Resident Evil:
The Whole Story.
Chapter Fourteen.
Chris sighed, bored out of his skull with nothing to do, the graveyard shift was always the most boring time of day, all the work that had to be done had been done in the day and Raccoon City had a very low crime rate, mostly due to how well funded and equipped the police force actually was, so there was actually very little chance of them being called out and if even if there was a problem unless it was something like a bomb threat or a hostage situation or something else unusual S.T.A.R.S was unlikely to be called out.
So right now all Chris could do was drum his fingers against his desk and flick the odd paperclip to keep himself busy, on the bright side at least he wasn't alone in his misery.
Jessica, David, Barry, Jake and William had also been forced to take on the graveyard shift as well so it wasn't as if he was short of good company to spend the night with it was just he really didn't want to be here tonight, he had planned to go out with Rosa tonight and he had spent all day looking forward to it and Wesker had only told him he would be on the shift an hour before it started.
It wouldn't be too bad if it wasn't for the fact that Barry was in such a bad mood that they could all pick up on it even when he wasn't saying anything. Very few things could actually put Barry in a bad mood, the only things that Chris was sure could put him in a bad mood was when he had an argument with his wife, when one of his girls was sick and his mother-in-law.
But none of those things were the reason behind Barry's bad mood tonight, his bad mood was due to the news he had received this morning.
Jenny Mitchell, the little girl they had found in the woods, had died due to complications in her surgery that was required due to her condition worsening, it had hit Barry hard due to his naturally paternal nature and the fact that he actually spoken to the girl and got to know her while they had waited for the ambulance to come and get her.
It wasn't just Barry who was upset by it however, Jessica seemed a little down as well as despite doing all she could to treat the girl when they had found she said that she felt like she maybe could've done more even though in her head she knew that she had done all she could do.
Chris felt sorry for the poor girl, she had been young and didn't deserve to die but he didn't feel the need to get hung up on it. He would just make sure that people who did that to Jenny faced justice, that was all any of them could really do.
The problem with that was that so far hadn't been able to find the cabin that Jenny had mentioned, the forest was huge and there were dozens, hundreds of cabins dotting the forest and it could be anywhere. It couldn't have been to far from the clearing giving that's was where Jenny had found them but a quick search had uncovered it and right now the police department was trying to make a decision on what their next step should be.
The silence that had fallen in the office was finally broken by David who stood up from his desk and stretched his arms with a loud groan. "Well, I don't know about you folks but I haven't had anything to eat damn near all day so I going to Emmy's and bringing something back, any want to come with me?"
At the mention of Emmy's Chris's stomach growled but it thankfully wasn't so loud that the others could hear it, Emmy's was his favourite dinner mainly due to it's comforting atmosphere, friendly staff and great food. It was quite far away from the station so David would be gone for a while but so long as there was at least to officers in the S.T.A.R.S office there wouldn't a problem.
He was about to volunteer to go with him but Jessica beat him to it, they stayed just long enough to get everyone's orders before they left the office with a promise to also pick up some doughnuts on the wayback.
When the door shut William turned to face Barry whose desk was right behind his. "How you holding up buddy?" William asked concerned for his old friend.
Barry heaved a heavy sigh and nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine. It was just a shock that's all that poor girl wasn't much older than Moria and now she's dead. She had her whole life ahead of her."
William nodded and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I know but it wasn't your fault, it was just a thing that happened."
"That the hospital was just a thing that happened, it doesn't make it okay!" Barry snapped and then he sighed and shook his head at his outburst. "I'm sorry man, it's not your fault I'm just frustrated."
William nodded accepting his apology but that wasn't what Chris was concentrating on. "What hospital?" He asked while his eyes narrowed in confusion.
William and Barry shared a glance and seemed to have a silent conversations for a few moments before Barry nodded and William opened his mouth, before he could begin to speak however Jake groaned and stood up. "I'm not in the mood to listen to stupid conspiracy theories so I'm going out for a smoke."
