POP! POP! POP!

Another zombie pitched forward, its ruined face slamming into the corner of the desk as it tumbled to the floor. Off to my right, Chris and Jill's unsuppressed shots signaled more of the abominations meeting their end.

"Clear.

"Clear.

"All clear."

We moved through the hallway, covering windows after that last bit of contact, fucking dogs had jumped right through them… We checked the room for any clues, trying to piece together what the fuck was going on even as we mowed down the things that dared attack us. We'd cleared the first floor like the team we were, but this place was built like a puzzle box on steroids, and it slowed us down. Finally, we reached the end and a door that looked ready to fall off the hinges.

Chris reached it first, jiggling the knob slowly, "Locked."

"Check, on it," I whispered, moving forward, fully intending to boot the fucking thing into oblivion.

"H-Hello?"

Rebecca?

"Becca?" Chris called.

"CHRIS! Help!"

Chris wasted no time, rearing back and kicking the door clean off the hinges, we moved in and fanned out.

"Clear!" I shouted, getting the all-clear from Jill a beat later. The smell hit me like a punch in my already sore jaw, old and musty, but with an edge of something dark and dangerous that kept my rifle tight to my shoulder. Rebecca was in the center of the L-shaped room, holding a limp figure in her arms.

Richard.

I dumped my pack and dropped to my knees next to them, "Becca, I need an assessment."

She shook a little, but the kid was gone, and in her place was something else. Her voice was strong when she spoke, "Puncture wounds on the left side of the chest both anterior and posterior, probable internal hemorrhaging, breath sounds are decreased, pneumothorax is likely, left lung is involved. But we've got bigger problems, do you have shears?"

I nodded, pulling them from my vest and passing them to her; she slid the blade under the hem of Richard's combat shirt and sliced it open in one swift motion, exposing the wounds.

Oh shit.

Around the two perfect holes, spaced about eighteen inches apart, the skin was ugly, mottled, veins were visible and inflamed big time, matching his arms' exposed skin. In a flash, I was back in the SOCM schoolhouse, watching a PowerPoint on animal bites.

"We can see from the radiating inflammation and venous prominence around the bite pattern, that there is an active venomous process. Can anybody give me something."

A young Ranger at the back of the room raised his hand, "Looks like a snakebite, sir…"

"He's been poisoned, but that," I held my forearm to his chest, "is way too fucking big…"

"To be a snakebite?" Rebecca finished, "It's not, and I can explain why, but we don't have time; there's a medical storeroom, one floor down," She pointed over her shoulder, "it was fully stocked and might have what I need to mix an anti-venom."

I nodded, "Then we go get it," I stood up; Chris and Jill looked at me expectantly, almost like…

They're waiting on my orders.

I took a breath and stepped up, "Chris, you and Rebecca double-time it upstairs, grab what she needs and haul ass back here. Jill, you stay here and set security with me."

"On it," Chris affirmed, grabbing Rebecca's hand and pulling her to her feet.

I grabbed Rich's assault pack's straps and dragged the delirious Bravo over to a corner, propping him against the wall, "Hang on, brother."

Chris and Rebecca pushed up the stairs, the teenage medic flashing me a thumbs up as she passed. The kid continued to impress. Jill crossed the room and covered as they pushed down the stairs and beyond. She waited for a moment before falling back to where I was covering the far door, the only one we hadn't secured yet. Coming on-line and bumping her shoulder into mine gently.

"Jill?" I whispered, my eyes never leaving the door.

"Yeah?"

"Love you, baby." I needed to say it, and the words flowing out of me soothed the pain and confusion I had buried.

"I love you too, babe. When we get out of this fucking hell-hole, I'm going to show you just how much."

Her sweet and salacious answer pulled a chuckle from me, despite everything, despite Richard fighting for his life and everyone we'd lost.

