After their refreshing swim, the convoy packed up and returned to the road. Ryan returned to the pickup truck, leaving Katie to the driving while he made his first attempt at charging his arm to sleep.

"Alice, I'm going to try to sleep for an hour. Wake me up then. If my arm isn't sparking, then wake me up early. Consider this a field test to see how long my arm stays electrified." He explained, pulling his mask and hood off - which was quite surprising. Normally he only removed one or the other, never both at once.

She gave a nod. "Okay, but if we need you, you'll be woken up regardless." She reminded him as he began to electrify the metal on his arm. It sparked and crackled, which was a good sign. It was holding the charge.

Ryan smiled before closing his eyes. A few minutes later, his breathing had audibly slowed, he was now asleep and his arm was still sparking and crackling. Good so far!

Alice kept a watchful eye on him for the next forty uneventful minutes, watching and listening. Sparks and hissing.

Suddenly she sensed a lot of zombies up ahead of the convoy, around a street corner as they passed through a small town. She grabbed her radio from her belt and informed Claire of their presense.

"How many can you sense?" Claire asked back.

"About two hundred and fifty of them." Alice replied with a sigh. She debated on waking up Ryan so he could fry them en masse. Was their sleep test worth 250 zombies to cancel?

"We'll take the other turn. Keep track of them untill we're all clear. There's too many of them for you three to take down. Hold your fire." Claire ordered, then began to relay their new directives to the rest of the convoy.

Alice lowered her radio. Even though Claire wasn't aware of their test, she had allowed them to continue testing how long Ryan's arm could sustain his sleep. She glanced back at his arm, it was still sparking madly, but the sounds had begun to grow quieter. Forty five minutes, and the sounds began dimming... Noted.

Ten minutes later, having passed through that small town safely, Alice checked on Ryan again, this time noticing that the sparks, though still very numerous, were starting to diminish in intensity and size. C'mon, they'd almost reached their goal of an hour! Still going strong!

As the seconds finally ticked down to the end of the hour, Alice never took her gaze from his arm. The moment that the time was up, she threw her personal safety into the winds and touched Ryan's neck, hoping he wouldn't shock her. She'd actually gotten used to his normal static aura, she could touch him without flinching... This was an exception though, due to the nature of their test.

Instantly opening his eyes, he grabbed her hand and turned his gaze upon her. He scowled until his eyes came back into focus a few seconds later, during which he released her hand and smiled.

"So... One hour? How was it?" He asked, purposely discharging his arm as he began to experimentally move his limbs, testing for any problems.

"Very fucking tense, I'll tell you that." Alice sighed. "But I can confidently say, you still have quite a bit of charge left after an hour. And you're right, you DO sleep like a stone."

"How long do you think I can last? Because compared to the amount of power I'd initially put into my arm, I only got back about..." Ryan paused for a moment to calculate the amount. "I'd say between seventy five and eighty percent of it."

"So you're saying that you could roughly sleep for four or five hours by using just your arm?" Alice asked, still taking note of the numbers and calculations. This was still an incomplete experiment, by no means was it even halfway completed. Now they had to try to acquire a shock collar and test it out on him.

"Something like that. But if there is a variable that makes me discharge at a different speed, then it could very well be higher or lower. We need to do more tests later on."

"Yeah. But for now, let's keep you awake. No more sleeping until we change the conditions and isolate the variables." Alice said as she turned to face the road ahead of them. "Besides, what if you added more metal to your body? Wouldn't that increase your external charging capacity?"

Ryan thought about it. More metal wouldn't be all that difficult to acquire, nor would it be that hard to make it wearable. Hmmm... where could he get more metal to work with?

"You mean give him more armour?" Katie suddenly asked, breaking his thoughts. "Why not try to find a museum that has medival armour? Isn't there stuff like that that's still intact?"

Alice's expression changed from pensive to impressed in an instant. "That's right! Platemail or chainmail would be perfect! I think that actually might work! But there's one problem... We'd have to sneak out at night... Not that we haven't done that before. Probably gonna have to tell Claire that 'Dawn' thing again."

"No need to worry. Look up ahead." Ryan pointed at a fast approaching road sign, which had tourism information. One of the things on the sign was a museum of ancient history. "There's the place. Now we just have to get there."

Just as Ryan pointed it out, Claire's voice came over the radio, signalling Mikey to locate a safe place to stop for the evening. Ryan, Alice and Katie looked around in surprise, it was actually really late in the afternoon, almost sunset. They hadn't even noticed!

