Carlos entered the hangar that Monday morning at ten minutes to eight, travel mug of coffee in hand and his pack slung over his shoulder. The guys turned and all eyes were on him, even Kevin's, though one was still swollen nearly shut. Carlos dropped his bag to the floor by his station with a heavy thump. It wasn't unlike his first day here, all expectant glances and pointed silence.

"What're you dipshits staring at?" Carlos asked, checking his pants. "My fly open?"

"Captain wants to talk to you," Kennedy volunteered, "In his office."

"Now?" Carlos asked, with a chuckle. "You serious?"

"Yeah," Kennedy didn't smile. "That's what he said."

Oooooohhhh the rest of the team jeered, as if sending a classmate to the Principal's office of their grade school. Carlos smirked, unamused.

"I see how it is. Fuck all of you," he said, and they laughed as he left the way he came, boots thudding on the cement floor, echoing in the space of the hangar.

Carlos wound through the hallways and around expensive desks, made the trek through security checkpoints guarded by soldiers in pressed dress uniforms, chins jutted in self-important decorum. When they let him through and he reached the correct office, Carlos knocked on the expensive-looking wooden door with hesitant knuckles and waited for a response. When none came, Carlos bounced on his heels, looked around, and raised his fist to knock again. The door opened. One of the two men from that day back in early October — the day where Carlos had awoken half-naked and half-alive in the cold white gleam of a hospital room, demanding answers and receiving only veiled threats — grimaced at him. He was an ugly man, his aspect hard and unpleasing to the eye, like it had been hewn from the side of a granite cliff. He looked unhappy to have been disturbed, the brackets around his mouth deep and frowning. The early morning light glinted off the pins and banners that studded his dark green dress uniform, the ones that signaled him as someone Very Important.

"Specialist," the Captain said, "nice of you to show up today. Come in."

Carlos followed. The Captain was middling-tall and of a strong, stocky build. He walked like he'd had a rod welded to his spine that kept it in perfect straight alignment, and moved with the ease of someone at least twenty years younger. The Captain circled to his chair and sat; Carlos waited, then seated himself. "Was told you needed to speak with me, sir." Carlos said.

The Captain tapped his blunted fingertips against the wood of his desk. "You chose a hell of a day to not show up for work, Son. Fucked things up for everyone. You'll do well to remember this isn't a traditional job; you have to be here."

"Personal issues," Carlos admitted, "they're settled now. Won't happen again."

"The world doesn't stop turning for your personal life, Specialist," the Captain retorted, sharp and without pity, "these personal issues wouldn't have anything to do with your teammate Ryman's busted mug, would they? He was gone the same day."

"Yes, they did, sir. Someone hurt him pretty bad. Didn't want to just leave him."

The Captain gestured to Carlos' face. "Looks like someone got you pretty good too, right there. You two wouldn't be starting your own private boxing club and not inviting the rest of us, would you?"

"No, sir. Nothing like that."

"Hm." The man sat back, rested his hands in his lap. His shoulders shifted under the thick, rugged material of his uniform coat, deep brown-green like bog moss. The Captain regarded Carlos with a tilted head, and it didn't strike Carlos as a particularly kind sort of regard; it felt more like looking for a weak spot to stick a knife. "I've been looking at your file. You served in the Corps for eight years. Made it to E-5. Then with Umbrella for… two, was it?"

"Yes, sir." Carlos nodded. He'd stayed in for two of his teenage years and most of his twenties, fucking around and being promoted not for love of rank or aplomb, but because of entropy. He was decent at his job, cool with everyone, but didn't really try for more, kept his head down and tried to not fuck up too bad if he could help it. After those eight years, Umbrella was a blessing — rigid enough to keep him on task, but without the decorum and red tape of traditional service, former of which always made him feel like a massive prick. Just blowing shit up and being a part of a team, drinking and rabble-rousing, collecting his check and going home.

"I'll be frank with you, Specialist. I've been hearing… interesting things about your performance in the field. We've interviewed your teammates — you know what they said about you?"

Carlos was silent. The man shuffled a folder of papers, spread them with a dramatic, ominous flair on his desk, and Carlos imagined the crawl of unemployment lines, reams of food stamp applications.

