Sherry swallowed heavily. “The inside-out men!
You saw one, didn’t you?”
Incredibly, Claire grinned, shaking her head. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I saw, an inside-out man . . . good description.”
She looked at Sherry more seriously, frowning.
“ ‘Men’? There are more of them?”
Sherry nodded. “Yes, but they aren’t anything like the monster. I only saw him once, from behind, but he’s a man, a giant man—“ Claire seemed excited. “Bald? Wearing a long coat?”
“No, he had hair, brown hair. And one of his arms was all screwed up, a lot longer than the other one.” Claire sighed. “Terrific. Raccoon’s got something for everyone, sounds like . .”
She reached out and took Sherry’s hand, squeezing it. “. . . and that’s all the more reason that you should stay with me. You’ve done a really good job of taking care of yourself, and you’ve been very brave—but until we find your parents, I feel like it’s my job for now, to watch out for you. And if the monster comes, j ’H_ril kick its ass, okay?”
Sherry laughed, surprised into it. She liked that Claire didn’t talk down to her. She nodded, and Claire squeezed her hand again.
“Good. So we’ve got zombies, inside-out men, and a monster. And a big bald guy . . . Sherry, do you know what happened to Raccoon? How this all got started? Anything you can tell me, anything at all—it could be important.”
Sherry frowned, thinking. “Well, there were a bunch of murders last May, or June I think—like ten people got killed. And then they stopped, but then maybe a week ago, somebody got attacked.” Claire nodded encouragingly. “Okay. Did more people start getting attacked, or ... what did the police do?”
Sherry shook her head, wishing she could be more helpful. “I don’t know. Right before that girl got attacked, my mother called from work really upset, and told me that I couldn’t leave the house. Mrs. Willis—that’s our next-door neighbor—she came over and cooked dinner for me, and that’s how I heard about that girl. Mom called again the next day, and told me that she and Dad were stuck at the plant and wouldn’t be home for a while—and then like three days ago, she called again and told me to come here. I went to see if Mrs. Willis would come with me, but her house was dark and empty. I guess things had already gotten pretty bad by then.”
Claire was staring at her intently. “You were alone all that time? Even before you got to the station?” Sherry nodded. “Well yeah, but I stay alone a lot. My parents are both scientists; their work is impor-tant, and sometimes they can’t stop in the middle of what they’re doing. And my mother always says that I’m very self-sufficient, when I want to be.” “Do you know what kind of work your parents do?
At Umbrella?” Claire was still watching her closely. “They develop cures for things, for diseases,”
Sher-ry said proudly. “And make medicines, like serums that hospitals use. ...”
She trailed off, noticing that Claire seemed dis-tracted suddenly, her gaze far away. It was a look she had seen plenty of times before, on both of her parents’ faces—and it meant that they weren’t really listening anymore. But as soon as she stopped talking, Claire refocused on her, reaching out to pat her on the shoulder—and for some stupid reason, that made Sherry want to cry again.
Because she’s listening to me. Because she wants to watch out for me now.
“Your mother’s right,” Claire said gently, “you’re very self-sufficient, and that you’ve made it this far means that you’re also very strong. That’s good, because we’re both going to have to be strong, to make it out of here.”
Sherry felt her eyes go wide. “What do you mean? Leave the station? But there are zombies all over the place, and I don’t know where my parents are, what if they need help or they’re looking for me—“ “Sweetie, I’m sure your folks are just fine,” Claire said quickly. “They’re probably still at the plant, hiding and safe, just like you were—waiting for people to come from outside of the city, to, to make everything better—“ “You mean kill everything,” Sherry said. “I’m twelve, you know, I’m not a baby.”
Claire smiled. “Sorry. Yeah, to kill everything. But until the good guys come, we’re on our own. And the best thing we can do, the smartest thing, is to get out of their way—to get as far out of their way as possible. You’re right, the streets aren’t safe, but maybe we can get a car. . . ”
It was Claire’s turn to trail off. She stood up and walked toward the big desk at the far end of the office, looking around as she went.
“Maybe Chief Irons left his car keys here, or another weapon, something we can use—“ Claire saw something on the floor behind the desk. She crouched down and Sherry hurried after her, as much to stay close as to see what she’d found. She already knew that she didn’t want to lose her again, no matter what else happened.
“There’s blood here,” Claire said softly, so softly that Sherry thought she hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
“So?”
Claire looked up at the plain tan wall, frowning, then back down at the big drying splotch of red on the floor. “It’s still wet, for one thing. And see the way it’s just kind of cut off? There should be some on the
wall here_” She rapped on the dark wood trim that lined the wall, then on the wall itself. There was an
obvious difference; a dull thump from the trim, but the wall sounded hollow.
“Is there a room back there?” Sherry asked. “I don’t know, it sounds like it. And it would explain where he took .. . where he took off to earli-j er. Chief Irons.”
She glanced up at Sherry as she started to feel along the baseboards, running her hands up the wall and pushing at it. “Sherry, look around the desk, see if you can find like a switch or a lever. My guess is it would be hidden somewhere, maybe in one of the drawers. . . ”
Sherry started to move behind the desk—and tripped, her foot sliding on a handful of pencils that she hadn’t seen. She grabbed at the desktop, trying to catch her balance, but still came down pretty hard on her bare knees.
“Ow!”
Claire was next to her right away, putting an arm around her shoulders. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I just—hey! Look!”
Her bruised knees forgotten, Sherry pointed at the switch under the top drawer of the desk, set into a small metal plate. It looked like a light switch, but it had to be for the secret door, she just knew it.
I found it!
Claire reached out and flipped the switch—and behind them, a section of the wall a few feet across slid smoothly upwards, disappearing into the ceiling and exposing a dimly lit room lined with oversized j bricks. Cool, damp air breezed into the office; it was a secret passage, just like in the movies.
Together, they stood and stepped toward the open-ing, Claire holding Sherry back with one arm until she’d looked first. The small room was totally empty—three brick walls and a stained wood floor, and only about half the size of the office. The fourth wall was dominated by a big old-fashioned elevator gate, the kind that pushed to one side.
“Are we going to take it?” Sherry asked. She was excited but nervous, too.
Claire had taken her gun out. She crouched down next to Sherry and smiled—but it wasn’t a happy smile, and Sherry knew what was coming before Claire said a word.
“Sweetie, I think it would be safest if I went and looked around first, and you stayed here—“ “But you said we should stay together! You said we could find a car and leave! What if the monster comes back and you’re not here, or you get killed?” Claire hugged her, but Sherry felt almost sick with helpless anger. She was going to tell her not to worry, that the monster wouldn’t come, that nothing bad would happen—and then she was going to leave anyway.