A/N: ZOMG 2 UPDATES IN AS MAY DAYS :p Seriously though, I've had a few of these chapters practically finished for weeks, hence the quick updates. Anyways, this chapter's for you, Peanuckle. ;D

Chapter 8: Nemesis

September 26th, 2114 hours

After a few minutes they came up to the end of Bowler Avenue. Sure enough, the street was chocked full of undead, probably hundreds of them at once, just milling around, bumping into one another or swaying slowly on the spot, just waiting for something edible to come their way. Luckily, they hadn't noticed the group of humans currently crouched on the street corner about 20 feet away from them, watching carefully.

"Looks like you were right after all," said Nick looking at Dean next to him. "Come on guys, let's shake a leg."

Dean smiled to himself as the group aligned themselves into a line of bodies, Joel at the front with his huge M249 raised to bear, and Taylor and Dean bringing up the rear, looking for any nearby threats trying to sneak up on them. The line snaked away from the street entrance, and into a nearby open alleyway, that was thankfully free of anything that wanted to eat their faces off.

"So what's your story?" asked Dean suddenly as they moved down the abandoned passageway.

"What?" asked Taylor, just concentrating on the area behind the rest of the group, using his rifle to sweep the immediate area for any potential threats.

"As in, how'd you come to be in the U.B.C.S?" continued Dean. "I'm sure you all have a story to tell? As in how Umbrella chooses you all in the first place?"

"Well," started Taylor, poking his rifle barrel into a dark doorway. "I was in the Green Berets, as a scout naturally. I kinda had a natural talent for that sort of thing. Then about this time last year I was approached by some guys in suits who said they worked for Umbrella, and they offered me a place in their paramilitary unit. They said I'd be earning a hell of a lot for doing their work. So naturally I said yes."

"That's it?" said Dean. "Sounds a bit too simple to me." Taylor just gave him a sideways glare.

"Most of us used to be soldiers or in other military units, hence our combat abilities," continued Taylor. "We agreed to join Umbrella because we needed the money or had nothing better to do, and now look where we are. Some of us have been in the U.B.C.S for years."

"Really?" asked Dean. "So stuff like this has happened before? Other outbreaks?"

"Yeah," said Devlan, cutting in suddenly from behind the two. "This time last year we were called out to some place in Siberia, where Umbrella were doing secret research. We were told they'd been a viral outbreak there, just like here, and all we found there was death and destruction." As he finished his little story, he appeared to look away into the distance and fell silent, apparently remembering what had happened during that incident. "There were more of them around every corner, no matter how many of them we killed."

"You'd think Umbrella would get their act together long enough to design shatter-proof test tubes," murmured another voice from ahead of them.

"Damn," muttered Dean to himself. He'd thought it'd be best not to bring up the past anymore with these guys, as it was a very touchy issue with them. It made him think of Umbrella once again. If some of the U.B.C.S had been in situations like this before, how long had Umbrella been carrying out research with this virus Nick and Taylor had told him about? How long had they been playing with fire, and was something of this scale inevitable?

"Boss, we got something here!" shouted a voice from ahead.

"What is it?" asked Nick urgently.

"You'd best see for yourself," came the solemn reply. Looking confused at one another, the U.B.C.S troops followed the source of the noise, appearing in a wide open space, a car park to be exact.

"Damn…" muttered someone from behind Dean, but he couldn't pin-point who it was, so fixated was he on the grisly scene before him.

The space was scattered with the corpses of at least 7 zombies, all of them lying amongst several parked cars or face down on the concrete ground. Weird thing was that none of them had been killed with conventional means. Most of them had huge holes in their bodies, not caused by weapon fire but through what looked like huge fists and feet. Others appeared to have had their necks snapped by some other manner as well, almost as if someone had just used sheer brute strength to kill these monsters.

"What the hell?" asked Lee loudly.

"Never mind that, come look at this!" half-shouted Taylor as he vanished around behind a large blue van. Dean came around the vehicle to see what all the fuss was about, along with several other U.B.C.S members into the bargain. He could see that something huge and metallic had crashed down right on top of a parked car, completely crumpling it into oblivion. To Dean's mind it reminded him of some kind of drop-pod, as the front of the thing was wide open, and he could make out 2 more sheets of deep red metal lying in other areas of the car park, like whatever was originally inside the pod had broken out and was now running amok somewhere. Whatever that 'thing' was, he'd rather not run into it.

