September 22, 1998.
Huo Xiu knew the story was about to begin in earnest.
After tonight, Raccoon City would plunge into a full-scale biohazard, and as though pulled together by gravity, the people destined to stand at the center of it were already beginning to step onto their respective stages.
Worrying would accomplish nothing.
He had eaten Chinese food yesterday, so today he decided on pizza.
Conveniently, he had never liked pineapple on it anyway.
“Hey, man.
That’s a pretty huge order.
You really gonna finish all that?” A man in a yellow outfit struck up a conversation with him.
Maybe Westerners simply aged faster; Huo Xiu genuinely could not tell whether the stranger counted as a young man or someone already sliding into middle age.
He was clearly not old, but he did not exactly look young either.
The face, however, was familiar.
Brad “Chickenheart” Vickers, pilot of S.T.A.R.S.
Alpha Team.
During the Mansion Incident, fear had overwhelmed him and he had fled in the helicopter.
Jill and the others had been remarkably forgiving—and lucky enough to survive.
Otherwise Brad’s panic might have made him the man responsible for wiping out the entire team.
Still, someone completely without courage could never have made S.T.A.R.S.
in the first place.
Brad would eventually confront what he had done and, in the end, redeem himself through sacrifice.
“Yeah, I can finish it.
What about you?
Why order two meals when you’re alone?” At this point Chris Redfield and Barry Burton were both away from Raccoon City, which meant the second meal was almost certainly for Jill.
Huo Xiu was not foolish enough to believe Brad had approached him simply for casual conversation.
The T-103-style cap with its Umbrella logo had made Brad suspect he might be connected to the corporation.
Brad had seen zombies with his own eyes, so he knew the S.T.A.R.S.
reports were true.
But in a city under Umbrella’s influence, statements damaging to the company could never spread freely.
Jill, Barry, and Chris had all effectively lost their positions because of it.
Brad had therefore started searching quietly for evidence against Umbrella.
If Huo Xiu really worked for the company, perhaps Brad could coax something useful out of him.
“The other one’s for a friend.
She’s been pretty busy lately.” Brad laughed the question off.
Huo Xiu had no interest in interrogating him over lunch; thinking too hard while eating ruined the meal.
Brad was equally relieved to avoid confrontation.
The place was crowded, and a scene here would help no one.
Worse, if a dispute broke out with an Umbrella employee, Brad knew the city’s authorities would probably find a way to blame him.
Chris and Barry were already in Europe, and Brad had remained behind in Raccoon City.
The last thing he wanted was to make Jill’s situation harder.
Silence settled between them.
When S.T.A.R.S.
first submitted its investigation report, Umbrella had mobilized every public-relations tool at its disposal, convincing the media that the team had hallucinated after ingesting some kind of drug.
Eventually even much of the police department stopped believing the evidence.
For a while, S.T.A.R.S.
became a citywide joke; anyone openly supporting them risked being mocked along with them.
A month later, however, the story had lost its novelty.
People stopped talking about it.
Someone saying they believed S.T.A.R.S.
might still earn a dismissive laugh, but few citizens cared enough to argue anymore.
“Want to go take a look around?
I’ve heard some weird stories about the wastewater treatment plant lately.” A glance around revealed more familiar faces than Huo Xiu expected.
At J’s Bar, police officer Kevin Ryman was already sitting down with a drink.
Pretty early for that.
Kevin had probably taken leave; otherwise this would count as skipping work.
Chief Irons might not care, but the deputy chief certainly would.
Then again, today was Irons’s speech, so Kevin would probably have to return later even if he was officially off duty.
Or perhaps he had simply timed his drinking around the speech.
In a nearby taxi, a young-looking woman sat in the back seat.
The name badge on her chest read “Yoko Suzuki.” “Sure.
Let’s go.” Brad looked surprised, but the invitation solved a problem for him perfectly.
He had been trying to think of a plausible reason to enter the wastewater treatment plant and confirm what was happening there.
Residents living near the facility had reported hearing strange snarls from underground.
Brad was almost certain those sounds came from zombies—and if people outside could hear them, the number of infected inside might already be substantial.
Worse, the treatment facility was underground.
