A glimpse of hope

The ground suddenly quaked and Claire missed her shot. The flame round exploded behind Sam, and through the fire Claire saw Dustin, with his remaining strength, pulled out the rook plug on the panel to lift the bridge. Within seconds the bridge would take them to a upper level, so Claire quickly jumped down, leaving Sam behind.

“Claire...” Sam cried with the craving look on her face and tried to move faster, but failed. She disappeared as the bridge moving higher. It was not clear how long would it take for she to find her way back, but at least it brought them some time.

Claire struggled to get up, just to be thrown into the depths of despair. Across the lifted bridge, she saw Dustin lying on the floor and breathing more and more slowly. He tried his best to crawl towards the work room, but it only took a few seconds for him to be totally exhausted and collapse. Since then he hasn’t moved an inch.

With Dustin downed, it’s impossible to reboot the generator in the work room now, which meant there was no way she could open the gateway in time and save Sherry. It seemed that this was the end.

Claire sat by the wall and gasped for air. Sam was turned into a vampire. Dustin was bitten and soon would join the undead. Sherry was locked inside a waste disposal room and suffering...She tried to help, but it seemed none of her efforts mattered. Everyone was just dead or dying.

How could you do it, Claire? How could you keep going after everything that happened? Sam’s words in the factory were echoing in her mind.

Claire raised her head with resolution.

...

Ten minutes earlier.

Claire went back to the middle waterway to find the key to the water injection chamber. She followed the waterway and checked every corpse that was wearing a lab coat. She noticed some of them have the same chest hole like Irons, which meant that they were implanted with those G-parasites. Judging by the degrees of decay of the corpses, she would said they have been dead for several days.

“So that monster has been breeding its parasites all this time in the sewer?” Claire frowned at another dead body, “How come nobody knows?”

Must be Umbrella covering everything up...She sighed. It was at this moment that she remembered the letter Chris sent back in the S.T.A.R.S. office, and connected the dots. Chris must’ve known something about Umbrella and went to Europe to investigate the corporation.

“Damn it...What have you got yourself into, Chris?” Claire took a deep breath and kept moving.

The waterway led her to a preparation room, where sewer workers grabbed their tools before heading down into the lower waterway. Immediately she noticed a blue key hanging on the wall, with a tag written “Sewer NO ENTRY ZONE” on it. Looked like this was what she needed.

She was ready to backtrack to the upper waterway, but suddenly there were waves on the water, and they were getting stronger. Something was in the water. She cautiously pulled out the MQ 11 submachine gun, right before a huge monster rose up in front of her.

Some parts of it looked like human, but with a lump of malformed muscles piling up on the left side of its body. On its left shoulder there was a great mass of tumors, covering something orange underneath it. This was the creation of G, a G-Adult.

Claire emptied the clip on the tumors and, when she was reloading, saw a large knife cut on its head. Was this the parasite that was cut by Sam in the orphanage? It has grown this big? She was shocked by the realization, and moved slightly slower. Seizing the chance, the G-Adult grabbed Claire with its overgrown left arm and tried to squeeze her.

“Ahhhh!” Claire cried in pain. It felt time some of her ribs were starting to crack.

The G-Adult opened its head like petals and stretched out a flower-like tongue. It was about to spit out some corrosive liquid to melt down its prey for it to eat. Claire was trying her best to hold back its tongue, but the pain of being squeezed was quickly draining her strength.

How could you do it, Claire? How could you keep going after everything that happened? In a daze, she felt like she could hear Sam.

Claire grabbed the grenade launcher from her back and stuck the barrel in its tongue. With the trigger pulled, the flame round was shot into the G-Adult’s body and exploded. It screamed in pain and released Claire, as its body was being burnt from the inside. The tumors on its shoulder exploded, too, and revealed the giant, mutated eye.

She took out her large caliber pistol and held the eye at gunpoint. After rapid fires, the eye burst into pieces and the G-Adult was completely neutralized.

“Because that’s all I can do...” Claire stared at its massive corpse and breathed heavily.

...

“Because that’s all I can do. Keep moving forward.” Claire stood up with her fists held tightly. She took one last glimpse of Dustin from afar, then turned around and went ahead to the north district gateway.

With only one of the two generators back at work, it would take much longer for the gateway panel battery to charge up. Claire was standing in front of the gate, thinking what she should do once she met Sherry.

Vampires’ image couldn’t be captured by the camera. When she saw Sherry becoming transparent on the monitor, she knew Sherry has been infected. Her painfully collapsing must be one of the symptoms. Claire didn’t know if there was a miracle cure, or how much time there was before Sherry completely turned. If there was actually nothing else she could do, at least she could just be there for her in her final moments.

Just when she was waiting for the battery to charge up, with a low humming sound, the other generator was rebooted and the process was accelerating. It was too good to be true. Claire was happy and surprised to see the shining green light on the panel. Did Dustin make it to the work room at last?

In less than a minute the gateway opened. Claire swiftly rushed towards the waste disposal room and pulled the lever to lift the door. Before it was fully lifted, she could hear Annette’s crying tone through the radio.

“Sherry? Mommy’s here...Sherry! Sherry, can you hear me!?”

“Oh, no. Sherry?” Claire bent down and headed into the room, only to find Sherry lying still on the ground.

“Claire...?” Annette was watching the monitor inside an office when she saw the young girl she met once approaching her beloved yet dying daughter. Sherry’s image was semi transparent now. She didn’t have much time.

“Sherry...Are you alright?” Claire knelt down to hold the girl. Her body was cold and her face was gray. There was fresh scars around her left eye. Instead of being slashed by claws, they looked more like something inside her own body trying to burst out her head.

“What are you doing?” Annette yelled helplessly through the radio.

“I’m here to help.” Claire replied calmly.

“Sherry’s be implanted...She can’t be saved.” Annette paused to hold back the tears, “William must be cross-infected with the ν strain, and infected Sherry through the G-embryo. We’re dealing with something new, something beyond the G here.”

“Are you fucking kidding me!? I don’t care about your experiments or viruses!” Claire looked angrily at the camera at the corner on the ceiling, “You’re her mother. Get in here!”

“You don’t understand.” Annette burst into tears, “William is still out there, and if I don’t stop him-”

“This conversation is over!” Claire shouted furiously and scooped Sherry up in her arms.

“Wait!” Annette was conflicted between her role as a scientist and a mother, “Wait...I...There were treatments for the G and vaccines for the ν strain...in my lab. It’s not far away.”

“Mommy...?” Sherry was so weak.

“There’s not enough time...Millions of lives are at stake.” Annette was trying her best to convince herself that she was doing the right thing. She looked at the fading image of her daughter one last time before turning off the monitor, “Sherry...Mommy loves you, sweetie...Goodbye.”

“Screw you...Sherry, don’t worry. I will get you whatever you need, OK?” Claire held Sherry in her arms gently to comfort her.

“Why...why are you doing this?” Enduring the pain all over her body, Sherry asked a question, the answer to which she was desperately hoping to hear from someone.

“Because I care.” Claire smiled.

“Thank you, Claire.”