The Ghost Survivors: Last Escape

by antihero276

Emerging from ground zero of the T-Virus outbreak and the destruction of NEST stumble two greatly differing corporate spies believed by the world to be dead. U.S.S. Special Agent GHOST and Organization operative "Ada Wong" cross paths and are forced to work together to survive and escape the infested Raccoon City. Short story. Aftermath of RE 2. RE 6 Ada/Agent origin story.

5. Chapter 4: Death's Door

Vong: Simmons would get everything that's coming to him. But him and Carla would be better developed and defined than they were in the game. He'd probably die as he does in the game, at Carla's hands, experimenting on him, getting her revenge. As for Frankl? I don't have exact plans for him at the moment, but he'll be a wildcard, around, and with the knowledge and ability to create Tyrants and Nemesis Parasites. Perhaps he will end up working at a lab in Carla's Neo Umbrella ;), with access to the full array of the various series bioweapons and viral resources to work with, would be a dream come true for a sick bastard like him, a mad scientist. He'd fit right in. I would expand on Neo Umbrella much more than it got in 6, include more characters/villains working with it, instead of just Carla and the J'avo. Actually, I could see my version of the Undertaker Commander being the one leading the J'avo for Carla, running the B.O.W. military forces. I would make Carla essentially become Spencer and Marcus's unintentional true heir, a combination of their strengths, visions and flaws, surpassing even the Weskers, Birkin, Colonel Vladimir and Lady Spencer in that area, the culmination of the horrors both men set loose on the world, Umbrella personified. Carla had so much wasted potential in the game, could have been greater than she was. To depict her as she should have been would be a hell of a worthy challenge as a writer.

My take on Resident Evil 6 would be the finale of this universe.

Maybe marriage, maybe not. Not really a priority to me lol what matters is they will eventually end up together... but if they did marry, he would take Jill's name of course. HUNK is never going to find out what his real last name was, nor his past before Umbrella. He'll always be a man of mystery on some level, however much we learn about him. I don't think it's very important. His story begins and centers around Umbrella and in the aftermath of Umbrella, not before it. Umbrella made him who and what he is. Lady Spencer knows his entire past, so does Oswell, not that he cares about it. HUNK is a former embarrassment (his affair with Lady Spencer) turned useful tool to Oswell Spencer, little more.

Akira-Hayama: Glad you like where I'm going with GHOST. Thanks to Capcom, I have many possible story branches to explore and expand upon lol given their love of creating and discarding their creations instead of exploring them further.

It's fun to parallel the similarities and differences between HUNK and GHOST, those who read both stories will see the allusions to one another. I liked that HUNK left GOBLIN 6 to die to complete his mission delivering the G-Virus, while GHOST was the one who put her out of her misery, essentially, and has given away the G-Virus to Ada. He's much colder and more closely guarded, where GHOST is definitely emotional, and always will be. More overtly human. The difference between time, experience, personality types and differing roles in the company.

The Ada/Dr. John Clemens plot point thing was only in the original RE 2 unfortunately, should have been worked into the remake as well, and other than that it was only text on a note in the first Resident Evil, so I can see many people forgetting about it. It was a last minute addition of mine as well, realizing it should be delved into a bit more with Ada, more humanity and depth, and you know me, I like to make the most of preexisting canon lol.

There were a number of characters I wanted to bring in from Outbreak, but I decided to focus it down on what worked best for the story purposes, instead of bogging it down. David King and Linda Baldwin were in that area at the time canonically, and Ada passed through the Apple Inn as well in Umbrella Chronicles, so them running into one another was more feasible than not. And it allowed me to explore the dynamics between two separate pairs of male and female survivors, and the Ada/GHOST dynamic in the presence of outsiders, after all this time they spent with just the two of them. Showing another side of Ada, more possessive, both of them having latched on to one another meeting under the circumstances that they had down in those sewers. Ada ain't the sharing type, or letting interlopers try to lure GHOST away. As well as showing how whipped GHOST is already becoming as he turns into Agent, how easily she has been wrapping him around her finger without even knowing it, standing up for and defending her after cursing her out earlier. Sort of a "Nobody insults her but me!" thing lol. When there's a perceived threat, they show that they do care for one another. Never said it was going to be a healthy ship lol. Quite the opposite. Stupid bravery on GHOST's part mouthing off Wesker, but to be fair to the man, he doesn't know yet that Wesker has superpowers lol, just looks to the rookie like some smug, blonde douchebag wearing sunglasses indoors and a turtle neck, imitating a Bond Villain. If he did know he would clam right up, backpedal, and/or react like Ralph Kramden in The Honeymooners: "Homina homina homina homina..." xD.

Wesker is more amused than not by GHOST, in a condescending way, especially seeing he could be a possible weakness in Ada that Albert might exploit. True to his villainous mastermind self, he is cold and not easily provoked, GHOST is an ant to him. He likes to let things play out and exploit them when there's a ripe opportunity. He is interested as we are to see how things develop between GHOST and Ada, though people are just chess pieces to him, nothing more. Well... apart from William Birkin, perhaps lol. I think the friendship there was genuine, between two villains.

Appreciated as ever, friend.

G Fawkes: I warned people this wasn't the epic of Their Last Escape lol alas. But I'm glad it has been enjoyable enough that people have wanted more. When I started this story I narrowed the focus down intentionally, as I've said it's more the afterward of Resident Evil 2 in some ways, the journey has already happened, this is merely closing up the Resident Evil 2 story through Ada and GHOST. Still, the story did grow a bit in the telling, I wanted to make it mostly character focused than sprawling action and adventure, as well as set up for a possible future. I used what I learned writing Their Last Escape and concentrated it all down to a short story, and it was obviously much easier than writing an epic journey. That's something that took me awhile, being able to narrow down what I need to write and adding more to it later, instead of writing every little thing in one go.

I have enough stories on my plate as it is lol and there are already plenty of existing Leon/Claire stories, like there are Leon/Ada stories. I like to try to write things that haven't been done before, delve into areas that haven't been explored as deeply. Also, interesting as that story would be, Leon and Claire sticking together through 2 like Rebecca and Billy did in Zero, I think that story works much better with them split up, the adventures they got into after separating, until coming back together at the end. Otherwise you have no Claire and Sherry story focus or Leon and Ada story focus. That game told two well done differing tales that I quite liked... though to me I liked Claire's scenario with Sherry more. I was sold better on the emotion there with Claire being a big sister/motherly type, going through hell and back to save Sherry from her monstrous parents, than I was on the Leon/Ada drama lol. I also think that Claire's scenario would have more of an effect on HUNK, when he finds it out on Rockfort Island, interrogating Claire and Sherry separately. Though in a RE 4 story he would sympathize with Leon a bit over Ada, given his own experiences with Lady Spencer. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Much appreciated.

Searathil:

1) U.S.S. was originally based on SAS training, given the Spencers and most of Umbrella's elite are British. That was the starting point for Lady Spencer when she founded U.S.S. with her family's military connections, investments and ties, hired instructors from them, but I can also see her having added elements of training from other military forces over the years as it expanded, recruiting instructors from around the world, becoming sort of a hybrid, but mostly retaining the SAS core.

2) Umbrella's reach is global, so they are pretty much everywhere in some form or another, but stronger in some places than others. Umbrella in this universe as I see it is at its strongest in Europe, the United States, Japan and West Africa. I don't have an exact military figure for U.S.S. off the top of my head, but obviously somewhere in the thousands. Though there are two categories U.S.S. falls into, Security Guards who protect Umbrella properties and assets, and Special Agents who go out into the field on operations. There are more Security Guards than Special Agents, and their training is somewhat less rigorous than agents, just like their tasks. Still really well trained through. Their weaponry is modern and even possessing some more advanced experimental weaponry normal military forces don't have, with Umbrella's advanced technology, they have a navy of course, air power, and will use a variety military vehicles where necessary, including tanks. Though they tend to prefer covert special forces operations over taking to a battlefield and marching their forces out. Where possible they prefer using other nations militaries for their own ends, to do the heavy lifting and dirty work, what with all the corrupt politicians and military brass on their payroll around the world. War might be profitable, but it is also very expensive, even for a global mega corporation like Umbrella, so they try to be careful about it. And of course they have access to B.O.W.'s like the Tyrants and Trash Sweepers, which they use also when necessary.

3) Yes. For everything else HUNK is, all his flaws, problems and how messed up he is, he's the real deal in battle, forged by experience. Wasn't all nepotism that got him his Grim Reaper legend. He excelled especially after Lady Spencer left, and he got that cold chip of resentment against her and Umbrella on his shoulders, focused and became more professional, became more than she'd ever thought he would be. Before then he was a very talented hothead, brash, emotional, arrogant, with only Lady Spencer really able to keep him in line, but not the HUNK we now know and love yet. He is U.S.S.'s best. Though where leadership is concerned, he is middling, prefers delegating command of squads to better leaders he keeps on his teams as such, though can make the tough decisions. For comparison, HUNK is a much better soldier/operative than Chris, would destroy him in a fight/battle, but Chris is the much better leader. HUNK's personality and baggage just doesn't lend itself well to command. He's more a solo operative or advisor than a leader, so he has difficulties wielding his power over others lives, considering he's always been the one others had power over.

Jinero: They would resist the Combine. Nuff said.

Jack Skellington: Happy belated Halloween to you too ;).

Thank you all for the reviews, as ever. Let's get this finale started.

---

October 1st, 1998, 5:36 AM

Main Lobby, The Apple Inn Hotel, Downtown, Raccoon City

After departing from the safety of her hotel room, they had no more than reached the top of the stairwell again when the high pitched, piercing, inhuman screech rang out through the lobby of the hotel around them. The first of the enemy found and descended upon them. Descended upon him. And the shit hit the fan.

Of course. Just when everything seemed to be going so well already. Raccoon City couldn't leave well enough alone... pulled the rug out from under them.

Together in an instant their gazes snapped upwards to the high up ceiling of the hotel where the sound emanated from, overhead of the upper floor walkway they were on... to spot it suspended there above, half in and half out one of the vent shafts there, legs out of view within it, dangling from them. Something both familiar... and alien at the same time... he didn't know about her, but he'd never seen anything exactly like it yet, even in the horror show that was Raccoon City. All the same, even with the shock of its hideous appearance, he tried to do what had to be done. The key word being he tried. MP5 snapping upward at it, GHOST squeezed down on the trigger as he aimed through the infrared scope at it, had it right there in the middle of the scope, in red... but no bullets roared out at the thing. It clicked... and betrayed him. No... he betrayed himself. In a terrible instant, he realized he'd never switched off the safety... and before he could do so, it had detached itself from the ventilation duct and was falling through the air, descending down upon him, elongated tongue whipping around it furiously... dropping down from above and landing on him roughly. The moment it struck him, it latched on to him, and down they went together from the momentum, toppling down the main stairwell of the hotel, falling steadily towards the lobby, amid his shouts and pained curses and its screeching, feeling the impact of each step as he gripped the thing right back, holding on and also trying to keep it at bay. Rolling together end over end. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, eventually, even dizzied, pained and disoriented, only half aware of what had happened and was happening, his eyes shot to it at once, what he could see from where he was, and he tried to pry himself from it. Unfortunately, he found himself laying on his back on the hard floor of the lobby, the air knocked from his lungs... and it was already straddling atop him, that whip-like prehensile, salivating tongue protruding from its mouth, the thing also stunned by the fall, but recovering more quickly from the unexpected tumble than he was. Getting an eyeful of the thing... for which there was only one astute assessment of it.

"What the fuck?! Get off me you crazy bitch!"

GHOST screamed at it as they began to struggle, and looked off to the side quickly, to find his MP5 laying over on the floor at the base of the stairs, not far from them. So close... but too far away. Nor could he immediately reach down to produce his MUP, with it trying to snap at him, and lash at him with its tongue. He couldn't even pry it off him, those long, slender legs wrapping around his own legs, stronger than they looked. Acting on instinct... knowing he needed to deal with the most immediate threat before him, he did what he had to do. Grabbing its wildly whipping tongue, he began squeezing down on it, wrapping it about his wrist like a rope, and staring back into its blank, milky white, widened eyes, mouth trying and failing to snap at him. He finally got a full, horrible eyeful of it... another sight of the many he would take to the grave... a grave he was probably a matter of moments from already anyways. In life it had been a young woman, now it was something between a twitching infected and one of the Inside-out Men... it still had its hair... long and dark, soaked and unkempt... and flesh on it, albeit turning a pinkish red, and various growths upon it forming. It couldn't stop moving, head twitching over and over, moving like some demonically possessed thing. The disturbing sounds escaping from its mouth lending credence to that thought. It even wore some tattered women's clothing clinging to its otherwise half nude body... but it was neither human nor a zombie any longer. Some Vampire fused with a Deadite looking abomination, if anything. A freak that had no right even existing... in a world of freaks. It had the tongue tongue of the Inside-out Men and the razor teeth were forming, if less pronounced... muscle as well, strong, tensed form. Tongue not as thick, but seemingly even longer, even more snake-like. It lacked the razor claws of the completed mutations, its tensed hands gripping his body army and latching on to him, with long talon-like nails instead of giant claws. He kept struggling with it... it was physically powerful, but not as much as the so called 'Licker' had been... or at least, his arms and legs were not as pinned as they had been in that elevator, nor was it as heavy as the Inside-out Man had been.

This thing he could resist, fight back against properly, if with difficulty. There was no heavy metal grating lying atop him either, separating them... but just now, he damn well wished there were. All the same, it had suspended itself overtop of him, and had no intentions of prying itself off him without a good deal of encouragement on his part. He grunted as he struggled against it with all he had, trying and failing to throw it off him with his legs and free arm, balling a gloved fist up and punching it in the side over and over with all he had. Raining blow after blow on the thing, though not making much progress. He followed up on the strikes by drawing his combat knife and beginning to stab it repeatedly in the same spot, twisting the blade, infected blood flowing from the wounds... but it didn't seem to feel either the blows or the combat knife, beyond further rage or frustration as he defied it. He yelled at it as he struggled, in growing frustration and exertion of his own as the specter of death drew nearer beneath the thing. Panic turning to anger and adrenaline.

"Honey... you got... real fucking ugly!"

It hissed and salivated at him as if it understood, rage burning in its inhuman milky white eyes as it tried to pull its tongue out of his grip... but before it could do anything more to him, just then a red light flashed into existence from somewhere above and had settled on the freak... and the one it belonged to opened up. The muffled echo roaring, carrying through the entire hotel lobby, slamming into the thing's back, blood spraying all over as it screamed from the powerful impacts wherever the laser sight fell, still struggling with GHOST, but its grip on his body armor loosening with each round. Over its bloody shoulder, he caught a glimpse of Ada standing up on the top of the stairs with her pistol tucked away and replaced by the Steyr AUG assault rifle in both hands, risen to her shoulder and coolly peering down the scope. The woman in red firing individual accurate shots, taking her time doling them out expertly, not wasting them... and putting them where they belonged, into the enraged abomination that looked back at her snarling and twitching. Long, glinting brass shell casings flying around Ada and rolling down the stairs. Anger to match even the enraged thing burned within GHOST as he looked back into the thing's hideous visage, still plunging his blade into its side over and over... he'd already been tackled by one of these tongued freaks already... and would not put up with another. Keeping his grip on the tongue, as the rifle shots from Ada above slammed into its back, distracted it from him, he rapidly resheathed his soaking combat knife and instead reached down into his belt with his free hand and produced one of the devices he found there, raising it up and peering down its open maw... opening wider as he strangled its tongue. With it distracted, he managed to sweep its legs out from under it, breaking its straddling of him, before rolling it over on the ground so he took his place atop it, settling his metal knee pad against its throat, putting all his weight on it, while keeping the tongue taut in his grip.

"That's it... come to daddy! Open wide, bitch!"

Popping the pin, he promptly stuffed the incendiary grenade down the gurgling, twitching freak's throat, before knocking it aside and scrambling off and away from it rapidly... fleeing back towards the bottom of the stairs. Trying to rise but his boots slipping and falling on its blood back down to the floor with another curse and a grunt. Fumbling with his MUP at the same time and drawing it at last as he put some distance between him and the thing, as much as was possible. It writhed and gurgled where it was bleeding on the ground, between the gunshots and knife wounds, trying to get back up on its feet, or tried to scream, with the grenade lodged in the way. Before he knew it the tongued thing burst into flames in front of him with a great explosion as the device detonated, brightly and loudly enough to make him wince. Then the gurgling sounds became piercing shrieks, damn near all of it alit in orange and blue flames, tongue whipping around in front of it as it moved this way and that in a hideous, rapid dance. Skittering about on the floor more like a multi limbed spider than a humanoid. Slamming against the nearby bar, flailing tongue knocking over and breaking bottles... then he heard further gunshots, from above, and glanced back up to find the woman in red still with the assault rifle risen, slowly, methodically, in a dream-like manner descending down the steps without looking at them, only seeing the mutant. Not the least bit perturbed by the horrific sight of the thing, or its shrieks. Putting round after round into it as it burned all the while, driving it back just as it looked like it was about to charge or leap at him again. Keeping it away from the agent. Snapping his head back towards the smoldering, screaming thing, gritting his teeth within the mask, he rose the MUP and opened up on it as well, the roar of the pistol joining in with the rifle above, as GHOST remained down on the floor in front of the staircase. The power of the rounds heartening, their thunderous booms overpowering its shrieks. Its blood sprayed about, the smoke billowing off it and rising high around it, spreading, a mist growing around the lobby. And then before GHOST even knew what it was doing, it scrambled back upright to its feet, then sprang high up into the air, sticking to the nearest wall over the bar and crawling along it, spreading the flames further, as it desperately sought out the closest of the ventilation shafts on the ceiling high above.

