Chapter 05: The Blind Terror

“Hey! I found something!” Rick heard Claire’s voice crackle from the walkie-talkie at his hip. He picked it up and answered that he’d be back down in a bit.

He took the spade key he found on the table in front of him and turned to head through the huge hole in the wall. After one last check to ensure he hadn’t missed anything on the third floor, he climbed down the stairs to the second, where he and Claire had split up.

That had happened after, as he’d expected, the fire shutter blocking the corridor to the STARS office had been lowered. It meant they needed to backtrack and find another way to reach their goal. He had gone up to scout and found another box of ammunition, as well as a hole in the wall that shouldn’t have existed.

Rick had been on the third floor only once, but he remembered that beyond that now-accessible room was a storeroom leading to the library’s upper floor. It was a new path that would avoid going all the way back. The spade key had been a very pleasant bonus to the discovery.

Walking down the steps, he stayed vigilant. Over the railing, he saw the zombie with its burst head on the first-floor tiles. Another stroke of luck. When they had first reached the second floor, this zombie had been shambling down from the third. Rick had lured it, and the idiot had tumbled over the rail, hitting its head three floors down. Even Claire couldn’t believe it.

“You’re here.”

Claire came from the side, nearly bumping into him and surprising him slightly—though not enough to make him react.

“Do you have a wrench with you?” she added, leading him to the shower room she had chosen to investigate earlier.

“A few.”

Stepping inside, Claire pointed at a pipe missing a valve. From the sound and the vapor pouring from the showerheads, Rick understood she wanted to close it. Peering past the broken wall, he saw why. The divider between the female and male bathrooms was destroyed. They wouldn’t have to go through the library to reach their destination. In fact, they would save a lot of time.

He put his bag down and began to rummage through it. “I found a spade key upstairs behind a destroyed wall. It leads to a small room connected to the library, but your way is faster.”

“That’s good. We can open the library and the West Office doors and create shortcuts.” Claire put what he recognized as a few incendiary rounds into his backpack once he pulled out three wrenches of different sizes. “On top of those, I found a small portable safe and a red herb.”

“Only the key…” One of the wrenches fit the broken valve, and he turned it. “I also found a full box of ammo and a locker with a lock on it.”

“There’s one here, too.”

“The safe?”

“Haven’t opened it yet. It’s a work in progress.”

As he turned the valve, he saw from the corner of his eye Claire holding a small box with buttons. From what he could tell, she had to push them in a certain sequence. Each correct guess lit a green circle; each mistake lit a red one.

Rick finished his task, and the vapor stopped pouring from the broken pipe. At the same moment, he heard a small jingle from Claire’s direction.

“I did it!” she said enthusiastically. Her tone then shifted to disappointment. “It’s a spare button for the console downstairs.”

“Well… we can’t always have nice things.”

His warm and amused tone surprised her for a moment. It was the first time Claire had heard his voice carry any positive emotion. Not letting herself be distracted, she agreed.

“Yeah. Although so far, we’ve found quite the loot. Ammo, a grenade, incendiary rounds… so it’s not that bad.”

Rick closed his bag after putting the wrench back and lifted it onto his shoulders. “True.”

They walked through the white-tiled rooms and reached the female changing room on the other side. Rick took care of the corpse sitting on a bench while Claire found nothing in the lockers.

Opening the door, they stepped into the corridor leading to the STARS office. A faint, coppery smell, old dried blood, hung in the damp air, and the distant patter of rain through a broken window did little to mask a deeper, wrong silence. The sight that awaited them was gruesome. Claire felt her stomach twist when she saw three dead bodies on their left. From the way they had barricaded the shutter with anything they could find, they had been attacked in the process.

Knife in hand, she dealt silently with two of them while Rick took care of the third. They found more shotgun shells and incendiary rounds. Silently, they turned to face the long corridor. A window on the side wall was broken. Rain blew in, driven by the wind, and formed a puddle on the wooden floor.

That was the only innocuous thing their eyes witnessed. Up ahead was blood and body parts everywhere.

“Oh, my g—”

Rick quickly put a hand over her mouth. He hadn’t been gentle, but the hint of panic in his eyes and his sharp gesture for silence made her swallow her protest. He released her and pointed his flashlight at the ceiling. Claire’s eyes widened in horror.

Above them, a creature hung from the ceiling like a grotesque sculpture of flesh. Sinewy muscles glistened wet under the flickering light. Pale, raw tissue stretched taut over elongated limbs, each tipped with claws sharp enough to slice steel. Its head was bald and eyeless, a cavernous mouth gaping wider than nature should allow.

She raised her gun, but Rick caught her wrist. A shake of his head and a few hand signs she interpreted as ‘It’s blind’ made her hesitate. The creature’s lack of eyes gave the theory credence. It also meant that, like the zombies, it could be avoided if they were quiet.

