Top Secret Underground Facility Code Name "The Hive"

Title: Resident Evil: The Fall of Sunnydale

Author: Nodakskip

Email:

Beta by: Theo

Rating: R

Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine; they all belong to their respective owners.

Setting: AU initially set during BtVS season 3.

Summary: The prequel to my fic "A Very Bad Night". And that small fic will be added to this one when that point comes.

Top Secret Underground Facility Code Name "The Hive"

Operated by the Umbrella Corporation

Location: Three Miles underneath Sunnydale, California

Sunday, September 6th 1998

12:45 pm

The man in the white lab coat walked calmly down the metal corridor. He casually glanced into one lab that held several large dogs in cages, the trainers injecting one of the hounds strapped to a metal table. Moments later, he rounded a corner and stopped at the lab numbered thirteen. A quick swipe of a security card changed the door light to green, allowing him entry.

Lab tech Alison Hardy looked up from her paperwork when the double steel 'airlock' doors parted. "Hi. What can I do for you?"

"Orders from Major Cain," the man told her as he handed her a folder of stapled papers. "They want a sample of the T-virus ready for transport."

Alison sat up at that. "What? This is the first I've heard of this. That's a high-level…"

"Biohazard," the man finished for her. "I know. But do you really want to be stupid enough to ask why he wants it?"

The young tech shook her head. "No thanks, I'd like to have as little contact with him as possible."

"Bet that's what his mother says as well."

"Probably," Alison said with a laugh. "Follow me." The man followed her up the stairs to another sealed door. She entered a seven digit code, and swiped her card key. "It'll take about twenty minutes to get into the hazmat suits, and-"

"Sorry, dear," the man told her. "But I don't have that kind of time."

"What?" Alison asked before she felt him grab her head…

Then she felt nothing after that.

The mystery man pulled her body into the vault and took her card. "At least you get a quick death," he said sympathetically to her dead-eyed stare from the floor. "Can't say the same for your co-workers, though." He crossed over and used her card to open the virus cabinet.

"Here we go…"

Hive Security Station

A few minutes later

"RQ?" Security Officer Mark Fillis asked into the air.

"YES, MARK?" a synthesized female voice asked from around him.

"I'm having trouble with the cameras around labs ten through fourteen," Fillis told the central computer known as 'Red Queen' or RQ. "They seem to be on the fritz again. Didn't the techies fix 'em yesterday?"

"WORK ORDERS HAVE REPAIRS SCHEDULED FOR THE EIGHTH OF THIS MONTH," Red Queen told him.

"Ah, crap. But you can do something about it right now, can't you?"

"AFFIRMATIVE. INITIATING TEMPORARY OVERRIDE, I WILL REROUTE THE CAMERA SYSTEM…STAND BY."

Several monitors in the large room started flashing as cameras were redirected. Fillis took this time to check the duty roster for September 8th, as such he didn't see what was on the screens behind him.

On a small screen a camera in a hallway panned over and zoomed into lab thirteen. It scanned for the personnel that should be on duty but could find none. While it swept the area, the camera stopped suddenly on a broken vial. A broken vial that had deliberately been left behind by the man who had killed Alison, as he'd known what would happen once the computer saw it.

The Red Queen's camera zoomed in closer to read the label on a large glass shard. When the label said 'T-Virus' the Red Queen computer went into alarm mode immediately.

"RQ?" Fillis demanded as he saw the red lights flashing. "What's going on?"

"MAJOR BIOHAZARD BREACH DETECTED IN LAB THRITEEN," the mainframe told him. "EMERGENCY PROTOCOLS ENGAGED. I AM SORRY, MARK."

"Sorry?" Fillis asked as he tried to get a working dial tone, automatically following his own training. "Sorry for what?" He spun at the sound of the glass security door closing. "RQ?" Though various monitors he saw trapped workers pounding on similar security doors as a gas flooded the rooms.

"Oh my God!" Mark said to himself as gas started shooting out of the room's vents. "RQ!" he yelled. "Stand down! Override Code 56 Alpha!"