Taylor was rooting through the interior of the structure, as the others crowded around trying to get a look at whatever was inside.

"Looks like a load of life-support systems, boss!" shouted back Taylor. "I'm guessing something alive was being kept inside here." The word 'alive' made chills run down the spine of more than one of the people assembled there. Some of them began to shift from their positions, looking around cautiously or training their weapons on nearby alleyway openings or the exit onto a nearby street.

A short distance away, Devlan came across something that looked like a large storage crate, left wide open. His eyes widened in surprise.

"Uh…guys! You might want to see this!" Soon, a small group gathered around Devlan's find. It was practically empty, but they could still clearly see a large indentation carved into a body of grey foam. It was pretty large, but anyone with a passing knowledge of military weaponry could tell you the outline belonged to a Stinger SAM missile launcher, hardware normally used to shoot down helicopters and other aerial vehicles. Pretty heavy ordinance. There was also a small square indentation within the box as well, possibly for the weapon's ammunition.

"Who was this for?" asked Lee, to no-one in particular. "Could it be for us?"

"No," replied Nick. "The only equipment we get is what we're sent in with." There was another uneasy silence, before Nick finally spoke up once more, his commanding voice ringing out across the area.

"OK people, let's just stay calm now. Taylor, Devlan?"

"Yes boss!" they both cried in unison, stepping forward.

"Have a look around the area, make sure it's safe. If you see anything, and I mean anything at all, get back here post-haste, understood?"

They both threw up a salute before Taylor led Devlan away down a nearby alleyway.

"The rest of you, keep your guard up!" urged Nick as he turned around to face the others.

Once the scout and the sniper had disappeared from sight, the other mercs began to pace around nervously, or stopped to check their supplies and equipment. Dean sat himself down on the hood of a nearby blue car and began to check his ammo count. He had plenty of handgun magazines for his sidearm, but he only had 5 spare shells left for his shotgun, along with having it fully loaded at the moment. Looking about, his gaze settled on a blonde-haired man walking past, who was holding a S.P.A.S 12 shotgun at his side. A patch on his chest read 'Benson'.

"Excuse me, Benson?"

"Yeah?" asked the merc, turning towards Dean.

"You got any spare 12 gauges on you? Cause I'm running a little dry," he explained, showing him the handful of shells. The man was silent for a while before he began to dig around inside his pockets and pouches.

"Yeah sure, how many do you need?"

"How many could you spare?"

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They stepped over another pair of bodies, and like the ones before these unfortunate souls had been clubbed to death with sheer brute force, their faces smashed (even further) beyond recognition.

"Who or what the hell got to those zombies?" asked Devlan to no-one, as Taylor was a few steps ahead of him, scouting out the alleyway ahead of them.

"Could you talk any louder?" hissed Taylor, in an effort to make his compatriot shut up. The sniper just growled in a low tone and shook his head slowly. The place appeared safe on initial glance, as something had come along and cleared out the zombies for them, but they just hoped whatever it was wasn't still in the area. Soon they could see where the alley came to a corner about 50 feet ahead of them, with dark alcoves on either side of them.

Taylor suddenly stopped and bought his hand up, nearly making Devlan walk into his back.

"Now what!" spat the sniper, clearly freaked out to the extreme.

"Shut up!" snarled Taylor, getting in his comrade's face. "You hear that?" Devlan fell silent, but he couldn't make anything out. But he strained his hearing; he could make out what sounded like small booming noises, like the footsteps of something rather large…

"That can't be good…" A second later, the two of them quickly took up opposite positions in the shadowy alcoves of the alleyway without a word, aiming down towards the corner ahead of them. Devlan could feel his hands getting clammy around the grip of his rifle, but he had to maintain his perfect stance and aim down the passage, so he could react instantly to whatever came around that corner.

More time passed, and the booming noises were getting closer and closer to their position. The suspense was killing them both, specifically Taylor. Then, it rounded the corner ahead of them.

Both of them stopped and balked when they could see it clearly in front of them. Somehow, legions of the undead, giant mutant bugs, and anything else Umbrella could create couldn't match the terrifying appearance of this new monstrosity before them.

"What the fuck?" asked Taylor silently.

