Resident Evil: Resurrection

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++


“There we are,” the doctor said warmly while he guided Carlos to sit on a large bed with stiffly folded sheets and blankets, all white. “This will be where you will stay just for a little while, until we can find you a permanent residence in the Hive. Well, since we’re here, I might as well do a full workup on you. You look healthy as an ox, but we can’t be too careful; I wouldn’t want you getting terribly sick from something I could have prevented today if I’d just checked. No need to worry about a thing though, you just sit back and relax. There’s a computer over there, and you can watch any kind of multimedia on it you’d like… but power to unnecessary electronics gets cut off at eight, just in case you’re surprised if a movie you’re watching is suddenly interrupted. Dinner is at six but if you’re hungry now just let me know and I’ll find something for you. Please try to relax, Mr. Olivera, you’ve hardly slept at all these last few days.”

Dr Abel stood and left Carlos to do as he pleased, but kept the room’s door open in case Carlos didn’t know how the intercom system by his bed worked and he wanted to call for the doctor. He went to his own desk in the main part of the lab then, with one last glance at the doorway to Carlos’ room, before taking a seat at his Desk of Very Important Computers.

“Doctor Abel,” Violet said as she blinked to life beside him. “Have you the samples for blood testing or should I acquire them from our test subject?”

He cleared his throat quietly. Violet was a sweet girl but as far as treating those they were testing went, she could use a lot of work on her… bedside manner, and her definition of ‘acquiring’ samples. “No, thank you,” he said politely, before reaching into his jacket and drawing out a sealed bag, holding it out. A mechanical arm reached down from the ceiling and accepted it, and in the blink of an eye the bag and arm were gone, whirring through the Hive to one of Violet’s test labs. “I have plenty more of those bloody bandages if you need more, so please don’t bother our guest. Run the standard panel of tests… HIV, Malaria, Hepatitis, so on and so forth. I somehow doubt he’s been stricken with anything of the sort but there’s no being too cautious.”

“The T-Virus?” Violet offered.

The surprise in the doctor’s face was plain as he looked at Violet.

She nodded her head. “I understand that you quarantined him for twelve hours, doctor, but after what I’ve learned from my sister’s databanks, that might not have been as accurate a test as we once believed. As you said yourself, there’s no being too cautious.”

“Right,” the doctor sighed, slouching some in his chair. Violet was correct, of course, but there was no mistaking the resistance he’d felt at her offer for that last test. Perhaps some part of him had been so thrilled at the negative results he’d wanted from Carlos and too eager to research the man in other ways that he had been putting aside the obvious need to test in a lab just in case, because he didn’t want to face the possibility of results he didn’t want. “Go on then, the T-Virus as well.” His gaze wandered over to the large two-way mirror that made up most of the wall of Carlos’ room facing Dr Abel’s laboratory. The mirror side was what Carlos saw and from the other side the good doctor got to watch Carlos’ every move without having the man able to look back at him for staring. The poor man was still sitting on the edge of his bed with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands, shoulders hunched. “Poor fellow,” the doctor murmured as Violet disappeared to attend to other matters. “If I were in his place, I doubt I should be in half as calm a mental state as he after all the horrible time he’s spent alone out there.”

His reverie was interrupted when the phone beside him jangled loudly. The doctor gave it a nasty look for startling him and an even nastier one when he saw the name displayed as the caller. A moment passed where he considered just letting it ring, but he knew that delaying one phone call now would inspire two or three times as many later. With a grunt, he keyed in the commands at his desktop computer and brought the video-telephony screen up, then struck the key to answer the call, causing his wife’s image to appear on the monitor.

“Richard Abel,” she bit out immediately when she saw his face on screen. “I have been struggling to get hold of you for an inconceivable amount of time!”

“Get off it, Kathy,” the doctor clipped back, while rubbing his forehead where a headache was already starting to cluster upon hearing her voice. “What do you want?”

Her anger was clear on her face, even in the poor quality image on his screen. “What a bloody charming way to address your wife, Richard. I know you’re up to something. You’re submissive and spineless at all times unless you have some secret project fascinating you and giving you the guts to actually stand up to people and ignore them. What is it this time and what is it going to cost this Hive?”

“You would like to know, you stupid old cow,” he grumbled under his breath.

“What was that?”

“I said you look lovely tonight dear,” the doctor pinched out with blatant bitterness, “and you need not worry about my activities, as they will cost the Hive nothing other than what I already use, which are Violet’s services and company.”

