on a nearby park-bench. He was a kindly gentleman, and after a few minutes of discussion and gestures, Chris sat behind the wheel once again. This was his car, and no one else was allowed to drive it. It had taken the better part of twenty minutes to find Brideswell Pond, but finally they had arrived, even with ten minutes to spare.
Brideswell Pond was at the outskirts of Eons Forest. Trees fringed the edges of one side and a large iron grate was set inches above the surface water. In fact, it looked more like a well than a pond, the walls of it having been built up I and a half meters higher than the water- but level with the ground-with red brick to prevent flooding.
Chris could see the water clearly. The water was free of algae, dark as obsidian, and despite the brightness of the moon and searchers' torches, there was no reflections of light on the surface, giving the illusion that the pool actually absorbed light. It was a portentous scene to begin a search with.
He spotted a group by the pond. There were at over thirty, ten of whom who were wearing bright yellow and orange t-shirts and reflective strips. As he approached the group gathered at the water's edge, a beam of torchlight hit his face, momentarily blinding him.
Through the after images of the light he saw a familiar blonde-haired dark glasses-wearing face sneering at him across the Pond. Wesker… Chris hurried to find the others.
'Wesker's here," he told them in a low whisper. He shook his head slightly as he tried to rid himself of the dancing bright spots before his eyes.
"Where?" Rebecca's eyes looked haunted. She had good reason; Wesker had shot her. In cold blood.
Chris pointed at black-clad figure over the water. Barry snarled. "This definitely means something to do with the T-virus has happened here," he growled.
Jill privately agreed, but outwardly she shook her head slowly. "Not necessarily," she said. "It could just be coincidence."
Barry snorted. "Yeah, right. He could simply be visiting his family."
Claire peered at Wesker. "Aren't they who we were talking to earlier?" she asked, referring to the group he was talking to.
"Yeah, I think they are…"
"What!" Barry exclaimed. "They know Wesker? It's probably a trap and they've been telling you false information!"
"Or," replied Claire lazily, "You could just be paranoid. Don't blame the kids. They probably think he's a kind man to search for someone he doesn't know in a strange town. They are the victims here."
Barry looked a little shame-faced, "Sorry. Gut reaction."
The group fell silent as the leaders told them the plans and safety measures the search required them to carry out. The entire group was paying careful attention, so Claire was the only one to see what happened next.
Wesker examined the storm water grate. It was rusty and neglected, but served to keep people from wandering into the dark drain. Rosanna stretched an arm through the bars and retrieved a sodden bit of material. Claire watched curiously as the group argued heatedly. Wesker fumbled at the grating, then opened the gate. Sena stepped through immediately, followed by Rosanna. After a seconds' deliberation, Ian also went through the gate. Wesker looked pointedly at a guy Claire didn't recognize, but he also went. Wesker looked over the volunteers to glare at Claire before silently closing the gate. She wondered briefly if the teens knew they were on the wrong side, or had even CHOSEN a side.
"Do not, under any circumstances, go anywhere alone or without the knowledge and approval of a Search Leader. This is for your own safety and the efficiency of the entire search…"
"Someone's already disobeyed one of those rules," she hissed in Chris's ear.
"What?" he spun round. The rest of the group followed suit.
"While the instructions began, Wesker and Rosanna and the rest left," she began to explain in a hurried whisper.
At the end of her account, Chris swore. "Wesker is taking those kids down to their deaths. Isn't the gate supposed to be locked?"
Claire gave her brother a withering glance. "Do you honestly think that would've slowed Wesker down if he wanted to go through it?"
The group turned to look at the storm-water drain. "The drain stops flooding in rainy periods," Rebecca said unnecessarily. "It will definitely carry the excess rain water into the sewers."
STARS headed off to the grating.
**
Ian shone his flashlight down the length of the tunnel. The sewers had walls that were probably some sort of grayish green. 'Probably', because they were so covered with grim and sludge it was hard to tell. Rosanna walked with her left-hand against the wall, leaving behind a trail of white chalk. In the other, she held a damp pink jersey bearing the name "Celia Tappan".
Ian watched her with awe. She and Wesker were the only ones not fazed by the stench. Higher up, the smell had been barely detectable. Here, it was trying to choke him, infecting his lungs and making his eyes water. He would've breathed through his mouth if the air didn't seem so thick with lethal microorganisms.
Beside him, Ben coughed and spluttered, "Ugh, that's NOT a good smell." Sena covered her lower face with her hand. They all followed Wesker and Rosanna. Ian watched as Wesker told Rosanna something inaudible. She looked a bit shocked but put the chalk way.
