ring, ring [Exemplary]

[Albert Wesker]

His eyes snapped open, and he lurched up into a sitting posture.

Cold tile under his hand, felt through torn and shredded gloves. Slick with blood and something else, icy-cold against his skin. Ragged breaths sucked in and wheezed out, the resulting rise and fall of his chest sending red-hot lines spidering over his entire torso. Complete, unremitting agony. The crippling, physical pangs and knives of discomfort were bad enough on their own. There was, however...a further complication. A devilishly potent headache, pulsing in time with the blood in his veins.

A sharp, piercing noise. Echoing through his surroundings. Ringing. Quiet enough, in most circumstances, but with the deafening silence of his current locale, coupled with the splitting pain clawing through his head... It might as well have been blared for all the world to hear, from a speaker right next to his head.

The extreme pain of his awakening, and the sudden nature of it left him reeling. Unsteady hands fumbled across the floor, feeling out something to take hold of, some kind of support. Something to help get him upright, get his feet under him again. It took him several minutes of blind reaching before his half-numb fingers curled around...something. The leg of some kind of table, or a shelf maybe, judging by the feel of it.

Carefully, slowly, he hauled himself up. His shoes slid and skittered in the mess on the floor, blood and something slimy green. Traction was a tough thing to come by, and it left him desperately clutching and holding tight to his support. A shelf, he came to find out as he slowly drew himself up to a more or less stable position, legs squarely under him again. Full of an assortment of all manner of smashed and overturned bottles, jars, beakers and racks of vials and flasks. Their myriad contents had all been spilled and splattered over the shelving and wall, pooling down it to add their diverse colors to the mess on the floor.

Thankfully, long since dried and evaporated. Aside from the stains and color, the mystery chemicals had nothing to offer that might prove a risk. No noxious fumes or pesky corrosive puddles to risk having wallowed around in.

Of course, something like that would have been the least of his worries, as he soon came to find out. Much more distracting, and immediate in its risk, was an announcement that rang out. A computerized voice, some sort of recording, spoke through a crackle of static and interference. "T-minus ten minutes until detonation."

"Detonation...?" he mumbled, staggering away from the shelving unit. Slipping and sliding over the slick floor, he caught himself on a table, taking a moment to steady his breathing. "What is the...meaning of this?" He had no clue where he was, how he had gotten here, or what any of this was about. But if there was a detonation already in progress... It was safe to say he was in deep, deep trouble.

His raggedy gloved hand, clutching at the edge of the table, slowly curled into a fist. In the scuffed, stained steel of the work surface, he would barely see a reflection. Even through it all, two dulled points of red light glimmered. "...very well, then...time to make my escape..."

He pushed off from leaning against the table, standing up with great effort. First step: find out where he was escaping from. A map or diagram of the place, maybe...this place had the feel of some kind of underground research facility. Bound to be one around.