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July 31, 1978
It was summer, twenty years ago and I was eighteen years old when I
visited there for the first time. I can still smell the stench of
the air stirred up by the helicopter's rotor blades. The mansion
looked perfectly ordinary from the sky, but on the ground, I sensed
something that made me fear to tread. Birkin, who was two years
younger than me, was interested in nothing but the research paper he
was reading.
We had only been assigned to that place two days previously, the
same day they decided to close down the executive centre we belonged
to. This looked either carefully planned or pure coincidence, only
Spencer knows. Here, Arclay Laboratory, wsa the very place where
Spencer himself had a base for T-Virus research.
As we got off the helicopter, we saw the Laboratory Manager was
waiting for us at the lift. I can't even remember the guy's name. No
matter what his official title, the laboratory belonged to Birkin
and I from that day. We were given full authority as chief research
engineers. This was of course, Spencer's intention. We had been
chosen. We completely ignored the Laboratory Manager and got into
the lift as the previous day I had memorised a map of the building.
As for Birkin, he didn't mean any offence but he never had time for
others. Being in our company for more than five seconds would have
made most people angry. The Laboratory Manager, however, showed no
response.
As I was an egoistic young man those days, I did not take any notice
of his lack of reaction. After all, while I was there I was merely
dancing to Spencer's tune and the Lab Manager knew his intention
better than I did and acted accordingly. While we were in the lift,
Birkin was concentrating on the papers, which contained detailed
records on Ebola, a Filovirus, which had been discovered in Africa
two years ago. Even now, many people across the world are still
studying Ebola. But there are two distinct reasons why. Some are
studying the virus in order to save lives, while others have more
sinister reasons.
Ninety percent of those infected with the Ebola virus will die. Once
infected, body tissue is destroyed within ten days. There is no
vaccination and no cure. If used as a weapon it is incredibly
frightening. Of course the treaty on Prohibition of Use of
Biological Weapons had been in effect long before that so it was
illegal to conduct research on the potential use of the virus as a
weapon. However, it is perfectly legal to conduct research on it to
prevent it's spreading if it was used by someone else as a weapon.
It is only a thin line between the two researches - in fact there is
practically no difference between the two. As you must investigate
how it can be used as a weapon in order to know how it can be
stopped.
This means it is possible to pretend that research is for the
purpose of prevention and cure while your true aim is the opposite.
However, Birkin was interested in neither of these routes as the
virus had too many imperfections.
Firstly, it dies easily when in contact with direct sunlight and can
only survive outside the body for a few days. Secondly, the virus
does not have enough time to move onto the next host as it kills its
initial host too quickly. Lastly, the virus is transmitted in body
fluids and secretions, which can be easily prevented.
However, consider this: What if the person infected with the virus,
could stand up and walk? And if, subconsciously they sought direct
physical contact with uninfected people? The Ebola gene is an RNA
gene. RNA genes can mutate a human's genes and that mutation would
allow the human to have monster-like semi immortality.
This creature would be a Human Biological Weapon - to all intents
and purposes dead as a human being but still infecting other humans
as long as it is alive. It was lucky for us that Ebola did not
exhibit such characteristics. We could keep Ebola with that
particular capacity just for ourselves.
The organization, which was established around Spencer, was for the
manufacture of this living weapon. Officially, it was a
pharmaceutical company specialising in a cure for the virus, but in
reality it was a factory producing biological weapons. The discovery
of the Founder Virus which can modify genes seemed to be the genesis
of this whole business.
In order to manufacture the Human Biological Weapon from the Founder
Virus, it was necessary to develop a variant with that particular
peculiarity enhanced. That was the T-virus project. The Founder
virus is an RNA virus. RNA viruses are known to have a tendency to
mutate. That tendency enables us to manipulate them, strengthening
their certain peculiarities.
Birkin wondered if he could combine the Ebola gene with the mutated
Founder Virus to enhance its peculiarity. The sample of Ebola virus
had already arrived to his laboratory. After switching from lift to
lift we eventually reached the top security unit of the laboratory.
Even Birkin took his eyes off the report when we met her for the
first time.
We knew nothing about her. She was the biggest secret at the
laboratory and her data was never removed from the premises. The
records showed that she had been there ever since the institute was
established. She was twenty-five years old. No one knew who she was
or why she was there. She was a human specimen to develop the
'T-virus' on. The experiment started on the 10th November 1967. She
had been receiving injections of viruses for eleven years.
