Necro-Post. It's a term that was introduced to me in a review for my recent-ish update for my Marvel story about where a long untouched story is seemingly revived by a post that none expected, I found the term so funny that I felt it applied here because hoo-boy it's taken some time to get back to this.

Been a quite a while since this was last updated, and with good reason. Life happens and sometimes things don't go your way, and you find yourself back to square one in a sense. I've been dealing with some stressful situations, along with some new stories that took my attention away, plot bunnies, the return of Bleach, etc.

Though with the release of the remakes of Resi 2 & 3, I must say that Capcom continues to outdo itself. Both of these games are outstanding in being remade from the ground up, with being basically considered new entries into the franchise in a sense, which the devs treated them as such, unlike the Resi 1 remake, but then again, it was made before 4 was released and thus we have different ways of playing the games. Although if what Capcom has said turns out to be true, then remaking the original again, but in the same style as they did with 2 & 3, it wouldn't be a bad idea honestly.

Let's face it. Fixed camera angles and tank controls are all outdated gaming mechanics that are very rarely used if at all and remaking 1 from the ground up like the previously mentioned games would bring it into a new age for fans and old alike. I played and beat REmake 1, and I wasn't too big on those aspects. It held me back from truly enjoying things.

If anyone's up for it, feel free to hit me up on Xbox for some Resistance.

Anyways, the way the stories had slightly been changed up did allow me to see how I could use them for this story had affected the timetable for this update. I'm sorry for not being able to respond to everyone's reviews or PM's about this story, but yes, it is continuing and will continue on despite some of the setbacks I've encountered. If the dialogue and flow of the first 10k feels a little clunky then be aware that it's been sitting unfinished for the better part of a year and since then I have become noticeably better as a writer.

I apologize if this chapter seems lacking in action, combat or whatever of the like, as I had to base this off of Remake 1's design and layout somewhat and storylines, which aren't really built to showcase everyone's side of things or environment design. Hence another reason why it should be remade in the same style as 2 and 3 were.

Now, onto the story!

Chapter 4 – Just the Beginning

-Naruto & Jill-

As the duo climbed the ladder to what they hoped was freedom, the pair found a wooden plank stuck between them and their escape. Jill attempted to try and pull it free with precise leverage but found little purchase, though Naruto took a more forceful approach as he punched the plank a few times before he managed to break a good part of it off to allow them to climb up above them, "Is your hand alright, Naruto?" Jill knew despite the fact that Naruto was 'enhanced' to put in layman's terms, he still no doubt was as vulnerable to skin breaking like anyone else.

Naruto rubbed his knuckles a bit to ease the pain that came with punching through four feet of teak. Long ago such a thing would not have drawn even a blink from the blonde yet years of living in Raccoon City with no real reason to stay in shape did he realize that he needed to recondition his body in the same manner that the gaudy, green jumpsuit boys did… he expressed a slight shiver in remembrance of how they would constantly preach about 'youth'… "I'll be alright, Jill. Come on…" Naruto gestured with his shoulder, "Let's keep going."

"Right behind you."

The two climbed up through the hole to find themselves in an old, dark hallway that had apparently not been used in several years, although the light at the end indicated that someone had been here recently, "One of the S.T.A.R.S. survivors?" Naruto asked in mild anticipation.

"No idea." Jill replied as she unslung the Remington from behind her in preparation for whatever was up ahead of them. She opted to take the lead due to her weapon having the advantage in close quarters while Naruto kept his Lightning Hawk ready if something came from behind or something else occurred. Moving closer and closer towards the light source, Jill & Naruto entered a candle-lit room where numerous chairs were stacked atop a table with various trinkets and along with an antique dresser that was strewn about with rotten food and bones, "Oh god…"

Naruto moved closer to get a better look, only to pull back as he held his nose. Heightened senses would make one recoil in disgust, only he hid it well after having adapted to that little change to his body since arriving here, "That thing… it's been living down here all this time?"

"It makes sense…" Jill looked around the room as she moved into another part of it where she saw a bed along with a collection of children's toys, as well as an old and weathered photograph of a family that looked so happy when it was taken, placed off to the side. A husband and wife in their early thirties if she were to judge correctly, along with a twelve-year-old girl.

Naruto came up behind Jill and reached for the photo to get a look for himself briefly before turning it over to see that someone had written on it, "'The Trevor family, 1967, ring a bell?"

Jill furrowed her brows in remembrance of the name, "Trevor… Trevor… wait, maybe…" Jill set the Remington on the bed as she reached behind to pull out a small notebook, "I thought that sounded familiar." She flipped through the pages of pencil writing to come to the last page that was written in, "George Trevor. He made this whole mansion, along with the guest dorms back up above us." Jill took the photo from Naruto as she folded it up and placed it into the notebook for safekeeping.

"Taking it for evidence?" Naruto inquired.

Jill nodded her head in acknowledgement as she put the diary away in one of her hip packs, "Every piece of evidence counts. We'll need every bit we can carry back to the airfield just outside the city." Scooping up the Remington, Jill looked up to where a nearby ladder leaned to see if it was clear to climb up, "The Chief'll open up a case against Umbrella once we show him what we have in the end. He can't deny what we've seen and what we get at the end of this."

'Ugh, that freak.' The blonde thought in disgust that he only just kept from his features at the passing mention of the Chief of the Racoon City Police Department, Naruto had the distinct displeasure of having met the man on more than one occasion for work reasons. The first of such meetings had been when the rotund man had come to the Kendo's gunshop in search of an Elephant Gun and a few boxes of 8 gauge slugs. He had smelt of sweat, alcohol and formaldehyde that drove his senses a bit over the edge, the man had given his reason for acquiring the weapon as hunting and taxidermy, it felt to the blonde that the chemicals were hiding something the unpleasant man did not want smelt.

While Naruto did like Jill's enthusiasm to see Umbrella burn for what they'd done here, he had serious doubts about getting official support from the city, and felt that it was best if he made it clear about something, "Jill, you said that your buddy told you that S.T.A.R.S. had a traitor on the inside right?"

Jill turned back to Naruto briefly while she kept an eye up above her, just to make sure they had a clear exit, "Yeah, Enrico said they betrayed us, along with Umbrella. Why're you asking?"

"Look, I don't want to be Johnny Raincloud here…" The ex-ninja began, "…but given how Umbrella sponsored your division, you have to consider that possibility that the company also has the police in its pockets, namely the Chief himself and a few others in the city's higher chain of command?" Corrupt businesses usually had corrupt law enforcement and officials backing them up to help cover whatever dirty secrets they had. And considering how Jill said there was a traitor in their ranks, he needed to get that possibility in her head; the sooner the better.

It appeared that his words had an effect, as Jill became stiff briefly before she responded, "Look, it's not like in those crime dramas where the cops and officials are dirty…" Jill tried to reason before Naruto quickly cut her off.

"And yet, your friend implied otherwise, Jill." Naruto made his over to Jill as he continued on, "Contrary to what you may think, and I don't want to sound like an asshole, but I know a good thing or two about corruption in the force." Jill gave him a skeptical look, causing Naruto to sigh a bit before he pulled his hand up, along with bringing up a single finger for each point, "Umbrella sponsored the S.T.A.R.S. division in the police department. Umbrella has a lab set up here no doubt, manufacturing and experimenting with whatever the hell is making the dead rise up along with mutant lizard-men. Your friend said you guys have a mole in your division. Said mole managed to sneak around in some hidden passageways throughout this place to kill your friend because he knew too much. Umbrella helped fund a lot of the city's infrastructure with the rebuilding of several important places, including the police department building." Naruto brought all five digits up as Jill seemed to slowly understand just how far this went as to what Naruto implied.

Umbrella owned the situation. Not the other way around.

Jill glanced down before she spoke up again, "… I… I'm just not… I can't believe that it would go that far up…" It seemed that all those crime dramas were becoming more and more believable if Naruto was able to connect the dots so much easier than she could.

Placing a hand on her shoulder, Naruto tried to comfort Jill, "I'm not here to make it sound like going up against Umbrella is impossible. It can be done; you just need to be smart about it. Confront the Chief if you want, but I don't think you, or anyone else in your division should do it, or risk getting put on the Umbrella watchlist. I already am, and the moment I get back home, I'm making damned sure I've got my stuff geared to go to my safehouse if need be, because there's no way in hell am I letting Umbrella make me 'disappear'." Ever since he set things up in Raccoon City, he made sure to have a safehouse good to go in the city, where he could still live and operate from in case his identity got blown in any way possible. Located in the warehouse district, the safehouse had everything he needed to keep going until he could get out of the city and move somewhere else.

Now it may seem that he would be forced to share with Jill and the others, if things didn't go smoothly.

Jill closed her eyes as she breathed in deeply, trying to take in the reality that Naruto was painting in front of her, "Ok… I won't try to bring things up with the Chief, but I still need to say something in my report. And Chris?" She gave a short, humorless chuckle, "I don't think he'll care too much if Umbrella starts watching him. He's too hotheaded, and after tonight, I wouldn't be surprised if he kicks the Chief's office door in and demand that he charge Umbrella with everything that's happened." It's what got him discharged from the Air Force in the first place, with Barry being the only one who vouched for him to get into S.T.A.R.S. Without that word, Chris likely wouldn't have a job at all.

"Boulder Shoulders always did seem quick to act." Naruto commented on Chris, with Jill giving a slight laugh at the nickname

"Heh, 'Boulder Shoulders'?"

"What? It makes sense."

Shaking her head, Jill slung the Remington behind her as she started to climb up the ladder, "Let's just get out of here."

After leaving the caverns along with the cabin that Jill informed Naruto of where she first encountered the disfigured hunchback, they finally made it topside where the night sky greeted them, "Fresh air, finally. I thought being underground was going to suffocate us with all that rancid air down below." Naruto was finally glad to be up and out of it.

Jill kept the Remington up as she gave a quick look around the surrounding area before pulling out her radio, "I'm going to see if I can raise Chris and Rebecca; tell them what happened and warn them we've got a traitor." Hefting the shotgun in her left hand as she gripped it by the handle while pointing the barrel down to the ground, her free hand went to the right side of her waist as she took the radio off her belt, clicking the receiver to try and raise Chris, "Chris, this is Jill, can you read me?" Taking her thumb off the receiver, she waited for Chris to respond with only static coming through. Jill opted to try again as Naruto looked around to see the mansion, they all came through initially to see some movement in the windows, "Chris, this is Jill, respond please."

Static again, "Dammit! This whole night's just been full of equipment failure."

"I'm sure you've got your traitor to thank for that tid bit as well." Naruto said as he came up alongside her, "I think we need to get back inside while we still can before any more undead dogs come our way." He unholstered the Lightning Hawk to be on the ready if they did show up that is.

Jill nodded in agreement, "Right. Hopefully, we'll get in contact with Chris and Rebecca once we're inside… again…" She suppressed a shiver back at the various traps the mansion was riddled with, being a collapsing ceiling, killer mechanical statues, and trap walls.

The duo made their way back inside the mansion, and after stepping through some hallways that were riddled with corpses, both old and what one could say with confidence were still gooey, they found themselves back in the main foyer of the mansion when they first entered the confusing building, "Back again…" Jill pulled out the Umbrella emblem they found back in the caverns to take a second look at it before her memory jogged a bit, "… I think I know where this goes…"

Naruto did a quick sweep of the place to see that so far there weren't any threats at the moment, though his sensitive hearing told him that something was in the ceiling above them, "Really?" He turned back to see Jill making her way to a hallway leading down beneath the main staircase. Taking this as his cue to follow, Naruto came up behind Jill as she stood in front of a large metal gate with two distinct engraved, octagonal slots, "Guess we need the second one to get it open."

"And hopefully where we'll find all our answers." Jill reasoned. She took the lead as she left the opposite way where she tried one more time to fiddle with the radio, "Alright, one more time…" clicking the receiver on the radio, Jill tried to reach Chris one last time, "…Chris, this is Jill, can you hear me? Respond if you can." She lifted her thumb off the receiver to await a response as Naruto merely watched on.

"…" Nothing but static again.

"Dammit!" Jill was about to throw the radio against the wall before she heard something come through, "… Jill? Is that you?" Chris' voice came through, if but barely. Jill quickly responded before she likely lost her signal again, "Chris! Thank God! I've been trying to reach you for a while now." Jill gave Naruto a thumbs up before he gave a small nod as he kept watch on the doors into the foyer, "Look, meet up with me in the foyer, I think we might be on the right track to figuring things out."

"I think so too. Rebecca and I were in the library and we found an Umbrella emblem that we think fits into that gate beneath the staircase over there."

"Naruto and I found one too, so get your asses over here and we can just end this nightmare." Jill slightly cringed at mentioning Naruto over the radio, though looking at the ninja he seemed indifferent to the mentioning. Though just as Barry before, Chris was surprised by that, "Wait, what's Naruto doing here?"

Jill knew that things would have to be explained eventually, so she decided to go with the short and sweet version of things, "Umbrella blackmailed him into coming so he's stuck with us for the ride."

Chris didn't sound so sure about things, judging from his next response, "Ok… I guess that'll have to do for now." Nevertheless, he accepted it for the time being, "Rebecca and I are on our way, we'll be there in a few minutes so hang tight."

