After five more checks, Kaplan finally announced the Red Queen was truly down.

“Are you sure?” Alice asked suspiciously. An obviously awkward look was on Kaplan’s face. Shade sighed. He was angry at Kaplan. The man almost got him killed, but he knew if he continued to blame Kaplan the man would either be pissed or disappointed at himself. Either case would be bad for the completion of this mission. So the captain did what was best for his team. He picked up the black container and started walking into the hallway again, showing his trust toward Kaplan with his actions. Plus, he could always just escape now that the door was broken through.

Apparently, failure could improve a person’s computer skills because Shade reached the other end in one piece. The rest of the team passed as well.

With the team inside the control room, the Red Queen was now completely defenseless.

The Sanitation Team worked expertly. Upon reaching their target, they pulled out the cylinder-shaped mainframe of the Red Queen and attached the electromagnetic pulse generator on the device.

A hologram projection appeared in the room. It was a red colored girl. She seemed cute, but none of the men present were convinced by the look of their enemies. Even Carl kept a straight face on at the hologram.

“Get out. You can’t be here.” The Red Queen urged.

“Don’t listen to her. She’s a holographic representation of the Red Queen.”

“You have to get out.”

The team didn’t say anything as they continued working.

“I won’t advise this. Disabling me will result in loss of primary power.” The Red Queen’s tone showed no emotion, even though she was able to get knocked out.

“She’ll say anything to stop us from shutting her down.” Shade reassured.

Alice walked by the Red Queen’s side. Carl suddenly noticed how similar Alice, in her red dress, and the Red Queen, in her red projection, were. It was not that surprising that they turned out to be one person.

“I implore you.” The Red Queen continued with a cold tone as the EMP was put in place. “Please?”

Shade, EMP controller in hand, looked at the Red Queen once again. As he pressed the controller and just before the AI was turned off, the girl looked at the team.

“You’re all going to die here.” It wasn’t a provoking threat. It wasn’t a dying scream. It was a simple statement.

The next second the entire room went dark. The voyagers knew that meant the entire facility was shut down. All across the Hive doors were opened, releasing the previously concealed dead into the world of the living.

At Dining Hall B, the lights went dark. JD and Rain frowned, but Xia merely grinned and gripped tightly to her rifle.

Carl bit his lips. He had considered stopping the mercenaries from turning the Red Queen off and thus end the infection from the very start, but he doubted the Sanitation Team would give up their mission just because a random recruit told them so, even if this recruit saved their lives. Plus, the voyagers would probably kill him before he could say the next sentence.

When Shade knelt down and started to take out the Red Queen’s hard drive, the four men and women at Dining Hall B were met with a rather hostile, and hungry, figure.

The sound of something moving brought the two mercenaries and the one voyager to their feet.

“I’ll check it out.” Xia said concisely as she strapped her sniper rifle to her back and took out two pistols from her belt. In a close quarter combat against a large number of fragile enemies, a one shot one kill rifle was much less effective than two rapid firing pistols. Then again, if the rifle was so bad against the zombies, why did she carry it around in her hands before? Was it for the undead, or was it for someone else?

Nevertheless, Xia had walked by several blocks when she encountered a certain knelt figure. She was wearing a white suit. Her face was unclear to Xia.

Xia drew her pistols on the zombie.

“Wait!” A loud cry came from behind. Xia turned and found an angry Rain coming up. Her rifle pointing at Xia. “Drop your gun!” She demanded. “Drop it!”

“I am not your enemy.” Xia replied concisely, not putting down her weapon.

“She’s a survivor and you want to kill her. Why?” Rain didn’t really care about a random survivor, but she didn’t know why the voyagers were here, and it bugged her. Her instincts told her to find it out. Shade was slightly more clever and knew when to be quiet, but Rain had slightly fewer concerns. She lacked the foresight that made Shade the captain.

“It’s my mission, now lay down your weapon before I put you down.” Xia turned around at Rain and ordered. The coldness in her eyes showed the mercenary she was serious. An NPC was threatening her, and it was more insulting than dangerous. Xia was a voyager. She had gone through hell, and she was proud of who she was. If Rain didn’t put down her weapon Xia would have no trouble in gunning her and, if needed, every member of the Sanitation Team, down.

As the two were arguing, the zombie was slowly crawling toward the two. When Rain turned and saw the decaying teeth in the zombie’s mouth, it was already too late.

The zombie leaped forward. Its eyes were filled with the desire for human flesh. Its rotting limbs reached forward. Rain tried to raise her gun, but it was too late. She watched in fear as the foul creature got closer to closer...and then the zombie’s head fell off. Its body twisted slightly as it collapsed, but remained still very soon.

Behind the zombie, Xia flipped her now stained dagger. Her pistols were in her belt. She was going to use them, but the zombie went for Rain and left its back open to her and allowed a chance for melee. If Jean was here she would’ve gunned down the zombie nonetheless, but Xia could never resist sliding her blade across the thin little neck of her target and watch blood pour out. In this case, there wasn’t much blood, but it was still quite satisfying.

“What…” Rain was unable to speak as she looked down on the body.

