“Tonight, you’re in for the fight of your life..”

Charlie had a flair for the dramatic. Anything to combat the dry lifelessness of the office. He strived to energize those around him to feel like a valuable and respected member of the team. That was why his coworkers, Eric and Linda, became his best friend and his fiancé, respectively.

“I have good news, and… less good news.”

Charlie stood up, chest puffed, beaming with pride.

“We have the greenlight for Operation Y2K.”

Operation Y2K was the largest security software update in the history of Umbrella. Sure, Y2K was an urban legend that nobody with an ounce of computer literacy would fall for. But, Umbrella’s IT department was pitching itself to stuffy old suits who only cared about money. The name was the only way to get their attention.

“Bad news?” Eric asked.

“They’re not giving us much time” Charlie shrugged.

“How long are we talking?” Eric groaned. He could already tell this was going to hurt.

“I promise it’s doable,” Charlie assured him.

“How fast is doable?” Linda interjected.

She didn’t like the way Charlie gulped. He was beyond awful at lying.

“They need deliverables in a week,” He winced.

“A week?” Eric snapped. “Seven days?”

“Five, actually,” Charlie grimaced. “Work week, remember?”

Eric reeled back in his chair.

“Why on Earth would you agree to that? Have you lost your mind?”

As much as Linda wanted to stick up for Charlie, he was leading them headfirst into several nights of crunch.

“You know how it is,” Charlie stammered. “Bunch of bean counters convinced ‘em that we could do the same job with less money-“

“Yeah, but your job was to make them realize how stupid that is!” Eric announced. “This is the problem with you, Charlie. People walk all over you because you let them through this compulsive need to be the nicest guy in the room!“

Linda kept her head down, playing with the plastic keycard attached to her lanyard.

“Stand up for yourself, man!” Eric continued. “Or don’t. It’s too late now.”

He slumped back down, and Charlie turned to Linda.

“Linda, your thoughts?”

“Look,” She started “The reality is that, no matter what, they expect Operation Y2K in five days. The way I see it, this can go one of three ways…”

“Do go on,” Eric said, an eyebrow raised.

“Well, we can complain and do nothing, losing our funding and jobs. We can try to do things their way and fail, which would at least look better on our monthly report-”

“Or?” Charlie added with a smile.

“Well, say we try this crazy proposal and we succeed, who’s to say the benefits down the line won’t work out for us?”

Eric didn’t respond, folding his arms with a frown. Still, Charlie and Linda knew him very well. The team was all in.

“I’ll get us some coffee,” Charlie announced before slinking out of the room.

Eric cleared his throat, causing Linda to jump. He turned around, his eyes trained on the floor.

“Is everything okay?” Linda threw out, hoping to dispel the tension that swirled around the room like a startled bat.

“He knows.”

“He knows what?”

“About us.”

Linda raised an eyebrow, prompting an exasperated groan from Eric.

“Don’t play dumb.”

“Don’t talk about stuff that doesn’t exist.”

“It did, once.”

The Umbrella Corporation’s annual Christmas party was always a bit of a dire affair. Unless you were a member of the board, you were stuck with tiny hors d’oeuvres and cheap champagne in a cramped hall.

That night had reached a whole new level of misery, as Linda and Charlie had been fighting. Charlie was more preoccupied with keeping up appearances. So it wasn’t long before he disappeared into the crowd, leaving her alone.

Linda tossed back drinks, hoping they’d kill her thoughts. It was on the balcony where she found an also drunk Eric looking out over a derelict part of Raccoon City. His face was swollen and red from crying.

He recounted the previous night. He got his heart broken by ‘The One’. Only, they weren’t. Eric had only taken them on a few unremarkable sounding dates.

Was it because Eric and Linda were both drunk, or because they were both feeling vulnerable? It could have been both column A and B, but their conversation took a quick turn. They were admitting things that they wouldn’t at gunpoint.

Eric started to remind her of Charlie, before they’d had their fight. In her inebriated haze, she imagined the hypothetical world in which she and Eric had dated. What would that look like?

