The First Hurdle

(A/N: I made a mistake in naming and describing the skill that Edward gain in the previous chapter which missed one of the effect I intended to write in. While I did fix it, this note is for those that already read it. There's a little addition to the name, Physical & Matter Movement Prediction. Yes, it didn't stop only in observing living body's movement. That's why, I thought it was too OP and asked for your opinion.)

Somewhere in Raccoon City. 11 AM.

A group of armed S.W.A.T. squadron was resting inside an abandoned store, left by its owner because of the outbreak. All of them were recouping their lost stamina after fighting for survival the previous night. Some were eating the snacks and sat down to regain their stamina or just sleep on the floor, and others were watching their surrounding for any possible threat, through the makeshift barricade they made to block the entrance. A moment later, one of the watchmen saw a figure in a distance, not far from their place.

"He's back." reported the watchman.

Another man, sitting on a stack of boxes at the corner, who seemed to be the leader, put down the energy bar he was about to eat and glanced toward the watchman. He walked toward one of the barricaded windows, and peeked in between the gap, looking for the man they were waiting for. He ordered, "Prepare to move."

With the end of his word, everyone abandoned their previous activities and started packing their stuff. They checked their weapons and supply, and then put on their gas mask, to hide their identities. It was the Hydra's small group, or what was left of them. Previously, they numbered around 30 men, but now, only ten people were standing inside this small store.

More than half of them were either killed in combat or got lost when they were escaping last night. When they invade Umbrella's secret facility, everything went well without any casualties. The plan was perfect, with the city plunged into chaos, they could have moved around much easier without interference from a third party. However, the unexpected appearance of multiple Hunters monster from the secret facility underneath Raccoon Memorial Hospital, cause their plan to fall apart. A little bit more, and they could have got the virus and research records from the facility.

The squad leader, Jack Rollins, instructs his subordinate to move the stacked shelf on the entrance. After it was done, a long-haired man with a titanium arm came in.

Looking at the bruised body and the torn clothing of the Winter Soldier, Jack frowned and asked, "What happened?"

The Winter Soldier then answered shortly, "Mission fails, the hive got destroyed."

"How?" Although it didn't matter if the mission succeeds or not, Jack Rollins was still intrigued by it.

"The main target came and interrupt the mission." answered, The Winter Soldier.

'Main target' thought, Jack while frowning. For the past few days, they have been searching for a secret facility to find something that essential for Hydra's future. And then, something interesting happened, the appearance of a small figure wearing a white trenchcoat with guns on both hands. The first time he heard about it, he thought it was just a cosplay done by a kid.

Until he saw it with his own eyes. The small figure appeared out of nowhere and started bombarding a horde of hundred zombies all by himself in the North side of the city. Mindless zombies might not be a threat for him and his trained squad. However, the way the small figure fought was what interest the higher up at Hydra's HQ. Every time his weapon was out of ammo, a light shone and then it transformed into another weapon. Sometimes smokes appeared and he would appear somewhere else. His movement and the way he fought was proof that he was trained for a long time. It was a magnificent performance, all and all.

Thus, a new mission came. Get him, dead or alive, but it doesn't mean that the previous mission should be abandoned. They still have to get the virus sample and the research records. Thankfully, this morning, a new update on the new location of the virus sample came.

"How did it go?" asked Jack.

"The main target fled, interrupted by an unknown figure." replied the Winter Soldier.

'Unknown figure?'

Just when he was about to ask about it, his subordinate muttered, "so useless, is this all he amount to?" followed by laughter from the others.

There was a small conflict between the Winter Soldier and his team, mainly because his team was jealous of the Winter Soldier's strength and capability. So whenever the latter shows a trace of weakness, they would excitedly mock him for it.

"Silence! I'm not done talking!" the shouting, together with the fury on Jack's face silences all of them. If only they knew how the Winter Soldier was made, they wouldn't have comment something like that, but only him and those that held the higher seat in Hydra knew about it.

He turned toward the Winter Soldier again and said, "New order came, we have the location of the virus sample."

"Where is it?" asked Winter Soldier.

"Inside a pendant of a blonde little girl, Sherry Birkin, daughter of Dr. William Birkin."

======

11.20 AM, Kite Bros. Railway Subway Office, west side of downtown.

After walking for 30 minutes, we finally arrived at the Subway's Control Room. The bright sky we saw earlier, was now painted with some dark clouds. Any moment now, the rain would fall, drowning all of the sorrows this city has been put through. Jill and I walked back to back as we went inside. As usual, the place was abandoned. Fixing the line would be an easy task as Raccoon City was a small city. The Subway line wasn't as complicated as those in big cities. However, my mind was preoccupied with something else.

'This is crazy.'

