A small shack greeted us as we crossed the courtyard silently, covering sectors and watching for dogs or more of those fucking lizards, looking too innocuous for its own good; I'd kicked the door down, and Chris took point, calling out that he had a hatch, locked up tight. Jill and Rebecca locked down the exterior, and I used the last of my C2 on the lock, overdoing it, but ensuring that the thick metal stood no chance. The walls of the shack shook but didn't collapse, confirming my suspicion that the faux-wood hid some kind of steel reinforcement. Chris helped me lift the deceptively heavy hatch, tossing it to the side with a dull thud. Chris moved to the opening, but I stopped him. I was going first, I'd be damned if someone else took the bullet.

Rung by rung, I'd climbed down the ladder, waiting for something to jump out of the darkness and end me. When my feet finally landed on corrugated metal, I let out the breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding, pulling a chem-light off my gear, snapping it to life, and waving it over my head—Chris's signal to head down.

I turned into the dark, dropping the chem-light and bringing my rifle up, flicking my light on and pushing the darkness back. I was on a landing of sorts, the shaft went down even further from here, another ladder leading into the darkness; I flashed my light over the railing and spied another horror. Tentacles or vines cut the ladder in two, writhing and undulating over one another. I sank to a knee, the ringing of boots above me the only sound in the tight space; I felt Chris drop to the catwalk behind me, a gentle tap on my shoulder a second later confirmed it. I rose to my feet as Jill's and then Rebecca's boots made contact. Raising my hand and motioning them forward.

"Ladder's a no-go." I whispered, pointing my light at the mass blocking our path, "Gotta move forward, my light only, keep our signature down."

Everyone nodded, and we moved for the door at the far end. Moisture dripped all over everything, whether from the July heat, or some other, more sinister mean, I couldn't dwell on. I simply didn't have any more room in my head for the wrongness of this place. It shouldn't exist, but tonight was a night of firsts. I'd have plenty of time to add this to the list of nightmares after we were all safe. The door was just a door, no pressure locks, no weird emblems, So I lined up and booted it; Chris snapped his rifle up and was the first one in, with me hot on his heels.

"Clear.

"All clear."

The small anteroom, we found ourselves in branched off in two directions. I drummed my fingers on my rifle, a plan forming.

The fastest way to do it.

"Chris, Jill take right, Rebecca? On me. You make contact with anything bigger than a zombie, fall back here. Priority is to figure out what the fuck is blocking our access to the lab and remove it if possible, find a way around it, preferably."

They nodded, "Shoot straight, Kelly," Chris whispered, holding out his fist.

I knocked mine into it, "Only way I know how, watch your ass."

Jill gave me a look as she moved to stack up; I winked at her and pushed to the far door, Rebecca, on my six. We breached almost simultaneously, a short hallway greeted Becca and I, a few doors littered up and down; we cleared them, the little medic impressing me yet again, as she took down a few zombies. By the time we reached the last door, hitting a dead-end, I'd have let Chambers watch my back any day. The place was obviously some kind of employee dorm, evidenced by the bunks, scientists from the lab below if the documents we scrounged were anything to go by.

"Listen to this," Rebeca caught my attention as she shuffled some loose files around, "Plant Forty-Two…It looks like an experiment log, and if I'm reading this right, it was exposed to the virus in small quantities, they terminated the experiments after it started to grow out of control, my guess is that it never stopped. It killed a couple of researchers, doesn't say how. But it does tell me how to mix the chemicals to kill it."

"Anything on where it was housed?"

She read on, when she looked up, her face was pale, "If this is accurate, right where Chris and Jill are heading."

I was already breaking for the door, "On me!"

We thundered down the hallway, checking corners and re-clearing on the run, crashing the anteroom door.

Please, baby, be here.

Silence.

"To the door, 'Becca!"

We were halfway across the room when the door in question slammed open, Jill came flying through, followed by Chris. Both breathing hard, both looking thoroughly terrified.

Thank God.

"Fucking plant!" Chris swore, delivering a kick to the door they'd come through, "Thing has the whole floor locked down, and I don't think you brought enough firepower, Mike."

"Not kidding, partner," Jill joked, but her eyes still held that fear, as I'm sure my own did.

I shook my head, "I didn't, but our resident genius," I pointed to Rebecca, who blushed a bit, "found a way to kill it. Fill them in 'Becca."

She ran over the abridged version; the chems she needed were here somewhere. She needed to deliver it to the roots of the thing, located somewhere below us; once she gave us the rundown, we split up again, going through the cleared rooms, thankfully, and by some miracle, we regrouped with everything we'd need. Now the question remained, how we'd descend the shaft with the plant blocking our only route? I had an idea, but it sucked hard.

