harleyscars Chapter 63 Welcome to Raccoon City
Chapter 63 Welcome to Raccoon City
Chapter 63 Welcome Back to Raccoon City
The door to the safe house was pushed open.
Li En stepped in sideways, holding Emily in her arms.
He walked straight to the cot in the corner and gently bent down to put the girl down.
The girl's fingers clenched the strap of his tactical vest, then loosened, and her breath settled into sleep.
"who!"
Grace, in the corner, clutched a table lamp, its base facing outwards, her back pressed against the concrete wall.
Li En glanced at her but didn't say anything.
He pulled the blanket from the foot of the bed and covered Emily with it.
The edges of the old, army-green blanket were frayed, and he tucked the frayed edges under the girl's chin.
Grace stared at his hand as he slowly loosened the lamp base.
But she still didn't move away from the wall.
She works for the FBI, and sometimes safe houses are more dangerous than the streets outside.
The person who is supposed to protect you may not have been ordered to do so solely to protect you.
"The child's name is Emily."
Li En turned around and stopped a few steps away from her.
"She was Victor's test subject, infected with the T-virus, and doesn't have long to live."
Grace's pupils suddenly contracted, and she subconsciously turned her head to look at the quiet little face on the bed.
"How can we save her?"
"It's up to you now, Grace."
Li En put his hands behind his back to cover his movements, and the hard drive fell into his palm.
He walked to the table and plugged in his old laptop.
"Look, although some sections are covered, your name is on them, and there's something else."
"Erpis".
Grace leaned closer and immediately recognized Victor Gideon in the file—the man who had knocked her unconscious.
She reached out and grabbed the mouse, flipping through the pages one by one.
Suddenly, his finger stopped on a profile.
"Mother----"
She suddenly raised her hand to cover her mouth.
On the screen was a faded archival photograph, in which a woman had the same blonde hair as her.
Grace continued flipping through the pages, faster and faster.
Disjointed images began to flash through her mind, like images abruptly interrupted by something.
She pressed her hand to her temple, clenched her teeth, and fine beads of sweat appeared on her forehead.
Li En leaned against the door frame, arms crossed, and remained silent.
Elpis needs Grace's biometrics, and this can't be rushed.
And behind that door, Zeno was still waiting.
Wesker's clone is quite powerful; he's at least on par with Captain America.
Firearms and grenades might not be enough to win.
However, that guy has a deep misunderstanding, which can be easily resolved if used properly.
"Leon." Shirley's voice came through the earpiece.
"There are absolutely no leads on Elpis. We've checked the servers of the CIA and the Pentagon, and they're empty."
"Perhaps higher authority is needed," Li En replied softly, tucking her chin further into her collar.
"I applied, and the higher-ups gave me orders to terminate the investigation."
Shirley's tone revealed an indescribable weariness.
It's worth noting that Leon not only single-handedly solved numerous biohazard cases, but also saved the president's daughter.
Shirley herself also helped with virus research and was a high-ranking member of the DSO (Security and Peacekeeping Organization), while Lyon was a founding member.
The DSO is also known as the "presidential sword," as it is directly under the president's command.
Even so, it still didn't work.
Li En tapped her arm lightly with her fingers twice.
He didn't actually expect Shirley to find anything.
Things that are deliberately erased will not remain on servers that can be accessed remotely.
If we could get one more set of information, we would be more confident about our plans after we got back.
Why was the investigation terminated?
"They didn't give a reason, only saying it was an order from above."
Sherry lowered her eyes and looked at her right hand, which was covered by a black glove.
The signs of the T-virus invasion had already appeared in her, only milder than in Leon.
She gently clenched her right hand into a fist, then relaxed it.
"Don't worry, we can definitely handle it."
"Don't do anything too reckless, Leon. I'll try another approach."
"Don't worry, I never do anything reckless."
Communication was cut off.
Li En walked over to Grace and glanced down at the page that was paused on the screen.
"Finished watching?"
Grace did not answer.
She stood up, walked to the bedside, and sat down next to Emily, the springs of the cot making a slight creak.
She reached out and gently stroked Emily's arm that was exposed outside the blanket.
She was so thin that the bone structure of her elbows was clearly visible through her skin.
There are more than a dozen needle marks of varying ages on the inside of my arm; some have scabbed over, while others are still fresh, faintly red marks.
Victor's hard drive contained all of the child's research data, and Grace dared not think about what was hidden beneath those columns covered by black bars.
"The Ark is in Raccoon City, and the information says Elpis is inside."
She looked up, her voice now steady again.
"But—that thing is very likely a new type of virus."
Li En nodded and told her what Shirley had just said.
The order from above was to terminate the investigation; someone didn't want them to get involved in this matter.
The room quieted down.
Grace knew what this meant.
"Elpis may really be a virus, but this is the only chance to save Emily."
Li En's voice rang out again.
