Title: Final Illuminations

Author: Malenkaya

Rating: R for violence and swearing

Summary: RE movie fanfiction. In this sequel to "Fading Away" and "Into the Light", Alice, Michael, Rain and J.D continue in their efforts to defeat Umbrella, finding along the way new allies, new enemies—and new hope for Matthew Addison.

Disclaimer: I'm feeling daring, so I'm not going to post one. Ever again! So ha ha. If, strangely and ironically, I disappear from due to this heinous offence, I will be found under "TMonkey".

Feedback: Please! I live and breathe reviews! Flames, as long as they're explanatory, are fine.

Author's Notes:

Firstly, I'd like to apologize for the total lack of thank you notes. I really have been madly busy, and stressed, and although finding the time to write is easy (as I do it during school), finding the time to get it all onto the computer has proven difficult. That being said… thanks again to DarkPrincessPyro99, XMaster, rain1657, sarahvspsycheotic, masked-in-your-shadows, Violet Eternity, Gabzilla, and Sakura123; I really appreciate it :)

To those who have commented—this will still be fairly short. I'm planning on about ten chapters right now, which, after Into the Light… feels pretty short :)

Also, I feel obliged to mention there will be an M/A scene in the next chapter. M who, you might ask? Michael? Matt? Ah ha ha:) I'm sure you all know what I'm talking about, and it is going to play a huge role, so enjoy it:) I am so excited to start writing the next chapter (haven't had time yet).

Thanks again, enjoy :)

Chapter Five: Objet Trouvé

When Rain finally woke up thirty minutes later, she was surprised to find herself not only out of her cell, but in the middle of a church.

The next thing she noticed was the white veil covering her face, and the folds of glittering white fabric covering her body.

The third thing she noticed was Alexei, sitting in a pew three meters away.

Unlike her, he was still dressed normally, in the black jacket and pants he'd been wearing when she'd last seen him crouched carefully over her in Umbrella's hallway, one warm hand carefully probing her wound.

The stricken expression on his face when he'd turned to run had been replaced by a vaguely ironic smile as he stared out the stained glass window in the ceiling of the church, where moonlight shone in brightly.

In front of him was a bible, and in his hand was a lighter.

"Alexei?" she asked, unsure.

Her voice cut through the silence of the church like a knife, and he turned to stare at her.

"Rain," came the unsteady answer, not from Alexei but from the person behind her, and she turned to see Matt standing there.

He put his hand up, and she could see suddenly the window between them—she put her own hand up against his and wondered why Alice couldn't be here to see this.

Matt's blue eyes shifted from hers to directly over her shoulder; she turned as well, her palm still against the glass.

Alexei was standing in the middle of the altar now, and Alice was directly in front of him, wearing a lacy wedding gown of her own. A black veil covered her face; both were stained in blood, and Alice was crying.

Alexei dropped the lighter, and the altar burst into flames.

Then they were back at Matt's gravesite, the earth in front of them scorched and black—

And Rain woke up on damp cement, shivering, aching, and wet.

She raised herself up slowly, cold, hungry, and pissed, and took in her surroundings.

At first glance, there was nothing to see; nothing but four walls of the same stone and a typical barred door.

There was a sharp pain in her palm, and she looked down to see the silver ring of keys still firmly grasped in her hand.

Memories came flooding back to her then, of being shoved into her cell—

"Crawford wants her here."

The first guard's voice cut through the hazy blackness, and Rain peered up at him in the darkness, her entire body aching.

"Why?"

Some other guard's voice, obviously a rookie; Rain could tell by the same fucking uncertainty in his tone that Kaplan's had held for so long.

But Kaplan had never whined. Not like this idiot had.

Nor had Kaplan ever been stupid enough to leave his keys hanging out in plain view in the rare event he was part of a prisoner transfer within Umbrella.

She grasped the silvery metal without even thinking about it, acting on pure instinct; they slid out his pocket, another mistake—he should have had them attached somehow, this shouldn't be so fucking easy—

She almost dropped them when she heard the first guard's response.

