A Star's Descent

Chapter One: Little Red Riding Hood

A Star's Descent

By evolution-500

Disclaimer: House of the Dead and Resident Evil are properties belonging to SEGA and Capcom respectively. I do not own any of these characters.

Chapter One: Little Red Riding Hood

The rain pattered down onto the forest as a helicopter flew through the skies above.

Barely visible on the Huey's belly were the words 'S.T.A.R.S.- Special Tactics And Rescue Services' along with its famed logo, which featured a collection of its namesake.

Consisting of Alpha and Bravo Teams, the S.T.A.R.S. unit was built to counter terrorist activity within Raccoon City, whether it was cult-based or not.

Though a small and quiet town, Raccoon City was infamous for its crime rate and cult-related murders.

To understand these phenomena, one would have to look at its history.

Although the Umbrella Corporation, a small pharmaceutical company whose products lined the shelves of most consumers, had helped renovate the area, it created a set of problems.

Many of the people that had been living in this region, mostly of lower class status, were unable to keep up with the swift changes that occurred around them and soon found themselves left behind.

To cope with their predicaments, they would turn to one of various different sources for solace, such as alcohol, drugs, religion, and sex. Suicide, while not the norm within the city, was occasionally reported.

Although there were programs that allowed some of these people a chance to get back on their feet, there were those who found themselves unable to even raise their fingers.

Religion was not a problem until the 1990s.

On August 27th, 1996, a cult of devil worshipers slaughtered 15-year-old Michelle Stevenson at the Raccoon City Park at quarter-to-midnight. Witnesses had only watched as the young girl tried to call for help, believing at the time that "it wasn't their place to intervene."

The next morning, rather than celebrating one of the town festivals as was planned and hoped, the populace was chilled to find the girl's body mounted on a small podium near the fountain, surrounded by burnt-out candles and with her heart ritually removed.

Newscasters and journalists started to sensationalize the tragedy, declaring in headlines that Raccoon City had become a haven for occult worshipers and that it was becoming a "morally unfit" place to live in. Interviews with the victim's tearful family served to fuel those feelings of public discontentment. By then, the RPD and the Mayor's Office were faced with an incredibly volatile situation.

Things worsened after an article by Ben Bertolucci from the Raccoon City Press was made public.

Not only were key details revealed about the investigation, but there came terrible suggestions that Stevenson's murder was the only case made known to both police and the public, and that the actual number of ritual murders could in fact be much higher than anticipated.

This new revelation caused a public outrage, which led to public protests and, in some occasions, riots.

Under such circumstances, one would have thought that the person in power would collapse under such strain and check him or herself into the nearest asylum.

However, in a brilliant gesture of political maneuvering, Mayor Michael Warren utilized that outrage to his advantage.

A few days after the protests, he had made the announcement of a special task force being developed within the Raccoon Police Department to not only deal with the city's growing crime rate, but to also keep such a tragedy from reoccurring.