Thank you guys so much for being patient and sticking with me. :D I don't think I've ever replied to this, but in regards to Branagh getting cured of the virus, the T-virus ended up being something designed to mutate. Blacklight itself consistently mutates. To have Blacklight try absorbing the T-virus from Branagh's cells is a danger in itself because it's known for it's endless consumption, so not only could Alex potentially absorb more than he intended, he might be inflicting Branagh with Blacklight as well. Also, I believe that when the hospital in RE went down, the doctors already tried using the usual methods to get rid of the T-virus to no avail.

I plan on doing something with Heller. I kinda liked the guy, you get to see a lot of his fatherly side at the end of his story. If I figure something out, he's definitely going to be limited on the F-bomb, and he's most certainly not going to be the ball of hot rage we all come to know. What do you guys think of the chapter names? My attempts of humor doesn't fit in the story, so I've been putting them as chapter titles instead. :)

"Most people don't believe something can happen until it already has. That's not stupidity or weakness, that's just human nature." ~Max Brooks, World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War

It didn't take long for Alex to return to the hall. It took even less afterwards for Claire to make it back.

"Find anything?"

Claire hesitated a split second before shaking her head. "Not much. Some bullets, gunpowder, and an attachment, but that's it. You?"

She was still uneasy around him, but it was a huge difference between unease and pure fear. He'll take what he could get.

"A knife," he grunted. "More ammunition for your gun. A hip pouch. And then, this." He held up the GM-74. If Claire blanched at the sight of it, he definitely didn't notice. Alex found himself glad that he didn't mention the grenade that he intended to keep a hold of. He passed all but the explosives and a single knife to Claire, starting with the pouch. She attached that to her waist then tucked the rest of the items within.

They didn't need to state that they should probably get going. Alex moved first, continuing through the rest of the hall with Claire at a short distance behind him. He didn't mind since it kept her out of his crosshairs. Actually, that's probably why she did it.

"There's a door over here," Claire muttered. Alex has given the Infected at the window an impassive glance before he began up the staircase. S.T.A.R.S. had to be on one of the other floors and he wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. Instead, he found Claire pushing through the mentioned door with her handgun raised, and Alex felt like he was trying to take care of a misbehaving child that kept running off to do their own thing. Another feeling that most certainly stemmed from his inaccessible memories.

He huffed, most certainly trying not trying to facepalm at the luck he has been dealt. At least she wasn't screaming after she disappeared inside, which could mean that she was either ambushed or completely fine.

Alex descended the staircase that he had half-risen on and walked over to the door. The plaque on the side read "Dark Room". He couldn't imagine what supplies would be helpful from a room that develops photographs.

He pushed through the door and found the place lit up. It had a cozy feel to it, like this little room was in it's own little safe bubble hidden away from the rest of the world.

"It's a bit relaxing," Claire stated. She had round the corner of the smaller room that was connected to here. "I can almost forget the epidemic outside."

Alex grunted quietly in agreement. He raked his gaze over the room, not quite finding anything of use here. Either there was nothing to grab or Claire had already gotten to it.

"I think I'm going to take a break," she stated. Claire made her way to the table and sat down on the chair with a pained grunt. Alex would have denied doing so if she hadn't rubbed her back with a grimace. He thought back to when he first saw her from the top of the buildings, and the way that pain ran through her actions.

"Let me see your back."

She shot Alex a look. It was one that explicitly demanded what the hell he was talking about. He frowned. "I want to see what's bothering you."

Claire thought about it, that fierce stare of her not letting up for an instant. If Alex had been human, he might have felt a bit daunted by that, but since he was currently the most dangerous thing out there...

"Fine," she sighed. Claire twisted in her seat with a grunt so that her back was to Alex. The expression she shot him showed just how much she didn't like the idea; then, very slowly, she moved her hands behind her back and lifted her shirt up only halfway.

