Adam Luck - Hahaha, thanks! I didn't really think about the whole Apocalypse nemesis reveal when I gave the T-002 an actual identity that relates to someone whom Woods had known. I actually really liked that from the movies as well (maybe that's what actually triggered the idea in the back of my mind xD). I really can't wait to start working on RE2 and RE3 events since there's just a lot of potential I could go on about with this whole crossover, even if I only manage to include one or two characters from the Black Ops series.
Also, your description for RE2 is pretty spot on with what I have in mind. Too bad though that the summary section is limited to just 384 characters, but I'll still think of something that's a bit more intricate. ;)
Another thing, thanks for being understanding! The last hiatus actually helped me cool off for a whole month before I immediately began working on the latter half of the story for the next two months straight so I may end up doing the same for the following sequel and the ones that will follow after.
And no worries! I don't plan on abandoning any story after the first one I ever did (which was Red vs. Blue: Corruption). I got extremely pissed when I lost over ten pre-written chapters for that crossover. And since those chapters were worked on between large time gaps, I lost almost every idea I had for the story so whatever I had planned, it all just got thrown out the window with the HDD failure I endured last year. That's why you may have noticed just how fast I worked on this one, especially given the fact that I wanted to keep this story fresh in my mind each time I'd continue writing a new chapter for it. (For those of you who already read my first ever fanfic, again, I sincerely apologize for discontinuing that whole story.) Anyway, I digress.
Again, there's no shame in looking up guides/solutions for puzzles of any kind! We all have our own ways of enjoying our games. :)

x-x-TheBurnedMan-x-x - Lol! Thanks, dude! I think it also helped due to previously having already worked on this way before I published the first chapter. By then, I was almost halfway done with the story's first rough draft. In my opinion, the hardest part was proofreading the first chapters, while also working on the later ones, which in return, caused me to rewrite some of the first chapters and vice versa due to many ideas that kept popping inside my head while also trying to make some of them work. Again, thank you so much! I might've accidentally hit a milestone without knowing if I was actually the first one you've seen to finish an almost 200k word fanfic this fast lol. In reality, it's taken me almost a whole year to finish this properly, but for a 180k+ word fanfic in general, I think it is reasonably fast.

Recommended BGM:

1. Resident Evil (Remake) & Director's Cut (DualShock Ver.) - Lab Entrance/Entrance to the Laboratory

2. Resident Evil (Remake) & Director's Cut (DualShock Ver.) - Contaminated/B3 Laboratory

3. Resident Evil Director's Cut (DualShock Ver.) - Prison

Chapter 28

The old mines have been a dark cold, miserable maze but at the very least, they had a map to work with as it led them to the closest route to the lab possible. Chris and Rebecca had reached the first basement level of the Arklay Lab, both of them shivering and soaked - and not without being freaked out by the dead creatures they've come across along the way.

Mutant green creatures, another giant spider but three times bigger than the one they've seen in the dormitory, and even dead rats.

The Umbrella scientists surely did not limit themselves from being disgustingly creative in their approach to making alien-looking monsters.

Chris rattled the metal doors in front of them that supposedly led to the heliport as shown in the papers, but it was firmly locked in place. The sign to their left showed that it would only unlock by a certain alarm system. It was a good enough try at least, hoping he would have sent out Rebecca with some sort of sign to give to Brad as Richard's radio was already completely broken.

He looked down the narrow hatch and sighed, turning to her.

"I'd like for you to stay here. If I'm not back in twenty minutes, head back to the courtyard and wait for help to come."

Flustered and upset, Rebecca shook her head. "I'm going with you! I've come a long way since— since after what happened with Edward the moment those dogs attacked us when my team arrived at the estate grounds. You'll need me if you find anything that's even remotely related to the origins of the t-Virus around here. Plus, I'm not willing to see someone else die. Not on my watch!"

"I know, but this is not up for discussion. Wesker may have already captured, if not, killed the rest of the team and may be looking to finish the job with us. We can't risk getting ambushed together as someone has to survive and tell people about the dark nature of Umbrella."

He smiled at her, putting a hand on her shoulder.

"And I know you've come a long way as a young rookie. This isn't about your competence, alright? Twenty minutes. That's all I ask."