"OVERRIDE CODE NOT ACCEPTED. EMERGENCY PROTOCOL 2 ENGAGED," the computer said way too calmly. "STERIZLATION IS IN PROGRESS."

The last thing Mark Fillis saw as he fell to the floor was the framed picture of his wife on his desk. He tried to reach for it, but the gas did its job too quickly.

All around the multilevel Hive the Red Queen computer was systematically killing its human workers in various ways. While that was going on, as per its secret programming, it sent a text message to another base in upstate New York.

HIVE COMPLEX COMPROMISED.

STERLIZATION IN PROGRESS: 83 COMPLETE

ALL ENTRANCES GOING INTO LOCKDOWN LEVEL 7.

Redtech Private Jet

Twenty minutes out of Sunnydale, California

Friday, September 11th 1998

The teenage girl looked very upset in her leather seat. Her parents had been more than a little secretive for the past few days, ever since they'd told her they were coming home early. The original plan had been for them to come back to the U.S. only a day before her senior year was to start. But now, here they were flying back to Sunnydale a lot earlier than that.

Not that the girl really minded, to tell you the truth. The Las Palmas resort was just boring as hell, and she would have nightmares about the size of the cockroaches for years.

"Come now, Cordelia," Charles Chase said as he stopped looking out at the passing ground below. "Are you actually going to sulk all the way home?"

"Yes dear, really," his wife Cilia chimed in. "Lord knows you've wanted to leave that resort for weeks. I know there weren't many good shops around…"

"That's not it, Mother!" Cordelia cut her off.

"So we guessed," Charles Chase said to that. "Honey, we know the real reason you wanted to return home."

"You do?" the brunette girl asked, amused. "Well, then why don't you enlighten me?"

"You're worried about your…boyfriend," Mrs. Chase said with a little distaste.

Cordelia knew that tone right away. "He's not like that Mother, God - if you just got to know him…."

"And that's precisely why we're coming home early."

Cordelia turned to her father in surprise. "Say what?"

Basement of 17619 White Oak Drive

Sunnydale, California

Two hours later

He was an interesting sight, one had to admit. Covers kicked down to his feet, wearing just his boxer shorts as he lightly snored on the pull-out bed. Cordelia would have thought her boyfriend looked cute, if not for the various bruises on his upper body.

This was the real reason she wanted to come back home for so long. After Buffy the Vampire Slayer had sent her undead boyfriend Angel through a portal to Hell, she had split town. And that had caused her, Xander and the others to have to pick up the slack.

Then, two weeks later, Cordelia had boarded a plane for Mexico while the rest continued fighting for their lives each night. As much as she hated to admit it, the young woman had felt like she was abandoning her significant other to the monsters while she got on with her 'pretty' life. Just like she had when Harmony and the others had forced her to dump him on Valentine's Day.

Sneaking in through the basement entrance, Cordelia was glad Xander had told her he was sleeping here these days, in order to avoid his parents given the terrible hours he kept with the Slayage. Because it meant she could avoid Tony and Jessica as well. Opening up the bottle of ice-cold water she had with her, Cordelia dumped it straight onto Xander's sleeping head.

The young man jumped up in surprise as the water hit him. "Wha-!" He glanced around in a daze before he heard female laughter. Xander's eyes widened as he saw his girlfriend standing there, "Cordelia? What are you doing here?"

"Hello to you too, dorkhead. And to answer the question, I came here to do this," the brunette told him before she climbed on the bed and straddled his lap. They made out for a few minutes, before the Chase girl finally came up for air. "Careful there, dweeb-o, what with those thin boxers I can actually feel your…you know."

Xander groaned. "Well, if I'd known you were coming…"

"Why, were you planning on hiding from me?" she teased him as the male teen held her tighter in his arms.

"No, it's because you're the one that doesn't want us to have sex yet," Xander told her. "But hey, I'm a guy…hot young girlfriend squirming around in your lap, kind of gets a response."

Cordy giggled at him before they started making out again. Eventually, before the point of no return came she broke it off, picked up his pants and tossed them to him. "Here." The cheerleader watched as he went behind the beat-up lazy boy chair to put them on. "So. Want to tell me about those bruises?"