As Jill had been talking with Chris, Naruto turned his attention back around him to hear the same creaking around them, only now did he look up to a horrifying sight: a massively mutated snake was up above them, and poised to strike at Jill. His heart began to beat intensely as he only had time to shove her out of the way, "Move, Jill!" Naruto dove right at the snake's intended target and shoved her out of the way from the snake, only to be met with the jaws that swallowed him whole…

"NO!" Jill was struck by anger and fear yet again tonight, not at the idea of dying so much as it was losing yet another friend of hers to this goddamned snake! She saw the snake swallow Naruto whole this time around unlike how it maimed and chomped on Richard. The snake finished swallowing its latest prey and set its sights on Jill one last time. She heard Chris' voice through the radio panicking, asking for what just happened, only she had tuned it out as she took the Remington and started pumping into the snake with shell after shell.

The snake recoiled slightly at the shotgun shells pelting its skin, as small drops of blood came through the shell pellets that were embedded into its skin. It began to get closer and closer to Jill, as she backed into a wall as she unloaded the last shell currently in the barrel. She was about to quickly get out of the snake's way to try and reload, only to be met with the snake twisting around to cut her off from escape.

Jill had been backed into a corner. Her gun was dry, and very little room to maneuver to do anything in retaliation. Chris and Rebecca would likely be too late to try and help her. Her face was filled with defiance, anger, and fear at dying like this in a place that was hell on Earth, "Come on, you son of a bitch!" She had dropped the shotgun as she took out her military knife she held onto since her days in the service, to hold onto some means of having an offensive option to use.

The snake seemed to register her words if that was even possible and lunged at Jill…

…only to stop midway…

Jill's eyes widened in confusion as she saw the snake recoil and begin to convulse, the pure muscle of its form deforming at odd intervals as if its bones were attempting to eject themselves. Next thing she knew, a muffled, yet loud gunshot tore through the snake's skin, followed by another, and a final shot that formed a horizontal grouping. What followed next, was a blade slicing outwards from within like a pin in proportion to the snake's size. The pained hiss of the snake only grew in intensity as the blade was drawn along the dotted line formed by the gunfire and separating tough scales and musculature with a razor's edge until finally a human growl could be heard from within. She watched on in morbid fascination as the cut in the serpent's belly rapidly expanded into a yawning chasm of bloody viscera, the retching snarls and hisses of the snake quickly being superseded by an angered man's voice calling from within. With one last spastic coil against itself in a vein and impotent attempt to stave off its imminent death, the snake finally keeled over lifeless as its guts and stomach fluids spilled from its filleted form; and from those rancid guts, one filthy and angry former Shinobi pulled himself free.

Naruto had quickly realized that one of them was going to be swallowed by that massive snake, though with his experience in the field sad to say as it was… he was the one who could kill the damned thing from the inside. He quickly had gotten a hold of his sword while he tried to use the Lightning Hawk to put a few holes in it to try and make cutting out of it easier.

Who needs clones to over inflate it, when you could shoot and cut your way through the fucker?

Jill was overcome with stupor as she held up a shaky finger, pointing at Naruto who was drenched in snake fluids, "H-How did you survive that?"

Naruto was currently holding his hands up to try and keep more of this sticky crap from getting on his shirt, "That… is the last time… THAT I'M GETTING SWALLOWED WHOLE… BY SOMETHING BIGGER THAN ME, GODDAMMIT!"

Wait, what?

Jill could only stare back and forth at Naruto who was fuming about his current condition, the now finally dead snake that had devoured Richard and nearly her once again, "This...isn't the first time this has happened…?" She was honestly afraid to even ask at this point, despite not intentionally doing so.

Naruto gave her a dry look before answering, "Three times…" The blonde stood up to start to try and wipe off the icky substance that was in the snake, "…including now… once by another fucking snake, and the second was…" He thought for a moment before on how a giant, lava-spewing, four tailed gorilla-monkey swallowed him whole, "…never mind… just bigger than me."

Yeah, better to keep that one a secret until the right time.

Jill gave him a quick once over to see that Naruto had wiped away some of the snake's bodily fluids, though there was no telling if it was infectious, "Naruto, you didn't get any of the snake's… fluids in your mouth, did you?" It was perhaps better safe than sorry.

"No."

"Then keep your mouth shut…" She looked to her right where she ripped off some decorative curtains to help wipe him down, "…better to not risk getting infected." Jill made her way over to Naruto, who reeked at the moment, though she had gotten used to the smell of shit and decaying corpses over the course of the night, and began wiping off the snake's body fluids, focusing on his face and head rigidly before she continued on down.

For Naruto, on one hand, he understood Jill's reasonings for doing so, but on the other with his own emotional reservations for the S.T.A.R.S. officer, he had to fight the slight blush that was building along with something down below… "You know I could've done this on my own, Jill?" What she should be doing, was getting the Remington reloaded and set for whatever the hell else was coming that heard all of the commotion.

Jill rolled her eyes at Naruto, "Oh please, we both know this is faster…" Speaking as she finished wiping him down for the most part, "…not only that after what you just did, I think we're safe for now with how fast you reacted to that giant snake." Taking the ripped up curtains that were now rather wet with snake body fluids, Jill tossed it aside as she gave Naruto a quick look to inspect for any place she may have missed, "You're good now." Nodding her head in acceptance, Jill went back over to pick up the shotgun as she unzipped her hip pouch to reload the 12 gauge shells underneath the barrel, only to find herself low on ammo, "Dammit, I wasted too much on that fucking thing…"

Seeing that he had arrived prepared, though not expecting to reveal his full arsenal or show a part of it at least, Naruto unslung the duffle bag on his back as he rummaged through it to find the spot where had expanded on to hold ammo, along with his custom Benelli M3, "Here, take this." Naruto tossed a belt of shotgun shells to Jill who caught it with the weight catching her off guard slightly, "I've got some more if you need the ammo."

Zipping up the duffle bag, Naruto slung it back around to move on as Jill got herself situated with her new ammo holster as she clipped it around her waist, although the latter's curiosity was getting the better of her, "What else are you carrying in that duffle bag? I mean, you've got shotgun shells for a shotgun that you clearly aren't carrying around…" Jill gestured around Naruto's body as she finished reloading while getting the spare ammo ready for easy removal, "…on top of the explosives you've got on you, which I still want to know how you got military grade C4." Naruto raised an eyebrow at that statement which prompted Jill to shake her head before looking down briefly, "Actually, you know what? Forget that last part. I don't want to know how you got that." She turned her gaze back to the man that had essentially thrown her whole view of him for a complete loop not too long ago.

Searching that another question that needed answering had just come up, Naruto felt that it best to somewhat gloss over the finer details but still give a decent answer that satisfied, "I've got ammo for my magnum, the Samurai Edge models I designed, 12 gauge, 9 mil, and few explosives among… other things that I use personally."

"Like those 'paper bombs', you said you used down below?" Jill asked in slight curiosity with an arched brow. C4 on its own was pretty devastating depending on how much was used, though the bomb that Naruto used to burn out the giant spider nest didn't seem that large. It would've only blown out a wall the size of a door, much like how they and SWAT teams were trained to use for breaching, but the amount of firepower needed to do that; kill all the spiders, burn out the webs and kill any remaining eggs along with it, was something that would've taken a ridiculous amount of explosives on the level of a 105mm round that the M1 Abrams fires.

Naruto had to concede the question to her, "Yeah, some 'specialties' of mine that I've made my own, using my own materials that I get from sources that I get from outside the city." He didn't want to say that he got some of the stuff necessary to make his ninja tools from the black market. The usual materials that he could get from manufacturers of gun parts didn't quite have what he needed, so he managed to make a couple of contacts that were able to 'acquire' certain items that he was able to make deals with and set up a small shop in his safehouse in the city. Out of sight, and out of mind.

Jill caught onto some of what he meant and was able to fill in the blanks on her own, "Well, it looks like I'm learning all sorts of things tonight."

The S.T.A.R.S. officer would've inquired if Naruto had anything to help deal with anything else unexpected tonight, or even start hypothesizing with him about the purpose for why Umbrella wanted him to be here tonight, but they were interrupted by the sound of the dining hall doors bursting open to reveal the pair that was Chris and Rebecca, both of their Samurai Edge models drawn at the ready, to which Naruto noticed that Rebecca had hers modified with a tactical rail that had a small red dot scope if he was correct by the brief glance he gave it, "Jill!" Chris lowered his gun as he gave a brief look at the giant snake corpse that lay in the middle of the foyer as Rebecca kept her gaze at the creature though she didn't lower the gun and for good reason.

"I can't believe you guys got it…" Not but almost six hours ago, Rebecca had arrived at the mansion's dormitory building after killing the Queen Leech with Billy, both whom had parted on good terms and she fully intended to rescind his part in the events of yesterday from her report, she found herself in a safe room where she had taken some much needed sleep after securing the room properly. Richard, her Bravo team member that had gotten separated from the rest of the team, managed to make his way onto the grounds and find her.

The two had gotten some rest as they did an ammo count before trying to explore the mansion grounds to hopefully find Captain Marini, only to pass by on the foyer's second floor to see two men, one dressed in all white with strange headgear as well as another in a grey military suit befitting of high ranking officer like that of a colonel behind him while carrying a body bag. The former had dispatched a pack of zombie dogs that mauled Edward and Joseph like nothing, while the shorter man simply twirled and oddly designed double bladed dagger around as if it were just an average Tuesday. Their view of the scene had been interrupted by the giant snake ambushing them, as it chased the two Bravo members around the mansion before Richard got clipped by its fangs,poisoning him.

Rebecca would've gone in search of the anti-venom, but she couldn't leave Richard alone to be caught by the other infected creatures wandering around. Luckily, the snake venom wasn't fast acting, rather instead it was a very weak form, most likely coming from a common species that just about everyone could treat in time, which bought them about an hour or so before Jill and Chris found them.

Chris had gone back to the other side of the mansion to search for the anti-venom to which was located in a chemistry lab luckily enough, meanwhile Jill helped her keep watch, 'At least it didn't kill anyone else…' Rebecca thought to herself before lowering her gun after poking it slightly to try and get a reaction. This time the snake was finally dead.

'Boulder Shoulders' as Naruto nicknamed him made his way over towards the two as he turned his head to see the snake once more before he spoke up, "You guys managed to kill that thing?" A bit of disbelief and astonishment were mixed together in Chris' tone.

Jill shrugged her shoulders before answering, "More or less, yeah, we got the bastard." She didn't want to say Naruto cut the damned thing from the inside out and shot it too, but they didn't need to know about that… yet…

"Where's Barry at? I thought he was with you. And why's Naruto here? How did he hear about this?" Chris asked Jill before turning his gesture to Naruto who stood next to her while he kept his eyes up above them at the upper walkway to make sure nothing would ambush them, though he really didn't want to look his friend in the eye just yet.

"Naruto's here because Umbrella blackmailed him into coming." Jill stated again before she elaborated slightly, "They threatened him that they'd kill us…" Gesturing towards themselves as well as Rebecca, "…if he didn't show up. What they want with him is something neither of us knows." The ex-army soldier stated with finality in her tone. Opening up her hip pouch, Jill pulled out the Umbrella emblem to gesture towards their next destination in the facility, "Now, let's see where this takes us." Chris pulled out the one that he and Rebecca had found in the library with Naruto and Rebecca coming in the rear as Naruto glanced around to make sure nothing was coming out from either side of the foyer's doors leading to the east and west wings of the mansion.

As they came around the corner that led beneath the main stairway, Jill caught a glimpse of Chris on the other side of a gate that separated the groups, "Here's hoping this leads us to answers for everything…" Chris said as he withdrew a similar emblem to the one that Jill possessed. Handing the former captain her own half of the emblem and using them to unlock the gate, Jill watched as Chris took the lead with his Samurai Edge sweeping the stairs with Jill following behind, Rebecca and Naruto respectively as Naruto shut the gate before catching up with the others, all the while mentally preparing himself for whatever else they may encounter, all the while hoping he would find answers as to what Umbrella wanted from him.

"The smell is getting worse as we keep going further down." Rebecca said nasally as she pinched her nose in disgust. Chris shook his head briefly before blinking to try and hold back his blanching skin. Jill had already gotten used to the smell after navigating the caverns thus far, while Naruto just was, well… used to smells like this… he scrunched his nose a bit before scratching the outside while they crept down further into the caverns. Before they knew it, they came down to a split in the pathway: one where the cavern kept going further on towards the right, while the other on the led left to a ladder going down, "Great, which way to go is the question now." The rookie wasn't all that surprised by this, based upon how many twists and turns that the Training Facility had underground network.

"We need to find the main complex soon…" Naruto spoke up as he made his way to the front, trying to think ahead, "…if we split up, we may be able to find it faster than together going one way." In all honesty he was trying to keep from revealing to anyone else about his past; Jill only knew a bit because he needed to have at least someone that was trusted to help him through the situation, that and he was counting on how close the two of them were to help make thing easier once all was said and done. Meaning it gave him more time with Jill for her to become more comfortable, or as much as he thought possible without her calling out his sense defying acts with no true explanation.