Rebecca looked away for a moment, thinking as she hung her head. A few moments later, she turned around to face him and nodded slowly. "Twenty minutes then."

Chris turned and started down the ladder, hoping that he could keep his promise to come back to her in time. The captain had successfully deceived them all, acting the part of concerned leader for weeks while missing person cases began to rise up and people winded up dead, and all along he'd known why.

The man was a complete sociopath.

Everything was going in perfect order. Wesker had just finished preparing all the files he needed to collect and all he needed now is to find himself an Umbrella high-level security flash drive to work with and he'd be golden. All the data and specimen samples will soon be collected and he will be one step closer to completing his own plans.

However, it was too bad that the Tyrant will be going to waste and he will most likely not see the potential results of the T-002 itself against the STARS. The thing was a marvel of surgical, chemical, and genetic engineering, and he stood in front of the huge beast for a long time, staring at it as if it were his own child. The ultimate soldier would be a real test on the battlefield. The life support system consisted of a green stasis liquid, holding it afloat inside its huge chamber. Sooner or later, he will have to deactivate the life support system and it will be the moment that both his and the rest of the surviving STARS members' lives will change forever.

If some of them are still alive, that is.

He felt extremely lucky that after having had Alex dispose of the shambling zombies upstairs, the low-level researchers would be no bothersome ever again. Even some of the human test subjects that looked weak and brittle, were mere zombies that looked like walking skeletons, some of which hardly bled at all.

As he smiled at the thought of just how easy everything seemed to be, the door behind him suddenly slid open. Wesker did not try looking back, thinking it may be one of his fellow STARS members to either confront him or be naively happy that they had finally found him alive.

However, his curiosity peaked as he heard someone dragging something along, and was met with a sudden pleasant surprise from a brainwashed Alex himself.

"[Found these two in the Visual Data Room]," he said in Russian almost emotionless as soon as he finished dragging the limp bodies of Frank and Jill near Wesker. His cold tone sounded a lot as though he were a heartless former vet from the fallen Soviet Army. "[Where would you like them to be?]"

Jill? How did she manage to survive Lisa Trevor and her rampage of skinning women alive?

Nonetheless, Wesker smiled maniacally, knowing Jill and Frank could serve a huge venerable purpose, and pointed to his right, commanding him in Russian. "[Strip them off of their weapons and zip tie their hands and feet. Lay them on the back corner near the computer panels on that metal beam underneath. Put the weapons elsewhere - I don't care what you do to them.]"

Wesker was somewhat fluent in Russian, all thanks to his old friend, Sergei Vladimir, for teaching him the language. He knew Alex would still understand him in English regardless, but he wanted to practice his Russian further in order to not have any of the other surviving STARS members understand what he'd be telling Alex what to do.

Without so much of a word, Alex did so without question, zip tying both their hands and feet, attaching the zip ties on their hands to the beam underneath, both now in sitting positions as they laid their heads on one another, still fast asleep. He took away both of their Samurai Edges, Frank's knife, and Jill's shotgun, putting the weapons several meters away from them, stacked against a row of computer terminals.

"[Stay here with those two. If they cause you any trouble, kill them. And if anyone should ever enter here before me, shoot them on site. Can't have any miscalculated stragglers delay my plans any further.]"

Alex silently nodded. His expression showed no signs of fear, sympathy, or remorse of any kind. It was as though he were a completely different person, a silent killing machine and Wesker savored every second of it. It was way better than playing the blackmailing card and he was glad that Alex pulled what he did on the way here. Kravchenko was, and still is, a genius, despite the unnecessary competition he had with him and Sergei nonetheless.

As Wesker exited the room and activated the elevator to step inside and head back to the basement level above him, he lost himself in thought, almost slightly nervous about what was to come next after he'd secured everything he needed to have. The prototype virus that he was given by Birkin was still in the culture tank room. If he were gonna go through with it, he would have to hope that Birkin was right about everything and that the next phase of his plan won't end in failure, all for a little miscalculation on his part.

But he wasn't worried. He knew that Birkin was one of the most paranoid people he's ever met and he'd have the virus tested and checked hundreds of times before handing it over to his friend, Albert. It was a necessary step, but a step that would most likely change everything for the better.

