”Why should I help you?” Jean sat back and relaxed. She wasn’t the one on a tight schedule.

The one with a tight schedule frowned. Jean was right. He just told her who took Alia away. Why would she take on what might be an army and risk her own life for some random girl that just stormed off? “What do you want?”

Jean looked at him and remained silent. Paul suddenly grew very impatient. “I know you came to us for a reason. Tell me, what do you want from us?” The soldiers took Alia because of her power. As far as he knew, they might be dissecting her right now. He couldn’t afford to play riddles.

“Fine.” Jean stood back up and walked closer to Paul. The man suddenly felt threatened, as if he would be cut into a million pieces the next second. It took all his might to stand his ground. Jean was satisfied at his reaction. Normal human beings would be peeing their pants against the scent she released. “Let me be straightforward. I came for you.”

“For me?” Paul rose his eyebrows.

“Like I said before, I am a woman on a mission,” Jean told a portion of the truth. “and I need help on that mission. I need someone clever. Someone determined. Someone...loyal.” She got dangerously close, so close that Paul could see every inch of her beautiful eye, but the man only felt infinite coldness on his back. “Let’s make another deal. I save your sister, and you swear your allegiance to me.” She concluded. “No self preservation or anything like that. You remain completely loyal to me.

Paul bit his lips. “How can I know you will keep up to your end of the deal?”

“It’s your choice.” Jean was not urgent at all. If Paul agreed, fine. If he didn’t, she could always silence him, and probably silence Alia as well, and then go find other followers. She wouldn’t leave any loose ends.

Paul had no idea how dangerous he was, but he did know he couldn’t save his sister by himself. It was his freedom versus his sister’s life. He finally made up his mind.

“I want to add another thing. You must ensure my sister lives.”

“As long as she doesn’t do anything stupid.”

“Deal.”

In what might be the last standing military base on the continent, a forty year old general in a straight army uniform stood in silence.

As the head of The Fortitude, a military base that held over three thousand soldiers, General Howe was a proud commander. He was frequently frowned upon by his colleagues because of his careful yet ambitious nature.

However, when trouble arrived, Howe was proven to be worthy of his pride. When all other bases fell at the hand of the tyrant virus, he alone stood tall.

The Fortitude was literally turned into a fortress. It was heavily defended against both outside and inside threats. First of all, the entire compound was put under 24/7 surveillance. Fully armed guards loyal to the commander himself patrolled the major positions. Levels of clearances were assigned to every individual in the base, and anyone in a position without the corresponding clearance would be arrested on site. If there were resistance, kill shots were authorized.

On the outside, guard towers, each occupied by three men, surrounded the entire place. Roadblocks made sure no enemy vehicle could force their way into the base. Armed helicopters could get into the air and unleash hell onto the attackers at a moment’s notice. Soldiers within the base were constantly alert. Even though, as a military base within American soil, The Fortitude was impossible to be attacked, every soldier could be mobilized within ten minutes after the order was delivered.

This was impressive, but if all the defenders were turned into zombies, then all the effort would be wasted. However, the heavy defenses paid off when the Umbrella spy was caught near the water supply system by a squad of three guards.

The highly skilled spy took down all three guards before they could pass a message out, but they didn’t need to. Howe ordered all guard squads to report in to a computerized central command every ten minutes. This was just a matter of a single tap on a phone, but the benefit was that it was covert. Those that weren’t guards weren’t aware of this mechanism, and the spy was, unfortunately, not a guard.

When the spy was jumped on by twenty fully armed security guards, the t-virus syringe was still in his bag.

Howe recognized the situation quickly. As ambitious as he was, he also recognized an opportunity. Without informing his commanders, Howe assembled a group of men ultimately loyal to him and interrogated the spy. With the help of certain drugs, Howe was able to learn about crucial parts of Umbrella’s plan. Those he didn't learn were being deducted with relative ease.

At this point if he informed the commanders and a warning was sent to all the military bases over the world, then Umbrella’s manufactured apocalypse might as well end right here right now. As intimidating as the company seemed, the paramilitary forces they had stood no chance against the might of the US Army. Their influence would die down as well once what they did was announced to the world.

But Howe kept quiet.

Everyone had an ambition. Howe was especially so. If he saved the world, he might be rewarded for his deeds. In fact he might even earn a medal and be moved up a few ranks. So what? He would still be just another tiny part of this country. He would still have to submit to the world.

But if he could keep his forces alive while the rest of the world died...he knew his men would remain loyal to him. There might be some that upheld the constitutional values, but he could manage to thin them down. His MP forces weren’t for show either. If he and Umbrella were the only forces alive and he could somehow take down Umbrella...he could rule the world as a king.

What was better? A king or a general?

And so Howe kept his mouth shut. A while ago, most of the contacts to the other military bases were lost. The few news that did arrive were mainly consisted of desperate cries for help which were quickly overran by the growing undead forces. Before the lower soldiers could respond, most of the armed forces were down, and, now left defenseless, most of the cities were being slaughtered.

This was when Howe took over complete command. Contact to the White House was lost, and as the officer with the highest rank Howe had absolute command over the fortress.

The first order Howe gave was to keep the entire fortress shut. Some pleas for reinforcement arrived, but the general ignored them. The few voices that advocated moving against the infected were shut down.

This changed slightly when one incident happened. A soldier suddenly showed the ability to control electricity.

Unlike the common awe of the lower soldiers, Howe immediately recognized it as a threat. Before the mutated individuals, mutants, appeared, he held absolute domination over the base. With an army as backup, he would be unstoppable in the zombie ridden world. Neither Umbrella nor undead could withstand the helicopters, armored vehicles, and missiles within The Fortitude.

Now, as individuals suddenly received special powers, Howe felt threatened. People tend to follow the strongest. For now he could maintain his authority with his military position and an iron fist, but if he was compared to someone who could breathe fire or read mind...Instead of relying on hoping he would eventually gain a power as well, he approached this method a more dominant way.

On one hand he rewarded the mutant soldier and rose her rank in an attempt to gain her loyalty. On the other hand he sent out smaller armed convoys into the cities. They had two missions: Gather resources and capture mutants.

Howe knew he needed to experiment on the mutants to find out how they gained their power. He also knew there would be a riot if he used his own men as lab rats. He needed outside mutants.

The result had been nice. Freshly turned mutants have trouble controlling their power. All the squads needed to do was look for random explosions of flames or electricities or something else and they could usually find an exhausted mutated human. The captures were easy as well. Even if the mutants weren’t worn out, they were fooled by the army uniforms. Without their powers, the mutants were completely vulnerable. A single tranquilizer could take them down.

Over ten mutants have already been captured. That count was increasing. Just a while ago one of the military convoys just arrived into the base with a female prisoner with the power of controlling fire.

He had no idea what that girl meant.