It was scurrying all the more like a spider now. Adhering to the ceiling, flaming tongue still whipping about, elongating further over its inhuman shrieks. Overwhelmed by the pain they were dealing to it.

"Didn't need Exorcist shit this morning..."

GHOST muttered under his breath as his pistol and Ada's assault rifle snapped up and tracked the thing all the way, her red laser sight on it guiding his own aim, still firing at it... but somehow it managed to shrug off most of the rounds striking it, more durable than it appeared, and keep crawling into the ceiling ducts. Blood splattering the ceiling along the way, a trail of it up there... before its form was vanishing away within the ducts again... banging around up there amid the metal, though its hideous, pained shrieks still audible in the distance. At least for a few moments longer. It faded away at last... either because it had traveled too far, or had finally succumbed... he hoped for the latter... but was fairly certain it was the former. Either way, the gunshots from the pair of survivors ceased... and only gradually did GHOST realize his heart was racing and his ears were ringing... breathing heavily... pain and aches spreading all over his body again... old aches and new ones alike, now, from the tumble down the stairs. Slowly, he lowered the pistol, grunting under his breath at the soreness, and trying to recover from the shock of the ambush. He must have hit every step on the way down the lobby, from the feel of it... but still the freak's face was at the front of his thoughts... anger towards it above all. Hoping the bitch was burning to a crisp up there. Either way... he knew, she would by morning. Some comfort that was, in the here and now... though it was better than nothing. At the same time, a shadow fell over him, for a moment his heart spasmed, sure it had somehow come back... and he looked up to it, to find her above instead. Ada was ejecting her assault rifle's spent magazine and locking and loading a fresh one into place, rejoining him at the base of the stairwell, scanning the area and the ceiling again with her rifle's laser sight to be sure, before at last lowering, safetying and slinging it over her shoulder in a series of rapid movements. Taking up the Chinese burst pistol again in one hand and looking down his way... lowering her free hand to him in offering... a trace of a smile touching those red lips... hazel eye looking more green than brown. Her tone washing over him, as quietly silky and teasing as the look in her eyes.

"If you were in such a hurry... we could have just taken the elevator down, GHOST."

The agent looked between her hand, back to the devastation at the bar, the fires now about the lobby... and to her again. For a moment he wanted to retort... instead he shook his helmeted head, exasperated with it all... then, hand shaking, he took her steady one, and she helped him back up to his feet... brushing him off with her hand and keeping close to him. As he tried to get his head back together, she gathered up his nearby fallen submachine gun, and slung it securely over his shoulder again, as it had been before... and then began to check him for any bites, wounds... until she was satisfied he hadn't been. He checked himself as well, his equipment and weapons... making sure he hadn't dropped anything else in the struggle... thankfully that didn't prove to be the case, all of it remaining securely attached to him. He looked back up to the ventilation ducts as she checked him, jaw tightening within the gas mask grimly... feeling the growing paranoia... not about to let himself be tackled again by a thing like that. The freak in the R.P.D. elevator had been too much already. This had perhaps been an even closer call. He muttered under his breath, as much to himself as to her, unable to repress himself, heart still beating quickly, working to keep any shakiness out of his voice.

"What the fuck was that thing? Never seen one like that before..."

"Mutated variant of the Lickers, from the look of it. It happens. Subspecies of a mutated species. The T-Virus always finds a way of outdoing itself, is truly evolutionary. Marcus saw to that."

"Inside-out Men. But... yeah... could have been their Queen from the look of it. Not sure if it was more advanced or not... but she packed a hell of a punch. Tougher than she looked... looked too fucked up to be able to move like that..."

"Poor girl."

"Poor girl? Fuck her. That thing nearly tore me to pieces... or jammed that tongue down my throat."

"Well we couldn't be having that, now could we? Look on the bright side... you're still ship shape and good to go, rookie. Your luck continues to hold out."

"That's news to me, red. And who the hell is Marcus? You mentioned him back upstairs. Never heard of him."

"I'm sure you haven't. Doctor James Ian Marcus was the original creator of the T-Virus and one of the company's three founders. He vanished and was mostly erased from the company's history by Spencer after a falling out, a decade back. Spencer took the credit for the T-Virus's creation. Marcus's favored students and supporters within the company were none too pleased... Director Bailey most of all, out in West Africa... but there was nothing they could do about it. Spencer was President of the company and Marcus wasn't... had his daughter running Umbrella Security Service at his beck and call... so they had to sit still and take it. It was among the Inner Circle. It was real cold blooded shit from the Spencers. Likely they did the same thing to Edward Ashford as well in '68... that laboratory accident of his in the Antarctic. Growing their power base. His heir, Alfred Ashford's father, Alexander Ashford, vanished in '83 as well... probably more of the Spencers bloody handiwork. By the few accounts remaining of Marcus, he would be getting off seeing the fruits of his work being introduced to Raccoon City like this... seeing the virus unleashed on a large scale. Just as Spencer must be."

"Sick old blue blood European virologist fucks... scheming elitist political bastards too... always the mad scientists, isn't it?"

"Marcus was an American, of a lower class background, unlike the Spencers and Ashfords. Managed to make his rise on merit. And by making the right friends, of course."

"That right? Equal opportunity scumbags, Umbrella. Right from the start, even in the hierarchy. Learn something new every day."

"You will with me around. Tell you more about them later... information I've scoured the world gathering. When we are free from here."

"Here's hoping..."

GHOST muttered wearily, and looked at her when she finished up with the rest of her inspection and nodded gratefully... knowing how lucky he was to have not been infected... how close the call had been... but at the time he'd not even been considering it, just struggling to survive. Somehow coming out the other end of it intact... no... not entirely somehow... as it had been with the thing in the elevator, he had her to thank for that... her intervention. But before he could thank her, say or do anything more, they heard the breaking of glass nearby... and a low, muffled moan. Together they looked past the bar and caught sight of it emerging... standing up from where it had lie before. The former employee, with the many nails sticking out of its bald head... white, glowing eyes looking back at them... freshly transformed into a Crimson Head... mouth opening and closing as it stared at them, smoke pouring from its mouth... steam. The blood within it brought to the surface of its flesh. But they didn't give it the chance to leap over the bar at them, or race around it. Glancing at one another, understanding in an instant passing between their eyes, they looked back as one to the former bartender turned Crimson Head. They rose their pistols in unison, her red laser sight settling on the mutant, and opened up on it together, the rounds of the MUP and silenced Broom Hc roaring through the hotel and passing into the former employee, slamming it backwards against the bar, knocking over further bottles in the process as it moaned, glass and alcohol flying, some of the rounds striking the mirror behind it and shattering it all over as well. A burst of her rounds catching it in the head and blowing its brains out, blood and grey matter spraying everywhere as well, staining the bar and broken mirrors. The mutated bartender collapsed under the barrage of oncoming bullets out of sight beyond the bar after a number of their rounds... and did not emerge into view from it again. Still, he checked over the bar, watching the nail headed thing twitching for a moment, before it finally went still in a pool of its own blood.

Quite dead at last, where it now lie beneath the bar. Together they lowered their pistols at last, and she glanced over his way as he turned back to face her. Her tone when she spoke was amused and silky, shaking her head very slightly.

"Looks like that plumber could use some practice. Didn't quite finish his job. Might have to complain to the manager."

"Not his fault. Shit like that happens. Even to the best of us."

GHOST's dryly amused voice returned with a shrug, the memory of the washroom returning to mind, his words drawing a deeper, appreciative smirk from her, though she made no further remark. Tucking away the MUP into his holster, he took up the slung MP5 again, this time making sure to retract the safety on it, grimacing within the mask... though she didn't give him a hard time about it, thankfully. Although he knew she should be for such a rookie mistake... the instructors back on Rockfort Island would have never let him hear the end of it... would give out the discipline big time. Another close call... another fuck up by him, forgetting his own gun's safety... letting himself get tackled down a staircase. Maybe he was lucky... that he hadn't broken his neck on the way down, at least. His face and neck were burning at the thought in a way that had nothing to do with the exertion and close brush with death. Making an ass of himself in front of her, as he had been since the start. But the impending nuclear strike quickly returned to his mind... despite the carnage of the hotel here. And as much as part of him wanted to hunt down the inside out broad and make sure she was finished off for good, the nuke reducing it to ashes would have to suffice... bringing a bitter smile to his lips. As soon as they were ready, the two survivors continued on together, moved back down away from the bar and through the corpse and fire strewn lobby of the hotel, the tapping of his boots and clicking of her heels emanating around the interior. Their weapons surveying the area, a red laser sight flashing about courtesy of her modified pistol. GHOST studied the corpses of the infected hotel employees and guests who had already been dealt with, along with the still bleeding, twitching one he had thrown over the stairwell earlier, and the plumber had finished off.

He resisted the temptation to shoot it some more, to stop the twitching and put it down for sure. But it would be a waste of ammunition he had the feeling he was going to need... and soon. Besides, they were leaving, and it would be dust before too long with everything else. As they moved they kept out of the reach of the corpses arms anyways, just in case, as they had done on the way up. Especially now... with time ticking against them to oblivion. Something told him with his luck if it hadn't been the inside out thing tackling him down the stairs, one of the slumbering zombies upstairs would have grabbed his leg and tripped him down the stairs. He looked one last time down to the corpse of the hotel employee he and the plumber had taken out before... then down to fireplace and couches set up at it, where the two other survivors had been before. Where the plumber and Umbrella doctor had been were only dried blood smears from the gunshot to the woman's leg... some left over bloodied rags and spent medical supplies as well. The two of them were gone... along with their bottles of whiskey... had a head start on them to the highway, no doubt... though had that injured leg working against her... unless the plumber had MacGyvered some crutches, or had carried her out. He had certainly looked strong enough to do so. GHOST was certain the gunfire he'd heard upstairs had belonged to them, out in the streets. Hopefully they had cleared a safe path for them as well in the process... as whoever had gone Terminator down in the sewers had inadvertently done for them earlier. Then again, this close to the end, seconds ticking away to the missile... he had his doubts things were going to go easily or smoothly on them, at the worst of all possible times. The wall crawling bitch had been proof enough of that already. His time down in NEST had also taught him that bitter lesson well, one the surface was doing nothing to dispel.

Ada's eye remained cool and calm as they passed the reception area, the front desk and reached the end of the lobby, the metal doors they'd breached to enter, keeping her guard up... and moving better than she had before, in spite of her own injuries. Too much was at stake now to be slowed by them, he knew... and now they were on a genuine time limit. A countdown to obliteration. This was not what he had signed up for... by any stretch of the imagination. A first mission culminating in a viral outbreak of monsters, and a nuke ready to rain down on his head. It was sheer lunacy to try to think about, to fathom... the scale such a simple mission had somehow grown into... he could ponder it later, if they managed to make it out of the city. Watch it all unfold on the news while getting himself drunk. If not? He wouldn't have to worry about it for much longer... the consequences of his fuck up in that laboratory for the world. He would be a distant memory. She continued taking the lead, and reaching the metal door the two other survivors had closed behind them, she grasped the dry blood covered handle and pushed it open, the cold air rushing within from the hall beyond. The two of them stepped into it without looking backwards at the lobby... proceeding down the hall again towards the breached main doors of the hotel. But they stopped as they neared the broken ventilation grating from before... the blood stained one, both aiming their weapons up at it... glancing between it and one another. Quite certain, without saying it, what had broken that vent now... and what might still be crawling around up there somewhere, burnt and enraged. But they heard no banging of metal... it had fled somewhere else to die or to slumber a final time... so together they carefully moved around the ventilation duct, keeping their weapons trained on it until they were past it and at the doors.

Once they were safely beyond it, returning their attention to the street, they stepped together back out on to the corpse strewn sidewalk in front of the hotel. Moving out of the cover overhead in front of the entranceway and sidewalk and back out to the street. Back out into the puddles, the rain and the cold breeze that shifted her hair and dress about, formed visible goosebumps on her flesh, but she did not shiver. Like before she stood in the semi dark of the storm, under the glowing neon red lights of the Apple Inn, illuminating her red dress. The morning light had drawn closer to Raccoon City than before, now, was near, but still the storm clouds kept much of it at bay. The falling rain was lighter than it had been before, but still present, sending ripples through all the many puddles. He joined her out in front of the hotel as she lowered her pistol in both hands, and he did the same with his MP5, surveying the vicinity together, side by side. The moans had grown louder... closer... and a number of scattered infected were out on the street among the vehicles out on the road, as it had been before... most standing upright, but some with broken, shot out or severed legs, crawling on the pavement... most of them not yet noticing the pair standing at a distance from them, observing them. They seemed to be common infected, instead of one of the mutated varieties... at least thus far. And no outright mutated monsters or B.O.W.'s. Thank God for small favors. Still... scattered or not, there were more of them now than before, and they were closer to the hotel than they had been. Clearly more riled up now, no doubt from the other pair of survivors who had passed through. GHOST could make out more corpses of the zombies lying out in the street that way... but there were more zombies standing up shambling about than there were lying bleeding in the rain. Still, every one that had been downed counted, eased a bit of the burden off them. Ada was the first to break the quiet between them, murmuring as much to him as to herself, it seemed.

"Hmm... stragglers. Was wondering when they'd show up."

"Linda and David must have stirred them up, after passing through here. Goddamn zombies... just what we needed more of."

"Infected."

The woman in red corrected him calmly, eye looking among them steadily, clearly committing their positions to mind. Preparing for their inevitable advance. There was a cool, calculating manner to that eye, unperturbed by the freaks that awaited them. It was both intimidating and reassuring at the same time.

"There are no such things as 'zombies', Agent GHOST. You watch too many movies. These are infected human beings."

"Think you need both eyes then, lady. And them checked. I see rotting, shambling, fucking zombies. Dead things walking around. Still... nothing we can't clean up..."

"Yes.", Ada's languid tone agreed simply, eye travelling down to the north. He followed her gaze to the distant wreckage of vehicles closer to the looming highway above. To the infected out there shambling on the road and the underpass, as she continued to speak evenly. "We clear the street ahead and make our way past the clutter and wreckage down towards that underpass below the highway. Then we get up there. Ready ourselves for Vladimir to make his pass... and get the hell out of here."

"Simple enough. In theory. At least it sounds simple. Reality has a way of disappointing..."

"So I've learned, even before Raccoon City. But it's the only option on the table. Unless you have a better alternative?"

"Who, me? Some dangerously good looking, badass rookie? Obviously not."

"Then we're doing it my way."

"Or the highway?"

Ada said nothing to that dry toned crack, though did not disguise a slight smirk, before taking charge once more and taking up her pistol and starting forward through the rain, heels clicking on the cement as she moved down the street towards the underpass and wreckage of the cars littering the street. Drawing a tired, reluctant breath he did the same of his submachine gun, following and keeping close and watching her back. He ignored the more distant zombies in the alleys around the road, the ones that hadn't noticed them... but others were closer to them among the wreckage, and noticed them rather quickly. Emitting their low, hungry moans and ravenous snarls as they spotted or smelled the pair of survivors... whichever the hell senses they even had left. Taking aim and peering through the infrared scope at their heads, GHOST opened up on them first, single shots only, conserving his ammunition, the roar of the submachine gun echoing through the streets. He gunned down several who had been banging on the deli across the street from the hotel, watching them collapse against the concrete, blood spraying all over the side of the deli, staining the windows and running down them like the rain. A couple rounds veered off and struck the window, shattering part of it, and he cursed under his breath every time he missed, before refocusing on downing the zombies properly. His scope alternating between both sides of the street, toppling the closest of the freaks shambling their way, their arms risen as they moved in that familiar gait, his weapon covering her... not that she really needed much of it. Ada had her own situation well in hand for the time being... the red laser sight flashing between heads patiently, putting bursts into each from the silenced pistol, somewhat muffled rapports echoing freely, spraying their brains all over the street and the nearby vehicles, putting them down real quick. An infected, rotting hound snarled and barked from one of the alleys, a former doberman, now skinless and monstrous... bounding out of it, and both of them turned on the spot and met it at once with silenced burst pistol and submachine gun fire. Rounds tearing through its mutilated body and dropping it on the sidewalk before it could lunge through the air at them, twitching and dying amid its own blood. But it snarls and barks drew out several more like it... a whole pack of the mutated canines... snaring their attention at once, side by side working together to take down the rest of them... a variety of types of dogs, they had been in life. Now they all looked pretty much the same... decaying, enraged, and ravenous... hungry, like all infected by the T-Virus that ran through them.

Marcus' handiwork, she had told him. It was good to have a name of the bastard who had designed something as fucked up as the T-Virus. Someone he could curse as GHOST fought to kill the virologist's posthumous, bastard creations.

