Capítulo 9: The Underground Tunnels
Claire reaches the end of the hall, unlocking the door leading to above the west reception room. She slowly pushes the door open, no zombies in sight. She opens the door all the way and heads to the door leading to the library, then hears gunshots coming from inside. She quickly barges into the room, seeing Leon being cornered by two zombies.
She draws her gun, shooting the zombie to Leon's left, Leon shooting the one to his right. Both their heads explode violently, some blood splattering onto Leon's face. Leon stands there, frozen, completely baffled by what he just witnessed. Claire hurries over to him, shaking him out of his thoughts.
"You aright?"
"Y-Yeah," He responds as he wipes the blood off his face onto his sleeve, "Just, wasn't expecting that,"
"That happened to me before I got into the station, kinda weird, but at least it saves us ammo,"
"I guess, you're right. You got the battery?" Claire reaches into her belt pouch.
"Right here,"
'Great!" Leon takes it and pulls out the detonator, putting the battery into it, "Let's go," They head upstairs and enter the third floor storage room. The corpse is still hanging upside down from the ceiling. They walks around it and head over to the barricade.
"I just, put these on it and press the button, right?" Leon asks as he stands in front of the barricade.
"Here, let me do it," Claire states, holding a hand out. Leon hands it to her and backs away.
"You seem to know a lot about weapons," Leon comments as she connects the detonator to the C4.
"My brother taught me everything he knew before I went off to college," Claire replies. She finishes setting it up, and starts the timer for ten seconds, "Come on, we don't wanna be near this when it goes off. The two hurry off to the other side of the room, taking shelter behind some piled up furniture.
BOOM!
Wood shrapnel flies everywhere, some pieces flying over there hands and landing at their feet. They get up, looking at a large hole where the barricade had been moments ago. The body hanging from the ceiling has fallen to the floor, and a bookshelf has fallen forward, leaning against a large cabinet, blocking the door back to the library. A loud screech pierces the air.
"We need to hurry,"They both say as they look at each other. They run to the cell to the woman statue, Claire pulling out the notebook and flipping through the pages.
"What's the code?" Leon asks as he stands in front of the statue. They can hear something crawling through the ceiling.
"Um, um, the left is a woman's head," The zombie that had fallen to the floor starts to rise to its feet.
"Woman's head, woman's head…" Leon mutters, "This things are all faded," Leon leans forward to get a better look at what carvings remain on the dials, "Got it! Next one,"
"Bow,"
"Bow, bow...alright! What's the-" There's a sudden screech as something comes crawling out from a hole in the ceiling. It lunges at the zombie, tackling it to the ground from behind. It proceeds to use its massive claws to tear the zombie apart.
"Here," Claire says as she hands the notebook to Leon, "I'll take care it," Leon takes the notebook and Claire grabs her grenade launcher. She walks out, the Licker hearing her footsteps. As it lifts its head up in her direction, she shoots a grenade. The Licker is engulfed in a flaming explosion. The licker flails about before falling onto its back.
"All clear," Claire says as she turns to Leon.
"I got it!" Leon says as he pulls the medallion out of the statue, "Behind you!" He suddenly shouts. Claire turns to see the Licker get back up on its feet. She barely manages to dive out of the way as it lunges towards her with a loud screech. The thing slams into the bars, but quickly regains its footing. Claire rolls onto her back and grabs another grenade to load into the launcher, but the thing is already turned to her. Before it can lunge, Leon runs to her side, and blasts it with his shotgun. The Licker falls onto its back, writhes a bit, then goes limp.
"Thanks," Claire says as gets up.
"No problem," Leon responds as he cocks the shotgun.
"What kind of piece of shit is able to withstand a grenade to the face?" Claire asks as they look down at the charred, bullet torn corpse.
"Apparently, Lickers,"
"Lickers?"
