It's difficult to negotiate with a girl who lives by the rule: once a traitor, always a traitor. I actually live by that logic myself, but there are always exceptions to the rules. It's not for nothing that they talk about second chances: if Jill Valentine almost died because of me, then saving a life can easily wash away such a transgression. Tit for tat. Today, mortal enemies, and a little later, allies fighting against a crowd of evil spirits. Isn't it just one step from hatred to love? Just as it's only one bullet from life to death.
Almost the whole way, I was left with the feeling that the partner trailing behind me was capable of putting a couple of bullets in my back. I not only felt this through the subtle reactions of her body, but also saw it with my own eyes. She is an experienced mercenary, strong and dangerous. Everyone in her place would give away their desires with their guts if they found themselves in front of a fighter of a similar level. An ordinary person would notice a slight twitch of the hand, and an experienced military person would immediately understand how someone reached for a pistol for a moment and thought about shooting.
— An excellent place, — I noted the lousy coffee shop, whose front door was decorated with human blood. The better the slogan, the more customers. The marketing trick in the form of a bloody door really appealed to me. Jill winced, but she, like me, has no right to complain. Another coffee shop is located in even more dangerous areas of the city; there, we will be eaten as desserts. Not we eat desserts, but us. This is very important.
— Are you serious? We need to get out of this city! Did you see Him? And this chaos!
— Chaos? It's been like this for a couple of days now, — I explained, raising my head and meeting my companion's gaze. — Did you forget the football show?
— What about it? — The unexpected question almost knocked me off my feet.
— Are you serious? — Confused, I instinctively asked this question. She hasn't been drinking for the last few days, has she? Trying to recover after being fired from a job where she was almost killed. Um, judging by the external signs, Jill knows a lot about choosing the right moment for a bender.
— I… was… busy in my apartment. And then he came, and… everything in the city went to hell, — what a cute excuse flew out of the mouth of the perky girl. It's a pity I didn't meet her earlier; I would have kept her company.
The last week was not very positive: the mass extermination of people, which is bad, forced me to analyze the situation from different sides. Not just the outside, where zombies roam. The inside, where a conscience awakened in me along with new views. Memories flared up, where a lot of attention was paid to ethics and morals. Orlov was mostly an egoist, but not arrogant like me; more down-to-earth.
— Gunfire, cannibalism, explosions, accidents, alarms — nothing, if a person is busy in their apartment, — savoring every word, I chuckled at the end and headed to the coffee shop. The barista didn't show up for his shift, so I'll have to make coffee with my own hands.
We were lucky that we took a route with the least amount of chaos. I expected to meet several creatures here, but they were not there. It seems no one thought of having coffee when there's anarchy on the street. Or someone wanted to, but as soon as they opened the doors, they were immediately mauled from behind by hungry creatures. If an infected person dies, the mutation is almost instantaneous, and the victim quickly rises again.
— There's…
— No one, but it's better to be sure, — I finished for her.
— I'm not prying, but don't you think there's something extra on your traitor's face? — Her accusation hit a sore spot. As if sunglasses would somehow prevent me from inspecting rooms in complete darkness. My eyes are not what they used to be, and I can only show my pupils to beauties… Um, with whom I am in a close relationship. Cat's eyes will not make the best first impression; rather, they will scare away all the ladies.
— But there's no smell of alcohol, — I returned the jab, as in the good old days, heading to the hidden rooms of this coffee shop. There are only a few of them, and my ears did not pick up any creatures, nor did my gut feeling. So I walked through the establishment as if it were my own home. Everything was good and calm, as if I were the master of a place that could be demolished by an explosion at any moment. Not a simple gas explosion. A nuclear one. According to my logic, it can happen in one hundred out of one hundred cases; there is no other way to neutralize the threat.
The president of any country will think three times before leaving a biological threat as it is. If this had happened in a remote village, there would have been opportunities to limit it to other means. But to clear a whole city, a hundred thousand infected, is almost impossible. And if the infection seeps into other settlements or spreads throughout the country, then the fun will begin: the last days of humanity.
— Clear, — coming out of the toilet, which I checked last, I was met with a slight smile from Jill. Ladies these days are too fickle. Five minutes ago, she wanted to shoot me; now she's smiling at a simple joke. — Other than the toilets, everything's clear.
— We need to check the second floor, — she nodded, but I stopped her with a gesture.
— I will hear the walking dead before they appear. There's no point in risking it by going up to the next floors. The first one is enough, — we both supported this remark, but then our paths diverged.
Jill began to look for a suitable table and chairs, cleaning the hastily left trash from the found table, and I went to work as a barista. The electricity had not been turned off yet, and there was a lot of work to do. A horse dose of caffeine wouldn't hurt my partner, especially if Nemesis gets in the way again. Two magazines for a pistol in a vulnerable spot are enough to disable it for a couple of minutes.
Two bullets per ordinary zombie.
Bad…
I don't have that much ammunition and resources. Fighting against zombies at a distance is not an option. Maybe I should look for something in the Raccoon City police station; there's a lot of weapons there because of the S.T.A.R.S. base.