With concentrated overlapping fire, they worked hard to take down the dogs before they could get too close... but his heart raced throughout, unblinking as he tried to make each shot count... and managed to, with her help. They screeched and barked, writhing and dying blood soaked about the street, torn up by the rounds. Ada's laser sight moving between each of them and firing another burst to be sure, putting them down entirely, dropping them at various spots around the road. Only when their twitching ceased did GHOST dare to breath and alter his stance next to her. There were dangerous as all hell, these infected mutts... more so than the common infected. Harder to hit, faster, and all it would take was one bite like any other infected. As they died, the two corporate spies looked at one another and shared a nod of understanding of the threat, how close it had been... before turning and refocusing on the other, common infected drawing closer. They opened up on the closest zombies to stem the tide of them, downing a few, and he covered her as she swapped out a magazine... and she did the same for him when it was his turn to reload. But pretty soon over the moans they both heard it, somewhere high above... echoing from far off... but drawing in closer... the cawing of birds, over and over... and looking up together towards the light of nearby street lamps, the early morning distant light, they saw the murder of crows descending. A flurry of beating black wings, like clouds themselves come to life and descending... not coming down for the rotting flesh of the infected they'd killed... but moving directly for the flesh of the living, taking the form of a woman in a red dress and a man in special forces gear. All they saw was their next meal... but not even needing to look at one another, the two survivors fed them a steady and immediate diet of leaden death instead. They opened up on the small swarm of cawing crows, tearing them apart under the flurry of rounds, feathers, blood and parts exploding and flying every which way. Her red laser sight moving rapidly between each, making each shot count, while he fired more freely, now and again slamming the butt of the submachine gun against the ones that got too close... though being as careful as he could. Even fully armored and uniformed, and them armed with beaks... he wasn't taking chances with the infected. Especially considering the cawing, screeching freaks were aiming for his exposed eye within the mask. One drew close to her, razor sharp beak ready to rend her own face, but before he could do anything, drawing GOBLIN 6's combat knife, Ada slashed one of its wings off instead, knocking it down to the ground where her red laser sight fell upon it, obliterating the rest of it to bloody mist under a burst of rounds that broke the concrete of the road. At once aiming back up to other oncoming birds and perforating them as well.

The murder only lasted a matter of moments... but it was moments that felt like years as the last of them struck the pavement... and he crushed it under his boot as the echoes of their joined gunfire ceased as well. The sight of them all dead and twitching heartened the agent, the dread and fear loosening... who managed to utter a gloating laugh through the gas mask. Shouting at them victoriously.

"That's right... buzz off, you mangy buzzards! I knew that bloody crow was a bad goddamn omen... sign of what was to come. Didn't think it would be so literal..."

"What crow?"

"Back during the meeting, up in your room, there was one perched in the window. Watching me. Couldn't tell if it was infected."

"I didn't see it."

"Lucky you. Wish I hadn't. Still giving me the fucking creeps."

"Superstitious nonsense, GHOST. Don't waste your time worrying about so called omens. Deal with the threats directly in front of you, instead of dreading some vague, unseen future."

"Whatever you say, red. Not like you're the one that crow was here for. Let's get up to that highway. This fucking city... glad I never visited here before... it's for the birds."

At the pun from him, her red lips smiled thinly yet appreciatively, but tucking away her bloody combat knife again, she shook her head and returned her attention to the rest of the infected drawing near, as he did the same. Getting back to their necessary priorities. Keeping his eyes and ears sharp for any more of the winged freaks. Compared to them and the hounds, the shuffling and crawling, rotting zombies were almost welcome to deal with again. Dangerous, but more predictable than the animal infected were, especially in their movements... and he'd gotten more practice in on them than birds or dogs. Raising their weapons, beginning to advance together side by side down the street towards the overpass, picking their targets, both of them opened up on the zombies. They worked well together, keeping the infected at bay, not allowing them to get very close and conserving ammunition. For the moment, conserving it was still an option. Thank God there wasn't a horde down here on this street, or it would be another story. All the same... it was better fighting up here on the surface than down in the sewer, even if there were more monsters to wade through up here. He would take a more open battlefield, even with the clutter around the road, over the dead ends in the sewer any day, the cramped spaces, while essentially running blind, even with her directions, all of it alien to him. And that didn't even include all the piss, shit and garbage, potentially infected water. Still, the gunfire was drawing steadily more attention from the zombies to their advancing position. Infected had risen on the wrecked bus... but most were trapped within the wreckage of the twisted metal. A couple of the former passengers of the bus managed to press through the partially open doors, moaning, but GHOST took aim through the infrared scope and put them down for their effort, painting the side of the already soaked bus in red. The rounds dropping them head first into the pavement next to the bus, where they lay twitching and writhing. The blood coating an advertisement with Umbrella's sexy blonde haired blue eyed spokeswoman model and actress on a tropical beach in a purple swimsuit and stockings for Aqua Cure that was plastered on the side of the bus.

ESCAPE TO ECSTASY! AQUA CURE!

Umbrella, ever getting their money's worth. Apart from with the T-Virus, of course. And apart from him... his blunder with it.

"End of the line, assholes!"

GHOST looked on from the dead bus passengers, and saw infected inside of cars, also buckled up and trapped in their seats, unable to do more than leer and snarl at them, pressing their hands and faces against the glass, clutching at it, or reaching for them through open, rolled down windows. They avoided the would be grabbers with ease and proceeded to ignore them otherwise. There was no sense to be had in wasting rounds on them... they had accidentally, thankfully, rendered themselves little to no threat. Unable to even unbuckle themselves or open doors. Just as the thing that had been GOBLIN 6 had been unable to take of its gas mask and feast on its rotting meal. Thank God the common bastards weren't intelligent on top of everything else. If they could run or think, pick up weapons and use them... or behaved more like the mutations... they would be fucked by now, and the infection would have definitely spread beyond the city limits. Quarantine Zone or not. Even so... GHOST saw one of the infected in the driver's seat of a crashed taxi, gurgling blood and trying to turn the wheel... the former driver still trying to drive it. The sight of that attempt at rudimentary intelligence gave him the creeps... so he fired a burst through the windshield and sprayed its brains all over the inside of the taxi, watching it slump forward against the wheel, against the horn, really. It blared a few times out of the vehicle, ringing sharply through the night as the former driver was twitching away, hitting the horn over and over in its death throes... the commotion making the agent wince. He cursed, well aware of the attention it was likely to draw, like the gunfire... before turning his attention to the next threat. A crawling zombie that had been a young man... with half its body gone... trailing blood and entrails behind it as it crawled towards them hungrily, snarling. It had no stomach, and still it wanted to feast on them. Ada put it down for good before GHOST could, dropping its head down into a bloody puddle. It was fucking lunacy, the stuff of nightmares... every sight he drew in moving through even this city, it seemed. Walking through what should have been civilization... seeing the consequences of what he had unleashed in NEST. This was only one street... what the hell did the rest of the city look like, by now? It made him want to puke... again. Filled him with unease. Perhaps in some ways being underground at ground zero for the majority of it had been a blessing in disguise. Somewhat.

At least he had been unable to see what had befallen the surface... the bliss of relative ignorance. Now it was undeniable what he had helped set free on Raccoon City. Set loose on the world.

"Madness... fucking insanity..."

He muttered under his breath, though the woman in red offered no remark, busily focusing on her targets. He had never thought anything like this would happen as a result of shooting some lunatic in a lab coat... a madman stupid enough to try to pull a pistol on a heavily armed squad of agents. He silently cursed Birkin for the millionth time... as many times as he had cursed himself. If anyone else left alive knew what he had done... all the friends and families on the outside, relatives of those dead or dying in the city... he would be dead even if he managed to make it out. Dying here would be quicker and far less messy and painful. But guilt was a distraction, right now, one they couldn't afford dragging them down... slowing them down. It was the nuclear warhead that stood out in his mind more than the horrors of NEST... everything that had taken place down there. All he knew was that he wanted to survive this mess he had played a part in causing... and that Ada was now the only chance he had of accomplishing that. Whether he deserved that chance or not... he was taking it. There was no alternative. Swallowing, he focused on the threats behind them, turning his back to her and walking backwards, shooting now and again at the infected trying to creep up behind them. Covering her as they passed further alleys and alternate roads off the street, the hotel and its red neon lights growing a bit more distant. The barricades and wreckage helped slow the zombies down from their position... but there were more and more of them the closer they drew to the underpass of the highway. And all their gunfire ringing through the night was alerting and riling them up, drawing them in, even as the horn beeps from the taxi mercifully ceased. Some of what GHOST thought to be genuine corpses laying against the sidewalk or among the wreckage moaned and rose up to their feet, awakening from their hibernation. A couple Crimson heads were among them... managed to break into a run towards the pair of survivors, but GHOST quickly shot out their knees, collapsing them on the pavement, before finishing them off. Still, it was a blessing relatively few zombies were here, considering it was Downtown... most of the city's infected were still probably on Main Street instead, as she'd mentioned, or spread around the city, with how long they'd had to congregate. Or were attacking the barricades of the Quarantine Zone surrounding the city, given how long the military and Umbrella must have been drawing them that way.

The military, U.S.S. and U.B.C.S. may have pulled back, as that blonde asshole calling himself Wesker and claiming to be Ada's boss had mentioned, but even if the zombies got through the barricades there, they would never shamble their way out of the blast radius in time. Assuming they even made it past whatever barricades the military and Umbrella had left behind to slow them up. He shot a former police officer then, blowing its rotting face off and the back of its head apart, dropping the moaning zombie where it stood, before gunning down a couple former civilians, the empty shell casings clanking against the cement around them. A snarling thing in a tattered dress that had been a child tried to lunge at him, but without thinking, acting on instinct, he kicked it solidly in the chest and knocked it back down on the concrete, before blowing its head off. Only in the aftermath being struck by a sense of unease and violation... that he had done something unforgivable... having to remind himself it hadn't been a little girl anymore. For all the good that reminder was, at the sight of it twitching and bleeding from his handiwork. Resisting the urge to vomit inside his mask... more of his handiwork bothering him... no... this was more of Birkin's handiwork. Marcus'. GHOST hadn't let the B.O.W.'s out of containment or injected him with a monster creating bioweapon he'd had nothing to do with creating. The T-Virus and G-Virus were nothing to do with him. The blood of this former little girl was not on his hands. She... it... was already long dead. His gunfire was punctuated by Ada's own occasional gunshots behind him, covering him in return... though he did not turn his gaze to see those she was putting down. Feeling a sense of relief to have her covering him... and enjoying the feeling of trust... of security. That she wouldn't let anything attack him from behind... as he wouldn't let any of the freaks attack her from behind. Even with the urgency, there was a strange comfort to the journey, as it had been down in the sewers when they fell silent, only the sounds of their guns doing the talking. The clicking of her heels and tapping of his boots... the falling of the rain and the moans and snarls of the freaks. Understanding one another just fine, at least where survival was concerned. The extended magazine in his MP5 soon ran dry, and in a hurry his gloved hands quickly ejected and replaced it with a fresh one, the expended one clattering to the pavement at his combat boots.

When they finally reached the underpass she stopped in her tracks beneath it, and he nearly bumped into her, freezing on the road as she turned back around to face him. Her eye looking between him and their surroundings, the other zombies drawing in closer, assessing the rain soaked area, all the corpses they had left behind littered about the road and vehicular wreckage, and how close the next infected lurching towards them were. Then after doing so, speaking again clearly and quickly, in a clipped, cool manner.

"Stop here, GHOST. No need to find a path up to the highway. No need to do this the hard way. How much do you weigh in all that gear?"

"Huh? Armor, equipment, weapons and all? Dunno... 208? Maybe?"

"Hmm. Hookshot will save us some time. Get over here. Hold on to me tightly."

"What?"

"You heard me just fine. No questions. Unless you'd rather stay down here. Let the infected hug you instead."

Ada looked back at him over her shoulder with her sole exposed, enigmatic hazel eye, gesturing for him to come closer to her, while the other hand holstered her silenced burst pistol and took up the grappling gun from her belt instead. There was something confident in her look, voice and manner that he trusted without hesitation, even with his misgivings. This was something she was good at, part of her world... she was a professional, experienced in it. Much more so than him. He had the feeling she was the best at what she did... as HUNK was at what he did. Now he followed her lead, as he had the company's legend. He glanced from her, up to the overpass, and back to her eye again. Maybe he had hitched himself to the right wagon after all. He did so at last, moving closer, making sure the submachine gun was slung properly over his shoulder, and wrapping his arm carefully and tightly around her waist, while she did the same with him, pressing close to one another. Raising the grappling gun upward then, she took aim down the sights while he glanced about their position nervously to more than a dozen of the infected shambling closer to them, through the wreckage of the street and over the bodies they'd left behind. Too close for comfort, surrounding them on all sides, by now. He considered raising the submachine gun in one hand to mow them down, buy her some more time... but before he could, she squeezed the trigger, an explosion echoing through the area as a line shot up noisily and made contact with one of the tall light posts up there. Line and hook securing to it rapidly. Before he could say or do anything, then, she pressed the trigger of the Hookshot again and gravity vanished beneath his boots. They flew upwards together as one out of the reach of the moaning group of zombies converging on them just in time, rising over the crashed vehicles and ever higher through the rain.

"WOAHHHHHH! SHIIIIIIIIIIIT!"

GHOST released a muffled, involuntary shout of alarm, echoing, holding on to her and the submachine gun tighter... but as they continued the rapid ascent towards the highway, he couldn't help himself, releasing a whoop of wild laughter to follow it. Mirth at the sensation, and feeling of escaping the freaks below the underpass in the nick of time. Glancing sideways he saw a tiny, satisfied simile touching her red lips as they hurtled through the air together... something pleased there on her bruised, bandaged visage. Reaching the top of the highway within moments, passing the railing along the side of it, they hung together several feet above the concrete, dangling back and forth from the line attached to the light post. Their slung weapons dangling from their backs and shoulders as well, though remaining secured to their bodies. There was a slight pained wince on her face when gravity returned... and he realized at once it must have been his weight holding on to her. Before he could say or do anything, take in their new surroundings, she tapped a button on the Hookshot and the hook and cord unwrapped and relinquished from the light post it had attached to, shooting automatically back down into the grappling gun. They dropped at the same time back down to the pavement of the highway's road, side by side, still holding on to one another... and already she was letting go of him and taking up her burst pistol again in her free left hand, while GHOST's mind was still reeling and recovering from the shock to his senses. She took aim with the red laser sight at several of the shambling infected that were up there on the highway in front of them, the silencer kicking out the muffled rounds, moving from head to head rapidly, putting them down on the blood and rain soaked pavement, one after another without batting an eye... until the area was secure. Only then did she lower her sidearm and look over her shoulder his way, still wearing that faint, confident smile on her lovely red lips. Smooth, confident, silky voice emerging from behind that alluring way she peered back at him.

"What's the matter, handsome? Aren't you glad you hooked up with me now, Agent GHOST? No thank you for the lift? Last time I throw you a line..."

At her unapologetic puns, unlike how it had been back in the monitor room, he stared back at her in silence for a long moment... then uttered a laugh through the gas mask, grinning unseen within it, unable to repress it. His excited voice burst freely out of his mask. Still feeling a jubilation from the grappling gun that he hadn't since Operation: NESTWRECKER had started. Nearly forgetting where he was and what awaited them if they didn't make it out on time. The hell the city had become around them.

"Holy shit... that was fucking awesome! Right out of a spy movie! I can't believe we did that!"

"Not my first rodeo, Agent GHOST... even if it is yours. It can be fun, now and again... even a bit like a movie. You have much to learn... but have some of the basics down, at least."

"If you say so, red. You sure you ain't carrying any other kickass gadgets on you?"

"Had an EMF Visualizer... infiltrated the underground and NEST with it. Lost it down there. Will need to replace it for my next assignment. Could use another line launcher as well, for building to building climbing... now that you mention it."

"We had some of those hacking devices as well... but no grappling guns. If QUARTERMASTER has any wonderful toys like that, I certainly don't know about it. Even HUNK wasn't carrying one."

"I'm hardly surprised. Not much use for one down in the sewers or NEST. Nor did he enjoy it nearly as much as you, when it was his first time with me on one. Didn't go quite as smoothly, either."

"No horseshit, Wong?"

"No horseshit, Juan."

Her silky tone was amused, and something in her features were visibly reminiscing back to a past. Another of the lives she had mentioned living, he reckoned. She turned and looked away from him again, surveying the highway for herself, and didn't elaborate further. He wasn't about to ask her any questions about it... any more than he would have of the Alpha Team Leader. Even if they did have time for questions, which was very much not the case. Instead he laughed again, this time at the image of HUNK hurtling through the air on a grappling gun, still deathly silent of course... like a statue. Nothing and nobody could make the man emote. Well... apart from GHOST himself, admittedly, though it was a feat he wasn't too proud to have accomplished. He recalled the Alpha Team leader's shouts, his cursing, and threats once they left Birkin's lab... but that had been only after he had fucked up half the mission. He'd had it coming, even if Birkin had as well. Old man Spencer had wanted Birkin alive for a reason... but the madman hadn't given GHOST much of a choice. When his senses recovered from the sudden flight up to the highway, unslinging his submachine gun and bringing it to bear, at the ready, while she silently inspected her Hookshot, he took a look at their immediate vicinity up on the overpass, at least long enough to deem it clear. As well as looking back down over the railing to the road they had come from, the Apple Inn Hotel. The zombies they had escaped from before were gawking up at them with dead eyes, jaws opening and closing, trying to shamble towards them, in vain. Wherever the pathway up to the highway on foot was, the exit, it wasn't down there near the zombies. There were more infected out in the streets around the hotel now, riled up by both pairs of survivors. They were converging on the Apple Inn, the red neon lights of the place illuminating them, out along the corpse strewn road and sidewalk. But he was content in the knowledge that the freaks below were no longer their concern, at least. Yellow, pink and red glowing neon lights on a sign on another building close by the overpass were flashing down on them where they stood at the side of the highway, advertising some brand of alcohol he'd never heard of.