"He's dealing with Parks."

Her fist clenched silently around the keys, and she slid them under the small of her back, hiding them beneath her.

"What are they—"

With her eyes closed, Rain couldn't be sure—but by the resounding thud, she figured the first guard had just slammed the second's head into the bars of her cell door.

Umbrella obviously didn't believe in coddling their rookies.

The second clang came when both exited the cell, banging the door shut behind them.

And then she'd passed out again.

Gazing at the keys in her palm, she shifted through them, and finally realized there was no way to know which one it was—she'd just have to try them all.

She shuffled slowly towards the door, her muscles still cold and aching—whatever Umbrella's guard's had done, it had been pretty fucking effective in slowing her down.

Taking a nap on concrete hadn't helped either.

She inserted the first key into the keyhole, and twisted it.

Nothing.

With a sigh, she moved onto the second.

xxxxx

"I killed William Archangelo."

Alice's voice was raspy and hoarse, a pathetic opposite to the cold confidence it had held only an hour before, and the sound of it filled her with disgust.

Crawford was practically bursting with malicious glee—his plan had obviously been successful, judging by the fact she'd started answering his questions immediately after returning to his office.

She didn't care anymore. The only thing she had cared about—still cared about—was Matt.

And it was already way too late for him.

Some part of her mind knew she had to pull it together, had to focus—if not for her own sake, then the sake of her team.

But the other part of her was still down in the laboratories, looking through that glass bubble that separated her from Matt, only inches and yet miles and miles away from him.

She had let Matt go once before, when she'd been forced to leave him behind in the Hive, and she had vowed never to let it happen again.

Funny, how history had a way of repeating itself.

"Parks!"

Crawford's voice, barking at her now—she stared dully at him, and was gratified, if only briefly, to see that he had finally been unnerved, if not by her silence than by the loss and detachment she could feel settling around her like a shroud, choking her in it's midst.

He slammed his hand down on his desk, his blue eyes like shards of ice as he repeated, "Tell me about Alexei Demitrov."

Alice shrugged, staring back out the window. Already high in the sky, the sun was lit against a brilliant backdrop of clear blue sky, not a cloud in sight—infinity materialized, directly outside her window, and Alice wondered if she could walk straight through it, enter into a world inverted, where Matt was safe and whole again, and she had never stumbled into this nightmare.

She could sense Crawford's rising impatience, and turned her gaze back on him, giving him a tired, utterly useless glare. "What do you want to know?"

Crawford just stared at her, and she stared back, completely uncaring about the malicious intent she could see swimming beneath his every twitch, every corner, every expression.

Then a smile crossed his face, and she felt a weary exhaustion threatening to overtake her as she realized this wasn't over. Not yet.

Crawford had hit upon a bargaining chip with her, and he was obviously unwilling to let it go.

"Let's talk about Matthew Addison," he said, tone deceptively bright, and the sound of his name issuing forth from Crawford's voice made Alice feel sick. "Shall we?"

Alice ignored him, staring back outside the window—she could feel tears starting behind her eyes again.

This time, she didn't bother holding them back—it was too late for that now, and they slipped down her face silently as Crawford continued to talk.

"He was calling your name the first time," he said carefully, studying her reactions. "We were injecting him with every solution known to us, and all he could worry about was you."

Despite her every instinct, screaming at her to look away, Alice looked back at him.

He looked triumphant as he continued. "It took him a week to forget his own name, and it took him a month to forget yours. We put him through every treatment we had—shock treatments, forced mutation, even resorted to physical torture when the situation called for it, and he continued to call out for you. Beg you to help him."

A slight pause and a smirk crossed over his face before he continued, "Funny how the human body works that way, isn't it? That emotional triggers last far longer than mental knowledge and memory."

He leant forward on his desk, drawing her into his blue eyes—the same shade of cloudless blue sky as Matt's.

But while looking into Matt's eyes had represented passion, and love, and shared hopes and promises—even now, when they were devoid of all other emotion other than fear—looking into Crawford's eyes was like being dragged into a torturous form of Hell.

