Bullets lashed against the old, rusted steps of the fire escape, sending sparks flying everywhere. Jill had no time to catch her breath and could only leap toward the blind spot directly beneath the wall.
Using a pile of garbage to cushion her fall, Jill rolled forward to bleed off the impact.
"Cough... ptoo!" Pain scraped across her shoulder blade, drawing a muffled groan from her. Suppressing the nausea brought on by the stench of corpses in the air, she plunged straight into the alley.
Something came straight at her—"Roar!"
In the alley, a middle-aged female Zombie, drawn by the deafening explosions and gunfire, had been staggering sluggishly around. The moment it caught the scent of fresh flesh, it was no longer slow, lunging at Jill.
Jill sidestepped the Zombie's pounce, then blew its head apart with a single shot.
Compared to the treachery of human hearts, mindless Zombies were far too easy for her to handle.
"She's in the alley!"
Bastards!
The shout from behind made Jill's face darken. Even in this hell, Umbrella still wanted to kill her. Meanwhile, seven or eight Zombies on the street across from the alley were closing in on her.
Just as Jill was caught between advancing and retreating, click—"Get in here!" A side door opened, and a disheveled-haired man pulled her inside.
Bang! The door shut.
"Tha—" Jill was about to thank him when she suddenly spotted the Umbrella logo on his shoulder. She snapped, "Umbrella bastard!"
"Hey, hey, calm down. I just saved you."
Dressed like a Mercenary—certainly not regular military—the man hurriedly raised his hands. "I'm Carlos from U.B.C.S."
"What's the difference?"
"At least I'm not with them. We were deployed here to save civilians." Carlos shrugged. "Didn't expect things to get this bad, though. It's complete chaos..."
Bang bang! Something slammed against the door.
The man quickly waved her over. "This isn't the place to talk. Let's get out of here first. I only happened to notice them sneaking this way, so I got curious and followed them. Didn't expect they were here to kill you. Beautiful lady, what terrible thing did you do?" he said as they moved.
"Don't joke around!"
Jill said unhappily, "If anyone's committed an unforgivable crime, it's Umbrella!"
"I wouldn't know about that. I'm just a Mercenary."
Carlos jogged along in short, hurried steps, speaking with self-mocking helplessness. "Why would an owner explain to a dog why it had to fetch the frisbee?"
"..."
Jill fell silent. After thinking it over several times and recalling Chris saying he was also with one of Umbrella's units, she spoke up. "Do you want to leave with me? Head west. An Umbrella unit will meet me there."
"Huh?"
Carlos froze for a moment.
What kind of twist was this?
Wasn't Umbrella's secret unit trying to eliminate her just now? She didn't trust him, an Umbrella U.B.C.S. Mercenary, and he hadn't received any orders. Now she was saying an Umbrella unit would meet her in the west?
Wait, let me think. This is a mess.
Was Umbrella having an internal conflict?
Thud thud~
Still thinking, Carlos rushed toward the end of the building and opened a door. "Not good!" Jill, following behind him, had yet to react when Carlos tackled her to the ground. At the instant they fell, a rocket suddenly flew over their heads.
Boom!
The furnishings inside were blasted to pieces. Scorching smoke and dust filled the room as plaster and rubble rained down.
"Cough, cough, cough... what the hell is that thing?"
Carlos rolled over and looked up, his face filled with horror.
Outside the door, across the street, a towering monster in a black robe lowered the rocket launcher in its hand. Its faceless, eyeless head, wrapped in pitch-black bandages, was looking at him—or rather, at Jill beside him.
Another tremendous crash rang out as another towering monster in a black robe jumped down from the rooftop, crushing a sedan beneath its feet. It let out a savage roar, forming distorted, unclear words.
"S.T.A.R.S... evidence... destroy..."
Thump... thump...
Its feet pounded heavily against the ground. The towering monster moved, breaking into a run like a heavy battle tank charging forward with a thunderous roar.
"My God, lady, what exactly did you do?"
"Fuck, stop staring! Umbrella's bio-weapons—run!"
Jill turned and ran. Glancing back, she could even see the malformed heart on the monster's face. Huh?! What was that?
Suddenly, Jill saw a small flying object with tiny propellers land directly on the monster. Then—boom!
A burst of blazing fire compressed the air in an instant before it expanded outward at an astonishing speed. Burning scraps of clothing flew through the air, and the shockwave from outside the door made Jill stagger. Her eyes widened.
Then another flying device descended, hovering outside the door as it spoke.
"Jill? Is that you, Jill?"
"Chris?!"
Everything Fear Comes From—
"No time to explain. Run!"
Chris's voice came through the speaker mounted on the drone in the smoke-filled room. Their life-and-death bond from their S.T.A.R.S. days made Jill instinctively trust Chris's instructions.
"Run!"
Jill hadn't forgotten Carlos, who had saved her life only minutes earlier, even if he was an Umbrella U.B.C.S. Mercenary.
She tugged Carlos.
Carlos reacted quickly as well. The two darted out one after another through the doorway blackened by the explosive impact. As she passed, Jill finally got a clear look at the monster, its entire body burning from the blast.
Humanoid, unquestionably a giant. It stood nearly nine feet tall. Its face, where the bandages had been blown apart, was a blurred mess without skin. Its exposed jawbone and facial muscles protruded grotesquely, swollen and enormous.
During the explosion, its pure black straitjacket-like coat had caught fire completely. Its torso, where the self-destructing drone had struck, sprayed blood across the ground. The monster's left shoulder and chest had been blown open, shattered ribs jutting out as sinews wriggled around them. Flammable material from the blast clung to the wound, leaving it charred black and pink.
Jill thought she could smell poorly cleaned grilled meat, mixed with a foul, burnt stench.
