Five reviews guys! Five! That's One-Two-Three-Four-Five people who bothered to spare time to comment on my story!

I'd like to thank my frequent reviewer, Tanya Adams 64 for once again reviewing my story. I hope you liked this chapter as much as you liked the last one!

Additional thanking goes to BravoDoc83 who gave me a long and harsh lecture about technical and military terms in which I thought I understand, but it turns out I don't. Thanks for opening my eyes on that subject, and I hope you will find this Interval more to your liking.

Last but not least, the author of the Last Man Standing Fanfic, Escape the Shadows had also reviewed. I hope you enjoy the chapter, and I'd like to thank you for allowing me to use names and such from your story in mine, and hope it will be inserted to your liking.

Now on with the story!

(----------V----------)

Disclaimer: Resident Evil and F.E.A.R are trademarked products of Capcom, Sierra and Screen Gems productions.

Interval Three: First Encounter
Entry One- Cold Reality

Mission Time: Unknown
Location: The Hive- Laboratory Administration Section. Floor Five

Eyes, frightened, terrified eyes, wide with sheer terror, stared through two small black round visors located it the front of his gas mask. He breathed heavily; long, prolonged breaths, as if he'd just run a Marathon. His heart exploded in his chest, pumping blood and Adrenaline at a speed matching the pistons inside an engine. A wave of cold sweat washed across his body as he inspected the wound in his left wrist; the thick, semicircular line of red seemingly taunted him, slowly dripping onto his black and white glove and staining it, tarnishing the green color of his assault rifle as it did. He glanced forward, at the creature left on the floor in front of him, and shuddered with horror.

"What… The FUCK?!"

The white light of the torch, located at the bottom of his G2A2 shone upon the man, no, creature, standing in front of him, causing an explosion of cold sweat to rush across him

It was once a man, but now, it seemed to have lost of all its humanity; pale, white skin covered the most of the thing's body, where it wasn't stained by red blood. The suit it once wore was tarnished and torn apart, revealing more pale and bloody flesh. Its left leg has been broken at the shin, a piece of bloody white bone erecting out of its pant leg and shining upon the torch's beam. Half of the man's face was missing, displaying a grotesque exhibit of red muscle and decay. Several of its teeth have been smashed out and missing, as red blood slowly dripped from its upper jaw to the lower lip, staining his chin and dripping down to the floor. A pair of milky blue eyes stared at him as an inhuman hiss left the creature's mouth

It started approaching him, limping on his broken leg and slowly, but steadily, closing the distance between them.

He backed away from the thing, keeping his weapon always pointed at it. His mind hurt; he had shot the man three times in the chest, he HAD to die. Hell, by the looks of it, he seemed dead. And yet, there it was, slowly pacing towards him, two arms slowly reaching forward to grab. More hisses and snarls reached his ears, he flashed his torch behind the creature and was stricken with dread; the bodies, the same bodies he'd seen when he stepped in the office, the ones which were stacked up like the morbid deck of cards

They were getting up to their feet

His eyes darted left and right, looking for a way out of the room; all the windows and the door were behind the things, in his own stupidity he backed himself against a corner of the office. He was trapped.

Fear was surging through his body like electricity, paralyzing him and numbing his mind, disabling him from thinking properly. All he could think of was the same image of the dead people, getting up to their feet. His mind played that in his eyes, over and over again. He felt the solid structure of the concrete hit his back. That's it; there was no more room for running. He reached the end of the line, and those things; whatever they were, were still gaining ground.

Gritting his teeth and shouldering the G2A2, he unleashed a long burst of rounds into the leading creature's chest. The sheer force of multiple impacts sent it backwards and into the bodies of more creatures. It didn't even fall over like last time, just recovered and resumed its gruesome manner of walking.

His mouth ran dry with fear. How could he withstand such a hit? Why wasn't it dead? What the FUCK was going on down there?

The man let out another hiss, snapping the soldier out of his trance. He once again took aim, but this time pointed the gun higher; the iron sights aligning between the man's eyes

He pulled the trigger.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

All three shots met their mark; one made contact directly in the center of the man's forehead, snapping it backwards. The other two hit slightly above its left eye, penetrating through the soft matter and into the skull. The back of the man's head literally exploded as the bullets escaped, spraying the creatures behind with a massive quantity of red liquid that made them seem even more dreadful as it slowly dripped down their hissing mouths and to the ground. The thing itself let out one more deathly hiss, but sonly after, collapsed to the floor, the shoes of other creatures stepping on its back as they made their way towards him.

But it was dead. He killed it.

He quickly ejected the empty magazine out of the weapon, reaching for a fresh one and feeding it into his G2A2 Assault rifle. He clicked the safety to Semi Auto and activated a small Laser Designator located at the side of the weapon's barrel. A red dot appeared on the chest of the woman in front of him, but she didn't seem to notice that as she snarled at him, revealing two rows of yellow teeth.

