Chapter 8

The Cure

With one final heaving blow, David took the edge of his hammer and laid it heavily down upon the Regis Lickers mangled, contorted, steam breathing face. Brains, blood and thick gray goop spattered in no certain pattern against the cheap wallpaper of the Apple Inn Front Lobby. The mother licker was dead.

David took no more time to accept the slaying that he just committed, and instead raced forward, past the bloody mess and towards the front door.

Tsssssssss! KABOOOOOM!

Suddenly, a hissing noise followed by a catastrophic boom thundered throughout the Apple Inn, and all sorts of dust and debris began pouring in from the ceiling.

Ten more feet…I'll be out of here…

The glass doors of the front lobby were only a few feet away but it felt like it would take an eternity to reach them. The boiler in the basement had been the cause of the fire in the hotel, and it seemed only so ironic that now it would make its final devastating blow. The explosion had crippled the structure, and it would collapse at any moment.

"Finally…"

David reached the front doors, grabbed the handles and-

Kachunk! Kachunk!

"No!"

The ceiling began to collapse; the walls began to cave inwards. Smoke bellowed in from all directions, and David felt himself get weak. He could barely see, he could barely breathe, and at this point he could barely think. His head was pounding, sweat beads were rolling down his face and all he wanted was a breath of fresh air…

I probably won't get that now…I'm going to die in here if my luck doesn't change this very second…

Glass shards erupted from in front of him and he heard what he was convinced to be the voice of God.

"You made it! C'mon let's get out of here!"

Strong hands grabbed David's arm and yanked him forward, out of the burning hotel. The weight of the ceiling finally buckled and came crashing down, David barely escaping with the blessings that were his legs. His face hit the cement outside of the Apple Inn hard, and he turned around just in time to see the whole building begin to cave in on itself.

But he was still alive.

…meanwhile, at the RaccoonCityHospital

The Raccoon City Hospital felt cold, and eerily sterile. Alyssa and the rest of her small team pressed forward in hopes of finding a cure for the deadly T Virus. In the back of her mind, she knew they probably wouldn't ever find it here. In fact, she was sure of it. If the cure was so easy to come by, then why wouldn't it have been given out to the citizens of Raccoon sooner?

Cshh…cshh…csh…

Alyssa heard footsteps, towards the back of the room and around a corner, near the luminous light of a vending machine. Shadows moved in the distance and a zombie stumbled into view, eminently lit by the surrounding light but still ever so dangerous. Alyssa leveled her gun, but then something strange happened.

Woosh!

Something moved in the distance and seemed to fly directly over the zombie, disappearing almost instantaneously. Not more than three seconds after it seemed to have vanished, blood poured from the neck of the carrier and its rotting head rolled off to the side, landing on the floor and exploding in an array of brains and gore.

"What the hell!" Alyssa shrieked.

A green, lizard like creature emerged from the shadows, crawling along the wall and staring strictly at the group with beady yellow cat like eyes.

"Heeeeeerah!"

It shrieked at them, and pounced off the wall at lightning speed. It landed on the floor, extending its arms outward, almost like it was stretching its muscles, and extended its thick black claws. It looked almost reptilian, but seemed to have the reflexes of a cat or some kind of feline.

"No time to waste, MOVE!" Alyssa screamed, leveling her pistol in it's direction.

"Follow me!" George yelled, moving to a door not far from where they stood.

Bam! Bam! Bambambam!

Alyssa fired off five rounds into the monsters face and was the last one to enter the next room. She slammed the door behind her and locked it, turning around to look at the rest of her team.

"What the hell was that thing…" Alyssa panted, scared out of her mind, "I mean… it took the head clear off of that zombie back there."

"They're hunters…" Yoko murmured, "I don't know why…I know that somehow… I feel like I know what they are…but I can't remember."

"What are you talking about girl? Hunters? That thing isn't a fucking Hunter; it's an oversized lizard, that's what it is. Let's get that damn vaccine made and get the hell out of here." Alyssa stammered forward in search of the cure.

…meanwhile, on the RaccoonCity Streets…

SMASH!

The police van overturned and spun violently out of control. David smashed his forehead against the glass of one of the back windows. The van had collided with another vehicle moving slowly and probably operated by someone who had drifted into the daze of the T Virus. The van flipped upside down and rolled three or four times before finally landing right side up, smashed tightly against a brick wall and light post.

Blood trickled down David's face, and when he finally came to, he looked in the front seat to see shards of glass permanently embedded in the faces of the two officers who had rescued him from the Apple Inn. Again, David was alone, and this time he had no idea where he was going to go next.

…elsewhere, on Main Street

Linda shouted vehemently at Rodriguez who stood boldly in her path.

"Let me go!" She shouted, her tone intensifying.

"No…" he screamed back, over the whistle of a helicopters spiraling blades. He was a Supervisor for the Umbrella Biohazard Countermeasure Service, and his sole instruction was to make sure that the 'package' and Linda were transported to safety immediately, "It's too dangerous to go back now."

"But I left something very important back there. Trust me, it's gonna be a big help to us later!" Linda's hair blew in the increasing speed of the wind, and her voice became muffled. Her beige Umbrella Research uniform fit snuggly to her body, and she was growing uncomfortable, "If the Daylight sample is destroyed, then you can kiss the world you live in goodbye. It's the only thing that can stop the cannibal disease, trust me I have to get it!"

"Fine, but understand one thing… when this chopper takes off, it's leaving with our without you, you got that? If its your ass or mine, you better believe that my ass is on that chopper, baby." Rodriguez was become annoyed, as he wanted out of this freakish city now, not later.

"I'll be right back."

With that, Linda raced back to the Umbrella Center in the heart of Raccoon City. She needed to retrieve the Daylight sample, and she would risk her life to do it.

…meanwhile, at the RaccoonCityHospital

An elevator took Yoko, Mark, George and Alyssa into the basement, where George directed them towards a machine in the back. There were giant canisters lined up along the walls of the basement, filled by large, frog like organisms that resembled the monster from the front lobby.

Yoko shuddered, violently, as if she was being reminded of something terrible. Images rushed through her mind of pain, suffering, destruction and death, caused by one person, one corporation, one deadly virus and one terrible mistake…

She shut her eyes and held them tightly closed. The images faded away, and she regrouped her thoughts and caught up with Mark, who had silently been keeping a watchful eye over her. She was a young 18, but her wisdom grew far beyond her years.

"This is the Medium Base, and if I just…" George set the sample into a machine, which rotated it into a small canister somewhere else, inside the same machine. A small humming noise was heard, and the Medium Base was ejected, now containing the Vaccine Medium, "Here we are…"

George took the sample into his hand and walked over to a different part of the cold, dimly lit lab, "And…" he set the sample into a new machine, and another humming noise was heard, "And as Archimedes once said…Eureka"

The medium ejected, now glowing with a bright light.

"Daylight…" George said, inserting it into a syringe. He pressed the needle against his forearm and injected it, replaced the needle and injected Alyssa, and so forth.

"Well my friends…" George said, "We are now, in theory, completely immune to the effects of the T Virus."

TO BE CONTINUED!