—The Makai’s private beach, 11:20PM—

Victoria felt the soft, familiar footsteps on the sand behind her. She didn’t have to turn around to know who it was. Suppressing a smile she said, “I guess you got my message.”

“I did.” Enrique said softly, his hands lingering casually in his pockets. After a moment of hesitation he sat down on the sand at Victoria’s side.

A minute of silence ensued, the only sound was coming from the waves as they washed ashore.

Enrique was the first to speak. “Your hair is different.”

Victoria glanced at him and blinked, astonished that he’d notice. It shouldn’t have surprised her much, she thought. Riq, being who he was, was more attentive to detail than other men.

“Yeah. I kinda got dragged into it.” Victoria shrugged. “It’s ok I guess”, she added, twisting a strand of brunette hair around her fingers.

“Looks good.” Enrique concluded. Honestly, he didn’t know much of anything about hair, but he had to admit it did flatter her. It was now at least three inches shorter and about a shade darker than what it originally was. The golden streaks that framed her face were now gone, replaced by more subtle highlights that only seemed to shine through if hit by light in the appropriate angle. Her bangs were also cut shorter, falling just below her cheekbones.

“Thanks…” Victoria smiled, grateful for the compliment.

Another short period of silence followed as each seemed to lose themselves in their respective thoughts. Victoria sighed, long and loud, digging her fingernails into the sand. She thought her question over and finally mustered enough courage to ask it even though she was terrified of the answer.

“Do you… do you think he’s alive?” Riq noticed the slight shaking in her voice.

It was now Enrique’s turn to sigh. Victoria had not mentioned a name, but he knew she was referring to her friend Sean Matsuda. After what he had seen this morning he feared that the possibility of finding him alive and let alone healthy was very slim.

“I don’t know.” He replied sincerely, trying to sound as optimistic as possible and yet feeling he failed miserably. His hand moved to hold Victoria’s, having to first dig her fingers out of the softness of the sand. “If he is alive, we’ll find him…”

“I could have done something to stop them, you know. I was with him, before they took him. So stupid…” She stopped, unable to continue, curling her knees up to her chest.

Riq frowned. The last person who should be feeling any guilt for what happened was her. “No…” He slipped his arm over her shoulders in an attempt to offer her some support. “What happened is not your fault. Don’t blame yourself.”

Victoria felt Enrique’s hand give a gentle squeeze on her shoulder, a sensation that provoked her breathing to stop just momentarily. She released the inhaled air, instantly feeling relieved of a small part of her growing tension.

“I’m not going anywhere tomorrow. After the fight, I’m staying here.” The subject had not come up yet, but Victoria felt the necessity to make it clear.

It took a moment for Riq to nod at her statement. “I’m not asking you to.” It was a problem, of course. She was his responsibility, and her staying only complicated his already dense situation. Riq was also aware that convincing Victoria to do otherwise was downright impossible, so asking her to keep out of harm’s way was as good as he could do for now.

Victoria smiled knowingly. “I’ll try to keep my butt out of trouble, I promise.” She said, smiling again at the small scowl Riq unwillingly produced.

Enrique had known Victoria for years now and yet the fact that this girl could, if she wanted to, slip into his consciousness and hear his thoughts, freaked the hell out of him. Not really because she was capable of something so unnatural… Riq had seen enough in his lifetime that rendered her abilities completely harmless in comparison… but simply because having his privacy threatened made him feel uneasy, to say the least.

Victoria didn’t have to probe into his head to have an accurate idea of what he was thinking. In fact, unknown to Riq, Victoria had never gone past reading his facial expressions or his movements, never had gone further than what she could see on the surface. She respected him. And that was probably why he was always such a mystery to her, Enid concluded.

Victoria slipped out of her short trail of thoughts and into the realization that Enrique’s arm still rested on her shoulders. Her fingers tapped onto her knee as she pondered on how much she could humiliate herself by doing what she was about to do next. Shaking the conflict out of her mind and bracing herself, she went for it. Slowly, she closed off the already small distance between Enrique and herself, and even more slowly, and frankly, very horrified, leaned her head just below his shoulder.