Raising the weapon, he placed the red dot right between her eyes and pulled the trigger. As the bullet escaped the lifeless body, her blonde hair was blown backwards, making it seem like the sun itself exploded out of her head. He wasted no time and fired again, taking out more and more of those things. The sounds of his gunshots rang through the room as golden shell casings flew out the side of his weapon, spinning around themselves like flowers in the wind and landing on the tiled floor while ringing like bells. His bodyweight shifted from left to right as he made sharp movements to aim at things that came at him from the sides. He was thinning their numbers quick, and soon the exit of the room was visible to him. He could make it out!

Placing another round into a red haired woman's face, he heaved a sigh of relief that seemingly removed a huge lead weight off his chest. It was finally over.

A moan came from his left. He turned sideways, weapon drawn. Too late

A young redheaded teenager pounced at him with frenzied hunger and sunk his yellow teeth into his wrist. Teeth gritted in muffled pain as he let go of his Assault Rifle and forced the young lad off his wrist and to the floor. He pointed the weapon's barrel at him, the torch shone, revealing a young boy, not older than sixteen, wearing a bloodied white shirt and a pair of blue jeans. His pale, freckled face distorted in rage and white, hollow eyes stared at his bleeding hand with obvious interest as he struggled to get to his feet, but a heavy army boot, placed on his chest prevented him from doing so.

The former teenager hissed in anger and struggled to get up, arms flailing aimlessly and mouth dripping with saliva. The soldier looked at him with a mixture of disgust and horror in his eyes and put the barrel of his weapon right inside the young man's mouth. Its teeth closed around it as it tried to tug and pull the weapon, as if trying to eat the metallic barrel

"Target Forty Six…" He applied a small amount of pressure to the black trigger and felt the recoil shift from the piece of metal to his body

BAM!

The lad collapsed to the ground, a gaping hole torn open in the back of its head, through which blood pored out in gallons, staining the black floor with a large puddle of crimson liquid and white bone fragments. It went silent, no more hissing, no more moaning. The only voice that could be heard was the soldier's own, low, computerized voice

"…Eliminated"

He kept staring at the corpse of the young man with horror, not able to realize the situation he was in. Why were those…things, could only be killed by a shot to the head? Why were they coming back to life after being killed? Why did the boy bite him? He stared at the bite mark again as it slowly bled out. The area around the bite felt hot, and stiff to touch, it was also starting to itch. He stood there for a second, entranced, until a beeping noise and a glow from his arm caught his attention. Quickly unfolding the Mini-Com mounted on his right forearm, he saw the small black screen was displaying three green letters:

ETM

An Emergency Text Message, that meant his teammates were still alive. He used the touchpad with his spare hand and extracted the contents of the message; it would seem his two remaining teammates, Bravo and Charlie had managed to rally together in a predestined location and were now waiting for him so that they can carry on the mission. The message also contained a warning about hostiles that were in the area and could only be killed by a shot to the head. He sent a quick acknowledgement message and set to head out. Checking his vest, he discovered he had just two more magazines, three N6A3 Fragmentation Grenades and a single AT-S landmine.

Positively enough firepower to get out of this hellhole.

He stepped out of the office and back into the hallway, through which he originally gained access to the room. He took a cautious look at the blood and debris littered floor. There was something missing there, something he saw when he came in, but now was no longer there.

The bodies

Shifting his body into gear, he ran as fast as he could through the bloodied corridor. Alone, he might serve as an easy target for those things, but when he will be in the company of his heavily armed companions, they'd defiantly have a harder time surprising them, or even posing a threat for that matter.

He had to get to Lab Sector 5, fast.

(--T--)

Christian has been sitting in the briefing room for the past five minutes without much to do. He was waiting his teammate, Maya Cohen, kindly nicknamed 'Mai', to arrive with the other member in his team: Simon Arturo, whom everyone named 'Spooks'. He kicked back in his large leather chair, placing both his army boots on the large glass table in front of him. He drew a lengthy sigh of boredom and drew one of his AT-14's, ejecting the clip and examined it for a long period of time; closely inspecting each and every curve in the small black cartridge. His love for pistols was common knowledge among his team, much his ability to handle those small pieces of destruction. His accuracy and speed were almost notorious, and that alone gave him the privilege to be the only person in the entire base allowed not to carry a rifle of some sort.

He always found them too large and uncomfortable.

"Hey, umm… Christian, D-D-Do you have any idea who's taking point?"

He glanced sideways, following the female voice that talked to him. His gaze met a short girl with brown hair that cowered in the chair as his emerald eyes rested upon her. Some of her brown locks hid her two brown eyes as she looked back at him, while pulling her legs up the chair. Mentally sighing, he stuffed a cigarette into his mouth and lit it up with his silvery lighter and inhaling a massive quantity of smoke into his lungs, breathing it out thoughtfully and allowing the small web formations of the smoke to float around aimlessly until ultimately vanishing.