"He loved you, Alice," he said slowly, every word dropping off his tongue like poison, violating the words as he said them, studying her carefully as he did so.

"I will kill you."

She said the words without even thinking them, her voice shaking with a barely controlled rage as she did so—and she realized that she herself was shaking, clenching the arms on her chair tightly to avoid launching herself at him. "Do you understand me? I will kill you."

She had no idea what she was saying, where these words were coming from—Crawford looked distinctly amused, and she had no idea what she hoped to accomplish by saying any of this.

All that she knew was that it wasn't too late. It couldn't be. They had the anti-virus—she had seen it herself—and she would come back and get it, no matter what the cost.

She would save Matt.

Or she would die trying.

The thought, and the calm, cold certainty of it, calmed her more than any other weak reassurances ever had, and she could feel herself, and the tension within the room, deflate slightly as she grasped onto it, holding onto it as if her very life depended upon it.

Alice barely flinched when the alarms went off, but the reaction in the rest of the room's occupants was instantaneous—the guards still behind her were instantly on high alert, holding their weapons at the ready in front of them and flooding out to flock the doorway.

Crawford stalked over to the desk, lifting the phone and barking, "What the hell is going on out there?"

Alice listened with some interest to the scared, high pitched voice coming through on the other end of the phone, but couldn't make out the words.

In the end, she didn't have to.

Crawford slammed down the phone without responding, and looked towards the door, his expression now distinctly furious.

"Nemesis," he spat, "Has escaped."

xxxxx

The fifteenth key had finally opened the door.

Rain had been wandering around for twenty minutes now, and she still had no idea where the hell she was.

On the bright side, she'd managed to find her way out of the prison—it hadn't been hard, considering the way out had been one long tunnel.

Besides that, she'd managed to find a passable weapon as well; some guard had left it on the floor, probably the same idiot that she'd taken the damn keys from.

The end of the iron baton had been coated in blood and a fine sheen of grayish slime that, despite all she'd seen with Umbrella, she still carefully avoided—but it was something, at least.

Wandering blindly around Umbrella's corridors wouldn't have been so bad if she'd been able to stop thinking about Alexei for fifty seconds.

She didn't want to believe he'd been behind this whole mess.

J.D would have been quick to point out all the tiny little details, all the nagging little factors that so clearly stated Alexei was to blame here—and she would have ignored him, recognizing his suspicions as both protective worry and misplaced guilt and paranoia after the whole Olivia fiasco.

Unfortunately, the more time she had to think about it, the more she became convinced that, at least in this case, J.D would be right.

She didn't want to believe Alexei was to blame.

But what the fuck did she know? Alexei hadn't—and still wouldn't—tell them anything. For all she knew, he was Crawford's personal right hand.

The second part of the issue with wandering blindly down the hallways was that the alarms had gone off five minutes ago.

After the first ten minutes, she'd given up trying to avoid the cameras; she knew, after working for Umbrella for more than three years, that they wouldn't exactly fixate their cameras in the corners like so many other idiots did.

Umbrella was smart enough to put them where they wouldn't be seen, and trying to avoid them was useless.

She had the baton, but unless Umbrella actually sent a couple of idiots with no weapons other than some basic wrestling skills, this wasn't a fight she was going to win.

With the pain still radiating in her abdomen, she wasn't even sure she'd manage a round with them.

The blinding pain had given way to a dull cramping that she could handle with ease—she knew, from experience, that the tranq effects would last for a few more hours at least.

However, judging from the shooting pain in her chest, she had a feeling there were at least a couple ribs cracked, if not broken, by the guard's kindly welcome.

She turned another corner, the alarms already numbed down to a steady drone, and dropped her baton.

It hit the floor, the dull thud resounding through the hallway.

The figure on the floor didn't flinch.

It was turned away from her, shivering and pale and freakishly thin, ribs showing through almost bluish skin; a silvery collar was the only thing it wore, wrapped around it's neck like some sort of torture device.

The sounds coming from it were uncomfortably human-sounding, whimpers of pain and fear, and she crept closer cautiously, stooping to pick up her baton as she did so.