Enid feel felt her heart stop as Riq’s arm levitated away from her body. Expecting some sort of rejection, she reluctantly considered moving away only to have her thought cut short by Enrique returning the embrace.

It was the least he could do, Riq thought briefly as he pulled her near. Victoria closed her eyes allowing the comfort he offered to sink in, losing track of how long they sat in silence.

“You have a fight tomorrow.”

Victoria’s eyes fluttered open at the sound of his voice. For a moment there she thought she felt his chin gently grazing the top of her head. She looked down at her watch. It was getting late.

“I guess I should go get some sleep.” Pulling away from him, she reached for her bag and slipped her feet into her flip-flops.

Smiling, she glanced at him. “Gracias, me siento mejor. (Thanks, I feel better.)”

Enrique nodded and offered her a small smile, then broke eye contact only to stare at the ocean again. “Buenas noches. (Good night.)” He said simply.

“Night.” She smiled again, and leaned in to give him a quick good-bye peck on the cheek, not aware of the subtle turning of his face towards her.

Victoria’s heart sunk, her cheeks flushing with an uncontrollable wave of scarlet embarrassment as she felt her lips touch the corner of his.

‘God what did I do?! Did he notice?!’

The answer to the latter was obvious, for Enrique was staring down at her with another one of those unreadable looks. This one was somehow different. In a mist of uncontainable feelings Victoria slanted her head towards his face again, this time the target of her lips being unmistakable.

CLICK! FLASH!

“What the hell?” Enrique heard himself say as his eyes squinted out of the temporary blindness caused by a bright, bluish, flashing light. To his left, Victoria was already up and on her way towards the culprit: an average height, thin man whose pants were rolled up to his knees in a futile attempt to keep them dry as he stood amidst the waves aiming a camera at the pair of fighters.

Two more flashes, then the photographer decided to run for his life as Victoria closed up on him. He stumbled into the water, miraculously salvaging his electronic equipment from getting soaked, and then ran for dear life again, this time on the dryer sand.

“What the HELL are you doing!” Victoria yelled, and was about to sprint in pursuit only to be stopped by a hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t bother.” Truth was, Enrique had other things to worry about… and restraining Victoria from impaling this man’s limbs to a useless mush was not on his list of priorities.

“But…” She turned around to face Enrique, and suddenly remembered just why the pictures must have been taken. She felt the blush on her cheeks again. “I…” she began to mutter something, before having Enrique hand her the bag she had left behind.

“Let’s get you back to the hotel.”

Victoria was more than grateful for the change of subject.
 

~*~*~*~

—Dry Dock 3, 11:38PM—

It didn’t take long to discover the reason for the smell.

At the desk with the computer, a figure was slouched forward over the keyboard. Closer inspection not only revealed the hole from a gunshot in the side of his skull, it showed maggots had already set up residence in his brain. Natalie stepped back and suppressed a retch. The computer screen was blankly white, with its drive case open. To get a better look would mean getting close to the body, and she wanted to keep her lunch down. Let the clean up guys worry about it.

“So we came here for a days-old dead guy? I thought we had plenty of those…”

Parker’s flat tone reprimanded her. “It’s a murder scene, so it’s not like we didn’t find anything here, Wyn. You check the closets and be sure of things. I’m heading back.”

Somewhere in her brain, a little red flag popped up. Resolutely, she pushed it back down. “…Fine.”

He went back the way they’d come, and she proceeded to the area they’d not yet checked. The rest of the room was unremarkable, if one ignored the questionable contents of various jars on the shelves. She would take a closer look later, when the lights were on and the clean up crew was down here.

The first closet she opened contained a cold storage unit with vials of blood and serums she wouldn’t know how to identify. The second contained something far more disturbing, something that made her jump back with a small shriek when she discovered it.

Inside a lit tank containing a viscous, milky-blue liquid was the body of… well, what the hell would one call it? Keeping her gun trained on it, Natalie stepped closer, praying it really was dead.