"I, found a note mentioning something like this, and that's what they called them. Apparently they use their tongues to stab through things,"
"Oh," Claire replies as she thinks back to the first one she encountered, "Makes sense, I guess...that name really doesn't help make them less terrifying,"
"You got a better name?" Leon asks as they walk past it and head to the fallen bookshelf.
"Coming up with a name for that is the last thing on my mind,"
Leon pulls the bookshelf back up, and they head into the library. A third zombie that they didn't kill before is walking up the stairs. Rather than waste ammo, they both climb down the ladder and head into the main hall.
"Hey Marvin!" Leon shouts out as they make their way downstairs, "We found-!" He stops talking when him and Claire see Marvin laying down on the bench, Sherry looking at him in concern.
"He's not breathing anymore," Sherry says as she turns to them in concern. They both hurry down the stairs and run over to check him. Marvin just lays there, motionless. He's dead.
"What the hell caused this?" Leon asks as he stares down at Marvin's body.
"Whatever it is, I'm sure we'll get to the bottom of it," Claire replies. She puts a hand on Leon's shoulder, "Come on, we need to get out of here,"
"Yeah...yeah," He says as he nods slightly, "I'm sure he would have wanted us to,"
"Come on Sherry," Claire holds out a hand and Sherry grabs onto it, the three of them heading for the goddess statue. Leon places the last medallion into the slot, and the lining at the base of the statue starts to move, It splits in half, both ends rotating to behind the statue out of sight, revealing bars. They quickly jump back when they feel the ground beneath their feet start to move. The ground sinks down, forming stairs leading to a metal fence door with an intricate design on it. As they go to step down the stairs, Marvin tackles Leon from behind.
"Leon!" Claire exclaims as she hurries down the stairs. They reach the bottom with a thud, Leon and Marvin rolling in separate directions. Claire looks down at Marvin, and sees his head drag down as he starts to get up. He's a zombie. Claire draws her gun and shoots him in the head. With one bullet, Marvin goes down.
"Leon, are you okay?" Claire asks as she goes over to him. He's bleeding slightly from his head.
"Sherry, can you look for a first-aid kit?" Sherry nods and hurries over to the bench Marvin had been laying on.
"Come on, please be okay," Claire mutters as she holds his head up to try and slow the bleeding. Sherry comes running down the stairs with a first-aid box in her hands, "Thanks," Claire says as she hands it to her. She puts a pad on his head and uses some gauze to hold it in place, "That should do the trick," She comments, "Sherry, can you get the door?"
"Mhm," Sherry nods as she opens up the door and holds it open.
"Thanks," Claire pulls up Leon by his arms, dragging him into the passage. Sherry follows, the door closing behind her. Suddenly, the stairs move back up, blocking the way back to into the station, submerging them in darkness. Lights from somewhere down a few steps turn on, illuminating a room and the stairway in a warm, comforting, glow. They head down the stairs, Claire letting go of Leon once they pull him into the middle of the room. Bookshelves make up the walls, most of them filled with books.
A desk with no chair stands in front of them, various papers sprawled out over it. To the right of it, sits a large container, similar to the one she had seen in the little room back outside under the main walkway. To the left, on top of a table, sits a miniature replica of the police station. To the right, a small unicorn and lion statue. The shelves, ceiling, floor, and furniture are all made of matching, dark brown, polished, wood. The symbol of a compass sits in the middle of the floor. A single passageway leads to the right.
"Stay here with Leon for a second, I'm gonna go make sure this place is safe," Sherry nods as Claire grabs her gun and flashlight. She walks down the hall, which is only a few feet long, and reaches a corner going left. She turns the corner and finds an antique looking elevator, a light inside it welcoming her.
"All clear," She says with relief as she heads back into the room. She checks the box, and finds two packets of handgun ammo, adding up to a total of twenty, three shotgun shells, and a flame grenade, "Sweet," She mutters as she takes the grenade and half the handgun ammo. She puts two bullets into her gun to fill up the barrel and puts the other eight into her bag.
"I'm gonna go see where the elevator leads, you stay here with Leon, alright?"
