He cut his hand open for the third time, watching the blood flower in his palm and drip between his fingers… And then the skin slowly knit together again.

"Jesus," Grayson murmured, and he did it again. The wound healed, smooth. "What in the fuck?" He stared at the unbroken skin of his palm, and wondered what sort of genetic fuckery was going on inside him right now, and whether or not it should worry him. He didn't feel any different...

The door opened. Grayson quickly tossed aside Alfred's paper knife and watched Alfred, who was Alfred again, step into the room. "How are you feeling, mate?" he asked, closing the door and sitting in the armchair beside the bed.

"All right," Grayson lied. "Little tired, but I'm okay."

Alfred nodded.

"So what's the plan?"

Alfred stared at him, then said, "Kill Redfield and Burnside, of course." He paused, however, his gaze drifting to the bloody paper knife on the floor, the bloodstains in the fibers of the carpet. His forehead creased, lips dropping into a frown. "Were you hurting yourself?"

"Not like that," Grayson said, and shook his head. He picked up the paper knife and demonstrated, cutting a line across his hand. The wound healed. Alfred stared, expressionless. "I don't know what's going on, man," he said. "I dunno whether to be scared or grateful."

Alfred sighed. "Suppose you'd find out eventually," he muttered, and looked at him. "My grandfather," he began, straightening up in the chair, "was a member of the Eugenics Education Society, and was an admirer of Francis Galton. Father, too. Grandfather initially wanted to make Umbrella into another Galton Institute—that's what they renamed the EES—but shifted his focus, instead, to the production of bioweapons at the behest of Spencer, as it was far more lucrative—"

"Get to the point," Grayson said, feeling his stomach drop somewhere near his bladder. "Please," he added.

"Your father subscribed to grandfather's idealogy, Grayson," Alfred said mildly, as if he was commenting on the weather. He laced his fingers together and smiled. "Scott was a researcher before he was a butler. So much for being a good Christian, hm?" Alfred laughed, then said, soberly, "He volunteered you as a baby to be the recipient of an experimental strain of the progenitor virus he and grandfather created, after it failed to have any effect on him. You were young, your cells malleable and fresh. His? It caused complications down the road." Alfred tapped his chest, where his heart was, and said, "Right here." He was quiet for a moment, and then, "That was why Spencer had my grandfather killed, Grayson. He wanted their research. How do you think Oswell ended up so sick?"

Grayson said nothing and stared at the floor, at the patterns and blood in the carpet. Annette had been right. But his own father? He buried his face in his hands. "Why not kill my father?" he asked, staring into the darkness of his palms, then opening his fingers and staring at Alfred through the cracks.

"Your father wasn't a founder, and Oswell needed someone around with intimate knowledge of the experimental strain," Alfred explained, shifting, the chair's wooden frame creaking softly. "Of course, it didn't do him any good. Your father hid his research."

She's on ice…

Chess is a game of foresight and careful planning, dear Grayson.

My maneuvers are always calculated.

I play The Long Game.

Spencer's last hope.

"Alexia is alive, isn't she?" Grayson blurted out, and stood up. He wasn't sure how he knew that, but he did, somehow, deep down in the core of him: that Alexia was alive, and that she had some sort of plan. A plan that predicated on Spencer's desperation for a cure, and his faith in her intelligence. He strode over to Alfred, scowling. "And she knew about this, didn't she?" he continued, angrily. "She knew about dad and this eugenics shit. Probably hid his fucking research, too. Maybe she was even in cahoots, had planned everything from the start."

"Alexia is dead, for the last bloody time, Grayson. You're raving."

Grayson turned away, marched out of the bedroom, and down the three flights of stairs. He needed some air, or he was going to punch Alfred, and then regret punching Alfred once the anger and the frustration left him.

Had this been the thing Alexia had told Alfred, before she'd died? Had Alexia been some eugenicist all along, with plans to turn him into some kind of weird fucking Übermensch? He knew the Ashfords prized pedigree above everything else, even to their own detriment, but Alexia had never been like Alfred in that regard. There had been times she'd even been alarmed by her brother's weird, manifesto-like monologues about the Ashfords and their "place" within the hierarchy of society. It didn't fit the Alexia he'd known…

Or maybe, he thought, Steve had been right: he was wearing rose-tinted glasses.

Or, something with his voice said, Alexia had been used as some kind of pawn in her father's eugenics vision.

"Or maybe," he said, out loud, "she was just indifferent to it all?"

It was still raining, the air smelling of petrichor and smoke, and underneath that, of rot. Alfred stepped outside and stood beside him. "I didn't mean to alarm you, Grayson," he said evenly. "Simply thought you should know."

"What else did Alexia tell you?"

Alfred looked at him, sighed and shook his head. "Nothing much," he said. "I don't believe Alexia knew much to begin with. She found the notes when…" His words trailed off, and Alfred stared into the middle-distance, his expression unreadable. "When," he continued, somewhat shakily, "I found out about Code Veronica. The secret of our birth. She did some digging…"

"What secret?" Grayson asked, looking at him.

"Nothing," Alfred said.

Grayson didn't press Alfred to elaborate; something told him, in his gut, that he'd find out later. "So my dad was an Umbrella researcher," he said flatly.

"Yes," Alfred said, folding his arms across his chest. "He was a junior researcher who'd worked under my grandfather, Spencer, and Marcus. And then later, alongside my father, once Umbrella became an official company." He paused, frowning. "Your father was immensely talented in his field. But then you were born, and things went awry with his research and his personal life, and so he effectively retired from the position. Father gave him a job as our butler to keep him close, and he often assisted father with the Code Veronica project. It's safe to say, I think, father would have struggled to unlock the intelligence gene without your father's help. And without that intelligence gene, Alexia would have never become… became the girl we knew."

Grayson stared, then said, "You're telling me Alexia was genetically-engineered. Like in fucking sci-fi movies."

"Indeed," Alfred said, nodding. "Grayson," he continued, and looked at him as if he'd said something stupid, "when was the last time you'd met a small child who understood logarithmic functions?"

"Exactly zero. Good point," he said. Then, "Was I part of this project? This Code Veronica thing?"

"No. Your father's research predated Code Veronica by a decade. Scott employed the knowledge he'd gained from those experiments in Code Veronica. Without his insights, I doubt father would have made such quick progress."

"What was the point of it all?" he asked.

"Selfishness. Why else does anyone do anything? There's no such thing as altruism, Grayson. Everyone wants something: fame, professional acclaim, reputation, and so forth. Selfishness is the impetus of progress, and that is the bitter truth."