--
The assault team was in a bad place. The breach team was gathering at the backdoor of the building, ready to make their move into the building and take out the targets, when they heard gunfire erupt from above them. With the surprise element gone, they blew the back door and rushed up the stairs, leaving two behind to cover the lift and take out the power. Uncarpeted stairs gave way to pounding footfalls, the unrelenting charge of the unit rattling through the empty stairwell.
An anonymous contact in the building had evacuated the tenants only minutes earlier. There weren't many to move; only a half dozen apartments in the building were occupied, and all on the lower floors. The targets had rented out both units on the top floor, and the floor below them was used for storage. The strike team could have gone in with guns blazing, but their leader had insisted on taking them alive if possible. Most of the men had groaned despite the rewards doubling if brought in alive; they were tired from chasing them for months on end. They just wanted the whole thing over with. Some of the men were considering abandoning the pursuit, doubtful that the remnants of Umbrella could even come up with the reward money with some of the ordinance they were being supplied with. After all, there were other high paying jobs that promised adventure out there.
The fifth floor of the building seemed quieter than the rest. It was one long hallway with doors on opposite sides, one leading to a two-bedroom unit, the other a studio. The team split in half, each side lining up along the walls, their stubby sub machine guns cocked and loaded. Lieutenant Cripps signaled to the breach man, a short stocky man from somewhere in the Middle East known to the others only as Kazir. While little to nothing was known about the man, Cripps knew he was reliable in a shootout. Grasping the heavy battering ram in his large hands, he shuffled to the enforced steel door. Sweating from the strain and his heavy armor, he set the ram into place and signaled for another man to grasp the other side. Most of the time he could take any door on his own, but the fact that this door was metal, and no doubt enforced, made it a two man job. Realizing time was of the essence, Cripps leapt forward to grab the other side's handles, tucking his rifle at his back. Kazir mouthed "on two", and began to count down. They rested the ram against the metal plate at the center of the door before slowly arcing it back. Before they could bring it down, however, the door disappeared in a ball of incandescent fire, and the world along with it.
--
"Alright, everything's wiped," said Jill, pocketing the computer disk as she finished the formatting command. "This has everything we know and leaves nothing of value behind."
"I'll cover your escape," Barry said, eager for an excuse to use his hand cannon. "With this," he added, and they half expected him to start petting his weapon lovingly. Chris horse collared him roughly from behind.
"Barry, you know we're set to go," Chris ordered, shoving him down the hole as Barry's expletives echoed off the walls of the shaft. "Ladies first," he beckoned to Jill.
"You say that after Barry and Leon go? Thanks."
"What can I say, I'm a progressive kind of guy," he said, kissing her deeply before sending her off. Setting the string of concussive grenades along the wall of the kitchen, he grabbed his trusty knife and pistol before leaping down after her.
Sliding through darkness, the deep rumble of the explosives going off above him shook the building to its very foundation. His mental timer was at 60 seconds for them fully evacuating their base of operations. Not bad, but not good either. It would definitely have to improve for their next one.
--
Chris was a liar, Leon thought to himself. He had promised a soft landing, and instead Leon found himself lying in the babbling current of foul smelling water. History books had told him all about the catacombs in France during the Revolution and Resistance movements, but he had no idea London had its own extensive network of underground tunnels.
Claire had somehow managed to land without so much as a drop of water on her person, while Barry was just as graceless as Leon, landing face first in the muck. Jill landed gracefully, dangling over the lip before swinging to land agilely on the side platform where Claire stood. Sadly, she was no longer wearing the short skirt, Leon noticed as he looked up. She had somehow found the time to change to a pair of slim dark slacks, and tucked her hair into a light beret. Leon definitely dug the look.
Chris came through last, signaled by the rumble above them. He landed squarely in the water, but squarely on his feet, as grimy water splashed into the surprised faces of Leon and Barry. Bits of debris and dust followed his arrival, sprinkling across the shallow water.
"What was that noise," Claire asked.
"I wired the door with explosives," Jill replied, her eyes scanning the dim darkness of the tunnel.
"I added a hoop of grenades to take out the guys on the hallway wall too," Chris said, pulling himself onto the platform to join them. "Won't kill them, but it'll give them the worst hangover of their lives."
"Did you get a good look at them," Barry asked to no one in particular.
"I did," answered Jill. "Definitely Umbrella Countermeasure core soldiers."
"Umbrella's Gestapo? That's strange," commented Chris, scratching his head before quickly dismissing the meandering thought. "We should get moving anyways. This way," he ordered, leading them down a path lit up by dim bulbs strung along the wall. Once they saw brighter lights down the tunnel, Chris reached behind him and cut the wire with his knife, drowning the long tunnel behind them in complete blackness.
"Why'd you do that," Leon wondered.
"I put those lights up to guide us out. Don't want UCBS following our bread crumbs, right?"
They trudged for another hundred meters when they heard the din of the train station ahead. Footing had become drier, surer, and Leon realized the drainage path had somehow taken them within earshot of a train terminal. A great escape route, he thought to himself. They were just outside the safety of the platform's lights when he felt the unforgiving barrel of a gun dig roughly into his back.
"What the—?"
Barry reached over and wrenched the pistol roughly from Leon's hand, and Leon felt Jill's warm breath on the back of his neck as she patted him down with her free hand. He shuddered.