Whether or not Jill had the same idea or not, she spoke up in agreement, "He's right. I don't think we'll have much time left with Brad still in the area and the chopper is probably running on fumes." She glanced back and forth between Chris and Rebecca hoping they'd agree with them.

Rebecca understood that splitting up sometimes had its benefits after working with Billy the previous night, and that this was most likely the best option they had, "I'm with you, both of you." She glanced back and forth between the gunsmith and senior S.T.A.R.S. member, "Who knows, we may end up getting there at the same time. But it's better if someone got ahead to do a sweep of the area."

All eyes looked to Chris since he didn't seem to be on board with the idea, "I don't know. Ever since we've split up, we've cut it close… a hair's breadth close to nearly dying several times. We've mostly just lucked out up until now." And he wasn't wrong. While Chris himself got separated from the others as they made their way into the mansion, Chris was on his own until he met up with Jill and they found the last members of Bravo Team still alive. Kenneth managed to make it here on his own, but by the time he got in, one of the infected men had caught him by surprise and tore his throat out. Forest had been pecked to death by a murder of crows up in the exterior balcony on the east side, and there was no telling where the rest of Bravo Team was at. Though from what Rebecca had told him, maybe Enrico was still kicking and trying to survive, but Rebecca hadn't seen him since the Training Facility, even though both were unaware that he had been shot dead.

Sensing that they had hit a bit of a roadblock, Naruto had to push for this decision, so he needed to use some carrot sticks to hopefully resolve this, "Maybe one of us will run into Barry down here?" He briefly looked at Jill, who by his trained eyes had gone stiff at the mention of the potential traitor's name being mentioned, "If we all go together down one way only, we may not be able to find him. Jill and I ran into him earlier in the caverns, but we got separated." Once again, Jill didn't say anything. Maybe she wasn't sure who to trust now, other than the whiskered blonde?

Chris looked down in thought, mulling over the points that had been made. There was strength in numbers, and with some added firepower from Naruto's customs which always delivered more than expected, they wouldn't have too much of a problem. But at the same time, they could get bunched up by a group of infected and get caught themselves. If they split up, they each were a pair that could move proficiently enough to get out of reach from being scratched or bitten, all the while having less firepower to put the infected down faster. Both options held their risks and benefits, though considering the situation with Barry, Captain Wesker and Enrico still possibly alive, "Alright, let's split up them, but let's make sure to not take any unnecessary risks. Let's not lose anyone else tonight." Chris looked to Rebecca for if she'd stick with him for the rest of the night since they had stuck with one another after helping Richard, she nodded on down the right for them to take. Taking it as a yes, Chris went down first before turning back towards Jill and Naruto, "See you two on the other side of wherever this leads us."

"Will do, Chris." Jill said as she gave a slight salute. Although Naruto went with his usual response filled with nicknames.

"No prob, Boulder Shoulders."

Both S.T.A.R.S. women gave a slight chuckle before they fought it down, although Chris gave a look of confusion before looking at his shoulders, "My shoulders aren't that big." He said with some slight insecurity before Rebecca said anything, "They're kind of average honestly."

"Oh, that's not so bad then. I guess."

Jill had her mouth covered to stifle the laugh that threatened to burst out loud, as to not make Chris feel even more insecure about his shoulders. She gave Naruto a slight look of amusement, "Nice going. You actually managed to lighten the mood up a bit."

Naruto merely shrugged his shoulders at her words, "It's nothing. I figured we needed some humor to keep on going through this nightmare…" He looked back to Jill seeing that he liked her more when she smiled, "…not only that, I'd rather have only you know the truth for now." Jill knew what he was referring to as she got the feeling that she'd need to help him through when the time came to come clean.

Reading her Remington, Jill turned towards the ladder as she spoke, "I'll have your back, but… I think I still need to know the whole truth from you." She looked back towards Naruto with some sympathy mixed with something else that Naruto couldn't make out, "You're not the only one with some history they don't want to talk about." Now that caught his attention. Naruto heard murmur that Jill had served in the American military, namely the Army branch for four years and was honorably discharged. But she never talked about it beyond just boot camp. Did she have something she was ashamed of talking about? Was that small bit of 'showing his hand' shake something within Jill? Either way, it seemed that she'd have his back, "Come on, we still need to look for the main complex here." Jill gestured for Naruto to follow her down the ladder towards their destination.

Seeing how Jill was taking the lead once again, Naruto followed her down after she gained some distance so as to not step on her hands while climbing down. As they reached the bottom, the cavern became far narrower with candles becoming alight on the floor, guiding them towards their next destination as they rounded the corner to hear someone struggling by the way they were grunting, "Think it's Barry?" Naruto whispered to Jill who had thumbed the safety off the Remington.

"Maybe, or Captain Wesker." She held the shotgun downwards so as to not accidentally shoot Barry should it be him, although she couldn't say she wasn't tempted to make him talk at gunpoint for leaving them down below the elevator before. Turning the corner, the duo saw ahead of them was indeed Barry trying to move something on a large stone slab. Jill breathed deeply in aggravation as Naruto patted her back to ease up on the aggression, though she wasn't able to tell if he could sense her anxiety for how she wanted to deal with Barry.

As the two entered the room, they could see that it was some sort of mausoleum, with one large sarcophagus that Barry was trying to slide open, coupled with a chain pulley that hooked to the center of the sarcophagus that went up and towards something on the other end on the far side of the room where a gate that led out. Off to the left were various wooden coffins with some of them having been busted open; whether they were from within or not was something best not pondered, while off to the right was a layer of mist that creeped up onto the walkway from what Naruto could guess, based off the slight breeze he was feeling from.

Deciding to give Barry a little push to the truth before they went any further into things, Naruto ahead of Jill with his Lightning Hawk drawn, he thumbed the safety off that resounded through the mausoleum garnering Barry's attention from the sarcophagus, "Guys, you're alive." From all the years Naruto had spent training himself in to deciphering people's motives, he could feel Barry's worry in his voice, though whether that was because they were alive or not was an entirely different question, "I was worried that you—"

Naruto cut Barry off before he could speak again as he pointed the magnum right at his heart, "Start talking, Barry. Real quick." Jill had caught up as she took Barry's Python from his holster since he couldn't very well do anything about the blonde's own gun right at this second, "You left us back down underground. Why?"

Holding the Remington by the stock in her left hand while pointing the Python at Barry with her right, Jill's patience was running thin by this point, "Don't lie to us!" She really was not in the mood for lying anymore. She wanted answers tonight.

Barry tried to placate them, knowing that he wouldn't be able to hide it for much longer but still needed to hold it in until the right time, "Look, I thought I heard something up above us, so I went to go check it out!" He glanced back and forth between the angered looks Naruto and Jill both were shooting at him, knowing that odds are he'd get into this sort of position eventually as this whole investigation dragged on.

Naruto however was not so accepting of the answer, "Cut the bull—" the blonde was abruptly stopped by the sound of clinking chains and shuffling footsteps that were accompanied by that moaning…

"Mutherrr…."

Jill and Naruto both had lowered their weapons as all three people had directed their attention towards the gate that was slammed open by the same creature that Naruto and Jill narrowly avoided engaging not too long ago, "Shit…" Was all Naruto could say.

The creature stepped on the rusted gates as it sent a chilling shriek that was accompanied by a new horror that it held within as several bloody tentacles jutted from the body as they flailed wildly about, like a snake trying to catch any unfortunate prey that drew close by.

Seeing that things were going to go south fast, Barry turned back to Jill, "Jill, hand me my gun back!" He shouted in desperation. Seeing that despite now having the advantageous weaponry and explosives that Naruto had with him, they likely wouldn't've done much good in such an enclosed space like this, coupled with the fact that the creature was able to regenerate quite quickly, they needed some extra manpower to get rid of it for as long as they possibly could. Jill twirled the Python back to Barry for her supposed S.T.A.R.S. member to retake, "Thanks, Jill!"

As the creature came around the bend towards their position, the trio opened fire with their weapons into the creature with the impact sending it back some steps as it shrieked in pain with the various shells and round penetrating its rotting/regenerating body, but it did little to put the thing down, "Fucking hell, how much does it take to kill this thing?" The ninja spoke aloud to himself as they began to move back slowly from the creature that began to creep towards the group again.

Barry unloaded the rest of his clip into the creature before he pulled out one of his speed reloaders to get Python ready again, "Son of a bitch, stay down dammit!" The creature shrieked again as it turned around to pick up a nearby rock and chuck it at the senior's head, although he got lucky when Jill quickly tackled him down before it could take his head off, "Jesus, thanks, Jill."

"Just don't die tonight, Barry…" Jill said, moderately annoyed that she had been forced to drop the Remington to get him down in time, but she quickly pulled her Samurai Edge out to start shooting once more, pelting the area that she thought had been a face in the vain hope that he 9mm slugs would at least blind the creature.

Meanwhile, Naruto was trying to figure out how to kill the beast since Jill had mentioned before that small arms fire would prove ineffective, and while he did bring up the prospect of simply beheading it, an experimental probe with his sword had resulted in the humanoid creature spontaneously developing tentacles with bony barbs at their tips that lanced at his approach like some giger-esque porcupine. Although, looking at the size of the sarcophagus and comparing it to the creature, an idea did come to mind.

"Jill, Barry!" Naruto said to try and get their attention over the gunfire, "Try to get it close to the tomb! I'm gonna try to lift the top off, then you two onload on it to force it back into it, and then I drop the top right on the thing!" Granted it was a crazy idea, but one thing that probably could do the trick.

"Are you crazy! That slabs heavy, I could barely even pry up the chain used to move the blasted thing." Barry replied incredulously at the obvious impossibility of what the gunsmith had proposed. He had tried to push the slab off in the hopes of finding some kind of puzzle piece that seemed to be integral in navigating the labyrinthine paths down here.

Seriously, who the hell puts keys and gems inside of statues and busts? As it turned out a good proportion of Umbrella's upper management had a shared fascination, if borderline fetish for puzzles, not that the current occupants of the under the puzzle riddled manor would have much cared for the knowledge. They were more concerned with halting the approach of the endlessly advancing humanoid monstrosity that was for all intents and purposes impervious to damage.

Jill knew that Naruto was much stronger than he looked. Coupled with how they were basically just wasting ammo at the moment, ammo that could be saved for potentially far worse things if that was even possible, she had to agree with Naruto, "Alright, just give us some time!"

Barry briefly glanced at Jill with disbelief, but that was quashed as he went back to shooting at the creature whom he blasted in the foot to try and slow it down, "I hope you two know what you're doing." He muttered to himself.

Naruto had to climb over the stone slab that sealed the sarcophagus up to reach the chain pulley, "Ok, just don't jump over towards me…" He was hoping that it wouldn't act like a predator of sorts and try to target the stray. As Naruto got to the chain, he began to pull on the pulley with all of his strength while noting that while it did have some weight to it, it wasn't as heavy as Barry made it out to be. But then again, this was more than likely his natural strength being far greater than the humans of this world.

As Naruto had made his way towards the chain, Jill and Barry had quickly moved back towards the cavern opening where Jill had picked up the Remington once more for its firepower, while Barry used a brief break in the combat to swap out to a stronger ammunition for his Python. Normally the .500 Hollow Points would blow the whole back on the way out of most living things, however, based upon how much punishment the creature had been taking from the usual 12 gauge and the standard .500 cartridge, this had to have some effect on it, "Eat this…" He aimed down the sights of the revolver to take lock onto the creature's head as he saw that Naruto, by some miracle, had gotten the stone slab pulled up to open the sarcophagus.

Seeing this as his chance, Barry pulled the trigger once to let the first round plow into the creature's shoulder. The uprated magnum round impacted the chitinous flesh with a great crack leaving a proportionately sized hole in the creature, though within the rancid flesh the bullet flowers out to deal as much internal damage as possible, a geyser of blood and gore spewing from the entry wound as the beast shrieked in pain as it was sent back a couple of feet before trying to regain its footing.

"How much punishment can it take?!" Jill said in astonishment before she reloaded the Remington.

Seeing that the creature was still a few feet shy of where they needed it, Barry pulled the trigger once more with the shot placed deep into the chest as the creature let loose a wail of pain before it was sent back once more. Although this time, the creature was holding onto the edge of the sarcophagus as it was leaning into it just enough for Naruto to see his opening, "Gotcha." Naruto had lifted the stone slab up to the ceiling before making sure the creature was far enough into the sarcophagus to let it go. Before the creature could get back up to retaliate, the stone slab slammed with enough force to practically pretzel the creature's spine and blood gushed from the corpse that now occupied the tomb.

As the ragtag group of law enforcement and one ex-ninja watched the slab wobble erratically while the creature went through what they all deeply hoped was its death throes, they were witness to the slow wind down of activity, the slabs movements becoming lethargic and shallow before finally the tomb's occupant let out a last wail, a painful longing in its tortured tone, "…mo…ther…"

Then all was still.

The S.T.A.R.S. officers were catching their breath while Naruto made his way back with them before proceeding, "Well, I think that thing won't be bothering us the rest of the night." He gave the protruding arm of the creature another glance before he concluded that even if it was still alive, that slab would render it neutralized.

