Her first thought caught her a little by surprise by the sheer acceptance of this thing before her, and the amusement she strangely took in it - who WAS she becoming? 'What happened? are you even too ugly for hell?'
The lumbering, rusting metal encased giant Russian's carcass staggered on its tree-like legs toward her as she pulled out her twin pistols and began firing at its seagull plucked skull.
He seemed to smile as he instantly lifted his heavily armored forearms, just like when they battled before, and succeeded in blocking his face and skull, just as her firearms were pointed at his head... he was much faster than before.
She none the less fired almost both full clips, trying to confuse him.
This fireworks show turned out to be as useless as it was costly in terms of her presently limited supply of shells. He kept on coming, unflinching from the onslaught of her guns.
All the time she was formulating her options on how to resolve this obstinacy that was once a living man; she tried her best to - in some way, any way - reason the impossible reality of his existence with her still lingering pre-Yamatai perception of what was reality.
There was, however, plenty of time to do that; after she settled this apparent unfinished grudge he had about being handed his ass by a girl... by handing him his smelling, putrid, rotting, half (bird and crab) eaten head.
She smiled mockingly at him, as she had done on the Endurance the time he lost it all to her, and waited.
He came within arms reach, and swung his right arm at the partially disbelieving young woman, missing by a hair, but leaving no question of his presence in her reality. She ducked, and rolled behind him as he followed through.
She crouched, and opened fire on what she was certain would be the back of his knees, not certain what, if anything, it would do; but as she tightened her fingers on her triggers, she found the question meaningless as she opened fire on the heavily armored front of his legs. He was faster, quicker, more agile - how?
Her bullets ricochet uselessly off the thick metal as he kicked sand into her face, and drove forward with his opposing knee, catching her uplifted forearms, and sending her sprawling backward, her guns flying out of her hands as he advanced quicker than she imagined possible, and grabbed her by her right ankle, and yanked her forcibly around, hurling her toward a huge rock, just out of sight of the tower Evan was only just reaching the lower platform of.
She was badly dazed by the impact with the rock, yet her adrenaline was surging, her focus singular. Nothing, not even this stand out player from a budget version of Resident Evil was a shock to her anymore. What was, she saw dawning on his face, was the look he gave her as she lay, dazed, and awkwardly splayed on the sand in her tight, curve hugging outfit - a leer akin to lust.
She almost vomited.
He was looking her over slowly, approvingly, not making any move toward her at all; he just walked around her to look her over from other angles.
He was hot for her!?
All her reason had gone bye-bye - The zombie wanted a go with the girl who killed it?
It smiled as if in affirmative response to her thought.
She breathed in slowly, and clung to an odd hope - she must have finally snapped. She honestly questioned if any of this was real - any of it: The hotel, Evan, HER! Was she really on this beach, her head still swimming from the impact of it hitting the rock, face to boots with this walking, licentious nightmare from her recent past? Or was she heavily drugged in an insane asylum, lost in her own private reoccurring hell?
She tried a risky move, and closed her steadily clearing eyes; she then bit into her own tongue till she shrieked; and opened her eyes in blind hope.
Still on the beach...
Still looking like a college fraternity brother's dream Yoga instructor...
... and still being given the eye by a nearly seven-foot tall corpse dressed like a walking dumpster.
"Yup... this is real," she muttered in exhaustion, "fuck.".
She had hoped for the asylum.
The thing that was the last of Mathias's dead, and decayed lieutenants still looked her over like a cat with crippled a mouse, as he once called her. She hoped he would act like himself soon, and give her something to anchor herself to besides her slowly withering confidence in her chances of getting off this beach in any state she would want to survive in.
The rotting, leering tank crouched in the sand and playfully tossed sand in her face, grinning wide, its yellow teeth and white gums reminded her of a poorly made up zombie in one of the many low-budget Horror films Sam brought back to their flat when she was doing her reasearch paper on the zombie phenomenon. Apparently it wasn't that poorly done.
