A/N: I normally write for NCIS, but I've been watching Resident Evil lately, so I decided to write something. There isn't much fics out there for Resident Evil anyway. It's kind of sad. This is set just after the end of Apocalypse, well before Extinction. And it was written because it always makes me sad that Matt turned into Nemesis and eventually died. He was one of my favorites. :) Anyway, enjoy?
I don't own anything.
"So… Alice, what was that thing?"
Alice turned and stared at a curious Angie, confused. In the halflight, she could tell that the girl was tired - they all were. It had barely been 12 hours since she'd exited the Umbrella facility, and every minute had been spent on the open road. Jill seemed to be the only one still awake, or perhaps it was only an illusion because her eyes remained constantly trained on the road, while the others occasionally cast worried glances backward towards Alice. Of course, all it took was Angie to break the silence, and cause the others to turn and look curiously at her as well. Obviously they were thinking something she wasn't.
"That… thing you fought. Before the helicopter went down. Before we managed to get you back."
"I think I heard someone say Nemesis or some shit," LJ offered, ignoring the glares he got for his use of language around the young girl. He only shrugged at them.
Nemesis. Of course. Alice looked away for a moment, images flashing in her head. She could see his face, as clear as day, with those bright blue eyes that had stood out as well. Images of when they'd met - when he'd appeared out of nowhere - and what they'd dealt with in the Hive. Even the look on his face when he found out she was his sister's contact, and the horror on the train, when they had realized that it wasn't over yet. She could see herself screaming his name as he was taken from her. And then… she could see him after all he'd been through, as Nemesis, as someone she didn't know.
She could see, as if it was happening in front of her, his death, and it took all of her strength not to cry out. They'd barely known each other for a few hours they'd been together, yet he'd grown to be important - almost crucial - to her survival. But she'd lost him… how could she explain that to the others? That he was more than just a creature, more than just what they'd seen?
"His name was Matt."
The words escaped before she realized she was talking, and Alice barely noticed as the faces of the others displayed their newfound confusion. They knew nothing, she forced herself to remember as to stop herself from doing something she'd regret later. They knew only the horrors of Raccoon City, not the horrors of the Hive and the race against time they'd faced, the race against time that had only lead to death in the end. They knew nothing of the train, of the Queen's chamber, of those who had died and how she - they - had been the only survivors. She doubted that they knew much more than her name and the past few weeks.
"Matt? Alice, you named him?" It was a horrible attempt to shoot humour into the conversation, and Alice's lower lip began to quiver, her emotions threatening to show themselves fully. She didn't know who spoke, besides the voice being male, and she didn't care… she didn't want Matt to go down in history as one of Umbrella's worst mistakes and Raccoon City's worst enemies.
"His name was Matt," the words the same, but her voice was stronger now. Alice became more aware of her surroundings, and realized that she was glaring at the people in the car with her. Why couldn't they just let the subject go?
"Matt was the only other survivor of the Hive. The Hive is where it all began, where the T-Virus escaped. There were… about ten of us that went into the Hive. Four of us died before the Queen's Chamber. There were four of us when we reached the train, but only two of us made it out. Matt… Matt was one of them."
It made more sense, but not much, she realized when their faces still showed confusion. With a sigh, Alice sat back and shook her head, waiting for the questions that were sure to come. And, just on time, Carlos leaned forward, locking his eyes with hers. However, it was Angie's curious voice that once again broke the silence. "You were there when this all started? You were… you were down there? My daddy told me about it once, but he… he didn't often go down there."
When she nodded silently, Carlos began to speak, his gaze still unwavering. "Then… Umbrella injected the T-Virus in him? He brought it to the surface?"
"No," her voice was as strong and forceful as before. She couldn't, she wouldn't, let them have the wrong impression of who Matt had been. "He was infected by a mutated creature that escaped from the Hive and managed to attack us on the train back. He would have made it if Umbrella hadn't…"
They all knew what she meant, and thus no one pushed her to finish her sentence. It was obvious that so much more had occurred. So much more had happened to her, more than they had previously thought. The monster that had tried to kill them, and ultimately her, had been a person at one time. After all they'd seen, it was believable, yet still they didn't want to believe. It would be so much easier to pretend that the creature - Nemesis - Matt - had originally been some other kind of creature, not human like they were.
"We… we had the antivirus," she continued. "I could have saved him. After everyone else… I failed them, they all died. Kaplan. Rain. Matt…"
She found Carlos's hand on her knee but barely acknowledged it. They knew her mind was in another place now, another horror of another time. Kaplan, Rain - two other names they'd never heard before, but they obviously held some significance. And she'd said ten of them had entered the Hive. If only two had escaped, then one could only imagine what had happened in the place where the T-Virus had originated from.
Alice gently shook her head, attempting to refocus on the world around her. She gave an encouraging smile to Carlos and gently laid her hand on his, but her mind was not entirely there. Images still flashed in her mind, now including those of Kaplan and Rain and the others they'd lost. Guilty thoughts told her that she'd have never made it out anyway, that it was better this way, for she now had others that were quite alive and well to protect and help her, but she knew she'd have given her life for one of theirs…
And only now did it make her wonder:
What would things be like now, if she'd had the chance to save Matt?
A/N: I may continue or this may be a one-shot. Not quite sure.