Chapter 13

"Alright, give me a couple of minutes to get into the main systems," Kaplan said as he pulled a high-grade laptop from his pack and connected it to the servers. "There should be enough juice coming from the backup generators to at least let me get the Red Queen's minor functions up and running."

"Do you need us to do anything?" Rain asked the tech specialist. "If you manage to pull up a map of the facility first we can probably get more ammo after we used a ton of it on those creatures back there."

"It'll have to wait until I can get the Red Queen up and the main power back on," Kaplan replied. "I can remotely open doors from here once I've run everything through a systems analysis."

"So we hold and wait?" I asked. "How long do you think it might take?"

"It could be fifteen minutes, or it could be a couple of hours," Kaplan said with a shrug. "It's not all that easy to predict these sorts of things."

"Alright, let's take a break then," Rain instructed. "Until Kaplan manages to get us some directions then we need to stay put," she looked at the door that we had pried open and at the desk that sat in the middle of the room. "This place is shit for defensive purposes," She turned to the rest of us. "Let's set up some tripwires and traps, at least we'll have a warning before someone or something tries to get in."

"I've only got one flashbang left," I replied as I pulled it off of its place on my vest. "But I do still have some line left."

"I've got a flashbang and a frag," Edward held out his grenades to people that were more experienced at this part of the job than he was.

"I've got two flashbangs, a smoke, and a frag," J.D said as he handed his grenades over to Rain. "Natalia has two incendiaries and a frag," he held out the grenades to Rain. "I think we should keep one of the Incendiaries in case another one of those creatures shows up."

"Edward, you're with me," Rain told the STARs officer. "We'll get everything set up while Kaplan finishes doing his diagnostics."

"Alright, that should have been enough of a rest," Captain Marini said as he stood up from where he had been sitting against a wall. "Let's get moving, I want to get a look at that facility before it gets too dark to see anything."

"I'll take point," Kenneth offered. "I've got the map that we found on the train anyway."

The members of Bravo Team then left the train station and began to follow the tracks deeper into the mountain.

–

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"How much further do we have to walk?" Richard asked Kenneth as they began to slow down a touch. "Cuz it seemed like this facility would be closer in my head."

"We're almost there," Kenneth said as he put the map away. "You should start seeing some of the buildings in a moment."

"We gonna talk about what we found back at the train station before we go investigate this facility?" Forest finally spoke. "Or are we just going to leave it unsettled?"

"No, we can take a small break and discuss it," Captain Marini said as he slowed down to a stop. "We would have talked about it earlier, but I wanted to give everyone time to process it."

"Captain Wesker can't be fucking trusted," Forest spat on the ground. "His name and picture on that paperwork in the station's office, and the fact that he's the one who sent us out into these mountains tells me that he had plans for us. And I don't take too kindly to people trying to get me or my friends killed."

"I don't know how I feel about it," Rebecca said after a moment of thought. "I do think we need to confront him on it though."

"I want answers," Kenneth said as he brandished the pack with all of the documents and evidence that they had found so far. "And I believe we will find them on this mountain."

"We only have the one sheet of paper so far," Richard agreed. "Let's build a solid case against him before we nail him to the wall."

"I'll take him on if this goes south," the captain said after everyone had spoken their piece. "We're here to investigate murders and other things anyway, so any evidence that we find we should be doumenting anyway. Hopefully we'll find what we need in this facility. And when we get back to Raccoon City we'll put it to use."

"Alright," Forest said after a moment. "But I'm going to put the bastard six feet under if he tries anything."

"If he tries anything then we'll all be helping you kill him," Rebecca spoke up. "I'm not dying here in these mountains."

"I'm in!" Kaplan cheered as he finally got the system up and running. "It's like someone tried to wipe the Red Queen's code out and replace it with something homebrew," the tech cracked his fingers and neck before getting back to work. "But they don't know that I was on the team that wrote her original code."

"So is she active?" Rain asked as she stood up.

"Yes Sergeant Rain Melendez," a child's voice came over the intercom. "I am now active and ready to assist."

"Can you pull up the security footage and tell us what happened?" Rain asked the now operational AI. "And can you get the lights up and running? We need to be able to see if there are any other people we can get out of the HIVE now that it's compromised."

"I am pulling up the security footage now," the voice replied. "Dr. Alicia Marcus is not normally authorized to view said footage, but due to the circumstances I am bypassing the normal security protocols."

I moved to keep an eye on the entrance as the others went to view the footage.

Camera angles then appeared on the screen as they saw a crate be pulled in via the subway entrance.

"This facility is dedicated to infectious diseases and antiviral research," the voice said as the footage shifted. "But we received an unauthorized shipment at around 0600 yesterday morning," a series of crates were brought into the facility via the subway tunnels. "But when I attempted to enact the proper security measures I was overridden by someone who had direct access to my core code and protocols."

The crates began to rock back and forth before they seemed to burst open, releasing what looked like zombies, those creatures that they had encountered earlier, and one more creature that they had not encountered yet.

"Upon the arrival of the unauthorized specimens, I attempted to lock down this facility," the Red Queen stated. "But I was forced to work around the new overrides in order to do so, and only managed to lock down the most critical areas of the facility dedicated to the most deadly of diseases and viruses," Unfortunately for most of the members of this facility, I was too late. Dr. Marcus was the only one in her lab at the time that I was finally able to lock down the facility."

"Who gave the override?" Rain asked as she looked over Kaplan's shoulder as he began to fly through the keys on the keyboard, pulling up a map of the complex and giving the team members access to the rest of the facility.

"I am unable to give out that information," the Red Queen replied. "It was deleted from my database."

"Are there any other people who made it out?" Rain asked again.

"I am afraid that you are the only people who are alive in this facility," the Red Queen replied. "My safety protocols recommend that you evacuate this facility and activate the self destruct before more of the infected are able to escape."

"Give us access to the Armory, and see if you can pull data on the infection," Rain told Kaplan. "We need to be able to show what happened here when we get out."

"I'm afraid all information on the infection is classified," the Red Queen said. "Any attempts to gain access to that information will be dealt with by any means necessary."

"Kaplan," Rain nodded at her tech specialist. "Pull all of the classified data from her drives. We can try and get access to it once we are out of here."

"You're all going to die down here," the voice said nonchalantly. "Lockdown protocols are now lifted for the interior facility, the exterior doors are locked down."