It was huge, well over 8 feet tall, and solidly built, its fists the size of bowling balls. Its whole body was coated in black material, aside from its fingers and face, the skin similar-looking to a zombie's pallor, but with a more ash tone to it. Its face appeared to be stapled together, with a long line of stitches and steel staples running down the right side of its face, leaving it with just a single, white, soulless eye. Large, purple tendrils were sprouting out of its right shoulder, one of them coiling around its wrist like a snake ready to strike. Its mouth was perhaps the most terrifying aspect of its visage though, as it lacked lips, just revealing a demented grin of huge fang-like teeth that terrified the hell out of Taylor. In its left hand it held onto a Stinger missile launcher, easily wielding a weapon that would require both hands for a normal man to lift or even fire. The creature looked about a little before it let out a low but deadly growl that sent shivers down the spines of the two men.

"What in God's name…?" asked Taylor.

"Nemesis…" whispered Devlan, visibly shaking in terror.

"What?" asked his companion.

"I thought it was just make-believe, a myth created by the guys at the barracks. But it's real!" Down the passage, the beast suddenly started striding towards where the two mercenaries were hiding, flexing its left hand as if in anticipation of a kill. Suddenly, it stopped dead about 30 feet away from them and glared straight towards where Devlan was crouched in his shadowy alcove. The sniper froze.

Shit.

The beast growled again and raised its mighty weapon onto its shoulder, a dry click sounding as it loaded a round into the weapon tube. In response, the sniper raised his own weapon and sighted over the monster's ugly face.

"No, don't!" hissed Taylor. Too late, as Devlan's rifle cracked loudly, the sound amplified within the narrow alleyway. Blood burst from the monster's face and its aim was knocked off-kilter, the rocket fired upwards into the upper floor of one of the building's that flanked the alley, debris raining down in every possible direction. Taylor dived out of cover just in time to avoid being crushed under a hail of bricks.

"You fucking idiot!" he shouted to Devlan, who was still rooted to his spot, looking terrified. "You could've killed both of us!" Then he looked back towards the monster, which had already recovered from the head shot, no trace of any wound on its ugly face to begin with. It was looking directly at Taylor, and it growled once more, louder than before, sounding more pissed off than anything.

"Oh fuck."

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The crack of a rifle, closely followed by a sudden explosion, made the men assembled on the lot jump in shock and surprise. Many of them closed ranks and formed a circle, their rifles aimed out in all directions, as Nick frantically shouted into his radio mouthpiece.

"Taylor! Roger! What the hell's going on back there? Respond, over!" The only response he got was fractured static, followed by a few short bursts of rifle fire. What the hell had they gotten into now?

Originally perched upon the hood of a blue sedan, Dean had risen to his feet along with the merc who'd helpfully handed him some spare ammunition for his shotgun, and they had both backed up towards the ring of guns in the middle of the lot.

"The hell's going on?" cried Benson, cocking his weapon. Another burst of rifle fire rang out from somewhere nearby.

"Quick! Shoot the fucker!" cried Devlan from out of sight. Rapid gunfire followed.

"It's like shooting a brick wall man!" shouted back Taylor, sounding desperate.

"GRRRAAAGGGHHH!"

That demonic roar made everyone's blood run cold and freeze up; their weapon's suddenly centring on the gate the scout and the sniper had left through minutes before. They'd been through a lot since landing in Raccoon City, but the sound that thing had made suggested they were about to face much worse very soon.

"What the fuck was that…?" wondered Dean as he took up a position near the back of well-armed survivors. A second later, the gate was thrown forcefully open and the two mercenaries fell through, panting for their lives. They began to sprint back towards the rest of their unit, but had barely made it 10 feet when the gate behind them was smashed off its hinges and something huge and dressed in black sprinted through the opening and grabbed Devlan by the back of his jacket, lifting him up and tossing him across the lot like he was a rag doll. The sniper cried out, right before he smashed spine-first into a windscreen, shattering the glass and not moving afterwards.

"Rob!" cried Taylor as he nearly ran into Nick at full speed.

Everyone else was too fixated on the new monster before them to notice this event. Its insane demonic grin, huge stature and single white eyeball terrified them all down to the core, as did the fact it was carrying a Stinger Missile launcher in a single hand with incredible ease. Throwing its head back, it let out another monstrous roar, before it began to slowly stride towards them.

"Don't stare, shoot the fucking thing!" cried out Nick, aiming his rifle at the thing's torso.