It was a moment of normalcy in this hell…

That was swiftly broken when something crashed into the uncleared door, a grating sound made it clear that something had hit and was sliding down the sagging wood. My rifle and Jill's Beretta snapped up, the tension slowly let off, and the door bowed back to normal.

"What the fuck was that?" Jill whispered.

I made a call, the door wouldn't take another hit like that, and we had to keep Richard safe until Chris and Rebecca got back, "Stay here."

"You're going IN THERE?." Jill whisper-shouted.

I pulled a frag out of my vest and handed Jill my rifle, drawing my Glock 34. "Nope. Cover me," I was done with things that went bump in the night, taking slow, measured steps until I was set on the knob side. I looked back; Jill had my rifle shouldered, aimed, and ready. I took a deep breath, holstering my pistol, my thumb slipping through the pin, and my other hand reaching out for the knob as the pin came free.

In a rush of movement, I yanked the door open just enough to catch sight of something monstrous on the other side, coiling, scaly, evil-looking. Two thoughts flashing across my addled mind.

That's a big fucking snake.

And goodbye, spawn of Satan!

I pitched the grenade into the room, laughing a little madly at the sheer unreality of what I was seeing, slamming the door shut and pinning myself to the wall. A pounding Crumpf that rattled the fillings in my head and made my jaw throb painfully, a second later followed by a vicious shrieking that bubbled into nothing told the tale.

"G'night fucker," I growled, throwing the door open wide and drawing my handgun. The snake thrashed, blood spraying the walls, the thing was easily twenty feet long, scaly body doubled on itself twice over, it was screeching and pulling itself along, trying to get to a hole in the far wall.

Trying to escape.

Nope.

I pulled the last frag, firing at the thing with my off-hand, the nine-millimeter impacts tearing ragged holes in its flesh, but not slowing the fucking thing down even a little. It rounded on me, and for a second, we locked eyes. Fear, cold and burning, ran down my spine as its screaming ceased, and it looked right through me. I saw madness in its eyes, pure and unblinking animal madness mixed with feral rage.

In a flash, it came for me, changing directions like it was nothing, I pulled the pin, letting the spoon go free, and hurled the grenade right into the center of the writhing mass, my now free hand slammed the door shut, I braced against it, and a moment later, the grenade blew, taking the door off the hinges, slamming it and me onto the floor. I rolled over, shoving the door off me and aiming my gun into the darkened room.

Nothing moved.

Slowly, a pool of blood edged its way out of the room into the hallway; I crawled backward towards Jill, trying to stay ahead of the seeping fluid. I bumped into her shins, and she grabbed the strap on my plate carrier and pulled me to my feet, keeping my rifle aimed into the abyss with her off-hand. I leaned forward, bracing my hands on my knees.

"Fuck me. Fucking bullshit…Goddamnit."

"Did ya get it?"

I stared up at her, disbelieving, did she really just say that? A second later, I snorted, cracking up even as I tried pulling myself together against the rising pain in my jaw.

"Fucking hell Jill."

The far door crashed open, Chris in the lead, his AR up and scanning, Rebecca close behind, "You guys good?"

"We're good," Jill called back.

I pointed at the pool of blood as Rebecca slid to her knees next to Rich, pulling out a vial and a syringe before injecting him high in the neck. "Speak for yourself, Valentine. How, and I can't stress this part enough, the FUCK! Does a snake get that big?!"

"I know how," Rebecca said softly, "Let's get Richard somewhere safe, and I can explain."

We ringed up around Chris as he hauled Rich to his feet, moving back through the cleared area, finding a side room with a couch and no windows, and laying the Bravo on it, I slid my pack beneath his head; it was the best I could do for now. We closed and locked the door, piling some furniture in front of it. It was a token effort, and we knew it, but we had a place to hold out for the moment.

"We found Barry,"

All eyes were on Chris as he spoke.

"Is he?" I let it hang.

"No, he's alive, insisted on going after the Captain, said they got separated. But I don't know, something was off, he seemed jumpy, scared even."