ZAPATA BEER.

Might have been a local brew... not that he got to drink much since joining the U.S.S. Strict discipline and training regimes and all. Unfortunately. All while that hypocritical batshit immaculately groomed and lavishly uniformed Commander Ashford had sipped his expensive liquors atop his damn palace balcony... attended to by his servants and maids... laughing that fruity little laugh of his and sniping targets with a modified sniper rifle. Live targets or otherwise... though he seemed to prefer the former to the latter. Prisoners from the concentration camp and asylum prison that freaky Dr Death was done experimenting on, most likely. Enemies of his and Umbrella's kidnapped from around the world and brought to the prison for interrogation, to be kept as hostages, for execution, or simply left to rot. He remembered their pleading and screams from the beach, where they were shackled for the aristocrat to snipe. Remembered the sea water lapping up against the beach turning red with their blood, before Ashford's goons hauled their corpses away, off for Dr Death to play with. He had only puked the first few times he'd seen it. The blue bloods running Umbrella were fucking nuts alright... all the way to the top... the Inner Circle running the entire show. Spencer. His own beloved father was among them too, heading Umbrella Spain... probably knew it first hand, and for all GHOST knew his old man was as nuts as the rest of them. He would never understand how HUNK managed to keep their company as long as he had. To be on such good terms with them as he was, the elites... especially while very much not being an elite himself. It was no secret that he was an American, and had been adopted by Lady Spencer.

Even so... nobody knew where the Grim Reaper had come from originally... at least nobody not among the Inner Circle, most likely. He'd been with Umbrella before Rockfort Island became the primary training base for U.S.S. Agents, had been taught elsewhere... maybe even the Umbrella Executive Training School in the Arklay Mountains that Ada had mentioned earlier. He felt a trace of pity for the man, being on that echelon, rubbing shoulders with and directly working for Umbrella's elites... to say nothing of the open secret on Rockfort Island that Commander Ashford clearly wanted to fuck him. Had always had him at the palace for dinner when possible, and apparently was envious of Comtesse Henri. Had been of Lady Spencer as well, back when she had been on the island with HUNK, had been staying with Ashford and overseeing the construction and management of the island on her father's behalf. It was little wonder HUNK had left Rockfort Island for France instead, and had taken up with the Comtesse. Despite her own reputation, even she couldn't have been as batshit crazy as Ashford... he doubted she was running her own concentration camps in Loire Village. At least he hoped as much... he probably didn't want to know what she was doing. She certainly owned a couple of research facilities, like Ashford owned one... God alone knew how many test subjects she went through... Ashford went through plenty of them as it were with only one facility on the island. But what went on at his underground B.O.W. research and training facility was highly classified, far above GHOST's pay grade. GHOST shook his helmeted head at the grisly memory of the well groomed lunatic up on that balcony. Leaving Rockfort Island at last, passing his training, eventually, had been a relief by the time it came. Three goddamn years. But in the end he'd only gone from a hell on an island to one in a city partially of his own making.

Just his luck, making a trade that bad.

The agent looked on from the glowing neon signs displaying the beer and the one for the Apple Inn, and back to their immediate surroundings up on the highway overpass, the section she had secured. There were scattered cars and trucks up here around the road in various damaged states, but not as many vehicles as he'd thought there would be... it wasn't packed, at least in this area of the highway. A white delivery truck was parked not far from them up down the road near an overhead metal section of the overpass. There were rain puddles all over, murky with blood from the zombies she'd just taken down... though there had been other corpses already around the highway by the time they got up here, also clearly shot through the head. Shell casings littered about, from her weapon and from others. The cool rain continued... though remained weakened a bit compared to the storm earlier... and he glimpsed more of the distant light of the rising sun behind the clouds. Peaked through the clouds. The storm was gradually abating on the horizon... would probably be over soon. Like everything else inside Raccoon City. All in all, despite the hellscape that was the city... it was admittedly a hell of a view from here. If they didn't make it, at least they could watch an impressive final sunrise. Assuming they weren't eaten alive by then. He glanced at his watch, silently torturing himself with unease as the seconds to their obliteration ticked down, pulse quickening. Yet her ever calm, collected, mildly wry voice drew his attention off his impending incineration and doom with ease, somehow, looking back up at her when she spoke to him.

"And by the way... you weigh a little more than 208 in all that gear. My old grappling device would have been under more strain holding the both of us."

"I'll try not to take that weight remark personally, red." GHOST felt his face smile weakly within the mask, meeting her hazel, watchful eye. Pulling his sleeve back over his watch, in spite of the temptation to look at it again. There was no sense in doing so... what was going to happen was going to happen, and she was his ticket out. He would trust her on that much... wasn't like he had any other options left. That chopper the giant commie bastard was piloting had to be here. "Even with the double standards at play. Somehow doubt you'd enjoy hearing it from a gentleman..."

"Mmm. Gentleman? Where is he? Let me know when he gets here."

"Touche. Nothing quite like the taste of one's own medicine, huh?"

"You're an idiot, Agent GHOST.", Ada laughed shortly at that with another exasperated look his way, red lips pursed. Despite the abrupt insult a dry amusement remained present as she went on chiding him. The laugh was genuine, he could tell... but seemed like the laugh of one who didn't quite know how to. Was still learning. There was no cold mockery to it. "I don't know how they passed you on Rockfort Island... or why HUNK accepted your transfer. Talk too damn much for a spy. Opening your mouth to Wesker like that back there, after I warned you repeatedly not to. You know that, right?"

"Sheer skill, Nikita. Hey, you brought me along, last I checked... so who's the idiot? I'm your idiot, apparently. Guess loneliness will lower any hot chick's standards. Or is it only bumping into each other during the middle of a zombie and nuclear apocalypse that'll do the job?"

The woman in red was silent at his smirking retort for a moment... before another slight, tired laugh emerged from her lips, shaking her head. Not arguing with him this time. Without a word she tucked her grappling gun back into her belt and looked away from him, down to the pavement... over closer to the edge overlooking the street they'd ascended from. Moving over to it, she looked over the side as well, getting an eyeful of the street, the swarming infected below among the wrecked street and in front of the hotel, and looking higher to the state of the city. Then she looked down to the pavement, spotting something glinting there in the nearby streetlight, near her feet, knelt down with a slight pained sound, and reached for the glinting object in the puddle there. Several such long, glinting metal objects residing there. She rose it up, examining it in the light overhead, pursuing her lips again thoughtfully. Looking between it, him and down the highway's road before speaking up to him again.

"Shell casings... from a rifle. The sniper Doctor Baldwin said was up here. Director Nielsen's henchmen."

"Yeah... no other sign of the U.B.C.S. though... thought we'd have to take a squad of em' out... must have taken off already. Gotten the hell out of Raccoon City, like any sane person. Shame. Would have liked to take out some of those merc assholes. One less problem though, at least... have enough on our plate already."

"Speaking of problems... can't these things leave a girl alone?"

With a simple nod of her head down the highway, he followed Ada's gaze with a risen brow in that direction... looking down the area. He saw the many cars and trucks down there, scattered and in varying conditions... but most of all he saw the figures shambling down there. Dozens of them... at the very least... probably more, with all the crashed and abandoned vehicles in the way obscuring the road. Quite a ways off... many of them moving about aimlessly, or feasting on corpses down there... but it was clear a number of them had spotted the pair of survivors, and were slowly shambling in their direction. Not all... but enough to become a problem, in due time. Especially considering the things he saw further down there among their ranks... mutated zombies. The bastards with the glowing eyes and purple toxic fumes... more of the smoking Crimson Heads as well... and worst of all the pale, naked, emaciated things. With the acid they spat... looking more like alien freaks than zombies... or like vampires. They had been among Birkin's experiments he had released in NEST, like the plant things... perhaps these were some of them, or they had naturally mutated that way on their own over the past days from the T-Virus as the Crimson Heads had. Not being a scientist he wasn't sure which was the case. He remembered how hard they were to kill... their regenerative ability, and the way they could move when properly incensed... in predator mode. Remembered a screaming scientist being mauled by one as GHOST watched from the air ducts, torn apart... and inhuman screams from it as well. Some of NEST's security forces had opened up on it with pistols... smoke pouring from its pallid flesh as it bled and knit itself back together... before pursuing the security, forcing them to flee. The ones it didn't outright tackle and feast upon. Spraying one of them in the face with its acid, melting right through the man's helmet and mask, thick body armor. Melting it to his bone. The blood curdling screams filling the air... it was almost a mercy when its mouth lined with razor teeth descended upon the throat of the poor bastard struggling in vein. Strong and durable, even with that emaciated body. Inhuman in every regard. No eyes either... but it could see its prey all the same. Sense them. Like the freaks with the claws and tongues, they had stalked the survivors of NEST over the passing days, but unlike the wall crawling freaks... them he had not fought if he could help it.

He'd had a couple encounters with one or two of them... had been forced to shoot off a limb or two, or take out their leg and flee while they were slowed and attempting to regenerate the appendage. That much seemed to at least be a weakness. For the most part he had been careful to hide from the pale bastards... not to engage with them at all if it could be helped. Idiot or not... rookie or not... he wasn't one in that regard. Was not suicidal. Thankfully, their numbers had been quite limited... and NEST had been a vast place. He'd not encountered them often in his time down there, compared to the other freaks populating the facility. He hadn't seen any of them killed at NEST though... and wondered how much punishment they could take, with that goddamn regeneration of theirs.

Though the agent sure as hell wasn't eager to find out anytime soon.

GHOST had hoped they had burned along with the facility during the self destruct sequence. And if that didn't do the job... the nuke sure as shit would, at least. He cursed loudly at the sight of the numerous assorted infected and mutations down there, as she rose to her feet at his side steadily, casually flicking away the rifle shell where it landed audibly and rolled on the soaked highway road.

"Fuck... could this night get any better? That helicopter ain't going to get here before we're zombie chow."

"Infected chow. It'll be here. Hold this position. They get close enough, we'll stop them. Slow them at least, long enough."

"Wish I had your confidence. You fight those scrawny, pale freaks down there, yet?"

"Yes. They are trouble. Dangerous. Fought worse things than them, though."

"Always something worse. Learned that by now..."

"Look on the bright side. It could be those worse things instead."

"Yeah... feeling real fucking lucky about now, red."

GHOST muttered under his breath, pulse quickening as time went on, the sight of the horde down there, the knowledge of the nuke and the seconds ticking away... and still no helicopter in sight. By contrast she stood as she had before, coolly, unperturbed, modified burst pistol down in both hands, but ready for the zombies she watched. To say nothing of the shotgun and assault rifle she was packing now. She wasn't the worn down, dying woman in the sewers he had mended... but another one entirely, who was not afraid... who was used to all this. In control. He didn't know how she did it... but was sort of glad he didn't. The last thing he wanted was to be so distant from the reality of the threat, not feeling it. He wasn't made to be cold and distant... as HUNK and her seemed to be when it came to crazy shit like this. Maybe that didn't make him as much of a badass from the movies... but he wanted to feel the things he did, and what he encountered... keeping in control, obviously, but still. This wasn't something anyone should be getting used to. Even so, he continued to draw a bit of courage from her confidence... though with each step the horde took down the highway, with no helicopter in the sky, he felt it steadily being leeched away. Like he was standing in the beginning of Day Of The Dead... he might as well have been shouting to the zombies through a bullhorn, drawing them their way. Then, he heard it... off in the distance... not the helicopter, instead coming from down the highway behind them... and together as one they both turned on the spot and looked in its direction. The roaring of an engine... headlights cutting through the dim early morning streets, illuminating various cars and the road. And a sizable metal shape hurtling down it... pushing through vehicles and smashing through the infected down there that got in its way, easily bumping the vehicles aside as if they weighed nothing. A military truck, quite large, metal plate covered, modified and reinforced, powerful, sparks flying on either side of it when it brushed with the other cars. Running over several infected lurching around down there as well, smashing through them, scattering them through the air like bugs, blood splattering against the windshield. Leaving them broken and twitching around the road, unable to rise again whether they were 'alive' or not. The wiper on it was going fast, wiping away the blood of the infected and the rain water alike.

His heart pounded in his chest then. Not with the dread and fear of before, but replaced by jubilation. His relieved, exuberant voice burst from his lungs and mask almost at once.

"Holy shit! Hey... it must be the other survivors! They made it to the truck after all! Let's wave em' down!"

"GHOST... we already have a...-"

"Maybe we can take it with them out of the city! Screw the chopper ride! It ain't coming! Hey! Down here! That's it! Come to daddy!"

Before she could say anything more, GHOST pulled away from her side and stood in the middle of the road, waving both arms and his submachine gun at the distant, quickly approaching vehicle... but it didn't begin to slow to pick them up. Over the engine he heard the sound of a cranked up radio playing a Grunge song of all things that he recognized, Saudade... the instruments and vocals growing steadily louder the closer it drew. The looming morning light and that of the light post caught the driver's cabin... illuminating the driver and his passenger. The familiar disheveled plumber sat behind the wheel, David, with the injured Umbrella scientist, Linda Baldwin, sitting closely in the passenger seat beside him. He didn't slow in the least, on the contrary, he turned a little, driving towards them directly, with evident intent. Cursing loudly, heart seizing, GHOST tackled Ada out of the truck's path and down to the highway, as the driver lay on the horn. Despite a painful landing on top of each other, he and Ada managed to uncoil from one another and scramble back on their feet quickly with each other's help, her cursing something quietly as well in what must have been Chinese, just in time for the driver to throw something out the open window that dropped to the pavement at their feet and rolled against Ada's heel. Simultaneously, the plumber named David stuck his hand out the window, waved his middle finger and gave a satisfied look in her direction. In their direction. The plumber laughing and yelling at them mockingly through the open window at the same time.

"Hitchhikers may be escaping sewer rats! Survival's your responsibility remember?! Adios assholes!"

"GREASY HAIRED MACGYVER SON OF A BITCH! COME BACK HERE!"

GHOST shouted back reflexively, feeling a pulse of anger as realization settled over him of the words, and the temptation to open up on the truck with his MP5 touched him, to shoot out the tires, raising his submachine gun in its direction and taking aim to do just that, but in a flash, it was roaring by, through a puddle of rain water, splashing and drenching the two of them from head to toe. GHOST grunted, cursed and grimaced within the mask while she remained still as a statue and expressionless at the downpour... and as one they looked to the open back of the troop transport truck... to spot a number of assorted, worn down, armed survivors within, also watching the two of them standing on the highway. It moved too quickly for him to get many details, but one looked like he wore a cop uniform and Kevlar, another a black man in a a security outfit... and a blonde woman in a red suit of some kind. At least half a dozen or so of them, all watching them. His temptation to open fire on the truck, on them, slowly faded away, lowering the soaked submachine gun again. There was no sense in punishing those other survivors for the spiteful asshole driving them out of the city to safety. They all looked like they had been through more than enough shit anyways... surviving as long as they had... he would not add to it. Some random masked guy making their escape efforts to this point all for nothing. It didn't piss him off any less... more if anything, the piece of shit scumfuck plumber hiding behind them like a rat. Whether they survived the escape now or not, it was out of GHOST's hands. Then the military vehicle was passing the white delivery truck ahead and plowing through a number of obstacles in its path... charging through the midst of the oncoming horde down there, sending the zombies and mutations flying through the air. And before long, the truck was gone altogether, fleeing the city, just as the plumber had told them they would be. The music and engine died off in the distance, leaving them standing together with only the sounds of the rain and distant moans to accompany them.

The agent looked slowly back to the soaking wet Ada, who had wiped off her damp, bruised face calmly, shaking out her soaked, short black hair, then knelt and picked up the object David had tossed their way. A drink can of some sort from the look of it... no, he realized... not that. The First Aid Spray bottle Ada had given them, back in the lobby... unopened and unused. She studied it speculatively for a moment, before meeting his eyes again, expression unreadable. He felt his anger gradually abating, not altogether, but enough of it to release a short, grim laugh in spite of himself, unable to resist it... shrugging his shoulders. Much as he'd wanted to empty a magazine into the driver, they deserved it... or rather, she had... and he now did as well by hitching his wagon to her. Was just as stuck with the consequences as she was. He looked her way, weary, muffled voice emerging from the gas mask again.

"I ain't saying I told you so or anything, red... but I did fucking tell you so, didn't I?"

"Flies, honey and vinegar. Yes. I remember you hurling cliches at me. I use that principle in my infiltrations... so I saw no need for it in this situation. An exfiltration. Might have had a point though, in hindsight."

"Rookie or not, I have my moments. And don't you forget it. Still... the fuck was that guy's problem? He nearly ran us over. Didn't tell us about that fucking nuke either. Son of a bitch must pay."

"Not our problem, now. Or priority. Holding and nursing a grudge is dangerous and detrimental in this line of work anyways."

"I guess. Well... on the bright side, they mowed down that horde for us, bought us some time. Least we'll live long enough watch a nice final sunrise. See ourselves turned to ashes, instead of eaten alive. Silver lining, right?"