Several rifles fired simultaneously, and blood sprayed out from the monster's body as the high-calibre rounds punched through its clothing. It barely flinched, even with so many rounds hitting it in such a short period of time, some of them directly into its ugly face.

"No fucking way…" thought Dean as he added his own shots into the mix, one of them catching the monster in the face, but it still didn't flinch. One merc with an M203 grenade launcher attached underneath his rifle planted his foot into the floor and launched a whistling grenade at the beast. The round sailed through the air until it was about 2 feet away, but the monster suddenly side-stepped the projectile with terrifying ease and speed, the round slamming into the gate it had emerged from instead and obliterating it in a shower of flames.

"Oh crap!" blurted the merc responsible as he hurried to reload his launcher. In response, the creature raised its own weapon and loaded a round with a dry click.

"Oh shit, he's gonna fire!" cried out Taylor. "Fucking move!"

Dean didn't need to be told twice, throwing himself into cover behind that blue sedan he was sitting at earlier, along with Benson. The rocket was launched with a high-pitched whistle, and it sailed through the air, past the Umbrella mercs who had thrown themselves into any cover they could find, and collided head-first with a white van, swallowing the vehicle in a blossom of flame. Dean grunted in exertion as he got to his feet, sparks and scrap metal raining down around him. Looking up, he saw the beast was once again striding towards the mercenaries, who were still busy trying to regain their bearings as it bore down upon them. Taylor and Nick were the only ones fighting back at the moment, firing on full auto right up until their rifles clicked on empty and they swore very loudly while reaching for fresh magazines.

"Oh no you don't!" Dean half-shouted, taking aim at the monster's head and pulling the trigger. The buckshot smacked into the side of its head, knocking it to the side and spraying even more blood into the air. It's attention diverted, it growled and turned towards him, its eye flashing in anger. He cocked the weapon and fired a few more times, catching the beast in the torso and gut, spraying more blood and causing it to stumble slightly.

Suddenly, it roared and charged at the R.P.D cop with the speed of a cheetah, covering several feet with each massive step it took. The Stinger launcher didn't slow it down either.

"Crap!" he shouted, turning and running away in the opposite direction, but the thing was rapidly gaining ground. He'd made it about 15 feet when he heard a grunt behind him and he instinctively dropped down and rolled forward, feeling a whoosh of air as the monster's huge weapon was swung at him like a club. It collided with the side of a parked car, the sheer force of the blow literally flipping the heavy vehicle onto its roof and leaving a huge dent in its side. Dean hated to think what would have happened if that had collided with his face. Quickly rolling onto his back, he tried to get to his feet when a horrifying grin filled his vision and a huge hand clamped down around his throat.

Before he could realise what had happened, he was plucked off of the ground like he were nothing and tossed across the lot as Devlan had been a short while before, bouncing off of the roof of another car and rolling off to land on the concrete ground hard. He coughed as intense pain flared up and down the left side of his body.

Shit, that thing's fast…

Rolling over, he saw the one-eyed menace approaching him once more, that malevolent grin plastered across its features, flexing its right hand a few times as it approached. Dean reached out, but his shotgun was nowhere to be seen, and he doubted his Beretta would do much to this beast, probably just irritate it a bit. He scrambled backwards, but the thing was closing in fast, reaching its free hand out towards him.

CRACK!

Blood exploded from the monster's chest and it grunted in surprise and took a little step backwards. Dean looked up and behind him to see Robert Devlan standing above him with his rifle aimed towards the beast, bleeding from a huge cut on his left temple. He looked absolutely furious.

"Dean, you all right?" he shouted, firing another shot. More blood sprayed from one-eye's face onto the ground near to Dean's feet.

"Oh yeah," replied Dean sarcastically, getting to his feet with a groan. "Aside from one-eye nearly killing me here, I'm just great!" Holding onto his side, he made his way over to the mercenary sniper, while watching the beast as it roared once more and tried to raise its missile launcher to fire again. A pair of figures appeared behind the beast and a booming sound rang out. Its body convulsed constantly and it suddenly fell face-first onto the ground, blood spraying from its back. Standing over it were Joel and Benson, both of their weapons smoking from recent gunfire. The beast tried to rise up again, a strange purple fluid pouring out of a great rent in its shoulder, but Benson planted his foot into the middle of its back and fired one last shot into the back of its skull, and it finally lay still.

