Notes: - Here we go, chapter four! Zet Sway your reviews are, as always, a pleasure to read. Thank you once again! Have a chocolate coated Krauser! And thanks also to manoerina for reviewing!

Apologies for the longer gap in this chapter upload. I'm busy working on the sequel!

The Facility – Chapter Four

Chris stared moodily out of the Jeep's passenger side window as the countryside whizzed by. Armed with the armour piercing bullets, they were now on their way back to the cave and the underground facility. Chris supposed that it was a good thing that they were pushing on with the mission since relations between him and Leon had hit a new low. After Leon had walked out of the room Chris hadn't really seen much of the younger man and the only communication he'd received was that they'd be setting off for the cave first thing. Chris had tried to speak to his partner over breakfast but every attempt at conversation had been rebuffed. He hadn't expected Leon to take the news so badly and he was struggling to understand why. If Leon had spent so long segregating himself from people just because he was worried about how they might react when they discovered he was gay, surely it would come as a relief to learn that he was being accepted with no trouble. Chris' head swam as he tried to make sense of it all. He supposed that he didn't know his partner as much as he thought he did. He just wished that Leon could see that he didn't mean anything malicious by reading the file.

It was a long and conversation-less drive. Chris found it awkward to be silent for so long but he knew there was no use in trying to speak. They arrived at the cave, wordlessly tooled up, loaded their guns with the new bullets and once again headed into the darkness. As they rappelled down the hole where the ladder had been Chris couldn't shake off the familiar feeling that they were being watched. There were no signs of the remains of the creature he'd killed with the grenade which un-nerved him slightly. They landed safely in the corridor and this time, Chris followed behind Leon. They carefully headed down the corridor for a few metres until Chris could stand the crushing silence no longer. He wasn't sure if it was the uncertainty of where they were going or whether he just needed to hear a fellow human's voice but he just couldn't take it.

"Look, about yesterday…don't you think that we should maybe talk about it or something"? He spoke awkwardly to Leon's black clad back as they reached a door.

"It doesn't require our immediate attention" Leon answered coldly. "What does however, is this door. I need you to cover me. Do you think you can do that"?

Chris nodded and sighed as Leon braced himself. The door was, of course, locked, which meant that it required a little brute force. With one swift and effective kick, Leon had the door open. The pair entered what looked like an old storage room. There were a few empty oil drums stacked up in one corner and large metal crates lined the length of the wall on the opposite side. Leon did a quick sweep of the room and came up with nothing. There wasn't even another door, which they could try.

"Looks like we're back to that door we went to when we first came here," Chris said. He wanted to add a little something about him being right all along but he sensed that it probably wasn't the right time.

"There could be more of those creatures in there" Leon replied, looking thoughtful. "There has to be another way into that room that doesn't leave us so open to attack"

"How about the air vents"? Chris suggested, nodding towards a vent covering in the top right hand corner of the room. "They've got to lead somewhere and I bet we'll be pretty safe in there" He added smugly.

"Hmm" Leon looked at the covering thoughtfully. "As much as I hate to admit this. You might actually be on to something" The covering was right above one of the oil drums. Leon grabbed hold of the drum and shook it, testing it for strength. He climbed onto the top of the drum and started to pull at the covering. His left side was still painful but he ignored the insistent throbbing and after a lot of jiggling and pulling, the cover came away in his hands. He discarded it carefully, not wanting to alert anyone who might be around to their presence.

Chris watched as Leon hauled himself up into the vent. He dashed over to the opening and followed, pulling himself into the cramped and dirty space. Leon's backside was mere inches away from his face but he resisted the urge to make any sort of comment. Instead he remained quiet as they crawled through the vent, heading back in the direction that they'd come from. In theory, the vent would lead to the room where the creature had been residing.

"When I helped found the BSAA I didn't imagine I would be crawling through dirty air vents…" He said, snorting loudly as he inhaled another generous amount of dust.

"Quiet" Leon snapped. "There's an exit up ahead"

Chris looked around Leon's ass and saw light flooding into the air vent from the gaps in the slats of a cover on the floor of the vent. They crawled over to it and Leon carefully crawled over it and awkwardly turned around in the vent so that they were now facing each other over the slatted cover.

"So what's the plan? Boot that thing in and storm the room with our guns blazing"? Chris asked hopefully. All this sneaking around wasn't really his thing. He much preferred action and shooting.