Her name was Tyler O'Neil, but all members of the team have previously nicknamed her Tai. She was the latest, and, if he put some thinking into it, the oddest addition to the F.E.A.R Strike Team; a shy, nice and young, very young girl at the age of sixteen, maybe seventeen, he couldn't remember. From what he had heard, she was a wiz with all stuff technical and cybernetic, able to hack complex security systems and knock down supercomputers within minutes, maybe seconds. She was very reclusive though; always keeping to herself, always quiet during conversations and times in which the team had gone out to have some off time outside the base. In fact, for the first week she was in the base, she hadn't let out a single word, but that was until Maya decided to step in. When the two began talking, there was an instant click; maybe because she missed female company in an all-boys team, nonetheless, the two became best friends in no time, always going everywhere together, talking and training, anything

"I think it's Spooks" he replied and placed one foot on the other, leaning further back in his chair and slapping the clip back into the butt of his AT-14. Her lack of confidence was a mystery to him; she knew that everyone on this team are the closest and most personal friends, and yet, when she talked to them, she kept stammering as if she was talking to one of the popular people in her high school. He mentally shrugged that thought off and took another drag of his cigarette; it calmed him for some reason.

The two black glass doors that led into the briefing room slid open in opposite directions, there were three people standing in the entrance, Sling recognized them immediately; the remaining three members of his team. He quickly swung his legs off the table as the three entered the large room and took their seats. One of them, a large, dark skinned man, gestured towards him with his hand. He slapped himself on the forehead and instantly took the cigarette out of his mouth, putting it out in a close by black marvel ashtray. Spooks hated it when people were smoking next to him.

"You should really think about quitting. That stuff can kill you" he said. His voice was low, masculine and rugged. It was as if the man had an aura of strength surrounding him

"I only smoke when I'm nervous" he replied, which earned him a round of looks from all the people present. The two always had this conversation whenever Sling was smoking next to Spooks. The gunman sat upright in his chair and stretched his body

"But you're always nervous!" his companion responded. By that time, Tyler was already stifling a giggle, those two never got old

"Yeah, well, I'll work on that later" Sling shot his comeback, which elicited a round of laughs from the table, but it quickly died down as Collins, the team's Commanding Officer raised his hands. Tyler giggled again, but tried to disguise it as clearing her throat.

Collins was a man in his late forties, his head was cleanly shaved, shining against the white lighting that emerged from the ceiling. He always wore large black sunglasses, no matter the time. He wore F.E.A.R uniform that resembled the pair 'Rowdy' Betters, the F.E.A.R team coordinator wore; a set of black uniforms, a flak vest and a small hat, both branded with the organization's logo.

"We'll start in a second" He said while getting up and walking towards a computer console, located in the far left corner of the room and activating it

"I'm just waiting for—Ah, there you are"

The doors slid open again and in came another soldier, already fully dressed and ready to head out. He was wearing the same uniforms as all the people in the room wore, an RPL sub machinegun slung on his back and he held a piece of Tactical Armor in his right hand, allowing his left to hold an ammunition vest. But that wasn't what attracted the most attention about his appearance

That title belonged to his face.

A black cloth mask completely covered the lower part of his face, concealing his feature in a perfect manner. On his eyes, large red goggles with a black outline and a thick rubber security strap that went all the way to the back of his head and top it all, a small black helmet that fit his head perfectly.

Tyler's eyes were attracted by the name tag on his chest. Usually, the uniforms F.E.A.R issued bore a small name tag, sewed into the left side of the uniform. The tag had the person's nickname written on it; hers read Tai, Christian's was Blind Slinger and Simon's read Spooks.

His read Point Man.

"People, I'd to introduce you to your new Point Man" Collins' rumbling voice boomed again, turning all attention back to him

"He's been specially assigned to us by my own request and will lead you in your next mission. You will refer to him only as 'Sir' or 'Sigma One'. Am I clear?"

The team of four nodded while the fifth soldier took his seat, posing himself in front of all the others. Tyler couldn't stop eyeing him; she looked to the left to meet Maya's eyes, also inspecting the new Point Man. Why couldn't he introduce himself was the first thing she wanted to know, the second thing was why hadn't Collins told them his name.

Did he even have a name?

"Good" Collins replied, clicking further on the keyboard. Suddenly, a beam of fine blue light shot from the ceiling down to the glass surface of the table. The five stared at it intensely as millions of small metallic grains appeared out of nowhere into the beam of light, composing a structure of some sort; it was made of twelve or so hexagonal rings that kept shrinking in size, like an upside down cone. They were all connected by a single pipe that went from the top floor to a large square hall in the bottom of the structure. Two small expansions left the square structure, going nowhere.