"That…" Barry started as he exchanged his hollow point for standard ammo to reload, "…was what I thought was back above us, so I figured I could try to put it down." He looked down briefly before turning towards the partially exposed corpse of the creature, "Guess I overestimated my odds and misheard it." He turned back to Jill and Naruto who now stood next to his co-officer to continue explaining, "When I didn't find any sign of it, I went back down below but I didn't find either of you. I thought you managed to find another way out." While it wasn't the strongest defense he had, Barry saw that the both of them were seemingly in acceptance of the answer, "Look, I'm sorry for pulling that stunt. We're…" Gesturing towards himself and Jill, "…better trained than to pull things like that without warning." Seeing the look exchanged between the two, they seemed to accept his apology/excuse for leaving them down in the caverns.

Jill sighed, rubbing her eyes before speaking up, "I think this night's worn us all down, some of us more than others…" Her eyes flitted to the blonde who had arrived later to the meat grinder unlike their unit, "…but anyways, we regrouped with Chris and Rebecca from Bravo Team, and we're heading down further that hopefully lead to the main lab complex." Jill was hoping that with the five of them together they could find the evidence they needed to prove what they had been seeing here all night, as no sane person would ever believe about the dead rising up and walking as zombies, coupled with giant mutant man-lizards, rotting sharks, giant snakes, zombie dogs… living plants…

Barry nodded in understanding, "Alright, I think it's best if we stick together from now on." Since this was likely the best chance for them to regain trust in his word.

"Wait!" Jill held up her hand to pause their advance, drawing the eyes of both men who gave her looks that ranged midway between confusion and interest, something that grew precipitously when Jill pulled her badge from her belt and held it out in front of her. "Naruto, put your hand on my badge." she said, drawing a confused look from Naruto who stood there glibly, "Now!" Jill insisted, the blonde eventually placing his blood, dirt and other fluid-soaked hand on the badge. "By the power vested in me as a member of S.T.A.R.S. and the exceptional circumstances of the evenings events I hereby deputize you to the RPD for the duration of this operation." she finished, putting the badge back on her belt.

Naruto stared at Jill for a good twenty seconds before turning his attention to Barry for an answer, the elder male mouthing 'Paperwork' and causing the blonde to nod uneasily. The undead were one thing, but the evil of paperwork could never be denied.

"Well, hopefully Boulder Shoulders and Rebecca made it to where we need to go." Naruto said as he started down the gate where the creature initially came from, "And behind mystery door number one..." As much as Naruto wanted to get out of this place, he got the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach that somehow in some way, Umbrella had made a problem that began with him. Jill and Barry both came up behind the ex-ninja as they headed down further into the caverns for a while where they eventually came to a ladder leading up to through a hatch that came up into a garden house.

With the trio now topside, and Barry having shut the hatch to keep any unwanted infected from coming up behind him, they exited the garden house to see that it opened up to a large fountain pool where an adjacent garden house was on the opposite side, quickly finding Chris and Rebecca on opposites sides of the fountains that encircled the perimeter, both turning something on their respective ends, "I think this'll lower the water to get us down there." Chris said in confidence.

Rebecca nodded before speaking, "From what I saw back at the Training Facility yesterday, it wouldn't surprise me that they hide things like this in plain sight, but why go through so much trouble is beyond me."

As they continued, Naruto, Barry and Jill came into their peripherals with Chris the one to acknowledge them, "Glad that you guys made it." He turned to them briefly before turning back to the fountain. Naruto had made his way over to Chris where he watched the man gripping onto a stone structure of a wolf emblem that was being turned right side up, "We saw an elevator heading down the shaft, and we think this leads down into the main part of the complex. If it does, we can end this whole thing tonight."

'Confident as ever, Boulder Shoulders' Naruto thought to himself. While that was nice thinking, he couldn't help but silently doubt that things were going to end tonight. Judging from all of what he had learned from what Jill had told him about her experience along with the evidence she had been collecting, it was likely this wouldn't end any time soon, "As long as we find out what Umbrella's been doing here, that's enough for me."

For Chris, he was trying to be as positive as he could about ending things. If they had enough evidence from this place, then they could take it to Chief Irons and with an investigation finally getting underway to make the conglomerate confront its crimes here. Although he had to admit to his curiosity as to why Naruto was here in the first place. It was true that Jill had said that Umbrella was blackmailing him, but for what was unknown. Maybe there were answers down below for that as well? Whatever the case may be, they'd get answers tonight. As for the questions he had for Naruto, he kept them to himself so as to not drive a wedge between them. Right now, they needed to stick together for what happened next, anything else would come after.

As the last Bravo member and 'Boulder Shoulders', as Naruto had dubbed him, finished cranking the emblems, they heard a loud rush as the water began to flow downwards quickly along with a large stone slab of the wall dropping down, revealing a stairway that lead towards the elevator which appeared to lead down into the structure, "One-way trip it seems." Barry said as he eyeballed the machinery that looked to nearly be on its last legs before proper repairs needed to be made. They could likely take the elevator down once, though back up was quite unlikely.

Jill went descended the stairs first before she opened up the gate for the elevator to gauge if they could all fit onboard for a single drop. Giving it a slight jump, the elevator shook moderately before she confirmed it was sturdy enough for them all, "Ok, it's good to go. Everyone hop on." With Jill's approval the rest of the group made their way down the steps while Chris punched the down button for the elevator door to close, lock and descend down further into the depths of the complex.

-Wesker-

While the survivors had been making their way down into the main lab complex, Wesker himself had been at work preparing to take the data he had at the lab with him after the Queen Leech created this disaster, all the while still playing along in that he was loyal to Umbrella. He had keyed up some recordings of the S.T.A.R.S. officers in their encounters varying from the expected death or unexpected survival, be it from a pair of infected humans, or the Hunter Alpha's that he and Brikin prepared to release in the event the 'accidents' couldn't take care of the survivors.

However, once Naruto, the source of the genetic markers of the newly created X-virus, arrived at the mansion grounds, Wesker shifted his focus onto capturing as much footage as possible for later analysis once he was able to relocate to a better safehouse. Better to get out from under Umbrella's nose as much as possible, especially when these smaller outbreaks could potentially expand into a viral cascade; one that Umbrella could not simply sweep under the rug, "Hmm, I should make sure that Sergei hasn't expunged my access codes from the servers just yet…" After his run-in with the former Soviet Colonel, with a new Tyrant variant that he had no knowledge of in tow, Wesker knew that he was quite likely on borrowed time at the corporation.

Hitting the keystrokes to access the general database that reached out to the other Umbrella facilities, all of which were codenamed, NEST.

The facilities were numbered, and each had their roles within the company for their research. NEST 1 was established as a viral research outpost where Birkin and his wife were placed in charge of overseeing the development of the current G and X-virus strains.

NEST 2 was established to allow for vaccine research into their viral work and weapons testing, currently the T-virus vaccine was under development by Nathaniel Bard and his team; although the facility also functioned as a massive storage unit coupled with the occasional weapons testing site. And while he didn't often care to hear about artificial weaponry that the military was already invested in developing, he did hear how Umbrella was developing a handheld railgun that could cut down buildings with a single shot.

Now that would've been a money maker that would sell for a mint on the open market to various countries and PMC's alike, although Wesker suspected that Spencer would have it sold only to the US and allied countries to help maintain the power and influence that his political allies held.

Then there was NEST 3, the biological weapons testing and disposal site where the Deacon was going to be transferred as soon as possible after the recent test that Annette conducted. While he had been out of contact with them since arriving at the Arklay Facility, he knew full well that the Deacon had survived the various pit fights that had been set against it.

As Wesker attempted to access the facility's databases, he was suddenly hit with a red flaring screen as a synthetic female voice spoke up, "Your access has been revoked, by the authority of Colonel Sergei Valdimir." Well, it wasn't unexpected, and he did have other means to obtain the data that he was lacking. But this did reveal something new to him.

Spencer had an AI developed for Umbrella, another thing that he was unaware of and yet more proof that he was being considered a flight risk by the circle of old men.

It was most likely developed by Umbrella Europe as he didn't have much access to that branch of the corporation even though he had a few ears inside of it, he knew of something called 'Project N', but beyond that, nothing much else. The European branch was always a secretive bunch when it came to their projects, only ever releasing their data when the final product had been finished to gloat over how effective they were in practice.

"It seems I have little choice but to use them to get any other data I'm missing access to." The traitor said to himself as he now needed people who could get the data for him, through clean channels or wet work mattered not to him. One of which he knew could be bought easily since he worked within the UBCS and was always willing to go the extra mile for a higher paycheck, hence why Sergei made him a Monitor. The other was at times often a freelance agent that made her living doing corporate espionage; while not the most famous in her line of work, she was certainly the best to employ, getting results despite the odds against her.

Wesker turned to a monitor that kept an eye on the fountain entrance into the facility, he saw the S.T.A.R.S. members plus X-virus source exit the elevator where they began to make their way through the facility, and towards him, "I should set the stage ready for their arrival." Keying the T-002 up he made sure it was ready to go whenever he needed it released, but he felt it also probably best to give them a little demonstration of what their new friend's blood was capable of producing with the X-virus.

Pulling up the locally saved X-virus data from the MO disc he brought with him to take the local data with, Wesker pulled up the Hammerpede's initial development vid file, as two of the scientists over at NEST 1 went into their room to inspect it. Suffice to say, it went about as one expected from a viral strain that mutated the infectee to such an extreme with very enhanced aggression levels…

"It's breaking my arm! It's breaking my—" A resounding crack of a bone breaking was heard from the recording, "AAAGGHHH! CUT IT OFF! CUT IT OFF!"

Yes, this one would do nicely. Best to save the Deacon for another time perhaps then. The only way to survive in this business was subterfuge and surprise.

-The Survivors-

The elevator came to a halt with the survivors stepping out one by one with their weapons at the ready, into the slightly alite hallway that led down into the facility where they saw the designation B-1F painted in bright white on an otherwise dirty wall. Naruto sighed in annoyance, "There's multiple floors in this place? Great. And here I was hoping for a single floor and another elevator."

The ninja drawled out before Jill patted him on the back, "Hey, won't be much longer now." Speaking up to try and keep things as positive as possible, just as he had done several times.

"Let's keep moving, there's bound to be a records room around here somewhere with what they've done." Chris took the lead as he designated himself as point man for the time being, leading the group towards another ladder heading down further into the lab. As they climbed down the ladder, Chris took note that the room was filled with some security monitors that still had some active camera's surveying the mansion as well as the elevator that they took down here, "Looks like some of the systems here were still active, though I can't imagine how they managed to keep it going with everyone having been dead for a while now."

"It's possible the facility has a pretty good power source to keep things running automatically…" Naruto said as he stood next to Chris, "…considering how much trouble they went to keep access to this place as restricted as possible, making people do fucking puzzles of all things to get to it, says a lot about their mindset when it comes to security." Seriously, why go through so much damn trouble just to open up a fucking door? An electronic lockpad would've done the same thing.

"Maybe they're just insane in a sense?" Rebecca spoke up, having seen how Dr. Marcus treated some of his assistants and fellow scientists from the records she and Billy had discovered back at the Training Facility. Using them as guinea pigs for the viral research was chief among them.

Barry was taking in their surroundings to try and see if he could act more freely from what Wesker had blackmailed him to do, but it seemed he had the bad luck that came with a broken mirror. A surveillance camera was currently watching them live as they talked amongst themselves, which he didn't want to give Wesker too much to use against them. Not while he still intended to get back at the man when he could at the opportune moment, "We should probably keep moving. It's not safe to stay in one place for too long."

Turning back to the doorway leading to the facility, Chris agreed with Barry, "Right, let's keep moving people."

As much as Naruto did agree, he did think that perhaps they could do something about the security system. At first, he wasn't too sure about whether or not he could sabotage the camera's wherever they hid themselves from them to spy on the survivors, but after taking a look at the security system here in the checkpoint, Naruto was able to see that maybe they did have some saving grace in whoever designed it, "I think I can give us some breathing room from here on out."

The S.T.A.R.S. officers turned to Naruto who was walking over towards the security camera pointing at them before he started to fiddle with it, as Jill voiced her confusion, "What do you mean, Naruto?"

Naruto began to unscrew the lens as he explained, "The security system, while nice and all, it's basic." He turned to glance at them briefly to see they were paying attention somewhat to his explanation, "It's what they use over in prisons with a wire to wire, peer to peer connection…" As Naruto took the lens out, he reached inside to grab a certain set of wires, "…they all signal to each other once to make a cohesive image relay system with no image delay. Knock out one switch, then you knock them all out. It's a piece of crap system to be honest, but I guess Umbrella didn't expect someone to be able to subvert it." One hand, he knew that the S.T.A.R.S. officers were wondering how he knew about that, to which he silently admitted to doing some research on multiple prison types in the event that something went south and he wound up in there, and needed to know a good few things in order to escape and start over… is what he wanted to say. In actuality he just got really bored waiting for a parts shipment at night and spent the waiting time talking to a prison guard getting his revolver fixed.