"Of course" Leon spat sarcastically. "There's probably a girl down there who needs rescuing and she'll be oh so grateful that you saved her from the monsters and the pair of you can make hot love on the corpses of whatever we'd killed"

"Now that's what I'm talking about"! Chris replied excitedly. He grinned at his partner goofily, pleased that the younger man was actually talking to him. Leon shook his head and leant forward to look through the slats. From what little he could see, it appeared that he was looking at a science lab similar to what he'd been in back in Raccoon City. The floor was made of white tiles and he could see a monitoring station with a row of flickering images. There was a takeaway coffee cup on the desk of the monitoring station, which indicated that it had been in recent use.

"So when are we actually going to do something"? Chris asked. "It's too hot in this damn vent, I'm sweating like mad" He wiped his wet forehead with the back of his hand and then wiped that across the chest of his t-shirt. Leon looked disgusted.

"I can't hear anyone down there" He replied. "Get ready to cover me just in case" He ordered before he started to kick at the cover. It came away easily and Leon even managed to reach down quickly and catch it before it hit the ground. He pulled the cover up through the hole and rested it against the wall of the vent.

"Let's go," He said before dropping through the hole.

Chris had to marvel at the way Leon managed to execute an agile landing. He followed through the hole and landed in a heap on the floor almost winding himself in the process. He got to his feet quickly and dusted himself off to cover his embarrassment. It didn't matter anyway, since Leon wasn't even looking at him. He was too busy scouting the room.

Just as Leon had assumed, they were in a lab. There were cupboards along the walls with the biohazard symbol printed on them and what looked like a large water tank over the other side of the room. There was an operating table in the middle of the room with a large desk beside it covered in papers and bottles containing various coloured liquids. Everything was white and pristine, a complete contrast to the storage room. A sick feeling descended over Chris. It was all too familiar to him, too much like the lab they'd found during the Mansion Incident.

"So this is some sort of research facility," Leon said as he strolled over to the desk and looked at the row of liquids on display. Chris chose to examine the large tank in the corner. The water inside was green and murky like dirty pond water. He tapped the glass but nothing seemed to stir. He heard a click come from behind and turned around to see a thick muscular arm wrapped around Leon's neck holding him close to a body. A large, mean looking combat knife was being pressed to his face and Leon's blue eyes were wide with shock.

Chris broke out into a cold sweat as he stared at the man who held his partner. There was something about the man's face that he recognised, the scar the traced from his forehead over his eye and ending near the corner of his mouth. The steely cold grey eyes, the self-satisfied smirk, the slicked back blonde hair. He knew he'd seen this man before but he couldn't for the life of him place where.

"Drop the gun," The man ordered, tightening his grip around Leon's neck and pressing the flat of the blade against Leon's cheek.

"Who the fuck are you"? Chris demanded with a growl.

"Tell him Kennedy," The man ordered, his eyes never leaving Chris'. He gave Leon's neck another hard squeeze.

"Krauser" Leon choked out as Krauser smirked. Chris glared at the man. He knew he'd seen his face somewhere before. His picture was in Leon's personal file. So this was the man who'd made his partner's life hell.

"They told you I died in a helicopter crash didn't they"? Krauser whispered teasingly into Leon's ear. His eyes locked back onto Chris'. "I told you to drop that weapon"

Chris slowly bent down, putting his magnum on the floor. His eyes never left Leon's. Whether his partner was trying to communicate something with his eyes Chris didn't know but there was no way he was going to put Leon's life at risk. Krauser walked Leon forward and kept a tight hold of him while he picked up Chris' gun. He relieved Leon of his weapon and then released him, shoving him hard into Chris. He pointed one of the magnums at the pair of them.

"Now move," He ordered, nodding towards a heavy metal door that led to the adjacent room. Krauser pressed a button on the doorframe and the metal door slid open revealing a completely pitch black room. He pushed Leon hard in the back and he fell into the room, following closely by Chris. Krauser then backed away. The pair saw him press the button once more and the door slid closed, leaving them in complete darkness. Chris felt a sharp elbow dig him in the ribs hard.

"You fucking idiot! You should've just shot him"! Leon spat. He couldn't see his partner's face in the darkness but Chris guessed that he looked distinctly unimpressed.