"Umbrella's research and development facility mark U-306. Codenamed, The Hive" Collins' voice said as the hologram spun around itself, allowing all the people present to inspect it

"Several hours ago, a team of Replica forces had taken hold of the seventh floor of the structure"

A blinking red arrow appeared next to the seventh ring from the bottom, the sign 'Point of Entry' shone next to it in white letters. Collins pushed it and the latter had expanded into three flat video screens, displayed the black and white dressed soldiers taking over the labs and offices. One of the screens presented the sight of one of the soldiers, gunning down an employee, practically blowing him across a table. All the people present glared at the screens with anger; since the Auburn incident, they learned how good Fettel's Replica forces were. Mai and Sling were the only ones of the Sigma team to have actually engaged Replicas, sent as a backup force to the F.E.A.R Alpha team that went in first. They knew all about what happened to the men and women of that team; deaths, horrible deaths. Two F.E.A.R members went down in unknown ways, not including two pilots that died during two rescue attempts and over thirty members of Delta Force's elite squad that perished throughout operations Initial Contact and Extraction Point.

"How many of these Test-Tube motherfuckers are we talking about?"

Tyler stared at Sling with shock; she knew for about four months, and throughout all that time, she never heard him say Fuck, not even once. He was mad at something, she could tell. It was more than just encountering these… Replicas, that's how Collins called them. There was something else, below the surface.

"Irrelevant. The insertion team was extremely small in size; ten, maybe less" He sighed "It's not the Replicas we're after"

"While attempting to take out the Replicas, one of Umbrella's teams, the Crimson Skulls, seems to have triggered an explosion in a level five Biohazard area. An unknown agent, codenamed Project T, was released into the air. Resulting an instant lockdown of The Hive"

Everyone shifted in their seats. The thought of being sealed shut in an underground tomb, with god knows what, made chills race across their skins. They couldn't help but to feel sorry for the members of the Umbrella team, they must be going through a living hell down there.

"Search and Rescue then, right?" Spooks asked. The older man ran his fingers across his bald head and sighed thoughtfully

"Not officially" he replied. The large man stared at him with shock. What in the world could he mean by that?

"From what I've gathered, Umbrella just wants us to retrieve their supercomputer's memory drive for analysis. When asked about their men, their representative regarded them as 'Secondary objectives, if any'"

"They're hiding something" Tyler said, stating the horrifically obvious. But coming from her innocent mind, those words made a great impact on the group. They all nodded in agreement

"Exactly" Collins finally said "And that's exactly why we're gonna handle the mission with opposing priorities; the mission's primary objective is to rendezvous with any surviving members of the Crimson Skulls"

The holographic screen was now presenting them with headshots of the Crimson Skulls' members, along their adjacent names

James 'One' Shade
J.D Salinas
Rain Ocampo
Ben 'Bennie' Kaplan
Lisa 'Medic' Leang
Boris Vankman

Jason Romano
Robert Westlake

"We're on a tight deadline here, head for the armory and gear up. The chopper flight to Raccoon city is about fifteen minutes long. Tyler. You stay here and study the blueprints of the structure. There has to be a way in, and it's your job to find it"

"I'm coming with you"

Her words hit him like a slap across the face. The shy girl suddenly stood up from her chair, all attention and eyes were on her. She blushed a bit, but still spoke those words.

"I'm just as combat qualified as everyone else in this room. I've been through all your training courses and passes with flying colors. I want to go"

She spoke with such vigor in her voice, such ferocity, that Maya's lips broke into a thin smile. She eyed her; the girl no longer seemed like the same shy child that always cowered behind her computer's screen and helped from afar, oh no, this was a completely different girl.

"You don't have to" Collins tried. As horrific as the thought was, he could spare a soldier, there's always another elite soldier in some unit that could be drafted as a replacement, but Tyler's keen ability was irreplaceable

"I want to"

Her reply was determined, craved out of solid rock and forged into cold steel. Maya's smile grew wider. She got up from her seat and padded Tyler on the back

"Come on then" she told her. The others were also getting up, heading down to the armory and picking up their ammo vests as they were leaving the room

"We've got work to do"

(--T--)

He took a long whiff as he entered the room. The heavy and distinctive scent hit him head on, it was smelly, rancid, even, one might say. But he enjoyed it. He walked into the large darkened room and stepped into the darkness and stench, reaching with his arm across the cold cement wall, feeling its texture to find what he was looking for, the small plastic knob that's been hiding from him in the darkness.

Click

His white teeth gleamed as light was poured into the room from above, shining across the large, black, oily, racks, across the green metal boxes and the small table located at the entrance.

It was his armory, and he loved it.