Barry didn't seem like the guy to spook; hell, he was bigger than half the shit running around here, but who prepared for this?

"This place has us all on edge, what gets me is that he wanted to go alone, who the fuck does that?" Chris ended with a note of frustration, grappling with something he couldn't understand.

I sympathized, rule number one, you never go anywhere alone. Now we had to find him again. But first, I wanted to know what the fuck was going on.

"Rebecca? Care to fill us in?"

She jumped when I called her name but nodded, and when she began to speak, I wished she hadn't. She talked about the helo going sideways, a train, and Ed, ripped apart by dogs, just like Joe. She spoke of a train, someone helping her survive her own nightmare; all the death and carnage she'd seen made my heart break for the kid who wasn't a kid anymore. We listened, let her spill everything until she said the words that stopped my heart in my chest.

"Umbrella's behind everything."

Oh, Jesus.

"What do you mean, Becca? How?" Jill asked, a note of horrified understanding creeping into her voice.

"They're developing bio-weapons, all of this," She gestured around the room, "The zombies, the snake, all of it, it's all because of a virus they developed to turn organisms into living biological weapons."

"Christ," Chris whispered.

It all snapped into place, everything I'd heard during my time in Salt Lake. I thought the worst of it was some unethical research, maybe some corner-cutting, but this? This made everything I'd told myself look tame.

Shake it off, you didn't know, this is so inconceivable it comes with a built-in alibi.

With the enormity of what we were facing finally laid bare, we sat in silence for a moment before Chris spoke, steel in his voice, "We have to get out of here alive, the world needs to know what Umbrella did here, what they're doing behind closed doors."

"Fuckin' A." Jill affirmed.

I nodded, "Let's focus on getting out of here first, Jill? Stay here with Rebecca, Chris? Let's move out and clear the second floor, we've got to find the rest of the guys."

He nodded, sliding a fresh mag into his AR.

I checked my kit, making sure nothing important had come loose; I pointed at my pack, still under Rich's head. "Rebecca, all my med gear is in that bag, anything you need you use. There's basic surgical kit, ketamine, everything you'll need to get Rich ready to move."

She nodded, offering me a small tired smile, "I'll do what I can."

I walked over and laid a hand on her shoulder, "You can do this, Becca, you've gotten this far, you're my new hero."

She beamed a little and nodded again, a light coming back into her green eyes.

I smiled, squeezing her shoulder; she hadn't signed up for this, none of us had, but I'd be goddamned if it wasn't gonna count for something when the dust settled. I turned to follow Chris to the door when a pair of arms wrapped around me; I smelled blood and grime, but the soft touch that had enchanted and intoxicated me for the first time all those months ago chased it away.

I leaned against Jill for a heartbeat, wrapping my gloved fingers around her arm. "Be careful," She whispered.

"You too, babe, back before you know it."

She squeezed once before letting me go. I gave her one last look, stacking up behind Chris, tapping his shoulder, and we were out and moving.

We cleared and re-cleared the first floor, moving up the main hall stairs to the second floor; doors led in every direction, but we'd done this dance more than once, the far door was first.

"Locked," Chris whispered, "got some weird emblem here, looks like we need a specific key." He looked back at me and grinned at what I was up to.

I was already unspooling det-cord, "Yeah, fuck that."

Forrest Speyer was dead. Not just dead but savaged almost beyond recognition. After Chris and I had breached the door, we'd found him on the balcony overlooking the courtyard, hundreds of small cuts covered his face. The blank staring holes where his eyes used to be were the crowning horror, taking a piece of Forrest so personal, and so intimate, that it seemed like the final "fuck you" from this nightmare factory.

Chris hadn't moved, when Forrest's body had risen off the floor, moaning softly, Chris had stepped forward and shot the thing he'd become in the face. Now he was on his knees next to our fallen friend's body, staring off into space.

I sniffed back a few tears; Forrest was a good man and an even better friend. But how I knew him and how Chris knew him were two entirely different things. "Chris, we've gotta keep moving, man."