As Naruto yanked one wire out, he knew that he took out the switch that would monitor all other camera's leaving only this one available for viewing, "Say cheese everyone." Naruto took a brief step back as he flipped off the camera with an open smile, though the others took a few seconds longer to go with the flow. They each brought the guns pointed up with a smile, though perhaps Barry grinned just a bit too much…

As soon as they got it out of their system, or rather Naruto did with his inner prankster having shown off a bit, Naruto yanked the second wire out to kill the entire camera system for whoever was still watching them, "Now that that's been taken care of, I'd say we've got a lot more freedom."

"Smart thinking." Chris stated as he pivoted back to the door to open it slowly with his Samurai Edge drawn at the ready. Seeing that nothing was around to threaten them, yet… Chris stepped out to check the hallway before he made the hand signal to move up with him and that it was clear for now. Turning the corner, Chris saw the silhouette of a human sitting down sprawled against the wall; thinking that it might be another infected, Chris thumbed the safety off his weapon before coming into view of the corpse, seeing that it had been dead for some time, albeit a gun in its right hand coupled with a head wound that had blown out the back of its skull, thus indicating that the poor bastard took his own life before he turned like the rest, "Clear. He's not getting back up." They breathed a sigh of relief in that they didn't wind up ringing the dinner bells so to speak. Perhaps they got lucky and wound up killing all of the infected people back up above?

They continued down the hallway slowly before they came to a t-section with a directory of some of the rooms in the facility.

On this level keeping to the left, were the staff quarter rooms and break room, while on the left going down a level onto B-2F was the records room coupled with the database. As for B-3F, that floor held the main laboratory, meaning that was where they likely would find the cause of everything, along with an elevator that led to a helipad. And finally, it held the primary power room that kept the whole facility going.

Seeing that they had too much ground to cover, Chris stepped forward to take command, "Alright, it looks like we can clear these floors faster if we split up, though I'm not too for it we don't have a real choice." Turning back around to face the others, Chris gave out the orders, "Rebecca, you and I will check out the staff and break rooms if there were any survivors who tried to escape and see if they have anything that we can use for evidence. Jill, Naruto, the two of you can head down into the records room to find out what they've been doing here all this time." He then turned to Barry with some reservation about the next order, "Barry, I want you to head down into the lab floor and try to get things set for Brad to land. I don't think we'll have much time left since he's been flying straight for almost twelve hours…" Taking a quick glance at his watch, Chris had kept up with the time since they arrived here at around 8PM, and they were coming up on 7AM in the morning, meaning that most likely they wouldn't have much fuel left in the chopper to get home, "…I know sending you on your own's risky but—"

Barry cut Chris off with a wave, "It's alright Chris, I've been able to take care of myself for a while now, so don't worry." Besides, with the camera's down, this was his chance to make preparations to turn things in their favor.

With their objectives in mind, they headed on to their respective locations to investigate the complex. Chris and Rebecca headed to the staff room first before Barry split off from Jill and Naruto who made their way to the records room.

For Naruto, he still had a deep feeling in his gut that he was going to find something to do with him here, as evident by the look of unconscious trepidation marring his face that Jill picked up on, "Hey, are you alright, Naruto?"

Scratching the back of his head, Naruto relented a bit, "I'm a little uneasy about this whole mess. Somehow, I just know that something down here's connected to me." He knew full well what Umbrella could do with someone like him, even just his cells alone were likely a gold mine of projects they could create., "I still don't know how they tracked me down, or what they found on me to try and blackmail me into coming here to rescue you guys."

Jill had a feeling that there was good reason to worry about what he said. Judging from what Naruto was capable of, she could tell that they would've cut him open to see what made him tick, to what end was only pure speculation. Seeing that they had now arrived at the records room that was designated by the nameplate on the door, perhaps this would help ease his concerns, "Maybe we'll find it in here? Who knows?" Opening the door, they moved in to see how the room had been set up, with a large projector setup ready to go along with various film canisters off to the right on a rack. To the left of the film roll canisters sat a series of computer monitors with VHS systems connected to them, along with some tapes. To the left side of the room, various filing cabinets that were organized by date all marked with specific color coded markers, most likely to ensure the important work was flagged up for future projects and research, "I think we just found everything we needed." Jill spoke aloud, though her tone then leaned towards disappointment upon some mental math about the logistics of transporting such formats of data, "Shame we can't take it all out of here with us tonight."

Now for Naruto, normally he wouldn't have showcased another thing like his special sealing duffle bag, but since Jill already knew well enough about what he could do to an extent, he stepped up to help her out with her job, "Maybe we can." Jill turned towards Naruto as he took the duffle bag off his person to set down on the table while unzipping it, "My duffle bag can take as much evidence that you need." Looking around, he could see that while Umbrella certainly had a lot of paperwork and films of their projects, he was confident that the sealing bag could take it all with them, but nothing else could go with it. There was a rule when it came to sealing referred to as the inverse spacetime constant, meaning that there was a limit to what could be stored in a sealing script of a certain size.

As for Jill, all she could do was nod her head at his words before speaking, "Ok, another thing that I now know about you. You've got a magic duffle bag that can hold whatever the hell you can get your hands on." Looking back at the projector, Jill took a few steps closer to it to see that a slide had already been loaded into it, "Looks like someone forgot to unload this." Hitting the slide switch, Jill began the projector showcase of what all Umbrella had been doing.

The first slide showcased the title; Umbrella – Bio-Organic Weapon Official Report.

"Looks like we finally get answers, Jill." Naruto spoke as he began packing in the files from the shelf into the sealing duffle bag.

Jill said nothing in response as the two of them read the contents of the slide, with Naruto looking up to read every chance he got.

The T-virus is the crowning achievement by Umbrella thus far within the company's lifetime, since the discovery of the Progenitor virus by our founders. Now we present to you several of our newly developed Bio-Organic Weapons, or B.O.W.'s for short.

The simplicity of the virus and its effects are what make it more effective than even Anthrax or Ebola when unleashed on a local population, making quick work of enemies that have the unfortunate fate of being victims of said virus

Hitting the switch to the next slide, they saw the same undead dogs that had nearly mauled them several times tonight and killed Joseph so fast before he could even retaliate.

The MA-39 Cerberus is one of several successful weapons we've developed. Using Doberman dogs, we saw that canines do possess some level of resistance to the T-virus after a month or so, the subjects began to showcase physical deterioration, followed by unprovoked displays of high aggression. Sedatives are effective for a short amount of time, before the unnatural strength begins to rise in the subject. Prior to his death, Doctor Marcus posited that the increase in strength was twofold in that not only where the subconscious inhibitions put in place to protect a body from damage are suspended but that mitochondrial energy production is increased by a factor of five at the cost of flesh entering rapid necrosis.

Jill shivered slightly back at the memory of trying to put a pack down that killed Joseph, only to find that her efforts were for nothing in saving his life or putting the zombie dogs down.

"Guess they turned man's best friend into his worst enemy." Naruto commented off handedly before Jill went to the next slide.

FI-03 Neptune. The Great White Shark was already an apex predator and killer long before we introduced the T-virus into its system. The only real changes that we observed were that it had resisted the T-virus infection progression for three months before physical deterioration began to set in along with the expected enhanced strength and aggression, however there is hardly any use for it outside of the water. Although the RI facility has expressed interest in using them to police their waters.

"What a way to make mother nature's best killing machine even more bloodthirsty." Jill commented before hitting the next slide to the mutant lizard men.

The MA-121 Hunter is a new and highly effective model that was created through the usage of the T-virus as a bonding agent to graft reptilian DNA to a fertilized human embryo by Doctor William Birkin. The initial result was quite promising. Promising enough that it spawned several offshoot projects within the Alpha, Beta and Gamma Hunter series that is in development. The easy development and deployment of these creatures has proven to be attractive to many of our prospective buyers.

The both of them were disgusted by what they had read off the slide, as neither could really say anything about. Only knowing that the creatures, while deadly, could be outsmarted to a degree as Naruto learned when he first encountered them. Though the next slide was what held so little information on it, yet it did little to ease their worries.

The T-002 Tyrant is the final product of our work here in Umbrella. I understand that not everyone has been informed of this project as many would likely object to human exposure to the T-virus after the disastrous testing of the late Dr. Marcus, however, the T-002 is the stepping stone towards what we have been trying to achieve all this time. The perfect lifeform. The T-001 Prototype was disposed of at the Training Facility as it was deemed to be ineffective, while work continued on with the current iteration that is the T-002. A full specimen was sent to our NEST 2 facility to continue research with higher standards of equipment and safety precautions, to be placed into the T-003 'Mr. X' project to create one that can operate within the public for Umbrella. The early stage issue of the incredibly rare genetic markers required for the synthesizing of a Tyrant has been circumvented by the repeated cloning of a loyal donor.

The slide itself held no picture of the supposed Tyrant, only a picture of a large incubation tube filled to the brim with some substance of sorts, and the silhouette of a large man inside of it, "Guess this Tyrant is something they've been trying to keep under wraps." Naruto said as he had stopped loading stuff into the duffle bag to pay attention to Umbrella's twisted work.

Jill had to agree with that stance, most people would look on this work as something abominable, "If most of the people knew that they were developing this thing, then it's no wonder they'd have them killed." Releasing this T-virus would be one such way to take care of things. Jill hit the switch for the next slide, only for nothing to show up at the end, "Guess this presentation was being put together before the outbreak here if that's all there is to it."

"Right…" Naruto nodded as he started back to putting the files into the duffle bag, "…well, now we know more about what's been going on, let's get everything in here and meet up with the others."

-Chris & Rebecca; Staff Quarters-

The other S.T.A.R.S. officers were currently rummaging through the various lockers of the scientists that had been working at the facility before the outbreak occurred were all either infected, deceased or missing. There was one person who had blown a hole in his head, much like the other person they saw just outside, though it was hard to tell if he was a scientist since they weren't able to see if the coat was white or not.

Chris was currently going through the lockers one by one to find any sort of incriminating evidence, "Nothing. Nothing from Bennet's locker, Rebecca." He turned to see Rebecca was currently trying to get into the local terminal that was still online to hopefully get some information off of it to download onto the blank MO discs that had been set on the desk.

Rebecca took a quick break away from her efforts to look over the clipboard list of the research staff that had been stationed here for Chris to move onto the next name, "Next up is John Clemens; the Chief Researcher of the lab. His locker might have something, given his position."

It was certainly better than nothing, since that was all they were getting at the moment, "Here's hoping…" Chris mumbled to himself as he opened up the locker to the right where Clemens' name was visible on the nameplate. Looking into the locker and off to the side, he saw a picture of who he assumed was John Clemens along with a woman of Asian descent hugging him and smiling stuck in the door. His girlfriend most likely. Looking through the various things he had, he took notice of a journal that had faced many years of use, judging by the wear and tear on the edges of the dog eared pages, "Let's see what you've got…"

Flipping through the pages, Chris saw that the handwriting was neat and ordered though there wasn't too much to go on, other than mostly personal entries on the man's thoughts on their work, with nothing going into explicit detail, "…just another day in the life of a scientist, it seems." As Chris was getting to the last few pages, he noticed how Clemens writing began to take on reservation with the work they were conducting, coupled with the mentioning of deteriorating health within the last couple of weeks or so, but now as he came to what looked like the end of the journal, he read through the last entry that was appeared to have been written to what he assumed was the girlfriend on the 8th of the month.

'Ada, by the time you read this, I will most likely be dead long after this point in time. Today's test turned out positive as I expected; somehow the T-virus had been released into the complex with my fellow colleagues and I now on borrowed time. Take the data from the terminal here in the staff quarters and head to the power room to activate the trigger system to destroy the complex. And make all of this public through the media to make sure that the corporation can't touch you.

I reset the password to your name for my administrator-user profile, be sure to make a copy of the data for yourself; one for you and one for the media to make public, in the event that one is lost over the other to ensure that you have some insurance against Umbrella.

I know that I don't have much time left, so I as well as a few others have decided to end things on our terms. Others want to try and escape to reach NEST for the vaccine, but I don't have my doubts with the lockdown procedures now going into effect. I am so deeply sorry that I've shoved this into your hands, but you're the only one that can do this. I'm sorry that there's nothing more I could do at this point; I love you Ada.'

Chris closed the journal after seeing nothing else at this point to keep reading through, "Jeez, I guess they made a smart decision to make it easy for us at this point." Turning towards Rebecca, Chris made his way towards her to help get things moving, "I found the password for this thing, 'Ada' is the way in on Clemens profile."

"Now we're making progress." Rebecca chimed with positivity in her tone. Typing up the password on Clemens profile, Rebecca saw multiple files that had been posted up on the desktop, each with some alpha-numerical designation on its name to organize it.

However, the file that caught Chris' attention was titled 'T-virus'. After reading the last journal entry by Clemens, Chris needed to know what this was, what it did, and if somehow, they themselves became infected by it, "Pull up the T-virus file there. Clemens mentioned how he and the rest of the staff got infected."

Rebecca had heard the T-virus mentioned by the Queen Leech-Marcus the previous night, and while she knew that it was capable of turning people to zombies, there was nothing at the Training Facility that she could sink her teeth into in trying to understand how the virus worked. Opening up the file, the contents were laid bare before her as she read through it to make sure she understood well enough what they were dealing with to which now, she finally understood the horror behind what Umbrella was doing, "Oh my God…"

-Barry-

"Come on, get in there you piece of shit…" Seeing that he had the opportunity to make sure they had an escape out of this disaster, Barry had gone down by the power room first to make sure he could find a way to sabotage this facility and leave both Wesker and Umbrella out to dry.

