Chapter Thirty Five
When Alyssa slipped from Nemesis's sights the giant began to grow anxious. As gun fire echoed across the outside of the facility Nemesis grew even more worried. So wrapped up was Nemesis in his thoughts of concern for the sudden disappearance of Alyssa that he didn't even see the large group of heavily armoured men leap from behind one of the cement corners of the mansion.
The group of ten appeared to have suffered tremendous injury already as they circled Nemesis while pointing their guns at him yelling words that the monster couldn't understand. He could make out a few of the phrases such as 'infected' and 'take down' but Nemesis was already batting the men aside as he stomped through the rapidly disintegrating circle, there was still the matter of finding Alyssa. When a bullet whizzed past the giant's right ear he turned to see that one of the armoured men was pointing a handgun, with a shaking arm, straight at him. Before Nemesis could react a loud throaty roar behind the group caused all them all to turn around in time to see Deception jump over the closet few before slashing outwards at his newfound enemies while snarling. The Hunter was partly covered in blood already and had not come alone. Infected suddenly sprang from all different directions that resulted in distracting the group of men.
The man with the shaking arm had not fallen for the surprise appearance of Deception and the Infected and continued to eye Nemesis while speaking rather quickly. As Deception got closer to Nemesis, the shaky arm man trained his gun on the smaller monster. He never got to fire the weapon however as Nemesis grabbed a hold of the man and with one easy swing threw the now screaming shooter into the mass of swarming Infected that were easily overwhelming the rest of the group. When Deception finally reached Nemesis who was standing still watching the carnage unfold he could sense the monster's distress at losing Alyssa. It was a different story inside the mind of Nemesis.
The time it had taken Deception to back away from the armoured men and Infected, Nemesis had sensed Alyssa close by and judging by the signal she was giving off was in danger of suffering further injuries. Glancing towards Deception, Nemesis roared loudly before running off in large strides around the side of the facility the men had come from. Deception had no choice but to follow, he wanted to escape this strange testing place not only in one piece but also with those he'd travelled with across the desert.
The large white tent that had been hidden behind all the vehicles beckoned to Jill, with good reason. Carefully walking along its sides she strained her ears listening for any noises within, this was no easy feat with all the other sounds such as gunfire and the occasional screech of a battle frenzied Infected. Reaching the front of the tent Jill paused momentarily before parting the plastic flaps of the tent and stepping into a world of blinding white. As her eyes quickly adjusted to the white surroundings Jill could easily see a row of four computers, one with a bullet hole through its screen and other familiar medical equipment scattered around the room. Passing by a stretcher with restraints Jill absentmindedly touched one of them as a shiver went up her spine. They knew we were coming and this was going to be… her thoughts were shattered when a shadow darted past outside the tent.
As the flaps to the tent were parted quickly and a figure stepped in breathing heavily Jill pointed her magnum at the new arrival not caring if they were human or not.
"Jill? It's me," the figure said cautiously.
Slowly Jill lowered her weapon to see the sweat drenched face of Carlos, "Geeze I almost put a bullet in your head, I thought you were…what happened before? We both ran off together and then when I turned around you weren't there and I…" she trailed off "I thought the worst, seeming as an enemy of ours was in such close proximity"
Carlos only shrugged, "I don't think we have to worry about any enemies for quite some time, they really have their hands full since the Infected and those other soldiers broke through the fences"
But Jill was still reeling over the fact that she could have easily shot Carlos without even thinking, she'd been so wrapped up in avoiding the various types of enemies that it hadn't crossed her mind that the other members of the team were still out there. She could only watch in a half trance like state as Carlos began to explore the room and examine the intact computers.
"These two are connected to the security cameras but this last one" he then glanced up at Jill, "I think we can use this to our advantage"
Snapping out her current state of mind Jill walked over to the monitor and noticed that Carlos was now staring at her with a look of concern, nudging him gently aside she smiled, "I'm fine, though I think the heat is really staring to get to me" glancing at the screen Jill first assumed she was looking at a schematic of one of the Sphere complexes however on closer examination she realized it was more then just an outlay of the labs. "Carlos, I think we've found the mainframe," she breathed.
