in great, bounding leaps.
He hit the door just as the shark was turning up ahead and grabbed for the handle, choking – – and it was locked.
Shit, shit, shit!!!
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 outside 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 undoubtedly 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 elevator.
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 concrete 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 naturally 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 anxiousLy 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 branching 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 carefully, 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 unlocked.
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, glancing at the empty slide projector. She let her gaze wander,