If a biohazard erupted and the plant ceased operating, the effects could spread directly into the subway infrastructure, potentially cutting off one of the most important routes survivors could use to escape.
“All right.
As long as you’re not scared.” Huo Xiu gave Brad a meaningful look and started in the direction of the R.P.D.
Thanks to yesterday’s reconnaissance, he had already memorized Raccoon City’s layout.
He had never experienced a memory this sharp before, but he certainly did not dislike it.
The enemies waiting below might not even be zombies, though.
More likely, they would be mutated fleas.
Disgusting.
If he were not worried about igniting unknown chemicals in the wastewater, he would have loved to solve the problem with a flamethrower.
Sure enough, no alarm sounded when they entered the treatment plant.
No one tried to stop them except the security guard at the entrance, and the moment he saw the Umbrella logo on Huo Xiu’s cap, he waved them through.
In Raccoon City, that emblem sometimes seemed to carry more authority than an order from the President.
They descended the stairs into a world without day or night.
Underground, the distinction between shifts barely mattered; whether it was noon or midnight, the only light came from fixtures in the ceiling.
For someone afraid of the dark, it might actually have been an ideal job.
The pay was high, the workload easy, and most of the day consisted of checking pipes and repairing anything that failed—assuming there were no damned mutant fleas.
“Good God…” Brad was not especially frightened.
The creatures inspired disgust more than fear.
He drew his Samurai Edge and immediately shot down a Drain Deimos, then started putting rounds into mutant fleas nearly the size of a human fist.
“…You wouldn’t happen to have another gun, would you?” Close combat was Huo Xiu’s specialty, but he absolutely did not want to punch zombies and giant fleas with his bare hands.
He could do it.
One punch would probably kill almost any of them.
That did not make it any less revolting.
Modern technology really is wonderful.
“Sorry, buddy.
No spare.” Brad checked his pockets.
He had only brought the Samurai Edge he knew best and its ammunition.
“All right…
I’ll make this quick.” Huo Xiu removed his gloves and tucked them into his coat pockets.
Washing skin was much easier than washing gloves.
Then he closed his eyes.
If I can’t see them, they won’t be as disgusting.
He attacked exactly as he had against Albert Lester, without even entering a combat form.
His baseline body already possessed Tyrant-level strength.
Against ordinary zombies and small infected insects, one blow per target was more than enough.
However tough they were, they were certainly not tougher than Hunters.
Closing his eyes did not leave Huo Xiu blind in any practical sense.
Sight was only one of his enhanced senses.
The Hypnos Tyrant had been specialized for close-quarters combat, and all five senses were exceptionally acute.
Counting enemies, tracking their positions, and detecting movement was effortless.
Ambushing him from close range was essentially impossible.
“…Wow.” Brad could do little but stare as Huo Xiu tore through the infected.
The guy was absurdly powerful.
Brad had initially assumed he was an Umbrella employee.
Watching him now forced a rather important correction: whatever Huo Xiu was, he was not even human.
Asking for a gun had apparently been less about needing one and more about not wanting to dirty his hands.
Even so, the savage efficiency of Huo Xiu’s fighting style reminded Brad of one particular creature described in Jill and the others’ reports—a special B.O.W.
developed by Umbrella, supposedly strong enough to swat rockets aside with its bare hands.
A Tyrant was the strongest creature Brad had ever heard of.
The guy casually slaughtering everything in front of him was the strongest thing he had ever seen.
Come to think of it…
he’s probably against Umbrella too, right?
With strength like that, killing Brad would have been trivial.
Instead, Huo Xiu had brought him here and exposed the infection.
“Is it over?” By the time Brad emerged from his thoughts, a mutated flea more than two meters tall lay dead at Huo Xiu’s feet, its head destroyed by a single punch.
Zombies and giant fleas covered the floor in eerily neat rows.
Every corpse was missing its head.
Huo Xiu still had his eyes shut, clearly refusing to look at the mess.
“Yeah.
It’s over.” Only then did Huo Xiu slowly open his eyes.
“All right…
I’ll wash my clothes and hands first, then head back up.
The news said the police chief is giving a speech today.”