Progressing from Arasaka

She looked at the citizens whose faces had gone pale at her words and sighed helplessly. "I'll find a way to open an escape route for you, but you'll have to walk it yourselves."

With that, Jill put on and secured her gas mask. After checking the magazine, she chambered the submachine gun codenamed "Saratoga" and looked at Marvin. "Are you coming or not...?"

"..." Marvin looked back at the colleagues watching him and the green recruits who had run into this mess the moment they joined the force. He gritted his teeth, stomped his foot, and said, "Fine!"

"Carlos!"

Jill nodded and pushed open the police station doors. Outside, although they had not had the chance to change into full M.S.F gear, the U.B.C.S members in tank tops, combat vests, knee pads, shoulder pads, and carrying automatic weapons were still far better equipped than the police with their pea shooters and handful of short-barreled shotguns.

"Hey, beautiful lady. What are your orders?"

Carlos was still the same, with messy hair and an unkempt appearance. Through the iron bars, he stabbed a Zombie in the eye socket, twisted the blade, and pulled it out.

"The police station may be Raccoon City's last survivor stronghold. We need to protect them as they evacuate."

"Okay, boys, time to work."

Carlos nodded, turned around, and called out to the U.B.C.S teammates keeping watch around the police station while clearing out the Zombie horde.

"I'll take point."

Carlos grabbed his modified tactical shotgun, kicked the doors open, and fired immediately. Buckshot tore through swollen, rotten flesh, spraying blossoms of blood as two lunging Zombies were blasted more than a meter backward.

Rat-tat-tat.

The crisp clatter of gunfire merged into a single line. Bullets flew from the chambers as Jill swept down a female corpse hiding behind a vehicle. The other U.B.C.S members opened fire as well, and the dozen or so Zombies that had gathered fell like cut rice.

This felt incredible.

If the timing had not been so inappropriate, Carlos might have even whistled.

Although they were still treated like stepchildren under Vera, even after their new boss had changed her name to Militech, at least ammunition was plentiful.

Those freakish B.O.W.s had basically been wiped out by M.S.F in one sweep last night. Moreover, new M.S.F units were continuously arriving, some accompanying military special forces specifically to hunt B.O.W.s and those mutant creatures while testing new weapons.

Rat-tat.

With Jill as the spearhead and U.B.C.S on the perimeter, the Raccoon City police escorted the dozen or so citizens who could still run. The group of more than sixty people left the Raccoon City Police Department and headed north along Central Avenue, preparing to enter Raccoon Avenue, where M.S.F was stationed and regularly cleared scattered Zombies, before leaving the city to the west.

Drip...

Within the group, a handsome white man with blond center-parted hair, wearing a dark blue RPD field uniform and carrying a pistol, held a blonde, blue-eyed little girl in his arms as he ran and continuously comforted her. "Sherry, don't cry. Don't be afraid. We're safe now. We'll definitely be safe."

"But... big brother, I miss Mommy... Mommy is still at the laboratory... She told me to take shelter at the police station, but she never came to find me... Dad... I dreamed that Dad turned into a monster and didn't want Sherry anymore."

"Watch where you're going, rookie!"

Just as the young officer felt gloomy and did not know what to say, Chief Marvin's roar pulled him back to reality. He hurriedly took a wide step, narrowly avoiding a blown-out car tire beneath his feet that nearly tripped him.

"Thank you, Chief Marvin."

"Sigh... When this damned Cannibal Disease broke out, I saw your appointment letter. You should have come a few days later, but before the outbreak showed any 'cannibalistic' symptoms, we were too short-handed and far too busy. Sorry, Leon. I dragged you into this damned hell called Raccoon City." The Black police chief spoke apologetically and slowed down. "Come on, let me carry her for a while. You rest..."

"No!"

Sherry buried her face directly in Leon's chest. Marvin was not embarrassed and merely smiled. "She really likes you."

"Maybe it's because when Sherry arrived at the police station, everything was too chaotic, so I protected her for several days."

"Leon." Claire slowed down as well. "Thank you for helping me these past few days."

"It's nothing. It's a police officer's duty, even if I'm still a rookie. That's what they all say."

Leon joked to ease the tension and patted the girl on the back.

Honestly, after learning he would be coming here to work, he had decided to stay for the long term and had already thought about how to get along with his colleagues. But after arriving, it had been work, work, work... endless calls.

There had been no time to rest. During that time, he had encountered this girl hiding around the police station, then met Claire while on patrol when she came to Raccoon City looking for her brother. Then, as if overnight, the Cannibal Disease had completely worsened. They had all gone mad, and only later did he learn they had been infected with some kind of virus...

