Chapter Thirteen: Family

Sunrise Towers

New York

0100hrs_

The steady beeping of the monitor brought some sense of calm to Alice. After her narrow escape with Dryden, she felt physically drained. And yet somehow she found herself helping Leon dispose of the corpses of some of his team – including the Barnes brothers, Phil and Lewis.

Alice knew why she was keeping herself busy; she was trying her best not to be left alone with Spence.

How was he still alive? Alice had thought for the millionth time, as she and Ada had dragged the final body into the huge incinerator (which was used to dispose of the building's garbage). She had driven a fire axe into his skull after a Licker had nearly chewed his body to pieces and infecting him with the T-virus.

Yet there he stood, talking in low voices with another old acquaintance – Jill Valentine – and shooting her covert looks every ten minutes.

Now that her work was done, she had followed Leon as he and Frank wheeled the immobile body of Dryden Wesker into the room that served as the building's hospital. It was certainly equipped like one: there were ten hospital beds in separate cubicles, and each cubicle had its own monitors and equipment. Two visitors could stay inside the cubicle at a time, and three rooms that branched off from the main 'ward' housed the surgery room, the mini pharmacy, and a small staff room.

Luda Davies, the only remaining doctor in Sunrise Towers, began her usual routine of checking Dryden's heartbeat and blood pressure the moment Leon and Frank had wheeled the bed he was on in one of the vacant cubicles. As she checked Dryden's eye with a flashlight, Alice saw that he had the same eye color as her. It unsettled her greatly, as if she was seeing her own eye in another person.

"He's in a coma," Luda said once they were in the hallway. "It seems that whatever mental ability he has backfired on him. I'm getting no response; but once I see the brain scan I can tell you exactly how bad the damage – or complete lack of it – there is."

"How long will he be like that?" Leon asked. "If he wakes up, I know he's coming after us; his visit made it clear."

"I say we kill him now," Ada hissed, her hand reaching for her holster. "He's killed many of us, Leon! I say he dies."

"No," a familiar voice rang out. Spence had turned the corner, and Alice noticed Jill was standing a few feet behind him. "If we kill him we lose our only bargaining chip. Dryden is valuable to Wesker; Jill asserts that Wesker is entirely dependent on him."

"All the more reason to kill him now and even the playing field," Ada snapped back. "The longer we keep him alive, the greater the risk."

Leon sighed. "Spence is right, Ada. We can use Dryden to keep Wesker off our back. But we need to make sure he isn't going to wake up anytime soon."

Ada made a disbelieving sound and stalked off. Leon watched her go and then turned back to Luda. "Just get us that brain scan and we can decide."

Luda nodded and entered the ward again. Alice saw, out of the corner of her eye, Spence take one step towards her. He hesitated, as if he could sense her unease around him. Not wanting to be left alone with him, Alice pushed the door open and went in.

She made her way to the cubicle to where Dryden lay and studied him. His similarities to Spence were uncanny. She became so engrossed in looking at Dryden's features that she failed to notice that Spence was standing beside her.

"Alice," he said softly, gripping her wrist.

Instinctively Alice wrenched her arm away from his grip. "Get away from me."

"Alice, I know I acted like a bastard the last time we met, but I was...greedy. I wanted to give you everything you ever wanted, but the circumstances didn't play out the way I hoped they would," Spence said in a rush. It was clear that he had been dying to say this to her for a long time, but for how long? How long had he been alive?

"Why are you even alive?" Alice hissed, her tone sounding harsh even to her ears. "I killed you."

"Wesker has developed a way of resurrecting dead bodies using their DNA," Spence replied. "Dryden helped him perfect it. We had to submit a sample of our DNA the moment we became Umbrella employees; I suspect it wasn't difficult for them to get a sample of mine."

Alice nodded. "And where did he come from?" She jerked her head towards Dryden, who was now hooked up to several monitors.

"Dryden was born a few years ago, shortly after you escaped the Hive and were placed in the Umbrella facility in Raccoon City," Spence said, finally raising his head to look at Dryden. "He's massively infected the T-virus, but like his mother he has developed a high level of resistance to it."

Alice frowned. The facts pointed only to one possibility, but it couldn't be... could it? Alice's eyes widened and she looked at Spence, who nodded.

"He's our son, Alice."

Alice felt as if the world came crashing down. Her son? Although the idea of having a son with Spence pleased her – no matter how hard she tried to deny it, Alice knew she was still in love with him – she knew that Wesker had probably placed him far from her reach.

"He – but – he's our enemy," Alice breathed, clutching the metal rail of the hospital bed, causing it to jerk slightly.

Spence silently covered her hand with his, and for a moment she allowed the warmth of his body to fill hers, before slowly edging away from him.

"Am I to watch my son die?" Alice continued, speaking more to herself now. "Wesker deserves to die. He deserves to die for taking my son from me. For...everything."

"He deserves to burn in hell," Spence agreed. "And I will personally see to it that he does."