That was all I could think about. The moment I received the new passive ability, my vision and thinking process expanded. The way I see the world also changed drastically. While I could already see in greater detail because of the effect from Eagle Eyes, now I could tell the process of how everything moved, why, and what will happen before it ever happened. The abilities explanation wasn't kidding, every matter that exists in this world was included in its effect.

To delve further into the abilities, one should know what can be dubbed as matters. Quoting the explanation from Regina, the answer was actually quite simple, yet complicated. To simple version is like this; Matter is any substance that has mass and takes up space by having volume. However, it does not include massless particles such as photons, or other energy phenomena, or waves such as light, or to the extreme, Magic. Matter exists in various states (also known as phases. These include classical everyday phases such as solid, liquid, and gas – for example as ice, liquid water, and gaseous steam – but other states are possible, like plasma.

Observing and analyzing them was like breathing for me, it happened unconsciously. Take the dark cloud in the sky for example. I've been observing it for a few minutes now, although I couldn't see them in greater detail since it was more than 10.000 meters away from ground level, exceeding the range of Eagle Eyes, I could still predict how and when the rain would fall.

'In 5 seconds, a flash of lightning will appear.'

5...

4...

3...

2...

1...

A bright light flashed when my count reached zero, followed by the sound of thunder after two seconds.

Bar-room!

"Whoa, that's a loud one, are you okay?" asked Jill, concerned with my sudden halt.

"It's fine, I'm just admiring the heavy rain," I answered.

"Rain?" Jill tilted her head upward and spread both of her hands. Although there were some occasional thunderclaps, and the gloomy cloud, there's no rain yet. "Are you sure? I think it would fall a bit more later."

"Yes, it will drown you..." I moved toward the door and went inside, leaving Jill outside alone. I smirked and counted inside my mind before continuing, "...now."

Zraaassss....!

It was a downpour, raining down on Jill. It's the violence of cumulonimbus storm cloud that creates the lightning, and that violence is rain drops, forming, rising, and falling, freezing and thawing within the cloud that makes tribo-electric fields that fire the lightning. Well, that was what Regina added when I started observing it.

She jumped onto the door to evade it, but the upper part of her outfit was already wet and damp. She wore white innerwear with a blue vest on top of it, which I thought a bit too open for me. It was like saying, "yo, zombies, bite over here, it's fresh right from the fridge." So when the downpour hit her, her shoulder was wet and the boob line was shown much clearly, a wet dream for the nerds in my past world, including me of course. I bet the new remake game would be modded like crazy by the gaming community, just like how they did with Skyrim. Damn, now I want to play it too, real-life sucks, the game world is better!

Anyway, the new ability was crazy as hell, as long as I observed it once, I could apply the knowledge anytime I want. I even memorize Jill's movement unconsciously. I need to adapt to this ability as fast as possible, so that I could improve my battle awareness and capability, including long-range and close-quarter combat.

Fixing the tracks was done by Jill, she started by turning the power supply on, bringing life back inside the room. The first thing I saw was a huge board taking the whole wall in front of us. It shows the rail's route through the city. There were 7 subway stations in Raccoon City, Redstone Street > Faust Avenue > Raccoon Central Station, which branched to Market Street and then Stoneville, while the other branch lead to Saint Michael's Clock Tower and then Fox Park.

After Jill was done correcting the line, with Fox Park as end of the line before proceeding toward Springfield, we went toward the Subway Station to inform Carlos and his group. There was underground corridor right under us that we could use to go there. All in all, it took us only 10 minutes, it could have been much faster if not for a few lurking zombies that infested the corridor.

Meanwhile, the percentage of civilians turning into zombies keep raising uncontrollably, going up to 31%. I already gave up on clearing that part of the mission, unless somehow a miraculous power that could eliminate all of them in an instant appeared, nothing would stop the zombies from infecting others. I just glad that unlike the game, the current situation was far from worst.

'I'll just do whatever I can, and leave the rest to God. You hear me, One Above All?'

Of course, there was no answer. It's not like I except him to answer either.

"We're here." said Jill, interrupting my thought.

The Subway was much livelier than I thought, at least the UBCS, mainly Carlos's team, had done a good job in protecting these poor civilians. I smiled as I found a few familiar face among the group. The bickering couple that lived upstairs, and the deaf flower shop lady. They were currently in queue for the next group to be transported to Springfield.

We passed the commotion and walked toward Carlos's group. Noticing our arrival, they moved toward a much quieter place. I could see the smug face of who would seemed to be Nikolai. Once I found the chance, I'll put a bullet straight into his brain. Like the saying, a good Nikolai is a dead Nikolai.

"You're back." greeted Carlos. "I thought it would take longer for you to do it."

