This chapter the song is "Fix Me" by 10 Years, but I'm BEGGING YOU – don't listen to an acoustic version. That's just NOT how the song should ever go. This is the last chapter. Hopefully the length makes up for its lateness.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Why don't I own anything? At this point, I feel like I should own something…

Chapter 3: Fix Me

I'm fine in the fire

I feed on the friction

I'm right where I should be

Don't try and fix me

The building went silent after the trio settled down to sleep. Alice could've heard a pin drop in the parking lot outside. As it was, all she could focus on was Claire's beating heart. The pulsation was steady, yet Alice felt as though she was being misled. There was no way Claire was asleep, not with the excitement of finding someone after so long. The redhead's still form, covered with a sleeping bag, said otherwise.

If Claire was asleep, then the girl beside her probably was too, but not Alice. The blonde shouldn't have even been lying down; she was so full of tension. She didn't know how Dahlia fit into their plans. Did the teen's appearance alter their destination? Was she a mere distraction, a time-waster when it came to Alice meeting her goal? She still needed to go to Raccoon City.

Tomorrow, whether the girl was ready for it or not, whether Claire would allow it or not – they were going.

Alice stayed mostly to herself the next morning, while Claire took to watching out for Dahlia like she'd done the night before. If Alice paid enough attention, she could almost figure out what was going on in their heads. Dahlia was cautious to show too much emotion while Claire encouraged her to smile with unhinged smiles of her own. Any other time, Alice would've offered her own brand of help to the depressed girl, but not today. This day was reserved for her own fears, and with Claire preoccupied, she would be handling them alone.

Sometime in the night, Alice had come to realize that Claire and Dahlia didn't necessarily have to come. She could make it into a day trip and be back before night fell. Alice pulled the redhead aside, watching as Claire kept her eyes trained on her suicidal ward.

"I'll be back tonight," the blonde said, keeping her voice low. It was like Alice didn't really know what she was saying. Her arguments were without order and poorly thought through. "She can't come. You should stay."

Claire's attention went back to Alice, so the blonde filled in for Claire by watching Dahlia over her shoulder. Besides, it was too hard not to notice Dahlia picking at her nails.

"You're not going alone," Claire replied. "We're not discussing this. You said we had to go, and we're going to do that together – or not at all."

Alice had been positive she shouldn't have tried to persuade Claire otherwise. It was a force of habit she was close to losing. She didn't have control over Claire; she barely had power over her own life.

Shut down by Claire's firm stance, Alice let the rejection settle deep into her consciousness. She was still going to Raccoon City – she was still going… home. A romantic would've said Claire was her home. An idealist would've said home was a place you resided, a place you slept in a room with four walls, and a soft bed. A more logical person would've said it was any place of dwelling for any length of time. Alice knew better than any of that. Home was the last place where things made sense. And things made more sense living in the mansion with Spencer, working for a dishonest company, and living for no one but herself.

Once again, before Alice knew it, a significant amount of time had passed. They'd apparently left the K-mart far behind. Was the teen gone too? Alice caught sight of Claire on the driver's side from the corner of her eye. Flashing her eyes to the right, she met Dahlia's eyes in the side mirror. The teen had been watching her, and probably for good reason.

There was absolutely nothing scenic about the trees stricken of life and leaves that existed in the landscape around them. Snowfall was absent from the region, the water-cycle having absolutely no liquid evaporation to pull from. If there was any place more dead on the entire planet, Alice didn't think she would ever be able to find it.

On the horizon appeared Umbrella's constructed wall. It was hard to make out through all the dead trees, but a few more seconds of driving towards it and the thin black line turned into a barrier that had once been impassable. Now, the wall was deteriorating in places. In fact, right where the road led up to it, the blockade was broken as if someone had once tried to drive a tank into it. Whatever had happened, it was clear enough for them to pass through without leaving their vehicle.

They had gotten that far when Dahlia realized where they were. "Why the fuck are we here? We can't be here!" The teen was losing it in the backseat causing Claire to brake them to a stop.

"Dahlia," Claire commanded. "It's alright. We're not staying here. We're just going to pass through."

The teen wasn't ready to be talked down so soon. "You're fucking crazy! If we go in there, we're never coming out."

Alice sighed, not holding back her aggravation. She was too stuck in her own head to hear the rest of Claire and Dahlia's conversation. It didn't matter to her how going to Raccoon City was rationalized to the girl. It didn't matter that there was simply no true rationale for it at all.