Not everything was written off; something must be left. We are not just going to have a good time in this city; today or tomorrow, we need to visit the Umbrella laboratory. A dangerous place where samples of various monsters could have escaped. I know those that were stored there earlier.
It's scary to imagine what the scientists have done in my absence. Explosive dogs? Wrap them in explosives and control them with a parasite. No, Alpha is unlikely to take root in living creatures; maybe Nemesis Beta? I haven't heard of such a parasite, but I didn't have full access. Only the founders of the pharmaceutical giant have it; Spencer has seized most of the assets and information, while others lag behind, but together, even they represent a treasure trove of useful knowledge.
— You've changed, — Jill quickly noted. — Or you're pretending to have changed.
— Flip a coin, you'll know for sure, — I chuckled at the useless remark, continuing to prepare a nice gift as a sign of reconciliation. In the refrigerator, for example, there were several desserts. The sight of them made me shudder; my body can hardly digest anything but meat. Raw, preferably. I'm not that hungry yet.
— Why did you betray the team? — Straight to the point, just the way I like it.
— I'm a virologist scientist, and the corporation tied me up before it transferred me and sent me to collect data for it among the military and police. There were no options to refuse or quit, just as there was no option to play the role of an obedient puppy. Umbrella quickly recognized all the actors and punished them cruelly; only those who served the company with their whole heart and body survived, — I answered thoughtfully and evasively. — But the company did not strive to create a cure for all diseases, using a special herb near Raccoon City and a group of outstanding scientists for its purposes. When I understood its true motives, I tried to avoid death, but at the same time, I put a stick in their wheels. In Spencer's mansion, it almost worked. Except that I miscalculated because of the Red Queen. They created something that instantly spoiled the plan of initiating my own death.
— A victim of circumstances?
— And of my own ambitions. I wanted to destroy the company by leaking all the data to the Organization that was trying to fight it, — I told her, placing two coffees and one dessert on the counter. Jill deftly grabbed them and went to the table, and I followed her. — In exchange for a leadership position. But as you can see, for the last few months, I've been living here and hatching other plans. After that, however, — I threw my hands up before sitting down at the table. — There was a leak of the T-virus; the infection got into the sewage system or the water purification station. The signs of infection appeared too quickly in the city's residents; the police chief began to lose his mind, and the city's mayor quickly fled the disaster.
— Irons and Warren worked for Umbrella?
— They were business partners, — I gestured, implying a simple bribe. — For money, people are ready for anything. For a lot of money, they're ready for everything.
— And what about the Organization? — Jill asked unexpectedly.
— I only know about its intermediaries. It's secretive, afraid that if uninitiated people find out about it, the giant company, the most profitable and powerful, will simply crush them like ants. An expected outcome, — I made a theatrical pause to get to the point. — It was, of course, expected. Umbrella made a colossal leak and lost a base. This might be beneficial to the top brass, but it's too early for a maneuver. NE-α is too imperfect to enter the underground arena; they don't have a financial crisis, nor do they have a shortage of investors. In short, a technical error, a terrorist attack, or sabotage. Anything of that. And this is capable of leading Umbrella to collapse. In theory.
— We were already preparing accusations against them. Chris is working on it, as you can see, things are going slowly, — she became thoughtful, sipping her hot coffee. — What do you suggest? You are a master of betrayal. How would you betray Umbrella to bring it down?
— You have one topic for conversation, which is wrong, — I stretched my smile, took a coffee cup, and tasted the invigorating liquid. Overall, it was quite tasty. — But you're thinking in the right direction. Umbrella did not expect the incident; this is indicated by a lot of ambiguous decisions. It acted quickly, but not enough to activate the self-destruction mechanism of the laboratory. A secret place where the data of all its crimes is stored. With the evidence, we may not win the war, but we can inflict reputational damage. Fewer investors, less company influence. We have to make a good half of their sponsors afraid.
— Why not all of them? — Jill asked skeptically.
— Even if we destroy the top of the iceberg, this company will continue to live happily. Its main goal is to sell biological weapons. Just imagine, with such weapons, any terrorist group can grab any superpower by the balls. America will no longer be able to intervene in military conflicts. Otherwise, at the New York airport, someone will break a vial with the virus and repeat the incident with Raccoon City, only on a much larger scale.
— No matter how you look at it, we'll lose. If we expose the company now, it will go underground and chaos will begin all over the world.
— If we leave it as it is, it will go underground much later, but with much greater resources and power. And don't forget, even if the president declares the company illegal, its laboratories are located all over the world. An open war with it is tantamount to causing outbreaks in all developed countries. Of course, the people at the top aren't fools. There's no reason for them to turn the whole world into a wasteland. A prime example of this is Nemesis. He's the one who attacked you. That bruiser with the stitched-up eye.
— What about him?
I was about to answer this question when I felt heavy footsteps…
— He is sentient, has intelligence, and can be controlled by a parasite implanted in him, — my words made her eyebrows crawl up. — And he's nearby. It's time for a strategic retreat, or we'll get into trouble.
— S.T.A.R.S.