As Jake left the room William held up his index finger to his back, when Jake closed the door he turned back to face Chris. "As I was trying to say before I was rudely interrupted, back in ninety...or what it ninety three?" He asked as he turned to back to face Barry.
"It was ninety two."
"Right, back in ninety two there was a private hospital built up in the woods near the base of the mountains. It was really, really classy and was supposed to have some of the best healthcare and medicine in the world and it cost a mint, even more than Saint Helen's apparently." William explained and Chris whistled through his teeth, Saint Helen's was a private hospital in uptown Raccoon City and it's treatment was affordable only to the mega rich, the mayor and his family always went there for treatment.
"Anyway, for a while everything seemed fine but a few months after the hospital opened their first patients after they were discharged suddenly started developing weird symptoms, rashes, violent sickness, high temperatures weird stuff like that. They went back in to the hospital for treatment but half of those patients suddenly died."
"The other half had to be kept in for further treatment, anyway apparently one of the families wasn't satisfied with the explanation of how there loved one died so they started to ask questions, before long the papers were asking those same questions as well and then the police department got dragged into and we launched a full investigation." William sighed and shook his head as he was assaulted by vivid memories.
"What did it turn up?" Chris asked, he was so intrigued that he had to hear how the story ended, it was rare for members of the team to tell stories about the time before you joined partly because they didn't want to exclude you but mostly because the stories tended to be downers, regular police work was dangerous but S.T.A.R.S was more dangerous by far.
"Human experimentation." William uttered darkly and Chris's eyes widen, he gave the information a moment to set in before he continued to talk. "Apparently the hospital was testing new developed medication on people to see how they reacted to it, you should've seen what we found. Some of the medication caused people to suffer from massive tumours."
"And they were covering their tracks as well, a reporter from Raccoon Daily went up their to get some information. Kirk or something like I think his name was, we found his body in one of the basement levels with a bullet in his head." Barry sighed and shook his head and he suddenly seemed a lot older than just thirty eight. "Poor kid was only twenty three years old."
"Needless to say the hospital didn't stay open much longer, the board of directors was arrested aside from the president and all the test subjects were moved to other hospitals for actual treatment." William sighed. "You see some bad things in this job but that was whole other league of bad."
"Damn." David whispered from the doorway, his eyes wide in shock while behind Jessica had suddenly gone pale and was clinging to the warm wet paper bag in her hands like a lifeline.
The three men sitting at their desks nearly jumped, they hadn't heard David or Jessica return and they were back much earlier than Chris would've expected, there mustn't have been much traffic or costumer's in Emmy's tonight.
Jessica shook hear head and started to hand out meals from the bag. "So, why didn't the president get arrested?" She asked quietly.
"He did a runner, apparently someone in the police department was related to his wife and they gave him a tip and he bolted, he's still wanted but we have no idea where he is. According to some rumours he's hiding somewhere up in the mountains."
"Why did Jake say he didn't want to here any conspiracy theories?" Chris asked, the words his teammate had used bothring him if this had actually happened.
"Apparently some members of the board said that the hospital wasn't acting on it's own power, they said that the company who developed and supplied the drugs were the ones ordering them to test the drugs on humans." Barry said while he opened the Styrofoam container which held his burger and fries.
"Which company was it?" Chris asked though he got a feeling that he knew.
"Umbrella." As soon as William said it Jessica burst out laughing as she sat down at her desk.
"Well, that's ridiculous. Just because Umbrella supplied the drugs doesn't mean they had anything to do with it and it's a big company of course they would try to shift the blame on them."
"That's exactly what Umbrella's representatives said." Barry muttered before shaking his head. "Anyway, I don't want to talk about this any more."
That seemed to be the general agreement in the office and turned to their meals but Chris, despite the fact that he was facing a double cheeseburger with spiced fries and a large coke, had suddenly lost his appetite
End of Chapter Fourteen
(A shorter chapter than usual, please review, favourite and follow if you would.)
