A few hours later, night fell.
With the chaos inside the terminal temporarily suppressed by the heavy-handed intervention of the military and local police, the once-panicked survivors had been herded into a temporary camp set up just outside the terminal building.
Rows of yellow quarantine tents had been pitched across the open ground outside the terminal. Large groups of survivors were being shepherded into the camp by soldiers with live rounds in their rifles.
Ryan stood beside a black armored business vehicle at the edge of the isolation zone, a black card glinting faintly between his fingers under the streetlights.
"Take it. The shopping district in the city center isn't far, and the stores over there should still be open." Ryan handed the card to Sherry, who had changed into clean casual clothes, his tone carrying a rare note of ease. "Ashley wanted to go shopping, so go with her. Tonight there's no reason for you girls to sit around the ruins eating dust. Put everything on the tab."
Ashley's eyes lit up instantly. She'd half expected Ryan, at a moment like this, to act like her stuffy father and have a small army of bodyguards lock her in some safehouse.
She threw her arms around Sherry in excitement and even leaned in to hug Ryan, only to be gently held off with a palm against her forehead.
"Have fun. Just don't wander too far. If you run into trouble, contact Carlos directly. Shadow Force has extraction points inside the city." Ryan lowered his hand and let his gaze slide over Leon, who wore a complicated expression off to the side.
A few minutes earlier, Leon had received a recall order from the President. Since he happened to already be in Harvardville, his vacation had naturally gone up in smoke.
Leon was currently leaning against the car door, his tailored suit still caked in dust. He let out a resigned sigh and complained, "Ryan, at a time like this, I think you're the only man generous enough to pack people off to the mall. Though fair enough. Ashley staying here would only make things messier, and this way I can handle the real business."
Sherry and Becky exchanged a glance. They had long gotten used to walking the line between life and death, but underneath it all they were still girls in the bloom of their youth. At Ryan's nod, the three of them climbed into the car under an agent's escort and left the blockade zone.
Once they were gone, the trace of warmth faded quickly from Ryan's face. He turned his head, his sharp gaze settling on the quarantine camp not far off.
At the center of the camp, tensions were already at the breaking point.
Federal Senator Ron Davis, crowned with that iconic Mediterranean haircut, was surrounded by a knot of bodyguards and in the middle of a full tantrum. He was brandishing a satellite phone, spit practically flying into the face of the SRT captain standing across from him.
"I'll say it one more time, I am a US Senator! You people are actually making me sit in a tent full of virus and low-class nobodies? If I get infected, your entire department is going in the ground with me!" Davis's duck-like voice was particularly grating on the night wind.
A low rumble of engines rolled in from the camp entrance.
Several heavy refrigerated trucks came slowly into the site, escorted in by military and police. The blue-and-white WilPharma logo on their sides stood out sharply under the beams of the floodlights.
At the sight of the trucks, Davis, who'd been throwing a fit moments earlier, brightened instantly and swapped on his sympathetic-politician face, striding forward to meet them.
Claire, sitting in a folding chair not far away and wrapped in a thin gray blanket, had been staring into space. The moment she spotted the WilPharma logo, she sprang to her feet, an unrestrainable anger flashing in her eyes.
As a core member of the humanitarian organization TerraSave, Claire knew all too well what kind of filthy business WilPharma had been running in India over the past few years. She marched over in long strides and came face to face with the man stepping down from the passenger side of the lead truck.
He was a refined-looking man in gold-rimmed glasses. A well-fitted gray suit, the kind of sharp, capable bearing that suggested efficiency, softened by the particular gentleness of a researcher.
"It's you?" Claire stared at him in confusion.
"Perfect timing, Mr. Downing! Your arrival is nothing short of a blessing for Harvardville!" Davis gripped the man's hand tightly and, turning to the media crews who had already set up their cameras, announced loudly, "With WilPharma's vaccine, we are certain to triumph over this act of terror!"
The man called Downing smiled with modest grace, but before he could say a word, Claire's icy voice cut in.
"A blessing? Senator Davis, do you mean the kind of blessing they earned by running illegal human experimentation on civilians in India?" Claire stepped right up to the two of them, her eyes locked on Frederic Downing. "It's been only a few hours since the crash. The entire airport is under total lockdown. And yet your WilPharma cold-chain convoy just happens to show up here. Mr. Downing, are you going to tell me this is a coincidence?"
A flicker of barely perceptible cold passed through Downing's eyes, but the expression on his face remained flawless. He adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses, his tone carrying the weary patience of a man being misunderstood.
"Miss Claire, I understand your prejudice against our company. But this shipment was originally bound for India. En route, we received an emergency requisition order from the government. Honestly, if we had arrived sooner, we might have been able to save some of the innocent lives in the terminal. Right now we are here to save people, not to debate corporate strategy."
Claire was shaking with anger at the airtight hypocrisy in his answer. She knew this was no coincidence, but she couldn't produce a shred of hard evidence.
Leon came striding over with Angela of the Special Response Team, cutting the confrontation short. His expression was grim, and in his hand was a just-printed fax document.
"Claire, drop it for now. This is worse than we thought." Leon handed the document to Claire. "We just received a public statement from the terrorists. They're demanding that the US government immediately disclose the full truth behind the Raccoon City incident seven years ago and publicly acknowledge that senior government officials were involved in Umbrella's virus research cover-up."
Angela added from beside him, "If the demands aren't met, they've threatened to release the t-Virus in residential districts of major cities across the country."
Claire stared at the statement on the document, her brow knitting tight. Something clicked, and she snapped her head up to look at Leon.
"No, wait. Do you know Curtis Miller? He used to be a member of TerraSave, but he left two years ago over ideological differences. I saw him earlier at the airport. His behavior was strange, but I didn't think much of it at the time." Claire's words came out in a rush.
Davis chimed in from the side. "I remember him. He was the one leading the loudest opposition back then."
But the moment the name "Curtis Miller" reached her ears, the color drained from Angela's face. Even her hand on her weapon started to tremble slightly.
"It can't be him. Because, because..."
Angela bit down on her lower lip, her eyes going red at the rims, and by the end of her own sentence she'd lost her conviction. She was Curtis's younger sister, which was precisely why she knew, better than anyone, what Curtis had been through.
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