"And stay down, fucker!" shouted the shotgunner, reloading his weapon. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief as they stared down at the beast that nearly killed at least half of them by itself, now put down with the use of serious firepower. Nick and Taylor approached Devlan and Dean, the latter holding onto a S.P.A.S 12 shotgun by the stock.

"I think this is yours?" he asked, thrusting it into Dean's arms.

"Yeah…thanks," he replied, taking the gun back and reloading it.

"You all right man?" asked Joel, stepping up to the small group and referring to Devlan, who was still bleeding from his head.

"I'll live," he said, giving a shaky thumbs-up and wincing in pain slightly.

"Well either way, let's get that patched up for you," chimed in Nick, calling over Daniels, who began to wrap a sterile gauze around the sniper's head. As that was going on, the other mercs in the lot began to gather, most of them reloading their weapons or gazing fearfully at the body of the fallen behemoth.

"Now what do we do?" asked Dean, matter-of-fact.

"We move on, now," replied Nick. "Let's get out of here before we get anymore nasty surprises." A chorus of agreements went up from the small group as some began to make their way towards the path out onto the street once more, glancing at the fallen monster with worried eyes.

"Amen to that," said Benson, standing near to the creature's body. "I'd like to get as far away from this freak as is humanly poss- AHHHH!"

With barely any time to react, the thing's arm had shot out and clamped down upon the man's leg, squeezing it and breaking his knee and shin bones in the process. He'd cried out and fallen to the ground, trying desperately to pry the giant fingers off of his leg. The others suddenly turned to look at the scene with shocked looks on their faces as the seemingly-defeated beast casually got back to its feet, leaving the squirming mercenary at its feet. As Benson tried to aim his shotgun at the beast's torso, it snatched the gun from his hands and crushed it into a warped piece of metal, tossing it aside like garbage.

Dean noticed that the numerous wounds it had received just before were gone, as if it'd never been shot in the first place, but the bullet holes in its black clothing still remained.

"Benson!" shouted Nick in surprise, opening fire on the monster, which barely flinched as it stooped down and plucked the unlucky mercenary off of the floor, holding him at least 6 feet off of the ground. With their aim blocked, the others could do nothing as Benson struggled to break free. Suddenly, a purple tendril burst from the creature's wrist and punched straight through the man's mouth and out the back of his skull, spraying blood, bone and brain fragments across the ground. Benson's body twitched a couple of times before he finally went limp.

"Jesus Christ!" yelled Dean as he witnessed the monster's terrifying strength. With its current victim dead, the creature retracted the tendril with a disgusting sound, before tossing the limp body aside like a rag-doll, and it smashed into a light post, wrapping around it with another resounding crack before falling to the tarmac. Turning its gaze towards the still-alive mercenaries, it let out another ground-shaking roar of rage.

"FUCKING RUN FOR IT!" screamed a panic-stricken Lee, and every man there, including Dean, turned on their heel and ran for it as quickly as they could, spilling out onto the street against Nick's objections. Then again, the normally restrained leader understood that flight would be the best option here, and followed his men out onto the street.

The one-eyed menace sprinted off after the fleeing mercenaries, determined to crush every single one of them like a bug. It roared again as it flipped over a sedan that lay in its path onto its roof with practically no effort at all.

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Primal fear had taken hold of the group. Taylor and Dean were running within the middle of the group, trying their hardest not to trip up and get left behind or trampled into the dirt by their fleeing comrades. There was a lot of shouting and pushing going on, as Nick was trying his best to keep some sort of order from the back of the group.

"Pull your ranks in!" he cried, being ignored completely. "Fucking keep your order!"

"GRAAGGHHH!"

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" shouted someone at the front.

The beast was sprinting after them down the road, rapidly gaining ground. Looking over their shoulders briefly, some of the men regained their incentive to flee and began to run faster, leaving the scout and the cop behind gradually.

"Slow…down!" panted Taylor, the sweat pouring down his forehead. But it was no use. Behind them, the monster raised its missile launcher and prepared to fire another shot at them. Nick saw this and shouted a warning to his men.

"GET DOWN!" he cried, and most of them dived for any available cover, behind dumpsters or wrecked cars, or in Taylor and Dean's case, into the nearby alleyway entrance. The rocket was let loose with a whoosh, and it slammed head-on into a parked police cruiser on the street, causing it to erupt into a fierce display of flame and sparks. Feeling the heat wave wash over them, Taylor and Dean shielded their faces from it and tried to make out the locations of their companions, but a wall of flame had suddenly appeared across half of the street, blocking their progress inconveniently.