If it so much as moved, she'd bash it's head in.

Within a few steps, she'd realized that it—that he—was human.

Human, and uncomfortably familiar, with dark brown hair, graceful, strong hands covering a square forehead and tearful face.

It was impossible.

And yet, the whisper slipped out before she could stop it.

"Matt?"

xxxxx

It had been over an hour since Rain and Alice had been captured, and they were still out here, sweating under the blazing sun and doing nothing.

Shaking Umbrella's guard's hadn't been difficult—they hadn't even bothered to pursue them when they'd run further into the forest, obviously having only been instructed to chase them off the grounds.

Alexei was sitting on a tree stump, staring off in the distance. His ankle wrapped, his face had slipped back into it's stoical mask, making J.D feel distinctly uncomfortable.

When Alexei looked pissed, at least it was something J.D could go on—something he could reassure himself as evidence to the fact that Alexei Demitrov was human after all.

But sitting frozen like that, J.D had no idea what the hell he was thinking or planning.

Michael wasn't much fucking help either—despite his early control and calm, it had become clear he had no more idea what to do than either of them did.

If they went in and got caught, both Alice and Rain were fucked. If they didn't, Rain and Alice were still fucked. It wasn't a hard equation.

Unfortunately, that meant sitting here, and waiting. Waiting for an opportunity, an inevitable break in guard when Umbrella would relax their high alert and return their focus to what was going on inside.

None of them had any idea when that would be—it could be in a matter of hours, or a matter of days.

Meanwhile, Rain and Alice were inside, suffering imprisonment, torture, and God knew what else.

"We should just go," J.D said for what felt like the hundredth time, breaking the unsteady silence. "This isn't doing anything."

Michael glanced up at him wearily. "J.D, if we go in now, we won't even make it past the parking lot."

"And if we wait, Rain and Alice might be dead by the time we go in," J.D countered.

"I told you," Michael said, sounding tired. "We don't have a choice. They're expecting us to come in—probably counting on it. If we wait, at least we'll have some element of surprise."

"Barely," J.D countered.

Michael didn't argue, but inclined his head in a weary sort of agreement. "It's all we have."

"Pretty fucking useless, if you ask me," Alexei drawled, and J.D turned to look at him, feeling a tinge of both comradeship and wariness at the shared opinion.

Alexei met his gaze plainly, giving him a bland smile. "So of course, we could follow your plan, Salinas. That way, we'd be sure to fail, instead of just damned likely to."

J.D let out a snort of disgust, shaking his head. "We should just go," he repeated under his breath, in no mood to argue with Alexei again—despite his dislike of the man, his earlier comments had struck a chord with him.

"J.D," Michael said, some warning in his tone.

"Look," J.D cut him off forcefully, knowing that what he was arguing was stupid, but not caring. They had to do something, or he was going to go insane. "We can't just sit here. If we go in now, we can at least have some chance of finding Rain and Alice before they're both dead."

Michael glared at him, an angry sort of energy lighting his eyes now. "With no cover, J.D? Just march in there while everyone's on high alert?"

"We have to do something," J.D argued sharply.

"Rain's right," Alexei said shortly, glaring at him. "You are an idiot."

"What exactly is that supposed to mean?" J.D snapped at him.

Michael put his head in his hands, letting out a weary sigh of exhaustion that they both ignored.

"Would you sit down, Salinas?" Alexei demanded.

"Right, just sit around," J.D said sarcastically. "That'll accomplish something."

"What the fuck is the matter with you, J.D?" Michael asked, lifting his head from his hands, his voice angry and exasperated—and with the words, and the tone he spoke them in, he sounded so startlingly similar to Alice both J.D and Alexei just stared at him.

"Alexei's right," Michael explained tiredly, ignoring their looks. "Rain's right. I know you're upset, but you're being an idiot."

J.D stared at him; Michael refused to meet his eyes, and he felt distinctly unsettled by his words.