The Captain cleared his throat. "Never gets in anyone's way, never involved in bullshit. Always willing to help out. Good guy." The man's eyes flicked up to Carlos, as if waiting for a response. He shuffled the papers again. "Knows his shit but isn't a know-it-all about it. Knows more about bioweapons than anyone else on the team." Another shuffle. "I don't know much about him personally but he seems okay. The guys rely on him." One more shuffle. "I wasn't sure about him at first but he's a great asset to the team." The man looked up again, to Carlos' face, which was now confused. "On and on like this. Seems like you've made a good impression. Given your glowing reviews, I'm curious why you thought abandoning your squad was appropriate for the welfare of one person."

"He needed help," Carlos said, "team needs everyone firing on all cylinders, sir."

"So would you think it's accurate to say you view yourself as having to take care of your team, then? Just you? They can't look after themselves?"

"No," Carlos said. The guy was starting to piss him off, twisting his words and making him sound stupid. "But when they can't, we don't just leave 'em. We're a team for a reason."

"Well, oorah to that, Specialist," the Captain said, with a sense of satisfaction that bordered on smugness, like he was the one who'd given a particularly good answer to the question, or was claiming Carlos' as his own. "Glad to see I made the right call."

"I don't follow, sir."

"Your team needs a fire leader, but it requires at least an E-6 rank, given the logistics." Carlos felt relief; they'd been without an acting superior officer on operations, and all the disorganization that followed would get cleared up in a hurry. An E-6 would lend some stability. As soon as the relief came, it was gone.

"We're promoting you from your last enlisted rank. You're now an E-6, with all the raises that entails, except you're strictly under the purview of the FBC, not the Department of the Navy."

Carlos blinked, frozen in shock. He felt like a man balancing a bunch of different-sized boxes as he wavered and tried to keep the pile from tipping; just as soon as you'd gotten the hang of the weight of your pile, another one dropped on top, fucked the whole thing up.

"I'm still maintaining control over the team, but you'll be the fire squad leader for field operations — the men will report directly to you, and you to me. Questions?"

Carlos was certain the Captain was mistaken, that his file had gotten somehow mixed up with someone else's. "I… I'm honored, but I didn't apply for a promotion, sir. I think Kennedy—"

"This isn't a democracy, son," the Captain laughed, gentle and pitying. The soft sound belied his hard face."Kennedy's twelve years old with no military experience, barely has hair on his nuts. And we need an experienced leader in the field who won't get our entire squad wiped the fuck out. There were two men on the squad with prior enlisted time. You, and Rawls." Keith. "And now there's just you. Moreover, you don't get a vote, even if it's for one of your teammates. Do you think you know better than me who should lead my team?"

"No, sir."

"So why are you arguing, Staff Sergeant?"

Carlos didn't have an answer.

"Congratulations. Now don't call in again unless it's to tell me someone died. I'll make the announcement later on today, so enjoy the goodwill of your teammates while you've still got it. They may like you now but when you're bringing the hammer down that'll slip quick. Are you going to be needing sanctioned time off in the next year? Some sort of…" his eyes traced Carlos, over his dark skin and kinky hair, "religious or cultural holiday, birthdays? Speak now or hold your peace when the time comes."

Carlos was quiet, a lump in his chest like a bite of food he hadn't chewed enough. Then, Carlos stammered, "My, uh…"

The Captain looked at him, his glance more pointed as the seconds ticked by.

"Gonna be having a kid." Carlos finished. "December, maybe January."

The man was still, staring at him. "Well, hell. You told the team?"

"No, sir. Just found out a few days ago. Still getting my head around it myself."

Then, the man laughed, a smile of straight white teeth split his red, shining face. "You work quick, son. When'd we see each other, October? That's when we talked about the Zombie Girl, wasn't it?"

Carlos just stared at him. Talked about her like they'd just had beers at a bonfire on a beach somewhere, not threatened her fucking life to get Carlos to do what he wanted. Carlos entertained a sudden, vivid fantasy of leaping across the desk, pulling that pine-green jacket over the Captain's head, turning his ribs into chalkdust. Carlos wasn't so loyal to the idea of the Corps that he didn't mind whooping some officer ass to show who he really was loyal to when provoked. Years in the brig be damned.

Zombie Girl.

"Her name's Jill." Carlos said. Then, with all the venom her new moniker deserved, "Sir."

"Huh. You and her, hey?" The man said. "Well, she's not bad looking. Congratulations."

It didn't make Carlos any less pissed — if anything, the backhanded attempted at a compliment made it even worse. Hey, congrats on knocking up the not-ugly Zombie Girl. You could have stuck your dick in worse!

Fucking prick.

"Alright, enough bullshit," the Captain said, Carlos' plight already forgotten, "get downstairs and don't say anything. They probably suspect, but it has to come from us officially. Dismissed."