"Are you sure about this?" Chris asked.

I pulled on the rope, triple-checking it before threading the end through the carabiner hooked to my hasty Swiss-seat, "Fuck no, I'm not. But it's the only way we get out of here."

"Let me go then."

I looked up into his eyes; he was serious, he'd jump into the unknown if I asked him to, which is precisely why I couldn't let him. The faith he had in me was touching, and I wouldn't abuse it so I could stay here, no matter how much I wanted to.

So I grinned, "No chance Redfield, can't have you stealing all the glory."

He snorted, "Goddamn…Glory… right. Just be fucking careful."

"Gonna try, brother."

I turned and climbed over the railing, popping a chem-light and dropping it down the shaft, trying to ignore the mass of vines; if they caught me, it'd be over real quick. The light fell fast but still seemed to take forever before it bounced off the slick concrete below.

About a hundred feet. If I slipped, if anything went wrong, I'd be dead before I realized it. I turned back the catwalk to find Jill right against it, reaching out, I let her take my face in her hands, and all I wanted to do was reciprocate. She gently nuzzled the side of my face before pulling back and kissing me gently, pouring everything that she had into it, the first we'd shared in this nightmare, it felt like coming home, and Christmas all rolled into one. I held her kiss, not wanting to let her go. A soft shriek from somewhere pulled us out of it; she broke the kiss and pressed her forehead to mine. "I'll see you down there."

I pressed right back, "See ya, baby girl."

Leaning back before I could stop myself, I threw my brake hand out, sliding down the rope and leaving Jill and our friends behind. The shaft was pitch-black, and the only sound was the soft rustling of the vines and the zipper-like sliding of the rope through my makeshift harness.

Only my mom knows that I'm scared of the dark.

I kept my brake hand out, coming in a little hot, shooting past the mass of vines, hoping I had enough rope, that it wouldn't slip through my fingers and send me plummeting to my death, or worse, that I'd be injured just badly enough to become fodder for a zombie or two.

Thirty feet down, forty, fifty. I kept sliding, my guide hand starting to burn as I rocketed down the shaft, barely maintaining control. The chem-light getting closer and closer.

Almost there.

I brought my brake hand back in slowly, feeling myself slow way down. It's probably what saved my life; a half-second later, my rope slipped the harness, no warning, nothing, the rope just wasn't there anymore.

"FUCK!" I shouted, flailing as I fell…

For about ten feet. Impacting the concrete floor of the shaft flat on my back, tucking my chin out of reflex and narrowly avoiding cracking my head open. I laid there for a second, the wind thoroughly knocked out of me.

"Get up, my friend, we will not die here, inshallah!"

Eylo, my Kurdish buddy, had his hand out; I let him pull me to my feet from the dirt street where the ISIS mortar round had knocked me flat.

I shot him a grin, my ears ringing. "Shukraan."

I rolled over, pushing myself off the concrete. Eylo had been a good kid, killed outside of Afrin, captured and beheaded; I quietly thanked him for giving me the strength to get up, before dragging my rifle up and flipping on my light, lassoing it up towards the catwalk, letting them know I'd landed safely.

Safe-ish

I flashed the light around the small chamber, spying an elevator door, the mouth of a cave, and a much larger and heavier pressure door behind me, standing wide open, someone had been through here before me. Who? Someone had dodged that plant. I shook it off, for now, moving towards the door, clearing the soft corners, and seeing nothing. I pushed inside and was greeted by the sterile corridors of Umbrella's lab; the smell of death and antiseptic told the tale.

I moved past a reception desk, papers scattered all over the floor, splashes of dried blood here and there; I kept moving deeper and took a knee to orient myself at an intersection; the roots of the plant had to be off to my left. I cleared the corner and moved into the long hallway, doors spanned the length, but the one at the far end, with vines growing around the edges, the steel warped and twisted, that was my baby. I moved, rifle up, listening for the slightest sound, any hint of someone here other than me. Someone had popped all the doors in this place, the exact opposite of a lockdown, none of it made any sense.

Unless it was deliberate.

A soft moan whispered behind me, I spun, dropping to a knee, three zombies shambled toward me dried out husks, more so than any we'd encountered thus far, all wearing lab coats, it jived with what we'd found in the mansion, the scientists had been killed and brought back by their bullshit leap forward for mankind. I started on the right, blowing a hole straight through the face of a zombie missing an arm, before working on the other two until the smell of cordite overpowered the scent of death, and my would-be assailants lay twitching on the floor.