Awareness came back to Alice when Claire released the brake and the Hummer began to roll forward. The blonde glanced to her side mirror. Dahlia was silent and suddenly staring very intently at the barricade in front of them. It was like an entrance to Hell, and that had to have been what Dahlia was seeing in her mind.

Just as they were about to enter, Claire leaned towards Alice to whisper, "We can't stay long."

An undead population too great to handle, radiation sickness, structurally unsound buildings, debris-covered roads, and one million other threats could await their arrival… and hinder their departure – permanently. It was a challenge Alice craved and yet another distraction to keep her from thinking of-

"Alice!"

Abruptly, Alice found herself being yelled at by Claire.

"God fucking damn it, Alice! Do you listen to anything I say anymore? Jesus Christ!"

The blonde woman tried to backtrack halfheartedly, "I'm sorry-"

"Don't! Don't even bother." Claire had stopped the Hummer. They couldn't have been more than a few minutes driving into the city because they were surrounded by post-nuclear attack suburbia. Homes to their left and right had blown-out windows; some of the cheaper houses were missing entire walls. Even though the Hummer's windows were up, Alice could almost taste the dry, still air outside.

"What is going on?" Claire asked, her voice much calmer and filled with concern. "You haven't been yourself for days… Weeks," Claire corrected.

"I- I…" Alice struggled to make her tongue work. Why were they having this talk now?

Claire released a breath, discontent that Alice had fallen into silence. "It's ok."

The conversation dropped, the redhead drove on, past the outskirts and into the core. Not a single undead was to be found, and not without reason. There was no living population in the city, and therefore no reason for the undead to return after the initial infected residents were destroyed by Umbrella. Damage wasn't limited to life. Most of the city skyline was missing. As the trio got closer to the blast site, more and more buildings contributed to an endless pile of rubble.

It wasn't long before they found roads too destroyed and debris-covered to drive over. If they wanted to push forward, they'd have to turn around and find another way. Claire was about to go back, but the second she stopped enough to put her vehicle in reverse, Alice got out of the Hummer without warning. Claire threw the Hummer into park and jumped out of the vehicle before Alice got too far ahead of her.

Alice didn't know where she was going; she didn't know why she was walking the first place. She was truly losing it. All she knew was that her instincts were in overdrive, and it had something to do with the nearly-toppled skyscraper in front of them.

The entrance to the building, perhaps an old corporate office, was facing the blast. Alice got to the doors, Claire and Dahlia not too far behind, and looked around.

It was almost as if the remaining structures had permanent shadows. When the bomb exploded, it created a light so hot – so unbelievably bright – that everything exposed to the flash had burned on the surface. Wood blackened with charcoal; concrete and asphalt discolored to the point that any object in the way of the light created a shadow behind it. It was eerie, especially when Alice saw the flash burn of human silhouettes on the building wall in front of her. Had they been undead? Part of the horde or not, they were all victims of a tragedy Alice couldn't stop.

The unsettling figures weren't the source of Alice's unease. Her boots kicked up a small cloud of dust as she walked inside the dim structure. Claire hollered not to go in there, but if Claire's words had any affect before this point, Alice had yet to show it.

Alice probably should have drawn her dual pistols. She just couldn't bring herself to reach for them; not even when the building creaked and seemed to shift as dust fell from above. The building was condemned to fall; it was only a matter of time.

The other two survivors appeared beside Alice as the dust settled. Claire was armed, and Dahlia was unarmed for fear of what she would do with a loaded weapon. The structure continued to breathe in; Alice knew, because each exhale was followed by the groaning of the walls and the appearance of more dust. Something was giving this place a kind of half-life – something was inside making the building moan, making it settle further into its fate ever so slightly.

Alice's heart was ready to burst from her ribcage. A small piece of concrete, no bigger than a marble, fell to the floor from a shadowy place where a ceiling should've been – instead she could almost see into the second floor. That same heart skipped a beat. What had she been thinking? Bringing Claire here, bringing the girl… Another piece of debris fell, this time a few feet from the first.

The sky was falling.

No – the sky wasn't falling. This building wasn't coming down; it was slowly being taken apart by claws too sharp not to leave a mark and a creature too heavy for anything less. If her jaw hadn't been clenched, Alice's mouth would have fallen open when she caught sight of the beast moving around in the darkness above them. It wasn't like the lickers she had faced before. It was so far mutated that it had grown multiple sets of arms and multiple tongues. A glimmer of a voice touched her consciousness. It said something about an experiment, fresh DNA, mutation… The childlike voice only triggered more questions.