When Alexei commented on his behavior, J.D pretty much dismissed it as bullshit. He didn't particularly care how reasonable that was—after Olivia, there was no way in hell he was trusting someone who'd edged their way into the group ever again.

But Michael—praise, and criticism, was like praise and criticism from Alice. Neither of them altered their words from their meaning, and neither of them said something they didn't mean.

Hearing the same thing from Michael meant there might actually be some merit to it.

"I didn't—" he started, faltering uselessly.

But it didn't matter, because they weren't looking at him anymore—they were looking past him, looking shocked and worried, and J.D turned as well, half expecting to see some Umbrella mutation directly behind him.

What he didn't expect to see was Alice, looking cool and refined as if she'd just stepped out a European opera rather than Umbrella's dead corporation.

"How did you get out?" J.D demanded without stopping to consider the words, and Alice fixed her bright blue eyes on him.

Her gaze, despite being trained directly on him, was uncomfortably detached as she answered coolly, "I walked."

Michael was next to find his voice, asking carefully, "Are you okay?"

She didn't speak, only stared at him as well, and Alexei broke the silence. "What happened?"

His voice was quiet, urgent—and they could all see now how clear it was, the absolute volumes her silence spoke.

Something had happened inside Umbrella.

Michael hurried forward, placing a careful arm around her waist and leading her into their group, directly past J.D; she allowed it as if nothing was happening, sitting only when Alexei and Michael pulled her down gently.

"Alice," it was Alexei who spoke this time, his voice urgent. "Alice, Rain is still inside. We need to know what happened."

Alice shook her head, refocusing only slightly at the mention of Rain. "I didn't see her," she said, her voice almost apologetic. "I just—"

She shook her head, whispering, "I don't know."

Her hands, folded in her lap, were shaking.

Michael and Alexei looked at each other, seeming to forget he was there, and J.D weighed his options carefully in his head.

Something felt wrong—it was that same sensation he got whenever he walked into one of Umbrella's traps, every time he'd entered the Hive.

That same feeling he had gotten—and ignored—every single time Rain had brought up her suspicions about Olivia.

Something had obviously happened to Alice, and Alice was obviously in shock.

For all they knew, it would be hours before they could get inside; and even then, unless Alice was ready by then, it would be with two men instead of three.

It would only take him a minute.

And before he could stop and think about it, before he could allow Michael's earlier warnings to seep into his brain, J.D turned and slipped away.

xxxxx

"Matt?"

The figure tensed, as did her grip on the baton.

And then he turned, pulling his hands from his face and pulling in a shaky gasp of air, and Rain almost dropped the baton again.

It was him. Matt. Shaking, dirty, bruised and beaten, but human, and staring up at her, his face a strange blend of terror and curiosity.

He didn't recognize her, and Rain swallowed hard, unsure of what to do.

"Matt," she whispered again, reaching out a hand to him—

And jumping back, unable to help it, when he flinched violently in reaction and turned away from her, crawling towards the wall.

She watched helplessly as he reached it and collapsed against it, turning to stare at her with wide, terror-struck blue eyes.

He was naked, and she felt a hot flash of embarrassment and anger for him, keeping her eyes carefully focused on his face, locking her brown eyes with his unsteady blue ones—

And realizing, too late, that his gaze was locked firmly over her shoulder.

The first blow to her head sent her careening into the wall, and she ducked the second only to be slammed into the wall a second time, collapsing to the ground.

Her head was spinning, and some part of her realized she was about to black out.

She forced her eyes open, curling slightly to brace her palms against the floor—if she passed out, her and Matt were both helpless, and she had no intentions of letting that happen.

Fortunately, the idiot had turned away from her, obviously convinced he'd done his job—judging by the white lab coat he wore, he wasn't even a fucking security worker, had only happened upon them by accident.

"They're in Hallway B, on Level two. Both Ocampo and Addison. Both are incapacitated—"

And, apparently, he was radioing in.

Her fingers slid carefully around the baton that had wound up a few feet away from her, and she stood carefully.

At the last minute, he seemed to sense her presence and turned—

And she smashed the iron baton into his head, hearing the sickening sound of skull collapsing in on itself as he crumpled.

