Resident Evil. Retribution

by John Shirley

  Its tongue extending, lolling, seeking, its muscles rippling, its exposed brain pulsing, the Licker moved down toward them, half slithering and half creeping. The enormous pink mutant got within reach of Barry, and before he could bring his gun into place, it slashed at him with vicious speed and accuracy, raking him with its giant claws. He screamed as the powerful blow knocked him back, hard, into the concrete wall. He sagged down it, groaning, his face streaming blood, his scalp torn loose and hanging in an ugly red flap.

  Alice was running toward Becky, but it was too late—the Licker shot its tongue toward the little girl, wrapped it around her, dragging her from Rain’s grip. She screeched in sheer terror.

  “No!” Rain yelled. She raised the gun Alice had given her, and charged the Licker, firing. One slash of its giant claws and she was flung away like a child struck by a drunken thug, spun through the air, hurling her off the elevator platform. She fell, screaming in pain, then struck the concrete below and lay there like a crushed rag doll.

  The Licker dragged Becky, still alive, up the wall toward its maw, drawing her closer as it reeled in its ropy, serrated tongue. Alice aimed carefully, trying to get a shot at the Licker’s brain that wouldn’t hit Becky. But suppose she did hit the Licker, enough to make it drop the child? She was high up on the wall of the huge room now, and almost certainly would be killed in the fall.

  Alice hesitated—and then it was too late. The Licker tucked Becky up close to it, like a lion dragging its prey to a den, and ducked into the big air vent high above.

  Feeling sickeningly hollow inside, Alice lowered the gun. She glanced over at the Rain clone—saw Luther kneeling beside her, checking her pulse.

  “She’s dead.”

  Alice looked up at the vent, and she made up her mind.

  17

  Moments later Alice was on the freight elevator, checking her weapons, making sure they were primed and ready. Aware that the seconds were ticking by, wondering if Becky was still alive.

  She looked over at Leon and Barry.

  Leon had returned to the platform, as well, where he knelt beside his friend.

  “Talk to me, Barry.”

  Barry grimaced. His face was laid open, one of his lips slashed through.

  “Feel like shit.”

  Leon began unwrapping a sterile medi-pad from the kit on his belt. He pressed the pad to Barry’s clawed face.

  “Here, this should help. Hold it in place.”

  Barry reached up weakly and pressed the pad against his skin, so that the medication would be drawn through the epidermis. He looked up at Leon, locked eyes with him.

  “Tell me, honestly. How bad is it?”

  “You know,” Leon began thoughtfully, “I think that thing improved your looks.”

  Barry laughed, and then grimaced with pain.

  “Son of a bitch! Don’t make me laugh.”

  Leon looked at his countdown watch.

  “Seven minutes then we’re out of here. We’ll get you help topside.”

  Barry nodded. Leon stood up and looked at Alice, who was walking toward the base of the ladder. He stared.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, in disbelief.

  “I’m going to get her,” Alice replied, simply.

  Leon laughed bitterly and shook his head.

  “I didn’t lose this many friends just to have you walk away!”

  “I plan on coming back,” she said calmly.

  Leon strode over and blocked her way.

  “Don’t do this. You’re more important than she is.”

  “Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” Alice said firmly.

  “This is a mistake!” Leon insisted.

  Alice gave him a diamond-hard, ice-cold look. A look that spoke eloquently of danger. It said, Try to stop me and I’ll cut you down.

  “Step aside,” she gritted.

  He took a long, slow breath—then he stepped out of the way.

  Alice walked over to the ladder—and so did Luther, offering her a small flashlight.

  “Take this,” Luther said.

  Alice took the flashlight and smiled at him.

  “Don’t be leaving without me.”

  Luther chuckled.

  “Are you joking? I’m coming with you.”

  Alice smiled—and then the smile froze on her face, melted away as gunfire cracked, and bullets ricocheted around them.

  Luther spun, groaning, and went down.

