Location: Orheiul Vechi, Moldova
Target: The Connections Main Laboratory (Site–Kólis)
Date: July 28, 2017
Time: 02:47 Hours (EEST)
The fog moved like a living thing.
It slid along the limestone cliffs in slow, deliberate waves, swallowing the Trebujeni valley below and muffling every sound except the distant, churning roar of the Raut River. The monastery ruins stood crooked against the night sky—stone crosses broken by wars long forgotten, walls hollowed by centuries of wind and prayer.
No lights. No guards. No signs of life.
And yet, to Alen Wesker's enhanced senses, the mountain breathed.
He stood at the very edge of the cliff, a phantom silhouetted against the pale, sickly moonlight. His black duster coat, woven by Isabella Gionne from the same ballistic polymer once worn by his father, absorbed the ambient light, rendering him a void in the landscape. Beneath the brim of his wide hat, his eyes scanned the abyss behind dark tactical sunglasses.
He didn't look like a soldier. He looked like an omen.
He tested the rope once—silent, controlled—then anchored it into a natural limestone fracture behind a fallen cross. No pitons. No metal. Nothing that would leave a scar for the BSAA or Blue Umbrella to find later.
He stepped off the ledge.
The Descent
The cliff face dropped eighty meters into the gray, swirling void. The limestone was slick with mist and ancient rain. Alen's boots found purchase where no footholds existed, his descent rapid yet silent, a spider dropping on a thread of silk.
Halfway down, the mountain opened its mouth.
A narrow fissure, half-hidden by overgrown ivy and shadows, waited. It was a ventilation intake from the Soviet era, forgotten by maps but found by Isabella's intel. Alen swung gently, guiding himself into the cave mouth. He unclipped, the rope recoiling silently back up to the anchor point.
Inside, the air changed. It wasn't just damp; it was warm. The scent of wet earth mixed with something sweet, sickly, and rotting—the smell of the Mold.
He moved deeper. The natural tunnel sloped downward, narrowing until his broad shoulders brushed the sides. Faint, thread-like filaments of white Mold traced the walls like veins beneath translucent skin. They pulsed faintly, reacting to his bio-electric field.
…intruder…
The sensation brushed the edge of his awareness—not a voice, but a collective recognition. The hive mind was waking up.
The tunnel ended at a circular drop: a concrete shaft fractured by time. Rust stains marked where a ladder had once been. Twenty-two meters straight down.
Alen dropped.
He didn't use a rope this time. He flared his coat, grabbing the rusted rungs only at the last second to break his momentum, landing on the metal grating below with a sound no louder than a whisper.
A rusted service hatch sat before him. He pressed the handle. It yielded with a groan of protest.
The Dead Corridor
He stepped into the facility proper.
The transition was jarring. The organic cave gave way to cold, sterile metal. This was the "Dead Corridor," a maintenance level abandoned on purpose to fool thermal scans.
Alen touched the temple of his sunglasses, activating his Reality-Lens.
The world shifted. The walls became translucent wireframes in his vision. Heat signatures flared red against the blue schematics. Patrol paths visualized as glowing lines on the floor.
Two guards stood ahead at the junction of the airflow control room. They weren't local hired guns. They wore heavy black tactical armor, unmarked, carrying suppressed carbines with under-barrel incendiary launchers. Connections Elites.
"Trinity," Alen subvocalized, his voice barely a breath. "Status."
<< You are entering the transition zone between Level 1 Logistics and Level 3 Research, >> Trinity's seductive, calm voice echoed in his earpiece. << The backdoor worked. You have bypassed the decontamination airlocks. However, heat signatures indicate heavy resistance ahead. Brandon Bailey is paranoid. >>
"Paranoia keeps you alive," Alen murmured. "Until it doesn't."
Alen didn't run. He shifted.
Activating the Spatial-Phantom protocol—a technique derived from his father's combat data and perfected by his own enhanced physiology—Alen moved faster than the shutter speed of the human eye. To the guards, he was a blur, a glitch in reality.
Snap. Snap.
