Reaching the front gates of the R.P.D was indeed a gauntlet. A lesser man would defiantly have died on the way, the carnage and horror that paved the devastated streets overthrowing their hopes, and finally the mindless beasts that roamed them finishing them off. He'd seen it happen on this scale before, not in Raccoon but in Avernus, too. Avernus was in flames when he reached it in his fledgling years, demons of a size and power that could easily rival the monster that William had become had paved the streets with blood and viscera. But strangely, the insanity that ruled the streets of Raccoon was of a deeper horror. . . The knowledge that these things had been made rather than born chilled the bones… To know that hey were now nothing more than things, even less sentient than mindless animals themselves… it must have chilled the human heart to know it.

Kain wasn't so easily disturbed by the sheer destruction and carnage. The curse of blood-thirst had tainted his thoughts considerably and the sight of bloodied monsters mewing for the chance to tear through ones flesh with their disgusting moulded mouth and jagged teeth only tickled at his humour and at a hunger of his own. The city was meticulous in its organisation. It no doubt took an age to build, but its apparent greatest flaw was this very fact. Its labyrinthine form trapped the humans in its complex like a spiders web and it was only because of Kain's inhuman senses that he was able to discern the location of the R.P.D without seeing the building itself. If Kain could describe it in terms that a human could understand, he would call it a vampiric GPS. It didn't work in the same way as the scientific device but with buildings of great importance, it yielded the same results.

Kain had killed a reasonable amount of the mindless undead with weapons when there were many and with his scything bare claws when they were alone, which that was a rare occurrence but the closer he sensed he was getting to the R.P.D, the greater the amount of zombies clad in police uniforms he would find. This was a bad sign; it meant that something terrible had happened and the R.P.D was at the centre. He doubted he would find a single soul alive in there. When he reached the outskirts of the Police Department, piles of crashed squad cars, Fire Engines, Ambulances and mangled, broken bodies were piled into haphazard mounds slowly being consumed by the flames of devastation. This pathway of viscera lead to a conclusion at the R.P.D building's gates itself and served as a firm warning to the condition it must have been in inside.

Kain kicked the main gates open with the scuff of the sole of his boot and was somewhat gratified to see the very entrance to the building directly ahead of him. It had been no great task to reach the building after all-

-But Kain's relief died in his throat when another of the undead creatures leapt from behind the gates and clutched onto him wit cold dead fingers with strength no human could possess.

"No!" Kain cried involuntarily, beating the creatures face with the butt of his gun, causing fragments of flesh to disperse from the skull of the monster. It mewed hungrily as it was tossed to the floor, and only rested briefly before it tried to get to its feet to attack again, but it fell straight back down again once Kain had placed a bullet firmly in its forehead.

Kain sighed. That was much too close for him to ignore. In his arrogance he was nearly taken down by that mindless thing. He was disgusted; it was no fitting end for someone whom had come as far as him, but looking at the corps now, Kain recognised the uniform as one of those S.T.A.R.S members, and rolling it over, he noticed it must have been killed by its face being smashed open. The Nemesis, as the young officer had called it, had apparently been more successful in intercepting its target than Kain was originally aware of. Kain was still crouched by the corps when he heard something that took him completely by surprise.

-"I was right here when the Nemesis killed him."-

Kain jumped around at the sound of the impossibly familiar voice behind him, his eyes slowly tracing up the tall walls of the R.P.D, and on the figure sitting leisurely on to top.

"And I was watching when it killed that young cop too."

It was William Birkin.

"How…?" Kain let out, the words breaking free from his lips before he could close them but realised the answer to his own question before he responded. William was translucent and sitting atop that wall sideways, his knees hugged into his chest with a grace that was simply not possible in a human. At least, not in a living human. He was a spirit, but his body wasn't dead yet… "How is that that you are here? You are not yet dead…"

William paused for a moment with a smile on his face. Being dead certainly had lifted his spirits. He seemed well aware that he was now invulnerable to the attacks of the undead creatures and beyond the sight of mortal men and relished in it. He was not, however, beyond Kain's sight, vampires being creatures far more sensitive to such things than humans and Kain frowned up at William, whom was looking down at him, gleefully aware that he was beyond his reach.

"My body is not yet dead, you know that." He said, much quieter than before. "But I also know that you've realised the eye on the creatures shoulder is a clue as to who is in control of they body at present. When it is open, the G-virus forces me aside and takes control and so I am able to dislodge myself from my body. It does not mean I am dead, however. I am simply, 'astrally-projected'. So long as my body lives, even if I am not in control of it, I will be bound to it like a dog on a leash."

"How sad for you…" Kain said sarcastically.

"Anyway," William said, taking up the previous line of conversation. "I did see you with that cop earlier, and I must say it was touching to see all that."

"What do you mean?" Growled Kain, looking up at the mad scientist.

