Chapter 2
Team Search
The hard nosed reporter known as Alyssa Ashcroft stepped foot onto the roof of a deserted building in the heart of Raccoon City. Dressed neatly in a marroon business suit, Alyssa's straight blonde hair waved aimlessly in the cool breeze, but the smell of death and decay permeated her nose and made her close her eyes.
She thought she could erase the memories she had endured already. The visions of burning buildings, flesh eating monsters and her own friends and colleauges turning into vicious blood thirsty beasts.
Alyssa paused and remembered that she would be strong enough to overcome whatever came in her way, and that there was no way she was going to let this beat her.
As she opened her eyes, in the distance she noticed a small figure, a human, peering over the edge of the roof. Alyssa had come here to maybe signal for a rescue, but in her heart she knew the reason she was here was to maybe find someone she could rely on other than herself. She moved cautiously forward and approached the girl carefully.
"Hey..." Alyssa murmered, almost in disbelief that there was anyone left still alive in this chaotic, death filled town.
The girl turned, and Alyssa smiled in relief. She was young, maybe twenty, but her eyes told a different story. The girl looked troubled, worried, and ultimately scared. But also, at the same time she looked intimidated.
"I came up here to look for help...do you know of anyone that might be looking for us?" Alyssa started, her calm voice easy in the cool wind. She realized her hair was beginning to become sticky,a combination of rain and her two day old hair spray.
The Chinese girl stood still, starring her down in the face like a fox waiting to pounce its prey. Something about her made Alyssa uneasy, very un-calm. She let out a deep sigh, and finally spoke.
"My name is Yoko." She purred, her voice soothing to Alyssa's ears.
Right about now anything would be soothing, seeing as all I've heard for the past two days is the last dying cries of the living and moans of the walking dead.
"Alyssa," she said, pointing to herself. She stood up, brushed herself off and at the same time realized that there was a helicopter disappearing in the distance, "Hey wait a minute, why didn't you-"
Yoko cut her off, sharply, "That wasn't a rescue squad. It seems they were here to drop off a package."
"A package?" Alyssa turned back around, realizing the subtle tone in Yoko's voice had somewhat dissipated. She sounded distressed, "What kind of package?"
Yoko frowned, "A person."
Alyssa froze. She looked over the edge and saw a shattered red cylinder, like the ones in the pictures she had received from a contact inside William Birkin's laboratory.
Jesus…Umbrella jettisoned a Tyrant to RaccoonCity…why on earth would they send in one of those…
"That wasn't an ordinary person. What did it look like? Was it wearing anything?" Alyssa shrieked, realizing she was losing all her cool. If it was a Tyrant, Umbrella now had a few models to choose from. The T-00, like the one the STARS had encountered in the Spencer Estate, or the T-01 retriever models…or maybe something else, something she hadn't received information about.
And if it was a retriever, it may be coming to retrieve your life, the way you have been fucking around with Umbrella's business and publishing internal documents in the press…smooth move Alyssa, never think before you act.
"It was wearing a black trench coat. It walked straight through that wall, right down there," Yoko pointed to the Arcade Mall. There was a gaping hole the size of…
-too big to be a T-01-
Alyssa realized it right away. The T-01's were only about seven feet tall, and judging from where she was standing now, the thing that walked through that wall must have had the strength and mass of a bulldozer…
Think Alyssa, what else had Umbrella been up to…you should know this shit already, you should know you should know!
"Lets go down and check it out. If we're fast, we should get past the monsters down there. I just want to see the canister they dropped it off in." Alyssa said, realizing how stupid she sounded. The streets were crawling with zombies, the newspaper building had been her refuge and obviously Yoko's as well, why on earth would they go back onto the streets?
"Okay, I'll come with you." Yoko said, smiling.
"Great, lets go then. You got a weapon?" Alyssa asked her hands on her hips. All she had was a handgun and her bruised, bloodied knuckles.
Yoko withdrew a small device from her coat pocket. It was a black and silver rectangular prism, with two metal spikes jutted out from one end. There was a switch on the bottom.
"It's a taser, an early model I found back in Japan, more of a self defense weapon. I've been able to take out a few of the zombies with it."
Silently laughing to herself, Alyssa nodded her head in approval, "Great, I should probably find some bulletsbefore we go down there. There has to be something in the abandoned offices that I haven't checked yet. Lets go see if we can find anything."
Alyssa headed back inside, noticing that Yoko followed slowly behind.
For some reason, Alyssa couldnt shake the feeling that this Yoko character wasn't telling her something…
...meanwhile, at a Diner in Raccoon City...
Kevin pushed the door of the diner open, hoping that he would find the girl who he'd sent there. His entire squad had been slaughtered, and he'd seen some good men be butchered by the cannibals. He couldn't shake the feeling that he could have done more to help them. But that was all over now; he didn't have time to think about that. If the girl was safe, he needed to do all he could to help get her out of the city.
The diner was quiet, calm and subtle. It was an L shape, seats lining the entire front wall and back. There was a center island that stretched from one end to the other, and behind it was a set of kitchen appliances. Everything seemed to be in working order. Kevin took a step forward, his boots crunching on pieces of broken glass-
broken glass covered in what seemed to be dry blood. What had happened here?
There was a creaking noise from the back, and Kevin knew he had to check it out. If the girl was still back there, he knew it was his duty to save her. She seemed like a sweet kid, probably not too much older than her early twenties. He thought she was gorgeous; she was blonde and fair skinned and very much the damsel in distress type. She was hiding in the back of his squad car when he'd first found her, and he'd told her to go back to the diner where she said she was working.