Simon 'Spooks' Arturo was a large man, by any standard. His figure reached up closer to the heavens than anyone else that he had ever met or known, throughout his life, people have always looked up to him, and not only because he was tall. White light shone across his chocolate colored skin, his small hat casting a shadow on his eyes and on his square jaw. He walked to the middle of the room and inhaled deeply, allowing the air to escape his mouth with a sigh of glee

"I tell ya, Sling, I love the smell of gun oil!" he exclaimed as the shorter man walked by him. He examined him; as nervous as ever, looking around in small, bird-like movements. The gunman turned towards his teammate with a crooked smile on the left side of his lip

"I just hope that's a pistol down your pants" he replied and chuckled. The larger man stared down with confusion to see nothing, and hear a wave of friendly laughter from his friend. He joined him and added a weak pat on the smaller man's back. Of course, 'weak' was a very relative term, as Sling nearly toppled over his feet with a yelp of surprise.

As he regained his composure, Sling got back up and turned towards his desired rack; Pistols and Light Firearms, whereas Spooks had gone in the opposite directions, searching for a shotgun.

"Let's see… Gonna need a pair of these, a couple of those…" He mouthed as he sorted through the long isle of black and slivery pistols. He picked a couple of AT-14's, the standard handgun for all F.E.A.R members and slapped them in two holsters on his custom made ammunition vest, on the sides of his waist, like a cowboy from those old westerns. Two 9mm Berettas went into an X shaped holster in the back of his belt. Last but not least was a single Desert Eagle, which he slowly inserted into his black thigh holster

"All gassed up and ready to go"

Spooks was across the other side of the room, sorting through an array of much larger weapons; Shotguns, Assault Rifles and heavier weapons. The long and black figure of an M-1014 Combat Shotgun already slung from his back as he continued his ongoing search through the rack from the proper weapon to fit the mission. His vest was already pumped full of shotgun slugs and buckshot rounds, the red shells gleamed inside his pockets as he slipped three US-449 Flechette shells into one of his back pockets. He always did that, even though he'd get arrested if he was caught using that type of armament.

He picked up another Shotgun, a VK-12 this time. The pump action shotgun had a much slower rate of fire than the semi-automatic M-1014; it was able to actually handle the US-449 without springing a malfunction. Slinging the weapon on his back, creating an X shape with the two shotguns, he turned to head out of the room when a spark lit up in his eyes, facing the weapons rack again, he bent down and picked up a large black case and carried it with him. The case was as big as a guitar case, made out of a solid plastic material and had a few words branded on with silvery letters

MOD-4 Rocket Launcher
Use with Extreme Caution

He met up with Sling and they both left the armory, just to run into the two girls, who seemed whizzing and panting, taking deep breaths to restore it. Tyler walked past the two men and into the armory, carrying a list of weapons Maya had ordered her to pick up and ready. In the meanwhile, she threw two large bags at the two men. When they unzipped them, the two were surprised to find a couple of wet suits, a set of flippers and an oxygen regulator

"Scuba gear, thought we were going underground, not underwater" the gunman stated while staring at the contents of the bag, still looking all around confused

"They're our mean on entry. I'll explain on the way" she pushed her head into the small room and yelled at the top of her lungs

"C'mon, Tai, Chopper leaves in two minutes!"

(--T--)

"Get off me before I stab your ASS!"

Rain's face distorted in rage as she tried to pry the deranged woman off her, pushing and fighting against the weight of the crazed scientist as she toppled over her and pinned her against the ground. Her teeth were still sunk inside Rain's hand; between the thumb and the index finger, closing like a vice and sending waves of pain through the girl's body, which only increased her annoyance. Balling her hand into a fist, she sent it into the woman's bloody jaw line and blew her onto the floor; the deranged woman releasing a strange howl of pain from her lips as she rolled helplessly across the floor.

The female commando shot to her feet and inspected her hand. The bite was fairly deep, tearing through her skin and flesh to draw a large quantity of blood that ran across her cut-finger glove. She brought her MP-5 to her wounded hand and directed the barrel at the woman, who now staggered to her feet, slowly. Rain gave her a spiteful look with her two blue eyes, her lips curled into a shape of utter disgust

"Stay. Back" she uttered the words as if she was breathing through red hot embers. The woman seemed to have ignored her words as she slowly closed the distance in her odd, wobbly steps. Rain's lips tightened in anger as her bloody finger locked around the trigger of her sub machinegun

"I said stay back, BITCH!" she now barked in anger. Once again, the woman ignored her, hissing silently and closing the gap between them. The grey light from the ceiling provided excellent visibility; Rain could see every single detail about the deranged scientist, her own blood now dripped from the woman's lips, her milky white eyes shone from under her brown hair and her white clothing had been destroyed and dirtied because of the tumble she took across the floor. She hissed; a low sound that escaped her lips and made the female commando surge with anger. Everything about that woman annoyed her. She wanted to kill her.

The woman's feet carried her into the five meter radius Rain had mentally thought of as her defense line. The barrel on her weapon was lowered, aligning with the mad woman's left kneecap. Rain's eye darted to the safety as her thumb clicked it off to Single Fire mode

"I warned you" she said and pulled the trigger. The bullet exploded out of the black barrel with a small blaze, screaming its way into the woman's body. It penetrated easily through the kneecap's right side, shooting the entire leg with a spasm of pain that made it twist left, escaping through the other side of the leg with a blast of blood, bone fragments and gunpowder that merged together into a cloud of red vapor that emerged from behind her leg. The woman's head was bent down for a second as she seemingly looked at her blown knee, but soon came back up. Her white eyes flashed in rage as she bore her bloody yellow teeth and black gums at Rain, hissing in anger, her already disgusting face distorting in a way that almost made it impossible to look at.

