an attempt. . .
David looked back at the colored pieces and tried to
focus, but couldn't seem to manage a single coherent
idea. It had been an awfully long day, periods of
intense concentration interspersed with violent rushes
of adrenaline. He'd run through fear, self-doubt, deter-
mination and then fear again, plus a handful of less
clear-cut emotions. Now he just felt frazzled, waiting
to see what would come next...
John grinned suddenly, a triumphant light in his
eyes. "The letters stand for the months - January, February, March, April, May, June - July. It's J, the
last letter is J."
"Brilliant," David said. He started to place the tiles in the indentation as John nudged Karen with his
elbow, still grinning. "And you thought all I was good for was easy sex."
As usual, Karen didn't bother answering. Relieved
to be through the second test, David pushed the last
piece into place. There was a faint click and the
rainbow lowered very slightly, perhaps a millimeter.
From above them, a gentle chime sounded from a
speaker, this one hidden by a fluorescent bar.
"That all I get?" John quipped. "No parade?"
David stood up, smiling tiredly. "I felt the same way with the other one. We should get moving, see
how Steve and Rebecca are making out."
"Interesting way of putting it, David," John said, chuckling. "Nice one."
It took David a moment to get it, though Karen
rolled her eyes almost immediately, then scratched
at them. When she took her hand away, David saw
that her right eye was extremely bloodshot. The left
was also slightly discolored, though not as badly.
She noticed his scrutiny and smiled at him, shrug-
ging. "I irritated it somehow. It itches, but it's fine."
"Don't rub it, you'll make it worse," David said, leading them toward the door. "And have Rebecca take a look when we get across."
They walked back into a connecting corridor and
started for the back exit, David steeling himself for
another dash across the compound. By his count,
they'd managed to take down three of the Trisquads
in full; three men outside of the boathouse and a
fourth on the run to the first building, then John and
Karen's five between blocks C and D.
Useful information, if you happen to know how
many of the squads there were to begin with.
He ignored the inner sarcasm as they reached the
metal door, Karen leaning back to turn off the over-
head light. They pulled out weapons and took deep
breaths, preparing and David felt a familiar sensa-
tion wash over him, one that he'd experienced before
in tight situations but had never been able to name. It
wasn't a feeling so much as a state of existence and
although not a religious man, it was the closest thing
he'd found to a belief in fate, a sense that there were
patterns at play beyond the realm of human influence.
Whatever was going to happen, whatever was al-
ready happening even as they readied themselves to
step back outside - all of the deciding factors were
now firmly in place, interlocking like pieces of a
puzzle. He felt it with a certainty that denied reason.
It was as though a great wheel of chance that deter-
mined outcome, that would show them life or death,
success or failure, had been set into motion and was
now spinning toward its inevitable conclusion - only
instead of slowing down, the wheel would turn stead-
ily faster, speeding up as it revealed to them what the
cosmos had planned.
In the past, he'd often found comfort in the sudden
awareness of that spinning wheel, the undefinable
sense that the outcome had been decided and all
anyone could do was watch it unfold. When he'd been
a child and his father had been on one of his drunken, abusive rampages, the belief in a bigger picture had
sometimes been the only thing that saved him from
total despair. This time, though ... this time, it felt
like a terrible thing, a dark and whirling carnival ride
that they had boarded by mistake, not realizing the
truth until it was too late, that they couldn't go back,
and there was no avoiding whatever lay ahead.
We hang on, then. We do what we can.
David stepped to the door, flicking the Beretta's
safety off. Whether or not they had any control over
what was to come, Rebecca and Steve were waiting.
The test room was quiet except for the soft hum
from the machines marked with blue numbers, nine
through twelve, and the occasional rustle of a turning
page as Rebecca went through Athens's journal. Steve
sat on the edge of a table and watched her read, his
thoughts restless and uneasy as they waited for the
others to show up. His chest ached mildly, both from
the small caliber round he'd taken earlier and the
anxious build of worry for John and Karen.
After a quick look at the other rooms in the
building, they'd both agreed that the test room was
the place to wait. It seemed that block B of the
Umbrella facility was mostly devoted to surgical
aspects of the bio-weapons research, the rooms all
white and steel, ominously stark and unpleasant.
Although the building was as stuffy and warm as the
others they'd been in, Steve had felt a physical chill as
they'd passed the empty operating rooms - as if the
chambers themselves had taken on the characteristics
of the T-Virus creatures. Cold and lifeless and some-
how mindlessly black with purpose. . .