"That museum's got a pretty secure perimeter. Maybe we could send our lovely trio to scout the place out?" Mikey replied, well aware that Alice, Ryan and Katie could hear him. "Hey, Ryan, do me a favour mate! Find me a nice looking sword. I think we should have another go at that boss battle from a while back, huh?"

Ryan chuckled. He then said jokingly to Alice. "I'll try my best. But I'd rather find a thunder spellbook instead of a sword."

Alice relayed his message, but Claire interrupted them and said. "Stop fucking around! We need a place to stop, and that museum is our best choice. Alice, Katie, Ryan, you three check the place out. Everyone else, set up while we wait for them."

Following Claire's Hummer until they reached the locked gates of the museum, Ryan, Alice and Katie began to gear up for their search in the museum. Ryan had already combined the Masterkey with his G36K, so he unloaded the M37 and slid those shells into the Masterkey. He then left the M37 in the truck, since he no longer required it. He then removed his bow and arrows. He was ready.

"Sigvus pacma parabellum." He said Telepathically, more to himself that to either Alice or Katie. They both heard him though, and Alice paused loading her M3 to glance at him.

"That didn't sound Japanese... What was that?" She asked as Katie stopped the truck outside the gates. They all climbed out, ready to infiltrate the museum's perimeter.

"Sigvus pacma parabellum. Latin. 'If you want peace, prepare for war.' I learned it from our uncle. His drill instructor made him recite it while he was in the military." Ryan said as he pulled up his mask and hood, once again becoming the deadly black shadow they'd become accustomed to seeing him as.

"Damn. That's quite the quote." Alice commented before Telekinetically breaking the chains that sealed the gates. "C'mon, I'll take point. Ryan, take the rear."

Quickly moving into the massive front parking lot of the museum, they noticed that there were many, many cars still parked inside. Ryan noticed right away that a few of them here and there had large slashes taken from the bodies, like something had attacked them with a huge axe.

"Alice, look at that." He indicated the nearest damaged car. "Know any B.O.W's that could have done that?"

Alice studied the damage. She too made the comparision of a large axe, but nothing B.O.W related came to mind. "No, nothing that I know about. Looks like they were wrecked by a huge axe or something."

"I thought that as well. We'd better be on our guard, something big is here." Ryan replied, scanning their surroundings cautiously. The hairs on his neck had begun to rise eerily. He had a feeling they were being watched or were walking into a trap.

"Wait!" Alice suddenly said Telepathically, her gaze riveted on something hidden behind the tire of a car. "That's a tripwire, this place is rigged with traps." She pointed at a thin wire, leading from under the car to a nearby pole. It was about six inches off the ground, which could be any number of possible triggers. "Go around it."

Ryan glanced under the car on his hands and knees. He carefully checked the tire and found a mousetrap jerry rigged to seemingly ring a cow bell, more than likey in a repetitive manner upon activation.

"It appears to be a sound trap. An alarm esentially. There's no way I can disarm it safely." Ryan informed Alice, who took note of the trap's usage and stored that info away for a later time. "Whoever made it knew what they were doing, and they did it really well."

"Okay, Ryan, you take point instead. Check each and every trap we find. Maybe we can use them to our advantage, if need be." Alice stepped away from the tripwire, and Ryan rose to his feet. "Sound traps are something new to me. Never seen one before."

"They're just fixed location alarms. Even something as simple as broken glass on the floor can be considered a sound trap. We'd better be careful inside the museum, who knows what is rigged in there?"

"Okay, I'll tell Claire." Katie suddenly spoke up. "If I stay back with them, I can relay messages from you to them with Telepathy."

"You sure, Katie? You've been staying back with the convoy a lot. Something wrong?" Alice asked as Ryan carefully scanned the pathway ahead of them through his rifle's integrated scope. He spotted another tripwire and what appeared to be a beartrap a few yards beyond it.

"I..Um... well, I want to make sure they still get live updates from our scouting... but I also want to well... I want to let you two have your space a bit more. I'm always in the way, and I kinda like K-Mart..." Katie's last sentence trailed off into an almost inaudible mumble, but Ryan and Alice got the point.

"Well, if you want the truth, Katie... I asked Ryan to marry me while we were at the spring. We've had our alone time for today, okay? But, if you really want to stay with them, go ahead. We won't stop you." Alice smiled as she crouched down to eye level with Katie and put her hand on her shoulder gently.

"So that means you're my aunt or something?" Katie's face lit up happily. "So we're a family now?"

"Well, to make everything a lot easier on us, let's just say I'm your new mom. Helluva lot easier than cousins, aunts, or all that confusing stuff. Ryan's still your brother, but I'm unofficially your mom, okay?"