Rain's face did not shift. Her weapon was now pointing at the girl's other kneecap, ready to go off again. The woman took another step forward, and in response, Rain fired again; blowing off her other knee and setting off another bloody cloud behind the woman's other leg. That seemed to have stopped her cold, she stood for a second, motionless.

And lounged forward

Rain was caught off guard by that move; instinctively, her thumb clicked the safety down two firing modes, to auto. She pulled the trigger with her bloody index and felt the weapon rattle slightly in her firm grip and against her shoulder as the last remaining eight rounds found their way into the woman's chest in a single furious burst of weapon's fire. The scientist was blown completely off balance, practically flying a small distance as a result of the multiple hits while screaming in pain, dropping beyond Rain's sight and into the darkness, crating a large rumble as her body probably collided against pipes and rods that were hidden inside the thick layer of white mist

She didn't even made it to eject her empty magazine before her comm. Unit went off, it was J.D, he sounded worried. She hated when he was worried about her, can't he understand she is well able to take care of herself?

"Rain? What the fuck is going on over there? It sounded like gunfire!"

She rolled her eyes, of course it sounded like gunfire; she fired ten rounds into that psycho cannibal bitch before she went down. She calmed herself down and responded

"I shot the survivor" she started, and before he could comment, her explanation came

"She bit me man, took a chunk right outta me. She was crazy"

"Bit you? Where? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, just a little—Stand by" In one swift motion, the girl exchanged her old magazine with a fresh one and pointed in towards the darkness. She heard something; like the old noise that made her encounter the mad woman. It was metal scraping against the floor, but much louder this time. It wasn't a can; it was something much, much heavier. She steadied herself and took a deep breath, there were more sounds; footsteps, feet dragging across the floor, it was everywhere, all around her. Making a full spin around herself, she scanned her surroundings; the darkness and the mist have both limited her sight range greatly, she was only able to see for about fifteen meters ahead of her before the darkness took hold.

The noises were louder now, it was beginning to scare her, elevate her pulse and shorten her breath. There were multiple attackers, all around her, and she couldn't see them. The scraping noise rose suddenly above all others, it sounded like it was inches away from her. She quickly turned towards the source of the sound. She was right; it wasn't a can this time.

It was an axe

The Red Crescent blade of the axe was being slowly dragged across the floor, eliciting the horrible scraping noise that reached Rain's ears. The long metallic handle shook slightly as it was held by the man who dragged the large piece of metal across the floor and towards her.

He looked very much like the woman she saw earlier; his skin was deathly pale, his white lab coat and pants were dirty and torn, sticking to his body as they almost seemed soaked with water. His left ankle has been broken, evident by his foot, twisting more than ninety degrees from the direction it should be facing, creating sickening crack noises every time he took a step towards her, his axe dragging across the floor.

But his face, his face made Rain's stomach churn with sickness, threatening to bring her lunch back to the surface. Half of them were burned off, crispy red and black flesh dangled in a completely disgusting manner from his bones. His eye has been missing from some reason, leaving a bloody gaping hole in his face. The girl cringed; entranced by the grotesque man's face, until more footsteps pulled her out.

She made another quick circle, her eyes widened. Those people were everywhere; she was completely surrounded by men and women that looked like the man with the axe; mangled, disfigured

Dead.

"Rain? Rain, come in! What's going on?" her earpiece screamed. She grabbed the collar of her jacket with fumbling, sweaty and bloody fingers, activating it. As her voice came through J.D's end, his face turned pale, she said the three words he never thought he'd hear her saying in his entire lifetime

"I need backup" she said in a frightened voice "Repeat, need backup!"

(--T--)

Beads of cold sweat rolled off the pale face of J.D Salinas. He couldn't believe his ears; the words he heard, the voice, it was completely unlike the Rain he knew. She sounded frightened, panicked; it scared him to no end. What could she have encountered that was so terrible to make her ask for backup?

"We've reached the chamber, J.D; take the two civilians and go!" A different voice came through the headset; it was 'One'. That was all the approval he needed to get; closing the computer shut and grabbing hold of his shortened M-16A2, he sprung from his chair and turned towards the darkness of Dining hall B

"You two, come with me! Go, go, go!" he urged them and took off. They followed suit, running after him the halls of the large hall, into the darkness and the white mist. Neither of them could see anything; running aimlessly through the darkness and being led by the soldier who was running in a much faster than theirs. He didn't even seem to care about them, only wanting to reach wherever he was running to, his M-16 ready to fire.

