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Ahead of him and to the left, from in between an of-fice building and a fenced lot, came a gurgling groan, then another. Three infected shambled out into the open, ten meters or so from where he stood. They were too far away to make out clearly in the waxy moon-light, but Nicholai could see that none of them were in good shape; two were missing arms and the third's legs had somehow been cut down, so that it seemed to be walking on its knees, each stumping footstep creating a noise like someone smacking their lips. "Uhllg," the closest complained, and Nicholai shot it through its disintegrating brains. Two more shots and the other two joined the first, collapsing to the asphalt in wet thumps. He felt much better. Whether or not he got an oppor-tunity to see his duplicitous comrades again – and he found that he felt strongly that he would – he was the superior man, and he would triumph in the end. The awareness filled him with a new energy. Nicholai broke into a trot, eager to meet whatever chal-lenge came next.
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
SIXTEEN
THE TROLLEY'S DOOR WAS JAMMED, SO JILL and Carlos had to climb out of a window, Carlos look-ing as drained as Jill felt. It was a frankly weird coinci-dence that the trolley had ended up exactly where they needed to go, but then the last several hours – hell, weeks – had been weird. Jill thought it would serve her well to stop letting things surprise her. The clock tower yard seemed empty of life, nothing moving but a thin haze of oily smoke boiling up from the cable car's electrical system. They walked to the unused decorative fountain in front of the main doors, gazing up at the giant clock and the small belfry that topped the tower, Jill's thoughts heavy with images of Mikhail Victor. She'd never even been properly intro-duced to the man who'd saved her life, but she thought that they'd lost a valuable ally. The strength of charac-ter it took to die so that another might live… heroic was the only word that fit.
Maybe he even killed the Nemesis, it was practically on top of him when the grenade went off… Wishful thinking, probably, but she could hope.
"So, I guess we try to find the bell mechanism," Carlos said. "Do you think it's safe to split up, or should we…"
Caw!The harsh cry of a crow cut him off, and Jill felt afresh surge of adrenaline pump new life into her veins.She grabbed Carlos's hand as a fluttering sound filledthe dark from above and around them, the sound ofbirds' wings pushing air.
The hall of portraits at the mansion, watched fromabove by dozens of shiny black eyes as they waited toattack. And Forest Speyer, from the Bravo team, Chrissaid he'd been ripped apart by dozens, perhaps hun-dreds of them."Come on!" She pulled at Carlos, remembering therelentless viciousness of the altered, oversized crows atthe Spencer estate. Carlos seemed to know better thanto ask questions as a dozen more hoarse cries piercedthe air. They ran around the fountain to the front doorsof the tower.
Locked."Cover me!" Jill shouted, reaching into her pack forher lockpick tools, the wheeling cries closing in onthem… and Carlos threw himself at the doors, hitting theheavy old wood hard enough that splinters flew. Hejogged back a few paces and ran at them again, bam… and they crashed inward, Carlos following throughto trip and sprawl across the tastefully tiled floor, Jillquickly stepping in behind him. She grabbed the doorhandles and slammed the doors closed not a second toosoon. There were two audible thumps from the otherside, joined by a chorus of angry screeching and thebrush of dark wings, and then they were retreating, thesounds fading away. Jill sagged against the doors, ex-haling heavily.
God, is it ever going to stop? Do we have to face offwith every demonic asshole in the city before we 're al-lowed to leave?"Zombie birds? Are you kidding me?" Carlos said,pushing himself to his feet as Jill manually bolted thedoors. She didn't bother answering him, turning to takein the clock tower's grand lobby instead.It reminded her of the Spencer mansion's foyer, thelow lights and Gothic scrollwork giving it a kind ofshabbily elegant atmosphere. A wide marble staircasedominated the large room, leading up to a second-floorlanding with stained-glass windows. There were doors
on either side of the room, a couple of polished wood tables in front of them, and to their left… Jill sighed inwardly and felt something inside tighten a little. She hadn't expected the clock tower to be some kind of untouched sanctuary, even as far out of town as it was, but she realized that she had hoped – a hope lost at the sight of more death. The scene told a story, a kind of mystery. Five male corpses, all of them dressed in somewhat military garb. Three of them lay next to the tables, apparently victims of a virus carrier; the carrier's bullet-riddled body was nearby. The victims' flesh had been gnawed, their skulls crushed and empty. The fifth corpse, a young man, had shot himself in the head, presumably after dispatching the zombie. Had he killed himself out of despair at the sight of his half-eaten friends? Had he been responsible somehow? Or had he known the virus carrier well, and taken his life after being forced to kill it?
No way we can ever know. It's just another handful of lives lost in some untold tragedy, one among this city's thousands.
Carlos moved closer to the bodies, frowning. From the grim look on his face, she got the impression that he knew who they were. He crouched down and pulled a blood-streaked duffel bag out from in between two of them, drawing a trail of red across the tile. Jill could hear metal touching metal inside, and it was obviously heavy, Carlos's bicep straining to lift the bag. "Is that what I think it is?" Jill asked. Carlos took the bag to one of the tables and eased the contents out. Jill felt a sudden, unexpected burst of glee at what was there; she hurried to the table, hardly able to believe their luck. A half dozen hand grenades like the one Mikhail had used, RG34s; eight M16 thirty-round magazines, loaded as far as she could tell; and, more than she could have hoped for, a US M79 grenade launcher with a handful of fat 40mm cartridges. "Weapons at the clock tower," Carlos said thought-fully. Before Jill could ask what he meant, he picked up one of the rifle grenades and whistled softly. "Buckshot loads," he said. "One of these would have blasted the living shit out of that Nemesis espantajo." Jill raised her eyebrows. " 'Espantajo'?" "Literally, a scarecrow," Carlos said, "but it's used like weirdo, or freak."
Appropriate. Jill nodded toward the men who had carried the weapons. "Do you recognize these people?" Carlos shrugged uncomfortably, handing her three of the hand grenades. "They're all U.B.C.S., I've seen them around, but I don't – I didn't know them. They
were just dumb grunts, they probably had no idea what they were getting into when they joined Umbrella, or when we were sent here. Like me."
He seemed angry and a little sad, and he abruptly changed the topic, suddenly remembering how close they were to escaping Raccoon City. "Do you want to carry the grenade gun?" "I thought you'd never ask," Jill said, smiling. She could use a weapon that would, as Carlos so colorfully put it, blast the living shit out of the Nemesis freak.
"Now all we have to do is find a button somewhere, push it, and wait for our taxi to arrive."
Carlos smiled faintly in turn, tucking M16 mags into his vest pockets. "And try not to end up dead, like everyone else in this goddamn place." Jill had no response to that. "Upstairs?" Carlos nodded. Armed and ready, they started up. The clock tower's second floor was really only a bal-cony that overlooked the front room. It ran along three sides of the building, and there was a single door where it ended, which had to lead to another set of staks – to the belfry, if Carlos remembered the term correctly. Where the bells were. Almost over, this is almost over, almost over… He let the repeating thought drive away almost everything else, too fatigued to consider his feelings of anger and sorrow and fear, aware that his breaking point wasn't all that far off. He could sort through his emotions once they left Raccoon behind. The balcony itself was as richly adorned as the lobby, blue tiles that matched the blue of the stained-glass windows, an arched overhang supported by white columns. They could see almost all of the fine balcony from the top of the stairs, and it appeared to be clear, not a zombie or monster in sight. Carlos breathed easier and saw that Jill also seemed more at ease. She carried the Colt Python and wore the grenade gun on her back, using Carlos's belt as a sling.
How did Trent know there would be weapons here? Did he know I'd be taking them from dead men?
Carlos realized suddenly that he was overestimating Trent's reach. There had to be another cache of weapons somewhere in the building, that was all, he and Jill had just happened across the duffel bag. The al-ternative – that Trent had somehow known about the dead soldiers – was too bizarre to consider. They started down the first leg of the balcony side by side, Carlos wondering what Jill would say if he told her about Trent. She'd probably think he was kidding, the whole thing was so spy-novel mysterious… Something moved. Ahead of them and around the first corner, something on the ceiling, a flash of dark movement. Carlos stepped to the railing and leaned out to look, but, whatever it was, it was either hidden be-hind one of the hanging arches or something that his exhausted brain had come up with to keep him awake. "What?" Jill whispered at his shoulder, holding her revolver ready. Carlos searched a few seconds longer and then shook his head, turning away. "Nothing, I guess, thought I saw something on the ceiling, but…" "Shit!"
Carlos swung around as Jill jerked her weapon up, pointing at the ceiling just in front of them as a creature the size of a large dog skittered in their direction, a thing with a humped body and multiple legs, its thickly furred feet thumping stickily across the ceiling faster than seemed possible. Jill unloaded three rounds into it before Carlos could blink, but not before he registered what he was looking at. It was a spider, big enough for Carlos to see his own reflection in its shining eyes as it crashed to the floor. Dark fluids spouted from its back as it thrashed its mul-ticolored legs in the air, ichorous blood pooling beneath it. The wild, silent dance lasted only a second or two before it curled into itself, dead. "I hate spiders," Jill said, a look of revulsion on her face as she started forward again, scanning the ceiling.
"All those legs, that bloated stomach… yuck." "You've seen these before?" Carlos asked, unable to look away from the closed fist of its body.
"Yeah, at the Umbrella lab in the woods. Not alive, though, the ones I saw were dead."