Why was a licker here? Why hadn't it been destroyed like everything else? Was it possible that it came directly from the Hive – that while lurking below it had somehow come from the bomb unscathed? It was far underground… It could've made it to the surface later… None of that really mattered. It was here now.

"Get out," Alice tried to warn her companions quietly.

If Claire knew of the monster they were about to face, it didn't affect her decision. "I'm not leaving without you."

Alice was reminded of the last time she faced such nightmarish-things. It was inside the church she'd met Jill. She had been so much more confident than the way she was now, even though she was only just becoming accustomed to her new state of being, even though she felt like a freak. She'd give anything for her freakish amount of assuredness now.

Just then, the licker took a step out of the shadows. Dahlia screamed, Claire aimed and fired at the fleshy hand, as Alice shakily drew her pistols. Claire missed; her target had been small and much faster than she anticipated.

The beast toyed with them, crawling back into the shadows where only Alice still had the ability to see it. The licker could not hide from her. All she had to do was aim and shoot. It couldn't be that hard. Just lift your arms, look down the sights, line them up with its head, take a breath, hold it…. squeeze the triggers. Alice was only on step one when the licker clicked its teeth together, almost as if it was communicating. Then suddenly another piece of concrete fell behind her.

The noise caused her to twirl. Of course the licker wasn't alone. They hunted in packs. How could she have been so stupid? So long as no more lickers were somewhere in the leaning skyscraper they were facing two. It's only two. Alice had taken on more before. She could do this now.

"Move quietly," Alice cautioned, knowing that the creatures hunted by sound and not sight. "Towards the door."

Dahlia went first, taking steps backwards, with Claire in front of her and then Alice. No one took their eyes off the place lickers were prowling, but while Alice's attention was on the one closest to them, Claire made it clear that the other was making a move.

"Alice, watch out!" Claire screamed as she shoved the blonde forward onto the floor.

Alice caught herself, the heel of her palms bruised with the impact but adrenaline kept the fall from being painful. There was no grace to be had except for the licker's armored tongue that had twisted itself around Claire's left calf. The redhead fell right next to Alice, their eyes locking for a second before Claire was dragged away. Alice tried to catch Claire's outstretched hand before it was too late but came up short.

"Claire!"

Alice managed to grab one of her pistols that hadn't fallen too far as she rose and shot into the darkness that swallowed Claire. She was completely off target and she knew it. She had to focus. It was too easy to center in on the pink tongues of the licker encircling themselves around Claire's body while the creature pulled her up a wall to eat her somewhere more private. The redhead's pleas for help were only causing Alice's raised hand to shake more. She would never be able to aim at this rate. It would be no use. She'd almost lost Claire because of her quick trigger finger and now she was going to lose Claire for lack of one.

"Save her, Alice!" Dahlia out-right screamed at the blonde.

Shaking with frustration, Alice threw her pistol to the side for all the good it did her and picked up a chunk of concrete. The weight of the rock didn't hinder her ability to throw it. It hurled for the creature like a comet and the resulting crater caved in the licker's face. Claire dropped from the wall and twisted her ankle as she landed.

The redhead stumbled towards Alice and Dahlia, adrenaline drowning any pain she could've had. Alice met Claire halfway. The activity in the building was getting noisier as more pieces of cement fell. Crystal blue eyes searched her partners' for reassurance for only a second until they were forced to flash to all of the movement behind Claire.

"Fuck," Alice stammered.

The many-handed demons were crawling out of the black heavens above, their clicking teeth like laughter; their pink flesh like moving wallpaper.

Alice's hands gripped Claire's forearms even tighter as she looked all around them. This was it. Raccoon had been the place of her birth and it was looking to be the place of her death – but not Claire's and the girl's if she could help it.

"Get Dahlia out of her," Alice paused and began to the find the place her mental ability lay dormant. "I'll distract them long enough…"

Claire squeezed Alice's left forearm in acknowledgement before trying to hurry the teen into the light of the outside world. Their path remained clear for all of two seconds until a licker claimed the advantage and blocked them from their goal.

Alice's eyebrows twitched as she sent the licker backwards out the door and into the building across the street. It had been an excessive amount of force, but she was nervous and walking on a thin line of control. What was important was that the exit was clear and that Dahlia and Claire made quick use of it.