It had no skin. None… but was larger than a man and roped with muscle. The body was shaped like a human male… but the forearms were thick, with sharp talons in place of fingers. A gaping maw lined with razor, pointed teeth were lax, an impossibly long and reptilian tongue hanging out. There were no eyes… but the brain covered the skull, rather than being protected by it.

Natalie caught her breath, forgetting the stench of the room or her mission, thinking only that this thing must belong to Umbrella, that the coloration of its brain and flesh reminded her too strongly of the pictures she’d viewed earlier. Files she now deeply regretted not finishing, but she didn’t have time to regret it for long.

Gunshots rang from above.

With the speed she was known for in the arena, Natalie backtracked and found the exit of the room. She raced down the hall, up the stairs, heart racing as she tried her communications device again.

“Dammit, somebody answer me!”

Nothing.

She cursed and went through the rooms of the first floor with the shotgun leading. Now she could hear voices. A female shouting. Sandoval.

Natalie reentered the room they’d started in just in time to see the body of Lars tumble down the stairs. From his open, expressionless eyes, she knew he was already dead. Blood leaked from under his arm and poured from his neck, where his armor didn’t protect him.

“Sh-t!” she cursed, stepped over the body and ran up the stairs as more gunfire sounded.

Pinned down where the hallway met the stairs, Sandoval was exchanging gunfire with the enemy. Wyn was almost to the top of the stairs when she called out. “How many?”

“Just one confirmed, but damn, he’s good!”

“I thought you were supposed to be out of the building!”

“What? What are you talking about? We lost communication on our way to you and were about to head back when we heard something upstairs. We came up and got attacked!”

So Parker was lying. Wynshire muttered the foulest invective to come to her creative mind.

“Bastard tagged Lars in the side on his first shot. Stupid kid wouldn’t fall back, tried to keep shooting…”

Natalie could tell the older woman was rattled by the way her hands shook as she reloaded. She moved into position to cover and returned fire at the enemy with Claire. She caught a glimpse of him at the end of the hall, ducking into a doorway for cover. The other end of the hall seemed empty, the stairs situated at the middle.

“Did you see the SAC?”

“No… he split off from you?”

“Just a few minutes ago, before I heard the shots.”

Sandoval cursed, stepped around the corner to fire.

And lost her head. Literally.

Natalie watched it as if it were in slow motion. A blade attached to a chain sliced through the air and her fellow agent’s neck, retracting in the next instant as the head rolled down the steps and the body crumpled.

Hot blood sprayed over Natalie’s shoulder, but it only took a breath for her to collect her wits and run. Back down the stairs, turned so that the shotgun covered her retreat. She saw someone start to enter the top of the stairs, one small, pale hand holding the blade that had cut down Sandoval. Natalie let loose with the shotgun, sending a spray of scattershot at the person and into the corner of the wall. A short cry rang out, then heavy footsteps from the other direction. She reached the bottom and bolted for the door. At a full run, she went for the van.

Inside she found what she both dreaded and expected. Matthews and Zieman, both dead, throats slit. The equipment was trashed, so was the wiring under the dash.

“F--K!” she seethed, grabbing a box of shells and running for it. She made it halfway down the block before a shot shattered the staccato rhythm of her heavy boot-falls. Pain lanced through her left calf and took her down, sending her tumbling in the momentum she’d built.

She cursed with vehemence and looked behind her. There, she saw something that sent black tendrils of hate throughout her heart, coiling into the bitterest resentment.

Walking towards her from the building was her SAC, Beretta in hand. Claire was empty; she’d have to take time to reload it. The shotgun she was reloading now, but had a thought in the middle of her rage.

If she killed Parker with nothing to show for his deception, she would be in trouble. True that Jack’s files supposedly gave proof of him selling info to Umbrella, but what if something happened to those? What if Jack got the wrong person? Worse yet, what if something happened to her tonight, and those files were never found. Rolling over as if trying to crawl away, leaving a trail of blood from the wound on her leg, Natalie pulled out her cell phone and kept it hidden. She pushed a few buttons until the recording device was engaged, then slipped the slender phone under one fingerless glove, the receiver sticking out just enough not to be muffled.