"Keep the hands up, cowboy," she ordered coldly. "Who are you really working for?"
"What the hell is this," Leon yelled, locking his fingers atop his head. "I'm on your side!"
"Are you? Awfully convenient how the UCBS found us today, after we lost them in Berlin four months ago."
"But I-I saved Claire!"
"All the more reason to suspect you're involved. How could you have known a sniper was there?"
"I saw the laser sight!"
"No self respecting marksman uses a laser scope in daylight," she growled, digging the gun in harder.
"And when Claire needed Chris' help in Rockfort? What did I have to gain by helping her then?"
"Chris, what is this!" Claire yelled angrily, struggling to fight past her brother's protective arms. He held her in place wordlessly, his eyes studying Leon's every word, every action. "I saw the laser in the smoke too!"
"Sorry Claire, but it's not so easy to know who we can trust," said Barry. "For all you know, Wesker might have something on him."
"What the fuck is Wesker," asked Leon, incredulous at this turn of events. "I don't even know what a Wesker is!"
"Wesker couldn't have anything on Leon," cried Claire. "This is going nowhere!"
"Wesker can get something on anyone," whispered Barry, his eyes sullen. "Believe me."
"Last time we trusted someone we shouldn't have, we lost Rebecca," Chris said, breaking his silence. Everyone lowered their head at the mention of the name, even Jill. Still she held her gun, though, aimed steadily at the base of Leon's spine.
Leon looked them over, finally understanding. "Listen, I can understand your paran—suspicion. But I'm working against Umbrella. They tried to kill me and Claire, several times over. I have no love for them, or for money. I'm working with the O.R.E. to protect the country and—"
At his back, Jill scoffed. "You can't seriously be this apple pie," she said.
"What do you mean," Leon asked, turning slowly to face her.
"You're gonna get yourself killed if you don't wake up, junior," she said harshly. "You're not 'serving your country' like a good patriot, you're helping the newest bad guys on the block who've just changed names. The O.R.E…? People aren't 'recruited' to join, they're forced into it."
"That's not how it happens," he said, doubt creeping into his words for the first time. The dim memory of Graham's unspoken threats lingered. While the two agents might've forced him to cooperate and meet, Graham really hadn't given him a way out either. It was Leon's own sense of nationalistic duty that kept him involved.
"Isn't it? They blackmailed a survivor I escaped with, dangling a pardon over his head, threatening deportation and a firing squad back home, and they tried to use my family as leverage against me."
Leon stood silently, her words tearing at him. "Then why are you here," he whispered.
"Because my grandfather died just before the disaster, and those bastards never realized it," she answered glumly. "So don't blame me if I have doubts about their integrity, much less their information network."
"But they…serve…America," he whispered.
"They serve themselves if they answer to no one," countered Barry. Leon turned to him in disbelief.
"You too?"
Barry looked down wistfully at his massive gun, his thumb pulling nervously at the hammer. "No, they didn't want me. Said I was 'too old'…didn't have the 'accuracy' to make it," he muttered. "Bastards."
"Did you about know this," Leon asked breathlessly, turning to Claire. "Is it true?"
"They told me stories, but I wasn't sure myself," she replied. "It doesn't matter, though, Leon. That's on O.R.E., not you."
"You really believe that?"
"I-I believe in you," she began, her words slowly gaining strength. "I know we're going to find Sherry—"
"Why did you let me in if you suspected me," Leon asked Chris abruptly. He had to deal with his problems one at a time. As much as he hated himself for it, the gun at his back would have to be dealt with now, Sherry later.
"It wasn't that we suspected you of anything, but you have to admit, circumstance is working against you…"
"Yeah, it's nothing personal," Jill said, her killer's facade beginning to fade. For the first time, Leon didn't notice the softness of her luscious features, so lost was he in his own troubled thoughts.
"You strike me as a good kid," Barry added. "And you obviously have good intentions. But things aren't so simple as choosing the good side over the bad side. Only thing you can do is make the best choice you can."
Those words…Leon had heard them before. Graham had said the same thing to him when recruiting him. Or was he forced into it like Jill said? Did he really believe what he was doing was making the country better? Leon looked over everyone in the faint light of the tunnel and suddenly felt older than he had ever felt in all his life. Jill lowered her gun slowly, her eyes sympathetic. Barry, too, looked solemnly at the confused young man, saddened that he didn't have enough answers to offer. Chris nodded to him and Leon turned away, walking into the light and away from the last remnants of S.T.A.R.S., a team he had admired and once aspired to join. Emerging from the dark tunnel, he was a changed man: cynical, jaded, confused.
Claire pulled away from Chris to follow him, but she felt his hand holding her shoulder.
"Let him go, Claire," he said simply. But for the first time in all their young lives, she refused to look up at her brother. Hesitating for little more than a heartbeat, she shook off his grip and ran after Leon. She didn't look back.
Note: This chapter is a bit shorter than I had intended, but I liked the image ofClaire running after Leon and away from her brother Chris. The conclusion to the European section will come via Interlude, which is the next installment. We'll also see Ada again, several months after Rockfort Island. Expect her to be a bit more dangerous than the last time we saw her. But of course she'll put on her lackadaisical appearance and pretend not to care too much. Ah, you just gotta love her.