Xander just shrugged as he zipped up his jeans and grabbed an old T-shirt. "Normal human fighting vampires…what's there to explain?" Moving around to the front of the chair, he sat opposite her. "Now, not that I'm not glad you're back, but mind telling me why and how? You steal a jet ski from that resort or what?"

"No, but God, did I ever think about it!" Miss Chase told him. "Honestly, I should be mad at you. All those cute-looking Mexican cabana boys who didn't speak a word of English, and yet all I could think about was how you were out there risking your neck every night. Just on account of el Buffo decided to run away from home like that."

"I kinda guessed you missed me from the almost nightly phone calls," Harris joked while ignoring the barbed reference to the Slayer. Then he got serious, "We had a trio of vamps last night, they tried to attack the Bronze. Some people died."

Cordelia almost said she wished she'd been there to help, but didn't - as that would have been a lie. "I take it the blonde wonder is still MIA?"

"Yeah," Xander sighed. "Giles is over in Oakland right now, checking out a report of some girl fighting vampires."

"Shouldn't the people he works for just bring in the new Slayer, though?" she asked him. "I mean, Kendra did die back then, so doesn't that mean there's another Slayer out there somewhere?"

Harris nodded. "Giles said she was in Boston. Apparently though, the Council's kinda reluctant to send her here."

"Why?" the girl demanded. "This is the Hellmouth, what the hell could there be in Boston to top that?"

"Don't know, sweetheart," Xander admitted. "My pet theory though, it's 'cause Giles 'let' Buffy be too independent."

"Ugh. Remind me never to go to England," Cordelia sighed at that news. "Now onto other, more important news. I want you to call Willow and Oz, they're gonna hafta patrol alone without us tomorrow night."

"Care to let me in on the why?" Xander wondered.

She groaned. "Because Daddy and Mother want to meet you."

"They've already met me," Harris reminded her. "We kind of grew up together, remember honey?"

"Yeah…" she said slowly. "But this is different. My parents have finally figured out how it's serious between us, so they want to meet you as my boyfriend. It's, uh, it's going to be a dinner thing at the country club, in formal wear."

"Say what?" Xander demanded at once. "One, I don't own a suit, and two, I don't know which fork goes with what spoon!"

"That's why I'm here," Cordelia told him. "I'll be your etiquette coach, and Daddy gave me one of his credit cards for us to go get you some dress-up clothes."

"Shopping…with you?" Xander shuddered. "Gheeeah. I think I'd rather fight more vampires."

"I'm not that bad!" she scolded him. "And this time it's different, it's for you."

Rolling his eyes, Xander leaned back in the chair. "Any other good news?"

"It, it seems Harmony and Aura are going to be joining us tomorrow night as well," Cordelia replied in a rush with a visible cringe.

"WHAT?!" Xander demanded, recalling the two girls that had led the charge for his girlfriend to dump him back in February. "Oh God, you're serious? Why couldn't I have just died last night as well?"

"Maybe it won't be that bad," Cordy offered. "Mother said she set it up for us to try to mend fences with them. I mean, you know how the Kendall's and the White's are almost as rich as the Chase's, my parents just don't want there to be any bad blood or anything..."

"There is only one thing those two girls are gonna be there for, and that's to get me so pissed off I'll make a scene in public, which is gonna be used to pressure you to dump me again!"

The brunette girl hesitated. The odds were that her boyfriend was right, but if there was one thing Cordelia Chase really wanted more than anything – it was for Xander to be accepted by her social circle, despite his unsavory family reputation, so that in a year from now the concept of leaving this cursed town for them to attend a prestigious college like Harvard together would be more than just a pipe dream.

"Tell you what," Cordelia made a decision, and she dragged her boyfriend onto the bed. "You play nice like Mother Theresa tomorrow night, and I'll..." She whispered the last bit into his ear.

Xander's eyes almost bugged out. "Say what?!" he said to her again, this time with a lot more incredulity.