"Being a spirit allows me a certain amount of clairvoyant insight, you see…" William said slowly. "I could feel what you were feeling, Kain, and you didn't want the boy to die." William shuffled his legs around to they were now dangling over the edge of the wall, sighing into the air like he was trying to find the right words to explain what was going through his mind. "We recently discovered a form of black hole technology that allowed us to make a rip in space and slip into other dimensions, like in that movie 'Event Horizon'. The first world we stumbled into was Nosgoth, and we planned on brining a few samples back with us for research. There, we met a hooded old man by the name of Moebius."

"Moebius…"Kain muttered angrily to himself. He was very familiar with that name.

"He was very helpful." William continued, ignoring the remark. "He told us that he could tell us where to find the most powerful being we could hope to capture, and so we took him up on the offer. He took us through time to your bedside where he said you were unconscious and recovering and not due to wake up from for another 100 years yet. That would leave us plenty of time to use you without even damaging the fulcrum of that world's history, though I believe Moebius lead us to take you for the opposite reasons. Of course, we took up Moebiuses gift."

"What relevance has all this to that boys death?" Kain said impatiently.

"I'm just getting to that bit." William said impatiently back. "We'd done some background research into you, so we would know what we were dealing with. Moebius was again very helpful in supplying us with the means to view you as you were in previous time periods, and while watching you through the portals of Moebiuses 'Time Streaming Chamber' as he called it, there was always this one recurring question; how can we contain him? You see, we were all – well - gob smacked by your disregard for human life, by your sheer will to survive and to kill. Nothing - it seemed - could stop you. You were beyond any monster I or any other Umbrella scientists I have ever know could craft."

"If that is so, then how am I any different from any other monster you have made, indeed, your G-virus self even?" Kain asked, his voice laced with anger.

"Because you have a mind, Kain. You are sentient, and that is what makes you most dangerous…. You are an intelligent life form. The most complex action some of our more intelligent creatures can do is operate doors and switches but you are a truly …. A one in a million find. People who are such merciless killers are unfortunately very flawed and weak both mentally and physically. Finding you was truly an incredible discovery… but you're from another world you see… We can't ignore the fact that you are quite possibly the most unstable monster we've ever come across. We can always put turrets in, or anti-B.O.W gas to deal with our virus-based creatures, but you're a creature that works predominantly by the laws of magic; a force that practically doesn't exist in this world!"

"I'm glad you're so excited." Kain said rather plainly, if a little mockingly.

"I was at the time…" William confessed. "And I think that was what drove me to pluck your sleeping body from your world like that… completely ignorant of what your true purpose was… " William shook his head slowly. "I'm sorry for dragging you to this world with no means to escape… I wouldn't have been sorry in life… I wouldn't have given a shit about you other than that you were mine and you were perfect."

"I belong to no man." Kain barked angrily.

"In theory no, but Umbrella still owns you, and because you're not a human, human rights don't apply to you. If you don't escape this world, then some other company will pluck you up and run all kinds of tests on you and that was the very last thing I ever wanted to happen to you."

-"And yet you stored me in a tank, feeding me life through a tube and did just that."

"NO I DIDN'T!"

The sudden outburst surprised Kain, the composed mad scientist changed in a second from cold and emotionless to a violent outburst, a sudden contradictory outburst induced by Kain's statement that William had tested on him… This lead Kain to be suspicious… If he didn't test on him, then how can he claim to know so much about his physiology?

"What do you mean?" Asked Kain softly, almost in an attempt to coax answers from him; the sentiment was not serious, mind you.

"I didn't want to test directly onto your body." William explained. "You were too valuable to throw away like that, so I had a copy made… We cloned you…"

"What?" Kain snarled, disgusted by just such a violation.

William continued as if he had not heard the remark.

"The first copy died within hours of being disconnected from life support. Cloned material doesn't last as long as the original flesh, and because your body's structure was so complex it began to deteriorate almost as soon as it was left to fend for itself." Williams voice became low, almost mournful. "He… was frightened as he died… He was a fully grown man with a sentient mind, but he was only an hour old… he had no idea what was happening to him…" William hung his head, showing a remorse he didn't poses in life… "His skin and organs were breaking down and crumbling inside him like cardboard in rain, slowly turning to mush… Decaying without the decay… His frightened stare through the glass… He wanted to ask me for help but didn't know any words… His bloodied hand pressing against the glass… mewing a horrible, painful sound…"

"He was not I." Kain said sternly making that, as least, a fact.

"No…" William whined slowly. "He was you in every way… Every single way; every single the bit of the monster you are now…He WAS you only without the memories, without the knowledge of humans and vampires and without anything to call his own." He seemed to lose awareness of where he was, becoming dazed into his memories and sentiment for the creature. "And he was so innocent… Yet just as capable of becoming you…"

"So he is dead." Kain snarled. "He is not any of my concern anymore."

