Saturday, July 24, 2004

   A Tribute to Perfection II

Typical schedule. Alarm rings. That loud, electronic buzzing sound that nobody in or out of their right mind can stand. A hand, curled into a fist, slammed down upon it. No effect, it kept going. Another two vigorous pounds and Wesker finally hit home at the snooze button, anything to end that cacophony. He sat upright about then, glancing at the clock. Still groggy, he had forgotten what time he set the thing for. The hands pointed at seven, and the sunlight pouring through white linen near the windows seemed to agree. Wesker was awake, and surrounded by lavish alabaster walls and paintings that he found tasteful. The room was divine. Sunlight. Horrible, horrible sunlight. His eyes always had been especially sensitive to that particular element of being diurnal, but it seemed especially prominent lately. Almost as if burning his eyes, he could imagine the pools of black that were his pupils coming to a boil when being presented to rays of natural light. And so, as tradition dictated, he unclenched his right fist and rummaged around the end table near the king-sized hotel room bed. Pad of paper, no. Pen, no. Another pen, certainly not. Chocolate mint wrapped in some sort of paper-foil combination, maybe later. Ah, there they are. Shades. He immediately closed his eyes and donned the things, unreflective opaque lenses of the blackest shade with rims to match. He'd had them ever since... No, best not to think about that. His mind seemed to be struggling with the events that took place at that wretched Spenser Mansion a short time ago, and even trying to delve into his near-photogenic memory archives resulted in something almost painful. Never having been one to wear much whilst sleeping during summer, Albert Wesker threw off the white bedsheet without hesitation and placed his feet on the carpet. Soft carpet. Very pleasant to one's feet first thing in the morning. It always paid to shell up the cash for the nicer suites that these establishments had to offer. He reached down into the duffel bag at the foot of his bed, and produced five objects. A tannish-khaki sort of shirt, pants of the same coloration, simple black boxers, and two socks. All of which were quite comfortable, only the best would do for one as rich as he. One who had worked as hard as he to get that rich in the first place. After changing, he strolled over to the room's mini-kitchen area, passing a decoratively framed mirror on the wall as he did so. Couldn't help but toss a glance at his body, and upon doing so, a thought floated through his head. "Another fine day to be Albert Wesker," he stated aloud before another thought occurred to him. This one resulted in a very miniscule frown. "...may be subject to change." He added in after a pause, knowing that the day's assignment wouldn't be a pleasant one. They rarely were. Whilst treating himself to a Danish complete with some sort of peach filling, he glanced over the file he had open on the thin, black laptop on the table. A powerful, efficient, and light machine provided by his employers. "I really don't see why you people have to monitor me like you do," his voice muffled thanks to his violation of that don't-talk-with-your- mouth-full rule every mother enforced when he was young. "I don't think you'll get much from watching me eat." His unseen gaze was directed towards the tiny square of especially smooth black plastic towards the top of the computer's monitor, knowing the technology of his employers he had figured it to be a camera perpetually transmitting when it was open. This conclusion arrived at out of paranoia. Paranoia that had, without a shadow of a doubt, saved him countless times. He skimmed over the text idly. "Blah blah, enter facility, something something, find source of outbreak, and..." Ah, now here was something new. The makers of this particular Umbrella Corp. facility were smarter than the average bear, and had designed a measure of security more discreet than a giant explosion that almost always failed in some way or another. He grinned as his eyes went over the next part of that sentence: Activate flow of acidic gas through the entire facility as to purge all within. Now there's something clever they came up with. That Umbrella, always thinking of my convenience. Of course, he wasn't working for Umbrella any longer, and his new client had more in mind than simply destroying the facility. "But of course. The ulterior motive." He scrolled his gaze over the true objective they had in mind for him, which was surprisingly without detail. "Find and retrieve object within the 'safe room' at all costs..." Must be yet another damned virus sample. He found himself questioning the practicality of all these viruses, a good bullet to the head typically does the trick to rid one of their enemies. Then again, bullets didn't self-replicate. Either way, the document mentioned something about getting there before Umbrella agents and cleaning up the mess before they could salvage anything. Should they have gotten there first, he knew his task's difficulty would multiply exponentially. He closed the laptop and shut it off, no longer wishing to be observed by his clients. Tossing the rest of breakfast down his throat along with the contents of his glass, that being milk. Nothing wrong with milk, it does the body good. He somewhat ran over that thought in his head as he traveled to the window, passing the mirror again along the way. He had no choice but to admire that body, those muscles of his. Capable, but not overbearing. He looked like a tough guy, an assassin, but certainly not a bodybuilder. They seemed stronger lately, or maybe it was just his mind shamelessly complimenting himself. No matter. Albert Wesker parted the curtains, and pushed the windows open. Resting his hands upon the sill, he leaned outside slightly, and inhaled a deep whiff of that smoggy air. The view of the cityscape from the twelfth floor suite was amazing, to say the least. Los Angeles would never know that Umbrella ever existed, thanks to his future efforts. Or at least that was the idea.

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