Birkin mumbled something - Was it to curse? Or to praise? We
realized that there was no turning back. We were to lead the
research to a successful conclusion or rot away like her? Of course
we had no choice. The sight of her bound to a shabby hospital bed
moved something in our conscience. Was it a part of Spencer's plan?
July
27, 1981
Today a ten year old girl was appointed as senior researcher at the
South Pole Laboratory. Her name was Alexia Ashford. I was twenty-one
years old and Birkin was nineteen.
Irritatingly, the rumour about Alexia of the South Pole monopolised
discussions amongst Arklay's researchers. The Ashford name was
legendary to the old staff who had been at Umbrella long enough to
remember. Whenever the research came to a standstill they always
said If only Dr. Ashford were still alive. Certainly Dr. Ashford was
a great scientist, one of the original research team who discovered
the Founder Virus and the originator of the T-virus project.
However, he died soon after Umbrella was established. Thirteen years
has passed since his death. What was the point of expecting anything
from the Ashfords? In fact, the South Pole laboratory, which was
founded after Dr Edward's death by his son, had so far yielded no
results.
So, not much can be expected from the granddaughter, Alexia.
However, from that day, our dotard subordinates started saying If
only Ms. Alexia were there.
It seemed like there was no potential for future development in this
lab, as long as we had staff like those bunch of idiots, who could
only judge people by their genealogy, instead of using their own
sense of values. Those fools could never take initiative and would
remain as minor researchers even though they had one foot in the
grave. But I was different, I had good judgement.
If I, as the chief researcher, had become emotional, the development
of the T-virus would have been delayed even further. To achive
results, one must stay calm and make sensible decisions whatever the
circumstances.
An idea came to me - The success of the research relied on how to
handle those ancient gentlemen. As they could drop dead at any
moment, wouldn't they be most useful if we were to use them for the
most dangerous experiments. The art of management is to utilise
everyone beneath you. However, Birkin was becoming a nuisance. His
reaction towards the Alexia rumours was so pathetic.
Although he never said it, he took pride in becoming the youngest
ever chief researcher at the age of sixteen. But this ten year old
girl had smashed this figurative trophy to pieces. It must have been
the first time he had felt defeated. He could never approve of
someone who was younger, with breeding, and a woman. It was
unimaginable that he was being affected by a personnel reshuffle in
such a far away place, where there had been no achievements for so
long. After all, he was still a kid. Immature as he was, I needed
him to pull himself together. Over the last three years our research
had reached the second stage.
By then, the T-virus was becoming stable enough to be used to create
Living Biological Weapons, better known as Zombies. However, the
virus would never be able to modify the human gene one hundred
percent - there are compatibilities between the virus and the genes
because no one person's genes are exactly alike.
Ten percent of humans would make a lucky escape and not develop the
disease, even though a zombie infected them with the virus. There
was nothing we could do about this, no matter how hard we tried. If
it had a ninety percent success rate then it was good enough to use
as a biological weapon. But Spencer didn't seem to be satisfied. Our
boss wanted a stand-alone weapon which could wipe out an entire
population. But, what for?
Essentially, the virtue of biological weapons was the low
development costs. But our Living Biological Weapon was becoming
extremely expensive. Spencer would never have chosen this path if he
was looking for financial rewards. If manufactured for use in
conjunction with an orthodox weapon, it would have made a handsome
profit. But to keep the research going to make a stand-alone,
exterminatory weapon did not make business sense.
Why did he continue ignoring the costs? If his aim was to monopolise
the entire war industry by changing the very concepts of war,
perhaps I could agree a little bit. I still didn't know what his
true intention was.
Apart from Spencer's intention, Birkin was engineering a living
biological weapon with an increased emphasis on its ability to
fight. He was trying to create it not only through mutating human
genes with the T-virus but also by adding another creature's genetic
information. The fighting living biological weapon would kill all
human beings, including those wearing body armour, or equipped with
biological warfare suits and those humans who escaped from death
through infection. It was later called The Hunter. But we had to
suspend the experiments for a while - to protect the specimens from
Birkin.
