Resident Evil: Exodus - The Tale of Elza Walker

Chapter 12 - Reptile

ASIDE - Download and read the complete novel at your leisure by cutting and pasting the link below in your Internet browser!
https://www.mediafire.com/file/f7o02jbrx2pszp6/exodus_revised_draft_v501.rar/file

--------------------

The first thing Elza saw and heard as she entered the Main Pump Room was the giant spider coming through the grate at its far end. The last thing the giant spider saw or felt was the nine-millimeter bullet from Elza's SiG Sauer P228. It hit square in the middle of its small head, almost dead center of its eye cluster, then ripped through the thorax and sternum before it punched a large exit hole out the other side and sailed on down the vent. The giant spider promptly flopped to the floor, tumbling as it did, its legs flailing wildly as the now-lifeless body went through its death throes. She heard the second grate open ahead and to her right, and whirled about, firing even as she completed her rapid turn. A second spider had started to emerge from another wall vent, mounted directly behind and to one side of the housing for a large industrial-sized pump assembly which dominated and split the room. The giant spider let out a wail and flopped down, having only gotten halfway through the vent, its forelimbs flailing and the rear ones rattling inside the vent behind it. One more shot from Elza and its struggling ceased.

The presence of the Main Pump assembly, which started at the back wall to the right of the door and took up most of the middle of the room, meant that the only free space for walking was shaped like a giant "U" around it. This space lay between the Main Pump itself and the outer walls of the Main Pump Room. Elza had no choice but to follow this path, as it was the only way around to the room's back corner. She could not see it, for the Main Pump itself blocked both easy access and any view of what might be back there. Elza had long ago tired of having to walk into blind corners and make blind turns, but she didn't have any other choice. With pistol held in a walking carry, she began to make the circuit of the Main Pump Room.

Elza was about halfway down the first leg of the "U," moving alongside the main control panel for the Main Pump, when she heard the sound of faint tapping on concrete. She immediately moved into a firing crouch, and a split-second later the source of the light tapping was revealed. Two long and spindly legs came into view around the far end of the Main Pump housing. She waited until the head came into view around its edge, then fired. The thing was fast and jerked back almost immediately, but not fast enough. It had pumped its front legs as rapidly as it could in its haste to back up, and one of them was shot through as it passed through the space where its head had been a split second before. There was a rapid-fire series of taps from behind the Main Pump as the thing retreated, then they slowed, and finally stopped.

Elza licked her lips. She looked up at the vent in front of her, on the bare wall where the turn in the room's "U" circuit was located, then at the far end of the Main Pump across from it. Any moment now, another spider could pop through that vent. If it did while she was going around the end of the Main Pump so she could get the one in the room with her, then she'd be trapped between them both. She didn't give a thought about the vent at the other end of the room, still blocked as it was by the dead body of the other giant spider. Both the vent that was still open and the giant spider on the other side of the Main Pump were her only concerns. She was going to have to take a chance to get the one with her. With that, she dashed around the end of the Main Pump and opened fire.

Kevin and Rita just about had the last of their group's gear stowed in John's backpack when there came a knock at the storeroom door. "Hey," came a familiar rough voice, "is youse two decent in dere?"

"What do you think?" Rita barked in reply. She was grinning as she did so, and gave Kevin a wink as she continued. "Get your fat ass in here, John, and leave your dirty mind outside."