When the announcement came down that afternoon, delivered by the man himself while they stood around their table, Carlos expected a fucking mutiny. It had been less than a year and Uncle Sam had appointed the Umbrella stooge to lead the survivors of the city his old boss had cleaned out. He expected walkouts and protests and strife, maybe a solid sock in the mush or two. He probably deserved it.

None came. All he received were mumbles of assent peppered through the silence, pats on the back, murmured congratulations and little comments that told him they figured that's why the brass was asking. Kennedy was quiet as a nun, focused on his work.

"Put these on your uniform," the Captain mumbled, and passed Carlos a small cardboard box lined with some sort of black, fuzzy material. When Carlos opened it, two patches, scarlet red with gold embroidered stripes over a pair of crossed rifles, stared back at him.

"How's that for some bullshit?" Kevin asked once the Captain had departed, and the men around the table laughed. Kevin clapped Carlos on one of his large shoulders. "You deserve it, dude."

"Good luck with this fucking dumpster fire, Sarge!" Came a cry from across the table, and they laughed again.

"Hey, quit that shit," Carlos warned, and Kevin pushed him. "Nothing's changed, not as far as I'm concerned. And don't call me Sarge."

But it was a fool's errand — everything had changed, and Carlos supposed now he would have to change with it, as well as he could. He watched the men around the table while they talked and cut up and threw light pieces of garbage at each other, same as any other day. Being responsible for them in an official capacity was scary, of course. But as the shock wore off, it was replaced with a sort of solemn optimism, and he pledged to them, silently, to do the best he could.

Then, in a turn of remembrance as unexpected as it was sudden, Carlos wondered if Captain Viktor would have been proud of him.

Carlos didn't have long to mentally adjust to his new station. That Sunday morning at about 3 am, his phone rang, rattling against his bedside table like the banging of a screen door in a particularly strong wind. It jolted Jill awake, and she moaned and rubbed at her eyes while Carlos had a short, stilted conversation with the man on the other end of the line, the broad of his upper back slatted with moonlight that peeked from the spaces between the window-blinds.

"Yessir. When? …understood. I'll make contact." She watched him climb out of bed and make a series of calls that were equally short, all with the same details.

"Listen to you," she said, and he turned to her like he thought she was asleep and her voice had startled him, "doing fancy NCO things with your fancy NCO patches."

"Just a fire team leader," he said, "I know I make it hard to control yourself, but… don't get too excited. This time, anyway."

Carlos spoke and fell into joking with his trademark ease, but his movements were short, unsure, and he forgot a certain few items more than once, having to cross the room over and over to retrieve them. Jill tilted her head. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah. …kind of." Carlos said. "Little nervous. Just first-day shakes, it'll pass."

"Just shows that you're taking it seriously," she said, "you'll do fine. Just be yourself." She watched him dress, the blue-purple shadows casting the carved lines and dips of his body in stark, hard, black reliefs. "Have I ever told you that I'm jealous?"

Carlos looked up to her from where he knelt, cinched the laces of his boots with the sharp whizz of fabric. "I wouldn't be. I told you I work with Kevin, right?"

Jill smiled. "…that's a good point, actually. But I'm serious. Just reminds me of getting to go into the field, I guess."

"Yeah, well, you'll be out there makin' 'em sorry again soon enough. You deserve some time to—"

"—rest. I know, I know."

Carlos laughed, a soft puff of air through his nose. "Startin' to sound like a broken record, huh."

"Maybe a little bit."

They fell into a companionable silence, and Jill watched him rifle through the gear in his bag, checking to make sure everything was present and intact. She laid back down. He tried his best to be quiet, but Carlos was as quiet as a bull at the best of times; if he wasn't clomping around in heavy boots and opening every cupboard and door in the apartment, he was talking to himself, making stupid jokes, knocking his head on things and cursing. But now, he was tiptoeing as best he could.

Carlos leaned over her, and the mattress bowed and creaked under his weight. "I'm gonna roll out. You wanna come lock the door?"

Jill extended a hand. He grabbed it and pulled her to her feet. She followed him, rubbing her eyes.

It was 3 am and Jill was tired and sore, not given to deep philosophical thought or introspection in hours such as these. But watching his nervousness made her nervous, knowing his chances of making a mistake leapt up by exponents. It was more than a feeling of fear; something had changed that early morning, a subtle but clear difference between when she'd fallen asleep and when she woke. Now it wasn't just intellectual — it was real, and it felt like she was watching her heart walk around outside of her chest, soft and imminently vulnerable. Open to damage. It was a strange, sudden emotional pressure that gave her pause. She reached out and touched his arm, just over the new patch, still stiff and freshly stitched to the corded sleeve of his black fatigues. He turned to look at her.