"The mainframe? Sounds too easy Jill, Umbrella just doesn't place a tent out in the middle of a battlefield and have easy access to their most secret bases for their enemies to just walk into and toy with" Carlos pointed out.
Jill only shook her head, "Maybe it was guarded and they didn't expect the place to be over run with Infected and unknown enemies, we should make the most of this while we still can, looks like whoever was here only had time to lock down all the facilities and sound the alarm for security" she then tapped on the keys bringing up a command screen, her fingers hovering over the silver keyboard, "I wonder if they use all the same system as the other complexes we've been to, it'd make our job a hell of a lot easier to shut these places down if it was"
A loud burst of gunfire nearby followed by a throaty roar caused Carlos to stare towards the opening of the tent, "Well I think for all our sakes we better hurry"
"Now who's the jumpy one?" Jill remarked smiling as she typed on the keyboard.
"I'm only stating the obvious, we're caught in a cross fire between what appears to be Umbrella's rivals who seem quite happy to literally crush their competition with any means necessary"
"You mean like the robot before, which I assume Alice eventually took out?"
"I didn't stick around to see… I was too busy looking for you and the others" Carlos lied, he still hadn't gotten over what he'd seen despite the man in the metal suit being an enemy he didn't deserve the punishment Alice had so brutally dealt out.
Jill suddenly sat back grinning from ear to ear, "Well that's one thing Umbrella didn't learn back at the Glasshouse Mountains" she then looked towards Carlos, "I think it's high time we both lived up to the reputation they've given us, time to do some damage with a few keystrokes"
Once again the satellites had proven to be ineffective as visual was lost with not only the cameras all around the facility but also with the two monitored subjects and it was starting to get to Griffin. He was just about to leave the observation room when Tracey suddenly called out to him. Stopping and turning around Griffin saw not only a worried Tracey but also the concerned faces of all the other research team members.
Griffin only sighed and was about to speak when the lights temporarily blinked off before switching on as a low humming sound filled the room, he was well aware what was going on but decided to ask the question anyway, "What just happened?"
"That's what I was about to say, someone is attempting to shut down all the power to S-1, whoever it is, aren't doing a very good job, they're slowly going through the complex room by room instead of taking out the entire grid for each level" Tracey replied.
Griffin simply stared back at the schematic of S-1 his anger slowly rising, there was only one available terminal that was still logged in to the mainframe and that was the single computer in the observation tent. It seemed that the not so diligent Paul had left his post, which was further pissing Griffin off. That fool's incompetence is going to cost this facility he thought in anger.
"The entire lower level's power outage has been cut, that includes all available holding cells to test subjects and life support for the deactivated clones!" Donald spluttered.
"Soon it'll be the whole complex, we'll be trapped if the power outage disables the locks"
Ignoring Donald's outcry Griffin glanced towards Stacey, "Is it possible to bring up the cameras for the observation base that is outside?"
Tracey only nodded and within a few minutes the screen on the monitor began to replay the most recent footage captured before the power collapse. It first showed Jill, one of the lead rebels, cautiously entering the tent followed by her partner, Carlos a few moments later. Seeing this made Griffin slightly calm down, it hadn't been the mysterious men from the black helicopter but the matter still needed to be dealt with.
How dare those criminals disturb my research, they've trespassed onto very dangerous ground however Griffin thought smiling.
Stepping away from the screens Griffin took out the small slim lined remote, "Reactivate all unaccomplished objectives in Project Alice, it's time we closed this chapter on these renegades for good"
The various commands that suddenly flashed across Alice's vision were ignored due to what lay in front of her. With the constant bombardment of Infected she had lost track of Alyssa's position, finding the girl however was easy when hearing the roar of Nemesis close by. Rounding a corner Alice saw the large bulk of the monster bending down towards a fallen form, near the pair was the Hunter who snarled as Alice approached while flexing his clawed hands.
