"Does she have any abilities?" Birkin's voice penetrated Sherry's thoughts. Startled she shot a glance towards him. He sat near the door. It felt better to be in close proximity to the creature outside. Not that he'd left the door open. He still wanted the barrier. He knew the creature hated him. He could sense the Neman's emotions the longer they were connected. For now, it was fully under his command, but it didn't have to like it.

Birkin couldn't believe how much had occurred since he had been away. Being away was how he chose to think about his death. The only way he could conceive the idea. He hadn't been involved in the cloning projects. He'd allowed Wesker to take several memory overlays not understanding what they were for, nor had he cared at the time. The virus he'd been working on had been everything, had cost him everything as well. His family being gone notwithstanding but the technological advancements Umbrella had come up with in the past few years were incredible

His own daughter's healing...he had skipped past the rest of her story and was completely focused on her abilities.

Sherry frowned. "I'm not sure." Sherry moved to place herself between Birkin and Anja. "But you're the last person I want to find out."

"Sherry, I don't think—" Anna started, trying to placate her.

"I'm not going to hurt her." Birkin looked mortified. "I was just curious to see if the ability carried down the genetic line."

Anna went silent, glancing between the two of them. She and Birkin had never met before. She began to understand the animosity Jake felt towards her as she watched Sherry and the clone of her father.

"Funny," Sherry faced him hands on hips, anger in her voice. "That's just what your friend Wesker said to me when he found out I was pregnant. He was going to keep me caged up. Jake's right. Our parents were fucked up."

Birkin's face turned red. "You know there is a chance they won't return."

"Don't say that."

"Sher—"

"Don't fucking say that!" Sherry turned her back on Birkin again. Oh God let him come back, Jake please come back, she prayed to herself. She thought she could stand being in here with the clone of her father, but the truth was Anja was the only person keeping her sane right now. Seeing her father's face was driving her crazy. For the first time in her life Sherry was ready to commit murder. Anna moved closer to Sherry and put a hand on her arm.

"I'm sorry."

"He'll come back," She whispered as she looked at Anna, still amazed at Jake's resemblance to his mother. She wondered if Jill had seen the difference because she'd seen Wesker's face every day. Sherry saw Anna and for the first time she could really see who Jake resembled. Sure, there were similarities between him and his father, but his coloring was from his mother and her alone.

A nagging voice in the back of her head told her Birkin might be right. They might have to claw their way out of here on their own. She, with her healing abilities might actually have a shot at it. Jake should too. But these...

Thinking about Jake gave her pause. She turned back to Birkin.

"What did you know before you knew who I was?"

Birkin looked at Sherry surprised. "What do you mean?"

"What did Wesker tell you?"

"He told me both of you died, it was the company's fault."

"And?"

"I had planned on taking revenge..."

"What stopped you?"

"Nothing stopped me. I found out you were alive. Wesker lied about some things. I never believed that the company was completely responsible. He had some part in it too. I want revenge on him for lying about that part...not letting me know you were alive. Letting his son marry you."

Sherry crossed her arms as she studied Birkin.

"There really is no "letting us" do anything." She finally spoke in a soft whisper. "Jake and I found each other without Wesker's help. Jake never knew Wesker was his father until I found him. Every decision we've made, we've done on our own. Without either of you."

"But—"

"And it's going to stay that way."

"Sherry, I know this is hard...but Wesker was my friend. And he lied to me..."

"So?"

"So, it's entirely possible Jake lied to you. Think about it. Just to cross the DNA between the two of you in the easiest way possible..."

"That's not exactly how Wesker operates," Sherry threw her hands up into the air, exasperated. "Jake is NOT his father."

"You don't know that."

"Actually, I do." Sherry turned away from Birkin again. This was the second time they had this argument. "No offense but the time to have this sudden interest in my welfare would have been years ago. Not now."

"Better late than never."

"NO," Sherry snapped. "But you are right about one thing. If they take too long, we may have to go on without them. I promised Jake I would stay alive and get Anja out."

Birkin breathed a sigh of relief. He had half thought he would have to knock Sherry out to get her to leave Jake behind. But she might just do it on her own, to protect their daughter. There was always a chance he wouldn't come back. Even better and he wouldn't have to do anything about it.

Anna had watched the exchange in silence. Her own thoughts stayed inside. She had so many burning questions for Sherry. But she didn't want to speak in front of Birkin. How old was Jake? Where had they met? What happened? Why had she left?

Anna was honest with herself, these people, all of them, painted a very different picture of Albert than the one she knew. In private, Albert had discussed making the world a better place using the memory overlay program to help trauma victims, restore people to their families. It had so much promise. But to bring back the dead...