Then, before either of them realized it, they’d kissed. Not the perfunctory little peck that Charlie had given her before. No, this was passionate. So passionate that, before they knew it, she and Eric did more.

Still, that was once, it was over a year ago, and it was something she’d never entertained the thought of again. It didn’t matter.

“If it doesn’t matter,” Eric threw out. “Tell your boyfriend.”

Linda flinched. “You mean fiancè.”

Eric retreated from the confrontation, sulking as he resumed typing.

“I still think he knows,” He tossed over his shoulder. “He knows, and he set up Operation Y2K like this to punish us.”

“Charlie!”

“Yeah. Charlie. Wait, what?”

Eric followed Linda’s gaze over his shoulder, ending up at the entrance where Charlie stood in a daze.

“Hey, buddy, you okay?” Eric asked, gripping his chair as he couldn’t decide whether to stand.

Charlie was speechless, trembling as he stared into space, his skin pale and his hairs standing on end. There were blood stains—some dried on his light-blue work shirt, others wet on his neck and cheek.

After what felt like an eternity, he turned to his coworkers.

“I… I uh—I need you both to come with me…”

The corridors outside had devolved into pure anarchy, gray walls smeared with blood. Anything that wasn’t nailed down had toppled over. All glass had shattered.

“What the hell happened here?” Eric exclaimed. “Did we get hit by terrorists or something?”

Charlie raised his arm, pointing to an injured man, popped near a wall as blood gushed from a tear in his shoulder.

“Did you call someone?” Eric coughed.

“I did. Yeah,” Charlie mumbled back. “I called 911.”

“Great. So, they’re coming?”

Charlie didn’t respond, his gaze stuck on the mutilated man in front of him.

“Charlie, are they coming?”

“I don’t know!” Charlie spun to face Eric, their eyes meeting. “The call might have cut out or something. I don’t know.”

Linda stepped forward. “We can take him to first aid. They can patch him up until we get in contact with a hospital.”

“I’m not touching him!” Eric snapped as he stepped back.

“We can’t do it without you,” Charlie sighed. “We need help-”

“I agree,” Eric retorted. “You do need help—the kind only a psych can give!”

“Eric-”

“I’m serious! Look around you, Charles. This place has gone to hell. Now, I sure as hell don’t want to wait around for whoever, or whatever, got to this guy before we did. Something tells me that’s not going to end well for us.”

Linda stepped between the two men, placing a hand on their chests.

“Stop it! Stop this right now!”

Silence settled over the two men as they lowered their heads like scolded children.

“Eric, if you want to leave so goddamn bad, fine. Go. I don’t give a shit. Charlie, if we’re moving this guy to Sick Bay, we’d better do it now. You get his arms, I’ll get his legs.”

Eric groaned, but joined them. With the weight divided, they lifted the man and started moving. The Sick Bay wasn’t faring any better. All the medical paraphernalia that wasn’t stolen was lying in pieces. They set the man down on a bloodstained examination bed, swiping the detritus aside.

Charlie looked for something they could use.

“No bandages, no antiseptic. Christ, not even a lollipop.”

“Great,” Eric asked the group. “Now, you agree that we need to get out of here.”

Charlie scrunched his face, trying to convey his disagreement without starting another argument.

“And, why would that be?” Eric asked.

Charlie croaked. “I don’t wanna leave this guy alone-”

“And you don’t wanna go out there,” Eric added. Charlie nodded in confirmation.

Eric sighed, folding his arms. “So, what do we do? Wait for them to come for us?”

“We need a minute,” Linda responded.

Eric gave her a solemn look, like he was about to do something desperate.

“Eric, don’t-“

“Charlie,” Eric murmured. “There’s something I have to tell-”

The man on the examination bed awoke with a snarl, wrapping his hands around Linda’s neck.

Linda and her attacker to tumble into the hallway outside. She felt his grip loosen from around her neck. As Linda raised her arms in a half-baked attempt at defending herself, she heard a grunt from inside the Sick Bay. Someone had thrown their arms around her opponent, pulling them inside.