Birkin, who had this meaningless anger directed at Alexia, started
acting abnormally. He worked through the night at the lab time after
time and repeated disorganized experiments one after another. Me and
my staff collected biopsy samples as quickly as possible before the
specimens could die, but we couldn't keep up with his speed. The
Manager of the Laboratory supplied the new specimens as if nothing
had happened, but they didn't survive long.
It was Hell. But she, the female specimen survived the hell. She was
twenty-eight years old by then and had spent fourteen years in this
lab. The numerous injections of the Founder virus she had received
over the past fourteen years would have left her bereft of any
logical reasoning, but if she still had any mind left, death would
have been the one and only thign she wanted.
But, she has continued to live. Why was she the only one to survive?
The experiment data did not highlight any difference between her and
the other specimens. We needed much more time to find out the answer
to that question.
December 31, 1983
My sixth winter at Arklay Laboratory.
Two almost stagnant years had passed without much achievement, but
the turning point has finally arrived. The catalyst was a report we
received that morning. Alexia had died at the South Pole institute.
It was said that Alexia was accidentally infected by the T-Veronica
virus which she herself had developed. At that time, Alexia was
twelve years old, and was too young to continue this kind of
dangerous research.
A rumour began to circulate that Alexia had deliberately infected
herself with the virus, but that seemed very unlikely. More likely,
she had not got over the death of her father a year earlier and had
made an error.
At the South Pole institute, Alexia's research was then taken over
by her twin brother, her only blood relative. But no one expected
any worthwile results from him. The Ashford family line seemed to
have almost died out without producing anything of note. As I
suspected, the legend surrounding this family was no more than that.
Alexia's death changed Birkin - or should I say it transformed
Birkin back to the person he once was. It played a major factor in
Birkin's psychological wellbeing as his researchers started showing
him more respect. With Alexia dead, the was no longer anyone who
exhibited greater potential than him. However, talking about Alexia
in front of him was still taboo. Birkin strongly disagreed when I
tried to get hold of a T-Veronica sample. I had to bide my time to
find a better opportunity to find out the truth about Alexia's
research. In spite of the fact that Birkin was in much stronger
position he still never grew up. However, in those days, I had much
bigger issues to contend with.
The Arklay Laboratory was situated in the centre of a mountainous
region, itself surrounded by a deep forest. I often went out for
walks during my time there, but I never came across anyone else.
Helicopter was the only means of reaching the laboratory, making it
inaccessible to outsiders. The remoteness of the area and lack of
people is an important factor when choosing a site for an institute
like this, in order to minimise a potential disaster if the virus
escaped. However, biological weapons were not as simple as that. The
viruses would not just infect human beings.
No virus chooses just one type of carrier. For example, apart from
humans, the influenza virus can infect birds, pigs, horses and even
sea lions. It complicates the matter further when you know that not
all the species of the same family can be infected, but other
species of birds are spared. More over, the same virus may take
different carriers, depending on it's variants. It is impossible to
know all the carriers for even just one virus. The biggest problem
is the high adaptability of the T-virus.
While Birkin was not contributing much I had been studying the
possibility of secondary infection from the T-virus. What I
discovered was that the T-virus has carriers in almost every single
species. Not only animals, but also plants, insects, fish, almost
all the species have a potential to multiply and spread the T-virus.
When I was strolling through the woods, i always thought - Why did
Spencer choose this location?
There were so many species that co-existed in the forest. What would
happen if the virus escaped and came into contact with a creature
capable of being a carrier? If it were some insects, then they would
not pose a big threat of secondary infection due to their size. But
insects can multiply to enormous numbers.
In that case, how far could the virus spread? Suppose it was some
plants. It may appear at first that the possibility of widespread
infection would be small as plants cannot move. But what about their
pollen?
This location was too dangerous. Come to think of it, it made
perfect sense for the Ashfords to choose the South Pole as site for
their laboratory. In contrast, this location, it seems, was selected
in order to spread the virus. But, that couldn't be ture, could it?
What did Spencer want us to do?
These thoughts were too important to share with anybody else in the
laboratory. The only person I cold possibly ask was Birkin. But, it
was obvious there was no point in talking to him about it. What I
needed was more information.
Around this time, I started to feel the limitation of my situation.
In order to find out Spencer's true intention, I needed to be in a
position which would give me access to the information I required. I
had no hesitation in giving up my present position for this purpose.
But, I did not want to be too hasty because if Spencer had any
suspicions about my real motives, then the game would be up.
