Chris jammed his hand into his wet vest and came
up with Alias's keys, fumbling through them as the fin
glided closer, the wide, pointed grin opening.
He shoved a key into the lock, the last key on the
ring that he hadn't found the room for, and slammed
his shoulder against the door at the same time, the
shark now only a few feet away.
The door flew open and Chris stumbled in, falling
and kicking frantically. His boot connected solidly
with the shark's fleshy snout, deflecting it from the
opening. In a flash, he was on his feet. He threw his
weight into the door and in a slap of water, it was
closed.
He sagged against the door, wiping at his stinging
eyes with the back of his hand. The lapping water
settled gently into smaller and smaller ripples as he
caught his breath and his vision cleared. For now, he
was safe.
He unholstered his Beretta and ejected the dripping
magazine, wondering how the hell he was going to
make it back upstairs. Looking around the small
room, he saw nothing he could use as a weapon. One
wall was lined with buttons and switches, and he
trudged over to look at them, drawn to a blinking red
light in the far corner.
Looks like I found a control room . . . aces. Maybe I
can turn off the lights and get the shark to go to sleep.
There was a lever set next to the flashing light and
Chris stared down at the faded tape beneath it, feeling
a numb disbelief as he read the printed letters.
Emergency Drainage System.
You've gotta be kidding me! Why didn't anyone pull
this thing the second the tank broke?
The answer occurred to him even as he thought it.
The people who worked here were scientists; no way
they were going to turn down the opportunity to study
their precious Plant 42, sucking up water from the
man-made lake.
Chris grabbed the lever and pushed it down. There
was a sliding, metallic noise outside the door-and
immediately, the water level started to drop. Within a
minute, the last of it had flowed out from under the
door and a gurgling, liquid gasp came from the
direction of the broken tank.
He walked back to the door, opening it carefully
and heard the frantic, wet thumps of a very big fish trying to swim through air.
Chris grinned, thinking that he should probably feel
pity for the helpless creature and hoping instead
that it died a long, agonizing death.
"Bite me," he whispered.
Wesker had shot four of the shuffling, gasping
Umbrella workers on his way to the computer room
on level three. He hadn't recognized any of them,
though he was pretty sure that the second one he'd
taken out had been Steve Keller, one of the guys from
Special Research. Steve always wore penny loafers,
and the pallid, dried-up husk that had reached for
him by the stairs had been wearing Steve's brand.
It appeared that the effects of the viral spill had
been harsher in the labs . . . less messy, but no less
disquieting. The creatures that roamed the halls out-
side seemed to have been totally dehydrated, their
limbs withered and stringy, their eyes like shriveled
grapes. Wesker had dodged several of them, but the
ones he'd been forced to put down had scarcely bled
at all.
He sat at the computer in the cool, sterile room and
waited for the system to boot up, feeling truly on top
of things for the first time all day. He'd had earlier
moments, of course. The way he'd handled Barry,
finding the wolf medal in the tunnels - even shooting
Ellen Smith in the face had given him a momentary
sense of accomplishment, a feeling that he was in
control of what was happening. But so much had gone
wrong along the way that he hadn't had time to enjoy
any of his successes.
But now I'm here. If the S.T.A.R.S. aren't already
dead, they will be soon and assuming I don't suffer
some massive lapse of skill, I'll be out of here within
half an hour, mission complete.
There were still dangers, but Wesker could handle
them. The mesh monkeys - the Ma2s - were un-
doubtedly loose in the power room, but they were
easy enough to get past, as long as you didn't stop
running; he should know, he'd helped come up with
the design. And there was the big man, the Tyrant,
waiting one level down in his glass shell, sleeping the
sweet, dreamless sleep of the damned. . .
. . . From which he'll surely never wake. What a
waste. So much power, crossed off as a failure by the
boys at White. . .
A gentle musical tone informed him that the system
was ready. Wesker pulled a notebook out of his vest
and opened it to the list of codes, though he already
knew them; John Howe had set the system up months ago, using his name and the name of his girlfriend,
Ada, as access keys.
Wesker tapped out the first of the passwords that
would allow him to unlock the laboratory doors,
feeling a sudden, vague wistfulness for the excitement
of the day. It would be over so soon and there would
be no one to witness his achievements, to share his
fond memories after the fact.
Now that he thought about it, it was a shame that
none of the S.T.A.R.S. would be joining him; the only
thing better than a grand finale was a grand finale with
an audience. . .
