Chapter 36
Ada Wong crawled away from the smoking wreckage on her hands and knees and slowly got to her feet. The fire burned brightly, the incredible heat pressing against her like a physical force. She shielded her eyes and gazed upon the flaming remains of the hangar.
“Jesus,” she whispered.
She took in the scene for a few moments before retreating farther away from the agonizing heat of the fire. She staggered slightly, head pounding, and maneuvered her way through the field of debris to a safer area, far from the flames.
She was so surprised to be alive that she wasn't sure what to do next. As it turned out, several large shipping containers were stacked behind the hangar, old rusted ones that were retired from active use but were apparently used by the railroad yard as regular storage. When Ada dove out of the window in the initial moment of the blast, she fell onto one and then miraculously tumbled right in between two of them stacked beside each other, knocking herself unconscious in the process. When the hangar exploded, the shipping containers absorbed the majority of the blast, caving in like enormous tin cans.
When Ada regained consciousness, she found herself cramped into a dark space about three feet wide, created when the shipping containers folded over sideways. The explosion knocked them over like a house of cards, but when they caved in, the narrow space remained in between them. Incredibly, Ada's body was protected from the shockwave as well as the incinerating heat.
At first, she considered herself lucky to be alive. But now that she got her first look at the smoldering crater, she realized that surviving such a devastating blast must have taken more than a miracle. She certainly hadn't expected to survive the explosion, and now that she saw just how tremendous it truly was, she wondered how she was still alive at all.
She wasn't completely uninjured, though. For starters, she couldn't hear a thing. Her ears rang as if she had just left a heavy metal concert. And she was fairly certain she suffered a concussion in the fall. But given the alternatives, she felt great.
Catching movement out of the corner of her eye, Ada looked up to see a white pickup truck drive along the edge of the railroad yard. She crouched down behind a cement platform off to the side of the hangar and watched as the truck slowed to a stop.
Leon sat in the driver's seat, looking toward the burning hangar. Looking for her, Ada guessed. She could just about make out the other two passengers in the truck as well, and smiled to herself to see that all three of them had survived the explosion.
Leon only waited a few moments, and then drove the truck slowly along the train tracks and gradually out of sight. When it was gone, Ada stood back up and slowly walked down the tracks in the other direction.
She felt a strange sense of satisfaction, knowing that Leon and the others survived as well. She debated the feeling for a little while, because it was such an unfamiliar sensation, and she couldn't exactly put her finger on what it was. She felt happy, which didn't happen much these days.
It wasn't often that Ada had the opportunity, or the inclination, to actually help someone other than herself. But it made her feel good to know that Leon, Claire, and Sherry all survived, and that she helped make it happen. She felt proud of herself, and for the first time in years, actually felt as if she had actually done something meaningful with her life.
She smiled to herself. “You're getting soft in your old age, Emily,” she muttered.
As she crossed the row of smaller office buildings and reached the end of the train yard, she turned to look back at the remains of the hangar. She would remember this. Whenever she began to doubt herself or her motives, or wonder about the morality of her actions, she would look back and know that at least one time, she did the selfless thing and tried to save someone else. Leon, Claire, and Sherry were safe thanks to her, and that counted for something.
She wondered if little Sherry had the slightest clue about what had really happened. Ada herself hadn't figured it out at all until she learned Sherry's name, and once she realized where she had seen the little girl before, everything else seemed to fall into place. Sherry's picture was in Ada's confidential dossier, along with the pictures of the Umbrella employees and other people of interest to Ada's employers. Somehow, Ada had crossed paths with the daughter of two high-ranking Umbrella employees, both of which were on her watch list.
The crazy woman in the underground lab was Sherry's mother, although Ada hadn't realized that until much later. And if Ada's guess was right, and she was fairly sure that it was, the mutated monster that nearly killed them was none other than William Birkin himself, Sherry's father. Ada could barely fathom the bizarre chain of coincidences that must have taken place to get all of them in the same place at the same time like that.
