Welcome To The Umbrella Corporation

Chapter Sixteen

Spencer studied the two men seated on the other side of his desk. On the right sat Wesker, wearing his mirrored sunglasses and feigning a look of polite disinterest, as always. On his left sat Birkin, sullen and unkempt, his hair a tangle and his eyes betraying a serious lack of sleep. In all his years of managing Umbrella’s Raccoon City facilities, Spencer had never before had two brilliant minds like these working for him at the same time, and he enjoyed simply studying them, reading their expressions and gauging their reactions.

Despite their intelligence, both of them were easy to read, easy to anticipate. Manipulating such amazing prodigies would be the high point of Spencer’s entire career. These two would go on to accomplish great things, of that there was no doubt, but Spencer knew from experience that men like them always performed better when they were competing with someone else. And with Marcus successfully out of the way, Spencer had free reign to pit these two geniuses against each other.

“You might be wondering why I called you both here today,” he said. “You might think it has something to do with the unfortunate turn of events involving the late Dr. Marcus. Maybe it does, but that’s coincidental. I would have called you here anyway, even if he had not met with such an untimely demise. I will admit, though, that his death makes things a bit more convenient.”

“What do you mean?” Birkin interrupted.

“He means that Marcus’ death was just the means to an end,” Wesker said.

Spencer smiled. Setting these two against each other was going to be fun indeed. “Yes, Wesker. That’s what I mean. But it was not the only means, just the most appropriate one. Even if Marcus were still alive, this meeting would still be taking place.”

“Then why did you kill him?” Birkin asked brazenly, the anger in his voice hard to hide.

The fact that Birkin was angry about Marcus’ death was not a surprise to Spencer. He knew how Birkin would react. But the interesting thing was that Birkin disagreed with the murder itself. Wesker, if he had been left out the way Birkin was, would be more angry about not being included in the plot or at least consulted beforehand.

“Didn’t Wesker tell you what Marcus was doing down in his lab?” Spencer asked.

“No, I haven’t,” Wesker said. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to.”

“Did he infect other people? Is that what happened?” Birkin asked, leaning forward, his expression grave. Combined with his bloodshot, sunken eyes, the look on his face reminded Spencer of a death’s head mask.

“Yes, he infected four people. One of them was a janitor at the training facility. You may have even met him.”

Birkin collapsed back into his chair, his face losing color. “Oh, my God.”

“Now do you understand why we had no choice?”

“He shot at us first,” Wesker said, trying to justify his involvement. “We ordered him to give up, but he refused.”

Spencer raised a hand, gesturing toward Wesker. “It’s all right, he wasn’t blaming you. Were you, William?”

Birkin closed his eyes and shook his head, the hair hanging in front of his eyes swaying back and forth with the motion. “No, I wasn’t blaming Wesker.” He opened his eyes and leveled them at Spencer. “I was blaming you.”

Spencer smiled, revealing bright, even teeth. Birkin would not have been surprised if they had been sharpened into points. “As well you should, dear boy. As well you should. I made the order, I’m ultimately responsible.” He waved his hand as if the conversation topic was a bothersome mosquito. “But enough of that, I was about to tell you why I called you here in the first place.”

“Yes,” Wesker said, “Why did you send for us?”

“Because I’m going to shut down the training facility and reassign you both to different laboratories.”

Spencer reveled in the stunned silence that followed. Wesker, behind his apparently unshakable exterior, was completely shocked by the decision, as Spencer knew he would be. After all, he had promised to let Wesker take over Marcus’ work at the lab, so how could he do that if he was being reassigned? Birkin, if anything, looked like he believed he was the subject of some outrageous practical joke; he looked on the verge of laughing in despair. He covered his eyes with his hands, almost shaking as he tried to resist exploding into a temper tantrum. Spencer wallowed in the emotional torment playing out in front of him for a few moments before giving them back a semblance of stability.

“It’s not as bad as you think. The regular labs will remain open temporarily until we can transfer all the personnel who work there, but the training labs will be shut down. Umbrella is starting up a new training facility in Arizona, so keeping this one running is no longer necessary. And your reassignment is not as drastic as it sounds. Wesker, you’ll be transferred here to the main Arklay laboratory to continue your research. Birkin, you’ll be transferred to the Raccoon City lab, which has more advanced resources to aid you in your own work.”

“Why send us to different labs?” Birkin asked. “Marcus wanted us to work together as much as possible.”

“Yes, and Marcus is dead.”

“You don’t want us working together, then?” Wesker said, knowing the answer.

“You’ll be working on drastically different projects,” Spencer pointed out. “So you won’t have much to talk about as far as your work goes. Feel free to associate with each other during your time off, but I doubt that you’ll have much of it. You’re both going to be very busy.”