Jill's apparent calm as they skirted the dead spider and continued on reminded Carlos how lucky he was to have hooked up with her. He'd come across a lot of tough men in his experiences, but he doubted very much that any one of them, put in her position, would be handling themselves as capably as Jill Valentine. The rest of the balcony was clear, although Carlos uncomfortably noted a shitload of webbing on the ceil-ing, mounds of the thick white stuff accumulated in every corner; he didn't care much for spiders, either. When they reached the door and swept their way through, Jill going in low, Carlos was relieved to be outside again. They'd come out on a wide ledge in front of the tower itself, a barren space surrounded by an ancient railing, a couple of defunct spotlights, and a few dead plants. There was a doorlike opening set a story higher up in the tower but no way to get to it. It seemed like a dead end, nowhere to go but back the way they'd come. Carlos sighed; at least the crows, if that's what they were, had migrated somewhere else. "So what now?" Carlos asked, looking out over the dark courtyard, at the still smoking wrecked trolley car. When Jill didn't answer, Carlos turned and saw her standing by a copper plaque he hadn't noticed, set into the stone face of the tower. She reached into her bag and produced a wrapped set of lockpicks. "You give up way too easy," Jill said, selecting a few pieces from the bundle. "Watch for crows, and I'll see what I can do about getting us a ladder."
Carlos covered her, vaguely wondering if there was anything she couldn't do, smelling rain on the cold wind that blew across the ledge. A moment later there was a series of clicks followed by a low hum of hidden machinery, and a narrow metal ladder descended from just beneath the opening above.
"How do you feel about standing guard for another few minutes?" Jill asked, smiling. Carlos grinned, feeling her excitement; it really was almost over. "You got it." Jill quickly scaled the ladder and disappeared through the open door above. She called down an all-clear a second later, and for the next several minutes, Carlos paced the ledge, thinking about what he was going to do after they were rescued. He wanted to talk to Trent again, about what needed to be done to stop Umbrella; whatever it took, he was there.
I bet he'd be interested in talking to Jill, too. When the 'copters come, we play stupid until they let us go, then plan out our next step – after a good meal and a shower and about twenty-four hours of sleep, ofcourse…
He was so fixated on their deliverance from Raccoon that he didn't notice Jill's expression at first as she de-scended the ladder, didn't really think about the fact that there weren't any bells tolling. He smiled at her… and then felt his heart sink, understanding that their trial wasn't over yet.
"There's a gear missing from the bell mechanism,"she said, "and we have to have it to make them ring.The good news is, I'm willing to bet that it's some-where in the building."Carlos arched an eyebrow. "How do you figure?"I found this next to one of the other gears," Jill saidand handed him a tattered postcard.The picture on the front was of three paintings hung
in a row, each piece incorporating a clock. Carlos flipped the card over and saw "St. Michael Clock Tower, Raccoon City" in fine print on the upper left corner. Below that was a printed line of verse, which Jill said out loud.
" 'Give your soul to the goddess. Put your hands to-gether to pray before her.' "Carlos stared at her. "Are you suggesting that wepray for the missing gear?"Ha ha. I'm suggesting that the gear is whereverthese clocks are."Carlos handed the card back. "You said that was thegood news – what's the bad?"
Jill smiled sourly, an entirely humorless expression.
"I doubt that the gear is going to be laying out in plain sight. It's some kind of puzzle, like the ones I ran across at the Spencer estate – and a few of those almost got me killed."
Carlos didn't ask. For the moment, at least, he didn't want to know.
Maybe he even killed the Nemesis, it was practically on top of him when the grenade went off… Wishful thinking, probably, but she could hope.
"So, I guess we try to find the bell mechanism," Carlos said. "Do you think it's safe to split up, or should we…"
Caw!The harsh cry of a crow cut him off, and Jill felt afresh surge of adrenaline pump new life into her veins.She grabbed Carlos's hand as a fluttering sound filledthe dark from above and around them, the sound ofbirds' wings pushing air.
The hall of portraits at the mansion, watched fromabove by dozens of shiny black eyes as they waited toattack. And Forest Speyer, from the Bravo team, Chrissaid he'd been ripped apart by dozens, perhaps hun-dreds of them."Come on!" She pulled at Carlos, remembering therelentless viciousness of the altered, oversized crows atthe Spencer estate. Carlos seemed to know better thanto ask questions as a dozen more hoarse cries piercedthe air. They ran around the fountain to the front doorsof the tower.
Locked."Cover me!" Jill shouted, reaching into her pack forher lockpick tools, the wheeling cries closing in onthem… and Carlos threw himself at the doors, hitting theheavy old wood hard enough that splinters flew. Hejogged back a few paces and ran at them again, bam… and they crashed inward, Carlos following throughto trip and sprawl across the tastefully tiled floor, Jillquickly stepping in behind him. She grabbed the doorhandles and slammed the doors closed not a second toosoon. There were two audible thumps from the otherside, joined by a chorus of angry screeching and thebrush of dark wings, and then they were retreating, thesounds fading away. Jill sagged against the doors, ex-haling heavily.
God, is it ever going to stop? Do we have to face offwith every demonic asshole in the city before we 're al-lowed to leave?"Zombie birds? Are you kidding me?" Carlos said,pushing himself to his feet as Jill manually bolted thedoors. She didn't bother answering him, turning to takein the clock tower's grand lobby instead.It reminded her of the Spencer mansion's foyer, thelow lights and Gothic scrollwork giving it a kind ofshabbily elegant atmosphere. A wide marble staircasedominated the large room, leading up to a second-floorlanding with stained-glass windows. There were doors
on either side of the room, a couple of polished wood tables in front of them, and to their left… Jill sighed inwardly and felt something inside tighten a little. She hadn't expected the clock tower to be some kind of untouched sanctuary, even as far out of town as it was, but she realized that she had hoped – a hope lost at the sight of more death. The scene told a story, a kind of mystery. Five male corpses, all of them dressed in somewhat military garb. Three of them lay next to the tables, apparently victims of a virus carrier; the carrier's bullet-riddled body was nearby. The victims' flesh had been gnawed, their skulls crushed and empty. The fifth corpse, a young man, had shot himself in the head, presumably after dispatching the zombie. Had he killed himself out of despair at the sight of his half-eaten friends? Had he been responsible somehow? Or had he known the virus carrier well, and taken his life after being forced to kill it?
No way we can ever know. It's just another handful of lives lost in some untold tragedy, one among this city's thousands.
Carlos moved closer to the bodies, frowning. From the grim look on his face, she got the impression that he knew who they were. He crouched down and pulled a blood-streaked duffel bag out from in between two of them, drawing a trail of red across the tile. Jill could hear metal touching metal inside, and it was obviously heavy, Carlos's bicep straining to lift the bag. "Is that what I think it is?" Jill asked. Carlos took the bag to one of the tables and eased the contents out. Jill felt a sudden, unexpected burst of glee at what was there; she hurried to the table, hardly able to believe their luck. A half dozen hand grenades like the one Mikhail had used, RG34s; eight M16 thirty-round magazines, loaded as far as she could tell; and, more than she could have hoped for, a US M79 grenade launcher with a handful of fat 40mm cartridges. "Weapons at the clock tower," Carlos said thought-fully. Before Jill could ask what he meant, he picked up one of the rifle grenades and whistled softly. "Buckshot loads," he said. "One of these would have blasted the living shit out of that Nemesis espantajo." Jill raised her eyebrows. " 'Espantajo'?" "Literally, a scarecrow," Carlos said, "but it's used like weirdo, or freak."
Appropriate. Jill nodded toward the men who had carried the weapons. "Do you recognize these people?" Carlos shrugged uncomfortably, handing her three of the hand grenades. "They're all U.B.C.S., I've seen them around, but I don't – I didn't know them. They
were just dumb grunts, they probably had no idea what they were getting into when they joined Umbrella, or when we were sent here. Like me."
He seemed angry and a little sad, and he abruptly changed the topic, suddenly remembering how close they were to escaping Raccoon City. "Do you want to carry the grenade gun?" "I thought you'd never ask," Jill said, smiling. She could use a weapon that would, as Carlos so colorfully put it, blast the living shit out of the Nemesis freak.
"Now all we have to do is find a button somewhere, push it, and wait for our taxi to arrive."
Carlos smiled faintly in turn, tucking M16 mags into his vest pockets. "And try not to end up dead, like everyone else in this goddamn place." Jill had no response to that. "Upstairs?" Carlos nodded. Armed and ready, they started up. The clock tower's second floor was really only a bal-cony that overlooked the front room. It ran along three sides of the building, and there was a single door where it ended, which had to lead to another set of staks – to the belfry, if Carlos remembered the term correctly. Where the bells were. Almost over, this is almost over, almost over… He let the repeating thought drive away almost everything else, too fatigued to consider his feelings of anger and sorrow and fear, aware that his breaking point wasn't all that far off. He could sort through his emotions once they left Raccoon behind. The balcony itself was as richly adorned as the lobby, blue tiles that matched the blue of the stained-glass windows, an arched overhang supported by white columns. They could see almost all of the fine balcony from the top of the stairs, and it appeared to be clear, not a zombie or monster in sight. Carlos breathed easier and saw that Jill also seemed more at ease. She carried the Colt Python and wore the grenade gun on her back, using Carlos's belt as a sling.
How did Trent know there would be weapons here? Did he know I'd be taking them from dead men?
Carlos realized suddenly that he was overestimating Trent's reach. There had to be another cache of weapons somewhere in the building, that was all, he and Jill had just happened across the duffel bag. The al-ternative – that Trent had somehow known about the dead soldiers – was too bizarre to consider. They started down the first leg of the balcony side by side, Carlos wondering what Jill would say if he told her about Trent. She'd probably think he was kidding, the whole thing was so spy-novel mysterious… Something moved. Ahead of them and around the first corner, something on the ceiling, a flash of dark movement. Carlos stepped to the railing and leaned out to look, but, whatever it was, it was either hidden be-hind one of the hanging arches or something that his exhausted brain had come up with to keep him awake. "What?" Jill whispered at his shoulder, holding her revolver ready. Carlos searched a few seconds longer and then shook his head, turning away. "Nothing, I guess, thought I saw something on the ceiling, but…" "Shit!"
