Sam had drifted off to sleep while Dean drove his beloved 1967 Impala. His brother had inherited the car from their late father and had lovingly maintained it.

It had been three days since they had escaped the Hive, narrowly avoiding the vans filled with Umbrella scientists who had arrived an hour after the team had been sent. The two brothers had barely managed to avoid being detected, and even now they had to be constantly vigilant.

Fortunately Sam had equipped the satellite that housed the Micheal Sword with lasers as a defense...he claimed it was so Project Micheal could get rid of debris and anything that might otherwise damage it.

Since it would cut down on the amount of repairs they had to do, the engineers had agreed.

MICHEAL was solar-powered and guided by thrusters. It could be anywhere over the world in less than five minutes if it went all out, and an hour if it conserved energy.

Umbrella now heartily cursed adding the weapons, as Sam had programmed it shortly before being drafted for the T-Virus experiments to destroy any Umbrella satellites that came anywhere near it...or anyone stupid enough to try and disable it.

Dean watched his baby brother sleep. It was comforting, hearing Sam snore in the seat beside him.

Suddenly Gabriel spoke up.

"Sam. Sam!"

Sam snorted as he woke up.

"What's up Gabe?"

"You asked me to keep an eye out for any survivors of the Hive. Well Project Alice was just activated."

"Shit."

Yesterday Raccoon City had gone dark as the dead began to file out of the Hive. Project Alice was another experiment with the T-Virus, and Sam had a pretty good idea who the test subject was.

"What's up?"

"The virus is out."

Dean's eyes flashed to the back seat, where the case containing both the virus and the anti-virus were hidden. He had to replace the leather anyway because it had been cracked, so he had hidden the case in the back during that time. It was safer than hiding it in the trunk at least.

"So what do we do Sammy?" asked Dean.

"Stock up," said Sam bluntly.

Dean seemed to consider that idea.

"How long do you think it would take us to reach Uncle Bobby's old cabin in the mountains?"

"About a few days."

Bobby had purchased some land in the mountains off the books and the paperwork had gotten destroyed in a file. It was very inhospitable for most and the cabin was all but forgotten by now.

They only knew of it because they had hidden there one memorable year when John started suffering flashbacks from his days in the service and Bobby didn't want them to see him in that horrible state.

John died that year when a cop ended his life for him. Bobby gained custody, but they still remembered that horrible time.

Since it didn't have working electricity, and the water had to be retrieved from a well, it was unlikely anyone would find them there.

Dean and Sam hit as many small towns as they could for supplies. It had taken a good chunk of Dean's cash to get a trailer they could safely attach to the car that would get over the hills. However it made hauling the amount of groceries much easier.

They might have felt guilty about using a fake debit card that Gabriel 'loaded' with cash, but Sam knew that these people wouldn't have a chance in hell surviving what was to come. With the virus out, they weren't likely to remain living in a few years anyway.

A month passed, and Sam saw an unusual log in the mainframe.

He hacked the computer and was very surprised to find Alice, the guard who had been so nice to him, staring back at him.

"Who are you?" she asked warily.

"A former Umbrella scientist. Hello Alice, it's nice to see your face finally," said Sam.

She stiffened.

"I take it they injected you with that damn virus too?"

"Wait...how do you..."

Sam rolled up his sleeves. The experiments had stopped, but the scars remained. She remained silent.

"Who are you and how did you hack this computer?"

"My name is Sam Winchester, and you can consider me your personal eye in the sky. You're not the only one who wants to destroy that damn organization. I'd invite you to our hideout, but we have enough trouble staying off the grid."

Alice seemed to consider his offer of help.

"Why are you helping me?"

"Payback. Project Lucifer is too dangerous for just one woman, no matter how skilled, to deal with," said Sam.

"Project Lucifer?"

"My own personal name for the T-Virus. You have anything better to call a virus that brings the dead to life?" he said.

She had no answer to that. It was a nice name for such a horrible virus.