"Oh I'm sorry" Chris said sarcastically. "Why didn't I think of that? I mean fuck it if that bastard stabbed you" He clambered to his feet. "I understand if you wanna see him shot-"

"Of course you understand" Leon replied acidly. "You read my fucking file. You know all about him" There was a metallic clang as Leon obviously punched or kicked one of the walls. "Fuck. Why don't you listen to me? Why don't you ever listen to me? I don't need a friend or a partner. Why did you have to read that file? Why couldn't you have just waited patiently, sat still and not touched anything? Why do you have to touch what isn't yours? Everything's Chris Redfield's property! You take what you want without giving a shit about any consequences"

Chris picked a loose thread on his t-shirt feeling stupid. He should've known all along that Leon wouldn't have taken kindly to his file being read. He'd never heard his partner sound so angry before.

"I'm sorry," He muttered into the darkness.

"Just leave me alone. I need to find a way out of here" Leon replied. He was silently cursing himself for not equipping himself with his usual hip light. He walked around the room with his hands outstretched and from sheer sense of touch alone, he worked out that the room they'd been put in was fairly small, no more that six or seven feet squared. The walls seemed to be made of the same metal as the ones in the corridor and the floor was solid concrete. There appeared to be nothing else in the room apart from the two of them. Chris could hear his partner wandering around the room muttering inaudible things to himself and he felt like it was starting to drive him mad. He slumped to the floor and leant his back against the wall. The silence between them was uncomfortable and it was obvious that Leon wasn't going to apologise for his outburst any time soon and Chris had no idea what to say to make the situation better. Jill had more than once accused him of being emotionally retarded. She said by the time he'd worked out what people wanted from him, it was too late. He wondered if Leon really didn't want anything from him. Reading his file had been an education to say the least. Leon was still fairly young to have gone through so much and knowing what he'd been through had aroused a new respect in Chris. He sighed deeply and stretched out on the floor, resting on his elbow. He had no idea of what had been in this room before him but he figured that if he hadn't picked up something from everything he went through in the Mansion, chances are he was pretty resistant. Without warning he felt the toe of a steel capped combat boot collide with his stomach and a warm body collapse over him before hearing the clang of something colliding with the metal wall.

"You fucking dick" Leon moaned. "Why would you lay down in a dark room"? He asked as Chris felt him roll off him.

"To go to sleep"? Chris suggested. "That's what mainly happens in darkened rooms," He added sarcastically.

"You're really annoying, you know that"? Leon spat.

"You might have mentioned that before yes" Chris replied. "Are you ok? It sounded like you hit the wall"

"Nothing my arm won't recover from" Leon answered. "Look, I can't find a way out of here"

Chris got to his feet and dusted his clothes off.

"Is there no air vent cover"? He asked.

"There could be" Leon said. "But the walls in this room are really high and I can't reach the corners…" Leon's shoulder collided with Chris' chest. "What the hell are you doing you oaf"? Leon protested as, without warning, Chris climbed onto his back.

"Getting a boost" Chris explained as if it were the simplest concept in the world to grasp. "Let's see if we can find anything now"

"Jesus" Leon moaned as he walked forward. "How much do you fucking weigh? A hundred kilos"?

"Ninety-eight actually" Chris responded with a goofy grin, even though he knew Leon couldn't see it. "Didn't want you to bust your Steri-strips trying to climb up my impressive physique. Anyway, I thought you wouldn't mind my awesome crotch poking you in the back"

"Oh yeah, with me being gay I positively relish it" Leon said sardonically as he moved, with great difficulty, to the first corner.

"Did you just make a joke"? Chris asked, sounding genuinely surprised. He hadn't expected Leon to react positively to that comment but he figured a good tongue-lashing was better than their previous awkward silence.

"Just hurry up and find something," Leon said quickly. Chris' bulk was testing the very limits of his bench-pressing abilities.

"Awesome! An air vent"! Chris exclaimed as his hands came into contact with a metal ridge. Further investigation told him that it was another air vent cover. He started to pull at it and it came away easily in his hands. He reached up and felt the air vent. "Feels smaller than the last one. Don't think I'm going to be able to fit through it"

"Get down then"! Leon replied. His shoulders were screaming in pain. He felt the weight suddenly shift off them as Chris slowly climbed down off his back. "How about you give me a boost this time"?

"Sure" Chris said, dropping the air vent cover on the floor so that it made a loud clanging noise. He waited for Leon to tell him off but nothing came. "How do you want to do it? Ass to face or crotch to face, the choice is yours partner"

"I'll tell you how I want to do it you vacuous oaf. I'll shove my foot up your hairy ass and launch you into that metal door. Your thick skull is bound to break it down," Leon answered smugly.

"My aren't we defensive" Chris said with a chuckle. "Are you sure you'll be able to cope without me"? He asked Leon dug his hands into his shoulder to climb up. He let out a grunt as he felt Leon's full weight rest on his shoulders.

