Something that transformed them into flesh-eating ghouls? That’s a bit far-fetched. . . . But it made more sense than anything else she could come up with, although she’d keep her mind open to other possibilities. As to her concerns about the team—Barry was acting weird and Chris and Wesker were still missing; no new developments there.
And there won’t be any if you don’t get going. Right. Jill put her musings on hold and stepped out into the hall.
She noticed the smell before she actually saw the zombie farther down the corridor, crumpled to the floor. The small wall sconces cast an uneven glow over the body, reflecting off of dark red trim and tinting everything in the corridor a smoky crimson. She trained her weapon on the still body—and heard a door closing somewhere close by.
Barry?
He’d said he was going to be in the mansion’s other wing, but maybe he’d found something and had come looking for her ... or maybe she was finally going to meet up with someone else from the team. Smiling at the thought she hurried down the gloomy hall, eager to see another familiar face. As she neared the corner, a fresh wave of decay washed over her—
• and the fallen creature at her feet grabbed at her boot, clutching her ankle with surprising strength. Startled, Jill flailed her arms to keep her balance, crying out in disgust as the slobbering zombie inched its rotting face toward her boot. Its peeling, skeletal fingers scrabbled weakly at the thick leather, seeking a firmer grip—
• and Jill instinctively brought her other boot down on the back of its head, the heavy treads sliding across the skull with a sickening wet sound. A wide piece of flaking scalp tore away, revealing glistening bone. The creature kept clawing at her, oblivious to pain.
The second and third kicks hit the back of its neck—and on the fourth, she felt as much as heard the dull snap of vertebrae giving out, crushed beneath her heel.
The pale hands fluttered and with a choking, liquid sigh, the zombie settled to the musty carpet. Jill stepped over the limp body and ran around the corner, swallowing back bile. She was convinced that the pitiful creatures roaming the halls were victims somehow, just as much as Becky and Pris had been, and releasing them to death was a kindness—but they were also a menace, not to mention morbidly un-wholesome. She had to be more cautious. There was a door to her right, heavy wood overlaid with twining metal designs. There was a picture of armor over the key plate, but like the other doors she’d come across upstairs, it was unlocked. There was no one inside the well-lit room but she hesitated, suddenly reluctant to continue her search for whoever else was wandering the area. Two walls of the large chamber were lined with full suits of armor, eight to a side, and there was a small display case at the back—not to mention a large red switch set into the middle of the gray tiled floor.
Another trap? Or a puzzle. . . .
Intrigued, she walked into the room and headed for the glass fronted display, the silent, lifeless guards seeming to watch her every move. There were a couple of mysterious grated holes in the floor, one on either side of the red switch, for ventilation per-haps—and she felt her heart speed up a little, sud-denly sure that she had found another of the mansion’s traps.
A quick inspection of the dusty display case de-cided it for her; there wasn’t any way that she could see to open it, the glass front a single thick piece. And something in one shadowy niche at the bottom glinted like dull copper. . . .
I’m supposed to push that button, thinking that it will open the case—and then what?
She had a sudden vivid image of the ventilation holes sealing off and the door locking itself, a death by slow suffocation in an airless tomb. The chamber could fill with water, or some kind of poisonous gas.
She looked around the room, frowning, wondering if she should try to block the door open or if perhaps there was another switch hidden in one of the empty suits. . . .
. . . every riddle has more than one answer, Jilly, don’t forget it.
Jill grinned suddenly. Why push the button at all? She crouched down next to the case and took a firm grip on the barrel of her handgun. With a single firm tap, the glass cracked, thin lines spidering away from the impact. She used the butt of the gun to knock out a thick chunk and reached carefully inside. She withdrew a hexagonal copper crest, engraved with an archaic smiling sun. She smiled back at it, pleased with her solution. Apparently some of the house’s tricks could be worked around, provided she ignored a few rules of fair play. All the same, she found herself hurrying back to the door, not wanting to call it a win until she was clear of the solemn chamber.
Stepping back into the blood-hued corridor, she stood for a moment, holding the crest as she weighed her options. She could continue to look for whoever had closed that door, or head back to the puzzle lock and place the crest. As much as she wanted to find her team, Barry had been right about needing to get out of the mansion. If any of the other S.T.A.R.S. were still alive, they’d surely also be looking for an escape. . . . Her thoughtful gaze fell across the fetid, broken creature that she’d killed, lingering on the slowly spreading pool of dark fluids surrounding its scabby head—and she realized suddenly that she desperately wanted to leave the house, to escape its tainted air and the pestilent creatures that stalked its cold and dusty halls. She wanted out, and as soon as was humanly possible.
Her decision made, Jill hurried back the way she’d come, gripping the heavy crest tightly. She’d already uncovered two of the pieces that the S.T.A.R.S. needed to escape the mansion. She didn’t know what they’d be escaping to, but anything had to be better than what they would leave behind. . . . “Richard!” Rebecca immediately dropped to her knees next to the Bravo, feeling his throat for a pulse with one trembling hand.
Chris stared mutely down at the torn body, already knowing that she wouldn’t find a heartbeat; the gap-ing wound on Richard Aiken’s right shoulder was drying, no fresh blood seeping through the mutilated tissue. He was dead.
He watched Rebecca’s slender hand slowly drop away from the Brave’s neck and then reach up to close his glazed, unseeing eyes. Her shoulders slumped. Chris felt sick over their discovery; the communica-tions expert had been a positive, sweet guy, and only twenty-three years old. . . .
He looked around the silent room, searching ran-domly for some clue as to how Richard had died. The room they’d entered just off the second-floor balcony was undecorated and empty. Except for Richard, there was nothing—
Frowning, Chris took a few steps toward the room’s second entrance and crouched down, brushing at the dark tile floor. There was a dried crust of blood in the shape of a boot heel between Richard’s body and the plain wooden door ten feet away. He stared at the door thoughtfully, tightening his hold on the Beretta. Whatever killed him is on the other side, maybe waiting for more victims—
“Chris, take a look at this.”
Rebecca was still kneeling by Richard, her gaze fixed on the bloody mass of his torn shoulder. Chris joined her, not sure what he was supposed to be looking at. The wound was ragged and messy, the flesh discolored by trauma. Strange, though, how it didn’t seem very deep. . . .
“See those purple lines, radiating out from the cuts? And the way the muscle has been punctured, here and here?” She pointed out two dark holes about six inches apart, each surrounded by skin that had turned an infected-looking red.