…but you didn't see her again, and if she hadn't listened to you she had probably been killed on the streets, dying a painful, brutal death-
"Shut up…" he whispered to himself, "Don't think that way."
He leveled his nine millimeter and lifted himself up onto the counter and hopped down, and felt something wet and gushy under his feet.
Oh fuck!
Kevin looked down, and realized the entire walkway was littered with body parts, covered in blood and he could even make out parts of a person's intestines. Clumps of hair littered the area, and suddenly the smell caught up with him. He was going to vomit, he just knew it.
"I found them like that a few minutes ago,"
Kevin spun around, and saw Cindy sitting, her face in her hands, sobbing. He jumped back over the counter, and headed in her direction, swallowing down bile as he did. He could feel the squish of blood and guts on the soles of his boots as he walked, and he felt like joining her in her cry as he headed towards her. He put his hand on her shoulder, and she looked up at him.
She looked like hell. Her mascara had run down her cheeks through her tears. Her blonde hair was still pulled up into the pony tail it had been when he saw her, but her waitress outfit was torn and ash stained. He looked at her and smiled, but she shut her eyes again.
"Look, we need to get out of here as fast as we can. I don't know what's going on, but I know it's not good. The streets aren't safe, and most of the police are dead. Is there a back way out of this place?" Kevin asked, slowly and calmly in hopes that she would answer the same.
She nodded, "Yeah, but I bolted it shut a few minutes ago in case something came through when I wasn't there. I put a few boards up against it, so we'll have to find something to take the nails out with."
Out of the corner of his left eye, Kevin saw something press up against the glass of the diner. Another carrier, this one worse off than the rest of them. It was missing both arms and the skin off its forehead. Its eyes were gouged, and it was dressed in baggy jeans and what was left of a jean jacket and white tee. There was too much of its body missing to determine if it had been male or female. Blood seeped out of its wounds onto the glass, staining it with gore. Kevin looked away, but saw that Cindy hadn't taken her eyes off of the site.
"Listen, we have to find a way out of here fast. The back door, where is it?"
"Through the office, where I had been hiding."
"Can we lock the office door too?" Kevin asked quietly.
"Yes, there's a chain lock and a bolt." Cindy stood up and headed in the direction of the office, and their escape.
"Okay, let's move out of here and see if we can find a way out of the city. The police station might be safe for awhile, but I don't know. Our best bet is to find more survivors, and see if we can network a way out of town." Kevin moved past her as he was talking and held the door open for her. She walked through, and he felt a wave of frustration rush over him.
He didn't ask for any of this. He was planning on quitting his job anyways, thanks to that prick Brian Irons. But there was nothing he could do now. He was caught up in this mess, and he wanted out. There would be no more silent whining. He was going to escape Raccoon City if it was the last thing he did.
...meanwhile, on the Raccoon City Streets...
George hit the ground with a soft thud. He grunted as he felt his shoulder hit hard. Main Street was a total wreck. Overturned police cars and the remains of the RPD officers littered the smoke stained street. George didn't know what to think anymore, and he silently crept into an unlocked SWAT van and sealed the door shut behind him.
One thing had led to another in the race against time to find a cure for the cannibal disease. He had been overwhelmed with the rush of disease riddled patients all suffering the same symptoms in the past week. Everyday there were people who entered the Raccoon Hospital suffering from nausea, skin rashes and burning sensations in their eyes and mucus membranes. He had seen many of them die.
Thank god for surgical masks…
He didn't know what he was breathing in. He didn't know if the virus was airborne, or even if it was a virus at all. It could very well be a bacterial infection, but never in his life had he seen any bacteria that powerful. By day three, the entire hospital had been completely filled and when he tried to dial out to find more help, the lines were all dead.
That was the twenty fifth…
It was the 26th now, and he knew for sure that he was the only living doctor left from that hospital. It made him sick to know that everyone of his colleagues had died in the battle against the zombies. The thought made him cringe…
George silently slid into the driver's seat and locked the door. He had never been in a police vehicle before, but he knew that it wouldn't be too hard to figure out if he tried. The keys were still in the ignition, and just before he turned them he prayed there was still enough gas in the tank to get him as far away from the city as possible.
Chk…chk…vroom!
The van started, and George grinned. He immediately rolled the windows up and sealed himself in the van. He pressed down on the accelerator and rolled through the once bustling streets of Raccoon City. Corpses riddled the cement, and he couldn't get past them without mowing them over, and he felt sicker and sicker with every body he pressed into the concrete. But George knew that he was going to get out, he just knew it.
Finally there was enough clear space for him to floor it, and he did just that. The SWAT vehicle reached about thirty miles and hour, and a wide smile stretched across his face. A virus carrier popped up in front of him and George seemed to lose it for a second. He had seen so much carnage that watching the body slam into his windshield and roll of the roof didn't do so much as make his stomach roll.
They killed my friends, now I kill them, here comes another one…
The carrier in front of him didn't walk like the rest of them. Dressed in a large navy blue security coat, the black man seemed to not even notice the speeding van until it was too late. It took him just a split second of view for George to realize that the carrier in front of him-
-oh fuck, that isn't a carrier!
Slamming on his breaks, George prayed that he would stop before he rolled over the first living man he had seen in days.
TO BE CONTINUED!