Linda scrambled to her feet as the door slammed shut. She twisted the door handle back and forth, only for the door to remain locked. She shoved her hands in her pockets to try and find her key fob.

Shit, I left it inside!

She called out Eric and Charlie’s names, pressing her ear against the door to listen for their response. All she got was bedlam, as the two men struggled to fight off their ravenous attacker.

Linda knew she needed to help her coworkers, but how? Get help? Find a weapon? Call the cops? Get another key? All possible, but she didn’t have a lot of time.

She broke off into a run, scanning for anything that could help her. How could something like this happen? Was it the apocalypse?

Don’t tell me it’s Y2K.

She was nearing the Security Station. The booth had its bulletproof glass smashed in. The shutters bent and dented with scraps of flesh and nail, like someone was trying to get in.

Linda’s first instinct was to go to the door, only to find it wouldn’t open.

So, she peered over the counter. She saw the guard’s corpse sprawled on the floor, limbs stretched and hanging to his torso by sinewy threads. His jaw dangled in place.

As she climbed over, the stack of closed circuit monitors caught her attention. She wasn’t alone. A lone figure limped through the hallway, fire-axe in hand. His uniform identified him as a Green Thumb, a nickname given to staff who worked in the greenhouse. He dragged a dead body, its shoulder cleaved in half.

He was heading toward her.

So, she threw herself to the floor, clamping a blood-soaked hand over her quivering mouth. Sure enough, harsh rubber boots crunched the nearby glass.

Then, Linda felt something brush against her leg. She spotted the dead security guard. Only, now he was trying to bite into her. It was hard to penetrate her skin when he didn’t have a jaw to apply force. So, he dragged his teeth back and forth across her leg, flopping like a dead fish.

Linda craned her neck to the screens. The Green Thumb was standing opposite the booth. If he put down the axe, and looked over the counter, he’d find his next victim. But, he didn’t. He turned his attention back to the corpse behind him. That was his priority. He continued dragging it away, leaving the trembling Linda to wait.

As soon as it was quiet, she jumped to her feet. With a cry, she stomped the Security Guard’s head into a pulpy pancake of meat and teeth shards.

Linda had made it upstairs, but to where? And where would she go next? She’d never ventured far from the IT office. This entire area was completely new to her. The architecture was elaborate, coupled with opulent furnishings and a luxurious design.

Great. More places for one of these monsters to hide.

She wished she had an opportunity to explore the building. When you worked for Umbrella, you stuck to your section. This was for security and safety reasons.

Plus, there were the shadier reasons. Umbrella made a lot of high-profile efforts to squash any attempts at unionization. Keep workers apart, don’t let them congregate, remove their avenues for communication. These were all tactics to prevent worker strikes.

Unless you were upper management, you spent your eight hour work days with the same few people. She wondered if that played into her relationship with Charlie. It was a great distraction from the ghouls wandering the halls.

Did Charlie know she loved him? Did she tell him enough? He wasn’t a mind-reader.

Walls of hands emerged from the dark to brush at her, causing her to run in the opposite direction.

At least the infected were slow. Whatever their affliction, it had reduced them to their most base functions. One had to wonder what the point was. Why would a company like Umbrella create something like this?

She wasn’t naive. She suspected there was a branch of the company dedicated to weapons manufacturing. This seemed like the most inefficient weapon. The secrets had to exist somewhere in Umbrella’s systems, but there was no way she’d have the clearance to access it.

She froze. Had Charlie accessed this information? Did he know the kind of company they were working for? Did he approve?

Oh God.

She turned to see Charlie, covered in blood as he brandished a blade broken off a paper guillotine.

“Are you okay?” He whispered.

She nodded.

“You scared the living heck outta me, running off like that.”

“I know,” She replied, not elaborating beyond that. What was the point? At least they were together now.

“Where’s Eric?”

“I don’t know,” Charlie responded. “We need to talk, the three of us.”

Linda took a deep breath. No running from this now.

“Look, I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry about what happened between Eric and I, and I’m sorry that I betrayed your trust. It was a complete mistake, and something I have never even thought of doing again.”

