"Sorry 'bout that," John called back to them, sounding anything but; he seemed wired with adrenaline-pumped glee.
In the few weeks since she and Leon had joined up with the fugitive ex-S.T.A.R.S., she'd discovered that John would make jokes about anything. It was simultaneously his most endearing and most annoying trait.
"Everyone alright?" David asked, and Claire nodded, saw Rebecca do the same.
"Took a whack but I'm okay," Leon said, rubbing his arm with a pained expression. "But I don't think—"
BAM!
Whatever Leon didn't think was cut off by the powerful blast that slammed into the back of the van. Still most of a block away, the sedan's passenger had fired a shotgun at them; a few inches higher and the pellets would have come in through the window.
"John, change of plans," David called as the van swerved, his cool, authoritative voice rising over the noise of the screaming engines. "We're in their sights—"
Before he could finish, John took a hard left.
Rebecca fell backwards, nearly crashing into Claire.
The van was now headed down a quiet suburban street.
"Hold on to your butts," John called over his shoulder.
Chill night air whipped through the van, dark houses flying by as John picked up speed. Leon and David were already reloading, crouched behind the metal half-door. Claire exchanged a look with Rebecca, who looked as unhappy about their situation as she felt. Rebecca Chambers was ex-S.T.A.R.S., she'd worked with Claire's brother, Chris, as well as undertaking a recent Umbrella operation with David and John, also ex-S.T.A.R.S.—but the young woman had been trained as a medic with a background in biochemistry. Marksmanship wasn't her forte—even Claire was a better shot—and she was the only person in the van who hadn't had any real training . . .
. . .unless you count surviving Raccoon.
Claire shuddered involuntarily as John took a hard right, veering wide around a parked truck, the sedan gaining ground. Raccoon City; the scratches and bruises on Claire's body hadn't even faded yet, and she knew that Leon's shoulder was still giving him pain—
BAM!
Another shotgun blast from behind, but it went wide and high.
This time. . . .
"Change of plans," David said, his crisp British accent calming, like the voice of reason and logic in the midst of chaos. It was no wonder he'd been a S.T.A.R.S. captain.
"Everyone brace for an impact. John, just past your next turn, bring us to a stop. Hit and run, alright?"
David brought his knees up, wedging his feet against the van's wall. "They want us so badly, let them have us."
Claire slid over and pushed her feet against the back of the passenger seat, knees bent and head down. Rebecca moved closer to David, and Leon sidled back so that his head was close to Claire's. They locked gazes and Leon smiled faintly.
"This isnothiri""he said, and in spite of her fear,
Claire found herself smiling back at him. After making it through the madness of Raccoon City, skirting the murderous Umbrella creatures and crazed hu-mans—not to mention their extremely narrow escape from explosive death when Umbrella's secret facilities blew up—compared to all that, a simple car wreck was like a Sunday picnic.
Yeah, just keep telling yourself that,her mind whispered, and then she didn't think anything at all, because the van was swerving around a corner and John was pumping the brakes and they were about to get hit by about a ton and a half of fast moving metal and glass.
David inhaled and exhaled deeply, relaxing his muscles as best he could, the squeal of brakes coming up fast from behind—
—andwham,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 shield the little girl from the truth. Sherry Birkin didn't need to know that her parents had been responsible for the creation of Umbrella's most powerful bioweapons; better that she remember her mother and father as decent people. .. .
"David? Anything wrong?"
He shook himself out of his mental wanderings and nodded at Claire. "I'm sorry. Yes, I'm fine. Actually, I was thinking about Sherry; how is she?"