Halfway was enough. Alex could see the bluish-purple decorating her skin. It crept up her back and disappeared beneath her outfit, but he could imagine that those bruises took up a majority of her back. It was amazing that she could even move normally considering how much it must've throbbed. Claire released a grunt as she allowed her jacket and top to slip through her fingers and adjusted it before she slowly turned back to face Alex with a rather expectant look. It was almost as though she was expecting him to say something.

Alex felt like he lucked out when he heard the sound of breaking glass.

"I'll go check it out," he muttered. "Stay here."

"...Okay."

Alex dipped back out into the hallway. He had to remind himself that Claire was human, and thus couldn't presevere like he could. She also didn't seem the type to take a break just because she felt like it.

The glass he heard came from the Infected he had bypassed earlier. It moaned quietly as it sat up and rose to his feet. Alex glanced back at the door with his thermal vision active to see if Claire had gotten up or moved. She hadn't.

Excellent.

Confident that he wouldn't get caught, Alex dug his tendrils into the shambling Infected. He focused on implementing it's genetic material into his cells, because he had no doubt that seeing this virus would undoubtedly help in the near future. It gave him far less living material to work with, so he wasn't surprised when the remains dripped onto the floor without him having anything to show for it.

That's fine. After all, Alex could hear another shuffling around just a couple stories above him.

A couple more Infected later and Alex returned to the dark room to find Claire standing and waiting. She raised an eyebrow when she saw him enter. "You took longer than I thought you would."

"Yeah..." He motioned for her to follow. "Let's go."

They were in the hallway once more. Alex ascended the staircase with what he hoped to be the last time tonight, barely paying any mind to the fact that Claire had come across the gooey remains of an Infected.

"Was this here before?" she inquired. Her features were twisted with genuine curiosity and disgust. Alex shrugged in response and kept going.

They were on the second floor now. Claire found herself drifting off to inspect the locker room, which Alex had to do his best to not groan in annoyance. She was certain that they needed everything they could get their hands on, Alex was the only one that knew that they didn't.

She came out of it with more ammunition, a key for a dial pad that she wouldn't get rid of despite Alex's reassurances that it was useless, and a healthy scare from a corpse. At least, Alex was confident that it was a corpse. It didn't move even when it got kicked through the steam that emitted from a punctured water heater. So with the locker room cleared, they moved to the third floor.

"Look at this."

Claire had stopped Alex to hold up a skeleton key with a spade-shaped bow. It was resting on the table just shy from the gaping hole in the wall. "Have you noticed that some of the doors have symbols on them?"

"No."

And Alex hadn't. There was no point when he could literally kick open any door in his way. So did that mean that this key had a corresponding door? What kind of police station had that?

"Oh."

The door led to another corridor. Alex and Claire had full view of the storm pelting the window several yards in front of them. They continued walking, only for Claire to halt when something flashed across the window with a snarl.

"What the hell was that?" Claire demanded. She hung a little bit closer to Alex, her blue gaze fixated on the glass with pure apprehension. She didn't appear conscious of her actions, so Alex did them both a favor and kept going like nothing had happened.

"Stage two of virus evolution," he mused. Claire might not have seen it clearly but Alex had the full image in his mind. They were like smaller, weaker Hunters.

"So that's the mutation that left those claw marks?" she whispered.

"Yes."

"...Fuck."

Alex found himself mildly amused. That felt like something Dana would say, and the two most certainly had similar personalities. It was mostly regarding their hard-headed stubbornness though. If they met they would either be best friends or get along like a house on fire.

They kept moving and the hallway soon gave way to a storage room. There was a thick smell of blood here that reminded Alex of the hallway with the keep out sign. Claire found herself more ammunition, and they reconvened in front of black iron bars that held a statue with a medallion behind it.

As well as seven dead bodies.

Four of them were Infected. Whether they were actually dead or feinting, Alex couldn't tell. The other three were police officers. Those three were missing their heads.

"Alex... take a look at this."

Claire held out a piece of paper. She had found herself another hip pouch and attached it with the other. Her gaze lingered on the bodies with a solemn air and Alex suspected that it had to do with whatever was written down. He took the paper from her hand and read through it.