"You are kidding me? You're flirting?" she sighed in nervous anticipation as he made no movement toward her at all, just kept tossing sand, and looking her over. Odd; she was all but powerless in this moment to stop him from crushing her like twig. Insanity begs insane responses. "Come here often?" she whispered as she slid her back further up on the rock.
Yet he was making no motion toward her, just smiled wider in response, and reached out to her face.
She turned away reactively, but made no move against him. If he fell forward, he could crush her ribs, her spine, head... for starters.
He touched her with surprising gentility, and made no effort to choke her, or rip her top off. She felt he was just toying with her, feeling he had all the time in the world to torture her mind and body - before killing her.
"Soft touch... Boris," she whispered; and got not so much as a hint of a response from him to his own name; just that leering, lustful look.
She let the unpleasantly familiar look give her a sense of mild reassurance - he was in no hurry to tear her body to pieces. Or was that a very BAD thing? She discreetly switched on her telecom unit on her hip, "Hell to Evan, come in second armed living person on this rock. We have a formerly deceased local seemingly anxious to get a little more familiar with me. How about you indulge a little homicidal impulse gratification and help 're-kill' this fucker?" she said softly, her eyes never moving from the hulking corpse.
"Didn't catch most of that; besides, I can't get a shot - you're too close." he said calmly, "How about you help me out by giving me a foot up on my competition? By the way... great attitude - under these unpleasant circumstances - you sound calm and cool as a rock."
"I'm scared shitless Evan," she sighed as the sweat covered every inch of her naked skin, "I'm just not very interested in letting that get me out of focus on Boris Badinof here and his seeming trouble with dropping dead."
She kept up the strange faux seduction as she very slowly brought her knees to her chest, her eyes smiling at the corpse.
What had been Boris was simply awestruck by her, till...
She drove her heels into its chin, driving it up on its feet. It staggered back, but didn't fall over.
"FUCK!" Evan shouted as he leveled the sniper rifle "WHAT the hell are you...? Oh holy fuck!" He aimed for the giant's heart, " You're a damn good striker 'L' but your friend seems a little 'under the weather' - ha ha'. And what the hell do you mean by 'Re-kill'?"
"He's Russian, and dead... he just hasn't gotten over the shock apparently."
Two fifty caliber bullets erupted out of his chest plate.
"Did that help him?" Evan sighed, then gasped in disbelief.
Boris didn't even turn to look, let alone fell over.
"Oh you stubborn fuck!" Evan screamed in frustration, "Just fucking go to the light."
Another powerful bullet ripped straight through Boris's chest, uselessly as the giant grinned at Lara.
Evan, even more frustrated, reloaded, and stepped closer from his perch, onto a grate laying between four wooden dock pillars, and threw a switch on the rifle - semi auto, "Pay the fucking ferryman!" He fired three successive rounds into the giant's stomach - nothing. "Why won't you just fucking die!?" he shrieked in panic as Boris suddenly sprang toward Lara.
There was one loud, reverberating gunshot, the sound of a solid impact, then...
Lara screamed.
"Lara!" Evan screamed as he dropped the empty gun, tore off his com unit, and sprang from the grate into the surf like a man possessed.
Five anxious minutes later, he came staggered on to the beach, grabbed a massive steel pipe and ran to where the giant lunged, his rage built to bursting his eyes from his own head as he raised the pipe and screamed with unbridled fury at...
Lara, standing over the motionless hulking carcass; the back of its massive head missing, her fifty caliber Dessert Eagle still smoking in her grip, and the grey mass of what was Boris's brain dripping from her chest and abdomen. "My hero," she smirked.
"Fucking lovely!," Evan gasped as he recovered from his adrenaline rush, "Upstaging me... you need to..."
She scrapped some brain from between her breasts, and smiled, "bathe," she finished for him, and walked down to the water, stripping off her clothes, "Don't get any ideas," she said as she tossed the top aside, "Thus far you aren't doing too well in that department... body shots on a zombie. Let me handle the heavy thinking; you can just stand there - looking delicious... or... help me clean my hair - for starters."
He smiled, and pulled off his shirts, "Nag, nag, nag," he whispered as he watched her run naked, and laughing into the surf.