Tucking away the unused First Aid Spray bottle back into her medical bag and closing it up, she followed his index finger as he gestured and looked down there with him, to the distance. GHOST drew the advanced binoculars QUARTERMASTER had outfitted the entire team with from their pouch and rose them to his mask, peering through them, magnifying. Shifting between the night vision and thermal functions on them. Thermals were useless against most of the infected, barring the Crimson Heads, though worked on most of the more advanced mutations and B.O.W.'s. Still, just now he returned to the ordinary lenses... with the streetlights and gradually rising sun over the city, night vision wasn't necessary. A number of the zombies had been run over by the truck, scattered about, injured or crippled... their pursuit of the two of them slowed down, at least. Some crawled, bloodied and broken, on the pavement, other lay twitching, limbs snapped. The sight of it made a faint smile touch his lips in the mask, despite everything. Despite his deep irritation with the plumber for not stopping for them... nearly mowing the two of them down as well... he couldn't deny the son of a bitch had done a good job in this instance. Still, a number of them could see the two remaining survivors on the highway, and as before continued inexorably, their pursuit slowed or not. Even if reduced to a snail's pace, they never gave up, probably the worst thing about them. He turned in the opposite direction then, magnifying once more, getting a view in the direction of the highway the truck had come from. To fins several more troop trucks like the first one quite a ways down there. There were some scattered zombies there among the vehicles as well, but relatively few in comparison to the opposite direction of them... the survivors must have cleaned them out down there. That, they were so far away they didn't even notice him and Ada. Wouldn't prove a threat. Then he lowered the binoculars again, tucking them away back into the proper pouch as she spoke up again calmly at his side, drawing his gaze her way again.

"So they did. Should come in handy. Spare us some ammunition, at least."

"Won't matter much, if that chopper doesn't show up. Might want to save a bullet each, just for ourselves. Just in case."

"Like I said before... so pessimistic for a rookie."

"Realistic. I really hope you didn't piss off our only way out of town. There are some more abandoned military trucks back down that way, saw them through the binoculars... not many zombies compared to this side of the highway. Maybe we could hotwire one. Or one of these babies... that delivery truck maybe... or more likely, most of the former owners have probably left their keys in the ignitions."

"No. We hold this position, GHOST. There are no guarantees a vehicle will escape the blast radius in time. Odds are that truck doesn't make it. The gunship is a sure thing, and will be here. Wesker's intel is never wrong. And he knows the Colonel better than anyone."

"Yeah... he looked perfectly trustworthy to me, between that sinister voice, threatening both of us, an all black outfit and the sunglasses indoors. Real stand up guy, honest looking type. That or a Bond villain... not sure which. Not as naive as you think. I got his type pegged."

"You'll fit nicely right into the Organization, then."

"SPECTRE or the Legion Of Doom by any other name, with my luck. Not sure if I should be flattered or not... but I'll take it as a compliment, red. Was already a henchman anyways... no reason I can't find a better criminal enterprise. Even if your boss is shady as hell."

"And your Umbrella superiors were not?"

"Fair enough."

"Good boy. Wesker will be your shady boss too, soon enough, perhaps. Depending on how things go."

"At least tell me he doesn't shoot P.O.W.'s from his balcony between sips of wine, playing a record player, and giggling like a school girl."

"He's a narcissist... like Ashford... but unlike him, a professional. A manipulative sociopath. Not a thinly veiled megalomaniac psychotic with delusions of grandeur."

"Gee... great. Talk about an improvement. This Organization pay better than Umbrella, at least? Job perks? Bonuses?"

"You're paid what you earn in this business... paid per your skill level. As long as you do your job right, acquire the right talents to succeed. Skills for kills, agent. Skills for kills. Your new company motto... you can forget Umbrella's antiquated, Utopian one. Easier to remember anyways."

"Hmm. Bet you're loaded in that case then. Skilled. In more ways than one..."

"Flattery will not earn you a bonus from the Organization, Agent GHOST... but don't let that stop you." Ada's silky voice returned his way, eye looking back at him with subdued interest. More of it than before... pursing her red lips as she went on. Just as silkily as before. "Might earn you a job perk or two with me, if you play your cards right, handsome..."

"Oh? Is that right? Never had a problem with trying my luck... and I always bet on red... red..."

GHOST felt himself return her subdued but evident teasing smile of approval from within his mask as they watched the distant but oncoming horde, holding their position. Somehow feeling his pulse quicken more at the way that hazel eye studied him, than it did at the army of the dead coming down to feast on them, or the nuclear bomb to incinerate them. But before he could come up with with something else witty and clever... and perhaps even more flirtatious, draw that silky voice from her again... something unforeseen by either of them cut him off instead. A bellowing roar rang out into the night, from somewhere... the highway shook... as there was movement around them, thunderous noises drawing closer, the smashing of creaking, twisting metal and shattering glass. For a moment he thought it might be an earthquake, pulse quickening, but it quickly settled down. Slowly, looking over back where the troop truck of survivors had come from, then upward as one, they saw it together looming over them... a massive shadowy bulk hanging up on an overarching metal section of the highway, perched and leering down at them like a gargoyle that hadn't been up there moments ago. The cars and trucks down near it were smashed up, in a way they hadn't been before... roofs broken in and crushed. Pulverized under the weight of the thing. The figure watched them up there... and before they knew it the shape on the overpass was hurtling itself through the air and rain, almost flying... right over the vehicles close by. Something colossal slammed down from above, smashing and cracking the concrete of the highway road not far from them, sending GHOST reeling backwards. Ada by contrast held her ground, as the dust around the figure gradually settled... drawing back the curtain for the two survivors to see... and revealing the hulking, rain soaked figure within a small crater in the concrete. For a moment GHOST thought it was made of literal granite... rock from the side of some mountain animated and come to life, a Golem of jagged, grey stone... but quickly realized it wasn't. Racing mind catching up with him.

No... not stone. That was merely its flesh and form... how it looked. Whatever the fuck it was.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding..."

A massive abomination rose from the dust... towering... perhaps nine feet tall at least, looming over all around it. Bipedal, standing like a man on a pair of giant feet, the road cracked beneath them... but not in the slightest sense a man... a mountain that walked... a monster covered in rock-like growths. Its hands were as gigantic as the rest of it, great bone-like claws on each finger... as Birkin's had been after his mutation. He remembered the swipe that had nearly taken his head off, if he hadn't thrown off its swing with a burst to its mutated eye and dodging back in time... instead it had knocked him to the ground, damaged his mask and scarred his helmet, and took out a steam pipe. The heat of the steam had harmed the mutated eye on Birkin even further, causing it to blink and its hulking form to be staggered, grunting. Enough of a distraction for him to scramble back to his feet and flee, while HUNK had been moving ahead in the opposite direction... the two separated by that ambush. This thing, whatever the hell it was, was easily comparable to the mutated Birkin. Could probably tear even the mutated scientist in half with ease... if GHOST had to make a bet between the two titanic monstrosities. The granite-like thing turned slowly in their direction, and he saw what passed for its face... the jagged maw of razor teeth and exposed red gums... the rage infused, granite face... eyes burning hatefully on its giant, bald head. Its head the only smooth part of its body for the most part. There were some small sections of visible red muscle on its midsection... and on its massive chest beat its sizable heart on the opposite side of its chest, and outside instead of inside, just as the eye on Birkin had been... though it was encrusted like damn near the rest of its gargantuan frame in the thick, jagged, rock-like flesh. Thick, taut, pulsing veins were visible along its dark grey flesh... and there were a number of wounds all over its body from an assortment of gunfire, some still knitting themselves back together before their very eyes, others taking longer. A putrid purple fluid being washed from the wounds by the rain. Some sections of its grey, stony flesh visibly burned darker than others.

Then its maw parted again and it uttered another massive roar that carried through the highway Downtown like a clap of thunder, startling the agent, his own heart racing faster than its exposed one.

"OH SHIT!"

GHOST's own horrified shouts and cursing burst from his mask in turn, frantically looking between it and the spy in red, who was somehow remaining cool to what she was seeing and hearing. Before he could raise the MP5 and let loose on the thing, she calmly plucked a stun grenade from her belt, tore the pin out rapidly with her teeth and rolled it over the concrete between them and it to the feet of the giant abomination. His heart pounding in his ears, the dread coiling like a snake in his gut, he whirled around with her, turning their backs on it as the grenade detonated, making his ears ring even from their safe distance. In a flash, as soon as it had detonated, they both turned back around at the deep, enraged roars of the giant, rubbing its eyes with a massive arm, grunting like a bestial animal and trying to clear its vision, disoriented by the concussive blast... at least for a few moments. Buying enough time for them to speak, and settle on a course of action. Well... for her to settle on one, and him to go along with it. Though he was quite unable to repress another outburst from escaping his lips, gloved hands gripping the submachine gun tighter in a vice grip.

"My God, no! Please! What the fuck is that?! Don't tell me!"

"Hmm. One of the worse things. The experimental 'Tyrant R' Doctor Baldwin mentioned, I'd presume. Mutated. Didn't expect to fight another of Vladimir's sideshow freaks."

Ada's unperturbed yet rapid voice observed after tilting her head to the side, popping her neck muscles and spitting out the pin that had been between her teeth. In a series of rapid, well practiced motions, she quickly holstered away her modified pistol and unslung her Street Sweeper, taking the modified riot shotgun up in both hands. She didn't take her eye off the lurching, dazed, enraged figure as she spoke to him, nor did the cool calm waver. Tone as resolved as her expression, somehow.

"No matter. Tyrants are tough... not invincible. Hit it with your grenade launcher, GHOST. We'll take it down in tandem."

"Are you nuts red?! Doubt anything of ours is gonna kill it! Look at the size of that fucking thing!"

"Remain calm. We needn't destroy it. We'll injure it into a stunned state. Experimental or not, it is a Series 103. The 103's go into a short term hibernation state to heal itself after taking enough damage. Just needs a bit more from the look of it. The hibernation should last long enough to stop it before the missile arrives to finish the job. Now trust me... and hit it with everything you've got. Shoot it in the exposed heart and in the head. Set it on fire. No holding back. Hurry now. It's recovering."

On that note of assessment and direction, before he could say or do anything, she rose the shotgun to her shoulder and led by example... taking aim, the red laser sight settling over the Tyrant's heart. The moment it reoriented itself, became aware of them again and took a step forward, she squeezed the trigger, slamming a shell into it, the shotgun booming, the force of the blast making even something its size recoil back slightly, breaking off bits of its rock-like flesh around the heart, pausing the mountain. It and her words also shocked him into action, heart still pounding, but instincts catching up at last. Without thinking he slung the submachine gun and drew both his grenade launcher and her redshirt liaison's .45, taking them up in both hands. Switching off the safety and aiming the grenade launcher over one arm, peering down the sights, he watched it burst into motion then, racing towards them with a roar. Moving faster than something its size had any right to... each step cracking the top of the road beneath its feet... and he knew if it made contact with either of them, they would be smears of blood and limbs on the pavement. It was a juggernaut as it moved, unstoppable... and he was certain that even as it was in motion it would have shrugged off and ignored any grenade he shot at it... not slowed in the slightest. It swiped its claws out at them as it charged, and cursing, GHOST was unable to fire the grenade launcher... too damn close, they would all go up. Instead he dived out of the way while Ada moved nimbly in the other direction, avoiding the massive thing as well. Where she did so and remained on her feet, poised, whirling around and firing further shotgun shells into its back, the agent landed painfully on the concrete, cursing. Even so, he otherwise ignored the aches as he scrambled up to his knee, taking aim at the Tyrant's colossal, shotgun shell ridden, muscular back where it had slowed and stopped its charge some ways away. Far enough away from them to do what he was itching to. Shouting down towards it through his mask.

"HEY! ASSHOLE! EAT THIS YOU FREAK!"

When he was certain it was a dead on shot, just as the Tyrant turned around to face them again for another charge, he took it, squeezing the trigger. There was a thump as the launcher kicked and responded, and the red tinted napalm shell hurtled towards and exploded against the giant bastard's midsection, the impact driving it back a step or two, and in an instant it had gone up in flames beneath the rain, the fire roaring and spreading over its body. The smoke billowing and rising above it in a cloud. At the same time Ada fired more shells into it, concentrating her shots on the heart, while GHOST rose the .45 and took aim at its head. The powerful pistol kicked in his gloved hand, roaring through the night along with her shotgun and the Tyrant's guttural bellows. The rounds slammed into its face with enough force to make it recoil slightly, as he carefully made each shot count, purple blood splattering over its face with each impact... blowing apart several of its jagged teeth in the process... and after six rounds the gun went empty, and he was startled for a moment, expecting seven, before remembering how the first round in the magazine had been used already. Thank God the poor son of a bitch had had extra magazines on him, at least. While he drew backwards to reload the .45 and his grenade launcher, she moved up a bit, still firing shells into the burning, roaring Tyrant, working to gain its attention on herself and off the agent as he reloaded. GHOST rapidly reloaded each weapon, sliding another magazine in place, and plucking another red tinted napalm shell from the correct pouch, popping it into place within the launcher, closing it up again.

"Let's see you chew on another of these!"

GHOST shouted at it as he readied himself, and taking aim with the grenade launcher, he squeezed the trigger, the second napalm round bursting on a lower spot of the looming Tyrant, spreading the blaze further over the bottom half of its smoking body, the impact knocking it back several steps this time. The smoke billowing off of it, as more of the sunlight of the looming morning struck it. In a flurry of movements he loaded a grey tipped ordinary high ordinance grenade shell into the launcher this time, closing it up and taking aim again as the inferno continued to burn. Squeezing the trigger, with a thump of the launcher, the shell flew home and flew true, impacting in its massive, muscular stomach this time knocking it back even further. All the same, despite the power of the blast, it did not blow the thing to pieces... merely opened a burning wound on its midsection... difficult to make out through all the fire charring its stone-like flesh and form anyways. Even so, he didn't let up on it, was not deterred, anger burning inside him, desire to destroy the thing... and each shot from Ada only encouraging him further. He opened up on it with the .45 again, alternating between its heart as she was and its head. The combined barrage kept it pinned to the spot for a moment, and again GHOST fell back and reloaded the .45 and grenade launcher... this time with a green tipped acid shell. It had made short work of the plant-like zombies down below the city that had been released during the outbreak at NEST, he had found. With luck it would prove useful against a Tyrant as well. As he finished reloading, she began to reload as well, ejecting and dropping the spent drum magazine of her shotgun and retrieving the second one, slamming it securely into place and readying the weapon to her shoulder. But before they could open up again on the Tyrant, it recovered from the barrage of gunfire and the explosives, and the monolith of fire charged at them again, smashing aside any cars in its way with ease, twisting metal and spraying sparks with each swipe of its claws.

"Oh shit!"

Again GHOST was forced to give up ground and dive against the concrete, getting out of the way of the charging thing just in time, though the grenade launcher slid from his reach. While she fired overhead, distracting the Tyrant, he crawled for the grenade launcher, breathing rapidly through the mask... and managing to reach it, he rolled over on his back and took aim at the Tyrant a bit further down the highway. His vision was blurred slightly, dazed, and he saw two of the Tyrant. Choosing one, hoping for the best... he squeezed the trigger, the weapon thumping in his hands. Fortunately it proved the right choice, and the shell slammed against the front of the burning, smoking Tyrant, breaking and spraying the glowing green, burning sludge all over it, oozing and dripping. It grunted in guttural sounds as the acid spread and burned, melting parts of its granite-like flesh, revealing the thick red muscle beneath it. The pain of it distracting even the giant abomination, actually hurting it. He remembered the gurgling of the plant infected experiments in NEST, the way they had reacted to the acid as well... while the Tyrant was much stronger than them the acid was still clearly taking its toll. The sight of it in pain made him laugh with something almost like relief... or at least with the knowledge it really could be harmed. That she was right... even something like this could fall, was not as invincible as it looked.

GHOST felt a hand grasping him by a strap on his armor, then, and for a horrified moment thought it was the zombies catching up with them, heart nearly bursting. Seeing red in the corner of his vision, aiming his .45 up at it... he found it to be her hovering over him instead, that resolute eye staring down the barrel calmly, reaching her hand down to take his. He stared at her blankly over the roars of the Tyrant... and instinctively grasped her hand, rising back to his feet at her side with her help... tucking away the .45, before reloading and slinging the grenade launcher. He was nearly out of grenade shells, double checking to be sure. Cursing loudly. He had been forced to expend most of them blowing his way out of NEST, when the self destruct sequence was initiated, while running the gauntlet through a slew of the worst freaks imaginable down there. And the Tyrant was too close to them now to hit it with explosive shells. He cursed himself for not salvaging the blue tipped cryogenic grenade shells he'd had down in NEST... using them all up instead. They'd been down there for B.O.W. containment, no doubt. He could have frozen the giant bastard's legs and blown them apart right out from under it. Do the same of its arms and render its threat null and void. As it stood, the rest of his shells he would have to save for the oncoming horde of the highway... instead. For the moment, he took up the MP5 in both hands, and aiming down the infrared scope at the hulking, burning monster, he opened up on it. Firing short, controlled bursts at its head and chest... and parts where its muscle tissue was exposed beneath the durable rock-like coating to its body. Sure enough as he'd feared, a few of the infected that had been far ahead of most of the others had wandered into the area, lurching and moaning towards the pair of the survivors. Attracted to all the commotion of the battle. One of them got too close to the burning, enraged Tyrant, which roared and swatted it aside with enough force to smash it through a car. It lay there among the twisted metal and broken glass, twitching and still moaning, but unable to rise and pull itself free, broken at several grotesque angles. Damn near every bone in its body almost certainly shattered. Another was bissected in half by a swipe of the Tyrant's claws, tearing through flesh, meat and bone with ease, both halves landing sickeningly apart from one another on the highway. The zombie still moaning and crawling, entrails trailing behind it.

