Стефани Перри: Zero Hour

Billy saw that Rebecca had blown out one of its knees, and hesitated only a second, just long enough to wonder why he hadn't thought of that. It wasn't dead, but unless it sprouted wings, it wasn't going tobe coming after them anytime soon. Then he raised the Magnum again, fixing on its fish-belly white skull as it floundered and clawed to pull itself closer, undoubtedly to continue its attack. It only managed to slide itself partway into the water, the dark pool churning with pink foam as it struggled to get out.

“Waste of ammo,” he half asked, glancing at Rebecca for her approval. As terrible as the thing was, he wouldn't feel right about letting it bleed to death, to suffer any more. It was another of Umbrella's

victims, in a way; it hadn't asked to be born.

“Yeah,” she said, nodding—but he could see the pity in her expression, could see that she felt the same way. “Do it.”

Two rounds, the second just to be sure, and the massive body slipped soundlessly into the pool of water, disappearing beneath the surface.

They walked over the dam in the rising light, the deep blue of the early hours giving way to a soft, faded gray that hid all but the brightest stars.

Rebecca walked quietly alongside Billy, noticed that the clouds were clearing out. It would be another hot summer day, though at the moment, she was doing her best not to shiver; the sun wouldn't be up properly for another half hour, at least. She was tired, more than she could ever remember being, but just knowing that the long, horrible night was finally at its end, that a new day was here, was enough to keep her from flagging.

At the end of the dam walk was a short ladder leading to a door. The went up, Billy first, and stepped into a turbine room, more rusty metal railings around cement walks and heavy piped equipment lining the walls. There were two doors. The north door dead-ended in a storage room. The door to the west was standing open, led through a long, fenced corridor to another door.

“Keep going?” Billy asked, and Rebecca nodded. It was probably another dead end, but she wanted to keep from having to go back the way they'd come for as long as possible. They'd witnessed enough death and destruction already; she didn't want to have to go back for seconds.

She paused as Billy started down the walk, noticing a silvered edge to the heavy door. It was reinforced with steel, and there was a keycard reader next to it. Someone had wedged a stick under the bottom of the door to keep it open.

A wet stick, she thought, reaching down to touch the glistening wood. When she pulled her hand away, slender strings of goo clung to her fingertips, stretching away from the stick.

For a half second, she had a confused idea that for some reason, the leeches had propped the door open—then shook it off, reminding herself that there were leeches all over the facility. She wiped her hand on her vest and caught up to Billy, who was almost at the far end of the walk already, reloading the Magnum.

The door was unlocked, and Billy pushed it open. Another cement and metal entryway, leading down another short hall. Billy stepped inside, sighing, Rebecca sighing along with him. Would this place never end?

The room smelled like a beach at low tide, though they couldn't see anything from the entry, the room opening up just out of sight. They'd taken two steps inside when they heard the click of a lock, the door sealing behind them.

“Automatic lock?” Rebecca asked, frowning.

Billy stepped back to the door, rattled the handle. “It was closed before. Doesn't make sense that it would lock after we came through—“

Rebecca heard something then, a low sound that made her heart skip. The sound quickly rose, became a deep, cackling laugh from the room beyond the entryway.

Without a word, she and Billy walked away from the door, both of them holding their weapons tightly, stepped around the corner—

—and froze, staring at the vast sea of life that surrounded them, that seemed to cover every square inch of wall, that dripped and crawled across the ceiling, the floor. Leeches, thousands of them, hundreds of thousands. The room was a large one, high and wide, split by a small corridor that ran along the back wall. Incinerators lined a central construct that rose to the ceiling, openings in the metal showing flickers of fire. There was a big metal door on the south wall, set back into a recessed doorway, which appeared to be the only other way out—if they wanted to run through all those leeches, which Rebecca most definitely did not. The cavernous space was bi-level, a catwalk encircling the central construct, an open fire at one side of the upper walk casting a flickering glow over the black, bubbling sea that washed across the room's every nook and corner—and on the walk, a lone figure, a tall, broad-shouldered young man, laughing, his strong, strange voice carrying in the salt-scented, rotten air.

“Welcome,” he said, and laughed again, a leech curled on each shoulder, others trailing down his extended arm. He was surrounded by the creatures. “So glad you could join us. You're the guests of honor ... After all, this is your wake.”

Rebecca only stared, stunned into silence, but Billy took a step forward, raising his voice.

“You're his son, aren't you? Or his grandson?”

Rebecca knew immediately who he was talking about, and found herself nodding. Ofcourse...

“That's right,” the young man said, smiling widely, a fiendish smile. “In a way, I'm both.”

He made a shrugging motion with his arms—and changed, the transformation rippling over his body like water, like a movie effect. His long, dark hair shortened, turned white. His youthful features melted into aged ones, lines and creases forming, his eyes changing color, the pupils enlarging. In seconds, he was no longer the young man, though his smile was just as cold, just as brutal.

It was Billy's turn to be silent, as Rebecca breathed out the name, unable to believe that it wasn't another trick, another false face. “Dr. Marcus?”

The man on the catwalk nodded, and began to speak.

“Ten years ago, Spencer had me assassinated,” he said, the memories flashing through his hive mind, the children remembering for him. The images were blurred and dark, indistinct in shape and color, but the feelings were as clear as they had been on the day he'd lost his life.

He had been expecting an attack for some time, but it had still come as a surprise. He'd been working in his lab, the children playing in the pool at his feet, when the door burst open—and then there was gunfire, loud and final. He remembered the pain as he fell to his knees, clutching at the holes in his chest, his gut—and remembered seeing two familiar faces, the men walking into the room, his brilliant

disciples, his best students watching as he gasped his last breaths. Albert Wesker and William Birkin, both smiling, smiling!

He remembered the sense of loss, the incredible anger that clawed to the surface of his dying mind as his body fell, splashing into the pool, the children scattering as everything went to black ...

... and then the memories changed, became the thoughts of the many. He could see his own face and body, half submerged, pale and ugly in death, but loved, so very loved by the hive mind. He had been their God, their creator and teacher, their father. They swam to him, wormed between his sagging lips, wiggled and strained to enter the gaping holes that had been blown through his poor flesh.

Marcus found his voice, telling the two stunned watchers what they needed to know, to understand. “They left me to rot, took my notes and closed my lab, leaving it all to the ruin of time. They didn't understand, you see. Time was what was needed. It took years for the T-virus inside my queen to reconstruct, to evolve ... And to become the variation that created what I am now.”