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Venom froze when the hulking Tyrant stepped out of the shadows. After a brief pause, he turned on his heel and slipped away without a word.
The Tyrant didn't immediately give chase. Instead, it reached down, hefted its massive machine gun, and then began lumbering off in Venom's direction.
Venom moved quickly along the cracked highway, his senses stretching out ahead of him. Alice was close—he could feel it.
He hadn't fought the Tyrant earlier for a reason. His plan was to lure that monster straight to Alice. Let her clash with it while he slipped in and seized his chance to merge with her again, copying her genetic code.
If it came down to it, he'd force the merge—tear the genes out of her body if he had to. But that was the last resort. After all, one should show a little gentlemanly respect to a lady.
After nearly fifteen minutes of pursuit, Venom finally found her.
Alice and her group were standing at the gates of an abandoned school, whispering among themselves, clearly planning to head inside.
Soon, they split up.
Some made for the basketball court, some toward the cafeteria, others down into the basement. Alice alone headed for the classroom building.
At the doorway, she paused. Blood smeared the entrance. She pushed the heavy doors open.
The corridor wasn't empty. More than ten zombies shuffled about inside.
Pale, bloodless faces. Eyes and nostrils leaking congealed crimson. No mistaking it—they were undead.
The sound of the door caught their attention. A few at the front turned, moaning, and staggered toward her.
Alice knew better than to use her gun. One shot and the noise would drag in half the city. So she slid her knife free from her belt, darted forward, and cut them down with swift, precise strikes.
The zombies dropped like stalks of wheat under a sickle.
When the hall was clear, she flicked the blood from her blade and sheathed it again, then began a careful search of the building.
Every classroom on the first floor was empty. She found nothing. Broken chairs and desks lay scattered, bloody handprints smeared across blackboards, stray teaching tools knocked about—all bathed in the pale, cold glow of moonlight. The whole place reeked of doom.
Elsewhere, her teammates were combing through their own areas.
Down a dim hallway, the female reporter crept nervously forward, both hands trembling around her pistol. At the corner of a classroom, she spotted a little girl crouched against the wall. Swallowing hard, she forced herself to approach.
"Hey… are you okay?"
She bent down to comfort the child—only then noticing the bones at the girl's feet. Human bones.
The girl suddenly whipped around and lunged at her. A zombie.
The reporter panicked, fumbling with her pistol. Her sweaty hands betrayed her—she dropped it.
"Aah! No—help—!"
The zombie tackled her to the floor and sank its teeth into her neck. Blood gushed, spraying across the tiles.
The scent drove the others mad. More zombies swarmed, piling onto her in seconds. Her screams cut off as she was swallowed by the horde.
From the window outside, Venom stood watching silently. He didn't lift a finger to help.
Then he froze. Something else… someone else… was coming. He turned his gaze toward the school gates.
The Tyrant was there, marching forward step by step.
"It's starting," Venom muttered, and in a blink, melted away from the window.
The Tyrant reached the school entrance. Slowly, it raised its enormous machine gun. The barrel began to spin.
Inside, Alice stiffened. She didn't know why, but she felt the danger before it hit. She dove into a corner just as—
"Ratatatatatatata!"
A hail of bullets tore through the walls like a hurricane. Had she moved a second slower, she would've been shredded on the spot.
When the barrage ended, the wall behind her was riddled with holes. Shafts of light pierced through, casting the corridor in a ghostly glow.
The others weren't so lucky. Special task force members in other rooms were caught completely off guard. The gunfire ripped through them in seconds, leaving their bodies twitching and blood-soaked on the floor.
Alice slowly rose from her crouch, peering through the bullet-punched wall. That's when she saw it—a missile, arcing straight toward her.
She bolted.
"BOOM!"
The explosion rocked the building, fire and smoke swallowing the hall. Alice hurled herself through a window, glass shattering as the blast wave flung her out onto the grass.
She tumbled across the lawn, groaning, then forced herself up, glaring back at the burning ruin that had been the classroom building.
And then, through the smoke, the Tyrant emerged, walking steadily toward her.
"Target sighted: Alice," a cold synthetic voice announced.
Miles away in a temporary command post on Raccoon City's outskirts, Umbrella staff watched the feed from their console. On the screen, Alice had appeared.
"Switch the target to Alice first."
The commander's eyes locked onto Alice on the monitor. After a pause, he made his decision—execute the plan.
He adjusted his headset, his tone like a sports commentator hyping up the main event.
"Gentlemen, the moment we've all been waiting for has arrived. Confirmed at 2:18:27—the plan is officially in motion!"
Two branches of the bioweapon program—Alice and Nemesis. Only one would prove superior.
The towering figure of Nemesis stepped out of the shadows, each stride heavy and deliberate as he approached Alice.
"The Nemesis Program."
Alice's expression tightened as she looked at the hulking figure. Old memories stirred in her mind.
Her hands moved slowly to her waist, pulling out her twin blades, ready for combat.
"....."