Idly, Ian wondered why they hadn't told anyone where they were going. It made more sense in terms of safety and efficiency. But Wesker had been against it. What did he know about Mr. Wesker anyway? He was Sena's relative, from Raccoon City, had some weird attachment to dark glasses… and there was something else. Something Ben knew, Ian could tell.
A memory sat at the edge of Ben's mind, stubbornly refusing to be remembered. Whatever it was, it was important. Something was wrong here. Ian caught his eye and he shrugged a question, what is going on here? Ian too objected to leaving without a word.
Perhaps Sena and Rosanna trusted more easily than the boys, or were simply more desperate to find the children, but they needed no time to decide about going down into the sewers depths at the behest of a man they hardly knew. Sena probably had come to the rational conclusion that uncles didn't generally kill their relatives. Ben refused to trust the man and Ian was naturally suspicious of someone who actually wanted to explore the muck that is the sewers.
Of everything, Sena's rashness shocked Ian the most about the whole scenario. She was terrified of small, enclosed spaces. Before a school mining trip, she'd deliberately sprained her ankle to get out of going, so why was she so eager today? He guessed it was Celia. The little girl went to Sena's old school after all.
Further down the tunnel split in two. Wesker cocked his head, as if listening for something. Ian copied him, hearing nothing. Suddenly, Wesker went to the left without a word. Ben and Ian exchanged confused glances, but followed.
***
Jill slid down a steep and slippery slope into the sewers. The temperature was lower here, and the reek of the sewers more potent. She pushed it from her mind and continued down the tunnel, hearing her fellow STARS members following behind. Wordlessly, she turned on her flashlight to penetrate the gloom.
A line of white cut through the sludge on the rounded sewer wall. Jill pointed it out to the others silently and began to follow it. After a few twists and turns, the line abruptly ended. Around the corner the tunnel split in two. With some whispered commands from Chris, so did the group.
Jill and Rebecca went to the left. Jill wondered why the other member of her group was Rebecca. She had, admittedly, found her teammates dead in the mansion, but had not handled it well. Jill was worried she would become a hindrance and be of little help. What if I get into trouble? Can I rely on her to help me out? She did help Chris sometimes in the mansion, but… Maybe Jill was being unnecessarily harsh, but these thoughts swirled through her mind, making her uneasy, distracted and irritable.
Rebecca sensed Jill's mood and guessed its cause. STARs didn't look upon her as a coward like Vickers, but didn't trust her as much in extreme situations as they would, say, Jill or Chris. Her lips formed a tight line. Mentally she promised not to let anyone down.
In such away did the two proceed down the dim channel that they were not aware of Wesker until he hit Jill squarely in the face.
***
Barry went up ahead cautiously. Wesker was down here somewhere, and that meant the group was far from safe. An expression of distaste crept across his face as he continued down a narrow platform that was a meter from the putrid river of filth. He heard a faint sobbing.
Chris heard this also, and went to investigate. A boy, no older than nine, sat hunched on a ledge alone. Barry recognized him immediately from newspaper photos. "Aaron?" he asked.
Behind them, Claire hurried round the corner as a big rat scurried over the ground. It paused in the middle of the tunnel and looked at her. It was easily as big as a cat, and muscled, lean. It was covered in places with thick glossy black hair. Elsewhere, skin had fallen off to reveal rotting flesh. It glared balefully at her, red-eyes menacing and sinister. Claire stared in horror and revulsion.
Her experiences in the Raccoon Sewers had told her that rats didn't generally attack unless you got too close to them. They also told her that these rats were infected with the T-Virus. Her worst suspicions were proven correct.
"There are lots of these rats in the sewers. Almost everywhere… but…they aren't further down, you know," said Aaron in a high-pitched voice. "Nothing is… apart from them."
"Who?" Barry asked gently.
The boy shook his head. "Is Celia around here?" Claire pressed.
Aaron's head snapped towards her. His clothes were ragged and dirty and hung limply around his scrawny frame. His tawny hair lay in a matted mess of dirt and twigs. In short, his whole appearance spoke of poverty and poor hygiene. But his eyes… they were sunken deep into his head and wide with panic. The boy was absolutely terrified.
"They have her," he squeaked.
"Who?" Barry repeated. "Who has her? We're here to find you both."
Aaron looked around frantically. "They're coming! The vampire children! The zombies!" His eyes began to roll wildly. Claire looked away sickened.