She smashed the radio as well, just for good measure, and turned back to Matt, dropping the baton on the floor without bothering with precision or ceremony.

In less than five minutes, this hallway was going to be swarmed with Umbrella agents, and Rain had a feeling her baton was going to be pretty fucking useless right about then.

Matt was still against the wall, trembling and vulnerable, obviously scared, and Rain felt a brief flash of helplessness.

She wasn't leaving without Matt.

Unfortunately, if she couldn't get him to trust her long enough to get him out of here, they were both fucked.

"Matt," she said carefully, dropping to her knees, trying to speak to him at the same level. "Matt, c'mon. You can trust me."

He only stared at her; hesitantly, she crawled forward slightly, holding out her hand to reachable distance. "Matt, please?"

Nothing changed in his expression, and for one terrifying moment, she didn't think anything would—that Umbrella would swoop down upon them, and they'd both be gone.

And then he placed his hand in her carefully, hesitantly, like a child, and she squeezed it gently, mustering a small smile.

He didn't return it—he was still obviously scared, and Rain felt sick looking at him, looking at this tiny, frightened shell that stared at her with such fear.

Matt had never, ever looked at her like that. Matt had always been strong, and brave, and had never shown her this kind of weakness.

Looking at him now, she couldn't help being glad that Alice, at least, wasn't here.

Letting Matt go was hard, but seeing him like this—would kill Alice.

And unfortunately, unless she could get Matt back by the time they left this place, it was going to happen anyway.

She pushed the thought away, saying urgently, "Matt, we have to go, okay?"

He stared at her nervously as she stood, still grasping his hand, tugging on it slightly, feeling like the was dealing with an overgrown child.

She couldn't help but remember their first time in the Hive, and how her, Alice, and Matt had all survived together. How Matt, despite her shoving him around and handcuffing him moments after meeting him, had been the first to notice when she'd grown too weak to walk—had carried her through the Hive, even though it was an obviously useless cause.

Now she had to carry him.

"C'mon, up," she demanded, and abandoning all measures of hesitancy, bent down and grasped him under the arms, pulling him up.

He was heavy, a full fifty pounds more than her despite how thin he'd gotten; but he tried to help as well, pushing himself up and draping himself over her, obviously too weak to stand.

She was touching him in places meant only for Alice, and felt embarrassed despite herself, trying to shift him so they could both walk properly.

It took too much time.

She froze when she heard the click of a safety being uncocked; when the sound magnified itself, Matt detached himself from her with another fearful cry, practically shoving her off balance with the force of it.

Lifting her chin, she turned to face them, a crowd of over fifty guards, taking care to ensure she stood in front of Matt—whatever happened, all she cared about was making sure he stayed alive.

It was dead silent in the room, and she realized, suddenly, that she could no longer hear Matt behind her.

The guards were no longer looking at her, but over her shoulder, and despite the risk she turned as well.

Matt was gone.

She was now looking at Nemesis.

The guards fired, and the air was filled with the deafening sound of gunfire as Rain dropped to the ground immediately, crawling out of the way, covering her head as she glanced up at the scene taking place in front of her.

The guards were still firing, bullets tearing into the monstrosity that had been Matthew Addison, and Nemesis tore through them like nothing was happening.

After all she had seen with Umbrella, Rain wasn't squeamish. She never had been, and she never would be.

But when the blood and gore began to spatter all over the walls like a Jackson Pollock painting, she closed her eyes.

Only to open them again, in shock and disbelief, when she heard J.D calling her name.

He came running into the room, took one look at her lying on the ground, covered in blood and gore as Nemesis tore into the guards still firing wildly past her—

And, for some inconceivable reason, lifted his weapon and took careful aim at Nemesis.

"No!" Rain shouted hoarsely at him, shoving herself to her feet. "No, J.D, put the fucking gun down—"

The guards that could still run were running now, taking advantage of the momentary distraction, and J.D fired, sending bullets rocketing forth from the MP5 into Nemesis and then into the wall as Rain slammed into him, throwing his aim off completely.