He materialized behind them before their bodies hit the floor. He caught them, lowering them gently to avoid the noise. He retrieved a keycard from the senior officer's belt.
"I'm at the Behavioral Observation Rooms," Alen said, dragging the bodies into a dark alcove. "Hooking you into the panel now."
He pulled a hardline cable from his gauntlet and jacked it into the door controls.
<< Accessing… Miss Isabella is on the line. She is looping the camera feeds and disabling the silent alarms. You have a three-second window. Mark. >>
The door hissed open.
The Research Wing
The room beyond was bathed in clinical white light. Inside, behind reinforced glass, grotesque experiments were underway. Three researchers in hazmat suits were observing a Molded creature tearing at a cattle carcass. Two armed guards watched the door.
Alen didn't hesitate.
He entered the room, a whirlwind of black fabric and violence. He didn't fire a shot. He used the environment. He grabbed a heavy microscope from a desk, hurling it with unnatural precision into the first guard's throat. Before the second guard could raise his rifle, Alen closed the distance, a ceramic knife flashing in his hand, severing the nerve cluster in the man's neck.
The researchers froze, terrified. Alen moved past them, striking specific pressure points. They collapsed, unconscious but alive. He stuffed them into lockers and the guards into a walk-in freezer.
"Clear," Alen said, typing rapidly on the main terminal. "Isabella, you have the floor."
"I'm in," Isabella's voice came through the comms, tense but focused. "I'm locking down the elevators so no reinforcements can come down from the surface. But Alen… I'm reading massive bio-energy spikes from Level 7. Bailey knows you're here. He's waking something up."
"Good."
Alen moved deeper, planting C4 charges on the structural support beams of the Mold Cultivation Chambers. He moved through the halls like a reaper, dispatching patrols with cold, lethal efficiency.
Suddenly, the facility's intercom crackled to life.
"We have a breach in Sector 4," a voice boomed. It wasn't a guard. It was him. Brandon Bailey. "How is this possible? The BSAA is chasing ghosts in Louisiana. Who are you?"
Alen ignored the voice. He found a maintenance vent, tore the grate off with one hand, and dropped into the freezing darkness of Level 5.
Level 5: The Cryogenic Archive
The temperature plummeted. Frost crawled across the hem of Alen's duster.
He landed in a vast, circular chamber. Rows of vertical glass pods stretched into the darkness, bathed in pale blue light. Inside them floated small, pale figures.
Children.
E-002. E-005. E-012.
"Prototypes," Alen whispered, disgust curling his lip. "Clones of Eveline. Failed experiments."
<< Master, >> Trinity warned. << These units are dangerous. Even in stasis, they are emitting a low-level psychotropic frequency. If they wake up… >>
"They won't wake up."
Alen moved to the central console. He found the emergency purge protocols. "I can't leave them, Trinity. They're living weapons. It's not a life."
He engaged the kill switch. Inside the pods, a humane neurotoxin was released. The figures twitched once, then went still. Their vital signs flatlined on the monitors. It was a mercy killing on an industrial scale.
Alen turned to leave, but a sound stopped him.
Sobbing.
It was coming from behind a heavy steel desk in the corner. Alen raised his custom Samurai Edge, the laser sight cutting through the gloom.
"Come out," he commanded, his voice hard. "If you are a threat, I will end you. If you are innocent, you have nothing to fear."
Slowly, a small figure rose.
She looked like Eveline—the same dark hair, the same pale skin—but she was younger, perhaps seven or eight years old. Her hair was cut short, a messy tomboyish crop. She wore a thin patient's gown, shivering in the cold.
"Please…" she stammered, tears streaming down her face. "Don't shoot. I don't want to die."
Alen kept the gun raised. "Designation?"
"E-017," she whispered.
Alen glanced at the nearest monitor, his eyes scanning the file Trinity pulled up.
SUBJECT: E-017
STATUS: Stable.
MOLD OUTPUT: Low.
PSYCH PROFILE: No aggressive bonding. No delusions. High empathy levels.
CONCLUSION: Combat viability zero. RECOMMENDATION: TERMINATION.
She wasn't a weapon. She was a failure because she was too human.
