Justice

It's still alive.

Somehow, horribly, incomprehensibly, Umbrella's monster is still alive. If it could have ever said to have been living. It's survived an anti-tank rocket. It's survived all the firepower I had back at the clock tower. It's survived being dumped in acidic gunk. And somehow, it has survived a round from a rail gun.

And it's still coming for me. Always, coming for me. Like the will of Umbrella itself, as if it were their right hand. Here, to stop what I now know is my last escape.

It won't survive what's to come. Not even Umbrella could create a creature horrific enough to withstand nuclear fire. For all the destruction the T-virus has inflicted on Raccoon City, a nuclear strike will eclipse that destruction in an instant. And as I stand here, as instinct whispers to me, I know that I should run. I have kept myself alive this long because I knew when to flee, and when to fight. When to choose my battles, to survive against the horrors against this city by keeping out of their unblinking gazes. Instinct tells me that I should leave.

But I choose otherwise.

A magnum is at the body of one of the soldiers. Revolvers are antiquated weapons by most standard – time of reloads, lower magazine capacity, muzzle flare. Revolvers are superseded by handguns in almost every way. But they have one advantage that an automatic weapon can't beat – they hurt. The bullets they fire have a slower muzzle velocity, and will lodge in the body rather than pass right through. They make you bleed. And in all this madness, it's with this slow-firing, antique weapon, that I find my ally.

"You want STARS?" I ask the creature. "I'll give you STARS."

It can't understand me. It probably can't even hear me. I know that it was a man once – its proportions were male at least, and from what we were able to gather in the months after the Mansion Incident, Umbrella's Tyrant line has always used a living human being as its template. But I can't think of this as a man. I can't even think of it as a victim. The man that was once this creature has suffered at the hands of Umbrella even more than I have, but that was long ago. Now, all I have is my foe. My nemesis. It is the name of this beast, and it wears its name well.

So I shoot it.

That was for Brad.

And again.

That was for Mikhail.

And again.

For all those whose names I will never know.

And again.

And for myself.

It's dying. Shrivelling up like a weak, wasted creature, finally put out of its misery. Some would call it a mercy killing. I would tell them that it is a sentiment I cannot afford. The nuclear strike will be a mercy killing, if the undead bear any resemblance of sanity in their decayed minds. But this? No. This isn't a mercy killing. This is something else.

But what?

Its name is Nemesis. It bears the name of a Greek goddess – a female deity of divine retribution. It bore her whip, and tried to deliver judgement onto me. Even now, my arm bears its scar where it maimed me – if I carry that wound the rest of my life, if the pain in my arm remains forever, I know that I will have got off lightly. But it is not a goddess. It is not divine. It is not of those who some say made Man, but a product of mankind itself. In all the horror that we can create.

I shoot it again. "This is judgement," I whisper. "This is justice."

And at last it dies. Truly, finally, dies. The nuclear fire will consume its flesh. But I have ended its life.

"And I've won."

I stand there and breathe, before tossing the magnum aside. There's no more rounds in the chamber. And I'm not counting on finding any more. In the few minutes that remain, the undead will be the least of my worries.

"I won."

For a moment, I smile.

Justice. Vengeance. Judgement. I can decide what to call it later.

But I have seen the end of my nemesis.

And that, to me, is victory.