She wasn’t sure how she expected Charlie to respond. But she never anticipated his look of bewilderment.

“Charlie, you okay?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Why do you want to talk to Eric and I?”

“To figure out our escape plan.”

Oh shit!

Linda wished for one of the ravenous wraiths to leap out of the dark and finish her off. But, that little mercy never came, as Charlie looked her right in the eye.

“Linda, what happened between you and Eric?”

“A-ha!”

It was Eric inserting himself into the conversation with the grace of an oncoming bus.

“Linda, you need to get away from him, right now!” Eric announced.

“Eric, what the hell happened between you and my fiance?”

She sighed. “It was a mistake I made a year ago when I was drunk.”

“Mistake?” Eric exclaimed.

She ignored him, continuing. “There was no passion. Only anger, and regret.”

“You were angry at me?” Charlie asked with sober earnestness.

“Yeah, Charlie. We were fighting, remember? It was killing me inside, and you were putting on a brave face.”

“Linda.”

“But, you stopped talking to me, even as I was crumbling in front of you. I felt less like a person you loved and more like our relationship was a Tamagotchi you were trying not to kill.”

“That doesn’t make what you did okay.”

“I know it wasn’t.”

“Hey,” Eric chimed in. “Now that we’ve got Linda’s dishonesty out of the way, let’s talk about yours, Chuckles.”

“Excuse me?” Charlie responded.

“Hey, Linda,” Eric called out. “Do you ever wonder about the levels of clearance that Charlie has over us? Charlie might not look it, but he’s an important man.”

“What is he talking about?”

“Nothing. Don’t listen to him.”

Eric turned his attention to Linda.

“I did some digging. It’s called the T-virus. Bunch of egg-heads cooked it in a lab as some kind of bio-weapon to turn people into braindead monsters-”

“What does this have to do with Charlie?” Linda interjected.

Eric, shaking with rage, jabbed a finger at Charlie.

“He found out about it a month ago!”

“What?” Linda gasped.

“The logs don’t lie! He knew we were working inside a ticking time-bomb, but he didn’t think that was worth mentioning!”

She turned to Charlie

“Why would you keep this from us?”

“I’m sorry, you cheated on me with my best friend!”

“I didn’t trap you in a building filled with monsters!”

“I was afraid you’d leave me…” Charlie continued. “… that you would go work somewhere else, and then you’d meet someone else, and then you’d have no reason to be with me anymore.”

Eric interrupted with a burst of violent gagging, but Linda and Charlie paid him no mind. This was their moment.

“Charlie,” Linda started as she touched his arm. “It wouldn’t matter if I worked anywhere else, or met anybody else. I don’t want anybody else. I only want you.”

Their eyes met, and they smiled. Linda remembered why she was so in love with this man.

Then, an axe cleaved Charlie’s head in half, spraying Linda with the pureed contents inside. As she wiped the remains from her face, Green Thumb stared through his spectacles.

Before Linda could croak Eric’s name, he raised his head, revealing his blank eyes and grey skin. With a grunt, he lifted his arms, taking clumsy steps toward her.

Eric was dead. This rabid, reanimated flesh-puppet stood in his place.

Eric sank his teeth into Green Thumb’s exposed neck. Green Thumb responded by separating Eric’s head from his neck. Then, he launched a fist into Linda’s stomach, sending her to her knees.

He proceeded to fireman carry her out of the room, ignoring her attempts to fight back. Outside, Linda noticed his other hand dragging Charlie’s dead body behind them.

“Charlie!” She cried.

“Quiet.”

“Or what?” She pushed. “You’ll kill me?”

“Can’t. Need one alive.”

She made another vain attempt to wriggle free.

“Where the hell are we going? Raccoon Forest?”

“Dormitory.”

Linda had never been to the dormitory before. That was for the scientists who lived on site. Green Thumb burst in, tossing Linda to the floor.

She struggled to take in the wall-to-wall carnage. Something had gone through the building and torn everybody apart. Green Thumb was crazy, but he wasn’t capable of this.

“What the hell happened here?”

