Anton Strout - Dead Waters

“But once he figured it out, he kept quiet and only used it on himself,” I said. “Which means that really was him we were fighting the other day.”

“Wait,” Trent said, leaning forward. “Are you saying the professor’s alive ?”

Connor looked at him, watching his face. “You mean you really don’t know?”

The color drained out of Trent’s face. “No. . . I mean, we knew he wanted to try and get the whole process to work on humans, but it had never succeeded. When he died, we thought that might be the end of it until Elyse talked us all into continuing on his work. But he’s alive?”

“Reborn,” I said. “Much younger, too.”

“Wow,” Trent said, suddenly looking more thrilled than terrified. “Forgive me, but from the practical science aspect of it, it’s impressive, isn’t it? How did he get it to work?”

Connor gave him a grim smile. “You remember what we said about your blood sparking up those movie creatures earlier?”

“Yeah . . .”

“Have you seen your pal George lately?” Connor asked.

“Oh,” Trent said. He sat there in silence as the realization took hold of him.

“So you’re saying you didn’t know this was Professor Redfield’s plan?” I asked.

Trent shook his head. “We were all going to get rich together making films—that’s it, as far as I knew. Think about it. If you could take a bank robbing movie and reproduce the contents of a bank vault. . .Well, it wasn’t like we were actually hurting anyone, right?”

“I think you’re underestimating the power of greed,” Connor said. “You know what I think? I think your fellow students had a better idea of what the professor was up to and I think they kept you in the dark. You were getting played, kid.”

“But why?” he asked. “Why would they do that?”

“I think the professor taught them something very fundamental about magic,” I said.

Trent looked at me, his face searching for understanding in mine. “And what is that?”

“Magic has a price,” I said, “and for something like Mason Redfield being reborn, that price is high. You want to achieve the impossible, there’s going to be a big price tag on that. This one was written in human blood.”

Trent was practically shaking in his seat, his eyes nervous. “I don’t want to die,” he said.

“We don’t want you to die, either,” Connor said. “If you help us, we’ll do our best to keep that from happening.”

Trent nodded, but didn’t speak.

“Good,” I said. I got up from my desk and stepped out into the aisle outside our work area. “Come with us, then.”

Trent stood and followed me, with Connor sticking close behind him. Trent seemed resigned to his fate, but I didn’t put it past him to try to make a run for it if we gave him an opportunity to. I headed upstairs, straight for Allorah Daniels’s office where Director Wesker was working alongside her. Jane sat exhausted with a ring of empty water glasses in front of her.

“We come bearing gifts,” I said. “Yet again.”

The three of them turned to look at us, all of them scrutinizing the stranger with us.

“And who is this?” Wesker demanded.

“This,” Connor said, slapping the student on the back hard enough to drive him forward, “is Trent. He’s our best chance at figuring out what our mad professor was really up to.”

“I’m starting to wonder if the water woman killed him so he could be reborn,” I said. “He had to die to be reborn, right? What kind of deal did Mason Redfield strike with her?”

Trent spotted the coil of film sitting on the laboratory workbench. “May I?” he asked.

Allorah waved him over but gave him a look that was stern warning not to mess with her.

Trent walked over with tentative steps and waited for her to hand the piece of film over, and then held it up to the light to examine it.

“Recognize it?” I asked.

Trent looked uncertain. “I’m not sure,” he said, and then his expression changed. “Wait. . .I do know this. I worked on it.”

“You did?” I asked.

Trent nodded.

Connor went over to him. “What is it you did for the professor, exactly?”

“I dabble in computers,” he said. “Mostly film editing. The professor had asked me to mash up some of these old monster movies with some old footage of him from his early twenties. He said it would help my skills at composite editing once he mastered the magic technique.”

“It did more than that,” Wesker said. “It helped him come back to life.”

Trent handed the film back to Wesker and stepped back. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know that’s what he was planning . . .”

Jane walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder. Trent flinched.

“What about this?” she asked. She spun around and pulled her hair aside, showing him the tattoo between her shoulder blades in the dip of her tank top. “Can you tell me about this symbol?”

Trent examined it for a moment, but then shook his head. “No,” he said. “I’m sorry. I haven’t seen that before. What is it?”

“I was hoping you could tell me,” Jane said, frowning.

“I think the professor was definitely making a watery new friend outside of those in the film department,” Connor suggested.

“We’ve been poring over the books to try and deal with the professor as much as we have Jane’s mark,” Allorah said, “but we don’t seem to be able to counter the film’s magic or destroy it.”

“Yet,” Wesker added.

“I think I can help you with your film problem,” Trent said.

“Let’s hope so,” Wesker said. “I’d hate to think these Other Division fools spared your life for nothing.”

“Way to encourage his cooperation, Director,” I said.

Trent ignored us and stepped over to the lab bench. “What do you have in the way of chemicals in your lab?”

Allorah walked him over to a storage cabinet against the wall and threw open the doors. “Help yourself,” she said.

Trent scanned the shelves of bottles and powders, and then took one of the bottles. He went back to the bench, grabbed the tub the film was lying in, and filled it with water. He pulled off the top of the bottle, shook it over the whole thing, and then stirred it with a glass rod that was sitting on the workbench. The reaction was instantaneous as the film destabilized and turned to a reddish brown mush in the tub.

“What did you use?” I asked.

Wesker looked a bit angry at the ease with which Trent had dispatched of the film and snatched up the bottle from counter. He spun it around in his hand to read it.

“NaCl,” Wesker said, and then threw it down into the sink. “I tried chemicals and acids, not to mention magic, and yet nothing. You just came in here, made salt water, and poof.”

“Yep,” Trent said, and then shrugged. “I don’t know why it works, but it does. We kept trying various experiments with the professor, and when they failed, he had us destroy the footage this way.”

“Salt water,” Wesker repeated. “So simple.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too badly, boss,” Jane said with encouragement. “Who would have known it would work, right?”

Allorah stood up from her spot at her lab setup. “I should have been able to figure that out,” she said. “After all, I have several case samples already that are full of salt water. From Simon’s wet coat to the water found in the dead professor’s lungs, even.”

“And I’ve certainly been on the receiving end of enough saltwater attacks,” I said, “that it’s obvious to me that the professor’s had a little help in making all his twisted dreams come true.”

Jane looked down into the tub, grabbing the sides of it and rocking it. The mush swirled as it broke down even more. “So, what?” she said. “Is that it? Does destroying the film destroy the creations? Is the professor dead?”