"If we don't go, she's dead."
He did not reveal the truth about Elpis.
Grace must not know this beforehand, otherwise she will reveal a flaw when facing Zeno.
Zino is a smart man.
Grace lowered her eyes.
Then she saw Emily shrink back.
That wasn't an unconscious movement during sleep.
She was not asleep.
Upon learning that the antidote might be a virus, she chose to curl up and pretend to be asleep.
Once everyone has left, I can quietly disappear from this world without causing trouble for anyone.
Grace reached out and grasped that thin hand.
"I will not give up on you, Emily."
The girl's body trembled slightly, but did not relax.
She continued to shrink, trying to shrink herself small enough that others would no longer find her troublesome.
"Everything will be fine." Li En walked to the bedside and stood there. "I promise."
After a moment of stillness, the small silhouette beneath the blanket slowly loosened its curled-up knees.
Li En bent down and lifted Emily off the bed; the girl's weight was so light it was almost negligible.
Her hands were not around his neck, but hung at her sides, yet she did not push him away.
He walked toward the door, with Grace following behind him.
I pushed open the door, and the afternoon sunlight streamed in through the crack.
Emily was momentarily blinded by the light and turned her face towards Li En's shoulder.
"Let's go, let's go to Raccoon City."
"Leon!" Shirley's voice suddenly trembled in the earpiece, "Are you really going?"
For the two of them, the name Raccoon City was the sum of all their dreams.
Li En did not respond.
He put Emily in the back seat, waited for Grace to get in, got into the driver's seat, and turned the key.
The Porsche Cayenne's engine emitted a deep, rumbling sound.
An hour later, the outline of the gas station flashed past the car window.
The corrugated iron roof was rusted through in several places, the gas pump was lying askew on the ground, and its outer shell was charred yellow from the fire years ago.
The convenience store's door frame is still crooked, with dents left from when something knocked it open more than 20 years ago.
About ten minutes later, a road sign emerged from behind the dead bushes by the roadside.
The sign was tilted, and a few faded letters could still be made out: Welcome to Raccoon City.
The car slowed down, and the exterior of the abandoned building was melted away by the high temperature, revealing the hollow bricks underneath.
The streets were littered with the wreckage of vehicles; the tires were long gone, leaving only rusty iron wheel rims half-buried in cracks in the asphalt pavement.
"Lyon, I've found a coordinate in downtown Raccoon City."
Shirley's voice returned to a steady pace.
"it is good."
Li En parked the car in front of a crack that spanned the entire street.
The crack tore a hole about two meters wide in the ground, with bits of asphalt hanging in mid-air at the edge, and below was a bottomless blackness.
He turned off the engine, turned to Grace in the back seat and said, "We can't get any further ahead, get out."
He opened the car door and went around to the trunk.
Under the cover of opening the trunk lid, they took out the weapons and equipment one by one from the storage space.
With unlimited ammo, the Glock was holstered on the outside of his right leg, the Alligator was clipped to his waist, and the Gal submachine gun was hung on his chest.
The Classic 70 was slung over the shoulder, and the RPG-7 rocket launcher was finally lifted out and rested against the safety bar.
The tactical hand axe was inserted into the axe sheath on his back.
One grenade after another was attached to the ammunition ring of the tactical belt, the metal rings making a fine clinking sound as they collided.
He closed the trunk, walked over to Grace and Emily, and handed them the alligator.
"Here you go. I'll walk in front for the rest of the way."
Grace lifted Emily out of the back seat and placed her on the floor.
The girl's cloth shoes trod on the cracked asphalt road, and she obediently reached out her left hand to hold Grace's hand.
"Can it work?" Li En glanced at Grace's grip on the gun.
Grace adjusted the position of her fingers, keeping the gun pointed at the ground.
"No problem, I'm an FBI agent."
"Okay." Li En turned around, facing the ruins ahead. "Then let's go."
As we passed through the first broken wall, the air suddenly changed.
The wind between the ruins stopped, and a layer of extremely fine white filaments filled the air.
He raised his right hand.
Grace stopped immediately and gently pushed Emily behind her.
Li En glanced around and his gaze settled on an abandoned office building whose walls were still relatively intact.
He expanded the scanning range of the biochemistry expert entry to its maximum, and red markers appeared in his field of view.
On the rooftop across the street, something is hidden behind a white, cocoon-like object.
"Grace, go into that building, find a small room, block the door, and wait for my message."
"Be careful." Grace didn't ask any further questions.
Holding Emily's hand, he crouched down and climbed through a broken French window into the office building lobby.
Li En watched them walk away, and only turned back after confirming that no red markers appeared on their path within the scanning range.
He looked up and, judging from the shape and size of the red markings, the thing hidden behind the white spider web was quite large.
With the spiderwebs spreading across the surrounding walls, it was no longer necessary to guess who the other party was.