“Outbreak,” Green Thumb murmured. “Virus escaped containment. We tried to board up here.”

Linda watched as Green Thumb laid Charlie on the floor. He tilted his head back, staring up into the ceiling.

“Someone flooded the Aqua Ring. It got so big, and so, so hungry…”

Sounds blended from above—stretching, unfurling, snapping.

“Gotta keep feeding it, so it won’t escape. It eats dead meat, but it loves the living…”

Vines stretched from the dark around Charlie’s body. Smaller tendrils dug into the exposed meat, then pulled him up. Then, she could hear flesh tearing, bones snapping, joints dislocating, organs pulverized.

All that remained of Charlie hit the ground with a wet slap.

More tendrils reached from the ceiling, hovering in wait.

“You’re not feeding me to that thing,” Linda announced.

“Have to,” He responded. “It’s the only way.”

Linda turned to run, flinching as the vines hit the floor near her. She could hear Green Thumb bounding in her direction. She scraped a clipboard from the floor, nestled in the grip of a severed hand and swung it at her enemy. The wooden board split in twain, the metal clip embedding in Green Thumb’s face. He doubled back, hands digging at the debris lodged in his cheek.

When he raised his head, he appeared to be melting. His face drenched in sweat, skin drooping as his pupils twitched, tucked in his upper eyelids. It had to be the bite from Eric. He was succumbing to it. Now was the only chance that she was going to get.

She screamed as she pushed Green Thumb into a curtain of vines. They snapped onto him, digging into his flesh. As the tendrils continued to pull him up, he started clawing at them, having turned from the virus.

The vines freed him, not wanting the spoiled meat. Linda watched as the rotting Green Thumb fell, folding in half upon hitting the hard floor. Even as his legs trailed behind him by a knotted thread of intestines and sinew, he snarled at Linda.

Linda welcomed the fresh night air as she threw herself through the in Raccoon Forest. While she was content to run as far as her legs would carry her, she knew he had to come up with a plan. The city was so far away, and she was already so tired.

Then, as though sent by a higher power, a divine light peered through the end of the woods. Whatever it was heralding, it had to be better than more trees.

Linda burst through a clearing, stumbling as she reached a dirt road. The lights were pouring from the front of an Raccoon City Police Department squad car.

“Hey!”

The officer’s voice was young, but with an authoritative depth to it. As Linda approached him, she already felt safer.

“Are you okay, ma’am?” The officer asked. “Can you tell me what’s going on?”

Linda began unloading everything about the events of the night in vivid detail. The Officer didn’t have to say anything. His eyes conveyed the bewilderment and confusion as she finally stopped talking.

“Listen,” He said as he led Linda to his car. “I’m going to take you back to the station till we figure out what to do next. It’s warm, there’s food and water, and you’ll be safe. I promise.”

Linda climbed inside, letting him close the door behind her. She could feel the weight lift from her shoulders.

Then, as his hand pressed against the door handle, he stopped, turning back to the forest. After a couple of seconds, he drew his side-arm, then he disappeared into the forest.

He’ll be back, She told herself. He wouldn’t leave you on the side of the road like this if he wasn’t planning on coming back.

WHAM!

Linda jumped as the Officer’s body slammed against the driver’s side window. Before he could sink to the ground, something dragged him back. She turned to the reinforced plastic separating her from the driver’s seat, staring at the empty key hole.

You have to go out there.

She cracked the door to the police car, enough so she could fit through. Holding her breath, she landed on the dirt in a crouch. Then she hazarded a peek around the corner, where a Dobermann was jaws-deep inside the Officer’s torso. It emerged with strands of meat that it gulped down before dunking its snout back in for more.

Don’t panic, or you’re next.

The car keys had to be on the officer’s person, but going for them would be suicide. The gun was a different story. She dove for it, firing with eyes closed, hoping it would work out.

When her eyes opened, she spotted the dog slinking into the trees as wounds on its legs left droplets of blood.

The Officer let out a wet gurgle as he fought to stay conscious.

“Take… my keys… get to… Raccoon City… you… need to… warn them…”