Katie shrugged. "You're still going to be 'Alice' to me. But sure, why not? I can't remember my mom anyway. Plus, our dad died when we were both younger."

Ryan shot them both a glance over his shoulder. He held his comments to himself for the time being, but he had a few questions for Alice.

"Alright, kiddo, go back to Claire and let her know that the place is full of traps. We'll let you know what else we find as we go." Alice patted her on her head, which earned her a beaming smile from Katie as she pulled her kitty hood onto her head and jogged back to the rest of the convoy.

The moment that she'd left, Alice turned to Ryan and readied her M3 at her shoulder. "You were checking for more traps, right?" She asked Telepathically as she also noticed the distant beartrap.

"Yeah. There's a tripwire about five yards from that beartrap. It's rigged right across the pathway, but it's way too close to this sound trap to be another one... It's different. I'll check it out." Ryan replied, crouching down and slowly approaching the left side of the wire, with Alice right behind him.

"What good is a beartrap in the middle of the parking lot? It's better if it was covered with sand or leaves... camoflauged, I mean." Alice asked Ryan as he carefully checked under the car to identify this trap type.

'Well, the undead are mindless, so they don't really have the mental capabilities to be fooled by camoflauge or trap placements. Shit, this is the wrong end. Other side must be the trap." Ryan got up and went to the other side of the path, checking the trap's design. "That's odd... This trap is rigged up into the car's engine. Can you open the hood for me?"

Alice Telekinetically opened the car's front hood, and slowly lifted it, which revealed an obviously trapped engine block. It had a shotgun aiming out of the grill, right towards the tripwire!

"Shotgun trap? Can you disable it? I don't think I can do anything with my Telekinesis." Alice carefully stepped over the tripwire and examined the design from the top.

"What type of shotgun is it? Semi auto or pump action?" Ryan asked as he checked the bottom. "If it's semi auto, then that means it can be reset, and reloaded."

Alice examined the shutgun closely. It appeared to be a semi automatic Benelli M4, AKA the M1014 from above, the ejection port was unobstructed and had no shells anywhere in sight. That also meant is was currently loaded. "Yeah, it's semi... and it's loaded. You think we can disable it. I want that beautiful gun."

Ryan slid under the car with a smile. That last comment alone was one of the reasons he loved Alice: She had always been, and was obviously quite proudly, a tomboy. No makeup, tea parties and dresses while she grew up. Nope, it was guns, sports and dirt stains for her.

Speaking of which...

"Hey, Alice... I know this is out of the blue... But I've been wondering... How old are you?" Ryan asked as he carefully began to unscrew some of the bolts holding the M1014 in place. He was also mildly surprised that a few of them were still magnetized, which made his task quick and easy.

"I'm 36." Alice smiled, resolving to scan their surroundings while Ryan disabled the shotgun. "Born in Detroit, but I moved to Raccoon City after I was hired by Umbrella to work as head of security at one of their labs."

"Wow." Ryan was actually surprised that she was still in her thirties. He knew - from his rapid maturation - that the T-Virus forced their bodies into their prime physical condition, but at first glance, Alice only appeared to be around 25 years old. "When I first met you, I thought you were about 25 or so."

"The T-Virus causes your body to rapidly regenerate cells, even to the point of accelerating or reversing physical aging. When I was first given the Virus, I was 32, but according to the results of too many fucking tests, I am now physically and forever more, about 24 to 28 years old. Same goes for you too. Since you've grown after bonding, it means you are about the same age physically. Around 24 to 28 years old. Permanently." Alice explained. "But there's something about Katie that's different. She's still growing, I'm almost certain of that, but it doesn't seem to be affected by the T-Virus like we were."

"Well, maybe it needs a certain amount of aging to take place before it can accelerate? I dunno, but what I can tell you..." Ryan smiled as he very carefully began to remove the M1014 from the triggering system that would otherwise fire the weapon. "Is that this shotgun is now on a hair trigger. I need you to click the safety on it. Now."

Alice instantly turned her gaze onto the switch and clicked it into the safe position with her Telekinesis. She then grabbed it from Ryan's almost motionless hands and wrenched it from the frame. "Done. Now it's mine. Let's get to work clearing a safe path through these cars so we can get inside the museum."

"Alright, good plan. Katie? Did you catch that?" Ryan relayed to Katie. "We're clearing a safe path throught all these cars. Tell Claire we've also found another trap type. It's rigged via tripwire to trigger guns hidden inside some of the cars."

"Okay, I'll tell her." Katie replied almost instantly. "What guns have you encountered so far?"

"Shotgun only." Ryan replied. "But I think there's more than just that around here."