He was sneering by the time he finished reading it. Some piece of scum thought that he could play God and decided to round up these officers and stuff them behind bars just because he got "cut off" by a company. This note came from their superior, which meant that this was an inside job. The Infected must've been used for entertainment, then the officers were put down when they were overwhelmed.

"This is sick, even for humans," Alex snarled. To put someone in a cage and watch them get torn to pieces... If he ever found who did this and they still breathed, he would personally enjoy ripping them apart.

"It talked about some C4," Claire murmured. Her voice brought Alex back to the fact that he wasn't alone, and thus couldn't go hunt for this piece of shit to his heart's content. "It hasn't been used yet, so it should still be somewhere around the building. If we can get this open, we can get that medallion."

She pointed over at the statue inside the cage. The Maiden Statue, if memory served right.

"It looks like we'll have to come back for it," Alex stated. His tone was a lot less angry than before, but that was only because the target of his aggression was nowhere to be found and he didn't want to scare Claire again. She was already giving him a wary glance every now and then since he had read the note as if he was a ticking time bomb. Alex gave the bodies one last, dark look before grunting and heading in the direction of the closest door.

He found himself in a library. They were on the second floor, standing on top of the balcony with a couple Infected moving down below. One was merely wandering, the other one was feasting. Alex pursed his lips as he thought about trying out his launcher. If he got the two of them together, he could see how many he needed to take one of these guys down.

"Hey, Claire," the radio crackled. The mentioned woman lifted up from her waist in the duration of it's pause. "...Is Alex still there?" Claire raised an eyebrow before she passed the radio over to his waiting hand.

"This is Alex. Over."

There was a longer pause.

"I got something I want to show you two. Meet me back in the main hall. Over."

Alex shot Claire a glance. "10-4, lieutenant, we're on our way. Over and out." He handed the radio back to her. She looked surprised as she clipped it back on.

"You speak cop?"

"Sure," he stated dismissively. Alex turned back to the puzzle on hand. That was to draw the Infected toge– Ah, it would seem that it wasn't needed. The wandering Infected had made it's way to the one eating. Alex raised his launcher with a feral grin and fired. There was nothing more satisfying than watching things burn. Even if those things weren't capable of screaming.

The two collected what loot they could find. Claire seemed adamant on lending Alex yet another knife that she lifted from a police corpse. "It's probably better if you have a backup knife. It's less... explosive."

It took a lot of effort not to roll his eyes. Alex pulled his own knife from his pocket. "Branagh already beat you to it."

Claire stared for a long moment. "So... you're telling me that you had a knife all this time, and you haven't used it?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

Alex scowled. "It's brittle and I'm not going to waste it on something soft."

She gaped at him. Whatever the reason was, Alex found that he really didn't care. He pushed the door open at the end of the set of stairs and took a quick glance around. He paused on the Unicorn Statue, but his gaze settled on more important things. Like the map pinned to the board.

It was a map that showed off the remaining floors. He found that S.T.A.R.S. office was on the second floor, which shouldn't be too much work. The staircase they bypassed had led up to it but it was blocked off by furniture, and the locker room still had it's water heater problem. The door he was in front of currently led to a hall directly to it, which he quickly tested only to discover that it was locked. An easy fix.

"Alex?" Claire had poked her head into the room just in time to see him pull his leg back. "What are you–?"

Crrrrrsh.

He blinked as his foot remained suspended. While the lock had remained strong, the door, on the other hand, had not. It now had a gaping hole in it's center that only grew larger when Alex ripped his leg out. He observed the barrier for a long moment, taking note of the fact that not even the hinges looked prepared to be ripped from the wall. He wasn't kicking anywhere close to full strength, but still...

"I should have burned it," he muttered. He leaned his shoulder against the door as he put his hand through the hole and fumbled for the lock mechanism. It clicked and Alex pushed the door open to find himself facing yet another dark hallway.

"What about the medallion," Claire asked behind him.