Alen lowered the gun. A memory flashed in his mind—Jessica Richard, his adoptive mother, holding his hand when he was a lost, angry orphan. Everyone has a right to live, Alen. Even the ones the world says are broken.
He holstered his weapon and walked toward her. She flinched, but he knelt, bringing himself to her eye level. He took off his sunglasses.
"I'm not going to hurt you," Alen said, his voice softening. "But you need to listen to me. I have to finish this mission, and it's going to get dangerous."
"You… you're not with Bailey?" she asked, wiping her nose.
"No. I'm the guy who's going to kill him." Alen gestured to an empty, older cryo-pod that was disconnected from the network but heavily armored. "I need you to get in there. I'm going to put you in a deep sleep. It's the only way to keep you safe from the fire."
"You'll come back?" E-017 asked, gripping his sleeve. "Promise?"
"I don't break promises."
He helped her in. As the glass slid shut and the sedative gas hissed, he watched her eyes close.
"Sleep tight, kid."
Alen turned around. His eyes were no longer soft. They were burning with blue fire.
"Trinity. Where is he?"
<< Level 6. The Command Core. He's waiting for you. >>
Level 6: The Monster
Alen didn't take the stairs. He smashed through the reinforced glass of the observation deck and landed in the Command Core, a massive server room filled with the hum of data processing.
The room was filled with soldiers. Twenty elite Connections operatives trained their weapons on him.
And above them, on a catwalk, stood Brandon Bailey. He was an older man, sharp-featured, wearing a pristine white lab coat that clashed with the industrial grime. He looked every bit the arrogant founder.
"Bravo!" Bailey clapped slowly, the sound echoing. "I assumed it was a strike team. Chris Redfield, perhaps? Or that government dog, Kennedy? But no. Just one man in a costume."
"I'm not a costume," Alen said, his voice vibrating with suppressed rage. "I'm the consequence."
"Kill him," Bailey waved his hand dismissively.
The room erupted in gunfire.
Alen moved.
He didn't seek cover. He became the cover. Utilizing the Spatial-Phantom movement, he blurred through the hail of bullets. He appeared in the center of the formation. His movements were a dance of gun-kata and brutal CQC. He used a soldier as a human shield, firing his Samurai Edge over the man's shoulder to take out two snipers on the balcony.
He kicked a server rack, sending the heavy metal tower crashing down onto three more guards.
It took forty-five seconds.
When silence returned, Alen stood amidst the carnage, breathing heavily. His energy reserves were draining. The Phantom moves took a heavy toll on his body.
Bailey looked down, his arrogance wavering for the first time. "Impressive. You fight like him. Like Wesker."
"You have no idea," Alen growled.
"But let's see how you handle perfection."
Bailey pulled a syringe from his coat—thick, black viscous fluid. He jammed it into his own neck.
"THE CONNECTIONS WILL NEVER FALL!"
Bailey screamed as his body contorted. His bones snapped and lengthened. Black mold erupted from his pores, tearing his lab coat to shreds. He grew to ten feet tall, a towering monstrosity of calcified bone and writhing black tendrils. His face was gone, replaced by a vertical maw of teeth.
He leaped from the balcony, shaking the entire mountain.
Alen barely rolled away as Bailey's fist pulverized the floor where he had been standing. A massive tendril lashed out, catching Alen in the chest and throwing him into a steel wall.
CRACK.
Alen slid to the ground, coughing blood. His ribs were fractured. He tried to stand, but Bailey was too fast. The monster grabbed him, slamming him into the ground again and again.
"You are nothing!" Bailey's voice was a distorted roar. "Just meat!"
Alen lay in the rubble. His vision swam. His gun was out of reach. His stamina was gone. Bailey raised a massive, spiked fist for the killing blow.
Alen's hand drifted to his tactical pouch. His fingers closed around a cold, silver vial.
The A-Virus (Animality Virus). Stolen from Glenn Arias in New York.
It was a gamble. A suicide run. The A-Virus aggressively rewrote DNA to trigger latent predatory traits. Combined with his father's Progenitor genes… it could kill him. Or it could make him a god.