Her first reaction had been thrilled. She was a scientist, it was only natural. But to discover the tall man Wesker had brought with him was her son? And he didn't know what to do around her. Anna grimaced, as the room fell into silence once again.

Only to herself was she going to admit that she'd fallen in love with Albert Wesker and the promise he'd made to change the world. Their long conversations had brought them close, a closeness he'd only showed when they were alone...

And yet, she'd fled from him before she died and raised their child alone in a third world country rather than be with Albert? What had happened?

She wrung her hands, leaving her thoughts unspoken. She wanted to ask Sherry all of these things, but now wasn't the time. The younger woman was protective of her own child and Anna understood that she'd been a test subject at one point. Perhaps both of them had been. It was only a theory, but it made sense to Anna.

The seconds stretched on as the silence grew. Outside the creature dragged it's claws on the floor until Birkin ordered it to stop.

Leon jumped into the hallway that twenty minutes before Chris and Claire had dropped out of. Ada dropped behind him silently. They turned around in a circle listening but hearing nothing but the buzzing of the flickering lights.

Leon sighed. Always bad lighting. "Wonder if this will be the next Raccoon City," he whispered out loud. What a homecoming this was. At least he was still armed. A forest had burned, he bet that in the coming days the burned out Arklay woods would be crawling with fire fighters making sure everything was burned down without a clue about what lay beneath.

Or worse, they might actually find it and let something out. He snickered at the thought. It would give the government a black eye, the idea that they'd missed something, but with B.O.W.s popping up all over the world it would be nothing new.

He started to the left keeping his rifle out in front of him moving slowly.

Ada shuddered inwardly, but out loud she replied with. "I'd rather not think about it. I'm pretty sure everyone you care about is in here."

Leon didn't reply. He wasn't sure if they were even going the right way and his head still hurt. He looked down and saw something dead, breaking down on itself. He moved closer and saw that it was a guard dog. The creature had a hole in its chest. Leon wondered what had killed it. He started forward around it without saying anything after a moment's hesitation Ada followed him.

The lights continued to flicker on and off. Leon half expected something to pop up in the black. "The lights always flicker when something bad is about to happen," He muttered. Behind him Ada snickered but didn't respond. "You working this time?"

"What's it to you?" Ada moved silently behind him. Just keep your distance, Leon.

"I don't normally see you this involved unless there's a job in the middle of it."

Ada shrugged behind him. "I don't know what you mean."

Leon kept moving forward. He would have liked nothing better than to have a conversation with this woman when she wasn't being mysterious. She was generally one step ahead of him. Worse he didn't exactly know who she was working for. Yet this time he was starting to have the feeling she was as much of a victim as Jake and Sherry.

"If I asked you what you were after this time around would you tell me?"

"Who says I'm after anything this time?"

"Never mind." Leon fell silent again, moving forward. She was going to keep the wall up that had always been there.

The lights kept flickering and they kept moving forward listening for any sound other than dripping water. Leon wondered what other creatures were down here. At this point he would have been grateful to run into a licker. The creature may have been lightning fast, but he could deal with that. They hadn't scared him as much as the creature they'd just encountered upstairs.

A licker was just an animal, basic animal needs, a super predator.

That creature though, it had seen him, and it seemed to "think" even as it was sizing up the infected wolf in the forest. The intelligence behind the inky black eyes seemed evil, as it stared at him. But Leon had seen evil packaged as a beautiful woman, so he supposed that his own prejudices could have placed that idea in his head. The creature had appeared to study him before Ada shot it. Really study him as it hoisted him off the ground. While he didn't doubt he would have ended up dead he couldn't put the thought out of his mind that it was a thinking mind in there.

Not just an animal, and not easily controlled like the J'avo he'd encountered in China. So, what was it? A guard dog?

"What's that?" Ada had stopped behind him. Leon mentally kicked himself for getting lost in his own thoughts.

He paused and listened, his eyes straining to see and his ears to hear.

There was a scratching sound against the floor coming from in front of them.

Tsssstssstsssss, hard nails against concrete.

He looked back at Ada, she stared at him for a moment and then nodded. They were going forward. Both of them were veterans at this. There really was no going back, to survive you had to hit whatever was in front of you and take it down. You couldn't panic, if you did, you were dead. Feelings had no place in this kind of work. They both knew that too.

The lights flickered back on and a monster finally showed up in the darkness.

It resembled the creature outside, but it still had some vestiges of clothing on, tattered around its body. It was crouched on the floor drawing its nails against the concrete. It made no move towards them other than snap its head in their direction. Leon raised his gun, but he didn't fire. Behind him, heard Ada inhale sharply and raise her sniper rifle.

"Stop making that sound." The voice was so familiar that Leon almost dropped his gun.

Birkin? Should he even be surprised?