"Yeah, well, I got a bit of a help," answered Jill, moving sideways to introduce me. "His name is..."

"Killswitch." I continued, knowing that Jill didn't know my alias yet.

A laughter came from the person I hated the most in Resident Evil Universe, right after Albert Wesker and that dwarf from RE 4. Everyone's head turned to him, including me. Nikolai Zinoviev then said, "Oh, is there something on my face?"

Just that, and he stood silence once again like nothing ever happened. There was a knowing smile on his face that irk me, making me even more suspicious of him. His body gesture was heavily trained to hide his intentions, so I couldn't observe any misgivings either, but I knew he was planning on something.

"I apologize for my subordinate's rude behavior." said an old man wearing a beret. He was in pain, I could see the bandages behind the his bulletproof vest, and the fresh red blood that started darkening. He was infected.

[Sir, may I borrow you new ability?] said Regina, suddenly.

She can use my ability? How? Without thinking about it anymore I answered, "Yes, I don't mind."

That words answered both the old man's apology and Regina's request.

"I'm Captain Mikhail Viktor, UBCS's Delta platoon leader." he said, introducing himself while holding his hand in front of me.

"Glad to meet you, Captain." I replied, shaking his hand. I didn't know why he was being polite to a stranger, moreover a toddler-sized person like me, but his next word answered it.

"I heard a lot about you. The Angel With Guns, you're pretty popular, especially among children."

What? That was the first time I heard it. I tilted my head, confused of the nickname that I was given without my knowing.

"Oh, you don't know? There were lots of rumor about you, since day one." Mikhail then proceed to describe my past achievement one by one, which makes me embarrassed to hear. If someone could see the face inside my helmet, he/she could see the red sun and the crumpled-paper-like face. Thankfully, Carlos stopped him and switch the topic for the next plan.

The next thing to do was to take all of the people in the Subway Station to safety. The Delta Platoon started to help all of the civilians to get inside the train, I couldn't help myself from glancing at the couple and the deaf lady. After they went inside the last carriage, I sighed in relief, knowing they will be safe once they reached Springfield.

I turned around, and then I saw him. Nikolai was looking at me with a slight smirk. If I turned a second later, I might have missed it.

'Ahh... you're dead.' I said inside my mind. We went inside the one of the front half of the carriage, everyone was already inside except for Carlos and a few member of his team. They were given separate mission by Mikhail. A moment ago, Mikhail wanted to stay with Carlos and his team, however his injury would be a concern for the team's well-being. They thought Mikhail was being suicidal because of the guilt he had after losing his members.

[A bite in stomach, blood pressure is rising, body temperature getting colder, reaching 25° Celcius, unconsciously producing excessive sweat. Turning into zombies, approximately in one hour. Currently suffering lapses of memory and guilt, affecting his judgement and reality.]

The sudden diagnosis of Capt. Mikhail Viktor broke my thought. How long has she observing him to reach that result. I could see it as well, but making diagnosis of him was a different matter altogether. Somehow, my assistant was getting more useful, I feel proud of her, just like a father that saw his child saying 'Papa' for the first time even thought he knew it was just a random gibberish.

Jill then moved toward Mikhail and convinced him to stay on the train. She even said that she will accompany him to safety, to treat the wound that he had. Well, of course I went in as well. Surprisingly, the carriage we were on, was empty, it felt like the God was saying, "now or never." If it was a jam packed carriage, it would be hard to kill him without having some casualties. There was a reason why Nikolai could survive this long, and that was his snake-like mind. He won't hesitate to use anyone as his shield or just to buy time, even when he didn't need to.

When the train started moving, Nikolai and Mikhail were having a conversation, while Jill and I sat next to each other a bit further away. The dim greenish light made the atmosphere even darker for me. I knew Mikhail was currently confronting Nikolai. I sharpen my hearing and started to eavesdrop their conversation, however, it was only the last part.

"Funny. The gate was locked. Don't you think so?"

But it was enough. Mikhail knew that the loss of his soldier and the wound on his abdomen was caused by the man in front of him. Nikolai didn't answer, and just snickered while smiling. That smile, that damn smile. I had enough of it.

I stood as light formed in my right hand and a Glock-G19 appeared, I aimed my gun toward Nikolai, ready to shoot. However, a different light appeared on my Limbo, making me halt. A second later the train's light was shut off, making my gauntlet the only source of light, and what followed next was an explosion, shaking the train really hard. If not for my Dexterity, I would have fall from losing my balance.

"Fuck!"

The explosion came from the last carriage, furthermore the young couple and the deaf lady was on the carriage next to it. I put all of my strength on my feet and dashed right away, a huge dent was carved on the train's floor where I stood before.

Nemesis has arrived.