Carlos swung around as Jill jerked her weapon up, pointing at the ceiling just in front of them as a creature the size of a large dog skittered in their direction, a thing with a humped body and multiple legs, its thickly furred feet thumping stickily across the ceiling faster than seemed possible. Jill unloaded three rounds into it before Carlos could blink, but not before he registered what he was looking at. It was a spider, big enough for Carlos to see his own reflection in its shining eyes as it crashed to the floor. Dark fluids spouted from its back as it thrashed its mul-ticolored legs in the air, ichorous blood pooling beneath it. The wild, silent dance lasted only a second or two before it curled into itself, dead. "I hate spiders," Jill said, a look of revulsion on her face as she started forward again, scanning the ceiling.
"All those legs, that bloated stomach… yuck." "You've seen these before?" Carlos asked, unable to look away from the closed fist of its body.
"Yeah, at the Umbrella lab in the woods. Not alive, though, the ones I saw were dead."
Jill's apparent calm as they skirted the dead spider and continued on reminded Carlos how lucky he was to have hooked up with her. He'd come across a lot of tough men in his experiences, but he doubted very much that any one of them, put in her position, would be handling themselves as capably as Jill Valentine. The rest of the balcony was clear, although Carlos uncomfortably noted a shitload of webbing on the ceil-ing, mounds of the thick white stuff accumulated in every corner; he didn't care much for spiders, either. When they reached the door and swept their way through, Jill going in low, Carlos was relieved to be outside again. They'd come out on a wide ledge in front of the tower itself, a barren space surrounded by an ancient railing, a couple of defunct spotlights, and a few dead plants. There was a doorlike opening set a story higher up in the tower but no way to get to it. It seemed like a dead end, nowhere to go but back the way they'd come. Carlos sighed; at least the crows, if that's what they were, had migrated somewhere else. "So what now?" Carlos asked, looking out over the dark courtyard, at the still smoking wrecked trolley car. When Jill didn't answer, Carlos turned and saw her standing by a copper plaque he hadn't noticed, set into the stone face of the tower. She reached into her bag and produced a wrapped set of lockpicks. "You give up way too easy," Jill said, selecting a few pieces from the bundle. "Watch for crows, and I'll see what I can do about getting us a ladder."
Carlos covered her, vaguely wondering if there was anything she couldn't do, smelling rain on the cold wind that blew across the ledge. A moment later there was a series of clicks followed by a low hum of hidden machinery, and a narrow metal ladder descended from just beneath the opening above.
"How do you feel about standing guard for another few minutes?" Jill asked, smiling. Carlos grinned, feeling her excitement; it really was almost over. "You got it." Jill quickly scaled the ladder and disappeared through the open door above. She called down an all-clear a second later, and for the next several minutes, Carlos paced the ledge, thinking about what he was going to do after they were rescued. He wanted to talk to Trent again, about what needed to be done to stop Umbrella; whatever it took, he was there.
I bet he'd be interested in talking to Jill, too. When the 'copters come, we play stupid until they let us go, then plan out our next step – after a good meal and a shower and about twenty-four hours of sleep, ofcourse…
He was so fixated on their deliverance from Raccoon that he didn't notice Jill's expression at first as she de-scended the ladder, didn't really think about the fact that there weren't any bells tolling. He smiled at her… and then felt his heart sink, understanding that their trial wasn't over yet.
"There's a gear missing from the bell mechanism,"she said, "and we have to have it to make them ring.The good news is, I'm willing to bet that it's some-where in the building."Carlos arched an eyebrow. "How do you figure?"I found this next to one of the other gears," Jill saidand handed him a tattered postcard.The picture on the front was of three paintings hung
in a row, each piece incorporating a clock. Carlos flipped the card over and saw "St. Michael Clock Tower, Raccoon City" in fine print on the upper left corner. Below that was a printed line of verse, which Jill said out loud.
" 'Give your soul to the goddess. Put your hands to-gether to pray before her.' "Carlos stared at her. "Are you suggesting that wepray for the missing gear?"Ha ha. I'm suggesting that the gear is whereverthese clocks are."Carlos handed the card back. "You said that was thegood news – what's the bad?"
Jill smiled sourly, an entirely humorless expression.
"I doubt that the gear is going to be laying out in plain sight. It's some kind of puzzle, like the ones I ran across at the Spencer estate – and a few of those almost got me killed."
Carlos didn't ask. For the moment, at least, he didn't want to know.
SEVENTEEN
AFTER TRACKING HIM FOR NEARLY HALF AN hour, Nicholai found Dr. Richard Aquino on the fourth floor of Raccoon City's largest hospital. Seeing the Watchdog made Nicholai happy in a way he couldn't ex-plain, not even to himself. A sense that all was right with the world, that things were unfolding as they should…… with me on top, making the decisions. In a mo-ment there will only be three left, three little doggies for me to hunt in the land of the walking dead, he thought dreamily. Does it get any better than this? Aquino was just locking a door behind him, a look of sweaty fear on his pallid face as his gaze darted around nervously. He pocketed his keys and turned to-ward the hallway that led back to the elevator, pushing his smudged glasses to the bridge of his nose. Nicholai was amused to note that he wasn't even armed. Nicholai stepped half out of the shadows, planning to enjoy himself. After Nicholai had spent over an hour getting to the hospital, jogging most of the way, the mousy Dr. Aquino had had the nerve to try and hide from him – although looking at him now, Nicholai thought it was more likely that the scientist hadn't even known that he was being hunted and had eluded Nicholai by pure accident. Aquino looked like the kind of man who could get lost in his own backyard; even now, the "watchdog" didn't realize that he wasn't alone anymore, that Nicholai was only three meters
away. "Doctor!" Nicholai called loudly, and Aquino jumped around, gasping, involuntarily waving his hands in front of him; his surprise was absolute. Nicholai couldn't help a slight smile. "Who, who are you?" Aquino stammered. He had watery blue eyes and a bad haircut. Nicholai stepped closer, deliberately intimidating the scientist with his size. "I'm with Umbrella. I came to see how you were progressing with the vaccine among other things." "With Umbrella? I didn't – what vaccine, I don't know what you're talking about." No weapon, no physical skills, and he can't tell a lie without blushing. He must be brilliant. Nicholai lowered his voice conspiratorially. "Opera-tion Watchdog sent me, Doctor. You haven't filed a de-tails report lately. They've been worried about you."
Aquino seemed on the verge of collapsing with re-lief. "Oh, if you know about… I thought you were…… yes, the vaccine, I've been very busy; my, ah, contact wanted the initial synthesis broken down into stages, so there isn't an actual mixed sample cultivated, but I can assure you that it's only a matter of combining ele-ments, everything's ready." The doctor practically bab-bled in his effort to submit. Nicholai shook his head in mock wonder, playing his part. "And you've done this all yourself?" Aquino smiled weakly. "With help from my assis-tant, Douglas, God rest his soul. I'm afraid that I've been running a bit ragged since his death, day before yesterday. That's why I've been remiss in my re-ports…"
He trailed off, then attempted another smile.
"So… you're the one they sent to pick up the sam-ple – Franklin, isn't it?"
Nicholai couldn't believe his own luck, or Aquino's naivete; the man was about to turn over the only TGViral antidote in existence, and all because Nicholai had said that Umbrella sent him. And now another one of his targets would be showing up… "Yes, that's right," Nicholai said smoothly. "Ken Franklin. Where is the vaccine, Doctor?" Aquino rumbled for his keys. "In here. I was just hiding it – the vaccine base, I mean, we've kept the medium separate – I hid it in here for safekeeping, until you arrived. I thought you were supposed to come in tomorrow night… no, the night after, you're much earlier than I expected." He opened the door and gestured inside. "There's a refrigerated wall safe behind that rather tacky land-scape – a recent addition by a wealthy patient, an ec-centric as I understand it, not that that's important…"
Nicholai stepped past the driveling doctor, tuning him out, still feeling dumbfounded that Aquino had been selected as a Watchdog, when he suddenly real-ized that he'd allowed the scientist to get behind him. It all came together in that instant, a complete sce-nario in Nicholai's mind – the stupid, gossiping science nerd, putting his enemies at ease, capitalizing on their underestimation of his abilities… The awareness took only a fraction of a second, and then Nicholai was moving. He dropped to his knees and swung his arms around, grabbing Aquino's calves and following through, liter-ally sweeping him off his feet. Aquino yelped and collapsed on top of Nicholai. A syringe clattered to the floor and Aquino lunged after it, but Nicholai still held his bony legs. The doctor had no muscle to speak of. In fact, Nicholai found it quite easy to hold the flailing doctor with one arm while reaching for the knife sheathed in his boot with his other. Nicholai sat up, jerked Aquino closer, and stabbed him in the throat. Aquino put his hands to his neck as Nicholai with-drew the blade, staring at his killer with wide, shocked eyes, blood pouring over his fingers as his heart contin-ued its work. Nicholai stared back at him, grinning and pitiless. Aquino had been slated to die, anyway, and that he'd attacked Nicholai only made his death a pleasure, in addition to its being a necessity. The scientist finally fell over, still clutching his bub-bling throat, and lost consciousness. He died quickly after that, a final spasm and he was gone. "Better you than me," Nicholai said. He searched the cooling body and found several more syringes and a four-digit code on a slip of paper – undoubtedly the wall safe's combination. Aquino obviously hadn't ex-pected Nicholai to be around to steal the vaccine. Nicholai stood and walked to the safe, revising his plans as he always tried to do after any unexpected oc-currence. Aquino had been expecting Ken Franklin to pick up the sample, which meant that Franklin would be putting in an appearance, unless the doctor had been lying. Nicholai didn't think so. Aquino had been so convincing because he had been telling the truth, an ex-cellent technique to distract one's opponent…… so I synthesize the vaccine, maybe enjoy some hunting while I wait for Sergeant Franklin to show up, get rid of him – and then destroy the hospital, Aquino's research along with it. If Umbrella's watching, they'll think everything is going according to plan. After that, there's only Chan and the factory worker, Terence Fos-ter… To hell with Mikhail and the other two, they weren't important anymore. As the soon-to-be only surviving Watchdog with information to sell, Nicholai would be worth millions. But with the TG vaccine in hand, there was no limit to what Umbrella might pay.
