As if the threat of annihilation by zombies, monsters and even William himself wasn't enough to belittle Kains' ego, which had been rightfully inflamed by his formerly uncontested strength, it was now a very likely fact that an evil was growing inside of him. No doubt the progress of whatever it was that had been injected into him had been slowed either by some chemical agent still circulating within him from the stasis, or by his rapidly recovering immunity to illness. He hoped that with the restoration of his strength, his body could destroy whatever virus the Umbrella Corporation had decided to test on him, but Kain could not ignore this burning, sinking feeling within him.
One of the small pieces of information that William had not withheld from him was that the second clone of him, the one they called 'Abel', was infected with G-virus to stop it from deteriorating and if it could become infected after such a short life, then there was every chance that he could succumb to it too. No matter how weakened he had been from his release from stasis, Kain deduced that he was indeed growing stronger once again, but he had believed he was simply recovering his old strength, but after reading about the capabilities of the G-virus and how it had been used to strengthen 'K-VAM-01-γ' (rather than calling it 02, γ 'gamma' indicates to a scientist that it is the second identical copy of 01 (which is alpha by default) rather than another 'VAM' type entity addressed with a name beginning with 'K' for example), Kain partly wonder if his 'regaining strength' was really the G-virus altering him and making him stronger only as a side effect of taking control. Freed from the stasis, if the G-virus really was within him then because of his weakened state, the chances of it taking him over completely was very high indeed.
Kain felt a brooding anger as he left that ST.A.R.S office, closing the door harshly behind him. The creatures Kain had faced and destroyed were nothing even compared to the beast William's physical body had become, yet within him was growing a great evil that could very well take his life. It was the only adversary he could not challenge and slaughter with his claws - a disease growing from within…
"This is still an uncertainty." Kain told himself, thinking the words firmly to reassure himself securely, but he knew that it was ludicrous to wish that the cold-blooded Umbrella scientist would just simply leave him in a specimen tank for seven years without prodding and probing and altering and copying… They must have done something to him…
Kain went on his way. Off to his right was the way back to the stairs that lead to the first floor, and to his left, the grey corridor kinked down again in a left turn, so that what was beyond it was a mystery to him. Littering the hard, dull wooden floor at haphazard points were remnants of broken bottle-glass mixed in with just a hint of human blood. Blood that Kain sensed had been tainted with the zombie-making virus so knew not to touch or taste it. If he had been at full strength then his body may even have resisted the effects of it, but he was so greatly weakened in comparison to his original prowess that even he was not confident of his own abilities, and Kain was notorious for his self-assured arrogance in the face of an uncertain danger. He moved on, and became aware suddenly that something had changed about this corridor. The stench of death had not been so intense when he entered the office…
Kain drew the weapon he had obtained from William and intended to make good use of it, maybe for the first time since William had fired it. Kain tried but couldn't recall precisely if he had used it since, and became further aware of just how he had been weakened sufficiently for the condition to even effect his mental operation; something such as that would not have escaped his awareness so easily prior to his abduction.
Sneaking silently to where the stink of rotting blood was strongest, Kain prepared himself to round the corns, back pressed firmly against the wall, when he heard something that told him his senses were not leaving him completely: A snarling moan and a wet shredding sound followed by gargled phlegmy sounds as the creature continued to moan as it no doubt buried it's face into the viscera of whatever or whoever it was devouring. The thought occurred in his mind briefly that it could be that little human child it was feasting on, but he disregarded it right away. She would have the sense to run from danger, wouldn't she?
Kain rounded the corner will no delay, no stiff, gradual turning to witness an intense horror like so many humans in the movies would do. He faced the creature head on, and saw to his relief that it was just another zombie and nothing stronger eating what was left of one of the officers.
He confidently put the gun away as he chuckled in amusement to himself at how marvellously messy a kill it had been: The entire end of that corridor was smeared with bloody handprints, scratches from what appeared to have been human fingers and wet marks dragging across the wall all focused on one almightily splatter on the door that itself dragged down to the corpse of the… well… what was once recognisable as a man on the floor. The animal itself, which had its back to Kain, was in a very advanced stage of decay. Every open wound on the creature he could see was filled with soft black blood tainted occasionally with streaks of deep red that glistened when they caught the light. It's pail white skin had been tainted brownish with the stains of old blood, which was now being consumed by the new blood creeping from rotten holes all over its body as well as fresh blood from the squelching, tattered mess that was once a being. The corpse was in very bad shape for the victim of just one zombie attack. Had Kain seen the body after the creature had left, he certainly would have believed he was torn to pieces by something far powerful that a zombie, and several of those at that! -
-Kain began to feel as though a part of him had realised something his conscious self had not yet noticed and so took another, more complete glance at the zombie creature that was burying its face into the guts of the man. After what he had discovered in the S.T.A.R.S office thanks to that spirit, any little suspicion he had that something wasn't as it should be, he would decided to follow up on. Information was the key to everything in this world. It was knowledge that brought him to this world; the knowledge of the human scientists that had created whatever had opened a path to Nosgoth, the knowledge of Birkin that had caused this nightmare in every form, and it was the human scientists thirst for knowledge that had kept him in this world for seven years. He needed to know it all or face the consequences of ignorance; his own annihilation or the damnation of spending the rest of his days in this disgusting world.