She heard his footsteps, heard the leather of his shoes creaking. He was close enough, now. She rolled onto her back, shotgun aimed for him. “I knew something was up. Shoulda went with my instincts and put one between your eyes in that basement, you son of a bitch,” she hissed.

Kyle grinned at her and made a mocking gesture. “But you didn’t, and here we are. A shame that so many resources were wasted for this, Wyn. But you know, we had to make it look real.”

“For what?” she demanded between clenched teeth, finger itching on the trigger of the SPAS-12.

“For making this exchange, of course.” He gestured behind him, where she could see another man exiting the building. The shooter.

“You’re giving me to them, aren’t you? You’re trading me to Umbrella.”

“We all gotta make a living somehow, Wyn.” He knelt, nudging her gun to one side with his, wearing that condescending smirk she hated so much. “And I don’t really care for how you make yours, either. You know, if it wasn’t for you and your bullsh-t, always bucking command, I’d be a lot closer to Assistant Director right now, and I’d never have to put up with you again.”

He fired a round into her flak jacket, drawing a gasp from her as the jarring impact of the bullet knocked the air from her, crushing down on her ribs for an instant that felt entirely too long. She fought to draw breath again, growled and pulled the trigger on her shotgun, though she was too winded to lift it.

The pellets sparked and ricocheted off the ground, two catching Parker in the leg. He leapt back with a curse, holding the offended and bleeding shin. He’d only been grazed by one, the other was embedded. But the pain was ignored in favor of survival as she fired again, hitting him full on in the chest.

Unfortunately, he also wore a vest, and was knocked back and winded the same as she’d been. She leaned up, aiming again, this time fully intending to kill him. “Eat this you c--k-munching-”

He fired before she did, but the report wasn’t as loud. A stinging pain erupted in her thigh, and she looked down to find a dart protruding from it. In his other hand she saw a second weapon, a tranquilizer gun. Flashbacks came to her of how he’d apprehended her and Jin weeks ago. The effects began to take hold, numbing and slowing her, but adrenaline kept her awake.

She tried to fire again, but her gun drooped too far, and as Parker recovered he ambled closer.

With a harsh kick he sent the shotgun from her grasp, and with two more he had her curled with her hand protectively over her midsection. Claire was snatched out of her holster and thrown a few feet away.

Natalie coughed, tasting blood. “You bastard… son of a bitch…”

Kyle snorted a laugh. Rez now stood behind him, glaring at Parker as the Agent reveled in his little victory.

“Oh, come on, Wyn, it’s not like I’m going to kill you. Although, when they’re done with you, you might wish you were dead. And your fiancé… looks like he might have been better off not getting mixed up with you after all.”

Blue eyes lost none of their intensity to the drug in her bloodstream. “You’re going to die for this, Parker,” she swore.

He turned from her with a careless laugh, now facing the man Natalie didn’t recognize, but hated already. “Now, I trust my account has already been credited?”

Sergei looked at the woman on the ground as he answered with a small smirk. “I’m told it’s being taken care of now.”

“Good. Now, go back and tell your bosses I want another eighty thousand.”

Rez looked at Parker with extreme annoyance in his eyes. “Let’s get two things straight. One, I’m no messenger boy. Two, you get only what you deserve. I told you not to damage her…”

“I was shot!”

“I told you not to come yourself. Besides, it gives you a plausible alibi as the only survivor. And as I said, you damaged the package, you stupid f-ck.”

While the two argued, Natalie stayed curled on her side, back to them. Numb fingers pulled out her cell phone and worked clumsily at the keys. She stopped recording, then typed in a text message she dearly hoped Jin could figure out and that she could remember accurately from glancing over the map at the briefing.

“Latitude…. It was… 212... 11... 7N…”

She pressed the keys as soon as the numbers came to memory, but hadn’t the time to spell out “latitude/longitude”.