"I'll muddle through somehow" Leon replied as he hauled himself up into the air vents. "Try not to get yourself killed before I can mount a rescue mission" He added. "If I choose to rescue you," he continued. Chris opened his mouth to reply but judging by the sound of rapid shuffling, he guessed his partner was already out of earshot.

Leon ignored the burning in his chest as he ran down the corridor. He'd managed to find his way out of the air vent system easily enough but it had landed him in a corridor that he didn't recognise. It had the same metal panel walls and grill flooring of the original corridor but this one was lined with doors. The few that weren't locked tight appeared to be offices, probably for the researchers. There was no sign of anyone, which Leon found immensely strange. Either this whole floor wasn't in use or the people that used to work in those offices had run away. If they had run away, what had they run away from? If they'd been some sort of viral spill there'd surely be bodies but with every room that he searched he found nothing. The corridor was eerily silent aside from the echoing of his boots as he ran.

Logically he knew that he would eventually come to a set of stairs or a lift. He was pretty certain that the facility stretched more than one floor as the vent he'd been crawling through had sloped upwards for quite some time. The only problem was, he had no idea how many floors he'd moved up. He felt disorientated and it didn't help that he was unarmed and that he knew Krauser was somewhere within the facility, possibly watching him. He'd checked every office he'd been able to access for weapons but so far had come away empty handed. He had no map, no GPS and no radio yet despite all this he knew he was probably in a better situation than Chris was right now. He leant against a wall to catch his breath. He knew he needed to get back to his partner and quickly. The terrible thought dawned on him that it was entirely possible that by the time he did get back to him, Chris could be dead. It was also a possibly that saving Chris could get him killed. He knew however that he needed to save him. Leaving him behind wasn't an option despite what his training told him. Leon sighed heavily and started to move once more.

As soon as Leon left him, Chris exhausted the entertainment value of his surroundings pretty quickly. He'd moved his hands across all the walls looking for something his partner might've missed but knowing all along that he hadn't. He'd tried to jump up to the vent opening but had failed and he'd tried to play catch with a penny he'd found in his pocket but had gotten pretty bored of that. All the while he'd whistled his way through Queen's greatest hits if only to keep himself sane. He never could stand silence. He was about to start on his own interpretation of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' when light suddenly flooded the room causing him to screw his eyes up in pain. The glare prevented him from opening his eyes for a good few minutes but eventually he found he could stand to keep his eyes open. Another couple of minutes passed and he could see normally again. There was a halogen light fitting built into the ceiling and now that somebody had turned it on he could see his surroundings entirely. There really was nothing more to the room than the door, air vent and the monitors that Leon had felt earlier. He jumped backwards in surprise as they started to turn on, one by one. He was being shown, if not all, then at least a large portion of the facility. He wondered who'd turned the monitors on and why until a horrible realisation came over him. He could see Leon running down a corridor on one of the monitors and on another he could see Krauser arming himself with a set of nasty looking knifes as well as a magnum. On more of the screens were zombies wandering freely around the facility's many rooms and corridors. The screen in the top left hand corner was partially obscured by a set of tentacles. He knew now why the monitors had been turned on. He was being forced to witness a particularly sadistic game of cat and mouse.

Leon clattered down the concrete stairs and yanked open the door at the foot of them. Logically because the vents had sloped upwards, he needed to move down to get back to Chris. He found himself in yet another corridor, this one identical to the last but with fewer doors. He'd obviously moved away from the offices, perhaps to a recreation level or perhaps some smaller labs. His urge to get back to Chris was pressing him on but he knew that there was no way he could go back into that first lab unarmed. He put his left hand on the first doorknob to open it but stopped when he heard an all too familiar noise. The distant low, guttural groan of a zombie echoed along the still corridor. Leon mentally cursed. He should've known he'd run into something like that eventually. The moans seemed pretty far away but since they were coming from the direction that he was inevitably going to have to go he knew he was going to have to deal with it sooner or later. He moved into the room and discovered that it was completely empty aside from an old vending machine which had an 'out of order' sign taped to it. He sighed deeply, not fancying his chances of just coming across a weapon. He knew that he was going to have to be a little more inventive when it came to equipment. As he was leaving the room he spotted a discarded ballpoint pen on the floor. He picked it up and pocketed it before slipping back into the corridor.