The zombie creature painfully drew its head up from the fresh sticky mess and Kain noticed something more about his appearance that set alarm bells ringing out inside him.
Its hair was white. White and the same length as his, and though some of it was stained with viscera, new and old, there was no mistaking that it greatly resembled him from behind.
Kain stepped backwards slightly and involuntarily as it shakily raised itself up onto its feet clad with toeless socks and began to turn to face him. Kain noticed that the socks were toeless because that its black claws protruding from its feet would cut the fabric and felt dread set in as it turned now half toward him. It was taking an age to turn, and Kain could now see why. Most of its arms were rotten and full of tattered holes, holes that were rimmed with yellow dripping puss and other unidentifiable fluids, but most torn and flayed of all its body was its stomach cavity.
The skin from its groin to its pectorals was simply not there anymore, and it was in such an advanced stage of decay that all the insides of the beast were drooping and blackish in colour, sagging from its body like decoration thick in forever flowing blood and sinew. This was no exaggeration. The monster appeared as thought it had its body turned inside out with only certain parts of its flesh still visible. The top half of its face was still there, but its cheeks, its nose… all of it was completely absent of flesh. There was so much gore and violent things running from where its mouth was supposed to be that one could not tell where the face began or where bone was. The only distinct feature discernable in the bloodied rotten mouth was a few sharp, almost metal in appearance, teeth poking through bits of flesh. These were apparent only for a few seconds before being hidden again by another thick ooze of dark blood.
It was facing Kain now, the thing hooked over and continually secreting blood in thick, viscous puddles on the floorboards. Kain shook his head in denial at the thing he was regarding. It was him. Himself. And Kain felt reality distort as he simply watched it watch him like the mindless animal it was.
At that moment, he recalled something Malek had said to him in his youth.
'It is not often that a man sees his own corpse, it is a sobering experience.'
Kain now understood those words fully. It was a very different experience from looking into a mirror and seeing this creature stare back. It was something quite indescribable…
On the zombies' right pectoral, Kain made out the faint markings of a black tattoo beneath crusty, streaky brown bloodstains. It was the symbol 'β' (beta). This thing had to have been K-VAM-01- B
'γ' (Gamma) had been the creature William had referred to as Abel, and this certainly was not it, yet it walked… William had told Kain that Abel was most likely loose, but failed to mention that beta version could also be on the prowl.
Also William had told Kain a rather touching story of how he had watched beta type gradually deteriorate and decay; yet here he was! Kain gritted his teeth. This was yet one further 'tiny' piece of information William had unwaveringly decided to keep from him. William hadn't told him that subsequent to its death, beta type had been subjected to further tests with the legendary 'T-virus'. It was rather impressive that such a senseless creature could have come this far, unless of course it was not as mindless as the formally human variety of zombies indeed were.
After taking some additional time to read through the files John wished him to view back in the S.T.A.R.S office, Kain had learnt how different people had reacted differently to the effects of the T-virus. Some kinds people would just simply die, others would die and become zombies, all the way up to the prowess of the project called 'T-002', which was a Tyrant, the most improbable form a T-virus contaminated victim could possibly take, it could without doubt equal the William mutation with its raw physical power. William belonged to the breed of gentleman who would not neglect one single opportunity to learn all he can from a virus, and now, thinking it over more thoroughly, Kain understood that it would have been a foolish thing to think anything other than the likelihood that William had subjected the T-virus to the body of beta type fully on purpose. He must have been curious and Kain could hardly blame him. He knew that he must have seemed perfect to them and William was the kind of man to improve upon perfection until its very limits.
But this thing was far from perfection. It was even significantly more brutal and ravenous than even the conventional zombie. The vampires desire for bloodlust on top of the nature of a zombie to seek out and destroy life must have been too intense a cocktail for death to smother.
The creature struggled to take a step forward, peeling its decaying foot from the floorboards that had been glued down with a thick paste of its own blood. It stumbled somewhat, a shudder going through its mutilated frame. Kain braced himself for whatever would follow.
Every point on its body unexpectedly rose up, like a rash of large goose bumps all rising simultaneously and moving gently under its remaining skin, like something beneath it was struggling, trying to burst free. Kain prepared himself with a lump in his throat. This disgusting blasphemy was William's work through and through. Kain would punish him at their next encounter, but for the moment, Kain's goat was to destroy this sickening abomina-
-From every lump covering its body, a mass of bloodied, fatty tentacles burst free, struggling and writhing in the air, covering every inch of it with a busy struggling mass of grasping appendages. Only its vague shape was visible now, almost totally hidden by the vine like, squirming tentacles. Kain drew his weapon without delay, not wishing to hazard an attempting to physically attack that… horrifying thing that claimed his image. Maleks words sounded again in his mind as it lifted its twitching arms in an unnerving, spasmodic fashion and hissed a hungry howl. Was this what would happen to him if he ever became infected with the T-virus!