"Where are we going?" the girl, Alice, asked. Matt turned towards her, she couldn't have been more than two feet beside him and yet, he couldn't see her face as it was hidden in the dark

"Dunno" he replied while taking short breaths. He wasn't accustomed to running this quick and it was taking its toll on his lungs as they strained to pump precious oxygen into his bloodstream.

J.D stopped running as he reached what seemed to be a human wall; without trying, he easily spotted more then a hundred people standing there, something was wrong with them; they just didn't seem right to him, something told him that, like a small voice in the back of his head.

"RAIN!" he cried out at the top of his lungs, the howl boomed and bounced between the large tanks and containers, it seemed to attract those people, as they turned to look at him and began walking it his direction in small, slow steps. This cleared his field of vision enough to see the lone girl, standing in the middle of the large crowd of those men and women

Rain

"Stay!" he barked at both Matt and Alice and took off into the crowd, running towards the wall of humans that walked towards him. He brought his M-16 into an offensive position, feeling the coldness of the weapon's barrel against his fingers. He fired in short bursts of four and five bullets into the bodies of those people; they went down quickly, clearing him a path. He could already see Rain clearly now, she made eye contact with him and quickly released another burst of 9mm rounds from her MP-5 into the chest cavity of another man which fell down to the cold floor

"Come on!" he screamed and grabbed her shoulder, pulling her along with him out of the crowd, which now turned its direction towards the two soldiers and closed the distance with a slow but steady pace. As they ran, he saw that the path through which he gained way to reach his teammate was blocked again by those odd looking people. His finger pulled the trigger again, firing the last three rounds in the magazine at them and taking them down, Rain helped with supportive fire; taking out more of them to clear a larger path through which the two left, jumping over the mound of corpses left by their weapons. J.D reached to a compartment on the side of his ammunition vest to take out a fresh magazine and reload his empty weapon. As he did, he could've sworn he saw the people on the ground staggering to get to their feet, but shrugged that image quickly; they were dead, he shot them right in the heart and saw them fall down.

Alice and Matt soon joined them as they raced towards the computer console, sprinting in a crazy pace to get away from those people. As they reached they console, J.D was stricken with a horrible feeling; he couldn't remember where the exit from the room was. Adrenaline flushed his brain, he tried concentrating as the four stood there next to the computer data port, those weird men and women were gaining more and more ground

"Which way?" Rain cried; her face was pale and flushed with cold sweat. She reached over her forehead and wiped it off, leaving a small bloody smear instead.

"I…I can't remember!" He replied, stressing, panicking. He took a look to the left; the empty isle was now filled with more people, they seemed to appear out of thin air, more and more of them, walking towards them in their ever slow pace. His eyes darted to the corridor through which he thought they came, but it was now also crowded with them; he could hear their footsteps, but not see them.

Only one way left.

"That way!" he suddenly yelled, pointing his gun at the only way in which those people didn't seem to be. The other three nodded and raced after him as his feet carried him in an incredible speed he didn't even know he was capable of. They raced down the black isle, jumping over pipes that ambushed them in the mist, which was now about knee high. He always looked to the sides, between the large tanks while still running forward; they were there, converging on them

Boxing them in.

They reached the end of the isle; a small nook in the wall, confound by two steel walls and leading to a steel door with a black and white keypad on the side. Around the two walls, there were many metal crates in various shapes and sizes and two more isles that led into different areas of Dining Hall B. Seeing the keypad from afar, J.D hurried and pulled out a small square black object with a glass screen and two wires that ended with connection plugs. He motioned Matt to catch his attention and threw it towards him. The man in the cop uniforms caught it and looked at it in a puzzling manner

"Just hook it up to the keypad and hit the green switch! We'll cover you!" He ordered him. Matt nodded and pushed his body over its limits, running past all the other three and stopping near the keypad. He grabbed the two wires with hands trembling with fear and attempted inserting them into the sockets, but his hands shook too much, the plug kept hitting the plastic outline of the sockets, sometimes sliding out of his hands.

"Shit!" He exclaimed loudly and tried again, unaware of what was going around him

Rain hopped onto one of the large metal crates and landed in a crouching position, like a cat. She raised her weapon and opened fire into the crowd in long bursts that depleted her magazine in an alarming rate

"Reload!" she cried out and proceeded with the procedure, to her side, she heard Matt swear loudly, she could almost sense his fear and distress, but decided not to invest too much thinking into it, slapping another magazine into her MP-5 and loading it

"Gotcha covered!" J.D yelled back. He fell into a crouched position behind Matt and opened fire. His M-16 was much louder than Rain's weapon as it roared and breathed fire and lead at the horde that walked towards him. The barrel shook in his hand as one long burst after another were unleashed, bullets sometime missing their targets and hitting the tanks behind, penetrating them and making streams of pressurized gas to escape in the form of white vapor