By the time they reached the building's back rooms, Jill was almost ready to admit defeat. They'd been everywhere, picking locks, slogging through each taste-fully furnished room, stepping over corpses and creat-ing a few new ones. A broken picture window outside the tower's chapel had allowed several carriers to get in, and they'd come across another viral spider in the hallway just past the library. Along the way, she told Carlos a little about the mansion and grounds of the Spencer estate, history that she had dug up after the S.T.A.R.S.'s disastrous mis-sion. Old man Spencer, one of Umbrella's founders, had been a fanatic for secret hiding places and hidden passages and had hired George Trevor, an architect renowned for his creativity, to design the mansion and to help renovate a few of the town's historical land-marks, tying parts of Raccoon to Spencer's spy fan-tasies. "This was all thirty years ago," Jill said, "and the old man was completely crazy by then, so the story goes. As soon as everything was finished, he boarded up the mansion and moved Umbrella's headquarters to Eu-rope." "What happened to George Trevor?" Carlos asked. They stopped outside yet another door, what had to be one of the last rooms. "Oh, that's the best part," Jill said. "He disappeared just before Spencer skipped town. No one ever saw him again." Carlos shook his head slowly. "This is one nut job of a place to live, you know that?"
Jill nodded, pushing open the door and stepping back, revolver up. "Yeah, I've been thinking that my-self."
Nothing was moving. Stacks of chairs to the right. Three statues, busts of women, straight in front of them. There were two corpses huddled together to the left of the door, a couple, holding each other, making Jill wince and look away – and there, hanging on the southern wall in heavy gold frames, were the three clock paintings. They walked into the room, Jill nervously studying their surroundings. It seemed normal…… but so did that room in the mansion that turned out to be a giant trash compactor. On impulse, Jill stepped back and used one of the chairs to prop the door open before going to take a closer look at the paintings. Well, kind of paintings. She supposed technically they'd be called mixed media. The three pieces were of women, one on each canvas, but each also contained an octagonal clock – the first and last set at midnight, the one in the middle at five o'clock. A small, bowl-like tray protruded from the bottom of each frame. They were labeled as the goddesses of the past, present, and future, from left to right.
"On the postcard, it said something about putting your hands together," Carlos said. "That's like the clock hands, right?" Jill nodded. "Yeah, makes sense. It's just obscure enough to be annoying."
She reached forward and lightly touched the tray on the middle frame, a dancing woman. There was a tiny click and the tray dipped like a scale, the weight of her hand pushing it down. At the same time, the hands of the clock started to spin. Jill jerked her hand back, afraid that she'd set some-thing off, and the clock hands quickly spun back to their previous settings. Nothing else happened. "Hands together…," she murmured. "Do you think they mean that all of the clocks have to be set for the same time? Or do they mean literally, the hands aligned?"
Carlos shrugged and reached out to touch the tray of the future goddess, definitely the creepiest of the paint-ings. The past was a young girl sitting on a hill, the present a dancing woman… and the goddess of the fu-ture was the figure of a woman in a slinky cocktail dress, her body enticingly posed, but with the bald, grinning face of a skeleton. Jill suppressed a shudder and didn't let any thoughts get started on the theme of imminent death, like I don't have enough of that already.
The tray Carlos touched dipped down, but again, it was the hands on the clock of the present goddess that moved. Apparently, the other two were fixed at mid-night. Jill stepped back from the wall, arms folded, think-ing – and suddenly she had it, she knew how the puzzle worked, if not the exact solution. She turned around, hoping that the missing pieces were nearby, and she smiled when she saw the three statues – ah, the symme-try – and the shining objects they held in their slender stone fingers. "It's a balancing puzzle," Jill said, walking to the statues. At closer inspection, she saw that each held a tray with a single, fist-sized stone. She picked them up, hefting each orb, noting the different weights. "Three balls, three trays," she continued, walking back to the pictures, handing the black stone -made from obsidian or onyx, she wasn't sure to Carlos. An-other was clear crystal, the third a glowing amber.
"And the goal is to make the middle clock hit mid-night," Carlos said, catching on.Jill nodded. "I'm sure there's a motif to the solution,a color match, like black for death, maybe… ormaybe it's mathematical. It doesn't matter, it won'ttake that long to try all of the combinations."
They set to work, trying each ball on one painting at a time, then using them all, Jill carefully studying the present clock's hand movements with each placement. It appeared that the different balls held different values, depending on which tray they were in. Jill was just starting to feel like she could figure it out – it was defi-nitely mathematical – when they lucked across the so-lution. With crystal in the past, obsidian in the present, and amber in the future, the clock in the middle struck mid-night, chiming softly. The minute hand started to move backwards with a clattering sound – and then the face of the clock itself fell from the picture, pushed out by some machinery that Jill couldn't see. In the revealed hollow was the glittering gold cog that had been miss-ing from the tower's bell mechanism.
Sneaky, you pricks, but not sneaky enough.
Carlos was frowning, his expression openly con-fused. "What the hell is all this, anyway? Who would hide the gear at all, and why in such a complicated way?"
Jill plucked the shining gear from its hiding place, remembering her own thoughts on that exact subject only six weeks before, standing in the dark halls of Spencer's mansion. Why, why such elaborate secrecy? The files Trent had given her just before the estate mis-sion had been full of clues to the mansion's puzzles, lucky for her; without those, she might never have got-ten out. Most of the bizarre little mechanisms had been much too intricate to be practical, time-wise or func-tionally. What was the point? After giving it a lot of thought, Jill had finally con-cluded that Umbrella's real board of directors, the ones no one knew about, were paranoid fanatics. They were self-involved children, playing secret agent games and betting with other people's lives, because they could. Because no one had ever explained to them that hiding toys and making treasure maps was something people outgrew.
Because no one has stopped them. Yet.
Suddenly eager to wrap it all up, to place the gear and ring the bell and just leave, Jill phrased it much more simply to Carlos. "They're wacko, that's why. One-hundred-percent grade-A jacked-up batshit. You ready to get out of here, or what?"
Carlos nodded somberly, and after a final look around the room, they headed back out the way they'd come.
away. "Doctor!" Nicholai called loudly, and Aquino jumped around, gasping, involuntarily waving his hands in front of him; his surprise was absolute. Nicholai couldn't help a slight smile. "Who, who are you?" Aquino stammered. He had watery blue eyes and a bad haircut. Nicholai stepped closer, deliberately intimidating the scientist with his size. "I'm with Umbrella. I came to see how you were progressing with the vaccine among other things." "With Umbrella? I didn't – what vaccine, I don't know what you're talking about." No weapon, no physical skills, and he can't tell a lie without blushing. He must be brilliant. Nicholai lowered his voice conspiratorially. "Opera-tion Watchdog sent me, Doctor. You haven't filed a de-tails report lately. They've been worried about you."
Aquino seemed on the verge of collapsing with re-lief. "Oh, if you know about… I thought you were…… yes, the vaccine, I've been very busy; my, ah, contact wanted the initial synthesis broken down into stages, so there isn't an actual mixed sample cultivated, but I can assure you that it's only a matter of combining ele-ments, everything's ready." The doctor practically bab-bled in his effort to submit. Nicholai shook his head in mock wonder, playing his part. "And you've done this all yourself?" Aquino smiled weakly. "With help from my assis-tant, Douglas, God rest his soul. I'm afraid that I've been running a bit ragged since his death, day before yesterday. That's why I've been remiss in my re-ports…"
He trailed off, then attempted another smile.
"So… you're the one they sent to pick up the sam-ple – Franklin, isn't it?"