I waited for a beat when nothing else emerged. I regained my feet, turning and pushing towards the door. I passed the glass-paneled offices, personal items scattered everywhere, it felt lived in, and for a moment, I felt a twinge of sadness for the pawns like me, that led to rage at Umbrella for throwing people away for their bullshit ideals.

Lock it up. Let's kill this overgrown weed.

I slung my rifle after one last glance over my shoulder, pulling a halligan from my pack and slotting it into the opening, the vines curled around the end as I heaved on the bar, the door screeched open, inch by inch. Veins stood out on my arms as I pushed against it with all I had, with one final rending scrape of metal on metal, the door swung free.

Fuck…

The room stretched on, vines overrunning every surface, and down into a massive pool, dark shapes weaved under the water's surface. The centerpiece was the plant's enormous root bulb, sucking water from a small overflow tank with a breached sidewall. I slipped inside, dodging vines that threatened to curl around my boots, pulling Rebecca's deadly cocktail out of my hip pouch, thanking god for the hard-case she'd packed the vial inside; more vines curled around me, and I picked up the pace, running, leaping over vines thicker than my leg, closing in on the tank's edge.

About time to end the- oh FUCK!

A fucking SHARK breached the water on my right, breaking the surface and hanging for a split second before crashing back down with a massive splash, pelting me with water. I kept running, fuck this whole room, and skidded to a stop, the vines were coming for me now, so I had a choice of getting eaten by a plant or a massive fucking shark.

It felt good to have options.

I unscrewed the lid of Rebecca's vial and hurled the whole thing into the brackish water, spinning on a heel and ducking another vine. The effect was almost immediate as I started running for the exit, the plant screeched somewhere above me, vines twitching wildly, still reaching for me as I sprinted, chunks of concrete were torn from the ceiling as the thing writhed, it's death throes coming closer to killing me that it had.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," I muttered like a mantra as I ran, hurling myself through the busted pressure door and back into the hallway, sliding across the polished tiles, the gash on my jaw throbbing painfully just to remind me it was there. I lifted myself off the floor and looked back; the vines had completely withered away, the bulb decimated by whatever Becca had mixed up, and not for the first time, I resolved never to fuck with the tiny medic. I shook off my latest near-death experience and jogged back to the entrance; I pushed past the outer door, firing up my light and lassoing it once more, letting everyone know it was safe to move. I leaned against the structure's wall, keeping my light trained on the mouth of the cave; I'd seen this movie.

A few uneventful minutes passed before I heard the elevator start up, grinding it's way down to me, I didn't have to wait long before the doors slid open and my team, the thought filling me with a little pride, fanned out and covered every angle.

"You good?" Chris called out.

"I'm good," I called back.

A shot echoed from the cave entrance, distant and muffled, but there all the same. I snapped my rifle up and got on line with Chris; we moved forward as a unit, Jill and Rebecca covering our backs. I popped around a corner and almost got a bullet in my face for my trouble, the round whining off the rocks in front of my face.

"Blue! Blue!" I shouted.

"Come out of there!" A voice boomed, and I recognized it instantly

"Captain Marini?"

"Captain!" Rebecca shouted, rushing ahead, "It's Chambers!"

I hooked the corner, Chris and Jill at my back, we fanned out around the small chamber, Marini laid against the far wall, blood steadily pumping out of his stomach, Rebecca stood infant of him, my mind registering her hands raise as we moved in.

"Clear."

"Clear

"All clear."

I lowered my rifle and turned to see Bravo's Captain pointing his Beretta squarely at Rebecca, who had tears in her eyes, "Captain, it's me." She whispered, imploring him to lower his weapon.

"I-I'm sorry, Rebecca, but I can't take any chances."

"Rico?"

I spun, Chris and Jill following suit, bringing our rifles and pistol up almost in unison.

Barry?

Burton looked like he'd been through hell, his combat shirt torn in places, dried blood caked in others, but his eyes were the worst; they were empty, haunted, as he looked at his friend.

"Captain, what do you mean?" Rebecca asked tearfully.

"There's a traitor in STARS, someone who led us into this nightmare on purpose." When he spoke through gritted teeth, I could feel the pain in his voice as clearly as I could feel my blood turn to ice in my veins.

Chris's voice was steely when he chimed in, "Who, sir?"

"It's C-"

A shot came from over my shoulder and smashed into Marini's face, his body jerking obscenely as his brains painted the wall behind him. I was already spinning to track the threat; Chris was running after the shooter, frustrated scream at seeing someone else die tearing its way out of him; Burton just stood there, his mouth open in a silent expression of utter horror. I ran after him, knowing who it was, knowing, and the horror washing over me like a tidal wave.

Captain Wesker had led us here to die.