Before this whole mess started, Wesker pulled him off to the side, out of sight and ear shot from the rest of Alpha Team that if he didn't cooperate with him, then Umbrella would have his wife and two girls killed with a single phone call. Barry despised this whole damned situation. He was being forced to betray his friends and fellow officers that he had known for several years now in order to protect his family. As much as he wanted to try and blow Wesker's head off, he couldn't. He couldn't take the risk of his family getting killed, but neither could he bear the idea of betraying his friends to this hell hole.

The only time he thought he might have to betray Wesker was at the very last moment when the man was still under the impression that he would play along with his schemes, but ever since Naruto showed up, he thought that Wesker would order him to kill the gunsmith, only he was told no such thing and to keep going as he was. Though now that Wesker no longer had any eyes on them, Barry had more freedom to act; not much, but still just enough to do some things out of sight.

After splitting off from Jill and Naruto, Barry at first made his way to the power room whereas luck would have it, was a manual detailing the maintenance of the machinery that kept this place running. However, what really drew his attention, was the self-destruct sequence that had been designed into the whole of the facility; the function meant in the event that if any viral weaponry got out, then not just the lab complex, but also the mansion, the dorms and surrounding area within a mile would go up in flames to contain the outbreak.

Having no real experience with this sort of thing despite the instructions laying it out for him, Barry felt it best not to touch the system until he could meet back up with the others, and after Wesker had been dealt with. He didn't want to risk the possibility of the facility going off prematurely and taking them all with it.

Right now, however, Barry was in the process of trying to get the helipad elevator back up and running, as someone had taken the damned battery out from its place. He chalked it up to someone trying to contain what happened here, so they disabled the elevator for escaping. He was struggling to get it back into place with the slot being so slim that reattaching the connections would prove to be a pain, though he wasn't one to give up on simple things like this. It was hardly any different from replacing a car battery, "…there. Now you're in." Barry was able to get the battery situated as he reconnected the negative connection before hooking the positive back up.

Dusting his hands, Barry hit the button to bring the elevator down and check out the helipad before flagging Brad down to land, that is until the radio came alive with Jill's voice, "Barry, Chris, come in, over."

Unhooking the radio from his vest, he hit the receiver to respond, "Barry here. Everything alright, Jill?" He let off to let a signal come through.

"Naruto and I grabbed as much as we could carry. We've got a lot to go over once we're out of here."

Chris quickly responded over on his end, "Chris here. Rebecca and I managed to grab some of the data here on the local terminal. It's not a lot, but enough to give us an idea of what they did, along with making sure the media knows what Umbrella's been doing to cover us."

"I doubt it'll be that easy, Chris." Jill said in a negative tone.

"What do you mean, Jill."

"I think Naruto can explain it better when we get out of here. Right now, the last place we need to check out is the main lab on this level. We'll head there now for you and Barry to rendezvous with us."

"Copy that, Rebecca and I are heading there now."

Barry hit the receiver to inform them on his own progress, "I managed to get the elevator back up and running to the helipad; I'll meet you there sooner, Jill."

"Copy that, we'll see you there."

Holstering the radio back onto his belt, Barry checked his Python and ammo before meeting up with the others. It was time to end this nightmare.

-Wesker; Main Lab-

"I suppose now I have no choice." Despite having lost his camera feeds thanks to that damned Uzumaki, Wesker had kept his own radio on to listen in on them, even though they used it sparingly save for this one time. Knowing full well he'd be dealing with the five of them together, Wesker began the self-destruct process to kick in about five minutes after releasing the T-002 from the incubation tube should they by some miracle kill it. Using what administrative rights he had left at the terminal, Wesker began the download process of the local data cache from the nearby servers into an MO disc he had inserted already before bringing up the X-virus video of the Hammerpedes for them all to see. It was not much, but he hoped the small act of psychological warfare would throw them off just enough for him to make his victory all the quicker.

Hearing the multiple sets of footsteps outside the door, Wesker knew that they were about to enter, as he quickly got everything into place, with Barry still under his thumb to keep them complacent with a gun to their heads, Wesker took out his own Samurai Edge before taking the safety off to point right at the door before it opened with Chris being the first one in, followed by Rebecca, Naruto, Jill and finally Barry at the end of the line as Chris voiced the obvious question lingering in the air.

"Captain Wesker? How did you get down here before us?"

Glancing to the side to gauge their reactions, all of them, save for Barry and Naruto were predictably confused. Barry of course knew full well what was happening, though Naruto had narrowed his eyes in suspicion at the man, most likely having come to the realization of things, but he wasn't going to let them do all the talking. Quickly pointing his Samurai Edge at the group, Wesker didn't want to leave things to chance, "Drop your weapons. You can stop right there, everyone."

Naruto was about to pull his magnum up, but he was abruptly stopped by Wesker's next line, "Don't move, Mr. Uzumaki, or she and the others will die." He pulled a small radio detonator from behind his back and tilted his sunglasses towards the corners of the room. The survivors slowly followed his gaze and felt their eyes alight on four industrial sized canisters, each one bearing a biohazard symbol, "I don't know the full extent of your abilities but I doubt you're fast enough to stop 15lbs of VX nerve toxin from sending the officers to an early grave." Wesker said with a smug authority, small smirk curling his aristocratic lips as he saw the X-source's blue eyes flit through a range of emotions, his mind doubtless trying to gauge a solution to the problem before him.

Naruto was internally cursing, while his knowledge of VX could be traced solely to that prison movie that had come out a few years back, he knew it would only take token exposure to kill a regular human with exposed skin. He would not give the flat top sporting captain the satisfaction of a verbal response and instead simply glared at him, gauging if he could shoot the detonator out of Wesker's hand during a moment of lapsed judgment.

"Very good, you can follow the rod and carrot method, that's promising for your immediate future Mr. Uzumaki." Wesker snaked, his unseen gaze turning to the eldest of their number, "Barry, if you would." The father of the group balled his fists before slowly walking over to Wesker's side.

"Barry? You're a traitor just like Wesker?" Jill said as she watched her longtime friend cross the distance to the cause of tonight's horror. Seeing that they had no other choice, the S.T.A.R.S members dropped their respective weapons.

Naruto turned to Wesker with a certain amount of ire in his eyes, "I finally get it, that was you that posted a blackmail letter through my door, I knew I had seen that handwriting before, I should have recognized it from the custom orders you placed at the gun shop. You're the one that shot Enrico dead, didn't you." There was no question in his tone, rather a statement of fact. Naruto suspected that someone high up had tracked him down to blackmail him, and after meeting Jill after her fellow S.T.A.R.S. officer had been killed, he had a sneaking suspicion that it was likely someone he hadn't met from the unit. Hearing how Bravo Team, save for Rebecca had all been killed, he doubted the rookie was the traitor.

The Alpha Team members were all pretty decent people, but he knew Jill and Chris the best, knowing neither of them were traitors. As for Barry, he knew that as a husband and father of fifteen years, he wasn't the type of person to turn traitor unless there was good reason. Leaving him and Jill down in the caverns was a small indication of betrayal, but he wanted to deny it. But, now that he thought about it, there were myriad interactions he had had with the man's work at his job, various requisitions forms for new weapons, ammunition and gun modification, hell, at this distance he could make out the notch he tended to file under the safety of Wesker's gun, the telltale mark as recognizable as the very handwriting that he now remembered from both the blackmail letter and Wesker's paperwork

Now that he was seeing the man, face to face, Naruto could see that Wesker had that certain air about him that set him on edge. Like a snake coiled up, poised to strike at a moment's notice. That he'd sell his own mother if meant getting what he wanted in the end, "Right on both counts, good sir. You really are a perceptive man, or mostly perceptive since you had suspected Barry of betraying you, but poor Lisa Trevor's timely arrival threw that out the window down in the crypt." So, his instincts were right on that count.

"Why, Barry? Why betray S.T.A.R.S., the both of you?" Jill asked in anger.

Wesker shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, "Because if he doesn't do what I say, Umbrella will have some words with his better half and two lovely daughters." The penny dropped. Barry was blackmailed in all certainty. "If they are lucky, they'll be sent off to sleep with a bullet in their skulls, if not... well we do need a new monster to poke and prod now that dear Lisa is no longer with us."

"And you, Wesker?" Chris said, still reeling from the betrayal of a man he thought he could count on and trust, "How long has Umbrella been paying you under the table?"

Wesker gave a snort of laughter before he explained, "Paying me? I've been with Umbrella since the beginning. I helped develop the T-virus right here in this very lab we're standing in now."

"So then, you were the one that sabotaged Bravo Team's chopper…" Rebecca accused before continuing, "…and you set the Training Facility to go up in smoke to cover your tracks." Not long after Bravo Team had left for the investigation, the chopper suffered a malfunction that forced them to land, leading her to Billy, the derailed Ecliptic Express train and the horrors that the Queen Leech unleashed in the Training Facility.

"Right on those counts as well, rookie." Wesker stated, "I needed to make sure that the outbreaks were contained here and there, though I admit, I had no idea that my former mentor's work would raise him from the grave. The old adage about old dogs and new tricks doesn't seem to apply to leeches." Wesker looked to Barry before he spoke again, "Speaking of old dogs, Barry, go make sure that the helipad's ready for Brad to land. We'll need to explain how you and I were the only survivors of this 'disaster'." The man said with a cruel sneer.

If looks could kill, Wesker would've been dead several times over by Naruto alone, though the S.T.A.R.S. members were shocked that Barry was going along with Wesker's twisted plan as he left the room. Though Naruto chose to continue questioning the other blonde for answers, "Care to explain that last bit, jackass?"

Wesker tilted the side of his head briefly in some slight amusement as he elaborated, "Well, considering that once we're out of here, I file all your deaths under the machinations of a long dead architect whose store of nerve agent was leaking out into the surrounding area to trigger the mass hysteria of 'monsters'." He kept his pistol pointed right at Jill, a little bit of extra warning to the blonde, Uzumaki seemed to care for her which made her ideal leverage. And what better way to keep the man complacent than keeping a primed gun trained on said leverage, "I mean, let's start painting the picture of what would happen, if by some miracle you made it out. Who would believe a word of what you say? An ex-Army soldier who had clear issues with her missions and couldn't handle getting her hands dirty with a little wet work." He said pointing directly at Jill whose eyes widened slightly at how Wesker vaguely alluded to her time Delta Force, "An ex-Air Force pilot who has issues with taking orders and dishonorably discharged for punching a senior officer in the mouth and insubordination." Gesturing to Chris who glared at the man for bringing up his record, "A rookie who is so far out of depth with what the world is like and thinks things will work out perfectly, and valiantly took one for the team on her first assignment." Referencing Rebecca who took that insult rather personally before she became confused at his last set of words.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"This." Wesker quickly pointed the gun right at Rebecca's chest and shot her right where the heart was covered by her bullet proof vest. Rebecca fell down against the nearby table and hit her head, knocking her out.

"Wesker!"

"You son of a bitch!"

The other S.T.A.R.S. members were shocked by their traitorous captain's actions while Naruto steeled himself to act as quickly as he could, though before he could take a step, Wesker held the detonator up again, "As I said, don't move, or you will become acutely familiar with choking on your own blood." Punching something up on the keyboard, Wesker brought up some video that was now in full display on a monitor for them to see titled 'X-virus Worm Testing & Results', "Now we come down to you… the man who quite literally appeared out of thin air, five years ago. No one would believe a word of what any of you would say, especially you."

There was an eerie silence in the air as Naruto said nothing, leaving the others confused by what Wesker was saying, that is until Naruto broke the silence, "When?"

"It took some time to track you down after we found those bloody bandages of yours, but I'd say that perhaps it was worth seeing some of your superhuman abilities in action where the cameras could capture it." Wesker could see that Chris had become even more confused by what he said, however, it was Jill that didn't seem to do so, rather she clammed up slightly. She had been with the blonde for some time now after he blew Enrico's head off, and it made sense that she had seen some of what he was capable of. Although Wesker was just beating around the bush, "But where are my manners, I should explain a bit. You see, Jill, Chris, your good friend here is quite the anomaly, or perhaps alien might be a better term per say, since as I'm sure you remember high school science, we humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes. Mr. Uzumaki on the other hand, has 24."

Chris and Jill's eyes fogged with confusion at that declaration as they glanced to Naruto who stood still, unmoving, glaring at Wesker, "This chromosome allows him to do unnatural and superhuman feats, like picking up a woman in full tac gear with minimal exertion and outrunning a massive boulder. Taking on the Hunters effectively as if it were no problem, or even shooting and cutting his way out of a giant snake." It seemed to Naruto that Wesker had been watching him specifically all this time since he arrived.

The shades-wearing snake had brought up a finger to raise one more point, "But let's not forget your little indirect contribution to Umbrella for your blood helped develop a whole new set of viral weaponry work…" Now it made sense to Naruto as his eyes widened in anger with how Umbrella had violated his being, even if it was indirectly done, and he guessed that this 'X-virus' was the result of it, "…now, let us observe how injecting said virus into a few simple flatworms had affected them." Bringing the finger down to press one of the keys, the video began the incoming horror show that captured the incident from a wall mounted camera.