"Get it. I'm not going far. S.T.A.R.S. should be on this floor."

He didn't wait for a response as he stepped into the hallway. The door shut behind him, only leaving behind a ray of light that shined through the gap. Alex moved brusquely, bypassing a door with a red diamond with his thoughts focused solely on reaching the office. He had barely reached the corner when a large screech sounded through the hallm

Something heavy collided with him. The sheer, unexpected weight threw Alex backwards momentarily and it took him a long moment to register the pain searing in his throat. He blinked and ran his fingers over the area, taking note of how his cells worked posthaste to bind everything back into place. He glanced back to see the flesh non-Hunter climbing on the wall in his direction from the path he had come from. So it could both climb and jump. Good to know.

As if sensing that he wasn't dead, it hissed and lunged at Alex again. He retaliated in turn by hooking his fist up from beneath it, effectively making it's fangs click together for only a split second with his collision before it went flying down the hall. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to kill the damn thing and it came right back. It did appear to learn it's lesson however, and kept to a distance, which wouldn't help it in the long run. Alex glanced at the door behind it, the very one he had come through, and flicked his thermal vision for a quick moment to see where Claire was. She was pulling what he assumed to be the medallion from the statue, which meant that he wouldn't have a lot of time to act.

Alex's thoughts were cut off as something pink launched itself from the non-Hunter's mouth. He caught it before it reached him and was momentarily disgusted when he found that it was a tongue. A wet, slimy, wriggling tongue. The creature snarled and pulled backwards, using a surprising amount of strength to reach it's elongated limb. It was attempting to make him fly towards it. He smirked.

Not on my watch.

Alex yanked the tongue backwards with a snarl of his own. The creature, having not expected it, went flying in his direction. However, it proved to be a quick thinker and extended it's claws. It's about that time that he saw the door at the end of the hallway move, and only had the time to think "fuck" before it was upon him.

Alex grabbed both of the creature's wrists before it could even slash him. It hissed and spat, trying to overpower him with it's own weight, which was something that would never work because it weighed about the average size of an human adult. Biting wouldn't work either because Alex still had it's tongue in his hand, and thus it would have to chomp it off in order to get him. No, right now, while Alex was stuck using normal strength, they were in a stalemate.

"Alex!" Claire shouted in alarm before she began firing.

The creature flinched when the bullets pierced flesh and it shrieked. Realizing that it was outmatched, it tried it's damndest to get away. It ripped one set of claws out from Alex's hands and he let it, because that would be the last thing it ever did. Alex reached into his pocket when the claws came speeding back towards him and mercilessly stabbed the knife into it's unprotected brain.

The non-Hunter's death throes were vicious and ear-splitting, yet Alex didn't dare let up. He pushed the knife deeper until it's flesh met the hilt and twisted. There was a sharp sound of metal breaking and the hilt snapped off from the blade, breaking just like he thought it would. He kicked it away and watched it still.

It didn't make sense. The first stage of this virus left the Infected as zombies, which meant that they didn't have pain receptors. The second stage obviously did. It was also more capable of thought considering on how it tried to attack Alex from a distance when it knew close combat wouldn't work. Were those effects of the living cells?

"Wasn't that the thing that crossed over the window," Claire asked. She approached Alex with her blue eyes trained on the creature.

"Yes."

She reached him and the creature hadn't moved the slightest bit. Then that gaze of hers found it's way to Alex. "You're not injured? Bit?"

"It was a pain of the neck," he grumbled. "But no, I'm fine."

Claire didn't appear to believe him but it wasn't like there was evidence around to indicate otherwise. He was right about the fact that this specimen was weaker than that of a Hunter. His head was still attached, after all.

"S.T.A.R.S. should be just up ahead."

Claire shot one last glance at the dead creature before she followed Alex down the rest of the hall and into an office.