Seeing the Hunter's actions only made Alice roll her eyes while moving forwards slowly taking out her two black handguns. Screw the other orders I can get kill two birds with one stone without the rebels interfering. She only grinned back at Deception while levelling her guns, twice the Hunter had wounded her and gotten away with it now with little room to manoeuvre the monster would have a hard enough time to simply slash and run the other way. Instead of attacking however Deception turned slightly and made a loud throaty roar which caused Nemesis to look away from Alyssa and towards the new enemy that had appeared.
"Don't waste my time Nemesis, we've been in a similar situation before remember?" Alice taunted as she raised the handguns. "This time however there's more at stake, these guns do more damage to you and your little friend if fired correctly and I never miss"
Nemesis only eyed Alice while standing his ground and roared while clenching both fists, once again the monster had made the message quite clear that he would rather die then see those he cared about be recaptured by former tormentors.
Ignoring the scrolling words across her vision for the second time Alice flicked the safety switch off both weapons and shrugged, "Too bad about your choice, I thought that you would've changed by now, my mistake"
Before Alice could go ahead with her threat an assault rifle sounded off not too far away, the bullets peppering the ground close to her feet. Turning away from both monsters Alice saw Jill and Carlos standing a few feet away both glaring back with looks of hate.
"Hey, you want to fight something how about us?" Carlos called out forcefully. "You're nothing but a childish bully that's been given guns to play with"
The orders this time weren't ignored and without further hesitation Alice fired back at the pair who spilt and ran past her. Following both Jill and Carlos while grinding her teeth caused her to miss them helping Alyssa up and sprinting around the side of the building with the two monsters following closely behind.
Once again anger took the better of Alice as she pursued the disappearing rebels. Cowards! The whole lot of them, why didn't they stand and fight? She thought in frustration. Still gripping both handguns Alice stepped out from behind the wall to notice that across the battlefield of corpses and feeding Infected that the group had disappeared. By now her anger had reached its high point, two targets had slipped from her gaze and giving a cry of frustration shot the closet Infected dead centre in the head. As the blistered corpse slumped onto the ground one of the large transport carriers began to move slowly forward, driving over the mass of bodies in the sand.
The stern face of Carlos only briefly glanced towards Alice as the truck turned and began to make its way towards the now open gates to the facility. Without even stopping to think what the outcomes of her actions would be Alice ran forward leaping over any obstacle that was in her way, aiming the guns at the large uncovered fuel tanks of the vehicle. They won't leave this place alive; I'll see to that, those pathetic weaklings won't know what hit them. By now Alice didn't care about anything else, even her other objectives which mostly concerned recapturing Alyssa and not harming the girl had been completely ignored.
The white truck had almost neared the gates and Alice still hadn't backed away from her pursuit. The scrolling objectives had long since ceased but a different kind of distraction now entered her head, the ringing was at first soft and easy to ignore however when it came around a second and third time Alice fought hard to simply step aside and discontinue her current mode of actions. Go ahead Griffin use your loud noises, this time I'm not walking away and if your precious Alyssa has to suffer then so be it.
A large squad of soldiers suddenly ran towards Alice and stood in front of her, raising their rifles in a threatening gesture. She didn't even care to notice if the squad were from Umbrella or otherwise and wasted no time in shooting two members in the chest while continuing her advance. One of the men barked an order out towards Alice as he attempted to hit the left hand gun from her hand, striking outwards with her right hand caused the man to fall backwards as his nose gushed blood, faintly she heard his heart slowly come to a halt but Alice was more focused on the truck then anything else. The other members of the squad had now realized that halting Alice would only result in their own deaths and parted as she strode past them.