The impossible creature then performed an action that was very much unlike usual zombie behaviour. It crouched abruptly, then leapt at him, jumped high up and clung to the ceiling of the building, scuttling across it on its back with its tentacles clasping to the heating pipes and electric cables running through the ceiling, and sprang from its point, open wide, at Kain. Kain evaded the attack by jumping back in the direction of the S.T.A.R.S office, barely managing to prevent himself from stumbling over in his haste. Kain was certainly not going to underestimate it. It was himself in every possible way and he knew better than anyone that to underestimate Kain, would be their ruin.
Its turn was slow and sluggish, but once he was precisely in front of it, it attempted another savage attack, a dashing slice, nearly tearing flesh from his body. It didn't stop moving, it didn't stop attacking. Kain didn't know how much longer he could evade it. It was just so fast! It couldn't have been simply due to the fact it was of vampire origin…
He needed to kill it immediately before it got lucky and one of it's wildly flailing limbs tore open his skin and most likely infected him.
After it threw one of its large swinging punches, Kain chanced to lung towards the actual creature itself in its moment of weakness, grasping its face in his pale clawed hands and twisting it violently before it had a chance to react. It dropped down dead, this time for good, as its head came away in his hands. Once satisfied it had stopped moving, Kain curiously turned the bloody lump of flesh that was the head over in his hands until the face, or what was left of it, met his. Chillingly, despite being mutilated beyond recognition with decay and tentacles bursting from every inch of it, it skull of the head… Kain felt the cheekbones under his fingers as held it and shivered at how alike they felt to his. He'd tried to distance himself from it mentally, but there was no way to deny that this was him in every way except for the memories that only he possessed.
And it had died.
HE had died.
He understood entirely now what the young rookie officer at the beginning of his quest was saying now. Things in this world that died once can die again, and he was absolutely no exception.
Kain dropped the tatty head to the floor with a heavy thump and it rolled so that it was now facing away from him. Its blood mingled with the matted, formerly white hair and slowly pooled beneath it in a tainted puddle, gradually soaking into the dark floorboards.
Kain was certainly not a faint-hearted man; His nature saw to that, but he was more disgusted by the meaning of it all… by what it represented….
"What so-called… human would create such a sickening parody of nature? And… of ME? How can such a mindless zombie, even of myself, have such power?"-
- "Because it's not a zombie."
Kain turned sharply around to see the man to whom his sheer hatred and abhorrence for that creature was directed at, the ghost of William Birkin. Or at least the visual representation of his astral projection. What served to enraged Kain further was the leisurely manner in which he was standing, with his arms comfortably folded and leading against a wall right next to the S.T.A.R.S office, a little distance away from him.
"What did you say?" Kain enquired in mild disbelief that this man could be human after doing what he had done. (Technically speaking of course, seeing as his body, wherever it may be, wasn't really human anymore…)
"I said it's not exactly a zombie – boy- one would be forgiven for believing that I'd not have to repeat myself with your" William made quotation marks with his fingers. "'Finely tuned vampiric senses.' We call it a V-ACT or 'Crimson head' as it was dubbed because of its taste for carnage and it is what happens if a zombie is allowed to enter a dormant state, usually after being taken out without decapitating or burning it."
This was bad news for anyone stuck in the R.P.D building. Kain had not encountered a single Crimson before this encounter, implying that none of the zombies had been killed or taken out by any survivors. It meant that his chances of finding any human life within the building were dreadfully low.
"How could you do this to ME?" Kain barked, genuinely angered by the disgusting freak of human nature. "To violate my body in such a way?"
"You're beginning to sound like an ex-girlfriend." William chuckled but then glared at him seriously, not altering his relaxed posture, however. "I didn't want to do it Kain, and it was the first time since I saw that failed female test subject back in the Spencer estate that I felt as though I couldn't do this. Do you know what that means?"
"I don't care – you still did this."-
-"I know!" Whined William abruptly, unfolding his arms and balling his hands to fists. "I go through every moment, every SECOND of my existence knowing that this, ALL OF THIS is my doing! Do you have ANY idea what it's like to both know and feel that a whole… world came toppling down into anarchy and pain merely at one… apparently… insignificant… whimsical…. choice?"
William seemed close to tears, but though Kain wasn't buying it (how could he? This man was clearly even sicker than he was) he spoke in a low and soft manner;
"I know, William… Believe me, I know… Better than anyone, I know what it's like to have the world healed or damned at your whim, and choose damnation…"
"Do you regret it?" William asked, calmly.