There were ten desks in the main office. Only a few had appeared to keep their personal items, which Alex speculated to belong to the survivors. Everything else was packed away in boxes. There were also numerous items strewn throughout, and both him and Claire came to a silent agreement to gather what they could. By the time he glanced up, he realized that Claire was busy looking at a picture frame. She noticed him staring and shrugged. "It's cute."

The "it" was a golden retriever. Claire had showed it to Alex, and all he could manage was a blank stare. He didn't find anything cute about it.

"...I'm checking the private office."

He moved around her and began searching the area that he had pointed out. There wasn't anything interesting to find. Some old investigation notes and even another picture of some short-haired girl in gym clothes, but nothing related to Umbrella. He paused with a frown as he became aware of a light buzzing in the back of his mind. It felt... familiar.

"Hey, Alex?" Claire distracted him as she peered into the office. "What are you looking for, exactly?"

With the buzzing forgotten, Alex slammed a drawer shut with a low growl. How was there nothing? Branagh made it sound like S.T.A.R.S. was good at their job. "Anything related to where Umbrella visited or worked."

"Oh." She held up a sheet of paper. "What about this? I found it in an envelope. Someone named Jill was addressing my brother. She thought that there was a connection between Umbrella and Gentek."

His interest peaked, Alex held his hand out for the piece of paper. Claire passed it to him without issues and he quickly scanned the contents.

Chris

I caught sight of McMullen getting out of the car with Allman. The CEO of Gentek with Umbrella? It gives me a bad feeling. I'll look into it.

Jill

McMullen. Alex pursed his lips in thought. That is– was, Dr. Mercer's superior. Those fragmented memories indicated that he was a stern but kind man whose interest was based solely in science. He had also taken Dr. Mercer under his wing. There had been someone... a woman? Who didn't like that.

"Is this the only thing you found?"

Claire nodded. "Yeah. Is that good enough?"

No, not really, but it shows that Gentek might have some collaboration. "It'll have to do." He dropped the piece of paper on the desk. "Let's see what Branagh wants."

They backtracked to the library where the last door of the second floor rested. It had a spade emblem on it, telling Alex that yes, the skeleton key was needed for some odd reason. They also had a companion that decided to remove itself from it's spot next to the door, so the Infected shambled aimlessly throughout the library. Claire was the one who took that down. Took quite a few bullets to do it too. She used the skeleton key on the door and they both ended back up in the main hall. Alex led the way back to the first floor, where Branagh was looking at his computer. He had a gun in his hand this time. Most likely stemming from paranoia of the Infected since they had left.

"What is it," Claire asked.

Branagh motioned her to move closer and showed her the computer. Alex peered at it, taking note of the unfamiliar person in the grainy picture.

"Oh my god, he made it!"

Branagh raised an eyebrow. Alex shifted his gaze towards Claire with mild interest. "You know him?"

"Yeah, that's Leon... er, Kennedy, I think?"

"The rookie... I thought he looked familiar."

A rookie? This Leon was dressed in civilian clothes as opposed to an actual uniform. Was it his day off?

Branagh pointed his thumb behind him. "You can make it to that courtyard through the second floor, east side."

"Okay, thanks Marvin, we're on it."

"Hold on." Branagh flicked his gaze over to Alex when they began moving. "Claire, you go on ahead. I want to talk to Alex about something."

Alex narrowed his eyes. The thought of leaving Claire alone for that extended period of time sounded like a bad idea. He glanced over at her.

"Don't look at me like that," she huffed. "I'll be fine."

That certainly didn't help sooth his worries but Alex nodded nonetheless. Claire's lips twitched into a smile and she left the two alone by heading up the stairs.

"What did you want," Alex questioned. Branagh met him with a leveled stare that didn't reveal any thoughts he might be thinking of.

"Hold on, not yet."

So this was something he didn't want Claire listening to. Something that required space. Alex's mind reeled as he thought of numerous possibilities. It wasn't until they heard the door to the second floor shut that Branagh spoke. "Now, I'm only going to ask you once."

Branagh's level stare of his had turned into a steely resolve, and Alex soon found himself staring at the barrel to a gun.

"What are you?"