"No, I wanna go with you," Sherry objects as she walks up to her. Claire looks at her pleading face. She glances over at Leon, whose still unconscious, then up at the stairway.
There's no way zombies are getting in from there, or through the elevator…
"...Alright, let me leave a note for Leon real quick,"
Claire walks up to the desk, grabbing one of the papers and flipping it over to a blank side. Grabbing a pen, she writes a note, and places it on Leon's chest.
"Come on," Claire says as he and Sherry head for the elevator, "Stay safe till we get back," Claire says to Leon before turning the corner and heading into the elevator. Only two buttons are on a small panel, one with an up arrow and the other a down arrow. The down arrow is the only lit one. She presses it and the shudders close, then they start to descend, the air around them quickly glowing dim as they descend. After a few seconds the elevator comes to a stop, and the shudders open. They step out into a deep, concrete stairwell. Lights in the walls dimly light the place up. The whole place is deathly quiet. With Sherry right behind her, Claire makes her way down the stairs, every footstep echoing. Heading down two flights, they come to a split path. Keep going down the stairs to the right to the bottom, or to the left into what looks like a maintenance tunnel, various pipes running along the walls.
They head to the right first, heading down the stairs and reaching the bottom, finding it empty except for a gun case with a peculiar lock. An indent in the shape of a badge is embedded into the lock. Inside the gun case are attachments for guns. To the left of the gun case, is a metal bar door. Looking through, they can see into a small room, stairs leading to a lower section with another elevator. Claire tries to open the door but it's locked.
"Looks like we got go the other way," Claire states as they turn around and head back up the stairs, going straight into the maintenance hallway.
The place is brightly lit, but all the pipes cast shadows all over the place. The flooring is made out of metal grating, along with the ceiling. The hallway makes a sharp right turn, then another. They pass through a room filled with large machinery. Heading on through, they enter a large open room. They go from stable flooring to a grated walkway, several meters above a room filled with various pipes and machines. To the far left is an abyss, going far down into darkness.
They walk along the walkway, which makes another right. The path connects to a small room, but the doorway is blocked by a fallen metal shelf. Claire tries to push it out of the way, but it doesn't even budge no matter how hard she tries.
"Sherry, do you think you can fit underneath and try to help me get it back up from the other side?"
"Yeah," Sherry nods. Claire steps out of the way and Sherry crawls underneath the cabinet.
"Alright, on three," Claire says as she grips the shelf, "One, two, three!" They both try to pull it back up, but despite their combined strength, it still refuses to budge, "We're gonna need Leon's help with this," Claire leans down and looks through the crevice Sherry had crawled through, "Come on back,"
"Okay,"
Sherry kneels down, and is about to crawl under, but she suddenly gasps and backs away.
"What?" Claire asks, a sinking feeling starting to pull on her shoulders.
"B...B...B-Behind...you," Sherry mumbles with a shaky voice. Claire turns around to see a creature that looks like man with blonde hair approaching her. His right arm is massive, and heavily mutated along with his torso, being made out of exposed muscle, with a giant bulging eye in the shoulder. The man's face has veins bulging through the skin and his eyes are very red. Their lab coat is torn at the shoulder
"Sh-Sherry!" The creature struggles to say in a deep, voice filled with agony. It suddenly lifts its right arm into the air, showing the sharp claws on it, and plunges it down at Claire. She jumps back, barely avoiding it. Sparks fly as his claw rips through the grating with ease, bending it as if it were made of paper. It grips its claw onto a pipe running under the walkway, and jerks it up, causing the walkway beneath her to give way.
"Claire!" Sherry screams as Claire falls down to the room below.
REFLEXIONES DE LOS CREADORES 
TIWHimitsu
TIWHimitsu I smell a boss fight coming up! What will happen to Claire and Sherry? What the fuck attacked her? And will Leon stop being a lazy ass and wake up from his nap?! Seriously, now is not the time to be taking one.
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