"What?"
"I said do you regret it?"
Kain thought for a few moments about that and then recalled what the situation was a minute ago, finding his anger flooding back into him in crashing, hot waves.
"It matters not! You will pay for the crimes you have committed against myself and my nature."-
-"I think I'm pretty much paying for it now, don't you?" William sighed.
"Then you are wrong." Kain barked. "This is but only the beginning of the pain I shall deliver unto you, Birkin."
"I'm an astral projection, remember?" William said, becoming a quirky kind of playful again. " And though I did this to your copy, I did it because it was my scientific obligation to do so, not because I wanted to mess you up. And besides this result is beyond what I was expecting, making it a very good thing I did this."
"You're insane."
"Well, yeah – where have you been for the past several days? As I was saying, I was expecting it to become a plain old zombie, but that thing changed straight into a V-ACT! Do you know what that means?"
"I feel you are going to tell me whether I want to hear it or not."
"It means that it, and therefore you, were already zombies to begin with!"
"Impossible – I am a vampire."
-"A reanimated corps, technically, hence all the undead imagery where referring to vampires in our literature. It finally makes perfect sense to me, Kain! When a vampire makes another vampire, something very similar to T-virus infection is happening! We understand that in your world, vampires take much more time and energy to make because some kind of 'magic' as Moebius calls it, is breathed into your corpses that then restores you. It's because that this process is so taxing that sire-ing a vampire can't be done at the drop of a hat, meaning that extinction is very possible for your race under Sarafan rule. It makes sense to me. If it was simply a matter of drinking vampire blood, then infect a town's water supply and within a number of days all the humans would become vampires. But you see this matter of breathing some airborne chemical into the corps intrigues me. Airborne T-virus reanimates a corpse in much the same way, apart from the lack of faculties and the progressive decay, so what I believe is happening to you vampires is an incredibly, exceedingly advanced for so zombification. And as a result when one of you becomes infected with T-virus, your body is already zombified so it mutates you into the next level, a Crimson."
"So this knowledge comes at the cost of his life? Most of what you have just said I could tell you myself!"
"Suddenly this concern and a value of life!" William chuckled. "It's funny that you only care for the losing of lives when they are yours. It's a shame you won't meet your destiny head on and just die."
"This is NOT my destiny!"
"You're right, it isn't… But this world is outside all your 'Time Stream' bullshit. Whereas in Nosgoth you have a prewritten path that is incontrovertible bar a few glitches, you do not belong in this world, and so you do not have a written path, that is if this world has a similar Time Stream mechanism to it. You are a foreign object in this world and you can change its prewritten path, as well as ours change yours. That was how we were able to abduct you even though your worlds destiny said you were to remain in that coma for 200 years solid."
"So you are saying I have the power to alter the fate of this world… of this very night?"
William nodded. He then paced towards Kain, past Kain and to the corpse of the K-VAM-01-BETA on the wooden floor. Kain turned as he walked past to study him closely, in case he tried anything strange or showed an emotion on his face that he did not intend for Kain to see. William told no secrets in his expression as he crouched and looked over the mess, and then rose to his feet to face him. He then smiled bizarrely.
"Is there anything you want to ask me about?"
"Why do you say that?"
"Because I can see it in your face, like you're hungry… for answers."
Kain remembered himself and the danger he could face growing within him and barked.
"I stumbled across some notes recently"-
-"I know. Those were Weskers'. He died before he could hide them. John gave them to you didn't he?"
"That is irrelevant!"
"Oh no it has all the relevance… John has always seemed a bit of an enigma to me and I him… And he could never turn down a mystery, the nosey man – that must be why he showed you those notes, to carry on his quest for the answer to this all."
"And do you have the answer?" Kain growled.
William grinned craftily and widely as he quoted a line from Kains' past: "I have the answers if you have the questions. What are the questions for these answers?"
This infuriated Kain, but he continued to ask. "What was happening to me over those seven years? Speak!"
"You were gestating in a tank, Kain."
"Before then!"
With a heavy sigh, William gave a tired and friendly smile. "John really did show you all the cards, didn't he?"
"I haven't the time for your childish banter, scientist! I need answers; What is inside of me!"
William's smile creased to a sick smirk, then his eyes shifted to something behind Kain.
"Who're you talking to, guy?" A young female voice from behind him, Kain spun around to meet the stare of a beautiful – and frightened – young woman. Her blue eyes were tainted by the terror of Raccoon city and with her creamy cheek with a smudge of dirt upon it, had the situation been different, Kain would consider her a most luxurious prize of a nights hunt.
But the situation was indeed different.
She tightened her ponytail and put away her own firearm in a strap on her hip pack that also served as a hip belt to her pink denim cut-off shots. She was wearing both pink shorts and vest, and beneath that was a kind of waterproof, figure hugging black garment that covered only to the tops of her knees and her elbows, some kind of feminine yet tomboyish fashion that Kain found most puzzling to him.