Nicholai couldn't believe his own luck, or Aquino's naivete; the man was about to turn over the only TGViral antidote in existence, and all because Nicholai had said that Umbrella sent him. And now another one of his targets would be showing up… "Yes, that's right," Nicholai said smoothly. "Ken Franklin. Where is the vaccine, Doctor?" Aquino rumbled for his keys. "In here. I was just hiding it – the vaccine base, I mean, we've kept the medium separate – I hid it in here for safekeeping, until you arrived. I thought you were supposed to come in tomorrow night… no, the night after, you're much earlier than I expected." He opened the door and gestured inside. "There's a refrigerated wall safe behind that rather tacky land-scape – a recent addition by a wealthy patient, an ec-centric as I understand it, not that that's important…"
Nicholai stepped past the driveling doctor, tuning him out, still feeling dumbfounded that Aquino had been selected as a Watchdog, when he suddenly real-ized that he'd allowed the scientist to get behind him. It all came together in that instant, a complete sce-nario in Nicholai's mind – the stupid, gossiping science nerd, putting his enemies at ease, capitalizing on their underestimation of his abilities… The awareness took only a fraction of a second, and then Nicholai was moving. He dropped to his knees and swung his arms around, grabbing Aquino's calves and following through, liter-ally sweeping him off his feet. Aquino yelped and collapsed on top of Nicholai. A syringe clattered to the floor and Aquino lunged after it, but Nicholai still held his bony legs. The doctor had no muscle to speak of. In fact, Nicholai found it quite easy to hold the flailing doctor with one arm while reaching for the knife sheathed in his boot with his other. Nicholai sat up, jerked Aquino closer, and stabbed him in the throat. Aquino put his hands to his neck as Nicholai with-drew the blade, staring at his killer with wide, shocked eyes, blood pouring over his fingers as his heart contin-ued its work. Nicholai stared back at him, grinning and pitiless. Aquino had been slated to die, anyway, and that he'd attacked Nicholai only made his death a pleasure, in addition to its being a necessity. The scientist finally fell over, still clutching his bub-bling throat, and lost consciousness. He died quickly after that, a final spasm and he was gone. "Better you than me," Nicholai said. He searched the cooling body and found several more syringes and a four-digit code on a slip of paper – undoubtedly the wall safe's combination. Aquino obviously hadn't ex-pected Nicholai to be around to steal the vaccine. Nicholai stood and walked to the safe, revising his plans as he always tried to do after any unexpected oc-currence. Aquino had been expecting Ken Franklin to pick up the sample, which meant that Franklin would be putting in an appearance, unless the doctor had been lying. Nicholai didn't think so. Aquino had been so convincing because he had been telling the truth, an ex-cellent technique to distract one's opponent…… so I synthesize the vaccine, maybe enjoy some hunting while I wait for Sergeant Franklin to show up, get rid of him – and then destroy the hospital, Aquino's research along with it. If Umbrella's watching, they'll think everything is going according to plan. After that, there's only Chan and the factory worker, Terence Fos-ter… To hell with Mikhail and the other two, they weren't important anymore. As the soon-to-be only surviving Watchdog with information to sell, Nicholai would be worth millions. But with the TG vaccine in hand, there was no limit to what Umbrella might pay.
By the time they reached the building's back rooms, Jill was almost ready to admit defeat. They'd been everywhere, picking locks, slogging through each taste-fully furnished room, stepping over corpses and creat-ing a few new ones. A broken picture window outside the tower's chapel had allowed several carriers to get in, and they'd come across another viral spider in the hallway just past the library. Along the way, she told Carlos a little about the mansion and grounds of the Spencer estate, history that she had dug up after the S.T.A.R.S.'s disastrous mis-sion. Old man Spencer, one of Umbrella's founders, had been a fanatic for secret hiding places and hidden passages and had hired George Trevor, an architect renowned for his creativity, to design the mansion and to help renovate a few of the town's historical land-marks, tying parts of Raccoon to Spencer's spy fan-tasies. "This was all thirty years ago," Jill said, "and the old man was completely crazy by then, so the story goes. As soon as everything was finished, he boarded up the mansion and moved Umbrella's headquarters to Eu-rope." "What happened to George Trevor?" Carlos asked. They stopped outside yet another door, what had to be one of the last rooms. "Oh, that's the best part," Jill said. "He disappeared just before Spencer skipped town. No one ever saw him again." Carlos shook his head slowly. "This is one nut job of a place to live, you know that?"
Jill nodded, pushing open the door and stepping back, revolver up. "Yeah, I've been thinking that my-self."
Nothing was moving. Stacks of chairs to the right. Three statues, busts of women, straight in front of them. There were two corpses huddled together to the left of the door, a couple, holding each other, making Jill wince and look away – and there, hanging on the southern wall in heavy gold frames, were the three clock paintings. They walked into the room, Jill nervously studying their surroundings. It seemed normal…… but so did that room in the mansion that turned out to be a giant trash compactor. On impulse, Jill stepped back and used one of the chairs to prop the door open before going to take a closer look at the paintings. Well, kind of paintings. She supposed technically they'd be called mixed media. The three pieces were of women, one on each canvas, but each also contained an octagonal clock – the first and last set at midnight, the one in the middle at five o'clock. A small, bowl-like tray protruded from the bottom of each frame. They were labeled as the goddesses of the past, present, and future, from left to right.
"On the postcard, it said something about putting your hands together," Carlos said. "That's like the clock hands, right?" Jill nodded. "Yeah, makes sense. It's just obscure enough to be annoying."
She reached forward and lightly touched the tray on the middle frame, a dancing woman. There was a tiny click and the tray dipped like a scale, the weight of her hand pushing it down. At the same time, the hands of the clock started to spin. Jill jerked her hand back, afraid that she'd set some-thing off, and the clock hands quickly spun back to their previous settings. Nothing else happened. "Hands together…," she murmured. "Do you think they mean that all of the clocks have to be set for the same time? Or do they mean literally, the hands aligned?"
Carlos shrugged and reached out to touch the tray of the future goddess, definitely the creepiest of the paint-ings. The past was a young girl sitting on a hill, the present a dancing woman… and the goddess of the fu-ture was the figure of a woman in a slinky cocktail dress, her body enticingly posed, but with the bald, grinning face of a skeleton. Jill suppressed a shudder and didn't let any thoughts get started on the theme of imminent death, like I don't have enough of that already.
The tray Carlos touched dipped down, but again, it was the hands on the clock of the present goddess that moved. Apparently, the other two were fixed at mid-night. Jill stepped back from the wall, arms folded, think-ing – and suddenly she had it, she knew how the puzzle worked, if not the exact solution. She turned around, hoping that the missing pieces were nearby, and she smiled when she saw the three statues – ah, the symme-try – and the shining objects they held in their slender stone fingers. "It's a balancing puzzle," Jill said, walking to the statues. At closer inspection, she saw that each held a tray with a single, fist-sized stone. She picked them up, hefting each orb, noting the different weights. "Three balls, three trays," she continued, walking back to the pictures, handing the black stone -made from obsidian or onyx, she wasn't sure to Carlos. An-other was clear crystal, the third a glowing amber.
"And the goal is to make the middle clock hit mid-night," Carlos said, catching on.Jill nodded. "I'm sure there's a motif to the solution,a color match, like black for death, maybe… ormaybe it's mathematical. It doesn't matter, it won'ttake that long to try all of the combinations."
They set to work, trying each ball on one painting at a time, then using them all, Jill carefully studying the present clock's hand movements with each placement. It appeared that the different balls held different values, depending on which tray they were in. Jill was just starting to feel like she could figure it out – it was defi-nitely mathematical – when they lucked across the so-lution. With crystal in the past, obsidian in the present, and amber in the future, the clock in the middle struck mid-night, chiming softly. The minute hand started to move backwards with a clattering sound – and then the face of the clock itself fell from the picture, pushed out by some machinery that Jill couldn't see. In the revealed hollow was the glittering gold cog that had been miss-ing from the tower's bell mechanism.
Sneaky, you pricks, but not sneaky enough.
Carlos was frowning, his expression openly con-fused. "What the hell is all this, anyway? Who would hide the gear at all, and why in such a complicated way?"
Jill plucked the shining gear from its hiding place, remembering her own thoughts on that exact subject only six weeks before, standing in the dark halls of Spencer's mansion. Why, why such elaborate secrecy? The files Trent had given her just before the estate mis-sion had been full of clues to the mansion's puzzles, lucky for her; without those, she might never have got-ten out. Most of the bizarre little mechanisms had been much too intricate to be practical, time-wise or func-tionally. What was the point? After giving it a lot of thought, Jill had finally con-cluded that Umbrella's real board of directors, the ones no one knew about, were paranoid fanatics. They were self-involved children, playing secret agent games and betting with other people's lives, because they could. Because no one had ever explained to them that hiding toys and making treasure maps was something people outgrew.
Because no one has stopped them. Yet.
Suddenly eager to wrap it all up, to place the gear and ring the bell and just leave, Jill phrased it much more simply to Carlos. "They're wacko, that's why. One-hundred-percent grade-A jacked-up batshit. You ready to get out of here, or what?"
Carlos nodded somberly, and after a final look around the room, they headed back out the way they'd come.
EIGHTEEN
CARLOS WATCHED JELL CLIMB THE LADDER once more, trying not to get his hopes up again. If this didn't work, he was going to be deeply – no, majesti-cally pissed.
Hell with it. If this doesn't work, we should just walk out, or see if we can get to that factory and steal our-selves a ride. She's right, these people are andar lurias, lost in space; the sooner we get out of their territory, the better.
He stared blankly out at the dark yard for a few mo-ments, so bone-weary that he wondered how he would do one more thing, take one more step; it seemed im-possible. All that kept him going was his desire to leave, to get away from this holocaust and try to re-cover. When the first massive peal of sound rang out, its deep and hollow tone rolling out from the top of the tower, Carlos realized he couldn't keep a lid on his hope. He tried, telling himself that there was going to be a glitch in the program, telling himself that Um-brella would send assassins, that the pilot would be a zombie; nothing worked. A helicopter was coming for them, he knew it, he believed it; he just hoped the res-cue team wouldn't have any trouble finding a place to land…… spotlights! There were four of them on the ledge and a crusty-looking control box near the door that led back inside; the light would guide the transport in faster. Carlos hurried toward it, glancing up to see if Jill had started down yet. She hadn't…… and when he looked ahead again, he saw that he wasn't alone. As if by magic, the giant, mutilated freak that had been chasing Jill was simply there, close enough for Carlos to smell a burnt meat smell, snarling, its piggy, distorted gaze turned to the top of the ladder. "Carlos, look out!" Jill screamed down, but the Nemesis-monster ignored him completely, taking a mammoth step toward the ladder, the eyeless snakes that were its tentacles whipping around its colossal head. One more step and it would be at the base of the ladder and Jill would be trapped.