"Chris!" I shouted as I ran, trying to keep pace with the raging ex-airman.

"I'm gonna kill you MOTHERFUCKER!" He screamed, somewhere ahead of me.

"REDFIELD STOP!" I shouted with everything I had left in me, I had to get him to slow down before we lost him too. I must've hit a nerve, as I turned the corner, I almost ran him over as he leaned on the wall just outside the entrance to the lab, trying to catch his breath. Barry, Jill, and Rebecca came racing up behind me.

"Fucking *Huff* Wesker." Chris breathed.

I grabbed his shoulders, spinning him to face me, "Chris, we'll get him, we'll get him, I swear to God, but we get him as a team, and we make him pay for it, all of it."

Something had gone out in his eyes, that last bit of hope maybe, but he nodded.

"I-I helped him."

At Burton's voice, I dropped my rifle and pulled my knife, the six-inch steel blade singing out of its sheath, I was gonna cut my name into him with it, shock overtook rage when I turned, and Jill placed a hand on my chest, the other one lightly gripping my wrist, stopping me from gutting Barry like a fish.

"Jill wha-"

"Wesker has his family, he was gonna have them killed if Barry didn't help him."

"I've heard it all, Jill, so have you, remember?"

"He's got my girls Mike, please, you guys know me." Barry sounded like he was on the verge of tears; I side-stepped Jill and got right in his face; the bigger man looked on the verge of crumbling, his hands shook violently. I looked him over, my knife still dangling from my fingertips; it took most of what I had left not to ram it into his heart. But the longer I looked, the more I realized he was a man with nothing left, nothing that Wesker hadn't taken from him. I slipped my knife back into the sheath with a whisper.

"If you're lying, Burton, I'll fucking bury you." Never hurt to keep them guessing; we'd find out if he was for real when I hooked Wesker up to a fucking car battery. I looked around, catching everyone's eye in turn.

"Let's go see the Captain."

We swept into the lab like death itself, zombies and monsters alike crumbled under the weight of our fire.

Room after room, we hunted our Captain down like the animal he was.

Finally coming to a hallway with only two doors at the far end, I pied the corner, spying a comms setup, crackling with static; I took the hard corner on the right, Chris taking the left, "Got a working radio here, Jill get on the team freq, see if you can raise anyone, everyone else cover."

Jill moved up and spun the dial, "Any stations this net, this is STARS Alpha Team in the blind, requesting emergency extract from any available units, our pos' is as follows." She relayed the rough coordinates, "We are in a lab facility beneath the Spencer Estate."

Nobody was more surprised than me when a voice finally cut through the static.

"-ill?"

"Say again, your last?"

"Jill? Is that you?"

Vickers?

"Vickers! What's your position?" Relief tempered our anger, but not by much; we still had business to attend to.

"Two miles out, and coming in hot, damn good to hear your voice! I can see the house, there's a helipad on the roof, try and make it there, I'm almost at bingo!"

I spied a map of the lab hanging on the wall and snatched it for reference; all we needed to do was get lost on our way out.

"Alpha copies all, see you soon." Jill finished, leaning on the table, her shoulders sagging for a second, before she straightened up, turning and giving us a nod, "Let's go end this fucker."

"Alpha? Move."

We fell back to the hallway, crashing the last door and fanning out.

Empty, but we had options; I threw some quick hand signals.

Jill and Chris, right.

Barry, on me, left

Rebecca, hold here and watch our six.

We moved, splitting off into the side rooms, offices with more evidence of Umbrella's evil scattered around. When only a dead-end greeted Barry and I, I motioned for us to fall back and consolidate on Jill and Chris. The big guy nodded, moving out first; he knew enough to know I didn't want him in back of me; we lapped Rebecca and pushed to the other side, into a room lined with tubes that stretched floor to ceiling, vague shapes were suspended in the liquid that filled them. An open door and a chem light marked the way; I stepped through the door and heard voices, faint, but there, just up ahead. Barry and I flowed around the room, checking every corner before moving closer to the voices, close enough that I could make them out.

"Surely, you didn't think I'd come in here without a backup plan, did you, Chris?"

Wesker, you greasy fuck.

"I couldn't give a shit about your plan, you helped murder our entire team, threatened to have Barry's family killed, and now you're gonna sit here and monologue like a villain from a Bond movie, you fucking psychopath?"

"Oh Chris, I had to tell Burton something to get him to cooperate; his family is quite safe."

At that moment, I saw Barry Burton become death and the fucking destroyer of worlds, his lips pulled back into a snarl, and his muscles tensed; right then, I was glad my name didn't sound anything like Albert Wesker. I motioned for him to go right, and I went left, eager to get more guns on Wesker; why hadn't they shot him yet?