But most of the infected that got through managed to avoid the Tyrant, however, and GHOST switched his focus to them, taking aim at their heads and popping them, one after another before they got too close. Then doing the same to several others a bit further down the highway who were approaching as well. Buying them some more time from the bulk of the main horde.

"Goddamn zombies..."

While GHOST dealt with them, Ada, in the meantime, focused all her effort and attention on the Tyrant. At his side, as he took down the last of the infected, he watched as the woman in red at last plucked one of the fragmentation grenades from her belt. Pulling the pin with her teeth and priming the grenade, Ada aimed and threw it, rolled it over the pavement towards the Tyrant as she had the other... rolled it beneath its giant feet... and when he stopped firing, before it detonated, she pulled him down safely behind the cover of a car close to them. The explosion rang through the air, throwing smoke, fire and shrapnel... muffled slightly by his helmet, but still powerful against his ears, cursing and gritting his teeth inside the mask. The Tyrant released another loud roar, and a glance around the car showed it lifted off its feet by the blast beneath them, toppling and slamming backwards down against the broken concrete crater once more with a thunderous crash. In the wake of the explosion her eye settled on his, and they shared a nod of understanding. At last, rising out of cover together as one, they swept around the car and aimed their weapons down at the smoking figure, the laser sight of her shotgun settling on it. No more roars emanated from it... it lay there still breathing... giant chest rising and falling, but burning, flames from the napalm leaping wildly along its form, and not stirring apart from that or rising up again from the small crater it lie in. At least for the moment... likely as it healed itself, just as she had told him it would do. Some kind of hibernation... however long or short it would last. Ada spat out the pin that had been in her mouth in the Tyrant's direction spitefully... a satisfied look touching her cold eye, firing the last shots of her shotgun's magazine into it. Opening up fresh wounds, breaking apart more of its rock-like exterior. Then rapidly reloading her Street Sweeper another time before slinging it and taking up her Steyr AUG assault rifle again. Taking aim through the scope, the red laser sight of the weapon pierced through the smoke and settled on the thing's giant head. Hazel eye narrowing through the scope, while the Tyrant's hateful shadowy, sunken eyes glared back at them... GHOST watched as she opened up on it, a roaring shot at a time, making them count, putting each round around its head and face, adding more deep wounds to the burning flesh, tearing open flesh. Spraying that purple blood every which way... yet even with the barrage of powerful rounds, its durable head refused to burst like a melon, as shots from it were like to do to an ordinary head.

After a decent number of shots, she lowered the assault rifle again, apparently satisfied with the results at last... hitting the safety and slinging it next to the shotgun, before reaching down and taking up the modified Chinese burst pistol again in both hands, red laser sight shining through the thick smoke and dust swirling around them. The horror and anger GHOST had felt was quickly replaced by relief and jubilation, shouting at the thing while gripping his submachine gun tightly, keeping it trained on the Tyrant, just in case. Firing a few more rounds into its burning body for good measure, opening up more bloody wounds on it as she had done with the assault rifle, hoping to keep it down for the count as long as possible. Alternating between its heart and head. Shouting at it over the gunfire, before ceasing fire and making sure the area around them was secure, continuing to speak with her.

"That's right you test tube motherfucker! Burn, bitch! You want some more napalm?! Get up and try it! I love the smell of burning Tyrant in the morning!"

"You're wearing a gas mask, handsome. Remember? But I can assure you, its quite an aroma, about now."

"Goddamn... fuckers are built to last alright. No wonder SHIPMASTER keeps them locked up and sealed on the cryo deck, under guard by QUARTERMASTER's high tech weapons. Thought those grenades would blow it apart for sure."

"Quicker than most too... cybernetically enhanced from the look of it... more durable... different... but predictable. It was freed of its control inhibitor, that prevents further mutations. Without its power limiter they are prone to going berserk. Gaining durability and other mutation benefits... but losing intelligence. I wonder how it was when it still had its coat. Even so... I've handled worse."

"If you say so, lady. If there's worse than that I'd hate to see one of the tougher models..."

"If you are... were... a U.S.S. Agent, you trained against B.O.W.'s. You didn't take the advanced training on Rockfort Island as well? Never fought a Tyrant?"

"No... heard of them, Colonel Vladimir's super soldier freak sons... but never saw one until this city. Never fought one until this mission. There was one down in NEST, a day or so ago... giant motherfucker. It wasn't mutated, like this freak. It was... it looked like a man. Kind of. A giant... wearing a huge bullet ridden and partially burnt black trench coat, boots and a fedora hat... of all things... stalking the corridors, while I hid in the vent shafts. Thought I was hallucinating when I saw it. Wish I were. It stopped at one point and looked up to the vents... thought it spotted me, but I guess it didn't. Kept trudging on. Put its gloved fist through one of the zombies that got in its way. Slammed it against a wall, swiped some others out of its way too, knocking them down like bowling pins. Really gave it to them... and the other freaks didn't fight back against it. Didn't run into it again after that, thankfully."

"That will have been T-00. Another T-103 Model. I crossed paths with it as well. Less pleasantly than your encounter. It was dispatched by Colonel Vladimir to retrieve the Golgotha Virus for Spencer, after your Alpha Team seemingly failed to do so. HUNK hadn't reported in, I suppose, so the Colonel took it as an opportunity to try and get a pat on the head from Spencer. Bring it in himself. Back room politics."

"Figures. Everyone in the world must be after that goddamn virus by now. Doubt Birkin was ever so popular as when he created that thing. Should have just sent that giant bastard to NEST in the first place, instead of us. Or the Undertaker Unit. Either probably would have killed everyone in their way down there... but compared to this shit? I'd take it. Or they should have just given us the go ahead to clean out the facility, instead of just fetching Birkin and the G-Virus. Everyone working down there already had it coming anyways. Fuck em'."

"Yes... they did. But it wouldn't have been prudent of Spencer... likely he wanted to extort that sneering bitch wife of Birkin's... and wanted all the scientists alive to keep working for him. Use Birkin as a hostage for leverage to keep Annette in her place. Either way, what's done is done. You were smart to avoid T-00. Even when unmutated, they are powerful, cunning, relentless. More intelligent with each passing model, it seems. Best not to fight them unless you have no choice. I... made sure it was destroyed... before you and I crossed paths, before the self destruction of NEST. With a little help. It had mutated by then... was stripped of its power limiter and going berserk. Just like this one."

"Doubt anyone not code named HUNK could take these bastards down without help. Even with the training on Rockfort Island. The bare minimum training to become a U.S.S. Agent was hell enough... you should have seen some of the freaks that crazy bastard Ashford has his labs churning out. The B.O.W.'s we were tested against were dangerous enough. Can't imagine how grueling the advanced training to take on these things must be. Not many of the agents who sign on for that come out of it alive. Never even crossed my mind to seek out that sort of training... the freak show we were trained against was bad enough. This is my first... hopefully last."

"Understandable. Well. Glad to be part of your first time. You never forget your first anything."

"You think those survivors in the truck fought it? Put it in that mutated state? Were escaping it? Led the bastard right our way? Sure looked like it was put through the ringer before us."

"Possible. But forget about the Tyrant and survivors now. There he is, right on schedule. Look up there. Told you Wesker doesn't get these things wrong."

Ada's calm, clear voice spoke again with satisfaction her her tone and her eye, raising her free hand and pointing up in the direction of the skies. He tracked her gesture, looking there... sure enough to find an unmistakable Hind D Gunship in the city's distance, soaring gradually towards Downtown... towards their spot on the highway. The distant engine not yet audible over the moans and falling rain. A long cable hung from beneath it, and attached to the cable was a giant red metal cargo container it was hauling. The sight of it heartened him in an instant, pulse quickening... their only remaining escape at last a visible reality, instead of the dubious word of some dramatic supervillain on a laptop screen. GHOST wasn't sure if he'd ever seen a sight more beautiful, in that moment. Or daunting... the idea they were going to have to rely on a perfect shot from a grappling gun of all things. Right now he wished they were riding out of the city in that truck... but so much for that. Still... he felt an elation he hadn't before... a chance. One he was going to take, and give it his all, or die trying one way or the other.

"Fuck yeah! That's what I'm talking about! Over here you big beautiful son of a bitch!"

"The Colonel's gunship... cargo and all. Come on, we need to get to a higher vantage point when it gets here, for the Hookshot. The top of that delivery truck should serve."

"This is going to take crackerjack timing, Wong!"

"Total concentration. You ready, Juan?"

"I was born ready! Right behind you! Let's move!"

With a determined smile, she was way ahead of him there, of course, already bursting into motion, moving like the wind even on those heels, down the highway towards the white delivery truck she had indicated. All the encouragement he needed and then some. Together they ran past the colossal smoldering, groaning Tyrant, not sparing it another glance just now. Ahead of him she rose her burst pistol and took aim at the closest approaching infected of the scattered horde, red laser sight flitting between them and opening fire. Moving from target to target like a scythe through wheat. Clearing them a bloody, corpse strewn path towards the truck. The infected moaned and snarled, tried to lunge at the spy and agent, but working together they put down the ones that got the closest. Pistol and submachine gun firing in unison, roaring, covering one another as needed. Twitching, blood soaked corpses falling this way and that around the highway, skulls bursting and the pulp within spraying. Together they reached the side of the truck, and while he covered her, she aimed her Hookshot upwards before looking back his way quickly, steady voice washing over him again rapidly.

"Hold on to me tight, GHOST, with both arms! My hands are occupied!"

Taking down another of the zombies nearing them, he quickly obeyed her order without a word, lowering his MP5 and wrapped his arms around her slender body tightly, and the moment he had she fired the Hookshot into the metal overpass section just above the truck. The hook slammed into the metal, and in an instant they were rising rapidly through the air again... the familiar weightless sensation returning... but the distance was much shorter than last time. Not leaving him any time to shout out at the jolting sensation and suspension of gravity. Then she was pressing the release button on the Hookshot again and they dropped down together on top of the delivery truck in an instant, the cord and hook returning to the gun in her hand automatically. GHOST withdrew from her, raising his submachine gun to his shoulder again and aiming down to the road while she did the same. Together they fired down into the growing horde of infected that began to circle around the truck, beating back some of the tidal wave of dead flesh, if not parting it. Her red laser sight flashed from head to head, firing a burst into common infected and mutated infected alike. Blowing out brains and skull... armor piercing rounds in the extended magazine, clearly, just as she'd said when they met. GHOST uttered a groan of dismay through the mask as every one downed was replaced by several more, it seemed.

"God damn it... we're just up to our ass in zombies again, Juan! Did I even leave NEST?"

The agent asked himself aloud tiredly. Capable as the armor piercing rounds were on most of the freaks, the rounds were of little use against the pale, meth addict vampire looking bastards, apart from knocking them down to the pavement. Their wounds already smoking and knitting back together as they gradually rose up again. Hissing and baring their jagged maws, salivating acid and blood alike as they regenerated. Burning through her magazine she ejected and replaced it rapidly, raising her eyes above the gathering horde. Instead she tucked the pistol back in her belt and did the same with the Hookshot, before unslunging and taking up the Steyr AUG in both hands, aiming it through the lightly falling rain to the approaching horde, peering determinedly down the scope... pitching in helping GHOST handle the sea of the dead... both of them working to keep it at bay as they waited on the helicopter. Turning now and again to keep an eye on the Tyrant, as well as take down the infected behind their position on the truck. Rifle shell after rifle shell echoing through the area, shell casings flying and heads blowing apart as her scope and laser sight shifted among them. Taking aim at some of the screeching Crimson Heads out there rushing towards the truck, prioritizing her targets and taking them down while GHOST fought the common infected. The bodies of the infected pressing up against the truck under their feet, enough of them to rock it slightly back and forth. Jaw tightening, he dug his boots in and let them have it, firing single shots, moving from head to head like she was doing. But the way they writhed and moved and shook the truck threw off his aim now and again. Sometimes one of the freaks tried to climb up on to the hood, managed to get on top of it, but he was quick to shoot or kick them back down into the crowd. Hands shaking as he attempted to reload, close to panicking the more the sea of the dead grew, their inhuman moans and wails surrounding them. Shrieks and snarls no person could make... a chorus of wails around them. He looked down the highway to where they had trickled in from, and they just kept coming, marching down the highway towards them... an army.

And to think it wasn't even Main Street... bad as this was, he wondered what dwell there. And the zombies were not alone, any longer. He saw other mutations out there among them, moving much more rapidly among the cars, flitting down the highway... a pack of them. Not infected dogs... but something far worse. Reptilian. B.O.W.'s. And the advanced clawed and long tongued mutations as well, crawling over the hoods of cars towards them. More of the sunlight was breaking through the storm clouds and over the city. The rain was still falling, but only lightly by now, better illuminating a good portion of the highway, and the army of monsters coming towards them. Shambling through the wreckage and parked vehicles around the road. Cursing again he shouted out to her as she ejected a magazine and reloaded her assault rifle, not daring to take his eyes off the infected for an instant as he did so.

"Shit! We got Hunters here now lady! The pale fuckers and tongue things too! I can't stop them all!"

"Almost got the shot! The chopper is nearly in range! Keep them back, GHOST! We need a little more time!"

GHOST cursed loudly in response and fired round after round of his submachine gun, burning through magazines as she was doing, fighting with all he had to keep them at bay. Working like a man possessed, feeling the sweat running down his face and back beneath the mask and suit. Keep them from climbing on to the delivery truck with them... but they never gave up, just kept on trying, blood soaking the entire hood, some of them slipping on it. An assortment of infected below them... former cops, fire fighters, SWAT, civilians, soldiers, U.B.C.S. mercenaries, even, shambling among them. Things that had been men, women and children alike. They were all a threat... a sea of enemies, their snarling, decaying faces and blank eyes all pretty much alike to him, staring up at them, jaws snapping, moans emerging. All sharing the same insatiable appetite... for the pair of survivors on their menu. He gunned down one of the scrawny, mutated pale bastards, shot it to the ground, shot its legs out from under it. But before GHOST's very eyes the flesh knitted back together, bone and muscle popping back into place... and the grinning son of a bitch rose up again within moments, no worse for wear. GHOST cursed again at the discouraging sight of their healing. Another mutated sort of infected he was familiar with began to appear as well... scattered among the horde. They wore tattered and bloodied clothing like the common infected... shambled and moaned like them... but they were different as well. The freaks with swollen dark purple, vein covered flesh, like they were coated with bruises... and glowing eyes... like cat's eyes, standing apart from their common infected cousins. A more advanced version... but the only difference he saw after popping one of their heads off in a spray of red and grey matter was the outpouring of toxic purple smoke from their corpse as well. Noxious fumes of some kind... toxic... T-Virus related, perhaps. Thank QUARTERMASTER for his gas mask... and that they were out in the open instead of encountering them down in the sewers. There had been enough nightmares to contend with back down there as it were.

Still, Ada was without a gas mask... all it would take was one of them popping off too close to infect her, he was certain. The T-Virus was bad enough on its own... what happened if it really was capable of turning airborne? And would the mutations derived from it be different? He didn't want to consider the thought. As such, he focused on keeping those infected in particular at bay, targeting them when they got too close... even as others drew even nearer to the truck. The arrival of another sort of freak... a new complication... frustrated him to no end. How many different repugnant mutated freaks could Umbrella's viruses create? Too goddamn many. By now he was as angry and frustrated with them as he was horrified by them. Before long he was down to his specialized magazines, QUARTERMASTER's armor piercing incendiaries, reloading rapidly. Taking aim at the more deadly mutations, he opened up on them, setting the bastards ablaze, tearing through muscle and bone with the modified rounds. Trying to make every shot count. Down in NEST... he had seen what fire was capable of doing to the zombies and other freaks... unfortunately the many sprinkler systems had kept that from being a viable option... and limited incendiary weapons. Out in the open now? The light rain wasn't enough to put them out. Shooting into the horde now and again, he lit some up, who in turn lit up others in their close proximity, smoke rising over the highway. Again he found himself grateful for the gas mask, while at his side Ada wrinkled her nose at the smoke... but looked upwards towards the approaching chopper. By now, she had gone through all her rounds for the Steyr AUG, seemingly swearing in her language under her breath. But instead of taking up the Street Sweeper again, she finally slung her spent assault rifle and drew the burst pistol and Hookshot in each hand, aiming the grappling gun in her right skyward, raising her other arm holding the pistol and firing selective shots now and again. Ambidextrous... she must have been, with the ease she made the shots with in her left. Though she didn't move a muscle otherwise as the agent shouted at the baying horde of freaks below them.

"Get some! Get some! Get some!"