The clouded skies cleared as Claire and Dahlia rushed out the door, light gracing their lucky escape. Alice's breath of relief wasn't dampened by the fact that more lickers jumped from above to prevent her from obtaining the same fate. Selflessness is never a curse to those who are sincere, and Claire's safety was all she ever could have asked for.

However, if Claire was to remain safe – there was work to be done. She couldn't leave any lickers with the ability to pursue and she couldn't rely on her mental powers alone.

Alice summoned the pistol she'd thrown away earlier and for the first time in weeks, pulled back the hammer with confidence. The woman followed every step to the letter that she could not do before and with each bullet fired – a licker near the door fell to its death.

If Alice wanted to survive, she had to get as close to the entrance as possible, but already long tongues were reaching for her. One caught her arm and yanked her across the lobby. With her free hand, Alice pulled a knife and cut off the flesh binding. Another grabbed her leg, so again she swung and severed the tie. Three more tongues lashed out and found something to hold. This was a game she couldn't play. The building couldn't sustain so much activity for much longer. Dust was a constant; so were the bits of falling concrete torn from the structure as lickers continued to find new purchase for themselves in the excitement.

Alice sneered as she fought the grip of a licker attached to her right arm. She didn't know why she'd come to Raccoon City, but it wasn't to die. Twisting just enough to aim her gun at the fiend, she killed the licker and shot the rest who had set to capture her. The blonde's gun came up empty as the last tongue released her body. Finally free, Alice tried reloading her pistol on the run but nearly knocked into Claire with a new assault rifle.

Of course the redhead was here and in danger. She'd left without a single argument and that should have been Alice's first clue. Claire wasn't leaving without her; she never had before.

"Dahlia's safe," Claire stated with importance, but Alice barely heard it. Whatever confidence she had gained by the redhead's absence was dashed on the fear that they would not survive the climax of this fight. A tongue lashed out towards Claire but Alice caught it and wrenched the smelly flesh from the mouth it came from with her super strength. Not even a lack of confidence was enough to alter the course of determination Dahlia had set her upon before. Suddenly, a licker charged the pair and barreled into them both.

The unloaded gun and knife dropped from Alice's hands as her back unceremoniously found the floor. Claire was still close enough to the door that if she left now a twisted ankle would be her only prize. Alice was not so lucky. Cut and bleeding, she lay among the sharp debris as a licker's tongue found her neck like a hangman's noose. The long muscle of the beast tightened as it pulled Alice deeper into the shadows.

Alice came to and was greeted with the sight of Claire getting to her feet in the bright doorway. Another licker grabbed Alice around her elbow and began to pull – igniting a tug of war between the agitated mutants.

Claire brought up the M16 she'd retrieved from the Hummer and shot the licker crouching between her and Alice. More tongues took hold of Alice as others tried to get to Claire. The redhead couldn't save Alice if she was taken herself. M16 fire continued to break the air; every few seconds Claire got to shoot one of the creatures pulling on Alice, but it wasn't even close to enough.

With a last ditch effort and show of strength, Alice got to her knees. Her arms were strung out in mock-crucifixion, each one with multiple tongues stretching the blonde to her breaking point. A normal person would've had dislocated shoulders and a soon-to-break neck by now.

"Go, Claire! Go!" Alice screamed above the gunfire while she was still able. The pain of being strangled was almost enough to overcome coherent thought, but she had one thing left to do.

"I won't leave you!" Claire shouted back, tears streaming.

More lickers attacked, and Alice was getting close to the one who held her by her neck. She'd be losing limbs at any moment, but that wasn't what was tearing her apart.

Alice coughed out a regret she could no longer contain, "I can't keep you safe," before using one last burst of mental ability centered on bringing down a vital part of the wall to her right.

Whatever Claire's reply – she wouldn't be able to give it. In an instant, the chunk of cement that Alice demolished created a chain reaction. The building came down on top of them in flurry of dust and pounds upon pounds of concrete.

Dahlia waited in the running Hummer, the doors unlocked, both fearing and hoping that the gunfire inside the derelict building would stop. Her young heart was pumping the terror straight into her bloodstream and her mind screamed with thoughts of her saviors dying. She couldn't have gripped the leather hand-rest of her seat any tighter if she wanted to.

The teen could almost sense that they were reaching the pinnacle of the fight, and a moment later, a sharp crack replaced the gunfire. Her chest seized up as the rest of the skyscraper finally tumbled down.

Dust expelled from the doorway and open windows as the upper floors collapsed. Dahlia couldn't see if anyone or anything made it out. The gray-brown cloud dispersed slowly and all the girl found from the safety of the vehicle was an immense pile of rubble.