With almost all of the researchers dead, Umbrella had decided to get rid of any evidence of the place's existence, while also taking everything they've studied thus far, sending most, if not, all the data and samples directly to another lab of theirs elsewhere. Wesker was gonna make sure at least half of their goals weren't going to be met, making Sergei a main problem in the future, which didn't exactly have him as worried anymore as he should've interfered by now if he was still around trying to finish off his own execution of X-Day.

As the elevator hummed to a stop, the gates opened automatically and Wesker stepped out, unholstering his custom Beretta as he sighed inwardly, trying to remember where was the last time he held his own security flash drive.

Damn it! The power room…

There was no way he was going back there. Making another run through the MA2s even with Mason's help, was already a pain in the ass when he needed to activate the circuit breaker in order to power the elevator. However, he really needed a high-level security drive in order to activate the UMF-013 supercomputer, access his own account, and transfer everything there was left onto the flash drive itself.

Then he remembered something else.

If his meddling through the research labs didn't fail him, he had remembered seeing John Clemens' lost security drive under a research table when he used his own to activate the computer in the main research room and deactivate most of the locks inside the lab using John's account as he was the only one with the clearance to unlock some sections of the lab he needed to go through first. As ridiculous as it sounded, his password was the first name of his girlfriend, the same woman he had been introduced to a few months back, Ada.

Three letters for a password? Is that the best you could come up with? No wonder why you're long dead…

He thought he wasn't going to need John's drive as he figured he already had his own to activate the computer terminals around, but much to his own carelessness, he had lost it in the power room when dealing with the relentless MA2s wandering about.

Slightly frustrated that he had to backtrack through the stench of the lab itself, he eased up to the corner and looked down the hall, just in time to see Chris Redfield walking downstairs, equipped with a shotgun, and straight into the metal doors ahead, a burst of hissing machinery noises echoing through the corridor before they closed.

Chris? How the hell is he still alive?! Jesus!

Apparently, he had underestimated the STARS even further. Not only has Jill survived her encounter with Lisa and Frank against Yawn, but what had Chris ever encountered for him to have survived this far? And he was seen all by himself. No one else seemed to be with him, which slightly surprised him as he had at least expected him to be with Richard or the younger rookie but Wesker guessed the Yawn bite was too much for him to have handled anyway and the awesome power of the Hunters might've proven too much for the other rookie to deal with.

If Chris had survived the onslaught of hunters that have invaded the estate grounds and possibly faced other subjects in the residence like Neptune or Plant 42, the chimeras might not kill him, and he had effectively blocked him off of that area from even letting him gain access to the triggering system in case he needed to.

Still, it didn't matter. By the time he would have retrieved the drive he needed, Chris would most likely be out by then, and either he could go ahead and kill him, or let Alex finish the job for him. One way or another, Chris was going to die.

Grinning at the thought, he quickly rushed down the hall, back toward the rusted metal door that led to the main corridor of level three.

That little swine won't interfere with my plans. No one will! I AM in control! My place! My rules! And no one knows that better than Alex Mason himself!

He almost burst out laughing until he almost tripped on a couple more unexpected corpses he hadn't seen before just in front of the door he had come in from. Chris might've taken out a couple more of the thin-brittle scientists and technicians that wandered around in the labs. Their skulls were blown to bits, evidence of the fact that he might've used that same shotgun on them that he was carrying. On one of the name tags, he recognized one of them, Dr. Ellen Smith.

That rotten corpse of a lady won't be bossing me around like a little bitch anymore.

He kicked her angrily, his boot crunching and snapping into the corpse's brittle ribs that felt like old hollow thin branches, the dry breaking of bone loud in the calm spinning sound of a giant turbine ahead of him.

There was a sudden, constant sound of heavy boots coming down from the stairs of B2, the footsteps slowly echoing closer through the hall. And then a loud rough hesitant voice erupted.

"Chris? Jill? …Frank?"

Mr. Burton! Alive and well.

Wesker raised his weapon casually, ready to pull the trigger once he'd see Barry step into view, and a short moment later, he then lowered it, thoughtfully.

Several seconds later, a slow grin began forming across his face.

