Chapter 3: You Have Now Entered the World of Survival Horror

Having a group of people in the far distance from your helicopter usually doesn't seem like a very threatening situation. After all, if they got hostile, you'd just fly away. It wasn't what you would call a big deal. However… when said group happens to have a rocket launcher with them… it tends to makes things a little bit more complicated. Actually, make that a lot more complicated, especially for Roy, Harvey, and Laurence. Things were not looking to well, as that missile soared through the sky, going straight for the helicopter. The three didn't take a second more to jump out of that aircraft as fast as possible and make there way to a safe place. Then again, everything was grasslands… where was a safe spot?

"Just… keep… running," Roy panted as they ran. He winced slightly as he heard the noise of something, well, exploding. He turned his head for the moment as he saw the MD-Explorer in flames. It looked as though it was melting, and crying. That poor chopper; it didn't stand a chance. There were still so many things that Roy wanted to test on that thing too! Now, he'd never get the chance.

"Oh this is just great…" he yelled aloud. "Can things possibly get any worse?"

Beep-beep-beep.

"This is Lorenzo to Thompson, do you copy?"

"This… is…. him… can I help you?"

"We head an explosion coming from your location. What is going on?"

"Oh… we just met the locals is all… they blew up our helicopter,"

"Excuse me!?"

"Y'all 'eard him. The helicopter is kaputz. Them there locals went and aimed one of them rocket launchers at it and blowed it up," Harvey added in on his radio.

"And you didn't try to stop it?"

Roy twitched for a moment before replying to that. "Daniel, it's a freakin' rocket launcher! How do you expect us to fight against something like that!?"

"You should have found away before to prevent it from happening,"

"Right… like I knew a bunch of guys from the middle of goddamn nowhere were going to pop up with a tool of death! Jesus!" Was the guy dense? Or just stupidly brave? Either way, if Daniel had been here, in charge of this, they'd all be dead by now.

"Perhaps, you could give us a little information as to what we should do now, since our ride is obviously not up and ready to go?" Laurence added in, trying to stop the pointless conversation. "Right now, we're just running…. because, well, they're still shooting at us… yelling not very nice things,"

"Just keep running until you find a safe-spot. When you do, shoot their brains out,"

Roy was a little startled to hear Cassandra's voice on the radio, but in a weird sort of way, it was comforting. "But, aren't these the locals? We can't just do that… can we?"

"They're no longer who they were. Las Plagas have gotten to them already. We're too late,"

"How can you be so sure?" Laurence asked, a little sceptical about the whole idea of there being a parasite so advanced as this one.

"Well, it's either that, or they're absolutely pissed off for no apparent reason. Either way, we're no longer safe. The game's begun, and now there's no turning back,"

Roy was silent for a moment. Cassandra, she seemed very different right now. This wasn't the original Cassandra he knew, nor was it the ignoring bitch that he was dealing with earlier. This… she sounded, professional and all knowing, but at the same time, scared.

Just what in the world was going on here?

"Listen up everyone, because I'm going to say this once," Cassandra was taking charge now. There were so many times where things had gone wrong because she As much as Daniel wanted to object to all of this, but even he knew that it was important at least to hear her out right now.

"These things aren't like anything you've faced before. They're not human, but they're not zombies either. They're… well a mix of both. They have the stamina and aggression of Umbrella's T-Virus, but they still function on an intelligent level. It's going to take more than just one bullet to take these bad boys down. Usually a blow to the head, or severing their spinal-cord should do the trick,"

"Wa-wait a second here!" Rio stepped in defensively. "Just what the hell do you think you're saying? These are people, Ms. Warren. Normal people! They're not soldiers of war, or anything…" The tanned young man tightened his hand into a fist. "They're people I know… family, friends… I can't just pretend they're nothing!"

Cassandra stayed silent for a moment, not quite sure what to say. Well, she had a few ideas, all that were very cold of her, but she didn't want to pass this off as a 'sunshine and pink pony' world either. She crossed her arms and tapped her foot, thinking. There had to be a better way to go around this. When she was in Racoon City, fighting against the T-virus, she too was faced with friends, family… neighbours… it was a hard decision, but eventually, she basically was nullified towards the end. Whether she knew the person or not,

"Rio… they are no longer the people you know. They are merely images of your family. Ghosts, really-"

"That's what you think-"

"It's what I know. Listen, I understand that this is hard, but right now, it's you, or them. Seeing that they're infested with parasites, I'm going to hope it's them,"

"The sheila's right, Rio," Bruce spoke up as he tipped up his outback hat. "I hate to say it, but something eerie is goin' on here. Now, I'm not saying shoot every single thing you say, but ya gotta keep your eyes and ears open, alrigh'?"

Rio gave his captain an angry look, but he knew that both he and Cassandra were right. It was just difficult for the young man to grasp. He couldn't understand how this all went wrong. "It just doesn't make sense… I mean, when I called them, everything seemed fine. They never spoke about anyone bizarre coming in,"

"It's probably because the person they met didn't look bizarre," Karen replied, crossing her arms. "They wanted to keep a low profile so that they wouldn't have us or anyone else on their tail,"

"Either way, we're sitting ducks if we just keep standing around here like this," Cassandra added, looking at everyone and bringing the radio up to her mouth again. "We'll leave it at this; if someone decides to try and attack you, it's more likely that they're infected. If that's the case, then we have no choice, but to neutralize them. Got that, Thompson? McKenzie?"

"Alls we gotta do is hit them there critters in the head something. We gotcha missy,"

"We'll try to catch up to you guys when we have the chance, though I have an inkling that's gonna be awhile. If you guys find anything worthwhile, give us a call,"

"Mm. You guys do the same," Cassandra replied. Before, putting down her radio, something suddenly hit her.

"… Roy?"

"Yeah?"

"… Be careful,"

"Heh. Don't worry about me. You just do the same, okay? I want to have someone's ass to look at once we're out of here. No-no, no need for words- I know you're thinking the same thing and that's all that counts,"

"… You sure do know how to make a miserable mission into an awkward moment, don't ya?"

Author's Notes: Yes… Roy just said that. Why? Because he can. Great guy, though… he's a guy. A guy in the military. Whaddya expect? If you were in the desert and you just had your one mean of transportation blown up and a bunch of angry folk were probably out to get your blood… you'd do the same, wouldn't you? I thought so.