"Be careful," she said, "come back safe. Okay?"

Carlos smiled, tired and wan, and after a moment's consideration, pulled her into an embrace. She stood there as long as he would let her, sucked up his smell and his closeness and his voice like parched soil sucked up rainwater, unsure when it would see it next.

"What's the best thing about Switzerland?" He asked, against the mussed brush of her hair.

Jill blinked. "What?" She asked.

"Well, the flag's a big plus."

Jill pulled away, sharp and fast, and glared at him, but was unable to fight back a smile. "You're the worst. Just the absolute worst."

"I know. I'll keep practicing." Carlos kissed her on her temple, and as he pulled away, he touched her stomach in a brief, gentle caress. It was a simple gesture, maybe even absentminded on his part — he didn't comment further or make a show of his touches, but Jill felt them. Felt them very clearly.

Then he turned, walked down the stairs, loaded his bag in his car, and pulled away.

Jill closed the door, clicked the lock. She stood there in the darkness, thinking. They'd been through so many dramatic overtures, so many end-of-the-world scenarios, so many things that — if you were in a movie, or something — undoubtedly proved the way one person felt about another. Character revealers, shown but never told. But that morning, she thought about the strange, simple way he'd tried to move so quietly so she could sleep. How he'd tried to console her, like it was her going out into the field on foreign soil before the crack of dawn. How he'd given her a goodbye, not content to leave without holding her, and then that stupid joke…

Jill caught herself smiling, despite herself. She knew that pressure in her chest, that reaction to a him-shaped hole as soon as he'd departed.

"God damn it," she said. Then, quietly, "fuck."

There were complications in that relationship of show-don't-tell. New jobs and deployments and pregnancies and trials. All very heavy things. But, irrevocable as some of them were, king among all these was love: the ultimate complication, and the only one with the power to change every single one of the others. Turn it to something different and beautiful. Or something terrifying, as she was learning in the deep jeweled hues of dawn.

Jill returned to the bedroom and attempted, unsuccessfully, to sleep. After two hours of tossing and turning, despite her exhaustion, she rose with the early morning sun and sat on the living room couch, watching the news. She eventually slumped over its arm in a heavy doze, and slept while the pretty blonde woman on the set spoke in grave, clipped tones about next week's upcoming Congressional trial.

May 21, 1999
Somewhere outside Baños de Agua Santa, Ecuador

The day started early in the vaulting brightness of an airport terminal. A flight from DC to Atlanta; then a connection they almost missed from Atlanta to Lima, Peru; then one more flight to a city named Quito inside the tight, insular borders of their final destination: Ecuador.

Quito was a city of stark whites shot through with black and terra cotta buildings piled around one central hill like worshipers upon their prayer cloths. Exhausted and jet-lagged, the team wandered outside in the baking heat to a bus terminal, where a team of two men were waiting. One of the men spoke broken English and the other none at all, both with skin as dark and shining as ochre, black eyes and wide, pale yellow smiles. They had a truck like someone would move house in, barren save for two benches on each side of the dingy white interior, studded with racing light rows of thick metal bolts that held the box of the truck together. The air was still and wet, heavy with the smell of sweat and dirt and stale paint. They sat on the benches, jostled and rocked by every strut of root, every chunk of rock under the truck's tires as they rambled down the wide, single dirt road that led away from the city.

Carlos wanted to speak but couldn't find the right words. He didn't want to sound like a fuckhead, recalled the young officers who'd spin by OCS for a few months then come back fully aware of the echelon of importance they'd been ushered into, with new speaking cadences and old biases, both wielded like weapons. Then he thought of Captain Viktor — Mikhail. To get him started, he tried to channel the old Tank, how he'd talk to his crew like they already knew what they were doing and just needed the gaps filled in, would go from there. It was worth a shot.

"Alright," Carlos said, "you guys've been to the jungle before, right?"

They turned their heads to him, their eyes meeting in silent questions. Head shakes in the negative met Carlos' question.

"No big deal. Okay, huddle close," he said. They leaned in, a parliament of sweat-sheened bodies and white faces already pink from the heat in the air, upper lips wet and hair limp under the moisture. Carlos gave a brief rundown of the problematic wildlife, mostly bugs and spiders; the need for venom extractors to stay nearby and in good working order; the need to tie back or cover your hair to protect from ticks.