<< Sir, >> Trinity panic-whispered in his ear. << Probability of mutation is 60%. Probability of death is 20%. Do not do this. >>
"I like those odds," Alen gritted out.
He jammed the injector into his neck and depressed the plunger.
The Awakening
Fire.
Liquid fire poured through his veins. Alen screamed, his back arching off the floor. His veins turned pitch black, visible through his skin. His muscles seized, then expanded, fibers knitting together with terrifying speed. The A-Virus bonded with the Progenitor, unlocking the genetic limiters.
Bailey paused, confused by the sudden surge of energy radiating from his victim.
Alen stood up.
He didn't struggle. He simply rose. His hat had fallen off, revealing eyes that were no longer just blue—they were glowing with a vertical, reptilian slit. The sclera burned blood-red.
"Now," Alen's voice was layered, distorted by power. "Let's try that again."
Bailey roared and swung.
Alen caught the fist.
With one hand.
The shockwave cracked the floor beneath them. Bailey shrieked in confusion, trying to pull back, but Alen's grip was iron.
"You wanted perfection?" Alen sneered.
He twisted. Bailey's massive arm snapped like a twig.
Alen moved. This wasn't the Spatial-Phantom technique; this was raw, unadulterated speed. He was a blur of violence. He dismantled the monster piece by piece, tearing off tendrils, shattering bone plates.
He drove Bailey back, forcing the behemoth through the reinforced doors and out onto the catwalk overlooking Level 7: The Heart. Below them, the massive fungal core pulsed.
"Wait!" Bailey gurgled, backing away, regenerating too slowly. "We can work together! I have data! I have money! I can give you the world!"
Alen reached into his belt and pulled out a distinct, yellow canister. The Necrotoxin.
"I don't want your money," Alen said, walking forward. "I want your silence."
He rammed the toxin injector directly into Bailey's exposed heart.
Bailey screamed as the calcification set in instantly. The black mold turned gray, then white, crumbling into dust. Alen kicked the statue, watching it shatter as it fell into the abyss of the Core below.
The Archive
The rush of the A-Virus began to fade, leaving Alen gasping, his body burning with exhaustion but stabilized by his immunity. The red faded from his eyes, returning to blue.
He stumbled to the main terminal. Bailey's personal console.
"Trinity," Alen wheezed. "Begin the transfer."
<< Accessing Connections Mainframe… Encryption bypassed. >>
Alen plugged in the massive data core he had brought.
On the screen, file directories flashed by at blinding speed.
* PROJECT E-SERIES
* PROJECT MUTAMYCETE
* FINANCIAL LEDGERS (1998-2017)
* H.C.F. PERSONNEL FILES
* LUCAS BAKER OBSERVATION LOGS
Just as his father had stolen the Red Queen from the Russian facility in 2003, Alen was now stealing the life's work of Brandon Bailey. Every dirty secret, every biological recipe, every contact.
"Take it all," Alen commanded. "Leave nothing."
<< Download complete. 100% of the archive secured. >>
Alen yanked the drive. He smiled grimly. "Now, blow it."
"Detonation sequence initiated. T-minus 4 minutes."
Alen sprinted back to the Cryo Lab. He hauled the heavy pod containing E-017 onto a hover-dolly used for moving equipment.
He ran.
He dragged the girl through the maintenance tunnels, up the emergency cargo elevator, and out into the cool night air of the ravine just as the ground beneath them buckled.
BOOM.
The implosion was muffled by the earth, but the shockwave flattened the trees. The Agricultural Institute collapsed inward, swallowed by the mountain as the C4 destroyed the support pillars.
Site–Kólis was gone.
Minutes later, a sleek, black VTOL jet—summoned by Isabella—descended through the fog, engines rotating for pickup.
Alen loaded the pod onto the ramp. He stood there for a moment, clutching the drive that held the secrets of a criminal empire.
"Mission accomplished," he said into his comms. "We're coming home."
The jet lifted off, banking hard toward the west, vanishing into the night before the Romanian border patrol could even scramble a radar lock.