"Follow the drone. Every road in Raccoon City is blocked. Survivors and Zombies are mixed together, and I'm still at least three blocks away from you..." Chris's urgent voice came through the hovering drone.
As Jill listened, she kept an eye on the rocket launcher-wielding monster across the street. Suddenly, it moved. "Chris! There's more than one bio-monster."
"Roar!" In the blink of an eye, the other Pursuer let out a low growl and raised its rocket launcher.
"Stop it." Chris's voice came through the drone's speaker as he spoke to someone else.
At once, the drone leading the way suddenly dove straight at the Pursuer aiming at Jill. "Roar!" Sensing danger, the Pursuer's rudimentary intelligence made it switch targets. Whoosh! It fired a rocket, blasting the drone flying toward it to pieces.
Why wasn't that as powerful as the previous one?
Reaching through the smoke screen, the Pursuer tossed aside its rocket launcher. Its single eyeless eye stared fixedly at Jill. Thud thud! With a speed utterly mismatched to its massive frame, it charged forward.
Watching the Pursuer yank a fire hydrant from the ground and swing it at her like a raging bull, Jill dove forward. Feeling the gust of wind pass almost against the back of her head, Jill felt like she was in serious trouble.
Why was this thing so hard to deal with? It was only targeting her!
Rat-a-tat-tat—
After pulling Jill up, Carlos grabbed his M4A1 carbine one-handed and fought as they retreated. He even threw grenades, but the Pursuer ignored him completely. The grenades he threw were wrapped in tentacles growing from the Pursuer's palm, then hurled back at Jill?
Using both hands and feet, Jill crashed through the glass of shops along the way to evade the explosions. Looking utterly bedraggled, with injuries across her face, shoulder, and arm, she emerged from another direction. Throwing a stun grenade, she shouted, "Fuck, if you don't know how to throw them, then don't throw them! Do you have flashbangs or stun grenades? A B.O.W. like this should be afraid of high temperature and bright light."
With a loud bang came an intense flash of white light, and the Pursuer's movements were indeed affected.
"But I didn't bring any!"
"Fuck! Then what do you have?"
"Offensive grenades, tear gas, flares, signal flares..."
The two temporary teammates dodged the Pursuer's attacks while fighting back and running. Their tacit understanding rapidly improved from their initial awkwardness.
"Hey, lady, where are your teammates? Get those flying things to save us! I'm almost out of bullets..."
"Roaaar—!"
Before Carlos could finish, an even more outrageous inhuman howl echoed out. It was that one!
In the distance, the Pursuer that had been burned black, engulfed in flames, and blasted to its knees began moving again.
Splat.
A pus-like substance sprayed from its charred, damaged body. The muscles and bones throughout its body wriggled like multiplying bacteria.
The monster knelt on the ground and howled. Its proliferating arms burst through its clothes and repeatedly hammered the road. Carlos didn't know exactly how powerful those blows were, but seeing the nearby sedan shaking, one solid hit would definitely send him to meet God.
"Oh no, this fucking thing isn't dead?"
Then, thud! Thud!
More heavy footsteps echoed out. Several things wearing black top hats and black trench coats emerged from the alley across the diagonal street. But judging by their bluish-black faces and massive builds, they were definitely not normal people. They began accelerating toward them.
Carlos's lips twitched, and he wore an expression uglier than crying. "Beautiful lady, did you blow up the Umbrella chairman's house, or do you have his stock transfer contract in your bag?"
"I only blew up a damned mansion! And I didn't even blow it up—it self-destructed!"
Jill was so frustrated she could barely speak.
First came the cleanup squad, then the B.O.W. Pursuers, then Tyrants... Umbrella really thought highly of her.
Buzz... buzz...
The hum of propellers.
"Jill! Go first. We'll cover you with self-destructing drones."
It was Chris's voice from the drone.
As he spoke, iron boxes with bulging centers and propellers at all four corners buzzed over Jill's head.
"Go through the alley on your left first. The Zombie horde hasn't reached it yet. From the drone's view, I just spotted a group of suspicious people circling around behind you. Run toward the open area on Raccoon Avenue. Zombies aren't the problem. We have several sniper positions set up by our own Umbrella unit on the high ground there. They can cover you!"
After that, the voice coming through the drone changed to Chris apparently arguing with others:
"...That B.O.W., the previous explosion doesn't seem to have killed it?"
"It's fine. The small self-destructing drones didn't carry enough explosives. I've already notified the evacuation point. The large self-destructing drones are on their way. They'll definitely blow it up! It won't get out."
"You guys, get the rocket launchers ready. You, set up the recoilless rifle... Delay them first. Control your fire and let them come closer before taking them out."
"Captain, the information Director Russell just sent over—this is travel data obtained by her informant in Paris. Paris headquarters transferred a large number of test subjects from the research facility. These should be those B.O.W.s."
"At least two Pursuers. More than seven mass-produced T-103 Tyrants have already been identified... Countless other T-Virus mutations and derivative B.O.W.s..."
In San Francisco, Vera, who was monitoring the situation in real time, rubbed her forehead.
Though the footage was unclear, she could still make out the outlines of two Pursuers cornering a man and a woman on a street.
This really was her fault.
Objectively and subjectively, she had never been involved in virology or B.O.W. work, nor had she specifically designed cybernetic implants for malformed organisms. But she had made Umbrella money.
No matter which department earned it, Umbrella's annual revenue increased once the money came in.
Although Vera took quite a bit of it, and more was diverted into other fields because of her existence, the additional profits would definitely make the Board of Directors increase investment in the research facilities in Raccoon City, Paris, and Africa.
Not to mention that Spencer, that old bastard, loved bypassing the company accounts, secretly siphoning corporate funds into viral research.
Vera had gained another point to use as leverage.
Before you continue