I pushed the corner and got my answer; Wesker held Jill in an iron grip, one arm around her throat, his Beretta pointed at the bridge of Chris's nose. Behind him in a tank stood something out of my nightmares, but I only had eyes for him.

I didn't give him time to blink, I didn't pause for a second, I snapped my rifle up and fired one round, striking him high in the shoulder that held his weapon, he screamed, and Jill wrenched free, running past me and out of the line of fire. Wesker clutched his injured shoulder as I went for the headshot, with his uninjured arm, he slammed his hand down on two buttons at once. The tank started to drain, and I hesitated, the thing inside it twitching, easily twelve feet tall, one normal arm and one that was just a cluster of wicked-looking claws, a throbbing tumor on its chest puled in time with an EKG machine.

"It's magnificent, isn't it?" Wesker's voice held the kind of reverence and love that most people reserve for a newborn child. "Just as you're quite the man, Kelly, leading these men and women through this place. I wish I could say I'm surprised. But then again, we're cut from a similar cloth, aren't we? Or didn't you tell your beloved teammates?"

Oh you fucker…Checkmate.

It was the last thing he could take from us before we killed him, our trust in each other, the faith they had in me.

Mine and Jill's love.

"Mike, what is he saying?" Jill whispered from behind me, her Beretta switching between Wesker and the monster slowly coming to life behind him.

"So you didn't tell them? Well, let me illuminate you as a parting gift. Mike here was employed by Umbrella after he left his old life behind, " Wesker smiled evilly. "Good job, partner."

The room dropped a few degrees, Chris broke all the rules and looked at me, shock written all over his face.

A few things happened at once, the Tyrant slammed it's fist into the glass, spidering it. A voice blared over the P.A, announcing that a self-destruct sequence had been activated.

And I double-tapped Albert fucking Wesker in the chest, knocking him back into his beloved pet. He hit hard, sliding down to the floor.

The Tyrant broke the glass seconds later, thick Lexan pelting us as the monstrosity stepped out, over Wesker's body and into the cold light of day. Its eyes scanned the room, impassive, unflinching until they locked on us.

I felt my blood freeze, "Fall back NOW!"

We ran for our goddamned lives back to the main area, Barry running up behind us, Rebecca waiting at the door with wide eyes as the canned female voice told us how much time we didn't have left.

"Helipad, go!" I yelled over the din, and all the while, the Tyrant crashed along behind us, hunting us down.

We rounded flight after flight of stairs, the roof was so goddamned close I could taste it, the Tyrant seemed to have given up, but I wasn't ready to hedge my bets just yet. Finally, we slammed the rooftop door open and were greeted by the sweet sound of thumping rotor blades.

Vickers had actually shown up. Color me surprised

He swooped low, heading in for a landing as I tried to do some mental math and figure out how much time we had left, Vickers skids touched down, and Barry helped Rebecca in, Jill and Chris jumped aboard, and I reached up to grab on.

At that moment, our friend decided to make an appearance with a bang, crashing through the roof and crawling out of the hole, rearing up to its full height and staring me down. I pushed away from the bird, pounding on the windscreen as I dumped my pack and motioned for Vickers to go; the thing was waiting for us to make a move before it overran the helo and killed everything I cared about. I wasn't about to let that happen. I raised my rifle and shouted over the roar of the rotor blades.

"C'mon, you fucking pussy! I don't have all day!"

Its eyes snapped toward me, and it started moving, a slow, languid pace like it didn't have a care in the world. I fired a whole mag as fast as I could, pumping rounds into the thing, but it didn't stop.

"Kelly, get clear! RIGHT!"

I dove to the blacktop, and a fucking rocket streaked over me and struck the Tyrant dead center of mass, blowing it into grisly chunks. I felt a hand on my back, pulling me up and into the bird.

"VICKERS, HE'S IN GO!"

Burton, you absolute unit.

The helo lurched up, clearing the roof, and into the early morning sky. I stared back at it and counted off in my head, making it to a minute and change before the charges stacked inside the walls blew, destroying the mansion in a spectacular thunderclap of fire and noise that destroyed the forest for a mile in every direction, bringing an end to this nightmare. I leaned back in my seat, exhaustion all but overtaking me.

Something bumped against the side of my head; I looked up and found myself staring into the barrel of Chris's Beretta, his eyes full of something that looked an awful lot like hatred. Jill stared at me impassively, her Beretta in her hand, Rebecca was eyeing me sadly, Barry was unreadable.

I'd been close to losing my life so many times in the hell we left behind us, but this moment right here? It made me wish I had.