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.Chris had found the rookie and thetwo of them were blundering around, probably look-ing for "clues."Besides, this room is comfortable.Maybe I'll take anap while I wait for the rest of them to catch up.He leaned back in the desk chair, pleased withhimself for all he'd accomplished so far.What couldhave been a disaster was turning out quite nicely,thanks to some quick thinking on his part.He hadalready found one of the crests, he had Barry and Jillworking for him and he'd had the good fortune torun into Ellen Smith while he'd been in the library.Oops, scratch that.It's Doctor Ellen Smith, thankyou very much.After fetching the wind crest, he'd gone to thelibrary to check the small side room that overlookedthe estate's heliport, the entrance concealed behind abookcase.A quick search had revealed nothing useful,and he'd been about to check the back room when Dr.Smith had shambled out to greet him.He had tried to get a date with her ever since he'dmoved to Raccoon, drawn in by her long legs andplatinum blond hair; he'd always been partial toblonds, particularly smart ones.Not only had sherepeatedly turned him down, she hadn't even tried tobe nice about it.When he'd called her Ellen, she'd coolly informed him that she was his superior and adoctor, and would be addressed as such.Ice queen,through and through.If she hadn't been so damnedgood-looking, he never would've bothered in the firstplace.But my, how your beauty has faded, Dr.Ellen.Wesker closed his eyes, smiling, reliving the experi-ence.It had been the ratty strings of blond hair thathad given her away as she'd shuffled out from behinda shelf, moaning and reaching for him.Her legs werestill long, but they'd lost a lot of their appeal - not tomention a fair amount of skin."What lovely perfume you're wearing, Dr.Smith,"he'd said.Then two shots to the head, and she'd gonedown in a spray of blood and bone.Wesker didn't liketo think of himself as a shallow man, but pulling thetrigger on that high-riding bitch had been wonder-fully- no, deeply-gratifying.Like icing on a cake, a little bonus perk for takingmatters in hand.Maybe if I'm lucky I'll run into thatprick Sarton down in the labs.After a few moments, Wesker stood up andstretched, turning to scan some of the titles on thebookshelf behind him.He was eager to get moving,but it might take the S.T.A.R.S.awhile to find the restof the puzzle pieces and there was really nothing hecould do to hurry the process; he might as well keepbusy.He frowned, struggling to make sense of the techni-cal titles.One of the books was called, Phagemids:Alpha Complementation Vectors, the next one was,cDNA Libraries and Electrophoresis Conditions.Biochemistry texts and medical journals, terrific.Maybe he'd get that nap in after all.Just reading thetitles was making him sleepy.His gaze fell across a heavy-looking tome sitting byitself on one of the lower shelves, bound in a fine redleather.He picked it up, glad to see a title he couldread printed across the front, even one as stupid as,Eagle of East, Wolf of West.Wait - that's the same thing written on the fountain.Wesker stared at the words, feeling his good moodslipping away.It couldn't be, the researchers had gonenuts but surely they wouldn't have locked down thelabs, there was no reason for it.He opened the bookalmost frantically, praying that he was wrongand let out a low moan of helpless rage at whatwas tucked into the sham book's glued pages.A brassmedallion with an eagle engraved on it lay in the cutaway compartment - part of a key to yet another ofSpencer's insane locks. It was like the punch line to a cruel joke.To get outof the house, he had to find the crests.Once out in thecourtyard, he'd have to make his way through awinding maze of tunnels that ended in a hiddensection of the garden - where there was an old stonefountain that marked the entrance to the under-ground labs.The fountain was one of Spencer'sfanciful creations, a marvel of engineering that couldbe opened and closed to hide the facility under-neath - provided, of course, that you had the keys:two medallions made out of brass, an eagle on one, awolf on the other.Finding the eagle meant that the gate was closed.And that meant that the wolf could be anywhere,anywhere at all and that his chances of even gettingto the lab had just dropped down to somewhere nearzero.Unable to control his fury, he snatched up themedal and threw the book against the desk, knockingthe lamp over with a crash and plunging the roominto sudden blackness.There was no longer any pointin holding on to the wind crest; his perfect plan wasruined.He'd have to give up his edge and hope thatone of the others would inadvertently stumble acrossthe wolf medal for him, secreted away somewhere onthe massive, sprawling estate.Which means more risk, more searching and achance that one of them will reach the labs before I do.Seething, Wesker stood in the dark silence with hisfists clenched, trying not to scream.TWELVEJILL HEARD SOMETHING LIKE BREAKINGglass and held perfectly still, listening.The acousticsof the mansion were strange, the long corridors andunusual floor plan making it hard to tell where soundswere coming from.Or if you even heard them at all.She sighed, taking a last look around the quiet,book-lined sitting room at the top of the stairs.She'dalready checked the three other rooms along thegallery railing and found exactly nothing of interest:a sparse bedroom with two bunks, an office, and anunfinished den with a locked door and a fireplaceinside [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]