Frank was experiencing a massive headache as he began to wake up from whatever high dose of anesthesia he got. He found himself lying on Jill's right shoulder, touching her hanging head. As he quickly backed away, startled to see where they were, he tried scanning around his environment, his vision beginning to clear as he struggled to take the zip ties off in vain.

He turned back to face the huge room they were in. Everything in the center was filled with giant glass capsules, capable of holding a full-grown man. Cables, computers, server boxes, and terminals, all of them were surrounding the room, connecting directly to the glass tubes with each of them containing some sort of unknown creature inside. Everything inside the room screamed mad sci-fi scientists trying to take over the world through biological experiments, and to him, it wasn't far-fetched from the actual truth. Then he looked at what was directly in front of him, his eyes not able to believe what they were seeing, but deep down, he knew what it was; who it really was inside the much larger, lone glass tube.

Tyrant.

Serrano…

It was his own, former teammate from back in his Angola mission in '86, now transformed into a terrible-looking beast. He was now made to be a biological weapon for Umbrella, possibly to be sold to the highest bidder on the black market. There was nothing he could do for his former teammate anymore…

He then quickly turned to Jill, trying to wake her up with his left shoulder.

"Ey," he said in a loud whisper. "Come on, Valentine. Wake up!"

Jill began to move slowly, trying to move her restrained hands, slowly realizing she couldn't go anywhere. She carefully opened her eyes, her expression showered in both fright and confusion, almost panicking hysterically.

Frank tried calming her down.

"Hey, hey, hey! You're fine," he said lowly. "We're just tied up somewhere in the lab."

Jill turned around to face him, quickly slurring her words for a brief moment.

"Frank—it's-Wesker—the traitor! And—Alex! He…"

She stopped to stare directly at someone who was standing behind Frank, her mouth opened as if the shock itself froze her in place.

Frank turned to see what or who she was staring at and much to his surprise, it was Mason, standing there with a blank expression, showing no care or mercy for the both captured Alphas.

"Mason?" He gasped.

Tears on his clothing were visible almost all over with small dark splatters of coagulated blood on his face and chest. Small-sized scratch marks appeared on both of his bare arms as though he had been cut by a series of small blades. His hair was a complete mess, drenched in sweat and blood, no longer the same, combed hairstyle he remembered him having hours earlier. The guy staring at them aimlessly looked as though he went through a violent war, blinded by a sudden glare of bloodlust in his eyes, almost as though they were detached from reality itself.

Woods did not let his appearance sway him away, however. All he wanted was for him to help get them out of there and look for the STARS traitor that was responsible for just about anything that has happened to them over the whole night.

"Get us out of here, brother! Wesker's an Umbrella mole. We have to get that fucker and escape out of this hellhole—"

He was quickly met with his own knife, almost touching his throat, and his green eyes now met his own. Whatever person Mason was before, he was completely gone. The blank, murderous stare in his eyes was not Mason's, and Woods knew that better than anyone else but he wasn't willing to believe it yet.

"Mason…" he said almost yearnfully. "What the hell happened to you?"

"[I'm only getting started,]" Mason whispered, menacingly. Woods was fluent in Russian himself, knowing exactly what he was telling them. "[Should I start with you?]" He then pointed the knife at a shocked and frightened Jill. "[Or with her?]"

Jill shuddered, her face covered in sweat as she became baffled about what was going on with Alex. "Frank, what is he saying? Why is he speaking Russian and why is he doing this?!"

Woods swallowed internally. He did not answer her question right away but simply kept studying Mason's detachment from his own former self. What he feared the most has now come to a sudden harsh reality.

"He… he's brainwashed. Hudson was right all along. Fuckin' Wesker was the suspected mole and now he might've used those Soviet numbers against him somehow," he said nervously, still glaring back at him with a troubled look on his face. He then began to talk directly to Mason, trying to put some sense into him. "Al, I know you can pull this through. Remember when Hudson interrogated you; asked you a bunch of personal questions about yourself the last time this happened? I was so pissed off at him when I found out how he and Weaver treated you that day at the abandoned NSA facility, but your ass pulled through like you always have."