Her thoughts wandered as she watched the hangar burn itself out. The flames seemed to flicker and move, and Ada slowly realized that the flames actually were moving. But it wasn't the flames after all.
Something inside the inferno was moving.
Ada stared in utter disbelief as a shape crawled from the fire, moving along the ground with one arm, smoke steaming from the charred body. One burned, twisted arm pulled a mangled torso through the debris, and only one detail showed through the blackened skin. An eyeball, hideous and yellow, emerged from the flesh, a blood-red pupil scanning the area in front of it.
“Oh my God ….” Ada whispered.
William Birkin was still alive.
Ada turned and ran away from the train yard, her head spinning. She went through a narrow parking lot behind some more buildings at the edge of the property and emerged onto a dark side street lined with parked cars. Not knowing which way to go, she turned left and continued down the street until she reached the next intersecting avenue, a four-lane street that seemed to head toward the outskirts of the city.
Ada walked out into the middle of the street and onto the grass median, under a streetlight, and looked around uncertainly. She had no idea how long it would take Birkin to heal enough to pursue her, or if he would pursue her at all. But her first through was to create as much distance as possible between her and him.
“Stop,” said a nearby voice.
Ada froze for a split-second, almost feeling that she had imagined the voice. When she turned around, Ada found herself staring down the barrel of a combat shotgun. The person holding it was a burly-looking Caucasian man with a buzz cut and a square jaw. He glared at her over the top of the shotgun, his eyes narrowed, finger on the trigger.
“Don't shoot me,” Ada said simply.
“Why not?” the man asked.
“Because I'm not infected.”
“I can see that.”
“Do you need another reason?”
“Maybe I do.”
They stared each other down for a few moments, giving Ada some time to study her opponent. Whoever he was, he wasn't some civilian. He held the shotgun like he knew exactly how to use it, and his stance hinted at military training. He wore ill-fitting jeans and a green hooded sweatshirt, but he had on black army boots.
“What was that explosion?” the man asked.
“Propane tankers,” Ada answered. “I blew them up.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. I was trying to kill something.”
“Looks like you succeeded.”
Ada managed a smile and shook her head ever so slightly, keeping her eyes fixed on the man. “Actually, I didn't succeed. It's still alive. So I suggest we get moving, before it comes after us.”
The man did not react at first, and then turned to look down the street Ada had come from. Seeing nothing, he glanced back at her, debating whether or not to believe her. Then, surprisingly, he lowered the shotgun and stepped toward her, limping badly.
“Come on then,” he said gruffly.
“You're hurt?”
“Yes.”
Two blocks down the avenue, much to Ada's relief, they found a car that still had th
e keys inside. The man got into the passenger seat, grimacing in pain when he bent his leg, and propped the shotgun up in his lap. Ada started the car, backed away from the traffic jam in front of it, and drove up onto the sidewalk.
It wasn't far to the outskirts of the city, and before long Ada drove along a street that edged the woods, passing signs that indicated that the main highway was just up ahead.
“Stop here,” the man said suddenly.
“Why?”
Ada did as she was told, and stopped the car along the side of the road. The man put his hand on the door handle and looked at her.
“We can't drive all the way out of the city,” he explained. “There’s roadblocks. The only way to get out is on foot. I was going to head into the mountains.”
“You don't want to get caught at a roadblock?” Ada asked.
“I have my reasons.”
He opened the door and got out of the car, using the shotgun as a crutch. He crossed the gully at the side of the road and started into the woods.
“I think I'll join you,” Ada said, getting out of the car. “I have my reasons as well.”
The man eyed her suspiciously and then shrugged, deciding that he really didn't care. Ada used the car keys to open the trunk and found what she was looking for. There was a flashlight, as well as blankets and other emergency supplies. The man waited up as Ada came into the woods after him, crunching through leaves. The trees ahead were dark and foreboding, but Ada flipped on the flashlight, so they could at least see where they were headed.
“So what's your name?” the man asked as they made their way into the forest.
“Vanessa Cooper. How about you?”
The man seemed to consider the question, as if he wasn't sure of the answer. He finally shrugged again and replied, “My name's Ted.”