"Are you… okay?" She asked in her musical yet youthful voice, now clearly unnerved by his appearance. Kain did not hear her, however, and found his self-control diminishing.
Such a beautiful prize –
He could smell it running up and down her neck: The fresh, sweet juice throbbing up her Carotid and the matured, seasoned liquid running down her Jugular. He was unaware that his dry, dark lips were parted eagerly willing to accept her gift of red, wet elixir into his mouth. His fangs grew in size at the tantalizing anticipation much like the erotic sensation of the male and he sucked at him lips as if it would serve to silence his cravings.
He had just remembered how starving he was and badly wanted her blood. That look showed upon on his pale, predatory face. She took a jump back with an alarmed yet confident look upon her face and pulled out her weapon once again.
"Back the fuck away from me!" She yelled, trying to sound authorities yet her pathetic please only served to arouse his predatory instincts further, like a small powerless animal hunted into a corner.
However she was not as powerless as he might have liked.
There was a bizarre popping noise and he felt something whiz past his ear. Smoke was trickling from the muzzle, ascending into the air and vanishing like a shadow fleeing light. She had fired her weapon at him! And she hadn't stopped there, either. She fired again and this bullet did not miss him. The small chunk of metal bore its way deep into his shoulder, shattering every scrap of flesh it came into contact with, splintering the very bone it was stopped by. For such a small thing, the pain was incredible and Kain, gritting his teeth, shrivelled up, clutching the hot throbbing pain on his left shoulder. Now he knew how William must have felt when those men shot him, but Birkin had been riddled through like Swiss cheese with these and had been in almost complete composure! Kain was not expecting such agony from such a little thing…
Kain did not see that the young had woman instantly regret what she had done even as the bullet left the very chamber itself and now stood with one fingerless gloved-clad hand clasped over her open mouth, her feminine face twisted with shock and disgust at what she did. When he cried out when the bullet hit him, he'd scared some sense back into her. He wasn't a zombie, he wasn't going to zombify, at least not yet, and she had just shot an innocent man simply because he creeped her out a bit. The horror of Raccoon city had got to her alright, and had made it all seem like some kind of sub-real experience, almost like a game. It was sick, but the truth was that it must have been the human mind's way of coping with the carnage… without going insane…
"Oh god…" She muttered woefully. "I'm – I'm sorry! I didn't - I don't know why I did that!"
Kain didn't respond, closing his eyes tight shut and hissing through his teeth as he wedged his claw into the ragged bloody hole and pulled out the piece of metal.
"Hey- you shouldn't do that!" She protested. "It might become infected with something."- She stepped towards him, rummaging in her hip pack for that first aid spray she picked up back in the Operation Room but was shoved violently away by the pale man, tripping and fell onto the floor from the sudden, unexpected force.
"You've done enough damage to me already, little bitch." He protested violently, and in her shock, the young woman scooted away from him across the wooden floor on her very hands and knees. He was angry, but though one would believe that it was understandable under the circumstances, he had been acting furious, aggressive and unpredictable even before Claire pulled that trigger. She had been genuinely fearful for the safety of her life when his piercing glance penetrated her soul leaving her feeling vulnerable and open to attack. It was a feeling she despised, making her uncomfortable and exposed to his will. If he had the power to do that with just a glance, she was too terrified to see what he could do to her if he managed to touch her, not that she was going to let him get near her after he had batted her away so powerfully with his bad arm, the arm she had planted a bullet in and should be incapacitated.
He was as white as a sheet and that didn't look too healthy. Was he turning into a zombie? It didn't look artificial…
"Who… are you?" She asked, trying to sound authoritative but failing dramatically, causing her to sound like a frightened little girl. She kicked herself for that, but awaited a response.
"What does it matter?" He spat rising up above her after plucking the bullet out as if it were a mere splinter. "It is indeed a wonder you have survived this long. I gauge that your time in this world is not long, girl."
"What are you talking about?" She asked, with a most annoying, teenage tone in her voice, climbing to her feet to face him boldly. "You're not making any sense."
"Know you not that every officer in this building is dead? How long do you think you can fare against the monsters and horrors lurking in this very establishment? Your time is short, mortal."
"Mortal?" The girl repeated, clearly confused by his strange dialect but continued to argue with him despite this. "And you're wrong about there not being a cop left alive. I came to the R.P.D with someone else: a rookie cop called Leon Kennedy. It's his first day on the job and he's as clueless about all this stuff as I am! Watch out for him, will you?"
"I will be sure to try." Kain responded, insincerely. "So, you were not here to witness the beginning of the end?"
"No, I came into town to look for my brother Chirs. I'm just about to check out the S.T.A.R.S office for him."
"Your brother was with the R.P.D S.T.A.R.S?" Kain queried, slightly baffled by this girls connection. She nodded her response. "I am afraid you will not find him here, girl. After the Mansion incident, Chris and the remaining S.T.A.R.S members disappeared."