  Alice looked up and saw two Umbrella troopers, running toward the elevator shaft, firing their weapons. She drew her pistol, and fired back. Luther fired from a prone position, and Leon lit up the troopers, too. The two clones staggered back, dancing with bullet impacts—and then fell, twitching.

  But more were coming, Jill Valentine and her squadron had reached the submarine pens.

  “Are you okay?” Alice asked Luther, hunkering beside him.

  “Clean shot…” But they both could see that his arm was mangled, broken. Alice shook her head, dubious.

  “Clean shot?” she said. Smashed by a rifle bullet, Luther’s arm was an ugly mess. He could bleed to death pretty easily.

  Clenching his teeth against pain, Luther sat up, using a piece of torn cloth to fashion a makeshift tourniquet. He glanced up at the ladder, and shook his head—then handed Alice a belt of grenades.

  “Go get her back.”

  Alice nodded, patted his cheek, strapped on the grenades, and jumped to the ladder. She started to climb.

  Leon and Luther watched her climb rapidly up; watched till she vanished into the air vent.

  “Don’t be late,” Luther called hoarsely.

  Leon got his weapons ready and looked for a secure firing position. The troopers came into sight, and began striding toward them.

  Alice climbed over the lip of the vent shaft. It stretched horizontally, a grey metal tunnel, into the wall and beyond. It was dark and close and claustrophobic and it smelled foully of Licker.

  It was hard to tell what was up ahead, in that murk—the creature could be thirty feet in, lying quietly, waiting for her, and she wouldn’t be able to see it. She was reluctant to turn on the flashlight—it could make the Licker charge her, and she preferred to catch it unprepared.

  Move, Alice. No time. Go.

  She stepped forward, feeling her way, listening— and then reminding herself that time was short. She pushed on faster, five padding steps, ten, twenty, thirty… and then she stopped, feeling the movement of on her face. She’d reached a junction where the tunnel was crossed by another.

  There was no choice, now—and she needed the light.

  Alice switched on the flashlight, keeping it angled low, so the light would be as unobtrusive as possible. The shaft stretched endlessly on, both ways, right and left. She saw no sign of the Licker, not even a claw mark.

  But there—something was lying a short distance to the right, on the metal floor. She went cautiously toward it, and realized it was Becky’s backpack. She picked it up, hefted it, then slung it over one shoulder.

  Had Becky dropped it to show her the way? Or had she dropped it as she’d died?

  Either way, Becky was this way.

  Alice continued on, and the darkness seemed to thicken around her, to whirl about, sucking at her like a drain. It pulled her down… She fell to her knees, shuddering, felt a warm wet trickling from the wound on her side. Bleeding again. Too much blood. She was on the verge of blacking out.

  Gritting her teeth, Alice forced herself to stand. She knew from experience that if she got into action, her blood pressure would rise, giving her a temporary lift, an inner crutch that could carry her. But she also knew that it might force blood from the wound in her side. Regardless, she had to chance it.

  She imagined Becky, clutched close to the monster, perhaps pasted to the wall with the webbing it issued from its mouth, cocooned until it was ready to tear her into pieces. Fury flared up in Alice, and she found herself striding forward, picking up speed, on into the tunnel. />
  Most of the little signs and directions stenciled on the walls and doors were in a language Dori didn’t understand. JudyTech said it was something called “Cyrillic,” a Russian lettering. But here and there were cardboard signs, taped on, giving English translations. One said MEN’S HEAD. What did that mean? Were there men’s heads in there? She’d seen stranger things.

  She had no wish to go into that room.

  Creeping along the narrow steel and plastic passage, her boots clinking on the metal, Dori wished she’d taken JudyTech’s offer, and let her come along on the search for food. But once they’d boarded the submarine, she’d seen how tired JudyTech was. So she’d insisted that her friend rest in their new hiding place—a room filled with old canvas hoses. It had something to do with emergency firefighting, and JudyTech said it wouldn’t normally be entered, so they would do well to stay there.

