2
With the new trainees already in their seats in the main lecture room, Dr. James Marcus walked to the lectern at the head of the room and set his notes on the top. He pressed a button on the lectern and the slide projector at the rear of the room clicked on, illuminating the screen behind him with the Umbrella logo. He surveyed the students with a critical eye, to see which ones were paying the most attention.
"Turn your computer screens on," he said as an introduction. Only a few of the trainees had not done so already, and he watched them do so quickly, now that they realized the class was under way. In his years of running the facility, Marcus had learned not to gauge his opinion of a student on his first impression of them, but on how they handled themselves in the first training class. The ones who were prepared and attentive right off the bat were usually destined for mediocrity, while the ones who showed up late and unprepared for class usually climbed the ranks quickly and eventually ran their own research teams. It seemed backwards, he knew, but that was the way it was.
He pressed the slide projector button again and the Umbrella logo switched to three words in large capital letters: DISCIPLINE. OBEDIENCE. UNITY.
"These three words are the motto of this facility," he intoned deeply. "I want you all to learn them, memorize them, and live your life by them while you stay here. Discipline, obedience, and unity. They are the characteristics by which I will evaluate you. Everything you do while you are here should be done in accordance with these simple rules."
He scanned the crowd of young faces. All of them under the age of thirty, with the prodigies Wesker and Birkin still in their teens, they were inexperienced and untested in their real abilities. In the coming weeks, Marcus would know more about them then they knew themselves, and decide just what they had to offer the company.
"Discipline is first. You are all expected to display discipline in both your personal and professional lives. I will not tolerate lack of self-control or willpower. You are employees of the Umbrella Corporation, and the way you conduct yourselves reflects on Umbrella.
"Obedience is second. You must always follow the rules and orders you are given, by me or any of your other superiors. As employees of Umbrella, you must always show obedience and loyalty to Umbrella. I will not tolerate insubordination in any form.
"Unity is third." At this, he paused to examine the faces in front of him. "I have already spoken to you all about this. While you are here, you are all equals. You are to cooperate and work together in all your endeavors, and never let your own self-interests conflict with the interests of your fellow scientists. You are one group, one cohesive unit working toward a common goal, and as such you should never let personal ambition get in your way.
"These are the three ideals you are to live by. But don't think of them as three separate rules, think of them as one all-important creed. You are always to be disciplined, obedient, and unified. Your career here depends on your adherence to that rule."
Some of the trainees, the less-creative, less-ambitious ones, nodded or gestured agreement with what he had said. Some of them might even take it to heart and sincerely try to follow the instructions. But Marcus knew they were only words, an abstract ideal far from the concrete reality. Few of the men were disciplined, a couple might be obedient, but hardly any would be truly unified. Since Umbrella specifically looked for candidates with proven ambition and creativity in their labors, Marcus sometimes felt he was telling them to follow rules in direct opposition to their very natures.
Like the young geniuses, for example. If there was anyone in the room not likely to follow orders, it would be the cocky Wesker, and if anyone was not unified with the others, it was the solitary Birkin. Both of them were brilliant, ambitious, and destined for successful careers with the company, and Marcus doubted either of them cared an ounce about discipline, obedience, or unity. In Wesker's case, he apparently cared only about himself, and in Birkin's case, he only cared about his work.
Marcus had to admit that even he didn't live up to the three words. He had been the one to come up with them as a slogan for the training facility, and he never bothered to apply them to his own work ethic. Do as I say and not as I do, he wanted to say.
The rest of the training session went smoothly, as Marcus blandly read off his notes, saying the same things he'd said to every group of new trainees for the past two decades. He wanted to get it over with as soon as possible, so he could get back downstairs to continue his work. He'd been making huge progress in the past few weeks, which frustrated him because it came right when he was busiest with the new trainees. It could not be helped, though.
After he was finished with his lecture and the obligatory question-and-answer session that followed, he gave each of them the Umbrella Employee Handbook and dismissed them. He gathered his notes and stuck them in his briefcase before heading out the back door to the patio behind the mansion, quickly escaping the room before any of the students had time to ask him something.
Outside, the sun was beginning its long descent behind the mountains to the west, and temperatures were dropping accordingly. Marcus walked briskly down the sidewalk along the south side of the building toward the astronomical observatory. It was a two-story tall domed tower with a large rotating telescope at the top. Marcus always wondered why it had been built, since Umbrella had no financial interest in astronomy and neither did he. It remained unused for the most part, since the scientists working at the mansion had little interest in or time for stargazing. As far as Marcus was concerned, it was only an expensive prop designed to cover up the real work done at the mansion. It was a mask, a decoy.
There was a balcony on the mansion's second floor that connected the tower's main observation room to some of the mansion's offices, but Marcus wasn't heading that way. He entered the tower through its rusty doors and, ignoring the circular staircase leading up to the second floor, went directly to the elevator that took up much of the space inside the first floor of the tower. Instead of up and down buttons on the panel beside it, there was only a numerical pad. Marcus entered in his five-digit code and the door hissed open.
He stepped inside and the door closed, as the elevator transported him underground.