Feeling a burst of freedom Alice continued forward grinning like a maniac, she felt as though nothing could stop her and even Griffin's own attempts had failed. The large silver fuel tanks were almost out of view as the fleeing vehicle began to disappear from sight; in a few more minutes the tanks would be unsuitable targets. Aiming towards them she was just about to pull both triggers when it happened.
Alice's vision suddenly plunged into darkness as her body froze to a dead stop and silence and stillness took over.
Ever since the attempted shut down of the Sphere, Griffin had been on edge, as it was due to the rebel's interference a few of the electrical connections had overheated and shut down manually, it would take several weeks to repair all the damage done to the facility. Glancing back towards the screen that showed the 'Alice cam' in motion he noticed that she'd located not only the two rogue monsters but also Alyssa who appeared to have suffered after her initial run through the testing grounds. You survived all the traps and perils, I can't wait to see how you did it Alyssa he thought.
For a few more moments Griffin only stood and watched the screen as Alice approached the pair of monsters, both had their backs turned and already the guns held by her were slowly rising up. Despite the fact that Griffin wanted Alice to carry out her actions the pair appeared to be very tired and there was a chance that they could be easily taken down with minimal damage.
He turned towards Donald and the two other male lab techs, "Call all remaining squads to the east entrance"
Looking back at the screen Griffin then met the gaze of Tracey, "Have the objectives to take down the rebels been reactivated yet?"
Tracey nodded, "Yes they have been for sometime"
"Remind Project Alice what her true mission is again, we can't risk being sidetracked, not now when those criminals are so close" Griffin replied in a weary tone, it started to grate his nerves whenever Alice would deviate from her set objectives due to the various grudges she harboured. None of this will happen in the near future, not when the X series is brought to light.
Griffin had only glanced away from the screen for just a few moments when Tracey suddenly shouted out to him. Snapping back around he noticed that the view had changed from being focused on the monsters to a large white carrier transport that was slowly moving forward. Once again the twin black handguns rose up and aimed at the vehicle's tanks. Glancing towards Alice's vitals on a separate screen showed her brain to be alive with activity as her heart started to beat faster and her muscles began to tense up.
Something had pushed Alice to a point of no return and Griffin knew once she'd entered the final stage of her anger nothing would stop her until the source of it had been completely annihilated.
"The rebels have taken one of the carrier rigs," Tracey said.
"Your point being?" Griffin replied in an annoyed tone. "Why is this a concern? In a few more moments we'll have rid ourselves of those criminals for good, without one of their leaders that group of renegades will surely collapse"
"Specimen 8940 along with the Nemesis unit are in that truck which is currently being targeted by Project Alice, if you let her follow through with shooting the fuel tank then the explosion will incinerate all of them" Tracey pointed out.
Griffin suddenly froze as his smiled faded, no longer was he in charge of the situation, it appeared the rebels were running the show now. Clever, very clever using Alyssa as a shield so they can make their escape, they're more ruthless then I first thought. His mind however switched from being calm to bordering on panic when seeing Alice draw closer towards the truck, the guns still in plain view.
"Have the alerts been set off?" Griffin asked.
"They've reached level three and she's still ignoring them, I don't think they're going to stop Alice" Tracey replied.
"What about the sniper towers? They have orders to open fire"
"I'm not getting anything from them, either the communications are down or they've been taken out"
Griffin quickly turned back to Donald, "Get security to cut Alice off before she reaches that truck"
As the squads circled Alice, Griffin easily knew they wouldn't hold her off for long. Two of them fell almost instantly, each bleeding from a single gunshot wound to the chest while another was unfortunate enough to receive a sharp uppercut to the face, which no doubt had enough force to send shards of bone into his brain.
"She's gone out of control," Donald suddenly spluttered. "Oh shit Project Alice has gone rogue!"