"Shit…Nick!" cried Taylor, trying to make out any movement on the opposite side of the flames. Not far away, the one-eyed freak was approaching once more, its missile launcher now discarded on the ground behind it. It had probably run out of ammo for the mighty weapon.

"Taylor!" cried Nick's voice from somewhere out of sight. "Don't worry about us! Just get the fuck out of there! We'll regroup at the clock tower!"

"We could be dead by then!" shouted Dean, glancing back at the approaching monster. The shotgun was getting clammy in his grip.

"You're with one of my best men, Dean!" came the reply. "Stick with him and you'll both make it, I'm sure of that!" Then there was the sound of several pairs of feet fleeing from the fire as fast as they could, leaving them alone.

"Yeah, much appreciated!" cried Dean sarcastically as he saw that the beast was almost upon them. Taylor grabbed him by the collar and dragged him down the alley for a few feet, then let him go so he could run by himself.

They ran on and on, turning numerous twists and bends in an attempt to loose the monster that was at their heels. No matter how fast they sprinted or how many turns they took, it was still right behind them. Dean could swear he felt it breathing down his neck at one point. Quickly, he ducked just as it threw a massive punch, the attack punching straight through a brick wall ahead of them. As it fought to free its huge arm, the two survivors pushed the advantage and ran on, trying to put as much distance between them and it as possible.

"Does this freak…ever…give up?" panted Dean, feeling his legs protesting under the constant strain of running for long distances.

"Just keep running!" shouted back Taylor, leading the way. Suddenly, he came to a halt and Dean nearly fell over him. Ahead of the two of them, a small courtyard beckoned, with several zombies wandering about within its confines, which gave an added danger. If they stopped to kill the zombies, one-eye would be all over them like a nasty rash. What to do…

"Come on!" cried Taylor, dragging Dean along with him.

"You crazy man?" shouted back Dean, hearing another roar of frustration nearby.

"We can make it!" reassured Taylor. "If we can get past those flesh-eaters smiley boy will have to punch through them to get to us! Come on!"

Seeing the advantages of his companion's plan, Dean went along with it, even though screwing up would get them eaten alive or beaten to a pulp by an 8-foot zombie on steroids. Narrowing his eyes as they approached the zombie-filled courtyard, Dean saw that the group had dispersed enough to leave them with an open space to fit through, which was kind of them, thought Dean. Lowering his posture, he and Taylor both tore past the flesh-eaters with relative ease, Dean having to shove a bulky man in a grubby vest and shorts out of his way.

They ran on some more, and Dean glanced over his shoulder to see their pursuer stop dead in its tracks as it ran into the group of zombies, who obviously mistook it for their next meal. They lunged at the beast to try and take a bite, and were clubbed to the ground or tossed about as they tried to attack.

They rounded a corner and kept on running, not stopping until they emerged out onto another open street and made a mad dash for an open pharmacy across the street from them, taking cover within it and praying that it wouldn't find them again.

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The Nemesis finished off the last infected civilian attacking it by literally tearing its head off and tossing the parts aside like garbage. With that nuisance out of the way, it roared in fury once more, the two puny humans it was chasing long gone. Barely 15 minutes ago, Umbrella's most powerful bio-weapon had come across a number of men who had attacked it using their puny weaponry, causing it a certain degree of damage and even managing to knock it out for a short period of time. Although these men had the logo of its creator on their jackets, it was still programmed to crush anyone and anything that stood in its way, regardless of their allegiance.

But it had only managed to kill one of them before the rest fled from its allmighty power, and it still wanted to take its frustrations out on anything that it came across.

Then it remembered its mission, one of utmost importance: to hunt down what remained of Raccoon City's S.T.A.R.S team and kill them all, to prevent any of the corporation's secrets from being told to the world, especially after what they saw at the mansion. It had only recently been deployed, and it was yet to find any of its targets that it had been given data for, but there was still plenty of time for a hunt. Unlike other B.O.Ws such as Hunters or Tyrants, the Nemesis had an actual concept of its mission, and would accomplish it to whatever end.

"S.T.A.R.S…" growled the monster, as it suddenly leapt 10 stories onto the roof of a small apartment building, before making more giant leaps across the neighbouring buildings as it searched for its prey.