"Well, you know, it's not sex according to the President," she reminded him. "But if you come near me with a cigar, I will skin you alive."

Griffins Men's Store

Sunnydale, California

Later that day…

"What do you think, young madam?" the shop tailor asked as Xander stood in front of the three-directional mirror.

Cordelia walked around her boyfriend and checked out the materials. "Hmm, not bad. But do you have it just a little darker than the navy blue?"

A shop girl picked up three pairs of pants and brought them over for her to inspect. "We have a few in stock that will fit the gentleman's size," the tailor informed her. "But it will not be a perfect fit. If we had a little more time…"

"I know, I know," Cordelia groaned. "Off the rack is so…ugh, not to mention plain. But we have to get it now. Oh!" she stopped as she saw the last pair of pants. "This one, without the stripes."

"An excellent choice, Ms. Chase," the man told her, as he summoned another girl who gave him a tape measure. "Now for some quick measurements, and we will attempt to find the proper jacket for young sir."

As the guy measured his shoulders, Xander rolled his eyes. "This is taking forever, Cor."

The teenage beauty queen shook her head. "Ignore him. He normally buys his stuff at stores with the word 'mart' at the end of them," she told the tailor.

The man cringed. "My sympathies, Ms. Chase."

"Hey!" Xander said to that.

Restfield Cemetery, Sunnydale

Not long after sunset

"So how long did it take?" Oz asked.

Xander shuddered, as he looked over the darkened graveyard in search of the vamps. "About four hours. And just for the record, so what if I buy my T-shirts in packs of three? That suit cost more than my dad's car payments for the last six months!"

"Maybe it's a long-term thing, y'know, an investment – for when you'll need it again later," Willow suggested as she sat on a tombstone. "Being Cordelia Chase's boyfriend is gonna make you run around in some high-up circles, I bet."

"They do tend to dress up a lot," Oz mused.

"Like Cordy would ever let me wear the same suit twice," Harris replied. "And on that note, I don't think my torture will end early tomorrow. So, are you guys going to be okay on your own tomorrow night?"

"Ah, sorry, Xander, I thought you knew. We can't go on patrol then," Willow told him.

"WHAT? And how come that is, Wicca girl?" Harris asked her in alarm.

Willow sighed. "We're not gonna be here in town. Mom and Dad are coming with, they want to see Oz and the Dingoes perform in Monterey."

Xander looked to his werewolf friend. "I thought you guys couldn't make it to that gig?"

Oz shrugged. "Devon managed to get the van repaired early."

Xander thought about it for a moment. "Jeez. Well, it'll be okay I guess. I mean, Buffy took the whole night off sometimes, what's the worst that can-"

Willow quickly jumped up and clamped her hand over his mouth. "Don't even say it, you'll jinx us completely!"

"The Hive"

Location: Three Miles underneath Sunnydale, California

Saturday, September 12th 1998

5:51 am

The large group of men approached the main vehicle entrance to the underground complex. All of them wore white hazmat suits and gas masks, but the most notable thing each one had was a sub-machine gun. Five men took up positions near the entrance while one in the back raised a small wireless computer. After a nod from the lead figure, he typed in the password.

The round red and white Umbrella logo in the center of the steel doors moved. It spun in place for a moment before retracting altogether, then a seam appeared where it had been and the massive doors started to part. All that could be seen through the opening was black space with the red alert lights going in the background.

"Air reads clear, sir," the tech reported.

The leader nodded, then he motioned to the soldiers. "Advance team, move in."

Minutes passed as the armed team entered the darkened Hive complex. "I've got them on the internal sensors, sir," the tech reported off his screen. "Nothing else reading…wait a minute!"

"What is it?"

"I've got a lot of motion," the tech reported. "But I can't get any body heat."

"Damn, the virus is still active," the leader growled. "So much for the sterilization protocol."

"The gas was still in the testing phase," the tech reported. "Plus we don't know which version of the-"

He was cut off by the sound of machine gun fire in the Hive, followed by screams.

"Advance team, report!" the leader shouted into his radio. Nothing but static answered him. He pulled his weapon as the tech's computer started going crazy. "What is it?!"