"Sounds like god damned Jumanji," one man said.

"So here's what's going on," Carlos said, unfolding a plastic map. "There's a city called Baños de Agua Santa — real tourist trappy kind of place. Supposedly sacred ground. Right outside Baños," he indicated a thatch mark on the map with a point of his finger, "are small villages, miles between 'em at a time. Umbrella's got a medical clinic for poor communities out there. Opened it to combat the AIDS epidemic, back in '93 when it was real bad in South America. Quiet, not much comes out of there."

"But now it ain't so quiet?" Kevin asked.

"Or it's too quiet." Kennedy said.

"Bingo," Carlos continued, "Uncle Sam's ordered 'em to fork over their medical records dating back to '93, but they've been radio silent ever since. Locals've been no help. We're supposed to go in and take the records, or document that there aren't any and bring back any employees we find."

"They're expecting trouble, clearly." Kennedy said, tilting his head and squinting at the map. "Are they thinking a bioweapon leak, or…?"

"Not sure what we're gonna find," Carlos said, "but they couldn't risk sending in the military, or it'd look like an act of war. So it's on us to find out what happened. These guys'll take us as close to the basin as they can, then it's a trek through about two days of rainforest to get there."

"Pff. They want trouble, I got some they can have." Kevin said.

"So it's mostly data collection," Kennedy said.

"We're hopin'." Carlos finished. "But we gotta be ready for anything, knowing these fuckers."

The truck stopped some hours later. They paid the drivers and baby-stepped in single file down a steep, grassy hill. Carlos pulled down a vine and it cracked in his hand, and once they entered the jungle, it was like entering a magic doorway into a children's story, all green finery and filtered light and alien noises. They walked and walked and walked, hacking at obstacles with machetes, covered in sweat almost as soon as they'd touched feet onto the fertile peat. Some hours in, a large cat with gleaming yellow eyes and a jet black coat sat by the path, watching them. Carlos encouraged them to just ignore it and walk behind him, but never to run — they didn't think you were food until you acted like food, and food ran. The team trailed after him, with slow, paranoid steps. The cat flicked at a bug with its ear and turned its curious head to watch them pass, then left without fanfare, having had its fill of its new guests.

The trip took just over two days on foot. They took breaks for water and sleep and food under tangles of mosquito nets, never stopping for more than two hours at a time before pressing forward. Clouds of curious black flies and vibrating mosquitoes followed them, held at a grudging distance by acrid coatings of bug spray. At one point the overhead canopy shook and they readied their weapons at the commotion. The chittering of monkeys squeaked from a branch, and then was gone in a flurry of freed leaves that drifted down like feathers. The noise spooked a nearby tarantula the size of Carlos' fist, which spun in place on a tree trunk just inches from Kevin's face, then skittered away to the safety of the forest floor. "JESUS!" Kevin screamed in surprise, and they laughed at him.

"Gonna make it?" Carlos patted Kevin on the back, and Kevin jumped again.

"It's official," Kevin lifted his black baseball cap, smoothed his dark auburn hair down against his head, and pulled the hat back over his forehead until it fit snug. "I hate the jungle. How's Canada this time of year? Anyone know?"

A chorus of jeering mumbles sounded as they passed Kevin in a line, stopped to playfully shove at him or pull his hat down over his eyes. "Hey, don't pretend like you love this shit either, fuckers." He followed after, rifle pointed at the ground.

As much as they fucked with Kevin, as much as they poked fun and laughed at his plights at the best of times, it was his sharp eyes and powers of observation that brought a single, sobering fact to the fore when their trip was almost through, near dusk on the second day. Kevin wiped his face, squinted around, screwed his mouth to the side, then asked:

"So… Where the fuck did all the animals go? I don't even hear bugs."

Kennedy made a sudden sound of surprise, a whap, and then an exclamation of disgust. He held out his hand; on the vented black leather of his glove, the body of a mosquito twitched and shook in its death throes. The insect was the size of Kennedy's hand, stretched edge-to-edge; one of its eyes was bulbous and milky and huge, almost the size of a large marble, the side of its body caved out to make room for the heft of it. Out of the monstrous lump on the side of its body, another set of four long, thread-spindly legs snatched and clawed at the air in impotent desperation, as if another animal entirely was trying to crawl out of the mosquito's carapace. Kennedy made another noise of fear, and shook his hand like a cat that had stepped on a strip of tape until the dead insect's body dislodged from him and fell to the floor with a gentle tap.