“That’s not what I heard,” she fired back. “I heard that you went on some hunting expedition in America – you, the mealworm, the shiftless sea slug – and came back with a man from the untamed lands. That alone was ruckus enough since it was a rumor about the Man Who Does Nothing, but bringing an unknown specimen into my Hive? As one of the Directors of Security in this Hive I demand to know -”

“Kathy!” Dr Abel interrupted, raising his voice and actually causing her to start, surprised with his sudden steely vertebrae to both his wife and his superior. “I went to you asking you for funding under the terms that you didn’t pry into my life over it and in exchange for you gaining full custody of our child. If this isn’t direct breach of contract I don’t know what is! Will you just leave us alone?!” He was huffing and puffing, red in the face and feeling his headache spread quickly. It took quite a lot to make the good doctor yell, let alone stand up for himself, so she was silent for once, though it didn’t last long. “I would never endanger the lives of those in this Hive, especially not you or our only offspring, and you know that! What the ungodly fucking hell did you bloody well call me up for and why won’t you just spit it out instead of lowing at me like the useless heifer that you are?!”

Her expression had grown cold, and he knew that he’d hurt her feelings; there was a momentary pang of guilt in him but it was stifled as she spoke up. “I was calling to express concern for my husband of two decades,” she replied in a clinical, detached voice. “Because he now spends his every waking hour – and most sleeping ones at that – in his laboratory, feigning real human interaction with a hologram and tinkering with his experiments and toys without making any sort of contribution to this Hive any more. You used to be one of our lead Engineers and a role model in this Hive, Richard, but all that changed, since -” She paused, and looked to the side with confusion written on her face. A shadow passed over her and he knew that one of her security officers was reporting something critical to her; nothing else would warrant interrupting one of the calls from the great head of security.

Richard Abel sat forward with a concerned frown when he saw a red light start to flash in her room and a she paled like she’d just seen a ghost; somebody was speaking to her in muffled tones and her expression was growing increasingly alarmed. Her head suddenly whipped around to face the monitor once more, “Richard! You overrode Violet’s restraint programming and allowed her access to dead Hives’ Queen files? What have you done!”

“That’s enough of that, I think,” Violet said gently. The screen went black, his conversation with his wife disconnected, and Violet tilted her head to the side when Dr Abel looked up at her from across his desk. “Apologies Dr Abel but I know how little you like speaking with your wife, and I have urgent news.”

He sat back in his chair heavily, and wiped away the sweat he realized had broken out on his forehead during such a heated conversation. “Yes, thank you Violet,” he said breathlessly, rubbing his forehead once more and pinching the bridge of his nose. “Just when I start to forget what nasty temperament that woman inspires in me, she comes back into my life. What news do you bring me?”

She pointed over at the room they’d set up for their guest just as the door slid closed and a secondary security door of solid steel slammed shut overtop it, locking into place. Richard started, and normally would have looked over at Violet, but he couldn’t take his eyes off Carlos as the man lifted his head and looked at the locked door. He wasn’t panicked, he wasn’t jumping to his feet screaming or alarmed at the sudden imprisonment… if anything, he looked... almost… as though he had been expecting it? That same bland expression was still on the man’s face, even as the doctor watched the room fill with gas to relieve the man of consciousness. Only when Carlos was out cold on his bed did the doctor look over at Violet with question in his face, and perhaps a little accusation.

“I’m afraid I told a little fib,” she said while lacing her fingers behind her back and blinking prettily at the doctor. “When you brought him here, I was indeed able to identify who he was, contrary to what I told you. He is who he told you he is, but that was impossible simply because Carlos Olivera died in the desert outside of White Queen’s hive. It wasn’t confirmed until I had a sample of his blood to match to old STARS records that this was indeed that same man. He is a fugitive from the Umbrella Corporation; he played a key role in the life of Project Alice, including aiding in removing her from one of our other testing facilities after one of her captures, and he is believed to be a romantic influence in her life. The puzzling thing, however, is that he is supposed to be dead; we had confirming satellite images of his death within a large tanker truck that exploded just outside White Queen’s Hive, and that fire was not something any human could survive, never mind the swarming reanimated corpses that had gotten into the truck cab with him before the explosion. Quite simply, it is impossible that he is alive… therefore, this is likely a clone of the original Carlos, not unlike the clones of Project Alice that were composed within White Queen’s deepest recesses under the guidance of Dr Cain. He may hold some secrets to finding Project Alice, let alone the medical strides we will be able to take by researching his genetic codes and figuring out the cloning techniques the late doctor had developed in which the clones retained some memories of their originals. Imagine the repopulation possibilities held within this man through such cloning techniques, if applied to the surviving human race we have contained within my Hive alone.”

His mind was racing as he fixed his gaze upon Carlos once more. Violet was right, she was completely and totally right! “My God,” he whispered, putting his fingers to his lower lip and leaning forward in his chair. “This might have perhaps been an even better find than Project Alice, then. Well done, Violet; we must begin testing immediately.”

“As you wish, Dr Abel,” Violet replied. A wicked little smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she stared at the doctor, but Richard didn’t notice it, as he was too fixated upon the unconscious man in lockdown only ten paces away.


++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Thank you for your continued patience with this story! As always, please read and review! I always love seeing your feedback! Thanks guys, -FS