Try to fight it

“I'm tired of running away.” Claire loaded her grenade with acid rounds and aimed at the creature, “Dustin, shoot those tentacles! Let’s deal with it here! Sam, you go check that control panel for the tunnels!”

“Al-Alright.” Sam nodded and quickly ran to the wall behind them. She shivered as the tentacle monster let out a horrific scream and started to approach them. She was still not used to this kind of scene, even though she had witnessed enough horror tonight.

“I got you.” Dustin switched to his magnum pistol.

With the teamwork they managed to cut off all three tentacles of that monster, while Sam successfully opened the secret passage. Claire fired the acid round, though it effectively repelled the creature and melted down its vines, it’s not enough to surpass its regenerating rate. That tentacle creature was even stronger than the last time she saw it. How was that possible?

“I got an idea. How many acid rounds do you have?” Dustin checked the magazine of his magnum.

“Two. Why?” Claire asked confusedly.

“See the green button there? That should open the picture window behind it.” Dustin pointed a button on the wall beside the window, “If we keep pushing it back to the window, maybe we can drop it into the zoo.”

“Good enough...” Claire focused on aiming at the creature.

With another acid rounds Claire managed to stun it. Dustin took the chance to rush towards the wall and pressed the button. The picture window was swiftly lowering.

A cold breeze swept in the room and everything seemed to be more intense. Claire fired again and pushed the creature out of the window, however, it used the remaining one of its half-regenerated tentacles to grab the edge and prevented itself from falling.

Dustin got close to it and tried to shoot the tentacle. But when he was about to fire, the creature whipped its tentacle at Dustin and wrapped his leg with it. Without any support it fell down the cliff, but also pulling him down with it. Dustin’s scream echoed in the valley and faded away.

“Dustin!” Claire cried anxiously and rushed towards the window. She looked down but only saw the deep, dark rift between the facility and the zoo. The chance of surviving the fall was...slim.

“Oh, no...” When Sam saw Claire turning around with a mournful look, she helpless sat beside the wall and sobbed with her head in her arms. Dustin had been protecting her for the last few hours, and he just died protecting them.

“Come on, Sam.” Claire came over and tried to help her up.

“It’s my fault, isn’t it?” Sam sounded about to break into tears and stayed down, “If I hadn’t asked him to come with me...”

“He wouldn’t have left you alone, you know.” Claire knelt down and patted Sam’s head with a sad smile, “He would’ve hoped you to survive, too. We can’t waste the chance he gave us.”

“How could you do it, Claire? How could you keep going after everything that happened?” Sam couldn’t help crying.

“Because that’s all we can do. My parents were gone when I was young. I grew up with my brother. ” Claire softly wiped her tears on her face, “For so many times we thought it’s just us against the world, but never for once did we think of running away. We just had to beat everything in our ways and moved forward.”

“But I’m so scared...” Sam looked at Claire, sobbing.

“I’m scared, too. It’s OK to be scared. But together we can beat this, too.” Claire stood up and once again reached out her hand, “We must keep going, Sam.”

“I...I’ll try...” Sam took her hand and got up.

“Yeah. Come on, let’s leave this place.” Claire looked at the secret tunnel and took a deep breath. She didn’t know where it would lead them to, but all they could do was to move forward, just like old times.

It took them several minutes to finish the walk and reach to end of the tunnel. After rolling the portable square crank on the side, the wall in front of them lowered and the exit was revealed. It was a room with an interrogation desk, opened vent shafts both on the ceiling and at the corner. Claire immediately recognized that this was the room where Sherry and she found the unicorn medallion.

“Was here...the police station?” Sam looked at the desk and wondered.

“Yeah...Which means that I’ve been circling around.” Claire walked in the room and found the heart sign only on the inner side of the door, “Although, there is something I want to check on.”

Claire took the portable crank from the wall and used the heart key to unlock the door. They followed the tunnel and, without encountering any danger, climbed the ladder at the end of it to get back to the art room. Luckily this room was still free of vampires. They cautiously walked out into the corridor and found another shutter, just as she remembered. After the shutter was lifted, a new area of the station was opened to them - the corridor outside of the chief’s office.

The chief’s office was locked behind a heart door, which could be easily unlocked by Claire now. They got into the room and was astonished at its exquisite decoration. Not only did it have art photos on the walls, but it also had stuffed animals all over the place. There was even a small room behind the office, where more giant stuffed animals were put in glass cases.

Claire casually picked up a book on a table in the office and found out that it was a taxidermy log. It recorded a white-tailed deer captured in the Arklay mountains, a Siberian tiger captured in Khabarovsk Krai and a pig. The former two were very detailed, however, the last log was blank, like the officer had planned to, but failed to capture it. She also found a parking garage key card in the private collection room, which could be useful.

“Hey Claire! I think you can use this!” Sam opened a drawer and found a submachine gun in it.

“Yeah. It might be handy.” Claire took it and had a look. It was an MQ 11 with extremely high rate of fire, which would be helpful if she was facing a large amount of enemies.

It was at this moment the telephone on the desk rang and scared the hell out of the girls. Claire almost shot it with the submachine gun, had it loaded. The phone kept ringing, so Claire decided to pick it up.

“Hello?”

“Good to see you again, Claire.” The fat man she encountered before, police chief Brian Irons, was on the other side of the phone. How he could “see” her was unknown, “We’ve got unfinished business.”

“What are you talking about?” Claire tried to remain calm.

“Don’t waste my fucking time!” Chief Irons yelled angrily, “Bring me the pendant or Sherry dies.”

“The pendant? What do you need it for?” Claire took the golden pendant out of her pocket and stared at it confusedly.

“Do you want the girl to die?” Irons calmly threatened her.

“Fine. Where are you?” Suppressing her anger she asked very politely.

“The orphanage.”

“The orphanage...? Where’s that?”

“In the neighborhood. You’ll find it.”

“Is Sherry alright?”

“For now.”

“I swear, you bastard, if you hurt her-” Irons hung up the phone before she could finish, “Damn it! Just you wait, asshole!”

“Who...who’s that?” Sam quivered as it was the first time she saw Claire in pure rage.

“Some crazy son of a bitch.” Claire furiously grabbed the ammo on the desk and loaded the submachine gun, like she was going to shoot the man with it into pieces, “Sam, you said you sister did a part-time job in an orphanage, right? How do we get there from here?”

“Well, it’s actually between the factory and the police station. Two blocks away, northeast, I think.”

“OK...Sam, there’s a little girl named Sherry. She was captured by that crazy man, and I need to go save her.” Claire tried her best to calm down, “I think you should stay in here. It’s safe in this room. And after I find the girl, I’ll-”

“No way! I’m going with you. Please, don’t leave me behind.” Sam shook her head, “Besides, Steph might have left some clues there...”

“I’m not leaving you behind. That man is dangerous!”

“Then let me help you! We’re friends, right?” Sam was a bit anxious, but still grabbed a folding cutter knife on the desk, “I...I can use a knife!”

“Uh...OK...” Claire sighed with a smile, “Just don’t be reckless, alright?”

“Speak for yourself...” Sam laughed to ease the tension.

There was another door at the west side of the room, which led them through a balcony before reaching an elevator. By using the key card, it brought them to the parking garage of the police station. The gate out, however, was already opened. There’s nothing else to stop them from leaving the station now.

Claire noticed a burning SWAT van at the other side of the garage, in front of a big hole on the wall. Looked like it had crashed something into the wall, but whatever that was was long gone now. She didn’t pay much attention to it, though, as her priority was to save Sherry.

Sherry, just hold on. I’m coming, Claire thought, and walked into the rain with determination.