Alex did not say anything back. His face was cold and dark. There was no sign of any emotion at all, except the inner feeling of bloodthirst, inching the knife closer to Woods' throat as the latter began to plead to him, trying his best to make him remember he is still himself, this time, in Russian.

"[Your name is Alex Mason. Aged sixty-five years old. In nineteen fifty-eight, we both met after I took you in when they brought you to the CIA. We were both in our late twenties on that fateful day. You always had that itch for action; always the reckless guy that would come out smelling like roses after a huge disaster, always had that fuckin' impulsiveness I could have never trained the shit out of you for as much as I could, but that's what makes you one of the best people I've ever known, brother!]" He then continued in English, his tone turning into a hopeless plea. "You never fuckin' give up, so for the love of God, REMEMBER WHO YOU FUCKING ARE, MASON!"

Frank was quickly met with a punch on his mouth, blood sprayed on the ground as his lower lip was now partially torn as a result. Alex continued to show no emotional response or distress as a result of Woods trying to plead for the real Alex Mason to come back from his own mental prison inside his mind. All that Alex was focused on doing was preparing to kill him, dropping Woods' knife to the ground as he unholstered his own gun, now taking aim at Woods' head a couple of meters away, his finger seemingly ready to pull the trigger at any time.

Jill was feeling incredibly hysterical but kept herself calm as much as she could, her heart pounding louder than the atmospheric sounds of the machines around them.

"Alex… You don't wanna do this," she didn't know if Alex was able to understand her, but she felt like she needed to at least try to help push some sense into him. "I don't— I don't know what Wesker did to you or what this Soviet number bullshit is all about, but I know, deep down, you are still the same good guy I've known, even if it was for the smallest amount of time since you and Frank joined up STARS," Jill was already becoming somewhat emotional, her voice starting to break down slightly, remembering the same cold blank expression that Barry had when he had ditched her underground. Except, Alex was doing all this under the influence of something far more sinister that may have already happened in the past, only this time, Wesker and Umbrella were responsible for his darker Soviet self. "Please, Alex. Don't do this!"

Mason still held the firearm, pointing it directly at a defenseless Woods before switching his aim towards Jill. For a small moment, however, Jill could've sworn she saw Alex's hand twitch ever so slightly after doing so, almost as if he was trying to fight for control, his mind seemingly fighting him back against his own will. However, that tiniest shred amount of hope she had was quickly snatched away the moment he started to walk closer to her intimidatingly, ignoring what has been said to him earlier as he crouched and forced the barrel of the gun directly into Jill's chest. Jill closed her watery eyes, almost as if she was accepting her inevitable demise, just like she prepared herself when Lisa Trevor was about to skin her alive.

"NO!" Woods screamed in vain, trying his best to wiggle out of his own restraints. He was not going to fail Mason or Jill as much as he failed his team in Angola. The survivor's guilt that ate him up after all these years was more than enough to deal with. Seeing that replay again for God knows how many times already in his life, it was not something he wanted to relive ever again. Seeing the floating creature in the giant stasis tank one last time, reminding himself of the failures in his life, Woods was ready to sacrifice himself. It was the least he could do to protect Jill from being killed.

"[Take me instead!]" He pleaded in Russian, his gruff and rough voice filled with anger, guilt, sadness, and despair all at once. "You wanna kill someone? Kill me! Your own goddamn brother! See if you have the fuckin' balls to do so, ya hear me?! SHOOT THE LEGENDARY FRANK WOODS, ALEX MASON!"

As if at the right timing, the distant sound of a mechanical door slid open and Mason quickly stood up, putting his attention away from the duo before Woods swung his tied-up feet against the back of his legs, making Mason trip and fall to the ground. He continued to wrestle him to the ground using his legs to keep Mason from grabbing the dropped gun that was several inches out of his reach. However, Mason was able to get the upper hand as he turned towards him and shoved his right boot against Woods' chest, incapacitating him long enough for him to reach his gun and run towards whoever had entered the room.

Shit! No!

"[Any trouble?]" The voice said in a low volume. Jill couldn't understand what they said, but Woods listened in closely, being able to comprehend what the voice had mentioned.

Mason, who was standing just across from the restrained duo, silently shook his head slowly, like a mute, obedient soldier.

