Chapter 3
William Birkin spent most of his time in the mansion’s extensive library and research center. He could burn through a 400-page advanced chemistry textbook in two days, sometimes stopping to take notes, but usually not bothering. There wasn’t much the books had to offer him that he didn’t already know. The biology books were more informative, since Birkin’s scientific background was more chemical than biological, and in particular, the cellular biology textbooks gave him a wealth of new information. The library at the mansion was much better suited to his interests than the libraries at his high school and the two colleges he’d attended. He was already coming up with new theories about how to combine his work in chemistry with what he was learning in cellular biology.
When he was a child, Birkin was a classic example of the nerdy kid in his neighborhood. When his schoolmates were saving up their allowances to buy a skateboard or new baseball mitt, young William saved his allowance to buy a chemistry set. The other kids on his block rode their bikes ten blocks to the local comic book shop, but Birkin walked seventeen blocks to the local library, where he could learn more about science. From the age of four, he knew what he was going to be when he grew up.
Although his grades in History and English were below average, in Science and Mathematics he was the first in his class. For his fifth-grade science fair, while other children were making vinegar-and-baking soda volcanoes and cheap electromagnets, Birkin duplicated the famous 1953 experiment by Stanley Miller (based on the work of Harold Urey, John Haldane, and Aleksander Oparin) where amino acids were created out of a simple mixture of hydrogen, water, methane, and ammonia. Needless to say, he won the science fair.
He graduated high school at fourteen and college at seventeen, and spent a year doing post-graduate work at the University of Chicago (the same school Stanley Miller had performed his experiment at) before Umbrella contacted him. They offered a healthy paycheck and the ability to pursue whatever research he wanted, and he gladly accepted the offer.
He turned the page of the scientific journal he was reading and was awakened from his study when someone knocked on his door. It surprised him that anyone wanted to see him. Since his arrival at the mansion a week before, the only person who talked to him was Dr. Marcus.
He got off his bed and opened the door. In the hallway, looking to the left and right as if worried someone would see him, was the other teenager at the mansion, Albert Wesker. As always, his sunglasses were on. Birkin had yet to see him without them.
“Hey, what is it?” Birkin asked.
“Can I come in?” Wesker asked.
Birkin, surprised at the request, opened the door wider, allowing Wesker to make his way inside. He quickly scanned the room and sighed. Birkin closed the door.
“Can I do something for you?” he asked.
“So what do you think of this place?” Wesker asked, instead of answering. He crossed his arms and leaned against Birkin’s desk, which was currently covered in a pile of papers and books opened to bookmarked pages.
Birkin sat back on his bed and stretched his legs out, putting the journal back in his lap. “Seems like pretty much what I expected. A bunch of uptight losers with Masters degrees who think that somehow makes them smarter than me.”
“What about Marcus?”
“Gives me the creeps, to be honest. Seemed pretty nice when I first met him, but I think he’s got some issues.”
Wesker nodded. “Have you seen that astronomy tower out back?”
Birkin smiled and nodded as well, keeping his eyes on the text in front of him. “There must be an elevator inside it. He’s got a secret underground lab, doesn’t he?”
“That’s the way I look at it. I already know there are science labs underneath the mansion. It’s where all the work is done once we finish training. The question is whether that lab connects to the others.”
“I have no idea,” Birkin said.
Wesker sighed again, visibly frustrated by something. He looked out the window at the night sky. “So you’re only eighteen, huh?”
At that, Birkin could not resist laughing out loud. “I knew it!” he exclaimed. Wesker turned and glared at him, but Birkin didn’t care. He snapped the journal closed and tossed it next to him. “I knew that’s why you came to see me!”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Wesker said quickly, defensively.
“I could see it in your face the first time I met you,” Birkin said, a wide grin on his face. “When Marcus told you how young I was, it looked like he’d just punched you in the stomach!”
“Just surprised, that’s all.”
“You thought you were the youngest one here?”
“Of course I did.”
“Does it hurt to know you’re not?”
Even behind the dark sunglasses, Birkin could almost see Wesker’s eyes as they glowed in anger. It was almost funny to see someone as controlled and reserved as Wesker on the verge of losing his cool. Birkin was observant enough to know that for some people, their cool is all they have to fall back on.