He looked up at the sound of my voice, and I was reminded of just how young he was. Tears shone in his eyes, but he never let them fall, "Y-yeah, okay Kelly, let's go."

I offered a hand and pulled him to his feet, "We'll make them pay, Chris, I give you my word they'll pay in spades."

His voice wavered a little when he spoke, but his eyes were hard. "They're gonna fucking burn for this."

"Amen, brother."

We moved around the second floor, blowing the doors we couldn't open. The puzzle was starting to take shape, documents we found all pointed to a lab underneath the mansion, a testing facility for Umbrella's abhorrent experiments, something about crests and keys and a door in the main hall leading to the entrance, how Umbrella's founder had built this mansion to his own personal, completely insane, specifications. There was no sign of Barry or Wesker, even as we rounded the third-floor stairwell. I thought I'd seen everything this house had to offer; nothing could've prepared me for what we ran into as we worked our way back down.

The thing that stood in our path looked like someone had coerced an alligator into fucking a cement truck, built like a brick shit-house, with long limbs rippling with muscles and claws that looked like they could slice through a tank. It caught sight of us as we came down the stairs, for a moment we stared at one another, then it's jaw unhinged, hideous mismatched teeth on full display as it screamed long and loud, leaving my ears ringing.

"Yeah fuck you too!" Chris roared, opening up with his shorty AR, the round impacting all over the things face, blasting it to pieces, it stumbled back a step, and Chris kept laying into it, but the fucking thing just wouldn't die. I side-stepped him, firing ten rounds like lightning, laying on the trigger with everything I had.

Finally, the thing folded, pitching backward onto the carpeted floor, shrieking in agony, as it convulsed. Chris jumped the last three steps, careful to stay out of those claws' reach, and shot it in the face one final time. Mercifully the thing finally died, its limbs going slack.

"Fuck me," I whispered. Chris and I shared a look that spoke volumes.

Fuck this whole fucking place.

I nodded at our unspoken agreement, and we hustled back to Jill and Rebecca.

I knew something was wrong when I pushed the door open; soft sniffling caught my ears; I lunged into the room, my heart in my throat. Jill sat with her back against the far wall, and Rebecca cradled against her chest, the latter crying softly. Jill looked up at the noise, fresh tears on her face.

"Jill?"

"Richard's gone." She whispered, her voice cracking.

"Forrest, too," Chris added, his voice thick with emotion.

Rebecca just cried harder, small sobs wracking her. Her whole team was gone, except for her Captain; I wasn't going to let her join them.

"Motherfucker…" I ran a grimy hand through my hair, this place was picking us off one by one, I looked at Jill, the thought of her torn open, wandering these halls as a monster until someone came along and put her down… I was gonna get them out of here if it killed me.

Chris seemed to sense where my head was at; he gently nudged me with his shoulder and whispered, "We'll get them out, Mike."

I nodded but didn't respond, mostly because I didn't know what I'd do with myself if we couldn't. I cleared my throat a moment later, "We think we found a way out, there's a lab facility that runs under this whole place, we have to get back to the main hall."

Rebecca didn't hear me, or couldn't; I was about to move when Chris crossed the room and took a knee next to her and Jill, whispering something in her ear that I couldn't hear. After a few moments, she nodded, standing up and wiping her tears; when she met my gaze, her eyes were hard.

Chris pulled Jill to her feet, and my motley little outfit moved out. The main hall was still deserted. We moved up to the landing, the slots for the crests greeted us. I pulled out my slap charges, not even close to playing Spencer's fucking games, spooling out the det-cord to a safe distance, just inside the dining-room door.

"Fire in the hole," I whispered, hitting the clacker.

SNAP-BOOM!

Bits of plaster shook loose and rained down on us, the wave causing a dull throb in my jaw, but when I peeked the corner, I smiled through the pain.

Our way out was wide open.