"A heat source right at the entrance, not human!"

In response to that, the remaining guards pointed their guns at the entrance. Their mounted flashlights scanned the area and found nothing. "It's here!" the tech shouted looking at his screen.

"I don't see anything!!" a guard said as he scanned his light again. "Wait…" He saw a trail of slime dripping from the ceiling. "What the…OH, GOD!!" he yelled as his light hit the strange creature that was crawling over them. "Fire!!"

The grotesque creature jumped down on top of him and ripped him apart. The others fired madly at it as it did something even stranger. A very long slime covered tongue came out of its mouth and with a whipcrack sound, wrapped itself around the tech's neck, yanking him off the floor.

While they tried in vain to kill the monster, one of them saw something else. "Hostiles coming out!!"

"Shut the doors!" the leader yelled as he fired at the zombies. "Seal it right now!"

One of the men tried to grab the unit off the decapitated tech's body, but found the computer shattered. "This thing's useless!"

"Hold the line!" the leader called as he hit his comm link. "Control, this is Unit One, we are losing containment…we can not shut the doors, I repeat – we can not shut the damn doors!"

Home Gym, Chase Mansion

Sunnydale, California

7:45 am

Cordelia pushed herself as the exercise bike went up its virtual hill. As she tried to ignore the pain in her legs she listened to the slightly Chinese weather girl, Terri Morales of Channel Seven.

"It's hardly eight am, and already the temperature is hitting ninety-one degrees, the woman said in front of the projected map. "The heat wave we've been in for the last few days seems to have no end in sight. The rainfall we were hoping to come our way went towards the south."

The map changed into a five-day forecast. "The high is expected to be just over 100 today with clear skies, and the same is expected tomorrow. On Monday the wind might pick up to gusts around twenty-five miles an hour, so hold onto those hats everyone," Terri finished up.

The teen girl slowed down as the 'hill' was defeated. Getting up, she went over and grabbed the jump rope. She counted out how many jumps she got in during the news 'TV buzz minute'.

"Excuse me, Miss Cordelia?" the maid's Spanish-accented voice called to her from the door. "Miss White is here to see you."

Cordelia took a drink from her water bottle before saying, "Thanks, Lupe, show her in."

The maid moved aside to allow the tall black teen into the room. Aura put a few dress bags on a hook before she came over. "Geez, Cordy. You're exercising full tilt already?"

"If you don't bust your ass, then you don't deserve to keep it," Cordelia recited her own motto. "I'm heading to the track tomorrow around two, want to come with?"

Aura shook her head. "Maybe in a day or two, I don't wanna pull a muscle before the senior year cheerleader training regimen starts. I'll be in daily workouts to make the squad before long, though."

Cordy reached up and shut the small TV off. "Honestly, if I couldn't go running in Mexico, I would have gone nuts." Grabbing her towel, she looked to her childhood friend. "Am I going to be pissed off at you after tonight?"

Aura smirked. "Blunt as ever, Cordy." She leaned against the Bowflex machine. "But no, you don't have to worry about me tonight. Harmony, on the other hand…"

"I'm honestly not surprised she's still trying to break Xander and me up," Cordelia admitted. "In her warped mind, this is the perfect fodder for her to dethrone me."

Aura agreed. "Yeah, well, we all know what she's like. That entire thing back on Valentine's Day…" she looked to her friend. "To tell you the truth though, I think it's that dressing down you gave her afterwards that really hurt her."

"So I bruised Harmony's little ego," Cordelia smiled. "God, I can't wait to be rid of her. Would have done it on Valentine's Day, but no…Mother wants her 'connections' with the Kendall's." She went back to the topic at hand. "Now, just to be clear, what was your beef with Xander then anyway?"

Aura looked at her like it was obvious. "Are you serious, Cordy? It's Xander freaking Harris! That guy's best friend was your number one stalker, till he moved."

Cordelia looked away for a moment. "Yeah, he moved."