-NEST 1 Facility; X-virus Viral Testing Room-

Two men in yellow hazard suits entered the room where a large tank of pitch-black liquid filled up about three quarters of the way to the top. Both men had begun taking a few instruments to begin their work, as one pressed a button next to a speaker, most likely in recording of this incident, "Alright, today's date is February 23rd, 1998. Yesterday at approximately 1PM Central Time, the newly developed X-virus by Doctor's William and Annette Birkin was injected into several flatworms to test on simple organisms before we move onto human testing." The men had obtained a large clear container with a metallic top to help contain whatever it was they were going to get, while the other held out a set of tongs meant for catching snake for some reason, "After injecting the worms with the X-virus, the tank of water has now been filled with some black substance, most likely something made by the worms now infected by the virus, although—"

The scientist was abruptly cut off before he could finish by his colleague, "I think I saw something move in there." The second man said as he pointed to the tank where the liquid shifted a bit briefly before something came out of it. It was a sort of snake-like creature that had pale, white-grey skin with a somewhat translucent appearance about it.

The first scientist took a step back briefly before getting the tongs ready for capture, "Uhm, it would seem that the flatworms have mutated rapidly and quite radically, based upon the appearance of what we're seeing right now/ the subject has grown in size, although I suspect that…" As the scientist drew closer, the 'head' of what used to be the worm opened up like a cobra's hood and hissed at them like said animal, "…the worm has mutated into a similar manner of the cobra snake. Now, we are attempting to wrangle it out of the tank and transport it out to another lab room for further study." As the tongs inched ever so slowly towards the mutated worm, the creature quickly opened up its 'mouth' with four visible fang-like teeth, one each on the corners of the mouth that opened up like a diamond, and attacked the tongs violently.

The scientist struggled to regain his grip on the tongs, however, he underestimated the strength of the mutant worm, "The strength of the worm has increased massively, showcasing a huge general benefit from the virus however-hey help me here, dammit!" He quickly saw the losing fight and ordered his colleague to help get the tongs back under control, only to find themselves losing it altogether as the mutant worm wrenched the tongs from his grip and then lunged at the arm from the tank, where it was revealed that the worm had grown at least five feet in length as it wrapped its body around the whole of the first man's arm, "Ghaah! Ok, maybe you should help me out here, okay!" The worm was beginning to coil around his arm with the head now having a firm grip on his hand, and those fangs did not look pleasant.

"Right, just give me the chance to get a grip on the damned thing!" The second scientist attempted to grab hold of the worm by its head, only upon touching it, the worm increased its hold over the other man's arm.

"Oh, God you're making it worse!" Both men tried to get the worm off now more than ever as its grip was only making him lose all feeling in his arm, that is until they were fighting against it when the worm started to bend his arm backwards from how it was meant to, "Woah, okay, help me get this it off! It's tightening up!" As the man tried to keep his colleagues' arm from bending any further by the worm, it was in vain, "It's breaking my arm! It's breaking my—" A resounding crack of a bone breaking reverberated through the room, "AAAGGHHH! CUT IT OFF! CUT IT OFF!" The worm had induced compound fracture as the bone was now protruding out as the worm had also torn open the hazard suit.

The scientist trying to help quickly looked around to see what he could use to kill the creature. Seeing a large scalpel over by the table, the second man had rushed in to grab it as he quickly took hold of the worm's head to start slicing through the creature, however, what occurred next was something they didn't see coming. With the worm's head having now been cut off, the rest of its body where it had been cut began to flail about spewing blood in the facemask of the aiding scientist, only for said blood to begin melting it into his face, "AHH! OH GOD, IT'S BURNING MY FACE IN!"

As for the worm that no longer had a head, a new one grew into its place, with the first scientist now having a panic attack, "CHRIST, WHAT'VE WE MADE HERE?!" The worm soon quickly slipped into the suit's opening as the unfortunate victim tried to get a grip on it but could only barely grasp it before it slithered beyond his control, "IT'S IN MY SUIT! IT'S IN MY SUIT!"

The aiding scientist tried to get the mask off in panic, as he turned around to grip the tank, only for another worm to spring out and bit his arm, causing him to drop in pain with the tank dumping out the contents onto the floor and himself. Several other worms began biting into him as the melting facemask collapsed onto his face to show how desperately he was trying to breath, but the other worms began assaulting his body viscously with blood beginning to pool up around them.

As for the other scientist, all he could do was scream in pain from the compound fracture, as the worm slithered up the neck. He began to gag, as the worm most likely was now entering his body through his mouth. His body began to twitch before the chest shook violently down to the stomach and it burst open in a shower of blood and organs following the worm that left the corpse…

-Now-

As Jill and Chris watched the recording, disgust and horror marred the faces at what they saw, "Beautiful, isn't it? And that's just from applying it to a simple lifeform. Think about refining it for human usage." In all honesty, Wesker thought that the physical mutations were something beneath him, yet he could not deny the results that the X-virus produced, "We've already done human testing on one subject, and it's worked wonders for him. Can't say he looks any better than the worms though."

Naruto all but glared at Wesker for his words and what he saw. They made something monstrous from his blood and praised it as something beautiful. It disgusted him to no end, "Before this is all over, I'm going to kill you for this, Wesker." And he meant every word of it. Even if Jill and Chris were to likely argue against it, seeing that Wesker knew too much, but honestly didn't care at this point.

Wesker didn't seem the least bit worried, "Why should I feel threatened by a rat in a trap? If you could somehow get across the room, disarm me and make me give up without ever putting one pound of pressure on this detonator and watching you all choke to death, then I'd consider commending you on doing the impossible."

"You do realize you'll be choking along with us, right?" Naruto spat in response, drawing little more than a smirk from Wesker.

"I always have a way out," Wesker said confidently.

Chris tried to slowly reach for his spare knife in an attempt to try and throw it at his arm and drop the gun that held them at bay, but it seemed that Wesker caught on quickly, "Keep your hands where I can see them Chris, I know you're good enough with that knife." Wesker started to move back over towards a large tube filled with liquid and a large figure bobbing in the viscous fluid. Though it was too cloudy to tell properly, "Now, I'd like to show you all something. The Tyrant." Reaching behind himself, Wesker flipped a switch to begin awakening as liquid began to drain from the massive tube; a large, bald naked man rested sleeping against the back of the tank, only now his skin was completely gray with what looked like several tumorous growths on its right left and left arm, though the left arm had been mutated into a nasty looking claw that seemed like it would've shredded even the Hunters to bits. The heart had somehow been moved to the other side of the body, and almost ejected into the open air as multitudes of veins and arteries were visible throughout the right side of its body that had spread out from the heart while the gums around the mouth were completely missing. All in all, it was a nightmare.

"Another magnificent creature by Umbrella, its potential holds almost more promise than X if I were to give you the raw data, which I'm not." Wesker said, enamored by the Tyrant. This was what Naruto and Jill had discovered back in the records room from the slide presentation, and it was no wonder that several of the staff members here were against such a thing. It was a violation of nature in and of itself.

Jill was having enough of this whole show-and-tell now, "So, you're just Umbrella's bitch, is that it?" She slung the insult at the traitor, "Did you use them to blackmail Barry into working for you?"

"Not exactly applicable anymore my dear." Wesker stated, "I never intended to go back to Umbrella from the start. But he was just that easy to manipulate using them. Despite having its own personal set of trained assassins, getting them involved with something as simple as this was too much trouble." That, and he didn't feel like having the ire of HUNK and his team aimed squarely at him, even more when the U.S.S. Delta Team that had been assigned for this mission was wiped out the night before he could make good on the death threat, with the team now having to be rebuilt from scratch.

Chris couldn't believe the bullshit flowing from his former superior's mouth, "Your days are numbered now, Wesker. Be it us or Umbrella that comes after you." He wasn't going to let the man get away with any of this, "But I'm going to damn well make sure that it's us." Chris practically seethed in anger.

Pointing his gun at them, Wesker decided to bring things to an end, "No, Chris, no… I don't think any of you will." Wesker moved to pull the trigger and end their lives and incapacitate Naruto if he could, but the changed in an instant when a gunshot rang out from the edge of the room. The bullet tore through his right shoulder before it pierced the tube containing the Tyrant and by some miracle didn't shatter it. Blood began to drip down the glass as Wesker gripped his shoulder in pain from the gunshot wound and dropped his gun and detonator.

All eyes turned to see that it was Barry whose own Samurai Edge was smoking from the gunshot.

"I had a feeling that you were looking for a way out of it." Naruto said as he looked back to Wesker who was trying to nurse his wound.

Picking up their weapons, Barry made his way over to Rebecca with worry in his eyes. He never meant for things to go this far, as when he left the room, he didn't leave the hallway, rather instead he had been just outside listening to the whole conversation, "Forgive me… I…" Barry shook his head for his actions.

Jill stepped towards as she patted his shoulder in apology of her own, "No, you're not to blame for this. Wesker did this. Not you."

"Even if it meant my family…" Barry holstered his weapon as he got Rebecca up off the floor who groaned as she began to stir and slung her right arm over his neck to pick her up, "…I couldn't bear the thought of betraying my friends."

Chris knew better than to blame Barry for anything. He had known the man since his Air Force days and he was the reason why he had a job as a S.T.A.R.S. officer in the first place, "I knew that you'd never betray us, Barry. You're a better man than that." Though now that that issue had been taken care of somewhat, Chris turned to Naruto who sighed to himself knowing what he was going to say next, "I think after tonight, maybe some explanations are needed. Just so we're clear on everything." He didn't mean it out of disappointment, but rather Chris needed to be clear about Naruto himself after what Wesker just said and showed to them all.

Scratching the back of his head, Naruto relented a bit with the situation, "I had a feeling one day this would happen, but—" Out of his peripherals, Wesker had reached for the detonator to flood the room, "—shit!" Naruto ran over faster than anyone else was capable of, shocking the male S.T.A.R.S. members, and pushed Wesker away from the tube before he pulled his gun out at him, kicking the detonator away, "And just what the hell were you trying to do there, you little shitstain?"

Wesker slowly propped himself up as he stood on shaky legs, stumbling towards the Tyrant tube as he gave a small laugh, "Should have watched the other hand, Uzumaki." Next thing they knew, the glass began to break as all eyes turned towards the Tyrant that was now awake and its right hand now firmly pressed against the glass, "Now, you all die, save for you Uzumaki. You're worth more alive than dead with your blood source for manufacturing the X-virus." As Wesker continued rambling, he was unaware of how agitated Barry's bullet had made the BOW.

He had programmed it with several objectives in mind, and that included the elimination of the remaining S.T.A.R.S. members. Unfortunately for Wesker who now had his back pressed up against the tank, his uniform was still the logo of the aforementioned unit; next thing they knew, the Tyrant thrusted its clawed left arm through the glass, shattering it upon impact and impaling Wesker, "GYUH!" Blood spewed from his mouth before he gurgled in pain as the Tyrant lifted him up into the air and threw him across the lab room, shattering the various glass tubes containing a range of body parts and experiments. The body that was once Wesker, now laid sprawled out on the floor lifeless with his sunglasses seemingly dimmed in death.

Naruto saw that this thing would in no case be easy to take down like the other creatures, bar that giant snake, and since the lab had little room to maneuver along with Barry carrying the slowly rousing Rebecca, there was only one solution, "Barry, take Rebecca up to the helipad and get out of here. Jill, Chris, you too. This thing'll gut you like it just did with Flat Top." He knew that likely the latter two would stay to try and help, but he was hoping Jill would see the reality of the situation to convince Chris to go along with it

"I've got her." Barry said as he took Rebecca out of the room and back towards the elevator.

Though Chris wasn't for this plan at all, "No way, this thing's too much for you alone."

He readied his Samurai Edge, that is until Jill turned around to speak up, "Chris, let's go. Naruto can handle it." After seeing what he was capable of tonight, Jill had faith that Naruto would pull through this situation. Truth be told though; she didn't want to leave him just like Chris. But looking at the situation they were in, the less people in the room, the better, otherwise they'd be slaughtered for wholesale.

Next thing they knew, the alarms began to blare all around them as the Tyrant turned its attention towards them now, as Naruto readied himself, "Go dammit!"

"Attention. All personnel, the self-destruct sequence has been activated with the unauthorized release of the T-002, you have fifteen minutes to evacuate to the nearest exit."

The automated voice that came over the alarms now made the stakes of escaping all the greater. Naruto gestured for them to leave as the Tyrant slowly made his way towards them, "Watch the other hand... damn it! Go. Now."

Naruto moved away from them, over towards some of the various other experiments in the lab, hoping to exploit the creature's size against it, hide from the lab experiment and kill it with hit and run tactics. Jill took Chris by the shoulder as they followed behind Barry to the elevator, before Chris made one last comment, "Put the bastard down hard!"

As the Tyrant loomed closer to Naruto, he aimed the Lightning Hawk right at the massive heart that seemed an obvious weak point, "Will do!" Pulling the trigger, Naruto shot straight at the heart of the Tyrant, however it seemed that somehow the twisted thing was smart enough to raise its clawed arm in response to his attack and the magnum round just barely punctured the organ as it went through the arm. The tyrant grunted in response to the action, but there was no voiced pain in its actions, rather the lack thereof concerned him.

