Chapter Eight.

The mechanics finished working and left the motor pool immediately without saying anything. The only way Seras knew they had finished was from the sound of the vehicle's hood shutting.

"That's our cue," Leon said, turning something near the wheel, starting the machine. He shifted it into gear and drove forward, towards the closed metal shutter.

"Is that supposed to open?" Seras asked, looking over Leon's shoulder through the small windshield.

"Yes," Leon said, plowing into the door. It tore and crumpled like it was made of tinfoil. The vehicle pushed through it and out into the night air. Leon remembered to turn the head lights on, illuminating a short stretch of concrete surrounded on both sides by a chain link fence. Ahead of them was the main fence that encircled the facility. It was twenty feet high, twelve of those feet was backed by a pile of squirming bodies.

"Are all the hatches locked?" Leon asked.

Jill was sitting in a chair in front of a monitor on the vehicles right-hand side. She tapped a few keys and looked around the cabin. "The computer says we're tight. I can't see anything open."

Seras looked over at Integra who was standing by the side door hanging onto a pole for support. She was looking around the small cabin, seemingly impressed. There was bunk space in the back, a bathroom area past that, near a pantry, and a small living area crammed with computers and other pieces of equipment. A ladder in the center of the living area lead up to a hatch, which Integra took a look at, likely to make sure it was closed.

Leon gave the machine some gas and shifted, heading for the fence as fast as he could. "Will those windows hold?" Seras asked.

"Umbrella made it, so…who knows," Leon said.

"This is going to be gross," Ashley, who was sitting in the passenger seat in front of a computer monitor with a joystick in front of it. "Are you sure we should use the gu…"

Leon didn't let her finish. He pressed the pedal to the floor and shifted again, crashing into the fence as fast as the short run-up would let him. Seras hadn't been holding onto anything and was sent falling into her buttocks with a thud. She got up, using the back of Leon's seat for support.

The windshield had become blocked completely by corpses. All were grey or black with ruined clothes. Time and the effects of the t-virus had erased their genders and racial features, making them all seem as one race other than human.

The bodies fell off the windshield and the going became easier for the vehicle as it cleared the area with the most buildup. Leon found the street he wanted to be on and maneuvered the unwieldy machine around corners, plowing through rubble, ruined barricades, and small groups of zombies.

"Ashley," Leon said. "I'm lost."

"Oh, right," she said, tapping buttons on her keyboard after setting the joystick down. Seras saw that she was pulling up three sets of maps. A topographical one, a street map, and what looked to be a satellite photo. The one from the satellite flickered every few seconds and wasn't terribly clear.

"They'll be busy until we reach the highway, or at least what's left of it," Jill said. "Hopefully the three left on the roof will fall off and we won't have to deal with them ourselves."

Seras walked back to a seat near Jill and sat while Integra remained standing. "This is…nice," Seras said, looking around the cabin.

Jill gave a half smile and shrugged. "It's a complicated machine built by Umbrella. I don't trust it."

Seras smiled back. "It beats walking. Oh, this is Sir Integra in case you hadn't guessed." Jill and Integra exchanged nods. "I think she's pieced out who you three are."

"It's too bad we had to all meet like this," Jill said. "Do you think this Alice person will go along with us?"

"Umbrella convinced the five of us to work with them. I can't imagine her being more stubborn and hateful towards Umbrella than we are," Seras said. "I still want to know how you three came to be here."

"We're a long way from Nevada," Integra said, walking up to the front of vehicle and looked through the windshield, using the back of Leon's chair to keep standing. "I'm sure there will be plenty of time for stories. Nevada is also quite large. I'm guessing we'll have a time finding this woman, assuming we make the journey."

Seras scratched the back of her head and watched Integra leaning over Leon's chair, looking at the road in front of them and down at their instruments. Integra was sounding more like her old self now that there was a mission to accomplish. What Seras feared now was a power struggle. Integra would naturally begin telling people what to do. Jill and Ashley, at least for as long as Seras had known them, weren't the types to care much, but Leon was another matter.

"That Wesker guy says he has a way of tracking her, sort of," Ashley said. "I guess she's…psychic or something. Leon, take a left here."

The vehicle turned left, hard, smashing through what sounded like a car and something wooden. It occurred to Seras that she didn't even know what city they were in. She decided she didn't want to know and took her eyes off the windshield. The bleak buildings illuminated in the headlights weren't things she wanted to look at.

"What do we need to be doing now?" Integra asked, to Seras's surprise.

"Sit tight," Leon said. "The satellites have a few possible routes mapped out for us. This thing can plow through most anything and has got gas mileage like you wouldn't believe."

Integra nodded but didn't move. Seras didn't expect her to. Sitting tight wasn't something Integra was used to doing. Seras sat back and closed her eyes, letting her mind wander. She pictured the inside of the vehicle, then the space between the walls. After that she envisioned the hull outside. Jill had been right about the three clingers. They had death grips on the roof, perhaps unaware of what was happening. Beyond that was the lifeless street, passing by like a river.

Death and menace were all around them, but the machine was humming like it was supposed to and there seemed to be a kind of flow to Ashley's directions. Seras hated to do it, but she let out a breath and allowed herself to feel safe. She couldn't read the future, not really, but for the first time in a long time she could find no immediate cause to worry. The sensation was tarnished only by the guilt of letting her guard down and Leon's earlier words. Umbrella had built this machine and any product of Umbrella was suspect.

That thought made her wonder. She wouldn't voice it out loud, not inside the vehicle itself, but later she would have to bring it up. If the machine was as self-sustaining as they had been led to believe, the temptation to simply say to hell with Project Alice and live out the rest of their days perusing other schemes was certainly there. Every Umbrella base Seras had ever heard about had been rigged to explode should things go to hell in a hand basket, so why not this little tour bus containing five of the companies (she decided to count Ashley) longtime enemies?

She couldn't sense a bomb, but impending doom in the form of gnashing, virus ridden teeth all around them, she might not be able to tell. The vehicle was likely bugged at the very least.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Jill asked, nudging Sera's elbow.

Seras looked at her without turning her head much. "I think I am. Not much we can do about it."

"I'm going to give the toilet a good looking over before I use it," Jill said. "That Lazarus guy looked like a creep."

Seras laughed. "Integra almost shot him."

"My aim was off," Integra said. "I'm sure he could have briefed us well enough with a bullet in his stomach."

They all laughed. It wasn't much of a joke, Seras thought, but it met the new world standard of what was funny.

To be continued…