– she said bullets don't hurt it
Desperate to do something, Carlos saw the large green power switch on the spotlights' control panel and lunged for it, not sure what he expected. To distract it, if they were lucky…… and all four lights snapped on at once, blinding, instantly heating the air around them and illuminating the tower, probably for miles to see. One of the beams was full-on blocked by the freak's hideous face. The light actually forced the thing to stumble backwards, giant hands covering its mutant eyes, and Carlos acted. He ran at the blinded Nemesis, M16 held high, and slammed the rifle against its chest, pushing as hard as he could. Off balance, it stumbled backwards, its legs slapping the ancient railing…… and with a brittle snap, a wide section of the rail-ing gave way, falling into the darkness, the Nemesis plummeting after it. Carlos heard a sickly thump from the ground below at the same instant that the over-heated spotlights shut down, making glowing dark shapes float in Carlos's eyes for a moment. The huge, mellow sound of the bells continued to fill the air as Jill scrambled down the ladder and un-slung the grenade launcher, joining Carlos at the bro-ken railing. "I… thanks," Jill said, looking into his eyes, her own gaze sincere and unwavering. "If you hadn't hit the lights, I would have been dead. Thank you."
Carlos was impressed and a little flustered by her candor. "De nada," he said, suddenly very aware of how attractive she was – not just physically – and how little experience he actually had with women. He was a self-educated twenty-one-year-old mere, and he hadn't exactly had a whole lot of time or opportunity to date.
She can't be much older, twenty-five at the outside, and maybe she…
Jill snapped her fingers in front of him, bringing him back to reality and reminding him of how tired he re-ally was. He'd totally spaced out.
"You still with me?"Carlos nodded, clearing his throat. "Yeah, sorry. Didyou say something?"I said we need to move. If it's still that feisty after a
grenade in the face, I doubt a two-story drop will kill it."Right," Carlos said. "We should circle around front,anyway. They'll probably drop a harness if they can'tset down."Jill nodded. "Let's do it."Ushered inside by the deep voice of hollowed metal,Carlos suddenly wondered if Nicholai was still alive -
– and if he was, what he would do when he heard the tolling bells. Nicholai heard the bells on his walk back into town and scoffed irritably, refusing to be baited. He hadn't expected the barely skilled trio to make it, but so what if they had? Davis Chan had filed another report, from a woman's boutique of all places, and Nicholai meant to track him down.
And why should I care if they limp away with their miserable lives, with what I've got?
Nicholai pulled the slender metal case out of his pocket for the third time since leaving the hospital, un-able to resist. Inside was a glass vial of purplish fluid that he'd synthesized himself, with a little help from an instruction sheet that Aquino's assistant had thought-fully left behind. Nicholai knew it would be safest to store the sample someplace, but the small container represented his au-thority over the other Watchdogs and a newly elevated status with Umbrella; he was a leader, a supervisor of lesser men, and he found that carrying the vaccine with him and occasionally holding it made him feel power-ful. Grounded, in a way. Smiling, Nicholai slipped the container back into his pocket, within easy reach, and started walking again, deliberately ignoring the bells. Things were going very well – he had the vaccine; he knew where Chan was and where Franklin was going to be in just under forty-eight hours; he'd already rigged the hospital to blow; and he would push the button as soon as his meeting with Franklin was over. Nicholai thought he might duck over to the factory and get rid of Terence Foster while he waited on Franklin, there was plenty of time -
– just like there was plenty of time to track Mikhail, to play at being a noble team member, to decide who would die first among them…
The clamorous bells pounded at him, seeking to re-mind him of his failure, but he refused to be distracted by the escape of three incompetents. He was getting closer to town, he could see the combined glow of hun-dreds of small and not so small fires encasing the dark city; even if he wanted to, he wouldn't make it back to the clock tower before the first helicopter came. And he didn't want to, he'd had the opportunity after killing Aquino and had decided that it wasn't worth his time. It was the right decision… and the strange doubts that curled up inside of him at the sound of the bells were to be disregarded; it meant nothing, that they had sur-vived, it didn't mean that they were as good as him. Besides, he still had a few dogs to put down to en-sure his monopoly on information. He thought that Chan might choose to bunk down at the store he'd re-ported from, as late as it was. Nicholai would kill him, take his data, and retire for the evening somewhere in the city. At the Watchdog briefing he'd heard that food was scarce, but he was certain that he could manage raid a few pantries for canned goods, perhaps. In the morning he would file his own report, to keep up his cover, and spend the day hunting up information of his own before heading west again. Everything was fine, and as he gradually crossed over from the suburbs into the city, the sound of the ap-proaching helicopter didn't bother him a bit. Let those spineless, shit-eating bastards run, he felt great, in con-trol, better than great. He only had a headache because of those damned bells.
They retraced much of their winding path through the clock tower, Jill wanting to make sure the Neme-sis either got confused or had plenty of time to wan-der away before they went out to meet the 'copter. As they walked, they hammered out a story to tell who-ever was running the evac – Jill was Kimberly Sampsel (the name of Jill's best friend from fifth grade), she'd worked at a local art gallery, no family, and she'd only moved to Raccoon recently. Carlos had found her just after his platoon leader, the only other
U.B.C.S. member to have survived, had been killed by zombies. Together, they'd made it to the clock tower, end of story. They decided not to mention Nicholai, the Nemesis, or any unidentifiable creatures they'd seen running around; the idea was to appear as ignorant of the facts as possible. Neither of them wanted to take any chances on the allegiance of the rescue team, and Jill had no doubt that there would be someone on the trans-port waiting to debrief them, so the simpler the story, the better. They'd just have to pray that no one had her pic on hand. They could worry about how to slip away once they got out of the city. At the front doors of the clock tower they paused for a moment, readying themselves, Jill feeling a strange mixture of happiness and anxiety. Rescue was coming, but they were so close to getting out now that she was afraid something would go wrong.
Maybe that's just because Umbrella is doing the res-cuing, God knows they don't have a very good trackrecord for keeping their shit together…"Jill? Before we leave, I want to tell you something,"
Carlos said, and for a few seconds, Jill thought her anx-iety was about to be confirmed, that he was going to tell her some terrible secret he'd been holding back, but then she saw his careful, thoughtful expression and thought different. "Okay, shoot," she said neutrally, thinking about the way he'd looked at her out on the balcony. She'd seen that look before, from other men – and she wasn't sure how she felt about it from Carlos. Before he'd left for Europe, Chris Redfield and she had been getting pretty close…
"Before I came here, I was approached by this guy about Raccoon, about what was going on here," Carlos started, and Jill had just enough time to feel stupid about her assumption before-his words sank in.
Trent!"He told me that we were in for a rough time, andoffered to help me out. I thought he was crazy atfirst…"… but then you got here and found out he wasn't."Carlos stared at her. "You know him or something?"Probably as well as you do. It was the same withme, just before the estate mission, he gave me informa-tion about the mansion and told me to be careful whoI trusted. Trent, right?"
Carlos nodded, and although they both opened their mouths to speak, neither of them said a word. It was the sound of the approaching helicopter that cut them off, that made both of them grin and exchange looks of joy and relief. "Let's talk about him later," Carlos said, pushing open the front doors, the chop of the 'copter's blades filling the tower's lobby as they both stepped out into the yard. Jill only saw one transport helicopter but didn't care, there obviously wasn't anyone else to evacuate, and as it swung over the crashed trolley, she and Carlos both started to wave their arms and shout. "Over here! We're over here!" Jill screamed, and she actually saw the clean-shaven face of the pilot, his smile glowing by the lights in the cockpit as he flew closer -
– close enough that she could see the smile disap-pear hi the same instant that she heard the weapon dis-charge to their right, a look of horror dawning on that youthful face.
Shhhh…
A line of colored smoke, streaking toward the hover-ing ship from someone on the roof of the tower's ad-junct buildings, surface to air, bazooka or rocket launcher……BOOM! "No," Jill whispered, but the sound was lost as the missile slammed into the 'copter and exploded, Jill numbly thinking that it had to be a HEAT rocket to do the damage it was doing as the airship spun toward them, listing badly to one side, fire spouting from the shattered cockpit. Carlos grabbed her arm and yanked, almost jerking her off her feet, pulling her out into the yard as a high, climbing, whining noise blew over them, the burning helicopter stuttering forward as they huddled behind the fountain…… and then it crashed into the clock tower. Flaming chunks of metal and stone and wood showered down upon them as the transport plunged through the roof of the lobby, and like the voice of destruction, Jill heard the Nemesis's triumphant scream rising above it all.
Hell with it. If this doesn't work, we should just walk out, or see if we can get to that factory and steal our-selves a ride. She's right, these people are andar lurias, lost in space; the sooner we get out of their territory, the better.
He stared blankly out at the dark yard for a few mo-ments, so bone-weary that he wondered how he would do one more thing, take one more step; it seemed im-possible. All that kept him going was his desire to leave, to get away from this holocaust and try to re-cover. When the first massive peal of sound rang out, its deep and hollow tone rolling out from the top of the tower, Carlos realized he couldn't keep a lid on his hope. He tried, telling himself that there was going to be a glitch in the program, telling himself that Um-brella would send assassins, that the pilot would be a zombie; nothing worked. A helicopter was coming for them, he knew it, he believed it; he just hoped the res-cue team wouldn't have any trouble finding a place to land…… spotlights! There were four of them on the ledge and a crusty-looking control box near the door that led back inside; the light would guide the transport in faster. Carlos hurried toward it, glancing up to see if Jill had started down yet. She hadn't…… and when he looked ahead again, he saw that he wasn't alone. As if by magic, the giant, mutilated freak that had been chasing Jill was simply there, close enough for Carlos to smell a burnt meat smell, snarling, its piggy, distorted gaze turned to the top of the ladder. "Carlos, look out!" Jill screamed down, but the Nemesis-monster ignored him completely, taking a mammoth step toward the ladder, the eyeless snakes that were its tentacles whipping around its colossal head. One more step and it would be at the base of the ladder and Jill would be trapped.