"No." William replied unkindly. "After that happened, I worked long and hard on making the second copy, using the G-virus to sustain it for longer than the unfortunate first copy. When we took it off of life support, however, it was trouble from the start. It had killed a few of our staff members before the order to put it back into stasis was passed, and even then it managed to break out again and go on a kind of rampage. We had to put it into a deeper sleep after that… You see, it was far more cunning, crafty and spiteful than the original clone; I suspect that was a side effect of integrating it with the G-virus… Not only that but it demonstrated vampiric behaviour, like the knowledge of the mist form, showing us that through the cloning process it had acquired at least one or two of your life memories… "

"How is that possible?" Kain demanded.

"We don't know." Replied William. "No scientific reason could explain it, which is what leads me to wonder if the first copy had memories too…" William stood erect on the wall now, gazing down at the vampire. "We named him Abel, as in Kain and Abel from the bible, but I warn you; He too is deteriorating but on a much slower scale than the first. The only way one can stop total cellular degeneration is if the DNA is replaced by integrating the originals structure into its own…"

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying … that if the disaster at the lab caused the cages to open"

-"Which it did." Interrupted Kain. "I encountered one of your monsters in the lift to the swears.

"Well then there is no doubt that Abel has been released…" And William continued. "And if he is… then I should warn you, he is a very serious threat to you."

"I fear no one."

"He is an enhanced version of yourself, Kain." William reminded him. "But the only way he can become perfect is if he digests you on a cellular level, and it wont be a quick death, Kain. The G-virus is doing exactly the same thing to my body right now and the only reason I don't feel any pain is because the G-virus is not yet in full control. He will entwine your body in a grip of G-virus and slowly devour you. You wont be able to control yourself, just change painfully, like a larva in a cocoon and when he remerges, you will no longer exist, and he with be an unstoppable fiend."

"And what would happen if the transformation was interrupted?" Kain queried.

"Alas, I fear Abel is not stupid; he could have formed a parasitic attachment of some kind that would continue to rewrite your DNA to his even after the death of the original being." William confessed. "It would not make any difference other than to slow the process."

"And what if the parasite is removed?"

But before he began with an answer, slowly William began to disappear from view, fading slowly into the blackness of twilight that had crept up on the two during their conversation. William looked down at the backs of his hands as the dissolved with confusion and bewilderment. Apparently, he had not foreseen his sudden departure.

"Wait!" Called out Kain, and Williams blue stare shifted to meet his.

"I'm sorry, it… it's calling me back… The G-virus…." And with that, William had totally faded from sight.

Kain relaxed. He was alone again and the stench of rotting flesh had most certainly gotten stronger as the cold evening had set in…

-And there was a sudden explosion that shook the very earth around him, causing small bits of dirt and rubble to briefly dance across the floor. Turning to the direction of the noise, Kain could see the sky literally lit up on the other side of the RPD building, black smoke twisting and dancing into the air with red hot flames licking at it as it ascended. Kain watching the bright fires for only a few minuets, making sure the fires would not burn down the RPD building itself, but they did not appear to be catching…

-But then, literally minuets after Kain had heard the crash of some kind; he saw something rather extraordinary indeed. -

A large metal flying vessel – a helicopter – began circling the RPD with its searchlight firmly placed on a roof of some kind obstructed from Kains view. He watched these events unfold calmly from the RPD courtyard with a cold expression –

- "I can't set her down! I'll throw you a rope ladder!" Came the sudden sound of voice from some kind of amplifying device on the helicopter, and it did so, lowering a rope ladder to the area somewhere behind the building, maintaining its position carefully.

- But suddenly there was a dangerous and sharp twinkling noise; the smashing of glass and the pilot of the device lost control, the helicopter veering haphazardly through the air. Kain wasn't sure, but looking at the flying machine with his sharp inhuman eyesight, he could see holes in the metalwork of its structure… Gunshots… And more of them appeared like they were conjured into the side of the machine as the disaster continued, the tearing sound of roaring blades distorting like the machine itself was dying.

Suddenly, the machine took a slopping coarse through the night sky and into the building, and again a thundering explosion tore through the air and shook the earth beneath Kain's feet even more violently than the crash outside the RPD gates. If Kain were worried about the crash beyond the gates burning down the Police department, then if the fire that the helicopter crash caused were allowed to continue, then certainly the whole building would be consumed. Fire was one of the few things that vampires feared. If Kain entered the building and was trapped by flames, then he would be in great danger…

But the RPD structure held a certain significance to the goings on in this city and Kain's only virtue was answers. William's monster was within those walls, and William knew more on how to return Kain to Nosgoth than any other… The large greenish structures of the buildings doors dared him to enter and face the monsters that lurked within. Kain smiled to himself as he pulled the door open, the wood scraping harshly in a deep, powerful noise. The sound greeted his pointed ears in an almost dark and infamous way… His dark lips manipulated into a smile and he took up the handgun he had strapped into his wasteland. This, he felt, was going to be entertaining…