"The tanks, watch the tanks!" Alice screamed in panic as she saw the white vapor escaping those huge black blocks of metal. She rushed towards Matt and tried helping him, but the device itself now slipped out of her sweat glazed hands and fell to the floor with a loud thud

"Shit! Shit!" she heard Matt scream next to her ear. He was completely freaked out by what was going on. She didn't respond, instead, ducking down to the floor and handing him the decoder so he could try again

"What's taking so long?!" Rain yelled over a burst of J.D's fire. She turned her head towards Matt to see him struggling with the decoder, the girl, Alice, was helping him, but they weren't able to put the plugs in. She turned her head back to the firefight and her eyes grew wide with horror

A man was only inches away from her face, opening his mouth widely, blood was dripping from his teeth as he growled and lounged forward

"Fuck!" she shouted in panic and sent a long burst into his head, blowing him back. More bullets hit the tanks, from both her burst and J.D's constant weapon fire

Warning: Environment Unstable

One of the tanks went off in a huge wave of shock and fire, lighting up the dark hall for a second in a blazing fireball that engulfed a large number of the men and women, burning them in an instant and knocking them to the ground. Alice screamed over the loud roar of the fireball in her own terror; some of those people were crawling their way towards them, still burning up as flames ate at their clothing and skin. It was mortifying.

J.D got up from his position and shoved Matt away from the position. He got tired of waiting for him to finish the simple task he gave him, his ammo was depleting rapidly, and it didn't seem the mass of people was following suit

"Move!" he exclaimed and quickly inserted the small metal plugs into their sockets. The hacking device started its work instantly, working to crack the key required to open the door

Decoding. Please wait




Complete!

There was a silent release of air as the hatch on the door opened, allowing it to be opened from the outside

"See how easy that was?" he taunted Matt and swung the door open

Just to be pulled in by a sea of dead hands

"Fuck! No!" He cried in desperation as he was dragged into the middle of the room, hands were all around him, he couldn't move. He struggled, kicked, screamed, punched, but in no avail. Teeth were sunk into every bit of his flesh, his nerves screamed in pain and agony as blood was drawn from all across his body, covering the filthy mouths of the creatures that bit him again and again, tearing away at his flesh and skin.

"J.D!!"

Rain's head went completely blank; she jumped off the crate and rushed towards the door, reaching in and grabbing J.D's outstretched hand. She grabbed it firmly in a steely vice grip, his palm was sweaty against her cut finger glove, but she wouldn't let go. Teeth sunk into her arm, leaving bloody markings across her tanned skin, surging pain racing across her body, but she wouldn't let go, just pulled harder on his hand, trying to pry him off those things' grip

"Don't let go!" he cried at her, pleading, begging. She didn't answer, her facial expression displayed sheer determination as she just pulled harder and harder. She is able to save him, she knew it!

A woman's teeth suddenly sunk into her exposed wrist, striking a nerve cluster. Her entire arm shook with pain as her hand involuntarily released J.D's and pulled back, away from the teeth that were impaled into her wrist

His hand sunk under the sea of humans that gnawed at his flesh, she could still hear his screams as he fought them off, or at least tried to. She knew J.D was a fighter to the last second.

Tears broke in her eyes as she leapt and sent her hand into the mass again, trying to find him again, she had to save him. She cried his name, but none replied, all she could hear were his screams, and her own crying.

Suddenly, his arm reached up, bloodied and bitten, flesh and muscles torn, but it was his hand. She wanted to reach forward to grab it, to try and pull him out again, to prove she wasn't useless, to save her best, her only friend in the world, but something caught her eye; his fingers, on each base of three of his fingers were small, silvery rings.

Grenade Pins

She wanted to save him, she wanted to stay, not to see the pins on his fingers, but her brains overcame her heart. She turned her head towards Matt and Alice, her face and voice distorting with fear

"Close it!"

The two quickly complied; pushing the large steel block on its hinges and back into its former closed position. Rain pulled out her bloody arm and helped them, the bolts locked shut, and with them, every hope in either her brain, or heart to save J.D. Among Umbrella's military personnel, the UG-25A scattershot grenades he was carrying were commonly known as Shredders.

Three dull explosions came from the other side of the door.

(----------X----------)

Entry One of Interval Three had come to its end, and with it, so did the life of one, J.D Salinas, a brave, fearless member of the Crimson Skulls, who gave his life to save the ones of his companion and friend, Rain Ocampo and the lives of the two civilians he didn't even know.

Sorry about that Emotional bit, I just hate killing my character, in any fan fiction. I've personally related to the character of J.D throughout many Fics I've read on the site, and, well, felt bad for killing him.

On a different note; I've been granted with permission from Escape the Shadows to use names, lyrics and songs from his awesome Fic: Last Man Standing. All credit of songs, names and… Lyrics, mentioned with relation to Last Man Standing are property of Escape the Shadows, and therefore, all credit goes to him.

Remember to review. Until next week, BYE!