Rebecca looked up, her eyes flashing with excite-
ment. "Listen to this:
'"They're still waiting for our feedback on expansion
ever since Griffith revved up the amp time. 'We've got the
space for up to twenty units, but I'm going to hold strong on
a max of twelve; we wouldn't be able to concentrate on
training more than four squads at a time. Ammon said he'll
back me up if there's any hassle.'"
Steve nodded, half dismayed and half relieved by
the information. They'd already knocked one of the
Trisquads out of the running, plus seriously wounded
or killed a couple of the individuals on another team;
that was good. On the other hand, it meant that there
were still a couple of the squads roaming around out
there - unless they're currently "engaged" with David
and the others. . .
He scowled inwardly, grasping for something else
to think about.
"Do you know what that means, 'revved up the
amp time'?"
Rebecca nodded slowly, worry creasing her brow.
"I'm pretty sure he means that Griffith sped up the
amplification process. Amplification is the term for a
virus's spread through a host."
That didn't sound like something he wanted to
think about either. By some unspoken agreement,
they hadn't talked about the possibility of John or
Karen being infected since David had left.
"Great. You find anything else in there?"
She shook her head. "Not really. He mentions the Ma7s a couple of times, but nothing more specific
than that they're a T-Virus experiment that didn't
work. And he's definitely kind of an asshole."
"Kind of?"
Rebecca smiled briefly. "Okay, that's an under- statement. He's a money-hungry, amoral bastard."
Steve nodded, thinking about the partial report
they'd found on the Trisquads and for that matter,
the very existence of the facility. Calling the T-Virus
victims "units," setting up operating rooms and apti-
tude tests to run them through like rats in a maze -
- it's like they can't acknowledge that they're per-
forming their experiments on human beings, on real
people...
"How could they do this?" he asked softly, as much to himself as to Rebecca. "How did they sleep at night?"
Rebecca gazed at him solemnly, as if she had an
answer but wasn't sure how to say it. Finally, she
sighed. "When you specialize in one field, particularly when it's a field that demands linear thinking and a
very defined focus on only one tiny element of some-
thing - it's kind of hard to explain, but it's frighten-
ingly easy to get lost in that single element, to forget
there's a world outside of that element. When you
spend your days looking into a microscope, sur-
rounded by numbers and letters and processes...
some people get lost. And if they were unstable to
begin with, the ambition to pursue that element can
take over, making everything else unimportant."
Steve saw what she was getting at and was im-
pressed anew with how thoughtful she was, how
clearly she communicated herself...
... all that and a smile that lights up a room; if -
- when we get out of this, I'm moving to Raccoon City.
Or I'll at least find out if she's seeing anyone...
There was a sound from somewhere in the building,
footsteps. Steve pushed himself off the table and
walked quickly to the door.
He leaned out into the corridor and heard David's
voice calling through the empty block.
"In the back!" Steve shouted, then waited, anx- iously watching the corner in the hall for David to
walk into view, John and Karen both healthy and
smiling beside him. Rebecca moved to stand next to
Steve, and he saw the same concern and hope written
across her delicate features.
Instinctively, he groped for her hand, feeling a
tingling jolt as their fingers touched, half expecting
her to pull away, but she didn't, leaning against him
instead as she held his hand gently, her skin soft and
warm on his.
John's booming voice preceded him down the cor-
ridor, loud and full of bright good humor. "Get your clothes on, kids, you've got company!"
She dropped his hand quickly, but the look that she
flashed him more than made up for it - a sweet and
wistful expression that made his heart skip a beat,
but there was a maturity there, too, a realization of
the circumstances they were in, an acknowledgment
of priorities.
No more until we're out of here.
He nodded slightly, and they turned to wait for the
others.
TWELVE
REBECCA COULD STILL FEEL THE LINGER-
ing warmth of Steve's hand in hers as David, John,
and Karen walked around the corner, John grinning
broadly.
"Sorry to crash, but we figured you guys could use a
little chaperoning," he said. "Nothing like young love, though, am I right?"
As the three stepped into the room, Rebecca strug-
gled to quash the blush she felt creeping up on her,
suddenly feeling horribly unprofessional. All they'd
done was hold hands, and only for a second, but
they were in the middle of an operation, in hostile
territory where even a moment's lapse of concentra-
tion could get them killed.
John must have picked up on her embarrassment.
"Ah, don't mind me," he said, his grin fading. "I'm just giving Steve-o a hard time, I didn't mean any-
thing by it."
David interrupted, shooting John a pointed glance.
"I think we have more important things to discuss,"
he said evenly. "We need to update, and I have a few things I'd like to go over.
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