No-one could hide from the Nemesis. They were only delaying the inevitable…

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Looking around, Dean couldn't help but notice how many of the products on the shelves were Umbrella products. Only about 10 of the items weren't Umbrella-related. Further proof that Umbrella Inc. had the greatest foothold for business in this town.

"Is it safe?" he asked from his hiding place behind the counter. Taylor was looking outside for any potential threats in the area, and to see if the beast chasing them had given up. 5 minutes had passed since they last saw it, so Taylor assumed that it would be safe to come out.

"You can come out, the big scary monster's gone now," he said with a mocking tone. Dean flashed him a deadly glare as he emerged to stand next to the scout.

"Well excuse me for being scared, but that freak didn't give you one of these," he said, lifting up his shirt and jacket to show a huge ugly bruise down the left side of his torso where he'd landed on a car when that thing tossed him a short time before. Taylor just chuckled at him like it was all some kind of joke. Dean ignored him as he sat down on the kerb to stretch out his legs and to recover from all the running he'd been doing. As he did, he rubbed his throat, which was still sore from when it had grabbed him by the neck.

"Now what?" he asked Taylor eventually, listening to the wind whistling down the empty street.

"We get to the clock tower, like the boss said," he replied simply. Taking a small device out of his vest, he pushed a few buttons and turned to Dean. "My map here tells me that the tower's still a couple of blocks away. We could make it if we move at a constant pace." Dean finished his snack and got to his feet.

"You got maps of the city in there?" he asked, stepping closer to have a look at the small device Taylor was holding.

"I took a few precautions before we left," replied Taylor, showing Dean the device, a small black metallic object with a small screen on the facing side, currently showing an outline of Raccoon City's streets in green on black. "State-of-the-art PDA device, it can store any information you want it to." Dean whistled in admiration and looked at the map for a few moments.

"Wait, the zoo's just a short distance away," he said, pointing down the street towards a place where an iron fence rose up around a block of isolated buildings. A sign reading 'Raccoon City Zoo: bring the whole family!' was erected on a street corner, indicating what was located there.

"I'm sure that'd work," replied Taylor. "It's better than going through the streets, where god knows how many zombies are lurking. Hopefully the place will be abandoned."

Dean didn't like that last comment, as with the state the town was in, there was a good chance that there were zombies lurking in every building, waiting for anyone to just wander through and become the appetiser. As he thought that, a solitary moan was heard, and he looked up to see a single zombie slowly crossing the street about 30 feet away from them, oblivious to their presence. It wandered on and disappeared around the corner. Then again, he thought, cutting through the zoo could help them get past any streets that were either crawling with undead or blocked off by wreckage. Looked like it was decided then.

"Fine," he said, getting back to his feet and stretching out his limbs. "Come on. Let's get going before anything ugly turns up." Dean walked by his companion, heading towards the Zoo's back entrance. Taylor packed away his PDA and followed after the Raccoon cop, his rifle raised in case anything suddenly attacked.

As they passed by a street opening, they noticed what looked like the carcass of what was formerly a rhinoceros, lying in the middle of the street and being torn into by several zombies, who failed to notice the still-living humans watching them.

"Damn," said Taylor. "Looks like this place has gone to hell too." Dean just watched in morbid curiosity as the former humans hungrily tore away at the dead animal like piranha in a feeding frenzy. If what he was told about there being a virus to blame for the chaos on the city, would it affect the animals in the zoo as well? His encounters with those giant mutant bugs and that smiley monster back there showed him that zombies were the least of his worries. How bad would it get?

"Come on," he said to Taylor, ignoring his dark thoughts. He led his companion towards an iron gate and opened it up, both of them stepping inside.

Barely a minute had passed when something else happened out on the street. One of the zombies feasting upon the dead rhino was suddenly distracted by some presence near to it and looked up from its meal, blood dribbling from its mouth onto the front of its shirt. Something huge stood over the scene, just watching.

Then in one single move, the zombies, the carcass, and a nearby parked car was tossed aside with terrifying ease via a single deadly blow, and a deafening demented bellowing sound echoed across several city blocks.

A/N: As always, R & R please. Next chapter is Raccoon Zoo, also featured as a scenario in Outbreak File #2. Thing is, I've never actually played File #2, so I'm not sure how you'll like it. Ah well, you'll see it here once I'm finally done with the tounching up.