  The cramped, low passages were lit by dull red lights, some sort of emergency lighting. She’d taken off her mask so she could see better, and she’d taken off the scarab, too, though she knew JudyTech wanted her to wear it in case they ran into anyone. She just hated the scarabs—even the ones that didn’t work.

  She kept moving through the red-lit dimness. It was very oppressive, all that red light and metal. It made her think of blood—and robots.

  Dori didn’t like robots. There were maintenance bots in Umbrella Prime, and if people got in their way, they were known to scoop them up and recycle them.

  She saw no robots, or people either, on the submarine. It must not have been staffed. There didn’t even seem to be a caretaker.

  Suppose she got lost? The submarine was so big, and most of the corridors looked alike, to her. She was already turned around, perhaps irrevocably.

  Maybe I should turn back…

  Then up ahead, a hand-printed sign on that oval metal door said GALLEY.

  Dori went to the door, and put her hand on the lever. She hesitated, then tried it, and it turned. The thick metal door swung inward. She stepped over the lower frame of the door, and into the galley. The lights were on, showing a room with white-metal walls and long white-metal benches and tables, all running the same direction as the corridor and the general thrust of the vessel.

  On the other side of the room there was an open window with a stainless-steel counter, where food was passed through, she supposed. She crossed over to it, climbed onto the counter, and through the window. Inside, there were microwave ovens, electric stovetops and—there, at the other end, a walk-in freezer, its stainless-steel door standing open.

  Feeling a warm glow at having succeeded at the task JudyTech set her, Dori crossed the tile floor and stepped into the cold of the freezer—when suddenly a hand closed over her mouth, an arm clamped her about the middle, and a gruff male voice spoke.

  “Well I wonder what we got here? Could it be one of the ship’s rats?”

  Alice came to another airshaft, this one directly above her—going straight up. She could hear air whispering along in it—and some other sound, perhaps a whimpering, perhaps just something breathing in a plaintive way. There was a cool-blue light coming from above, and it reflected off of a wet coating of slime on the metal walls. The light fell on a cocoon, glued to the wall of the shaft some distance up.

  It was a cocoon big enough for a little girl. And it was moving. Eyes peered down at her.

  Alice’s heart twisted at the sight. At least she was alive…

  She started to step forward, looking for a way to climb up to Becky—then the girl broke one hand free from the cocoon. She used it to sign to Alice.

  “Trap,” Becky signed frantically. “It’s a trap…”

  Alice peered past her, up the shaft, where the shadows had thickened like dust-coated spider webs, and she could just make out a bulky shape, a shadow darker than the rest, shifting slightly, poised up there—waiting to drop on her.

  Waiting to pounce.

  Lickers appeared to be the embodiment of murderous rage, and nothing more. But they had been human beings once, and they retained human cunning. There was an evil hibernating in the human brain, and it could be fanned by genetic engineering, she knew. It could be spurred into wakefulness, an insect inside that could take over the mind and make its monstrous appetites, its rapacity, the center of all meaning. Lickers weren’t just mutations—they were the personification of the most primeval impulses in humanity, the animal within the animal.

  Don’t underestimate these creatures, she told herself. Not if you want Becky to live.

  Leon and Barry were crouched in the hallway, firing at the troopers. Return fire churned the concrete walls as if by a dozen jackhammers. Luther was firing from the elevator platform. They were trying to conserve ammo—it was getting sparse.

  The troopers were fifty yards off, crouched behind crates and columns near the pens, sniping at them, sometimes firing long machine gun bursts. Luther picked out a target, a black-masked head poking out from behind a concrete post—dropped the crosshairs of his sights, and squeezed the trigger. The gun bucked in his hand and a pink mist spread from the jerking figure as the man tipped over, dead before he hit the ground.

  But bullets from another enemy weapon sizzled overhead and he had to flatten down to give them less of a target. It seemed to him that he recognized the woman who was firing at him. It was that mind-trapped commander, what was her name—Jill Valentine. The bitch was shooting at him personally.