"Which reminds me. If you can give me targets to hit, I can reign down the hand of God on Umbrella."

"How?"

"I've been a very bad little experiment..." said Sam cryptically.

Sam walked into the kitchen and turned on the TV. It was run by a solar-powered generator, so they could watch as much as they wanted and not worry about being found.

Sam was very thorough when it came to staying off the grid. The water was recycled and filtered multiple times before they were allowed to drink it. Their electricity came from a generator and they made sure to stock up on anything that could keep for years without going too bad.

Dean might have called him paranoid had he been anyone else, but considering the way they were raised he approved heartily of such measures.

The entire world had become enemy territory with the satellite grid overhead, even if MICHEAL destroyed any near their location that could catch an aerial view of them.

Sam even had Gabriel keeping an eye out for anything that even looked like Umbrella catching a whiff of their location. Between him and Castiel, they would at least have advanced warning.

"Sam...what exactly is this Micheal Sword? I've heard rumors for years in Umbrella about a secret weapon that was scrapped at the last minute and it was called Micheal Sword," asked Dean. It had always bugged the soldiers that so much money had been wasted for a weapon that they never used at least once.

"A solar-powered laser strong enough to melt the Eiffel Tower or reduce any building to burning rubble. It's called the Micheal Sword because when deployed it's like the hand of God being unleashed on whatever is unlucky enough to become a target. Why are you asking me anyway?"

"You think I forgot about your precious MICHEAL project that got us into this mess?" countered Dean.

Sam smirked.

"Want to know a secret that Umbrella was too embarrassed to let out? The only reason the weapon was never deployed was because the codes to access the firing mechanism were 'lost' by the head programmer in charge. And since all the files were deleted a week before and the computer destroyed, it was impossible to use the weapon."

Dean stared.

"You hid the files didn't you?"

"That was the same week I first heard about the T-Virus and what it did. Shortly after they 'volunteered' me for Project Lucifer and I was forced to stay in the Hive until some idiot unleashed that virus."

"Why not hack the computers though?"

"Because the entire thing had a program that Umbrella didn't know was added until they tried to forcefully access the firing program."

Dean's eyebrow went up.

"You added an AI without telling them didn't you?"

"Hell yes I did! Originally it was so the satellite could determine whether or not to move out of the way or just destroy anything that came too close. Once I found the T-Virus I added additional programs that gave it a mind of it's own and then destroyed the codes."

"You and your artificial intelligence addiction."

"Remember how I made all those AI that ended up being scrapped in the end?"

"All except Gabriel and Castiel."

"Well that was to throw off Umbrella. They didn't see any harm of me creating more personalities, so long as they did nothing. It was why they didn't suspect anything when I gave you one as a present."

"Wait...you said that the Micheal satellite is run by an AI. And you made multiple ones so they couldn't figure out which one. And the device you gave me was an AI that could talk back and think..." said Dean, slowly realizing what Sam had done.

"Yes?" said Sam smugly.

"You have got to be shitting me. You sent me the AI in control of a multi-million dollar satellite that could destroy buildings with a laser?!" said Dean in disbelief.

"The greatest shield ever conceived is Ignorance. You never knew what Castiel really was, and everyone assumed that Gabriel had the codes or one of the scrapped ones did. And since I named him Castiel, no one suspected that the one I gave you held the codes."

Dean sat down hard on the chair. Sammy had given him more than a friend to talk to, he had all but handed the key to one of the most dangerous weapons in existence.

And all this time Dean had just thought Castiel was a way for Sam to stay in touch with him through Gabriel.

"Why don't we destroy Umbrella?" he asked.

"No. It's too soon and once they realize that the codes are still around they'll stop at nothing to find us. Right now were a mid-to-high priority target to find and dispose of. We're on their list of people to kill, but we haven't done anything for them to bring out more than a few troops to kill us if found. If we unleash Micheal they'll figure out that one of us has the key code and they won't settle for just killing or capturing us. And I won't risk that weapon in the hands of an organization determined to profit from that damn virus," said Sam firmly.