SEVENTEEN
JILL HAD TAKEN THE ELEVATOR INTO WHAT
seemed to be another part of the garden or courtyard,
although the area had been isolated, surrounded by
trees; she'd guessed as much from the few overgrown
potted plants and the welcome sounds of the forest
beyond the low metal railing. There had been nothing
to see but a rusting door set into a nondescript,
overgrown wall, welded shut and a large, open well,
like a stone wading pool. Inside had been a short,
spiral staircase leading down to another small ele-
vator.
Which I took, but now where the hell am I?
The room that the elevator had led to was unlike
any other part of the estate she'd seen. It lacked the
strange, fetid charm of the mansion, or the dripping
gloom of the underground. It was as though she'd
walked out of a gothic horror story and into a military
complex, a utilitarian's bleak paradise.
She was standing in a large, steel-reinforced con-
crete room, the walls painted a muddy industrial
orange. Metal ducts and overhead pipes lined the
upper walls, and the room was rather aptly titled
"XD-R Bl," painted across the concrete in black,
several feet high. Any sense she'd had of where she
was in relation to the rest of the estate was totally
gone.
Although it's as cold as everywhere else, at least I
know I'm still on the grounds. . .
There was a heavy metal door on one side of the
room, firmly locked. The sign to the left of it stated
that it was only to be opened in case of a first-class
emergency. She figured that the "Bl" on the wall
stood for "Basement level one," her theory confirmed
by the bolted ladder that led down through a narrow
shaft in the concrete; where there was Bl, B2 natu-
rally followed.
And considering the alternative, it looks like that's
where I'm headed. My other option is to go back
through the underground tunnels.
She peered down the ladder shaft, only able to see a
square of concrete at the bottom. Sighing, she held on
to the Remington and started down.
As soon as she hit the last rung, she turned anxious-
Ly and faced a much smaller room, as bland and
industrial as the first. Inset fluorescent lights on the
ceiling, a gray metal door, concrete walls and floor.
She walked through quickly, starting to feel hopeful
that there were no more creatures or traps. So far, the
basement levels had offered nothing more dangerous
than a lack of decorum. . .
She opened the door and her hope faded as the dry,
dusty smell of long-dead flesh hit her. She stepped out
onto a cement walkway that led over a flight of
descending stairs, a metal railing circling the path.
At the top of the steps was a crumpled zombie, so
emaciated and shriveled that it appeared mummified.
She held the shotgun ready and walked slowly
toward the stairs, noting that there was a hall branch-
ing off to the left where the railing stopped. She
darted a quick look around the corner and saw that it
was clear. Still watching the desiccated corpse care-
fully, she edged down the short corridor and stopped
at the door on her left. The sign next to the door read
"Visual Data Room," and the door itself was un- locked.
It opened up into a still, gray room with a long
meeting table in the center, a slide projector set up in
front of a portable screen at the far end. There was a
phone on a small stand pushed up against the right
wall, and Jill hurried over, knowing that it was too
much to hope for but having to check just the same.
It wasn't a phone at all, but an intercom system that
didn't seem to work. Sighing, she stepped past an
ornamental pillar and walked around the table, glanc-
ing at the empty slide projector. She let her gaze
wander, looking for anything of interest
and it stopped on a flat, featureless square of
metal set into the wall, about the size of a sheet of
paper. Jill stepped over to take a closer look.
There was a flat bar at the top. She touched it
lightly, and the panel slid down into the wall, reveal-
ing a large red button. She looked around the quiet
room, trying to imagine what the trap would be and
then realized that there wouldn't be a trap at all.
The mansion, the tunnels - all of it was rigged to
keep people from getting here, to these basement levels.
They're way too efficiently dull to be anything but where the real work gets done.
She knew instinctively that her logic was sound.
This was a board room, a place for drinking bad
coffee and sitting through meetings with colleagues;
nothing was going to jump out at her if she pushed the
button.
Jill pushed it. And behind her, the ornamental
pillar slid to one side with a smooth, mechanical hum.
Behind the pillar were several shelves, stacked with
files and something that glittered in the soft gray
light of the room.
She hurried over and picked up a metal key, the top
of it imprinted with a tiny lightning bolt. Slipping it
into her pocket, she flipped through a few of the files.
They were all stamped with the Umbrella logo, and
though most of them were too thick and ponderous to
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