Resident Evil: Underworld Read Free Page A

inhaled and exhaled deeply, relaxing his muscles as best he could, the squeal of brakes coming up fast from behind—
    —and wham, violent motion, a sense of incredible vibration, a second that seemed to stretch for an endless and silent eternity—
    —and the noise coming immediately after— breaking glass and the sound of a tin can being crushed amplified a million times. David was jerked forward and back, heard Rebecca emit a strangled gasp—
    —and it was over, and John was already hitting the gas as David rolled to his knees, raising his Beretta. He shot a look out the back and saw that the sedan was motionless, skewed across the dark street, the front grill and headlamps smashed all to hell. The slumped, shadowy figures behind the spidered glass were as still as the ruined car.
    Not that we fared much better…
    The inexpensive green minivan he’d bought specifically for their ride to the airfield no longer had a bumper, tail lights, a rear license plate—or, he imagined, any possible method for opening the back gate; the door was a warped and crunched-up mass of useless metal.
    No great loss. David Trapp despised minivans, and it wasn’t as though they’d planned on taking it to Europe. The important thing was that they were still alive—and that—for the moment at least—they’d managed to avoid the infinitely long arm of Umbrella’s wrath.
    As they sped away from the wrecked car, David turned and regarded the others, reflexively putting a hand out to help Rebecca up. Since the ill-fated mission to the Umbrella lab on the coast, he’d grown quite attached to the young woman, as had John. The rest of his team hadn’t survived—
    He shook off the thought before it could take hold, and called up to John that they should circle back toward their original destination, staying away from major streets. A bad break that they’d been spotted just as they were leaving—but not all that surprising, however. Umbrella had staked Exeter out two months earlier, right after they’d returned from Caliban Cove. It had only been a matter of time.
    “Nice trick, David,” Leon said. “I’ll have to remember that next time I get chased by Umbrella goons.”
    David nodded uncomfortably. He liked Leon and Claire, but wasn’t so sure how he felt about two more people looking to him for leadership. He could understand it with John and Rebecca, they’d at least been part of the S.T.A.R.S. before—but Leon was a rookie cop from Raccoon and Claire was a college student who just happened to be Chris Redfield’s little sister. When he’d made the decision to break from the S.T.A.R.S. after finding out about their connection to Umbrella, he hadn’t expected to continue leading, hadn’t wanted to—
    —but it wasn’t my decision to make, was it… he hadn’t asked for their allegiance, or offered himself up as decision maker—and it didn’t matter, that was just the way things had turned out. In war, one didn’t always have the luxury of choice.
    David glanced around at the others before staring out the back, watching the homes and buildings slip past in the cold dark. Everyone seemed a bit subdued, always the aftermath of an adrenaline rush. Rebecca was unloading clips and repacking the weapons, Leon and Claire sitting close together across from her, not talking. Those two were usually joined at the hip, and were still as tight as they’d been since David, John, and Rebecca had picked them up just outside of Raccoon less than a month earlier, dirty and damaged and reeling from their run-in with Umbrella. David didn’t think there was a romantic connection there, at least not yet; it was more likely their shared nightmare. Nearly dying together could be quite a bonding experience.
    As far as David knew, Leon and Claire were the only survivors of the Raccoon disaster who knew about Umbrella’s T-Virus spill. The child they’d had with them had only had the faintest idea, although Claire had been very careful to