“Don’t worry about it,” Birkin said, softening the blow. “I don’t think anyone else knows how old either of us is. Marcus hasn’t announced our ages in class or anything.”
“The other guys know we’re younger, though.”
“Yeah, so who cares which of us is the youngest? They’re jealous of both of us.”
“You’ve noticed that?”
“I’m not blind.” When Wesker didn’t respond, Birkin continued. “All that ‘unity’ crap that Marcus talked about won’t mean a thing, you know. Those other guys aren’t gonna treat us as equals. To them, we’re just a couple of punk kids. They won’t cooperate with us.”
“Well, who says we have to cooperate with them?” Wesker asked.
“I think Marcus would.”
Wesker shook his head. “Marcus won’t make us do anything. He knows that you and me are the smartest people here. Those other guys are just taking up space as far as he’s concerned.”
“You think so?”
“No one else in that class can compete with us.”
Birkin thought about it. He was no expert at gauging other people’s intelligence and did not claim to be. But in the few days he had been at the mansion, he could already sense how he and Wesker were on a different intellectual wavelength than the other trainees. He didn’t know what it was, precisely. Maybe something in the way they talked, in the way they approached the subject matter, their opinions on what was discussed in class. It was hard to pinpoint where the difference lay, but it was what separated people who were interested in science from those who loved it.
Some of the other men at the mansion seemed to view chemistry and biology as their job. It was a career, not a lifestyle. Science was how they made their living, but after the job was done, they did something else for fun and recreation. For Birkin, science was the recreation that he also happened to make money at. He had no other hobbies. He lived his work.
He didn’t think it was that intense for Wesker, but even Wesker, in his own self-important, arrogant way, loved the science as much as Birkin did. They just approached their love affair from different angles.
“So what does all this mean?” Birkin asked after a few moments. Wesker was right, but did being right amount to anything worthwhile? Did it change their situation?
“We have an insight,” Wesker said, tapping his temple with a forefinger. “We have the advantage over the others. We know that we’ve been chosen for better things.”
“I don’t see where you’re going with this.”
“I’m saying that we don’t have to play their game. They aren’t training us, they’re just testing us. Marcus is testing all the new employees to see how they fit into the hierarchy, that’s all this is. It’s a stress test.”
“So how does that change things? We still have to pass the test, don’t we?”
; “We’ve already passed it,” Wesker said, “Because we figured it out. Tomorrow, I’m going down into the labs and getting started with what I want to do. I’m not even going to class anymore.”
“You’re taking a risk,” Birkin said, wondering if Wesker was even being serious. If he was, then he was even more arrogant than Birkin thought he was.
“Marcus is looking for leaders. Going to class just makes us followers. We’re still young, we haven’t been tamed by the establishment. All those losers out there have been institutionalized. They’re accepting the pattern because they’re used to it.”
Birkin studied his new compatriot, the only peer he had. Wesker was smart, maybe as smart as Birkin was, but he was rebellious, and he was making a whole mess of assumptions about Marcus’ intentions and Birkin’s judgment. Wesker was the one who hadn’t been tamed, he was the one thinking outside the box. Birkin never considered skipping his training or jumping ahead without explicit permission from Marcus.
“So why are you telling me this?” he asked. “Why not just skip the training yourself and leave me up here with the others? It would make you look better than me.”
Wesker spread his hands. It was involuntary body language, a gesture that he was not carrying any weapons. It meant he wanted to be trusted. “I’m just giving you a chance. You’re like me, I wanted to let you know.”
“You won’t do it without me.”
Wesker’s hands dropped. “Even if I’m right, if you don’t come along, Marcus might think I jumped the gun.”
“He’ll think you were getting too greedy, you mean.”
“Are you coming or not?”
Birkin took a breath and rubbed his chin. Did he really want to keep attending those lame training sessions when there was more important work to be done? Wesker was undoubtedly right about the two of them being smarter than the others, and he was probably right about Marcus’ expectations of them. He could get started on his own work tomorrow, and who knew what kind of research materials would be available in the labs that were not available in the library here in the upper part of the mansion? There was so much more to learn.
“All right,” he said finally. “I’ll do it.”