"Calm down all of you" Griffin said harshly. Looking at the screen one last time he sighed, he'd hoped that Alice would've kept her usual unstable personality under control when dealing with the rebels, however it seemed once again despite all the recent 'conditioning' he'd given her it would always be the same, the hate Alice carried for the rebels would never disappear. Glancing back to the now worried Tracey he shrugged, "Shut the system down"
Tracey only blinked at Griffin while frowning, "Sir?"
"Do it, shut Project Alice down, that's an order, if she destroys that transport then we'll lose the corporation's single most valuable asset and I'm quite sure you don't want that on your mind Ms Kingly!" Griffin snapped.
Cringing from the outburst Tracey hurriedly began to type in commands as her long fingers danced across the keyboard. The blue screen in front of her suddenly went dark while the words System Shutdown flashed across.
Feeling a slight tinge of anger Griffin ordered Tracey to place a timer on the system to reboot in five minutes before rushing out of the room and back down the corridor. Going outside Griffin noticed the soft rays of the dying sun and the air now carrying an icy feeling when it lightly blew past him. Looking out across the battlefield of broken bodies and dying men he noticed a single figure standing alone and rigid near the metal fence. Getting closer Griffin met up with the remains of the squad that had been ordered to take down Alice previously.
"Are the snipers still in position?" Griffin asked the squad leader.
The leader, who had a dirty sweat stained face only appeared confused and at the same time frightened while approaching the motionless Alice, "We lost communication with them soon after the raid, a large group of those creatures got to one tower but as for the other two…" he then trailed off as Griffin only nodded and motioned for the squad members to form a tight circle around his 'bodyguard' there would only be a few minutes remaining before the implant would reboot and reactivate Alice.
Quickly removing the dropped handguns from the sand along with the shotgun, Uzis and swords Griffin stood back and waited, counting down the seconds until the glazed blue eyes that now stared across the landscape would blink and become more animated.
Suddenly both eyes fluttered as Alice shook her head while putting her left hand to the side of her face cringing as though getting over a bad headache. At the same time the squad all cocked their weapons at her, the metal snickers sounding off in unison. Alice only stared back towards Griffin appearing confused to what had just happened.
Griffin only stared back, while crossing his arms and looking upset, "Frankly I'm disappointed in you Alice, I've seen all I need which proves that you are crossing the boundaries with those emotions of yours" he then gestured towards the armed soldiers. "Now under the circumstances if a superior's order was refused then the one who disobeyed it would be shot on the spot, no inquiry and no questions, however being what you are I'm afraid I can't do that, you're a valuable bio-weapon despite your many faults"
The circle then disbanded as the soldiers lowered their weapons and began to back away. Griffin only watched them go with a calm gaze before turning back to Alice.
"This little incident almost cost this company because you can't learn to control your violent urges to destroy anything that moves, I should report this anomaly to the committee so they could authorise me to further update your programming but where's the fun in that?" Griffin snapped, he then leaned in closer, "I know you were wanting to kill them all including Alyssa, you failed in your mission and current objectives which is very upsetting"
"What did you do to me, why can't I remember?" Alice hissed flashing Griffin a dirty look.
"Think of it as a reminder, if you don't want any more memory lapses I suggest you follow orders from now on, it'd make it easier for both of us, I won't go to the committee with this but remember today very well so the next time you decide to pull a little stunt such as breaking ranks again these events will come to mind" Griffin commented. "I can go much deeper with the programming Alice, this is only the tip of the iceberg and I'm pretty sure you like being able to choose to do things for yourself at the moment"
Alice began to say something else but Griffin cut her off when raising his right hand, "Do you understand what has been said to you?"
Clenching both fists Alice found herself replying back with a phrase that had been previously programmed into the implant, "Yes Dr Griffin" she said nodding stiffly.