Dean sat back.

"And if we used it, then they would definitely call us terrorists...dammit Sammy, why the hell did we get into this mess?" said Dean.

"Because like Uncle Bobby might have said, we were idjits," said Sam sadly.

Sam and Dean watched as the world around them went to hell. It had only been a year, but already people were pointing fingers at Umbrella. The virus was loose, and people were waking up and realizing who was to blame for this current crisis.

There was even talk of Judgment Day, as some of the scientists remembered the satellite that had gone to nothing because the codes were 'lost'. People started talking about how Umbrella couldn't be trusted because they had such a dangerous weapon just floating around waiting to be unleashed on the innocent populace.

Sam decided to have a bit of petty revenge and bought a computer that he used to leak videos of the Micheal Sword tests and the location where the laser hit. He then donated it to a third world country after wiping all traces he had used it.

There was an investigation and later a riot when evidence was found of Micheal's deployment.

Sam would eventually consider using Micheal as a way to ruin Umbrella, but he refused to do so until he had a decent reason to. Dean didn't know how to do it, so Sam didn't worry about his brother trying to get some justice of his own.

Besides, talking to Dean for three years had an unexpected side effect for the AI Castiel.

Castiel had developed, of his own 'will', a respect for life. Something many humans didn't have. Just as Gabriel had developed a rather odd sense of humor and a love for the most embarrassing sites he could find.

Naturally when Dean saw exactly what Gabriel enjoyed he became best friends with the AI, to Sam's horror. As such they usually traded for a few hours.

Dean still hadn't forgiven Sam for finding a way to power his portable hologram projectors off of solar energy. Or installing a hole in the bathroom so Castiel could follow him in there.

Gabriel had figuratively laughed himself sick when he heard Dean's girly screams when Castiel surprised him one night while taking a shower. To make matters worse Castiel had a video camera that had been installed earlier that morning and Sam hadn't told Dean the entire thing had been taped.

It wasn't revenge for convincing Gabriel to leave those little traps for Sam to stumble on while observing the world outside last week. Really.

Sam grabbed his gun bag and ran up to the zip line. He had a rather thorough perimeter line around the house, and it was manned by an AI at all times.

And someone had just breached the outermost line. That perimeter was twenty-five miles away from the house.

Sam was on the scout-post with a sniper rifle before the intruder broke the second line.

"Halt. You have entered a restricted area. Leave now or you will be shot," intoned Castiel.

Sam's breath hitched, though it was disguised by Dean approaching.

Ada Wong, one of Umbrella's top agents and problem solvers. This...could be very bad.

"Dean Winchester. One of Umbrella's best soldiers until you suddenly went off the grid shortly after the Red Queen went rogue," said Ada, recognizing Dean immediately.

"Ada Wong. Wesker's bitch," said Dean with venom, "What are you doing here?"

"Umbrella sent me to find out why you suddenly vanished. And to see if the rumors were true that you have one of their experiments," said Ada calmly.

She was fully aware of the sniper in the tree, but she was also smart enough not to try anything just yet.

"If by experiment you mean I swiped one of those vials of anti-virus, then yeah, I stole one of them," said Dean.

"You have the anti-virus?"

"It was bad enough I had to shoot my own brother in that god-forsaken hellhole. I don't want to end up like Sam did or work for a company that can screw with you even after you're supposed to be dead and buried," said Dean.

"And the sniper above me?"

"An old friend. He agreed to join me up here in exchange for protection," he said.

"Hand over the anti-virus."

Dean signaled Sam to keep his gun trained on Ada. She had no idea he had both the anti-virus and the virus itself, and he wasn't about to tell her that much.

He tossed her the vial and after making sure he didn't have anything else hidden, she left. Mostly because Castiel appeared and acted as though he was the sniper she had noticed in the trees.

As far as Umbrella was concerned, Dean was a mostly harmless ex-employee.

Sam was very good at covering his tracks.