Prologue
July 4th, 1998
Obedience breeds discipline. Discipline breeds unity. Unity breeds power. Power is life.
The muffled sounds of applause and cheering could be heard in the background. In a small, but cozy ready room, Dr. James Marcus readied himself with a makeup woman named Lois Sanders. Marcus glanced at her, and thought she was rather attractive, but clearly no younger than thirty. Marcus was a prime sixty-nine, and he felt it. His back was aching most of the time, and he wondered if he probably should go to the doctor for some medication.
Nonetheless, he felt excited tonight, because he was about to be on the ALL ABOUT RACCOON television show, part of the Raccoon 7 news station. This show liked to discuss some of the greatest aspects of the small city. Tonight, he was the honored guest. He played with his hair, and gave the good looking girl a smirk.
"What do you think?" he asked.
"Not bad. Though I really don't think it's gonna matter much. The show's pretty casual in its dress," Lois replied.
"All the meetings I go through with the company, and I'm worried about the audience of tonight's show," he said.
They both laughed.
"You'll do fine," she said.
The crowd went silent, and the host, Christina Johnson, cleared her throat.
"This city owes a lot to the next guest. I believe that if it weren't for him and his corporation, we would have still been suffering from the last pandemic well into the mid-nineties. Who is he? Well, he is none other than co-founder of The Umbrella Corporation, Dr. James Leonard Marcus," she said.
The audience broke out into a large cheer as Marcus stepped out onto the stage. Walking towards the desk and chairs, Marcus almost stumbled, but recovered himself. Everyone in the crowd chuckled, even Marcus himself. He made it to the chair, and shook hands with Johnson. He then took his seat.
"Are you alright, sir?" Johnson asked in a low voice.
"Oh, I'm quite fine. If you can't learn to laugh at yourself, I think we'd all be way too serious. Besides, I think that's a sign of just how nervous I am today," Marcus said.
They both gave a chuckle, and let out a little sigh of relief.
"Well, I'm grateful for you to be here, Dr. Marcus, as I'm sure you're well aware how much you've done for this fine city," Johnson said.
"Well, I give more thanks to Raccoon City, because they welcomed us with open arms when we needed a home base originally," Marcus replied.
"Can you tell us what made you want to get into pharmaceutics?" Johnson asked.
"It honestly goes back thirty or so years. To say that our life's work was, as you say, life itself, well that was kind of the point. We wanted to make sure things like the pandemic, as you already mentioned, never happen again. We all have family who have suffered from terrible diseases. My goal was to make sure they never suffered long, if at all. At Umbrella, we want to make your health our priority," he said.
The crowd cheered.
Marcus looked on at the crowd, and felt his anxiety flair a bit, but in all honesty, he was enjoying it. Ozwell would get a kick out of it if he knew that Marcus got stressed over a television audience of all things after the multiple board of executive meetings they'd been to that had been less than favorable over the last few centuries.
"I assume you've got a lot going for you, in your long career with the corporation.
Any regrets?" Johnson asked.
Marcus took a moment to think about how to answer the question. The truth was that he had, at most, one regret, and he thought about that now, but how to explain it without delving into some of the darker secrets of the corporation. These were dark secrets that nobody but the inner most circle at the corporation knew about. To Marcus, it must have looked like he was staring out into space, but then he turned and gave a good, but emotional look at Johnson.
"There is one regret, but I imagine that it worked out for the best as I had to leave behind someone special to achieve so much in my life. From what I recall though, the person in question is living a happy life, and has a very successful career. Knowing that, I feel that I can, at least, die easy knowing it won't have any lasting effects," he said.