"[Good. Make sure you keep an eye out for Barry and wait for him near the elevator. He'll be bringing in one more guest for the show that's to come.]"

What?!

"Barry?" Jill echoed quietly, the only thing she was able to understand from that entire conversation.

Is Barry involved in all of this as well? If not, what are they gonna be doing to him?!

Mason immediately left out of view, and the silhouettes of the two people on the other side of the room met for a split second through the thick row of glass tubes that were in the way before one of them left the room and the other one finally revealed itself to them.

"Albert-fucking-Wesker…" Frank growled as he still felt the pain in his lungs each time he took a breath. "I knew you were a dickhead since the very beginning."

Jill's face became contorted in disgust. "...So you're the—"

"Double-crosser?" Wesker finished off Jill's sentence, smiling as he began doing work on the computer terminal near the abomination of a beast in front of them. "Well, I wouldn't exactly word it that way but I couldn't care any less. You two will be free from this world very soon, Jill."

Jill and Frank's blood began boiling up at the sound of Wesker's calm, malicious voice. It was hard enough to keep themselves from blowing up in anger, especially Frank, who had just witnessed his own best friend almost kill them both because of his own meddling.

"The numbers..." he grumbled. "How the fuck were you able to get Mason to do your dirty work?!"

Wesker grinned widely in response, his gaze still focused on the computer terminal in front of him.

"As you may know, that was all the Soviets' doing. Umbrella had access to their brainwashing research since the fall of the Soviet Union. All I had to do was inject him with a special serum I made to activate the programming and say some… special… enchantments with those wonderful numbers. Quite easy to manipulate that tough G.I."

Fuckin' Hudson had to be right about everything. Goddamn it!

Frank clenched his fists tightly, his face wrinkled in anger, wanting to strangle him for what he'd done to his best friend. "So you're just another commie scum of Umbrella trying to finish off what the Soviets started? Is that it?!"

"Excellent deduction, Woods. But I think you misunderstand me. I have no intention of bringing back old history. No, I fashion myself laboring for a bright new future; a future even Umbrella themselves won't ever come to understand!"

"You fuckin' psycho…" Woods responded as he shook his head in complete disgust.

Wesker chuckled inwardly as he continued to type on the terminal in front of him. "A psycho that will soon have the power to help usher in a new era."

"Then why eliminate STARS?!" Said Jill angrily, remembering the murder of Enrico Marini in the old mines.

"Believe it or not, that's Umbrella's intention. Why do you think they've put up audio tracking devices hidden around each and every one of your living spaces? They couldn't have people like Redfield running their mouths about rumors and conspiracies against them. You think Umbrella didn't notice the sudden coincidence of a pair of ex-CIA agents joining STARS when casualties started to mount up across the Arklay Mountains? But all for the better." He then looked Woods directly in the eyes. "Even if you or Alex somehow manage to escape out of here alive, the government won't be happy having two of the most wanted people running rampant in the wild on their list of guilty names."

Frank's expression changed to sudden bewilderment.

"What do you mean?" He growled.

Wesker laughed as he inserted some sort of red drive on the terminal. "For starters, no one will believe a word you say about this whole mess. Second, the STARS will be blamed for the destruction of everything that has happened in this place. And since you two are both known ex-CIA agents, well… not a very good reflection on anyone's part, am I right? The perfect scapegoats!"

Frank tried his best to wiggle himself out again in a desperate attempt to kill Wesker before he did any more damage than he has already done. But there was no getting away. The zip ties were holding on tighter each time he tried his best to take them off.

If only I had my knife…

He looked away from where he stood and to his right, the knife was lying on the ground, almost a few meters away. But the ties on his hands did not let him reach it, let alone his own height not being enough to stretch his legs and grab it by using the heels of his boots.

As Frank struggled to get the knife, Jill continued to stare at Wesker, almost as if she wanted to burn him using her own eyes.

Whatever Wesker was planning right now, she knew he was up to no good, and seeing the big white humanoid creature inside the tank next to the terminal that Wesker was working on made her sweat even more, not even able to imagine what the Tyrant would do to them or the rest of Raccoon City if it ever got out.

It wasn't long before the sound of a distant elevator began to chime in a slow hum of machinery and seconds later, the door out of the room suddenly slid open.