Claire nodded, lowering her arms but keeping her revolver ready. Slowly, they walked forward, watching their steps. He pointed at a door on the left, and she understood it was the entrance to the STARS office.

Everything went well. They reached the door, and Claire, who was closest, reached for the handle. Their stealth operation came to an abrupt end when she pushed the door open. It squeaked.

The creature let out a blood-curdling scream and launched itself at Claire. One moment she was standing; the next she was face-down inside the office, with Rick screaming in pain. Her brain raced. He had pushed her inside and taken the hit instead. She rolled onto her back, gun aimed, to assess the situation.

The thing was on top of Rick, who was on his side. He had a hand on its throat, pushing the deformed head away to avoid its gigantic maw. A long, whip-like tongue shot from its mouth, unnaturally long, and tried to pierce Rick’s skull. He barely dodged by wrenching his head to the side.

Claire fired. Four bullets found their target: the creature’s oversized brain. A perfect group shot, and it was enough. The creature’s body went limp and collapsed onto Rick, who shoved it off.

He turned, half-crawling, trying to stand. His hand slipped on the blood on the floor, and he fell forward. Thankfully, Claire was there to catch him. She dragged him inside and closed the door.

For a terrifying second, her mind went blank and her hands trembled. Blood was everywhere, his blood. She forced a sharp breath, clamping down on the panic. They didn’t have time for it.

“The desk on the right,” he told her, grunting in pain.

She didn’t think twice. A medi-kit hanging on the wall explained his instruction. Rick dropped his bag and sat heavily in the chair. It was only then that Claire saw the three deep, bloody claw marks on the right side of his waist.

Rick swiveled, took the med-kit, and dumped its contents onto the desk. Antiseptic spray, bandages, band-aids. It was completely stocked.

Claire helped him remove his sweater and the shirt underneath, revealing a bruised and heavily scarred torso. The fresh, bleeding wound was bad, but what shocked her more were the old scars. Some were even cigarette burns. She’d recognize them anywhere; her brother was a smoker and had burned himself carelessly more than once.

‘Question for later,’ she thought as Rick sprayed the wound.

Containing her guilt and rising anxiety, she spoke. “What do you need me to do?”

“Any good… at sewing?” It was obvious Rick was fighting not to scream. The spray contained alcohol, and applying it to the open wounds had to be agony.

She shook her head. “Never sewn anything.”

“Yeah? Well… no better time… like the present…” With his off-hand, he pushed a small box containing thread and a needle toward her. “I’m right-handed, and the injury is too high for me to see what I’m doing.”

Soldiering on, Claire opened the box and prepared herself without another thought. Meanwhile, Rick opened the envelope of mixed herbs and applied a pinch directly to the lesions to staunch the bleeding. She was amazed by the effect; within a minute, the blood flow had slowed to a seep.

When Rick stood up, she was confused—until he sat on the desk and pushed the chair toward her. He didn’t say a word, his eyes closed, jaw clenched tightly against the pain.

Claire had to match his courage. Sitting down, she began to work. She might never have sewn before, but her brother had once explained how a doctor had closed a cut for him. Actually doing it was another ordeal, but she didn’t let her confidence waver.

Her left hand held his hip firmly; her right held the needle, poised to pierce the skin. Shooting one last look at his strained face, Claire took a deep breath and pricked the flesh. His suppressed grunt didn’t stop her. She pushed the needle through, pulled the thread, and repeated the motion on the other side of the wound.

Over and over she repeated the action. Under her fingers, she could feel how tense his muscles were. In a burst of empathy, she spoke to distract him.

“Thank you. And I’m sorry.” She didn’t whisper the words; she owned them.

“It’s fine…” His reply came through a clenched jaw. “Wasn’t your fault.”

“No, but you didn’t have to push me out of the way.”

“And have Meathead on my ass ‘cause you died? No thanks.”

“Meathead?” Claire was confused for an instant. “Are you talking about Chris?”

“It proves my point that you knew who I meant.”

She almost chuckled. “That’s true. It’s a Redfield trait, sadly. Acting before thinking.”

“Noooo. Really? I hadn’t noticed.” His sarcasm made her smile—both because it was funny and because talking seemed to take his mind off the pain. At least partly.

“I’ll have you know, I’m not as bad as he is.”

“The jury is still… *UGH!*” A flare of pain made him grunt loudly. “What are you doing down there? Closing the wound or sewing your name?”

Claire adopted a stern voice, though there was no heat in it. She had just pulled the thread taut, sealing the lesion, and knew it must have hurt. “Don’t tempt me.”

She made sure everything was secure before tying off the thread and cutting it.

“One done, two to go.”

Her optimistic tone clashed with his unamused one. “Joy.”