The enhanced armor piercing and incendiary rounds he carried worked a hell of a lot better on the mutations than the conventional rounds did... he lit up and tore apart every pale bastard he could see, watching them burn and collapse under the shots, twitching and writhing around on the pavement. Being burned faster than their tissue could knit itself back together. Fire was the key for mutations... along with dismemberment... he just wished he'd been able to get his hands on a flamethrower down in NEST... especially against the plant freaks right out of The Thing. The mutations might have been durable, deadly, but were no match for mother nature's elements. All the same, they were tough... and he went through the remaining magazines rapidly, despite his efforts to conserve ammunition. Reaching for another magazine in a pouch... his hand grasped at nothing. Cursing, he quickly looked to find he had burned through all his submachine gun ammunition, had been unable to conserve and dole it out better. Too damn many of the bastards to even think of conserving ammunition, just now. Maybe if they were on the retreat, instead of standing in the middle of the freaks. Slinging the depleted MP5 frantically, he took up the grenade launcher in both hands next, aiming out into the horde... choosing a car that a number of the infected were swarming around, aiming and squeezing the trigger. The high explosive shell thumped out the end of the barrel, slamming into the vehicle and detonating it, the tank of fuel going up with it. The force of the explosion rang through the highway, blew up and blew down dozens of the freaks, including some of the mutations... metal flying about and slamming into others, some set on fire and stumbling about. Thinning their ranks. Making an even greater mess of the road than it already had been before. The sight of them exploding to pieces, toppling and burning heartening.

"That's what I'm talking about..."

The spreading, growing fires burned brightly, the light washing over the section of highway, and already he was rapidly reloading the next of the few remaining shells... taking aim at the oncoming Hunters and firing at them. But they were quick, the bastards, too quick... most of them scattering and avoiding the brunt of the blast, the horde taking it for them once more. Only killing a couple of the Hunters in the pack, blowing their reptilian, muscled forms to pieces along with the common infected. He cursed through the mask, loading in and firing the rest of the shells, blowing up more of the vehicles and firing into the biggest concentrations of the horde... but by now much of it was too close to fire on without blowing themselves up too. A couple of his shells managed to wreck havoc on the Inside-out Men crawling along the vehicles, blowing many of them apart... though far from all. He loaded a remaining Acid Grenade into the launcher, leveled it at a group of the infected bunched together, and let loose with it. The shell impacted against one with enough force to slam it to the ground, detonating and spraying the green gunk within the shell every which way, melting and burning away the already rotting flesh it made contact with. Eating through several of the pale bastards as well. Even without the power of explosive and napalm shells, there was no chance he was risking firing an acid shell at close quarters. He'd seen what it had done to the freaks and the living alike, down in NEST... especially the screams it drew from the latter. He grasped a spare Napalm Grenade next, inserting the red tipped shell into the launcher, and letting loose on the horde as he had with the Acid Grenade... but spraying the crowd with fire, this time... turning a number of them into shambling torches, their arms risen and wandering towards them even as they burned away, their legs collapsing beneath them.

Soon he was out of each type of the shells entirely, and slinging the grenade launcher rapidly, he instinctively drew the MUP in one hand and the .45 in the other, taking aim and opening up on the wailing, screeching, ravenous horde around them with both pistols. Trying not to lose it to his fear and dread and focus on doing his duty... to her. To their survival. She was counting on him... had entrusted him with this, as she likely had no other. One of the Hunters screeched as it drew closer... the alpha of the pack, most likely, bigger than the others... but it was still a good ways off, wreathed in the flames of numerous vehicles along the way. One of the crawling bastards with the claws and long tongues reached the delivery truck before it, crawling on the overpass above, scaling it with ease and preparing to launch itself at them. At her, specifically, as she aimed her Hookshot at the approaching gunship, mostly defenseless, not even seeing it... its prehensile tongue darting around as it screeched and readied to throw itself her way. To feast on her.

"Here... swallow some of this instead."

GHOST opened up on it, pistols roaring in their respective hands, aiming for the exposed brain cavity... unleashing a torrent of rounds on it... tearing through it bloodily... the barrage enough at least to drop it off the metal it clung to and down into the crowd of the living dead, where he lost sight of it among the bodies and debris. He rapidly reloaded the magazines again and opened up on the baying horde, scoring as many head shots as he could... but it was hopeless. Like trying to stop a tide... which was what the bastards had become by now. There were too damn many of them, all the noise on the highway was drawing them in from all over... he saw some shambling up roads and walkways connected to the highway, converging on their position... and he was running out of ammunition. Even if he wasn't, there were still too many of them... all the ammo in the world wouldn't stop them if there was only one man firing it at them. Sure enough, he burned through the magazines for the MUP and .45, tucking both away and rapidly drawing the TEC-9 she had given him, opening up on the horde with a shout, the welcome, defiant roar of the machine pistol echoing through the highway. The heavy beating through the air and against his hand as lead raced through the air and it rained shells. Blowing down a good number of them with a sweep of his arm from left to right. But still, more rose to take their place. It was the end... he knew it... they began to climb on to the hood again... he kicked a determined Crimson Head back into the mob with a grunt, knocking over several in the process, but in an instant another freak was taking its place clambering on to the hood. Her red laser sight of her pistol settled on ones he missed now and again, taking them down for him, but it only bought them seconds. Breathing heavily, he met them with his boot and machine pistol and combat knife, stabbing one through the left eye socket, twisting and pulling the blade out as it fell back. The knife was a last resort though, he mostly stuck to his machine pistol and kicking, and did his damnedest to make every shot count. He was heated and covered in sweat beneath the body armor, hot all over, breathing heavily through the gas mask and exhausted... ready to drop... but knew he couldn't stop... and didn't. Yet no matter how many of them he knocked off the hood of the shaking vehicle beneath them, they kept scrambling atop it.

"Can't... can't keep this... going... too much..."

Then, when the ammunition for the machine pistol was also running low, and all hope was lost, he heard the familiar explosion behind him of the Hookshot. Heard it slam into metal somewhere above... as he recognized the sounds of the passing gunship's engines roaring somewhere near overhead. Making its fly by. He had missed its sounds over the screams, wails and snarls, the moans of the horde, and his concentration at battling them... but she hadn't. And he heard her voice, shouting rapidly with an urgency he hadn't heard from her before, while a hand pulled on one of his armor's straps.

"Got it! Come on GHOST! Move it, agent! Down on to the pavement! We need a running start for momentum! Hold on tight and keep pace! Both arms again!"

Heart racing frantically as her hand left the strap, he spun around just in time to watch her jump down nimbly from the delivery truck and over the thinner section of the mob around it... landing on her heels upright, raising and firing her burst pistol in her spare hand. Helping him clear a section for him to get through as well, while her other hand was aimed overhead with the Hookshot. The line from it was elongating in a series of whirring noises as the giant red tanker beneath the gunship gradually passed overhead and away from the highway, headed northward. GHOST opened up on the thinned section as well, gritting his teeth within the mask and shooting down a number of the infected in the way, clearing a small, brief gap in their ranks... enough room, before leaping off the delivery truck and down to her side, nearly tripping but managing to keep his balance. They were so close he could practically feel their dead, clutching hands swiping through the air as he ducked beneath their arms... dodging their clumsy attempts to grab him and pull him back into the horde with them. He shot a few more of them, round housed a rotting former cop rapidly and plowed his way through another, knocking the rotting former U.B.C.S. mercenary aside to the concrete. Once he was clear, and they were together again, he broke into a run at her side, boots and heels echoing over the area. The snarls and moans right at their backs, so close he could almost feel their hands, the horde overtaking the delivery truck they had fled from. In a flash, moving closer to her and wrapping an arm around her waist tightly and drawing her against the side of his body armor, while she stowed away her pistol and held on to the Hookshot with both hands. Behind them several of the Crimson Heads ran after them... some of the emaciated, faceless pale bastards stopped their creepy, leering walking shit and broke into a charge as well, the way he had watched them charge at NEST employees. Knocking aside anything in their way. They got a running start, racing towards the edge of the highway as the lead Alpha Hunter was fast on their heels. Tearing through the infected in its way, slowing it a little, claws rending them apart, separating flesh, muscle and bone alike, outright decapitating some of the infected in its path in sprays of blood, the rest of its pack doing the same.

It wasn't the only problem, by now.

Ahead of them, the still burning, smoking, bullet ridden Tyrant had slowly risen from its crater on the road, first to its knee, fist against the concrete, then rising to its feet, towering. Much of its grey rock-like flesh was now blackened or raw and exposed, getting its second wind and leering in their direction... before trudging down towards them as well. Giant feet stomping over the concrete, cracking it apart under the impact, an enraged mountain of smoking fire bearing down on them. GHOST cursed loudly at the sight of it, opening up on it with the TEC-9, spraying it in the face and exposed heart until he ran dry. It had drawn back a giant arm and was mid swipe of its bone-like claw in their direction when the rounds caught it in the face and chest, pausing it for just a couple precious seconds to throw off its aim. Missing them as they dodged to the side just in time. The agent quickly stowed the now useless, emptied machine pistol back away securely in his belt. At his side Ada drew her remaining stun grenade with one hand rapidly, pulling the pin with her teeth and throwing it in the Tyrant's direction, before spitting out the pin and gripping the Hookshot in both hands again. GHOST didn't bother to reload though, instead he ran with all he had left, resisting the urge to scream as the pursuing Tyrant, Hunter and horde swarmed after them. Inspired by Ada's retreating action, GHOST drew his last remaining incendiary grenade, popping the pin and dropping it behind them as they fled. The concussive device she had thrown detonated behind them, along with his incendiary grenade soon after... but he wasn't sure then if the Tyrant or any of the B.O.W.'s were affected by them or not. All he was sure of was what was in front of them... as well as that they were royally fucked... there was no escape, surely. This wasn't some action movie where everything turned out well for the heroes... this was reality. It never worked out for the 'good guys'. This was the part where they were devoured alive by the horde, fell to their deaths off the highway, or were incinerated in nuclear hellfire. With their luck they would fall off, break their legs, then be devoured alive and turned to ash by the nuke. He knew that. But still he ran with her, gasping and wheezing through the mask, feeling every bit as on fire as the lumbering Tyrant was.

Still he trusted her... the determined look in that hazel eye of hers.

"I'm already too fucking old for this shit!"

At the last moment, the lead Hunter in front of its pack screeched and charged forward through the flames of the incendiary grenade GHOST left behind, vicious razor claws swiping towards them... but the moment it did so, gravity suspended itself beneath their feet. They were up and away again, hurtling through the rainy air. Flying. GHOST uttered a loud, muffled scream, his other arm wrapping around the woman in red's slender waist as well, both arms holding on to her for dear life. He looked down to find the swipe of the claw had taken off her heel, exposing her bare foot, and the sizable, screeching Hunter, unable to slow its momentum, slammed against the back windshield of a car, smashing through it. Ada looked down as well, following his gaze to the highway, where the horde of infected had overtaken the van and entire area of the highway they had defended, and where the mutations and B.O.W.'s now dwell... left behind. The burning Tyrant bellowed a futile, thunderous roar after them, helpless for all its strength... going berserk... blinded by the stun grenade after all, and swatting aside and tearing apart entire rows of infected, mutations and other B.O.W.'s alike with its clawed hands. Arms becoming giant battering rams slamming through the ranks of the freaks around it, most of them too dumb to avoid the berserk thing. The Alpha Hunter had recovered from slamming against the car, and was looking at her black stiletto heel it was still holding it in its clawed hand... and Ada's cold, dismissive voice close by returned his attention her way.

And to their current, pressing situation as they flew through the air.

"You can keep it."

On that parting, contemptuous note, looking away from the highway, glancing back down at GHOST, his grip tightening on her, she pressed the secondary trigger on the Hookshot, reeling them upwards steadily closer towards the tanker and gunship they flew beneath and behind. GHOST looked down over the now smaller, passing cityscape far beneath them as they flew on, dread coiling through his stomach at their heights... the urge to vomit... all it would take was one slip and it was all over. There was nothing right about this... at least with HALO jumps, nerve wracking as they were off the coast of Rockfort Island, there had been a parachute and a backup one at play. All there was here was a grappling gun... and luck that may or may not be about to run out. To make it even better... he'd never been good with heights, naturally. At the very least... if he slipped or fell... he wouldn't even feel it. He forced himself to look ahead, and not below. Drawing upwards further still, they at last slammed against the side of the tanker with a grunt each as they reached the embedded hook... and he watched as one of her hands rose and settled on the top of it... her other preparing to tap the button that would snap the hook back in the gun. But before she did she looked to him, leaning in and shouting to him over the engine and rotors above, looking strained and pained as gravity returned, along with his weight on her.

"You need to let go of me GHOST! Grab on to the container and climb! Nice and easy now!"

He obeyed at once, understanding, despite his fear, carefully removed one arm from her, gloved hand raising and gripping the side of the top edge of the tanker, his other copying the action, working to pull himself up as best he could. There were spots on it with enough leverage to grip on to with both hands, at least, for the moment. With his weight off of her, she was already nimbly pulling herself up and atop the tanker, wincing from her injuries, but managing, especially with much less weight she carried compared to him. The line coiling back into the Hookshot, the hook snapped off the side of the tanker and returned to the device, and at once she was securing it to her belt. Her hand shooting up to hold on to the cable overhead, steadying herself on the spot where she stood. He tried to pull himself up... but the strain and weakness in his arms had worsened. He was stuck. Feeling his body heating up even further, sweat pouring, exhausted beyond measure as it all caught up with him at the worst possible time. Dangling precariously over the passing, doomed city below. His limbs exhausted, and weighed down by all his gear. He dug his boots against the side of the container... but slick with rain water, they slipped down it again uselessly, and he cursed through the mask.

"Ada... I can't... I...", GHOST managed to grunt through his mask to her, grip tightening. He heard only his own muffled, frightened breaths, the swishing of the rotors and the engine as the rain continued dripping down his lenses. Flowing into the broken one and forcing him to blink. He snapped his head up, looking to her standing above him, exerting out more panicked words. "Help me up... please. I don't want to... I'm not... Ada!"

The mysterious woman in red stood over him in the rain, then, the sunlight of the approaching dawn through the clouds illuminating part of her, while shadows remained over the rest. The red and black butterfly pendant at her throat glinting in the nearing morning light. Her exposed hazel eye as veiled and enigmatic as her hidden one... staring down at him in visible contemplation. Looking at him the same way she had on that train at NEST, a lifetime ago. Holding his life in her hands. Contemplating what to do with him. He remembered her from his dreams, then... faceless and looking back at him after bursting from her coccoon, seeing him... the red and black wings protruding from her back, carrying him away into eternity with her. Then the memory was gone, and she began to move towards him carefully, one heel clicking on the metal surface of the container, while her bare one tapped upon it. For a moment that felt like an eternity, he was all but certain she would kick him over the side... or draw her pistol, settle the laser sight on him. Put a round in his hand. Cold horror spread like ice water through his veins at that dawning realization. But before he knew it she was kneeling down above him, one hand reaching out for his while her other tightened on the cable behind her to brace them both. Cool, controlled voice washing over him like the rain, a touch of a wry smile touching her red lips and hazel eye.

"Come on, GHOST. Up you get. Today isn't the day you die. You better hold on tight. You're in for quite a bumpy ride."

"I... I am?"

"Consider Raccoon City a taste of what's to come. You've done well. Take my hand."

Looking from her hand and meeting her steady eye, breathing deeply, considering her words, remembering the ominous dream... nightmare... he hesitated for only a moment... then he clasped her offered hand tightly, grunting as he put everything he had left into climbing up to join her. Even with the helicopter flying steady, it was difficult... and would have been impossible otherwise he was certain... but with her help, together, they succeeded all the same. Aching muscles straining further, GHOST half climbed and half was pulled up on to the cargo container with her at last... and at once he slumped down on the surface of the sleek red container at her heeled and bare feet, gasping and wheezing hard, trying to catch his breath. Heated all over. Inside and out... a furnace turned on in his armor. Then he rose his head, taking in his surroundings on the container, not daring to look down below them yet... a gloved hand grabbing on to the nearby cable just as he sat up a bit, the wind of the turbulence moving against them both. He saw her hair shifting with the winds... but she remained where she was, standing, watching over him and holding the cable, and with a perfect, unnatural calm he did not feel and could not share. The agent speaking again over the sounds of the engine wearily. Meeting Ada's studying gaze.

"Thanks... red. I uh... thought this was the part where... the femme fatale bit kicked in. That you were going to let me drop... outlived my usefulness..."

"Thought about it... like I did down in NEST. Another me would have."

"I see. Well... glad it wasn't her I ran into... then..."

"As am I."

The young woman assured him... and she merely smiled those red lips at him again on that note, inclining her head slightly, saying no more on the matter just then. Offering her hand again to help him up to his feet beside her instead. He did so at once, gripping Ada's hand and rising on the cargo container carefully, grabbing the cable as she did and bracing himself next to her once he was back up. Eyes within the heated gas mask looking over the surface of the red container they were perched atop of. There was a small keypad in the center of the container... with a panel of nine number buttons within it, and three differing sized glowing light bars on a small screen next to the buttons... one red, the middle and shortest bar yellow, and the longest below it was green. A designation written above the encrypted device locking down the mysterious contents of the sealed cargo container, next to an ever familiar logo of the red and white umbrella.