"Yeah… I heard about that…" She said mournfully, hanging her head.
Kain recalled a memory he experienced while in the S.T.A.R.S office, the one of how he had felt the prescience of a young woman and man, the man wearing a strange leather jacket playing a guitar. He must have been her brother Chris, and as she turned back to the S.T.A.R.S office door, Kain received further conformation of this.
On the back of her denim vest was an angel holding a bomb with the slogan 'made in heaven' along the top. Kain chuckled, recognising the pattern from Chris' jacket. They must have been close…
"Have you been in there?" She asked, still turned to face the door.
"I have." He replied. "But the room has already been searched; you will be hard pressed to find anything in that mess."
She let out a heavy sigh. Clearly this was not the response she wanted to hear.
"Think I'll go check it out anyway, 'case you missed something."
William giggled to himself at her presumptuous words, and in the process reminded Kain that he was still there, watching this all wordlessly, however the girl had not seemed to notice him, despite having deliberately positioned himself right next to the S.T.A.R.S office door, leaning against it almost carefree in way.
"I can assure you I did not miss anything of importance." Kain grumbled, trying not to lose his temper but as she moved, Kain saw that she was facing William and still hasn't noticed him. William found it odd too, raising one eyebrow as the woman placed her hand on the doorknob, straight through Williams' insubstantial form-
-and drew it away suddenly with a gasp. William jumped too from the sudden movement.
"What is the matter?" Asked Kain, playing along with her total ignorance towards Williams' existence.
"My hand…!" She somewhat exclaimed, staring with a frown at it unable to work out what had just happened to it. "I felt like I just bathed it in cold… air!"
William smiled.
"She must not be able to sense spirits half as well as you can." He chuckled as she further studied her hand. "I've heard thing on T.V that I previously assumed to be bullshit. Things like, how children and the innocent can sense paranormal things better than others. She must be a very down to earth woman if she couldn't detect me until she made contact. Assume you can see me clearly, Kain, because vampires are particularly suited to handling non-scientific based forces and so are incredibly sensitive to them."
"And what of your child?" Asked Kain, wondering if it was possible that Williams little daughter would be able to sense the spirit of her father.
"Child?" Asked the young woman, puzzled. Kain felt foolish to have said that aloud after William's explanation.
"I meant to say…" Kain thought quickly, much to the amusement of William, who was laughing out loud and distracting Kain. "Have you seen a small female human child in this building? I encountered her earlier and she did come this way."
"A little girl?" She asked. "There's a little girl running around in the police station with all those monsters around and you let her get away?"
"I did not LET her do anything." Kain growled, extremely irritated by both her unjustified accusations and by William's weird laughter, which Kain felt was exceptionally pointless and unnecessary, directly solely to annoy Kain further. "That girl escaped me but I can assure you that on our next meeting I WILL secure her."
"Yeah… You better…" She muttered, and William's laughter finally came to its conclusion, and he wiped a tear from his eye.
"It wasn't funny." Kain growled under his breath, now no longer able to contain his impatience for the mad scientist.
"What?" She asked, again hearing his comment. Kain frowned; nothing seemed to get past her.
"Nothing." He responded, "I meant to ask for your name." The truth was that he really didn't care what her name was, but if he were to encounter Williams' daughter and this woman got to her first, if he knew her name then the little girl would see him more as an friend rather than the potential foe she saw him as back in the Operation room.
"I'm Claire. Claire Redfield. I came here looking for my brother Chris, but it looks like he's not here, luckily." She responded with a smile, a smile that lit up her tired, pale face like a moment of sunlight through the murk of disgust that had a permanent grip of her features so long as she was in this accursed Raccoon City. "You?"
"I am Kain." He answered with an air of authority and defiance in his words. He wanted her to know from the very moment of their official meeting. "I am here…." He suddenly realized he didn't have an explanation to be here, or indeed why he was here. If he told her that he simply wished to find a way out of Raccoon City, then she would wonder why he was exploring this building rather than out in the streets trying to find an escape. She clearly came here with that young rookie officer she mentioned earlier and was now trapped within the R.P.D building. Maybe the mortal was naïve enough to believe he would aid her in her escape…
He remembered he had drifted off into that thought mid sentence and hadn't given an excuse for him being here. Claire was glaring at him with a confused and questioning look upon her soft face her mouth open slightly in perplexed disbelief, and behind her, William was leaning off the wall imitating exactly the same look only on his face, however Williams' version of her expression had a disingenuous overtone that showed he was mocking Kain, serving to distract him from finding an excuse quickly.
"I'm searching for… a man." He lied. "William Birkin is his name, and that girl is his child."
"William Birkin?" Repeated Claire once again like an annoying echo.
"Awww - you're searching for me?" William said, rather than asked, again mocking Kain's poor excuse for an excuse. "I never even knew you cared!"