The other girl didn't notice and just kept going, "You yourself established the social pecking order. You set the bar on date-worthy material, who we date and who we don't, and then you go and grab one of the 'don't' pile? You know you would have done the exact same thing if I'd started dating, say, Jonathon Levinson." The girl went over and shut the door to the small gym. "And if you must know…I was a little jealous."

"You were?"

"Yeah," the cheerleader admitted. "The jock gene pool in this town is WAY too shallow; we have far too many male bimbos around here. And then you go and get one that seems to have a brain." She sighed. "Plus you ended the…thing we had going, for him."

Cordelia didn't dwell much on the fact that when they were younger, she and Aura had briefly 'experimented' with their sexuality. "Well, I couldn't go around cheating on him," was her only reply.

"And that's what's weird also, Cordelia," Aura told her. "You never gave a damn about that before. Hell, I don't need to remind you what you did while you were dating Bobby Markson, do I?"

"No you don't," Cordelia replied, recalling that particular screw-up. "And as for what we had, it was…good, but we both knew we weren't going to go all Ellen DeGeneres later on in life."

"I know," Aura replied, looking a little hurt nonetheless. "But you have to admit, it wasn't bad."

Cordelia laughed. "Except for that night your older brother almost caught us."

Aura giggled at that little 'sitcom' moment, before she sobered up. "If Harris is what you want…"

"He is," Cordelia affirmed.

"Then I'll help run interference with Harmony," her friend told her, admitting defeat. "Now go take a shower, girl, the hair stylist should be here soon."

Sunnydale Beach, Sunnydale

9:21 AM

"God, look at that view," Donna told her two friends. "I told you it would be better to come here than some snow-covered college back east."

"At least you don't have to share a dorm room with Goth girl," Kelly told her, as they stopped by a cave entrance.

Their other friend Brenda teased her, "Come on, all she needs is a makeover."

"She'll be fine if I can just…" Kelly said before she screamed.

The other two girls came closer, and saw a man's arm grabbing their friend from the mouth of the cave. "Get off of her, you sicko!" Donna yelled as she grabbed the arm and gave it a good yank. "Oh God, he's covered in blood!" she screamed.

Brenda came over to help pull when something grabbed her leg, and pulled her down. "Ahhh!" she screamed as she was dragged into the cave.

Her scream caused an old fisherman to come running. "What's going on…?" He stopped dead in his tracks. "Holy mother of God!"

The old man had lived here in Sunnydale all his life and had seen things better not thought of, but even so he had to try not to vomit from what he'd just witnessed. He turned and bolted down the beach. "Zombies!!"

Control Room

Redtech Corporate Headquarters

Sunnydale, California

The same time

Major Timothy Cain watched the monitor as the infected zombies came out of the cave entrance. With no emotion, he picked up the phone. "This is Cain. Activate Operation Retrieval of employees Level 6 and above." After he hung up he went over to the female tech. "Prepare to initiate city-wide containment as soon as the retrieval teams are finished."

"Yes, sir," the woman said as she began typing commands into her console.

"Sir!" a uniformed man called from the other side of the room. "The Board wants to know what's going on."

"I don't have time to brief them now," Cain told the man before he activated a PC camera link. "Lieutenant," he said as the image of a large black man came up. "How long will you need?"

The man on the screen checked his computerized clipboard. "We should have everyone out of Sunnydale within 45 minutes. Luckily, Mr. White and his family are in Sacramento for the Governor's fundraiser along with most of the town's upper-class citizens." He had no idea that Aura had made a last-minute decision to stay behind.

"What about Chase?" Cain asked as he looked over his own list.

"Not due back from Mexico for at least another week," the lieutenant replied, again completely ignorant of how the man had already arrived home with his family. So much for modern technology.

"Very good," Cain told his man. "We'll regroup at the fallback point alpha, beyond Raven's Bridge. All other access routes out of the city will be blocked shortly."

"Understood, sir," the man on the screen replied before the screen went back to the company logo.

Cain then turned to his people. "Begin the 'scorched earth' policy with the servers and files," he ordered. "I don't want anyone to be able to find anything here…just in case."