"We're getting close," Carlos said, "gotta be."

"Doesn't look good," Kevin said, and stomped on the bug, scraped his boot on the jungle floor.

Carlos moved ahead of the unit by a handful of paces, scanning the ground for traps or tripwires. The edge of the treeline presented itself, the huge, gnarled root systems becoming occasional and then petering out completely. He crouched, and peeked out from behind a massive tree, its bark clustered with dead white fungi that hung in a peeling linoleum curtain. The unit crept up behind Carlos and hunkered down.

"Holy shit," Kevin said, as he peered down the sights of his rifle. "What the fuck is that…?"

Carlos unfolded his binoculars and looked. The medical center was tiny by American standards. When compared to the sprawling, mirrored multiplexes that housed Emergency Rooms back home, it was downright pitiful. Perhaps the size of a small grocery store. It was built from grey cement, with a curling dirt drive-up that lead from, and to, the only road that Carlos could see, down the hill about half a mile. There were no parking spaces; you dropped someone off here and left. No sleepovers. A plastic sign with an illustration of a flying dove, branch of leaves in its beak hung over the door:

Nuestra Señora de los Dolores
Fundado 1993

Carlos looked to the right to where Kevin gestured his attention. A pit had been dug into the dirt, the size of a large swimming pool. In it was nothing — nothing but three or four black tactical shovels, left buried point-down in the pit or thrown to its side.

"Someone's cleaning up a mess," Kennedy said. "A big one. I'm turning on my bodycam."

"Good idea," Carlos said, and switched his on as well. The rest of the men in the unit followed suit.

"I got the heebie jeebies just standing here," said one of the other men, "something's fucky, Heavy."

Kennedy took out his camera and began to silently snap photos. He took twenty if he took one, then messed with the handset of his recorder. They sat, sweating in the bush, wiping away wetness from their foreheads and their upper lips. Carlos peered up to the canopy. Without the animals, without the everpresent chitter of insects and small birds, something ominous and dark swept over the trees, even though the sun dappled through the emerald green boughs with as much cheer as he'd ever seen, sending spinning spots of light onto the soil like a huge disco ball.

"How long does it take to send that to control?" Kevin asked. "I'm sweating bullets over here."

"Backing it up," Kennedy said, "the signal's weak. Give me two more minutes." The team waited. A drop of sweat pooled on the sharp point of Kennedy's nose, then fell to the hot floor below. Even under the heat that turned his pale skin boiling pink and his hair a sweaty tumble, Kennedy was one of those guys that couldn't be ugly if he tried, all chiseled angles and full lips; even the way he looked confused and serious at his computer equipment looked like he was smoldering for a photo, rather than plunked into the lurid humidity of the Ecuadorian jungle. Even a two-day trek didn't ugly him up. Carlos might have been a touch envious at the lack of upkeep this indicated. Then, Kennedy said, "Its gone. We're good."

Kevin looked around. After a moment to survey, he crouched beside Carlos. "You sure this is the place? Looks abandoned to me."

"Me too," Carlos agreed. His eyes drifted back over to the pit, the black shovels thrown to the side. "Someone made a pit to bury or burn something but didn't get the chance. Let's hope it is and make this quick."

As they approached the door, a large, silver-colored logo — an umbrella, its points reaching in every direction — was built into the cement entrance floor like a star on the walk of fame, scuffed almost smooth from years of foot traffic, dirt ground into the corners and the textures.

"Of fuckin' course," one of the men said, "always so proud of their stupid fucking logo." He spat on it.

"Kennedy," Carlos said, and Kennedy was already behind him, readying to snap photos. The remaining four men followed after him, scanning the place, guns at the ready while he worked.

While they did so, Carlos drifted to a large poster tacked to the hospital's front window, behind a shield of protective glass, its colors faded and stolen by the abusive South American sun. It had a picture of a woman, smiling down at a small child while the child washed her tiny hands in a basin, soap frothed up to her wrists. Las manos limpias son manos felices! It declared. Then, below, in Portuguese, it repeated the same. Below that, some sort of European language he couldn't place. Then, finally, in English, Clean hands are happy hands!.

"Bet your hands are real happy right now," Carlos mumbled.

"What's it say?" Kevin asked, and stopped beside him. Spanish was close enough to Portuguese — his family's native language, the one his mother had insisted on speaking at home his entire life, and would smack at him with a sandal if he tried to speak English instead — that Carlos could take an educated guess on what it meant.