212117N
1575749W

She hit the send key. When her phone’s background screen showed again, she looked longingly at the picture of her sleeping lover. She burned the image into her head, knowing that perhaps that morning would be the last she’d ever see of him, or rather, the last he’d see of her. On a final impulse, she put a hand to her throat and jerked loose the necklace she wore with her cross. Removing the only two other pieces of jewelry that mattered, both rings, she slipped them onto the cord and looped it twice around the phone’s hinge before flipping it shut. The argument behind her had gotten heated, and she could hear the shooter threatening Parker, and her boss’s silence.

She wouldn’t be another mysterious casualty. He would know what happened to her and who caused it. God willing, he’d use the information wisely. Praying the damn thing didn’t break into pieces, she sent the phone skidding across the pavement, landing under the van.

Rez turned toward her at the sound, saw her hunched over with her hands moving. He stalked over, kicked her to roll her on her back, and sneered when he saw scattered shell casings. It looked like she’d inched closer to her revolver, which he now picked up and examined. “Nice gun,” she heard him say dryly, right before he drove the butt of his rifle into the side of her head and all went black.

~*~*~*~

—U.P.R.F., Level 6 — Black Card Sector, Umbrella exclusive room, 12:01AM—

“You have the specimen? Yes? Yes? Good. Hurry back. We need to repair her as soon as possible so we can begin work. No. We’ll see. Goodbye.”

Dr. Anthony Reis hung up the phone and smiled pleasantly to Dr. Noiv. Both sat across from each other at a table, upon which the only thing was a single red file.

“Success?” Noiv asked.

“Obviously,” Reis responded, opening the file. Within it was a stack of documents, the top being a copy of “Mien’s” tournament ID, a picture of her without the disguise, and one of her federal badge ID. Beside each of those were various lines of information linked with her. Taking a red marker from his lab coat pocket, Anthony marked “acquired” at the top of the page. He closed the file.

“We have two subjects in custody. Were we not to have more by now? I do not care for the neighbors we’ve allowed to move in…” Noiv referred of course to the separate but symbiotic Shadaloo facility.

Reis grunted, “Neither do I, but it seems our contract will hold for the time being. He supplies funds, which we need after the loss of both resources and public trust, and we provide him with what he wants, if we are successful.”

“The transference of a soul isn’t something I’d imagine such a crude organization is capable of.”

“Be that as it may, we still don’t know a lot about this energy so broadly termed as ki, qi, or chi. However Bison plans to transfer his own is not our concern. We simply have to make sure his host body can be made to never require another transfer, or maintain for many years at the least.”

“I thought we were designing other … things of interest for him?”

“We are, yes. Those are important, but apparently his plans regarding these ‘relics’ he’s been lusting after are slow in coming together, and may fall apart entirely,” Reis replied.

“How surprising,” Noiv snorted, his hint of sarcasm evident. “A group of ancient devices meant to contain and bestow unfathomable power? Preposterous.”

Reis stood and walked to his filing cabinet, used his personal keycard to open it, revealing a drawer full of other files, all red. As he replaced the one on Natalie Wynshire, his thumb brushed over a few others, nudging them open to reveal other pictures. A Japanese girl with short brown hair, dark eyes and a winning smile. A Hispanic woman with light brown and blond hair. A man with black hair and gold eyes, among several others.

He closed the drawer, which automatically locked back.

“But we’re really here for the projects, aren’t we? I mean, money’s worth only goes so far when compared to science…” Jacques’s eyes lit up on the last words, giving him a slightly mad look.

Reis smiled, “Only so far, yes. At least we have these subjects. I have a feeling this new one may prove quite useful, in more ways than originally intended.”

“If we can control her,” Noiv countered.

“Yes, if. If not, then…” he turned, looking over the rest of the room.

Around them, lining the walls of the expansive room, were rows of tanks, uncountable at a glance. Inside each was a body, some mangled and unrecognizable, some too human in their last moment of terror or despair. All of them were failures. All of them were ‘learning experiences’. None of them were alive.

At the end of each row stood a few empty tanks, like coffins waiting morbidly to be filled.