This is Gōlaka-50. Here, the Indo-Iranian nations are a superpower.
Ah, Harvardville... It was once a more stable city. On the upside, it's the HQ of a very reputed pharmaceutical company. On the downside, it's taken more than that to keep the Deathforce Dimension from opening its dreaded portals into cracks and crannies of this city's reality.
Great hosts of naval, SOF, and ground force personnel are now stationed in and outside the city. Forts have been built. Automatic weapons are a common sight...as are metahuman mercs. They've been ordered to open fire on any zombie, or creature with any similar MO, that dares approach Harvardville's defenses.
WilPharma's HQ is in this city. Rumor has it they've created a vaccine for the T-virus. It sure has been a while, though, since that rumor was first spread... The company gets a lot of support from the NAF, though; and that includes from a Senator, who's gone as far as moving his own offices to this city, who's now the chairman of the Senate Davis Committee; a committee that specializes in the sterilizations of cities affected by either the Deathforce Dimension, the late Umbrella Corporation's own poisons, or both.
On the edge of the city, the Air Dome Laboratory stands. It's the latest pork barrel that the NAF has managed to roll out. As far as Harvardville is concerned, though, its development was paid for solely by WilPharma money. The dome is a state-of-the-art facility, which houses five moveable sectors. It's a virus research institute, which allegedly exists for the purpose of the research and development of vaccines for viruses.
Meanwhile, the warriors in the forts keep shooting zombies who dare come down from the mountains. Harvardville, it turns out, is at the base of a mountain range. For now, all of the zombies have been exiled there. Alas, the military can only do so much good for so many...
These are the offices of Sen. Davis. They're located about halfway between WilPharma HQ and the Air Dome Laboratory. But then, one might as well say that zombies eat brains.
Like a good Senator...figuratively speaking...he sits at his desk, and types emails. He half-grins, while doing so.
A lot of his emails come from an alias-toting whistleblower within WilPharma's ranks. They're telling him how much money the company is making, and how much it's likely to make, based on how much other companies make.
Naturally, the Senator replies with a mandatory thank-you; assurance, more or less, that he doesn't want out of the conspiracy that he's neck-deep into. The conspiracy also includes a few Tricell personnel in other cities; most notably ones in Rajasthan, Bangladesh, West Punjab, Bagmati, and a tiny little thing called Bajirib.
A buzzer on his desk goes off. He addresses it. It announces the arrival of the WilPharma rep, who's coming over to visit. The Senator smiles, and orders him allowed in his office.
He stands, moves over to a mirror, and prepares himself for the meeting that follows. It takes a lot of effort, after all, to be a valued member of an insider trading ring. Too bad most of Davis's constituents can't be expected to understand.
As he surveys himself in the mirror, he only sees his reflection...for now. Alas, all he's got to do is look away from his face. Too bad most self-respecting politicians don't.
Out of the corners of his eyes, he sees scary things. He never gets a good look at them; they just leave him with crept-out hunches. Nonetheless, he needs to make an appointment to get his eyes checked. Good thing he's got health insurance with WilPharma, as well as insider trading contacts.
At last, the WilPharma rep arrives. He's Bajiribi. He looks like he might be half-Marathi, too...
Cordially, the two men sit on either side of a very small coffee table. They share a smoke, while talking sensitive material in secret. Or rather, they EXPECT this to be done in secret...
Over the surface of the Senator's desk, near a pen tip, a tiny portal of Deathforce magic opens. The pen lies on its side, atop a few stacked sheets of paper. Sen. Davis's name is engraved on its side. The portal, though airborne, looks like a tiny little speck of ink; one that the pen itself would leave, via its red point.
From the portal, Claire Redfield falls. She's now a ten thousandth her normal size...courtesy of a stint in the Deathforce Dimension. She doesn't know it yet...but she now has superhuman abilities, as a result.
The paper allows her a soft landing. Above her, the portal vanishes. Now, lying on the paper, she catches her breath, and absorbs her surroundings.
She's like a dust mite on the Senator's desk. A framed photograph of him, standing next to the President and shaking his hand, towers over her. Light reflects off the frame's glass surface, and hurts Claire's eyes.
Far from her, she hears voices. They're very loud. As soon as her hearing adjusts to her new predicament, she recognizes one of those voices as the Senator's. Now, she's terrified. Claire's never been the Senator's biggest advocate; but then, that's probably because the Senator opposes Terra Save, a simple, well-meaning human rights agency...that Claire just so happens to be a part of.
Alas, as the moments pass, Claire begins to see an advantage in her predicament. She's now in a position from which spying on the Senator is tactical...if not entirely strategic. By doing this, she could score a few points for Terra Save...and not to mention children and families all over the world.
Deviously, she hides under the picture frame. Right now, she doesn't have to. But she might have to, when and if the Senator returns to his desk. At her new size, it seems more likely the Senator won't see her. Even so, she can't get caught. Again, the Senator is not her biggest fan right now...if he could ever be.
She listens. At the small coffee table, the two men spill everything. And yet...they don't spill what Claire would love to hear. Either they're not talking about it because they've nothing to do with it, or because they're better at keeping secrets than a sleeper agent. But of course, Claire can't dismiss the possibility that these two men are sleeper agents, of sorts... And yet, she'd think that if they were, and they were alone, they'd feel freer to disclose inside references, at least, if not actual information...
Claire sighs. She's not sure what she did to get trapped inside the Deathforce Dimension...but she's starting to wish she hadn't.
In the Senator's window, some potted plants grow. They're dying. And yet, there's a plant care book on his shelves...kept in a place on the shelves that seems just a bit more used than the rest...
Just above a huge brown leaf, another Deathforce Dimension portal opens. Moments later, it closes. Unclear, at first, as to what that fuss was about...
Soon, though, it becomes apparent. From seeming nothing, atop the leaf, a tardigrade grows. He doesn't get very big...but he becomes visible.
Alas, something's wrong. He doesn't look as cute and cuddly as a lot of his non-Deathforce kin do. As a matter of fact, it looks as if the Deathforce Dimension has mutated him... Either that, or the Umbrella Corporation has...
This tardigrade now has the jaws of an ant. He also has the hind legs of a weta (i.e. a cricket from Victoria). He has the tail of an opossum. He has the hood, and fangs, of a hognose snake. Around the midst of his body, he has the clitellum of an earthworm.
This tardigrade is also an Umbrella Licker. Either that, or he also has the long, sticky, prehensile tongue of a burrowing frog.
At his size, the Deathforce tardigrade poses no obvious threat to humans. Alas, he's so small, he could leap into someone's head, via their ear, and start feasting upon their brains.
Alas, real bears prefer food that's smaller than themselves. (Non-Deathforce tardigrades are also sometimes called "water bears.") Lucky for this monstrous creature, there is something...or rather, someone...smaller than itself in this city. And she just so happens to be in this Senator's office.