Small progress, far from done

Sherry stood up and walked out from the cover. She glanced around every corner to make sure they were safe, even when a lady with a gun was standing right in front of her and gently holding her hand. She looked up at Claire while a slight smile flickered over her innocent face.

“Can you help me find my mom?” She asked hopefully.

“Your mom is in the station?” Claire didn’t feel good as she knew what the hell was going on in here.

“No...She’s somewhere under the station...I think.” Sherry’s voice was getting low as if she’s feeling down, “She’s working at Umbrella. She’s making an important new medicine.”

“Umbrella? That big pharmaceutical company?”

“My mom’s always at work. I don’t get to see her much.” Sherry lowered her head and looked at Claire’s hand that holding hers, “When those monsters showed up, I came to the police station to find help. But the officers...they...Since then, I’ve been looking for a way to get down there to find my mom.”

“Well, don’t worry. I’ll help you find her.” Claire smiled.

“Sher...ry...”

A distant, haunting voice calling Sherry’s name circled into the tunnel. The voice was so twisted that whoever made that was in terrible pain. Sherry, contrast to Claire being suspicious and horrified, seemed to be nervous and anxious to hear that, and ran towards the ventilation shaft behind the locker.

“Sherry, wait!” Claire chased up but failed to reach her as she was crawling into the vent.

“That’s my dad! He must’ve have been attacked by those monsters! I have to help him!” Sherry’s voice echoed in the vent as she was going deeper.

However, after a few turns and climbing up a ladder, she actually dropped from the ceiling into the interrogation room. Claire could see her through the one-way mirror while she couldn’t. Sherry was a little discomfort at first but the moment she saw the unicorn medallion on the desk, she realized that this was the room that Claire has been trying to get into.

“Claire...are you still out there?” She’s terrified to be alone again.

“I’m here!” Claire yelled while pounding on the door.

She even tried to shoot at the mirror but it was bulletproof. The vent was too small for her to crawl in, of course, but luckily she found a pair of flame rounds in the locker beside her. Well, by all available means she could not get in the room.

Sherry also failed to unlock the door. She clearly couldn’t go back the way she came in, so her only way out was another ventilation shaft on the other side of the room. But before she tried to leave, she grabbed the unicorn medallion on the desk, and a folded paper beneath it. The folded paper, fortunately, turned out to be a map of the underground tunnels, which marked the secret passage under the goddess statue and some major repair pipelines.

“Claire! Take this!” Sherry squeezed the medallion and the map through the gap under the door, “I can follow the pipelines to go underground! My mom might be there!”

“Hey! Sherry! Don’t go alone!”

As far as Claire’s concerned, Sherry was perfectly safe in this interrogation room, where basically no vampires could get in. There might be time for her to find a key somewhere in the station and reunite with Sherry. But the little girl was too **** to find her mom that she went into vent, ignoring Claire’s appeal.

“Oh my god...” Claire looked at the medallion in her hand and sighed anxiously.

She opened the map and surprisingly found out that the secret passage in the main hall could potentially lead them to a underground facility before getting to the parking lot, which meant that she might catch up with Sherry there. Without further ado, Claire ran out the tunnel, returned to the art room, where there were radio signals, and called Leon.

“Leon? Are you there?” She nervously waited for him to respond.

“Claire? What’s wrong?” Finally Leon replied. He was breathing heavily, sounded like he has just been through some crazy shit.

“I found the unicorn medallion you’re looking for here. You got any luck there?” She kept walking back to the main hall.

“Yeah, I have the maiden medallion. We can open the tunnel in the main hall now!” He yelled in excitement, “Did you find the little girl?”

“She helped me find the medallion, actually. We’re separated now, but I think the secret tunnel can lead us to her.” She answered with confidence.

“OK. Return to the main hall. I’ll be there in a minute. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“Agreed.”

In two minutes she got back to the main hall and placed the unicorn medallion on the panel. The second lock was unlocked and an white door was in front of her. She could feel warm wind breezing through the gaps, which was enough proof for her that this secret passage could lead them outside.

After another two minutes she saw Leon rushing out from the library. She could see the happiness on his face, which was a rare thing since every time they met tonight hasn’t turned out good. Leon put the the maiden medallion on the lock, finally opening the secret tunnel. Behind the door was a stair leading into the darkness. They did’t know what’s under there, but surely it was better than here.

“Right, let’s-”

Before Leon could finish the sentence, the shutter door on the east side was completely crushed. A giant humanoid creature, nearly 8 feet tall, with three tentacles coming from its mouth and hands and with green vines covering it body, walked out slowly. Leon seemed to be more anxious than usual when he saw that thing.

“Jesus. That thing again? And it’s...bigger...” Claire worriedly grabbed the grenade launcher.

“You’ve met it before?” Leon was shocked.

“I thought I’ve burnt down that son of a bitch in the east office.” Claire loaded one of her remaining two flame rounds with her hands a bit shaking, “How could it still be alive?”

Leon aimed at the monster and fired. The bullet blew a big hole in its head, burnt the tissues around it. The monster screamed at the two of them and started approaching, while the wound on its head was slowly regenerating. Claire was astonished that the bullet Leon fired was more powerful than normal ones, though still not effective enough to kill it. Looked like she needed to do it the old way.

“Try this again!” Claire pulled the trigger and fired a flame round.

To their surprise, the monster swept its tentacle so swiftly that it deflected the flame round into the wall behind it. In the fiery light, it looked like a invincible devil. Claire had only a round left, which could be their last chance to defeat it. It must have some kind of core in under the vines in its body that wasn’t totally destroyed last time. Maybe this time...

Leon pulled out the shotgun and looked at Claire, while she was also looking back at him.