The truth was he didn't really care, and William knew it, but Claire didn't know it so it was good enough, and if she were to uncover any connection between him and William, then Kain had just told her a reason for it.
"Why are you looking for him? Is he a friend who got caught up in all this?"
"He's not a friend…. However…"
Claire leant forward slightly, as if she were keen to hear his reason for plunging himself into this nightmare, and simultaneously, William leaned forward too, again mimicking her actions and trying to put Kain off. He also wanted to make Kain feel uncomfortable about saying just what he saw in William Birkin to go through all this in search of him.
"However I am in search of him because he holds the answers to a dilemma of mine."
"I do?" Asked William, turning a bit serious for a moment.
"It would seem that I am infected with… something" He left out any direct mentioning that it was a virus that had cause the disease. He didn't want her to think that he had any real involvement in this. The humans of this world were far more perceptive than back in Nosgoth, even the females, but he wanted to kill two birds with one stone: giving an excuse to Claire while asking William the question that had been lingering in his mind since he read those papers. Claire had just interrupted them before he had a chance to question William, but he wasn't going to give in just yet. "This infection… has quite possibly something to do with the events taking place here today… and yet I do not know what is happening to me… It could be fatal…"
"Is it like whatever's turned all these people into zombies?" Claire asked, catching on a little too quickly for Kain's comfort.
"It is, but on an advanced level. I can reassure you that any adverse side effects shan't be an immediate threat to you."
"Uh… You kinda don't look ok, Kain… Are you sure?"
"I am fine." He said, close to barking, but he had to control his temper somewhat. If he were angry and aggressive towards her then she would believe he was infected with the zombie virus and might try to shoot him again. The bullet hole she had inflicted him with was already starting to heal, but because of his weakened condition, it was taking far longer than he was comfortable with. Normally he would have killed her for doing that to him… but it was becoming easier for him to stay his hand against the humans… It must have been something to do with the weakness that had gripped him. "You will be vigilant for the child, will you not?"
"Yeah… It's just… just that her father is mixed up in all this…"
"Indeed."
"I think I saw a little girl in a duct back when I was on the first floor, but she was there and gone so fast I didn't think I'd really seen anything…"
"She does move surprisingly quickly for a human." Kain agreed.
"'For a human'?" Repeated Claire and Kain cringed. He was accidentally letting a lot slip lately because of his diminished strength. Kain was becoming sick of explaining what he was to each and every dull mortal he stumbled across, so he came right out and said it.
"Yes, for you see I am a vampire."
"…………………………….Uh…." Claire backed away. "Right… you just… go that way and I'll go in here…" She tried the knob for the S.T.A.R.S office door hastily, clearly unnerved by his confession.
"Dear, dear you freaked her out." Commented William. "You shouldn't be so forward with a lady."
Kain lost all patience with the fucking man. "Will-You-Shut-Up?"
"Who're you talking to!" Claire yelled. "You're not making any sense!" She was obviously frightened again by now, and there was nothing Kain could do or say to explain away what he had just said. He didn't stop her from hastily fleeing into the S.T.A.R.S office, simply because he wished to be rid of her awkward self. Now he had enlisted her help, so to speak, locating William's daughter should be a doddle.
"I wouldn't want anyone else looking for my little Sherry." Commented William; still irritatingly there and guessing on what was going through Kain's mind. He was a pretty good guesser…
"What say you if my intensions are not wholesome?"
"I hope by 'unwholesome' you mean 'violent'." William commented, partially joking yet he continued on a more serious note. "But I sense you wont hurt her, just as you didn't hurt that Claire Redfield when she shot you through the arm."
"She did not 'shoot me through the arm.'" Kain growled angrily. "The bone stopped the projectile."
William laughed. "Same difference! She shot you and you didn't do anything about it! I'm really impressed at this new level of self-control you've achieved, Kain! When we were gaining battle data, one of the main thing we noticed about you was your lack of restraint; how you unwaveringly tore into some of the most staggering monsters Nosgoth had to offer and won, yet! You were all bio weapon, Kain. I spoke with Mortanius about how he created you to destroy human life, how he selected a man so mentally tainted it would make him unstoppable, and the practice he performed on you was not very unlike what we did with our Tyrant and our Nemesis project!" William laughed the depraved laugh of a mad scientist and it was at times like this that Kain was reminded just how outstandingly different from humans this … being truly was. "It was so quaint to envision it all, Kain. A humble little Necromancer performing this… incredible genetic modification with his little spells or whatever it was he did exactly. It was… beautiful to think that such a scientifically primitive culture had compensated with this 'magic like force'. It was treated like a science – it was delicious to watch Mortanius at work!"