I concentrated on my research with Birkin so that my real thoughs
would not betray me. While we were keeping ourselves busy, the
female specimen was almost forgotten about. A failure, with no use,
but still she lived on. We called her a failure because we could not
get any valid data from her. Until that experiment took place, five
years later...
July 1,
1988
It was our 11th summer since we arrived at the Arclay Laboratory. I
was twenty-eight years old. Birkin was then, a father with a two
year old girl. His partner was also a researcher at Arklay. It was
hard to believe that anyone could marry and bring up a child while
both of them worked here. On the other hand, because he was
different he could continue his research at Arklay. Only the mad
could succeed there.
In those ten years our research finally reached the third stage. A
highly sophisticated Fighting Biological Weapon - with intelligence,
which would obey programmed orders and act as a soldier. That was
the monster we tried to create and we called it The Tyrant.
But, from the beginning there was no huge obstacle - it was almost
impossible to obtain a living subject on which we could base the
Tyrant. The supply of genetically adaptable human beings for the
Tyrant was extremely limited.
This is due to the nature of the T-virus. The T-virus variant which
was ideal to create the zombies and the Hunters was suitable for
most humans, but it had a fault of making the carrier's brain cells
decline. To transform the carrier into a Tyrant we needed to keep
the carrier's intelligence at a certain level. In order to overcome
this issue, Birkin had been working on extracting a variant which
would cause the least damage to the brain when it was adapted
perfectly to the carrier.
However, humans with a genetic match to this variant were extremely
rare. The Genetic Analytic team's simulation report told us that
only one in ten million would be infected and transform into a
Tyrant with the remainder becoming zombies.
It might have been possible to develop a more progressive strain of
the T-virus which could transform more humans into Tyrants. However,
to push the research further, first of all we required human
subjects with a perfect genetic match to the variant.
There was little possibility that such a specimen would be supplied
to us, because even if we scoured the whole USA, we would only be
able to find fifty or so of them. In fact, at that time, even with
the utmost effort we only managed to collect a few specimens with a
close match. Even from the outset, our research was at a standstill.
But one day, we heard a rumour that a European laboratory were
working on a project to create a third Living Biological Weapon. It
was called the Nemesis Project.
I acted quickly to obtain a sample from the project so that I could
use it to our advantage. Of course, Birkin was against this idea,
but this time I somehow managed to persuade him. He had no choice
but to admit that our research wouldn't go any further unless we
found the matching specimen. A few days later, in the middle of the
night, a parcel arrived from Europe via various transit points. It
arrived to our heliport in a small box.
Nemesis Prototype
We had to pull many strings to obtain it from the French laboratory
where it had been developed, but it could not have happened without
the support of Spencer. Birkin showed no interest at all, but he
accepted the importance of the experiment. The samples had been
developed with a brand new design in mind.
A parasitic living body, created by genetical modification - that
was Nemesis. A living body with intelligence, which was unable to do
anything on its own. However, once it parasitised the brain of
another living being, it would take full control of the body and
demonstrate its highly developed aptitude for combat. The project
was to provide the intellience and the biological body for combat
separately and then combine them in order to create one living
biological weapon.
If it was successful we no longer needed to worry about the problems
we had previously encountered. But there was a new problem in that
it did not always settle in the carrier in the same manner as we
desired.
On the report attached to the sample, we saw nothing but a long list
of deaths. The carriers lasted for only five minutes after Nemesis
took control of their brains. But we already knew that an incomplete
prototype would be extremely dangerous. If we succeeded in
prolonging the carriers' survival then we could hope to take the
lead in the Nemesis project. This was my aim. Naturally, I was
planning to use the female specimen. With her unusual ability to
survive, she could endure the Nemesis prototype for a long time.
Even if we failed, we would lose nothing.
However, our experiments took an unexpected turn. Nemesis vanished
when it tried to enter her brain. At first, we could not understand
what happened. We never thought that she would take over the
parasite. That was the beginning. Until then, she was barely alive
but something was about to awake in her. We had to start examining
her afresh.
Over the last ten years, she had been checked down to the minutest
details, but we decided to ignore the past data and start anew. Now,
for the first time in her twenty-one years of being here, something
no one had seen was about to be revealed.
After much examination, only Birkin noticed it. Something definitely
existed in her. This, however, went beyond the original T-Virus
project and led us in a totally new and different direction. That
was the beginning of the G-virus project, which changed all our
destinies.