Stepping away Griffin only smiled cruelly, "Good to see that we're both on the same level again, I think it's for the best that you keep out my sight until I send for you, I'm going to be busy for a few more hours before we leave the Spheres, there's nothing else we can do here for the moment"
Watching the smug Griffin walk off Alice waited until the doctor was out of sight before retrieving her weapons that had been piled to one side during her blackout. Putting all the weapons away she could only stare back across the desert landscape as the sun began to set, unable to express the emotions that had been brewing inside of her. How dare he force me to say phrases like a trained parrot! Alice thought angrily I'll continue to resist even if it means temporarily forming a truce with enemies just to make you suffer Griffin.
Thinking about the brief cooperation with Jill and Carlos made Alice faintly smile, it appeared that Griffin didn't like helping other enemies out and had become disturbed by what he had to do protect his own skin.
Just another weakness you've unwillingly revealed to me Alice thought as she began to pick a path through the rotting corpses and back towards the facility.
The moment the white carrier transport had been safely out of range Carlos gave a loud cheer before turning to face Jill who only smiled back at him.
"I think we can say that went reasonably well, at least one of those Spheres won't be in operation for a long time" Carlos remarked grinning.
"It's just a shame there's still three more of those labs out here in the desert," Jill said as her smile faded. "All those experiments with the T-virus are still going to continue"
"Come on Jill stop being so serious, we screwed up Umbrella's plan with what they've been doing out here and by he looks of things they even had to call off their strongest weapon in order to deal with the damage we did back there"
"I don't think Griffin called Alice off" Alyssa suddenly spoke up as she faced the pair. "There's very little he could've done to stop her from shooting at us, I had the impression there was more to what happened before, did you notice how Alice suddenly went still as though she couldn't move?"
"Sorry I was too busy avoiding the Infected that were trying to tear out the front fender to notice" Carlos shrugged. "Either way we all got out alive"
Jill had noticed Alyssa had gone quiet again and looked towards her, "Something wrong?" she asked softly.
Alyssa only shook her head, "I'm just really tired…that helicopter who were those people?"
"You saw them too?"
"Not really, all I saw was a black helicopter fly over the mansion once when I came back outside, I may not know a lot about the vehicles Umbrella uses but I know that helicopter didn't belong to them" Alyssa said while yawning. "I'm just…kinda glad we left that place I didn't like what I saw there"
Seeing Alyssa turn back to look out of the window made Jill repress any urge to force the girl into saying anymore about what she'd just said. The kid's had a few hard weeks, whatever she saw must've messed her up pretty bad but it's not my place to say anything Jill thought as she too turned to look through the windscreen at the dying rays of the sun across the desert.
"Well don't think this adventure is over yet," Carlos said breaking the awkward silence.
"What do you mean by that?" Jill asked frowning.
"Frank said he'd only be in the Birdsville area for a week now and if I'm not mistaken we've taken a little bit longer then that to travel through this desert so…"
"We've driving all the way back to Cairns?" Jill finished as she glanced up towards Carlos. "That's insane we'll never make it plus two members of our team aren't really suitable for passing through the security checkpoints"
"I really love it when you get all serious and sceptical at everything we do, glad to have the old Jill back" Carlos said smiling.
"It's all part of the thrill isn't it?" Alyssa spoke up.
Turning Jill saw Alyssa's tired eyes staring straight back at her but also noticed there was a kind of twinkle to them, her body may have been tired but it was clear to see that Alyssa's fighting spirit hadn't given up. Faintly from behind the seats there came a dull growl, which caused Jill to throw both her hands up into the air as she sunk down into the seat.
"You're all crazy" she said then glancing over at Carlos Jill nudged him in the ribs, "You especially"
"What can I say? I love action, just try and keep me away from it" Carlos smiled.
All sceptic thoughts aside Jill couldn't help but laugh at the remark as Alyssa and Carlos joined in as well, however there was one thought that still plagued her mind and it would stay there until the fight against Umbrella was over. We won for now but they'll get stronger and so will we.
Continuing forward the large truck bounced over the desert landscape and into the fading light leaving a faint dust trail in its wake.