Miss Rika finished checking the last person and stood up. She frowned and turned to me. "Did you realize that someone is missing from here? The team that went inside the mansion should have even members, not odds."
"Yeah, there is no way I would miss it." I looked at the corpses.
There was one person missing... or rather two if we counted Leon.
"I think we found the traitor." I added.
Miss Rika nodded. "Yeah, let's move again. We need to find a trace of the remaining member, both Leon and that traitor."
***
Moving on, we found no trace on the surface so we moved to the basement. There was no other choice.
But there was something I wanted to do before going into that hole. Something that I needed to do to get rid of the uneasiness I felt since entering the mansion.
"Miss Rika," I said and stopped.
She looked at me with a raised eyebrow and asked. "What's wrong? Why did you stop?"
Instead of answering her question, I took a deep breath and pointed at one direction.
There was a pistol covered in blood near the wall, and it was lying in a puddle of dried blood.
I recognized it.
"That gun belonged to Leon." I said, taking the gun into my hands.
Miss Rika took the gun and inspected it for a second.
"This is definitely Leon's gun." She nodded. "And this is..."
She wiped away the dried blood and checked the remaining bullet. She frowned after she finished checking and turned to me again. "He shot once. The blood on the floor might not belong to him but his attacker. He is still alive and there is no sign that he was injured. The attacker is the one that got shot. We can be certain that Leon is still alive and in a condition to fight before he got captured."
I nodded and looked at the trail on the floor. There were two trails leading to the same place and they stopped in the middle of the corridor. One trail looked like someone was running, while the other looked like someone was limping.
"Let's follow the trail." I suggested and Miss Rika nodded in approval.
We followed the trail to the basement. There was no sign of zombies, just a few dead Cerberus and Lickers. As we walked deeper into the basement, we reached a room filled with glass tubes filled with water.
It was a strange sight to see, especially when the water was dark and murky and the tubes looked dirty.
Some broken monitors hung on the ceiling and some wires hung from them.
There was a stench coming from the room. A smell similar to rotten meat mixed with chemicals. It wasn't a pleasant odor but it didn't bother me much. It just reminded me of a hospital lab or something.
The room itself seemed pretty big and it had many doors leading to other areas of the mansion.
But the most important part of the room was the big monitor in the center.
"It's been broken intentionally." Miss Rika commented.
The monitor had a hole on it, probably because it was punched.
Miss Rika touched the hole and looked around the area.
"This is a tough screen. Not something you can punch normally." She added and I nodded in agreement. "Yeah, and there is no trace that someone used a blunt weapon to break the monitor."
We looked around the area and noticed something else.
There were two holes in the ceiling, big enough for someone to climb up.
"They used the ventilation duct." Miss Rika concluded. "There are some marks on the wall and ceiling, it's hard but we can do it. Though I don't think we should follow them."
"Yeah, I agree."
It was too dangerous to follow them.
"We should return and-"
Just as I was about to finish, I heard a beeping sound. It wasn't loud so I missed it when I first heard it but after hearing it again I knew it was real.
Without hesitation, I grabbed Miss Rika and carried her.
"What are you-"
"Stay still." I said in a serious tone and bolted out of this broken laboratory.
Then I ran through the hallway to the surface. I kept on running even as Miss Rika protested and demanded that I stop. I ignored her, focused on getting away from the danger.
Light shone in front of us. The exit was in sight and I felt tremor from under my feet.
Following that, a loud explosion rang and a blast wave sent us flying forward. The mansion blew into pieces behind us as I jumped up high into the air.
"Shit, shit, shit." I cursed under my breath and hugged Miss Rika tight in my arm.
We crashed on a tree and bounced down a rough stone before I landed hard on the ground. A sharp pain spread from my back and my head was hit with a blunt force.
I looked down and sighed in relief seeing Miss Rika safe.
However, my body wasn't in that great of a condition. Bruised and bleeding, I could feel a sharp pain coming from my left leg and arm.
"Are you okay?" I asked Miss Rika, who was panting heavily.
She nodded, looking at the destroyed mansion in shock before turning to me again.
"That's my question. Are you okay?"
I shrugged. "It's nothing major. I'm fine. Just some bruises and scratches. But I'm worried about you."
Miss Rika rolled her eyes but nodded nonetheless. She moved away from me and dusted her clothes.
"I'll contact HQ," she said as she took out a communication device. "Let them know we're alive."
"Good idea." I laughed wryly.
***
Leon coughed up blood as he was thrown into the corner of the small dark cell. He realized his hand was bound by metal and a chain connected to the wall.
"Fuck. Where is this?" He mumbled as he struggled against his restraint, his eyes narrowed.
Dust and dirt fell on top of him from the ceiling, but the chain didn't even budge. It was too tight.
He gritted his teeth in anger and looked around him.
He was trapped inside a cell, a cell with a heavy iron door with a barred window.
From what he could see, this was an old underground prison. There were no lights and the only illumination came from the dim sunlight coming from the small hole in the ceiling.
Because he could only see the sunlight, it meant he wasn't that far away from Arklay mountain. Either that or a day had passed since he fell unconscious. And judging by the throbbing pain in his head, it was more likely that he had been knocked out for hours.
But that was the least of Leon's worries at the moment.
"Fuck." He cursed under his breath and looked at the chains binding him.
It only rattled loudly and didn't even break from his effort. No matter how hard he pulled it, the chain stayed firm and strong.
It was time to give up.
Leon sat down with his back against the wall, trying to recall what had happened before he ended up in this situation.
'Wesker is a traitor.' He remembered the blond man with red eye and a smirk. 'And that girl on the monitor is... Who is she?'
He couldn't remember anything else besides those two facts.
Everything else after that was blurry in his memory. His mind went completely blank as if someone wiped all his memories clean.
'Shit. Shit, shit. This is not good at all. What am I going to do?' He cursed in his mind, unable to think straight.
Then suddenly he heard footsteps.
***
Advanced chapters in my pat reon / DungeonLove