Just then, "Stop!"

As the group passed through an alley, Jill, at the front, suddenly crouched halfway and switched from her submachine gun to a shotgun. Click!

A slug was chambered. Through the infrared night-vision tri-lens goggles whose model she did not know, she clearly saw the outline of an orange-red, deformed crawling creature and what seemed to be a half-crouching humanoid silhouette in the corner.

"Come out!"

Blood and gore burst from the deformed crawling creature in the alley!

"Fuck! It's those U.S.F bitches!"

"Don't shoot! We're alive. You win."

A group of six men and women in black Combat Suits emerged from the alley. Every one of them was wounded and wrapped in bandages, covered in blood, grime, and dust.

"Umbrella's?!"

When Jill saw the red-and-white umbrella insignia on their shoulder patches, her voice instantly rose several notches.

"Aren't you Umbrella too? Oh, right, you're Militech now. M.S.F."

The middle-aged woman at the front wore a transparent full-face mask and carried herself with poise. "We're U.S.S Delta Squad. We accept Director Vera Adelheid's proposal."

"What proposal?"

This left the Delta Squad members stunned. "You don't know?"

"What am I supposed to know?"

Jill still did not lower her gun, and both sides remained locked in a tense standoff.

Leon set Sherry down and looked at everything helplessly, until—"Ah, looks like the lucky outsider doesn't understand." A mature, slightly husky female voice sounded beside him. Catching the fragrant breeze as she approached, Leon blushed and stepped back.

"Miss Ada... do you know something?"

This capable Asian woman in red was someone he had rescued from outside several hours earlier. She had claimed she had come to Raccoon City to look for her boyfriend's things, so he had brought her back to the Raccoon City Police Department. During that time, she had behaved herself, aside from liking to tease him whenever she had the chance.

"Ah, so cute."

Without anyone noticing, Ada stepped close to Sherry. Then, with lightning speed, she tore off Sherry's necklace, pulled out a grappling gun, and—whoosh!—shot up toward the rooftop.

Leon was still completely stunned.

"Who was that?!" Carlos reacted and opened fire, but none of the shots hit. After a few agile swings, she had already vanished from sight.

This left Jill, who was facing off against Delta Squad, even more confused.

What was going on?

Only then did it happen—thud! Thud!

More than ten figures landed steadily from the height of a second floor in succession, making dull impacts. "Ms. Valentine, step back." As he spoke, he stepped forward and separated Jill from Delta Squad. Their uniforms were not all that different from Jill's, but anyone with eyes could see that they carried an entirely different aura.

"Lupo, you made the right choice," he said.

"So the real players have finally arrived? It seems Director Vera Adelheid has gained the upper hand in this internal conflict within our former company. The Board of Directors really had the nerve to send us on a mission to purge Raccoon City's survivors." The woman called Wolf Mother mocked herself.

"Good that you understand. Come with us. Link up with Alpha Squad, withdraw from Raccoon City, and the Executive will see you."

"Alpha Squad still has survivors?"

"Yes, and not just HUNK the Grim Reaper."

After confiscating their weapons, the real M.S.F mobile unit soldiers gestured for Delta Squad to follow obediently, keeping a close watch as they hurried toward Raccoon Avenue in the northwest.

The leading M.S.F commander instinctively swept his gaze over the survivors. "Hm?" He stopped.

His gaze settled on the little girl crying because her necklace had been taken.

"What are you doing?!"

Claire immediately stepped forward to stop them, only to be flung two or three meters away by an M.S.F mobile unit soldier's arm, landing hard on her backside.

"Sherry Birkin, daughter of William Birkin, Umbrella's Chief researcher in Raccoon City, and Annette Birkin." He stepped forward, stared at the girl, and spoke each word distinctly.

"Take her!"

"Hey, hey, gentlemen, let's talk... ngh..."

"Don't meddle, rookie! We have far more restraint than you imagine."

With one hand, he pinned the inexperienced Leon in place, leaving him unable to move. Leon hissed in pain. That hand was not merely like an iron clamp—it was one! It was too hard! His shoulder bone ached sharply under the pressure!

He released Leon and ignored Sherry's crying as he picked her up. "Your mother, Annette, has already been rescued by us. But because of your special identities, Executive Vera Adelheid wishes to see you."

"No, I don't want to... I don't want to see Vera Adelheid! She's a bad person! She's the bad person who made Dad ignore me, stop coming home, and stop loving me! I don't want to! It's because of her..."