"What the hell are you doing, Rain?" he shouted at her as she shoved him back against the wall.

Nemesis turned, starting for them, and they both tensed; J.D made a move to fire again, and Rain slammed him back into the wall, wincing when she heard his head connect to it—

And then gunfire erupted again, and three things happened at once.

Nemesis turned and started for the new threat.

The new threat, three remaining Umbrella guards, thought better of their idea and ran.

And J.D crumpled.

Rain faltered under the dead weight, and both fell to the ground, J.D splaying out as Rain checked him over, her heart swelling in panic as she ran her hands over him—

And then J.D swore loudly, shoving her away and turning to grasp his upper arm; his hand came away soaked in blood, and relief crashed over her even as he glared at her. "What the hell is going on?"

She scowled at him, opened her mouth to answer—

But Nemesis was racing after the guards and she shoved herself to her feet, ignoring J.D for the moment, prepared to run after Nemesis if she had to—Matt was still in there somewhere, and she wasn't leaving him.

Halfway down the hall, Nemesis spasmed, it's massive claws wrapping themselves around it's own neck, and Rain saw the collar there sparking with live electricity and realized with horror that they were shocking the monster to keep it docile.

It collapsed, it's features melding gracelessly into Matt's—the bulk and metallic disappearing into visible ribs and smooth white skin as his sobs filled the air again.

J.D stumbled up to stand behind her, staring at the sight in front of them with both shock and almost perverse amazement. "What the fuck is that?"

"That?" Rain asked tiredly, turning to look at him.

"That's Matt."

xxxxx

Sometime while they'd been sitting here, trying to bring Alice out of her dazed stupor, J.D had slipped off.

And despite being angry at him for his idiocy, Michael was angrier at himself for not having been able to see it coming.

After a string of angry cursing, Alexei had stalked off as well for no other reason than to let out his own anger, leaving Michael alone with a practically catatonic Alice.

Nothing had changed in the last twenty minutes; Alice was still staring up at the blue sky above them, her hands folded carefully in her lap, shaking slightly.

Michael sat silently, unsure of what to do or say—with his limited amount of medical training, if it had just been shock that had been keeping Alice so quiet, this would have been an entirely different situation.

But shock had given way to a silent sort of composure; and though she had stopped shaking so fully, her hands still trembled.

"Michael?"

When she finally broke the silence, her voice was barely more than a whisper, and he started in surprise. "Do you think Matt—do you think he could still be okay?"

He stared at her, expecting to see that same blankness in her eyes; but when she turned to meet his gaze, her blue eyes were distant but clear, more focused than they'd been in the last twenty minutes.

He considered lying to her; but Alice had never lied to him, and he knew she would want the truth, just as he would have in her situation.

"No," he said quietly, shaking his head. "Alice, Matt's already mutated."

"You said there was an anti-virus," she reminded him, her quiet tone overtaken by an almost desperate sense of urgency. "Remember?"

He felt a hot flush of shame threaten to overtake him as he responded carefully, "Of course. But Alice… Matt didn't make it out of the Hive."

Her voice was quiet again, barely more than a whisper as she responded, "Yes, he did."

Michael started, glancing at her, expecting to see some remaining vestiges of shock or desperation in her eyes, anything to convince him that what she had just said was born only from unfounded hope.

But her gaze as she looked at him was resolute, and he realized, with a sickening twist in his stomach, that he now had a huge dilemma on his hands.

They both jumped up when the rustling of shrubbery became apparent to them, too loud to be only Alexei or any Umbrella guards looking for them.

They didn't have to wait long.

The three figures stumbled into the clearing, each looking dirty and exhausted—Alexei came out from behind them, his typically haughty expression wary as he kept his gun trained on the middle figure.

Alice let out a soft cry of recognition, her gun slipping from her fingers and dropping to the ground, and as Michael stared at the same figure, he realized suddenly the reason for Alice's shock, and for the ensuing questions.

Matthew Addison was standing in front of him.

And he was still human.