Chris watched as Leon tried another door. There was a lift at the end of the corridor that he was in but the way to it was blocked off by a group of three zombies that were in the middle of feasting on a body. Judging by the stained white lab coat that had been carelessly discarded on the floor, Chris assumed that the poor bastard had been a researcher. The sweat began to collect on his forehead as he saw Leon move further and further up the corridor, closer to the zombies. He wanted to yell, shout out and tell him not to go that way but without radios, there was nothing he could do. Krauser was now stalking the corridors obviously searching for Leon and judging by the amount of weapons he was carrying, he was almost certainly after blood. Chris slammed his hand against the wall of his prison. He needed to get the hell out and quickly. He needed to find Leon and escape or find Krauser and kick the guy's ass. Now that the lights had been turned on he could see the open-air vent easily. It didn't look that high up. He ran towards the corner and started to jump up towards it. With each time that he missed, his feelings of desperation grew. He kept checking back on the screens watching his partner get closer and closer to the zombies. Leon didn't have any guns or knives, would he be able to tackle three of them unarmed? He jumped up for the air vent again, cursing loudly as he missed once more. His eyes flicked back to the screen where the researcher's body was still being mutilated. He imagined Leon sprawled out like that. Would they be able to smell the infection from his wound? Would that draw them to him as soon as they were done with their sick feast? What if Krauser found him at the same time? He didn't doubt Leon's abilities in combat but surely he wouldn't be able to fend them all off? He saw Leon's body with Krauser stood over it, gloating and spitting vile words at him. Chris let out an almost inhuman growl as he clawed at the walls with his hands, trying to crawl up to the only escape route.

He jumped as a scraping noise filled the room. He turned to see the metal door slowly sliding open, its sudden movement and reverberating noise ten times louder in the silent room. Chris felt every muscle in his body tense as he waited for something to attack him. He could see by the screens that Krauser was still stalking the corridors and that Leon hadn't yet made it to the zombies. His hands formed into fists as the door opened fully. He might not have a gun or a knife but he knew that he could pack a decent, if not deadly, punch.

When nothing leapt through the doorframe, Chris took a few tentative steps forward. He poked his head out of the prison and his brow furrowed in confusion. There was nobody in the lab. No monsters, no zombies, no people. He looked upwards, checking that nothing was hanging on the ceiling waiting to jump down but there were only strip-lights. Chris stepped out into the lab and put his hands on his hips, confused. He shrugged it off quickly however, knowing that it was best not to look a gift horse in the mouth. Maybe it had been some sort of technical failure that meant the door had opened? Whatever. He needed to get to Leon and he needed to get to him quickly. In the corner to his left he spotted an oak door and thundered towards it. It was locked but a swift shoulder barge sorted that out. He found himself in a stairwell with a set of concrete stairs that wound their way upward. He hurried up the stairs and stopped at the first door that he came to. His idea was to comb each floor until he found Leon or Krauser.

Leon pressed his back up against the wall as he withdrew the ballpoint from his pocket. A few metres ahead he'd spotted a group of three zombies feasting on a corpse. The group was blocking his access to the lift and he knew that if he wanted to stand against the three of them he was going to have to have the element of surprise on at least one of the godforsaken creatures. Luckily, the three zombies had their backs to him and judging by the horrible smell emanating from them, they'd been around a long time. Knowing what he knew about zombies that meant they'd be dry and brittle and easier to take down. He moved stealthily across the floor and went for the zombie closest to him. He ran forward and jammed the pen into the base of the first zombie's skull. A wet squelching noise told him that he'd hit his mark and the zombie crumpled to the floor. He stood over the body and tried to retrieve the pen but it was stuck fast. He quickly leapt back and grabbed the second zombie around the head, twisting it violently until he head the sickening snap accompanied by the sound of skin tearing as he broke the creature's neck. The third zombie had, by now, noticed his presence and lunged for him but Leon moved quickly, grabbing the beast by its brittle wrists and pushing it to the floor. It let out a low moan as it tried to right itself. Leon stamped on its head as hard as he could, his boot penetrating its skull and causing the liquefied brain matter to splatter up the leg of his combats. It was then that he noticed that it was wearing what looked like a security guard's uniform. Trying to ignore the sound of the bodily fluid dripping through the metal grill flooring onto the pipes below, Leon searched through the body's pockets and tactical belt. He found a couple of clips for a 9mm but no sign of the actual weapon. He pocketed them anyway, knowing from experience that ammo should always be taken. He also found what looked like a security key card. Finally, he grabbed the nightstick from its belt loop before standing up and pressing the lift's call button.

END OF CHAPTER FOUR