He took the RPG-7 off his back, pushed the rocket into the launch tube, and walked directly below the building.
When he reached the bottom, he saw several white skeletons scattered on the ground.
A rustling sound came from above.
Li En looked up, took a step back, and simultaneously raised the RPG launcher.
That thing was climbing out from the edge of the roof.
Eight black, segmented limbs were spread out, each thicker than a human thigh.
Its torso emerged fully from the shadows of the rooftop, its black armor reflecting a glossy, cold light.
Dozens of compound eyes were arranged irregularly on his head, all turning in his direction.
He pulled the trigger.
The rocket, trailing a white plume of smoke, shot out of the launch tube and pierced the thinnest intersegmental membrane of the spider's carapace beneath its head.
An orange-yellow fireball exploded on the rooftop, scattering fragments of shell and green fluid in all directions.
The thing was blown in two, with half of its torso still hanging on the edge of the roof, green liquid gushing out from the broken section, pouring onto the wall and dripping down.
Before the smoke and dust had even cleared, a black tide suddenly surged from the pile of debris on the ground.
Countless tiny spiders emerged from the cracks in the mother spider's broken shell and crawled rapidly toward him, the rustling sound of their legs rubbing against the ground becoming so dense that it seemed to blend together.
He reached behind him, grabbed the incendiary grenade, pulled the pin, and threw it toward the center of the black tide.
The projectile bounced off the ground and rolled into the area where the spiders were most concentrated.
The flames exploded with a roar, and the orange tongues of fire rolled along the ground, swallowing the small black dots one by one.
The charred carapace crackled and popped under the high temperature, and a strange burnt smell filled the air.
It doesn't smell like burnt protein; it smells more like a complex mixture of organic matter and some kind of chemical solvent that has been ignited.
It has a pungent smell, but it's not nauseating.
Li En stood at the edge of the fire wall and waited for a moment.
The red markers in the field of vision gradually decreased from being densely packed until only a few scattered dots were left struggling on the periphery of the flames.
He drew his tactical hand axe, walked over, and chopped the remaining crawling spiders one by one.
After finishing, he rubbed the hand axe against the broken wall next to him a couple of times, then put it back into the axe sheath on his back.
He walked through the window of the abandoned office building and returned to the doorway of the small room where Grace and Emily were hiding.
The door was blocked from the inside by an overturned metal desk.
He knocked twice, waiting for Grace to drag the table away.
Li En nodded to Grace, signaling her to follow.
As Grace passed the spot where the battle had just taken place, she saw the pile of things.
"What are these?" Grace gripped the handle of the alligator gun and instinctively pulled Emily further behind her.
She looked up and glanced briefly at the charred hill.
It is at least two or three stories high and wide enough for two trucks to park side by side.
When she was hiding inside the building, she only heard the sound of explosions and flames, but she never expected it to be something like this.
Li En led the way, stepping over a broken utility pole that lay across the middle of the road.
"Come on, let's go through this window."
Grace gripped the alligator tighter and quickened her pace to catch up with Emily.
From that moment on, she no longer doubted whether she could leave Raccoon City alive.
Her gaze fell on the back of the man in front of her.
If you follow him, nothing will happen.
This trust caused her to miss many details.
For example, Li En climbed over several windows and turned several corners along the way, each time without hesitation.
For example, he never took out his phone, yet he precisely avoided all the collapsed buildings and broken roads.
When they arrived at the Army Corps of Engineers' blockade point, they did not miss a single fork in the road.
Several military tents were pitched on a relatively flat open ground. The tent fabric had been faded to a grayish-green color by the wind and sun, and the ropes were loose, swaying gently in the wind.
Inside the tent were two rows of folding tables, on which sat several dusty computer monitors, one of which still had its power light faintly flashing green.
The battery still had power.
Li En walked over and pressed the power button.
The screen lights up, and the desktop wallpaper is the BSAA emblem.
"Shirley, there's a BSAA camp here. They've been to Raccoon City before."
"What are they doing here?" Shirley's voice held a hint of wariness.
"I don't know, but the computer wasn't locked."
He glanced at the file directory on the desktop, his gaze lingering on the briefing marked with the city center.
"They were also heading towards the city center."
"Interesting. By the way, when I was searching the Pentagon's data just now, I found that there was no record of the missile launch from Super Raccoon City back then."
"That's not surprising."
Li En casually replied, and then removed the entire computer's hard drive.
Along with the data previously looted from the sanatorium, he packed it into a weapon box and put it into the space warehouse.
The more data we have, the higher the success rate of developing the drug after we return.
After looting, he had Grace take Emily to the outer perimeter of the blockade and hide behind a half-collapsed concrete wall.
He took a high-explosive grenade from his waist and pulled the safety pin.
It was thrown towards the door of the blockade.
Boom!
Smoke and debris billowed out of the door frame, and the door tilted inward, revealing a jagged opening.
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