"Hey," said Barry with surprising gentleness, showing his fatherly skills, "It's okay. You can get out of here. Go down this way and just keep left. You'll go up a slope and eventually through a gate. There you'll be at Brideswell Pond, where everyone's searching for you. Tell them we came down here. Okay?"
The boy nodded, for the moment calm. Barry gave him a slight push in the direction of the exit. He headed down the grungy tunnel.
"Wait," Chris called softly, recognizing the voice. "Did you call STARS?" Aaron nodded. "Why?"
"The vampires," he whispered, "my brother told me to ring STARS if I really truly saw something. So I did."
Chris smiled sadly. "Goodbye."
***
Wesker grinned as he towered over Rebecca and Claire. Meddling fools. Rebecca trembled as he sneered at her. Wesker grabbed the unconscious Jill by the collar of her blue jersey and pulled her down the tunnel. Uneager to lose her, Rebecca hurried after him.
***
In the darkness, Sena shut her eyes as Ian and Rosanna began arguing. She argued with Ian herself all the time, but when Rosanna did… It made Sena uncomfortable. It was too much like the time before her parents' divorce. She sunk to the floor and pulled her legs to her chest. A child-like gesture, but it helped lock out her pain.
She couldn't see as Ben leaned towards her. Without the torches, the tunnel was cocooned in darkness. "You okay?" he asked.
She snorted in reply. No. Memories bite. Here everyone is arguing about how trustworthy Uncle Al is while we should be searching for Celia and Aaron and all I can do is stop myself from crying.
Claustrophobia drained her senses and the fear made her exhausted and weak. She fought to keep her hysteria under control, but the pitch-blackness didn't help her at all. Why did he make us turn off the torches? It makes the darkness seem alive. She tried to laugh it off. I'm afraid of the dark?! It didn't help her much.
"Talk to me," she said, "please. About anything. I need to stop myself from losing it."
Ben obliged. "When I was at a camp in the mountains, I realized I had become thoroughly lost…
Sena listened half-heatedly, catching only the occasional word. It served to distract her from her fear, and for that she was thankful. She couldn't even tell what the story aws about now. A camp… and how Ben's decision got the whole lot of them lost in the forest. Maybe not a cheery topic… but Ben told it lightly.
He listened to the gloom for a sound of Ian and Rosanna. They had been listening to his story, and had stopped arguing. Sena was more relaxed. He smiled to himself. I am a help to these people, he thought, even if it is only to distract them with something stupid.
"I'm going to look for Uncle Al," Sena declared. The title Amy had used was comforting. She would use it as well. It added a bit of normality to the situation. Not that being in a sewer is family outing but… Ben's tale had calmed her enough to realize that Wesker had been gone for a while, alone. There was a very real possibility that he was lost. Sena did not like losing family members.
"I don't think-" Ian began.
"I know you don't think Ian," she snapped. "I'm looking for my uncle. I'm not asking for permission. Keep them out of trouble, Roz."
She disappeared out of hearing. After fifteen minutes, by Ian's watch, a light shone down the tunnel. Wesker returned with two women who had asked about the sewers earlier. He returned with a gloating smile and with a confiscated torch. But without Sena.
**
Wesker glowered at the teens, Rebecca and unconscious Jill. Sena is lost? How do you lose someone just like that? I need to find her; she could be in a lot of trouble. How did this happen?
Echoing down a tunnel, just loud enough for his ears to pick up, Wesker heard sinister laughter. Sena. If she was going to be anywhere, down that path was as good a guess as any. It sounded like she could use some help.
He glared at the group. "Stay here," he commanded. "I think I know where Sena is, but I don't want to lose you all."
"Why don't we come with you?" Ian asked.
Wesker gestured to the unconscious Jill. "Look after her." Without another word, he disappeared in the direction of the laughter.
***
In the darkness, Sena trembled, and not only because of the cold. Wesker had set down a passageway a long time ago, and she had been certain it was this one. Unnerved and worried he would get separated from the group; Sena had followed.
She cursed her stupidity. Now it was she who was lost. Her fingers searched frantically through the contents of her bag as she continued down the tunnel. Finding her torch, she snapped it on.
This part of the sewers was the same as any other. Thinking of finding some chalk to leave a trail with, Sena delved into her pack once more. She couldn't find any. Trying desperately to still her quivering hands, she peered down the tunnel as far as it would go.
"Huh... hello?" she stammered. "Anybody there?"
There was no reply except for a low snickering behind her. Sena swung round with the torch, to find nothing. Severely shaken, Sena abandoned all sagacity and prestige. Still trembling, she ran unashamedly away from the mocking laughter as it grew steadily louder.
*******