  He wondered for the hundredth time if Ada was dead. They were pretty close, him and Ada. Maybe it was superstitious, but he thought he’d feel it if she were killed. And he wasn’t feeling it.

  You get crazy thoughts under fire, he mused. Believing in the supernatural. No atheists in foxholes.

  But if Ada was alive—where the hell was she?

  Don’t think about it. The mission is a mess. They’d probably never get Alice out of here, as per the plan. A fucking waste, and I may not even salvage my own life.

  Leon looked at his countdown watch and felt his stomach contract in dread.

  1:47 — 1: 46 — 1:45…

  He looked up toward the ladder Alice had climbed. No sign of her. And no more time to wait.

  Another long burst of gunfire came from the enemy. Bullets cracked and ricocheted around them. They couldn’t take much more of this—the troopers were bound to charge soon. And his watch was still counting down.

  He had to make a move.

  “Get back to the elevator!” he shouted, over the racket of gunfire. “Less than two minutes! We have to move! Now!”

  Barry shook his head.

  “You go. I’m just gonna wait here awhile…”

  “Barry…”

  “When the countdown hits zero, you have to be on that elevator, and someone has to stay here. Besides…” He let loose another volley of shots, driving back a tentative charge by the troopers. “…I’m kinda enjoying myself.”

  Leon shook his head. He’d known Barry a long time. They’d already lost Sergei. Maybe Ada, too. He was failing to keep this mission together—at least he should get Barry back. And he knew damn well what Barry planned to do. Playing the goddamned hero. There had to be another way.

  Barry loosed another burst, slapped in a magazine—then turned frowning to Leon.

  “You still here? Go!”

  Leon sighed—and turned away.

  Sometimes there just wasn’t any other way.

  Standing just a step back from the overhead shaft, Alice checked the hook gun to make sure it was ready to fire. She knew if she stepped into the square of light under the shaft, the Licker would strike. Unless she struck first.

  Alice held the gun in her right hand, angled upward. Split seconds mattered now. This had to work—she’d only have one chance. And she’d better be right about where she thought the Licker was roosting…

  The mangled creature had set up this trap for her personally. She was sure of that. She had tricked it into running headlong into that mirror wall; into getting itself badly sl
iced up. She’d toppled a stone archway on it. The Licker knew who its enemy was. And if it caught her, it would probably take a good long time to kill her. It might keep her alive for days, slowly chewing her up.

  You’re not going to get that chance, monster. You took the wrong hostage.

  The moment had come. She was dizzy with blood loss, but she was also adrenalized, and ready to fight.

  Alice stepped into the square of light, aiming and firing all in the same motion. The Licker struck, too— shooting its tongue, the pink cable streaking right at her. But the grappling hook zipped up, up, and past the Licker, just as she had planned—and drove itself into the concrete of the wall. Alice pressed the “wind” stud and the cable pulled tight. She braced herself, ready for what was coming.

  Suddenly she was jerked into the air, pulled up the cable at seventy miles an hour, using every last erg of energy to hold on with her right hand. In her other hand she had her auto pistol.

  The long serrated tongue licked past her—missing. But Alice didn’t miss. The cable pulled her up close to the creature, and she could see it clearly, outlined against the darkness. She pressed the gun muzzle to its head as she was pulled past it, too fast for it to grab her—and she fired, holding the trigger down, tilting the gun to keep the muzzle pointed at the thing’s leather brain as she whipped past it, up to the hook.

  The bullets tore that brain to shreds. Instantly the Licker shuddered and collapsed… falling down the shaft.

  As she reached the top, Alice adjusted the hook gun, then lowered herself to the girl, landing on a ledge beside her.

  “Becky!” She used a knife, cut her free. Immediately the little girl was signing.

  “Thank you, Mommy—I knew you’d come!”

  Alice hugged her—then froze, listening. The unearthly cries of more Lickers filled the ventilator shaft. She looked down—and saw a swarming crowd of Lickers crawling up toward them. Umbrella must have released all its mutants, in a desperate attempt to stop her and the strike team.