The first shot and shock of damage however had been the impetus for the Tyrant to shake off what little drowsiness it had before, its granite like muscles flexing and falling into a tensed form, hardly a stance rather a instinctual readiness for combat. As Naruto was about to fire off another round, this time aiming for the head, the Tyrant suddenly sprang forward toward him with unexpected speed and the clawed hand raised high to slash at him, "Shit!" Naruto quickly dove out of the way as the claw came down in a savage swipe, only barely grazing his body, "You're faster than you let on you bastard." Naruto quickly turned to level the magnum against the Tyrant, another .50AE slug rending the air of the claustrophobic lab, grimacing when his stone-faced opponent used its long claws to block the shot.

Dashing between a pair of large steel vats, Naruto quickly rounded on the creature that leaned between the vats in search of him and unsheathed his sword, cutting into the beast's knees in hopes of crippling its movement. The cut was far shallower than he would have wanted but it drew a pained noise from the mountain of bone and sinew strung together by crimes against nature. Whipping around, the Tyrant's clawed right arm retaliated in a bestial haymaker in hopes of goring the ex-ninja in one fell swoop but only succeeded snipping the strap of his duffle bag that clattered to the floor unceremoniously. Making the best of the Tyrant's overextension, Naruto took aim and plugged four more shots into the freshly made cut his sword had made, the splinter of bone heralding the buckling of the limb.

Roaring in discontent, the Tyrant set off in a limping pursuit of the agile blonde who ran to the other end of the lab, arms pouring the ground to make up for the damaged leg. Looking back over his shoulder at the charge, Naruto continued his sprint towards the wall until he was sure that the BOW's clawed hands were snapping at his heels before jumping at the wall and performing a backflip. Its prey gone, the Tyrant did its best to course correct but its forward momentum caused it to crash into the wall head first, a crater forming from its impact. Naruto took the time to overlook the battlefield before the Tyrant burst out of the concrete of the wall, a chipped talon but otherwise fine. "I wonder if you can see in the dark…" Naruto began to shoot out the lights up above them to darken the room and hopefully take the Tyrant's vision away.

This action seemed to aggravate the Tyrant's behavior as it lunged once more at Naruto, though Naruto was able to get out of the way once again as he rolled off to the side of the creature, this time the Tyrant's instinctual flail clipped his Lightning Hawk and sent it spiraling to the far wall, leaving Naruto only his Kodachi, "Dammit…" The blonde muttered to himself as he slowly readied his blade once again. At the moment, getting up close and personal would be suicide against the Tyrant, but Naruto did still have some ranged Jutsu's he could use, albeit they'd be weaker than normal, and once he used it, he'd need to move fast before it homed in on him.

"Attention, you now have ten minutes to evacuate the facility."

The proclamation over the Tannoy system was accompanied by red warning lights beginning to strobe throughout the room, lighting the dark room in reddened jumping shadows that Naruto used to slip past the Tyrant that was growing aggravated. A slice at it's the heel and a kick to the back sent it landing on its exposed heart once again before Naruto disappeared between a bank of computers that looked to have been in use since the 1980's.

Now time was starting to catch up and he needed to end this quickly as Naruto had the Shadow Clone he made earlier disperse and the Senjutsu it had been gathering came rushing into him. Oh, how long it had been since he felt its power. Keeping himself low and out of sight from the Tyrant that by now had got to its feet shakily, Naruto held the blade low as he began to channel some wind chakra through it so as to not draw any light over to his position while he moved around the corner to flank the Tyrant that had gone pitched and yawed on unsteady legs. Peering around the corner, Naruto saw that it was unaware of his position and decided to make a surprise attack at the legs to permanently cripple it. If he could do that at least, he'd be able to get his gun and duffle bag back safely.

'Wind Style: Art of the Gust Blade'

Slicing horizontally towards the Tyrant's legs, Naruto sent the Jutsu across to inflict as much damage as possible particularly where the ankle met the calf to cripple it, though it seemed as if the Tyrant was letting pure instinct guide its mighty physical strength. The moment the Jutsu began to make contact with its skin splitting open and muckles being blitzed, the Tyrant immediately pivoted around to charge him blindly, albeit somewhat clumsily since its legs had just taken a rather serious hit, though its speed was only ever increasing with each attack, and that was scary, "Fuck!" Naruto dove out of the way like a matador, only this time, the Tyrant managed to make a small slice across Naruto's back, "Dammit! I'm out of practice." Naruto had jumped atop a computer bank as the injury was not too serious, it stung like a bitch but in truth his toughened body could shrug it off even without the Senjutsu.

The Tyrant meanwhile had stumbled down a bit as it was gripping the nearby table for support to try and get back up. Naruto saw that he had bought himself some time to get to his weapon, hopping down as the gash knitted closed, though the lingering sense of pain was still there, "Ok, I've got you now asshole." His words seemed to reach the Tyrant as it had now foregone the table to try and crawl over towards him instead, since the legs weren't very useful for speed anymore. He had to give the fucking thing dedication though for its tenacity to get to him.

Naruto made his way back over to where he had last seen his magnum, stepping over Wesker's body in the process, briefly looking back at the bastard with disgust at the putrid feeling of his cell's desperately attempting to cling to life that he sensed through his Senjutsu before retrieving his Magnum. He turned to see that the Tyrant was closing in on him as the clawed arm scraped across the floor to try and make another move, "Yeah, I'm not letting you get that close again." Checking the floor, Naruto had managed to find the Lighting Hawk and check it over quickly to see that he still had some ammo left in it, "Good to go." Turning back towards the Tyrant, Naruto pointed the barrel right at its head as he channeled Lightning chakra into the rounds for extra effect, "Find rest you poor bastard." Naruto changed target to a large container of corrosive liquid to the left of the Tyrant and unloaded the clip into it, the plastic barrel splitting under the gunfire and dumping its contents over the granite colored humanoid.

After a few seconds of dousing in the electrified Carborane acid, the Tyrant was already convulsing in agony as its skin began to blister and deform, quickly reaching a consistency akin to hot glue before running off the top layer of flesh into the lab's sluses. It let out a snarl of angered pain as the deluge continued, muscle and sinew liquifying in a matter of seconds before it began the exposed arteries and veins spilled open like sand in the path of the tide. The genetically grown weapon made one last desperate spasm to escape its impending doom but its nervous system, so fried by the lightning chakra coursing through the acid, sent it rolling directly under the barrel that emptied its remnants onto the beast. By the time the barrel was empty, all that remained of T-002 was a vaguely humanoid shaped mass of flesh with tarnished bones poking from the sludge.

Holstering the magnum, Naruto stepped around the foul-smelling substance and quickly went to grab the duffle bag since the straps were shredded by the Tyrant previously and quickly left for the elevator to escape with the others.

"You now have five minutes to evacuate."

Just as the automated voice came up once again, Naruto ran into Jill who just turned the corner, most likely coming back to make sure he was still alive, "Naruto, come on, we need to get out of here now!" The duo quickly got onto the elevator as Jill looked him over to see the cut that he received from the Tyrant, "Are you okay? That thing didn't…"

"I'm alright, Jill. You don't need to worry about me." Naruto said as he waved her concern off, but she didn't seem to like how he was talking about an encounter like that.

"Don't go thinking you can take on everything on your own." Jill spoke softly, "You had me worried when you didn't come back after the ten-minute mark." She rubbed his back gently despite the situation they were in to try and soothe any pain he had. At first Naruto wanted to protest once again to Jill's concerns, but seeing how she was genuinely worried for his safety and the injury he received, he decided it was best to just let her do her thing, "Not only that, I want to know the truth about you. The honest truth."

Considering how he was now in this position of having to come out with the truth of who he was, he didn't blame her for being curious, especially after Wesker showed off that sickening recording. Although, there was something else that Wesker said about Jill in particular that she appeared shocked to have revealed, "I'll make you a deal when we get done with this, Jill. I'll tell you about me, if you tell me about you and your military service."

Jill looked down briefly in slight shame, sensing that was going to be brought up as well, but she knew he would ask about, and so she turned her gaze back to Naruto with a small smile, "Deal."

As the elevator came to a stop and the doors opened, the chopper was on the helipad with the others already onboard as Chris got up to wave them on and shouted over the roar of the engine, "Come on, get in!" Barry was in the co-pilot's seat next to Brad while Rebecca had her head bandaged up a bit and sitting behind Barry, meanwhile Chris had taken the seat behind Brad himself.

The duo raced for the chopper as Chris took the duffel bag from Naruto who jumped in as did Jill to take the rear seats against the backside right as Brad began to take off, "Hang on everyone!"

The chopper lifted high into the sky as the mansion began to shrink into the distance, meanwhile Naruto as well as the others watched on as the whole of the facility along with a full mile went up in a bright light, signifying that the self-destruct sequence had taken everything it had with it. The shockwave was minor as it hit the chopper to upset its flight pattern briefly before Brad and Barry managed to get it under control.

Naruto leaned back as he breathed a sigh of relief before he felt Jill's head lean onto his shoulder. He glanced over just a bit to see that she had taken her S.T.A.R.S. beret and closed her eyes after the night of exhaustion began to take over, though she did have one thing left to say, "Just to remind you, I'm running your bar tab into the ground, Fishcake."

The nickname Jill had for Naruto came up with Chris actually chuckling at that, with ninja giving him a light, but friendly glare before he started chuckling along with him. Their slight bit of amusement died down until Chris spoke up, "Naruto." The S.T.A.R.S. officer said to get his attention, "I know after what happened tonight, we've got a lot to talk about. But ultimately, I think we're in this together now against Umbrella." He was subtly implying the connection that Naruto had through the X-virus in Umbrella's possession now after watching that twisted recording.

Knowing that Chris was right, Naruto knew that the time had come, "You're right. Though, I doubt you'd believe what I'll say about the truth about me."

"I might surprise you." Chris said as he shrugged his shoulders, which garnered a raised brow from Naruto. Seeing the slight disbelief on his face, Chris gestured to the peaceful form of Jill laying on his shoulder, "She trusts you. And that's enough for me."

Naruto looked over to Barry and Rebecca, both of whom had their attention on their conversation with Naruto bringing up the question, "What about you two?"

"After the last couple of nights, I think anything's possible at this point." Rebecca said in an accepting tone, that bordered on exhaustion and perhaps a bit of intrigue? Naruto wasn't able to tell properly.

As for Barry's opinion, "Considering how you saved our asses down there, I think you should get the benefit of the doubt. Good enough for me." Short, sweet and to the point it seemed.

"Uhm, can someone just explain to me what the hell happened down there?" Was all Brad could muster up after flying for several hours straight in the dead of night.

Jill could only laugh with some humor and mirth at Brad's question, "Hell of a night." The others smirked at her words in that in a sense she was right, but they had about an hour before they reached the S.T.A.R.S. airbase, which left Naruto free time to get some shut eye as he rested his head on Jill's own before relaxing as best he could.

Down below just on the outskirts of the forest beyond where the Arklay Facility once was, Albert Wesker looked to the sky with a grudge having now developed between himself and the survivors. It seemed that Birkin's Prototype virus had done its work and brought him back from the abyss, but only stronger, faster… superior… Unclipping the hardcase, Wesker opened it to see that the vial of the X-virus sample he brought with him was intact, "Big things have small beginnings…" He said aloud to himself as he gazed back at the shrinking form of the chopper, "…and your lives are about to be hell from here on out."

Holy shit, this chapter took a while to write out as Resident Evil 1 was not well made for what one would call proper storytelling, much less made large enough for several people to make their way through a mansion and not encounter one another in proper fashion either. Hence another reason why Resi 1 needs a Remake treatment that 2 and 3 obtained.

Anyways, I apologize for this chapter's lack of major action and combat with the BOW's as they were all very simply designed and made, with the layout and movements of characters, zombies, etc. all being very basic. The dialogue, while improved over the original somewhat, was hardly any better than what we have now in the recent entries of the last decade and a half. My creative juices were running low as I had been writing some other stories and was still going off of those writing styles, so I apologize if there seemed to be some words that needed to be there, but weren't.

The next few chapters of this story will be what I consider the Interim Period, the calm before the storm that is the Raccoon City Incident, and that will be a long arc. We'll get some development with Naruto and his relationship with Jill, development with Chris, Barry, Rebecca, the Birkins, etc.

The next story that's due for an update, is my Marvel story, "A Long Way from Home: The Revamp", with Naruto having been flung into the mainstream Marvel universe where the comics take place and that Naruto too is also post-The Last, but he has some new things about him that I hope make him interesting to readers. If you're interested in it, then all I ask is that you keep an open mind when it comes to my stories as you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by what you'll find. Such as in my NarutoxFate story, the recent Bleach crossover that's gone into overhaul and others that I have on my profile.

So anyways, continue to read, review, favorite and follow this story, and any others that you guys might be interested in following along. Tell me what you guys liked and/or dislike about this chapter as well as future chapters on this story as well, as it helps me become a better writer as a result.

See you guys next time ;) !