After injecting a small dose of sedative with a mild anesthetic effect and putting the girl to sleep, he pressed his earpiece, connected to a secure frequency, and spoke in a voice too low for outsiders to hear as he strode forward.

"Boss, mission complete. G-Creature 'William' has been eliminated. No life signs remain. The remains were destroyed at high temperature. The Raccoon City mission targets have also been largely cleared. Special target Ada Wong was spared according to your orders. Over."

"Very good."

Vera's cool voice came through the earpiece.

"The operation is over. Withdraw from Raccoon City in an orderly fashion. This city no longer has any value. This sort of image-building rescue operation does not require you. That would be too wasteful."

Sigh, it felt like I was back in those days of staying up late. The readers from my old book know... Ahem, it's a little late. Sorry.

Vera, the "Conscientious" Capitalist

In less than half a day, Vera's orders had been effectively carried out.

M.S.F, which had inherited and retained the efficient centralized command style of the pre-1991 CCCP and KGB, operated with astonishing efficiency. After receiving the largest survivor group stranded at the Raccoon City Police Department, the M.S.F outpost on Raccoon Avenue in western Raccoon City began withdrawing, with personnel leaving the urban area one after another.

The Umbrella pharmaceutical factory in Colorado that Vera had taken over immediately began working overtime after receiving finished T-Virus inhibitor doses transported by M.S.F. The first batch of specialized cloud-seeding rockets loaded with inhibitors had also arrived on the outskirts of Raccoon City.

Search-and-rescue helicopters bearing MILITECH markings and the new logo—a V-shaped pattern nested within a square, black background with yellow stripes—circled over the city, repeatedly broadcasting that the "Raccoon City Emergency Sterilization Operation" had passed both houses of Congress and officially taken effect following the President's signature.

Many mainstream media outlets in the USA had been invited to witness the horrifying, devastated scene from the Militech search-and-rescue helicopter fleet.

The live footage showed burning buildings, abandoned vehicles, mangled corpses, and wandering hordes of Zombies...

It silenced many members of the public who had fiercely protested Congress dropping a nuclear bomb on its own soil. The people of Colorado in particular made an almost complete reversal, changing from protest marches to marches in support.

They had thought it was exaggerated. They had not expected it to be true—and capable of getting even worse!

It was better to wipe out that kind of thing with a nuclear bomb, lest it escape and harm people.

Naturally, Vera would not miss such a perfect publicity opportunity. From the helicopters' aerial view, countless M.S.F soldiers were escorting survivors out of Raccoon City. Some soldiers carried children, while others rescued citizens from the jaws of Zombies...

The sight of U.B.C.S members, wearing Umbrella's red-and-white umbrella insignia yet all wounded, fighting biological disasters and carrying out disaster relief in Raccoon City also gave rise to more online voices saying that not everyone at Umbrella was bad.

Of course, Vera would never admit that the IP addresses of the users who first posted those selectively quoted remarks were in California.

The effect was immediate. The criticism aimed at Washington and the White House gradually faded away.

Her old upperclassman from many years ago, who now served as Speaker of the House, privately sent her a "like." Simmons, who had proposed "nuclear sterilization," also expressed his thanks.

The method she had used to absolve herself subjectively had also objectively eased Simmons's pressure considerably.

Bzz... bzz...

In the early hours of September 27, amid the night, the roar of vehicle engines and the whooshing launches of specialized cloud-seeding rockets had echoed continuously for more than half an hour. At Militech's evacuation point on Acre Scenic Avenue in western Raccoon City, Chris stood silently in the rain, listening to the piercing wind.

The sobbing of passing survivors, the loud shouts of disease control inspectors, the police sirens maintaining order, the roar of National Guard vehicles setting up the blockade...

"Brother."

Wearing a raincoat, Claire walked over, worry written all over her valiant yet exhausted face.

"I'm fine, Claire."

Chris removed his helmet and turned sideways. Two days and one night of continuous fighting had left his hair disheveled, his beard untrimmed, his eye sockets slightly sunken, his face pale, and his lips dry. There seemed to be a trace of dullness in his expression, and he looked exceptionally haggard.

Claire stressed, "You need to get some sleep!"

"Forget it, Claire. You can't talk him into it. He'll definitely say, 'I've already held on this long, so there's no rush for a little longer.'" Jill walked over at that moment. She had changed out of her M.S.F protective suit and wore a raincoat, holding a bottle of mineral water. She lightly patted Claire on the shoulder, then tossed the bottle toward Chris.