"What, the sign? It's in Spanish, but… Our Lady of… Sadness? Pain? Something like that." He said. "Sounds like fun."

"Wait," Kevin said, nonplussed, "you don't speak Spanish?"

"Nah. Do you?"

"You're fuckin' with me. I thought you were Mexican?"

Carlos thought it was a joke, but Kevin's confused expression told him otherwise. "Oh yeah?" Carlos stilled his face, raised an eyebrow. "Well, I ain't. That a problem?"

Kevin's earnest expression became embarrassed, panicked. "Oh. I uh — sorry, man, I just thought you all knew, well…"

"What do you mean 'you all'?"

"Don't be like that. I just thought… you know..."

"I'm fuckin' with you." Carlos laughed. "I don't care."

Kevin let out a breath, wiped his forehead with his arm. The reddish-brown hair on his arm was slicked flat with sweat. "Man, fuck you." He said.

Carlos tapped Kevin's nose from the underside, made his face tip up with a jolt of surprise. It was then Kennedy and the others returned. The team waited for him to do his evidence-collecting computer magic a final time, leaned against the pillars and the walls.

"Sorry guys," Kennedy apologized, jabbing at the controls, "shouldn't be much… there. All good."

"Alright," Carlos said, "check your gear, safeties off. I don't gotta tell you how to handle this shit so I'm not gonna pretend I do. Get in, get out."

"You said it," one of the men said, "I'm ready to get back in some fuckin' AC. And a beer."

"Hey, hey wait—" Kennedy said, and held up a hand. "You smell that?"

They stopped and looked at him.

"Blood?" Kevin said.

Kennedy nodded. "It kind of smells… sweet. Do you smell it?"

Carlos nodded as well. Kennedy was a full-grown man, only two handfuls of years younger than he, but plain as day, Carlos could see him sopping up the lessons and the teachings, applying them to the missions with studious intent. It made Carlos feel like maybe this gig wasn't going to be such a hard sell, after all.

"Yup," he said, "good call. Behind me. Lets get it done and get back home ASAP."

With that, Carlos led them through the blue-black of the front door, and into the unknown that lay beyond.

May 21, 1999
Washington, D.C.

That morning, after the morning news had subsided its incessant chatter and before lunchtime, Jill's phone rang. The tiny device beeped out an electronic version of the reveille horns that were such a terrible thing during her stint in the Army, the ones they played every morning at wakeup. It was annoying and strident but that was the point — it never let her sleep. She groaned and leaned over, checked the caller ID. She didn't recognize the number.

"Hello?" She said, and leaned back against the couch.

"Good morning. I'm looking for Jill Valentine. This is Captain Harris of the Federal Bioterrorism Commission."

"Oh!" Jill said, in surprise, and sat up. "Good morning, sir. How are you?"

"Just fine," he said, "I'm calling because Doctor Behara told me you were looking for opportunities to help the Commission. Considering your resume, we've much to discuss. Do you have time today to come down?"

"Of course," Jill said, her chest filled with excitement. "Absolutely. What time would be best for you?"

"I think three should be fine," he said, "do you have a pen so you can write the directions down?"

Jill knew the area well. It was down the street from the compound where she'd been treated by the same people; a bad memory, and returning to that place left a bad taste in her mouth, like returning to the scene of a crime where you'd been victimized. But her personal feelings didn't matter, outstripped with the brisk energy of optimism and hope. When she hung up, she, perhaps out of instinct, turned to call for Carlos, to tell him the good news. When she realized he wasn't there, it was a strange wilting feeling, some of the victory diminished.

When Jill Valentine presented to Harris' office that afternoon, his first shock was just how petite she was. She was slender and compact, and even though she wore a pair of sensible low heels and he was only a humble five-foot-ten, she was short enough that he had to look down to her by degrees. They shook hands, hers of delicate size, but of a grip deceptively sturdy against his. If he hadn't seen the evidence for himself, he'd have called you a liar when you'd told him this was the Jill Valentine of infamy; she looked better suited to some sort of sport where her diminutive size wouldn't have been a drawback. Definitely not some sort of Larger Than Life action hero.

"Miss Valentine, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance," he said, "finally."

"The pleasure's all mine," she said, with a warm smile. It lit her face from within. "Thank you, Captain."

"Of course. Please, sit."

He offered her coffee, which she declined, but she did accept a glass of water.

"So," he said, "you said you wanted to help our operations, specifically where they pertain to Umbrella."

"That's right," she agreed.