U.M.F.-013

Umbrella Corporation

GHOST glanced at her, and her back at him, remaining silent, revealing nothing to him if she did know what it was. He didn't have the faintest clue what it could be about... besides that it was something important to Umbrella, enough for old man Spencer to send Colonel Vladimir to come fetch it in person before a nuclear shitstorm... and that it was bound for the Leviathan. Another Umbrella matter far above his pay grade... and no longer his concern, given his seeming new employment, if her and this 'Wesker' character were on the level. He didn't know about the obvious supervillain... but if she hadn't been, she wouldn't have saved him as she did... now would have been the perfect time to discard him. It was almost a comforting thought, all things considered. Which said a great deal about the insanity of this situation. The heat by now was unbearable... all he could do to relieve it was unstrapping and removing his battle scarred helmet, clicking the strap to his belt and fastening it there securely, and doing the same of his gas mask on the opposite side of his belt. The muffled effect was gone, the sounds of the engine and wind clearer against his ears, along with the red tint vanishing from half his vision, as the welcome, cool air rushed over him in a torrent. Feeling it move through his hair, washing over him... like the faint rain washed over his sweat soaked, bruised face. Breathing in the cold rejuvenating air slowly... clean, not smelling of smoke or death. He welcomed it... all of it, recovering already, somewhat. Enough at least. His right hand went back to the cable again, gripping it, and looking her way, his other arm wrapped around her waist, helping keep them both in place as the container jostled now and again. At his touch, her eye met his in return, seeing him devoid of the mask, and she smiled deeper, visibly satisfied... even though she had already seen him before. She looked up at him as though he were someone else, now. And the way she looked at him... the way she smiled made him feel warm, returning it at once. But then... in so short a time so much had happened to him... that he wasn't sure if he was the same person anymore. She stood there in the growing sunlight and slowing rain, with the backdrop of the passing devastated city around them... and he hadn't seen a more beautiful woman in his life. Injuries and all. They didn't seem to exist in that moment.

He closed his eyes at last for a moment, gathering himself and working to clear his head from what they had just survived together. Come to grips with it as they flew over the city, however many feet in the air above the horrific madness happening down there. But after only some moments, her voice opened his eyes again.

"Look... over there. Another chopper... incoming. Looks like they're making it out just in time too."

GHOST looked at once to where she gestured, towards the northern side of the decayed, smoking, ravaged city. Sure enough a helicopter had pulled away from an old, run down, rusted looking ironworks factory out there beyond a looming, damaged clock tower... a smoking, destroyed hospital, a devastated park and what must have been the Circular River, flowing through the park and near the factory. The helicopter was leaving behind a horde of riled up zombies and mutations of their own there in a courtyard, so small from this elevation they looked more like a swarm of angry ants. The chopper was headed towards them, or at least closer to them, on an adjacent flight path. A white and blue police helicopter, he recognized, with ARKLAY COUNTY SEARCH AND RESCUE imprinted on the side of it. He felt her reach down to one of his pouches, then, retrieving the pair of binoculars he kept there and raising them to her eyes, magnifying them gradually. GHOST couldn't make out the details of the occupants within the chopper from where they were... but he could see there were several figures within, in addition to the pilot. She uttered a sudden laugh at his side, then, an unexpected one, and his eyes shot back down her way again with puzzlement. Whatever it was she saw behind the binoculars amusing her thoroughly.

"What is it?"

She merely shook her head slowly without answering, retracting from the binoculars... and tucking them back into his pouch again. Then she withdrew the G-Virus sample from her own pouch, and her other hand left the cable as he supported her waist. She rose the titanium encased, faintly glowing purple sample, waving the bioweapon lightly back and forth at the helicopter, before raising her other hand to her lips and blowing a kiss at it. GHOST looked down at her morbid amusement, puzzlement turning into bewilderment, as she stowed the sample away safely again, her hand returning to the cable and other arm enveloping his waist once more. The helicopter was continuing on northward, very gradually away from them, bound for the distant Arklay Mountains from their trajectory, as the gunship above soared them to the northeast... bound for the flagship of Umbrella's fleet even further away, New England, off the coast of Tall Oaks. Ada continued watching the police helicopter thoughtfully for a moment, visibly contemplating something... and GHOST glanced between it and her, and heard his voice awkwardly break the silence between them at last. Curiosity at her gesture gripping him.

"Uh... what the hell was that all about, red?"

"Another road not traveled. Flying away. Again."

"What? Was that English? Still giving me the dramatic, cryptic treatment?"

"Of course... wouldn't be much of a spy otherwise. Suck it up, agent. You like the way I do things. Nearly as much as puns."

"You are charming for a lady in a mummy costume and cocktail dress... but not so sure I'd go that far..."

"You would not have stuck with me this far otherwise."

"Well you sort of kidnapped me at gunpoint... but if that's how you want to remember it... selective memory... think that's more of a sign of you liking me than the reverse. Or is that just your way of making friends? No wonder those others tried to leave us for dead back there. Takes a special kind of headcase. Remind me to get it examined when we get out of here..."

She said nothing to that dry remark, but uttered a faint laugh, looking quite amused and satisfied with herself. It was good enough for GHOST, curiosity about the helicopter fading away. What was done was done. He merely shrugged, sighed and looked back down to the smoking city they were reaching the outskirts of, watching it all. Seeing the hordes of the dead and scattered mutations down there. Glimpsing what must have been Main Street... the devastation on it, how concentrated the freaks there were... taking a brief look at it through his binoculars... and was more glad than ever they'd managed to avoid it. Bad as the highway had been... they would have had to be lunatics to try to make it through the midst of the city... to have taken the surface route. He looked through the binoculars to the Quarantine Zones around the city that the military had indeed drawn back from... the zombies trying in vain to get through some of them, but remaining held back by all the extensive barricades. He drew back from the lenses again, tucking the binoculars away once more, pondering the matter. Maybe the truck full of survivors had time... would make it out safely, depending on which route the highway led to. Maybe. Bitter as he was at the way they had parted... he still understood, and would have done the same in their position. But this was his position, now. Not with those survivors... or with Umbrella... but with her. And whoever their ominous employers now were. Whoever 'Wesker' represented... some nebulous 'Organization'... if that was the actual name for his new employers, he would be seriously disappointed with the lack of creativity. At least 'Umbrella' made sense, from the House of Spencer's coat of arms. He felt her tug on his shoulder just then, and he looked to her hurriedly, to find her nodding away from the city. Following her troubled hazel eye... together they saw it, on the northern horizon, speeding toward Raccoon City... a jet of exhaust and fire trailing behind it, leaving a cloud in its wake. There could be no mistaking or denying what it was. Death... oncoming. The nuclear missile, soaring towards the gunship... or rather off to the side of it, but too close not to frighten the agent, who uttered an alarmed shout and gripped her and the cable tighter as it zipped past them and towards the center of the city, eyes tracking it. The police helicopter remained relatively near them, but the diverging paths were only widening.

GHOST spoke up, then, as he watched the missile make its final descent back where they had come from... tone low and hollow. Disquieted. Feeling his pulse quickening more steadily, something grim and bitter coiling in his stomach.

"There it goes... it's the end... isn't it?"

"Yes. It is.", Ada answered quietly, eye also tracking its imminent trajectory at his side. Her grip on him tightening. All the same, she was not shaken, remained in control of herself, even now, turning her head away from the missile at last and staring back at him. "And the start of something else now, perhaps. You shouldn't watch it. Don't need to see this. Never look back, GHOST. Or you'll only end up lost."

"Then what should I do?"

"Oh... I can think of something..."

Her bruised face smiled sadly and tugged on his shoulder strap again, forcing him to look away from the speeding missile, and back down to her. He peered back at her enigmatic expression for a moment, not understanding... but within mere moments, he did. Before he was even aware of what she was doing, or talking about, she was stepping up on to his combat boots, bare foot pressing gently against one, the remaining heel digging into the top of the other a bit painfully... but even that quickly vanished. Wrapping both of her arms around his neck tightly, pressing her body against his, Ada distracted him from all the pain... the horror and exhaustion... from everything when she kissed him. Deeply. Intimately. Eyes widening for a moment of surprise at the sudden embrace, the warmth... her taste. As though she were pulling him away from the horror and into a world of their own, where only they existed. As she did, within moments, their watches struck 6 AM, while the nuclear missile struck Downtown and detonated somewhere many miles behind them, obliterating Raccoon City off the face of the earth while the Colonel's gunship safely made it beyond the outskirts of the city turned to ashes. A second sun appeared in the skies over them, behind them, bathing them both in the bright white light of the flash and the spreading shockwave that shifted the gunship and cargo container back and forth, turbulence. Releasing a muffled breath against her mouth of alarm at the explosion and turbulence. One hand settling under her slung assault rifle and shotgun, gripping her back tightly and the other the cable overhead, keeping them in place as best he could.

"Mmmph..."

GHOST thought he saw the outline of her grinning skull through her pale flesh and muscle between kisses amid the unnaturally bright light that washed over them... so quickly he knew he had imagined it... but then, blinking, the unsettling image was gone, and his mind was lost, focused only on the warmth and passion she shared with him. Surrendering. He held her back firmly, other hand gripping the cable tighter, keeping them safely on the shaking cargo container, responding to the embrace, shutting his eyes tightly and kissing her back slowly and deeply... losing himself in the good feeling. The only one that was left... holding her like a drowning man would a life preserver. Tasting her. Nothing else in the world mattered... not what they had endured and survived apart and together... not the armies of monsters that had teemed through the sewers and city... all his dead friends and teammates, not Umbrella... the people he had killed and deaths he had caused... nor the cleansing nuclear hellfire wiping an American city off the map. She was right... he couldn't look back. Not now. He needed to simply go along with it. Had already made his decision anyways... was committed. They stood together in the rain, morning light and nuclear light at death's door... and they didn't even care, then and there. At last the kiss broke... but she nuzzled his stubble lined face, kissing around it... and the tip of his nose... tender in a way he'd never imagined she would be. Heart racing, he gently pressed his forehead back to hers, nuzzling her back... finding he had to catch his breath... she had taken it all away from him with ease. Knew it too... from the red lipped smile that had formed.

This was a woman who knew full well the effect she had. At last he found his pleased, slightly exasperated voice, then, speaking again quietly. Murmuring... as a hand found out the butterfly pendant at her neck, fingers absently stroking the red and black wings.

"Wow... that was... uh. So... um. What... was that for?"

"Mmm. You decide. Had several good reasons for it. Usually do for the things I do. Enjoyed yourself?"

"It was... good... Catherine..."

"That's better.". Ada smirked back at him at the name, as one touched his own lips, recovering from the embrace slowly. Still a bit light headed though... taken off guard. In the best of ways. "I know it was, GHOST... but it never hurts a lady to hear it. Plenty more where that came from, when we're safe. I'd say you've earned it."

GHOST breathed slowly, drawing in more of the cool morning air... the rain by now barely touching them, a mild sprinkle. He watched the passing trees, forests, the Arklay Mountains where the police chopper had vanished towards, and the Circular River below flowing out of the city. Listened to the rumbling of the gunship's engine above him, swishing of the rotors... its unseen occupants quite unaware of the excess cargo they had hauled out with them. He looked everywhere but the place he wanted to look most. Willing himself not to. In his mind's eye he saw the mushroom cloud, looming behind them... but he didn't dare look back at it. At the devastation... the buildings turned to dust and debris, over a hundred thousand people turned to monsters and then to ash. It would be all over the news before long anyways. On every channel, newspaper and all over the web... unavoidable. But she was right... he didn't have to see it now. The destruction he had caused with one stupid, instinctive action. All of it was on him now, with Birkin undoubtedly dead. She wouldn't have kissed him if she knew, he was certain... she would have kicked and shot him off the tanker without hesitation. The guilt of his actions in NEST threatened to rankle at him again... a secret he would have to keep for the rest of his life, however short or long it proved... but again he forced himself to focus elsewhere. On her. On their escape. And... her taste, still on his lips... and he already looked forward to the 'more' she spoke of. U.S.S. didn't exactly improve an agent's chances of getting laid. There were very few women in the organization as it were. Hadn't stopped HUNK, of course... but he was another story altogether, residing somewhere between the Inner Circle and the U.S.S. With them, one of them, the best of them... but not one of them at the same time. Got to attend more parties and social events as well... was used to them.

Together they stood against one another, watching the distant sun rising... watching the storm and the rain abating around them. When the rain stopped falling at last, no longer pelting his armor or face and hair, he broke the silence between them, once more, the reality of their situation returning to him again. The present. Watching the passing trees and lands far below the Hind gunship uneasily, continuing northeast, before looking back her way again.

"Speaking of safe... hate to kill the moment... but... I doubt we want to be perched on this tanker atop Umbrella's holy grail when it reaches the Leviathan. We would look rather silly, now wouldn't we?"

"To say the least. Thrown into a cell and tortured to death by the Colonel was more what I was thinking than looking silly, though. Shipped off to Rockfort Island together perhaps, placed under Doctor Stoker's dubious definition of 'care'. I've heard the stories, of him and Ashford's experiments. Not my idea of a good time."

"Likewise. Saw some fucked up shit during my training, there. Doubt that creepy bastard Dr Death would get his hands on me before Instructor Hadley beat me to death with his baton. Would probably be a mercy, though. That or the guillotine. Rather just jump off this tanker right now."

"Fortunately that won't be necessary. I have more creative, fun ideas for us in mind than a double suicide or interrogation, torture and execution. We'll head to a safehouse of mine in Arklay County, another of my contacts will be waiting. Then we're on the next private flight in first class for two out of the country. To friendly territory of mine, far away. America isn't going to be a safe place for those in our trade to be, for awhile, after Raccoon City."

"I bet. Globe trotting, huh? Could use a vacation, I suppose. After that. Didn't pack my shorts, though."

"You won't be needing them."

"Oh really now, red? Heh. Aw shit... I just remembered..."

"What?"

"Left most of my personal effects in the trunk at the end of my bed, in the barracks at the Paris Facility. HUNK is going to have them all burned with the others belongings when he gets back... our records erased as well. My parents will be told I'm dead... if they're told anything at all."

"I'm afraid so. One can't simply waltz into and around the Paris Facility undetected... not with all that security... much less to pick up your personal belongings. Even I'm not that good. Let it go, GHOST. I've buried my past more than once. It meant picking up and leaving everything of mine behind, belongings and the world I knew. Everyone. Everyone who wasn't already taken from me. Didn't have help for it either... had to struggle alone... while you'll have me."

"I suppose... could be worse... when you put it like that. Where to then, Nikita? West Africa? South America? Japan?"

"Those are Umbrella territories. The last thing we need is to alert or draw the attention of the U.I.D. and U.S.S. I have another destination in mind. You'll see it soon enough. After that... like I said... we keep running and never look back."

"I... think I can do that..."

"I know you can. I could, at a much younger age than you. I'll teach you. You still have a great deal to learn... things Umbrella didn't prepare you for. About the world... our world. How to survive in it... navigate through it. With Umbrella you were another cog in the machine... with me you can become something more."

"I'd like that. In that case... red... for a first lesson... I hate to kill the mood even further than the nuke did... but how the hell were we planning to get off this damn thing? To this Arklay County safehouse of yours? Don't exactly got parachutes on us. So... what do we have?"

Ada looked at him curiously, then, amid the rumbling of the engines, and shifting of the tanker beneath their feet, as though startled he didn't know the answer to that question already. As though the answer were obvious. And then, one arm leaving his neck and the other remaining around it, when she reached into her belt and drew the Hookshot, waving it in front of him with that red lipped knowing sort of smile on her bruised, bandaged face... he realized it was obvious. Whether he liked said answer or not. With a low sigh of resignation, he nonetheless felt his lips return her smile... though a good deal more tiredly than hers.

"Cowabunga. What the hell... you only live twice."

"In that case... welcome to your second life, GHOST. Hope you survive the experience."

---

And thus, a Resident Evil "legend" is born, and a hell of a partnership. Farewell GHOST and Raccoon City, hello Agent and the world.

Very much enjoyed this chapter, getting to the climax and action, after the action was well earned by this point, them working together as they do in RE 6, including some grappling gun fun together lol, instead of Ada just launching herself somewhere and Agent teleporting up beside her as soon as she lands. Basically Ada = Batman and GHOST = Vicki Vale. Also had fun including a couple 'Boss Battles'. The Suspended from Resident Evil Outbreak to begin with at the hotel, just as I had HUNK and Carlos fight the Leech Man at the hospital, both duos wiping the floor with bosses who gave the Outbreak survivors a hard time, being properly armed unlike those survivors. Along with Tyrant R, of course... more of a challenge... always love me the Tyrants.

I also liked writing the dynamic between Ada and GHOST out in the battlefield, along with all the bad omens for GHOST, over the course of the story, warning signs about Ada that he just ain't reading the way Leon did. Unlike the self aware and moral cop, as a corrupt thrill and power seeking henchman, he's falling for her and into her world head first... ignoring the troubling signs. They will not be good for one another... but they will be together, have one another.

Ada: "Wesker is not a megalomaniac." Not yet, red.

And a little cameo from our heroes of Their Last Escape, of course, crossing paths and going in opposite directions, as well as a glimpse of the fleeing Outbreak survivors. I decided to choose a canonical escape for them, how they got out of the city, went with the truck, and had all of them escape together.

You just know Ada made GHOST carry her all the way to the safehouse once they got off the tanker, what with her missing heel xD.

Coming up next, the epilogue to this little piece, as I finally push GHOST fully out of his POV and would be protagonist role, and into his true destined role as Ada's whipped, bumbling sidekick, Agent. Reviews and comments are appreciated as ever. See you next time ;).