Suddenly, Birkin caught on. “Are we being promoted?”

After a short pause, Spencer nodded. “I’m promoting both of you to Research Project Manager, effective immediately. Birkin will be in charge of the city lab and direct all the work done on the medical applications of the Progenitor. Wesker will run the Arklay lab and continue working on the Progenitor’s mutative qualities and related research.”

Once more, Spencer carefully watched their reactions. Wesker sat up straighter in his chair, a satisfied smile just barely curving the edges of his mouth. Birkin set one elbow on the arm of the chair and rested his chin in his hand, looking Spencer as if trying to figure out what the catch was. Wesker was happy with the outcome, but there was no fooling Birkin. He calculated the possibilities in the back of his head, and Spencer could almost make out the equations floating there.

“Can I bring any of my assistants along?” Birkin ventured.

“Of course, if you like. There are other scientists already there who will be instructed to work for you as well. You’ll have about thirty people under you.”

“What about me?” Wesker asked eagerly.

“There are almost sixty people working here, and most of them will be under you, but not all. Some of them are independents who report only to me.”

Birkin spoke up again. “And I’ll be free to conduct whatever research I like?”

“I expect you to continue the work you’re already doing, but yes, you can work on anything you like. You’ve expressed an interest in using the Progenitor for medical advance, so the lab is well prepared to deal with work of that nature.”

Birkin lifted himself out of the chair and stood. “I’d like to get started then, if that’s all right with you. I have some things I want to finish up at the other lab.”

“Go ahead,” Spencer said.

Birkin gave Wesker one last look before leaving the office, moving like a man on a mission. Wesker shook his head as the door clicked shut, smiling to himself as if amused at something that no one else found funny. He reached into his pocket. “Do you care if I have a cigarette?” he asked, pulling out an unopened pack and a lighter.

“I don’t mind,” Spencer replied. “In fact, I’ll have one as well,” he added, opening one of his desk drawers and taking out his own pack of cigarettes.

Wesker lit up and took a long drag. Spencer put a cigarette between his lips and Wesker held out the lighter to light it for him. “I didn’t know you smoked,” Wesker said, putting the lighter away.

“Since I was fifteen. But back then, everyone smoked. It’s less socially acceptable now. They say it causes cancer.”

“It probably does. But there are worse diseases to get, I suppose.”

Spencer laughed. “Indeed there are! Cancer would be a blessing compared to what we could be infected with.”

They smoked in silence for a few moments. Spencer tapped his cigarette with a forefinger, knocking ashes to the floor. “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

Wesker took the cigarette from his mouth and held it between his fingers, studying it as he blew out a cloud of smoke. “I guess I’m wondering why you promoted us. I don’t mean to imply that I’m not grateful, because I am. But you must have other people with more seniority that deserve to be in charge.”

“There were other candidates for the Raccoon City position,” Spencer admitted. “But no one with Birkin’s vision and work ethic. The other people who applied for the job will surely complain, but if they don’t like it, they can transfer somewhere else.”

“And here at this lab? Aren’t you already in charge? What do you need me for?”

“I need you to continue the research Marcus was doing.”

“Have you looked over the notes I gave you?”

“Some of them.”

“Marcus created a completely new strain of the Progenitor. He called it the T-virus.”

Spencer nodded and blew out smoke. “Yes, I know.”

“I’m still looking at his papers, but as far as I can tell, he didn’t have time to do much testing with it. I think he discovered it just a day or two ago.”

“That recently?”

“Yes, so he doesn’t have a whole lot written about it. I want you to know that I don’t know exactly what we’re dealing with. Marcus speculated that the T-virus was different from the Progenitor, but so far it seems to have the same basic qualities.”

Spencer waved away Wesker’s concerns. “Don’t worry about what Marcus speculated. I don’t trust any of his methods or his conclusions. Once you begin work on the T-virus in earnest, I would prefer if you started with a clean slate. Ignore everything Marcus did. Just start at the bottom and work your way up.”

“How long will it take to bring everything over from the other lab?”

“We’ll have all of Marcus’ materials here by tomorrow. The rest of the lab will probably take months to transfer completely. As I said before, you’ll be very busy.”

When they were done smoking, Spencer procured an ashtray from a desk drawer. They both crushed their cigarette butts into it. Wesker breathed out his last lungful of smoke and sat back in the chair.

“Is there any advice you want to give me before I get started?” he asked.

Spencer smiled. “Well, let me just tell you this. The training facility was just the beginning. Even this new work with the T-virus is just a taste of things to come. Trust me, you haven’t even scratched the surface yet.”

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