Without breath and thoughts of personal safety, Dahlia opened the door and ran to the wreckage. Lack of air caused her to cough and rising dirt lodged itself in her throat and lungs making her struggle to breathe even more. Her coughing was the only sound to be heard for miles and the silent, dead Raccoon City was rapt with the girl's obsession to dig through the rubble.

Dahlia carefully picker her way over the broken cement; her pant legs occasionally catching on exposed steel bars and hindering her climb. Old pieces of paper caught in a light breeze and littered the dirty street. The teen wasn't sure where she should start. The place she was at now was as good as any other.

She was a good girl. She was a nice a girl. There was nothing she had done to deserve the cruelty she was enduring now. Her fingers became scraped quickly and bled as she heaved aside any piece of concrete light enough for her to move.

They weren't many…

Minutes passed and steady tears wet the girl's cheeks. No, she had not earned this.

Dahlia worked late into the day, scattering the debris she could move, and shouting at what she could not. Occasionally she would call out for Claire and Alice. There were no answers; there were no signs of life.

All was lost.

Night was going to make an appearance soon, but as much as Dahlia wished to continue the search she couldn't deny that she was exhausted and didn't want to stay in Raccoon City overnight so exposed. The teen sighed and turned to the Hummer, feeling guilty for quitting on Alice and Claire when they had not given up on her. What more could a fifteen year old girl do?

Or was she sixteen now? Her birthday was in mid-January, and for all she knew it had already passed. Fifteen or sixteen – it hardly made a difference, Dahlia felt no older than the day the outbreak happened, and as a young girl when she watched her family get murdered. Every kind of caretaker from then on had died too, so why shouldn't Alice and Claire be dead?

Looking past the skyline and into the setting sun, that's when Dahlia realized it… that what she had been digging through all day were the graves of two people who had joined the ranks of the those she cared about. She was in the exact same place before they found her. Lost and hopeless.

Dahlia kicked a section of rubble in frustration. It wasn't supposed to be this way! The girl lashed out again with her foot. Nothing made sense! A third kick caused her to curse from a stubbed toe. The loosened concrete mass shifted and revealed a startling sight. A hand – two of them... Both were bruised and covered in dried blood. They seemed to be reaching for the other. It was a severely morbid vision that filled Dahlia's imagination.

She could see Claire and Alice fighting for their very lives, and at that same time trying to get to one another when the building finally became unsound… Dahlia's eyes watered again. It was such a tragedy. Two people so in love – so close to being together in death – and yet a few inches set them infinitely far apart and dying alone.

Dahlia wasn't sure which hand belonged to Claire and which belonged to Alice, but she reached out for them both and held the chilled hands. If they couldn't hold on to each other, they would both just have to hold on to her for a little while.

Perhaps through the transferring warmth, or the sincerity of Dahlia's intentions, one of the hands in hers moved ever so slightly. The girl released them both in surprise and once again started digging…

"I know how you feel about giving up," Dahlia said while holding her hands over one of the Hummer's vents expelling hot air, "so… how about starting over?"

Claire's eyebrow perked as she looked to the teen causing the healing gash on her forehead to sting. "What do you mean?"

"I mean… I want a new name," the girl announced, proud that she had thought of such a thing.

"A new-"

"K-mart," the teen interrupted smugly. "It's... where you found me, and where I found hope."

Claire snorted at the cheesy name but then realized the girl was serious. A new voice came from the seat next to her.

"I like it."

Claire looked at Alice and discovered the blonde smiling lightly.

When K-mart quieted down, happy with her endorsement, Alice risked a glance at Claire. Her smile widened before she had to turn her eyes back to the road ahead of them. No, she didn't go to Raccoon City to die… but the trials there were just enough to count her among the living for as long as she had people who needed her.

So, I did a ton of research for this bad boy. I know a fair amount about nuclear blasts, but I had no idea what kind of damage a 5 kiloton warhead would do. That's such a small bomb as far the world's military practices go. However, I'm pretty confident that everything I described is as accurate as it can be, and that it would be (mostly) safe for Alice to want to go digging around Raccoon City.

I hope you all enjoyed this story. This is the end as far as I know but I may get in me to write the entire rescue someday, and that's even more likely if you ask for it.

Sorry that I'm so twisted in the head and write such sad stories. But they don't call me angst-master for nothing. ;) Andrea out. Reviews in!