July
31, 1995
It was summer again and seventeen years from the time I first
visited the place. Whenever I went there I was remembered the smell
of the winds from that day. Nothing has changed since then, even the
buildings and surroundings. I could see Birkin, who had already
arrived, standing on the heliport. I had not seen him for a long
time. Four years have passed since I left Arklay Laboratory.
At that time, when Birkin's G-virus project was approved, I applied
for my transfer to the Information Bureau and was readily accepted.
It must have looked natural for everyone that I was giving up my
career as a researcher and seeking a change. Actually, the G-virus
project was beyond my abilities. Even if I did not have any reasons
to find out Spencer's true intention, it was true that I felt my
faculties as a reasearcher had reached their limits.
In spite of the downdraft caused by the helicopter, Birkin never
took his eyes off the research papers. Although it seemed he still
visited Arklay regularly, he was no longer a researcher at that
facility. Sometime ago, he had been transferred to a huge
underground laboratory in Raccoon City, which was his base for the
G-virus project headed up by himself.
Quite honestly, four years ago, I never thought that Spencer would
approve the G-virus project because it was founded on an unknown
belief and deviated from the original concept of a biological
weapon.
The distinct difference between the G-virus and the T-virus was that
the organism infected by the G-virus continued to mutate by itself.
Because a virus is an unprotected form of a gene, it can easily
mutate. This mutation can happen when a virus is left on its own,
but once a virus is in other organism, it is a different story.
A gene in an organism's body hardly mutates even though its
structure was modified by a virus, unless some external influences,
such as exposure to radiation, takes place. However, an organism
infected with the G-virus keeps mutating itself without any external
influence until it dies.
Similar characteristics did exist in the T-virus. When we placed the
Living Biological Weapon under certain circumstances, we recorded
some genetic recombination caused by an activated virus in it's
body. However, in the case of the T-virus it always needed some
external influences to trigger the recombination and the results
were always close to what we predicted. G-infected organisms totally
lacked such predictability. No one could foresee what recombination
it would take, and whatever means to stop the process it kept
mutating nonetheless, making our manipulation worthless.
Seven years ago, Birkin found signs of this effect in the female
specimen. On the surface she had not changed at all, but internally,
she changed continously and remained alive by merging and coexisting
with all the experimental viruses she was administered. And the
twenty-one years of internal mutation evolved her enough to accept
the parasitic organism Nemesis. The G-virus project was trying to
push this abnormality to the ultimate limit. But, the end result of
this project could be either the evolution of the ultimate organism
or total destruction. Can we call this a weapon?
What made Spencer approve this project? Even though I had been in
the Information Bureau for four years by this time, I could still
not understand his motives. And now, Spencer does not even come to
Arklay. It is as if he had foreseen something was about to happen
there. The image of Spencer fading away from me like a mirage in the
desert. But an opportunity must present itself sometime. If I can
survive until then.
The lift was carrying both Birkin and me to the highest security
level, to the place where we saw him for the first time. The new
chief researcher John, Birkin's successor, was waiting for us there.
He was transferred from the Chicago laboratory and was said to be an
excellent scientist, but he seemed to be too normal to work for this
laboratory. He had doubts about the cruelty of the research and
reported to his superior to correct the situation. That caused a big
enough stir even in the Information Bureau. It was everyone's
opinion that if any information was leaked, it had to come from him.
We ignored John and started to give her final treatment. To kill
her.
She has regained a little intelligence after taking in Nemesis. But,
it resulted in nothing more than making her behave strangely. The
odd behaviour continued to escalate. Nowadays, she peels off other
women's faces and wears them over her own. The records show that she
behaved in the same manner when she was first given the Founder
Virus. We were never sure what made her react in such a way, but her
termination was decided after three researchers had become her
victims. Now that the study of the G-virus was on track she lost her
status as a valuable specimen.
The termination of her vital signs was checked and confirmed
repeatedly for the next three days. Then, the body was taken away to
some location at the instruction of the Laboratory Manager. Even
now, I still do not know who she was and why she was brought here.
Of course it was exactly the same for other specimens. However, she
had not been there, the G-Project might never have existed and if
that was the case then Birkin and I would be in very different
situations.
As I left Arklay Laboratory, I was thinking things over. Just how
calculating is Spencer? |