"But you're set to testify before the Congressional committee next week, are you not?"

"That's correct."

"Hm. Well, your testimony is what's important at this juncture," the Captain said, "and we expect it to take some time. Cutting off the head of the Hydra, as it were. But after that's over and done with, we'd be glad to have you aboard, so consider this your offer letter." He paused. "Now… there is some concern about fraternization, as its come to my attention that one of our soldiers in a position of command and yourself have a history pertaining to the incident in Raccoon City. We've had some discussions of your safety in the past, and I don't think he'd be able to command you in an impartial manner." To Jill's confused tilt of her head, he said, "I'm sure he'll know what I'm talking about. So field operations would be out, of course, at least on my team. But intelligence would be perfect, if you're so inclined."

"Yes," she said, "any way I can help, I will. Intelligence, field operations — I'm here to be used however I can be."

"So," he said, and leaned forward with his elbows against the desk, "tell me some ways you can help us."

Valentine's eyes, somewhere between gray and the brightest blue he'd ever seen, became solemn. Any shred of a smile of her face died to embers.

"I have eyewitness testimony," she said, "hard evidence. Files collected. Suicide notes from Umbrella mercenaries. Photos. Virus samples. My blood is evidence, in and of itself. Everything I have or will have is pledged to destroy them for what they've done. And if I can serve as a conduit for your Commission doing so, everything I've got is yours. But more than that - I know how they work. I know who they are, and I know how to cut them down where they need to be. Just point me in the right direction, and they're as good as a crater in the ground. I promise you that."

The Captain smiled and suddenly, in a great rush, came around to understanding the many infatuations that seemed to hover around her like a perfume. She was pretty enough, sure; but her intensity was what grabbed and shook you. Even now, with all he knew, he felt its fingers curling around the core of him. He understood, started to believe, despite himself.

"I very much appreciate your enthusiasm." He said. "I'm glad you came forward. This will be an amazing stabilizing force to our operations. I think we can do great things together."

Valentine responded with a genuine rush of agreement, of thanks, and at the hope in her face, he almost felt a pang of guilt.

Almost.

They talked a bit more about logistics; about dates and times, payscales, benefits. Convincing minutiae. Valentine finished her water, and she stood again. They said their goodbyes and shook hands. He promised to be in touch after the trial for her start date and debriefing. The Captain watched her leave, click the door politely closed behind her. After a moment, when he was sure she was gone, he fished a small clamshell phone out of the locked drawer of his desk, dialed a few numbers on the keypad. Then he leaned back in his full leather seat, enough to make it creak.

"Uh uh. She came in just now Pretty little thing, huh?" Speaking on the other end. "No, I didn't. I pushed her off. Who do you want? Sullivan?" He pulled up to his desk, scribbled a note. "How much?"

The Captain wrote down the dollar figure. It was more than they were paying him — of course, they'd put all four of his children through school at Yale and Penn, but this was enough to retire on, for one person. He made a mental note to bring that up once this was all over.

The man on the other end said something else. "No, no word back yet," the Captain responded, "It should be soon, unless the jungle did our work for us. I'll let you know when I hear something."

The Captain hung up, and made another call. "Sullivan. I need your location. We've got a job for you. Get a load of this: 350 k. Yes, just for her. Yes I'm sure. Just do it, please."

After the conversation ceased and he clapped the phone shut, the Captain sat back with his fingers laced over his stomach. He was glad she'd swallowed the line about the testimony — it was a slick piece of off-the-cuff misdirection on his part, given she wouldn't be around to give testimony, either way it went. Any jerkoff could have orchestrated that, but the counter-terrorism team was the real gem; he'd sent them on enough hunts to prop up their confidence, even elected an actual leader, before dancing them into the waiting arms of Umbrella's clean-up team. Nobody would question if they'd run into too much trouble. That was the real beauty of recruiting people who'd lost everything — nobody would come looking. MIA, KIA, it was all the same in the end. Except this time, KIA netted him about 75 thousand dollars a head. It was steep, even by Umbrella's standards, but every other avenue had failed, and they were on the defensive, desperate to avoid a surprise at trial. A real two for one fire sale.

The Captain paused for thought, brief and regretful. But then justification took hold. It wasn't his fault this was how the world worked; he was just doing his best to survive. Nobody could fault him that, surely. And if they did, well, chances are he could pay them to not. It hadn't failed him yet.

The Captain lit the thick brown tube of a cigar he'd stored his desk for special occasions just like this one, took a deep drag, and daydreamed of what he'd spend it all on.