– she said bullets don't hurt it
Desperate to do something, Carlos saw the large green power switch on the spotlights' control panel and lunged for it, not sure what he expected. To distract it, if they were lucky…… and all four lights snapped on at once, blinding, instantly heating the air around them and illuminating the tower, probably for miles to see. One of the beams was full-on blocked by the freak's hideous face. The light actually forced the thing to stumble backwards, giant hands covering its mutant eyes, and Carlos acted. He ran at the blinded Nemesis, M16 held high, and slammed the rifle against its chest, pushing as hard as he could. Off balance, it stumbled backwards, its legs slapping the ancient railing…… and with a brittle snap, a wide section of the rail-ing gave way, falling into the darkness, the Nemesis plummeting after it. Carlos heard a sickly thump from the ground below at the same instant that the over-heated spotlights shut down, making glowing dark shapes float in Carlos's eyes for a moment. The huge, mellow sound of the bells continued to fill the air as Jill scrambled down the ladder and un-slung the grenade launcher, joining Carlos at the bro-ken railing. "I… thanks," Jill said, looking into his eyes, her own gaze sincere and unwavering. "If you hadn't hit the lights, I would have been dead. Thank you."
Carlos was impressed and a little flustered by her candor. "De nada," he said, suddenly very aware of how attractive she was – not just physically – and how little experience he actually had with women. He was a self-educated twenty-one-year-old mere, and he hadn't exactly had a whole lot of time or opportunity to date.
She can't be much older, twenty-five at the outside, and maybe she…
Jill snapped her fingers in front of him, bringing him back to reality and reminding him of how tired he re-ally was. He'd totally spaced out.
"You still with me?"Carlos nodded, clearing his throat. "Yeah, sorry. Didyou say something?"I said we need to move. If it's still that feisty after a
grenade in the face, I doubt a two-story drop will kill it."Right," Carlos said. "We should circle around front,anyway. They'll probably drop a harness if they can'tset down."Jill nodded. "Let's do it."Ushered inside by the deep voice of hollowed metal,Carlos suddenly wondered if Nicholai was still alive -
– and if he was, what he would do when he heard the tolling bells. Nicholai heard the bells on his walk back into town and scoffed irritably, refusing to be baited. He hadn't expected the barely skilled trio to make it, but so what if they had? Davis Chan had filed another report, from a woman's boutique of all places, and Nicholai meant to track him down.
And why should I care if they limp away with their miserable lives, with what I've got?
Nicholai pulled the slender metal case out of his pocket for the third time since leaving the hospital, un-able to resist. Inside was a glass vial of purplish fluid that he'd synthesized himself, with a little help from an instruction sheet that Aquino's assistant had thought-fully left behind. Nicholai knew it would be safest to store the sample someplace, but the small container represented his au-thority over the other Watchdogs and a newly elevated status with Umbrella; he was a leader, a supervisor of lesser men, and he found that carrying the vaccine with him and occasionally holding it made him feel power-ful. Grounded, in a way. Smiling, Nicholai slipped the container back into his pocket, within easy reach, and started walking again, deliberately ignoring the bells. Things were going very well – he had the vaccine; he knew where Chan was and where Franklin was going to be in just under forty-eight hours; he'd already rigged the hospital to blow; and he would push the button as soon as his meeting with Franklin was over. Nicholai thought he might duck over to the factory and get rid of Terence Foster while he waited on Franklin, there was plenty of time -
– just like there was plenty of time to track Mikhail, to play at being a noble team member, to decide who would die first among them…
The clamorous bells pounded at him, seeking to re-mind him of his failure, but he refused to be distracted by the escape of three incompetents. He was getting closer to town, he could see the combined glow of hun-dreds of small and not so small fires encasing the dark city; even if he wanted to, he wouldn't make it back to the clock tower before the first helicopter came. And he didn't want to, he'd had the opportunity after killing Aquino and had decided that it wasn't worth his time. It was the right decision… and the strange doubts that curled up inside of him at the sound of the bells were to be disregarded; it meant nothing, that they had sur-vived, it didn't mean that they were as good as him. Besides, he still had a few dogs to put down to en-sure his monopoly on information. He thought that Chan might choose to bunk down at the store he'd re-ported from, as late as it was. Nicholai would kill him, take his data, and retire for the evening somewhere in the city. At the Watchdog briefing he'd heard that food was scarce, but he was certain that he could manage raid a few pantries for canned goods, perhaps. In the morning he would file his own report, to keep up his cover, and spend the day hunting up information of his own before heading west again. Everything was fine, and as he gradually crossed over from the suburbs into the city, the sound of the ap-proaching helicopter didn't bother him a bit. Let those spineless, shit-eating bastards run, he felt great, in con-trol, better than great. He only had a headache because of those damned bells.
They retraced much of their winding path through the clock tower, Jill wanting to make sure the Neme-sis either got confused or had plenty of time to wan-der away before they went out to meet the 'copter. As they walked, they hammered out a story to tell who-ever was running the evac – Jill was Kimberly Sampsel (the name of Jill's best friend from fifth grade), she'd worked at a local art gallery, no family, and she'd only moved to Raccoon recently. Carlos had found her just after his platoon leader, the only other
U.B.C.S. member to have survived, had been killed by zombies. Together, they'd made it to the clock tower, end of story. They decided not to mention Nicholai, the Nemesis, or any unidentifiable creatures they'd seen running around; the idea was to appear as ignorant of the facts as possible. Neither of them wanted to take any chances on the allegiance of the rescue team, and Jill had no doubt that there would be someone on the trans-port waiting to debrief them, so the simpler the story, the better. They'd just have to pray that no one had her pic on hand. They could worry about how to slip away once they got out of the city. At the front doors of the clock tower they paused for a moment, readying themselves, Jill feeling a strange mixture of happiness and anxiety. Rescue was coming, but they were so close to getting out now that she was afraid something would go wrong.
Maybe that's just because Umbrella is doing the res-cuing, God knows they don't have a very good trackrecord for keeping their shit together…"Jill? Before we leave, I want to tell you something,"
Carlos said, and for a few seconds, Jill thought her anx-iety was about to be confirmed, that he was going to tell her some terrible secret he'd been holding back, but then she saw his careful, thoughtful expression and thought different. "Okay, shoot," she said neutrally, thinking about the way he'd looked at her out on the balcony. She'd seen that look before, from other men – and she wasn't sure how she felt about it from Carlos. Before he'd left for Europe, Chris Redfield and she had been getting pretty close…
"Before I came here, I was approached by this guy about Raccoon, about what was going on here," Carlos started, and Jill had just enough time to feel stupid about her assumption before-his words sank in.
Trent!"He told me that we were in for a rough time, andoffered to help me out. I thought he was crazy atfirst…"… but then you got here and found out he wasn't."Carlos stared at her. "You know him or something?"Probably as well as you do. It was the same withme, just before the estate mission, he gave me informa-tion about the mansion and told me to be careful whoI trusted. Trent, right?"
Carlos nodded, and although they both opened their mouths to speak, neither of them said a word. It was the sound of the approaching helicopter that cut them off, that made both of them grin and exchange looks of joy and relief. "Let's talk about him later," Carlos said, pushing open the front doors, the chop of the 'copter's blades filling the tower's lobby as they both stepped out into the yard. Jill only saw one transport helicopter but didn't care, there obviously wasn't anyone else to evacuate, and as it swung over the crashed trolley, she and Carlos both started to wave their arms and shout. "Over here! We're over here!" Jill screamed, and she actually saw the clean-shaven face of the pilot, his smile glowing by the lights in the cockpit as he flew closer -
– close enough that she could see the smile disap-pear hi the same instant that she heard the weapon dis-charge to their right, a look of horror dawning on that youthful face.
Shhhh…
A line of colored smoke, streaking toward the hover-ing ship from someone on the roof of the tower's ad-junct buildings, surface to air, bazooka or rocket launcher……BOOM! "No," Jill whispered, but the sound was lost as the missile slammed into the 'copter and exploded, Jill numbly thinking that it had to be a HEAT rocket to do the damage it was doing as the airship spun toward them, listing badly to one side, fire spouting from the shattered cockpit. Carlos grabbed her arm and yanked, almost jerking her off her feet, pulling her out into the yard as a high, climbing, whining noise blew over them, the burning helicopter stuttering forward as they huddled behind the fountain…… and then it crashed into the clock tower. Flaming chunks of metal and stone and wood showered down upon them as the transport plunged through the roof of the lobby, and like the voice of destruction, Jill heard the Nemesis's triumphant scream rising above it all.
NINETEEN
CARLOS HEARD THE MONSTER'S SCREAMING howl and started to get up, still holding Jill's arm. They had to get away before it saw her…… and the front of the building cracked open as though it were made of balsa wood, wreckage from the helicopter spewing out in a burst of smoking debris. Before Carlos could get down, a large piece of blackened rock from the building's outer wall smacked into his left side. He heard and felt a rib give way as he fell, the pain instant and intense.
"Carlos!"
Jill leaned over him, her gaze darting back and forth between him and part of the tower he couldn't see, the grenade launcher still clutched in her hands. The Nemesis had stopped roaring; between that and the sudden, brutal silencing of the bells, Carlos could hear something thumping heavily to the ground, followed by the crumble of powdering rock in a slow, even rhythm. Crunch. Crunch. It's coming, it jumped off the roof and it's coming… "Run," Carlos said, and he saw that she understood, a second before she took off, that she had no other choice. Boots kicking the ground away, she left him alone as fast as she could.