“Based on the level of decay, she has been dead for a while.” Xia, strangely, explained. A slight smile was around her lips as if she just got a treat. “Something is off. We need to fall back and regroup.” There was no fear or surprise in her tone, but Rain was too shocked to notice that.

When the two returned to where Addison and JD were, they realized the rest of the team was present as well.

Rain scanned the team before looking at Shade in slight shock. She realized there was one less of them than before. Shade shook his head, and Rain sighed.

“What happened?” Carl pointed at Xia’s bloody dagger. He wanted to make the mercenaries aware of the situation they were facing as soon as possible. The sooner they realize who they were facing, the better they could respond and put down the infection.

Xia glanced at him, noticing his intentions but not caring. “Rain and I encountered a corpse. A living, moving corpse. She tried to bite Rain’s head off. I killed her.”

Before the rest of the mercenaries could raise another question, the sound of metal sliding on the floor attracted their attention.

The team turned and realized dozens of figures, all obviously dead but still moving, were walking through the columns formed by the licker containers.

“Hold it right there!” Shade ordered loudly. Xia told him they were hostile, but he wanted to make sure. What happened next proved Xia correct.

The dead growled and made a move. A zombie with half its head gone lead the charge. As if a signal was given, the entire zombie horde charged at their food sources.

“We’re surrounded.” Jean commented, raising her rifle.

“Open fire! Take them out!” Despite being completely confused about what just happened, Shade finally gave the order, and then all hell went loose.

Mercenaries showed the zombies why they were chosen to handle the Red Queen incident. With incredible skills, they were more than capable of gunning down slow zombies that were completely in the open. Bullets were fired in short, concise bursts rather than long, continuous firing to preserve ammo.

“Aim for the head.” Carl added as he saw a few mercenaries were wasting bullets on the zombie’s limbs and body.

Xia gave a questioning look at Ivan. The mercenaries were doing well. Too well. With their increased number they were taking down zombies before they could get close enough to even pose a threat. The mercenaries carried enough ammunition for a frontal assault. Maybe they couldn’t slaughter all the zombies in the facility, but they might be able to reduce the zombie count to a number low enough so the Umbrella reinforcements could put down the infection. This would be great for the world, but not for the voyagers.

Jean fired a single bullet into the skull of a zombie and looked at her mission tab.

Name: Jean Turner

Current Dimension: Resident Evil

Current location: Racoon City, America.

Mission: Terminate Umbrella Corporation.

Reward: 1500 red crystals

Optional mission: Terminate virus infected creatures. Reward will be based on the type of creature.

--- 1 zombie(0.1 red crystal)

Follower: (0/2)

The single zombie brought her 0.1 red crystal. Ten zombies would be 1. A hundred would be 10. The girl did the math, thought about it for a second, and typed something on her watch. The two fellow voyagers glanced at the message on their watch and looked up at her, slightly impressed. Jean gave them a firm nod.

Ivan turned and fired his Gatling gun, but not at the zombies. Instead, the majority of his bullets hit the licker containment cells.

Jean typed one word on her watch. Tank.

In the chaos of battle, the mercenaries didn’t have the luxury to see where the bullets landed. Even if they did they would just think Ivan missed. But Carl, who had been paying attention to Ivan and Xia the entire time, noticed what the man did.

“Be careful of the tanks!” He yelled while sending a death glare at Ivan. He realized what he was planning on doing. The licker tanks were unstable, and firing on it would cause it to explode. If the explosion wouldn’t kill the mercenaries, it would open up an opportunity for the zombies to get closer and use their teeth on the ranged soldiers. Carl was one hundred and two percent certain the voyagers would stand by and watch as the Sanitation Team die. Carl had tried so hard to get into this nice position, and he would not let a greedy bastard ruin it. How could the man even think of using the tanks? He had no idea Jean was the one that came up with the idea. That was exactly what Jean wanted.

Ivan looked at Carl, ignored him, and continued to fire on the containers. It took two more seconds for the tank to reach its limit. The warning light that showed “unstable” was suddenly consumed by an explosion that engulfed not only the container and the licker inside but also knocked the rest of the team off their feet.

Carl felt his head banging on the metal floor. He groaned and stood up, only to see a burning zombie crawling toward him. Its legs were gone, along with half of its left arm, but its right arm was still reaching out to him. Its entire body was on fire, and a disgusting smell of burnt flesh made Carl want to vomit. Suppressing that urge, he reached down into his belt, pulled out a spare pistol, and blew the zombie’s head off close quarter.

He immediately realized it was a mistake when he tasted something salty in his mouth.

“Get up!” Shade groaned and stood back up. Using the tempory firing vacuum, the zombies had gotten much closer. Unlike the human beings, zombies didn’t get affected by the explosion. They could still move and fight when they were literally being roasted while just the sound of the explosion made it difficult for the mercenaries to balance themselves.

Glancing through the team, Shade realized three of the four Hound Squadron mercenaries were gone. He didn’t know what happened to them, and he didn’t really care. They could be dead, dying, or on a stealth mission, but all Shade wanted now was to get out of this place. Grabbing Carl and a few other mercenaries to their feet with one hand and laying down suppressing fire with his other hand, Shade gradually retreated.