Listening to the scientist go on and on, Kain realised that William had 'opened a gate' so to speak, and was ripe for plumbing for answers and information as to what Umbrella's agendas really were. They hadn't contained it in any documents for fear of accidentally leaking the classified information that Nosgoth even existed. He could tell him everything when he was like this. It was just a matter of pushing the right buttons…
William chose his words carefully. "What precisely did Mortanius show you?" He asked, giving William incentive to continue.
"He supplied us with a sample of 100 pure vampire DNA in the form of a blood sample belonging to a long dead ancient named Janos Audron."
"DNA?"
William smiled. "Deoxyribonucleic acid. All living things have a set of unique instructions contained within their cells that act as blueprints for a life form, be it plant or man. We were very grateful for the sample, but Mortanius said he couldn't supply us with the heart from which he got the sample, something to do with preserving history, and he couldn't, or wouldn't, provide us with a living human born vampire. He seemed powerful enough to secure one… Anyway Moebius was more than happy to help us choose from a selection of common vampires he'd rounded up, but after a while he saw that our interests were in a powerful human born specimen. First thing, he gave us an apparently notorious sample he called 'Vorador', that he said had murdered all but three of the previous Circle Guardians but after pitting him against one or two of our bio weapons we could see that personal tragedy had caused him to become a little long in the tooth, and besides, his DNA was in an advanced stage of being rewritten. We wanted something fresh, yet powerful. Something that was at an early stage of this long process. He gave us you, Kain."
Kain felt his blood boil at how he described the abduction and torture of his fellow vampires with such in cold and indifferent manner. This human utterly was nauseating. Kain suppressed his will to protest and let him continue. He had yet to discoverer Umbrella's intentions for him and had to endure more of William's disgusting tales to get at the truth.
"Kain, you have no idea just how confusing a monster you are." William smiled, folding white lab coat clad arms. "You see, Chimpanzees are insentient monkeys and yet they share something like 97 or 98 of their DNA with humans, making only about 2 of their codes being different information. You, therefore, are practically indistinguishable from a human in similar elements and the genetic difference is into minute decimals. However we've discovered there is something in the cells of 'sired' vampires that rewrites their DNA over an incredibly long period of time. It's similar to Alexia's stolen research notes I'm sure you read through, where she planned to rewrite her DNA with the T-Veronica over a period of years. The vampire process is so complex that it takes… well; we haven't yet found a human who has become 100 vampire yet! It's also reminiscent to the process that happened to my deceased mentor James Marcus with his leeches and the T-virus. It too rewrote his DNA, but because he was released and still being altered when he decided to make his prescience known, he could be destroyed by sunlight! Fledgling 'sired' vampires undergo a similar vulnerability for a number of years after infection, just like our bio weapons! Because of the vast number of similarities we deduced that we could begin a process… Alexia took the remnants of an ancient virus from the queen ant and implanted it into the mother virus to created T-Veronica, and we hoped to do a similar thing, finding the gene in the vampire genome that provides the instructions to make vampires and implant it within a virus, thus synthesising our own vampire-producing technology."
"Is that all of it?" Kain darkly grumbled, fascinated as well as appalled by William's info.
"Of course it isn't – If it was then we would have been perfectly happy with just the blood sample. We wanted you because the accumulate results our combat data showed that you were easily capable of taking out our Tyrant-002 without the aid of weapons. You… were far more powerful than something that could be produced by the T-virus and that was incredible to us! All the money and research that had gone into discovering and creating it and all the while you were running around Nosgoth for God knows how many years as the perfect combat ready killing machine! When I was told this, I didn't believe it because it was so ridiculous that something this incredible could escape our attention, but after seeing the devastation that one Fire Demon left in its wake when it destroyed our first base camp, and then learning that it was nothing compared to what you had faced and defeated, well, from that moment on…" William's bright eyes glazed over in a look of creamy, preoccupied pleasure, scientific pleasure, one might add, but Williams dangerously lustful gaze into space told of a scientific love that left Kain feeling even more dirty, violated and uncomfortable than ever before. "…I knew I had to have you, Kain…."
Kain suddenly decided that he'd have to find his answers at a later time as his cold marble skin began to craw at the insinuation in Birkin's whole manner. He would no doubt encounter William later on in his quest; he would not lose anything from letting the sick freak go now to cool down for a while.
"I do not belong to you or anyone, mortal." Kain spat, his harsh and uncompromising words serving to snap William out of his vaguely lustful trance. "I am my own man, I uncover my own answers and I follow my own path, not the path that you or John has intended for me to follow."
"John intends to help you get back to Nosgoth with your life intact, Kain." Confessed William, now quite angry at Kain's impudence. "He also believe that of all men, you could be the one who shuts down Umbrella and all the ruthless bio weapon companies that scourge the face of this world."
"I care not for Umbrella." Kain then continued on his way through the murky passage, past the shredded remnants of what had been his identical copy and over to the wood door exiting the corridor. "When I have escaped this city I shall escape this world without stopping to pick up the pieces left by you disgusting humans fraternisations with the sinister forces of science."