Carlos turned his head as he sat up, willing himself not to feel pain, and saw the creature standing in a pile of broken concrete and burning wood, unaware that the hem of its leathery coat was on fire as its aberrant gaze tracked Jill. As before, it didn't seem to see him. As long as I don't get in its way, Carlos thought, propping himself against the cool stone of the fountain, lifting his rifle. It doesn 't hurt, it doesn 't, doesn 't. In a single, powerful motion the Nemesis lifted a rocket launcher to its giant shoulder and took aim, as Carlos started firing. Each chattering round from the Ml6 sent a fresh pulse of muffled agony through his bones, but his aim was good in spite of the pain. Tiny black holes ap-peared on the creature's face, and Carlos could hear the ping of ricochet off the battered launcher. The fleshy tentacles that rose up from beneath the monster's long jacket whipped around its upper body as if outraged, coiling and uncoiling with incredible speed. Carlos saw that it was swinging the bazooka toward him, but he kept firing, knowing that he couldn't get up in time to run. Get away, Jill, go! It sighted Carlos and fired, and Carlos saw a burst of light and motion coming at him, felt the heat of the high-explosive anti-tank missile radiating against his skin…… and somehow, he wasn't dead, but something not far behind him blew up. The force of the blast lifted and threw him roughly against the side of the fountain; the pain was spectacular but he raggedly held on to consciousness, determined to buy Jill a few more sec-onds. Half laying across the lip of the fountain, Carlos started firing again, shooting for its face, rounds going everywhere as he struggled to control the weapon. Die, just die already… But it wasn't dying, it wasn't even flinching, and Carlos knew he only had a half second left before he was blown into a greasy stain on the lawn. The rocket launcher was pointed directly at Carlos's face when it happened, a one in a million shot -
Carajo!
– as one of the metallic pings turned into an explo-sion, a sudden white-hot light show. The monster pitched backwards as its weapon disintegrated, drop-ping out of sight. Carlos's rifle went dry. He reached for a new maga-zine, and there was new pain. He lost track of the light, darkness pulling him down. Jill saw Carlos collapse and made herself stay where she was, standing between the trolley and a hedge row. She'd seen the Nemesis go down, thrown into the burn-ing rubble by the misfire that had obliterated its bazooka, but its confirmed ability to avoid death kept her from going to Carlos. If it was still coming, she wanted to keep it focused on her alone. The grenade launcher felt light in her hands, high adrenaline giving her a second wind with a ven-geance and when the Nemesis rose up, one shoulder burning, blistering black and red flesh visible beneath its ruined clothing, Jill fired. The buckshot-loaded "grenade," like a super shotgun shell, sent a concentrated blast of thousands of pellets across the yard, but she missed the howling Nemesis entirely, the shot tearing new holes in what was left of the tower's front wall. The Nemesis stopped screaming even though its chest was still burning, the skin crackling and black now. It squared its body toward Jill as she broke open the grenade launcher and snatched another load out of her bag, praying that it was more seriously injured by Carlos's lucky shot than it appeared. It lowered its head and ran at her, its gigantic stride carrying it toward her incredibly quickly. In a second it was across the yard, its snaking appendages spread out as if to grab her up. Jill leaped to her left and took off at a dead run, still holding the grenade, in between the row of hedges and the undamaged west wall of the tower. She could hear it enter the row behind her as she reached the end; it still almost had her, its speed extraordinary, putting it an arm's length away as she rounded the end of the row…… and something struck her right shoulder as she tore around the hedge, something solid and slick, bur-rowing into her flesh like a giant, boneless finger. It stung, a thousand hornets at once flooding her system with poison, and she understood that one of the search-ing tentacles had pierced her. Oshitoshitoshit, she couldn't think about it, there wasn't time, but the Nemesis stopped suddenly, threw its head back and bellowed its victory to the cold stars above, and Jill stumbled to a halt, shoved the load into the gun and snapped the breech closed…… and fired as it lunged toward her again. The shot clipped the howling Nemesis just below its right hip and tore into the meat of its upper thigh, bits of skin and muscle flying out behind it…… and it crashed, a few more momentum strides and it went down in a spray of ravaged tissue, monstrous and silent and suddenly still. In a fever to reload, Jill dropped the second to last buckshot grenade, and it rolled away. She managed to get a firm grip on the fifth and was just snapping the gun closed when the Nemesis sat up, facing away from her. Jill aimed for its lower back and fired, the thunder of the weapon just another dull sound beneath the ringing in her ears. The Nemesis was moving, standing up when it was hit, and the pellets hit low and left, what would be a lethal kidney shot for a human. Apparently not for the S.T.A.R.S. killer. It stumbled, then stood up and started to limp away, one giant hand clapped over its new wound.
"Carlos!"
Jill leaned over him, her gaze darting back and forth between him and part of the tower he couldn't see, the grenade launcher still clutched in her hands. The Nemesis had stopped roaring; between that and the sudden, brutal silencing of the bells, Carlos could hear something thumping heavily to the ground, followed by the crumble of powdering rock in a slow, even rhythm. Crunch. Crunch. It's coming, it jumped off the roof and it's coming… "Run," Carlos said, and he saw that she understood, a second before she took off, that she had no other choice. Boots kicking the ground away, she left him alone as fast as she could.
Carlos turned his head as he sat up, willing himself not to feel pain, and saw the creature standing in a pile of broken concrete and burning wood, unaware that the hem of its leathery coat was on fire as its aberrant gaze tracked Jill. As before, it didn't seem to see him. As long as I don't get in its way, Carlos thought, propping himself against the cool stone of the fountain, lifting his rifle. It doesn 't hurt, it doesn 't, doesn 't. In a single, powerful motion the Nemesis lifted a rocket launcher to its giant shoulder and took aim, as Carlos started firing. Each chattering round from the Ml6 sent a fresh pulse of muffled agony through his bones, but his aim was good in spite of the pain. Tiny black holes ap-peared on the creature's face, and Carlos could hear the ping of ricochet off the battered launcher. The fleshy tentacles that rose up from beneath the monster's long jacket whipped around its upper body as if outraged, coiling and uncoiling with incredible speed. Carlos saw that it was swinging the bazooka toward him, but he kept firing, knowing that he couldn't get up in time to run. Get away, Jill, go! It sighted Carlos and fired, and Carlos saw a burst of light and motion coming at him, felt the heat of the high-explosive anti-tank missile radiating against his skin…… and somehow, he wasn't dead, but something not far behind him blew up. The force of the blast lifted and threw him roughly against the side of the fountain; the pain was spectacular but he raggedly held on to consciousness, determined to buy Jill a few more sec-onds. Half laying across the lip of the fountain, Carlos started firing again, shooting for its face, rounds going everywhere as he struggled to control the weapon. Die, just die already… But it wasn't dying, it wasn't even flinching, and Carlos knew he only had a half second left before he was blown into a greasy stain on the lawn. The rocket launcher was pointed directly at Carlos's face when it happened, a one in a million shot -
Carajo!
– as one of the metallic pings turned into an explo-sion, a sudden white-hot light show. The monster pitched backwards as its weapon disintegrated, drop-ping out of sight. Carlos's rifle went dry. He reached for a new maga-zine, and there was new pain. He lost track of the light, darkness pulling him down. Jill saw Carlos collapse and made herself stay where she was, standing between the trolley and a hedge row. She'd seen the Nemesis go down, thrown into the burn-ing rubble by the misfire that had obliterated its bazooka, but its confirmed ability to avoid death kept her from going to Carlos. If it was still coming, she wanted to keep it focused on her alone. The grenade launcher felt light in her hands, high adrenaline giving her a second wind with a ven-geance and when the Nemesis rose up, one shoulder burning, blistering black and red flesh visible beneath its ruined clothing, Jill fired. The buckshot-loaded "grenade," like a super shotgun shell, sent a concentrated blast of thousands of pellets across the yard, but she missed the howling Nemesis entirely, the shot tearing new holes in what was left of the tower's front wall. The Nemesis stopped screaming even though its chest was still burning, the skin crackling and black now. It squared its body toward Jill as she broke open the grenade launcher and snatched another load out of her bag, praying that it was more seriously injured by Carlos's lucky shot than it appeared. It lowered its head and ran at her, its gigantic stride carrying it toward her incredibly quickly. In a second it was across the yard, its snaking appendages spread out as if to grab her up. Jill leaped to her left and took off at a dead run, still holding the grenade, in between the row of hedges and the undamaged west wall of the tower. She could hear it enter the row behind her as she reached the end; it still almost had her, its speed extraordinary, putting it an arm's length away as she rounded the end of the row…… and something struck her right shoulder as she tore around the hedge, something solid and slick, bur-rowing into her flesh like a giant, boneless finger. It stung, a thousand hornets at once flooding her system with poison, and she understood that one of the search-ing tentacles had pierced her. Oshitoshitoshit, she couldn't think about it, there wasn't time, but the Nemesis stopped suddenly, threw its head back and bellowed its victory to the cold stars above, and Jill stumbled to a halt, shoved the load into the gun and snapped the breech closed…… and fired as it lunged toward her again. The shot clipped the howling Nemesis just below its right hip and tore into the meat of its upper thigh, bits of skin and muscle flying out behind it…… and it crashed, a few more momentum strides and it went down in a spray of ravaged tissue, monstrous and silent and suddenly still. In a fever to reload, Jill dropped the second to last buckshot grenade, and it rolled away. She managed to get a firm grip on the fifth and was just snapping the gun closed when the Nemesis sat up, facing away from her. Jill aimed for its lower back and fired, the thunder of the weapon just another dull sound beneath the ringing in her ears. The Nemesis was moving, standing up when it was hit, and the pellets hit low and left, what would be a lethal kidney shot for a human. Apparently not for the S.T.A.R.S. killer. It stumbled, then stood up and started to limp away, one giant hand clapped over its new wound.